(A/N: Hola! Hallo! Howdy! So I've wanted to update all of the past few weeks, but it has been hard. This chapter is one of the ones that I have been building up to for a while. And I don't want to screw it up. I honestly have no idea what questions and reactions someone would have in this sort of reunion. This is based on what I think would happen, and if it isn't completely realistic….well, I apologize. With all of that, I would really appreciate reviews telling me how I did. And I still own nothing.)

Chapter 14: So….How've You Been...These Last, erm 11 Years?

I honestly don't think I slept last night. I mean, I went to bed and it was warm and cozy and everything but my brain just would NOT shut up. And my heart was and is still racing like me to the bacon platter in the Great Hall. At some point I realized that sleep was a lost cause and just lay there, staring at the canopy of my bed trying to stop myself from hyperventilating until it was an acceptable time to be getting up. Acceptable just happened to be 5 a.m. to me this morning. That's one symptom of a Kayla-style meltdown.

I practically jumped out of bed and ran to the shower. I don't wanna look like a slob when I meet my parents! I mean, I am a slob, but I don't want to look like it! My hair has to be neat and shiny or I'll never forgive myself! My tie has to lay just-so, or I'll never live it down. Are my converse double-knotted? Obsessive preening, symptom number two of a Kayla-style meltdown.

Sitting down on my bed, I tried again to calm myself. Deep breaths, Kayla, deep breaths…. Well, hell! All those TV shows were lying, because telling myself to breathe deeply wasn't doing jack-shit to calm me down. In fact, I think I'm pretty close to hyperventilating. Fabulous. As if I weren't nervous enough about meeting my FRACKINGBIRTH PARENTS, I now have to worry about if I am going to make myself pass-out and ending up in the Hospital Wing. That would be just bloody perfect! I would miss meeting them and they would think that I don't want anything to do with them! I need them to accept me! I could handle the flipping Smiths being A-class ignorant assholes because they weren't my real family! If my parents don't love me, it will break me into a million little pieces! Holy hell, I can't breathe… And the final and most evident symptom of a Kayla-style meltdown….a panic attack.

"Kayla?" A quiet, worried voice floated over to me. Glancing over, I saw that it was Hermione. To indulge my Texan roots: Well, butter my rump and call me a biscuit! Assessing my wheezing, pale state on my bed, she knelt down next to me.

"Kayla, I know I haven't been there for you these past few weeks and there really was no good excuse for that; but I'm here now. I need you to breathe deeply and slowly. Like this," she demonstrated inhaling and exhaling at a calm pace. I tried to emulate her. "Good. Now, I know that you are nervous about meeting your parents today. You would have to be insane, well -more insane than you already are, to not be. However, I am sure that your parents love you and will take care of you. Otherwise, they would not try and meet with you in the first place."

"B-but I'm no-ot the top of the cl-class! I'm not-t popular-!"

"Honestly, Kayla! There are more important things than grades!" Hermione's eyes sparked there at the irony of HER saying that. "As for popularity, why should that matter either? They won't care! They'll love you no matter what, because you are their child. End of story!"

My breathing was mostly evened out by then with just a stutter here or there. However there was still some doubt in my eyes.

"Kayla, if they don't accept you (which is nearly impossible) I'm sure you would be welcome at my house!" Hermione exclaimed. "Now, I am going to go get ready and then we are going to breakfast! No arguments!"

Well, rawr, Hermione! I guess I know why she's a lion now! I had wondered with all her nerdiness, why she wasn't in Ravenclaw…

I'm still so bloody nervous that I don't think I'll be able to eat much, but now I'm not in such a blind panic. Hermione came out and grabbed her bag, grabbed me, and set off for the Great Hall. My boys were already there, waiting for us. (Well only me, really, but they were getting Hermione too and they were gonna like it, damn it!)

"Well you look awful." Ron stated. Now, some girls would be reprimanding him for lack of tact, but as his sister I just responded as though it were nothing. (Which it really was.)

"I feel awful." I replied.

"Well, don't. Mum and Dad are going to love you. They have a ton of us boys, they'll be thrilled to meet their oldest daughter." Ron said in a comforting sort of way.

"I just don't want to mess this up." I said in a soft tone.

"We've got your back." Harry said with a kind and fierce sort of smile. Hermione nodded in affirmation.

Maybe I could make it through this.

~oOo~

Even though we were finally getting to the interesting stuff in our lessons, they were passing at a disturbing rate. I mean in Charms, we were making things FLY and I barely paid attention. I mean, Hermione and I were the only partnership that got it easily, but I didn't feel the sense of achievement that I normally do when I get something right. I'm just so damn nervous. It's like I just blinked and it was lunch time.

My steps grew heavier and heavier as I made my way to the Entrance Hall where my parents are going to wait for me. I don't think I can do this. I was about to turn around and just run until I couldn't anymore when Ron caught ahold of me.

"Where d'you think you're going?" He asked with a semi-angry, semi-sympathetic expression.

"I was thinking of how New York is supposedly very beautiful at this time of year…" I feebly try to joke.

Ron snorted, "Save it. Mum and Dad love us all and you running away will only hurt us all." Then he did something I wasn't expecting—he hugged me. He isn't the most emotionally aware person around, so that's a really big deal, okay? Yeah. Then he took my hand and dragged me to the Great Hall where there was a couple looking around anxiously. The man was tall, thin, balding, wearing glasses, a ginger (shocker, that), and really kind faced. Next to him was a short, plump, red-haired woman also with one of the kindest faces I've ever seen. When they spotted Ron and I, they both started smiling and waving. Also, it looked as if my dad was restraining my mom….. that's worrisome. When we got over to them, mom couldn't take it anymore; she ran and gave me a bone-crushing hug exclaiming while crying, "Oh, Kayla, dear! Oh, it's so good to finally see you! Dear, I'm ever so sorry that we couldn't find you! It's just Arthur's boss isn't the most understanding of fellows, and your siblings needed me, and I hadn't even gotten to name you so the point-me charm wouldn't work! Oh darling, could you ever forgive us?"

She had finally stopped to breathe and had loosened her grip so I could also breathe a little. Dad was watching with a huge smile and tears in his eyes. Ron was grinning, too. Blinking rapidly, trying not to cry myself, a grin forming while I returning the hug, "Well, ya'll are already being much better parents than the Smiths; I'll tell ya that! They would never have gone through such great lengths to meet me. Now, come over here dad; I need a hug from my father!"

Hugging both my parents was one of the best moments I've ever had. It just felt so great, with all the love I had never quite felt from the Smiths. Sure, they would hug me, but I never realized just how fake they were until I got this hug to end all hugs. When we were all hugged out (I had grabbed Ron to join in on it), we all were wiping tears from our eyes and grinning.

"Well, sweetheart, I'm sure you have some questions for us and we have some for you as well so why don't we find some place to go talk?" Dad asked. I grinned and nodded as we all linked arms and started walking. We eventually settled on sitting outside by the lake under the shade of a tree. Mom produced a basket filled with lunchtime goodies from her purse. My jaw dropped at that, because the basket was ginormous and her purse was tiny. She smiled a bit at my reaction and handed me a turkey sandwich. Once we all had our food, which was amazing, we decided to start.

"So, darling, where have you been all these years?" Mom asked.

"Up until March, I was in Austin, Texas in America." I said while chowing down on the food, because 1) I'm hungry and 2) my mom can COOK.

"Until March?" My dad asked with a confused and worried.

"When I told the Smiths that I wanted to go to Hogwarts, they took that to mean that they should kick me out. Flawed logic, if you ask me." I said in a would-be calm voice. Ron, who was beside me, snorted a little at the last sentence.

"HOW DARE THEY?! YOU ARE A CHILD! HOW WERE YOU SUPPOSED TO FEND FOR YOURSELF?!-" My mom was screaming. However my dad raise a hand to ask her to be quiet so he could say something, with a pretty durn angry expression himself.

"Molly, those people did a horrible thing. However, they aren't here and Kayla obviously did not die on the streets. Kayla, sweetheart, where were you after that?" He asked.

"Professor McGonagall brought me to the Leaky Cauldron where Tom let me stay in exchange for performing." I said with a wistful smile. I really am starting to miss performing there.

"What sort of performing, dear?" Mom asked, sounding sort of suspicious of this deal.

"Singing and playing the piano. I mostly sang stuff that was by muggle artists. It was quite popular." I answered.

"That sounds fascinating!" said my dad with a giddy expression that kind of worried me a bit.

Ron spotted this and whispered, "Dad's obsessed with all things muggle." Huh, that's actually kind of neat, in a silly sort of way. Something's still bugging me though, about what mom said at first.

"Mom, what did you mean about dad's boss? And what does that have to do with ya'll not being able to look for me? Didn't he have vacation days he could take or something?" I asked kind of hesitantly, I mean, I don't want to push things.

"I think I might be able to explain that a bit better." Dad said. "You see, I work in the Department of the Misuse of Muggle Artifacts. I love it, but the fact is that not many of those in power find us important or worthy of respect. As a result, our funding isn't exactly abundant and there are only two of us employed in it. The workload is immense and the pay- just isn't. When we lost you, it wouldn't have been a problem for me to go searching for you but the lack of funding in my department made paid vacation an impossibility and if I requested it, I would probably have been fired. You know how large our family is, so I have to work quite a few hours to make ends meet. The pay also made hiring a babysitter so that your mum could look impossible as well, at least, a babysitter who could handle seven children.-" "No one can handle Fred and George" Ron muttered. "-So really, all we could do was wait until your Hogwarts letter was sent. We really didn't know if you were alive, to be perfectly honest; all we could do was hope. You see, on the list of prospective students it also shows who their parents are. (A/N: Because plot convenience.) It however, did not say where you were. That information only becomes available when the letters addressed by the Self-addressing Quill. Professor McGonagall sent us a letter saying that she wanted to confirm it was actually you before telling us where you were, so that we wouldn't be walking into a trap. There are still many dark wizards about who don't much care for the fact that I petition for Muggle Rights. I do wonder why she never got back to us, though."

"Thanks for the explanation, Dad, it cleared up a bunch of things. I think, in turn, I have an explanation as to why Professor McGonagall didn't tell you where I was or take me to you. In all truth, the day she found me, my entire life was pretty much scattered into the wind. I found out that I'm a witch, that the people I had been living with weren't my family, that they didn't actually care about me, and that I'd have to find a place to live. I was a wreck, and I think she realized that I wasn't ready to meet ya'll just yet. I needed that time to try and get over the Smiths and come to terms with the fact that my real family was out there." I explained quietly so as to hide the shaking in my voice. I don't think I succeeded too much though, because mom glomped me again and my dad patted my shoulder.

After that, we pretty much played twenty million questions until dinner. We had just settled in with my other brothers, Harry, and Hermione when Professor Twitchy-I mean- Quirrell burst in with his turban a not-so-hot mess.

"Troll- in the dungeons! Thought you ought to know." He shouted and then collapsed in a dead faint.

(A/N: Yes, I know I left it at a cliffy….feel free to throw rotten fruit at me all you want. However, it took over a week of writing for me to get this chapter how I wanted it to be. My brain hurts. Could ya'll soothe it with some reviews, mayhaps? Thanks for reading!)