The silence, when Jamie stopped playing, felt more noticeable to Julia than his off season, prancing tune.  It felt heavy, the silent background, like it was listening.  Everyone in the castle was listening.  Even the silence.  Julia didn’t want to be gossiped about – not in a negative way.  Jamie was right about that.  She knew he was right, and he knew her well.  But she had a hard time accepting the idea that the only girls who were attractive enough to be liked were the girls who misbehaved enough to get themselves talked about in unpleasant conversations.

Julia leaned slightly into Jamie as he put his arm around her, as if to imply a hug without actually stooping to one.  She was beginning to pout, and she knew it.  It was sweet of him to say she wasn’t invisible and all that – it was what he was supposed to say in his official capacity as her best friend – but that didn’t mean that Julia had to believe every word he said if she didn’t want to.  

She scrunched up her nose at the tingles forming in her face and reached for the piano again, starting in with a heavy handed version of Hark, the Herald Angels Sing, banging away at the keys with more energy than really necessary.  

The thing was, she knew perfectly well in her own mind, that it wasn’t so much about “bagging a lad,” as Jamie so aptly put it, as it was about knowing that she was wanted.  A girl who wasn’t fancied by anybody would never have any status worth mentioning around school.  A girl who managed to finish her NEWTS without ever kissing a boy was pathetic.  It didn’t matter how sweet or talented she was – if she wasn’t attractive enough for anybody to fancy her, then she was clearly lacking something.  Julia just didn’t know what it was.  

“Why am I playing a Christmas song?” she asked.  Julia hadn’t really noticed what she was playing, and frowned at her hands, though she kept on with the song.  “Is it almost the holidays yet?  I think I’m ready for a break from school.”



Life unfolds in proportion to your courage.