Zoe
After the meeting, my head feels thick and heavy, as though a solid fog is moving through it. Half-formed, half-coherent thoughts hang limply in my mind, drunken and senseless, swinging and teetering like broken chains.
I feel one of Blaise's hands rest on my arm, his palm and fingers large enough to circle my entire bicep. I look up at him, snapping out of my trance. He opens his mouth to say something. Someone else beats him to it.
A woman with lilac hair is offering to show Blaise and I to our rooms -- the ones we'll be staying in for who knows how long -- when she, too, is interrupted.
"I was actually hoping to talk to Zoe, first -- if that's okay." The short and stocky boy who's apparently materialized in front of us blurts. "And I was thinking I could show her to her room, too, when we're all done. If that's okay, of course."
Immediately, I can tell that no filter exists between this boy's mind and his lips. His words are a vocalization of everything floating -- no, bouncing, whizzing around, sometimes colliding, even -- inside his head.
Blaise raises an eyebrow at me. I know this means he's asking if I'd like him to wait for me. I think to myself how funny it is that we can communicate without words. With such simple physical gestures.
I shake my head no at him, and he and the purple-haired woman wander off.
"Sorry for that." The boy says. He looks to be around my age. "My name's Mikey, by the way. Mikey Madaris."
He shoves a flexed hand out into the space between us, grinning. I take it, and he does a quick sort of spasm that I'm guessing is supposed to be a handshake.
"My dad is Martin -- the one that brought you down here? Charms professor? He's kind of a quiet guy, all-business, y'know? Sorry about that, too."
I don't know how to respond to this, but there's no need -- Mikey goes on without waiting for an answer.
"I'm a sixth year here -- I know you're a sixth year at Hogwarts, so we've got that in common. Here -- let's start walking. I'll show you where your room is -- it's in the northwest tower."
Again, without waiting for a response, without even really looking at me, Mikey takes off. A brief moment of shock ensues before I gain the sense to follow him. I jog a few paces to catch up. He's already talking again by the time I do.
"Not many people know about your prophecy -- Dumbledore wanted to keep it under tight wraps when he found out. I guess You-Know-Who didn't feel like spreading the word either. Probably thought it would make him look weak or something like that. But I've known about it for years. My dad wanted me to be apart of the group after my mom --"
He stops suddenly, and something flickers in his eyes.
"Anyways, my dad wanted me to know all about how dangerous dark wizards can be. He knew I'd take everything seriously, and that I wouldn't tell anyone about it -- which I haven't, by the way. Not a soul. I don't really have a big role in things, like Ingrid or Vaughn or my dad do. I think I'm just supposed to support you, be your friend, you know?
Anyways, I've been waiting for you to come to Beauxbatons since I found out you existed. We've all been waiting. And here you are, finally! Not that I'm happy about the circumstances, of course -- I can't imagine what it would be like to go through what you've gone through. You must be really brave, to be facing all of this like you are."
I don't say anything, but a pale resentment begins to burn beneath my ribs.
Brave? I consider myself far from it. Bravery and I exist in two separate dimensions, never to unite, never to be associated with one another. I did not volunteer for this position, like some noble individual stepping forth from a crowd of unwilling others. It was forced upon me -- a big, steaming pile-of-something shoved into my palms before I could protest.
I loathe myself for not being the brave and noble heroine that these people think I am. The feeling spreads through my body like illness.
"The death eaters took someone I loved, too, you know." Mikey says. "My mom, when I was six. She was an auror -- always hated the dark arts and anything to do with them. She felt it was her personal responsibility to rid the world of bad people. Her ambition got the best of her, though. She just left home one night and never came back. It was one of You-Know-Who's bunch who did it -- a death eater named Augustus Rookwood. They were never able to pin him down for it, either, the bastard."
I'm quiet for a moment as the weight of Mikey's story settles into me.
"I'm sorry to hear that." I say. I really mean it.
He offers me a small smile, but it doesn't hide the pain masked beneath it. "It's okay. I have my dad, still."
Mikey bids me goodnight when we reach one of several landings on a spiral marble staircase, which is lined by elongated windows on one side and residential doors on the other.
I don't know which room belongs to Blaise, so I resign myself to the one Mikey showed me to. It's small, but comforting. I especially like the ovalar french window, through which that same milky moonlight leaks through, staining the walls and the floor.
I decide that I can't help but like Mikey. Boyish energy seems to spill from him with liquidity, but it also serves as a durable, well-worn mask for deeper layers of hurt.
As I lay in the foreign bed that night, I think of the pained smile he gave me. I think of how I felt its familiarity deep within me, reverberating in my chest and echoing in the spaces between my bones.
***
The following morning, I'm pulled from sleep by the sound of a feeble knock at my door. I open it to find a house-elf waiting outside, balancing a tray of wobbling eggs, goat cheese, and crepes. When I plant a silver sickle into the elf's palms, intending to convey my gratitude, it bursts into a fit of sobs and scrambles back down the staircase.
Further up the staircase, I hear the heavy sigh of a door as it's pulled open, followed by the hollow noise of footsteps descending the stairs, growing closer.
My heart feels as though a fist has wrapped around it and squeezed tightly when Blaise appears around the wall. When he sees my head peeking out of the doorway, he falters.
We stand there for a moment. Neither of us are sure just what to say to the other.
"Talk to me." I blurt out. "Please."
It feels as though he's barely spoken to me, or even looked in my direction, in days. I can feel it happening -- his regression into his old self. The one that won't open up to me, that won't say more than a few words in my presence.
"And say what?"
"Anything." I say. "Like how are you feeling?"
Blaise pulls his lower lip between his teeth. Still, he refuses to look at me.
"Why won't you talk to me?" I try to keep my voice from trembling as it squeezes past the knot in my throat.
He sighs, finally meeting my eyes. "I'm trying."
His hand slides to the back of my head, his fingers weaving themselves in between strands of my hair. He guides my forehead to his lips, leaving a tender kiss from which warmth seems to blossom down into the rest of my body.
Before I can get another word out, he takes off down the stairs. The moment is over, and the warmth settles into my bones and dies.
I know he's struggling with all of this, maybe almost as much as I am. Having to see his mother again, especially when he knows the fate she's set in store for me, must feel impossible. But his emotions are wrapping him up, strangling him until his voice box is swollen. He won't, or can't, speak to me about any of it, and if he doesn't soon, then the gulf that's opened up between us is bound to grow wider.
He's shutting down when I need him the most.
My thoughts are interrupted by the third individual to appear in my doorway today. It's the slender-figured Ingrid. I remember that she's a professor at Beauxbatons, as well as head of the organization dedicated to helping me through this mess.
"Zoe -- I'm sorry to be bothering you this early in the morning." She says. "I hope you managed to get some sleep, because your first training session with Vaughn begins in ten minutes."