Of Grief and Imagined Betrayals

Prologue

It happened on a Monday.

My tenth birthday to be exact. Petunia had begged off the family festivities in favor of a swim party down the road, so it had just been the four of us: mum and da and Cypress and me, all singing off-key along to the radio as we sped down the motorway to the zoo. My brother was amusing me, in his own subdued way, by leaning over and whispering his own particularly randy version of the songs in my ear while I giggled and pointed out castles and flamingos in the clouds. Mum was laughing; I can still hear it quite clearly. It is a sound that to this day makes me feel both warm and empty...

Because then that laughter was replaced with screaming and suddenly there was the screeching of tires, the flash of blue sky, and the weight of my brother's body thrown on top of mine.

When I had awoken in the hospital, my world had been turned upside down. It came to me through veiled eyes and snippets of conversations barely heard, but I understood it well enough. My parents were dead. I can still feel Cypress' clammy hand clutching mine as the realization hit.

From that point on, none of us had ever been the same.

The twins, instead of turning towards each other for consolation, grew apart in their grief. Petunia bitterly hated herself for not being there the moment her parents had been taken away; the guilt manifested itself in her, hardening her, though it had taken me a few years to recognize this. Cypress, on the other hand, felt an estranged sadness that his twin hadn't been there, hadn't experienced the terror of blood and death that haunted his every step. He drew away from both of us until sometimes he seemed only a stranger in his indifference.

As for me, well, I learned how to keep secrets. I had always been a happy, outgoing girl, but that had changed. Living with our godmum taught me about hiding things; at first I learned to conceal the depth of my grief which later gave way to hiding my true thoughts and feelings, all behind a mask of calm.

Months crawled by until the owl came, and with it the letter that still continued to change our lives.

Hogwarts.

It was an escape from the harsh reality of living with a woman who had no use for children other than to have someone to change the station on the radio when needed. Yet it wasn't my escape.

Cypress packed his belongings carefully as I sat on his bed, watching as the wall opposite the window faded from a burning red to gray ash.

"You won't forget about me, will you?" I asked somberly.

My older brother's shoulders sagged just a little before he came and sat next to me, nudging me just a bit with his shoulder. "Of course not, Bug."

I smiled slightly at his use of a nickname long neglected.

He fiddled with his sleeve and continued, his eyes distant. "If I could take you with me--you and Petty--I would in a heartbeat." He sighed and stared out the window at the peeling billboard across the street only visible now through the garish yellow haze of the street lamp. "I'm sorry, you know. I'm sorry I haven't been the greatest big brother to you. Maybe one day I'll be able to."

It was weird not having him around any more. Almost as weird as not having mum wake me up in the morning by opening my window shades with a smile and a good morning song or da toss me up on his shoulders so that I could pretend I was flying. But just like it had with my parents, the weirdness faded until it was just another emptiness in my life, something always there yet just below the surface.

Petunia and I went to school and played in the garden and learned how to hold the ball of yarn just right while godmum Annis knitted and life continued on. Cypress didn't come home for the holidays like we had hoped but he sent an owl laden with candy and pictures, so I suppose the ache of missing him was eased just a bit.

We had run upstairs to hide the gifts before our godmum saw--she tolerated nothing out of the ordinary, sometimes I thought the only reason Cypress had been allowed to go off to Hogwarts was only to get him out of the house--and we had each chosen a sweet to sneak before dinner while looking eagerly at pictures of our brother whom we envied immensely. I had chosen what looked to be a frog made out of chocolate and I couldn't help but squeal in delight as it magically hopped around the bed. Petunia, on the other hand, chose a bright yellow gobstopper which she peered at cautiously--my hopping food had made her feel a bit queasy--before sucking on it happily.

Even though we had heard all about wizarding photos from Cypress in his earlier letters, it was a completely different thing to look at and hold the pictures themselves. I thought it was one of the most amazing things I had ever seen and rolled my eyes when my sister said that it was creepy. Petunia felt that it was almost like the people in the photos were watching her. Her paranoia was obvious even at age eleven.

There were seven pictures in all: shots of his dorm and dormmates (a dark haired boy sat with her brother on his bed winking lewdly at the camera while the others sat on the floor below them, laughing at something Cypress said), shots of the school grounds, and shots of the game that Cy had written about multiple times in his enthusiasm, Quidditch. That night, in the privacy of my own bed, I indulged myself in elaborate fantasies where I too could be magical.

The following summer Cypress came home much happier than he had left. He sat up late whispering to Petty and me about all the things he had learned and about how he was hoping to try out for his house Quidditch team the coming fall if he could find some way to convince godmum to buy him a broom.

It wasn't until a scorching July afternoon, when the owl dropped off two letters instead of one, did things begin to unravel. The moment I read that I too was invited to go to Hogwarts, Petunia let out one huge sob before running out of the garden and into the house. Of course I felt guilty for leaving my sister behind but I couldn't help the fact that Petunia was as normal as normal could be. Besides, I knew that Petty wouldn't be happy at a school that didn't teach lessons on stories and mathematics. Beaming, I looked up at my brother knowing he would share in my delight but was saddened to see not a smile but a worried frown creasing his face.

"She'll get over it, Cy," I said and my heart dropped when he nodded distractedly and went inside.

For the rest of the summer, Cypress was agitated and worried but he picked up his lessons with me in earnest. By the time we were ready to pick up our school supplies, I felt as though I would explode if I didn't see and experience all the things he had talked about. But for some reason, Cypress didn't seem as anxious to show me all the things as he was to describe them so I asked him about it.

"Look, Bug, I'm just worried, you know? Things are a bit... different in the wizarding world."

And that's when it came out. He needed me to keep a secret. I agreed without hesitation, after all, I saw the necessity in hiding truths but most importantly, he was my brother and I trusted him more than anyone else in the entire world.

That night, I learned about the darker side of the magical world. The side that scorned those who came from non-magical families, preyed upon their weaknesses, and tortured them with that knowledge at every turn. He had learned about this right off and in a desperate bid for self-preservation, he had lied about his heritage. I found it remarkable that a society so focused on the purity and rights of blood would not instantly recognize one who didn't belong.

"But we do belong," he insisted. "They are only spouting what their parents tell them anyway. They don't know the difference."

I hugged my knees against my chest and thought about it. I thought about it so hard and long that my head began to ache. "What house do you think I'll be sorted into?" I finally asked, picking at my toenail polish, a remnant of Petty's attempts to sooth the growing bitterness between us. We had, after all, endured an entire year together, thick as thieves, without our brother. "Do you think I'll be with you?"

Smiling, Cypress mussed my hair. "You'll probably get put into Hufflepuff because you are all innocence."

Privately, I disagreed with him but that was just another of my many secrets so I simply smiled dutifully. "Would you be happy if I was sorted into Slytherin with you?"

"Of course. But I think you'd be much happier if you went into Hufflepuff or Ravenclaw."

"No Gryffindor then?" I giggled, knowing how much my brother despised that house.

"A Slytherin and a Gryffindor in the same family? Doesn't happen very often..." He trailed off, seemingly lost in thought. After a moment he seemed to come back to himself with a soft chuckle. "Besides, you're much too smart to be placed in that house."

Just a month later, waiting to sit on the stool in front of the entire Great Hall to be sorted, that sentence was echoing over and over in my mind. I looked over to Cypress surrounded by his friends and took a deep, shaky breath when he nodded encouragingly. To my utter mortification, when my name was called, a couple of boys at the Gryffindor table hissed loudly, but I tried my best to ignore them as the hat was placed on my head.

It hadn't taken him much time to decide. In fact, he hadn't really let me have a say in the matter at all.

"Gryffindor!"

The only thing I remember from the rest of that night was the look of horror that passed over my brother's face.