homemade dynamite

I. HISTORY & BACKGROUND

Many things could be said about Mudungus Fletcher—not many of them flattering—but it could not be said the con artist who so deftly move through the magical world was without his charms. It was what kept him out of Azkaban, and it was, his daughter would later reflect, what catalyst for her entire existence. What else but an immense amount of charm could have swayed her birth mother, a young, Pureblood socialite—who’d, in a fleeting moment of rebellion, found herself at the Hog’s Head on a hot summer night 23 years ago—give her father the time of day, even for one night?

Regardless of what the pureblood princess who’d birthed her had in mind that night, it was clear Stassi herself was not part of the plan. A romp with a degenerate like Mudungus Fletcher could be overlooked, but a child born out of wedlock to him? Was too much for her, or her family, to bear. And so she bore it in secret for nine months, and on January 21, 2002, Anatasia Fletcher came into the world. Given her father’s name, because her mother knew, even at birth, she would not be keeping her.

And whatever other flaws Mudungus might have (and Stassi could testify, there were many) he did keep her. When she was dropped off on his doorstep by a house elf only a week after her birth, he kept her, and raised her, in whatever way he knew how. And if he were a bit more absent than he ought to have been—-if Stassi spent much of her childhood alone while Mudungus was out, making shady deals in shadier places, he at least always came home to her. He, at least, did not toss her out like yesterday’s trash, to be somebody else’s problem. Her childhood was not what one would call stable—-how could it be, with a career criminal for a father?—-but it was informative, and Stassi was nothing if not a quick learner.

II. HOGWARTS & CURRENTLY

Stassi arrived at Hogwarts with secondhand robes and caustic wit that worked well to cover any insecurity she had. It was hard, at times, to come face to face with those who turned her nose up at her—-not necessarily because she cared about their opinion in particular, but because in their place she always imagined the woman who’d given birth to her, the flaws they would mock her for, she imagined, were all the reasons she was so unceremoniously given up. She was sorted into Ravenclaw, but traditional academics were never really her forte—-maybe a result of growing up around con artists and manipulation, but what Stassi truly understood? People.

Hogwarts got more bearable in her later years, when Stassi got better at containing her anger and resentment—or drowning it out in firewhiskey when she couldn’t. She was friendly enough, but not normally a friend; letting people close to you was just allowing them the chance to abandon you later  on, so far as she was concerned. Still, there were a few that slipped through the cracks.