PART ONE


- Prologue -

You would have thought it was the apocalypse and that the world as we knew it was coming to an astonishing and melodramatic end. Honestly.

"Mum," I sighed, exasperated at the extent of her intolerableness. "Really, the living room is fine. Aside from the vase, but that was a complete accident, and Sirius already apologized for that. And if you'd have let Lily fix it, it would have looked just as it did before, absolutely no harm done—"

"Grace. You already know how I feel about magic in my household," she replied impatiently. She turned from me and switched the faucet on, acting as if the dishes were more important than my feeble attempts to console. "Just pick up what's left of the vase and make sure there isn't any glass left on the floor."

"It was an ugly vase anyways. You hated it."

She shut the faucet off and gave me a sharp look. "Grace, just do what I tell you and then you can leave."

"All right, okay." It was pointless. I would leave for the school year, leaving my mother annoyed and fed up with me just as she always was. I should have very well expected it, but I wasn't happy with the idea regardless.

I walked into the living room with the trash can in my hand and found Sirius, James, and Lily all crowded around the television set. They'd apparated here to take me to the train station with them, and in the process Sirius had arrived standing on the table, shattering my mother's vase. The combination of this and the fact that they had "used magic in the household" didn't settle well with my mother, but their apparition here meant she wouldn't have to take me to the train station, and due to this she would just have to tolerate a little bit of magic. When I'd returned to the trio, James was sitting wide-eyed in front of the television screen, and Sirius was twisting the knobs and hitting all the buttons.

Lily was laughing at their amusement, apparently after a defeated attempt to explain the workings of the thing. "No, Sirius, you have to stop pushing everything..." She stopped when she saw me come in, and smiled at me. I returned the gesture half-heartedly. Normally, I would have joked with her about James and Sirius's bewilderment, but I was too worn out from my mother's sore temper.

I took my wand from my sweater pocket and levitated the broken glass into the air and into the rubbish bin. My mother would have a fit if she'd seen me, but she hadn't, and I was in no mood to get on my hands and knees and locate every single shard of glass. Besides, I was of age, so it only made sense, didn't it? I brought the bin back into the kitchen, where my mother had resumed her dish washing.

"Okay, I'm done. I'll get going now," I said to my her, who turned briefly to look at me before I left. "Um, tell Dad I said good-bye when he gets home tonight."

She nodded stiffly, muttered a bye, and turned back around.

I stood there for a moment, and then glanced into the living room, where Sirius, James, and Lily were still laughing. I took a moment to collect my trunk, which sat beside the refrigerator, and left the kitchen without another word.

Sirius caught my eye when I walked back into the living room. "Gracie, have you ever tried this telly thing? It's amazing!"

"Once or twice," I said. I shared a look with Lily, who smiled again. "Should we leave before they break the TV?"

"Probably a good idea," Lily said.

"Come on, children, time to go," I teased, considerably lackluster, and reached over to shut the television off.

"Lily should probably do the disapparating," James commented, "seeing as Sirius tends to apparate onto tables."

"Hey! I already said sorry for that!"

"It's fine, it's fine," I reassured, taking my trunk with one hand and grabbing Sirius's nearby hand with the other. "Let's just go."

The other three joined hands and in a moment the world was nothing but a dizzying blur.


A/N: Thanks for reading the first installment! Chapters get longer from here, promise. :) x