Melody Riddle and the Prisoner of Azkaban

Chapter 1: I'm a Textbook

For my third installation, I have a year of more teenage girl problems than immoral issues. By the end of it, I missed having the simplicity of only doing what needed to be done.

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"Wands choose the wizard. The wizard must be deemed worthy by the wand to be able to use it properly." I repeated. This activity may be boring to most other people, especially to my mom and uncle, but having my grandpa — famous wandmaker, Garrick Ollivander — teach me about wands was a favorite pastime.

"Very good," my grandpa said, "Very good! I believe you can now start helping me run the shop this year, Melody."

"Really? I can?" I asked him excitedly, bouncing lightly on my toes.

"Of course," grandpa said, "After all, you've studied so hard that you know how to work with wands better than your own mother... you know their importance and how different each wood and core are. You've even memorized the properties of all the wands I've ever sold. Melody, you have a good memory."

I laughed, "Good thing, too."

My Uncle Gerald walked in and said, "Nah, you don't need the whole memory of what wands have been sold to who."

"Whom," grandpa corrected him, continuing with a smug smirk."Melody, tell him."

"If someone were to lose or break their wand, they would come back to the shop to get a new one. Knowing what their original wand was helps to narrow down the number of wands to test them with." I rattled off.

Gerald snorted, "Good job gramps, you turned your granddaughter into a textbook."

"Gerald," grandpa said in a warning tone.

I couldn't be mad at Gerald for saying that, I certainly felt like a book sometimes... as much information as I could retain. Like a show-off-know-it-all, and that was the one uncomfortable part about it. Grandpa was always excited about me being just like him, though Uncle Gerald and mom certainly detested the idea.

Wands were just an interesting subject to me, but I hadn't expected to be the heir to the wand shop, knowing everything about it. I thought maybe Uncle Gerald or mom, since they were technically the next generation. But, neither one of them wanted it, so I was the next best choice for grandpa. His special prodigy.

Gerald held his hands up defensively, "Just saying, dad."

"Right," grandpa muttered, walking away.

"Your welcome," Gerald said to me.

I smirked, "Yeah, thanks, but I was enjoying being the smart one."

Gerald blew a raspberry at me, "You enjoy being a smart ass. That's what you meant to say to me, isn't it?"

"In a way, but you put it so rudely."

Gerald burst out laughing. "Go finish your schoolwork. Orele said you have a lot extra from Professor Snape."

"I know, I know, I'll finish it before July anyways. And you know that! I just wanted to fit in my lessons with grandpa. By July I'll be ready to go to the shop with him." I was really excited about that. Wands were my most favorite subject to learn about; the different woods there were, which cores worked best for certain woods, and, more amazingly, the mind of a wand. Each one had a different personality from the next one, like people, and so it made them living, breathing objects.

"Again, smart ass."

"Gerald, watch your language around my daughter" my mom came into the room.

"Oh, please, you were saying that at Melody's age!"

"Shh!" she hissed at him.

I chuckled and snuck out of there to go upstairs to my room. It was always best to get out of the room before they got their wands out and duelled each other. The way they fought made me glad I didn't have any siblings... my age anyways.

My mom is now six months pregnant. The problem is that the man who got her pregnant did a memory charm that backfired on him before they could even officially get married. Now he has no memory of her, me, or even anything about the magical world. He used to be the best-selling author, Gilderoy Lockhart. I horribly despised him.

Mom still visits the idiot but... she goes in secretly. The hospital has no record of her going there, and they didn't put any record of their engagement either. And, apparently, mom wanted to keep it that way. Sometimes I wonder if she had merely used the man to get another kid as a way to replace the one she left in America with my Muggle stepdad. Though she always refused to admit her feelings in front of me, she missed him as much as I did.

She'd only just admitted to me last month that my dad was an extremely resentful man that couldn't know love if it had slapped him in the face. His memory had almost swallowed my life force at the end of the school year, and it left me wondering. What she wouldn't admit was that the teenage memory I met had grown up to be Lord Voldemort, which was really beginning to piss me off that I couldn't get her to give me the whole truth. One step at a time, I guess.

I'd already met my real dad and, though he asked for my help to get immortality, he'd never shown any sign of considering me something to easily toss aside when my use was over. Of course, I wouldn't know that until he really had no more use for me. I wanted to know my dad, I wanted him to... want me. Even though I knew he was still incapable of love, I continued to dream that the things I did for him would give something to the table.

I reached my room where Bodoujn, my sweet black cat, was sitting on the bed waiting for me. He gave me a look that seemed to say 'get to work' and I chuckled, sitting down next to him to scratch his head.

Taking out all the homework I had, I took a quill and worked on it for about five to six hours before I finished. Homework was easy enough, and I sometimes found that I kept wishing that my teachers would give me much more work for the summer. If I told anyone I felt that way, I would be called crazy.

Oh, well, what else would you call a girl who is borderline between good and bad?