When September Falls...

[auntbijou.livejournal.com]

Title: When September Falls
Author: auntbijou
Rating: G
Pairing: none
Summary: Just because they’re Muggles, doesn’t mean they don’t notice Trouble coming…
Warning: Spoiler for DH, hints of danger
Words: 976
Disclaimer: It all belongs to the lovely J.K. Rowling. I make no money from it, and play in her universe only for fun!
A/N: This is a sequel, of sorts, to my piece, “When September Comes.” This one is a bit more serious in nature, being as it falls during what would have been the Trio’s seventh year in Deathly Hallows.




Something is different this year. Something that we can all feel. Twenty eight years I been working here, and I tell you, it ain’t been like this since, well, not long after I started. Let me see, it was bad then. I’d only been here near five years. It had been uncomfortable, but it didn’t get really bad until after they found ol’ Mervyn Entwhistle, our own Robert Entwhistle’s grand-da, lying on his back, staring up at the rafters like he was shocked, like he couldn’t believe what he was seeing before he died. Yeah, he was dead, didn’t I mention? Not a mark on ‘im, but there was this funny smoky thing in the sky, and for a minute, when I was lookin’ up at it, it looked like something. Like, I dunno, a head with a really long tongue. Or a skull.

Bah, I don’t remember. But everything got dark, everyone got nervous, and even them what showed up on September first, they was all quiet and nervous, and … there weren’t as many of ‘em. And I’m reminded of that now. It’s been an uncanny summer, cold, foggy… everyone’s sayin’ it’s that global warming messin’ the weather up, but I dunno. Somehow, I don’t think that global warming’s got nothing to do with it. I think… I think it’s them oddly dressed people, somehow.

There’s not as many of them this year, and them that came in looked nervous, exhausted… and scared. The ones who didn’t were the ones who looked normal, the ones who are like us, but maybe their kid got that something extra that made them just enough different they could walk through that wall between Platform 9 and Platform 10. Something about them was like lambs to a slaughter, I don’t know why I was thinking that, but some of them, the new ones, the first timers, I couldn’t help it, I went up to them, to their parents, and I said, “I don’t know what’s going on, but I don’t think you want to put your kid on that train. I’m telling you, take your child home. Please. Something bad is going to happen.”

Sometimes, they’d look at me, and grab their protesting child, and they’d leave in a hurry, as if what I’d said had only confirmed something they’d been feeling. Others looked at me like something they’d scraped off their shoe, and continued on like I hadn’t said nothing. What would I know, I only run the newsstand, right? Just another Londoner scraping by, what? Oh well, I saved the ones I could.

Another thing, that red-headed family… they been coming here to bring a kid nearly twenty years now, it seems. This year, they only had one, the girl, and I could see they didn’t want to bring her, but that girl, I could see she was made of pure stubborn. Just like her mum, she is, and right one. One day, if she lives so long, she’s going to be a right terror with her own brood. Thing is, though, I wondered where the tall lanky brother was, and the bushy-haired girl what spoke so prissy, and then, the black haired chap. The one with the glasses that bounced off the ball a few years ago. There’s something about him, and I can’t help worrying, because somehow, I think it all clinches on him. And if he’s not all right, then we aren’t, either, and maybe I should head down to my cousin in Dover. Maybe me and the missus should finally take that holiday we been talking about for the last ten years, go to Dunkirk and look for my grand-da’s grave, or maybe even to Florence and get warm again. The damn fog sets a chill in your bones, and I swear there are times when it gets so thick I feel like I’ll never be happy again. Dunno why, but it gives me the willies.

It’s all on that black-haired chap with the glasses, I’m sure of it. I got me instincts, I know what me gut tells me and it tells me we need to get out. We need to leave, because things are changing, and it won’t be good. More than a few of the regulars, like me, have already gone. They’ve got instincts, too. You don’t live in the city and not get a feel for when Trouble is coming. Big Trouble.

When I saw the people in the black robes coming through the station, I knew it was nearly too late. I knew I wasn’t going to be able to help any more of those families that weren’t like the wizards, because I can say that now. That’s what them folk are, witches and wizards. And something bad is going down with them, I know it in me bones. So, when the people in the black robes with the too-happy faces came through the station, I closed my stand, waited for them to pass, and then I left. I stopped any stragglers who looked like they were heading for that special gate, and I told them only one thing.

Run.

Because that’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to run. Now. While the running’s good. I’m going to gather up Meg, going to call our Peggy, stop long enough to bleed my bank account dry, and we’re leaving. All of us. Luggage? Who needs it, when it’s your life on the line? Yeah, we’re going. Bloody September, bloody wizards, and their wars… I don’t need no part of it.

One day, they’re going to figure out they’re not alone in this world. That they got to share it with the rest of us. I, however, don’t plan to hold my breath and wait. I got my family to protect. Good luck to you all, and godspeed.

Comments

[star54kar.livejournal.com]

Oh wow! This is such a refreshingly original perspective on events!

Thank you so much for sharing:)