Goodbye Sky Harbor

Goodbye Sky Harbor

Chapter One: Of Wilted Roses

Everyone forgets things. One cannot possibly remember every event from the moment they were born until present. The important events stick out, landmarks that float to the surface and memories that speckled the early life become more condensed as we grow. Like a timeline, we specify certain occurrences to certain ages. It's how the mind works.

Holly Hocks was in every way typical. In every way but this. Her memory worked entirely well, very well in fact, except for a void that seemed to fill her memory where ages one to five should have been. It wasn't a simple matter of not being able to remember, there simply wasn't a single trace or hint of recollection, as if someone had taken a pair of scissors and simply cut that part of her life out.

She couldn't even remember it in dreams. And the void seemed, at times, to begin to consume Holly entirely.

Wads of paper, old letters, legal pads, dusty-looking books, candles burned very low, a stack of teacups, a wilted rose, and a set of keys tossed carelessly on a stack of photos. So stood the cluttered desk in the corner of the room, a desk that seemed to sag with the weight of what anyone would (and everyone did) see as junk. Holly called it an organized mess, her roommates called it a disaster, and Roger would later proclaim it the workstation of a genius.

But for now it simply served as a place for Holly to pile books as she consumed them.

"Not studying?" Emma, one of Holly's roommates, asked.

"Hmmm," Holly murmured in reply, turning the page and shifting positions on the bed.

"How do you expect to pass History of Magic this year if you never open a book? A textbook."

"Sexual favors," Holly replied curtly.

"On Binns?! That's an image I don't need... nor do I know how you would manage it," Emma said as her forehead creased in thought.

"I wouldn't dwell on it," this remark earned Holly a skillfully aimed book to the head.

Upon further inspection, she saw it was the History of Magic textbook.

"S'all it's good for anyway," she mumbled and tossed the textbook onto the floor, returning back to the book she was reading, Nine Stories by the Muggle author J.D. Salinger. A much better read, in her opinion.

Holly was the furthest you could possibly get from the Ravenclaw stereotype. Wit and intelligence, she had both. But the know-it-all nature combined with a nasty sense of competition that the rest of her house possessed is where she fell short. Schoolwork bored her (as it would any normal person) and she preferred to read for pleasure, wizarding and Muggle books alike. Her thirst was less for knowledge and more for escape, and in between the yellowed pages and black type print she found her solace.

Holly heard someone in the doorway clear his or her throat loudly. She ignored this and continued to read. More noise, some shuffling, and a lot of coughing. Still no response from Holly. Out of the corner of her eye, Holly noticed even Emma had pulled herself away from her schoolwork and was peering over at the doorway curiously. Finally, with the person sounding like they were hacking up their right lung, Holly let her eyes flicker briefly to the figure leaning against the doorframe.

"Davies," she said in a monotone voice.

"Think you could tear yourself away for a moment, Hocks? We've got a team meeting, as I'm sure you've conveniently forgotten," Roger said, clearly agitated.

"Coming," Holly muttered, then paused, "how the hell did you just get up here?"

"Threw myself up the first six steps and ran the rest just in case," he shrugged and headed back down the stairs. Holly threw her book on the floor and wandered downstairs where she found the rest of the Ravenclaw Quidditch team assembled haphazardly on the various sofas and armchairs in the common room. Some scowled at her, others simply looked at her with indifference, and only Cho made the effort to give her a strained smile.

"As you all know, all Quidditch games for the year have been cancelled," Roger began, looking less than happy about admitting this small fact. "However," he continued, "this doesn't mean we're going to spend the year lazing about. I can't force any of you into practicing," again, another grimace at having to admit that, "but I strongly encourage you all to do so on your own or with a few members of the team, hell, even members of the opposing teams if you so desire. Just--just try and keep it together, will you?" Roger sounded exasperated and his teammates all nodded, more to humor him than anything else.

Holly sighed quietly to herself, frowning a bit.

"Don't see how you'll be missing the game, you were always late to practice, if you were even there at all," Terry Boot snapped. Holly narrowed her eyes and was about to retort when a voice broke in.

"Nevermind the fact she's one of the best players on the team," Roger said, glaring at the younger Ravenclaw. Terry just scowled and retreated to one of the study tables on the other side of the room.

"I don't see why you bother and stand up for me. You just make more foes that way," Holly said bitterly.

"And I don't see why you don't stop provoking these people. Being late to practice, leaving your room a mess, skipping out on study sessions? You're asking for it," Roger returned, sitting down next to her on the couch facing the fire.

"I'm the black sheep of Ravenclaw. There's one in every house. I just got the coveted position," she rolled her eyes. "I don't belong here, Roger. I never have," saying his first name felt strange on her tongue, the last two years on the Quidditch team had disciplined her to call him "Davies." But off the pitch, as a friend, he was Roger. Not that she saw him much off the pitch anymore.

"But--" Roger began.

"I don't belong anywhere. I don't mind it, though. I like being alone. Really, I do," Holly watched the flames from the fireplace dance before her, feeling a desperate desire to go and join them.

"Which is why you go and do something as outrageous as date Marcus Flint?" Roger said with vehemence evident in his voice.

"Yeah, well, at least he made me feel noticed. Acknowledged. Not invisible."

"I thought you liked being invisible," he said with a smile, changing the subject slightly.

"Most of the time, I suppose I do. But one can only carry on with that for so long."

"I noticed," another grin.

"Yeah, well, you're a lot more perceptive than you let on. They put you here for a reason, after all."

"Holly Hocks, that was--" but Holly cut him off.

"It's either Holly or it's Hocks, not both," she said tersely.

"That is your name, you know. Both parts. Some people string them together, this thing called your 'full name,'" Roger quipped.

"Yeah, well if your prat of an aunt suggested you be named after a plant, you might be bitter, too."

"And holly isn't also a plant?" Roger smirked.

"A slightly more respectable one, at least," she frowned.

And so the conversation turned to the usual banter that the two carried on until Roger had had enough of the quips and retired to go study for the night.

Roger Davies, she decided, was a boy of many faces. The Quidditch captain, all work and no play. The friend, concerned and compassionate. The acquaintance, someone to exchange light-hearted jokes with.

But Holly did treasure what little they did share; she didn't have many friends. Roger was one, mostly due to Quidditch and house relations. Emma Langford and Cho Chang, the only from her own year within the house, were friendships spawned early in first form over spilled potions and trivial crushes on sixth years. Then there was Gryffindor Katie Bell, whose passion for Quidditch, easy-going nature, and excellent sense of humor had sparked post-game conversations and then amiability between the two. Perhaps oddest of all, though, was Phinius Derrick of Slytherin and she still wasn't sure where he came into the picture.

But those were it.

There used to be the rest of the Slytherin gang: Higgs, Pucey, Bletchley, Warrington, Montague, and Bole.

But then again, there also used to be Marcus Flint.