Legal Disclaimer: I own my stuff, but not the original source material. That belongs to whoever. Also, the opinions and interpretations I use here may not reflect the same in said whoever that owns the source material. Look, I'm just a poor college librarian. Suing me isn't going to get you anything but tears.
Warning: This work may be offensive to some readers. Feel free to back out if need be.
Author's Note: I sit down to write a fluffy birthday fic and spend 600 words breaking my heart before giving up just letting Miriam shove her way in like she wanted. Brief recap: this fic takes place in an AU where Harry was sorted into Hufflepuff & the entire House rallied around him. It does take place in a series, but you don't have to read the other pieces (most of which were written by Magi Silverwolf, not me), in order to understand this work. Oh, and the Abbotts are Jewish as well as cobbled together from multiple adoptions some of which may or may not have started with Miriam going "you need a home. You're mine now."
Jewish Culture (Quick & Dirty): Savta is the Hebrew word for "grandmother". A tichel is a headscarf that is traditionally worn by married women but can be worn by anyone. Tichels can also be worn in a baffling array of ways and come in even more different colors & styles. Bubbala is a Yiddish term of endearment (think "darling" or "sweetheart). Plotz is also Yiddish and means "to explode" or "to burst". Vus machs da roughly translates as "what's up?". Momzer roughly means "bastard". Mishpocha means "family" in the same sense as Ohana, and fershtay means "understand?". Uh, all of that last bit is Yiddish.
Submitting Info:
Stacked with: Hogwarts (Term 12); MC4A
Individual Challenges: Cete; Rainbow Focus; Fore-Touch; Love Language; Hufflepuff MC (x4); Sett to Destroy; Finding Family; Brush; Summer Vacation; Seeds; Tissue Warning; No Proof; Golden Times; Interesting Times; Old Shoes (Y); Ethnic & Present; Neurodivergent; Quiet Time; Booger Breath; Booger Breath Rider; Rian-Russo Inversion; Flags & Ribbons; Letter of the Day; Hold the Mayo; Short Jog; Yellow Ribbon (Y); Yellow Ribbon Redux; Two Cakes!; Green Ribbon; Greatest Gift
House: Hufflepuff
Assignment No.: Term 12 – Assignment 4
Subject (Task No.): Beauty Therapy (Task#8: Write about a Parselmouth, canon or not.)
Other Hogwarts Challenges: Insane Prompt Challenge [185] (Hugging); 365 [165] (Insistent); Gwen's Candy Shop [Bowl 3](Jewish); Baking King Cakes [Step Two](Coins); Make a Fairytale (Prince/ss); Friendship Frenzy [19](Birthday)
Other MC4A Challenges: Wi Bingo [5D](Gift)
Representation(s): Jewish Abbotts; Autistic Harry sorted into Hufflepuff; Healing through Love
Bonus Challenges: Fruit Fly; Gingersnap; Misshapen Pods; Second Verse (Ladylike; Not a Lamp; Found Family; Nontraditional; Zucchini Bread; Mother Hen; Spinning Plates; Unwanted Advice; Car in a Tutu; Rock of Ages; Hot Apple; Lettuce Hold Hands); Chorus (Odd Feathers; Wabi Sabi; Machismo; Peddling Pots; Mouth of Babes; Tomorrow's Shade; Larger than Life; Unicorn; Turtle-Duck)
Tertiary Bonus Challenges: T3 (Tether); SN (Rail; Ameliorate); FR (Satisfaction; Liberation); O3 (Oath); TY (Enfant); SHoE (Onus)
Word Count: 1220
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In Blood
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Harry came down the stairs carefully so that he didn't disturb the strange silence that hung about the Abbott house that morning. Well, it was less of a house, really, and more of a very small manor house. In addition to Hannah Abbott and her mother Zillah, there were about ten other Abbotts that lived there and many, many more who visited several times a week. The point is that Harry knew that they needed the room, unlike Ernie and Zacharias who also lived in manors but with just their immediate family members. Of course, having so many people who lived there meant that the quiet was just downright eerie, because normally there were at least three different arguments going on at any given time.
He chewed on his bottom lip once he reached the bottom of the stairs. Zillah had told him that he was welcomed everywhere in the house when he had stayed there over winter break, and Hannah had been super insistent that she was going to keep him forever. But all of that had been before the fight in Great Hall at the end of their first year and then all the hubbub that had been happening with the headmaster. It had been a whole month, too. Then there was how surprised everyone was yesterday when he had just told the adder to get off the garden patio before she got stepped on, and she had obeyed. What if Zillah had decided that he was too much trouble and had sent everyone away so that could be spared the disgust of seeing him beg not to be sent back to the Dursleys?
His eyes stung at the very thought. He had gotten used to being surrounded by people who at least seemed to care about him. Going back to only having that during the school year when he could help his fellow Hufflepuffs would be like losing a limb.
Maybe Ernie or Zacharias would let him hide in one of the many empty rooms at their place? Harry would have asked Susan, but the redhead was best friends with Hannah and prone to yelling when she thought someone was being stupid. He wouldn't be able to live with himself if he was the reason that Susan and Hannah fought. The two were practically glued to each other. Anyone who even thought of coming between them should feel really, really bad about themselves.
Harry crept forward towards the closed doors of the dining room. Normally the doors were standing open, so that everyone could come and go as they wanted. Miriam, the oldest Abbott in residence and who everyone called savta which made it very confusing who exactly was her children, always said that it was so that everyone knew which room the food was in. She would usually follow that with asking him if he had eaten recently—not in a mean way but like in the same bossy way that Hannah did while they were at Hogwarts.
She would not approve of the doors being closed.
What if the Abbotts were having a family meeting? Maybe that was why the doors were closed. His stomach twisted like it had right before his Sorting. This had to be it. He had known it was too good to be true. Aunt Petunia had always been very clear that the only reason she had kept him around was because he was related to her. Why would the Abbotts want to keep him?
Maybe if he hid in the attic for the day, they would wait until tomorrow to tell him that he had to go and he wouldn't have to spend another birthday facing just how unwanted he was.
Right at that exact moment, the doors to the dining room slid open with a loud clatter as they moved along their tracks. Harry flinched backwards, his heart pounding at the suddenness of the sound.
"Savta, we have to wait," Zillah whisper-shouted at Miriam who was bustling through the doors. As always, Miriam had on robes in shades of purple that were open to reveal the black slacks and blouse she wore beneath. Her tichel also reflected her favorite colors. Unlike how Zillah liked to wear hers (layered into a braided tail that hung down behind her left ear), Miriam preferred to have hers without any loose ends and the knot on the top of her head. "Savta, we were going to let him sleep in, remember?"
"I can't wait anymore, bubbala," Miriam exclaimed. "I'll plotz! It's his first birthday with us! We're still fattening him up! Oh, do you think he'll like his presents?"
"You could just ask him, Savta," Hannah commented from the stairs behind him. Harry made an embarrassing squeak of surprise as he spun to face the blonde. She grinned and ruffled his hair. Then she grabbed him and gave him a loud, smacking kiss on the forehead, just because she could. "Vus machs da? You look like Isaac stole the last blackberry jammy dodgers again. Who do I need to sick Susan on this time?"
"No—no one?" Harry stuttered. He glanced at the two women standing next to the dining room watching them. Zillah was a pale contrast next to Miriam, dressed as always in Hufflepuff colors. Miriam looked like her earlier claim about exploding was true, as she bounced in place with obvious excitement. Harry refused on Hannah to whisper his question, not feeling brave enough to let the adults hear. "Are there really presents?"
"Of course, there are, silly!" Hannah laughed around the end of the words. Her grin got even bigger. "There's even a crown for you to wear while opening them because you're the birthday princess!"
"And, and I'm not getting sent away?" Harry asked even as he flushed at the reminder of how he had let Susan and Hannah put him in some of their dresses while they were playing dress up. Not that it really made as much difference in the wizarding world as it would in the Muggle one. Robes were practically dresses. He swallowed around the lump in his throat. "I'm not going back to the Dursleys?"
"Oh, bubbala," Miriam cried as she swept him away from Hannah and into a fruit-scented hug. "Oh, you're never going back to those momzers—"
"Savta! Not in front of the children!"
"From my lips to Heaven," Miriam swore easily and kissed Harry's forehead with the same breath. "You're mishpocha now. That means that we're never giving you up. Fershtay?"
"Even with the snake thing?"
"With all the blessings you come with, babbala," Miriam assured him. "Even the ones that not everyone would see as such. You're family. And that…?"
"Doesn't end in blood," Harry recited, just like he had the night he had joined Hufflepuff. The words didn't send the same sweeping tingle through him that they had that night, but he didn't mind. He may love the family that he was with his fellow Hufflepuffs, but now he was beginning to realize that he had something better. Impulsively, he leaned into Miriam and said something that he never would have mentioned to Aunt Petunia. "I'm hungry, Savta."
Miriam pressed another kiss to his forehead.
"And we shall feed you," she promised.
Then she did just that.