The Allure of Darkness

Presence

Gryffindor Dormitory [March 15th]

Alexander lay comfortably in the warmth of his crimson red sheets, staring up at the ceiling of his dormitory with unfocused eyes. He had spent a lot of time angry at this mother for tearing their family apart, but her desperate words the last time he had visited her in Azkaban greatly affected him.

He pressed his eyes shut as he kept seeing the heavy tears that ran down her gaunt features. What were they feeding her in that prison? Were they even feeding her?

He couldn't help but feel afraid for his mother, despite her traitorous actions. Whenever he closed his eyes, he could see her distressed face and her heartbroken words kept echoing in his ears.

The last time he had seen her was in the height of winter, and he still remembered the feel of the cold wind biting through his heavy cloak when he was in the prison. He frowned as he remembered that his mother hadn't even been given a cloak in the harsh winter. Suddenly, the warmth he drew from the heavy duvet wrapped around him felt suffocating and he guiltily tossed his sheets aside.

He choked back a sob as he wondered if she would even survive the next few months. He had planned on secretly visiting her at the end of the term, but he wasn't sure if she would still be alive when he arrived at her cell.

And that disgusting cell. His lip curled up in memory of the dark hole they called a cell. He couldn't recall seeing a single window or light source in the cell. Even the small flicker of light he had been provided at his last visit was feeble at best.

He knew his father had cut off all ties to his mother. James Potter hated his wife with a burning passion.

Ex-wife, Alexander corrected himself in his head. Wizarding marriages were difficult to dissolve in their world, but when his father, the Head Auror at the MLE, requested a speedy divorce, even the Ministry couldn't deny him. He supposed the fact that his mother had tried to poison his father was more than enough reason for the paperwork to quickly be approved.

He suspected his father had already had their divorce papers drawn up long before the incident. It seemed as though his father was simply waiting for a reason to break away from his wife and the attempt to murder him had certainly been a convenient excuse.

Alexander sighed. He knew that was more than enough reason for his parents to separate, but he couldn't help but feel angry at how easily his father had turned his back on his mother.

Her tear-stained face flickered again in his mind and Alexander groaned.

She was clearly in so much pain. As he thought back to his childhood, he realized that she had always been struggling. She had always hidden her pain from him. She never let him know just how much she was hurting.

And he hated her for it.

If only she had told him about her pain. If only she had told him about...about his brother earlier in his life. If she had shared her burden with him, then maybe–just maybe–their family would still be whole today.

Though, as he thought back to the way she had sobbed over his dead brother, he realized that their family had been broken a long time ago. Perhaps it had been doomed from the moment his brother had left them.

Try as he might, Alexander had yet to procure one memory of his brother. He barely knew anything about him. All he knew was that his brother's name was Harry. Harry had green eyes like his Mum, and dark hair like his Dad.

His own hair had started off rather dark before adopting a reddish hue as he grew older. It had been awfully unruly as a child. He wondered if Harry's hair had done the same.