Cigarette Daydreams- ꜱɪʀɪᴜꜱ ʙʟᴀᴄᴋꜱ ᴅᴀᴜɢʜᴛᴇʀ

Memories and flashes of the past.

Aurora had never had a 'family'. It was something that many people took for granted. Oh how she'd do anything to have a loving mother and a proud father; somebody who would drop her off at Kings Cross on the first of September, somebody who would send her presents on her birthday, offer her support and love and just make her feel like she was normal. Instead she had a dead mother, a dead mother whom she'd never known, and a father who had abandoned her when she was three. 

It hadn't always been like that, no. Aurora could remember days when it had just been her and her father. The memories were faint, and the edges were blurred - but she could remember. She could remember how he used to sing her sweet french lullabies every night before she went to sleep, how he used to protect her from the monsters hiding under her bed, how he used to try and braid her hair, only to grow frustrated and give up. She remembered how he used to have a mouth worse than that of a sailor - he used to swear accidentally, not even noticing at first, but then his eyes would widen and he would gasp over dramatically, before hastily correcting himself. She remembered when uncle Moony would come around, though his face was unclear, and how he had been her favorite Uncle. How her Uncle Prongsie would throw her in the air and then catch her, or pick her up and run around with her over his head, so that she could pretend to ride a broomstick; she remembered how her Auntie Lily would teach her how to brush her hair, and paint her nails, and how she would be the one to buy her clothes because her father used to deck her out in leather. Oh she remembered, and how she longed to go back in time.

She always used to think that it would just be her and her father forever. When he left her, she used to sit on the windowsill of the orphanage and stargaze - and she would sing those sweet french lullabies to the Canis Major constellation, though her attention would be solely on the Sirius star. As she grew older, the memories started to fade, until she could no longer distinguish between what were memories, and what were childish fantasies. 

And as Aurora sat against the trunk of a great oak tree, now fifteen years old, she couldn't help but think that her three year old self would have been disappointed in what she had become. Because little Aurora, who used to love dressing up as a princess, would surely have wished for a better - a happier - future, and Aurora's future was nothing like she would have imagined.

Instead of seeing herself as a princess, dancing around her castle in sparkly ballgowns with her handsome prince, she saw herself as a burden. Her future was hidden underneath a blanket of mist; it was dark and grim, there weren't any stars or castles, no, but the moon was still there. Because it was the moon that caused Aurora the most pain. 

Aurora's father wasn't there either, because she couldn't remember enough of him to paint a true picture in her minds eye. She knew of his appearance, he was a famous Auror and was constantly in the papers with his best mate James Potter, but she didn't know what he was like. The Sirius Black she knew was very different from the Sirius Black that the world knew - but the Sirius Black she knew was from twelve years ago; so she supposed that she didn't really know just who Sirius Black was. All that she knew that he valued his godson over his daughter, and that he hadn't come back for her, and he wasn't planning to, because he left her on the orphanages doorstep on the thirty-first of October nineteen eighty-one. 

In Auroras mind, it was simple. She wasn't good enough; she had disappointed him. Maybe it was because she wasn't naturally talented at quidditch, maybe because she was a werewolf, or that she wasn't smart enough. Or perhaps it was because she just wasn't Harry Potter. She didn't know what she had done wrong, but she must of done something, or he wouldn't of left her.

Right?

But it all came back to the Potters. Aurora understood that they needed help, and that James Potter was her fathers best friend, and that harry was her fathers Godson. She knew that on that fateful Halloween night that Sirius had every right to go and help them. But he didn't come back. He and James built a future for themselves, they were both insanely rich, but still decided to run off and become Aurors. But they both still had time for Harry, so why did they not have time for her? Was it all for show - when they would play Broomsticks in the living room, or when he would read her stories of princesses and frogs? Or perhaps it was a childhood fantasy, maybe she just made it up to prove to herself that her father did love her once, and that she wasn't a waste of space.

So as she watched Harry Potter swagger past with his group of tag-alongs she couldn't help but feel insanely jealous. He had taken everything she loved, he had taken her father away from her, had taken her Uncle Prongsie and her Auntie Lily, had left her with nothing. Nothing other than a box full of broken memories. She couldn't help it- she was so insanely jealous. He had a family, she did not. He had money, she did not. He had friends, she did not. He had everything she ever wished for - and he took it all for granted, strutting around with his nose stuck in the air. She loathed him, she loathed him but at the same time, she wanted everything he had. Everything that had once belonged to her.

It was the day of the first quidditch match of the season - Slytherin versus Gryffindor. Well, now it was Hufflepuff versus Gryffindor, because Aurora had suggested that they swap last minute with the excuse that both her and Draco's arms had still not recovered. In reality, they just really didn't want to play in the rain, because they knew that they couldn't win when they couldn't even see each other.

Flint told Wood last minute, so that the Lions would have no time to prepare themselves. Aurora would have thought that that was a cruel move, if she had not already been in foul mood. The intrusive thoughts had broken through the damn she had built to secure her demons, and were now washing over her like a tidal wave of emotion; she felt awful, and at the center of her problems was Potter, so, she mused, why not? It was a petty ideal, but the look of indignation on their faces was worth it. 

Aurora pushed her way through the crowds of umbrellas and water resistant shields, making her way forcefully into the Slytherin stands. The weather was awful, the rain was coming down in great, fat drops, and the wind was roaring like a great, egotistic lion -  biting at students noses and causing them to go a soft pink colour.  Within five minutes of the match Aurora was already frozen, the water somehow finding its way through her cheap second hand coat - though that wasn't very surprising when you considered just how battered it was. She was shivering violently, teeth chattering and fingers trembling, and she was certain that one of her ears had dropped off completely. Lee Jordan's commentary was drowned out by the wind, though apparently still audible to McGonagall, who was scolding Lee and attempting to snatch the microphone off him. 

The players appeared in great flashes of red and yellow; bludgers were flying and people crashing - at one point an umbrella flew out of the stands and onto the pitch, and one of the player had crashed into it. Eventually, somebody called a time out, and the players flew down to the ground and scrambled for shelter in the locker rooms. For about five minutes the game paused, before Hooch blew the whistle and the game continued. The gale only seemed to worsen, and a thick layer of fog had settled itself over the pitch. Lightning flashed and thunder banged, and suddenly the temperature dropped rapidly.

Aurora rubbed her hands together, trying to generate some warmth to unfreeze her fingers, but it was no good and soon frost began to settle on the seats beneath her. She looked up, and froze in shock. A hundred dementors were floating down from above the arena, and in their midst a body was falling, plummeting down from the sky like a rock. They were wearing robes of blood red, and it became clear just who they were. Harry Fucking Potter.

Dumbledore, who Aurora had only just noticed, rose from his seat in the teachers stands. He calmly pointed his want as Harry's limp figure and bellowed" Arresto Momentum" at the top of his lungs, so loudly that even the wind couldn't swallow it up.

Aurora could only assume that Harry's decent had slowed down, because her vision slowly clouded over. She could hear the cries of the students around her, and the wind wailing, but it was like she was underwater. She was suddenly very cold, a deep, unsettling chill had settled upon her. It went deeper than her skin, it was inside her chest - crawling and slithering around her interior like a great, slithering serpent; the screaming returned, but it was not from the students - it was a woman. She was screaming in agony, begging and pleading for somebody, anybody to come and help her; she sounded so close, yet so far away, and Aurora knew instantly that she had to help. What was she doing standing there like an idiot while somebody was being tortured - dying - right next to her? She had to help, she had to save her - 

-but she couldn't, she couldn't save her, because the world suddenly went black.