Like Silk

1.

Before she's even let go of the portkey, the sun is blazing down on Lavender. She can feel it on her shoulders and she's afraid to open her eyes. She lets go of the empty cigar box and reaches out her hands blindly. She giggles as they immediately brush cloth and the heavy fall of hair. She tugs one of Parvati's braids.

There's a gasp, and the hair is yanked out of her grasp. Parvati's voice hisses, "Lav!" but it's coming from behind her. Lavender slowly peels her eyes open to see Padma standing in front of her, rubbing her scalp.

"That hurt," she informs Lavender, scowling, and even though her eyes do not look especially angry, Lavender finds herself looking away, down at the ground, and steps back to stand beside Parvati.

Padma has always intimidated her, ever since first year. Where Parvati is all laughter and hair ornaments and talk of boys, Padma is quiet and serious and serene, and Lavender cannot find a single thing to say to her.

Here, it is especially bad, for here she cannot escape up to her bedroom with Parvati, as she has done all the other times, the past three summer holidays when Parvati has come to visit her in Brighton. Now, the summer after their fifth year, she is finally going with Parvati and her family to her grandmother's house in Maharashtra, a name Lavender repeats over and over to herself until the syllables feel strange on her tongue, terrified that she will pronounce it wrong and everyone will be horribly insulted or laugh at her or worse, Padma will simply smirk and turn away, hair and skirt swishing.

Every summer, Parvati has announced in writing her intention of having Lavender come to stay, "at the end of July, yeah? Or maybe the beginning of August, it's not quite so hot then." But the plans were never firm and like so many other goals and to-dos, they simply floated away as summer progressed. And besides, India is so far away, Lavender's mum said it simply wouldn't be practical to go only for a week or two.

But finally, they had made plans in April and confirmed them by May and Lavender had finally prevailed upon her mother to accept that yes, she was quite old enough to spend a whole summer away from home, thank you very much.

But now, standing here in front of the house, Lavender isn't so sure. She looks around as Padma and Parvati's parents emerge from the house, hurrying toward their daughters yet still managing to look stately, embracing them. She looks at the house for the first time, seeing the wide, sweeping porch with the thin railing all the way around, the columns appearing too narrow to hold up the second story, and the roof that curves up and away at the edges. She isn't sure she is ready for this at all.