Who: Hannah and Susan Where: Their room What: Talk about Bellatrix, mostly. Angst and Woe. When: 10:30ish at night, Sunday the 30th Rating: PG-13 Status: Complete
Hannah returned to the room she shared with the other seventh year Hufflepuff girls after a half-hour in the loo, emptying her stomach. Sniffling, she wiped her eyes and fell into bed, shoving her journal off the side.
Susan, who had been sitting cross-legged for nearly an hour staring, trembling at the page she was now sorely tempted to rip out, glanced over, jerking. Her eyes were wide, and bore signs of -wanting- tears, but not being able to find enough upset to replace the fear that kept them so dry. "Hannah." The voice was a whisper. A noise that reflected anger gone horribly, horribly wrong. "Hannah." A choke. "What's wrong?"
"I've really done it this time, Susie," Hannah replied, trying to whisper, but her raw throat not allowing it. "She'll go after daddy, won't she? She said she'd string me up and bleed me dry. She said she'd make you all suffer."
Susan's mouth dropped open in horror, and she tumbled through the pages of her journal, one leg already to the ground as she stumbled in Hannah's direction, trying to read and ask and understand in a simultaneous burst of nervous energy. "She... her?" Rage, then, spilled hot and violent and so-uncharacteristic across her features. "I'm going to." Teeth clenched. She could -not- let that bitterness leave her lungs. Shaking, then... her whole body shook before Hannah's bed as she clutched the journal, a page crumpling under her tiny fingers.
"I should've kept my mouth shut, Susie, but I just couldn't. It's just not right that they're wandering around writing in journals. My mum should be writing me in a journal - your aunt, Neville's parents...but not them," she said the final word with clear disdain.
Susan leaned heavily against the bed, wave after wave of nausea striking her. The journal, then, thudded atop so she could see what was going on. "Where? I ca-" and then there. On HIS page. She was silent as her finger traced down over the page, past the areas that were hexed to invisibility, confusion and fear twisting through her. "N..n-no." She was supposed to be the strong one, dammit! "Sh-she can't." Tears unleashed, then, and her eyes, wide and terrified, were up, as shaking hands stretched before scrambling knees. Like a child, Susan tumbled onto the bed. "N-n-no. no." Hysterical calmness in her voice, high pitched but articulate.
"I'm sorry, Susie," Hannah cried, grabbing her cousin's pajamas and pulling her close. "I won't reply again. I owled my dad and asked him to go away for a little while, just in case. And I reported this all to the Aurors downstairs. They promised they'd look into it."
She shook. God, how she shook in pajamas, in Hannah's arms, a terrified choked sound squawking at her throat unnaturally. Susan's grasp was deadly tight on her cousin, as if she was afraid that letting go might mean something... something worse. "Okay." Too-fast, she breathed out the response. "Please please. Not you or ..." Tears again. How could she be so weak when Hannah needed her? WIth almost a violent cough, she ripped out strength from somewhere stomachward. "They won't. And if they try. We'll...." Hatred then, and she could not go on. She could not become one of them.
"We'll be strong," Hannah insisted, hugging Susan tightly. She shouldn't have said anything, she realized now. Again with the opening her mouth when it should be firmly shut. If she'd kept it shut, Susan might never have noticed the entry and comments. "We'll go to dueling club, and we'll practice, and we'll work with the DA. We'll protect each other and our families. That's what we'll do."
Susan had in those short moments, regained some measure of balance between fury and fear, and settled against Hannah, tears spilling down her cheeks but breath easy. "Yes. We will. We're going to learn everything we bloody can to stand by our families. They think we're weak and frightened? No." Anger glittered across her eyes, but something else - resignation - was in her voice. "Even if we have to duel them with flamingos." A wet, loving smile.
"Oh Susie..." Hannah gave a sad little laugh, wiping at her eyes with one hand while the other still kept hold of her dearest friend. "You really are crazy, you know."
Susan couldn't help but smile. She needed to smile. It ached across her face as she laughed, useless and sniffly, into her cousin's shoulder. "We are really a sad lot, aren't we?"
"We are, but at least we're together." That's what really mattered, for now. If the world was going to hell, at least they'd all go down fighting side-by-side.
Susan looked as though she might cry again, but luckily the desire was quelled into the sharp grip she took of Hannah's hand. "Damned right we are." Her mouth trembled a bit into a resilient smile. "I love you, Hannah-nana."
"Love you too, Susie-roosie," came the natural reply, just the same as it ever was. Hannah couldn't help but smile. "I've got to get out of here. Go back to bed, okay?"
Susan, nodded, faintly surprised. "Alright -mum-," she teased, before gathering up the journal, hating, fearing it, and set it directly beneath her bed. She wanted nothing to do with it until she'd had a good night to sleep on it. "You come crawl in if you want, alright. I don't take up the whole bed like I used to..."
"I will, when I get back." That's what she needed - to curl up and cuddle tonight. "Which you know nothing about. I did not tell you I was going out, because you are Head Girl and that would not be proper."
Susan blinked up. "What was that? You're going to brush your teeth? Gosh, Hannah, I don't see why you have to tell me about it." Susan rolled over with a loud yawn, and then curled up into her pillows. "MMmmmm pillows."
Hannah rolled her eyes and put her pillow and blanket on Susan's bed so that she'd have no choice when she got back, then grabbed her cloak and snuck out of the room. She needed to walk, to run...to go down to the Dark Arts room and fight. She needed to pull out that stupid training dummy and fire spells at it until she felt better.