the trial ; d.m

8

"He snapped my wand! My fucking wand, Theo!" Geneva yells the minutes her husband enters the foyer later this evening. "I want him out. I want him gone. I don't care where. He has to go."

She's lured the storm within the walls.

"Hold on, Gen—"

Theodore peels his jacket from himself as he steps inside the door, shrugging off the pellets of rain that the storm managed to batter him with.

She was in the drawing room when she heard him apparate onto the veranda. After staring at her wand absently for too long, his entrance broke her out of this resignation.

She shoves the two pieces of her wand up, flinging them out in front of her like a madwoman. She feels mad, dangerously high from the addictive stench of fury.

"Look at this! He's a fucking psychopath, I'm telling you."

Theodore progresses forwards, a gentle air about him. She clenches her jaw in frustration.

"What happened?"

"He threatened me, and then—" She feels like she's snitching to a professor. "And then he stole my wand and held it to my—" She catches her breath and clings to her throat, where the red raw mark of the wand stains her skin. "To my neck and— and snapped it."

"Why did he threaten you?"

His tone is calm. It only infuriates her. He should be ballistic. He should be storming into the East Wing with nothing but murder on his mind.

But that's not Theodore.

"Does it matter?"

"Gen, if you pushed him—"

He stops talking immediately when evaluating the scorned, shockingly outraged look on her face. "I just mean— surely his actions weren't unaccounted for. Did you say something to him?"

"Yes, just as he said things to me," she states, annoyed. "I want him gone, Theo. Someone else can have him— or he can go to Azkaban. I don't care, I just want him out of my house."

She turns away, wanting to leave with the final word and conclude this decision.

"Well it isn't really your house, is it?"

She snaps her head back, almost giving herself whiplash, conscious of the dumb look on her face. Her husband hasn't spoken to her in this way before. Never would she expect to hear something so immature from the man who appears to have no trace of boyishness left within himself.

It momentarily shreds the anger from her, leaving her stunned and gut wrenchingly hurt.

And God forbid he make her feel unwelcome in her own home. Because he knows that it has never quite felt like such a place.

"Why would you say that?"

He squeezes his eyes together in strain. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean that, you know I didn't. Look I'll speak to him. I'll put more precautions in place if it makes you feel safer, but Gen, we can't get rid of him."

"Why not? Oh never mind— because the only reason they're keeping him out of Azkaban—where he should be is because of his money. Right?"