| 15 September 1942 |
[25.09.08|16:14] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| |  hurt | ] |
I know Mulciber didn't mean to call me a Mudblood; I'm not an idiot. But I don't care. I still can't believe he used the word in a letter to me.
I tried to talk to Arianwen, but she doesn't care that I didn't mean things the way she took them, either. I told her that if he had actually taken advantage of her, that if it was true and not just a filthy rumour, she should complain to Magistra Chattox-Kyteler, and she laughed at me and told me that I didn't have the first idea what I was talking about. I asked her how it could mean anything that she told him yes, when he was her guild-master and twice her age, and the only path for her to realise her dream, and she said that I was a fool and I'd understand if I only knew him. But that's the thing about the Malfoys. They're cultured and witty and pretty and gentle and genteel; and they always get whatever they want. I've watched the little one do it to Moody and Riddle, not to mention his peers: Dashwood Minor and Miss Casaubon and most of all Miss Lovegood. I can imagine what he'll be like when he's thirty, and Arianwen thinks she had her own ideas when she was dealing with that?
He covered for us with Magistra Chattox-Kyteler. He let us use the Floo at the hospital. I don't even want to know what he was thinking when he saw her with me. I really rather hate him.
Arianwen asked me what I would do if she asked to tie me down to the bed. I couldn't answer her. Is that what she did with him? I can't take any more of their reason. That's the other thing the Malfoys always are: so very reasonable. Until the moment when their eyes go bright and they're beyond it. Moody's like that. I wonder if we'll ever see him again. Or any of them. And if not, why did they leave her here? Did she mean nothing at all to him? |
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| 14 September 1942 |
[22.06.08|01:44] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| |  shocked | ] |
She still writes to him.
He wrote her a letter and it got here in the middle of the night, and Goyle had someone take it to her in the infirmary, and she isn't coming to breakfast. Because she's already answered him. Tish Larkin and Theodora Blackwell took great pleasure in telling me all about it, and Doria Nutter asked me, five minutes later, if I wasn't sorry I'd let Siobhan get away. |
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| 28th August 1942 |
[07.08.06|13:28] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| |  listless | ] |
It’s officially the night before Mulciber’s party. Too late to write Siobhan and beg her to come as my date, a failing of which I have no one to blame but myself for, given that I’ve been too much of a coward to even dare speak to her. If I don’t watch out I’m going to turn into one of those melancholy young men that waste away from love, forcing Siobhan to follow me to the grave and from my heart shall grow a rose and her heart shall grow a briar and all that. (I think I may have had too much exposure to the Childe Ballads in my prior youth.)
Crockford would say I’m being ridiculous, there are other girls in the world, but then he would say that, being Crockford. One gets the feeling that one girl is just as good as another with Crockford. And I don’t want just any girl. I want the girl. The one that makes almost every other girl look like a pale shadow next to her. And I’m being obsessive. (Sometimes I wonder if this is why we broke up.)
Well. I’ll just have to manage without her. There will be other girls with which to dance with at Mulciber’s party. Rosier might even be there, perhaps without any of her fiancé’s friends in attendance if I’m lucky, and if so we might even get a friendly dance in without the immediate danger of my being turned into so many potions ingredients.
And I shall have fun there if it kills me. |
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| 25th August 1942 |
[09.06.06|10:59] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| |  moody | ] |
When I was very small, we had a gardener named Tom that I was very fond of. He’d talk to me while he worked: tell me things about the plants and the insects and everything. I used to sneak away from my nurse to see him whenever I could.
I was five when he was dismissed from our service. And that was when the trouble between Mother and Father started.
What I’ve never told anyone is that sometimes I wish they could divorce. And I suppose they technically can, but it’s not really a viable option. It would make people Talk and I don’t think even Mother wants that. And I probably blame her for more than her share of it all, but at least Father doesn’t flirt with my friends. (Or anyone, really—he’s so discreet that even God probably doesn’t know who his affairs are.)
Sometimes I wonder if Mother still thinks she’s eighteen or if she’s trying to make up for her lost youth or something. Anything to explain why she acts the way she does. I suppose I should be glad that she’s mostly just set her cap on Diggory and Mulciber. Diggory doesn’t think she’s serious and Mulciber…well, I should think that would be obvious. It bothers me a little that she doesn’t seem to loathe Crockford as much as she used to—the sad thing is, he probably would take her up on it if she propositioned him, if only because then he’d finally get laid.
But then, I half-suspect that Crockford would sleep with Professor Scalara if it would mean he’d finally get laid.
Sometimes I think the reason I visit Crockford as often as I do is that no matter how odd his parents can be (and they can be very odd), they do at least love each other. |
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| 20th August 1942 |
[24.03.06|01:01] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| |  moping | ] |
Mulciber’s having a party. I’ve already RSVP’d for it, of course. From the quality of the invitation, I’m sure that it shall be a grand and glorious affair.
It makes me miss Siobhan. I don’t know why.
We weren’t working out. I accept that. And it wasn’t either of our faults. It’s just how it was. But Lord, do I miss her.
I haven’t written her since then. I don’t know what to say. She was one of my best friends. Siobhan—Mulciber—Crockford. My best friends. And I no longer know how to talk to her. Perhaps we never should have walked out in the first place.
Maybe I’m making too much of this. Maybe once term starts we’ll be all right with each other, that this horrible silence is because neither of us want to make the first move.
I don’t know. But I can hope.
And I can go to Mulciber’s party. It will do me better than moping around here. |
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| 18th August 1942 |
[09.03.06|00:47] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| |  bored | ] |
Exactly two weeks left. Lord, but I hope they don’t drag on as the last two weeks have. I need to get out of this house and away from Mother before I am driven insane. Cricket helped, but I don't know how much.
She’s moping around the house now, probably because Diggory went home. Crockford went home as well after supper, though really I should have invited him for another night. I hate to admit it, but I do get lonely here and even reading can only help so much. I think I may have committed The Code of The Woosters to memory.
(Not that I really mind memorizing such scintillating prose. It’s just a pity that there’s none of my friends that I can share it with. Not like with the cinema. Pity, that—I think Crockford would get a kick out of Spode and the Black Shorts, if nothing else. Perhaps I should use Psmith to lure him in.)
“You can’t be a successful Dictator and design women’s underclothing” is quite positively one of the best lines written in the English language. Rendered into Latin it might make a truly stunning motto. |
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| 5th August 1942 |
[10.12.05|01:31] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| | embarrassed | ] |
I have a sneaking suspicion that the reason Mother stopped bothering Dylan is that she has found herself another beau. Or at least this is why she has been receiving a truly obscene amount of post these last two days.
I am of a mind to invite Hubert over this weekend in order to punish her. She always has despised his politics. |
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| 2nd August 1942 |
[21.11.05|01:24] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| | pissed off | ] |
… if the Plan had worked the way it was supposed to, there wouldn’t be bruises the size of Moody’s fingers around Mulciber’s wrists.
He’s corrupting him. Next thing you know they will go out to be slaggy and have scary, dangerous sex together with random other inverts.
I have created MONSTERS.
About the only good thing is Mother hasn’t flirted with Mulciber once today. |
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| Morning, 1st August 1942 |
[10.11.05|20:20] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| | grumpy | ] |
I am out half this month's pocket money and it is all Mulciber’s fault.
It was Flitwick’s decision. Flitwick. Our prefect. He says it’s a ‘compromise,’ but it’s not really.
It’s my so-called punishment for ‘cheating to help Moody get some,’ that I had to pay his winning from the bet out of pocket, so we could still keep the bet open for someone else to win. Who won’t be me. I don’t know if that’s official or not, but that’s what Crockford wants, but at least making me pay up made him shut his big fat mouth, which is even bigger and flaps more than those Dumbo ears of his.
Do inverts really just fall into bed together within minutes—I swear, it was less than an hour—of walking out together? It’s ridiculous. They’re all slags.
I almost wish I hadn’t told them anything. |
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| Just after midnight, 1st August 1942 |
[08.11.05|19:33] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| | embarrassed | ] |
I’ve created a monster.
In the hours since they came here, they have spent all but two Doing It. And will presumably spend even more time tomorrow. I’m surprised that they were able to stop for supper.
I’m starting to think that they will drive me madder than they did while they were mooning after each other.
Maybe Mulciber wasn’t the slag. Maybe inverts in general are slags.
It’s certainly starting to look that way. |
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| 31st July 1942 |
[02.11.05|17:36] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| | disappointed | ] |
No prefect’s badge.
Thankfully, Mother won’t go on about how she’s sure they’ll still take me at Eton while my friends are here. If I’m at all lucky, she might be distracted from that point by the time the weekend is over.
It must have been Flitwick. He is ridiculously sociable and cheerful and helpful etc, etc. Almost Hufflepuff-like. Moody’s always beating up Mulciber's roommates the fourth years (with reason, admittedly) and Crockford…
Crockford is Crockford.
I’ll be sure to congratulate Flitwick when he arrives. |
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| 30th July 1942 |
[01.11.05|18:51] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| | determined | ] |
By the end of this weekend I will have put an end to this. No longer will I have to watch the two of them idiotically mooning over each other and not doing a damn thing. I will have solved this and guaranteed that I shall come out of this upcoming year sane.
If all else fails, I will lock them in a room together overnight.
As Miss Zabini so often says, this is not a threat—this is a promise. |
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