Hate
“Eleanor, come on, get up and go back to your dorm and change.” Harry raised his right brow at Eleanor who was still in his bed, refusing to get up. Breakfast in the Great Hall has already begun and almost everyone is there already, but he still can’t force his sister out of his bed. “Eleanor.”
“Harry,” she whined. “Can I just please stay for the meantime? I’m not feeling that kind of well,” she pouted as Harry took a seat beside her on his bed. “I’ll go during lunchtime and eat with you. Please?”
“Are you fine?” Harry frowned and placed the back of his palm along Eleanor’s neck and forehead. “Do you need to go to Madam Pomfrey? I’ll take you to her.”
She shook her head. “No, I’m fine, I just need to have a few more moments of rest, please?” Her gaze lingered down in an attempt to persuade Harry to let her go, and in succession that her brother took a deep sigh and nodded, she smiled. “I promise I’ll go down at lunch and eat with you.”
Harry bit his lower lip and spent a few seconds staring at her and studying her before sighing. “I’ll come up here to get you for lunch, alright?”
She smiled and nodded at him, taking his right hand and intertwined his fingers with hers for a short while. “Alright.”
Eleanor covered herself with the duvet when Harry walked out of the room with the promise to eat lunch and walk to the Black Lake with her when he came back. Eleanor actually does not feel under the weather to the point of needing to go to the hospital wing. She just feels… out of the mood. She drew a deep breath before closing her eyes to doze off to another round of sleep.
It’s not long when Eleanor opened her eyes when she heard the dorm door opening. Assuming it’s just Harry or one of his dorm mates, she tried to ignore it when she heard a girl’s voice.
“This must be Harry’s bed, but who is this under his duvet? I just saw him in the Great Hall earlier,” said the girl when it reached her side. Ginny?
Just what is she doing in her brother’s bedside? Why is she sneaking in? Not able to contain her instant annoyance, Eleanor threw the duvet off her and faced an open-mouthed gingerhead. “May I ask what are you doing here, Ginger?” she asked, raising her right eyebrow at the girl, noting that the nickname she used for her is a result of her irritation at the gingerhead.
“Eleanor?” Ginny questioned. “What are you doing here?”
“I asked you first, Weasley.” She stood up and crossed her arms over her chest. “What are you doing here?”
“Well…” Ginny cleared her throat before continuing. “I should be the one asking you that question. You’re a Slytherin, this isn’t your house. Most specifically, this isn’t your dorm room.”
“Yes, but this is my brother’s.”
“Same as mine—”
“But this isn’t your brother’s bed, but mine. This is Harry’s bed.” She pointed the bed across Harry’s. “That is Ron’s.”
“Oh.” Ginny blinked as Eleanor scoffed. “I must have mistaken it, then.”
“Mistaken? I heard you,” she replied as she take a step towards the redhead. “You know that this is Harry’s bed. What do you want?” She surveyed her from head to toe until she noticed that she hid something behind her back. Without saying anything else, she grabbed unto Ginny’s sleeves to latch unto what she is hiding.
She frowned. “A flower and a note?” she scoffed. “What, are you like courting my brother now?”
“Give that back!” Ginny aimed to have the flower and the note back but she quickly held wand and pointed it at her, making Ginny step back. “You can’t use that wand on me,” she challenged. “I’m Ron’s sister.”
“And so? I’m Harry’s 𝑜𝑛𝑙𝑦 sibling,” Eleanor put pressure on the word only to signify that whatever she do, Harry will always be on her side. That’s their oath. She then look at the note and cringed. “Pathetic. I didn’t know that you Weasleys are poetic. I might ask Ron later about how poetic the Weasleys are.”
Ginny puffed out some air in irritation. “I’m telling you to Professor McGonagall and to your head of house. You are not supposed to be inside other houses. I’m pretty sure they would get mad and put you in detention.”
“I’m pretty sure they wouldn’t do that as it is the Headmaster that allowed me to sleep with my brother,” she grinned. Ginevra Molly Weasley can’t do anything to put her in detention, or to put her in the bad light. She would be the one to do it to her if she continues to be flirty with her brother. “And besides, Harry will also be put in detention. You wouldn’t want that,” she shrugged. “Harry will get mad that you put her sister in detention.”
After a few seconds, it is Ginny who raised her brow at her. “Then I’ll tell them that you steal my thing.”
“Your thing?” Eleanor looks offended. “Your thing, which is a love note to my brother, then?” She looked at the note and the flower that she put in Harry’s bed before pointing her wand at it. “This?” she grinned. “𝐼𝑛𝑐𝑒𝑛𝑑𝑖𝑜.”
Ginny’s eyes widened when both the flower and the note burned into flames without affecting the bed sheet. “Why did you do that?” she shrieked.
Eleanor ignored her before speaking again; her voice firm and low, and the hint of finality and threat— a tone she learned to do in order to scare the other kids in their school to do her will. “Get out, and don’t you dare bother my brother again with your little lovesick shenanigans, or else not only your love letters will burn to ashes.” She turned to step towards Ginny again. “Got it, Weasley?”
The moment that Ginny stormed out of the room with tears on her face, Eleanor slumped herself on the bed and cleaned the bed by hand and threw it out before getting the diary out of her robes. Angrily, she took the quill and began writing to her friend.
—
“Hey, Potter.”
Harry, together with Hermione and Ron, stopped on their tracks when they heard Draco Malfoy before heading out of their Transfiguration class. “What is it, Malfoy?”
“Where’s Eleanor?” he asked, making Harry frown.
Harry then raised his right brow at him and asked, “Why are you asking?”
“Because she didn't come back to the common room last night, so I know she’s with you,” he answered. “And she missed her classes.”
“You don’t have to worry about my sister, Malfoy, I can take care of her on my own,” he said. “Now, we will be going to check on her if you don’t mind.”
“What’s that?” Ron asked, bewildered. “Did Malfoy really not threw a mockery at
us? Wait, is this really happening, Harry, ‘Mione? And why is she asking about Eleanor?”
“Ron, Draco is Eleanor’s friend,” Hermione explained. “He might be an absolute git to us, but that doesn’t mean he would be one to Eleanor, also. Plus, Eleanor’s in Slytherin.”
“That, too,” Ron muttered and looked at Harry who’s scratching his already untamable hair. “I can’t understand why the sorting hat put your sister in Slytherin. Aren’t all the Potters put in Gryffindor?”
“No, they were not,” Hermione answered. “Dorea Potter is a Slytherin.”
“Look guys,” Harry sighed, not wanting his friends to talk about her sister any longer. “I don’t care what house she’s in, even if it’s Slytherin. If that’s what the sorting hat thought she’s best, then okay! Well now, we can say that Eleanor is the first student in Slytherin to not be evil.”
Harry decided to go straight into the dormitories and frowned when he saw ashes by his bedside floor. “El?”
“Harry,” she greeted back lamely. “Did you know that Ginny Weasley fancies you? She came here earlier with a rose and a love note.”
Harry noted that her voice is unusually low. This is one of the few times he had seen Eleanor so down and annoyed, and irritated. “I… didn’t know.” He walked towards his bed and sat beside her. He reached her head to let it rest on his shoulder. “And what if she did?”
“I don’t like her!” Eleanor snapper. If it were other boys that Eleanor snapped on to, they would probably be surprised but since it is Harry, he just sighed and nodded at her. “She’s like a puppy going after you! Whenever you’re in the Great Hall, in the hallways, she’s always behind you, giggling like some… some kid on our muggle school!”
Eleanor had always hated the girls in her school. Those girls were always so mean, and so giddy, and she don’t like them as much as they don’t like her. “Well, it mustjust be a passing fancy, Lily. Ginny will be over me by next year, I’m sure.”
“But what if it’s not?” she sobbed and snuggled closer to him. She started playing with his hair to calm herself down. “What if she wants you for herself and take you away? Will you leave me for her?” Her voice is small.
“What?” Harry’s brows furrowed and his face crumpled up by her question. “Of course not. Why would I do that?”
“Because you might want to make your own family with her and leave me. I don’t want that, Harry.” Harry once again took a deep breath as Eleanor stopped playing with his hair to wrap her arms around his torso tightly.
“I won’t ever leave you, Lily, you know that,” he said, hugging her back. “No matter whose girl I am with, you’re still my priority. Alright?”
Eleanor slowly loosen her grip on him and looked up at him. “You promise that?”
Harry then smiled and moved his head up and down twice. “I promise. Now, come on get up, let’s get lunch on the Great Hall, and I will walk you to your class.”
—
“Eli, whose owl is that?”
Eleanor looked at the owl who suddenly landed in front of her, carrying a covered bowl of what it looks like as food. “I don’t know,” she answered until the owl handed its one leg to her and saw a note attached to it. She got the note out of the owl’s leg and unfolded it.
𝐸𝑙𝑒𝑎𝑛𝑜𝑟,
𝐼 𝑘𝑛𝑜𝑤 𝑦𝑜𝑢’𝑟𝑒 𝑠𝑡𝑖𝑙𝑙 𝑚𝑎𝑑, 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝐼’𝑚 𝑡𝑒𝑟𝑟𝑖𝑏𝑙𝑦 𝑠𝑜𝑟𝑟𝑦 𝑓𝑜𝑟 𝑤ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝐼 𝑠𝑎𝑖𝑑. 𝐼 𝑝𝑟𝑜𝑚𝑖𝑠𝑒 𝑦𝑜𝑢 𝐼 𝑤𝑜𝑛’𝑡 𝑠𝑎𝑦 𝑖𝑡 𝑎𝑔𝑎𝑖𝑛, 𝑡𝑜 𝑎𝑛𝑦𝑜𝑛𝑒. 𝑃𝑙𝑒𝑎𝑠𝑒 𝑎𝑐𝑐𝑒𝑝𝑡 𝑚𝑦 𝑝𝑒𝑎𝑐𝑒 𝑜𝑓𝑓𝑒𝑟𝑖𝑛𝑔. 𝑀𝑦 𝑜𝑤𝑙 𝑤𝑜𝑛’𝑡 𝑙𝑒𝑎𝑣𝑒 𝑦𝑜𝑢𝑟 𝑡𝑎𝑏𝑙𝑒 𝑢𝑛𝑡𝑖𝑙 𝑦𝑜𝑢’𝑣𝑒 𝑓𝑖𝑛𝑖𝑠ℎ𝑒𝑑 𝑖𝑡.
𝐷𝑟𝑎𝑐𝑜
Eleanor sighed as she folded the note and tucked it on her robes before pulling the cover off the bowl and revealed what’s inside— fresh and ripe strawberries. She bit her lower lip to try to prevent herself from smiling but she cannot help it.
𝐷𝑟𝑎𝑐𝑜 𝑘𝑛𝑒𝑤 ℎ𝑒𝑟 𝑓𝑎𝑣𝑜𝑟𝑖𝑡𝑒𝑠.
Maybe she’ll give it a few hours before forgiving him.
—
All of her close friends noticed Eleanor getting quieter and quieter by the day. They, especially Harry know how outgoing Eleanor can be, and how open she was about her thoughts, but as days passes by, those words never came as they thought.
“What’s got your knickers in a twist, Eleanor?” Ron asked while they were eating in the Great Hall. She said excused herself from Draco and their friends when her brother, Hermione, and Ron came to the Great Hall to eat with them.
She frowned when she heard him. If they were at the Dursleys right now and it had been her or Harry who said those words, they would have been slapped by the mouth because of the use of absolent language and told them that they are no better than their parents, when clearly, it is the Dursleys who are no better. They are horrible people. “Nothing.” She doesn’t have the energy to argue with anyone right now. If it has been a normal day, she would have told him to mind his language because it sounds so dirty. The thoughts of Ginny going after her brother’s occupying her.
She looked at the entrance when Ginny entered with her friends. Her eyes went straight to Harry and Eleanor doesn’t like that. Turning her back on the girl, she pushed her plate back slightly away from her and snuggled towards Harry, holding him tight.
Lockhart apparently started a duelling club and had Draco and Harry duelled with each other. According to Pansy, Professor Snape offered to vanish the snake that Draco conjured from his wand, Harry started hissing. She didn’t know it wasn’t normal, as Harry had freed a snake when they went to the zoo before. They said Harry is a Parseltounge, and the only wizard who was recorded as Parseltounge is Salazar Slytherin and the Dark Lord Voldemort themselves.
𝐼 𝑘𝑛𝑜𝑤 𝑎 𝑝𝑙𝑎𝑐𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑐𝑎𝑛 ℎ𝑒𝑙𝑝 𝑦𝑜𝑢 𝑤𝑖𝑡ℎ 𝑦𝑜𝑢𝑟 𝑝𝑟𝑜𝑏𝑙𝑒𝑚, 𝑚𝑦 𝑙𝑜𝑣𝑒. 𝑊𝑜𝑢𝑙𝑑 𝑦𝑜𝑢 𝑤𝑎𝑛𝑡 𝑡𝑜 𝑔𝑜?
𝐻𝑜𝑤 𝑐𝑜𝑢𝑙𝑑 𝑎 𝑝𝑙𝑎𝑐𝑒 ℎ𝑒𝑙𝑝 𝑚𝑒 𝑤𝑖𝑡ℎ 𝑖𝑡?
𝑀𝑎𝑦𝑏𝑒 𝑦𝑜𝑢 𝑠ℎ𝑜𝑢𝑙𝑑 𝑘𝑛𝑜𝑤 𝑤ℎ𝑒𝑛 𝑦𝑜𝑢 𝑔𝑒𝑡 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑒. 𝑊ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑑𝑜 𝑦𝑜𝑢 𝑠𝑎𝑦?
𝐼 𝑑𝑜𝑛’𝑡 𝑘𝑛𝑜𝑤. 𝐼𝑠 𝑖𝑡 𝑑𝑎𝑛𝑔𝑒𝑟𝑜𝑢𝑠?
𝑁𝑜, 𝑙𝑜𝑣𝑒. 𝑁𝑜𝑡 𝑎 𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑖𝑛 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑒 𝑤𝑖𝑙𝑙 𝑏𝑒 𝑑𝑎𝑛𝑔𝑒𝑟𝑜𝑢𝑠 𝑓𝑜𝑟 𝑦𝑜𝑢. 𝐸𝑣𝑒𝑟𝑦𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑖𝑛 𝑡ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑟𝑜𝑜𝑚 𝑤𝑖𝑙𝑙 𝑏𝑒 𝑤ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑦𝑜𝑢 𝑛𝑒𝑒𝑑.
𝐼’𝑙𝑙 𝑡𝑟𝑦. 𝑊ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑒 𝑖𝑠 𝑡ℎ𝑎𝑡?
𝐹𝑖𝑟𝑠𝑡, 𝐼 𝑛𝑒𝑒𝑑 𝑡𝑜 𝑙𝑒𝑛𝑑 𝑦𝑜𝑢 𝑠𝑜𝑚𝑒 𝑜𝑓 𝑚𝑦 𝑝𝑜𝑤𝑒𝑟𝑠 𝑓𝑜𝑟 𝑦𝑜𝑢 𝑡𝑜 𝑒𝑛𝑡𝑒𝑟.
That night, using Harry’s invisibility cloak that he lent her, she sneaked towards the girl’s bathroom on the second floor, faced the lavatory, and started hissing like a snake exactly the way the diary had thought her. She rolled her eyes in doing so. Seriously, this doesn’t make any sense to her. How could the diary taught her to be a Parseltounge. 𝑆𝑖𝑙𝑙𝑦 𝑝𝑖𝑒𝑐𝑒 𝑜𝑓 𝑝𝑎𝑟𝑐ℎ𝑚𝑒𝑛𝑡.
After hissing the words the diary had told her required to open the room, her eyes widened when the pipes in the lavatory maneuvered by itself and opened. Gulping, she slid down and went straight as the diary told her, and was welcome by a man when she entered the final room.
“I see you have followed my instructions, Eleanor. Welcome to the Chamber of Secrets.”