"What do you mean?" she heard and immediately groaned. Ron. Ronald Weasley was the third worst case scenario. Oh he would be quick with the conclusion even if Harry had, apparently, already tried to explain to him that she was there. And why she was there. Sometimes, she thought, Harry was quick. Or could be, rather, when the mood took him.
She heard Harry mumble, and then Ron again.
"What?"
She braced herself, then sat a little straighter as she took another sip of her tea — and it was barely after that that Ronald, all red hair and cheeks and ears, stormed in.
"What?" he asked again, pointing at her.
"I didn't want to live alone anymore," said Hermione calmly.
"And I didn't want to live alone anymore," repeated Harry, just as calmly. "So we decided to move in together. Flat mates."
"And there's..."
"Ron," Hermione looked at him and smiled. "Do you honestly think that Harry and me would work? Ron, think. Please. Honestly. Look at me. I'm in my dragon-jammies. The library here is extensive and I have to study for the NEWTs." She arched her eyebrows and after a moment, Ron sat down with a resigned look on his face.
"Well, it would be weird. Just as you and me would've been weird," he said after a moment. Hermione breathed a silent sigh of relief. Any other reaction from him would have probably resulted into Ron storming back to the Burrow and telling his family that the two of them had been thrown over for Harry and Hermione respectively. Which wasn't true and Ron, deep down, knew it. Her and Ron had never really officially ended it. Well, they had but how can you end something which hasn't truly begun? And Harry and Ginny had other reasons. Not that she would mention them, or even give Ron a hint what she suspected — or rather what she tried to figure out.
"So?" asked Harry suddenly — sounding very impatient.
"What?" Ron asked back.
"I think Harry wants to know if there is a special reason for your visit," she smirked.
"Nah," he shook his head. "I thought, you know, we could hit the Quidditch supply store. And maybe go for a fly. Ginny's been all depressed and won't fly, Percy's a prat about flying, George is only ever at the shop, Bill's with that wife of his and Charlie is back in Romania. There is nobody to play with."
Harry nodded. "We can. Hermione, you don't mind, do you?"
She shook her head. "I'll be in the library anyway." She caught Ron's expression at that moment — and there was something in it that she didn't quite like. There was something in his expression that had the alarm bells in her head going but she sort of clung to the hope that Ron didn't just say he believed them — but honestly did.
.
He had disposed of the letter. He had resisted the urge to rip it up but he hadn't resisted the urge to throw it into the crackling fire. He hadn't resisted the urge either to watch it burn. There was something soothing about throwing an unwanted thing into the fire — the furniture, the letter, the books before they had gone. It was scourging, it gave him a kind of satisfaction.
He had returned to the old textbooks and his notes. Eleanor had mentioned something about the library, and he would, sooner or later, joined, but the thought of Mrs Callaghan reminded him of the invitation to Christmas, and it made him have to wade through old memories — of former Christmases. In that house, at the other building, institution, that he had almost called his home. Both of which had not been as much his home as this empty house already was. And he had never been closer to anyone. Had never before felt the urge to get someone actually something for Christmas.
Now he did. He wanted to repay her kindness. Kindness he hadn't asked for and kindness he had never expected. It didn't matter now if he deserved it or not but he would get some money from his mattress, or maybe the money she had stacked up carefully and had told him to keep (might as well — bloody Ministry). Maybe it was a good idea, actually, to use the money the Granger girl had delivered to buy a present for his kind — Muggle — neighbour. That way, he wouldn't use it for himself, he would have nothing to do with it, actually. He would just spend it. For someone who ca...well, cared for him. There. He had thought it. He would use the money for someone who cared about him. Money given from people who thought they could buy him, could soothe their guilty conscience by only paying him off.
He smirked to himself — the first smirk for a long time — and put his shoes on and the leather jacket she had given him before he stuffed the money into the pockets. He would have to drive into town — a town he hadn't visited in years and he would have to do that without Mrs Callaghan. Would have to find his own way around. Take a bus. A bus.
But he couldn't just get her something from the supermarket. That wouldn't be right. Not that he knew what to get her and again, he delved into memories. Memories of when he had been a boy, memories of that time when he still had a grandmother of his own. Old woman and never particularly nice. He had only ever met one grandmother — father's mother — and he had no fond memories of her. In her opinion, his mother had been strange, he had been strange and her son should have done much better (probably, from his adult point of view, his other grandparents had thought the same thing). She had, as far as he could remember, not liked much but she had always complained about being cold and had always worn those shawls around her shoulders. He caught an imagine in his mind — too old to be remembered clearly — of her wrapping herself in a sort of soft, finely knitted shawl and him desperately wanting to touch it. His fingers being batted away, a voice saying he was too dirty to touch it and he would make stains on it.
He shook his head — shook the memory back where it belonged (to the very back of his head) and left his house. He would get onto a bus, and into town and would buy the best wrap-around-thing he could find, the warmest, the softest. For her.
Severus checked carefully that his door was locked (remembering he still had to fix that window in the back) and walked down the road where he had seen buses stop. It couldn't be so difficult. He would just get on one, get out at the other end and would wander around until he found a suitable shop. There were no wizards living in that area, he knew, and with a determined scowl, he waited for the bus. There was another person — a young man, not much older than his former seventh years, and Severus watched how he got onto the bus, talked to the driver, handed him some money and then sat down. This wouldn't be so difficult. Couldn't be.
Well, yes, the driver looked strangely at him when he handed him a crisp, new twenty but said nothing and so he sat down, just as the young man had done and waited. Bus-driving was worse than a car — had always avoided the Wizard equivalent and he knew why.
Severus closed his eyes briefly, tried to remember that there was no wand to grasp should he find himself in a dangerous situation. He just had to relax, had to put himself into another place without using Occlumency. Head to ignore the buzzing noises from the people around, the old lady behind him chattering or the young girl giggling into a phone. In the bus. A phone. Strange. He would have to ask Mrs Callaghan about that.
When all was said and done, he reached his destination quicker than he thought and even though there were a lot of people where he got from the bus, there wasn't this overwhelming urge to run away — or to hide -as he had done when going to Ikea. Maybe it was because he could see the sky, or maybe because he knew he was there for a purpose. That he had to be there in order to do what he came to do. Not for himself.
It was still — a new experience. Shop windows and signs and people wanting to give him stuff, papers, on the streets. He was glad he hadn't forgotten how to scowl and that kept most of them away. He looked around, walked up and down the street — until there was a small, tiny shop window with just the thing he wanted. It was broad and looked soft. Cream-coloured (black probably didn't really suit Eleanor) and with determination in his step, he pushed the door open.
17. Instrument and Experiencer
Instrument and experiencer:
If an agent uses another entity in order to perform an action, that other entity fills the role of instrument. In the sentences The boy cut the rope with an old razor and He drew the picture with a crayon, the noun phrases an old razor and a crayon are being used in the semantic role of instrument. When a noun phrase is used to designate an entity as the person who has a feeling, perception or state, it fills the semantic role of experiencer. If we see, know or enjoy something, we're not really performing an action (hence we are not agents). We are in the role of experiencer. In the sentence The boy feels sad, the experiencer (The boy) is the only semantic role. In the question, Did you hear that noise?, the experiencer is you and the theme is that noise.
Eleanor Callaghan couldn't help but push the curtains aside slightly. Who would not watch if two men walked past the street who looked absolutely out of place. She knew one of them — Draco, Severus's godson and the other one looked like his father. They looked very much alike but his father did not look like a boho-hippie. Quite on the contrary. He wore an expensive looking coat with fur trimmings and he had eccentrically long, silvery blonde hair. It seemed to be a sort of snotty, posh, rich man, the way he turned to his son — and began to glare at him. As quietly as she could — and because her lip reading wasn't up to much, even if it was snotty, posh English — she opened her window. It was close to an argument, from what she figured even before she opened the window.
"You will only use him," said Draco, angrily.
"You don't understand," the older man replied, his tone rather low and threatening.
"I'm of age. I fought, Father. Explain to me. Just explain it! Why are we here? Why do you want to see him? He says himself he's a Muggle now."
Eleanor frowned and hid a bit lower behind the curtains. Something in her brain — twitched. There was something. Something she knew and yet didn't remember. Something that made her want to sit down in the dark and think. There was something — and she couldn't quite remember. She couldn't quite remember and she pressed her eyes closed tightly.
"You would not understand!" the older man argued.
"Try me," snapped Draco.
"You forget your place, son," he replied coldly and so quietly that if she hadn't paid close attention, she wouldn't have heard him. He continued in that low tone. "And you understand nothing about Wizarding honour."
Her brain twitched again. There was something — and when she wanted to follow that twitch in her head — it was gone again. Wizarding? Muggle. Sect? Religion? One of those who thought they could practice magic by...there was something more. Something she couldn't put her finger on. The words were strange, yes, but there were plenty of strange people in the world these days. People who believed in aliens and beings on Mars and people who believed in all sorts of deities and disregarded Christianity. The world was confusing these days.
But this was a different kind of confusing. This was like something pointing at something else in her mind, in her memory and she didn't know what it was.
"I have my honour. And I want to know what you want with my godfather," Draco started shouting now. That boy had obviously no control over his emotions. She would have to keep an eye on him. He seemed edgy and twitchy and nervous. Christmas with his family would be good for him. Better than with the man she considered to be his father. That man clearly had no love for his son.
"I want what's best for Severus," he replied — and for a moment, Eleanor was startled. He had never mentioned friends. And this man seemed to consider himself a friend — and he would be if he made him godfather of his son. But then there was a hiss. "And for our family."
Draco looked both frightened and angry — that much she could see through the curtains and if this went on for another moment, she decided, she would interfere. Would just walk out of her front door and greet Draco.
"What would you want from him? He's just a Muggle now. He won't be of any use to you anymore. You can't get into the good books of the Ministry because of him."
"Says who?" the man glared at Draco and began, slowly to walk towards the house. Whatever they were talking about — she would have to tell Draco that it wasn't probably the best idea to talk in front of other's people's windows. Even if it looked as if nobody was in.
But there was, suddenly, that twitch in her brain again. A slight buzzing sound almost, a tapping, a nudge. Something. Something that she couldn't quite grasp. Oh, this was annoying. She might be old but her memory was usually good. It would come to her — it usually did. And even more so when she didn't concentrate on whatever it was that she wanted to remember.
She took a deep breath and straightened — next to the window — before she rushed to the front door and opened it carefully.
The two men still stood there, between her house and Severus's now and she coughed. "Ah, Draco, I thought it was you," she smiled broadly. "Severus is not at home if you want to see him."
"Oh," said Draco. He shot a look at the other man, then turned his eyes on her again.
"Would you like a cup of tea?" she asked him — and only him. There was no way she wanted that posh, snotty person in her house. He looked at the row of houses with that sort of disgust on his face that she didn't even want to see what he thought of her little house. Or of Severus's house — the empty one.
The young man shot the older one a look, rather rebellious, and then looked back at her. "I'd love to."
She smiled and stepped aside to let him step in. He walked past her, and when she wanted to close the door, impolitely, before the older one could walk in, he pressed past her as well, following Draco. She was close to growling — and throwing him out — but then her good manners won.
"Into the kitchen, please, Draco," she said friendly and blocked the way into it, before the older man could follow him.
"I'm Eleanor Callaghan," she said challengingly and in her best English.
"Lucius Malfoy," the man replied coldly. "You obviously know my son."
"Obviously," she replied just as coldly. "Would you like a cup of tea, too?" And what a strange name he had — Lucius. Did people forget about normal names? Not that Severus was a normal name but Eileen had told her why she had named him this way — she had told her. But Eleanor couldn't remember why. There was that itch again. There was something. Something. And she didn't know what it was.
