Chapter Thirteen

Bad Weather and Birthdays

The Reserve team tryouts on Thursday took well over an hour, but by dinnertime the Gryffindors had their backup players. The three Chasers were two first year girls and a third year boy. JJ got one of the Beaters' spots and the other went to a first year boy. Emma became the reserve Seeker, and the Keeper's spot went to Eiley, a first year girl who Mia knew from the HEC.

"So, you can't have been flying very long," Mia said to Eiley as the two of them and Emma worked on the Bug Hotels the following evening.

"Only a few weeks," Eiley nodded. "Should I put earth or grass on the floor of this one?"

"Grass, and some leaves," Emma said decisively. "Yeah, I was never any good at sport at primary school, but flying's different, somehow."

"Do you think we'll get to play, Mia?" Eiley asked.

"Probably not," Mia said. "It's the way things go, isn't it – when we didn't have reserves we needed them, and now we have them we probably won't need them. But you never know."

Lily and Mac came wandering over. "How's it going?" Lily asked.

"Good," Eiley said.

"What's this one for?" Mac asked, peering into the bug hotel Eiley had just been finishing off.

"Knarls," Eiley told him.

"We reckon it'll have to be here for a while before they'll use it, cuz they're so suspicious," Emma said.

"What are you two doing down here, anyway?" Mia asked. "I thought you were putting up posters with JJ?"

"We finished, so we thought we'd come for a walk," Lily shrugged.

Eiley checked her watch. "It's quarter to eight. We should be heading up to the castle," she said, standing up.

"Coming?" Mia asked Lily and Mac.

"Of course," Lily said, scowling. "We're not going out or anything," she told Mia later, once they were in the Gryffindor Common Room.

"Yeah, right," Mia grinned.

The following Wednesday was Mia's fifteenth birthday. She woke up early and crept out of bed to see what the weather was like. She could hear the rain before she reached the window. Great. She and her friends had planned to muck about on the Quidditch pitch tonight, but it didn't look like that was going to be possible now. Mia sighed heavily, and Lily, whose bed was nearest the window, stirred.

"Whassup?" she asked sleepily.

"It's raining!" Mia said. "On my birthday!"

"Shame," Lily yawned, and then rolled over and went back to sleep.

It rained hard all day, and by lunchtime Mia was thoroughly grumpy. Their third trip into the Forest for Care of Magical Creatures had been cancelled due to the weather, and they spent their lesson in a disused ground floor classroom. Professor Nilsson had been in an uncharacteristically bad mood in Modern History of Magic, and spent the last five minutes of their lesson and half of break complaining about their last lot of homework. To cap it all, Professor Hawksworth decided today was the perfect time to spring a surprise Wizarding Social Studies test on the fourth years.

All in all, this was turning out to be an awful birthday, Mia thought as she walked down to lunch alone – Hugo had gone off to find Rachel. When Mia reached the Great Hall, she looked up and down the Gryffindor table but couldn't spot any of her friends. In the end, she sat alone.

She'd almost finished eating when Lily and Hugo finally made an appearance.

"Where have you been?" Mia demanded.

"Stopped to ask Professor Reuben something," Lily said. "I'm starving." Mia pushed a dish of shepherds' pie down the table toward her.

"Where's Rachel?" Mia asked.

"She went to send a letter," Hugo said. "What's for lunch?"

Mia sighed and shoved food in Hugo's direction too. She didn't expect her friends to hang off her every word, but it would be nice for them to pay some attention to her on her birthday.

"Happy Birthday, Mia."

Mia turned around to see Emma stood behind her.

"Thanks, Emma," Mia grinned.

"D'you want to go for a walk up to the Owlery?" Emma asked. "If you've finished eating?"

"Sure," Mia said. "See you guys in Charms."

Mia enjoyed the walk with Emma, but she ended up being the last one into Charms, and when she got to the classroom it was to find that the only remaining seat was on the opposite side of the classroom to Lily, Hugo and Rachel.

"We tried to save you a seat, but she wouldn't move," Lily said, glaring at Ilonka, who was sitting next to her.

If it had been Hugo's birthday, Mia would have offered to swap seats with him so he didn't have to sit alone. Heck, if it had been Lily's birthday she would've demanded someone swap. But no one offered to swap, so Mia went and sat in the last empty seat.

"Happy Birthday, Mia."

Mia turned around to see Theo sat behind her.

"Thanks," she said.

"Cheer up, misery guts," Theo said. "It's your birthday."

"Yeah, and it's raining, and I've had crap lessons, and my friends deserted me at lunch, and now I'm sat here all by myself!" Mia said. "Sorry, Theo, ignore me – I am just being a misery guts."

"There's still this evening," Theo said.

"Yeah, and we were going to play Quidditch, but it's raining, so..."

Theo leaned over and patted Mia on the head. "Aww, diddums." Mia tried to be annoyed, but she couldn't help but laugh.

Professor Flitwick climbed on the stack of books behind his desk and started the lesson, so Mia turned around and tried to give him her full attention. Charms was one of the subjects Mia generally struggled with, and today was no exception. It was their second lesson on Summoning Charms and last lesson Mia felt like she hadn't made any progress.

Now, after a short recap on the theory, Professor Flitwick set the class off practising. Theo was soon summoning a neat pile of cushions from across the classroom whilst Mia was unable to make her matchstick do anything more than twitch. She gave up in the end and watched Lily and Hugo giggling and whispering to each other. Mia wondered whether she could wake up and start her birthday again if she went to bed straight after dinner.

"Let me see you try, Miss Dursley," Professor Flitwick squeaked, and Mia jumped – she hadn't known he was there. Mia tried in vain to summon the matchstick and in the end Professor Flitwick moved on, after commenting that Mia needed to keep practising for homework.

"I'm never going to be able to do this," Mia sighed, turning around to talk to Theo. "How do you do it?"

"Magic," Theo grinned, and Mia rolled her eyes at him.

Mia met up with Lily in the corridor after class.

"Alright?" Lily asked.

"Hmmph," Mia said.

She turned to head down to the Great Hall for dinner, but Lily caught her arm.

"You don't want to go to the Great Hall," Lily said.

"What are you on about?" Mia asked. "Yes I do – I'm starving."

"No you don't," Lily said insistently, tugging on Mia's arm. "Come on."

"Where are we going?" Mia demanded, letting Lily drag her off in the opposite direction.

"You'll see," Lily said.

For five minutes, Mia allowed her friend to lead her on what appeared to be a wild Snitch chase around the school. Eventually she'd had enough.

"Lily, if you're taking me somewhere just take me otherwise I'm going to dinner."

"Okay, okay," Lily said, turning around. "In here," she said a couple of minutes later, steering Mia into the Inter-House Common Room.

"What-?" Mia began, but she stopped mid-sentence as all her friends jumped out from behind sofas and curtains, yelling, 'surprise!'

"Happy Birthday, Mia," Lily grinned. "Sorry we all abandoned you at lunchtime, but this took a bit of organising."

Apart from her friends – all of the Gang, the Gryffindor Quidditch team, and most of the HEC – the Inter-House Common Room was deserted since everyone was at dinner. Mia's friends had decorated with bunting and streamers, and several small tables had been pushed together and were filled with food.

"Happy Birthday, Mia," Mac said, rushing forward and pinning a 'Birthday Girl' badge onto her robes.

"Thanks," Mia grinned. "Thanks everyone."

"Right! Let's eat!" Lily said decisively, and they all crowed around the food table.

"Where did all this food come from, anyway?" Mia asked the people nearest her as she helped herself to sandwiches and sausage rolls.

"Cass got it from the kitchens," Al said, his arm around his girlfriend's shoulders.

"Thanks, Cassie," Mia said.

"It's no problem," Cassie smiled. "They were so excited – you should've seen their faces. I'll let them know you like it, if you want, next time I see them."

"Yeah, that'd be great," Mia said.

After everyone had got food, they sat around in little groups eating. Mia ended up sat with Emma, Matilda and Eiley.

"Are you enjoying your birthday, Mia?" Eiley asked.

"I am now," Mia grinned. "The rest of it was pretty rubbish, but this more than makes up for it."

"The bunting's all recycled," Matilda told her. "And once we're done with the streamers Albus conjured we can use them as bedding for some of the bigger animals in the mini-beast hotels."

"Good to know, Matilda," Mia grinned.

"Right, let's cut the cake before everyone comes up from dinner and wants a bit," suggested Theo, and everyone gathered back around the table.

Mia had to endure a raucous version of 'Happy Birthday to you', then fend off the cries of 'speech, speech!' before she could cut the cake.

They were just in time, as the Inter-House Common Room started filling up with people coming up from dinner, and the cake certainly wouldn't have been enough for everyone.

"Where's Lily?" Mia asked Hugo, a little while later, when a group of them were sat around the fire, scraping their cake plates.

"You mean you haven't seen them?" Hugo asked, incredulous, looking over his shoulder across the room.

Mia looked too and saw Lily and Mac sat in an armchair together. They weren't kissing at the moment, but were nevertheless fully engrossed in each other.

"When did that happen?" Mia asked.

"Round about when you cut the cake," Hugo grinned. "How long have we been saying that's going to happen?"

"Weeks and weeks," Mia said. "It's taken them long enough to get their acts together."

"So, you and Mac, eh?" Mia asked, grinning, as she and Lily walked back up to Gryffindor tower at the approach of curfew.

"Shut up," Lily said, her face turning the same colour as her hair.

Mia laughed. "You two took your time."

"Shut up," Lily moaned.

"Is he a good kisser?" Mia persisted.

"Mia Dursley, if you don't shut up right now I'm gonna hex you and I don't care that it's your birthday!"