Aunt Molly had let them back outside that evening for a campfire. They had strategically placed the fire off across the yard, far enough it was out of direct eyesight.
Fred and George were attempting to breathe fire, which was as dangerous as it sounded, convinced they had manipulated their whiskey to allow it without risk of a burning. They were so drunk that they couldn't keep the fire on the tip of their wands lit long enough to try it.
Cedric was sitting on a stump, watching and laughing with a cup in his hands, eyes bleary. He had stayed on for dinner and would most likely end up spending the night, he was well in his cup. The weird sisters were playing over the wireless and Jamie was lounging against a log, smoking a spliff. She had stashed it inside of the log in an empty candy canister.
She looked lazy, eyes half shut, and would occasionally hand her cup over to Ron, who would take a drink and shudder. Jamie was a good older cousin to Ron and Ginny, she included them, even though the activities were often illicit.
The fact that not a single Weasley family member had mentioned the fact that they now knew the truth: that Jamie was adopted and Harry Potter's older sister (The Girl Who Lived), was something Jamie was grateful for. For years they had went on to believe she was one of them, when at the end of the day and as the dust settled, she still was in their eyes.
Molly had strode forward from where she and Arthur had been waiting with her parents at the train station, picking them all for the start of the summer holiday, and had pulled her into a hug. It had been almost rib crushing, and they had stood there for several moments before Arthur had taken his turn to hug her, squeezing her shoulder, and nothing else had been said. It had been business as usual, they all went for a quick lunch together and then split off to their respective homes. Her cousins had never uttered a word about it, it was like nothing had happened, and certainly nothing seemed to have changed.
The secret was still there. Their families, Harry, Hermione Granger, Severus and Sirius and Remus all knew the truth, everything else was still entirely a secret, on Dumbledore's orders. So, she was still a fraud, in her eyes.
"Think they'll ever get that fire to stay lit?" Cedric asked from across the circle. She chuckled, a rich throaty sound, and shrugged her shoulders. Ron slumped beside her, lying on the ground and watching the fire.
"Alright Ronners?" She nudged him, and he gave a little giggle sound and nodded. She smirked. "The thing you gotta know about the twins is they have good ideas, they're just too dumb to realize they shouldn't test them drunk."
Cedric threw his head back and laughed, and easy smile on his face. He watched Jamie run her fingernails through Ron's ginger hair, a look of affection on her face, a tiny smile. The boy was already asleep.
She stood up and pulled off the flannel shawl she had nabbed from the house and threw it over her sleeping cousin before making her way over to collapse on the ground beside Cedric. She lay back, propping her weight on one arm, still smoking away, watching the twins wrestle on the ground.
"Does it ever get old hanging with them?" He asked her curiously.
"Never," the corner of her lips curled up. "They're my best mates."
"You're always with them," Cedric nodded. "Hard for me to ever get a chance to catch you alone."
"What you trying to catch me for, anyway?"
"I half fancy ya, to be honest," Cedric admitted and his face turned red.
"Half," she scoffed. "What's there to do with half?"
"I don't mean it like that—I've liked you for years," he sputtered.
"My dad liked my mum for years," she murmured before seeming to catch herself. "I wouldn't call that half anything."
"Aw, Shack, you know what I meant, don't twist my words," he protested as she stood up.
"You don't want to half or full me anything, really," she flicked her spliff into the fire. "I'm not worth the trouble."
"Shouldn't you let me find that out?" He barked out a laugh, thinking she was joking.
"It's your life, Ceddy," she called over her shoulder, "ruin it how you want to."
"I'll gladly let you ruin my life!" He called back to her jovially as she flipped her hair over her shoulder. She left the four boys to their own devices, content on finding her older cousin Percy's abandoned bed to crawl into.
"And he doesn't even seem to notice me, as like, a person, you know? I don't know what he wants," Ginny was grumbling from where she was sprawled across Percy's/Jamie's bed. It was mid-morning, Jamie had just awoken, and Ginny was griping about Harry's continual obliviousness to her existence. Apparently her brother had been ignoring Ginny's "subtle" hints of her interest the entire school year.
"You are a person, though, Gin," Jamie was standing at the mirror hanging on the back of the wardrobe, applying her signature smoky grey eye shadow thickly across her lids and smudging it under her lower lash line. Her mother complained it was too "night time", but Jamie thought the nighttime was the most fun. "Boys his age are just now starting to even notice girls in that way, and frankly, you don't want to be an experiment while they're figuring it all out. You're the grand prize, Gin, not the rookie's first ribbon. Learn who you are as a person first, learn your own standards, and then be her. If he's the right one, that's all it will take."
While it was rather odd to be giving love advice to her cousin (adopted) about her little brother, she enjoyed being able to talk to Ginny about real life stuff now that the girl had turned thirteen.
"It's sort of hard to know who you are," Ginny's muffled voice sounded from where she had buried her face into a pillow in pseudo-frustration. The girl was suffering from a case of puppy love after all—she would be fine. "They don't exactly teach that at school."
"Of course they don't, you learn that as you go, outside of the classroom, with your friends and all the dumb mistakes you make, blah blah blah," Jamie said as she outlined her top lid with liquid eyeliner. Jamie knew better than to line both the top and bottom eyelids—only a select group of women could pull it off, it always made you look older (not in a good way) and made your eyes small and squinty.
"So do you know who you are?" Ginny rolled over back onto her back, watching her favorite cousin finish off her makeup. Molly was just now allowing Ginny to use mascara and a little pressed powder and lip gloss, but Ginny was eager to learn what she could about the other stuff as well.
"Not really, that's kind of hard," Jamie swished her auburn hair over her shoulder, turning to give her cousin her full attention. "They'll want you to grow up really fast, Gin, but do yourself a favor and take your time. It's hard enough as it is to figure things out, it's even harder to force yourself into it too early."
"Still don't know what you want to do after Hogwarts, huh? I bet it's a lot of pressure to pick something when you still have two years left of school," Ginny nodded with understanding. The girls got on well, always had, Ginny was very mature for her age, and after dealing with unimaginable circumstances during her first year at Hogwarts, Ginny was wise beyond her years. She had been ensnared by the devil himself, the essence of Lord Voldemort, and managed to break free. Jamie admired her youngest cousin more than she would ever be able to admit.
"My parents really, really want me to do well this year, and to think about what I want to do then job-shadow and intern this summer," Jamie admitted. "It's been, like, the main topic of the summer. My dad wants me to go into my seventh year with a clear head and a 'foundation of experience', which means I need to kick ass this year first."
"Does he want you to be an Auror, too?"
Jamie shrugged at that. Her dad was a very well-accomplished Auror, had traveled all around the world and assisted many other governments with protection and security education. He may think she would make a good Auror, but he kept it to himself, too much of a new age, free spirited dad to push his daughter toward one singular path. Guin, however, had no problem with being the pushy parent. She wanted Jamie to work for the Ministry in some capacity, sure it secured great stability to live from.
That was a source of…tension, she supposed, between her parents, but they often debated over parenting, so it wasn't necessarily note worthy. Her dad read eccentric crunchy parenting books (wizarding and muggle) and really wanted to talk to her about her feelings, how she was coping with things, if she needed to talk to Dumbledore. Was her aura cloudy? Guin had grown up without much parental direction, as girls weren't necessarily encouraged to do much outside of marrying and having children and continuing the family line back then, so she tried to make up for it. She hovered, she interfered, and she constantly voiced her opinion and questioned everything.
Gods, she loved them both.
"I think they just want me to settle down and take things seriously, but whatever, moving on," Jamie waved her hand dismissively, already bored with this turn in the conversation. Ginny narrowed her eyes in frustration, she had commented many times before that Jamie had a bad habit of closing herself off when things got deep. "Lets go get breakfast."
Ginny sighed and gave her a pitying look before scraping herself off the unmade bed, leading the stampede down the rickety old staircase.
Jamie was too busy adjusting her stack of hand woven bracelets she had been making all summer, which she wore on both wrists, to notice anything unusual. It wasn't until she was slamming into Ginny's back and ricocheting into the kitchen door frame that she swore and looked up.
"Jamie! Language!" Molly squalled out from where she was standing at the sink.
"Sorry," Jamie muttered, her eyes trained on the new additions at the table that morning. Hermione Granger, and her brother, sat staring at her in surprise from her outburst.
"Not hungry," she muttered and turned on her heel, dodging past Ginny and out into the garden. She had been desperately wanting to talk to her brother all summer, but coming face to face with him so abruptly—Jamie had chickened out. She decided to sit on an old stump, and internally scold herself for being such a coward.
"Hey," she lifted her head to see Harry standing over her. His hair was windswept and messy and he had bags under his eyes from the exhausting day. His glasses were crooked and the knee of his jeans was torn.
Jamie had successfully lurked around the garden during breakfast, ducking behind a tree when the rest of the gang ran out to the play field where they played pick-up Quidditch. She had been standing there, torn between going to play and continuing to sulk, when Molly had ordered her into the house and set a plate before her, charmed to keep warm.
"Hey little brother," she greeted, leaning back in her chair to give him her full attention. At her words, his eyebrows shot up and he quickly sat down across the table from her. Early morning sunlight was streaming in through the windows, seeming to outline them in a golden, hazy glow.
"So it's true then, what Sirius and Lupin said, you really are my sister," Harry said slowly, his knuckles clenched so tight they shown white.
"Yea Harry, it's true."
"You knew about this, all along, and you never said anything?" Harry's voice was sharp and there was a deep pain in his eyes. She sighed, her eyes flickering toward the windows and then to the bookshelf where Molly kept pictures of her children and Jamie through out the years. "All this time, you had so many chances. You knew?"
"Well?" His voice cut into her silence and she looked back to him.
"I've known my whole life, Harry," she murmured quietly, her fingertips reaching out to absently trace the wood grain on the tabletop. "I remember that night, you know? Halloween. I was right there in the room, I remember it all."
"You remember them?" He leaned forward, curiosity getting the best of him. "Our parents? You remember them?"
"Just glimpses really," she shrugged. "Sometimes I get nervous, thinking maybe they are dreams or things I really want to be real, but I tested them with a penseive, and I saved them, they are real."
"How do you know they are real?"
"You'll find that if you alter memories or if they are completely made up, they will be cloudy, dark, and very choppy. True memories, real memories, they are crystal clear. I have them, saved in Professor Dumbledore's office."
"What are they?" She couldn't help but feel of pang of sadness at the tone of his words, so hopeful.
"I can show you, Harry, if you'll let me," she offered, extending the olive branch.
"I would, I will," her brother murmured, his expression growing thoughtful. "I just feel like…everything I've ever known has been a lie."
"I know you do," she sighed. "They all thought…well, Dumbledore thought it would be for the best, to protect us. I would have gone with you, too, I think, if I hadn't of been aware of what had happened. I was so used to living in the Wizarding world, and you were just so young."
"That-That actually makes a little sense," Harry nodded. "I guess it would be pretty hard to hide a baby with a scar like mine amongst wizards and witches."
She simply nodded and reached out slowly, put her hand on his. "I want you to know, Harry, that I've always loved you. I may not have shown it in the way I should have, but I've always cared."
"You've always been good to me, Jamie," Harry shrugged off her apology. "I remember meeting you on Platform 9 ¾ for the first time, I remember sitting next to you after I got sorted. You stood up for me, you helped me during Quidditch practice, and you've just always been nice to me. I guess, I'm happy that you are my sister, it could be a lot worse."
"Yeah, that's for sure," the corners of her lips turned up into a grin and he laughed. "Listen, let's focus on being friends and getting to know each other, okay? We don't have to make things weird, it isn't weird, just know that I'm always here for you, and I'll always have your back."
"Thanks, same for me to you," he nodded, a relieved look on his face. "I'm glad we got that all cleared up."
"Me too, kid, me too."