Keily's Chronicles: Part 1 - The Disappearing Act

On request...I will now write up about what happened to me during the whole final battle against Emperor Palpatine. From the first signs of trouble to my kidnapping, my subsequent escape and my part during the final fight on Mustafar.

And so...lets start off with the first part of my little story...

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I don't know about the rest of you, but I despise the idea of war. Especially if it involves people that I care for deeply. Now, it's not to say that the people I had to see off cared deeply for me, or I for them, but...I suppose I loved them enough to start crying my eyes out like a ninny when they left. It all started about the end of May* or so...when I finally taught the boys how to use the laptop...more or less.

Draco and Severus were in quite the foul mood. Severus more so than usual, which I find quite odd as A) There were no students for him to deal with, B) No one he knew from home was around and C) There was no sign of Potter. But at the time, I didn't think too much of it, so I just let them stew over for quite a bit. After all, it wasn't prudent to get on the nerves of a man who could hex you to Hell and back and, as stated before, Snape was in the worst of moods I've ever seen him in.

It was when they started acting nice that I started to worry.

Now, these two had been living with me in relative quiet (as seen from the lack of posting in my blog) for the last...I don't know. Almost a year or so. They would either hog the bathroom(Draco), hog the kitchen(Severus) or just generlaly make my life that much harder at home (mysterious messes, destroyed appliances, strange fumes from the basement, etc...), but I had always considered this sort of behaviour quite normal. Something to expect. I expect Draco to act like a spoilt brat. I expect Severus to insult me, especially if I do something stupid.

The last thing I can ever expect from them is an offer to take me to the festival down in the Old Port of the city on Saturday. A Japanese festival. In other words... a yukata wearing, gold fish catching, cherry blossoms falling all over the place with an old monk standing to the side...Japanese festival.

"Did you guys drink something odd? Like an experimental potion or...I don't know...one of the Red Bull cans?" I asked them, looking at both men incredulously. I knew that neither were into other cultures all that much and the thought of lingering around too many muggles for the disclosed amount of time (which was a full day) they gave me for our outing was torture for them. More than once have I heard both of them mutter 'bad enough we live with a family of them'.

Either way, we went out to the Old Port to have our day of 'fun'...which didn't turn out so bad. If you had ever been to a festival, you know how lively and fun they can be. And Montreal has so many festivals during every year....like the jazz festival, the matsuri, the just for laughs festival and various others. Usually, I wouldn't attend the matsuri fest, but it was very nice and very well funded by the boys (where and how they have the money, I'll never know or ask). We went to the vending stalls first, buying up lots of treats to eat while we had fun out in the sun. I also bought a few boxes of Pocky for my sister, because I knew she'd be angry at me for not taking her out and forgetting to buy her some stuff.

After the vendors we went on to play games through the day...Well, I did. Severus just watched while Draco ran off somewhere with some gypsy girl. I was trying to win myself a fish, but it just wasn't any fish...it was a very beautiful male guppy with the loveliest and rare blue blue tail you had ever seen--but I was having problems catching it. Usually, people would have to catch a goldfish--and there was a stall for that--but since they gave the choice of getting an assorted fishie...I couldn't resist! At home I have two large tanks full of fish. One has different types, while one is just full of guppies. And when I spotted this little darling amongst the other variety swimming around I gave up around twenty bucks trying to catch it.

How you can catch a fish at one of these games is that you get a bowl and a paper screen which is really delicate. What you're supposed to do is to catch the fish with the screen and lob it into your bowl. But the thing is...it takes a lot of skill...otherwise, you break your paper screen and have to buy another one. As long as your screen doesn't break, you can keep trying. But once it's gone...tsk!

I sat in front of that stall for at least an hour, ruining screen after screen trying to get the rascal. I did catch a few other fish in my attempts like a tetra and a couple of small tiger fish. Sweaty, tired and feeling my legs fall asleep and my stomach cramp, I declared defeat.

"That little bugger does NOT want to be caught!" I said, sighing heavily. I looked at the tank of fish sadly, still longing to get the cute little guppy. Severus nodded in understanding, taking a small interest in the tank as he leaned over to inspect it.

"...Which one was it?" he asked, still peering into the water. I pointed out the fish and he nodded again. He took out a few coins and handed them over to the owner who in turn gave him a paper screen and a bowl. My eyes bugged out as he began to try and catch the guppy. I sputtered and tried to talk him into reason.

"Severus! Come on, you don't have to do this! S...stop, please! I could always get one from the pet shop!" I told him, blushing in embarrassment. I'm the type who can't stand having others help me. I enjoy doing things for myself. But there he had gone and tried his best to get the fish for me. After about five tries (around three dollars) he got me the little guppy I had sat so long trying to catch. He held it out to me in its little plastic bag. I didn't say anything and neither did he.

"Just take it already. You're making a scene." he said, finally. Without a word, I gingerly lifted the bag from his hand, face in an obvious red. After that we just walked around a bit more before going for dinner.

* * *

Dinner had been a pretty private affair, just between Severus and I. Apparently, Draco had found a very nice Canadian witch (who was supposedly pureblood) and had decided to go out with her for the night, leaving behind a few things he had purchased with us to take home. One of them had been an early birthday present for me which boggled my mind. One, because he knew when my birthday was when I specifically didn't tell him. And two, for the fact that he had bought me a magnificent red kimono that I gladly showed off for the city to see...even if Severus and I had chosen to eat in a quaint little Italian restaurant in the downtown ghetto. It was a nice place, one I used to visit very often when I was in high school. It had the best thin crust pizza you had ever tasted and their pasta is to die for! But that's just my opinion...

Still, dinner was mostly quiet...unusually so. I mean, it wasn't as if Severus and I had soul pouring, heart warming conversations most of the time, or anything. Our dinners are usually quiet. We might talk about what went on in the day, perhaps a few spottings of people we knew, but most of the time...we say nothing and just enjoy the silence from the bustling day. That night...the silence was sort of strained. Like there was something that Severus really wanted to tell me, but couldn't. Or perhaps...there had been a secret he wished to tell me.

But it had been alright, if only for that short amount of time...to pretend that everything was alright. I'm good at pretending, I've been told. But I could only pretend so long...especially when someone else is pretending better than me. I think that's a little petty of me, but...

"Severus?"

He looked up at me, looking slightly surprised, as if I had interrupted him in the midst of thought. His face is soon schooled into an expression of irritation--something I'm much more familiar with.

"Yes?" His voice is full of bite, but then...it softened. "...Yes?"

"Is something wrong?" I asked. "The both of you have been acting...odd."

He raised an eyebrow. "How so?" he inquired.

I sighed and shuffled a bit in my seat. I poked at my food, trying to think up the correct way of expressing what I felt...what I wanted to tell him so he wouldn't misunderstand.

"Why are you being so nice?" I asked him before I could stop the flow of words.

"Do I need a reason to be?"

Silence.

"Yes." I laid my fork down, unable to eat another bite of my food. "You...are Severus Snape." I told him, a sharpness in my voice I hardly ever used. "You...have never been known as a fair man...or a nice man." I looked up at him to see his reaction--watch his expression change into something familar such as indignant rage or...or even...something likened to dislike. But he had looked at me calmly, as if expecting this from me...or just that he was used to such words. It wouldn't surprise me. I've probably told him this before...or maybe he had already heard it from someone else...

Many a time have a Severus Snape fan have wanted to tell him this exact speech after Rowling had mentioned it in one of her interviews. Many a time have I wanted to slap him, take him by the shoulders and give the man a good shaking and tell him the speech so many wish they could just say...And I had just said the first few lines of it...

...but I dared not to say the rest.

We went home in silence, Severus picking up the bill. It had gotten chilly when the night came down and he offered to give me his coat. I didn't take it, nor did I decline, but he shrugged it off and set it around my shoulders anyway. Nothing of too great importance happened as we walked down the downtown streets at night. But he did let me take his arm when I thought I saw something in the shadows.

As I rummaged through one of my bags to get my house keys, Severus pulled out one of the parcels Draco had left with us before he ran off with that gypsy girl for the night. It was a long, rectangular box...one that had made my suspicions rise. He gave it to me, mumbling something about my twentieth birthday that was in a while. I opened the box and found exactly what I had expected from someone so practical.

A wand.

You'd think that since I was quite a sensible enough person that I would have thought that the wand wouldn't work for me. But no. I took the wand out of its resting place and gave it a swish. Red sparks came out the end and we both smiled.

"Cherry wood, unicorn hair...ten inches." he said.

"It's beautiful." I replied.

Silence.

"Severus..." I said, my voice cracking a little and I swore that I could feel tears prickling at the corner of my eyes. I didn't know whether it was from that particular gesture or from the whole day or just from this bad feeling that I was getting, but the tears were coming.

Now I know what some of you are thinking. Oh! It's a crying moment! Here he comes with a comforting hug or a passionate kiss! Let me tell you something me buck-o's...Severus Snape does not hug people and Keily Shinra does not kiss men before the third date.

Severus rested a hand on the top of my head, as if that was all I needed. As if I were just a little child...

"You know how to use it, don't you?" he asked quietly.

I nodded. "Yeah..." I answered. "I do."

"Good."

After that, we went our separate ways. Me to my room on the second floor and him to the guest room in the basement. I had tried a few spells with the wand, not really wondering at how I was able to work it. But I didn't do much else with it that night. You'd think that I would have been so excited to have received a working wand from one of the most famous wizards in the whole world...But I didn't. I actually felt pretty bad.

I did my nightly rounds of checking if the house was secure. Windows shut, doors locked, appliances that weren't in use unplugged...that sort of thing. I hadn't checked my messages all day on the net and had been itching to take a look, but weariness won over my addiction to the net, so I went with the rest of my rounds...

I put my newly acquired fish into their respective tanks. I ended up watching my new little guppy for a while, a warmth filling my heart at the sight of it, for one reason or another. It, along with the others, came close to the glass, peering at me with their small eyes. In a fit of sentimentality, I named the little guy 'Severus', before going downstairs to check up on his original.

He had already fallen asleep on the bed, still dressed in his clothes from the day. I took a seat beside him on the floor, leaning against the bed as I look at him. I didn't know what to think as I stared at him like some lovesick fool. I don't think I had thought anything during those few moments of watching him getting some rest. I didn't remember resting my head down on the mattress and closing my eyes...I barely recalled reaching out and taking a bit of his sleeve in my hand.

I guess, despite being like Severus at times...despite my wanting to be a mother...or a maternal figure...in my heart I'm pretty much a kid and all I really wanted was...

* * *

It was around noon on Sunday that I woke-up, warm and tucked in bed. I had my Severus plushie (something that the real Severus abhorred, especially since it had NO LEGS and was missing his RIGHT ARM) in my arms and I felt pleasantly groggy. And then I realized I was in the guest room. Note for all: I HATE sleeping in the guest room. It has pictures of ANTS in it and I ALWAYS get creepy dreams about ants crawling into my ears because of these pictures. PLUS, Severus slept in the bed in the guest room.....

So, Severus plushie on hand, I bolt out of there and head to the main floor, yelling the first thing that came to mind. "Severus!!!"

I had expected some sort of snappish insult or some sort of drawling remark, but nothing came. The house was still; no reply came. I looked around the house, checking to see if anyone was about. No one was there. I was alone. All alone. My parents--who wouldn't notice the End of the World even if it proposed to them on bended knee--had gone out for the day with my little sister and my grandmother had went for a walk. The only noise I could hear were the sounds of my fish tanks.

Feeling a little weirded out, I fed my fish and went to take a shower to calm my nerves. After that I had breakfast and was able to think things through. Perhaps Draco and Severus had gone out? It wouldn't be the first time that they had done so without saying anything and it certainly wouldn't have been the last. But as the day wore on...I became very worried...

Especially after I caught sight of what was on Kenya's blog.

Motherhood

Sorry for not posting in a long time. Real life got in the way--among other things--but I am back. So no worries! As school winds down and summer dawns up here in Canada...most likely I'll live a much more interesting life. But since I am here at the moment, I suppose I should say something of interest...sort of. I found it interesting and a bit distressing. The Twit found it hilarious while our resident Git just smirked knowingly at me.

Alright, as some of you might have realized from my few posts...I have a little sister. She's cute, I suppose. Really annoying at times and she can even get me pretty angry, but hey...she's a kid and I can't really hold it against her. Thing is I've always been called her 'Second Mama', as I take care of her more than my mother does. I know what you're thinking: "Oh, no! Not another teeny bopper who angsts about abusive parents!"

One, I am not a teeny bopper. I haven't been since I was...what...eight? And if it extends to teenage years I won't be nineteen for long. Next month is my twentieth birthday.

Two, my mother is NOT abusive. She's just irresponsible. She loves us just as much as any mother should...she's just bad with money and dealing with kids. She's still loving...to a point. You'd go crazy too if you had a daydreamer twenty year old daughter who isn't employed and a very young daughter who can't fend for herself just yet.

Anyways, I've always did my best for my little sister. Take her to school, prepare her meals, dress her up, get her to go to bed...that sort of thing. I play with her every day, tutor her...everything I wish I could do for my own kids. The topic of children has always been a very, vry, very sensitive point with me since an accident in my childhood wrecked my chance of having kids. Technically I could have kids if I decided to get operations or something of that nature...however...the chance of the child NOT being stillborn, miscarried or having some sort of disease is very low. So I don't have much of a chance of having my own flesh and blood kids.

Quite a few of my friends tell me that I would make a lovely mother by the way I treat them and my little sister. That the kids would be happy no matter what. Ha. If I could have kids.

Today as I took my sister to breakfast at her school I had to ask her a question. I knelt down to ask her if she wanted cereal or bagels and one of her friends pointed out that I talked like a mom. I was both nauseated and happy. A weird combination, I'm sure. Later on, other kids asked if I was my sister's mom and I had to fight back from crying. The cake was when my sister actually hugged me and called me mom.

I wonder if women, by nature, just get very sappy as they got older. I never used to be so emotional as a child. The only times I cried was when I got hurt. I suppose I could've ended up worse.

Snape and I met up at Melange de Magique as I walked home. It was a bit of a tradition now between us. He would head off to check the store while I took my sis to school and then we'd walk home together. We didn't talk to each other much--not that we usually do during our walks together anywhere--but the silence stretched between us seemed a little bit more unbearable than usual.

But things could have been worse.

But things look like they're looking up already.

Excuse the random sappy rant.