It did not take long being back at school before Scorpius noticed something was wrong.

We were sitting in the library and he was helping me with my Transfiguration homework. There were several things I had to transfigure for first year exams and I was having a lot of trouble with avifors. I kept getting baby birds without feathers.

"Loads of first years have trouble with this." Scorpius assured me. "We will just keep working on it until your birds are fully fledged and flying."

I nodded and shrugged. I was having trouble caring about any of this now.

I didn't much care about anything. How could my grandparents just cut me out like that?

"Hey, Lils." Scorpius covered my hand with one of his. "What's wrong?"

"I don't know… everything… nothing…" I was a little embarrassed to admit he and Albus had been right. "I guess, like you said, I am just too sensitive."

"We never said TOO sensitive. You are just the right amount of sensitive." Scorpius rubbed my hand. "Now tell me what happened."

"It is just… I got home, and everything was great at first. My father and I cooked together like always. It felt good, normal."

Scorpius nodded encouragingly at me.

"But then, I guess it started when I noticed most of the presents under the tree had my name on them." Maybe there had been other signs, but this was the first one I had noticed. "My father is pretty careful about making sure we feel equal. But I figured maybe Angus just had more expensive presents, he is older he needs more stuff than I do." I knew it wouldn't help to explain computers to him.

"That makes sense." I could tell he didn't really get it yet, but he was trying. "So, are you worried your father is making more of a fuss over you know and your brother feels left out?"

"No… wow, that never occurred to me." Way to increase my anxiety. "But no, Angus and I are pretty well grounded that way."

I explained about how we would give away most of the presents that my grandparents gave us to like children's hospitals and such.

"That is really nice…" He seemed like he was trying to wrap his head around the whole donation concept. "I didn't know your father would want to do anything like that."

"You just don't know him." I smiled, thinking of my father. "He is really very generous. Once he told me he had a lot of past mistakes to make up for."

"OK, so that makes sense I guess." What makes sense? That was a weird thing to say.

"Right… anyway." I decided to ignore his weird comments for now. "I kept waiting for my grandparents to show up. Father always made some excuse and said they would be coming over "soon" but they just… didn't."

Scorpius frowned.

"Then remember the night of the Christmas Tree Lighting?" He nodded. "They came over after Uncle Harry came to get me and left before I got back."

Scorpius' lips thinned and his frown deepened.

"Father told me that a lot of my presents under the tree were from them, but I recognized his handwriting." I sighed. "He had bought me a lot more presents to make up for the ones Angus got from them."

"Well… that is something." I could tell he had no idea what to say.

I let him off the hook. "Scorpius, I don't need you to come up with all the answers. Just be here while I do."

"And have you come up with any?" He already knew the answer, he was just giving me a chance to say it out loud.

"Yeah… I think my grandparents may be…" I whispered. "arseholes."

I could tell he was trying not to laugh. What can I say? I can't curse without blushing! "We knew that, but what made YOU come to that conclusion?"

"We" knew that? Who did he mean? How did they know? Did I really want the answers? I was starting to think there was more going on here than I knew. Like a LOT more.

I hadn't told anyone about this yet. Not even my father. "When I took the wrapping paper to the bin there was a "present" from my grandparents in there. Opened."

"Why was it in the bin?" He asked softly.

"It was a coupon, 50p off of canned cat food." I dug it out of my pocket and showed him. "Wrapped in a box with brown paper that came from a grocery bag."

"Do you even have a cat?" He asked looking over the coupon.

"Nope. But maybe I should get one... you know… just to annoy them?" I grinned.

"I think that is a brilliant idea!" He handed the coupon back. "Here, if you do you will need that."

I tucked the coupon away. "I think I should get one and take pictures of me shopping for food for it with that coupon!"

With that we went back to studying in a much lighter mood.

A couple of days later Scorpius came in and grabbed me by the arm. "Come on!"

I could tell he was excited, but I still had to tease him. "What if I don't want to go?"

"Then I am kidnapping you." He grinned. "In a non-kidnappy way."

"How do you plan to accomplish that?" I laughed getting up.

"With charm?" He suggested.

"Or not." I teased, but went with him.

He brought me out in front of a large hut on the grounds.

"Where are we?" I looked dubiously at the hut. It looked like it might fall down. And maybe like it had been in a fire at one time.

"Hagrid's" He said knocking on the door. "He is an old family friend."

The huge man who had taken us across the lake the first day opened and smiled down at Scorpius. "Scorpius, glad yer could make it. They are all cleaned up and ready."

"They?" I questioned.

"You'll see." Scorpius looked so excited I let him continue pulling me inside.

I had seen Hagrid around the school, of course but I had never spoken to him.

"Hi." I said a little uncertainly.

"Glad ter have you here too, Lilliana. Come on in, I'll put some tea on." He did seem glad we had come over. And he was so friendly I was at once comfortable with him.

"Thank you, Hagrid." I gave him a genuine smile this time. "I am glad to be here."

Scorpius was leaning over a basket near the fire next to the biggest dog I had ever seen. The dog was doing his best to plant slobbery kisses all over Scorpius, who was trying to push him away with a laugh. I was guessing the dog was the same gentle giant his master was.

"Come here." Scorpius called to me putting his hands in the basket.

I came over and leaned down. I couldn't help but squeal.

"Oh Scorpius, they are beautiful!" I scooped out a ball of fur.

The basket was full of the most beautiful and soft white kittens I had ever seen. Some had a little brown, others had a little black.

The one I scooped up was all white with a bit of grey around her face and the most beautiful blue eyes. Her soft purring immediately tugged at my heartstrings and I felt much calmer.

"They old enough, Hagrid?" Scorpius called out.

"For what?" I looked up from snuggling the kitten.

"For you to take home, of course, silly." Scorpius smiled stroking the kittens head.

"Aye, they are ready alrigh'." Hagrid sat three mugs on the table and filled them with steaming tea. "Eating' solid food and everythin. Be a bit afore they are catchin' their own dinner, but they'll do alright."

Scorpius helped me up, being careful not to dislodge the kitten.

We sat down to enjoy tea. The cakes were a little hard. Like a rock is a little hard. Which I suppose makes sense since Hagrid called then rock cakes.

"Yer sure didn't take yer looks from your father." Hagrid winked down at me.

"Oh, I forgot you knew father." I smiled back at him. "No, I am told I look a lot like my mother."

From within my robes I took out a locket and opened it. "That's her."

"You were told… righ" Hagrid looked at me kindly. "I heard yer mother died when you were just a wee slip of a thing." He looked at her picture a long time, a puzzled look on his face.

"I don't remember her very well." I slipped the locket back in to my robes. "Angus remembers her better."

"Yer brother?" Hagrid asked.

"Yes. He tells me stories about her sometimes." I stroked the kitten's fur, amazed at how calm I felt while doing so. Not like my mother's death was meaningless, but like it hurt a lot less to think about.

"That'd be yer brother then?" Hagrid didn't feel like he was prying or just asking out of politeness. He sounded like he really cared.

"Yeah, he is away at sleep away school too." I hadn't talked this much about my family in a long time. Especially my mother. "I worry that father will be too lonely."

"Were yer mother sick very long?" Hagrid refilled my tea.

"No."I stared in to my tea cup. "From what I have been told, father went to work and when he came home she was sitting right at the kitchen table just… gone."

"What are yer goin' to name her?" Hagrid got up and put a little blanket in another basket and helped me settle her in.

"I think Amata." I smiled down at the sleeping kitten. "You know after the girl in the Tales of Beadle the Bard."

Scorpius had brought me the book to read so I could see the differences between muggle fairytales and wizard fairy tales.

"That's a great name!" Hagrid patted Amata's head.

"Come on, Lils, we have one more thing to do." Scorpius took Amata's basket from me.

We went out to a nice sunny patch of grass and he pulled a square plastic box from his robes.

"Muggle camera." He grinned. "I got it from my grandfather."

"I thought your grandfather hated muggle things? I asked confused.

"Different grandfather." He worked the buttons on the camera. "This one loves everything muggle. He is Uncle Ron and my Mum's dad. He would think YOU are brilliant!"

That was a really nice thing to say. It didn't make up for everything but it helped.

He waved for me to sit down while he fiddled with the camera.

I arranged my robes around myself and pulled Amata out of her basket.

Scorpius took a bunch of instant pictures of the two of us. One with me smiling and motioning at the coupon with a big thumbs up.

When we were done I grabbed a quill and some parchment to jot off a note about how excited I was that they remembered my new kitten and I would be using this at a store to buy her cat food. If I could find a wizard store that accepted muggle coupons.

I took great delight in writing that I would be going to a wizard store.

When I was done I put a picture in an envelope with my note and we rushed off to the owlery to send my letter to Uncle Harry to mail out for me.

When the owl took wing we both collapsed against the rail laughing until pour sides hurt.

"Do you feel better now?" Scorpius asked between chuckles.

"You know… I do. I Really do." I scooped up Amata.

I was actually surprised that it was true. It was a silly bit of revenge on my grandparents to send that picture, but I didn't feel the least bit sorry for it.

...