August 1998
I’m under the tree again.
I always miss this tree when I’m at school. When things change so much and so fast, there’s something comforting about things that stay the same forever.
When I’m here, I remember. I remember a lot of things, because when I look around at everything now, it looks exactly like it did then.
The tree has beautiful leaves. When I see them, I remember how I used to leave for school just when they started to change to a golden colour. When I was younger, my Aunt Eileen painted me pictures of the tree in the fall. Aunt Eileen swore up and down that those pictures were exactly what the tree looked like in October, all red and orange and gold, but I really couldn’t know for sure because I hadn’t seen the leaves in October since I was ten.
The tree also has a really thick trunk. I remember when I was eight, my cousin Violet and I tried to stretch our arms all the way around the trunk, and it took all four of our arms, plus almost the whole length of a jump-rope, to stretch all the way around it. Violet moved to France when I was twelve, and even though there were tearful goodbyes and promises to write, I only got one letter from her before school started, then she forgot all about me. I don’t see Violet anymore because she’s on my mother’s side of the family. My father never liked my mother’s family much, and they didn’t like him.
I remember the night after my mother’s funeral, when I was ten, how I slept out here because the house had too many memories in it. It reeked of my father’s cigarette smoke as well, because without my mother telling at him to smoke outside, he just lit up whenever he pleased. That was only for the first few months - then Aunt Eileen started spending summers at the house to keep me company while my father worked, and she made him smoke outside again.
I remember the day I stopped being afraid of fire. I had stolen a matchbox from in the house, the ones my father used to light his cigarettes. I stared at the first one for fifteen minutes with sweating hands before I got up the nerve to light it. I blew it out right away. A full box of matches later, I could sit and stare at the fire for a while, and then I would blow out the flame and draw with the thin swirls of smoke.
I remember playing imaginary games with my friends when I was a child, where we pretended to be fairies or cats or princesses. I remember sitting out here for a long time, the night before I left for Hogwarts. I remember spending golden afternoons eating fresh fruit under the tree with my best friend.
I remember a lot of things under the tree, and I do a special amount of remembering today. Especially of that one day, a year ago.
*-*-*-*-*-*-*
August 1997
The day is so much like caramel - sweet, sticky and golden-coloured. The sun is like a blanket on most of the field, save for the shade of a couple of smaller trees and one huge tree with light green leaves. The branches stretch just far enough to leave a dappled pattern on my thin, bare legs, the bottom half of which are in the creek, gloriously cool compared to the rest of me. I pull up bits of grass and rip them into tiny pieces before dropping them into the creek, watching them sail away. Suddenly, a voice catches my attention.
–Eloise?â€
A girl with blond hair is standing in the field. She’s wearing muggle clothes like me - jean shorts and a light blue shirt. I stand up, ignoring the way the grass prickles my feet, trying to recognise her. When she spots me, she waves cheerfully and runs towards the tree and me. She gets close enough for me to see her eyes and suddenly it hits me - it’s Hannah.
She used to be my best (also, only) friend, but I haven’t seen her since her mother’s funeral. She’s thinner now than when we were at school together, but she looks so much healthier as well than at the funeral where she looked like she was on death’s door. Mascara coats her lashes and her lips are glossy - things I’ve never bothered much with. She shrieks out loud when she sees me.
–Eloise! It’s so good to see you!†She pauses, surveys me up and down. –You’re so tall now!â€
She’s right. I notice for the first time that my eyes are level with hers. Suddenly I feel as though I’ve been stretched out - I sit down against the tree trunk and pat a spot on the ground for Hannah to join me.
I can’t think of what to say. Despite the fact that we’re both now motherless, I was so young when my mother died and I don’t want her to be upset by something I say. Suddenly I remember a detail from before.
–How was your birthday?â€
Hannah smiles. –Good. It was pretty quiet. My cousins came to stay and they just left this morning - we played a lot of backyard Quidditch. Dad gave me a watch as a gift - tradition, apparently - and also this.†Hannah pulls a gold necklace out from under her shirt - on the delicate chain is a charm shaped like a bird, which appears to be holding the chain in place. –It was Mum’s. Apparently she got it for her seventeenth, and she wanted to give it to me on mine.â€
–That’s beautiful.â€
Hannah rubs the bird between her thumb and forefinger. –Thanks. Wearing it all day, it was almost like she was there. I just wish she’d seen me turn seventeen.â€
I recognise the feeling from my birthday. From Christmas. When I got my OWL marks and found out I got an Outstanding in Charms. But I don’t say any of this. I just stare at my feet.
–Chloe made me about twenty of these woven bracelets,†Hannah suddenly continues. –Also she got me these. Catch.â€
Hannah pulls a square tin out of her bag and tosses it to me. I pop open the lid and see that it is crammed full of little sweets in shiny wrappers.
–Toffees. I figured, who better to share them with than my best friend.â€
I laugh, lie back on the grass in the shade of the tree and pop one in my mouth. The sweet and salty flavour explodes across my tongue. In a world where everything is different, I’m so, so glad I have my best friend back.
We soon figure out how much there is for us to catch up on. Neither of us have been at school for nearly a year, and we’ve not just been sitting at home. Hannah tells stories about her and her sister. She has a bubbly, contagious laugh, and eyes that light up when she smiles. She’s happy again - not like at the funeral. She doesn’t seem as scared as I usually am.
We eat toffees and talk until the sun appears to be sitting in the field, a ball of orange, red and gold.
–I miss everyone,†I say suddenly.
–So do I. In fact, there was someone I liked a lot. I was always too scared to say, though,†Hannah says, gazing dreamily at the sky.
–Ernie?â€
–No,†Hannah says emphatically. –Nothing like Ernie. This person - they’re shy, but always kinder and far, far cleverer than they think they are. But they’d never want me - never.â€
I don’t know what makes me do it. I don’t know what comes over me. Her lips are tinted with toffee, her face is sunny, and I realise how much I really care about her and how much I want her to be mine, forever.
I kiss her.
I’m kissing Hannah Rose Elizabeth Abbott, my beautiful, amazing best friend, who is worth so, so much more than she thinks she is.
And for five seconds, I’m convinced it’s what she wants too. That this is the beginning, the kind of glowing moment they always talk about in storybooks after the rocky roads and before the Happily Ever After.
But then it’s not.
When we break apart, Hannah has this stunned, scared look on her face. She gets to her feet, and I do too. I feel a cold, dreading feeling sinking into me like a stone.
–What’s wrong?â€
She claps her hands over her mouth, shaking her head.
–Oh, Eloise, I’m so, so, sorry.†Tears well up in her eyes.
–So you didn’t mean -â€
–No.â€
–You meant someone else.â€
–Neville. Neville Longbottom.â€
–Right. So …†I touch the hem of my top self-consciously. –Erm, happy seventeenth, then.â€
–Yeah. Thanks.†Hannah’s cheeks are pink. –I’ve got to go, I -â€
–Yeah.†I save her the trouble of having to come up with a lie. –Of course. See you around.â€
Hannah turns and darts away.
I sit down. My face feels hot, so do my eyes, but I don’t cry. It was feeble, just a feeble hope.
She left her toffee tin behind. I unwrap the last one, pop it in my mouth. It tastes like her lips did.
I suppose I’ve got a while to wait for that Happily Ever After.
*-*-*-*-*-*-*
August 1998
I remember that day a lot. I spent a lot of time wishing I’d just kept my stupid feelings to myself, because then I wouldn’t be in this mess. I spent even more time thinking about what could have happened. And then after that, I thought about how stupid it was that this bugged me, because There’s A War On Already, and there were more important things to worry about then whether I possibly could have had a girlfriend.
The worst part is that not only did I lose a chance at something new, I lost my best friend. When we both went back to school, people barely remembered we were friends. Those who did assumed we grew apart. But sometimes, if I looked two seats to my right in charms, or opposite and three to the left in Herbology, or at the next table in Potions, I’d see her watching me. Those huge, green eyes, were - regretful? I figured it was just my imagination.
She’s written to me twice since the battle. The first was when her younger sister, Chloe, had died, and she wanted me to come to the funeral. Not really the way I wanted us to start being friendly again, but at least we were speaking. The next letter was different. It was very careful, with dots of ink where her pen had rested while she thought. She was inviting me, (only if I wanted) to a wedding. Last year, I had noticed her growing closer and closer to a boy at school. Neville - the one she told me about. She said they were getting married on August 13th. Not that she would notice, (and not that she should, I reminded myself for the hundredth time), but she had her wedding two days after her birthday - exactly one year after the day I kissed her. Today.
So I’m sitting here again. I figure I’d better think about her one last time before my memories become tinted by an image of her in her wedding dress. It’ll be beautiful, I’m sure of it. She’ll be beautiful too. But she’s always been beautiful. Hannah always had this shining, pretty happiness about her, and I was happy to walk behind her in the glow. She wasn’t quite the same last year though, and she had no light at all at the funeral. I hope that Neville was able to bring the light back.
I stand up. I’d curled my hair and I’m wearing a green dress. Normally it wouldn’t matter, really, but I want people to know that Eloise Midgen is okay. Even if Eloise Midgen is very much not okay, that’s not what matters.
Eventually, I will be okay, I tell myself.
I remember how I had cried under the tree when my mother died, but also how the wounds had healed, and that as long as I didn’t pick at them, I was fine. I remember how I was teased and bullied in school, and how Aunt Eileen would send me letters saying how ugly and pretty were on the inside, and that she loved me, and then I would be fine. I remember when I found out Aunt Eileen had been killed just a few months ago, and my father, who I never thought had cared about me, had promised he’d be there this time. And he was, in his way, and I was fine.
I took a huge breath, stuck as real a smile on my face as I could, and started to walk. I had to tell my friend how happy I was for her. Because I was.
I remember how I was always fine. And I would be again.