The Weird Sister
By Chris Lillith
Disclaimer: All the people and places you recognize are owned by J.K. Rowling and are property of Scholastic and Bloomsbury Publishing Companies. And anything that is new belongs to me and may be derived from other writings of people on this site.
Harry Potter was not an ordinary boy. He was a wizard, one of the finest in fact. He was about to start his sixth year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. The last year was one of his most interesting. He had captured Peter Petigrew and cleared the name of his godfather Sirius Black. But Voldemort was still on the rise. It was still being shielded from the wizarding community's eyes. No one wanted to believe that You-Know-Who had returned to power.
Harry was lying on his bed staring up at the ceiling, it was July 30th. It was the eve of his sixteenth birthday. Sirius had been acting oddly all day. Harry lay there pondering what Sirius could be up to.
Harry was used to his godfather being pretty down to earth and pretty mellow. But he had made Harry do homework and chores and what seemed like anything that he could think of to keep Harry occupied. And at dinner he insisted that Harry drink all of his milk. He never, or rarely made Harry do anything. Which actually made harry do more than he normally would have.
Harry fell asleep on top of his bed. Unknown to him Sirius had drugged his milk that night and put him to sleep.
Sirius peeked around the door to make sure Harry was asleep. He came in and picked up his godson with practiced grace and carried him down the stairs and out the door. He put Harry into the sidecar of his flying motorcycle.
And they flew off into the night.
~~~~~
About an hour later Sirius pulled into the Burrow's driveway. Molly was there already and so was Arthur.
"Hello Sirius," said Arthur. "Any trouble on the journey?"
"Well other than not much cloud cover, no, no trouble at all. Harry fell for the milk thing. But, I think he suspected something." Sirius answered.
"Of course he would!" said a voice from behind them. "Why wouldn't he? He has always been pretty good at noticing stuff like that." Ginny had come out of the back door wearing a nightgown and a rather large blue plaid bathrobe.
"Ginny!" squealed Mrs. Weasley. "What are you doing out here? I thought you were asleep upstairs with your brothers!"
"I was asleep until I heard you say that silencing charm on all the rooms. I got curious so I came to see what was going on. Is that Sirius? What is he doing here?"
"Ginny, Sirius is here because it is Harry's birthday," said Arthur.
"If it's Harry's Birthday shouldn't he be with Harry at their house. After all it is midnight."
"You didn't wake up Hermione or Penelope when you came out of the room did you?" Molly asked worriedly.
"No of course I didn't! Those two sleep the sleep of the dead! Ad what's with the interrogation! I didn't do anything I swear! And you still didn't answer my question!" Ginny's famous red headed temper was flaring and she was trying in vain to keep her voice down.
"Ginny, darling, we just had to be sure that you were the only one that was awake. You see we put Harry to sleep with a potion and brought him here for a surprise party tomorrow. Only it was supposed to be a surprise for all of you kids." Arthur could visibly see Ginny's temper deflate. He continued, " Charlie, Bill, Fred and George, and Professor Lupin are all coming tonight. Tomorrow when you all wake up Harry will be asleep on the couch and we would have filled you all in and then shout surprise and so on and so forth."
"So why did you not tell any of us about it?"
Sirius spoke up. "Because Harry, with his amazing powers of perception, would have known that you guys were keeping something from him and that would have made him suspicious and he would have figured it out."
"Oooohhh"
"Ginny we need to get everything set up. You need to back to bed dear," said Mrs. Weasley gently.
"Mum. Do you honestly think that I can go to sleep now? Plus I can help keep everybody in bed in the morning."
"How?" said Sirius. He himself had not thought past that one part of the plan.
"Easy," said Ginny. "I saved some Spell Potion from last year. It's up in my trunk."
"What's 'Spell Potion?" asked Mr. Weasley.
"I won't tell you unless you let me help."
"Ok! You can help! Just incase you hadn't noticed it's 12:15 and if we don't start soon Fred and George will be here before we can get Harry settled and then we'll really be in trouble."
So the four of them got started. Arthur and Ginny carried Harry into the house while Sirius hid his bike in the garage (because if the Weasley twins found it who knows what would happen). Molly was in the kitchen starting the cooking and cleaning that needed to be done.
Fred and George came crashing in through the back door about an hour later. Ginny had just finished squeezing oranges for the juice in the morning and Mrs. Weasley had just put a massive sized birthday cake into her magically enlarged oven. Fred and George had large bags under their eyes and were dragging their feet. They barely put their brooms into the closet before they lumbered up the stairs and crashed into their beds and were fast asleep.
Behind them Ginny said, "How nice to see you too."
She followed them upstairs and silently got a small vial of smoky blue potion off of her shelf and went to all the rooms and put two drops into each of the sleeping people's mouths, those people who didn't know about the surprise anyway.
When she returned downstairs
~~~~~
Sirius and Arthur were in the living room magically putting up decorations. Molly could hear them arguing from the kitchen.
"He would want blue bubbles floating around the ceiling. What do think Arthur?"
"Oh definitely not Sirius. He would like green streamers strung along the edges of the walls up close to the top. Like this here."
"He would not! Blue bubbles!
"Streamers!"
"Bubbles!"
"Streamers!"
"Will you two stop it please!"
Both men looked at Ginny who was standing in the doorway looking rather ticked off.
"If you can't agree then compromise! Honestly, you two are like over-grown five-year-olds. Why don't you have the green streamers around the room and then small blue bubbles that go around the streamers?"
Sirius and Arthur were looking extremely abashed. They were looking like little lost puppies so Ginny decided that she was going to help them without their noticing it.
"I personally think that blue and gold bubbles would look good around just nothing and then have streamers around a sign that says 'Happy Birthday Harry'. But since no one asked me I'll just go back into the kitchen and get yelled at to go to bed and keep out of the way." Ginny let out a large sigh as she slowly turned around and headed back into the kitchen.
"Well, if you put it that way. You can come in here with us," said Arthur. "Just as long as you don't get in the way."
Ginny knew admittance when she heard it. She came in and started directing them what to do. There were a few 'border skirmishes', but other than that everything ran fairly smoothly.
When Mrs. Weasley took the cake out of the oven a little while later. She came to see what had happened to her daughter. She gasped at the wonderful sight that her eyes beheld.
The room had golf-ball-sized bubbles in gold and green floating in random patterns around the ceiling. There was a large sign that read 'Happy 16th Birthday Harry!' written in flowing green script. And the room was filled with a faint gold light that looked like bubbling champagne. It was perfect.
~~~~~
The next morning many people were feeling wide-awake but couldn't get out of bed. It was too comfortable and warm. And no one had anything to do, it was a Saturday.
Hermione lay in the bed next to Ginny's. Ginny was still sound asleep and she and Penelope Clearwater, Percy's girlfriend, were talking.
Hermione had changed from her 4th year, bucktooth, bushy haired, flat-chested self. She was now what you would call an English beauty. She had slightly wavy chestnut brown hair that was down to her waist. Her curves had filled out a little more over the summer and her teeth were just the right size for her face. She had a slight sprinkling of freckles across her nice, slightly pointed nose.
Penelope, on the other hand was a bombshell. Her thick dark hair was perfectly straight and she had dazzling grayish-blue eyes and perfectly straight teeth. She had been Percy's girlfriend at Hogwarts and then again after Barty Crouch died and Percy became second in his Department.
"So what was it like when Percy called you up?" Hermione asked.
"Well, I was quite shocked really," Penelope answered. "I was starting to miss him. Even if he does get to involved in his work and can be a pain in the arse sometimes, he can actually be quite sweet. I was starting to miss those stolen kisses in the hallways in between classes. I was getting so over-working at graduate school that I didn't have time for anyone else. So when Percy called, I didn't have anyone else in my life and I had just graduated, so it just all fit together."
"Yeah," said Ginny, who appeared to be groggily awake. "I wouldn't be surprised if you had a diamond ring on that finger of yours soon. I mean, ever since the two of you got back together, he has been the happiest I that have ever seen him. You could even call him giddy."
They all laughed out loud at this. It was pretty hard to imagine Percy as being giddy.
Their conversation slowly turned to boys and who at school was cute, and so on, you know, girl-talk.
In the room directly above them Percy had his head stuck to the floor listening to every word they were saying. He had a smile plastered on his usually serious face. Penelope really loved him. It's a good thing that he was so lost in 'happy-land' that he didn't hear Ginny's comment about the diamond ring.
Ron, Fred and George were all still fast asleep in their respective rooms and Harry was still in his drugged sleep on the couch.
Sirius, Mrs. Weasley, and Mr. Weasley were all just laying their heads down for a 'short rest' on the dining room table. The food was being kept magically hot and the smells kept from wafting up the stairs to lure young people down.
Bill and Charlie crept in the back door as silently as they possibly could. They had just apperated from the Ministry building in London. Charlie stepped on the loose floorboard in the dining room and instantly all three of the adults jolted up from the table. Sirius was rubbing his eyes and Mr. Weasley was trying in vain to cover a rather large yawn. Mrs. Weasley rose quickly from the table and chided Bill and Charlie for being late and worrying her. She told Charlie to go and wake the girls and bring them down stairs quietly and instructed Bill to silently wake his four brothers.
Charlie knocked gently on the door of the girl's room. He heard some scuffling and then heard his sister's voice. "Who is it?"
"It's me, Charlie. Now all of you get some decent clothes on and come downstairs quietly."
"OK" was the unanimous reply from behind the door.
Bill, on the other hand, was not having as much luck. He was trying, without any reward, to wake Fred and George. Ron and Percy were already on their way down.
Fred and George were near impossible to wake, unless you knew how.
"There are Filibuster Fireworks for free on High Street," Bill said simply.
Fred and George both sat bolt upright and chorused together, "Free Filibuster Fireworks!"
"No not really you two. Now come downstairs."
As he left the room he heard Fred muttering, "We fell for it again old buddy." And George replied, "That we did, that we did."
Bill smiled knowingly at his younger brothers. No matter how old they got they never truly grew up.
Every one was now gathered in the silent kitchen. No one knew what was going on except for the older Weasley brothers except for Percy, who was equally in the dark. Ginny was probably the best liar in the history of the Weasley clan. She never let a hint slip.
Sirius entered followed closely by Mr. and Mrs. Weasley, all nine pairs of eyes turned toward them, some with anticipation, and the others with puzzlement.
Sirius gathered them all together and whispered their directions to them. Slowly merciless smirks spread across their faces. Slowly they all crept into the living room where Harry was asleep on the couch. They all spread out around the couch and Sirius signaled with his fingers, 1… 2… 3…
"HAPPY BIRTHDAY HARRY!" they all yelled as loud as they possibly could.
Harry, who had been sleeping peacefully on the couch, leapt about four feet into the air. HE sat up on the couch clutching at his heart while every one else was on the floor in stitches.
When he caught his breath he yelled, "That wasn't funny!"
This only caused further laughter from the group on the floor.
When everyone had calmed down enough they all went into the kitchen and crowded around the breakfast table.
Mrs. Weasley had out done herself. There were scrambled eggs, sunny-side-up eggs, sausages, bacon, toast, waffles, blueberry pancakes, steaming oatmeal, and fresh squeezed oatmeal, all in vast amounts. Everyone dug in heartily. There was talking and laughter all around.
Just as breakfast was finishing, well actually, after Fred and George had finished their sixth helping, (because every one else was already done) there was a buzzing sound coming out of the fireplace.
Mr. Weasley went to answer it. A woman's head burst out of the fireplace. Arthur gasped in surprise.
"Molly!" he cried. "Molly! Get in here quick! Sirius you too!"
He was blocking the fireplace from view. Harry, Ron, and Hermione, who were sitting on the couch, couldn't see a thing.
Molly and Sirius entered the room at the same time the figure looked at them and vanished from sight.
Molly sat down hard onto the floor.
Arthur was quickly by her side and Sirius was staring at the fireplace as though something was about to come out of it and pounce on him.
Molly was muttering things like, " How could she be? She never sent word. Not even after 15 years. Arthur what are we going to do? What are we going to do?"
AN: Hope you all liked it. Cliffhanger I know, but don't worry the next part is on the way if you all want it that is. Hope you had a Happy Turkey Day.
Chris Lillith