Soundtrack

10. Skyfall by Adele | Ambush in the Sky

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MAXINE

Ever since I left Hogwarts for the summer, I was upset that I never got to say goodbye to the only home that I ever had. I knew that things weren't going to be the same after I left King's Cross that day. It was good, though, going back to the Dursley's house with Harry. So the summer wouldn't be too boring, especially with Harry around. He was always able to cheer me up whenever I was down. Draco did that for me all the time while we were at Hogwarts.

Draco. Where the hell did he go after that night?

It bothered me that he hadn't written to me ever since he left Hogwarts with Snape. I wanted to know if he was okay. I wanted to know if he would come back for me after this war was over for good. All of this was stupid, every bit of it. I knew that what I did back at Hogwarts was stupid, too, and not just because Roxanne practically yelled at me about it. I never liked her, really. She always seemed like a bitch in my eyes, and there was no doubt that she felt the same way about me. But she obviously didn't know what it was like to have feelings for someone. I didn't care if protecting Draco was a bitchy move.

Well, maybe I did care a little bit.

Knock, knock.

"Go away, Harry!" I shouted from the chair that I was sitting in.

"Max, what kind of brother would I be if I let you stay in that bedroom like I have for the past month now?" he pointed out from the other side of the door as I turned around in my chair, facing the window.

"You'd be the best brother ever," I retorted back, looking out the window and watching the empty street. "Just leave me alone, okay?"

I saw Harry's reflection in the window as he opened the door and sat down on the bed beside me. "You're upset, aren't you?"

"Maybe," I muttered, not turning around to face him.

"Do you want to talk about it?" he asked.

I looked down at my hands and sighed. "I don't know if I want to talk about it with you," I replied, shrugging my shoulders.

"Why not? You can always talk to me, you know."

"I know, Harry," I said, turning around and getting up from the chair, plopping down on the bed across from him.

"Then talk to me."

"I can't."

"Why not?"

I rolled my eyes in frustration, shaking my head. "Because what I did was selfish. I know you're still mad at me about what happened back at Hogwarts."

"I never said that I was mad at you," he assured me.

"You probably told the others that you were mad at me. I bet Roxanne would've loved to hear those words come out of your mouth."

"Don't listen to Roxanne. She just likes to get on your nerves, that's all."

"Well, she does a good job at it," I said. "I can't stand her. It's bad enough she made me feel guilty about what I did. Not only that, but she had to open her big mouth about--"

"You and Draco?" Harry finished for me.

I nodded. "Yeah. That."

"Why didn't you tell me about it?"

"About sleeping with Draco?"

"Well, that too, but I was talking about his mission. Why didn't you say anything to me about it?"

I huffed another sigh and shook my head once more. "I was ashamed of what I did. I put my feelings first before anything else. I was only thinking about what I felt for Draco instead of the safety of Dumbledore and the rest of the school. I was worried about Draco and what would happen to him."

"His mission was to kill Dumbledore, Max."

"Yeah, and he almost died because he couldn't do it. He doesn't have the guts to kill someone. You don't know him like I do, Harry. He cares about me. He'd never do anything to hurt me."

"What about the rest of us, Max? What about the Weasleys and everyone else?"

I groaned in frustration, burying my face in my hands. "Look, I'm sorry that all of this happened. I take full blame for all of it. I take blame for Dumbledore's death, the Death Eaters coming in the castle--"

"Max, don't," Harry stopped me. "Don't ever blame yourself for what happened that night. None of it was your fault. You were confused about everything at the time. Blaming yourself for everything only makes it worse."

I gave him a look of sadness and fell back on the bed. "Why do our lives have to be complicated?"

"Because you make it seem more complicated than it already is," he said.

"I know I do."

Harry chuckled and headed downstairs. Because I was tired of being in the bedroom, I followed him. The Dursleys had abandoned the house just a few hours ago, and we didn't blame them. They seemed to know that a war was rising and they didn't want to be right in the middle of it. Voldemort would torture them and eventually kill them if he had to.

"Why does this house feel so empty?" I asked myself.

"Because there's no furniture in it," Harry pointed out in a playful tone.

I whacked his arm as he chuckled at me. "Shut up. You know what I mean."

He smiled at me and I smiled back. I was glad to hear that he wasn't mad at me. I didn't want the others to be mad at me. Roxanne, however, I didn't care what she thought. She never really liked me, anyway.

"Now what?" I asked him.

Suddenly, there was a knock on the door.

"Who is that?" I questioned as Harry went to go answer the door. I followed him and watched him open the door. Smiles went across our faces as we saw who it was.

"Hagrid!" we exclaimed with joy at the same time.

As he was greeting us, Ron came running through the door and gave Harry a hug. I looked outside and ran past the others and practically attacked Elle and Hermione when I saw them.

"Where's Roxanne?" I asked.

"Don't worry, Max. Mrs. Weasley wouldn't let her come," Elle teased.

I rolled my eyes playfully at Elle and laughed. "Who else is here?"

"Oh, you know, just the best group of Gryffindors!" Sam shouted from behind me. "Minus Alex, of course, since he's in Ravenclaw."

I turned around and saw Sam, Josiah, and Alex behind me. I gave each of them a hug. After I gave Alex a hug, I spotted Lysander behind him. I ran over to him and gave him a hug.

"Hey there, Max," he said to me as I pulled away from him.

"It feels like I haven't seen you in forever, Lysander," I told him.

"It's only been a month," he chuckled.

I couldn't help but smile at him. Lysander and I had history. He was my second love. In fourth year, I went out with Cedric and fell in love with him. I watched as he was murdered by Wormtail in front of me during the Triwizard Tournament. Cedric was my first love, and getting over him was the hardest thing in the world for me. Lysander helped me get over Cedric's death. In fifth year, when Voldemort got inside my head, Lysander was there to help me. He was with me during all those nights in the Gryffindor Common Room, comforting me and telling me to shut Voldemort out. Most of the time, I was able to do it when he was around. It was a dark phase for me. Not only did that happen, but Harry was going through the same thing and was constantly ignoring me. Harry was always mad at me at the time, and even the others took his side. Everyone except Lysander. We started to fall for each other, but things began to change between us after that year. Then Draco came into the picture, and my feelings for Lysander went away. While my feelings for Lysander went away, Lysander's feelings for me remained the same. I didn't know what he felt for me now, but I was hoping that we were on good terms, which it looked like we were.

"Why is everyone here?" I asked him.

"To get you and your brother out of here, of course," he replied. "Are you still fucking my cousin?"

"What?"

"Draco. Are you still fucking him?"

"How do you know about that?"

"Roxanne told me."

My blood was beginning to boil. Roxanne told him about us? Oh, right, she never liked the fact that Lysander and I fell for each other. It was because the two were best friends. I didn't know why she had to butt into my life. Was it because I was famous? Was she jealous of me?

"Max! Lysander! Get inside!" Moody yelled at us.

We both went inside and greeted everyone else. Finally, Moody explained to us why they were here. He told us that Harry and I still had the Trace on us, which broke once we turn seventeen, which was four days from now. For a month, he had created the Polyjuice Potion and had a plan for people to impersonate me and Harry, which we did not like.

"No. Absolutely not," Harry said.

"Told you! You owe me five Galleons when we get back to the Burrow," Elle whispered to Hermione. Hermione groaned as a smirk came across Elle's face. "I'm so good at making bets."

"Look, if you think that we're going to let you guys take that stuff--" I started.

"It's not like we haven't risked our lives for you two before," Ron exclaimed.

"This is different, Ron. I mean, you're taking that and becoming us. No. Hell to the no. We won't let you guys do that," I said, folding my arms over my chest.

"Everyone here is of age and they've already agreed to take the risk," Moody told us. "The Weasleys and Mundungus will go as Harry, and the Grangers, Fleur, and Tonks will go as Max. Each of you will have an escort. Harry's escort will be Hagrid, and Max's escort will be Lysander."

"Great," I muttered to myself.

After everyone drank the potion, we all changed clothes and then I went upstairs with Harry and packed my things in my rucksack. After I was done, I looked out the window and saw everyone getting ready to leave.

"Harry?" I said.

"Yeah, Max?" he asked, standing beside me.

"Are you scared right now?" I asked him.

He shook his head. "No. I'm terrified."

I nodded my head. "So am I."

"Come on. Let's go." I followed Harry down the stairs and out the door. I gave him my rucksack and a quick hug and walked towards Lysander, who already had my broom in his hand.

"Ready?" he asked me, raising his eyebrows.

I nodded my head. "I think so. Listen, about earlier--"

"Alright, everyone! Head for the Burrow!" Moody shouted.

I quickly mounted on my broom and got ready to fly. I looked at Lysander and he looked at me. "Don't let me fall, okay?"

"Wouldn't dream of it," he said, giving me a weak smile.

After Moody counted to three, everyone began to fly in the night sky. I flew behind Lysander. I finally caught up with him by the time we were above the clouds. I grabbed my wand from my back pocket, getting ready for whatever was coming our way. I wasn't sure how long it would take to get to the Burrow, but I didn't want it to take a long time.

"There's the Potter girl!"

"No, to your left! She's to your left!"

"Death Eaters," I mumbled to myself. "They've been waiting for us all this time."

"Crucio!" a Death Eater shouted my way, sending the spell right at my side.

I screamed, dodging the spell with my wand and sending a spell back at him. "Stupefy!" I shouted back, knocking the Death Eater off his broom.

"Max, behind you!" Lysander shouted.

I turned around and saw another curse being aimed at me. Lysander saved me by shooting a spell at another Death Eater that was trying to kill me. I didn't realize how many showed up here tonight. It was starting to freak me out a little. I hadn't seen Harry ever since we left the Dursley's house. I hoped he was okay.

Suddenly, I screamed in pain. "Lysander, help me!"

"What is it, Max?"

"It's...him."

That was when I saw him. Voldemort had his wand and he shot the Killing Curse at me. I raised my wand and shot a spell, colliding with his. I noticed that there was another red spell coming from my left. I looked over and saw Harry in the sidecar with Hagrid. After a moment of struggling to not break the colliding spells, Voldemort finally gave in and let go, screaming in defeat and anger.

I sighed in relief and almost fell off my broom from being exhausted. "Lysander...Lysander..."

"Max!" he shouted, trying to catch me before I fell. He tried to hold me and control where he was flying at the same time, but once we were close to the Burrow, he lost control and we fell in the water.

I began to cough and shiver uncontrollably once I felt the water soak through my clothes. "That was fun," I said.

"Are you alright?" he asked.

I nodded in response. "Yeah. You?"

He nodded back. "Yeah, I'm fine. Where are the others?"

"I don't know. They might already be here."

"Maybe. I didn't see them behind us, though."

Lysander helped me up from the water and didn't let go of me. Our eyes locked for a brief moment until we heard people screaming our names from a distance. We grabbed our brooms and walked to the Burrow. Everyone was outside when we got to the front yard. I looked at the front door and saw Roxanne standing there.

"Is it me or does Roxanne look...I don't know, angry?" I whispered to Lysander.

He shook his head. "Nah. She's probably just frustrated."

"Frustrated about what?"

He shrugged. "Dunno. Guess we'll find out in a second."

Roxanne ran over to us and threw herself into Lysander's arms. "I'm glad you're okay, Lysander. Mad-Eye's dead, you know," she said. When she pulled away, she looked at me. "I hope you know that George lost an ear trying to protect you, Maxine."

"To protect me? I didn't see him the entire time I was flying," I told her.

"Really? Because according to Lupin, he was right beside you when that curse hit him," she exclaimed.

"Well, in case you didn't know, Roxanne, but there were four other Max's up in the sky, so it could've been one of them that he was beside," I retorted.

"Oh, stop it, Maxine. Stop putting the blame on someone else when the whole point of the entire mission was about getting you and your brother to safety!"

"I'm sorry that Voldemort wants us dead, Roxanne! I can't help that! I can't protect everyone, you know!"

"Of course you can't! That's why Dumbledore is dead now! He's dead because of you!"

"Roxanne, stop it!" Harry intervened.

I began glaring at her. "Well, I hope you remember what you did to me, Roxanne! I can clearly put the blame on you for what you did to me!"

"What the hell are you going on about now?" she asked, throwing her hands up in the air in frustration.

"You told Lysander and everyone else that I was with Draco! You told them about what happened the night Dumbledore was killed!"

"Well, it was a bitchy move, am I right?" she retorted.

"I don't care if it was a bitchy move, Roxanne! The point is, my private life is none of your business! Why do you care what I do, anyway? Is your life getting boring so now you're trying to ruin everyone else's lives? Who's the bitch now?"

"Shut up, you two!" Sam yelled. "What the hell is wrong with you two?! It's only been a couple of minutes and you two are already at each other's throats!"

"That's because she's selfish and she doesn't care about anyone else but Malfoy! She doesn't care about you guys, Elle and Hermione, my family, not even her own brother! She betrayed all of us! I hope Voldemort kills her and Malfoy!"

"Roxanne!" Ron shouted.

It felt like I was shot in the heart. Even though I didn't like Roxanne, what she said really did hurt. Did she really hate me that much that she wanted me dead? My hatred for Roxanne grew as I ran inside the house and up the stairs into the bathroom. I slammed the door behind me and locked it as well.

"Max!" Harry shouted, banging on the door. "Open the door! Talk to me, Max!"

"Just leave me alone, Harry!" I cried out through the tears that were forming in my eyes. Once I heard Harry walking away from the door, I gave in and cried until I wasn't able to cry anymore.