Growing Up

The boy is just a newborn baby, and his father looks at his dark hair and pale skin approvingly, as if appraising merchandise. His mother looks at him with pride in her eyes, satisfied with a job well done and a duty fulfilled, but with little affection, and then she hands him to the members of the family, all of whom look at the boy's face and search for telltale signs of nobility. When he cries he is loud and refuses to quiet down until he has gotten exactly what he wants, and everyone looks at his mother with different degrees of approval etched on their faces, because she has done a good job. The boy will do, they all murmur to one another. The boy will do just fine. He is worthy.

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The boy is one year old, and he can say a few coherent things amidst the endless prattle that pours from his mouth. He has been dressed in fine black velvet, warm and stuffy and shiny, and he is being passed around from aunt to uncle to grandmother and cousin as they all look at him, happy that his skin retains its translucent pallor, glad that his eyes are light and bright and shine with intelligence as they track people across the room. When he is returned to his mother she holds him efficiently, but not lovingly, and her hands never stray from their path so she never runs her fingers through his fine, fine hair, nor feel the softness of his skin.

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The boy is two years old, and he climbs the steep stairs of the house unsteadily because the steps are too tall for his chubby form. He wanders around aimlessly, never straying far from the watchful eye of the house-elf that has been ordered to track his every move. He never goes up to the third floor, and he never enters the library, because both those places are forbidden to him. He is too young to understand them, too young to know anything but that he was born for a great destiny, and that he will fulfill it when he is old enough, although that will not happen for many years to come.

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The boy is three years old and no longer an only son. But because his younger brother is treated with the same apathy he himself receives he has no reason to be jealous, and thus he isn't. He is a proud boy, heir to both a long line and fine blood, and his brother is not, his brother is nothing but a second son, while he is the first born of a father and mother so pure and noble that there is no doubt in anyone's mind that he will do anything but live up to their expectations. Whenever he manages to escape the watchful eye of the house-elf that silently tracks him he struggles to teach himself to make sense of the symbols in the many books around the house, but so far they all escape him, and somewhere deep down he worries that this means that he is not good enough for the destiny that is waiting for him.

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The boy is four years old, and when he plays around the yard and he falls and scrapes his knee and his skin breaks for the first time the blood refuses to stop flowing. He sits stupefied, watching immobile as the dark stain spreads through his robe until his mother picks him up without affection and points her ebony wand at his injury, muttering a string of words with barely contained fury. Then she takes him inside and forbids him to play any more. She leads him to the parlor and goes into the library herself, returning with a quill and blank parchment and some books and tells him, still angry, that it's about time he learned to read and write things other than his own name, forbidding him to leave the chair until he has filled at least one roll of parchment with his scribblings. He does not know why she is angry with him, because he has done nothing wrong, and that in turn frustrates and angers him, and deep down he revels in the feeling.

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The boy is five years old tonight, and he sits at the dinner table with his parents, dressed in his best robes, speaking only when addressed because that is what he has been told to do, and he is not one to forget the unspoken threats that lurked in his father's tone. He is at the table while his brother is upstairs asleep because he is the heir and his brother isn't, and because he needs to learn how to behave himself, how to act the role he was born to perform. Across the table sit friends of the family, all of them as pure and pale and rich as he is; all of whom are suitably impressed by the decorum with which he conducts himself, so befitting for a boy perhaps twice his age.

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The boy is six years old now, and he knows many things, things his father has taught him while they sit together in the library late at night, things he has learned from reading books or things he has heard his mother talk about with her sisters as they sit outside in the autumn, when the sun will not threaten the sickly pallor of their skins. He wants to know more, he wants to know all there is to know so long as it is interesting, but his father forbids him from touching the books in the higher shelves, and his mother from going out through the front door and playing with the children he can hear through his window, so that at the end all he has left is tedium and boredom and things he has already done before. He does as he is told reluctantly, because he knows that he has no real choice. Not yet, anyhow.

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The boy is seven now, and he learns something new every day. He knows now that for some, like his brother, happiness is for sale and can be bought at the magical side of Hamley's, and he knows that for others, people themselves are not much else than commodities. He knows that being born into the family does not entitle him to his parents' love, but it entitles them to do with him as they please. He knows that Muggles are lowly creatures, and that filthy mudbloods are to blame for the state of the world. He knows that children whose parents never cared for them are clever and resourceful, because he is one of them, and he knows that when his father returns from his frequent trips he will always bring him a thick book, and his brother a toy. He also knows that his is a great destiny, and everyday he strives to live up to everyone's expectations so that no one will ever doubt he can fulfill it.

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The boy is eight years old and has discovered the joys of abusing power, but he does it in private so that his mother will not find out, because no matter how much power he might have now, he is still too young to do anything but dream about the day in which he can talk back to his mother. By himself he has discovered the joy of cruelty, the sickening pleasure he feels when he snaps a wounded bird's neck, and hears for the first time the nauseating sound of flesh and bone ripping and tearing. He knows of the delight of watching the house-elves quiver in fear when he threatens them with clothes, and the elation of being called nothing but master by those around him. When he is alone he revels in the ecstasy of watching his mother's cats as he feeds them his brother's pet rat, and he knows that no one will ever blame him for the rat's disappearance because he is the heir and his destiny is great and what is the importance of a rat's blood compared to his own satisfaction?

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The boy is nine, and as he skulks behind the yard door he listens to his cousins talk about the school he will undoubtedly attend in two years, because it is his right, his fate. He eavesdrops on their murmured conversation and licks his lips in anticipation of all the things he will do when his time comes. He will be famous, he knows that much, and his name will be whispered by other students with the same mixture of adoration and fear with which he himself whispers his parents' names, as befits their greatness. He will have friends, and people will flock to him because of who he is, of what he is. And like his father has told him to do, he will study them and brush them off condescendingly, because there are few people out there who can claim to be his equal, who can claim to have a right to speak to him on even footing. Those people he will seek out, and those relationships he will cultivate, but the rest he will disregard and ignore and scorn because they will mean nothing to him.

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The boy is ten years old, and he thinks he knows everything. Better yet, he knows he knows everything. He wonders what the point of continuing to study is, what useful thing there is left for him to learn, because his father has already taught him everything he will ever need in life, taught him about blood and status and family and mudbloods, about all the things that matter. He can speak in two languages now and the house-elves quiver at the sound of his footsteps, because they know how much he still delights in cruelty, in playing with a wand he is too young to own, and how often he will explode in anger because his mother will not let him do the things he wants, but instead forces him to sit still inside the parlor while the sun is bright and memorize old names from dusty tomes that only add to the heavy burden he has been born to proudly carry on his shoulders.

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The boy is eleven now, and he is finding, to his dislike, that he knows a lot less than he thought he did. He thought he knew what his place was, where he belonged, but he was mistaken. He thought he knew how the world worked, but suddenly he finds he is ridiculed and scorned by those who ought to have flocked to him. He only knows that he has angered his parents beyond forgiveness through no fault of his own, and he knows that he in turn is angry beyond words with the stupid hat that put him where he is now. Despite what he is being taught, he clings to the vestiges of knowledge his parents gave him and uses them to protect himself against the vicious looks he receives from those who ought to have adored him. He is better than them, and if he thinks of this only as a test he will get through it unscathed. He is a quick student, and has already learned to keep his mouth shut at times, and to not ridicule in public the mudblood filth he is forced to live with, especially if he wants to avoid a sound trashing at the hands of boys much older than him. He resents the power all of them have over him, and he longs to return home, where his whims are immediately carried out without argument by submissive house-elves.

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The boy is twelve and has learned that he cannot call on mudbloods to their faces, not if he wants their help or companionship. He is only beginning to understand that mudbloods themselves are not that loathsome, and he often has problems trying to reconcile some of the things he learns in school with the things his parents taught him, because it seems unreasonable that so many of the words he heard from them could be wrong, and yet they seem to be. Still he is lofty and haughty, and will only condescend to spend time with the rest of the boys in his dormitory because his pureblood friend - his only friend, but he does not want to think of that because it is a sign of failure - has told him to stop being such a stuck up prat, and to loosen up a little, because otherwise he is never going to have any friends - and besides, there must have been a reason he ended up where he did, mustn't there?

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The boy is thirteen and prowling the school corridors one night when it suddenly dawns on him that he ought to be elated at his freedom. He knows now that there are things in life other than what his parents offer him, and because he had never heard of any of them until two years ago he finds them all that more enticing and tantalizing. He wants to try everything, to do all the things he cannot do at home and to run around and skid his knees and curiously watch his own blood pool until someone other than his mother comes and shakes him, worried not about the role he was crafted to play, but about him.

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The boy is fourteen when he finally realizes that even if there is no real way to be sure whether it is his parents or his friends whose morals are right, he likes the latter a lot better, if only because it allows him to rebel against his mother and call her all the filthy things he has learned from his friends, and to ignore his brother and disrespect his father. He can sneak around the house at night and go into the library and leaf through the forbidden books, but one look at them makes him squirm and shudder and he never wants to see them again. Instead he waits for morning, when he goes out into the garden and makes a mess out of himself and disregards his tasks and snubs his heritage. He defiantly challenges his parents to call him on this behavior because he still thrives on the knowledge that he is the heir of a proud line, even if no one finds any reason for joy in that any longer.

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The boy is fifteen years old when he hears firsthand the sickening crunch of bone again, and this time it brings him no pleasure, because it is happening to something he deeply cares for, in that strange possessive manner that was engraved into him so long ago and that he cannot rid himself of. He has known, for what now feels like a long time, that there are many things worse than being a mudblood - if being a mudblood is a bad thing, which he has doubts about - and he counts his family amongst them. But he has never really understood how the world outside his house truly works, until one night he learns far more than he ever wanted to, as he listens to the pained howls of someone whom five years ago he dismissed as insignificant and now means the world to him.

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The boy is sixteen and irresponsible, and he has yet to learn about guilt and remorse. He dreams of glory and adventure and freedom from the ties that still bind him to the dark house where he spends his summers. He knows that he wants freedom, and he knows how to get it, and he even thinks he has enough courage to run away from it all, although he does not know what he will do afterwards. His father taught him long ago to always develop thorough strategies for the aftermath of anything, but as part of his break with the family he has chosen to forget everything he ever learned in the cold winter evenings spent sitting on the floor of the library, even the sound advice that was given and that works regardless of the circumstances. He does this because he knows that no matter what, he has friends, and his friends will take care of him and help him and not expect anything in return, unlike the friends his father hoped he would make at school, who for every concession made expected retribution.

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The boy is seventeen but he is no longer a boy, not as the world he lives in reckons these things. His hair is as fine and black as the day he was born, and his eyes are still pale and quick, but his skin has darkened from playing outside in the sun and fraying his robes and not worrying about what will happen if he falls and breaks his skin, because he can heal his cuts without a second thought and even if he couldn't, someone else would do it for him. He knows that even though he can, he should not buy friendship, and he has learned that the fact that his best friend is marrying a mudblood is cause only for celebration. He has grown up, but he still believes that he knows everything, that he is invincible - his largest shortcoming. Years of being brought up to fit a role he no longer respects cannot be so easily neglected, and his love for cruelty and intolerance for stupidity and even the knowledge that he is better than those around him cannot always be ignored or cast aside, although at least he has grown up to know right from wrong with much more clarity than he ever thought he would.

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narie, Chicago, IL, USA
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