Authentic Uncle Nate
I quickly put my wand away and Uncle Nate stops me. "Don't put that away." He whispers to me as he loosens his grip on my wrist. I look at him confused as to how he would know what a wand is. He seems to catch on and his expression tells me that he wasn't supposed to know what a wand is. "I mean, what is that thing going to do?" He asks me. I shake my head at his lame attempt to pretend he doesn't know what it is. We are close, but my dad told me not to tell anyone in the family, even Uncle Nate. I didn't know why, but I obeyed, until now.
I give him a raised eyebrow and he lets out a sigh. "Okay, you got me. I know about the wizarding world, don't put that away." He says pointing at my wand.
"But how do you know?" I ask him. He shakes his head, indicating that he doesn't want to answer it right now, or it might not be the best time and place to discuss this. "And didn't you leave to go to the city?" I ask him. Now it's his turn to look at me confused.
"What are you talking about, I never left the city, and I don't even know how I got here." He says rubbing the back of his head. I start to feel fear and anxiety creeping up on me. "Someone impersonated you using the po-," he finishes the sentence for me.
"Polyjuice Potion." How did he know about that potion? I'm a muggle born witch, or at least I assume that I am. How does my Uncle know about the wizarding world, but not my parents?
"Are you sure you're not a wizard of some kind?" I ask him folding my arms.
"I swear to you I'm not, I just work closely with a colleague who is a wizard. I told him about you and he told me about You-Know-Who and the dangers of it. That's why that wizard left the wizarding world." He says explaining to me how he knows about the world that has been hidden from muggles for a long time. I furrow my brows finding this hard to believe. "I'll explain more later." Uncle Nate says as we hear footsteps coming towards the campsite. I pull out my wand ready to send a hex towards whoever is coming.
The person sounds like they have been running and when he comes closer I recognize the figure. It's Cedric. "Cedric!" I whisper, trying not to wake up anyone. I lower my wand and he turns around. He also has his wand out, but hides it immediately when he sees that I'm not alone.
"Rebekah? What are you doing here?" He asks me. A cold breeze comes by and I hug myself trying to keep myself warm. Uncle Nate does the same and I finally see that he's only wearing his boxers, and his undershirt. Cedric advances towards my Uncle Nate, and he looks ready to punch him.
"Cedric, stop, it's not what you think!" I say to him. He steps back, but he still looks angry. I didn't know that he still cares about me. I blush at the thought, and I am glad that the darkness of the night is hiding it.
"Did you think I… No never I would never, we're like practically siblings!" I hear Uncle Nate say, and I can just see himself straightening his undershirt and making himself look taller. Cedric is about half a head taller than my uncle.
I look at Cedric and see that he has soot all over his face and his hair, and I notice that he has a cut on his arm after my eyes had adjusted to the darkness. "What happened? Did something happen after the game?" I ask him, concern lacing my voice. I reach out to his face and try to wipe some soot away, but I end up smearing it. I remove my hand right away, not sure why I even did that.
"There were," I see Cedric look back at my Uncle, and I tell him that it's fine. "Death Eaters everywhere. They set nearly all of the tents on fire. He says as he ruffles his hair to allow some of the soot to fall away.
"Where's your dad?" I ask him, Mr. Diggory doesn't seem to be too fond of me right now and I don't want to bump into him again.
"He's coming, go back into your tent." Cedric instructs me. I nod and walk back into my tent. I insist that Uncle Nate comes into the tent with me but he decides to just hide among the trees. I go back in as quickly as possible. Maddie is still sleeping and I slip into my sleeping bag and put my wand to my left so Maddie doesn't see it if she wakes up.
"My boy, are you alright?" I hear Mr. Diggory ask his son. "Looks like a family is out camping." He says, and I can picture him looking at the two tents.
"They're sleeping, let's keep it that way." I hear Cedric whisper to his dad.
Yes let's keep it that way. I think to myself. I look over at Maddie and she's awake. My eyes widen and I put my finger to my lips to tell her not to say anything to me. I keep my wand at my side and she nods in agreement. She sits up in her sleeping bag, she looks ready to do something if anything went wrong. I can see her watching the two figures in the tent, the short one is Mr. Diggory while the taller one is Cedric.
The sound of the tree leaves rustling cause Maddie and I to look up. No Uncle Nate, what are you doing? I think but after the rustles of leaves I don't hear anything, but I see movement outside of our tent. I look at Maddie and it seems that she's testing her ears as well.
"Can you hear me?" She mouths it or she says it very loudly.
I shake my head in response, trying to figure out what is wrong with my ears, and the next thing I know is that my head hits the pillow, and that is the last thing I remember. I wake up the next morning and from the light outside I can tell that it is probably around seven o'clock. I look over at Maddie and she's waking up as well.
"Last night was really weird," She says rubbing her eyes.
"Yeah it was." I say forgetting the fact that my ears did not work for a while last night.
"What is this?" I hear Maddie ask as she pulls up my wand. "It is a very decorative stick." She adds looking at the details of my wand. How do I explain this without revealing that it's actually a wand? I don't want her to take it and keep it.
"It's a family heirloom." I lie. I know it's weird that a decorative stick can be an heirloom, but maybe. Maddie does give me a puzzled look. "I know it's weird, but it is." I say to her. She shrugs and gives me back my wand. I smile at her as a thanks and tuck it away somewhere safe in my duffel bag. It's already full of clothes so my wand will not bend and break from the sudden change in shape of the bag.
I change into the outfit that I prepared for today, a pair of jeans, a solid long sleeve shirt, and a pullover hoodie to keep me warm for this morning while we are still in the woods. After I changed out of my pajamas, I begin to roll up my sleeping bag as tight as I can so I can put it in the bag that the sleeping bag came in.
After I stuff it into my bag I put it next to my duffel. I look around the almost empty tent to see if I have missed anything. "Alright looks like I have everything." I say touching my pockets to see if I have my pager in my pocket, so I can let my parents know when we are leaving. They have always been quite overprotective of me for as long as I can remember.
"Same here." Maddie says as she finishes up stuffing her sleeping bag into the small bag. "Time to take down the tent." She says as she steps out of the tent. I wonder if Uncle Nate got out of here, his car is gone. I think, I do remember not seeing it when we made our way back last night. Maybe the imposter moved the car and hid it somewhere.
I step out with my things as well and I put them on the picnic table. I walk back towards the tent and begin helping Maddie take it down. I see Maddie look over her shoulder to her parent's tent. "This is weird, my parents are usually awake before me." I hear her say.
"Maybe they went out to grab some firewood." I say to her as I shrug my shoulders.
"Yeah maybe, or they decided to sleep in." I hear her say as I finally manage to pull out the last rod that keeps the tent down. She laughs a little when she sees that I'm sitting on the floor.
"You try pulling them out," I say with a teasing tone as she lifts the pole out of the grass. I help her pull it out and fold it up. After that we move on to the other poles. I hear the zipper of the other tent opening and I look over and see Maddie's parents stepping out. I smile, glad that they had their goodnight's rest.
"Good morning," I say to greet the two of them. They say good morning in return and give Maddie a good morning kiss.
"I thought you two were already up," I hear Maddie say as she drops the tent to give her parents both a peck on the cheek. I continue pulling out the pole and I fold it up as I go so it will not be too long to handle once it is out.
"We were, and we heard the two of you, so we thought we wanted let you two clean up first." Mr. Labelle says with a huge smile on his face. I chuckle at their decision while Maddie pouts at her two parents. "It looks like you two are nearly done." He adds pointing at the tent.
"Yeah just need someone to push the pole out." I say as I give Maddie an accusing stare. She sticks out her tongue at me like a two year old and begrudgingly walks to the other side of the pole to push it out of the tent. "Thank you," I say and the two of us laugh as we finish taking down the tent. "I'm going to miss this." I say as we fold the tent up and neatly and tightly as possible.
"Me, too." Maddie adds as she puts the poles into the bag, while I'm standing there holding onto the folded tent. She opens the bag up and I put the neatly folded tent into the bag. She zips it up as I look around to see if we missed anything.
After we had our last breakfast out in the woods we begin to make our sandwiches for lunch. I make sure mine doesn't have any cheese in it. I never really liked cheese. We begin to pile everything into the car and make sure that there is room for everything that we brought with us. Mr. Labelle goes into the driver's side, while I sit behind him, and Maddie sits behind her mum. Maddie's a little taller than me, that's why I always sit behind her dad. I don't mind it all, really. If I had a car I would rather have a short person sit behind me instead of a taller person.
Throughout the car ride we were just talking about the things we enjoyed about the camping extravaganza. I leave out the part of Uncle Nate coming to our campsite in his underwear, and Cedric coming over as well. I keep replying that scene of when Cedric thought my Uncle was a predator and how he reacted. Does he actually still care for me, as a friend? I feel my heart fluttering again and the butterflies in my stomach awaken to a bright new day.
"Why are you blushing?" I hear Maddie say in a teasing tone. She even gives me a friendly poke. I put my hands up to my cheek and they feel pretty warm. My eyes widen realizing that my cheeks are betraying my feelings for Cedric. I look at Maddie and she's anticipating my answer, and my hands are still covering my cheeks.
"I don't know what you're talking about." I say beginning to use my hair to cover up my cheeks.
"You know, you're terrible at lying, right?" She says crossing her arms. I roll my eyes and give up. I whisper to her and she squeals. I put my finger on my mouth to indicate for her to be a little quieter. Her parents can totally hear this conversation. My parents don't even know that I have a crush on my supposedly long-time friend, Cedric. These feelings came out of nowhere! "I knew it! I knew you liked him." She says a little too loudly. I give her this look and it doesn't seem to be registering.
"Maddie, your dad needs to concentrate on the road, shh." I say trying to keep her calm. She quiets down a little because we are still driving down the mountain roads which are always turning.
"How long have you had a crush on him?" She asks me in a low voice, finally. This girl knows that I don't like someone out of the blue, but this one is out of the blue. I saw him again and the heart fluttering, and the butterflies came at me like a train.
"Yesterday. I think it's just because I miss him." I say shrugging my shoulders. "I have to think about these things for a while, you know me." I say to her, and I already feel myself blushing thinking about him.
"Are you sure? I've never seen you blush this much for a boy." She says raising her eyebrows up and down. I shake my head, not really sure about this anymore, but I turn the subject towards her.
"What about you? You somehow 'charmed' my Uncle Nate yesterday." I say using air quotes around the word "charmed". It seemed like he was under some spell, I wonder if she really is a Veela, or at least a half-Veela. That makes me wonder if male Veelas can seduce women who aren't Veelas.
"Maybe he finally saw how beautiful I am." Maddie says as she moves her hair blonde hair over her shoulder. After the long drive back into the city the Labelles drop me off before going to their house to drop everything else off.
"Thank you so much for the wonderful time, and the surprise." I say to them, though I did hesitate a bit. That was not the real Uncle Nate who came to surprise me yesterday morning.
"Of course, I'm glad you had a great time." Mrs. Labelle says as she gives me a hug. I hug her back. Mr. Labelle opens the trunk of the car and starts to pull out my suitcase and I help him move some things around so that nothing falls out of the car. I grab my sleeping bag and my pillow from the car as well and begin making my way to the door with Mr. Labelle close behind; he's helping me with the suitcase. I stop at my door and take out my keys. I look for the one that's for the front door, but someone opens the door. I look up and see my parents standing there.
"Mum, dad! You're back early!" I say as I drop my bags and embrace one after the other. I missed them so much, I always do whenever they have these business trips. My dad is a manager for a business and is sent from one place to another for conferences. My mum also works there, and the company decides to send my mum along. Of course when I was younger she wasn't able to attend, but after sending me to Hogwarts, she was able to go.
"Yes, we wanted to surprise you!" My mum, Helen, says as she cups my face with both of her hands. I smile, glad that they're back. My mum looks younger for her age, she has fair skin like me, dark black hair, and deep brown eyes. My dad, Henry, also has darker skin and his hair is beginning to gray and thin out, but he still looks young for his age as well. My dad is about 1.80 meters tall, while my mum and I are 1.60 meters tall.
"Well you did." I say in response as I pick up my bags again. Mum and dad step back allowing me room to come into the house. I say goodbye to the Labelles as they drive their car up to their driveway, which was right across the street from our own.
"Had a great business trip?" Mr. Labelle asks as my parents let him in so that he can set my suitcase down somewhere in the house.
"Yeah, it was the usual boring business trip." My dad says in response as he walks into the living room. Mr. Labelle places my luggage down while I place my pillow and sleeping bag on the couch. My mum gives Mr. Labelle a hug as a way of greeting him.
"Thank you so much for taking her out on the camping trip." She says smiling.
"Of course Helen, we didn't want her to be alone when her birthday was coming up." Mr. Labelle says as he smiles at me. I smile back, glad that they did invite me to go camping with them.
After the three of them exchange a few words Mr. Labelle walks over to his house so that they may unpack from the trip. My dad closes the door behind him and he walks over to our cozy living room. The tv is next to the big window, and our couch is across from the tv. The fireplace is in the opposite corner of the couch and there is a beige colored carpet all around the house except for the kitchen and the bathrooms. There are pictures of me when I was younger, and a pictures of my family with the extended family. My Uncle Nate is even in some of the pictures that are displayed throughout the house.
"How was your camping trip, dear?" My mum says as we sit down on the black leather couch.
"It was wonderfu1! I had a lot of fun with the Labelle's as usual." I say telling them about the picnic we had at the end. I didn't want to mention about Uncle Nate being there, because my parents knew where he was supposed to be (the states). I do want to ask them about how Uncle Nate knows about the wizarding world, his excuse was somewhat lame. My parents have never been to Hogwarts, but then again, how else would Uncle Nate know about the wizarding world? If I had a friend that was going to Hogwarts instead of me, I would know about the wizarding world, as well, right? "I really enjoyed the food that Mr. and Mrs. Labelle made. It was really good, but I do miss mum's cooking." I say as I put my head on her shoulder for a brief moment.
I hear my mum chuckle and she strokes my hair before I lift my head up from her shoulder. "We missed you, too darling." She says as she pulls me into a warm hug. My mum looks at the clock and notices that it's nearly dinner time. She leaves the couch and begins walking towards the kitchen.
While my mum is in the kitchen I talk to my dad about the camping trip and tell him how beautiful it was. Maddie and her family took a lot of pictures, and they're going to have them developed probably in a week or so. "I would love to see them." I hear my mum say from the kitchen. Oh no, why did I mention the pictures? "Uncle Nate" were in those pictures, looking at Maddie with googly eyes.
My dad's phone chimes as we sit there in silence for a bit. He takes it out and reads the text message or email that he received. "Rebekah, I think you should go unpack, and see what you need to pack for school." He says gesturing for me to go upstairs.
"But school isn't until September 1st." I say slowly while I get up from the couch at the same time.
"Well, it's good to be prepared." My dad says as he sends me off to my room. I walk up the stairs and look at him suspiciously as he just smiles and gestures for me to go to my room. I look away and just walk up the rest of the stairs and up to my room. My door has my first initial on it, which was a block of wood in the shape of an "R" that Maddie painted; coincidentally the colors are green and silver, as if she knew that I was sorted into Slytherin at Hogwarts.
I open the door to my room and walk in. To my left is my bookcase full of the books I have read since childhood then around the corner is my desk, which is also usually stacked with my "to read list". I have a bay window with curtains that are flying from the breeze blowing every now and then. My bed is across from the bay window, facing it, and the closet is in between the bay window and the bed. I notice that my bags are leaning against the closet door, and I begin to unzip my duffel bag and begin putting the folded clothes onto the bay window bench.
I take out my jacket and open the closet door to find a white box sitting on top of my dresser. It was also tied up neatly with a simple solid colored bow. I hang my jacket first and look at the box, wondering if I should open it. Maybe they're planning something and they're going to have a "scavenger hunt" for me so I can find my presents. If my dad knew, why would he send me up here? I wonder, still looking at the present. Maybe I shouldn't, I think, as I leave the box where I found it.
I continue unpacking and see something on my bed. I look at it and can tell that this is from Maddie. It is wrapped in brown packaging paper, and it nearly takes up my whole bed. I can't believe I missed it. I hesitate before I open the present. My parents are definitely planning something. They know I hate surprises, and parties. I would like a simple hang out with family and friends, that's it. Maddie and I have only been in touch since the two of us basically went to "boarding school". Sure the other neighbors have children my age, but I'm not as close to them as I am with Maddie. It would be weird to have some people I barely know at this party. I shake my head at the thought and just begin sorting out my clothes again.
The dirty clothes are a pile on the floor so I remember which ones need to be washed, while the ones that don't need to be are hung in my closet or put away. I always bring extra clothes with me just in case things go awry, you never know. After I make sure that everything is put where it should be I pick up the pile of dirty clothes and begin making my way to the bathroom. I open the door and make a left to the bathroom down the hall. I walk into the bathroom and put my clothes into the hamper.
After that I decide to go downstairs, I didn't want to start packing for school just yet. I know summer is nearly over, but I also don't want it to be over. Sixth year is one of the most stressful years at Hogwarts, besides last year with the O. , now it's about preparing for the N.E. exams, just thinking about it gives me goosebumps.
"You're going to school in a week, you should start packing." He responds as he manages to "herd" me to my room and close the door behind me. I sigh as I look around to find my uniform for school. I manage to find my jumper, skirt, four sets of button down shirts and two sets of skirts. I find my shoes, and black knee socks, and black stockings, I usually wear the stockings during the winter months.
I begin packing the casual clothing that we can wear at school, along with at least four sets of pajamas. I also find the books that I bought from Diagon Alley and begin packing them in the big Hogwarts trunk, over the years it has been decorated with stickers and some letters from my friends that I kept, especially the birthday cards, well the ones that I really liked I taped to the inside of the trunk, the rest are on the walls in my room.
After packing up just a little bit more I take out a book and begin to read. I end up taking out an Anne of Green Gables book, and begin reading from the beginning. I loved the movies and the books were more magical than what was put on screen. It's funny how the wizarding world believes that muggles don't have magic, books are one of the many evidences that muggles do have magic. These authors have the ability to create a world and transport their readers into another one without ever leaving one's house.
I close the book after I have read about 10 pages and decide to put on the necklace that my mum gave me. Did my parents mean for me to open the presents in my room? I shouldn't, it might ruin whatever they're planning. I think as I try to ignore the wrapped present on my bed. It's not flashy or anything, maybe that's why I didn't see it when I walked into my room. I knew I needed to unpack, and my focus was on that, so I don't think about the present on my bed.
