Post by laundry basket on Sept 18, 2007 17:02:45 GMT -5
Disclaimer: Yes, this is SO TOTALLY MINE. In case you didn't realize that my name is JKR.
Author's Note: Just so you know, I procrastinated my math homework last night to write this. And I am procrastinating math homework by posting this.
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“What do you think of Genevieve?”
This was the sort of question that Minerva had become used to answering over the last several months. Anyone who entered the staff room was subject to numerous questions on baby names from a very pregnant Victoria Vector, who, confined to her chair until a good Samaritan came and helped her up, had taken to walking around with various Wizarding children naming books to entertain her. Privately, Minerva felt that lugging around even more books than the Ancient Runes professor already did would not help with the back pains she complained of often. Of course, Victoria was a generally good-natured person, so her constant inquiries were put up with well by the other staff members.
“It’s a little flashy,” Minerva admitted, not taking her eyes off of her latest issue of Transfiguration Today.
“You’re right,” Victoria conceded from her position beside the fireplace. She brushed a tendril of blonde hair from her shoulder and rubbed her stomach unconsciously. “Actually, I don’t think anything starting with ‘G’ sounds good with ‘Vector.’ Maybe something in the A’s?” she pondered out loud, flipping through her book once again.
“I’ve always liked Agatha,” piped up Charity Burbage, the Muggle Studies professor. From the corner, Rolanda Hooch snorted.
“Sounds like a grumpy old maid,” she told Charity. “What about Amy? Simple and nice.”
“I think that Ashton is a lovely name,” said Poppy Pomfrey dreamily from the old worn couch in the center of the room, where she was sitting beside Professor Dumbledore, who was reading intently.
“Ashton’s old school,” scoffed Charity. “And it seems like more of a boy’s name. Now, Agatha, that’s class.”
“What do you think, Min?” Poppy asked her friend, who was already deep into an article on Animate Transfiguration.
“Minerva,” she corrected without thinking. Rolanda and Charity both rolled their eyes, and Albus smiled slightly into his book.
“Fine, Minerva,” Poppy corrected exaggeratedly. “What name do you like?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” Minerva said absently, flipping through the magazine. “Ariana is quite pretty, don’t you think?”
If she had not been so caught up in her article, she might have noticed Albus’s slight intake of breath. And she did pride herself on being able to pick up whenever he was concerned with something— it was a side effect of their long years of friendship and, very recently, their relationship. She still had to try not to do a mental happy dance when she thought about that word, and how true it was. Relationship, relationship, I have a relationship with Albus Dumbledore!
“What did you say?” he asked her, and Minerva looked up, her glasses faintly askew. Her mind was still whirring with the information she had just read (“Man in Bombay turns cat into bread box!”), so she didn’t pick up on the odd lilt of his voice.
“Ariana,” she repeated. “It’s a lovely name, don’t you think so, Albus?”
“Yes,” he murmured inattentively, his eyes slightly unfocused, and Minerva peered at him worriedly. He tended to let his mind wander off; but this time he seemed… different, somehow. “Yes. I have to go. Excuse me, ladies.” Before she could ask him what was wrong, Albus had tucked his book under his arm and strode from the room, without so much as a goodbye.
“What’s the matter with him?” Rolanda wondered, flipping herself over from where she had been sitting upside down in a shabby armchair.
“I don’t know,” Minerva muttered. It wasn’t like Albus to act like this. And when she had mentioned that she liked the name Ariana, his eyes had gone so strangely… almost like he were looking at another time. With a jolt in the pit of her stomach, she speculated if Ariana was the name of a lover long past. Had she reminded him of her, unconsciously? Oh, Merlin, she was working herself up.
I’ll just go ask Albus about it, Minerva thought as calmly as possible to herself, as the other women resumed their conversation on names. He’ll tell me. It’s nothing to worry about. Just because he might have an old flame named Ariana and I happen to love the name and want to have a baby named Ariana but I can’t because every single time I look at my child I’ll be reminded of my husband’s love life and…
Very quickly, Minerva cut herself off.
When the sodding hell did we get married?
“I’m going to go talk to him,” she announced to the room.
“Who?” Rolanda asked. “Ouch! No need to be so bloody violent!” she boomed when Minerva smacked her with a stray cushion.
“Albus, you imbecile!” she groaned exasperatedly. Rolanda smirked.
“Do try not to miss dinner, dearie,” she said in a carrying whisper.
“Oh, shut up,” Minerva snapped, aiming to get another strike in with the cushion before leaving the room.
She walked briskly down the hallway towards Albus’s private rooms, which were separate and completely secluded from his office. Minerva felt quite proud to be one of the select few who knew the location of these rooms.
“Memento mori,” she said to the oil painting of a giggling couple, which guarded the entrance. They smiled brightly at her before swinging open, allowing her to step into the chambers. Minerva gave the walls and floors a pleased look as she did so and allowed the painting to close behind her. They were decorated in a tasteful ensemble of deep purple and pale blue, and she adored every inch of it.
Slowly, she made her way to Albus’s bedroom, which lay to the right of the main chamber. Minerva knew he was inside, for the door was open just so, allowing her a slice of view of the inside, and she could quite clearly see Albus sitting on his bed, holding something in his hands.
She knocked softly on the door, pushing it open another crack as she did so. “Mind if I come in?” Minerva whispered, not sure why she felt the need to. Albus jerked around, and it was then that she saw he held a picture frame in his hands, and a very old looking one at that. The rusty border was dusty and gnawed in places, from what she could see from the doorway.
Albus seemed to hesitate a moment before nodding to Minerva. “Please, come here, my dear. I… I have something I want to show you.” Her heart did flip-flops as she crossed the room, anxiously wondering what the photograph in the frame showed. This was it. He was going to tell her he still loved Ariana passionately was going to run away with her, leaving Minerva broken and alone, a spinster forevermore—
She really needed to stop reading so much Muggle poetry.
Minerva perched on the edge of his bed, and Albus smiled at her before sliding over to sit beside her, so that their legs were touching. He held out the frame to Minerva, looking just as nervous as she felt.
“This is Ariana,” he murmured, and then fell silent. With a feeling of extreme dread, Minerva looked down at the photo. It was just as she had feared. The woman was beautiful.
Except… except, she didn’t look like a woman. She didn’t look like she was older than fourteen or fifteen. And, by the type of nightgown she was wearing, seemed to be living in the eighteen hundreds. A quick calculation told Minerva Albus most definitely would have been alive during that time. Perhaps he had even taken this picture. In the photo, the girl was sitting in a bed, a comforter tossed off of her as though she were just about to get up. Her long tangles of hair matched Albus’s in shade, though hers fell all the way down her back, and appeared knotted and un-brushed.
“Who… who is she?” Minerva finally asked. It was then her gaze fell on the entirety of the girl’s face— she had a long, slightly crooked nose, and eyes that shone with deep blue. “She’s related to you!” From beside her, Albus nodded sadly.
“This is my sister,” he told her, voice thick with an unknown emotion. “Ariana.” Instantly, relief flooded through Minerva’s body—he didn’t have some unknown lover whom he was going to leave her for! Yes! At the same time, an unreasonable amount of questions were boiling up inside of her.
“I didn’t know you have a sister,” she eventually choked out.
“Had,” he corrected gently. “She died… oh, a week or so after this picture was taken.”
Gulping, Minerva tried desperately to gain control of her queries. Why didn’t you tell me this? Why don’t people know? Why is Ariana a secret?
Almost as though he had read her mind, or perhaps he had answered these questions many times before, Albus said, “Ariana… she was—Minerva, Ariana was not like other girls.”
“How? What happened? Why?” Minerva asked suddenly, the words tumbling out of her mouth in a rush. Albus looked at her, and she was shocked by the sadness and regret in his normally twinkling eyes.
“My sister… when she was six years old—a group of Muggle boys attacked her.”
“Six?” Minerva interrupted, aghast. “A little girl, like that?” Albus nodded, and wiped his eyes subtly. Unconsciously, she put her arm around him, and he leant into it gratefully.
“Yes,” he answered at last. “Six. Minerva, they broke her. Her magic… it went bad. It turned inwards, and drove her insane.” She stifled a gasp, and, unable to stop herself, Minerva felt her eyes prickle with tears.
“Your sister?” she murmured. “A little girl… poor, poor thing…” Unbeknownst to either of them, they were both crying now, crying for the fate of someone whose life had ended so long ago.
"My father went after them," Albus confessed. "They locked him in Azkaban, Minerva, and he couldn't tell them about Ariana, they'd take her away."
"So much for you to live through," she muttered, her heart breaking.
“There’s more,” Albus mumbled into Minerva’s shoulder. “Min, dear, don’t think harshly… I was young, idiotic—oh, Merlin, how stupid…”
“What is it?” she asked, no longer worried about causing him to hurt. It was painstakingly obvious he needed to get this out, relive to forget.
“My friend,” Albus told her, voice slightly muffled in her thick locks of hair. “My friend… his name was Gellert Grindelwald.”
“The Grindelwald?” she gasped, memories of her school years, of living in terror of this man, flooding to the surface.
“The Grindelwald,” Albus verified, sounding heartbroken. “He—he had come to visit his aunt… we were friends. Best friends.”
“And?” Minerva whispered, barely able to raise her voice enough to be heard.
“And… we got caught up in each other. We wanted to change the world. But Ariana… Minerva, she was so innocent, she had no idea what she could do. She didn’t mean to. She killed our mother.”
“She did?” Minerva murmured under her breath, trying to comprehend all of this. Albus had a sister. Albus had a mentally unstable sister. Albus is an orphan. Albus wanted to change the world with Grindelwald.
“I was left to look after her,” Albus admitted, his head still buried in her neck. “But I wanted to get out, to be great. Oh, Merlin, if I had only looked after her…” His voice choked for a moment, and Minerva rocked with him, slowly, until he could control himself. “My brother Aberforth told me I had to remember Ariana. But I was so caught up in my fantasies of getting out… if only Gellert hadn’t been there that day… if only I hadn’t been so harsh… if only…”
“If only, if only,” Minerva chimed softly under her breath. “You can’t change history, my dear.” He nodded.
“I know, I know. You see… it got… it got violent. Gellert was always so rash—he cursed Aberforth badly, Minerva, with Crucio. I think that’s when our friendship truly ended. Even if things had turned out differently at the end of it all…” He gulped, and tried to continue without sobbing. “I cursed him back. And Aberforth got in—it was a duel, a dreadful duel. We didn’t know Ariana was still there—she had been reading—or, rather, looking at the pictures—” Albus allowed himself a small chuckle, “and she panicked, with all the flying curses and colours. She tried to help, but it got out of control.” Here, he finally let himself go, his body shaking with remorseful sobs. “One of us hit her. No one knows who. She died, Minerva, and I couldn’t bring her back.”
“Poor, poor thing,” Minerva breathed, still rocking Albus, tears streaming down her own face. She really didn’t know if she was talking about Ariana or Albus.
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Ah, the angst!
New to me. Hope I wrote it well.
Author's Note: Just so you know, I procrastinated my math homework last night to write this. And I am procrastinating math homework by posting this.
---
“What do you think of Genevieve?”
This was the sort of question that Minerva had become used to answering over the last several months. Anyone who entered the staff room was subject to numerous questions on baby names from a very pregnant Victoria Vector, who, confined to her chair until a good Samaritan came and helped her up, had taken to walking around with various Wizarding children naming books to entertain her. Privately, Minerva felt that lugging around even more books than the Ancient Runes professor already did would not help with the back pains she complained of often. Of course, Victoria was a generally good-natured person, so her constant inquiries were put up with well by the other staff members.
“It’s a little flashy,” Minerva admitted, not taking her eyes off of her latest issue of Transfiguration Today.
“You’re right,” Victoria conceded from her position beside the fireplace. She brushed a tendril of blonde hair from her shoulder and rubbed her stomach unconsciously. “Actually, I don’t think anything starting with ‘G’ sounds good with ‘Vector.’ Maybe something in the A’s?” she pondered out loud, flipping through her book once again.
“I’ve always liked Agatha,” piped up Charity Burbage, the Muggle Studies professor. From the corner, Rolanda Hooch snorted.
“Sounds like a grumpy old maid,” she told Charity. “What about Amy? Simple and nice.”
“I think that Ashton is a lovely name,” said Poppy Pomfrey dreamily from the old worn couch in the center of the room, where she was sitting beside Professor Dumbledore, who was reading intently.
“Ashton’s old school,” scoffed Charity. “And it seems like more of a boy’s name. Now, Agatha, that’s class.”
“What do you think, Min?” Poppy asked her friend, who was already deep into an article on Animate Transfiguration.
“Minerva,” she corrected without thinking. Rolanda and Charity both rolled their eyes, and Albus smiled slightly into his book.
“Fine, Minerva,” Poppy corrected exaggeratedly. “What name do you like?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” Minerva said absently, flipping through the magazine. “Ariana is quite pretty, don’t you think?”
If she had not been so caught up in her article, she might have noticed Albus’s slight intake of breath. And she did pride herself on being able to pick up whenever he was concerned with something— it was a side effect of their long years of friendship and, very recently, their relationship. She still had to try not to do a mental happy dance when she thought about that word, and how true it was. Relationship, relationship, I have a relationship with Albus Dumbledore!
“What did you say?” he asked her, and Minerva looked up, her glasses faintly askew. Her mind was still whirring with the information she had just read (“Man in Bombay turns cat into bread box!”), so she didn’t pick up on the odd lilt of his voice.
“Ariana,” she repeated. “It’s a lovely name, don’t you think so, Albus?”
“Yes,” he murmured inattentively, his eyes slightly unfocused, and Minerva peered at him worriedly. He tended to let his mind wander off; but this time he seemed… different, somehow. “Yes. I have to go. Excuse me, ladies.” Before she could ask him what was wrong, Albus had tucked his book under his arm and strode from the room, without so much as a goodbye.
“What’s the matter with him?” Rolanda wondered, flipping herself over from where she had been sitting upside down in a shabby armchair.
“I don’t know,” Minerva muttered. It wasn’t like Albus to act like this. And when she had mentioned that she liked the name Ariana, his eyes had gone so strangely… almost like he were looking at another time. With a jolt in the pit of her stomach, she speculated if Ariana was the name of a lover long past. Had she reminded him of her, unconsciously? Oh, Merlin, she was working herself up.
I’ll just go ask Albus about it, Minerva thought as calmly as possible to herself, as the other women resumed their conversation on names. He’ll tell me. It’s nothing to worry about. Just because he might have an old flame named Ariana and I happen to love the name and want to have a baby named Ariana but I can’t because every single time I look at my child I’ll be reminded of my husband’s love life and…
Very quickly, Minerva cut herself off.
When the sodding hell did we get married?
“I’m going to go talk to him,” she announced to the room.
“Who?” Rolanda asked. “Ouch! No need to be so bloody violent!” she boomed when Minerva smacked her with a stray cushion.
“Albus, you imbecile!” she groaned exasperatedly. Rolanda smirked.
“Do try not to miss dinner, dearie,” she said in a carrying whisper.
“Oh, shut up,” Minerva snapped, aiming to get another strike in with the cushion before leaving the room.
She walked briskly down the hallway towards Albus’s private rooms, which were separate and completely secluded from his office. Minerva felt quite proud to be one of the select few who knew the location of these rooms.
“Memento mori,” she said to the oil painting of a giggling couple, which guarded the entrance. They smiled brightly at her before swinging open, allowing her to step into the chambers. Minerva gave the walls and floors a pleased look as she did so and allowed the painting to close behind her. They were decorated in a tasteful ensemble of deep purple and pale blue, and she adored every inch of it.
Slowly, she made her way to Albus’s bedroom, which lay to the right of the main chamber. Minerva knew he was inside, for the door was open just so, allowing her a slice of view of the inside, and she could quite clearly see Albus sitting on his bed, holding something in his hands.
She knocked softly on the door, pushing it open another crack as she did so. “Mind if I come in?” Minerva whispered, not sure why she felt the need to. Albus jerked around, and it was then that she saw he held a picture frame in his hands, and a very old looking one at that. The rusty border was dusty and gnawed in places, from what she could see from the doorway.
Albus seemed to hesitate a moment before nodding to Minerva. “Please, come here, my dear. I… I have something I want to show you.” Her heart did flip-flops as she crossed the room, anxiously wondering what the photograph in the frame showed. This was it. He was going to tell her he still loved Ariana passionately was going to run away with her, leaving Minerva broken and alone, a spinster forevermore—
She really needed to stop reading so much Muggle poetry.
Minerva perched on the edge of his bed, and Albus smiled at her before sliding over to sit beside her, so that their legs were touching. He held out the frame to Minerva, looking just as nervous as she felt.
“This is Ariana,” he murmured, and then fell silent. With a feeling of extreme dread, Minerva looked down at the photo. It was just as she had feared. The woman was beautiful.
Except… except, she didn’t look like a woman. She didn’t look like she was older than fourteen or fifteen. And, by the type of nightgown she was wearing, seemed to be living in the eighteen hundreds. A quick calculation told Minerva Albus most definitely would have been alive during that time. Perhaps he had even taken this picture. In the photo, the girl was sitting in a bed, a comforter tossed off of her as though she were just about to get up. Her long tangles of hair matched Albus’s in shade, though hers fell all the way down her back, and appeared knotted and un-brushed.
“Who… who is she?” Minerva finally asked. It was then her gaze fell on the entirety of the girl’s face— she had a long, slightly crooked nose, and eyes that shone with deep blue. “She’s related to you!” From beside her, Albus nodded sadly.
“This is my sister,” he told her, voice thick with an unknown emotion. “Ariana.” Instantly, relief flooded through Minerva’s body—he didn’t have some unknown lover whom he was going to leave her for! Yes! At the same time, an unreasonable amount of questions were boiling up inside of her.
“I didn’t know you have a sister,” she eventually choked out.
“Had,” he corrected gently. “She died… oh, a week or so after this picture was taken.”
Gulping, Minerva tried desperately to gain control of her queries. Why didn’t you tell me this? Why don’t people know? Why is Ariana a secret?
Almost as though he had read her mind, or perhaps he had answered these questions many times before, Albus said, “Ariana… she was—Minerva, Ariana was not like other girls.”
“How? What happened? Why?” Minerva asked suddenly, the words tumbling out of her mouth in a rush. Albus looked at her, and she was shocked by the sadness and regret in his normally twinkling eyes.
“My sister… when she was six years old—a group of Muggle boys attacked her.”
“Six?” Minerva interrupted, aghast. “A little girl, like that?” Albus nodded, and wiped his eyes subtly. Unconsciously, she put her arm around him, and he leant into it gratefully.
“Yes,” he answered at last. “Six. Minerva, they broke her. Her magic… it went bad. It turned inwards, and drove her insane.” She stifled a gasp, and, unable to stop herself, Minerva felt her eyes prickle with tears.
“Your sister?” she murmured. “A little girl… poor, poor thing…” Unbeknownst to either of them, they were both crying now, crying for the fate of someone whose life had ended so long ago.
"My father went after them," Albus confessed. "They locked him in Azkaban, Minerva, and he couldn't tell them about Ariana, they'd take her away."
"So much for you to live through," she muttered, her heart breaking.
“There’s more,” Albus mumbled into Minerva’s shoulder. “Min, dear, don’t think harshly… I was young, idiotic—oh, Merlin, how stupid…”
“What is it?” she asked, no longer worried about causing him to hurt. It was painstakingly obvious he needed to get this out, relive to forget.
“My friend,” Albus told her, voice slightly muffled in her thick locks of hair. “My friend… his name was Gellert Grindelwald.”
“The Grindelwald?” she gasped, memories of her school years, of living in terror of this man, flooding to the surface.
“The Grindelwald,” Albus verified, sounding heartbroken. “He—he had come to visit his aunt… we were friends. Best friends.”
“And?” Minerva whispered, barely able to raise her voice enough to be heard.
“And… we got caught up in each other. We wanted to change the world. But Ariana… Minerva, she was so innocent, she had no idea what she could do. She didn’t mean to. She killed our mother.”
“She did?” Minerva murmured under her breath, trying to comprehend all of this. Albus had a sister. Albus had a mentally unstable sister. Albus is an orphan. Albus wanted to change the world with Grindelwald.
“I was left to look after her,” Albus admitted, his head still buried in her neck. “But I wanted to get out, to be great. Oh, Merlin, if I had only looked after her…” His voice choked for a moment, and Minerva rocked with him, slowly, until he could control himself. “My brother Aberforth told me I had to remember Ariana. But I was so caught up in my fantasies of getting out… if only Gellert hadn’t been there that day… if only I hadn’t been so harsh… if only…”
“If only, if only,” Minerva chimed softly under her breath. “You can’t change history, my dear.” He nodded.
“I know, I know. You see… it got… it got violent. Gellert was always so rash—he cursed Aberforth badly, Minerva, with Crucio. I think that’s when our friendship truly ended. Even if things had turned out differently at the end of it all…” He gulped, and tried to continue without sobbing. “I cursed him back. And Aberforth got in—it was a duel, a dreadful duel. We didn’t know Ariana was still there—she had been reading—or, rather, looking at the pictures—” Albus allowed himself a small chuckle, “and she panicked, with all the flying curses and colours. She tried to help, but it got out of control.” Here, he finally let himself go, his body shaking with remorseful sobs. “One of us hit her. No one knows who. She died, Minerva, and I couldn’t bring her back.”
“Poor, poor thing,” Minerva breathed, still rocking Albus, tears streaming down her own face. She really didn’t know if she was talking about Ariana or Albus.
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Ah, the angst!
New to me. Hope I wrote it well. 
great work loved it
