AN: Helloooooooo guess who turned 18! Me! I'm an adult now, heck yeah! Anyway, I finally finished this chapter. Don't worry, it's not 8,000 words again, but it's still a pretty decent length at a little less than 6,000. Lots of stuff happens.
I want to thank everyone for sticking with this advertised SiriusxOC story even tho there is no SiriusxOC yet. I'd also like to apologize, because I think we're looking at another 10-15 chapters before we have some SiriusxMarina action, and even that will be kinda minor. Just a heads up! I hope you guys are in for the long haul, because in total this work will probably be in the neighborhood of 40-50 chapters long. I mean, we're covering like a whole decade, here, and right now we're still in third year!
Marina looked up from the photo of her smiling, squirming baby brother to see that, across the table, Annie had gone pale as she looked at the opened letter in her hands. There was a muggle envelope sitting in scraps next to Annie's plate of breakfast waffles, and the pages were on white sheets of paper, so Marina guessed it was from her parents—what other muggles knew to send her mail to Hogwarts? The look on Annie's face sent Marina's gut twisting. Whatever it was, the news was enough to take Annie's usual passively cheerful expression and turn it completely blank.
"Annie?" Marina asked, voice gentle, yet still loud enough to be heard over the bustle of the Great Hall. "What's wrong?"
No response. Marina wondered if Annie heard her at all; she just kept staring at the letter. Curious, Marina leaned forward, trying to catch a glimpse of the words through the back of the paper, but that's when Annie jolted back to life, refolding the letter and tucking it back into its envelope. When Marina looked back to her friend's face, the usual smile was back, though it didn't quite reach her eyes.
"It's alright, Mina," she said, picking up her fork again. "Just a letter from my mum, is all."
If nothing was wrong, then Annie wouldn't have reacted the way she had, Marina was sure. Something was the matter, but Marina knew Annie. After three years, she had learned that Annie, for all her blunt honesty, was quite a private person. Just like after Christmas holiday, Marina would have to find some time alone with Annie to discuss whatever news her mum had sent her. As it was Thursday, they had a free period before Charms, so maybe they could go to the library. Or, better yet, they could test out the Come and Go Room.
After Lark finished scarfing down her breakfast, as was her habit from years of waking up late, she announced that she was going to the library with Artemis. From the way the other girl looked up from her oatmeal with slightly quirked eyebrows, Marina got the impression that Artemis hadn't known she was going to the library with Lark until Lark said so, but she wasn't opposed to going either. After daintily stuffing another spoonful of her breakfast into her mouth, the spindly girl stood up to follow Lark out of the Great Hall. Once they'd gone, Marina fixed Annie with a serious look.
"There was some bad news in that letter, wasn't there?" she asked.
Annie's smile faltered, and she nodded. "I don't want to talk about it or I might start crying," she said.
Marina nodded and reached across the table and around a platter of pancakes to place her hand over Annie's in what she hoped was a comforting gesture. "How about we go up to the seventh floor?" she suggested. "I'd like to try out the Room again, now that I know what it is."
"And I'd like to see it," Annie agreed.
While Annie ate the rest of her waffles, Marina hopped up from the Ravenclaw table and wandered over to the Gryffindors to show Quincy and Gideon the picture of Charles Michel. Quincy smiled and said he'd have to come see him over their upcoming holiday, while Gideon took the moving picture for a closer look. The image was a loop of Charles Michel laying on his stomach, his raised head bobbing around a little, looking at the camera with wide eyes before his face broke out in a wide smile.
"He's what, one month old, right?" Gideon asked.
"Yeah, why?"
"Look at his eyes," the ginger boy said, holding the photo and pointing. "He's got dark brown eyes already. If he were getting green eyes like yours, they'd be blue right now."
Marina took the picture back to study her baby brother's eyes; Gideon was right, they were dark. "I thought babies were born with whatever eye color they were going to have anyway," she said. "If he were going to have green eyes—or, well, greenish eyes, because it's not like my eyes are really totally green—he'd have blue eyes right now?"
Gideon nodded. "Yeah. Molly was telling me about it over Christmas. You know, because Charlie was just born in December."
It was only a few minutes longer before Annie came over to collect Marina. "See you lot later," Marina said, getting up from the table and taking her photo back so she could follow her friend out of the Great Hall. The two girls began the exhausting climb up the stairs to get to the seventh floor.
"Why are we doing this again?" Marina asked as they were forced to double back as a staircase moved away from a third-floor landing.
With a fond shake of her head, Annie replied, "The Come and Go Room, of course. And I said I'd tell you what the letter was about."
After much stair-stepping, they were finally standing in the seventh floor corridor, backs to that ridiculous tapestry. Thinking very, very hard that she needed somewhere to talk with her friend, Marina paced back and forth in front of the stretch of blank stone wall. She looked back at Annie when the double doors began materializing, grinning, a triumphant feeling ballooning in her chest. Her success was furthered when Annie pulled open the doors to reveal a little sitting room done in soft blues and creams. There were no windows, nor was there a fireplace, but it was somehow well-lit and not at all drafty, as most of the castle was in this season.
Annie and Marina sat down on the velvet sofa and made themselves comfortable. "This is perfect," Marina said, clasping her hands together against her collarbones.
Annie nodded and pushed her glasses up her nose. "It really is fascinating. I'm quite glad you found this before Gideon or Quincy did, Mina, because they would have lorded a secret like this over us forever."
"It is rather more impressive than the kitchens, isn't it?" Marine smiled, but she reminded herself that she was here for Annie to discuss her family. "So, what did your mum write to you about?"
Annie lost her pleased grin and looked down at her lap. There was a period of silence that stretched out for what felt like ages, and Marina thought that if Annie was taking this long to tell her what was wrong, it must have been something really bad. At last, Annie said, "I can't go home for Easter holiday."
"Oh." That was all? Why was that so upsetting? Though Marina was confused, she kept it to herself. "Did something happen?" Worst case scenario, Annie's parents officially disowned her. Or maybe that crazy lunatic had really started following through on his threats against muggleborns, though Marina was pretty sure that would never go anywhere as long as the Ministry was around. What was his name? Vladimir or something?
When Annie answered, her voice was thicker-sounding, and if the blonde looked up, Marina was sure she'd see tears in her friend's blue eyes. "They've gone off on holiday without me," she explained. "It's a cruise. No warning at all. I—I suppose they don't care enough to have me with them anymore." With a quiet sob, Annie broke down in tears.
Marina thought back to the beginning of the semester, when Annie had been so distraught over how her family had ignored her all of Christmas holiday. As she wrapped both arms around her friend, she wondered how people could be so cruel to their child that they decided they didn't want to deal with her anymore. It made no sense to her. It wasn't like it was Annie's fault that she had magic, was it? How could someone hate their child for something that wasn't even her fault?
It didn't make any sense at all to Marina, but she left her confusion for another day. The thing to do right now was focus on helping Annie. "I think you have two options," she said softly.
Annie sniffled and sat up. "I—two options?"
Marina nodded. A chunk of her curly hair fell in her face, and she tucked it back behind her ear. "There's two things you can do," she repeated, gathering up the loose fabric of her robe sleeve to clean the smudges and tears off her friend's glasses. "You could stay here for the holiday, or you could go home with one of us—you know, me, or Lark, or Artemis, or something." She happened to glance over and notice that a small coffee table had appeared before the sofa. It displayed an array of pressed handkerchiefs.
After pointing this out, Marina watched Annie lean forward and pick up a simple white one to blow her nose in. After a moment, during which she appeared to be thinking with that faraway look of hers on her face, she said, "It would be rude to invite myself to someone else's house for the holiday. It would be better if I spent it here. That's one option."
"Why would it be inviting yourself to someone else's house?" Marina asked. She cocked her head to the side, wondering why Annie came to the conclusion she did. "It's asking if you can spend the holiday with a friend because your family will be on a cruise."
Long blonde pigtails swayed as Annie shook her head. "I can't ask Lark or Artemis. I'd have to explain so much; I haven't told them anything."
"Well…I could write to my mum and ask her if you can come home with me for the holiday. My parents would understand."
Annie looked up from where she was twisting the handkerchief in her lap, beaming even though her eyes were puffy and her nose was red. "Really? You'd do that?"
Marina nodded and smiled what she hoped was a reassuring and comforting smile. "Of course. I'll write out a letter to my mum today and send it off as soon as I can. That way we can have an answer tomorrow morning." When she turned to stand up, intending to go and start writing the letter at that moment, Marina found that the handkerchiefs on the table had been replaced with parchment, ink pots, and a selection of quills. "Oh," she said.
"This is quite an interesting room," Annie commented, also noticing the writing implements. "I wonder who built it into the castle. Do you think it was one of the founders of Hogwarts that did the spellwork to set it up?"
Scooting forward on the sofa and picking up a quill at random, a dark one with a green iridescence, Marina glanced around the room. "Could've been. If one of the founders did create it, then I suppose that means this room belongs to one of the houses."
"I'm not sure I like that concept. Maybe all four of them worked together on it."
"We'll probably never know," Marina said. She dipped into a pot of black ink and wrote out her letter:
Dear Mum,
I have an urgent question to ask you. For complicated reasons that I can't explain
"Wait," Marina said, "can I tell my mum what's going on with your family, just briefly?"
"Sure," Annie answered, shrugging. "I don't see why not."
Marina crossed out "can't explain" and continued:
Dear Mum,
I have an urgent question to ask you. For complicated reasons that I will explain briefly, I would like to invite Annie to our house for Easter holiday. In short, her muggle family is not very accepting of her magic and has decided to leave on a holiday cruise without her, leaving Annie without anyone to go home with for the holiday. It would be really sad to leave her at school alone, and I'd like her to enjoy time with a family because she hasn't had an enjoyable time with her family on any of our school holidays since first year. Can she come home with me pleeeeeeaaaaase?
Please reply promptly, love,
Mina
It wasn't until after a particularly grueling Arithmancy class, during which Marina amused herself by watching Artemis make all sorts of disgusted, exasperated, and irked faces while Alfred Smith debated some stupid connotational technicality with Professor Traduce for a whole twenty-three minutes during the course of a class translation activity, that Marina was able to make the hike up to the Owlery. The school owl pecked at her fingers as she tied the parchment to its foot and flew off in a haughty ruffle of feathers without even a hoot in her direction. Marina was reminded, as she was every time she employed the services of a school owl, of how glad she was she had chosen a cat as her companion rather than an owl. She just didn't see how anyone could be friends with an owl. Never had she met a sweet-tempered owl, though Lark's owl was tolerant enough to take treats without nipping anyone's fingertips.
By the time Marina made it back to the Great Hall, lunch was almost half over with. That was okay though, Marina knew, because in the grand scheme of things, one slightly rushed lunch was worth Annie spending the holiday with a welcoming family. The only really unfortunate thing was that she was too late to have any sort of warning that Alfred and Etta were in the middle of intensely snogging; if she had been there earlier, she would have had time to look away and save her appetite. So, after all, it sort of worked out that she didn't have time to eat very much anyway.
—
Friday morning started out alright, even though it required sitting through double Potions and then Divination before lunch. Annie, who had been rather subdued for the remainder of the previous day after the unfortunate happenings of the morning, was back in her usual high spirits, and Marina, too, was looking forward to receiving her mum's answering letter at breakfast. Leaving Lark to sleep, Annie, Marina, and Artemis made the long trek downstairs to the Great Hall. With her own plate of fried eggs and sausage sitting in front of her just begging to be devoured like the wonderful savory breakfast it was, Marina watched Annie pour herself a bowl of the sugariest cereal within reach.
The owl post arrived only moments later, and the Stewart-Lautrec barn owl swooped low over the table to drop a scroll in front of Marina, though the letter actually landed just on the wrong side of a large tower of scones and rolled to Artemis. Pausing in the middle of spreading blueberry jam thickly over a slice of buttered toast, Artemis dusted the crumbs off the parchment and handed it across the table to Marina. Written in her mum's immaculate, angular cursive, the letter said:
Mina, my darling,
I have sympathy for your friend's situation. As you can imagine, I know firsthand how it feels to be shunned by one's family. That said, neither I nor our house is in any condition to host a holiday guest. Charles Michel requires a large portion my attention, and there is none left to entertain one of your friends.
Truly, I do hope the situation is resolved, and I regret that opening our home cannot be part of it.
Much love,
Mum
Marina frowned. Sure, it made sense that with a new baby her mum wouldn't want to host, but that just wasn't good enough for her. This was Annie; couldn't her family make it work for her? Maybe she should've written the letter to her papa instead. He would have understood and let Annie stay for the holiday.
"Bad news?" Artemis asked, calling Annie's attention to the arrived letter.
It was like Marina could physically feel Annie's cheer dissipating as she read the short letter over Marina's shoulder. Suddenly, her friend was no longer relaxed and happy and enjoying her breakfast, and instead she was tense and closed-off. Marina looked over, and, sure enough, Annie's face had fallen into a blank mask. She cast a worried look across the table to Artemis.
"I'm staying at school for Easter holiday," Annie stated, turning her attention back to her cereal with significantly less enthusiasm than earlier.
Artemis lifted one eyebrow at Marina. "Why were her only two options to stay at school or go home with you?" she asked Marina. It was less startling now, after three years, how stunningly accurate Artemis could be in her conclusion-drawing. Her dark eyes slid over to Annie, giving her a penetrating look. "What's wrong at home?"
Annie heaved a sigh and answered, "My family isn't a fan of magic. It's been quite—" Her voice cracked, and she swallowed, blinking into her cereal bowl. "—quite a problem."
Artemis was quiet, furrowing her eyebrows. "I understand, you know," she said, reaching up to tuck her dark hair behind her ear, though it was already smoothed back.
Before they had a chance to find out if Artemis would say anything else, Lark flopped onto the bench space next to the thin witch. "Well," she said, grabbing for one of the scones, unbuttoned shirtsleeve nearly missing a jug of pumpkin juice, "I had quite the dream this morning. I thought I'd come down early rather than try to catch an extra twenty minutes' sleep." She took a large bite. "Why the sad faces, girls?"
"Annie needs a place to go for Easter holiday," Artemis answered quickly, eyes flicking quickly from Annie to Lark.
"Oh," Lark said. "Is everything okay?"
Artemis said nothing and looked to Annie again, who only blinked long and hard behind her glasses to ward off tears. In her stead, Marina took a breath and said, "It's rather a touchy subject." She glanced over at her blonde friend and made the decision to wrap an arm around her back, pulling her over to rest against her shoulder. "In a nutshell, her parents don't like magic, and it's been causing problems in her family for a couple years now. She got a letter that her family have all left on a cruise for the whole holiday—"
"What's a cruise?" Lark asked.
"It's a vacation on a large ship," Marina answered. "Anyway, she's got nowhere to go besides staying here."
Lark tsked and reached across the table to touch Annie comfortingly on the shoulder. "What about one of our houses?" she suggested.
With a roll of her eyes, Marina replied, "My mum already said she can't come home with me."
"Temmie?"
"Purebloods."
Lark snapped her fingers. "Ah, right. That'd be a disaster, wouldn't it? Well…" She popped the last of her scone in her mouth and looked off into the distance. "Well, I can write my mum today and tell her I'm having a friend come for the holiday." Nodding to herself, she swallowed and then smiled at Annie. "Yes, I'm sure it'll be fine. My older siblings bring friends home out of the blue all the time."
Annie sniffed. "I don't want to be any trouble," she said.
As expressive as always, Lark's features shifted into a look of horror. "Oh, of course not!" she cried. "Annie, you're no trouble to anyone who cares, and of course we all care about you. My parents'll be glad to have you, trust me."
Before leaving for class, Marina popped down the Ravenclaw table to tell Levi they didn't have to meet that afternoon if he didn't want to, it being the day before the holiday and all. The second year boy nodded and wished her a happy Easter, and then the girls all headed off to Potions. And when that was over, they went to sit through Divination, where at least Gideon and Quincy were able to distract Marina from how nonsensical the day's lesson was. Then it was lunch, where the second year Gryffindor boys transfigured Dumbledore's podium into a giant chocolate rabbit and made tulips sprout from between the stones in the floor. Herbology and Defense practically flew by, and then Marina was finally free. She spent the afternoon in the Ravenclaw girls' dorm packing with her roommates. They all had a discussion about Annie, and both Lark and Artemis proclaimed their support for her, affirming that she didn't have to go through it all without plenty of help. Marina appreciated how much the other two girls cared for Annie and wanted to be there for her. She was also glad that Annie seemed open to letting them into her personal problems.
"If you're ever going through a tough time, please please please don't feel like you have to pretend in front of us," Lark said, precisely folding her sweaters to pack. "You're so sweet, but we don't expect you to be sweet and perfect all the time, you know."
Annie smiled. "Thank you," she said, removing Maia from where she was sitting on top of her shirts. "I'm sorry I've been keeping this from you and only telling Mina."
With a shake of her head, Artemis dumped a collection of stockings into her trunk. "It was a big deal for you," she said.
"Exactly," Lark agreed, nodding. "It's hard to share something when it's really important to you."
The next day, after an unusually short train ride, Marina watched, smiling, as Lark introduced Annie to her parents and brothers and sisters. Thank Merlin the Maxwells were easygoing and took no issue with a short-notice houseguest. As for Marina's family, her parents met her on the platform with Charles Michel. Her little brother was even more adorable in real life than he was in photographs. She was excited to spend time with him, no matter what Quincy said about babies.
Or at least, Marina had been excited to spend time with her baby brother. She stopped being excited when Charles Michel screamed all the first night she was home, keeping her and Maia awake. Then he spit up all over her the following day. And then Marina discovered the horrors of diapers. By the fourth day of Easter holiday, the fourteen-year-old found herself at Quincy's house.
"I hate babies," she announced as soon as Mrs. Jackson left the two friends alone.
Quincy made a face. "Oh come on," he said. "It can't be that bad. Remember how I said they were cute enough to make up for it?"
Marina snorted. "Clearly you've forgotten," she said. "I haven't slept properly in three bloody nights. Merlin's pants, I'm not going to survive the whole holiday."
"So he's not cute at all?"
"Merlin, Quincy, that's not the point! Don't the cons of a baby outweigh the pros?"
Quincy shrugged. "I mean, I'm sure it's worth it to raise a whole person. We were babies once, too."
Marina shuddered. "I can't imagine sneezing mashed peas into my mum's face. There's no way I was ever that small."
With a shake of his head, Quincy got up from the couch to wander into the kitchen. Marina followed him and leaned against the counter while he poked around in his pantry. "You know, I'll bet you were even more difficult to deal with as a baby."
"No way. Charles Michel is a complete nightmare." She scowled. "And even his name is ridiculous. Why are we calling him by both his first and middle names, anyway? It's just a mouthful."
Quincy surfaced from the pantry with a box of chocolate biscuits. "Your mum was, what, seventeen? Eighteen?"
"What do you mean?"
"When she had you. That was probably really hard for her. She was alone, too, yeah?"
"Well, sort of, but—"
"You shouldn't be so quick to judge your brother, is all I'm saying," Quincy said, and he chomped down on a biscuit.
Marina sighed and gave her best friend a fond smile. "Since when are you all fair?"
Quincy shrugged and grinned back. "I got yelled at a few years ago for insulting my friend's mum based on a stupid stereotype."
Despite Quincy's admittedly wise words, Marina still found that she wasn't very much a fan of living with a baby. Maybe the worst part was that she couldn't just talk to her mum for five minutes without Charles Michel interrupting. Not to mention she heard her mum talking about staying home from now on because of the new baby. There was no way a silly baby was worth giving up her job at the Ministry, was there? Her mum didn't want to stay home for her when she was a baby, so what was so special about Charles Mi—oh, bugger, it was even too long to say in her head! That kid needed a nickname. Or even just Charles would be fine, right?
Anyway, Marina sulked around her house practically all holiday long, avoiding her brother as much as possible. It didn't work out so well, though, because the seventh time she tried to get away with using her already-finished DADA essay as an excuse to go hide in her bedroom instead of help feed Charles or whatever her mum wanted, she was called into the kitchen for a serious discussion. She could tell by her papa's stern tone of voice.
Marina pushed her hair behind her ears as she sat down at the table, looking between her parents, though most of it fell around her face anyway. Her curls were quite long now compared to how she kept it as a child, though they were still too short to tie all of them up at once, and frizziness was becoming a real problem that she should probably talk to Lark about. Lark's hair was a long mass of pretty, bouncy curls that somehow always looked good. If anyone knew about how to fix frizzy, curly, tangly hair, it would be her. Marina knew her mum knew nothing about really curly hair, since her own hair was barely wavy, though it also always looked perfectly styled. Well, almost always. This holiday Marina had seen her mum's hair in more ponytails than she had ever seen it in. Today, for example, Bobbie had even used a headband to keep her blonde hair away from her face. It was probably because of Charles.
"Mina, dear, we want to talk to you," her mum said.
Her papa leaned forward, worry clear in his eyebrows and the line of his mouth. "Are you okay, mon cœur? Do you feel well?"
Bobbie sighed. "Theo, just hold on a moment. We're concerned, Mina, with how much time you've been spending in your room or out of the house. You've barely spent more than ten minutes with us or your brother outside of lunch or dinner." She tilted her head and scrutinized her daughter, something that had always made Marina want to fidget and run away as a kid. Even now, the look caused Marina to shift in her seat and cross her ankles the other way. "Is there anything we should know about going on with you?"
It would probably be rude to say she didn't like having a baby brother. However, Marina had always been quite terrible at lying. Conflicted, Marina shrugged, glancing between her parents. It was only a short-term delaying tactic, she knew, because one way or another, her mum would weasel the truth out of her; she always did. Even now, Bobbie's eyes were narrowing, and the scrutinizing look intensified. For what felt like ten minutes but was probably closer to one, Marina held nervous eye contact with her mother, waiting for the probing questions that would undoubtedly come next.
And then Charles started crying from his nursery.
Marina breathed out a sigh of relief as her mum got up to go pay attention to the baby, leaving her daughter behind. She couldn't resist rolling her eyes as she watched Bobbie leave the kitchen.
"Don't think I didn't see that," her papa said. Merlin's pants, she had forgotten she was still stuck with her other parent. "Please, chèrie, talk to me. What's wrong?" He smiled softly. "I promise you, I will not be angry."
Without her mum in the room, it was easier for Marina to take in a deep breath and talk. "It's horrid of me," she prefaced, "but I don't like having a baby brother. He's loud all night, and he smells, and he threw up on me, and he's taking over our whole lives. I don't even know why you had another kid in the first place." She looked down at the table rather than watch as her papa's face fell. "I suppose you think I'm a terrible daughter for saying so. It's just that I don't understand why everyone wants to go though so much trouble for him. And his name is bigger than he is. Why are we calling him Charles Michel? Why not just Charles?" With a groan, Marina dropped her head on the table.
She heard her papa sigh and lean his weight forward on the table. Then she felt him stroking her hair gently, being mindful of the tangles. "I know it's difficult," Theo said. "You were an only child for fourteen years, and now you have someone new in your family who needs a lot of attention. My parents started fostering children when I was a couple years younger than you are, and I understand that it's not fun to share your parents with someone suddenly. Babies especially are difficult. You're right, they aren't very fun. But Charles Michel is part of our family now, and we love him."
Marina turned her head on the table so that she could look over at her papa and his kind dark eyes. She was grateful that he was being patient with her and trying to help, but he wasn't understanding her completely. "But—"
"Do we know what the problem is yet?" Bobbie said, entering the kitchen again with Charles in her arms. She bounced him gently, sitting back down in her chair.
"Mina is having difficulty adjusting to having a new brother," Theo answered.
Sitting up, Marina sighed. "I found out I don't like babies," she stated.
"Well, darling, whether you like babies or not, Charles Michel is your brother, and you will love him."
"Maybe I don't love him," Marina blurted, immediately realizing that was not the best thing to have said, no matter how true it was, especially in this moment.
Her mum's expression turned sharp, her green eyes freezing over. "Marina Rose Stewart-Lautrec," she said. "In this family, we love each other. You may not like him, but you are obligated to love him. That's what it means to be in a family."
Marina crossed her arms. That didn't even make any sense. How can you force someone to love someone else? "You can't make me love him."
"I bloody well can; I'm your mother."
"Bobbie, Mina, this is not—"
"No, Theo, she needs to understand—"
Marina stood up and watched her parents argue about her for only a moment before feeling tears lump up in her throat. She turned on her heel and ran out of the kitchen.
"Marina, we're not finished discussing this!" her mum called. Charles started up crying again.
"I don't care—I'm going to Quincy's!"
She heard her papa persuading her mum to "let her go, just let her think" as she shoved her feet into her boots and stepped outside, slamming the front door shut behind her. Her blood seemed to simmer under her skin, and she felt hot even in the early April chill. Storming out fo the house was stupid, she knew, but so was the idea that she had to love her brother because her mum said so. You loved your family because you loved them, not just because they were your family, right? She loved her parents because they raised her and took care of her and were supposed to always be there for her and, well, because she just did. There was nothing to love about her brother besides the fact that he was her brother.
Actually, she thought, walking along the sidewalk, maybe people are your family because you love them. She loved Quincy more than she loved Charles. Why couldn't she just have Quincy as her brother instead? Well, he wasn't actually related to her, was he? Alright, so people have to be related to you to be family, and that's why they're family, but why does that mean she has to love them? And what about people you love who aren't your family but become your family? When you get married, you love someone so much you want them to be your real family. So you can choose your family, sort of, Marina concluded. That just didn't explain why she was "obligated" to love Charles Michel.
When Quincy opened the door, Marina stomped into his house and told him everything in one breath.
He hugged her when she was done. With her chin just barely fitting over his shoulder, Marina realized for the first time that he had grown significantly taller than her recently. "I'm sorry, Mina," he said, and then he let go of her. "Do you think you'll sort it out before we go back to school on Saturday?"
"Well I don't bloody know," she huffed. "My papa will probably try to fix everything as soon as I go back home, but I'm pretty sure my mum will be stubborn about it, and I'm pretty sure I'll never agree with her. I'm not insane, right? It does make no sense, right?"
Quincy shrugged. "I mean, it does make sense to love your family. You love your family unconditionally, right? That's what people always say."
Marina didn't know what to say anymore. She had a lot to think about. Rather than reply, she just shrugged. They spent the rest of the afternoon talking about Quidditch and holiday homework and anything that had nothing to do with baby brothers. When it was time for dinner, Quincy's mum asked if she wanted to stay, so she did, partially to avoid going home for as long as she could and partially because Mrs. Jackson was an excellent cook. She did go home after that, though, knowing her parents would start to worry if she stayed away too long after the sun went down.
Her mum didn't bring up their earlier discussion once for the remaining days of Easter holiday, and her papa seemed reluctant to address the issue before her mum did. Marina boarded the Hogwarts Express that Saturday after tense goodbyes, holding Maia to her chest to ward off the feeling of not-quite-guilt sinking like a stone in her gut.