A/N: First attempt at a Harry Potter fic, brought to you by my love of Sirius Black. The books were my childhood but it has, admittedly, been a few years since I read them (I'm in the process of digging up my old copies - specifically the fifth one, which is when this fic takes place) so I'll definitely end up making a mistake or two, and it likely won't end up being too strictly canon compliant - I'm aiming more for entertainment than accuracy, so I'll have to ask you guys to be lenient when it comes to suspending disbelief. As things stand, for the sake of the plot, I've already altered ages and timing a little - for this little scenario to work out, James and Lily would have to have gotten together at least one or two years earlier than they do in the books, and the remaining Marauders would be a year younger or so than they are in the book (I think).
Honestly, I know it's a cheesy trope/idea but it won't leave me alone so I have to write it to get it out of my system. Hopefully I manage to do it with some amount of originality - or have it be entertaining, at the very least. Title is taken from the Oasis song of the same name.
"A sister?"
Molly Weasley was ashen as she sank into one of the dining chairs in Grimmauld Place.
"It's not possible," Arthur echoed his wife's sentiments, looking around the table as though waiting for a punch-line.
"It is entirely possible," Dumbledore said simply "Seeing as it's true."
The faces around the table all slowly turned to Remus and Sirius for confirmation. The two shared a reluctant look before the Remus sighed.
"James and Lily were very young - as was their relationship. Sixteen, for Merlin's sake. They made a...An informed decision."
"A judgement call," Sirius mumbled.
"You knew?" Molly's voice was dangerously close to a shriek "Both of you?! And you never saw fit to tell that poor boy?"
"Of course we wanted to tell him," Remus sighed "But-"
"It's not possible," Snape snapped from the corner, speaking for the first time since the meeting began "There cannot be a daughter. Did you forget that I attended Hogwarts with you? If such a...a thing had occurred, we would all well know about it. It would be obvious. Wormtail is lying - he must be."
"A bit late for an introduction to the wonders of concealment charms aren't we, Snive-"
Sirius began to snap, none too fond of being called a liar, only to be interrupted by Dumbledore.
"Enough."
The word was said softly and without malice, but it might as well have been a shout for the way it silenced the room. Sirius' jaw clenched but he stopped all the same, instead choosing to resolutely return the black look Snape was sending his way.
"We kept it quiet, covered for them when possible, managed it the best we could. Kept those who knew to a minimum - the Marauders, Albus, a few select professors, the families...Lily, of course," Remus was the one to steer the discussion back on track.
"So where is she?" Molly asked "This sister?"
"There was talk of the Potters taking her. Or the Evans'. They could look after her while James and Lily were at Hogwarts, then by the time they finished their studies they could…" Remus sighed "Well, it didn't work out that way."
"Evidently not," Snape spoke.
"The complications involved in such an arrangement would've been numerous," Dumbledore picked up where Remus left off "Especially seeing as they wished to conceal the child from their peers. Teenagers can be cruel, especially so in a situation such as this. What could they do? Have the grandparents pose as the girl's true parents only to reveal the truth once they left Hogwarts? Rush back home each holiday to care for an infant they were sorely unprepared for?"
"There was a muggle couple who were old friends and neighbours of the Evans' - a couple who, conveniently enough, couldn't conceive. Seemed like a perfect idea at the time. They could take the girl, be her legal guardians, but Lily and James could still see her," Remus continued once he could see the nods in agreement towards Dumbledore's point "The plan was never to separate them, you see. The child was to grow up knowing full well who her real parents were - with a support system in place for when her magic showed."
"They didn't tell the muggles that last part," Sirius snorted.
"I'm sensing a 'but'," Tonks muttered.
"The bastards moved, didn't they?" he replied "Lily gave birth in the early summer, and by the time she came back from Hogwarts for Christmas they were gone, taking the girl - Heather - with them."
This revelation was met with silence. Remus watched Sirius' increasing agitation with a knowing look, Snape stared straight ahead, face an impassive mask, while everybody else seemed lost for words.
"That poor girl," Molly eventually breathed, tears in her eyes.
"James wasn't exactly unfazed either," Sirius muttered.
"They stole her child? Why wasn't something done?!" she ignored his muttering.
"What could be done, Molly?" Remus sighed "It was all perfectly legal - by the laws of both worlds. The agreement for them to stay in touch was just that; an agreement. Nothing more. Nothing binding. It was...Well, it was taken for granted that they'd keep their word. They trusted them."
"The Ministry would never back a move to do anything about it. It would likely be viewed as safer for the adoptive parents to be treated as the parents of a muggleborn would be, rather than stoking frictions between muggles and wizards," Kingsley nodded thoughtfully "Although surely once the girl started Hogwarts, somebody would have told her the truth?"
By 'somebody', it was perfectly clear he was directing his words towards Dumbledore. The headmaster sighed, pushing his spectacles further up his nose.
"Miss Potter - or rather, Miss Heather Barrett, as she is known now - chose not to attend Hogwarts."
"Beauxbatons, then?" Tonks frowned "Strange choice."
"It appears not. She remained in muggle schooling. For all intents and purposes, the girl lives as a muggle."
This was the straw that broke the hippogriff's back, with the table's occupants bursting into an uproar of outrage. The only exception, other than Dumbledore, was Remus, who sat calmly. It didn't take long for Sirius to notice, his surprise sparking into anger.
"You knew?" he asked, tone full of accusations.
"Of course I did, Sirius," Remus replied "I taught at Hogwarts. Did you think I wouldn't have tried to seek her out?"
Sirius paused. In truth, it had never occurred to him. With a flash of guilt, he realised he hadn't even thought to look for the girl himself in the two years following his escape from Azkaban. His focus had been on his godson. He supposed that was the second way he'd wronged the girl - the first being before she was even born.
"You're telling us she refused magical schooling? Is that even allowed?" Molly's voice cut above the din, bringing the attention back to Dumbledore.
"We cannot force attendance," the headmaster replied calmly "Miss Barrett is aware of our world to an extent, and has some limited knowledge of her parentage, but decided not to be part of it. Such is her right."
"Perhaps it would be better if attendance was compulsory," Sirius pointed out "The girl has Death Eaters out looking for her and what to defend herself with? Her fists and her wits?"
A few of the table's occupants murmured in agreement.
"All the Dark Lord has at present is Wormtail's assurances, but they are working to find the midwife who delivered the girl. Seeing as the muggles who adopted her would have naturally taken her to muggle doctors from thereon, and under a name unknown to them, there is little that they might trace from our own medical records, should they obtain access," Snape said "They are moving quickly, however…"
The potions professor seemed to have gotten over his shock, face schooled carefully back into its usual impassive mask. He would never be the type to go as far as to outright say things like "there is hope", but his implications were clear.
"So we need to find her first then," Sirius said, determination shining in his eyes.
"Oh, I'm quite aware of where she is," Dumbledore said, now clearly acting deliberately oblivious to the fresh wave of outrage that this sparked "I have been keeping an eye on her ever since the death of the Potters. But now it seems there is a necessity to place guards on her. Not to her knowledge, of course. The less Miss Barrett knows for now, the better."
Every time Dumbledore referred to her as "Miss Barrett", Sirius had to bite his tongue to stop himself from correcting the man and insisting her call her "Potter". It was almost an insult to Lily and James' memory, to refer to their daughter by the name of the bastards who had stolen her.
"For now?" Tonks echoed.
"At this point, bringing her into our world is unavoidable. If Voldemort knows of her, I see no reason why Harry should not."
The music was deafening, but that was the point of a place like this. The nightclub was small, dark, filled with smoke, and easier to miss than notice in the alleyway it was located in. The walls were plastered with as many photos of muggle rock bands as possible, some of whom Sirius even recognised, and the floor was so sticky that it felt like every step he took was doing its best to rob him of his shoes. Under other circumstances, or perhaps back in his Hogwarts days, Sirius might have enjoyed it, but under these circumstances, he had other things on his mind. On the bright side, Remus looked even more out of place than he did, despite being similarly dressed in the muggle clothing they'd procured, which gave him a good chuckle whenever he spotted the man hovering uncomfortably towards the side of the room looking very much like somebody's parent. What he didn't know was if the discomfort was due to their surroundings, or due to girl on the grimy stage.
While it was common knowledge that Harry was a dead-ringer for James, with the exception of his eyes, Heather Potter (for he refused to think of her as Barrett) was a mix of both of her parents. In the muggle photograph that Dumbledore had provided them with, she had looked very much like Lily. Now, however, her red hair had been dyed black, taking away some of the resemblance. As he watched her, Sirius couldn't help but go back and forth on which he thought she was most like.
She stood to the left, as she had the first time they'd seen her in person the previous night, head bowed as she plucked out a rhythm on the haggard bass guitar slung low against her hips. She looked at the ground more than she did at the small crowd, tightly packed crowd gathered - the few times she did raise her head, her eyes remained lowered. On the seldom occasions that they weren't, they flashed a green matching that of her brother's exactly. Her bone structure was that of her father's, all sharp lines and mischief, but her facial features themselves held Lily's softness. It was like seeing two ghosts at once up on that stage, all depending on her expression at the time. Her smirks and glares were James', without a doubt, but her smiles (which were far rarer, from what he'd seen so far) were her mother's.
In a way, Sirius was relieved that she wasn't the carbon copy that people proclaimed his godson to be. He loved the boy dearly, but there were days when the resemblance was difficult to witness. A blessing and a curse; for even though it reminded him that the boy was a piece of his best friend, it also reminded him of said best friend's absence - and it was something Sirius hardly needed reminding of.
The singer, a lanky blond man, continued to wail, growl and shriek into the microphone. At one point he approached Heather, pressing himself up against her back with a sleazy grin. It wasn't so much the action itself that had Sirius frowning, but the way her lips thinned in return as she stepped towards the edge of the stage to get away from the man, eventually going so far as to put one foot on the barrier separating the stage from the crowd, rising to her tiptoes on the other so as little of her was on the actual stage as possible. A few hands reached out from the crowd to grab at her legs, but she barely seemed to notice. The singer gave a smug smirk towards the back of her head, but otherwise backed off. Across the room, Sirius noticed Remus fixing the man with a distasteful look of his own.
It wasn't until the band had retreated from the stage and the next one was up (the one the crowd had actually gathered to see, if their reaction was anything to go by) that Remus joined Sirius and they turned their attention to the small stall at the back that Heather now sat at with the guitarist, a tall beefy man riddled with tattoos. Leaning back in the plastic chair, she chatted animatedly to the man at her side as she fiddled idly with a pack of cigarettes. T-shirts were lined up on the table in front of them, along with a stack of CDs and what looked like signed photographs. They didn't seem to be making many sales.
"I don't like this," Remus sighed.
"It's more crowded and noisy than I'd have liked, but even if they found her here, they wouldn't do anything in front of so many people. Not yet. They'd need to be more powerful - or more desperate."
"Not that," he shook his head 'Not that that helps. Look at her, Padfoot. She's awfully thin, and she could barely stay on her feet up there."
The same could be said for most in the room, but Sirius could see his point. There did seem to be a difference between whatever was normal here and Heather's appearance. The man at her side was equally dishevelled and worn, but he didn't have the dark circles under his eyes that she did, and his eyes themselves were less glazed over. At least she seemed more at ease without that singer around. The frown on her face while during the incident on stage had made her seem older than her twenty years. Last he'd seen, the singer had been pulling a pretty redhead in the direction of the toilets.
"What would they say if they were alive to see this?" Remus sighed wearily "What would Harry say, if we'd agreed to bring him?"
Sirius' jaw clenched and he said nothing, ignoring the thoughts that insisted they'd failed the woman who wasn't even aware they were watching her now. It would be a lie if he said he regretted refusing his godson's pleas to join them that night. He'd wanted to give in, especially given how lucky he was that Harry was even still talking to him after finding out the knowledge he, Remus and Dumbledore had chosen to withhold. However, it had been an entire war in itself to even be here himself. For now Sirius just had to comfort himself with the fact that, in all likelihood, they'd be bringing Heather directly to her brother before long.
Heather cursed, using the hand that wasn't lugging her bass to pull her jacket around herself as if it would do anything to shield her bare legs from the bitter cold. The leather skirt she wore had seemed like a good idea at the time, but now it was stiff and annoying and it wouldn't bloody stop riding up and she couldn't wait to swap it for a pair of fluffy pyjama trousers. It was late - she'd had to sprint to get the final bus of the night - and the dead streets had her feeling jumpy. It didn't help that all of the streetlights in the area seemed to glow more of an orange light than a white one, casting the streets in a dim glow rather than actually brightening much. Usually it didn't bother her much, but tonight it just felt, well, spooky. Like there were eyes on her.
Gritting her teeth and deciding it was better to be safe than sorry, she picked up her pace and moved her pen knife from her jacket pocket to her sleeve. The only thing of value she had on her was her bass, and she'd be damned if she'd let some mugging bastard have that. Her flat was in a bit of a rough area of North London - but the nicer side of it, at least. The buildings were cleaner and newer on this side, but the people were the same, and she'd long lost count of the amount of leering men she'd ignored cat-calls from as she made her way home at night, picking up her pace while trying to keep any hint of anxiety from her face. On the odd occasion she'd be particularly unlucky and the cat-callers would decide she was worth pursuing, dogging her footsteps and growing increasingly frustrated at her decision to openly ignore them. It was just a feature of the area - one all of her female neighbours resolutely endured and nervously laughed off. At least it meant the rent was cheaper.
However, a nagging feeling told her that this wasn't what was happening tonight. There had been no calls, no whistles, no leers. Hell - no people. The whole situation set her teeth on edge in a way that didn't feel like paranoia. Usually she relished empty streets. It made her feel like the night was her own. Tonight, however, she was certain she could feel eyes on her, and the fact that the owner of said eyes had yet to reveal themselves couldn't mean anything good. With little else to do, she tightened her grip on the knife and pushed on, focusing on thoughts of cups of tea and the blankets piled on her bed.
After what felt like a lifetime, she was through the doors of her apartment block. She was too focused on her various aches and pains, along with how damn cold she was, to pay much mind to the pink-haired woman who paused to hold the door for her on her way in.
A/N: I feel like I should mention that this story is going to touch upon things like addiction/substance abuse (drugs and alcohol) as well as mental health issues (depression and anxiety in particular), along with mentions of past dub-con (I'll put a warning for this in the specific chapter itself), so if reading these themes would negatively affect you then please don't continue reading. I'm hoping it won't be all as dark as I'm making it sound, though. There will definitely also be buckets of snark and fluff mixed in, to keep things bearable.
I know it could easily be Mary-Sue-esque to have the OFC be in a band, so I'm trying to counteract that by having them be pretty unsuccessful and putting more of the focus on the darker side of the alternative-y subculture - it's more of a 'naive dream going down the toilet' scenario than a 'they're the next Guns n' Roses' thing. As far as my plans go, the band itself/performances etc. won't feature very heavily in the story beyond being mentioned.
Finally as much as I love Gary Oldman, I definitely think Sirius was cast older in the movies than he is in the books, and I always tend to picture book!Sirius as looking similar to (if not a slightly older version of) David Oakes as Juan Borgia in the later seasons of The Borgias. I'll put a link or two on my profile to the specific look I personally have in mind when I write this, but it's up to you guys what you want to picture - whatever rocks your socks.
Now that I'm done with my habit of being way too chatty in A/Ns, I hope you guys enjoyed!