Callie reached over and touched the tip of her middle finger to her lamp. The rosy light revealed her clock’s hands pointing in an obtuse angle at the numbers one and seven. She moaned and gingerly shifted to get up from the bed. Her lower belly was taut ” she needed to pee, badly.
She always had to pee badly. She was always too lazy and too reluctant to even move an arm when she was deep in a book so she always let the urge pass until it was no longer bearable. And ever since she’d left her nursery and her grandmother had fitted this new room for her, with an en suite, Callie had neglected going to the loo more and more. Ugh. It was painful.
She shuffled to her en suite doubled over.
Beside the bowl, a small bookrack stood, filled with Austen, Eliot and Brontë novels, which her grandmother insisted Callie couldn’t reach majority without, but just then, Callie’s attention and sleepiness wasn’t diverted.
She sank down on the toilet seat cushion and reflected on her dream. If only she had peed earlier, she would have seen her mother! She had been so near, Callie had called her, and she had been about to turn, her hair the same as Callie’s, only thicker... her cheeks were the same, her nose was the same... and then Callie’s impatient bladder had to intervene.
“Damn.”
Callie clapped a hand to her mouth when she heard herself. And then she giggled. Her grandfather would have been proud. He’d always insisted she should know how to be candid ” as long as the swear word she chose was elegant and never demeaning. She supposed ‘damn’ would be allowed, since it was elegant and invoking perdition was not demeaning, was it?
She wondered what her mother would think, though.
She’d much rather it wasn’t so, but as she grew older, she was finding herself wondering what her mother would think oftener and oftener.
Callie flushed the toiled and then looked toward her bath shelves. Did her Mum like the smell of apricots, too? Or maybe apples?
Would she like Callie’s burgundy tiles and aquamarine carpets and accents?
And what was her opinion of Catherine Earnshaw when she chose to marry Edgar Linton instead of Heathcliff?
Wincing because her lower belly still felt tender, she went back to bed and stared up at her lace canopy, willing herself to go back to sleep and recommence her dream, but her mind was too busy, too excited with another thought.
Her mother was in England.
It was her most treasured Mum-fact.
Next to ‘hair exactly the same shade of mink brown like mine’ and ‘the very same mania for books, if not more rabid’.
Callie sighed. She was going to England at last. To Hogwarts. She wondered if there was this chance, however little, that she might meet her mother there.
Joanna Bowling’s book-signing was the first time she had gone to England in her memory. She hoped they would go back, and get her supplies there at Diagon Alley.
Her father had always been forthright that he and her mother had not parted in the best of circumstances. But why was she, Callie, included in the separation? Didn’t her mother want her?
As always when this thought intruded upon her mind, she banished it under threat of an Avada Kedavra.
There must be another reason why her Mum had not seen her or visited her. Her Mum loved her, certainly. Callie clung to this belief. And her father never disagreed with it.
The only other time she’d been late in the morning was when her father had given her all four The Lord of the Rings books for her seventh birthday. When he’d found her still reading at four in the morning, immersed in the Silmarillon, he had summoned the rest of the books and refused to give another to her until she promised to go to sleep at nine again, no matter where Bilbo was.
Callie giggled a little at the recollection as she clasped her favourite pleated skirt.
Her Aunt Pansy had shown her photographs of herself wearing the Hogwarts uniform, and the black pleated skirt Callie was wearing now was very close to the Hogwarts skirt. For good measure, Callie opened her jumper cabinet and stood back on her heels tapping her chin as she looked at them. All of them were thick cashmeres and wools.
As the summer was getting warmer by the second, she’d feel and look ridiculous wearing one, she thought resignedly, pulling on a white pearl-buttoned shirt instead.
That was when she spotted it: a russet vest still with its price tag, which she delightedly yanked off.
She then ran halfway to her door, paused and then went back inside her wardrobe, her pink slippers flying off in her wake.
“...will be devastated, I tell you.”
“I’ll deal with it, Mother, thank you.”
“Don’t ‘mother’ me in that tone, Draco Malfoy.”
“Father, will you please stop smirking at... at the magnolias and... the coffee urn?”
“If it bothers you, avert your eyes. I shall smirk as I please.”
Callie was bemused at the conversation she heard as she approached the portico off the dining room. Usually, by this time she was already in her favourite nook under a pear tree in the garden while her father stayed with her grandparents’ late breakfast.
“Darling, there you are. You’re a little tardy today aren’t you?”
Callie grinned. Trust Grandmother to call two hours ‘a little tardy’. “Good morning, parent and grandparents.”
His father scowled at the greeting. He opened her mouth to scold, Callie was sure, but then closed it again. “What are you wearing?” he asked instead, rather brusquely, staring at her feet.
They all looked down at the black round-toe shoes with its burgundy velvet toecap.
“They’re called slip-ons, Draco. And rather nice, aren’t they, my love?” Grandmother winked at Callie. “Naturally, as I bought them.”
For some reason, her father looked even sulkier. She kissed his cheek and sat down beside him. She had just risen again to kiss her grandparents, too, when she saw all the parcels and packages beside her grandmother’s chair.
“What are all those, Grandmother? You can’t have gone shopping this early!”
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw her father flapping open Le Magique Mirror with speed.
“They’re your Hogwarts things, sweet pea,” her grandfather replied drily. “Your father had them delivered by owl order.”
Callie sank back down in her chair with a leaden weight in her still empty stomach. She looked down at her hands and blinked. She couldn’t believe it: she felt like crying! “Oh. I thought we were getting them ourselves in London.”
Her father must have heard the hitch in her voice because Le Magique Mirror crunched as he crumpled it again to his lap.
“I’m sorry, Callie, I’m just not ready to let you go yet. You’ll leave me soon enough anyway, aren’t you?”
“You were supposed to come with me to Diagon Alley, Father! Did you think I will only take Grandmother or Aunt Pansy?”
He winced.
“Darling, it’s not so bad. It’s hot as Hades over there right now.”
Callie only barely heard her grandmother. She stirred her tea and concentrated on keeping down sobs.
“Are you very hungry, Calliope?” asked her grandfather suddenly.
“Not really,” she answered as low as possible ” any louder and they would hear how a lump was obscuring her throat.
Her grandfather got up. Callie was struck with how tall he was, and how he would always be one of her pillars. “Well, I fancy a walk. Care to join me?”
“Don’t be silly, Lucius, let her eat first.”
“She’s not hungry, Narcissa. Take your tea with you, my pet, and a croissant.”
Callie did as she was told, placing a sweet roll over her teacup and taking her grandfather’s hand. They descended the three steps of the portico and walked toward her pear tree.
“Now then, don’t mind your father. If it’s any comfort ” you know he’s still utterly besotted with your mother, don’t you?”
“He is?”
“He is, the fool.” Her grandfather rolled his eyes. They paused under her pear tree. He motioned for her to take a bite of her food and Callie obeyed, chewing and then sipping her tea.
“But how is that a comfort to me, Grandfather?”
“This is making him squirm. Your dismay at missing going to England for your things is nothing compared to his own discomposure. Let that console you.”
Callie grinned. Her grandfather’s dry humour always tickled her.
“Why are you all decked in red anyway?” he asked casually as they walked again. They left the shade of the pear tree and took the path to the orchard.
Callie shrugged. “I’ve always liked it. It complements my hair and eyes, don’t you think? Don’t you like it?”
It was his turn to shrug. He opened his mouth as though he was about to say something, but he apparently changed his mind about it because he just smiled instead.
They left her teacup in the low brick fence separating the chateau’s garden from the orchard. Her grandfather lifted her up easily to the fence’s top and she jumped down on the other side. He hoisted himself up and over the fence a moment later, landing beside her with a grunt. He grimaced. “I think we’ll have to go through the gate later. Stop grinning, you impertinent girl. It’s not as if you’ll stay young yourself.”
Callie laughed outright at that and he glared at her for a second before grabbing her, propping her back on top of the wall and tickling her waist, threatening to tip her over on the other side as she shrieked and fought him off.
When she was sure she was starting to turn blue, he pulled her back down on the ground. He put a hand on her shoulder and led her off as if nothing happened. She leaned on him as they walked, still weak from giggling.
They had neighbouring plantations, so theirs couldn’t entirely be maintained by elves. They hired people, Muggles, who tipped their hats to them as they passed. The pears were flowering, and they met a handful of pruners on the way. Her grandfather would nod back, but the Champs du Rose workers considered him aloof. Callie liked him as he was, though. This outward hauteur fitted him. And that was what it was, really, outward only. He was never rude and had always been warm to her.
“I reckon all blame rests on me, you know, my pet.”
Callie was startled at this continuation of their light-hearted conversation. “What do you mean, Grandfather?”
“Well, you know how we once held wrong beliefs, don’t you, about Muggles and Muggleborns?”
Callie nodded. She wondered where this was going.
“It all sprang from there, your mother and father’s estrangement.” He didn’t elaborate. Callie nodded nonetheless. She knew her mother was a Muggleborn.
“Your father, grandmother and I were not alone in being fools. There were others. It was a vulgar meddlesome such person who drove your mother and father apart.”
They reached a secluded part of the orchard where no workers were puttering around. The hill was sloping a little to the path to the vineyard beyond. Her grandfather led her to lean against a tree.
“Understand that I am not about to tell your parents’ sorry tale to you, my dear. It’s not my place. I’m just... well, I feel like I need some forgiveness from you. I myself spouted insults to your mother once. I thought her beneath us. I even quite hated her, all those years she always bested your father at school.”
Callie let it all sink in and then smiled. “It’s our rule not to dredge up past things, Grandfather.”
He only looked even more sombre. He bent at the waist and grasped her shoulders with both hands. “Calliope, about that, I’m afraid you might face ugliness at Hogwarts because of... You know our story, don’t you? We have been acquitted, your father and I, and we have paid for the things I have blindly allowed the Dark Lord to coerce us to do, but our name’s still mud in British Wizarding society. Are you sure you are intent on going to Hogwarts instead of Beauxbatons?”
Callie reached up to cover his hands with hers. “I’ve thought about it, Grandfather. I’m actually surprised Father hasn’t talked to me about it yet. I have my answer ready when he does. And that is: this is my chance to prove to them that the Malfoys have changed. And if there are people there who will turn up their noses at me before knowing me, they’re not worth bothering with.”
Her grandfather straightened up with a glazed look in his face and smiled. “You are so like your mother.”
“I am?”
He nodded and snorted. “Don’t pretend surprised, I’m sure your father’s told you countless times already. Self-possessed and tenacious to a fault.”
“Tell me more,” Callie said eagerly.
“You know enough to be going on with.” Lucius waved a hand dismissively. “I admired her determination even while I avoided talking to her. My pride was in a pitiful state then, you understand. And I’m so glad you seemed to have inherited none of that pride ””
“I do have some pride!”
He chuckled. “Well, you do. Of course you do.”
“And my mother made Grandmother read Muggle literature, didn’t she?”
“Yes. It was during those days when they kept delaying my trial, I think. They were determined to stretch my time in Azkaban because having your mother on our side assured everyone I would not be incarcerated. Well, your grandmother never fails to keep her stiff upper lip, but your mother would not have that. It was either your grandmother had to talk and grumble and even cry as she should, or occupy herself. Since the library at the Manor had been emptied, your mother provided the books ” and subtly thumbed her nose at our patrician pureblood nonsense as well.”
Callie noted that her grandfather spoke almost fondly, and that was saying something. “You don’t hate her anymore, do you?”
“That’s ridiculous ””
“But you called Father a fool earlier for still pining for her ””
“Exactly. For pining instead of going after her, Calliope.”
“And if he does?” Callie was intrigued with the possibility. “You don’t really care about her being Muggleborn anymore?”
“Calliope Malfoy, I play golf with Mr Carew and Mr Murier every Sunday ””
“Oh, yeah, I forgot.” Callie giggled. It was their private joke, hers and her grandmother’s, about how his grandfather’s old cronies would have reacted to Lucius being addicted to this Muggle sport and always going off with these two Muggles who owned the vineyards next to theirs.
“And all idiotic principles about blood were completely banished from my mind when I fell in love with a certain half-blood wench eleven years ago.”
Callie smiled and put an arm around her grandfather’s waist. He bent and kissed her on the cheek and on the forehead before they started walking again.
“You’ve sidetracked me. I had a very different reason for asking you for a walk.”
“What is it?”
“Well, your idiotic father is so preoccupied with your going to Hogwarts that he’s forgotten there is one thing you still need to go to England for that can’t be acquired through owl order.”
Callie gasped. “My wand!”
When they arrived back in the house, her father was alone in the portico and the parcels and packages were gone.
“Your grandmother has finally allowed the house-elves to take them to your room,” her father said morosely. “She’s in her drawing room, Father.”
Her grandfather nodded and left them, squeezing Callie on the shoulder and giving her a secret smile.
“Finish your breakfast, love,” her father said, not looking at her, but pouting at the magnolias.
“Why are you broody today, Daddy?”
“I’m not,” he snapped.
Callie laughed. She was still too merry with her grandfather’s coup of an idea.
“Maybe we should go out, to shake you out of it.”
“Nice try, chipmunk.” He winced at that, as though something in his words brought pain to him. “And where do you propose to go?”
“How about getting my wand with me?”
“Shite! I mean ” you didn’t hear that, Callie ” I can’t believe I forgot your wand!”
“Well, it’s not among those things available through owl order, is it?”
He groaned. “What are we going to do? I can’t ””
“Why not? Father, why are you so deathly afraid of going to England? Is my mo ” Mum that mad with you?”
“Yes, she is ””
“What did you do?”
“It wasn’t me, Callie.”
Callie panted slightly. She hadn’t realised she’d been holding her breath. Never before had she delved like this about her father and mother’s past. All her father and grandparents had told her before whenever she asked was that they’d fought so badly they had to be in two different countries. All of Callie’s curiosity reached momentum now at her father’s strange queasiness ” as if he and her mother had the fight yesterday and not eleven years ago.
“What happened, Daddy? I’m about to go to Hogwarts. I think I’m old enough to know.”
“No, love, please ””
“Not even her name?”
“Oh, Merlin, I’m sorry, love, especially not her name.”
“Why? I promise I won’t go looking for her! How could I? I’ll be in school ””
Callie was beginning to be frantic with fear and doubt. What happened that her father wouldn’t even tell her her mother’s name? Was her Mum some... some criminal, maybe? But that didn’t make sense, since she was the one who helped clear her father and grandfather’s name.
It all clicked suddenly: ‘having your mother on our side assured everyone I would not be incarcerated.’
“She’s famous and influential, isn’t she?”
Her father gulped visibly.
“Am I not enough for you, Callie?”
“Don’t do that, Daddy ” I can see right through that Slytherin tactic!”
Her father stared at her. And then laughed. “You’re scary sometimes, Calliope.”
“Laugh all you want, I’m not giving up on the subject. I need to know ” does she hate me, too? Is that’s why I’m not supposed to know she’s my ””
“Merlin, Callie, no!” Her father was suddenly kneeling down beside her, his arm around her waist, giving her a gentle shake. “Your mother loves you. How could anyone not love you? Don’t ever think she has anything against you, love. It’s just we had this agreement ””
He grimaced and didn’t continue.
“Agreement?” Callie prodded. Her mind was whirling.
Her father went back to his seat and slumped down to the table; the first time she’d ever seen him do so.
When he looked up, his expression was so pained and exhausted that she almost regretted asking her questions. Almost. She held her breath in anticipation, wondering if she was finally about to be enlightened about the mystery behind her parents’ separation.
“Callie, your mother and I hurt each other so much we decided never to see each other again. Well, it was her decision, really.” He paused, and his eyes looked far-off, reliving the memory. Callie frowned and shook his arm. She was resentful that he would go off like that when she had nothing whatsoever of her mother to recall, too.
Her father took a deep breath and nodded to himself.
“This agreement we had...” he continued, eyes still shining more than usual, “well, you will more or less find it out, I think. You inherited your mother’s genius after all. Sooner or later, you’ll discover it. But I’d rather not help you by telling you your mother’s name. Do you understand?”
“No! That’s ” what on earth ”?” Callie had an insane urge to stomp and shriek and pull her hair. Or maybe her father’s hair. He only tortured her further with his cryptic answers!
He smiled ruefully. “I’m sorry, love, please don’t hate me so much for not telling you. I really can’t. Please don’t anguish over it. Now, before we lose you to your new books upstairs, let’s go get your wand.”
At least, he knew how to placate her. Damn Slytherins.
Author’s Note: Champs du Rose is the same name I’ve used for the vineyard in Then Somebody Bends. Too lazy and too attached to it to make another name. ^_^ Thank you for reading, please tell me what you think. Oh, and before I receive complaints, keep in mind that though this is inspired by the worldwide beloved film, of course I can’t just imitate it in every way. I have to depart from it ‘a little’ (Narcissa’s measure), if I still want you to read this! You agree? Bon!