Taste of Youth

Mr and Mrs. Potter were two of the coolest parents I had ever met. Mrs. Potter had this wide breathtaking smile that crinkled the edges of her eyes and almost immediately after I gave her my name, wrapped me up in a bone-crushing hug. Mr. Potter had salt-and-pepper hair that stuck up almost exactly like his sons and spoke with the kind of charisma that could rule a nation. They were older than most parents and I figured that was why James was such a spoiled little boy.

After the millionth time of giving them my thanks Mrs. Potter gave a warm laugh and leaned in whispering, “It’s alright dear. I’ve wanted to meet you since summer! Sirius wouldn’t stop going on and on about this girl he met at Flourish & Blotts.”

I laughed aloud covering my mouth with my hand trying to keep it down and caught Sirius’ eyes when I glanced over. He raised his eyebrows at me, wiggling them ever so slightly, and I had to bite back another howl of laughter. Turning back to Mrs. Potter I sent her a wide smile, leaping into a conversation with her about my training and laughing as she recounted some of her own incidents within Hogwarts. Mrs. Potter seemed to delight in having another female around and kept me close for most of the walk out and around the corner from the station. Once we’d gotten to the small section of alleyway that Portkeys were allowed, we gathered about a small crinkled blue bag.

The sharp angry pull at my navel had my head spinning as fast as the world around me was. My eyes lifted from the bag and caught the laughing gray eyes of Sirius, his face broke out into a smile that made me flash a grin in answer. When Mr. Potter called out for us to let go, my stomach twisted and Sirius gave me a reassuring nod before he let go himself. I swallowed and dropped my hand. My back hit the back lawn of the Potter house with a solid thud and the faintest of cracks. Letting out a small groan, I rolled over and found myself once again face to face with a laughing Sirius. Reaching out with the arm that wasn’t stuck underneath me I smacked him with as much force as I could muster and he howled with laughter. When I tried for him again, he caught my arm and rolled over pinning me as I kicked and squirmed.

“Sirius!”I laughed still kicking beneath him, “Lemme go!”

“Then stop trying to hit me!”

“Then stop laughing at me you twat!”

He leaned forward his laughter in my ear, “But it’s hard not to.”

“You’re such a pain in the ass.” I managed to get us flipped over my hair spilling into Sirius’ face.

He blew at the gemstone strands and sent me a wide grin, “Enjoying your position?”

I reeled back and scrambled off of him, warmth tinging my cheeks as I kicked some snow onto him in my hurry muttering under my breath, “Prat.”

Sirius had grin about his face that was irking to say the least so I sent him a glare and hurried over to where Remus was standing underneath the awning of the Potter house looking distinctly amused. I nudged him in the ribs sharply when I had secured my footing on the icy porch and the werewolf let out a laugh shaking his head at me. Sirius came bounding up behind us as we moved to go inside and dumped a handful of snow in my hair causing me to sputter and snap around. He wore this big grin on his face, the snow still glistening white in his dark hair, and he leaned forward shaking his head like a dog letting the snow fly. I yelped and shoved him lightly, returning the favor with a shake of me own head, my gemstone colored strands flying wild and slapping both of us in the face.

We stared at each other for a second, a second that Remus took to disappear into the house with the others,and burst into laughter. I tried to push my terribly tangled wad of hair away from my face as I did and a piece of it had gotten caught in the zipper of Sirius’ jacket. The boy laughed at me as I struggled to pull back and finally at my glare undid the tangle with a light tug. I sent him a half-hearted scowl and he grinned a little more waving me inside with a flourish of his arm and a slight bow that made me want to tease him had it not worked so well for him.

With a single step everything seemed to change, Mrs.Potter was scolding James in a motherly manner and Mr. Potter was letting out a buoyant laugh engaged in a conversation with a smiling Remus. It was warm in the Potter house and it wasn’t just the fact the heater was on, it just felt like home. Something in my stomach twisted and ached and it wasn’t until Sirius had tossed a long muscled arm around my shoulders that the tension unfurled. I glanced up at him and offered up a weak smile. His answering smile was warm and knowing.

“I always feel weird when I walk in here for the first time in awhile,” He murmured into my ear watching the family like atmosphere with slightly darkened eyes, “ It never ceases to make me think about what it would have been like growing up like the others did.”

I gazed at him for a moment taking in his strong jaw and sad gray eyes, “Yeah, I get that.”

He looked down when I spoke and I was sure he hadn’t heard me because of how soft I had said those words but then he looked even sadder. Then the sadness was gone just as quickly as it had come and Sirius was smiling again tugging me over to the group. I bit back a laugh shaking my head at him, he reminded me of an over grown puppy bounding about and changing moods just as fast as he could run. Mrs. Potter had me put my bag in the guest room across the hall from the rooms that the boys would be pairing up in and after we had set all our stuff down, she ordered us to go have fun doing something while she cooked dinner.

The boys set about planning a snowball fight and I shook myself free of them, heading for the kitchen purely out of guilt. Most of the time my mother hated cooking so much she left Leon and me to take care of ourselves while Olivia and her went out to one of their catered parties rich husbands in tow. I wasn’t used to having someone else in the kitchen, wasn’t used to being told to go have fun while there was work to be done. I opened the door to the kitchen to see Mrs. Potter dancing around humming with a spatula in her hand and broke out into a wide smile.

“Johnny Cash?” I asked when she stopped to stir something in a sizzling pan.

The older woman jumped flinging a bit of meat into the air and onto the counter whipping around to look at me one hand over her chest, “Merlin that scared me, Luciana.”

I gave her an apologetic smile hovering in the doorway, “Sorry.”

“Don’t be dear.” She waved the spatula at me and wiped some food from her blouse, “Are you always that quiet?”

“I guess so.” I pushed some of my hair out of my face and shuffled my feet, “Would you like some help?”

Mrs. Potter smiled, “The boys too rowdy for your tastes?”

“Something like that.” I smiled and pulled my hair back into a ponytail at the wave of her hand.

We worked for a while in silence, me chopping away at vegetables and her watching the meat humming a sad tune that seemed to fill the room all at once. I found that Mrs.Potter didn’t like cooking with magic, she said that it left an after taste on the food she couldn’t quiet stomach and she thought using magic for things like that took some of the love out. She liked dancing around too, waving her spatula and swinging her slim hips in a rhythm all her own. I watched her dance most of the time lending my voice when she started humming Muggle songs and she got me to dance with her once before the two of us nearly tipped all of dinner onto the kitchen floor.

It was after the third time I had to redo my hair that she asked me the question I had been waiting for, “How in the world did you get a color like that in your hair? Unless of course that’s how it’s always been and then that is still very strange.”

I laughed tugging the last strands through, “A friend of mine thought it would be fun to change my hair color and it got stuck like this.”

“Really?” She mused tilting her head at me and smiling warmly, “Would you like me to give it a go?”

“Have at it.” I grinned and closed my eyes when she pointed her wand at me.

The feeling of a bucket of ice water washed over me and I shuddered opening my eyes to peer at a strand of my hair. It was back to the strange off colored blond I had been born with and something in my stomach twisted again because the color was the same as nearly every member of my known family. Olivia’s grinning face flashed behind my eyelids and I fought the urge to run and hide. I looked at Mrs. Potter and sent her a smile equally as happy to have my hair color back as I was to want it go away. She sent me that ultra-wide grin of hers that crinkled her bright blue eyes and didn’t make her seem anywhere near her age. There was a ruckus outside the swinging door that lead to the kitchen and the boys laughter burst somewhere in the sitting room.

“We’re back!” Sirius bellowed poking his head through the door with a wide grin and started at the sight of me, “Your hair is blond.”

“Yeah.” I reached up to touch my hair, my cheeks flaring.

He nodded very slowly, “It looks nice.”

“Thanks.” I murmured pushing a few stray hairs out of my face and trying to ignore the warmth in my cheeks.

“Right.”Mrs. Potter said biting back a smile her eyes dancing, “Sirius, why don’t you take Luciana out of here and entertain her.”

She snapped one of the kitchen towels at me making me jump and scurry over to where Sirius was coming completely in through the door. Our shoulders bumped as Mrs. Potter hurried us from the room and into the muted sound of boyish laughter. The swinging door slid to a stop behind us and James let out a whoop from somewhere farther in the house. I rocked on my heels trying to decide whether I should move first or if I should stay standing awkwardly next to Sirius. There was a tug on my hair before I figured out my answer and I looked up at Sirius who was squinting and turning the small clump of my hair he held around in the light. I gave him an odd look that he only smiled at and twined the strand around his finger.

“I touch your hair a lot don’t I?” Sirius asked paying no mind to the fact I was trying to pull my hair free.

“Yes, you do.”

“Don’t you find it strange?”

I stopped moving and stared at him for a long moment, “It never really occurred to me to find it odd.”

“So,” He paused watching my face carefully, “I can keep touching your hair?”

“If you must, then I suppose I could deal with it.” I looked away from his prying eyes feeling suddenly very defensive.

His grin was face-splitting, “I hope that’s the way you say you like me touching your hair.”

“In your head maybe.”