Sisters; Can't Live With Them, Can't Prank Without Them

The wrong thing at the wrong time

"Missing," said Lione. "Oh no. Poor Lucy."

"This is impossible," I said, knowing full well that it was indeed very possible but not knowing how incredibly probable it was.

Across the room I saw Lucy's brother Colubra get up and walk out to where Lucy was. He was carrying a letter that looked similar to the one now lying on the table.

"I know!" said Gregory. "Parents don't vanish. Or aunts and uncles." He corrected himself, remembering his own links to the missing couple - even though he'd never owned up to it before then. "I mean kiddies do because they're easy to carry off. You just throw them over your shoulder and run away. But adults struggle. And they're bigger too." He seemed to be trying to make up for Lucy's absence by taking her role as the talkative one while the rest of us were speechless. "And a witch and wizard too! How could he do it?"

"Who?" I asked. "Do you mean... do you think Evil creepy guy has something to do with this?"

"Of course I do," said Gregory, rolling her eyes. "Who else do you know who'd be up to something like this? Who else would do something so horrible? We all know it was him."

"We don't know anything," said Lione, quietly, avoiding eye contact with Gregory and me. "No assumptions. We are in way over our head here. We always were." She bit her lip. "Let's try stay out of it this time."

Gregory jumped to his feet. "I'm going to talk to Air Jet."

"No!" Lione's head snapped up and she gave him a meaningful look. "You have no idea what she's going through. Leave her be and let Colubra deal with it." Lione picked up the letter, folded it, and slipped it in to her pocket. She stood up. "I'm going to get my books for first lesson. I'll see you in Transfiguration.

***

Lucy didn't show up for lessons for the rest of the day and Lione was unusually quiet about it. She left Dinner early with a serviette full of food for Lucy. When we got back to the Common Room we found them near the fire with schoolbooks spread in front of them. Lione was giving Lucy that day's homework and teaching her the spell we learnt in Charms. We sat noiselessly down next to them and got on with our own homework. No one said a word. The silence was unbearable. I had to break it. I picked a seemingly safe topic.

"So," I said, being a follower of the belief that all uneasy comments should begin with that word. "Easter holidays coming up then." If only I had seen or understood the warning look Lione shot at me. "We get to pick our subjects for next year, don't we?"

"Yes," said Lione, carefully. "I'm going for Care of Magical Creatures."

"Me too," said Gregory. "How about you Joseph?"

"I was considering Divination," I replied.

Lucy still didn't meet anyone's eye.

"I thought you were against that prediction thing," said Lione.

"Well it can't be that hard can it? Plus any subject that lets you browse over tons of star charts can't be all bad."

"You have to pick at least two," said Gregory. "What else are you picking, Lio?"

Lione shrugged.

"If we get them over the holidays," I mused. "You'll have to pick them while you're at your grandparents, won't you Leigh? While the rest of us stay here."

There wasn't silence after that because both Lione and Gregory sucked in a foreboding breath. Lucy looked up at me. Alarm bells rang in my head and I deeply wished I could take back the words. Take back the conversation. Take back any thought of mine that might make Lucy think about her homeless situation.

"You can stay with us!" Gregory burst out. "I mean you're my cousin no matter what anyone says! I'll make them like you. Not even my family could be cruel enough not to offer you a room now. You are their flesh and blood and all that."

Lucy packed up her books with a strange calmness and left. Lione started banging he head on a book and Gregory shot me the darkest glare I have ever seen. Worse than anything Jane Jordan could have come up with.

"Look," I said. "I'm sorry. I was only trying to help."

"It's all right," said Lione, still bashing herself. "It was bound to come up some time."

"You know what," said Gregory. "It's bound to be Aurors investigating this, right? If not just members of the ministry. They don't know what we know about this. About scary creepy guy. We should investigate this on her own."

Lione jumped to her feet, declared, "You're an idiot!" and marched off.

Gregory looked utterly bewildered. "What?"

***

I saw a huge foreboding house that I just knew was Malfoy Manor. It was large, dark with Slytherin banners hanging out the windows and was surrounded by scary looking black fields. The whole house was shaking as if there was an earthquake. People were running out of it, screaming and waving their arms. People I recognised. Lucy, Gregory, Lione, Laura, Samuel, Robert, Anya, Jane Jordan, Melanie, Snape, Browen, McGonagall, Dumbledore (who, for some reason, was dressed for the beach and carrying a deck chair), Caitlyn, my cousin Jack and Harry Potter were all there running for their lives. The house started to shake more violently and, for an instant, it seemed to fall back on itself then it exploded in a shower of green imps wearing black hats and shorts. The imps landed gracefully and joined hands. They then proceeded to dance around the ruins of the building singing,

"Magic is as Magic does and Magic is as Magic does and Magic is as Magic does and Magic is as Magic does and Magic is as Magic does and Magic is as Magic does and Magic is as Magic does."

One of the imps moved forward so all I could see was a close-up of his head while the others continued to dance and sing, "Magic is as Magic does and Magic is as Magic does," leaving a gap where he had come from.

He winked at me and said, "You'd better wake up now."

I said up straight and screamed. Gregory, Robert and Samuel gave me looks I was sadly getting used to.

***

"Let me tell you 'bout,

Straaaaaaaange things are happening to me!

Straaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaange things

Straaaaaaaaange things are happening to me!

Ain't no doubt about it!

Hey Joe. What have you guys done to Lione recently?"

We glared up at Melanie. "None of your business."

"I mean," she said, ignoring us. "I know she's a bit hung up on Lucy's parents and everything but I'd have thought you guys would have stuck together through something like that. Not tick each other off."

We ignored her. She shrugged and continued singing.

"When somebody loved me,

Everything was beautiful,

Every hour was spent together,

Lives within my heart

When she loved me-"

"Will you knock it off!" Gregory yelled.

Melanie shrunk away. "What?"

"Just... leave us alone."

Melanie actually looked scared as she left. Everyone in the Common Room shuffled away from us.

"I never thought I'd say this," I said. "But she might actually..." I hesitated, genuinely shocked that I was about to admit this. "Be right."

"I know," said Gregory sulkily. "I never thought you'd say that either."

"I meant the whole sticking together thing."

"I know that too."

"I mean they haven't talked to us for days. Lucy's been distant ever since the letter and Lione hasn't said a word since you suggested that we investigate Lucy's parents' disappearance."

"I hate this!" Gregory cried.

"Why don't you apologise?" I suggested.

"I don't even know what I did wrong," he protested. "I didn't call her a girl or anything. How can I apologise for something I don't even know?"

"Well talk to her then. We should both go. Do you really want to incur the wrath of Lione again?"

"Incur?"

"Receive."

"Oh. And-"

"Anger. Like when she made your hair flash..."

"Oh. Oh! We'd better go."

We jumped to our feet and climbed the staircase to the girls' dormitories. Or at least we tried to climb the staircase to the girls' dormitories. We got a few steps up and the whole thing decided to turn in to a slide sending us to the bottom again. A few seconds later Lione and Lucy came sliding down crying "Whee!"

"I love it when boys try to climb the staircase!" Lione cried.

"Great minds think alike, eh?" said Lucy, quietly. "We were just coming to talk to you."

"Are you all right?" Gregory asked with a level of sensitivity that shocked me.

Lucy nodded.

"Why couldn't we get up?" I asked. "What curse did you put on it?"

Lione smiled at me and shook her head. "I didn't do it. It's an automatic reaction to stop boys from getting in to the girls' dormitories. The founders reckoned that boys were sneakier and worse than girls - which, if you ask me, is unfair. I'm so much sneakier than most of the boys I know and proud of it - so they made it so girls can visit the boys but boys can't go anywhere near girls."

"But we've been up there before," I pointed out.

"We bribed Mildred for that," said Lucy.

"Who?"

"The staircase? She's called Mildred. We bribed her."

"With what?"

Lione shrugged and said, "Alcohol," as if it was obvious.

"What?"

"Yeah," said Lucy. "Mildred's a nice person but she's got a bit of an alcohol problem. We got some beer and poured it out at the top. That's why she let you up. But once she's drunk she has a bit of a problem distinguishing between people so that's how Robert and Samuel got up as well."

"And that explains the interesting version of 'I did it my way' you may have heard."

***

I can't presume to say that Lucy was over it then. I don't think she ever got over it. I don't think you can. But Lione had been talking to her in the special way only girls know about and boys fail miserably at. Unless of course they're in a position to talk to a girl objectively and have no ulterior interest. None. At all. Ever. With any girl. A- I think you've probably got it by now. I guess Lucy just got on with life and tried not to let it get in the way. Though I have to say she was quieter afterwards.

Gregory sent dozens of letters to almost his entire family. At least every member that was still living in England. He was determined to get Lucy accepted back in to the Weasley clan so she wouldn't be quite as homeless as she was. He was especially pleased with a letter from his grandparents saying he and Lucy could stay with them over the holidays. Lucy pretended that she wasn't all that bothered but I knew that little note (and the huge amount of gingerbread witches that came with it) thrilled her. I spotted it in her pocket weeks later. We were also still eating gingerbread weeks later. Months later.

So the term went on, and the biscuits slowly evaporated, and we pulled a fair amount of pranks on the school. Nothing spectacular, just average stuff. Lione wet off on the dreaded trip to her Grandparents and we studied for the end of term exams (while eating gingerbread of course) and chose our subjects for our OWLs.

We were sitting on the floor with the forms in front discussing each subject while we munched the gingerbread witches (I realise I'm mentioning these things a lot but you have to realise there was a LOT of gingerbread).

"What about Care of Magical Creatures?" I asked.

"I'm going for that," said Gregory, quickly.

"So's Lione," said Lucy, smiling. "What a coincidence."

Gregory looked panicky. "What?"

Lucy was grinning very widely now. "Nothing. Oh nothing. I was considering Muggle Studies."

"But that's all about Muggles," said Gregory, scornfully. I glared at him. "No offence."

"I know!" said Lucy. "But aren't they just fascinating! I mean electricity is just amazing. How they can get everything working on it when they can't even see it is beyond me."

"What about magic?" I said. "Muggles aren't a primitive species you know."

Lucy and Gregory have me looks that clearly showed they disagreed.

"Magic's different," said Lucy. "It's... magic. Electricity seems to be this amazing force that can do almost anything. It's not just that. I want to learn about their medicine and their telephones. They have pictures that don't move! How can they live with that? Then they have a whole series of pictures that do move!"

"So do we..."

Lucy ignored him, too infatuated by the joys and mysteries of the world of Muggles to pay any attention to anything else. "I want to learn about Football!"

Melanie, who was passing, froze and looked at her strangely. "Lucy, you are the only girl in human history to say that."

"I'm doing Divination," I said, ignoring her (a technique I was an expert at). "And Study of Ancient Runes. I'm not that good at languages but a dead one can't be that hard. It stays the same and that's the sort of stuff I'm good at. Plus no one will mind if I pronounce it wrong because they don't know how it sounds."

"What do you think of Euphonology?" Lucy asked, wobbling her quill between her fingers and covering her hand with ink as she did so.

"What's that?" Gregory asked.

"Oh, they introduced it the year my brother took his options. It's the study of magic through music."

"Sounds boring," said Gregory. "I guess I'll take Divination as well. What do you think Lione will pick?"

To which Lucy burst out in to a large fit of laughter.

When Lione returned a week later and we did find out what she picked Gregory was a bit disappointed.

"You're taking Arithmancy!"

She shrugged. "Yeah? So?"

"Why didn't you take something easy like... Divination."

"I like numbers, what's wrong with that?"

"Everything," Gregory muttered and wandered away.

Lione giggled and turned to Lucy. "How you holding up?"

"I'm doing okay. How were your grandparents?"

Lione groaned. "Same as always. Completely spooky, strict and freaky as always. Why on earth do my parents make me go through that?"

"Maybe they want you to get to know your grandparents. Have a good relationship with them and everything. It's a nice thing to have."

"With my grandparents it's torture. My Grandfather even gave me a test to make sure I remembered every member of my family tree! Birth and death dates and everything! Have they no sanity?"

Lucy giggled. Lione smiled.

"I suppose it could me worse. My mum had to learn her mother's family tree off by heart as well. I only need to know the Lazaro one."

Lucy laughed again, said, "Welcome back Leigh," and went to sit down next to Gregory.

Lione grabbed my shoulder and led me away.

"You're gonna love me," she said, flashing me her most excited smile. "I've got a surprise for you."

I backed away slightly. "What?"

"I've got a pressie for you."

All I could think of was that Gregory was going to kill me.