Chapter 36: Nobody’s Heart Belongs to Me
Only the pillow nearby.
Some have a reason for dreaming “
Why can’t I?
I feel forsaken on nights like this.
Can’t I awaken to someone’s kiss?
Only my book in bed knows how I look in bed,
Nobody hears when I cry.
Everybody has someone “
Why can’t I?
By August, practical, levelheaded Dr. Rhonda Sepell was convinced that Clancy Norgard was of sound mind, but that she, herself, was certifiably insane. After endless telephone and written inquiries and hiring a private investigator, it was determined that no such establishment as the Leaky Cauldron even existed. Then how, Rhonda wondered, had Clancy and she been able to exchange correspondence? Moreover, there was no record of an Albus Dumbledore, a Severus Snape, or of any castle in use as a school located near a lake.
Eager to recover her memory, Clancy allowed doctors to examine her physically and mentally. She underwent psychotherapy, hypnosis, and past life regression. Certain that in a former incarnation, she had been a member of the Algonquin Round Table set, she was dismayed to learn instead, that she had been a novelty performer in a pink striped bathing costume who, on horseback, had dived off the end of an amusement pier six nights weekly, with matinees on Sundays. Clancy promptly demanded a refund.
Feeling that her life had fallen out of balance, she arranged for a Feng Shui practitioner to evaluate her home and perform a Space Clearing Ceremony. After a thorough examination of each room, Clancy learned that she had constipated Chi. In order to alleviate the problem and increase the flow of positive energy, the specialist advised her never to keep an image of a rearing horse in her bedroom, and to substitute jade plants for her cacti. As she had never considered keeping an image of a rearing horse in her bedroom, and was quite fond of her cacti, Clancy decided she could make do with her constipated Chi, and that the only thing she needed to eliminate was the Feng Shui practitioner.
Dotty old Mrs. Lawrence suggested that Clancy have a psychic reading. She escorted her personally to her own clairvoyant, Madame Aurora Dufey, who gave consultations from her small apartment above a shoe shop in Eagle Rock. The results were disappointing. Madame Dufey told Clancy that she was a “good person with a loving heart”, but that her future looked “ominous”. However, for an extra $100.00 cash, she was confident that she would be able to channel the spirits properly and persuade them to be more specific. When Clancy refused, Mrs. Lawrence suggested the $25.00 Dearly Departed Séance Special. Clancy agreed, and challenged the spiritualist to produce Aunt Hilly.
Dimming the lights, Madame Dufey seated herself between the two women and addressed Clancy. “Your aunt will communicate only with me, but for an additional fee of ten dollars, you will be allowed one question.”
“Very well, but I’ll pay you the entire amount after I ask my question. I think that’s fair, don’t you?”
The seer smiled nervously. “The spirits trust you, my child.”
With that, Madame Dufey instructed the women to close their eyes and join hands. Clancy cocked open one lid when she heard the metallic clink of something dropping from behind the curtain in the kitchenette.
After a short time, Madame Dufey rolled back her head and moaned; her grasp tightened, as she dug her sharp, porcelain nails into Clancy’s palm. She began to speak in a slow, eerie monotone.
“Aunt…Hilly…can…you…hear… me…?”
“Yeeeeesssss,” came the faint reply, which seemed to originate from behind the curtain.
“Your niece seeks your guidance. She needs your reassurance that all will be well in her future, and she longs to know that you are happy in the great beyond.”
“I am at peace,” replied the voice, which sounded nothing at all like Aunt Hilly’s. “Tell my beloved niece that her Aunt Hilly loves her and she must always remember to…”
The voice faded, but Madame Dufey beseeched it to continue.
“My time on this earthly plane grows short. I need stronger psychic energy to remain among you.”
“How much money have you got on you?” Madam Dufey muttered out of the side of her mouth to Clancy.
“May I ask my question now?”
“Oh, very well,” the woman huffed.
Clancy cleared her throat. “Aunt Hilly?”
“Yes, my child?”
“Can you give me an anagram for ‘Aurora Dufey’?”
The voice remained silent.
“You recall what an anagram is, don’t you, Aunt Hilly?”
From behind the curtain, came the muffled sound of someone thumbing rapidly through the pages of a book.
“Aha!” Clancy broke free of the psychic’s clutches, and crossed the room to part the curtains. Behind them, a wild-eyed woman missing a front tooth grinned idiotically.
“That’s my sister-in-law,” Madame Dufey explained. “Pay no attention to her. Resume your seat, or the psychic connection will be broken.”
Clancy whirled on the woman. “My aunt could always come up with an anagram!”
“The…uh…transference from one’s earthly existence to the…uh…afterlife sometimes erases one’s comprehension of “”
“Even so,” Clancy countered. “Anagrams never lie. ‘Aurora Dufey’ is an anagram for YOU’RE A FRAUD!”
Helping Mrs. Lawrence to her feet, Clancy and her well-meaning neighbor scooted out the door.
With the exception of perusing a few promising fortune cookies from time to time at Wok King Miller’s Mandarin Cafe on Colorado Boulevard, that was the last of Clancy’s forays into the paranormal.
Meanwhile, Snape had become an active member of the Order of the Phoenix, passing information to them on the occasions Voldemort chose to take him into his confidence. In exchange, Dumbledore allowed Snape to leak certain facts to the Dark Lord that would convince him of Snape’s loyalty, yet not threaten the integrity of the Order’s undercover operations.
Through use of the Pensieve, Snape extracted his most cherished memories of Clancy, along with the more embarrassing ones, as well. Dumbledore urged him to set his priorities, and Snape had grown accustomed years ago to deferring to the headmaster’s demands. Snape realized that many lives were at stake “ most importantly, his own.
As winter approached, Clancy adjusted as best she could to her selective amnesia. She remained unemployed, spending her time moping about the house and watching old films on television. She owned two homes free and clear, and with her small inheritance and the rent she collected from leasing Aunt Hilly’s house, she didn’t need to work. But how, she wondered, would she ever be able to alleviate her boredom?
Often she distracted herself by visiting the Huntington Library, and wandering through its art galleries and botanical gardens. Clancy enjoyed the solitude and the beauty of nature. On weekdays, she had the run of the place. It was just her, the waterfowl, and elderly foreign tourists. She was plagued constantly along the walking trails by strangers handing her their cameras and asking her to snap their pictures, but she was always willing to oblige “ and she did come away after one encounter, with a faithful pen friend in Latvia. It was a tranquil existence, but hardly a fitting life for a young woman. Her mind was slowly atrophying, but Rhonda proposed the perfect solution.
On the evening of January 9, Clancy continued Aunt Hilly’s tradition of celebrating Severus’ birthday. Her aunt and she had observed the occasion together every year, and the festivities brought back fond memories of their time together. Clancy bought a cake and invited Mrs. Lawrence and the Sepells to her party.
“Clancy,” Rhonda began, “Brad and I have decided that it’s time for Amy to study voice and piano.”
Wincing, Clancy looked over at Amy, seated at the dining room table stuffing her mouth with devil’s food cake. She kicked the table pedestal repeatedly, working off her sugar-induced kinetic energy. Annoying little brat, Clancy seethed internally.
“Does Amy want to study piano and voice?” Clancy stole a sidelong glance at the child, as she finger-painted chocolate icing across her placemat.
“Not really, but we think it would be beneficial for her. Come on,” Rhonda coaxed, “The diversion will be good for you.”
Clancy sighed heavily. “Why not? It’s always great fun to teach a child something they don’t want to learn.”
Thus, it was settled. Lessons would begin immediately, with an hour of piano instruction on Mondays, and an hour of vocal training on Wednesdays. Clancy lamented that her New Year was off to a hellish start.
Snape’s luck paralleled Clancy’s. Professor Dumbledore assigned him to give Harry Potter Occlumency lessons to help the boy learn to block his mind from invasion by the Dark Lord. So while Snape attempted to impart his knowledge of Occlumency to a hotheaded Gryffindor who loathed the sight of him, Clancy attempted to show little Amy how to hit middle C, while struggling to control her inclination to hit little Amy.
One afternoon, soon after Amy’s lessons began, Clancy’s telephone rang. Before going into the den to answer it, she instructed the child to practice the C scale, and reminded her, yet again, to cross her thumb under when she reached the F key. When she returned a few minutes later, she found Amy seated on the floor pulling photographs out of one of her family albums. One picture ripped from its plastic sleeve, was of a small fair-haired girl, clinging tightly to a middle-aged woman, as a stern-faced man glared at them from a doorway. Another showed a pimpled teenager sitting alone in her bedroom, stabbing a pair of scissors into the pages of a magazine. In her hand, Amy clutched a photograph of a grinning boy pointing at a scrawny, crying girl wearing roller skates, who had fallen on the sidewalk.
“Is that my daddy?” Amy asked, indicating the boy in the picture as she held it up for Clancy to see.
“ENOUGH!” Clancy shouted, when she saw the mess Amy had made. As she reached for a flyswatter, the child gulped, and sped out the back door.
After a few months, Snape had his fill of teaching Harry. He found the boy’s lack of concentration infuriating. When he caught Harry nosing about inside the Pensieve, prying into a private, painful memory of a day he’d suffered abuse and humiliation at the hands of two high and mighty Gryffindors, Snape lost control. Recalling how his tormentors had used their swagger and bravado to window dress their torture of anyone whom they considered different from themselves, he gripped Harry by the arm and threw him down on the floor. Ordering him out of the room, Snape exploded a jar of cockroaches over the boy’s head as a parting shot.
As another school term ended at Hogwarts, dire events began occurring that finally convinced the Wizarding community that Voldemort had returned. After a thwarted attempt by Death Eaters to steal a prophecy from the Ministry of Magic, leaflets were distributed to alert families to take precautions. Citizens were encouraged to stay in after dark and to increase security in their homes. They were advised to be suspicious of family members and friends who behaved peculiarly, as it might be an indication that they had been placed under the Imperius Curse, or that possibly, they might be Death Eaters who had altered their appearance with Polyjuice. A chilly mist blanketed the land, and freak weather conditions plagued the country. A bridge collapsed, people were disappearing, and there had been two sensational murders.
When he’d resumed contact with the Dark Lord, Snape began spending his summer holidays in a bleak mill town, in a shabby abode that was untraceable by Muggles. Dumbledore enticed Hogwarts’ former Potions master Horace Slughorn out of retirement in the hope of obtaining crucial information from him needed to help Harry defeat Voldemort. Snape, Dumbledore decided, would teach Defense Against the Dark Arts when school resumed in September.
Dumbledore’s health had declined, due to a hand injury he’d sustained while dueling with Voldemort during the Ministry confrontation. He began depending heavily on Snape to provide him with healing potions. Realizing his time was short, the elderly wizard took steps to prepare Harry for the day when he would have to face the Dark Lord.
While Dumbledore focused his attention upon leading Harry on a journey of discovery, Snape’s thankless responsibility was to deal with Draco Malfoy. In order to guard his cover as a counterspy for the Order, Snape had made an Unbreakable Vow to protect Draco from harm, and to ensure that the assignment the Dark Lord had given the boy to perform would be fulfilled. As an extra stipulation, he had agreed foolhardily to complete the task, should Draco fail.
After more than a year, Clancy’s memory of her time at Hogwarts had still not returned, but she began to develop unusual tastes and behaviors. While alone at night in her living room, she stared into the fireplace for long periods, as if she were waiting for someone to appear inside of it. Once, when Rhonda asked her to identify the name of a composer, she said, “Colo Porterus”, but when Rhonda gave her an odd look, she quickly corrected herself, and explained that she’d meant to say Cole Porter. At the market, Clancy began purchasing large quantities of frozen pumpkin pies “ not to eat, but to liquefy in a blender and consume as a beverage.
But the strangest eccentricity of all, was her growing fascination with the pineapple pin. She never wore it, yet she fondled it often and kept it near, as if it contained the key to solving the mystery of her amnesia. The Summoning Bell, however, remained untouched, gathering dust on the hutch above her desk.
A pale, dark-haired man with indistinct facial features began to invade Clancy’s dreams. Fragments of fantastic imagery announced his arrival: a broom -- a bull -- a pink feather boa -- argyle socks -- a large disembodied nose. White knobby knees -- swirling snowflakes -- tartan fabric -- a pair of trousers floating downstream; such absurd visions beset her nightly. Upon awakening, she felt a sense of loneliness so acute, that she would have to will herself to concentrate on reality, and avoid the temptation to stay in bed and muse for the better part of the morning.
As a psychiatrist, Rhonda had studied dream analysis, but she was reluctant to apply a strict Freudian interpretation. She believed the broom, the bull, and the boa might be phallic symbols, along with the large disembodied nose. The swirling snowflakes might represent Clancy’s frosty ambivalence toward men, and the trousers floating downstream, she felt, could possibly mean that Clancy feared her chances of finding a man were slipping away from her. Yet, she was at a loss as to how to work out the significance of the white knobby knees and the tartan fabric. But the cure, Rhonda believed, was for Clancy to start seeing men.
One evening in mid-December, as Rhonda and Amy were helping Clancy decorate her artificial Christmas tree, the subject of Clancy’s love life came up. Rhonda’s advice was not well received.
“What for?” Clancy scoffed. “I have no interest in seeing men. I’ve met the perfect man in my dreams. He’ll do, for now.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. He isn’t real. You can’t fall in love with a figment of your imagination.” Rhonda handed Clancy a small green elf made from a pipe cleaner.
“Ah, but what a fabulous figment! I’m beginning to think that imaginary men have the most to offer a woman.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, for one thing, we can assign to them qualities that aren’t so easy to come by in the real world. My fantasy lover can be whatever I need for him to be.” Hanging the elf ornament on a low branch, Clancy added, “And as strange as this may sound, even though I can’t see his face, I feel as though I’ve met him, and that one day we’ll find each other again.”
“Careful, Clancy,” Rhonda cautioned. “You’re guilty of magical thinking.”
“What did you say?” Clancy frowned, as she pondered Rhonda’s meaning.
Amy entered from the kitchen with a handful of cookies. She held a gingerbread man between her teeth, poised to bite off its leg.
“You’re looking for a link “ a set of coincidences that doesn’t exist. Just because your subconscious creates a perfect man, doesn’t mean you’ll find him.”
“I never said he was perfect. All I said was that I have a strong feeling that I’ve met him.”
“Daddy says you’re gonna die an old maid,” Amy chimed in, before devouring the gingerbread man’s head.
“Amy, hush!” Rhonda warned her daughter. “Your father was making a joke.”
“No, he wasn’t. Daddy’s always saying that Clancy could find a boyfriend if she’d keep her stupid mouth shut.”
Clancy bit her lip, and harbored a delicious image of a lightning bolt striking Amy at the end of a dark deserted pier.
“Keep it up darling, and Mommy and Daddy won’t have a roof over their heads.” Rhonda smiled at Clancy awkwardly.
“It’s all right. I know I’m a frequent topic of conversation in the Sepell household. You leave your bedroom window open just like Aunt Hilly and Uncle Ziggy used to do. I’ve gotten an earful of Brad’s opinion of me more than once.”
“Clancy, I’m sorry. I worry about you, so naturally, Brad and I discuss your problems from time to time. We both agree you should be dating. I’ve suggested that he set you up on a blind date with one of his friends from Cal-Tech.”
“No, Rhonda. Definitely no.”
“But, why? The holidays are the worst time to be alone.”
“Thanks for reminding me.”
“Well, think it over, anyway. Maybe after the first of the year, you’ll change your mind.”
After finishing with the decorations, Rhonda and Amy returned home, leaving Clancy to stare at her synthetic tree. A fitting symbol for my synthetic life, she reflected. As she was about to put away the ornament box, she discovered one that had been overlooked. Carefully unfolding a wad of tissue paper, Clancy found the white winged horse that she had received long ago as a gift from Aunt Hilly.
“Hello Pegasus.” She hooked the fragile object securely to a prominent branch underneath the star. “You’ve always been my favorite, you know. At least you can still make me smile.” Clancy continued talking to the tiny creature, as if it could hear her. “I wonder if I’ll ever be truly happy,” she observed, before snorting, “Yeah -- when horses fly.”
By March, Rhonda had worn Clancy down and she had agreed to meet one of Brad’s colleagues, but she reconsidered and cancelled their date two hours before he was due to arrive at her door.
“Why, Clancy?” Rhonda demanded the next morning. Brad told me Hiram is very nice. He holds two doctoral degrees, owns his own home, speaks five languages, and loves music. What more could you ask for?”
“Look me straight in the eye, Rhonda, and tell me if you’d go out with a man named Hiram E. Slice.”
Rhonda’s lip began to quiver, and soon they both convulsed into a fit of the giggles.
“I do see your point, but it was rude of you to cancel out on him at the last minute “ even if he does have a silly name.”
“I was playing around with letters in my mind while I was washing my hair, and I discovered that Hiram E. Slice is an anagram for ‘I’m a chiseler’.” That’s why I cancelled the date. As I’ve said many times, anagrams never lie “ they reveal hidden truths.”
After a second round of hearty laughter, Rhonda suggested Clancy meet another of Brad’s friends, Varian Chill.
“Varian Chill?” Clancy scrunched her nose. “You’ve got to be kidding. I don’t even like the sound of it. Varian Chill…Mrs.Varian Chill…Clancy Chill. Awful. I wouldn’t even consider going out with him.”
“You’re being much too choosy,” Rhonda scolded, as she headed for the door. “Think it over for a few days, okay?”
Clancy promised to think it over, and she did. Twenty minutes later, she telephoned Rhonda and informed her that Varian Chill was an anagram for “arch villain”. When Rhonda related the anagram to Brad, he threw a fit and refused to offer any further matchmaking assistance. “Let the nutcase find her own dates,” he muttered. “And I wish her luck!”
The Sepells began to bicker and bandy Clancy’s name about, until the telephone rang again.
Rhonda answered it. “Hello?”
“Would you mind shutting your window?”
“Sorry, Clancy. Sure thing. Talk to you later.”
Putting down the receiver, Rhonda carped, “Now see what you’ve done?”
“ME? You’re the one who “”
“Shut up, Brad.”
“Yes, dear.”
At Hogwarts, students and faculty alike were living in fear. Katie Bell, a Gryffindor Chaser, had been injured by touching a cursed necklace, and somehow a bottle of poisoned oak-matured mead had turned up in the castle, nearly taking the life of Ron Weasley. Eloise Midgen’s parents had decided the previous summer to take her out of school, and many more parents were beginning to panic. Snape met with Dumbledore privately in the Forbidden Forrest one evening to discuss his concerns.
“Headmaster,” Snape pleaded, “you’re taking too much for granted. I…I don’t want to do it anymore.”
“No, Severus, you agreed to do it, and there is no turning back,” Dumbledore insisted angrily. “Moreover, I suggest you continue making investigations. I’ve asked the same of the other Heads of House, as well.”
The sound of a twig snapping nearby caught Snape’s attention. “Shh,” he whispered, as he cocked his head to listen. “I think we might have been overheard.”
“Calm yourself, Severus. I’m sure it was only Hagrid. He told me he comes into the Forbidden Forrest each evening about this time to chat with your little friend.”
“My little friend? To whom are you referring?”
“Why, Glutgut, of course. Hagrid told me the Jarvey found a mate and they’re expecting their first litter. Soon the forest will play host to the wonder of life renewing itself, and Hogwarts will have its first jargon of…er…jibe of…oh, whatever the collective term is for Jarveys.”
“That preposterous creature is no friend of mine! How can you jest, knowing that soon you might…” Snape closed his eyes and turned away, as if what he was about to say was too painful for him to express.
“Die? I am prepared. I have been for years,” Dumbledore assured Snape casually. “You must be prepared too, Severus. I believe we will both know when the time is right.”
Snape began to pace, then stopped abruptly to regard Dumbledore. “How can you stand there taking this all so calmly? Have you considered what will become of me should anything go wrong?”
“I have -- and I have also considered what will become of you if you do not honor the Unbreakable Vow. You are in a position to be of much greater help to Harry in the future than anyone else in the Order.”
“The boy won’t accept any help from me.”
“You’ve had years to build a relationship with him, and yet you haven’t been able to let go of the past. You’ve created your own monster. Nevertheless, once I am gone, you must continue to protect and to help him, by any means. I place my trust in you to find a way.”
Snape shook his head in anguish as he considered his limited options. Dumbledore clasped him by the shoulders and began to chuckle softly.
“Wherever our destiny may lead us, if I could impart to you one piece of my philosophy that I would wish for you to remember always, it would be “ ”
“Please, Headmaster.” Snape looked to the heavens for strength. “You’re going to lecture me yet again on the redemptive power of love, aren’t you?”
‘You’re quite mistaken. I was merely going to observe that death is easy; comedy is hard.”
“But, what now?” Snape asked trying to keep Dumbledore focused on the gravity of the situation. “What action do you propose we take next?”
“I would suggest, Severus,” Dumbledore responded, linking his arm with Snape’s, “that we hasten to the Great Hall “ before we are late for pudding.”
Spring came to Pasadena, and Rhonda’s well-meaning matchmaking began afresh. To Clancy’s great surprise and the Sepell’s shock, the third time was the charm, and Brad’s friend and colleague Preston Yancy, passed his two-month trial period and became Clancy’s steady beau.
“Is it getting serious?” Rhonda pressed at lunch one day.
“No. Preston’s nice enough, I suppose, but…”
“But what?”
“I’m still dreaming of FIG.”
“FIG? You mean the implausible figment of your imagination with the knobby knees, argyle socks, and disembodied nose?”
“Yep. That’s the one. FIG. It stands for Fabulous Imaginary Guy. I’ve decided to call him that since I don’t know his name.”
“I still say it’s Severus.”
“How could it be? True, I mentioned meeting him in my letters, but according to that investigator you hired, he doesn’t even exist!”
“Well, under the circumstances, I think you’d better hitch your wagon to a sure thing. Preston is flesh and blood, at least. By the way, what attracted you to him in the first place? If Brad is any example, seismologists are not known for being scintillating conversationalists.”
“To be honest, Rhonda, I’m not sure. Our first dinner date started out badly, until he mentioned his dog and showed me her picture. I suppose it’s ridiculous to date a man just because his dog has a cute name.”
“I’d say so. What’s so special about the dog’s name?”
“Her name is Buttons. Isn’t that the sweetest name you’ve ever heard? She’s a border collie.”
“Yes, they’re an appealing breed, all right. I’ve seen border collies on TV that are smarter than some men.”
“I’ve seen cardboard boxes that are smarter than some men, but no matter…”
“I say give Preston a chance. He’s certainly attractive enough “ tall, blonde, tan. Definitely marriage material.”
“Not for me, he isn’t. Do you think I’d want to go through the rest of my life as Clancy Yancy? And there are more drawbacks I’ve discovered, too.”
“Don’t tell me, let me guess: you found an anagram for his name?”
Clancy nodded. “Pony ancestry. I can envision our future offspring having horse teeth.”
“Or,” Rhonda added, “overly large genitalia.”
Their laughter cut off as the dour waiter presented them with their fortune cookies.
Rhonda grabbed the closest cookie to her and broke it in half. “Marry in haste, fly to Reno.”
Clancy opened hers. “Magic is in your future,” she read. “Humph. That makes about as much sense as the fortune I got last week.”
“What did it say?”
“I’ll gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today.”
“So much for the ancient wisdom of Wok King Miller,” Rhonda hooted. “Any more complaints against Preston?”
“Yes, as a matter of fact, I do have one more. Did you know that by day, Preston assumes the role of a mild-mannered Cal-Tech seismologist, but by dark of night he moonlights as a…as a…” Shaking with laughter, Clancy couldn’t continue.
“Well? A male stripper “ a cake decorator “ what?”
“He’s a…polyphonic whistler!”
“I’m not sure what that is “ can he whistle at more than one pretty girl at a time?”
“On our first date, he claimed he could whistle two notes at the same time a full octave apart or at any closer interval “ and that’s when I made the mistake of my life.”
“What do you mean?”
“I asked him to prove it. He did “ and he’s been proving it ever since. It’s the most fascinating “ and the most annoying thing I’ve ever heard. He whistles for his dog, he whistles tunes on the radio…”
“Does he whistle while kissing?”
“No, but the only reason I ever kissed him in the first place was just to shut him up. He’s one of only six in the world.”
“Men you’ve kissed just to shut them up?”
“No. Polyphonic whistlers. That’s six too many, if you ask me.”
“But he has a steady job and he’s intelligent…in a male sort of way…and he is handsome.”
“Handsome? Preston? Are we talking about the same person? He’s all right, I suppose, but I wouldn’t call him handsome. No, no…he can’t hold a candle to FIG. I want someone thin and pale “ someone with a more prominent nose.”
“Must it be disembodied and floating around the room?”
“Don’t be absurd, Rhonda. I’m willing to make concessions.”
“You’ve developed some very unusual tastes.”
“Have I? But what fun is kissing if you don’t receive a sound poke in the eye now and again? No, Preston’s nose is much too small.”
“Clancy,” Rhonda said with a bewildered smile, “you’re one in a million. I’ve heard of women holding out for a hero, but it seems you’re holding out for a honker.”
“I’ve made up my mind. Preston’s coming over tomorrow night and I’ve planned an Italian dinner. Sometime twixt the tortellini and the tiramisu, I’m going to tell him it’s over “ if I don’t lose my nerve.”
The next evening, Clancy was determined to free herself of Preston Yancy. In an attempt to soften the blow, she devised a plan to convince him he was lucky to be rid of her. She’d never been the best cook in the world, but she thought if she put her mind to it, she could do a bit worse. She added a lavish amount of salt to the salad dressing, undercooked the pasta, and tampered with the tiramisu.
When Preston arrived, wine in hand to whet his whistle, Clancy took the bottle from him, dropped it deliberately on the floor, and apologized for her clumsiness. Preston barely touched his dinner. Instead, he whistled chorus after chorus of the theme from The Bridge on the River Kwai.
I can only stand so much. “Preston,” Clancy ventured pleasantly, “I’ve been giving some thought to our…association, and frankly, I don’t see us having much of a future together.”
“Okay.”
Okay? “What I’m trying to say is, I’m not in the right frame of mind to pursue a relationship with anyone right now.”
“Okay.”
Well, that was easy. “No hard feelings?”
“Nah, we’ll just keep it casual.”
“Keep what casual?”
“Us.”
Apparently, Preston did not understand plain English. The more Clancy protested, the more amorous he grew. It soon became evident that he was tired of being put off, and that he intended to collect on his investment of two month’s worth of dinner dates. Before she knew what was happening, he was carrying her into her bedroom. She struggled and threatened to call the police, but he covered her mouth and shoved her against her desk. The impact dislodged the Summoning Bell and it toppled from its perch.
In his dungeon chamber, Snape was awakened shortly before dawn by a piercing ring. Clancy? “Lumos,” he mumbled sleepily, as he reached into the drawer of his bed table to find the one-way mirror. Speaking her name, he watched as the clouded glass sharpened into focus.
Clancy panicked. At a loss for what to do, she tried to relax and act as though she wanted him to seduce her. As Preston released his hand from her mouth to kiss her, she waited for her chance, then gave a sharp upward thrust with her knee, striking him in the groin. Doubling over in pain, he let go of her.
“You bitch!” he hissed, coming toward her again.
“KEEP AWAY FROM ME!” she screamed.
Spotting the Summoning Bell lying on the floor, she dived for it. Before Preston could stand upright, she used the bell to conk him hard on the side of the head.
Snape observed the scene, powerless to provide assistance, and rebuked himself for altering the Forgetfulness Potion.
Preston lay slumped on the floor, cursing and moaning in pain. As Clancy ran from the room, she collided with Brad, who had entered through the patio.
“We heard you scream! What’s the matter? Are you hurt?”
Trembling, Clancy pointed toward her bedroom. “Get him out of here! Call the police…kill him...do anything…just GET HIM OUT OF HERE!”
Rhonda raced down the hall toward them. “Clancy, what’s happened?”
“I HATE MEN! I HATE THEM! I…” She broke down in tears.
Placing her arm around Clancy, Rhonda guided her into the den. Brad hauled Preston out to the street to await the police, as Rhonda prepared some herbal tea to calm Clancy down.
“I’m through with men,” Clancy pledged when she regained her composure. “No more matchmaking, no more blind dates “ I just want to be left alone.”
“I understand. Brad had no idea Preston would ever pull something like this. He would have never set you up with him if he hadn’t assumed he was a decent person. We both thought he was a nice guy.”
“I’m not holding you two responsible. Until tonight, I thought he was all right, too. It just proves that people aren’t always what they appear to be.”
“Try to put it behind you. You’re well rid of the creep.”
“I’ll say,” she spat, then added cynically, “The only thing I’ll miss about that louse is his border collie.”
Exhaling a sigh of relief, Snape put away the mirror. “It’s my fault she’s unhappy. I’ve never brought anything but unhappiness and misery to anyone I’ve ever known.” Cursing violently, he shook his head, recalling the prophecy Professor Trelawney had asked him to relate to Clancy three years ago: Beware of a man with a border collie.
As the weeks went by, Clancy rallied from the incident with Preston, and she began to see Brad in a new light. She’d always thought him a fool. She’d seen him drunk and insolent, only to do a complete reversal moments later and cower while Rhonda henpecked him. But he’d been there for her when she needed him, and she was forced to admit that she’d been wrong. Both he and Rhonda had supported her when she’d pressed charges against Yancy, and she’d discovered that there must be something good about him, after all. Rhonda had seen fit to marry him, and she was an intelligent woman. Perhaps, Clancy realized, it didn’t matter if a man had irritating flaws “ as long as he knew how to conduct himself honorably in a crisis.
Clancy’s dreams of FIG continued. Their accompanying imagery still puzzled her, but overall, she looked forward to spending time with her nocturnal fantasy lover more than she did to living out her drab waking hours alone.
One overcast day in June, Clancy came home exhausted from shopping and decided to take an afternoon nap. Falling into a heavy sleep, she drifted into a disturbing nightmare. She saw her black clad faceless lover running rapidly in the dark, holding one hand up to his head as blood gushed through his fingers. Unable to scream and will herself to wake up, she tossed violently from one side of the bed to the other, flailing her arms, as images of jumbled letters whirled through her mind. As she turned toward her nightstand, she knocked over a cactus plant, causing some of its needles to drive themselves into her hand. With a yelp, Clancy awoke, struggling to catch her breath. In her dream, she’d heard the sound of great wings flapping, but upon awakening, the noise turned out to be nothing more than a helicopter flying low over her house.
“Cynic man fled…man cynic fled…fled, cynic man,” she panted incoherently. “Something is wrong!” Clancy sat up and shuddered, wondering if she should relate her horrific dream to Rhonda. “Something is…horribly…wrong.”
Feeling as though she’d spent the last two years burdening her best friend with her troubles, Clancy waited a few days before mentioning her dream to Rhonda. She mulled over the phrase “cynic man fled” incessantly, until at last she discovered that it was an anagram for “find me, Clancy”.
Rhonda tried to convince her it was a meaningless dream “ or perhaps she was punishing herself subconsciously for some imagined sin. But whatever the case, she told Clancy to move on and to not let it worry her.
As the months passed, Clancy’s memory of her phantom lover’s flight never faded. And the strange anagram message never left her mind: Find me, Clancy.
With Rhonda and Brad’s encouragement, she decided to start teaching piano and voice full time, just as Aunt Hilly had done. Amy, once an obnoxious brat, had blossomed into a lovely young girl by her eleventh birthday, and after a bad start, had resumed her music lessons and shown improvement.
By New Year’s Day, Clancy was optimistic that 1998 would prove to be about as discouraging as the last two and a half years had been, and the memory of her dream still haunted her.
In late spring, Clancy began rehearsing her students for their first recital, scheduled for mid-July. Her odd behaviors and verbal inaccuracies continued, but by now, her friends had grown used to treating them as commonplace. After three years, Rhonda held out little hope that Clancy would ever regain her memory. In fact, she’d now been home for nearly the same length of time that she’d lived in the U.K.
“Give us one of the old songs that Aunt Hilly used to sing,” Rhonda begged Clancy after she’d joined her neighbors in their living room after dinner one evening. “How about one of the old war tunes she used to sing for us when we were kids?”
“All right.” Clancy walked over to her aunt’s well used piano and seated herself on the bench. “Do you remember this one?” she asked.
“There’ll be owls flying over
The white cliffs of Dover,
Tomorrow, just you wait and see.”
“Doesn’t she mean bluebirds?”
“Shush, Brad,” Rhonda whispered.
“There’ll be love and laughter
And peace ever after,
Tomorrow, when the Wizarding world is free.”
“Mom, what’s she “”
“Not now, Amy,” her parents said in unison.
“The shepherd will tend his sheep,
The valley will bloom again,
And Flitwick will go to sleep
In his own little room again.”
Finishing the last refrain, Clancy swiveled around on the bench and regarded the Sepells just as curiously as they were regarding her.
“Who’s Flitwick?” Amy asked.
“I…I don’t know. I meant to sing ‘Jimmy’. I’m not all at sure why I keep making mistakes like that.”
As the recital neared, Clancy worried that her living room was too small to accommodate her students’ families. She hired studio space on Mission Street and even passed out flyers along her block to invite her neighbors. When the big day arrived, Rhonda helped her prepare the refreshments, and they left early to set up the buffet before the performance.
After Clancy made a brief welcoming speech, Amy took her place in front of the microphone to lead off the show. Seated at the piano, Clancy waited for her to nod to indicate that she was ready to begin, but the girl developed stage fright. Clancy shrugged, and began playing the introduction. Amy joined in after eight bars, warbling “Vaga Luna” in a shaky soprano.
A stranger entered midway through her number and took a seat in the last row. He watched the proceedings with curiosity. For the closing selection, Clancy’s youngest pupil, a freckle faced boy of five, struggled to play a beginner’s piece, but forgot his fingering and cried for his mother.
“Try again,” Clancy urged. “Take your time and concentrate.” She offered him a tissue and backed away from the piano.
The man in the last row nonchalantly removed something from his coat pocket and aimed it at the tearful lad. Placing his small fingers on the keys, the boy played flawlessly with an attack and technique that would have put Paderewski to shame.
Queuing up the performers to take their final bows, Clancy was bewildered by her pupil’s miraculous improvement, but grateful that the evening had not ended on a sad note. When the applause ended, the audience and recitalists made a beeline for the buffet.
The stranger rose and approached Clancy as she was disconnecting the audio equipment.
“Excuse me, Miss Norgard,” he said. “I’m on holiday at present, staying with friends. I found your recital announcement left at their door, and I decided to attend. Your pupils were brilliant “ especially that last young man.” He grinned enigmatically.
“Thank you for coming! I’m glad you enjoyed the performance. You’re British, aren’t you?” Clancy asked.
“Yes, I’m from London.”
“London? Tell me, by any chance…have you ever heard of a place called the Leaky Cauldron?”
“Yes, I stop in there frequently, as a matter of fact.”
“Y-Y-You do?”
“Yes, why only last week I “”
It was all Clancy could do to remain calm. “Listen, could we meet somewhere and talk after I’ve finished here? I have all sorts of questions I’d like to ask you.”
“All right. I arrived here by bus. If you wouldn’t mind giving me a lift back to Pennsylvania Circle, perhaps we could chat over tea at my friend’s place.”
A half hour later, they were on their way. She decided the man had a trustworthy face, so she invited him to her home, eager to grill him for information.
“May I offer you something to drink?” she asked as soon as they walked through the door. “All I have is milk and Diet Dr. Pepper, or I can make tea, if you’d like.”
“Dr. Pepper will be fine, thanks.”
Clancy excused herself to the kitchen and returned a few moments later with two glasses. Offering one to her guest, he accidentally tipped it, and dribbled a bit of the sticky liquid on his tie.
“That was terribly clumsy of me. May I trouble you for a napkin?”
“Of course.”
Placing her glass down on the coffee table, she went back to the kitchen. Quickly, the man removed a phial from his pocket and poured its contents into her drink.
“Here you are,” Clancy said when she returned. She handed him the napkin and invited him to sit beside her on the couch.
The man answered her barrage of questions as best he could, and watched her keenly as she sipped her drink. Downing the last of her Dr. Pepper, Clancy attempted to stand, with the intention of refilling their glasses. Instead, as she rose, the room began to spin about her. She lost her equilibrium, collapsed backward onto the couch, and passed out.
Lifting her gently in his arms, the stranger carried her down the hall and located her bedroom. He placed her on the bed, and then regarded her for a few moments with sadness and deep concern.
“And now, Clancy, it’s only a matter of time…until your troubles really begin.”
Then, with a wan smile, he Disapparated.
AUTHOR’S NOTES:
Nobody’s Heart Belongs to Me/Why Can’t I?
Lyrics by Lorenz Hart
The White Cliffs of Dover
Original Lyrics by Nat Burton, 1941
Absurd HP alterations by Vocalion, 2005
Wok King Miller’s Mandarin Cafe: There is no Chinese restaurant in Pasadena by that name, or anywhere else, to the best of my knowledge. Chinese restaurants in California tend to have extremely wacky names, employing every awful pun imaginable on the word “wok”. This is my own literary spin on the dubious art of restaurant naming. This link should explain things: http://www.joaquinmiller.org/About/miller.html
The End is Near: The next chapter will be the final one and will include the epilogue. In response to the e-mails I’ve received, please let me assure you once again that this story will end happily. Will it comply with future canon? Only in my dreams.
Special thanks to LariLee for beta reading.