Any attempt to rid of the boggart would be futile, she told herself as a wave of panic overcame her. Not only was she staring into the dead, cold stare of the woman whose death she had been responsible for, but now she had to picture her—it—as something funny?

It seemed impossible, but not trying didn’t seem like much of an option at the moment. She gave Rex’s hand one good squeeze before she released him and took one small, single step forward.

“Riddikulus!” she tried, envisioning the dead woman wearing a suit and with a mustache. Try as she did, it did not work; she could only focus on the dead stare even as she tried to envision her in the silliest outfits.

Then again. “Riddikulus!“ she cast, her tone firmer. She imagines the woman being restrained by strings and forced to dance like a puppet. It minimizes the perceived threat—and more importantly, the sudden appearance of puppet strings and a dancing Mrs. Whitledge made Flora giggle.

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Flora seemed to have a bit of luck, her melodic giggle emboldening the Hufflepuff. Rex moved to stand between his cousin and the creature, which reassembled itself to take the form of Uncle Andren, dead on the floor.

"R-Ridikulus!" Rex commanded more boldly than he felt, and then erupted into nervous laughter when Andren became a bear rug with Andren's face.

  

Flora's boggart may have been a manifestation of a deceased Mrs. Whitledge, but in some way Rex's boggart—and even the form it took after the spell was successful—was a tad more unsettling. Perhaps it was because she'd known her pseduo-cousin most of her life, or perhaps it was because the rug was no less unsettling than the image of him dead on the floor, but Flora did not like it. At all.

"I don't imagine you know how to get it back in its container, do you?" she managed after a brief moment of speechlessness.

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"Perhaps if we stun it and drag it?" the Hufflepuff asked, not at all certain—a fact that showed plain as day in his voice.

  

At first the suggestion seemed silly. How would they stun an... Andren... rug? Only then it set in that the rug was still a creature, and most creatures had ways to be subdued.

"Stupefy!" she cast, before she could either agree or disagree with Rex. It did not seem to move, but rugs did not typically move anyways.

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In truth, he had expected a bit of argument from Flora, but she seemed entirely gung-ho as she set about stunning the boggart. Rex couldn't really tell if it had worked, but moved to grab the 'rug' by its rear legs so it might be dragged back into the wardrobe.

"Why Mrs. Whitledge?" he asked as he worked, the question nagging at his mind. She was not like his uncle, was not someone Flora cared about. Hell, Rex hadn't even known she knew the late socialite.

  

The boggart did not make a noise as they worked to drag it back towards the wardrobe, and neither did Flora as Rex began to question her. She knew why it was Mrs. Whitledge, but that was a moment in her life she worked (unsuccessfully, apparently) to forget, and speaking about it with Rex would not help any. She pretended not to hear him, grunting in mild pain as her shoulder bumped into a piece of furniture.

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It was awkward indeed to wrestle the creature back into the wardrobe, and required much of Rex's attention. As he slammed the door gratefully shut, however, the Hufflepuff realized his cousin hadn't answered him.

"Flora?" he asked, brows narrowing slightly. Perhaps she hadn't heard him. "I asked, why should Mrs. Whitledge be your boggart?"

  

Only in the brief moment it took for Rex to shut the wardrobe did it dawn upon Flora that she could lie to him. There were many reasons a girl could fear a corpse—not this corpse, perhaps, but if she prolonged the silence long enough she could probably come up with a reason he would accept.

Only... Flora did not like to Rex. It was a given. She'd never had a reason to lie to him. He was family, and, as far as friends were concerned, he'd always been kind, gentle, and good to her. Sure, she withheld truths from him, like her monthlies that had begun plaguing her at the beginning of the summer, but never directly lied. The guilt on her face was evident by now, and she fidgeted with her hands as they were clasped together in front of her.

"Well," she began, not knowing how to explain to Rex that he was cousins to a criminal, "her death was a terrifying one," she concluded, only it did not sound like she was finished. Something caught in her throat—dust, perhaps—and she coughed.

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Rex thought on that for a moment. To be run down by a carriage was a dire fate, but it had been some years ago now, and surely dead relatives were far more troubling than dead strangers. Aunt Rufina run down by a carriage, for example.

But then... the Mrs. Whitledge boggart hadn't looked so much like a woman run down by a carriage as she did Doctor Frankenstein's monster. The Hufflepuff was missing something.

"I suppose," he allowed skeptically, "but surely as you did not know her in particular, she should not trouble you so much. After all, it's not as though you witnessed what happened!"

  

Flora remained silent, her gaze avoiding Rex's. She wanted to tell him. She needed to tell him. And yet, Flora valued Rex's opinion over anyone's her age—even Sirius or Hesper—and she didn't want him to think her a bad person. She kept her mouth shut.

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   Aldous Crouch

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"Flora," Rex pushed, growing concerned now.

  

Her breathing quickened and grew heavier, and her eyes flickered around the room as if searching for an out. The panic was building, and despite her efforts to avoid his gaze she kept finding it every few seconds. Finally, her bottom lip began to quiver and the inner corners of her eyes began to sting with tears.

"Oh Rex," she bemoaned, sitting on the edge of his bed and burying her face in her palms. She didn't know the best way to explain it, but she had to, didn't she? "We killed her." The words left her mouth in a whisper, and though she dropped her hands she could not lift her head to meet his gaze. "Our carriage—it was so foggy, and—oh, we didn't mean to—but Mama said not to—she said—" She dissolved into broken sobs, her shoulders shaking. The imagine of the zombified Mrs. Whitledge penetrated her mind, and it wouldn't leave.

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At first, Rex didn't properly register what she was saying. All he knew was that Flora was in anguish, and he hastened to sit beside her, wrapping a reassuring (if slightly awkward) arm around his cousin's shoulder.

Then her words sank in.

"You...you killed Mrs. Whitledge?" Rex asked, aghast, his arm dropping back to his side.

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   Flora Mulciber

Flora buried her face into Rex's shoulder as she sobbed. The guilt had been building up inside of her body for so long, and now that it was out in the open—Merlin, he was going to hate her, wasn't he? He dropped his arm from around her and she was forced to look up at him to face his questioning.

"Our carriage hit her," she said in a small voice, suddenly unable to meet his gaze. "I was scared, and Mama told me not to say anything." She sniffed and wiped the tears from her cheeks, trying to maintain what little dignity remained. "I'm such a terrible person. I should have done something, but - but - but what?" She dissolved into tears once again, burying her face in her hands.

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It took several long moments—too long—before Rex could collect himself enough to say anything, let alone something useful. The thought that Flora (not alone, of course) had been responsible for a woman's death was dwarfed only by the thought that she had been carrying the weight of this guilt ever since.

His hand did not return to her shoulder, but did find her own, squeezing it tightly.

"You should have told me," Rex murmured, but even as he said it, the Hufflepuff could see how it would have been impossible for her to do so. Flora would never risk betraying her mother, not even to lighten her own burden.