The Harry Potter World

When I started school, I talked to other muggleborns, asking each of them about how they found out they had magic, how they felt about it and most specifically, how their parents felt about it. The kids would say it was "cool" or "weird, but you know." What do you expect, they were eleven. About their parents' reactions, they would say, "they said they always knew I was special" or "mom says it opens up a lot of opportunities for me." My parents' reactions were slightly different. They thought I must be practicing devil worship, or was possessed by something evil.

My parents were religious; I suppose they still are wherever they might be out there. We weren't Catholic, but we were very religious. We went to church every week and meetings throughout the week whenever they may be. We didn't drink or smoke, we were modest, because we were supposed to be. So when a nice old lady came to our house and told me that the oddities that had followed me my whole life were signs of my magic, my parents didn't take the news well. They prayed endlessly and the whole time, I begged that they let me go to the school the woman had told me would teach me to harness my powers. My parents said that this was a wicked desire that would only encourage the evil in and around me. But finally, we agreed to a deal. They said I could go to the school for one year and that if I wanted to continue magical education after that, they would send me anywhere in the world I wanted to study—and promptly disown and forget me.

They thought I would come to my senses. I thought they would come to accept me.

We were all wrong.

I came back so excited. I had learned more than I had ever dreamed, though not always what my teachers were trying to teach me. I was so excited to tell them about my powers, to explain that I had learned to use them for good, that there wasn't any more wicked in the magical world than there were in the normal one.

My parents never came around. When they realized I had not "accepted the wickedness of my actions, the evil that was growing within me" they were furious. When I had been home for a day, my dad came into my room where I was doing some research on an advanced spell I had heard about, but was having trouble working. He sat down in the chair in the corner of my room and looked at me, in that second looking so old and tired that I felt awful for all the stress I had caused him.

"The deal hasn't changed so you have a choice to make." I told myself not to cry, but I couldn't follow my own advice.

"But… bu… I d-don't want to leave you all." His face and he was on the verge of a smile, something I realized I hadn't seen from him in a very long time.

"Then we can put all this behind us?"

"N-no, I can't just… I can't…." With that, his face fell then hardened.

"Well then it looks like we have your answer." He stood and started pacing around my room, looking like he was going to start punching the wall. "Where do you want to go?"

"I… I don't know." I wanted to stay with my family, but I also wanted to pursue my education; now that I had begun learning, I felt like it would be physically painful for me to stop, like cutting off a part of me. There was no way around it, no way for me to have everything I wanted. I told him I would have to think about it. He told me to make it quick because they had run out of patience.

After he left, I must have cried for at least an hour before I had drained myself. And then, I started down the only path I had left to me by writing a letter to my old librarian. I had not been popular at school, Salem's School of Sorcery. I had been the dweeb everyone pitied and looked down on. I kept to myself and… I was a bit of a weirdo. If my family was cutting me off, I figured a fresh start all around might be the best plan and while Salem hadn't been a bad school, I also knew that there were far better schools abroad, I just didn't know what they were. Ms. Seaman, the school's librarian had been one of the few at that school to be genuinely kind to me, although she was a bit of a nut, which might have said a fair deal about me to be honest. Since I didn't have access to wizarding communications I had to send the letter the muggle way which meant it had to go four days through the mail system to get across the country to Salem, Massachusetts. And then I had nothing to do, but wait.

I mean literally nothing. My parents wouldn't look at me in the eye. The few times they had to speak to me, they looked over my shoulder or stared at whatever they were doing. I stopped eating with them and no one complained. I wasn't allowed to go out so I stayed in my room all day, self-imposed imprisonment. My little sister didn't understand what was going on, didn't know about my magic, didn't know about my school and didn't know why no one was talking to one another. All she knew about the situation was that I had gone to a special school for the year and that was it. She kept trying to get me to come out and play with her, and considering my total lack of company, I would have done so gratefully, but the first time my parents caught us playing mancala together, my step-mom grabbed my sister and took her to watch TV while my dad grabbed me and threw me in my room. I found light bruises on my arm from how tightly he had grabbed me, though I don't think he had meant to hurt me, and they didn't bring dinner to me that night like they had every night before then. Finally, after one very long week, an owl ran into my window in the dead of night.

I ran down stairs avoiding my parents who had fallen asleep in front of the TV in the family room and went out the back door to the owl that hopping around and shaking its bumped head. He looked at me accusingly as if closing the window was something to be blamed for. "Shut up!" I growled at him when he opened his mouth to squawk. He remained silent, thank goodness, with another accusatory glare. I swear he rolled his eyes before sticking out his leg for me to untie a letter from. The string was barely loose when he flew away. I sat down right there to read it by the back porch light.

Dear Skylar,

I am so VERY sorry to hear about your trouble at home. Unfortunately, there is no way for me or any of the faculty here at the school to intervene, but I think you are a very brave girl to choose your own way. You remind me of a heroine I read about once, but I can't quite remember who. Something classical… perhaps someone from a Jane Austin novel? I forget, but I am very, very proud of you my dear.

I had forgotten Ms. Seaman's propensity for rambling. Instead of reading it all, I scanned until I found the bit about possible schools somewhere about halfway down the second page.

About possible schools, there are many to choose from. Let me see if I can narrow it down some. We would of course love to see you continue here at Salem, but I do understand if you would prefer to pursue opportunities at another school as there are many excellent ones. There is one in Spain, La Escuela de Encanto y Pociones, where there are several respected teachers and many world renowned students have graduated from the place. However, while they have produced some very exceptional wizards, the vast majority of the school is ruled by low standards, both educationally and personally. There is also a school in England, Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. It is one of the most respected schools in the world, a surprising feat for a school named after a skin disease-ridden swine. However, like I said, it is a very prestigious school and also has a very benevolent and respected headmaster from what I have been told. Another respected school is Beauxbaton, a French school run by, if rumor serves, a half-giantess. However, as with the others, the school is old and well-known as one of the best establishments our world has to offer learning wizards.

The letter continued, telling me to do my own research, wishing me good luck and reminding me, for some reason, of her old and infirm aunt. I shoved the letter in my pocket and snuck back upstairs, collapsing on my bed. Do my own research? How was I supposed to do that? I didn't know anyone magical in the area and in any case, I wasn't allowed out of the freaking house! I tossed the letter aside, crumbled and slightly torn, and tried to make myself go to sleep, but that didn't work until at least 5 a.m.

I woke up sometime around noon. At one point, my dad would have disciplined me for sleeping in like that; now, I doubt he even noticed. I scratched out three letters, one to each of the schools Ms. Seaman had offered, explaining my situation and asking if I could be enrolled there. And since all three letters were going overseas, I had an even longer wait this time. By the time the first letter came, the only time my dad would speak to me was when I came down for food and he would ask if I had made plans yet. I would tell him I was waiting on a correspondence and he would nod, end of conversation. My step-mother never spoke to me anymore and my sister was too scared too. It was a very lonely time.

After a couple weeks, I received two letters in one night. The first was in French and smelled like too much perfume. The second was in Spanish and smelled like too much liquor. Seeing as I understood neither French nor Spanish, I figured that nixed any plan of going to either of those schools. All I could do was hope desperately that the warty-pig school would accept me. It was another three days before I heard from Hogwarts.

Dear Miss French,

We would be happy to welcome you to our school. And while I am sorry for the circumstances which have turned you to us, I do look forward to meeting you. We will contact your previous school, but I am sure everything will be in order and you will be able to enroll in our upcoming term beginning in September. I have enclosed a pamphlet about our school, its history, and courses offered here. I invite you to read it to become more familiar with our establishment. Please write to me with your decision and we will send someone to your residence to discuss any necessary arrangements with your parents. Again, thank you for your interest in our school and we look forward to seeing you here.

Warmest Regards,

Albus Percivil Wilfrid Brian Dumbledore

Headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry

It all sounded like the answer to my prayers, except for the bit about sending someone to speak to my parents. There was no way in hell they would go for that. But I also didn't want to tell this Mr. Dumbledore that I had never even asked so I emerged from my room to trudge down to where my parents were eating breakfast.

"Dad, Lyn?"

"What?" my father responded sharply. I swallowed, wanting out of that room.

"I wrote to a few schools and one just wrote back saying that they would accept me—"

"Good, when should we send you?" Where they really so ready to be rid of me? Did I mean so very little to them?

"Well, I don't know. They want to send someone to talk to us about arrangements." The last sound was barely past my lips when my father turned an ugly shade of red.

"No! I will not allow any more of those people in my house!" I nearly said 'those people like me?' but my dad would have seen that comment for what it was, a war cry, and a war between he and I would quickly become ugly. I wanted to scream and rage and cry, but I just ducked my head so he couldn't see any of that and nodded, exiting quickly.

The owl that had brought Mr. Dumbledore's letter was still hanging out in my room, standing on my bookshelf, her head ducked under her wing. The sun was up, I suppose it was her natural sleep time. I just hoped she wouldn't make a mess; I was not an animal person. I pulled out another sheet of paper and pen to respond to Mr. Dumbledore.

Dear Mr. Dumbledore,

Thank you for your acceptance. I would be honored to attend Hogwarts and look forward to beginning. As I said in my last letter though, my parents are not supportive of my continued magical education and for obvious reasons will not allow a school representative into our home or anywhere near them. Could I meet the representative another way? Perhaps at a nearby restaurant or coffee shop somewhere nearby? Thank you.

Skylar French

I'm not sure what exactly I was expecting after that, but it was not what actually happened. About a week after I sent that letter off with the owl, getting it out of my room before it could make a mess or stink up the place, it tapped on my window again. There was only a small slip of paper attached to his leg this time, and on that slip, there were only two words: 'Get ready.'

Within seconds, I had the answer to the question of what that meant. The doorbell rang and I heard my dad's footsteps move towards the door and the door opened. There wasn't even a pause before my dad's voice roared through the house. "SKYLAR ANN FRENCH!" The landing halfway down the staircase overlooks the front door and I only had to make it that far to understand my father's fury. A tall man with a long white beard and semiformal wizarding robes stood at my front door. He had a pleasant smile on his face like this was not only the welcome he expected, but the one he wanted. However, if you looked past his half-moon glasses, you could see a glint in his eyes like we had just failed a test. From the pamphlet I had poured over for the last week—so much that I am sure I could quote it word for word by now—this was Headmaster Dumbledore. He had ignored my warning and come to my home himself.

"Um, hi," I squeaked.

"Miss French, I presume," he asked politely.

"Yeah, um, yes." What is it about a British accent that makes you feel like you have to be formal? Or maybe it was just the man in front of me. He had a sense of nobility about him.

"Perhaps you would like to join us down here?" he gestured and I realized I was still on the landing halfway down the stairs. I nodded silently and descended, avoiding eye contact with my step-mother, who was glaring at me, and looking at my dad, who was glaring at the headmaster. I kept my eyes on Mr. Dumbledore who smiled politely.

"I am Albus Dumbledore, Headmaster at Hogwarts. You may call me Professor Dumbledore."

"Pleased to me you Professor Dumbledore," I squeaked again. A glance at my dad told me he was about to blow and I didn't know what to do. Politeness dictated that we welcome Professor Dumbledore in and ask him to sit, but the look on my father's face told me that the best idea would be to get the old man out of here as quickly as possible. Professor Dumbledore decided on his own, turning my father's anger on him rather than me.

He swept right into the living room and motioned my parents to the couch. "Please be seated, we have much to discuss." My dad's eyes widened, but apparently his fury had him tongue tied so he simply held Lyn's hand and sat with her on the couch. Professor Dumbledore pulled out a wand and made a comfortable looking armchair out of thin air. "Miss French," he asked me, "would you like a chair as well?" My other options were to sit with my parents on the couch or to sit on the piano bench, but the looks on my parents' faces told me that encouraging this man to perform more magic would be a mistake so I shook my head and took a seat on the piano bench which I forgot until that moment was broken. I sat gingerly after hearing the initial squer-erk of it accepting my weight. He looked around at us as if we were the best of friends. "My dear," he asked after a moment, "would you be so kind as to make some tea?"

"Oh, um, of course. Is hibiscus alright?"

"Sounds perfect." I nodded and rushed into the kitchen, put some water on to boil wishing it would hurry. It was awkward listening to the silence in the other room, as if everyone had just disappeared. As I poured water into the mugs with the teabags, he called, "One cube of sugar for me please," and I was embarrassed to realize I hadn't asked. I wondered idly if tea-making etiquette was something taught at Hogwarts. I figured that one cube was about one spoonful so after adding his one and my three, I brought our mugs in. I had made myself some automatically, needing its reassuring warmth all of a sudden. "Thank you, Miss French," he offered.

"Skylar is fine, sir."

"Well then, thank you, Skylar," he said with a benevolent smile. He took a sip and smiled. "Quite refreshing," he complimented me. "But now I am afraid it is time to talk. Would someone please explain the situation to me again? I find myself rather confused." The glint in his eye once again belied his words. My dad though seemed to sense no danger because, as if released by the old man's words, he leapt into the explanation without a care.
"My wife and I are against the practice of sorcery, the fact that my daughter has the ability at all is evidence that something has been done very wrong in her life. When Skylar was informed that she possessed this… magic," he seemed to choke on the word, "we were against her cultivating it and discouraged her from going to that institution. But she insisted and we made a deal that she could attend for one year, but we would not allow any more than that and if she continued to pursue an education in that field, she would have to do it elsewhere. We told her we would help her get anywhere else in the world she wanted, but after that, she was on her own." He paused for breath and continued at a slower pace. "We want nothing to do with your world. In fact, I have no idea why she brought you here." Professor Dumbledore sat quietly considering my father's words before speaking.

"Where do you expect her to live?"

"Excuse me?" my dad asked incredulously.

"Where do you expect her to live?" he repeated. "As I am sure you know, Mr. French, England does not have a foster system like America does. We have instead an overabundance of orphanages and children's homes. I can't believe you would want your daughter to be raised in one of those."

"She made her decision to leave. Where she lives and it is not our problem." The rejection, though I had been living through it for the last several weeks, stung painfully and I flinched. My parents imagined it so black and white; either I wanted to live with them or I didn't and those options corresponded exactly to either I didn't want to learn magic or I did respectively. How did they not get that I wanted both sides of it, that there were a million shades of gray that I couldn't get through.

"Somehow, I doubt very much that your daughter wants to leave," Dumbledore said quietly, but with a dangerous tinge I think my father finally caught. "I think she feels rather forced out of this home." He waved off my dad's shouts that he did not want me to leave and that I hadn't been forced anywhere and continued. "You have forced her by making her choose between her true nature and your picture for her." I blew away the memory of a scripture verse about the natural man being an enemy of God. Despite, and in part because of, everything I had gone through in the last year, I still believed in God. I just wasn't sure if He still liked me much. Professor Dumbledore pulled my attention back the conversation with a question directed at me. "When do you expect to leave, Skylar?"

"I… don't know. I guess whenever the arrangements can be made."

"Within two weeks," my father interjected. Could he really get me out of their lives so quickly and easily?

"Hmm." Mr. Dumbledore seemed to be considering something as he looked between me and my parents. "May I talk to Skyler alone, please?" he asked, though it sounded more like a command. My parents didn't trust or like this man, but they found nothing wrong with leaving alone with him as they headed up stairs to their room. After the sound of the door closing was heard, Dumbledore watched me for a moment before speaking. "What is it you would like, my dear?"

I wanted everything, but at the same time, it seemed like it shouldn't be too much to ask. I wanted my parents to love me enough to accept me magic and all. I wanted to be able to study magic without having to choose between that and my family. Weren't your parents supposed to love you, no matter what you did or were? Wasn't that practically a requirement for being a parent? I was sure the man before me knew all the feelings that were raging around my head, but he waited for me to speak. "I don't know, sir." He looked at me with sympathy.

"I am very sorry, Miss French. This is not a choice such a young person should have to make." I wanted to scream that no one should have to make this choice. Instead, I nodded and took several deep breaths in an attempt to hide the tears that tickled my throat.

"What do I do?" I was begging at this point. Abandoned by my family, I was lost. I clung to my empty mug like it was a lifeline that could save me from anything to come.

"I am afraid, if your parents are truly set on cutting you off—"

"They are."

"Then you will have to live in an orphanage until an alternative can be found." He said it like he really did care and wanted to do more, but couldn't change the way things were. I suppose even magic can't fix the irreparable. When he said the word 'orphanage', it was like every drop of fight went out of me and I went limp, almost dropping my mug to the ground.

"Do you know of a place that will take me?" I asked. I was asking for an orphanage recommendation. I couldn't think of anything more rock bottom—if anything, this was mining into the rock bottom to drop down to new depths. I prayed that orphanage recommendations were not something he got asked for regularly.

"There is a home where two of our students live. They are siblings, both older than you, but I'm sure they would be happy to take you under their wing for the summer." I nodded, too numb to give a thank you. I must have sat there for a full minute before the next obvious question came to mind.

"Who do I call and what should I say?" He patted my hand sympathetically.

"I have a friend in the Ministry who can take care of the arrangements for you," he assured me. At a flick of his wand, a sheet of paper appeared out of thin air and he wrote a name and address down, then handed the paper to me. "Two weeks from today, this woman will meet you at the London airport and she will take care of everything," he promised. I nodded again, this time remembering a polite 'thank you' and glanced at the words of the paper. The letters all swirled around like gibberish. I tried to give a polite smile as well, but the muscles in my face didn't want to cooperate and I failed miserably. He patted my shoulder then and left. Without another word, I all alone in this house.

After that day, my parents, who had already been ignoring me for the most part, now acted as if I wasn't even there, like I didn't even exist to them anymore. When I told my dad I needed a plane ticket to England, he didn't even glance up. He just reached in his pocket and handed me his wallet without a word. And this is where I cracked. Perhaps another girl would have interpreted his actions as those of a parent who trusted his daughter, but to me, it was just further proof that he wanted me out with as little fuss as possible. So I went back to the office and changed the flight I had planned. I had set myself up in economy seating, but I flipped to first class. I suppose it wasn't much, but it was as much as I could do. They didn't want to remember me, but at the very least, their bank statements would remind them of me for a few months. Without a second thought, I clicked onto another site and bought a few more things, books and clothes, with the all expensive same day shipping. Slightly mollified, I took my dad's wallet back to him smiled my most innocent smile at him; he never even looked up to see it.

The woman Dumbledore had told me about had sent, as she termed it, a 'parcel' which included the address of the orphanage, in case there was anything I wanted to send ahead, a plain sheet of paper that would convince the muggle authorities that I had a passport, even though I didn't, and sheet that explained that my books, robes, and supplies would be paid for by a fund set up for 'underprivileged children', orphans and cast outs and the impoverished. Hating the idea of having no money besides what the school gave me, I decided to do a little more damage to my dad's credit statement. One evening, I 'borrowed' his card, then walked down into town to the ATM. I had seen my dad use his PIN more times than I could count and had accidently memorized the number. I withdrew $500 and slipped it into my wallet, returning my dad's card before he ever noticed it was missing.