Little Memories

Charlotte lay back in her bed, sighing heavily. It was the first time she had genuinely felt alone in the longest time. Her room was quiet spare the howling wind outside her window and the crackling, warm fire that like the room. She was tired of everything, saddened by the hole she had dug herself in. Everything about the first half of the year had been so totally wrong. She was engaged, but it was a sham. She was in love, but with a guy that was always mad or yelling at her. She did bad things in the train compartment with her “fiancé”, but there was no way he could be considered more than a friend, despite her desperate tries to make something more out of it.

The lonely blonde squeezed her eyes shut, lifted her hand to her forehead, and openly cried in the solace of her room. Everything had gone so terribly wrong. She could only hope that her little birthday party would go as planned, but even then she doubted it would. She hadn’t had the best track record ever since Draco stole and broke her broomstick so many birthdays ago. Charlotte was beginning to believe that nothing she ever did seemed good and right.

One day, Charlotte managed to pull herself from her room, she had been taking all her meals there and passing her time being either reading or playing the baby grand in her room. She wanted to go to the kitchen and try her hand at cooking or baking. She thought, perhaps, if she did something she found great joy in, she’d be able to get her mind off of things for a while. But Charlotte never managed to get to the kitchen. She was called into the parlor by Gregory and, instead of being the bratty, younger sister she wanted to be, joined him. She then discovered that he wasn’t alone like she initial though. In two separated chair, in the dark, mahogany-paneled room, Crabbe and Draco were sitting, watching her every move intently as she entered the room.

“What do you need me for, Gregory?” She asked, not bothering to keep the tone of annoyance from her voice as she crossed her arms over her chest, dividing a stare between the three of them. She noticed there was a stack of books on one of the tables; a multilayered rectangular shape backlit by the roaring fire that lit and warmed the room. As she crossed her arms over her chest, the light from the fire caught the generously-sized ring on her finger and she saw Draco’s jaw stiffen and him shift around in his chair. Gregory gave a mere nod as he took a seat and Crabbe stood, bringing an archaic looking book with him as he approached Charlotte.

“We were wondering if you could teach us how to perform this spell,” he asked her, flipping open the book with a creak of the spine. He thumbed carefully through the old pages which, if they weren’t held together by magic, Charlotte felt could crumble beneath his touch. He stopped on a certain page and placed his finger under a certain name and passage. She read over the whole thing a few times with a furrowed brow before straightening up and looking between the three of them.

“What are you three planning?” She asked incredulously, shaking her head a bit. Draco stared at her for a moment and she caught his eyes. They held each other’s stare for a bit longer than they held the others before he turned and lowered his eyes. Charlotte had seen something behind his gaze, some emotion there, that she knew he wanted to have guarded but let slip. She continued to stare at him, frowning a bit as he threw up every metal block he had, his mind remaining on a particular nightmare he had earlier in the school year.

The spent the whole afternoon and some of the night practicing a miniature version of the spell, lest it get out of control. Charlotte, however, was keen to keep a watchful eye on the three, to make sure they weren’t being careless or if they weren’t focusing intently on the spell. To do so, would mean a tragedy for the four of them. They were messing in seriously dark magic that even the greatest wizards could not imagine handling. It practically unheard of for four, Hogwarts-age wizards to try and do such a spell, but with Charlotte’s aide and careful observing, they managed to control it.

Come to find out, Gregory had invited Crabbe and Draco to stay over the entirety of the break, which automatically meant they were going to try their best to crash her party. Thankfully, Gregory made sure they stayed in his wing of the castle. Part of Charlotte wanted Draco to stay in the room across from hers, to crawl into his bed like they had when they were young. It killed her that she was in her own home and she felt like such a stranger. It was like it was just a place to rest her head, not to be loved in. It felt like just a space in-between, a middle ground, or like standing on a calm beach and facing an angry sea that was inevitably going to swallow her whole. After this break, Charlotte knew, things would all take a turn for the worse. The world and life she knew would cease to exist and she would be forced to fit into another mold and walk of life when it was all said and done.

Late that night, when Draco knew everyone would be sleeping and tucked away in their rooms, he silently crept to Charlotte’s wing of the house. His head kept screaming at him to stop and turn around--a few rowdy portraits had too--and leave. His heart, however, pleaded with him to at least get a peek at the girl he loved while she was peaceful and sleeping. The last few times he had seen her, including their practice, she had been cold and distant to him. And she managed to maneuver that ring in just the right way that it would sparkle and gleam, taunting Draco more into regret and sadness that it wasn’t his ring on her finger.

As he entered the perfectly square room that contained the doors leading to “his” room and Charlotte’s room. He went to the door to the right, tentatively and quietly pushing it open. The fire had been doused, so the room was dark spare the light from the half-moon outside. He could see Charlotte’s form underneath the blankets of her bed. She didn’t move, so he assumed that she had no knowledge of his presence in her room. Leaving the door cracked behind him, he slowly began to move into the room. The wooden planks beneath his feet feeling relentlessly cold, pressing and urging him to move faster but he didn’t. By the time he reached her bed, his feet were throbbing from the cold and he gently lowered himself down at the foot of her bed and relieving his feet of the cold.

He turned to look at the beautiful girl who lay in the bed, drawing in a sharp gasp of air when he noticed just how beautiful she was in blue light cast by the moon. It danced across her features so fittingly, illuminating her pixie-like features perfectly as she slept. Her lips were slightly parted, her chest slowly moving up and down as she gently breathed. Draco loved how peaceful she appeared, how at ease she was in her sleep. It was so unlike the angry or emotionless girl he normally saw. Her thin, feminine hands were folded beneath her head, finding a way to taunt Draco with that blasted ring even while she dreamed.

Draco sat in her room for the longest time, just watching her sleep. He was exhausted, but he pushed through it for a little while longer. He just wanted to watch her for a little while longer, knowing the next time he saw her she’d probably be as spiteful as ever. However, when he finally found it within himself to leave, she suddenly drew in a sharp breath of air and shifted around in the bed. He stared at her with wide eyes, slightly afraid of what she would do if she found him up and watching her sleep.

“Draco,” she breathed, her hands clenching onto the pillow beneath her head and grasping a bit at the fabric. Draco’s brow furrowed as he watched her silently, wondering what kind of dream she was having. Judging by the expression on her face, it was definitely not a pleasant one. Her expression few more and more distressed as the dream progressed and it took everything Draco had not to reach out and wake her from the nightmare she was having. Finally, her facial features smoothed out into almost awe, but relaxed all the same.

“Jack-Jackson?” She asked softly into the night. “A-and…Aislinn?” She paused for a moment before she nodded against the pillow. Her face relaxed completely and she went back to sleeping peacefully, leaving Draco more confused than anything. He knew a Jackson, he was on the Quidditch team as a Chaser. However, he knew no Aislinn, so he wasn’t sure why Charlotte would be dreaming about a girl named Aislinn. He sat there for a few moments before he stood and quietly left.

The entire time they were walking back, Draco’s mind wandered to whatever the content of Charlotte’s dream was. He knew that Charlotte normally had the gift of foresight and that it came to her in dreams. Why would she say his name as if he were causing her some sort of pain, then two stranger’s names softly and sweetly? It baffled him, she baffled him, but he knew there was no way he could ask her about it. As he lay his head against his pillow, back in his room on Gregory’s side of the house, all he could think about was how he and Charlotte should be together. He should ditch Daphne and he could suggest that she could end things with Theodore, romantically at least. He let out a heavy sigh and closed his eyes tightly against the tears that threatened to pour from his eyes at the recognition that he probably had ruined things with Charlotte forever.