AU

6. Clara

Sorry it's so late! I watched The Breakfast Club for the first time and just about passed out from exhaustion.

Mentions of cutting and eating disorders.

After lunch, I'd gone back to Gryffindor tower to chat with Ginny some more. On my way, Violet rushed past me, informing me that her surname was to be Prince and Harrison's was Gold. Ginny didn't even bat an eye at the odd statement after Violet ran off I'm the direction of Dumbledore's office. When I asked her about it, she informed me that her brother and his friends did weirder things.
There wasn't all that much to talk about, really. Ginny told me that her father worked in the ministry and was obsessed with Muggles, that her older brother Charlie worked with dragons and her older brother Bill was a curse breaker, that her brother Percy was in the castle but spent more of his time in his dorms than anywhere else, and the events of the previous year.

"You're telling me there's a secret room in this castle only Harry Potter can open and you were brought there and almost murdered by a semi-living memory of Voldemort-" she flinched, "and you're just casually sharing about it?" I asked. The ginger shrugged.
"Most people with trauma like that find it hard to talk about." I said.
"I think it's easier for me to cope when I talk about it. I had a lot of memory loss while I was being possessed, talking about it makes me feel like I'm not crazy and that it's not just some weird side effect of the ordeal." Ginny explained. I nodded. That made sense.
Ginny decided to spend the night. She brought some stuff over and took the empty bed on my right.
We were having a nice conversation when two girls came in chatting loudly.
"And when I finally got her owl-" the blonde girl who was speaking stopped in the middle of her sentence. Her hair was long and reached her waist. She had stitched pink lace onto her uniform skirt and she wore bright makeup.
The other girl had obviously dyed black hair. It was shaved on one side and the other was long and draped over an eye. She wore dark eyeliner and a black choker.
"Hi." I said.
"Hello." The blonde girl said, smiling shyly. The other girl didn't respond.
"You're Clara?" The blonde asked. "I saw your name appeared on the door earlier but I never saw you in here so I didn't say anything." I simply nodded. Nobody asked why Ginny was here.
"I'm Sophie Lake and that's Hades Everest." She told me. Hades sat on what appeared to be her bed and cuddled the elephant stuffed animal. I'd figured the stuffed animal would have been Sophie's, but who am I to judge?
"Clara Potter."
"Are you related to Harry Potter?" Hades asked, her voice soft and raspy.
"I-" I should say no, even if it was true for me. "I'm not. We just have the same name."
"Oh." Hades didn't press the matter, she just turned into her side.
"Hades is a bit of the quiet type, but she warms right up after a bit." Sophie assured me. We didn't say much after that. Later, we tried waking Hades for dinner, but she was fast asleep. We came back immediately, exhausted from a day of doing near-nothing, Sophie changed into pajamas before climbing into bed.
Ginny quickly fell asleep once we were all settled. I laid on my back, having changed right after Sophie. If I had gone to Hogwarts, would I have met these girls? Would we have been friends? Would I even be a Gryffindor if I hadn't been forced to live in a war zone?
I rolled into my side. If it weren't for Voldemort, perhaps I wouldn't know these girls, but I would have been allowed to have friends.

Waking up was difficult. It always had been. Ginny hit me with a pillow several times before I reluctantly sat up in order to stay awake.
"You missed breakfast. It's almost eleven. I would have woken you earlier, but I didn't bother once breakfast was over since you'd only be hungry for longer." Ginny told me. I sighed.
"Everyone should be boarding the train soon. To come back." Ginny told me. I nodded and stood slowly.
I changed, taking my sweet time to get the uniform just right. Today was the first day it would actually matter. Ginny dragged me down the stairs and into the common room.
"I have an essay to finish. You don't have to stay." She told me, sitting down on the floor since the couch by the fire was taken.
"I don't have anywhere to be." I said. I probably should go talk to Harrison and Violet to make sure we all had our stories straight, but I could see them later. I sat beside Ginny on the floor.
"You're so lucky you don't have any homework." She said, taking a long roll of parchment out of a bag I don't even know she'd brought.
"Oh-"
"Who's this?"
Two almost identical voices suddenly asked, and two identical boys sat on either side of me.
They were both gingers, leading me to think they might be Ginny's brothers, but not every ginger was a Weasley.
"Oh!" Ginny said, as if welcoming the distraction. "This is Clara. She just transferred here. Clara, these are my brothers, Fred and George."
She's told me about these twins. The troublemakers.
"Hi." I said quietly. I didn't want to get on their bad side so I wouldn't get pranked, but I wasn't too keen on having too many friends. I wouldn't be able to handle leaving so many people behind.
The twins grinned identical grins. "I'm Fred," One said.
"And I'm George." said the other. There had to be something to tell them apart, right? One of them had a freckle on their left ear, but I couldn't remember which twin it was. Oops.
"How do people tell you two apart?" I asked them. Perhaps they wanted to be told apart.
"They don't" The twins responded in unison. I sighed.
"I'm Clara." I said.
"Hello, Clara." The twins chorused. Ginny cleared her throat.
"Right, that's enough of that. What do you want?" She asked the boys.
"What? You mean we can't make friends for the sake of it?" One asked in mock offense.
"How could you even suggest we might have an ulterior motive?" The other continued, dramatically leaning on my shoulder as if devastated. Ginny just rolled her eyes.
"Don't mind them, Clara. They're like that." She said. "Why're you two here anyway? I thought you went home for Christmas."
"Decided not to." The one laying on my shoulder said.
"We wanted to see what the castle was like all empty like this." The other twin said, laying his head in my lap.
"Well you don't need to harass my friend for that." Ginny said, flicking the forehead of the ginger laying in my lap.
"Harass? Oh no." He replied.
"Don't you have an essay or something, little sister?" The twin on my shoulder asked her. Ginny looked back at the roll of parchment she had been writing on, then at me. I smiled at her.
"You have to finish that. I'm okay with keeping them company." I told her. Ginny smiled appreciatively and went back to her essay with a scowl at the twins.
"We really did just want to meet you." The twin on my shoulder whispered into my ear.
"You were successful." I told him.
"Where are you from anyway?" The twin on my lap asked. "I've never seen you before."
And thus, I told my story. Again.

The school was much larger than I'd anticipated. When the students came back from the winter break, they filled the Great Hall to the bursting point. The noise in the hall was deafening. As I sat between Ginny and Hades, who had been woken by Sophie just in time for dinner, I waved at Violet and Harrison. Violet sent me a quick wave, Harrison nodded in my direction. The two didn't sit together, though. Harrison sat beside a brunette girl and Violet sat in a fairly empty spot. Had Harrison made a friend and just left Violet to fend for herself? I frowned. They should be friends, we were all in the same situation and we would need each other's support.
Dumbledore said some quick words, welcoming everyone back, before he clapped his hands twice and food appeared. We dug in happily. I didn't say much, just listened to the conversation around me.
Ginny nudged me with her foot. She pointed to a ginger boy who had his nose in a book and a Head Boy badge. "That's Percy." She told me through a mouthful of chicken.
"You didn't tell me he was Head Boy." I said. Ginny shrugged and went back to her chicken.
I turned to Hades. Sophie was chatting at her excitedly about something and Hades was nodding along. She had mashed potatoes on her plate, but she wasn't eating them, just pushing them around her plate.
Now that I was close, I noticed her wrists were incredibly small. She wore a thick sweater under her robes, so I couldn't tell if the rest of her was that skinny, and her bed was against the wall opposite mine in the dorm. Did Hades have an eating disorder?
Mom always told me that there were certain questions you just don't ask people, and that was one of them, but was it overreacting to go to an adult about it? Eating disorders could ruin your life, or kill you. She didn't need to die. She couldn't.
I turned back to my food, my appetite suddenly gone. Perhaps I should go to McGonagall and ask her to check on Hades.
"Not hungry?" Ginny asked me. I looked up and leaned close.
"Does Hades have an eating disorder?" I asked.
Ginny glanced at Hades then back at me. "I don't know. I've never really noticed she was there." Ginny looked a bit worried though, which squashed the suspicion that she didn't care. Hades stood abruptly, said bye to Sophie, and then sent me a meaningful look as she left. I watched her leave and then turned back to Ginny.
"Should I talk to McGonagall?"
"I think so."
I glanced at Sophie as I took a bite of cooked spinach. The blonde was focused entirely on the two girls in front of her, as if she hadn't even noticed Hades leaving. I looked back at my plate and forced down a few more bites of steak and garlic potatoes before leaving briskly. I didn't really know where I was going exactly. I was going to miss dessert, an experience I knew I would probably never get, but dessert would be there tomorrow. I couldn't stop thinking about Hades. She was only twelve, like me. What could have possibly caused her to develop an eating disorder?
I considered going to the library, but what would I research there? I didn't even know exactly what was wrong, so should I really go to McGonagall if I wasn't sure? What if I walked in there and she told me I was overreacting. Maybe Hades just wasn't hungry.
I was suddenly compelled to stop. I turned to see Hades leaning up against the window, her pale eyes glistening in the fading sunlight. She looked at me.
"Thanks for your concern, Clara. I'm fine, really." She said quietly. But it was like I saw through her then. The hastily concealed bags under her eyes, the thing scars on her neck and just barely visible under her sleeves. The way her sweater hung over her frame loosely.
"Can I... give you a hug?" I asked her, taking a step closer. How do you talk to people who are mentally ill?
"I'd prefer if you didn't." Hades told me. I blinked at her for a moment. No? I didn't think people even said no to hugs. I thought everyone said yes just to be polite. But it wasn't my job to touch her if it made her uncomfortable. I stepped back and nodded.
"That's okay." I told her. After a moment of awkward hesitation, Hades extended a hand.
"Handshake?" She offered. I shook her hand with a grin. Hades smiled back weakly.
I needed to talk to McGonagall.

2060 words
4/20/20

The next few chapters will contain some stuff on eating disorders, mental illness, and there will be a more detailed discussion of abuse. Be warned.