Making Waves

by Lily Lorelei

If there's one thing I'll never understand about my sister, it's her love of messing with people's heads. Making waves, she calls it. I'm more likely to call it making trouble."

Making Waves

By Lily Lorelei

Disclaimer: It's simple, really. Anything you recognize belongs to JKR. Anything you don't belongs to me. Thanks for not suing me!

A/N: Hello, everyone! Lily Lorelei here. My chaptered story, Mimi in the Middle, is having some characterization problems, and so has been deleted for editing. Meanwhile, here is a one-shot inspired by, beta-ed by and dedicated to my sister, Slytheringirlandproud, as a belated birthday present. Never stop making waves. Update 8/25/08: Thank you also to my good friend MysticSorceror for suggesting some helpful changes to be made.

"No one sits with him, he doesn't fit in,
But we feel like we do when we make fun of him.
'Cause you want to belong, do you go along,
'Cause his pain is the price paid for you to belong?
It's not that you hate him or want him to die,
But maybe he goes home and thinks suicide,
Or he comes back to school with a gun at his side,
Any kindness from you might have saved his life...

Heroes are made when you make a choice..."--"Hero," by Superchick

"Okay, how does my hair look?" I asked anxiously, trying to check it in the rain-spattered side mirror outside the car.

"Good enough," replied my sister Jasmine, shutting off the engine. "It's just kids from primary school. I don't know how Melissa even knew where to contact us."

"Oh, I called her to give her our address when we moved, remember?" I said, pulling an umbrella from the back seat. "She's lucky we were in the area. Wasn't it nice of her to invite us to her birthday party?"

"I'm surprised she even remembered us, frankly," said Jasmine, opening her door. "Well, let's get this over with."

"Jasmine! Laurie! Ohmigosh, it's so great to see you guys!" No sooner had I shut the door behind us than we found ourselves veritably smothered by an enthusiastic Melissa. After a moment she took a step back to look at us. "I love your dress, Laurie! Jasmine, those boots are…interesting."

"You like them, Missy?" Jasmine replied, turning her heel to show off her black leather thigh-highs.

"Um, well, drinks are this way. Come on, you have to see everyone!" Melissa led the way into the brightly lit dining room, past a brightly-colored banner that read, "Happy 18th Birthday, Melissa!"

Jasmine sent me a smirk and a wink and followed.

"…And remember that time you slipped in the lunchroom and your skirt flew up?" Jamie laughed. Melissa grinned and blushed at the memory.

"Oh, yeah? What about the time you tried to plant a kiss on Piers Polkiss at recess? He ran so fast!" Jamie groaned.

"I don't know what I saw in that scrawny little rat," she confided, after glancing around to make sure said rat was not in earshot. "Always basking in the benefits of being lackey to Dudley Dursley."

"He, on the other hand, isn't looking so bad these days," I muttered with a glance across the room. Dudley Dursley had certainly changed in the eight years since I had seen him last. Melissa told me he had been involved in the youth wrestling program. It had done wonders to rid him of his leftover baby fat, I'll tell you that much.

"So, Laurie, is Lucy still living with you guys?" Jamie asked, referring to Jasmine's and my miniature dachshund.

"Yup, in fact, I think we brought a picture. Hey, Jasmine! Do you have that picture of Lucy?" Jasmine glanced up from the refreshment table where she was refilling her plate.

"Oh, yeah," she said, pulling it out. A tictac box full of small red pills fell out of the pocket of her denim cut-offs.

"Um, here, you dropped your…pills," said a girl standing nearby.

"Thanks," said Jasmine, sticking the box back into her pocket. Melissa and Jamie gaped.

"Laurie, is your sister on drugs?" Melissa whispered.

"Oh, no, it's just ibuprofen," I said quickly. "She gets migraines a lot." Melissa nodded, relieved. The girl by the table was eyeing Jasmine worriedly. Jasmine noticed this and smirked. She caught my eye and grinned at me.

I smiled and shook my head. If there's one thing I'll never understand about my sister, it's her love of messing with people's heads. Making waves, she calls it. I'm more likely to call it making trouble. I remembered one of my most vivid memories concerning this tendency of Jasmine's. It occurred with these same people, actually, during the few months that Jasmine and I spent at school with them…

"Now, remember, girls, all you have to do is be outgoing. Find someone who looks lonely and go say hi. You'll make friends in no time." Our mother handed us our lunches and stood with us at the door of the classroom. "Are you sure you'll be all right? Remember, if it gets too hard, you can always come back home."

"No one homeschools anymore, Mom," said Jasmine impatiently. "We'll be fine. See you this afternoon."

I bit my lip and waved a last goodbye to my mother as she walked away down the corridor. I turned to follow Jasmine as she pushed open the door and stepped boldly into the classroom.

A pretty little girl with a brunette pixie-cut looked up as we entered. "Oh, are you the new girls?" she asked excitedly, bouncing over to greet us. "I'm Melissa, but you can call me Missy. Are you twins? Miss Keating said you were twins. You don't look like twins. What are your names?"

"Um, I'm Lauren," I said uncertainly.

"Lauren, that's pretty! Can I call you Laurie?" Melissa squealed.

"Um, sure, if you want to," I said, not wanting to offend her. Lorry? What am I, a truck?

Jasmine was regarding this bubbly girl with distaste. I nudged her. "Oh, and I'm Jasmine," she said casually.

"Jasmine, that's so cool! Can I call you Jazzy?" Melissa bubbled.

"No," said Jasmine shortly.

"Oh, okay," said Melissa, looking put out. She took a step back and looked us up and down. "What's with that necklace?" she asked, pointing to Jasmine's choker. It was a black chain with a skull-and-cross-bone emblem.

Jasmine smirked. "Like it? It's my favorite."

Melissa nodded uncertainly. We were saved from the awkward moment when our pretty blonde teacher, Miss Keating I assumed, stood up at her desk and clapped her hands. "Okay, class, I want you all to give a warm welcome to Lauren and Jasmine Rowland, who just moved to Surrey from…Northumberland, is it, where you were homeschooled?"

I nodded. "We lived out in the countryside with no school nearby, so my mum thought it would be easier to teach us at home."

"I see. Yes, well, you'll all have a chance to welcome them at lunch break, but for now, let's break into pairs for science lab."

"Be my partner, Laurie?" Melissa asked, taking my hand. "Um, Jasmine, you could ask my friend Jamie to be your partner," she offered, pointing.

Jasmine took one look at the bleach-blonde, ditzy-looking girl chatting with her desk mate and wrinkled her nose, albeit almost unnoticeably. "That's okay," she said smoothly, glancing around. "I'll ask that kid." Jasmine made a beeline for a scrawny black-haired boy sitting by himself. Unlike the rest of the class, he wasn't making any effort at finding a partner.

"But that's—" Melissa began, but Jasmine had already slid into a desk next to the boy's and struck up a conversation. The boy looked surprised, but smiled slightly and answered her. A bigger boy behind the boy was glaring at them with a menacing glint in his small, beady eyes. Melissa shot him a glance and winced. "She'll learn soon enough," she murmured, leading me to an empty pair of desks.

Jasmine and I sat with Melissa and Jamie at lunch that day. After lunch we followed them out to the schoolyard where they joined a complex hand-clapping game. I watched, trying to follow the movements and remember the words. After a while I looked around for Jasmine. She was nowhere in sight.

I wandered around the schoolyard for a bit before spotting a narrow gap between two buildings. That looks like a likely spot, I thought to myself, making a bee line for it. Sure enough, I found Jasmine sitting on the ground between the bricks, doodling on a notepad. "I got bored," she explained as I sat down next to her.

"It is a little overwhelming," I replied. She shrugged and stared out at the schoolyard. A familiar-looking boy with jet black hair skidded to a stop outside our hiding place. He glanced around frantically as if looking for an escape route.

"Oy, Potter!" Jasmine whispered fiercely. He spotted us and leapt behind us, crouching down. After a moment a gang of big, mean-looking boys ran past, shouting.

"You can run, but you can't hide, Potter!" yelled their leader. Jasmine smirked. I took a closer look at the scrawny boy and recognized him as Jasmine's science partner.

"Thanks," he said to us, shifting into a more comfortable position.

"No problem," Jasmine said, at the same time that I asked,

"Why are they chasing you?"

"They do whatever my cousin Dudley tells them to do. He hates me," said the boy with a shrug and a wry smile.

"Why?" asked Jasmine. "This is Harry Potter, by the way. My sister Lauren," she said by way of introduction.

Harry gave me a friendly smile. "I dunno, he always has," he said in answer to Jasmine's question.

"That's stupid," she commented. He shrugged. "So what happens if they catch you?"

"They beat me up," he said simply. I gasped. Jasmine raised one eyebrow.

"That's stupid," she repeated.

"Doesn't anyone help you?" I asked, my heart going out to this lonely boy. "Don't you have any friends? Why don't your parents call the headmistress or something?"

He shifted awkwardly. "Nah...I'm okay."

I frowned in concern. Jasmine narrowed her eyes suspiciously, but let it drop. "So, you two are twins, right? You don't look like twins," Harry said curiously.

Jasmine rolled her eyes. I laughed. "We get that a lot. We're fraternal twins."

Harry nodded and tried to look like he knew what I was talking about.

"It means we're not identical," Jasmine drawled. Harry's expression cleared and he nodded more enthusiastically.

Encouraged, I continued. "Our eyes are different colors, for one thing. Mine are green like our dad's, and Jasmine's are brown like Mum's."

"People say I look like Dad and she looks like Mum," Jasmine added. "Which parent do you take after?"

Harry blinked. "I dunno..." he said vaguely.

Jasmine looked at him for a moment and nodded slightly. I was lost. "Well, what do your parents look like?" I pressed, but the bell prevented Harry from answering. Jasmine, Harry and I spent a few moments disentangling ourselves from the narrow space before heading to class.

Focused on keeping up with the material and letting Melissa fill me in on the latest gossip, I didn't think much about Harry Potter until the following week. We were once again asked to divide into pairs for science. Melissa paired with Jamie, so I latched onto Jasmine. Our class had an even number of students, so I was surprised when I heard Miss Keating say, "Harry, don't you have a partner yet?"

Harry glanced up from the book he had been reading at his desk and shrugged. "Guess not," he said listlessly.

"There's no one absent," said Miss Keating, puzzled. "Jacob, Dan, Michael, I said pairs, not threesomes," she said with a sigh. "There, Jacob, go sit with Harry. He won't bite you."

Jasmine's brooding eyes followed Jacob as he moved reluctantly to an empty desk next to Harry's. She frowned slightly before turning back to our assignment. I watched her nervously. I knew that look, and I didn't like it.

Melissa, Jamie, Jasmine and I were late for lunch that day, due to Melissa having forgotten her lunch money and her mother having brought it to the office. After retrieving said money we arrived at the lunchroom to find it nearly full. Our usual table was occupied. Melissa glanced around the room and sighed. "We'll have to split up," she said.

"There's plenty of room over there," said Jasmine, pointing. I looked and saw Harry Potter sitting in a corner by himself. He appeared to be scarfing down a sandwich as fast as humanly possible.

"I see a spot at Allison's table," said Jamie quickly, scurrying away.

Jasmine rolled her eyes and grabbed my arm. "Come on, Lauren, let's go. Coming, Missy?"

"Um…" said Melissa hesitantly. "I see a couple spots over there, Laurie," she said, pointing in the opposite direction. "I'm sure we can pull up a chair for Jasmine," she wheedled, taking my other hand.

I glanced back and forth, torn. Jasmine rolled her eyes and let go of my arm. I almost dropped my lunch bag and scrambled to catch it. When I looked up, Jasmine was walking purposefully toward Harry's table. She sat down and opened her lunch without further ado. Harry glanced up with an expression of pleasant surprise. He smiled shyly and returned to his sandwich.

I hesitated for a moment, debating whether or not to join her in her apparent social taboo, judging by the fact that several jaws in the immediate vicinity had dropped (which, this being lunchtime, was mildly disgusting). Melissa, however, took advantage of my moment of indecision and, still holding me firmly by the hand, led me to a table at the opposite end of the lunchroom. I shot a last glance toward my sister and followed.

Jasmine didn't join us at recess, so I slipped away from the jump rope game to look for her. I spotted a group of kids in back of the building and thought I heard my sister's voice. I snuck a glance around the corner cautiously.

"What's it to you who I sit with?"

"Normally? Nothing. But that Potter kid is nothing but trouble." I recognized the voice of Georgia Wyatt, who, Melissa had informed me, was one of the "popular" girls. "Trust us; you'd be better off just ignoring him." I could almost hear Jasmine's eyebrows jumping into her dirty-blonde bangs.

"And why is that?" she inquired coldly.

"Well, he's just weird, for one thing. He has no fashion sense. And he managed to get himself on the bad side of Dudley Dursley and his friends. If you keep hanging around him you'll end up on their bad side, too. And that's one place you don't want to be."

"How do you know what I want?" Jasmine countered. I winced at her hostile tone. Barely one week we've been here and she's already making enemies.

"Fine then," Georgia huffed indignantly. "But don't say I didn't warn you." There was a corroborating murmur from the rest of the group, and they left. Jasmine watched them go with a look of distaste before walking the other direction, towards my observation point. I fell into step with her.

"Are you sure this is a good idea?" I asked.

"What's a good idea?" said Jasmine casually.

"Making friends with Harry. He doesn't seem very…" I trailed off uncertainly.

"Popular?" Jasmine finished. I nodded, and she gave me a look that said she thought I was mental. "So what?"

"Well, don't we want to be popular?" I asked.

"I don't. Do you?" she countered. I shrugged.

"I guess not," I lied. "But not being popular is one thing. Being unpopular is another."

"So?"

"So, you're going to get into trouble. What if you get beat up?" You may not care about your own reputation, but that's not all that's at stake here.

Jasmine snorted. "Who's going to beat me up? Dursley? He wouldn't dare. There's no way the teachers could ignore that."

"Laurie, come quick! You've got to see what's happening!" Jamie grabbed my hand and raced toward the school building. My stomach plummeted. I had a bad feeling about this.

Over the past two weeks, Jasmine had remained firm in her decision to befriend Harry Potter. The first couple of days, she had asked me to tag along when she sat with him at lunch or at recess. Melissa, however, always had something better for me to do, and Jasmine soon gave me up as a lost cause. "You're lucky you got out when you did," Jamie told me now.

"What's going on?" I asked, panting.

"You'll see," said Jamie ominously. We skidded to a halt outside the entrance.

"This has gone far enough, Rowland." I gulped.

"Dursley, you're being unusually loquacious," said Jasmine coolly. "Was it something you ate?"

Dudley Dursley hesitated for a moment, thinking this over. He gave up and went back to the subject at hand. "I'm sick and tired of seeing you and Potter being all chummy."

Jasmine blinked at him. I held my breath. Harry tried to step in front of Jasmine, opening his mouth to speak. Dudley jerked his head at another big boy named Gordon. Gordon grabbed Potter and twisted his arms behind his back with one hand. Gordon clapped his other huge hand over Harry's mouth when he tried to protest.

Jasmine shot a glance at Harry, but didn't speak. Dudley stood there stupidly, waiting for a response. When none came, Dudley's right-hand man, Piers Polkiss, stepped in.

"If she wants to get chummy with Potter, let her." The onlookers gasped. Dudley turned to him in shock. But Piers wasn't finished. "If she won't listen to reason, maybe her sister will."

Dudley's gaping jaws twisted into a wicked leer. "Good call, Piers," he grunted, sidling up to me. I flinched away. "What do you say, Rowland? You know Potter's no good, right? You know your sister's making a mistake. You can convince her." He wrapped his beefy fingers around my arm and squeezed. I winced.

"Leave her alone," said Jasmine sharply.

Dudley ignored her. "I said, you know Potter's no good, don't you?" I swallowed hard and nodded. "You know he's nothing but a worthless loser, and your sister would do better to stay away from him, right? Say it."

"Y—yes," I whispered.

"Say, 'Potter and my sister are both worthless losers.'"

"That's enough," Jasmine said loudly, as I hesitated.

"What are you going to do about it, Rowland?" taunted Dudley. "You have a choice. Him—" He jabbed a finger at Harry. "—or her." He twisted my arm and I cried out in pain. My pleading eyes met Jasmine's. Her face was unreadable. I glanced at Harry, who made one more attempt to escape and grimaced when Gordon stomped on his foot to stop him. I looked away. This was all his fault.

It seemed like hours before anyone spoke, and in those hours, as Jasmine stayed silent, I realized that I didn't want her to make this choice…because I didn't want to know what her choice would be. For the first time in my life, I took the lead.

"She doesn't have to make that choice," I spat angrily, wrenching my arm from Dudley's grasp. I spoke again before he could react. "I'll make it for her. She can have her precious Potter. I want nothing to do with either of them." I didn't think anymore. I didn't look at anyone; I didn't dare. My courage was spent, and I ran.

I bolted inside the doors of the school, deafened by the bell ringing directly above me. I didn't stop until I was safe at my desk. But as I blew past, I heard Dudley say, "Don't think this is the end of it, Rowland. She hasn't saved you a thing."

Months passed, and my house became eerily silent. My sister and I did not speak of school to our parents except under direct questioning. We did not speak to each other at all. To this day I have no idea what was going through my sister's head during those months as our bright, cheery autumn faded to a damp and dismal winter.

At school, I had many friends. Never at the top of the social hierarchy, I was always looking up with admiration and ambition. My sister remained firmly at the bottom, with Harry Potter. I pretended not to see her as she was pushed and tripped in the halls, the same way I pretended not to see Harry on the rare occasions when Dudley caught him at recess. Jasmine, too, pretended not to see me looking the other way.

As for me, I was miserable. I had done what I wanted: I had taken myself out of the picture. I wasn't involved in this battle of wills, but try as I might, I couldn't ignore it. For a while I tried to convince myself that I had been trying to help Jasmine that day at recess, by letting her do the right thing without worrying about me. But I knew that all I had really wanted was to help myself.

Finally, during the Christmas holidays, my mother had had enough. "I want the truth, girls. What is going on with you? Are you in trouble at school?"

Silence.

"Jasmine? Lauren? Please, girls, you can tell me. Are you being bullied? You've been so miserable these past few months that I'm tempted to pull you out of school. We can go back to homeschooling. Would that be better?"

"You can't, Mum!" Jasmine burst out. "Then they would win."

I glanced up, and my startled eyes met Jasmine's dark, determined gaze. I flinched away.

"Who would win, Jasmine? Are you being bullied?" my mother repeated anxiously. "Lauren? Tell me, please."

I glanced again at Jasmine, who shook her head behind my mother's back. But my mother was right. This had gone on too long. I nodded "yes" to my mother's question.

"I'm calling the school," said my mother firmly. "You won't go back there. I had misgivings about sending you to public school from the beginning. You'll be much happier at home."

"But Mum—"

"But nothing, Jasmine. This isn't about winning. It's about your well-being and happiness. I don't want to hear another word about it." My mother left the room to find the phone.

Jasmine shot me a glare before she, too, left, muttering, "Our happiness isn't the only thing at stake."

I went back to my book, feeling as if I couldn't do anything right.

I never saw my classmates after that until Melissa's party nearly eight years later. Only six months after my mother pulled us out of school, we moved again, this time to a small town in Yorkshire. There was a cheap little private school there, and my mother agreed to enroll us there for secondary school.

I called Melissa and gave her our new address, but we didn't stay in touch. Over time my sister and I got back on speaking terms, mostly due to my constant badgering. It was an unspoken rule between us that we never mentioned our brief public school days to one another. I thought about them often, but years passed before they came to light once more...

I gulped down the last of my soda (which I suspected was spiked) and said loudly, "Oy, Dudley! Whatever happened to your cousin? Why isn't Harry here?"

Jasmine stared at me, as did nearly everyone in the room. Dudley seemed to struggle for words. "Um, he, er…he couldn't make it," he said vaguely.

"I heard he went to St. Brutus'," Georgia said derisively.

"Huh?" I said intelligently.

"St. Brutus' Center for Incurably Criminal Boys," Georgia clarified.

Dudley shifted uncomfortably. Jasmine threw back her head and laughed. All eyes turned to her.

"That," she said, grinning, "is awesome!"

I will never understand my sister.

A/N: Thanks so much for reading! Please take the time to review; any and all comments are appreciated! Lily Lorelei