Dinner for One (Open)

The twins were gone. Aisha had prepared the perfect Christmas for the three of them, with the tree and presents and a dinner and overall coolness. But her efforts had been in vain. The day after they returned from Hogwarts, all bright-eyed and happy, a man had shown up at the door. And over tea, he had explained that he was the twins’ father and had come to take them away. All the way to Fiji, where he was living. The twins would have to attend a different school and she would probably never see them again for the rest of her life. They would forget about her in their happy little bubble with their new guardian.

So she had spent Christmas alone, forced to chuck away the presents, strip the Christmas tree of its colourful, bright decorations and flashing lights and eat the turkey and roast potatoes and vegetables by herself. The house was empty and seemed cold, uninviting and desolate, even to her. She couldn’t imagine how she had been happy here before she adopted the twins. It just didn’t seem like home anymore. She was considering moving out, to a cosier apartment somewhere, since this huge house wasn’t necessary when it was only her living here.

To avoid being alone in the huge empty house, she found herself spending much more time out. It started with long shifts at work, every day of the week. But there were rules about how much time she could actually spend working to stop her overworking herself so there was still a lot of time where she had to go home. And she couldn’t visit her mother every day, what with her living miles away and being busy with her own life. A lot of the time she was around shops, restaurants, on walks, anything to keep her out of the house and slightly happy for a tiny bit.

Today, it was a trip to the Leaky Cauldron after work, to grab some dinner, stay until late evening and then go home drunk enough that she wasn’t scared of the house. Aisha apparated there and took a seat at one of the few booths left. It was ridiculously crowded, probably because it was dinnertime and the wizarding world was hungry. She ordered fish and chips and sat back, reading the Daily Prophet while she waited for her food to arrive. It may be a while, what with how busy it was in here.