Closed Solo Pre-school Jitters

It had been a while since Claire received her acceptance letter, bundled up with the knowledge that magic was real and she was a witch. It didn't make sense to her, even though she'd seen the letter. Even though her dad had told her it was true.

She had spent the entire day on the large oak tree in the park near her house, sitting on one of the lower branches and staring at her acceptance letter. The words were jumbled together from hours of staring at them, but the words 'Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry' stood out, and they replayed in her head over and over again. It was such a silly name for a school, but it felt so significant. So important.

She'd felt so many mixed feelings when she found out that her mom was a witch.

On the one hand, she was disgusted. She'd always had a image of her mom in her head, despite having not seen her since she was too young to remember anything about the woman. She imagined a woman that was tall, proud, and apparently too busy for a daughter and husband. Now, she could only picture her mother as a grotesque woman with boils on her nose, cackling wildly into the night as she abandoned her family. It was an unfair mental image, since Claire had seen plenty of witches at Diagon Alley when buying her school supplies, and they seemed perfectly normal, but years of thinking witches were fictional had taken a toll on her mental image of what it meant to be a witch.

On the other hand, Claire felt betrayed. Her dad, the only person she'd ever known she'd always have in her life, had lied to her. He'd never told her that her mom was a witch. She didn't like being mad at her dad. They didn't talk about her mom much at all over the years, so one little detail about her shouldn't have bothered Claire so much, but she could remember the 'sorry' in his eyes when he told her that her mom was really a witch, and that she could be one too, if she wanted to be.

Claire didn't know for sure that it was much of a choice. Could she be made to go to a magical school whether she wanted or not? She wasn't sure. But part of her wanted to go, if only to see what it was about magic that would have made her mom the person she was. Maybe not raising your children was a cultural thing in magical families?

The voice of her aunts called out from the other side of the park, and Claire hastily stuffed the letter into her pocket, for once not caring if something became wrinkled and worn. She climbed down from the tree, smoothed her shirt which had become slightly disheveled from the climb, and ran to her aunts.

Tomorrow, her life as a witch would begin.