Chapter 9
Lily woke up before the others. Wiggling and squirming to get out of the piles, she realized the true meaning of squished. Once she was free, she started towards the house, where she entered the kitchen and put a pot of water to boil. The house was mostly clean, but the evidence of the kids midnight snacks and wrestling matches showed. Waiting for the kettle, Lily busied herself by washing some left over dishes, sweeping a spot of the floor and wiping of the counters. She was just finishing when she heard a voice on the stairs.
"Well now, you didn't have to clean up after us."
Lily turned to meet the eyes of Julie Potter, who sat on a bar stool across from her.
"I know, but I want to. I hope you don't mind that I was making myself some tea."
"That's very sweet of you, and no, I don't mind at all. Make yourself at home"
"Thank you, would you like some?"
"No, I don't particularly like tea."
"Me either."
At this last statement, Julie's eyebrows rose, a questioning look on her face. Lily smiled slightly, taking the screaming kettle of the stove and adding it to her cup of herbs.
"Um, I- I get these… pain attacks, is what I call them. They come out of now where, it feels like I'm going to die, but at the time it doesn't sound so bad."
In an instance, Julie Potter disappeared and Dr. Potter Appeared into her place.
"Is it internal or external?"
"Both, but after the attack leaves there's no evidence of it."
"None?"
"Nothing whatsoever"
"What's your red blood cell count? Blood pressure? Bone marrow? Do your pupils dilate? "
"Um, I understood about half of that." She smiled apologetically.
"Right. Of course. What medicine are you on?"
"Some herb concoction. I got it back when they were smaller; Madame Vince thought they were anxiety attacks."
"They're not, follow me, you need something stronger. " Pushing her stool back, Julie hopped off and excited the kitchen. Lily followed her into the small hallway. She had thought that there were only 2 doors in the hall way, but now she saw that there were three. They went through the third one, into a comfortable room, with a counter, sink mirror and cabinets on one side, and a bad and window on the other. Lining the counter and Lily guessed the cabinets also, were herbs and mixtures and medical spell books.
"Marcus added this room on when we were married; we use it as an infirmary of sorts. Go ahead and sit down."
Lily took a seat on the bed; which was surprisingly soft. From there she watched Julie spring around the room, reading from this book, checks with that text, gathering from this container and mixing it with that herb.
"Well now," She said once she had a cauldron steaming on the fire. "That ought to do it. It should need to sit steam for a few days. But as soon as it's done, I'll send it to you"
"Thank you," Lily said as they walked out of the rooms and back into the big room. "You really didn't have to do that for me."
"Its fine Lily, I'm glad to help you."
By now the kitchen was full; the kids that had been sleeping when they left were now racking the cupboards for breakfast. The bedding they had slept on lay discarded on the couch.
"Hey Aunt Julie, when is Anna going to be here?" Joanna asked
"Anna?" Asked Lily as she sat down at the bar next to Gemma.
"Our cousin." Said James as he butter a piece of toast.
"Your cousin? Bloody hell, how many cousins do you have?" James smiled at that, his tongue lying on his lip.
"Not that many more," Said Gemma as she took a piece of toast from James and handed it to Lily "Just Mary and Anna. Mom was one of three daughters; Isobel, Julie and Kate. You know all of Moms and Aunt Julies kids and Aunt Kate only had two before she…."
"Before she what?" Lily asked looking from Gemma's face to James.
"Before she died."
"Oh. I'm sorry how did that happen?"
"She was murdered." James said with a disgusted look in his face. "She and her husband Trevor. It was horrible. Little Anna was only 4 and they both saw it all."
"That's horrible."
"It is. After that happened, Mom and Dad took them in without a second though. They have an uncle, Aaron, but he lives in the States, so usually they stay here."
"The States? Is that where they are now?"
"Yeah, Dads going to pick them up from the ministry later."
"The ministry?"
James nodded, pulling out another piece of toast from the toaster. "It's the only place you can use floo powder to cross over the sea."
"Oh. Is the Mary in our house in her 2nd year the Mary you're talking about?"
"Short. Brown hair, black eyes, real shy. Yeah, that's her."
"She seems nice."
"She seems scared."
Lily titled her head. "Scared?"
"You don't see your parent's death and go away completely fine Lily."
"Oh hell."
"Yeah, she was older, she remembers more. Especially the part where they tortured her dad for information first."
"That's disgusting."
"It is."
For a moment they all ate their toast in silence. Marcus came down the stairs, talked to Julie a moment and then left, Nate and Izzie came down and ate, Izzie holding the new baby. Morllie and Tommy got into a food fight that was soon stopped by Ashley who looked tired but still hauntingly beautiful.
"So what are we going to do today?" Asked Michael as he sat down and was quickly joined by Ashley
"Where did you sleep? You were with us last night but when I woke you were gone." Lily said to him
"Where were you when we woke up?" James asked.
"I came inside, I couldn't sleep." She looked back at Michael.
"That's sweet of you to notice. Half way through the night, Tommy woke me with several unconscious kicks to the stomach. I slept in the round room."'
"The round room?" Lily asked looking around at them
"Its one of the guest rooms, it's like a circle, so we call it the round room."
"One of them? How many do you have?" She looked at Ashley who held up three fingers with her mouth full of cereal.
"Three?" At her house they didn't even have one, when ever company spent the night, Lily had to give up her room and share with petunia.
"yeah," said Gemma" The round room, the blue room and the brown room."
"How many rooms does this house have exactly?"\
James paused, counting on his fingers. "9"
"9?"
Ashley nodded this time "5 on the second floor and 4 on the third. On the second is Moms and Dads room, the nursery/Baby's room, Tommy's room and Anna's and Mary's room and the blue room. One the third is mine, James and the two other guest rooms. "
Holy crap. "Anna and Mary share a room."
"They choose to" Said Michael "Originally the round room was Anna's, but they wanted to be together."
Lily nodded, that made since; sticking together would help. Sometimes there was nothing worse than being alone.
"But seriously," said Gemma "What are we going to do today?"
For the next few moments they brainstormed all the things they could do before they finally decided on a list of activities. For the rest of the day, Lily and the Potters and the Collins ran around the yard and Godric's Hallow doing whatever strange or nonsense activities that came to mind. Lily pulled out her camera and grabbed snapshots of everything that happened. When darkness fell, they made a huge bed in the living room popped popcorn, got Wizarding snacks and watched Muggle and Magic shows alike. Around 9, the younger kids had to go to bed and around 1 in the morning the parents put their foot down and made the rest of them go upstairs. Lily and Gemma wiped off the blankets the best they could before collapsing on them.
Lily awoke some time later that night. She thought she heard the door slam and, as usual, curiosity got the better of her and she crept outside. Walking along the path to the garden hidden behind the pool, Lily looked up at the stars. They were magnificent, with so little light coming from the house and village, stars that were so rarely shown beamed into the sky. The Milky Way, a pooling lake across the sky, was clearer than if it had been highlighted. She stared up at it and some many other small beams of light; because of this she didn't even notice the figure in the garden with her until she ran into them.
"Oh, "She let out a shaky breath. "Hey James."
That's it for now. Please review!
LIZIES