And Who Might You Be? PV Amanda Sparrow Cl

Entertainment: something that people of all ages, sizes, shapes, and colors sought. And entertainment was exactly what Amanda was on a mission to find that particular afternoon. And for Amanda, there was no better place to be entertained than the library.

Now, Amanda was a rather mischievous child. She spent a lot of her time plotting pranks and executing her schemes at the expense of others. But there were times when even a prankster must have some quiet, chaos-free time to themselves and Amanda’s peaceful getaway could be found within the crisp pages of a book. Her family had shelves upon shelves of them at home, but Amanda was not home, so she would have to make do.

Amanda entered the Hogwarts library and immediately got down to business. She walked straight over to the bookshelves, satchel slung over her shoulder, and began her quest to find a good book. Romance? Nah. Non-fiction? Oh, God no. Sci-fi? Some other time. Amanda began to feel cross. There was no feeling more frustrating than being unable to find reading material. She finally came across a book that looked mildly interesting. It was a tale of magic and danger, a tale of heroics and betrayal. It was filled with daemons, gypsies, and child-nappers. Plus, there were polar bears. Sounds good to me, Amanda thought as she pulled the book off of the shelf.

As she turned around the corner to peruse the library shelves some more, she ran smack dab into a girl. The girl apologized and Amanda’s face lit up with recognition. “Oh my gosh, Kat? I never thought that I’d see you here! It’s been so long! What happened to you? You just up and left and I never heard from you again!” Amanda hugged Katherine. “I’m so happy to see you!”

Katherine was utterly confused. She didn't know this girl and was very confused as to why she was hugging her. She pushed away from the embrace.
"What are you doing? Do I know you?"
But after she let the girls words soak in it all made sense.
"Okay let's say I do know who you are, which I'm not sure I do, when and where did I meet you? Has it been in the last two years in Scotland because if it wasn't I don't remember you I'm sorry."
Years before when Katherine was nine she had an accident. She didn't remember any of it but as she looked into the girls face on memory came to the surface. She was running through the woods. The sky was clear with no clouds visible even though it had rain minutes before. The forest floor was damp but the cool water seeping into her shoes make it feel worth it at the time. The air was cold but Katherine didn't seem to notice the slight discomfort. In the memory, she was running away from someone, but she didn't seem to be doing it in fear. Her past self-started to look back at the person chasing her but before she could see who it was she felt a jolt in her stomach and was back in the library. She grabbed onto a shelf for support before falling into the girl's arms.

When Katherine pushed her away, Amanda was confused. Oh no. Did I do something wrong? Then Katherine asked her when they had met. “Up in the Appalaichains, a few years ago. You don’t remember? My family had a vacation home up there and you were right next door. We would always play together in the woods,” Amanda replied.

When Amanda’s family moved from New York to Los Angeles, her parents had wanted to have the option to go back to the east coast often for vacation, so they had bought a vacation home in the mountains. The first time they went, young Amanda had been skeptical. She didn’t want to leave Los Angeles and go far away. But that all changed when she had met Katherine. They were next door to each other and played quite often. Amanda could remember running through the woods with Katherine, the cool mountain air rushing past her face. Laughter had rung all around them, echoing through the woods. But one summer, Katherine was just gone. Ten-year-old Amanda couldn’t understand why her friend had left her. Amanda had never expected to see Katherine again, much less in the Hogwarts library.

Amanda was brought back to the present when Katherine fell into her arms. “Kat! Kat, are you okay?” Amanda panicked and carried her friend over to a chair and set her in it. “Can you hear me?” Amanda couldn’t lose Katherine, not again.

'Amanda, that was her name,' Katherine remembered. Was she the one there when Katherine had her accident? She must have been because she didn't remember it either. That's the one think Katherine always knew and feared: remembering the person who got her into this mess in the first place. But it didn't feel like she had imagined it. When it haunted her at night she had always thought she would feel anger, that she would explode with the mysterious powers that somehow saved her from dying from extreme brain trauma. But now she understood that Amanda too was saved by her wizard properties. Only she remembered something of her past. Katherine did not. She soon gained back her ability to see straight and the world stopped spinning. She felt like she was going to throw up, either from the sudden flow of understanding or from the dizzying realization that she had gained a memory back from her past.
Katherine stood up straight again. She staggered but remained upright.
"I think we should go sit down," She croaked. As they were walking back to the study area of the library Katherine realized that Amanda had no idea why Katherine had disappeared. Did she not notice the gap in her life missing when she got out of the hospital? The whole situation made no sense to Katherine.

Amanda couldn’t make sense of this whole situation. First, she runs into a friend that she thought was dead in the school library. Then, that friend doesn’t remember her and almost passes out. What next? I’m going to discover that I’m the long-lost heir to some little European country? Amanda agreed to go sit down and walked to the study area with Katherine.

Suddenly, it all hit Amanda. That one gap of a few months where she couldn’t remember anything from. Something must’ve happened. Her parents had told her that she had been playing with her brother Johnny and had fallen out of a tree and hit her head. The more Amanda thought about it, the more Amanda realized that her parents must’ve made something up. But why? Was the truth really so horrible that she couldn’t have heard it? Amanda knew that her parents were only looking out for her, but she was still cross with them. Amanda wanted to grill Katherine, ask her questions that would provide answers that would lead to the truth. She wanted to know what really happened that one summer up in the mountains. But she could only get out two words: “Oh God.”

The two girls made there way over to the tables. As they were sitting down Katherine saw a wave of realization wash over Amanda she stumbled forward and the two girls helped each other into the chairs.
"It hit you didn't it?" Katherine asked, trying to figure out where to start the story. She knew there were many people including Amanda involved in the fall, but she had only met one before Amanda and that girl knew what had happened. Katherine wasn't really surprised that Amanda was hit this hard by it. None of the girls had any memory of the accident, but Katherine just wondered if, like her other friend, Amanda had no memory of that day or something more or less. Not that it made a difference to Katherine. She still didn't have any memory from before that moment. She was still the girl next door who didn't remember her past. She was still torn up about it too. But there wasn't much she could do so she just kept swimming and hoped to get through it alright.
"I know this is difficult but I will explain it I promise."
Katherine wished she didn't have to put so many people through the pain of this. That her mistake has altered so many lives. She felt horrible. What if someone lost a family member and they don't remember them because of her. Katherine knew what that felt like, not knowing who is your family and having to re-learn your sister's name. It was devastating for all of them, but Katherine felt like she was hit the hardest by the weight of it all.

Amanda sat down slowly. She wasn’t quite sure how to process what was happening. Her thoughts tumbled around in her mind, swirling around and around as if they were in a whirlpool. There were so many new questions and queries that Amanda had, but there was one that kept circulating back to the center of her focus: What actually happened? It was as if Amanda was in a thrilling movie, and some big plot-twisting secret was being unearthed. It was always some dark secret, something that that particular character didn’t want to accept. But a little thing called a reality check told Amanda that this wasn’t like that.

Amanda nodded her head when Katherine asked if it hit her. “It hit me, alright. It hit me hard. I had totally forgotten about that gap in my memory until now. I mean, it’s not as drastic as yours, but it’s still there.” Katherine then said that she would explain it. Amanda smiled weakly. “I would like an explanation. It’ll be nice to finally hear the truth.” Amanda didn’t know what to do with herself. Unearthing new knowledge was always a little daunting, especially when you weren’t sure what to expect. But Amanda steeled herself, bracing for whatever Katherine might have to say. It would have had to come to light at some point.

"I don't want you to freak out either, it's really not your fault. When my mom told me about the accident when I finally started questioning about it, the first words out of her mouth were, 'It was an accident honey, but the authorities said you were the first one to fall down and your friends tried to help you but they couldn't get there without jumping. They were just trying to help.' I felt so bad when she said that, so guilty. All of this is my fault. I was the stupid one who fell down the stupid waterfall and I was the one you came down to get. You fell down from a lower height to try to get to me and you hit your head. I wasn't supposed to survive but my father came and helped through some of the surgeries, in secret of course, and got my health back up. He said he couldn't do anything about my memory he said meddling with one's head can have worse consequences than leaving it alone."
Katherine sighed and felt a slick tear slide gracefully down her face.
"I'm so sorry. I ruined your life I know but I'm so sorry."

Amanda sat there and listened as Katherine told her all about the incident. When the other girl finished, Amanda stared at the table, letting everything sink in. “Wow, uh, okay. Your life was the one that got ruined, not mine. I mean, we sold that vacation home shortly afterwards but that was no big deal. And it’s not your fault that we went down to help you. We wanted to. We were concerned about our friend and so we took the risk. We knew what we were doing.” Amanda gave her friend a hug. “You don’t have to apologize, Kat.”

Amanda wondered why her parents hadn’t just told her what had actually happened. Maybe they thought that Katherine had died and didn’t want Amanda to have to carry that burden. Maybe they just wanted Amanda to be able to move on. She sighed and rubbed her eyes. This was all very confusing. “Just curious, who were those other people? I don’t remember any of them.” Wait, Amanda thought as she tried to grasp the wisp of a memory that floated through her mind. But just like that, it was gone. Amanda frowned. Not remembering was extremely frustrating. It was like hearing about something that happened to someone else, only that someone else was actually you.