❝WELL, HELLO, LOVE...❞

.・。.・゜✭・.

Goodbyes are always awful, but they are especially terrible when saying goodbye to people who don't like you all that much. It feels a lot like flushing your pet fish down the toilet; you only knew him for three days, but he was nice to have around, and this would be a lot nicer if your mum weren't shouting at you from downstairs to come and have breakfast.

This is why Arabella Sayer is taking as long as possible to finish packing her trunk. She's practically packed already, except for her wand, her History of Magic textbook, and the little red squirrel nibbling a carrot on her windowsill. But she's dreading going downstairs.

It's not really that her family doesn't like her; it's just that, well, they're not really her family. Ara's not related to them, and so they've always done their best to make sure she feels as much like an outsider as possible. She doesn't even call them "Mum" and "Dad"; they've always been Stephen and Calla.

The story she's always been told is that her parents were Muggles who didn't want a Wizarding child, so they gave her to Stephen and Calla to raise, but Ara finds this hard to believe. Not only because whenever she brings up her parents, Stephen and Calla hastily change the subject, but because of the words the Sorting Hat whispered in her ear five years ago.

Ah, an interesting one. You have no idea how powerful you are. Powerful, but gentle.

When your mother sat on this stool, I saw cunning and sharp wit in her.

But you... Bravery, intelligence, compassion... So much empathy...

Better be GRYFFINDOR!

Ara's never mentioned those words to anyone else; she's kept them to herself because they're the only evidence she has that her parents might have been magical, or at least her mother was.

She checks her watch; it's half past two now. She sighs. "We should probably go, huh, Jasper."

Jasper chitters in response, still focused on his carrot.

Ara sighs, pockets her wand, throws A History of Magic into her trunk, and locks it. Then she scoops Jasper off the windowsill and slips him gently into the front pocket of her dungarees. "No more Scabbers, Jasper, isn't that nice? No one to steal your hazelnuts?"

Jasper sniffs, clearly remembering the past few summers with distaste.

Ara drags her trunk down the stairs, wincing at the dull clunk as it hits every single step, and then pulls it into the sitting room, where her family is sitting on the sofa, looking awkward already.

"Well, goodbye, I suppose," she says finally, shoving her hands into the pockets of her trousers uncomfortably. "I'll...see you."

Stephen nods, unusually focused at a spot on the wall beside him. Calla gives her an insincere smile. "Goodbye, dear."

Everett just rolls his eyes.

This happens every summer since her first year, every time she leaves for the Burrow. Ara would much rather be there than here, but she'd love to skip the odd farewells.

The only people in the house Ara really likes are Bea, who's staying with her friend Jane and who she said goodbye to early this morning, and the cat, Hector, who meows sadly from the windowsill, as if to say goodbye.

Deciding against saying anything else, Ara reaches into the pot on the mantle and pulls out a handful of Floo powder. God, she hates traveling this way. But until she can Apparate, it's the only way.

The flames flicker and turn bright green with a loud poof. Ara sends her trunk through first, hoping no one's standing in front of the fireplace on the other end (last summer, Percy dislocated his kneecap), and once it's disappeared, steps in herself. She waves one last goodbye to the awkward party in the sitting room, shouts, "The Burrow!" as loud as she can, and shuts her eyes tight against the revolving fireplace, one hand holding Jasper close to her chest.

And as quick as it began, the spinning ends abruptly and Ara tumbles out of the fireplace, stretching her hands out, watching the floor speed towards her–

A pair of strong hands grabs her and hauls her to her feet before she hits the floor, and Ara looks up into a pair of very familiar blue eyes, twinkling mischievously. "Fallen for me yet, sweetheart?"

"Hi, Charlie." Ara smiles and wraps her arms around his neck tightly. "You still smell like smoke!"

"Hazard of the job. I only just got home a few hours ago." Charlie laughs and lets her go, then turns and shouts up the stairs, "Hey, you lot! Ara's here!"

There's a faint shout of excitement and then the thundering of five pairs of footsteps on the stairs, all chattering loudly. Ara grins. This is what home feels like.

The minute Ara's free of Charlie's arms, Jasper leaps out of her pocket and skitters up one of the chairs, leaping onto the kitchen table and chomping down on a stray hazelnut Ara had in her pocket.

Ginny's the first off the stairs, squealing happily as she collides into Ara's arms. "You're here!"

"Hi," Ara laughs, squeezing Ginny tightly. "I missed you!"

As soon as Ginny lets go, there's a flash of bushy brown hair and the faint smell of ink, and then Ara's being squeezed to death again. Ron waves awkwardly to Hermione's right, and Ara grins at him, waving back.

Then there are two thumps, two loud war-whoops, and George Weasley tackles Ara in a huge bear hug, roaring with laughter. Ara wraps her arms around his neck, giggling as they sway side to side. "Hi, George."

George lets her go, still grinning, and then she sees her other best friend in the world, the one that makes her stomach do flips when he smiles. He raises his eyebrows at her. "Well, hello, love."

Ara smiles back, her stomach turning over and over happily. "Hi, Freddie."

Fred pulls her into a gentle hug, wrapping his arms around her waist, and whispers, "I missed you," in her ear, before kissing the top of her head and letting her go.

"Did I hear right, is that–?" A plump woman with red hair just like her childrens' wearing a floral apron and wellies pokes her head in the room, and when she sees Ara, her eyes light up. "Oh, Ara, dear! It's good to see you, I was just out feeding the chickens–" She pulls Ara into a tight hug, already fussing about how underfed Ara looks and she'll make apple cake fresh for dinner and her bed's already set up in Ginny's room. Ara just closes her eyes and lets Molly's familiar scent wash over her: cinnamon and wildflowers, and just a little bit of earth, probably from the boots.

"Come on, Mum, get off." George tugs at Ara's arm gently, grinning at his mother. "We've got loads to do without you strangling her."

Molly rolls her eyes, releasing Ara, and swats George's hand playfully. "Remember, your father and Bill get home at five tonight!" she calls, turning away from them and heading into the kitchen. "Dinner's at five-thirty!"

"Bill's coming?" Ara raises her eyebrows curiously as she follows the twins up the winding stairs to their bedroom. "I haven't seen him for ages. He doesn't come home every summer, does he?"

"Nah." Fred shrugs. "Probably a hell of a lot more fun in Egypt than here, I'll bet."

"Not in the summer," Ara counters, shaking her head at him.

"I know that." Fred rolls his eyes back at her. "I've been."

"So if Bill and Charlie are here, where are they sleeping?" Ara asks, and George gestures to the door on the third landing, upon which there is a sign, held up by a single thumb tack and which reads: Fred 'n George. Enter at your own risk.

"Our humble abode," George quips, pushing the door open with a grin. "We get to room with ickle Ronnie and his famous friend."

"Lucky us," Fred adds, smirking. "But Harry doesn't get here until tomorrow, so we've a little time to show you all our wondrous new inventions."

"Ooh, yes, please!" Ara drops down onto the nearest bed, the one she knows is Fred's, and crosses her legs underneath her. "Has your mum calmed down a bit, you know, about Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes?"

George grimaces. "Best if you don't mention that, actually. You know her, she can be a bit...tetchy, and what with Percy leaving school and our O.W.L. performance–"

"'Disappointing, even for the two of you,'" Fred says in an uncanny impression of Molly. Ara covers her mouth to keep from laughing out loud. "Mum's not the biggest fan of the joke shop thing, we'll put it that way."

"But you're carrying on?" Ara asks, raising her eyebrows. She hopes they won't give up just because Molly disapproves, because if she's being honest, if there were a list of the things Molly disapproved of, they could pull Bill across the sea from Egypt by paper.

"Of course we are." George winks charmingly at her. "What, you think we'd give up just because Mum had a fit? Oh, how little you know us."

"Behold–" Fred fishes in his pocket and pulls out what looks like a toffee in a yellow wrapper– "Ton-Tongue Toffees! Turns one's tongue into–well, I suppose the name gives it away."

"It should make your tongue at least a foot long, but we haven't been able to test it since Mum found all our stuff," says George, dropping down onto the bed opposite Ara. "We're going with Dad tomorrow to get Harry, and we figured we'd test it on his fat lump of a cousin."

"Oh, don't look like that." Fred sits down next to Ara, shaking his head at her frown. "He's a git and you know it! He deserves it!"

"I don't think anyone deserves to have their tongue stretched out without knowing about it," Ara says honestly, pulling the little pencil stub from her back pocket and dragging it gently across the back of her hand.

"It will be funny, though," Fred says, poking her nose and grinning.

Ara can't help but smile when he does that. "At least tell me you've got an antidote or something."

George grimaces. "Not yet?"

Ara rolls her eyes. "And you two call yourselves inventors!"

"Hey, not fair!" Fred protests, and when she pokes him in the arm, grabs the pillow from the head of the bed and smacks her over the head with it.

Ara's not one to back down from a challenge, so she whips George's pillow out from under his arm and hits Fred right back in the chest.

"Oi!" George grabs her around the waist and holds her still so Fred can hit her again with the pillow. Ara laughs and wrests free of George's grasp just long enough to smack him in the face, sending him flying back onto the bed. Fred snickers, pausing long enough for Ara to hit him, too.

"Hey, you lot, that's the pillow I'll be sleeping on!" Charlie barges into the room and wrenches the pillow out of Ara's arms, but he's laughing, too. Soon, Ginny's in the midst of it all, and someone pushes Ara onto the bed behind her, and then Fred's beside her, shielding her from George's pillow, and they're all roaring with laughter.

This is truly what family feels like, Ara thinks. And she loves it.

.・。.・゜✭・.

ohhh to be a weasley... ;-;

thoughts on the first chapter? it's definitely different than anything else i've published so far, so what do we think?