Hi, yes, it's been a while! What else is new? "Soon. Ish" proves to be nearly a year. You're all used to me by now, right? I hope?

Anyway, I know I've said this before and you have no reason to trust me, but I AM finishing this project and its remaining four chapters for Camp Nano, so they WILL be posted by the end of the month. I swear.

This chapter, an exploration of Lorcan Scamander, will make slightly more sense if you've read A Lot to Learn. Fair warning.

When his twin brother called a family meeting, Lorcan Scamander knew something earth-shattering was about to happen. Lysander hated family meetings. He had once referred to them as "banal exercises in enforced familial delusion." Lysander calling a family meeting was the equivalent of their mother declaring that the Crumple-Horned Snorkack didn't exist. It may not have been out of the realm of possibility, but it was just about the last thing Lorcan expected to hear.

"A family meeting?" their father repeated after carefully setting his knife and fork on either side of his half-eaten dinner.

"Yes," Lysander confirmed, sounding not at all nervous, but Lorcan knew his brother's tells, and he knew it was an act. "After dinner. If that's all right."

So there they all gathered as soon as the meal was through, Rolf and Luna sitting calmly on the settee, Lorcan much more anxiously perched on the edge of a footstool while Lysander stood before them, using the coffee table as a buffer and pacing back and forth. Rolf and Luna patiently kept their silence, waiting for their son to address them. Lorcan had to physically hold back a verbal interruption and force his hands to remain still. Just when Lorcan didn't think he could keep quiet another second, his brother spoke.

"As I know you all know, I've spent a great deal of time since our return to England thinking about the events of this summer and thinking about the future."

Lorcan gave a curt nod, though no question had been asked. Lysander wasn't alone. They had all spent a great deal of time thinking about everything that had happened that summer. A family trip to Brazil had taken a disastrous turn when Lorcan and his brother had run afoul of a giant demon spirit, and only barely escaped with their lives, thanks to the quick and bizarre thinking of their mother.

But Lysander was talking about more than just the attack. He'd gone into that forest hating his mother and everything she stood for and believed in, and he'd left a convert to her methods and ways of thinking. He'd changed, fundamentally, and he was determined to go forward a better person than he'd been in the past six years. Lorcan was determined to help him. He had a plan. They had a plan. They'd worked it out together. More or less. So why did he feel so nervous?

"After a lot of careful reflection and consideration-" He paused to take a deep, fortifying breath, and Lorcan felt his heart plummet toward his shoes, "-I have decided not to return to Hogwarts for my seventh year."

Lorcan was the first member of the family to find his voice after that stunning pronouncement. "What?" he managed to get out after only a few seconds of wordless gaping.

"I'm not going back to Hogwarts," Lysander said softly, more to the floor than to his brother. "I have applied for, and been accepted to, the Magical Exchange Program at Castelobruxo. I leave for South America next week."

It felt like someone had Vanished the floor under Lorcan's feet. He stared at his twin, mouth working silently as he sputtered, trying to latch onto a coherent thought, preferably something that would prompt the Just kidding! that had to be coming.

His parents rose and declared things like, Lysander, that's wonderful! But Lorcan found himself frozen in place, unable to speak or even wrap his brain around Lysander's pronouncement.

He knew he had to chime in eventually. It would become noticeable if he didn't. But before he could even begin to figure out how he felt about this, his mother ushered Lysander away, into the drawing room to make up a list of things he would need before his departure. As she crossed the threshold, she looked back at Lorcan and offered a sympathetic smile.

Lorcan retreated to Lysander's room, to wait for his brother and to compose his thoughts. As he replayed the evening over and over, perched on the edge of his brother's desk, his bewildered indignation turned into something else entirely.

He barely let Lysander get through the door. "So, do you want to tell me what this is really about?" he asked his brother as soon as the door had clicked shut. If Lysander was surprised to see him, he masked it well.

"Dramatic as always, I see," Lysander intoned with a roll of his eyes.

"Don't do that," he said in a voice that was quiet and even, but deadly serious. "Don't deflect and revert because you're defensive." Lysander's whole body remained tense, his eyes flashing with fire for just one heartbeat more. And then he closed his eyes, all tension and anger draining out of him, and when he looked at Lorcan again, he looked impossibly weary.

"I can't go back, Lorcan," he said softly. "I've thought about this a lot, I've played out every scenario, and - if I go back to Hogwarts, I go back to the person I was. I don't think there's any escaping that."

Lorcan felt a wave of relief. Was that all that this was about? "Lysander," he said with a little laugh, standing and crossing toward his brother, "of course there's a way to escape that, we've talked about it. You stop hanging around with Martin Belby-"

Lysander turned away before Lorcan could get near him. "I don't hang around with Martin Belby, I share a dorm with him, and he's in three of my N.E.W.T. classes, he's not the easiest person to-"

"But that's why you have me, and Maddie and Callie and Louis-"

"Who aren't Slytherins!"

"And that's why you have Roxie, who-"

"Who isn't a student anymore, Lorcan, will you stop and listen to me?" Something in his brother's voice stopped Lorcan's headlong rush of words. Something in his voice, and in the fact that he turned around to face Lorcan head on instead of talking over his shoulder at him as he busied himself with a suitcase. The brothers stared at each other for a long moment. Finally, Lysander spoke. "You don't know me very well," he said.

Lorcan opened his mouth, indignant, an angry response at the tip of his tongue, but Lysander cut him off with a raised hand.

"I know that's my fault," he said, and Lorcan closed his mouth and listened warily, dolefully. Lysander took a deep breath before continuing. "But it's the truth. You don't know me very well anymore. But I do. I know myself, inside and out, and I am telling you that if I go back to Hogwarts, I will not change. I am not strong enough to hold on to the new version of myself, not even with your help. I need a fresh start, Lorc. I have to do this."

For one more moment, Lorcan held onto his indignation and reproach. But then his brother's words really penetrated. He was so used to snide, sarcastic Lysander. He wasn't used to his twin being truly honest. Being vulnerable. And he couldn't ignore it now.

"I'm sorry," he said quietly, the fight going out of him. He sank onto Lysander's bed. "I'm being selfish."

He heard Lysander exhale at that, and he heard the relief in it, which made him feel guilty all over again. The bed beside him dipped down as Lysander sat as well, so close their knees were nearly touching, but neither brother looked at the other.

"That's not a shortcoming, Mr. Hufflepuff." The words were almost playful, which was still fairly foreign, though Lysander had been trying it out most of the summer. Lorcan smiled and looked over.

"Still unfair of me, though. If this is what you need to do, then this is what you need to do, and it's not fair of me to stand in the way of that. It's just . . ." He stopped himself before he could continue acting unfairly by making the argument. He shook his head sharply and stood. "Never mind. I'm excited for you, Lysander. Honestly." And he made his way to the door, refusing to look back.

"Lorcan." Lysander stopped him with one word. Lorcan's hand was on the doorknob, but he couldn't leave now. Slowly, he turned to face his twin. "It's just what?" Lysander asked when he had Lorcan's attention. Lorcan shook his head again.

"It doesn't matter," he said, just wanting to escape now that he'd decided to be happy for his brother and not hold him back with his own selfish wishes.

"It does matter," Lysander said, standing and crossing his arms. "Stop deflecting because you feel guilty. Talk to me. Please."

It was the please that did him in.

"This was supposed to be our year," he said in a small voice. "I don't know you very well anymore, you're right, but this year was supposed to change that. I was supposed to be able to get my best friend back." There was more, but he couldn't say it out loud. He would tell the truth, he was telling the truth, but he was also determined, truly, to let Lysander do what he needed to do. He would not express the details that might manipulate Lysander into changing his mind. He would not. "That's all, really," he said, talking mostly to his shoes. "I had a plan, to get to know you again, and to let you get to know me, and I just, I can't very well do it if you're halfway around the world, is all."

"You could come with me."

Lorcan's head snapped up and he stared at his brother. "What?"

The corner of Lysander's mouth lifted. "Relax, Lorc. I was kidding." And he turned away, back to the suitcase.

"No, I didn't mean - you just caught me off guard," Lorcan said, moving back into his brother's line of sight. "I don't - do you want me to come with you?"

"Lorcan, you're not coming to Brazil with me," Lysander said, looking his twin straight in the eye. "Okay? You are going back to Hogwarts and living your last year as planned with all your friends. I'm going to Brazil. And I'm going by myself. Now, we can talk about this more later if you want, but right now, I have a lot of packing to do."

It was clear Lysander wanted to be alone, so Lorcan slipped from the room, but he couldn't get the conversation out of his mind. Had he meant it? Did he really want Lorcan to come with him to Brazil? He'd said he was joking, and he'd said it the way he'd said it other times this summer, when some attempt at humor had fallen flat. Maybe it had just been a joke, and if that was the case, then for him to even be thinking about completely uprooting his life . . .

He needed more information. He just didn't know how to get it. Asking Lysander for further clarification wasn't going to get him anywhere. So Lorcan settled for the next best thing. He waited for morning, for Lysander to leave with their mother to shop for Brazil, and snuck into his brother's room to snoop around.

It was a fruitless endeavor. There were some pamphlets about Castelobruxo and its exchange program, and Lysander's letter of acceptance from a Professor Almeida, but if he'd been hoping for a diary entry or an application essay that included something along the lines of I really can't imagine doing this without my brother, then he was, predictably, disappointed.

"Out with it," his dad said over the kitchen table as Lorcan sat staring aimlessly at his lunch.

His faux-casual "Out with what?" was met with a pointed look over the top of his father's glasses. He sighed. "Should I go with him?" he asked his father. Rolf's eyebrows raised in surprise.

"Did he ask you to?"

Lorcan sighed again, heavier this time. "Yes. No. I don't know, maybe."

"You know that only one of those answers can be true, right?" Rolf asked his son. Lorcan sighed one more time for good measure and explained.

"He did ask me. Then he said he was joking. So actually, 'yes, no, i don't know maybe,' is entirely accurate."

Rolf frowned and tapped a long finger against his lips, contemplating. "Let's approach this from a different angle," he finally said. "Could you even go with him? Term starts next week. Do you know how late they'd accept an exchange student?"

"Another two days," Lorcan said. "I snooped in his room this morning."

"Okay," Rolf said, nodding. "Then next question. Do you want to go? It shouldn't just be about following Lysander, it should have some benefit for you, too."

Lorcan was quiet for a moment. "I actually thought about it, a while ago," he admitted. "Last summer. They've got one of the best magical flora programs in the worlds. I could learn a lot. It'd be hard to not spend this year with Maddie and Callie and Louis, but . . . no. I wouldn't just be following Lysander."

Rolf nodded again. "In that case, it does seem to come down to whether or not Lysander really wants you there."

"And I'm right back where I've been all night," he muttered.

"Then stop asking yourself did he mean it or didn't he, and think about it like this. If he didn't mean it, if he was joking, but you go anyway, what's the worst that will happen?"

"He'll be pissed at me," Lorcan said heavily. "He'll say I went Full Lorcan and overreacted in the worst way and he won't want anything to do with me the whole year and he'll resent me forever."

Rolf had a bit of trouble hiding his amusement. "Okay, little Doomsayer," he said, which had always been his father's way of alerting him to the fact that he was heading for Full Lorcan Overreaction. "Forever is a bit strong, and if, in this hypothetical scenario, that turned out to be his reaction, you could leave South America and come back to Hogwarts. But now flip it. What if he does want you to come, and you don't. What's the worst case scenario then?"

For some reason that he couldn't fully pinpoint, Lorcan had a very strong reaction to that question. His hands went cold and his stomach went tight, thinking about the possibility of Lysander, alone in that school so far away, a gap at his side where his twin should be, would be if he'd actually cared enough to see through the deflection of Relax, I was joking.

He remembered, suddenly, something Lysander had said in the rainforest. I was terrified, my first night in Hogwarts. You were in a different house, and we'd spent the last who knows how many years of our lives traveling the world, in a different country every month. I didn't know anyone. I was lonely, and homesick, and scared, and you weren't there, okay?

Slowly, he looked up at his father, who seemed to already know the decision he'd come to. "I . . . have some letters I need to write."

Four days later, he strode into Lysander's bedroom and shut the door deliberately behind him.

"Come in," Lysander said drolly, looking up from his perch in the window seat, his hands paused mid-page-turn of the book he had been reading.

"I have a question to ask you," he said without preamble. "It is a simple question. It is a yes or no question, and I need you to answer it honestly, with only a yes or a no." Lysander crossed his arms over his chest and waited. "Do you want me to come to Brazil?"

Something flashed in his brother's eyes, some kind of panic which was quickly tamped down. "Lorcan-"

"Yes or no, Lysander," Lorcan interrupted.

Lysander's eyes flitted to the door and back to his brother again. "I already told you, you're not-"

"Yes or no, Lysander, the instructions were not that difficult," Lorcan interrupted again. Lysander set his jaw and looked at his brother with eyes of steel.

"I'm not asking-"

"I'm in," he told his brother, holding up the letter that had arrived moments before. "I wrote to Professor Almeida, I applied to the program, they accepted me. I will start as a student at Castelobruxo next week. But only if you want me to."

Lysander stared at the papers in Lorcan's hands, an incredulous and slightly pained look lining his face. "Why would you do that?" he asked in a tight voice, and for a moment, Lorcan was afraid he had actually gotten this wrong and Lysander was furious with him. But then his brother spoke again. "Why would you - you have the perfect life waiting for you at Hogwarts. You have friends, a girl who's head over heels in love with you, a future you've been planning for years. Why would you apply to an exchange program halfway around the world?"

"Because you sat on the floor of the Amazon rainforest and told me that your first night at Hogwarts was torturous because I wasn't there," Lorcan said, and Lysander looked away, and Lorcan kept talking. "And what I didn't tell you was that it was exactly the same for me, Lysander. You weren't there. I didn't know what to do. And I tried to sit with you at breakfast the next morning, and you wouldn't let me, and I didn't know what had happened, and then you weren't there, but in a different way. And the only reason I ended up with any friends at all is because I used to sneak down to the dungeons during your potions lessons and sit outside the door and pretend like we were in class together, and Roxie Weasley caught me one day, which is how I realized I'd had the wrong class the whole time."

Lysander looked like he wanted to laugh at that, but his face was tight and his eyes were bright and he was clearly trying not to cry. Lorcan was fighting back his own tears, but he refused to let that stop him. He kept talking.

"I've had six years with my friends and the girl who might be in love with me, we haven't talked about it, and my plan. But you're my brother. And I want a do-over. That's why I-"

"Yes." The word was choked out as Lysander stood suddenly. "Yes, I want you to come with me. I want you there. I don't want to do this alone."

Lorcan let out a breath he hadn't realized he was holding. "We really have to work on this asking for help hang up you've got going on, you know that?"

Lysander gave a watery laugh, and then he was in Lorcan's arms, embracing his brother for all he was worth. "Well, we've got plenty of time for that," he said in Lorcan's ear.

"Yes," Lorcan said, pulling back and holding his brother solidly by the shoulders. "Yes, we do."

Fun fact, immediately following the end of this, Lorcan goes to tell his mother that he's also going to Brazil, and her response is "Yes, dear, I bought your things last week." Because Luna.

The twins bothered me for a long time because I couldn't figure out what to do with them. Then I got the prompt for A Lot to Learn and it's like they came up and introduced themselves properly. I don't have a lot more to add about Lorcan here, because I feel like everything I've written for him speaks for itself. But in case you're curious, the girl who is head over heels in love with him is Maddie Longbottom, who you will meet in two short chapters.

Thanks for reading!