Always Second Best
Summary: On Halloween ten years ago, Lily and James Potter were away at an Order of the Phoenix meeting, and Voldemort entered their little house in Godric's Hollow with one intention: to kill the Chosen one. But when he fired the killing curse at Harry Potter, he shot back the spell. Dumbledore got to the house before anyone else, and thinking that Charlus, Harry's twin, is the BWL, gives Death payment for letting him live so long in the form of Harry, thinking he is giving her the unimportant twin, when he is giving her the more important one. Ten Years Later, what will happen when both twins go to Hogwarts?
Disclaimer: I can swear to you on my life that my name is not JK Rowling, and I do not own Harry Potter.
I will try and do as little bashing as possible but there WILL be Dumbledore and Ron and James and Charlus bashing. That's all. Honest *crosses fingers behind back*.Neglect but NO abuse.
A/N Yes, I went on a weekend break with my laptop where there is *deep breath* NO WIFI! So chapters 2-4 were written there, and Chapter 4 is proudly the longest Chapter I have ever written! :) Hope you like them!
Chapter Two
Ten Years Later - The Potter's
In Godric's Hollow, not much showed that ten years had passed.
The grass was maybe a little greener, and the tiles on the before destroyed roof of Number 13 looked a little newer. But Godric's Hollow was more famous than it had ever been before, as famous as it had been when Gryffindor himself lived there. Because now, over a thousand years after Gryffindor had died, the VIP who resided in Godric's Hollow was Charlus Sirius Potter.
Every wizard, witch, muggleborn, pureblood, squib and half-blood knew his name. Because Charlus was the Boy-Who-Lived.
Everyone knew the story of ten years ago, how You-Know-Who came to Godric's Hollow on All Hallows Eve, and banished the Death Eater Wormtail (as he was now known, it sounded much more evil compared to "Peter Pettigrew") to Australia, killing him in the process.
How he came into the nursery of the twin Potter boys, and cast the Avada Kevada at Charlus and his brother Harry. How he had shot the evil spell back at You-Know-Who and killed him. Harry tragically died in the attack, but Charlus lived and was the first and only person to survive the killing curse to date, and as a one year old baby too!
As Rubeus Hagrid would've put it, had he known the truth: Codswallop.
But the great wizarding public didn't know that, and Charlus Sirius Potter was fawned upon as if he was God's gift to the human race. And, eventually, due to for as long as he could remember being treated this way, he began to believe it as well.
So it was no surprise that when Charlus got his Hogwarts letter he was subject to national rejoicing (again), and parents who had children in his year were preaching them to be nice to him, and try to be good, and never be mean to him. Try to get his autograph if you can, and if you can become friends with him, even better! Because Charlus Potter is sure to be a very influential man when he grows up and he would be a good friend to have.
So in the Potter's own home, it was obviously going to be so much worse.
Lily and James Potter were still good people. They stuck with Lily's Christian beliefs and went to Church every Sunday. They loved all their children.
But not exactly... fairly.
Rose Lily Potter was a beautiful little girl of nine-almost-ten, with ebony black hair and startlingly green eyes, she shared her "dead" brother's looks, and her mother's brains. Alec Remus Potter was six years old and had dark brown hair and hazel eyes, with his mother's features and his father's love of Quidditch.
They were happy children, but it was times like the 1st of July, 1991 that they were reminded that Charlus was always better than them, and whatever they did they could never, and would never compare to the Boy-Who-Lived. Or, in private, they called him the Boy-Who-Unfortunately-Lived, but if they were ever overheard they would've gotten a sharp slap.
'Bu' you kno' what'll 'appen if we go down dere!' Alec Potter complained to his sister as he was dragged down the stairs to the kitchen.
'We need breakfast! It's the most important meal of the day, remember? If he gets too loud we can sneak some food up to my room, now come on! Or are you a scaredy cat?' Rose hissed to Alec as they rounded into the Potter's kitchen.
'I'm no scaredy cat!' Alec huffed, and as if to prove it he strutted into the kitchen on his tiptoes for all of five seconds before dropping down to his normal height.
They then proceeded to grab some bacon and eggs sit down quietly at the table. James was immersed in his paper and Lily was immersed in "proof reading" Charlus's fanmail, in case there was anything nasty in there that might her special little boy (a nickname that hurt Alec's feelings when he heard it). So neither of them noticed their two youngest wolfing down their breakfast as if their lives depended on it.
'Muuum!' Charlus's shout from upstairs carried all through the house and down to the kitchen. Immediately Lily jumped up and ran upstairs. Their conversation carried downstairs very clearly.
'What's wrong Char?' (Another awful nickname "just for home" used by the Potter parents for their eldest child.
'Mum! I can't find my Nimbus 2000!'
'Oh dear! JAMES! WHERE'S CHAR'S BROOM?' Lily yelled from the top floor and still managed to hurt the eardrum's of all the Potter's on the bottom floor.
James bellowed back with a higher volume (if that was possible) 'I HAVEN'T TOUCHED IT! WHERE'VE YOU HIDDEN IT?' like a normal morning in the Potter household. James often accused Lily of hiding things (especially the butter) and Charlus often lost his broom (insert latest model) and Alec was often scared of Charlus's shouting so Rose had to drag him downstairs (nearly every day).
Except then, the family owl Godric (named after Godric Gryffindor) flew into the kitchen, looking exhausted, with the mail. James didn't seem to notice this and continued yelling to/at Lily ('WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU HAVEN'T HIDDEN IT? WOMEN HIDE EVERYTHING!'), so Rose grabbed five stray Knuts that were on the table to pay for the Prophet and jammed them in the owl's pouch.
Godric dropped all the heavy letters thankfully and then flew away from the very loud humans he had to keep coming back to. The younger ones were okay, he thought, but the redheads and the man were enough to hurt anything's ears! He only hoped that the nice young one (Alec) who sometimes gave him bacon could still hear properly.
Rose then proceeded open up the mail, saying quietly under her breath so just Alec could hear 'Bill, Bill, Bill, Prophet, Fanmail for Charlus, Bill, St Mungos Reciept, Bill, Bill-'
'We know a lot of people called Bill don't we?' said Alec in that way of childish innocence that only those of seven and under can pull off at the breakfast table.
Rose smiled and ruffled his hair and made no other reply, but Alec was satisfied and went back to eating his breakfast like nothing had ever happened.
'-Bill, What is tha- oh! Alec, look! It's Charlus's Hogwarts letter!' And indeed it was. It was made of thick, creamy paper with green ink making the intricate Hogwarts shield of the four houses. Both children looked at it in awe for some minutes, savouring the letter.
'Do yo' thin' we'll ever get one?' Alec asked, suddenly cowering away from the letter.
Rose turned sharply to look at her younger brother 'Of course we will! What makes you think we won't?' she whisper shouted (oxymoron), not bothered if James heard or not, because he was still shouting and would remain doing so until Charlus found his broom or a miracle happened.
And this was the miracle.
'Charlus said I'm a stupi' littl' squib.' Alec said, voice teary. Rose turned her head towards the staircase and her eyes narrowed into slits. When she was younger, Charlus had done exactly the same thing. To do it to her was one thing; to do it to her little brother was another.
'Don't!' Alec reached out his hand, and at first Rose didn't know what he was talking about. Then she followed his gaze and saw how tightly she had been gripping Charlus's Letter. Immediately she dropped it, and the letter flutter down to the ground, topside up so you could see the address:
Mr C. Potter
No. 13 Godric's Hollow
London
The Largest Bedroom(/s)
Rose smirked inwardly at the last line, that last kick in the gut.
She had often said to her parents that if they had four bedrooms, how come Charlus had the two largest ones? But Lily and James just waved it off and said they just seemed bigger, and Charlus needed more room.
He had one for himself and his Quidditch stuff, and another for his mountains of toys and presents (mostly never opened) that nobody used or needed. Lily and James had their room, and that left Rose one room (because girls need their space! Lily had insisted) and Alec having to take the landing where Lily and James had set up a camp bed.
Rose often found herself bristling at these arrangements, and it was wholly satisfying that she had it down on paper that she was right, not that it would ever make much of a difference.
Alec bent down and carefully picked up the letter, holding it at arm's length as if it were a disease. He looked to his sister and she nodded, James still oblivious because of his shouting.
'Dad.' Alec voice was quiet and drowned out, so Rose decided to help him a little. She stood up and made her way over to their father, who was (guess!) oblivious to all this because he was shouting to Lily to tell Charlus that 'OH YES! I DID MOVE IT TO CHARLUS'S SECOND BEDROOM! SORRY LILY-FLOWER!' But as soon as he finished this particular yell to the inhabitants upstairs, a feminine voice shouted in his poor, unsuspecting ear 'DAAAAD!'
He jumped about a foot in the air.
When he landed he had accomplished three things.
1) He had turned round in his seat.
2) He had knocked his own glasses off.
3) He had given himself a wedgie.
Once James had readjusted his glasses to see his daughter and youngest son, who he wasn't aware had entered the room, Alec took his fingers out his poor sensitive ears because he knew just how loud Rose could yell on a bad day.
'Ow, Rose! What'd you do that for?' Rose simply rolled her eyes and pointed to the table, on which was resting Charlus's Hogwarts Letter, in all its cream-and-dark-green glory.
Well, it went downhill from when James's eyes bulged out of his head like they were going to come out (which Rose decided she definitely wanted to review in the Pensieve later).
'LILS! CHAR! CHAR'S HOGWARTS LETTER'S HERE!' At first Lily was going to shout at James for shouting at her, then she went over what he'd just shouted to her. "Char's Hogwarts Letter's Here!"
Char had obviously heard right the first time, because her redheaded son dropped his Nimbus 2000 and raced downstairs like a stampede was after him. All Lily could think as she quickly followed her redheaded son down the stairs was "Oh, How quickly they grow up."
Alec stared at the letter, knowing that it was the last seconds of wholeness it was going to have, and he slowly shook his head in sadness. Another poor object ripped to shreds by the one and only Brat-Who-Lived.
And of course, that was exactly what happened, along with boasting and begging to go to Diagon Alley, and somebody's ego getting bigger and bigger.
But when the newspapers later asked Lily and James for a statement of what it was like for Charlus to receive his Hogwarts letter, they had said that they'd all been eating breakfast when the letter came in, and they'd all been very happy for him to receive it, (Quickly adding that of course, that there was no doubt that he would have received it, but getting it was nice all the same.) especially as on the same day Lily had been offered the post of Muggle Studies Professor and James had been offered the Flying Professor Post. Both of their youngest would be coming to Hogwarts with them and it was going to be a very fun year for everybody.
Well they wouldn't have told them what really happened, would they?
-(.)-
So, just to get a few thing straight, here is the timeline:
July 31st 1980 - Charlus and Harry are born, Charlus at 11:56pm and Harry at 11:59pm, even though it is recorded as Midnight on August 1st.
Halloween 1981 - Charlus and Harry attacked by Voldemort. Harry is BWL but Charlus gets the credit, and Harry is pronounced dead when Death takes him away to clear Dumbledore's debt. Chapter 1 takes place.
August 9th 1981 - Rose Lily Potter is born.
September 2nd 1985 - Alec Remus Potter is born.
July 1st 1991 - Charlus & Harry receive Hogwarts Letters. Chapters 2 & 3.
July 5th 1991 - Harry & Potters go to Diagon Alley. Chapter 4.
September 1st 1991 - Charlus and Harry go to Hogwarts. Chapter 5.
Hope that helps! Nothing's set in stone but that's my rough plan. REVIEW! ;)