Chapter Text
seven
“I hit my peak at seven”
Chapter One:
Nine Years Ago
The families of Black and Dell went far back– generations far. Every summer since Eliane could remember she spent with the Blacks, some at their house, some at the Dell’s, but it never mattered where it was to her. Summer meant she would see Sirius, Sirius Black, her only friend, her best friend.
“Eliane get down here!” Her mother’s shrill voice somehow reached new levels of sound that were incomprehensible in Eliane’s mind.
She threw her last piece of clothing into her trunk, slammed it shut, buckled it, and ran out of her room and down the stairs. Her mother sat at the Dell’s long dark oak dining table staring with furrowed eyebrows at her watch, clearly annoyed at the length of time Eliane had taken to get ready. This was common with Eliane and her parents: Eliane simply going about her day and somehow ruining her parents simultaneously. That was the special thing about Sirius, he did not care about how late she was, or the funny faces she made, in fact, Sirius laughed at her funny faces. It made her smile to think about it. Her mother looked up from her watch.
“What are you smiling about?” She asked.
“Nothing,” Eliane wiped the smile off her face.
Eliane’s parents walked into their fireplace and Eliane followed.
“12 Grimmauld Place.”
The trip began as it always did, with pleasantries and unpacking. Eventually, Sirius and Eliane were able to catch up on their years apart while their parents were distracted by some deep political conversation. Of course, the two kids had kept up with one another by owl, but only so much could be said in a letter. They summarized their past year in small sentences until they were told to sit down at the Black’s long dining table to have dinner. After dinner Eliane and Sirius were sent to bed and soon after the entire house went to sleep.
Eliane always had trouble falling asleep on the first night of the trip. The black walls of the house and the creepy dark drapes that fell around her bedposts frightened her. So, when Eliane could not fall asleep she was not particularly surprised. It was not until around 5 in the morning that Eliane heard signs of another awake being in the household. First came the clear clattering of shattered glass, and loud footsteps, then came the yelling. It was muffled through her door at first, but Eliane could make a few words out: useless, mess-up, and child.
Eliane tip-toed to the door as quietly as possible, pausing twice from the squeaky floorboards, until she reached the door, cracking it open slowly. There in the hallway sat sweet small Sirius beside a collection of glass shards, looking like a wounded puppy as his mother berated him with insults. Eliane wanted to run over to him and protect him from his mother’s fury, but her fear of Sirius’s mother– Walburga –overpowered her instinct of bravery.
Finally, after a couple of minutes of waiting squatted by her door, Eliane heard Walburga walk away. Eliane crept into the hall as quietly as she could, tiptoeing over to Sirius’s hunched-over figure. She whispered his name into the darkness of the early morning.
“Ellie?” Sirius insisted on shorting her name when they first introduced themselves; it stuck.
Eliane was not sure what took over her that special day nine years ago, but something in her screamed ‘move,’ so she did.
“Follow me,” Eliane grabbed his hand, leading him down the stairs.
“Where are we going?”
“I’m not exactly sure yet,” Eliane admitted.
Sirius did not seem to mind this fact, as he continued to follow Eliane out the house, down the street, and into the gloom that was early morning London. The two walked down the sidewalk side by side as the sun slowly began to peak out of the skyline. Eventually, they came upon a forested park, with an arched gate protecting it from the city. Eliane looked up to Sirius.
“Let’s go in,” Sirius said.
Sirius grabbed ahold of the gate and used his legs to push himself to the top of the fence surrounding the park.
“Wait for me!” Eliane piped from the ground.
“Did you think I was just going to leave you?” Sirius laughed.
Eliane rolled her eyes at him before staring at him blankly.
“Alright! Grab the fence and I’ll pull you up the rest of the way,” Sirius said.
Finally, Sirius pulled Eliane up and over the fence and the two of them landed in the park. As soon as Eliane’s feet touched the ground she saw the forested surroundings of the park and immediately felt compelled to run. Eliane broke out into a sprint, dashing into the woods, Sirius falling close behind.
“What are you running for?” Sirius asked while running to catch up with her.
“I don’t know!” Eliane turned back, smiling, to see Sirius smiling as well.
That was her goal Eliane realized, to make him forget about his mother and his dad and the endless list of tortures that were his daily life at Grimmauld Place, to make him smile. She felt the grin across her face grow larger.
Next thing she knew Sirius was next to her, grabbing her hand and pulling her along, deeper into the forest, beyond the trails, beyond the city. The trees whooshed past them in an array of shades of green and brown. Eliane was not sure how long they had been running when Sirius, who was now ahead of her, finally slowed to a stop. There was a beautiful aquamarine creek nestled between the ridges of the rocks and trees. The two children stood for a moment staring into the peaceful scene before Eliane felt a splash on the leg of her pajama pants.
She turned her head to see Sirius in the creek giggling. Eliane wondered when he had even gotten into the creek.
“Hey!” Eliane huffed down at the young Black.
Sirius only splashed her again and again until she ran out of his reach screeching in protest, much to his dismay. After finally receiving a promise from Sirius that he would not splash Eliane, she sauntered back to the creek, sitting on a log nearby.
“I dare you to jump in,” Sirius challenged.
“I don’t want to,” Eliane snuck her nose up and away from the creek.
“C’mon! Be brave Ellie!” Sirius laughed from below.
“I am very happy in my dry pajamas,” Sirius rolled his eyes at that.
After talking for around five minutes Eliane finally sat on the bed of the creek, not thinking much of it. That was a mistake. The next thing she knew Eliane was yanked into the creek legs first. The water hit her like a ton of bricks, overwhelmingly cold, and almost sharp, but once Eliane surfaced from the water and heard Sirius’s giggle it all went away. She began to laugh once again, as Sirius always seemed to make her, and the world around them disappeared. It was just Sirius and Eliane.
Present Day- September 21st, 1976
Eliane Dell has not talked to Sirius Black in five years, not since Sirius was sorted into Gryffindor. Six years ago the two had been sorted into different houses, Black into Gryffindor and Dell into Slytherin. It was safe to say Eliane could not believe her ears when the sorting hat shouted out Gryffindor whilst on a Black’s head, but at the same time Ellie knew Sirius, and she knew that Sirius was brave through and through. It just left her wondering what his parents would say, what he would do, and how would he make friends. She attempted to ask him this on their first day of class first year but was met with nothing.
“Sirius!” Little Eliane skipped up to Sirius in defense of the dark arts. “I can’t believe you’re in Gryffindor! What happened? Did you make any new friends?” Everything fell out of her mouth in classic word vomit fashion.
Sirius turned around to face Eliane and suddenly he was not looking at her anymore; his eyes focused behind her. Eliane turned around quickly to see a group of three boys walking towards Sirius, A tall one with dirty blonde hair, a short one with gold hair, and one in the middle with a pile of brown curls on his head. It was like something had shifted in Sirius when the three boys appeared. Eliane had never seen him like this before, suddenly he moved away from Eliane without saying a word and made his way towards the three boys, Eliane later learned their names– the whole school did too– Remus, Peter, and James. Eliane heard the boys ask about her.
“Who’s that Slytherin who you were talking to?” James asked. Eliane could hear the disgust in his voice as he said Slytherin. Like it was a curse.
“Oh, we weren’t talking. I don’t befriend Slytherins,” Sirius responded. All four of them laughed.
A week after the incident Eliane visited the Owlery and was met with a long letter from her mother telling her to stay away from Sirius by any means necessary. She did not think that would be a problem considering they now seemed about as close as two magnets of the same pole, but the letter cemented something for Eliane. Eliane believed in fate. It all seemed to fall into place; the universe did not want her to talk to Sirius. The universe seemed set on keeping them apart and Eliane was never one to challenge the universe. The universe brought her to Sirius many years ago, it must have good intentions.
Although Eliane believed in fate, it did not make the situation any less hard for her. She spent many weeks feeling alone–isolated from her only friend– but eventually Eliane moved past it, made some friends, and all the pieces fell into place. Well, more like Eliane fell into place, she found friends and quidditch, and fit right in. And she had almost forgotten about the incident and the letter, until now.
Now. Now when she was in a class with all four marauders for three classes on her timetable. Just her luck. It had been five years since she had a class with all four marauders. Sure, she had the occasional class with Gryffindors– or a single marauder– in the past five years, but she had been extremely lucky in that she never had a class with the marauders, as a cohesive unit. This year she did not have the same luck.
It is the 21st day of Eliane’s sixth school year. She sits in the back of the potions classroom beside her friend, Cerese. Eliane met Cerese second year when she was assigned new dorm mates– Cerese had a collection of vinyls ranging with anything from Bob Marley to the Monkees– and the two have been friends ever since.
Eliane had begun to zone out. She did this every now and then, completely zoning out when a class got too boring, and it was becoming a problem as she would miss essential information such as projects or essays due the next week. Despite this, she continued to zone out. It was not her fault Potions was incredibly boring. Thankfully, Cerese was a diligent student the majority of the time and could catch her up on the class.
Eliane zoned back in.
“… and this is the flobberworm. Now don’t be fooled by its name…”
‘Snoozefest,’ Eliane thought.
Another ten minutes went by when suddenly Eliane’s attention was grabbed again. The entire class let out a gasp and Eliane was snapped back into focus. Her eyes quickly landed on a flobberworm suspended in the air, no not one flobberworm, dozens of flobberworms flying around the classroom in circles. Some students began to laugh while others screamed in horror at the slimy creatures. Eliane just stared in shock at the whirlwind of worms, until her concentration focused on the marauders, all four of them feigning fear at the worms with hidden smiles at the situation.
Eliane knew the marauders were up to this, it was just too typical, and apparently so did Professor Slughorn. Suddenly all the worms fell to the ground and with a single swish of Slughorn’s wand they all began to float back to their enclosure.
“That’s it!” Slughorn yelled. “I am tired of these pranks! Whoever did it fess up now or face the consequences!”
Professor Slughorn’s face seemed to have grown as red as a tomato and Eliane swore she could see small wisps of smoke exiting his ears. Eliane had never seen Slughorn so angry. He seemed to have finally reached his breaking point after dealing with marauders pranks year after year. However, Slughorns discipline seemed to fall on deaf ears; Not a single student spoke a word, and looking over at the marauders’ clump of desks they even seemed to look innocent, all four of them staring almost confused up at their professor. After a minute of silence– which Eliane thought was very merciful of Slughorn to give them– the potions professor finally broke the silence.
“Alright then! You will all face this as a class then! Assigned seats for the rest of the term!” The classroom let out a collective groan.
“This is rubbish! We all know it was the marauders,” Cerese complained from her spot next to Eliane.
Eliane agreed with Cerese but she found herself too irritated to respond and settled for shaking her head at the audacity of those four boys.
Once Professor Slughorn was able to gather the class’s attention once again he began calling out names. It seemed Slughorn’s strategy for the seating chart was going alphabetically by last name and pairing the first person called with someone completely random. Eliane hoped Slughorn appreciated the way Cerese and her had always turned in their assignments on time and the way they paid attention the majority of the time, then maybe he would seat them together. Eliane focused on Slughorn as he began to pair the third seating duo.
“Sirius Black and…,” Slughorn began, trailing off to find the unfortunate person who would have to be Black’s desk-mate. “Dell.”
END OF CHAPTER ONE