It was a bright day in Enfield, where the skies hang white in the sky, cloudless; like bloodless skin, yet rain still fell and drenched poor Caroline till her clothes hung to her skin and her chocolate hair stuck to her neck. She'd been caught in it, of course, as the day had begun dry and boring until the heavens opened and rain poured down.
Ma had sent her to get some shopping from the supermarket with Connor, and they'd been caught in the storm on their way back to the bungalow. The weather really did dampen his mood more than usual but he was his regular salty self, arms crossed, mouth pursed into a pout as he stomped beside his whistling sister.
"Don't you have some kind of umbrella in that stick of yours, Cara?" Connor said grouchily, heaving the bag in his arms.
"I'm not allowed to use magic outside of school." She told him, but that was apparently the wrong answer.
"What's the point then?" He sneered.
Cara sighed, a droplet of water dripping off the tip of her nose as she watched Connor stomp ahead, his small figure getting blurry in the heavy rain pour. She didn't like talking about magic with that brat, but she knew he had a right to be mad about it.
"Oi, brat." She called, jogging up to his side and ignoring his sour expression "I do actually have an umbrella, if you want to use it."
"There's no point. I'm already wet." He said.
"…I guess so."
Silence fell between the two, only broken by the odd dog sprinting by them, or the sound of the train horn echoing from nearby or by a child splashing in the puddles. It was sort of uncomfortable.
"How's school been?" She asked, desperate to break the quiet "Your maths teacher – what's her name, Miss Pretty or whatever - was impressed with your final, right?"
"Yeah." Connor muttered "I got 50 out of 51."
"That's awesome! I'm really proud of you." She grinned at him, lips twitching at the corners. She hated to think about how much effort it took to smile at her brother. It made her feel like the biggest shitlord in the universe.
"I didn't do it for you." Connor peered down at his shoes, and for some reason it just made Cara feel worse "…That looked like it hurt."
She frowned and looked away. "Connor, I-" But they were already in their dinky little garden with the rusted gate and wilting flowers, so the conversation was already over. Connor leapt over the gate, and barged into the house with his soaked shoes and dropped the bag onto the counter in the kitchen before sprinting up the stairs and disappearing.
"Won't see him till dinner." Ma commented, shoving clothes into the washing machine. Her eyes were far away, like they always went when thinking about Connor. "How did it go? Did you two talk?"
"I tried, ma." Cara said, unpacking the shopping and beginning to put everything away "But, he's tough."
"It's not easy for him, Cara."
"I know that!" She barked, then closed her eyes when she saw her mother wipe at her eyes "You think I don't know that? Whenever I try to speak about magic, he just gets so upset-"
"Not everything is about magic. Surely you have hobbies outside of that. You two could bond over something else." Mother replied disapprovingly.
"Ma, it's not happening anytime soon." She said.
"Don't say that." Mother exclaimed, grabbing Cara's wrist and pulling. "You will, you can't-"
"Chill out, Lex." Cara whipped her head towards the garage door to see Da standing in the doorway, arms crossed, hair tied messily back "Let the kid go." Ma's hand slowly released Cara's arm, and she turned on her heel with a small noise, starting to make a cup of tea for herself. "Hey, Cara. C'mere for a sec."
She followed him into the garage, taking note of the darts in the dartboard had the Chudley Cannons logo designed on the flight. They were new. His notes from work were sprawled all over the desk in the furthest corner, with books piled up around it like some sort of barricade and towers of notebooks amongst ridiculously thick novels with potions balanced on top of them. There was a small humming of a song in the air, but amongst sound of da boogying to the song, she could hardly make it out. He had a new astronomy poster on the ceiling below the sofa, and by the sofa was nana's beanbag, floating mid-air.
"You've been decorating." She commented dryly, walking further in and closing the door behind her, absently prodding the beanbag with her finger.
"My own little haven." He told her "Could be yours too. Your ma declined. Said it's cruel to keep secrets like this."
"She's not wrong. Not right either, I guess." Cara shrugged, and leapt onto the beanbag, grinning with it stayed floating and wiggled her feet "I'd pay you 50 galleons to organise this shithole."
"No way. This is my shithole. I'll shift my stuff to one side, you can have that side." He waved his hand in her direction "Don't want a coat rack anyway."
"You swine." She laughed, jumping off the beanbag and venturing further forward, reaching for a vial of bubbling black potion that smelt of liquorice. "What's in this? You better not tell me it's from someone at work. I'll tell ma you have this."
Da guffawed and side-eyed her. "No, you won't."
"No, I won't." She agreed "But, still. What is it?"
"Makes your eyes fall out." He told her, laughing a bit manically when she shoved the cork back in and placed it back on the book called 'How to Realise it's Love before it Punches you in the Face.' "I should probably get rid of that before the ministry get their hands on it. Got very sticky fingers they do."
"Do they have right to take things from St. Mungo's?" She asked in surprise, eyebrows raised to her hairline.
"The ministry can do whatever they want. It's filthy." He scoffed, waltzing from the desk to the sofa and falling onto it with an exaggerated sigh "Healer Carter nearly got fired for trying to save a man last Thursday."
"I bet this is confidential." She pointed at him.
"I like to believe you're trustworthy." He winked cheekily.
"Me too." She smiled "So? What was so wrong with Healer Carter saving a man?"
"The man was a werewolf." Da told her "Everyone was terrified of him, afraid he'd…lose it. Curse them. But, it wasn't a full moon, and Healer Carter trusted the man's word. 'I won't hurt you!' He'd said. Screamed, more like." Da inhaled shakily and stood from the sofa, pouring two glasses of firewhiskey and handing her one. He swirled the amber liquid in the glass, staring at it like it hypnotised him.
"Did the man die?" She asked, watching the distraught expression on her da's face. It felt like everybody today was sour. Cara supposed such a feeling was contagious.
"Yeah." Da nodded "Yeah. The head of the floor told Carter that if he pulled another like that he'd be gone in a flash. Gives them a bad name, giving kindness to monsters when there's little enough for the good ones."
"You'd think there would be less discrimination in a hospital." Cara frowned into her glass.
"Since the World Cup, everybody's been on edge." Da answered "Since that riot, and all those people came in injured, anybody different is deemed a threat."
"Isn't that wrong?"
"It's fear, Cara." Da said, turning to her "It's what everything right now is built off."
Cara fell silent, already familiar with her Da's ranting with so much pent up rage that he confided in a fifteen-year-old girl that could do nothing but listen. Maybe, that's all he really needed.
"One day, da." She approached in a way one would to a spooked animal and patted his shoulder "One day, we can live without fear."
"What a beautiful idea." He said whimsically, turning back to her "…Want me to heal that?" He gestured to her arm, where red finger marks were bruised into her wrist, soon to become purple but he didn't wait for her response as he whipped out his wand. The bruise faded back to her regular warm skin.
"You just wanted an excuse to use magic." She grinned, cracking her knuckles "Show off."
"Maybe. Maybe not." He shrugged.
Cara stayed in Da's haven until she'd finished her drink, then placed it back on the desk and left with a wave of the hand. She heard him lock it after her. She knew it was wrong but supposed he was smart keeping it from Connor, he would blow a fuse if he knew.
In the living room, Ma was watching Wayne's World on the telly with her slipper-ed feet on the ottoman. She called for Cara to feed Rowley when he came back then went back to laughing at the film. The sounds of the radio echoed from upstairs, from Connor's room; something about football. Cara didn't care for football herself, she'd tried watching it but it bored her half to death, which just pissed Connor off more.
She found herself standing outside of his bedroom, hand raised to knock but stopping just before her knuckles hit the wood as if saying 'are you sure you want to face this?' and whilst her immediate answer is 'not really' she knocked anyway.
"What, Cara?"
She cracked the door open and peered inside at the messy bedroom, clothes all over the floor, a muddied football in the corner, Connor lay atop the unmade bed, eyes staring up at the glow in the dark stars blu-tacked onto the ceiling.
"What do you want?" Connor sighed in exasperation. What did she want? She wanted to see how Connor was, if he was alright, if he wanted to do something, like go to the park of the cinema to see that new film he wanted to watch-
"What?"
"How'd you know it was me?" She asked curiously.
"Who cares?" He snapped, then groaned under his breath at her raised eyebrow and said "You knock funny. Like, it's uneven."
"Uneven?"
"You wait longer on the third knock." He said, glaring at her "Is that all you wanted? To know how your knocking sounds? That's kind of dumb."
"Con-"
"If you don't want anything, then." Connor pointed to the door after a second of silence, before she could get a word out. It sparked a sudden rush of irritation inside her.
"Don't be like that." She snapped at him "I-!"
"- don't care." Connor snarked back "Just go away."
Cara blinked owlishly at her brother, face slack at the blatant…dislike from him. She swallowed thickly, fisting her hands by her sides and considered fighting him on it, trying to get him to sit with her and just talk to her. She thought that she should tell him exactly what she thought of him in that moment, but she knew for a fact that words would just light that fire inside of him, giving him more reason to despise her.
So, she turned on her heel and left the room without another word. She knew that would piss him off more and as she walked down the hallway to her bedroom, she heard the radio switch off.
Without the gentle hum of the commentator's voice, the house felt oddly quiet. Like, an unsettling sort of quiet. She could hear the quiet volume of Wayne's World, but ma always had it on the lowest setting so it was barely audible. It made her regret leaving Connor without saying something, maybe the football commentator would bring her peace of mind.
Just as she opened the door, she heard a demanding meow from the wind and saw a small, furry little head stuck between two slats of the blinds. "Rowley." She exclaimed, grinning as she rushed over to help the idiot from where he managed to get stuck and let him leap to the floor.
Rowley was a pretty fat tabby cat – whenever Cara tried to put him on a diet, he merely went to any neighbours with cat food and begged, defeating the point of the diet - with giant green eyes and the sharpest claws known to man.
"Meow." Demanded Rowley.
"Okay, okay, you impatient sod. Let's get some food in you." She said, shooing him from her room and following him downstairs to the porch where his food bowl and drink bowl were kept. Rowley ate with the speed of a dying man, then leapt onto her stomach and sunk his nails in, crawling up to her shoulders and resting across them.
"As cute as that was, you prick, that fucking hurt." She cursed quietly, walking back through the house, hand reaching up to scratch behind his ears as she made her way back to her bedroom.
It was the smallest in the house, her parents decided it was fairer if Connor had the biggest room, so she had a room that could fit a single bed, a wardrobe and a desk with very little space for anything else. All her friends said it was small but she preferred the word 'cosy.'
She'd had the walls painted a faint shade of yellow in third year after Luna told her it was the colour of her 'aura' which stuck with her. Her wooden blinds were drawn, letting in lines of light from outside, and the window was open so she could hear the tweeting of the birds on the fence and the woofing of the neighbours Rottweilers. The wall beside her bed was line with the charms Luna gifted her to protect her from dark spirits and whatnot, the girl often spoke about Wrackspurt's and Nargle's and aura's, and whilst others thought she was loony – cue nickname – to her, Luna was one of the sanest people she'd ever met.
Luna's owl had arrived a lot during the holiday, often perching on her windowsill for a snack which it ate whilst Cara read over the letter and scratched out one of her own. Luna had asked if she was excited to start fifth year, and had said how excited she was to be going back to school.
"I'm excited too." Cara said quietly, sitting down and letting Rowley climb down onto her lap, head tilted back to stare up at the ceiling, absently stroking a purring Romney. She didn't have an astronomy poster, or glow in the dark stars. Just, blank, white wall. It made her want to put up a Ravenclaw poster or maybe pin her scarf to the wall, for house loyalties sake, of course. Or for a splash of colour to a bare room.
Luna would appreciate that.
But Caroline Sparks knew that Connor snuck into her room when she was away, and she couldn't blatantly show off like that. She couldn't do that to her brother.