August 13th, 1889 — Hogsmaede - Binn's Residence

It was past 7 pm, and the sun had gone down as Ronan arrived at the Binns homestead. She moved down to the kitchen door which was at the bottom of a small cobbled stairwell next to the main door and essentially the servants quarts should they have any, which Ronan knew of at least one. She gave a knock and waited, grey eyes looking about her, though there really wasn't much to see besides a bucket here and a shovel there. Her arms folded and unfolded as she waited, and before too long she gave another knock.

@"Alina O'Malley"

  

Lessons and chores. That was what she had done today. Mrs. Binns had been quite willing to allow her into the home. Though they both agreed that doing chores was best as it would not cause Mr. Binns to ask too many questions.

At the moment she was scrubbing the floor, not a complaint to be had. Better than being yelled at. So when the knock was heard, she wasn't the one to get up.

The cook was, well, cooking. A late dinner tonight, and the woman was hard at work and grumbled in annoyance when there came another knock. But at least her hands weren't soaking wet. So she opened the door and gave her best fake smile. "Yes, can I help you?"

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Ronan looked to her daughter, who seemed to stare directly through her, as if she was a nothing, a nobody, a simple beggar at the door. It hurt, it hurt beyond words, and it took everything in her to keep a steady voice, "Got ah minute to talk lass?" Her arms crossed and she shifted from one foot to the next as she waited for an answer.

  

The cook huffed and the fake smile dropped before she returned to work. Never a handsome lad to swoon over, oh no. Alina glanced at the cook as she grumbled a bit with her thoughts. She tried not to snicker, that wouldn't be nice to the woman who was being nice to her so far.

The redhead looked to the woman who hadn't been so nice and sighed. "What is it ma?" She said before returning to scrubbing the floor. She made a promise that she was prepared to keep.

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Ronan didn't step inside, just watched through the doorway as her daughter worked away, well atleast she got her work ethic from her. She took a breath though and eyed the cook, cooks talked, and more so Ella worked here. She didn't want to cause any issues for her sister, who was not nearly this difficult at this age, but then again life wasn't exactly stable during those years. "In private lass." She requested.

  

Was the woman kidding? Seriously? Alina held in a groan before turning to the cook. "I'll be right back. Careful, floors not done yet." She received a grunt in response before getting up.

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Ronan stepped aside to let Alina through the archway and gave a nod to the cook, "Thanks miss." She closed the door and then looked to Alina grabbing a bucket here and there and flipping them over. She sat on one and gestured to the other then her hands moved, fumbling about as she retrieved a smoke. She was nervous about something, and needed something to kick the nerves before the kicked her.

She lit up with the aid of her wand and thought for a moment about how to start this. Martha had told her to be up front, to be honest. Well here it went. "When I was ye age, I eh didn' really have anyone who believed I could do somethin with me life, and so I made ah lot of stupid decisions. I, uh..." She had never really talked about her past, constantly trying to hide it, and in her own way running from it. "gots me Hogwarts letter and ah few months in the year got expelled for, heh, just bout everything. Ran cons, stole, hustled, bettin pools, fightin rings. Heh, one time me broke into the Defense Against the Dark arts class and stole ah bunch of doxies, then went and set up ah fightin pit for 'em. It was interestin...anyway I know ye ain' goin to do anythin like that." She took another drag. "Anyway, gots expelled few months in, and by Christmas me Mam was dead." It was hard to say even after all these years, Ella and her didn't talk about it much if at all, because of the nightmare that came next.

  

So? What was this? Her mother confessing she was wrong? Or trying to prove some point that clearly wasn't being expressed properly? Alina had remained standing. She kept herself from crossing her arms and/or pacing, though that in turn made her feel like sitting down. But she didn't.

At this point, Alina really didn't know what her mother wanted. Did she literally want Alina to go nuts from pure annoyance? Did the woman want to be a monkey again? Because that was a pure accident and not something Alina was ready, or willing, to do again any time soon.

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Ronan was quiet for a long moment, it couldn't be helped as the suppressed memories flew to the forefront of her mind. Finally though she found the courage to speak, "So after me Mam died, me Dah sent me and Ella to ah Magdalene Laundry, a convent sorta for wayward lassies, where ye do laundry in an effort to reprent for ye sins." Her eyes were starting to tear up and she sniffed before quickly trying to wipe them away.

"The nuns there told me I was there because me killed me Mam and caused me sister sufferin, all because of me wicked ways, told me I'd amount to nothin, be nothin, worth nothin, eternally damned. First ye know, didn' believe 'em, but days, weeks, months, years..." She shook her head, "Came to believe I was in hell, and me deserved it. Deserved the beatins, deserved the work, deserved the guilt, and everythin else that came with it, like me Dah and brother dyin, was because I didn' repent hard enough." She couldn't stop the tears now, they just kept coming as she bared a soul that was raw and crushed. "Then ye Dah came along, got me out... and me thought maybe me repented long enough, cause I was given an angel." She sobbed now uncontrollably. "I'm sorry lass, me so sorry." The guilt was still there, the words of those nuns echoed in mind day in and day out. She was a failure, she was responsible for the pains of her family, and the one blessing she had, well as usual she had fucked it up.

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Finally the girl sat down. What else was she going to do? As her mother spoke, she listened. Didn't speak, just listened.

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It took several minutes before Ronan was able to calm, though the woman looked like a mess as her curtain of red wavy hair was drawn back. Her eyes were read and puffy. Her cheeks were stained with tears, and her nose was in desperate need of the hanky she was trying to find in her pocket. A few minutes of searching lead to an old rag she kept.

"Me never had much of ah Mam, she was sick quite ah bit, and me Dah didn' know what to really do with us kids, guess that's why he threw me and Ella away, maybe he just wanted to rid himself of ah devil." She shrugged, "Can' blame him really." She sniffed, "I've never wanted ye to feel thrown away, plagued with the devil at ye back, felt less then what ye are...I never wanted nothin but the best for ye, and me knows I've done ah shitty job of it lass. Ye deserve far better then what I've been able to offer ye." The tears welled up again as she stole a glance to the girl. She had to look away. "Sorry lass." It was said in earnest. She was fighting to get her composure back now, even though on the inside she was dying, because the one good thing in her life, the one thing that kept her moving all these years she had to let go. She wiped her cheeks and blew her nose on the hanky before shoving it back in her pocket and rising to her feet. There, she was honest, and now she supposed she best leave the girl be. Wee bit didn't want nothing to do with her anyway, and who could blame her.

  

The girl sighed after a moment. "I don't see you as the devil, ma. A pain to talk to sometimes, but not the devil." A really big pain sometimes, but she didn't think her mother needed to hear that at the moment.

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Ronan pulled out of her pocket a large pouch of coin. She expected the girl to want nothing more to do with her after this, and based on the past week expected her to leave her for good. In the pouch had to have been 50 galleons, "It's all I got." She said quietly, it was going to Alina anyway. The grey storms in her eyes that held so much fight had died down to a thick fog filled with misery. The girl seemed unphased though and Ronan had nothing left to give her. She had spared every coin she had made, she had denied her own comforts so that the girl could have more. "I'll have the robes altered in ah week." She had bared her soul, and still it appeared not enough, the girl wanted more. She took a deep breath and nodded again, but then turned and headed up the steps. Defeated.

  

Now was the time for Alina to be confused. And as the woman went on, her eyebrow raised. "What are you doing?" She finally asked. This wasn't logical. It didn't benefit either of them in the long run.

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Ronan paused in her step as her daughter called out, not having expected that. She turned. "Leavin ye be?" She said now equally confused. After all Alina had left home and in her own way made it abundantly clear she didn't need no want her mother anymore, which hurt Ronan more than anything, but what could she really do about it? "I mean, ye left home, ye found ye own work, ye act like me the bane of ye existence, what ye expect me to do Alina? Curse ye, drag ye home, and chain ye to the house?"

She shook her head, "Lass, me don' have that kinda energy right now. Me works all day and then most the night. Ye say me ain' got faith in ye, ye bloody wrong. But ye want to fly away from me nest, well..." She gave a shrug and looked away the tears coming back again. "Can' stop ye lass, all can do is make sure ye got the best chance possible, and well ye made it abundantly clear me does ah shit job when in the picture. Anyway, love ye lass...always have, always will." Her voice shook in the end, because she didn't want to say goodbye, but she felt every time she reached out for the girl, the girl pushed her away and ran further. She began to go up the stairs, thinking what she was doing was the right thing.

Ronan had convinced herself she was unwanted and not needed by her own daughter and with no one to tell her she was wrong the demons within were kicking her ass hand over foot. She wasn't perfect, she wasn't always strong, and now she was at her breaking point, too exhausted and overwhelmed by the day in and day out drudgery that was their life, too broken inside with no one to pull her together and tell her it would all be alright.

  

Her shoulders slumped a little, she held in a sigh. "Ma, I only wanted some space. It felt like you weren't listening to me, only telling me I was wrong without staying to figure out if I was right. Having faith doesn't just mean saving money and sending me off. Having faith means... it means listening to what I gotta say too."

She paused a moment, then did sigh. "I left 'cause I didn't want to keep revisiting the same argument. I felt that if we did, one of us would turn the other into something that neither of us intended. And magic would have nothing to do with it." She added with a shrug, clutching her elbows on either side with a slight shiver. She had hated her thoughts and feelings when she had seen red. It hadn't felt like her, but it was. And she needed to figure that out.

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