𝗔𝗖𝗧 𝗜 ━━ 𝗧𝗛𝗘 𝗣𝗘𝗥𝗙𝗘𝗖𝗧 𝗦𝗧𝗔𝗥𝗧
039. monsters and madness

( song for the chapter:
matilda — harry styles )

WIZARDING WORLD, 1968

          𝗧𝗛𝗘𝗥𝗘 𝗪𝗔𝗦 𝗦𝗢𝗠𝗘𝗧𝗛𝗜𝗡𝗚 𝗜𝗡𝗛𝗘𝗥𝗘𝗡𝗧𝗟𝗬 𝗪𝗥𝗢𝗡𝗚 𝗪𝗜𝗧𝗛 𝗧𝗛𝗘 punishing existence of being a girl. Some called it hormones. Others called it hysteria—the kind of bullshit made up to make women look deranged. That wasn't particularly true most of the time; girls weren't crazy. They weren't monsters.

      Scarlet Bridget had quite a difficult time to make herself believe it. She was seven when the nightmares started and all she could think about was the fact that she is a crazy monster. She sees the world like one of those freaks in St Mungo's and a voice lingers in her mind, groaning all the ways she could destroy something precious. Perhaps the concept of insanity ran too deep in her fucked-up bloodstream.

      The rest of the English families—the pureblooded ones, they either envied or feared the Bridgets. Only the Bridgets themselves were allowed to acknowledge they might even be born cursed.

      Then it was their anger. It was ugly, violent and made the back of Scarlet's neck crawl with fear that one day she wouldn't be able to hold back. Her anger was a tether, growing thin and frayed over the course of centuries of ancestral rage, and every push and pull twisted the urge deeper into the pit of her stomach.

"Where were you last night?" Celeste Bridget asked her husband who just entered the living room after disappearing for two days.

She dressed up perfectly even though she hadn't set foot outside. The thousand galleons worth of pieces of jewellery glinting under the eye-twitchingly bright chandelier of the Bridget Manor.

"None of your damn business."

All of their arguments started this way. Something about the curse of a rotten, loveless marriage that made them incapable of being near each other. It was a small ember to ignite the flame.

"Oh well, excuse me for caring. Next time, I won't wait late for you."

"Do you have to start this bullshit this early? I've got a headache."

It was the first time Scarlet heard her father say he's got a headache. Zircon Bridget was a strong man—incapable of showing vulnerabilities. She took note of his father's health, Celeste did not.

"Salazar, it's one in the afternoon, I wouldn't exactly call that early."

Celeste looked like she knew the mistake the moment she made it, and sucked in a sharp breath, waiting to be struck down in her place. Scarlet's eyes shot up from her book—she always had a book in her hand, in case a situation required her avoidance and she had an excuse to pay attention elsewhere. An unspoken threat hung in the air over a heavy paise, and she shivered at the shadow that overcame her father's face.

"Don't you ever—"

"I know, I know. I–I'm sorry. I didn't mean to. It was an accident." She put one of her hands up, palm facing away from her face in a defensive manner. As though anything could strike at any moment.

Moments like this made Scarlet feel small. Weak, how easy it was for her to deflate into this simpering child that cowered from her father's rage.

"I should've listened to them," Zircon seethed at his wife who was still sitting down, clutching onto the wooden table tightly. Her knuckles washed over into this cream-white colour. "When they said Celeste Malfoy is fucked in the head."

"You know I'm not like that anymore," It was Celeste's biggest role—to prove to the pureblood community that she is not that immature rebel anymore. She grew up.

"You're disgraceful."

"You're the worst." Celeste snapped through gritted teeth.

"Is that right?" the tension swelled and Zircon's lips curled up at the slightest. He stared at Celeste as though she were prey and he was ready to hunt her.

"Yeah, it is! All you do is make our lives fucking miserable!" She yelled, and he looked satisfied enough that he got through her. Scarlet could only think of her father as some unnatural creature, the way he only smirked as Celeste started to raise her voice. As though it was exactly what he wanted.

"D'you think you'd be any better if I was gone? You'd be even more miserable if I died."

"You should. I wish you would."

Scarlet told herself she would not recall what happened next. It was a blur, it will become a faded memory when she grows up. However, that afternoon, she remembered it all too well. The trauma was drilled into her head. The tragedy of it all made her doubt if she could ever escape it. The never-ending days in her haunted home, the endless stream of contempt, the ongoing crisis between her parents being unable to coexist without ripping each other to pieces.

A part of Scarlet also wished her father did die. At nine, she could not understand the momentum of the wish she desperately wanted to come true.

"Scarlet, go inside."

"No." She replied. Zircon sent her an astonished look, an angry look in his bloodshot eyes. But along with that anger, there was a sense of pride. He was glad the way she replied. He wanted her to reply to everybody in that way.

Bridgets don't answer to anybody.

Not even their own family.

"Don't you dare do this in front of her." Celeste warned.

Zircon only saw this as an opportunity to teach Scarlet a life lesson—they don't answer to anybody.

"And what the hell are you gonna do to stop me?"

"You're a bad father—!" she started to scream as soon as Zircon started to march up to her.

A clap of thunder echoed across the room. The sting of his wedding ring ripped across her cheek. Everything went quiet.

Scarlet blinked back the traitorous tears slipping through the cracks of her facade.

"I fuckin' hate you!"

"Yeah? I hate you more." Zircon picked up a bottle of wine that Celeste was drinking initially and threw it across the room. And it landed on the window behind the couch Scarlet sat on. She watched the pieces of glass crumbling down, breaking apart in perfect harmony—as though everything occurred in slow-mo. Then a piece landed on her jaw.

      Her head felt heavy—perhaps in fear, perhaps in confusion. She didn't flinch or cry at the stinging pain on her left jaw, right around the corner of her ear. Letting out a small whimper, she touched the pained part of her face, pulling out the piece of glass.

      Then the ringing came back. She couldn't hear her mother's cries, her questions only echoed in her mind and then faded away into the air. The corners of her eyes were blurry.

      Then came the look of regret on Zircon's face. His anger dropped with a flip of a coin, and he dashed towards her. She felt both of his parents' hands roaming all over her cheeks and hair, searching endlessly for the broken pieces of glass that could have landed on her.

      Unfortunately, they could not see the piece of broken glass that stabbed right into her heart that afternoon.

      Scarlet heard the endless apologises, the countless use of the word 'sorry' from her father.

      Then Celeste pulled out her wand and directed it right against Zircon's neck. He stopped. Frozen. Unable to act.

"You shall never, and I mean ever cause harm to my daughter again, and if you dare do such a thing, I'll kill you myself." It was the most expressive she ever saw her mother be. Scarlet lived in a house where everybody folded their feelings into a neat pile and hid it in a dark basement. 

      Feelings were not something the Bridgets would talk about—unless it was burning anger. 

      Anger was something that always existed.

      But not in the Malfoys. Malfoys were cruel. They were not unfeeling. They were never angry towards their own family and had the ability to exist harmonically.

      It was that afternoon, the moment Zircon had the undying audacity to cause harm to her daughter, that Celeste truly felt like she was a Bridget by marriage. That burning anger. The never-ending sizzling in her heart.

      Silence reigned, and the lights inside dimmed until the windows went black. 

HOGWARTS, PRESENT

      SCARLET DID NOT KNOW WHAT CAUSED that same old anger she felt to make a return. She was known to be collected and calm no matter what he circumstances were.

After muttering the passcode, she pushed through the entrance of the common room whilst it was quite late at night. Then came a series of clapping from the group of Slytherins.

A light chuckle left her crimson lips. "Are my eyes deceiving me, or you're actually on my side?"

"Nonsense, Scarlet, you could kill somebody and we'd still be on your side," Everest ran forward and wrapped her arms around her shortly before pulling away.

The group of friends were sitting on the sofas, discussing their upcoming Quidditch match against Ravenclaws. Scarlet joined them even though she was not on the team.

"When we arrived at the station," Regulus started, referring to himself and his parents. "Some woman was whispering about you acting so viciously, and mum tore them to shreds."

"Mrs Black being empathetic, that's something I haven't witnessed before," Rosier winked as Regulus glared at him for such words.

"The rumour was that he came after your integrity, I guess that's why she defended you." Everest told her friend.

"What matters is that Mulciber got what he deserved," Barty shrugged.

"You said you don't even know what happened." Evan turned to him with a perplexed look.

"Who cares, we all know Scarlet never does any wrong." The Crouch smirked.

Scarlet proudly grinned. "Why thank you, Bart... you all are adorable."  Barty rolled his eyes at her playful and sarcastic tone.

"And Scarlet... you sure know how to choose gifts," Everest gasped, pointing at the bracelet she wore, crystals carved into shapes of light-blue crescent moons and yellow suns. 

      Perhaps, that was the only present Scarlet put any mind to. The moon that represented herself, being brightened up with the presence of the sun that was Everest Chassuer. 

𝑪𝑨𝑹𝑨 𝑺𝑷𝑬𝑨𝑲𝑺:

as you can tell, everest is the james potter
to scarlet's sirius black. 

anywhooo, until the next chapter,
goodbye wattpad.