Quidditch League

Round 4: Don't Take Things Out of Context

Keeper: "Well as long as we're digging up the past, we may as well dig up your mother" Grimm

Word Count: 1039

A Blast From the Past

"Hey, Seamus! Ethan wrote to us!" Lavender took the letter from the owl's leg, immediately recognising her youngest child's writing. "I wonder how his third year is going? It's such a big step up."

Seamus walked around the corner into their living room, toweling his hair dry after his morning shower. "I'm sure he'll be fine. He's a big boy now, you just love to coddle him."

"Do not!" Lavender retorted.

"Do so."

"Fine, I do but he's our little boy, Shay. He was so small when he was born, and he's still so small now." Lavender followed Seamus into the kitchen. "Ooh, if you're making tea I'll have one."

"So what does our little one have to say?"

Lavender read aloud.

"Hi, Mum and Dad,

I hope you're both well, as well as Jas and Niamh.

3rd year is so much harder than 2nd year! And we've got all the elective subjects, and I don't even know if I've chosen the right ones. I LOVE Ancient Runes, but Divination is utter rubbish. I just can't seem to get it. I'm doing so well in Charms, it's my favourite subject now. It's much better than Defence Against the Dark Arts, and the stupid professor.

We have a project in History of Magic about the Wizarding War that you guys were involved in. Can you send as many newspaper articles to me as you can? I know you've kept them because I found a stash over the summer. I want to have the best project, and having two war hero parents is awesome! I mean, because you guys were older when I was born means that most of the other kids in my year don't have such cool parents. I'm so getting an O for this project.

Anyways, how's work, Dad?

How's the business going, mum? I've got so many ideas for new products for you. I'll tell you when I'm home for the holidays.

Can't wait to see you both again

Lots of love

Ethan"

"At least he remembered to ask after his sisters this time," remarked Seamus with a slight laugh. "Not one letter last year mentioned them."

"He found the pictures and articles. I thought you hid them, Shay?"

"I did hide them, it's not my fault if he found them. He did say how well he was doing at charms, he probably just undid my concealment charm."

"Do you think he saw the… photos of me?" Lavender looked worried; there were medical photos in there documenting her recovery from her werewolf bites. She didn't want her thirteen-year-old son looking at some of the more graphic images.

"It doesn't matter if he did or not. Those photos show how much of an amazing mum that he has. How strong she is. Come on, let's go find them for him."

Lavender nodded her head and took Seamus' hand when he put it out for her. They walked hand in hand up the stairs into their bedroom, a cup of tea in their other hands.

Seamus pulled out his wand and pointed it under their bed, "Revelio." A box rippled and appeared in front of him, he pulled it out and set it onto the bed covers. "Ready?" he asked Lavender. She nodded in response. He pulled the lid off and there in front of them were photos from over thirty years ago. Memories poured back into Lavender's mind, the anger, the pain... the guilt. Her eyes flooded with tears, and some escaped and fell onto a newspaper article with the headline 'VOLDEMORT DEFEATED'.

"It seems like a lifetime ago," she whispered.

"It was," Seamus responded. "We've had our life since then. It's nothing but a bad memory now."

"It's not just a memory for you. I feel it nearly every day."

"I know you do," replied Seamus. He moved over to where Lavender was sitting and gently rubbed her back. "I know your scars will never fade, but I sometimes think that it made us who we are today. We have Jasmine and Niamh and Ethan today because of our strength and resilience and I wouldn't change it for the world." He slowly kissed the scars that crawled up her neck.

"Alright, Mr. Sentimental," laughed Lavender as she wiped a tear from her cheek. She picked a photo up from the box. "Do you remember taking this one?" It was a group photo from towards the end of their seventh year at Hogwarts. Everyone was in the Room of Requirement and everyone was smiling in spite of the varying levels of injury some of them had. "It took ages to get everyone ready to take this, how difficult it was to organise 25 people into a photo. Look, it's in this newspaper too." The photo in the paper had the caption: The face of resistance.

"It's so strange looking at these again," Seamus said, "we look so young."

"Well, we were eighteen. As long as we're digging up the past, we may as well dig up your mother." Lavender laughed as she picked up another newspaper. This one had a picture of Seamus and his mother. She was ruffling his hair whilst he smiled at the camera.

"Oh, gods! I don't know why she made me do that. It's so embarrassing! I think that was a couple of days later, so she was probably still happy that I survived. And I just let her do that."

They slowly worked their way through the box, reminiscing and laughing at various photos and newspapers. Of course, the Daily Prophet over exaggerated nearly everything: the way they had it nearly everyone who survived managed to kill at least fifteen Death Eaters apiece and had some sort of horrific injury. Of course, it was true for some people.

They reached the bottom of the box and found a folder with the bone and wand logo of St Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries and the title 'Patient 293284: Lavender Brown'.

Lavender flicked through the photos and medical charts in the folder lingering on the lunar cycle chart. How different her life could have been…

She sighed deeply and added the folder to the top of the pile to send to Ethan.