Witch Child

Witch Child

She hides behind the tapestry, crawling behind the niche in the walls of Hogwarts that she discovered not a week ago. Biting her lip, she hopes that the tapestry's languorous movement will not give her away. She fears too much what might happen. So she doesn't breathe, and if she must, she will do so very slowly.

Count to five.

One. Two. Three. Four. Five.

Inhale.

One. Two. Three. Four. Five.

Lily hears footsteps and she knows that it is they. She is doubly sure not to breathe now and increases her count to ten. Maybe that would make time pass faster. Mum had always told her that time was relative. Lily didn't understand what relative meant but comprehended immediately the experience it was implying. She could be washing the dishes for only ten minutes and it could feel like a lifetime, or she could be lying on the grass, reading her favorite novel, for hours and it could feel like a minute.

Maybe it would work now.

One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six. Seven. Eight. Nine. Ten.

The echoes of the footsteps fade away. They're turning a corner, possibly. And a few seconds later, Lily cannot hear them at all. It is safe.

She places a hand over her mouth and coughs surreptitiously. If they are still here, they will notice and they will drag her out of her hiding place, push her against the unyielding stones, and torture her.

The word they used is still etched in coal black in her mind. It accompanies her always.

Mudblood.

When she finally arrives at Transfiguration, the class glares at her reprovingly and Professor McGonagall tells her to sit down and to see her after the lesson is over. Lily mumbles an excuse about getting lost but knows that there is no conviction in her lifeless voice. Focusing her energies on transfiguring matchsticks, she tries to block out the fact that the professor can see through her flimsy lie.

All of her friends (or are they acquaintances?), giving her sympathetic glances, leave. It is with a sudden finality that the classroom door shuts, relegating Lily to the stony realm of the authoritarian Minvera McGonagall.

"You weren't really lost, were you?" is all she asks.

She ponders lying, despite the strict ethics she has been held up to her entire life. It would save her from detention, and if she could summon a convincing enough I'm-a-first-year rebuttal, the professor might even pass over the mandatory lecture required for tardy students. But she does not have the heart to lie.

Lily scuffs her shoes against the floor. "No."

"Might I ask what made you late for my class, then?" Professor McGonagall's eyes are cold; she feels increasingly desperate. "You have been at Hogwarts, Miss Evans, for over two weeks now. You're a smart girl. Surely you at least know how to get to your classes?"

"I do."

Professor McGonagall walks out from behind her desk and approaches Lily. "Are you sure everything is all right?"

She remembers, remembers it vividly, the first time they slammed her against the wall and leaned in so close they spit in her face, the first time they cursed at her, brought their wands out for intimidating show, the first time they anointed her the scum of wizarding kind, the Mudblood. She should tell Professor McGonagall, she thinks. Yes. An adult would deal with it and make sure that they were punished, that they would leave her alone.

All Lily can do is nod her head and smile when she is dismissed.