Chapter 1
Amelia watches the first drops of summer rain race one another down the window.
Her dad hasn’t been home in days, running off the second they got off school. When she got home there was hardly any food in the house and her mum was nearly comatose on her bed.
It’s always this way, and somehow she still hopes that it’ll be different.
Either way, she put herself together and walked her four younger siblings down to the shops. They don’t have much money, but Edgar’s out converting his galleons to pounds so they can eat come next week.
Their parents are magical, but they both gave up their magic when they were teenagers, refusing to practice again. Leaving the rest of the family with muggle money and muggle food.
Her two youngest siblings, Lucy and Liam, both four years old, run chase one another in circles around her legs as she checks items off her list. She laughed when Liam accidentally runs into her and picks him up, placing him in the trolley so he’s free of Lola’s clutches. Her sister pouts, crossing her arms and trailing after Amelia slowly to make her upset known. She ruffles her short black hair.
Amelia fixes a pin in her hair, making sure her space buns don’t fall out with one hand and pushing the trolley with her other. She blows a bright red strand out of her eye and grabs a box of cereal from the shelf.
Her other siblings are a bit older, ages nine and eleven. Margaret, the nine-year-old, has already shown signs of magic while Rowen has all the signs of a squib. But, she supposes, they’ll find out for sure once school starts again in the fall.
Amelia will be going back for her sixth year, Edgar his seventh. She had to beg him to go back, he swore school just wasn’t for him. He’s right in a way, they can’t teach him anything he doesn’t already know.
Their nana used to say that Edgar must’ve been switched at birth, that he was too smart for their family.
Edgar isn’t a bad person, far from it, but they have different methods of doing things. Last year, he started an underground scheme at Hogwarts where he sold fake gillyweed to other students (it was literally transfigured grass). It got them money, sure (he somehow got away with it, she still has no idea how). But Amelia just, you know, got a job instead.
They haven’t been that close in recent years. Sometimes she wonders if it’s her fault.
She’s halfway through the produce aisle when she feels a thump on the top of her head. Amelia reaches up only to find a crumpled up piece of paper atop her head. Rolling her eyes, she unfolds it and smooths it out on the trolley handle.
Come outside . It’s urgent.
It’s in her brother's scratchy handwriting, written with a nearly inkless pen. On the corner of the paper she can see scribbles from where he’d tried (and failed) to get it to work.
Amelia looks up, catching sight of Edgar with his back pressed to the window, smoking a cigarette. She turns to Rowen.
“I’ve got to go for a second, you’re in charge.” She points at him, and then Margaret. “If you steal anything and get caught I’ll pretend like I don’t know you.”
Margaret rolls her eyes and nods, smiling a bit.
She pats Rowen on the shoulder and makes her way out. The rain has started coming down harder, barely missing them off the small portion of roof above their heads outdoors. She’s wearing a light green long sleeve, but it wouldn’t matter either way. It’s not the cold kind of rain.
Ameila holds her hand out to Edgar, watching as he rifles through his leather jacket pocket. “You couldn’t have come inside?”
He hands her a cigarette.
“Magic thing. Didn’t want Rowen to get upset again.”
She nods, remembering the last time they mentioned magic around him, he’d cried the entire night in their mothers arms. Poor kid, she thinks passingly.
“You’re not supposed to use magic outside of school.” Amelia mentions his little paper gesture. He must’ve used a transportation charm.
She snaps her fingers to light the cigarette between her teeth.
Edgar gives her a dry look. “Pot, kettle.” He waves his hand at her.
Amelia smiles, turning her head to blow out a cloud of smoke. “Fair enough.”
She’d picked up smoking from her dad before she could even go to Hogwarts, she thought about putting it down a couple of times, but it helps with her nerves. Besides, nobody ever expects it from her.
When Edgar doesn’t laugh she looks over at him, entirely serious. She’s about to smile wider and fight him into laughing before he turns to her.
“Listen,” He pauses, taking a long drag. “I have a favor to ask you. You’re not going to like it.”
“Okay, walk me through it again.” She says, much later as they walk.
The rain is coming down in light waves now, kissing her cheeks. They went back home after the store to put away groceries, but it wasn’t long before Edgar was dragging her out again, rambling like he’d gone mad. She threw on her raincoat before they left the house, her clear one with little strawberries on it. Even still, her fingers are turning red from the newfound cold.
“A quidditch competition.” He states, as if that clears anything up.
“I don’t play quidditch.”
“Technicality. It’s more… flying. You’ve flown before.”
Amelia scoffs lightly. “Yeah, in second year.”
Edgar puts his hands in his pockets, walking faster to the point where Amelia has to jog a bit to catch up. He looks at his watch anxiously and back up.
“That’s the second part.”
“Where are we going?”
Amelia would do anything for her brother. Really, she’d do anything for just about anybody. She has an awful inability to say no. Regardless, she just wishes he’d actually tell her what she’s meant to be doing.
“To a restaurant. Meeting some of my friends.”
She stops in her tracks, hands stuffed in her pockets.
“Vanity?”
Edgar looks back, pulling out another cigarette and biting it between his teeth. “She’ll be there.”
“She hates me.”
“Emma doesn’t hate you.”
But she does. Amelia knows she does.
Edgar has been friends with Emma since they were eleven, the troublemaker and the infamous half-blood Slytherin.
She’s only met Emma once, two years ago.
Emma had left without a single word every time she entered a room since. She won’t look at her, she won’t speak to her.
“I heard her call me a two-faced bitch.”
Her brother waves his hand flippantly, not really paying attention. He drops his cigarette and crushes it under his heel. The restaurant Edgar leads her into is a nice, clean place with floor-to-ceiling windows that sits between a boutique and a corner store.
Emma is hard to miss.
She sat at a table with Lucinda Talkalot, perched on top of a tall chair with her elbows on the hardwood table. There’s a smile on her face, a small but true one that Amelia is sure she’s never seen before.
Amelia finds that Emma has a way of attracting attention. She doesn’t do anything in particular, but she’s the first person you notice when you walk into a room, she has the kind of radiance that’s only seen elsewhere in the sun.
It’s intimidating. And daunting. And horrible.
She hates it. And her.
The two girls look up as they approach, Emma’s expression turning completely blank. Lucinda is still smiling, though, the kind that lights up her entire face. The kind she reserves for Amelia’s brother.
Wand to her head, Amelia couldn’t tell you how Lucinda feels about her.
The former Quiddich captain (she’s been competing with Emma for the position since fifth year) has been dating Edgar since they were thirteen, and they’ve never once broken up.
Everything feels a bit— stilted with Lucinda. They’ve sat together at lunch when Edgar wasn’t there a couple of times, but everything feels awkward, like they’re both trying too hard.
Amelia even tried to learn more about ballet (Which Lucinda also does— a controversial move for a pureblood Slytherin) so they could make conversation but it didn’t work so well.
Regardless, Lucinda smiles at her (a little less) and pats the seat next to her. She sits down gratefully and eyes her brother expectantly.
“I need a favor.”
Emma looks at him dryly. “So you’ve said.”
“—From you and Lia, Ems.” He intertwines his hands conspiratorially. “It’s about the flying competition Hogwarts is hosting.”
“You want me to drop out.” Vanity says, like a statement.
“—No—“
“—She’s competing?” Amelia looks at Edgar, betrayed.
“Why do you care?”
“Because—“
“Shush!” Lucinda cuts in, holding up her hands as if to physically stop their bickering. “Children, the lot of you.”
She motions for Edgar to continue and he does. “I’m putting Amelia in. Ems, I need you to help her prepare.”
“What’d you want me to do? Sew her a uniform?”
“She can fly, but she isn’t a seeker. That’s the whole competition. Chase the snitch, the last one to drop out wins.”
A lightbulb turns on in her brain as he speaks, and she vaguely remembers Dumbledore talking about a Quidditch competition hosted at Hogwarts for the students.
With a cash prize.
It seemed stupid to her at the time, the whole premise, but then again she never really got Quidditch in the first place.
“We’ll be competitors.”
“It’s Slytherin versus Gryffindor.” Amelia replies, addressing Emma directly.
The other girl ignores her. “It’s in a year. She won’t be beating anybody with a year of practice.”
Ouch. If she was honest, Amelia didn’t really think that she could either, but she didn’t have to say it. Edgar rolls his eyes, and opens his mouth to speak but closes it when the waitress comes over.
They all ordered their drinks before he continued, playing with the wrapper of a straw he’d found on the table. “It’s an optional money competition. There’ll be plenty of people there without much experience. Besides,” He nods at Emma. “You’re a good teacher. Lia’s a quick learner.” Edgar tears the wrapper in two. “You’re practically a match made in…”
“...Heaven?” Lucinda prompts, staring at her boyfriend with an amused stare.
“Yeah, that.”
The two of them, as well as Lola and Liam are purebloods, while Rowen and Margaret are half-bloods from their dad. He didn’t cheat, necessarily, their parents were separated for several years, but Amelia knows her mom resents their muggle mother regardless.
Either way, she doesn’t have much to show for being a pureblood. They’ve been living in the muggle world since her parents separated after the twins, when their parents both gave up their magic.
Still, Edgar spends most of his time in the wizarding world, and half of his time embarrassing himself with getting muggle references wrong.
“Why can’t you do it?” Amelia asks, accepting her strawberry milkshake from the waitress. Her brother’s a much better flier than her.
“I’m banned from quidditch competitions.” He responds blankly, sipping his soda obnoxiously.
“What?”
Lucinda sips her iced tea. “He cheated on the last one and tried to use wandless magic to slow everybody else down.”
Amelia rolls her eyes. “I don’t know why you’re dating him.”
There’s a collective silence at the table before Emma snorts. “ Lucinda was the one casting the spells.”
The sun is just starting to set when she walks out of the restaurant, feeling sick to her stomach and determined at the same time. A train passes nearby, and cars race past across the street next to them, everybody eager to get home.
Edgar is still inside paying, through the window she can see Lucinda leaning on the front desk, laughing at some joke.
She feels in the pocket of her trousers, finding a stray cigarette and digging it out with two fingers. Amelia checks all her pockets, uselessly, for a lighter. She doesn’t need one, obviously, but Emma doesn’t seem to know you can light them with magic. That, or she thinks Amelia is too stupid to do it. Either way, all according to plan.
Amelia makes a point of looking especially distressed before, finally, Emma folds and holds out a lighter with a sharp hand. It’s a black zippo with stickers nearly covering the entire thing. She smiles at her gratefully and receives a glare in return.
She could tell Emma had something weighing on her the entire time they ate, and Amelia knew if she could get her alone her presence alone might be enough to anger it out of her.
Sometimes, people are really predictable.
“Why are you competing?” Emma asks, leaning sideways on the wall beside them, arms crossed.
Amelia takes a long drag, angling her head so the smoke doesn’t hit her. She looks down at her shoe and kicks a rock. “Edgar asked me to.”
“Do you want to?”
She thinks for a moment. “Yes.”
“Why?” Emma says, exasperated.
She looks Emma in the eye for perhaps the first time, and she really studies her. Her pitch black eyes, tinged with desperation. Long, black curls that go in layered waves down her back. It’s the first time she really noticed how pretty she was, just as a fact.
“Because the prize money is twenty thousand galleons.” Amelia pauses, smiling a bit despite herself. “Not everybody has a trust fund, you know.”
Emma Vanity is notorious for having come from a family of quidditch players. It’s her legacy, her entire life.
Amelia wonders if she ever feels pressured, if that’s why she seems so desperate for answers now. Why wouldn’t Amelia want to compete?
Emma shuts down, her glare sharpening. “I don’t know what that’s supposed to-”
“I’m not trying to insult you, Vanity. I’m really not. It’s just a fact. I know why you’re competing, so I’m telling you why I am. My entire family lives in the muggle world because my parents couldn’t hold up jobs in the wizarding world. We’re barely making it as it is. If we got those galleons we could move back. My parents might practice magic again, my siblings can grow up around magic. So, yes. I want to compete. Okay?”
Normally, she would’ve been kinder. But Emma Vanity has a way of exhausting her, it seems.
The other girl stares at her for a long moment.
“Well we’ll have to start now if you want to have a chance. We can’t meet at my house, so I’ll come to yours.” She demands, leaving no room for negotiation.
Amelia is about to reply when Edgar and Lucinda walk out, hand in hand.
“You ready?” He asks, nodding at her.
She looks at Emma, who hasn’t looked away once, and back at her brother.
“Yeah. Let’s go.”