Who: Rose Zeller What: Rose comes home to find a message carved into the door. When: Friday evening Where: Rose and Astoria's flat, Diagon Alley Rating: PG-13 Status: Complete
When Rose first saw it she didn’t do anything rash, she simply stopped and remembered the first time the word had been uttered in her presence. Casting her mind back she recalled sneaking up the stairs past her room to lean out the window on the third floor and listen to her brothers sharing secrets and cheap whisky on their ledge. The wind had chilled her to the bone and the rim of the frame jagged into her skin in a way that the eight year old knew would leave tell-tale bruises. Back then she’d been more upset about not being able to wear her favourite summer dresses than the fear of being caught eavesdropping. It had been summer, the days were stretched out impossibly long and warm in front of her and her two favourite people in the world were back from Hogwarts and trading insults and jokes about their previous girlfriends. Neither of them noticed the dark brown head peering out from the window above and learning vocabulary her mother would blush at.
The slamming of a door below and the chill of air from the street brought her back to the present and staring at the ugly black words carved into the chirpy blue paint of her door. Pureblood Bitch.
Looking at the words was a personal test for her as she fought the urge to react more to the memories that the words had brought than the act of vandalism itself. Carefully she drew herself in and locked down any visual reaction in case she was being watched before stepping over that final step with heavy feet and turning the doorknob to step inside the flat she called home. For a heartbeat the words were obscured by the fabric of her skirt but when she shifted they were still there and as cruel as the brief memory of her brothers: memories couldn’t bring one back from the dead and the other from teetering on a thin line with only the paralysing fear of putting a foot wrong and losing his family. Rose couldn’t - wouldn’t – be like him and with the sheen of childish admiration rubbed off long ago she filled a bucket with water and kneeled on the flagstones. Her tights were ripped and the water was so hot that it scalded her knuckles and flushed them lobster red but with each dip and scrub at the door her spine grew straighter.
As her lips thinned she wished desperately she were the sort to kick the bucket over and let the dirty water trickle down below to whoever had dug the words into the pristine wood with malice and hate. What would people think when they saw the words? What would Astoria think?
The words from Stuart Yon’s article bled into the door as Rose scrubbed a little harder, with a little more force until it no longer mattered if she lost a nail or scraped her knuckle. All her focus was on getting those words out of her door.
Each swipe of the wet rag brought the words out in fresh relief and highlighted how futile her efforts and yet she continued. Deliberately, insolently she rolled her sleeves up to expose the pale, smooth unmarked flesh.
Let the neighbours watch, she thought. She had nothing to hide.