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boggled

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I really need to get some sleep and I can't, despite having worked part of the evening and all of the night shift. It's going to be so strange Saturday and I wonder if it was right for me to have invited Jack when so much is expected of me. I really should be there tonight but I don't want to be. And I don't know why.

Mother says I need to gird my loins because the next five years of my life will be weddings and more weddings. Most of them mistakes--her words, not mine, and of course she's not the least bit bitter. She thinks I don't want to go to Melina's party tonight at the Malfoys' because I'm upset that I'm not getting married myself, but I'm not, any more. I'd say I can't believe Melina is, but really, Marco and Melina have been married since we were children; the ceremony's practically an afterthought. She had some adventures while they were apart but she came right back to him like a hawk comes to the glove--and I can't help but wonder what she'd be like if she hadn't been hooded and jessed before she was ten. Of course that's hardly Marco's fault.

( Part of it I suppose is that it isn't just Melina's party any more--it's Valeria's party, too. )

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nostalgic

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It feels so very, very odd to watch other people get ready for school when I'm not going myself. Maybe I should have gone home last night, but we got to working after Hadrian and Endymion went up to bed. Fiammetta is so excited! I wonder how Cousin Alanna is taking it. I'm really sad that I'm not getting to see that; hopefully Mother and Addie are. Normally Alanna would be staying with us, as Justin once did--but Cousin Mike won't have his children around Lavinia.

I feel very sorry, actually, for my brother and Endymion (who haven't come out of their room yet). I can't imagine what it would be like to be either of them, going to school the morning after Endymion's poor defenceless reputation was shredded like lettuce and served as a side dish next to Daddy's and Lady Malfoy's. Hadrian will say he doesn't care, and even mostly mean it--but eventually he'll draw blood if people are careless talking about it, and Marvell ought to remember that Endymion is her mother's fosterling, but she won't, and she won't protect them like I would have done, and like Addie would if she could.

Hadrian is so very proud, and proud of Endymion, and forgiving of every mad thing he's done, because that is my brother's nature.

Daddy and Lavinia have so much work to do. I told them I'd take the boys and Fia to King's Cross, and I will. Even if Lavinia comes too.

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frustrated

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Well, everyone but me is going to school, and I am finally happy not to be going back--even if it does feel exceedingly strange not to be.

I had dinner with Charles. He's been trying to get me to go out with him for weeks. Even before Derek and I broke up. So it was easier to go than to keep putting him off, and he is very handsome.

I even considered him as a short-term option for fun and games, briefly, but then I realised that I have never actually heard him say anything nice about anyone other than me, or the people I'm related to. Which means that eventually, after he got what he wanted, he'd treat me the same way he does everyone else.

Not my thing.

That Zitek boy was awfully sweet, even if he was a cocky bastard with self-admittedly shitty impulse control. But he's married (and Mother says his wife is gorgeous, even when rabid) and he's fucking his brother. And he's had Endymion.

Why are all the decent ones so bloody overcirculated? Oh, yes. Probably has something to do with this bloody WAR we keep having. Damn it.

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irritated

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I don't know what's worse. Arianwen and Marlie and Corinne and Poppy being so damn sympathetic, my mother being so damn pleased, Laurens being so damn superior (well, clearly not that, I'm used to it), or Jameson being so awkward. Just because Jameson Wilkes "took" my virginity (it might be more accurate to say that I threw it at him until it stuck, except that being as how it was Jameson Wilkes, I didn't exactly have to keep doing it until my arm was tired) and knows I've just been dumped does not mean he needs to be awkward about admitting to Mum that he knows perfectly well that his nephew has eloped with Hadrian!

(I asked Arianwen why she wasn't more upset about that and she informed me blithely that Hadrian was absolutely apologetic and even more absolutely impotent with her. Apparently he has nice hands, although he was adamant that he wasn't using his mouth, which is more than I wanted to know about my little brother.)

Of course Charles Lamercier is being equally infuriating about being right. Mustn't leave that one out, because he's a Yank too and he went to school with Derek and he told me Derek was a wanker when I started seeing him. But what was I supposed to do, go out with the Silly Blond Thing just because he wanted me to? (Among the things I am trying to wash out of my brain tonight, along with Hadrian's sexual foibles, is something Corinne told me about the Silly Blond Thing last night when we had all had altogether too much to drink after leaving my mother's house. On the other hand, if I don't wash it out of my brain, I could always tell Arianwen. Who might be interested in checking it out for herself...)

Which apparently I don't think of as my house any more, even though I technically still live here.

I wonder if Mum missed any of Daddy's port or brandy when she cleaned out his things. Surely she didn't know all of his hiding places. Failing that, Hadrian and his sweetheart said they left me something in his old room, but I'm really not in the mood for absinthe.

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depressed

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There's nothing quite so much fun as breakfast with Mother and Luna and Addie and Marlie. Speaking from a purely sarcastic perspective, of course. Arianwen is still at Olive Hornby's place. Not that I blame her.

I'm going to speak to Corinne later today. Poppy Pomfrey is moving out of the house where she and some of the other journeymen and magistri have been living, and I think I am going to take Poppy Pomfrey's old rooms as soon as Addie has gone off to school. Mother and Luna need some time to themselves to figure out what they're actually doing (above and beyond the obvious) and I didn't have the heart to tell either Addie or Mother that I'd broken it off with Derek Greene--not this morning, anyway.

Mother seems to be getting over Daddy and Lavinia. At least she didn't react to seeing them out and about in the papers. She wasn't very happy about Hadrian though.

I'm so used to thinking of Endymion as an owlish waif, with big round spectacles and messy hair, that I seem to have managed not to notice him growing up to be beautiful, with a smile you could die for. I suppose that's what comes of having known him since before we went to school--I didn't really pay attention to the changes over time.

I didn't see Mother and Luna coming and I didn't think Hadrian and Endymion would go back together either. I don't know why I think I know anything at all about people these days.

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heartbroken!!!!

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Damn him anyway. He's just a bloody stupid foolish man. And he doesn't trust me.

I don't care what his family wants to do. Nobody asked them. If he trusted me, he wouldn't want that contract. I am not going to sign it. If he wants to go back to the Lost Colonies and marry bloody Agatha D'Ascalle, I don't bloody care!

Luna is here. I saw his hat on the coat tree. Luna is here and Addie has gone to bed and Arianwen is staying with Olive Hornby again and I don't know where Marlie is and I don't suppose I care to know, either.

Daddy has Lavinia, Mum has Luna, Hadrian has Endymion and I'm not ever getting married. I wish I were more interested in girls--they make more sense. Maybe I'll just have a child of my own when I want one, like Lavinia did. All my very own. Since Hadrian probably won't pass on the family name, I might as well. If I don't I'll probably grow up to be a strange old hag with a pink cottage and ninety-three cats!

I'm going to have a nice long bath and I'm going to actually fill the tub.

He can have his stupid ring back, too.

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awake

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Oh, shite.

I suppose Mum figured him out after all. It was bound to happen eventually.

Do I stay in here and let them go on thinking I'm asleep? What am I going to say to her after he leaves? When are Addie and Hadrian supposed to be home? Did Marlie and Arianwen go with them?

Oh Jesus Holy God and fuck. All we need now is a lightning rain.