Who: Pansy Parkinson and Matthew Selwyn
What: Matthew's looking for flowers for his sister's grave again, along with... something more...!
When: Friday, 10 June 2002, early in the morning (Well, as early as Posies is open! XD)
Rating: Say... PG for likely talk of Death (and not the fun, whimsical one from the Sandman comics, either! XD)
Incomplete

Matthew Selwyn was not in a particularly good mood today, to be honest. He had taken some flak from his superiors for taking the morning off -- apparently it was some sort of falsely observed Queen's Birthday in Papua, that wasn't even the Queen Mum's birthday! As if Selwyn, or indeed anyone living and breathing in Britain, should give a tinker's damn for such... trivial matters of state -- not since last night had seen a special evening edition of the Prophet boast the escape of all the Death Eaters from Azkaban!

Selwyn had lain awake most of the night, listening to every little creak of his old Elizabethan house, certain that Rodolphus, and all the Death Eaters he had rescued from prison, were going to turn up at any moment to start the slow torture into madness and death that Rodolphus Lestrange had promised him. The worst part of it was, Matthew felt as if there was some way he could have -- should have -- stopped this whole madness: by turning himself in for unspeakable torments from the Aurors and Hit-wizards who guarded the prison, solely for the purpose of penance -- and, naturellement, for having the opportunity to have Lestrange's communiques traced back through the journals! Yes, Selwyn had known full well that Rodolphus was up to something; why, even looking back on his own notes to the man, he'd seen mention of an escape planned for their imprisoned "brothers". (Matthew found the idea that he was related to any of those brutes absolutely laughable, if not completely worthy of tears, as well. He'd much rather have his sister back, than several dozen bloodthirsty "brothers" such as he was apparently stuck with, until his death -- and his swift descent into Hell for all he'd done in his relatively short life...)

But sometime in the middle of the night, he had realised something: he was not an island -- nor was any man, according to some Muggle philosopher or other. There were more people he could be concerned with, aside from his own hide (which, truthfully, he didn't place much value on, these days.) Such as that Parkinson girl: had she been completely ignorant of her father's and brother's activities with the Fraternity of the Knights of Walpurgis (known, since Voldemort had taken power, as the Death Eaters, naturellement) -- or had she been complicit, rather? Either way, she could be in danger, now the Death Eaters were roaming free again. Suppose, for example, they assumed she had remained in the castle, to fight for Harry Potter? Matthew's stomach turned as he recalled the typical punishment for traitors, back in the days of Voldemort's reign. No, he had to find the poor girl, as soon as possible, and be sure that she was forewarned, and so forearmed...!

Unfortunately, the Parkinson girl was no real friend of his; why should she be friends with a man old enough to be her father, after all? But that meant he knew her only through her shop, which he had faithfully patronised for all the monthly flowers he laid upon his sister's grave, ever since she opened her doors to the public.

(And why had he done so? Because he felt terrible for the poor girl -- forced to earn a living, as her parents' property had no doubt been seized in connection with Investigations Into Death Eater Activities, on the part of her father and brother! For Merlin's bloody beard's sake, the poor girl had just barely been of age when the Dark Lord fell! How could she be as guilty as her elder brother? Besides which: Matthew suddenly realised that this train of thought took him right back to Diana Selwyn's station in life -- what her situation would have been, in fact, if he'd ever been suspected in her miserably short lifetime... Well, suspected by anyone but her, that was!)

No, it would have to be the shop he would find her at, then... Only... what excuse could he give for checking in on her? But of course, that seemed simple enough, with Di already at the forefront of his thoughts: her birthday was coming up -- what would have been her forty-third, had her life not been so cruelly snuffed out before her nineteenth. (How could he have done that to her, anyhow? Stabbed her so heartlessly, through the heart: the heart in which she trusted him -- enough to listen to what he had to say, at any rate...!) He swallowed hard before he entered the shop, trying to choke back the lump forming in his throat at such thoughts.

"Hullo, Miss Parkinson! I had a bit of time off work, and decided to come by and... see about more flowers for-- Di's grave...!" He had told the shop-girl once or twice before (at least!) about his sister, and just why he was buying her flowers every month, and always on the fourth of the month-- the anniversary of her death. He hoped she took his cracking voice as a sign of sadness for his sister, and not for her; it would be truly ridiculous, at first blush, to be mourning for a shop-girl he barely knew, after all!