Author's Note: Back in 2009, I started a fanfic about a young American Muggle girl named Adela who lived next door to a mysterious British couple, "Stephen" and "Miranda." They are better known to HP fans, of course, as Severus Snape and Minerva McGonagall. I posted two installments of the "Adela-verse" in 2010 and 2011 (they're still here on FFN and on AO3, too, if you want to check them out).

I always intended to write a third and final installment, but, desperate and unreformed procrastinator that I am, I didn't get around to it until now. But at last Adela has taken up her pen and journal once more, to tell us all about "Stephen" and "Miranda" and her trip to visit them in Scotland.

Since this entry is positively Adela's last, I indulged myself by allowing her to write as much as she pleased. Now, she's a chatty sort, so the result is l-o-o-n-g, and parts of it, to quote Adela's friend Dr. Reese, might be seen as "outside the main narrative." Feel free to skim and skip if Adela's loquaciousness becomes too much for you.

I think you'll be able to follow the story even if you haven't read the previous installments.

Enjoy!

- - - / / / - - -

"My Journal of Being 13 and Our Trip to Scotland" by Adela

by Kelly Chambliss

- - - / / / - - -

Chapter One

- - - / / / - - -

January 10, 2001

"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times."

That's a line from A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens. (He wrote really long novels back in the 1800s, in case you haven't heard of him.) I haven't read that book yet, but soon I'm going to. I did read the first paragraph though, when I was over at Dr. Reese's house, and that line says exactly what yesterday was to me. The best of times and the worst of times.

I'll explain all about it, but first I have to tell what's been happening since the last time I wrote in my journal. That was on December 17, 2000, the sad day I found out that Stephen and Miranda were thinking of moving back to Scotland.

An awful lot has gone on since then, like Christmas for starters, and some of our relatives came to visit, and then school began again, and I've been so busy that I haven't had time to write.

I need to catch up now before I start to forget stuff.

I wrote that entry about Stephen and Miranda moving, and I hated the idea so much that I didn't want to think about it any more. Luckily there were all sorts of fun Christmas things to do. That last week of school before Christmas vacation, we had hardly any homework at all, and Pop and I spent every evening that week making Christmas cookies and fudge and what Pop calls his secret Jevic family recipes - - potica and paprenjak. In English they are walnut roll and pepper cookies. (You wouldn't think that cookies with black pepper in them would be delicious, but they are.)

Then on that Friday before Christmas, the relatives came, Uncle Douglas (he's Pop's brother) and Aunt Cheryl and my cousins Douggie and Alicia. They're 11 and 10, so a lot younger than me, but we have fun anyway. Next year I'll probably be too old to play with them, I'll be 14, and that's pretty grown up.

Uncle Douglas and his family live in Maryland, and they always come to visit at Christmas. They stay at Aunt Cheryl's mom's house. I call her Grandma Glenna even though she isn't actually my grandmother (you know I was adopted, for one thing, plus Grandma Glenna is related to Aunt Cheryl, not to Uncle Doug or Pop). But she's as good as one.

They all came over here on Christmas Day, Grandma Glenna and Grandpa Wally, too. Some years, Dad's relatives Granddaddy Edwards and Uncle Ross come from Tennessee for Christmas, but they couldn't make it this year.

Also this year, Pop's youngest brother, Uncle Matt, was with us. He's a lot younger than the others. Uncle Matt is 30. There are 13 years between him and Pop and 15 years between him and Uncle Douglas. One time I heard Grandma Jevic tell Grandma Glenna that Matt was her "surprise baby." I used to think that meant she never knew what he'd do next, but now I know it means that she didn't expect to have another baby when she was so old. Over 40! (Grandma Jevic died when I was ten, I still miss her.)

We don't usually get to see a lot of Uncle Matt because he travels all over the country and even Europe and places like that. He works for the government or something. Pop always claims that Matt is a "super-secret double-naught spy," like James Bond 007. But Uncle Matt told me that's just Pop's silliness. Matt says he does technical stuff related to computer security and it's not exciting at all.

Of course, that's exactly what he would say if he actually was a double-naught spy. Or any kind of spy. He could hardly come right out and admit that Pop is right. So I am "reserving judgment," to use words that Dad often says.

Uncle Matt is probably not a spy.

But he could be.

Whatever his job is, he's super cool, and I was really happy that he could come for Christmas this year. He couldn't stay long, he had to leave at 6:00 am on the day after Christmas, but he still found time to take me and Douggie and Alicia tobogganing at the ski center and then to get hot chocolate and donuts in the ski lodge afterwards. We had a lot of fun.

Christmas Day itself was great. Dad roasted two turkeys and Pop made his famous pecan-and-mushroom stuffing, and Grandma Glenna brought her special scalloped potatoes, and everybody really liked the cookies and things that Pop and I made.

I got excellent presents, too. After I saw A Tale of Two Cities at Dr. Reese's house, I told her I wanted to start reading grown-up books like that, and she gave me one called Pride and Prejudice by an author named Jane Austen. She (Dr. Reese) got Dad to put the package under our tree so I could open it on Christmas morning. I saw Dr. Reese at her New Year's party and said thank you, it looked really good. She said she's teaching the book in one of her classes this semester, and I can read it at the same time, and we'll talk about it together.

As nice as the holidays were, I was very sorry that Stephen and Miranda weren't home. They went back to spend Christmas and Hogmanay in Scotland. I was really disappointed, because I had never heard of Hogmanay until I met them, and I was so looking forward to doing first footer with them, and all the other things Miranda told me about, like black bun cake and whiskey toasts. I was even going to ask Dad and Pop if I could have a sip of whiskey with Stephen and Miranda at the stroke of midnight on Hogmanay.

But alas. It was not to be.

They left for Scotland on the same day our relatives came, the Friday before Christmas, and they were away for two whole weeks! They got back last Saturday, just in time for Stephen's birthday on Tuesday (January 9).

I didn't expect that he would even say anything about his birthday, because Miranda told me that he hates what he calls "birthday fuss" and doesn't even like presents! She did say that I could bake him a cake though, and Dad took me to the supermarket on Sunday to get the ingredients.

It was a carrot cake with cream cheese frosting, it's Grandma Glenna's recipe. On Monday after school, I made the cake all by myself and didn't need Pop's help at all (Dad wasn't home, he has a night class on Mondays this term).

Oh okay, I did get Pop to take the pans out of the oven for me, but only because I had this silly fear that I would drop them. Otherwise, I did it all myself and cleaned up, too.

While I was waiting for the cake to cool so I could frost it, there came a knock at the front door. Pop went to answer it, and I was totally amazed to hear him say, "Hi, Miranda!"

It was Miranda! I was so excited, because she hardly ever comes over unless she's been specifically invited.

Pop was like, "Good to see you. Come in, come in. Have a seat, can I get you a drink?"

She said, "No, thank you very much. I shan't stay. I've merely come to invite you and James and Adela to tea tomorrow to celebrate Stephen's birthday. I apologize for the short notice, but we hadn't been sure of our plans."

I bet that meant she had to talk Stephen into it.

Pop is always up for a party, so he said, "That sounds like fun. Adela and I will definitely be there, and I'll check with Jimmy when he gets home. But I don't think he has anything else going on."

"Excellent," Miranda said. "Shall we say six o'clock? And now I'll bid you good evening."

Pop showed her out, and then he came back in the kitchen grinning. In a really fakey British accent he said, "Did you he-yah? We have been ahsked to take tea chez S&M."

And he pretended like he was sipping from a cup with his little finger held up in the air. I could tell he was looking forward to it. He likes Stephen and Miranda a lot, he even thinks Stephen is sexy.

I thought things couldn't be more perfect. We were invited to tea with Miranda and Stephen! And I was taking him a cake I made myself.

So at two minutes to six yesterday, we headed across the yard. (Six o'clock seemed a little late for an afternoon tea, but probably it's a British thing.) Dad carried the cake and I brought the card I'd made that we all three signed.

It turned out to be the best of times.

And the worst of times.