1 December 1998
Dear Theodore,
I have delayed my letter in hopes that it reaches you at home, and is not deferred from Egypt. Rupa would be very cross with me indeed if she were to fly so far south only to have to fly north again, and as you have witnessed, she is a temperamental creature already. If she could speak I am sure that she would berate me endlessly, if continue to begrudgingly deliver my letters.
I am not familiar with Essex, though am not a complete stranger where maritime pleasures are concerned. As a child might, I prefer playing in the surf, but would not object to more adult pursuits. I am sure I have more Charms for water survival and sport than I could ever use. You will grow weary of lessons from me if we continue in this way. Perhaps this is what I shall tell my mother and father, that I am employed for the holiday for private lessons in all things from languages to Bubble-Head Charms. I must think of what I should truly say and soon, as my time here is now less than a week. Zelma goes on as though I am not leaving at all, and I cannot yet tell if this means she intends for me to return after the holidays or if she has simply forgotten that I have engagements other than those she has arranged. We did a very hard thing today, observing a pair of Muggles here who had been Obliviated after a giant destroyed the schoolhouse in their village in the mountains. They lost both of their children and believe the incident to have been a natural disaster. Zelma did not want to speak with them, but was instead interested in my opinion on what it could mean to have lies standing in for true and genuine tragedy. She has an uncommon interest in grief, Zelma does. I felt like swallowing everything that I wanted to say about what was necessary to preserve the secrecy of our culture, but I did not. We have made sacrifices, as well. It is sometimes easy to forget that one resides within the eye of a storm, to mistake a sharp gale for a breeze.
I would hope that the word you are wanting is Sakhi. It is... not the same as the other, but the sentiment is. I shall tell you what it means when I see you, as I do not want for you to use it in error or false feeling. I suppose finding this out is gift enough.
Padma
( . )
3 December 1998
Dear Theodore,
We have had a light snow this morning! Only a dusting, really, but I traced characters with my boot heels in the snow and felt very fine. I am so eager to see you to be home. I know I must deal with ugliness in time and perhaps less even than I imagine myself to have, but still. I am hopeful.
How are your mother and Max? And how was town? I will be contented with any agenda you should set if it includes walks and stargazing and any other thing. When should you like for me to visit? Diagon Alley would do, briefly. My plans beyond what we have talked long of are slim. I promise not to tutor you as I am sure I have nothing whatsoever to teach, anxious and aimless as I grow daily. I write and scratch and strike and produce nothing. It is shameful and I am utterly without excuse. Zelma claims I am very distracted and hardly of use to her, either, but it seems she does wish me to return after the holidays. She has given me several books and has demanded I finish them one and all before 10 January. I have already begun on the first, a memoir.
Am I a gentle woman? I feel bristling and charged, every nerve a spiking fright. Should you put but a finger to the tip of my nose you would have quite a shock. Still. I will tell you when I can look you in the eye, or perhaps your shoulder, or your booted feet.
What would you have for Christmas?
Padma
( . )
4 December, 1998
Dear Padma,
Scotland is snowy too, snowier than a dusting, so its good to hear you have boots this year. There isnt any here in Burnham, but there isnt anything Ive found to do either. Im not adventurous when it comes to Muggle towns in Britain, I feel out of place. Theres some dodgy looking restaurants, a movie cinema, and little shops, besides the boating club. I never know what to make of the money - now they go by pee, which Max would find hilarious, but my father says shillings, and there were twelve pence in a shilling, and two hundred forty in a pound. And now there are a hundred, but its still pence, which is also pee?
Merlin I miss Galleons and Sickles. Dont start me on figuring out their tipping.
Mother and Max are well, though Im not keen on talking to Mum about her appeals on behalf of Joseph. She seems to know Fathers a lost cause, though she says that visitations are allowed and encouraged me to come with her closer to Solstice. Our solicitor seems to think that with this remodeling of Azkaban and the criminal court system, there is an argument to be made that Joseph was a child who was - and I nearly choked, hearing her say this - raised in a Pureblood biased home. I am to meet with Mr. Whitling on the twelfth, to discuss my upbringing. I cant imagine a more uncomfortable afternoon.
Its good to hear youre expected back, as you seem to take some enjoyment at least from the work, and your taskmaster too, in her own right. Maybe this is your work, your book. Not the same as Zelmas of course, but your own account of the more recent goings on. Look at what happened at Hogwarts from every angle, make a judgment for historys sake. Youre more than qualified.
Ive known you to be gentle far more than I have to be prickly, spiny, or shocking, but will avoid your nose all the same. If youll consider it, Id like to have a picture of you of my own making. Nothing scandalous, I very strongly assure you, just to attempt to capture with camera what you challenge is better penned by pen.
Very soon, and very happily, in your company,
Theodore( . )
5 December 1998
Dear Theodore,
If you should like it, I would give you some happy distraction before you must meet with this Mr. Whitling. I am feeling considerable ire on your account, for all it isn't my place. The whole of our last year at Hogwarts stripped each and every student of any child that remained, and there was no Professor Carrow to orchestrate what happened that night. All was willful, and even if mislead, leniency of this kind... I could not support. The reformation of character must first come with an understanding of that character, a confrontation of deed and intention.
I am sorry. I really haven't anything to say about Joseph that I could feel justified in writing for all I might write of it anyway, but I think you should know that I am conflicted. I think these feelings, the memories of what happened, must come out of me someday, if not in a book than in another form. I cannot go on all my days living with the weight of every shared and secret horror. Perhaps Zelma had more interest in what happened at Hogwarts than she let on, if she accepted me when she did. For her this is all one great war with a breath held in between, and in the scope of her research, I cannot disagree with this view. As for my being qualified... I cannot think of many who would wish my voice to be the one heard, if any at all. Certainly I do not wish it.
And now I am thinking myself perfectly of a mind to agree to any request made in kindness. I cannot promise I will not blink.
Tomorrow evening Zelma and I are dining with several of the distinguished scholars of Berlin for a far more formal evening than you had your last in Portugal. I shall retire sober and sore from stiff, half-understood conversation, and Apparate home in the morning. While I know better than to want to see you very soon after, I will admit I would rather ignore such inclinations than suffer failing to act because of them.
This does not make me a gentle woman, I think.
Anxiously,
Padma
( . )
![[info]](https://www.insanejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small}
![[info]](https://www.insanejournal.com/img/community.gif){kind=small}