Remember Me

Ever since they had left Grimmauld Place, the strain started to show on all of them. They now had no safe shelter to live in, no place to go to. Instead, they were really out on the streets, tired, hungry, and frustrated at not being able to use magic. They broke into old deserted places whenever they could. Sometimes the squat showed signs that other people had lived there, old mattresses or blankets lying on the floor. These were the better ones – when they had nowhere to sleep apart from cold floor the raggedy mattresses felt like heaven. Food supply was running low too, as Hermione’s amount of Muggle money was running out fast, and they couldn’t carry too much with them anyway. All of her money was now spent on buying food and water, and as they had left Grimmauld Place so hurriedly, without any warning, they were missing a lot of things like blankets, hairbrushes and a change of clothes. Cassandra had now come of age too, so her, Ron and Hermione sometimes went off, so there was a considerable distance between them and Harry, and used magic to tidy themselves up a little.

Constantly on the move, they walked all day long. Tired, hungry, and missing contact with people other than themselves.

Cassandra couldn’t stand it some days, yet on others she tried to keep up a cheerful persona to make the days seem a little more bearable. But it was hard when they had to sleep on cold, bare floorboards or, when they couldn’t find a squat, grass or mud. On these days she became irritable, and snapped at them all, sometimes retreating angrily into a corner.

Today, they had been lucky. The place they were staying for the night was cold and uncomfortable, but they had a shelter. Cassandra had bought them all a round of ham sandwiches, and it was on a slightly fuller stomach than usual that they settled down for the night.

Cassandra couldn’t sleep. Instead, she sat hugging her knees, her wand held loosely in her hand, watching the dreary grey light that filtered in under the door. The wind outside was wild. Fog crept in stealthily under the door.

She screwed up her eyes and banged her chin on her knees. It wasn’t that she had made the wrong decision by coming with Harry, Ron and Hermione – she knew she would never be able to stand it if she hadn’t – but, still, she had never thought it would be quite like this.

Well, what did you think, she told herself. Did you think it would be like a holiday? Not having to go to school, just doing whatever you want?

But she hated it, hated the conditions they lived in.

She heard footsteps from behind, and felt someone sit down beside her. Cassandra lifted her head.

“You can’t sleep either?”

Harry shook his head, running a hand through his hair. “No.”

They both sat in silence for a while, immersed in their own thoughts.

“Do you,” began Cassandra hesitantly. “Do you ever feel like we shouldn’t be doing this?”

Harry frowned slightly. “What d’you mean?”

“Oh, you know…on the run, really. I mean, we’re just teenagers!”

“You’re of age,” he pointed out.

“Only just! And is that all I get for my seventeenth birthday? A couple of stinking sandwiches and nothing else. Did we celebrate it in any way? No!” Her voice rose angrily.

Harry looked down at the floor in shame. “Cass, sorry…I didn’t think…”

She glowered at him, then her expression softened slightly. “Guess things are different when you’re on the run with the Boy Who Lived, huh?”

Harry rolled his eyes. “Boy Who Lived,” he muttered mutinously. “Boy who bloody well has to keep living or else, really.”

Cassandra smiled. “Too true.”

The grey light was growing a little darker. The wind threw up dust so it spun and danced in the air.

“And I keep thinking about Debbie and John,” Cassandra continued. “I mean, I don’t even know if Debbie knows I have my memory back now. And I’m so worried about her…you know, as John is…well, Imperiused, and so she’ll be all alone and thinking she’s lost me and John, and I don’t know what’s happening to John! If he…Oh God, what Lucius Malfoy’s making him do, and I can’t stand it, and I just…” She trailed off. Harry’s hand rubbed small circles on her back comfortingly.

“I guess I can’t really worry about that, can I?” she muttered, wiping her nose.

“Don’t be stupid,” said Harry. “It’s natural that you’re worrying about your family. We all do.”

“Of course, yeah, yeah.”

Again, there was silence. Only the peaceful sound of Ron and Hermione sleeping filled the room.

“Aren’t you scared sometimes?” whispered Cassandra.

Harry considered the question. “Who wouldn’t be? It’s Voldemort.”

“I’m not.”

Harry grinned, and moved closer to Cassandra as she shivered. “Really?”

“Nope.”

Harry’s smile deepened. It was so like Cassandra to pretend otherwise.

“Only,” Cassandra said, stretching out the word. “Next time we have sandwiches, can we have something other than ham?”

“What?”

“Oh, let’s be really exotic and go for cheese.”

“Wow, really different.”

Cassandra bit her lip. “Harry…”

“Yeah?”
“When I was, y’know, in St Mungo’s, there was this woman in the bed next to mine, I don’t know what was wrong with her or anything, but she was there. And, well, I didn’t realise it at the time, but they did tests on us. Not proper tests,” she said hurriedly, seeing the look on his face. “Ones to see what blood status we were. And, well, this woman, yeah, she was a Muggle born. And, I didn’t realise what was going on, but I remember these…um, Healers came and took her away. She was still ill and everything, she wasn’t cured. But they took her away, and I don’t know what they did to her, but she never came back.”

Cassandra bit her lip again. “They always gave us these booklets to read about Muggle-borns and they were basically saying how polluting they were, and people were starting to believe that.” She drew a hand across her eyes. “I hate that, Harry,” she said. “I hate it, what’s happening. It should never, ever happen.”

Harry rubbed her back again, and Cassandra put her head on his shoulder. His dark head rested on top of her bright one, and Cassandra closed her eyes, peaceful.

Sometimes in life, when things are going wrong and you don’t know what to do, when you’re scared and frightened and have pressure weighing you down, small times really matter to you.

Sometimes, when the world is dark, it’s the little things that matter.