Perhaps Tomorrow.

McKee wandered the corridors like no explorer. She stopped not at giggling portraits, nor murderous ghosts. The many enticing mysteries of the castle did not tempt her. She strolled along in a death march, a swerve of her hips jutting out the stiff wool of her black robes.

Hiding beneath the folds of the hood was a face containing nothingness. The skin only gave away its taught, peach-fuzzed texture to two deeply set lines swooping down from her flared nostrils.

Breathe in, Breathe out. Repeat as desired.

Her wiry hair crept out from beneath the hood as weeds would from a garden. While a lovely shade, it was almost always tainted with an unwashed appearance. A wayward tendril waved with delight at the ancient tapestries Margaret neglectfully passed.

It was often said of McKee that should she shut her eyes, her only claim to beauty was the glow in her cheeks. So often, the Slytherin girls would circle up and guffaw to jokes about her many awkward traits.

Her mother had always said she would grow into attractiveness. Her mother was now dead. She'd been a recent casualty of the war with Voldemort. The death was unintended, for whatever comfort that offered her.

Not a tear had escaped her eye since she'd heard. What good would crying do?

McKee prided herself in being able to avoid useless emotional rubbish. Even as a fifth year, she had yet to make a friend. Useless emotional rubbish.

However, she wasn't sure if she could believe her own thoughts anymore. Her temples pulsated as she struggled to remember when the last time was she was touched by anyone. Lately, she's been feeling like she was more mirage than matter. It was a deadly image.

She stopped, noticing a sparkle in her peripheral vision. These days, she noticed the sparkles. She allowed her gaze to slide over to the arched window. Near the top lay and embedded image of a hippogriff in flight.

Deciding the stone ledge would lend enough room for perching, she brought her hidden knees up and used her arms to pull her body the rest of the way. She hugged her legs, grateful for the human touch, even if it was her own.

McKee often wondered why it didn't seem that she cared. She despaired the loss of her mother. It came as a crushing loneliness, and the realization that she was human. Humans were social creatures that depended upon one another for survival.

She stared out the window, toward the lake that had donated a sparkle to her night. It didn't seem particularly special upon sight, but people enjoyed looking at it. It was as if it made them feel better just to know the rippling vastness was there. They couldn't live without it. It was the same with Mum. I felt better just knowing she existed. I'd feel better if I existed.

She sympathized more with the Giant Squid than she cared to acknowledge. It could never hope for the companionship of its own kind. McKee knew it was the same isolations that bent her ear and left her lying cold at night.

She longed to feel a part of a great human unconscious. Instead, she dwelled in a world that didn't know her. Only gravity recognized her presence and held her close, tying her down as if she were a ward in a home for the mentally diseased.

The Squid rippled a tentacle above the water. She thought it was beautiful and mimicked the waving motion. She watched her fingers dip and flow. She wanted to be the hippogriff in the window, free to fly.

Damned gravity, always holding me to a life no one cares for.

She stood on the ledge, her forehead pressed into the cold, hard glass. Her fingers splayed out on either side, as if they were the gnawed feathers of some Dream Master's headdress. She glared the several stories down at the black blanket of grass. For someone who wants to fly, why do I stare at the ground?

She squatted momentarily to liberate the latch and let the towering glass swing outward. She breathed deeply and the air filled her torso with the iciness of cold water. Her brown eyes quickly dried in the gusty mountain breeze. She blinked, and her lips tweaked upward as the wind playfully ran it's fingertips through her eyelashes. Now, this is better.

Margaret stepped closer to the edge to better glimpse the steep drop to the ground. Would it brake my legs, or would it be more? Would I fly?

Her arms rolled up over her head and she rocked forward onto her toes, smiling peacefully. She glanced at her striving, stretching arms and caught another flash of a sparkle.

The moon shone brightly for the sliver there was left. It peeked and scampered as the linty clouds aided its efforts. You wax. You wane. You're there in circular glory, then you're gone. How can you keep coming back? What keeps you here?

She laughed as the answer wafted through her mind. Gravity. Of course.

The shadow-infested grounds aroused her curiosity once more. Yes, I know how persuasive gravity can be.

Her lanky arms dropped back to her sides. She knelt and pulled the pane of glass closed. There was a finality in the click. It resounded in her mind as a warning.

Not today.

McKee sat, allowing her legs to swing out to the side. She blew a frizzy tendril away form her eye. Her nail tapped the glass, as if poking the abused moon awake.

You've made your point. I, too, shall go through it all and meet you back at this spot. We'll see then who wins: flight or gravity. Remember me. It may be tomorrow.

Yes, perhaps tomorrow I shall fly.