CHAPTER TWO: America's Finest
Harry opened the door to Grimmauld Place and rushed inside, where he was immediately greeted by a plump figure's arms thrown around him.
"Ah, Harry dear! I'm so glad to see you!" Mrs. Weasley gushed in happiness. "Now, go put your bags upstairs with the others, breakfast will be in an hour. Everyone got up now that you're here!"
Harry ran upstairs, delighted to finally be able to see his best friends. When he opened the door to Ron's room, he was immediately greeted by a shock of red hair. Fred, George, Ron, and Ginny were all sitting by the door and gave Harry a huge hug. When they finally had hugged him so long he was almost suffocated, Ron let go and went to sit by Hermione on the sofa, who immediately jumped up to say hello to Harry.
Harry was just about to ask how the Order was doing, but at that moment the door burst open.
"Hermione, help! Nick just hid my wand again! You know how I feel about Nick touching my wand!"
A very pretty girl with brown, highlighted hair, a deep blush, enchanting brown eyes, and Abercrombie and Fitch clothes was standing in the doorway, looking a bit annoyed. Her tan skin had one imperfection, and that was deep scar on her upper right arm.
Hermione turned to Ron. "Ron, where did it go?"
Ron tried to hold in a laugh but was unsuccessful. The girl in the door half laughed, half screamed as she ran over to Ron and started shaking him.
"Ron, it's not funny, where did it go?" she said, but it sounded very ironic as she was laughing her head off. Harry looked at Fred in total confusion but he just started laughing.
Again the doorway was burst into, this time by a boy. He was very good looking and looked a lot like the girl. He had dark brown hair, deep brown eyes, tan skin, and an identical scar. When Harry got a closer look he saw the scar looked strangely like a lightning bolt. Harry was now even more interested in these two. He wore a grey shirt with green lettering that said "Mayfield Football". This was extremely interesting, because it had a picture of a wildcat with an American football on it.
"Oh, Lauren, have you seen my wand anywhere?" asked the kid, and he burst out laughing. Harry figured this must be Nick, seeing as though he was laughing so hard.
"Oh Nick! You are so dead!" She ran over to him and they started play fighting. When they were finally exhausted, Fred and George started laughing even harder and Fred held out Lauren's wand.
"Sorry Nick, younger twins side with their own type in the end. Besides, we have a meeting to attend." said Fred, half goofy and half serious. They were now in the Order of the Phoenix, as they had finally become adults.
As Fred and George exited the room gallantly, the girl and the boy sat down on a bed. They smiled at the same time a dazzling white smile when they finally got the chance to see Harry. As he looked at them he noticed that they had matching shell necklaces, so they must know each other pretty well.
"Hi!" Lauren giggled outgoingly.
"Hey!" Nick said smilingly.
"Hey smiley boy, cut it!" giggled Lauren. "Oh, we call him smiley boy because that's all he ever does. I swear, if I died he would be smiling and crying at the same time at my funeral."
Harry was quickly put at ease by these outgoing people. He wondered why they were here and how they knew each other.
As if reading his mind, Lauren turned to Ron and said "Ron, why don't we tell Harry why Nick and I are here? He must be really confused."
"How did you know my name?" Asked Harry.
"Well besides the fact that Ron told me, you have that wicked scar on your forehead that is about as hard to miss as mine." Lauren explained, smiling. Harry could see that this girl was an optimist and always seemed to enjoy herself. She could even make light of her horrible scar, which amazed Harry.
"Lauren, Nick, I think it's time to give Harry a proper introduction." Ron said, turning to the two.
Lauren nodded and giggled again. "Just as long as he doesn't think Nick and I are going out… ew!" Nick coughed as Lauren went on. "You know, that's what Tonks thought at first!"
Ron laughed. "Ok, we'll start with that. Harry, these two are not going out. First off, the younger one, Lauren Sterle…" Lauren elbowed Ron. "I mean, Lauren Batt. We'll explain that later." Lauren shook Harry's hand. A warm feeling shot through Harry that he couldn't explain, so he tried to shrug it off as Ron continued talking.
"And this is Nick Berne… erm, Nick Batt. Sorry guys, I can't remember all the time." Nick waved from the bed and grinned.
Harry felt dizzy in shock. "You two are related?"
"Yep." Nick smiled. "In fact, we're fraternal twins. Well, obviously, since I'm so good looking and Lauren isn't."
Lauren shot a glare at him but was holding back a grin. She moved from the squished bed to sit down next to Harry on his. The warm feeling swept up again, and he turned red. Ginny and Hermione seemed to notice and silently laughed, but Ron looked confused.
"Anyways, this whole wizard thing is actually pretty new to them." Ron explained, taking over. "They're actually here because they're my cousins, or at least the people who took care of them were related to me… and they're your father's and Lupin's godchildren!"
Harry gasped at the news. The twins nodded and sighed in unison. "You know, we don't know who our parents are." Explained Nick, "We just are pretty sure they were married secretly, according to the note they left behind. But they must have been friends with our godfathers, so that narrows it down. We only know what we do because of the note. We didn't even know we were related."
Lauren took over. "Ok, here it is. Where we live, the big bad guy isn't just Voldemort." Looking at Harry's surprise at the name, Lauren sighed and said, "In America, we don't fear names, though you all have very good reasons.
Well, thought Harry, that explains the loud voices and soft accents. Their voices were smooth and singsong, a trademark of Americans. Lauren was tall and thin, another trademark of an American. Nick was shorter and thin, so obviously they were mixed nationalities. Harry's best guesses were very variable, like Italian, Slovenian, Irish, German, Austrian, Romanian… and obviously English if they were James's godchildren. But then again, did it matter in America?
Lauren continued. "Well, Voldemort's cousin, Elvis, is the true evil. Wanna see?"
Nick pulled out a picture of Elvis, a man who seemed to swing hips a lot and had a guitar. He looked pretty scary, with that hair.
"Nice try, guys." Ron said. "They pulled that on me too, Harry, and I believed it. He's just a singer. But the real bad guy here is…"
"Lord Reldemort." Nick and Lauren said, obviously doing all they could to not tremble. "He really is Voldemort's cousin, and the two of them are big and bad in the US."
"Anyways," Lauren continued, "He tried to kill us after Voldemort was defeated by you. According to our note, our parents were so strong as Order of the Phoenix spies that together the two of us would be a threat to him. One of us is destined to kill him or die. The other's destiny is uncertain. All of this happened when you were three and we were one. So I guess that the two Death Eaters with Voldemort the day he tried to kill you were the ones who were made to kill us. Well, since your mother shielded you, she left something in the Death Eater's Killing Curse. They cannot kill children who are destined to fight the dark arts."
Nick took it up from here. "As it ends up, they died and gave us the same scar as you. Our mother died then, from the shock of the spell. It could still hurt her, she was actually half muggle. Since he was out of the house, our unknown father left and has just died recently, not knowing we were still alive. We were immediately separated by the United States of America Ministry of Magic, but we still went to the same muggle schools, Mayfield Middle School and Millridge Elementary. We were good friends and actually had a joke about being twins."
Lauren took it up again. "We went through years like this, not even knowing we were wizard and witch. Our muggle parents and siblings hid the notes and letters from us. But they couldn't hide anything that would soon happen from us on the last day of our 7th grade, when we were thirteen."
Nick began the story again. They were the perfect twins, talking for each other when the other didn't have the words to. "We were at the 'promotion' dance the last day of middle school; it was about noon. All of the sudden a huge burst of white light came through the room and knocked us all over, all 400 of the students and teachers. A beautiful phoenix, who I now know is named Fawkes, was carrying a golden lion. Two more phoenixes were behind him and picked the two of us up. Death Eaters and aurors ran into the gym."
"We were totally freaked out, especially when our clothes changed to a white gown and for Nick white clothes." Lauren admitted. "There began the all out battle between the two sides, with us on the phoenixes backs. We were confused and being shot at with Crucios and Avada Kadavras. Then Dumbledore ran in." Lauren grinned. "He got us out really quickly. He explained what we just told you to us. We saw the fighters run out and were transported to a deserted field by the aurors for safety."
"We later learned that only one muggle died in the fight… our good friend, Gianni." Nick said bravely, but his voice still cracked. Lauren looked on the verge of tears at the name. He must have meant a lot to them, thought Harry. He felt bad instantly about himself not having any muggle friends, but then guilty for even thinking that.
"Anyways," Lauren said, hurriedly. "We learned about our families and that we were twins. We were not allowed to know everything. I think, deep down, that Dumbledore knows who our parents were. We just need to discover it now. But before we found out about the lion, we were taken to the Tinora School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. We learned there until this year was over. We took summer courses so that we could catch up. We're only fourteen, but we're taking your classes."
"American magic is taught much more quickly and more advanced than England's." Hermione explained to Ginny, Ron, and Harry. "And even for Americans they're quite smart."
Nick blushed at the compliment and continued. "So to find our roots, we transferred here. We might not be old, but we play a mean game of Quidditch. Lauren was a Seeker for the minor league Cleveland Phoenixes and I was a Keeper. But since we're in Gryffindor and you have those places filled up, we're trying out for chasers. Dude, we're sweet at that too." He ended, using some American English at the end. "We're famous for our Quidditch. America's finest, babes!"
"You big head, we are not! We're famous for Reldemort's little episode. We're like Harry in America." Lauren explained.
Ron grinned. "So we've been teaching them a little English slang, but they like using sweet instead of brilliant and they overuse keen. Nick also calls us homies instead of mates."
Lauren laughed. "You British are so funny! I never realized what Americans must sound like to other countries!"
Hermione giggled. She seemed so happy with Lauren around. In Harry and Ron's company she was always the third wheel, but she finally had a best friend to fall onto. Nick seemed completely happy with Fred and George and both liked and loved his sister, so he wasn't alone either. Harry realized how nice it was that everyone had someone.
"Well, seeing as though it's breakfast, shall we go downstairs?" asked a face that suddenly appeared in the doorway. It was…
"Bill!" Lauren screeched. She gave him a huge hug and started skipping.
"Lauren treats Bill like he's her big brother. He taught her how to play some pretty sweet chess. Since she grew up with four younger siblings she always wanted two things: a big and twin brother. Now she has both." Hermione explained, throwing in the sweet and trying to add more American English.
"Alright, I'm game!" Nick exclaimed in his cool accent. Everyone ran downstairs for breakfast, ready to face the Hogwarts Express.