early childhood
1881 - 1893
1881: she is born in a drafty, old farmhouse to a fifteen year old, wealthy, upper class future debutante from scotland, only having a few moments in the bright, shiny new world before she is swept out of the bedroom by her grandmother and placed into the arms of the farming couple who agreed to adopt her and promised to keep their mouths shut about the whole affair for a decent sum of money. days later, she is christened with her name for the season in which she was born, a gorgeous autumn.
1886: autumn finds joy living in the country, having plenty of room to toddle around and explore. she loves chasing around the chickens, napping with the dog, sitting among the flowers, and watching her father work the land. this year, the family is blessed with a baby boy in the summertime and again, they choose to give him a name to represent the time in which he was born - august. autumn isn't quite happy at first, as she was used to having most of the attention, but in time she loved auggie.
1888: despite being so young, there was nothing that autumn enjoyed more than reading and making up her own stories. she spent a lot of time wheeling auggie around in a wagon and telling him the wild things she'd dream up and read about, especially as she had been attending school and learning quickly. autumn loved school, and simply couldn't get enough, though she tended to not like her teacher who punished her often for her daydreaming habits and impulsive nature. if she managed to go a whole month without a caning or talking to from her teacher, her parents would treat her to a trip to london and might buy her an ice cream, or even better, a new book. this really helped curb some of her school problems, but it didn't fix it completely.
1889: once again, the family is blessed with a new baby and this time it's a little girl. just like her siblings, she is named for the season, a delightful springtime name of rosemary. autumn is enamored with baby rosie and she carries her around everywhere, but only after begging her parents for ages because she thinks she's big enough to handle it. however, autumn is clumsy and one time while showing rosie a newly born calf, she tripped and dropped her. suddenly, a burst of accidental magic came out and it made the ground temporarily bouncy and soft, causing rosie to be just fine. autumn was relieved, of course, but she could hardly believe what happened and she tried to explain it to her parents but they chalked it up to a child's imagination. in the coming weeks, autumn paid more attention to what she was doing, seeing if she could make something magical happen again.
1893: as she got older, autumn couldn't help but wonder why she looked nothing like her siblings, nor her parents - she was redheaded and freckled, whereas they had fair, blonde hair and no freckles. they told her she looked like a cousin of her father's, but as far as she knew, his family had passed so they could never prove it to her, as photographs wouldn't help. still, she was loved dearly by her parents and her siblings, whom she doted on everyday. autumn felt happy at home where she learned womanly trades from her mother, did farming chores with her father, and shared dreams and stories with auggie and rosie. a few more times she noticed her magic come out, but only when she was especially distressed, like when a teacher disciplined her or when she almost set the farmhouse aflame while cooking a shepard's pie. she still didn't know how to explain it, until one day she received a letter from hogwarts school of witchcraft and wizardry and a man came to her home to explain things to her parents. at first, her parents were very apprehensive, as it was unholy to have a witch in the family, and they needed her to stay and help out on the farm, plus it was expensive to send her, even with the first year paid for, but they seem to be starting to crack, and perhaps by september they will agree to let her go. autumn prays everyday that they do, as she is incredibly excited.