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Chapter 4: Our Thirty-Six Year Old Selves
A/n: READ THIS SO YOU'RE NOT CONFUSED!! To try to avoid confusion, whenever referring to Lily Potter, I'll use the name Isabelle. Whenever referring to Lily Finnigan, I'll use Lily. When I'm referring to Julia Potter, I'll use the name Julia, when referring to Julia Weasley, I'll use Lauren. Later in the story when I refer to older Blake Potter, I'll use Blake, and I'm sure you've figured this out already, but when I refer to younger Blake, I'll use Evan.
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Lily Anne Potter-Finnigan smiled warmly at the guests, and introduced herself to Blake and Julia.
"Hi, I'm Beth and Bree's mum, Lily. You must be the new students Beth wrote me about."
"Yeah, we are. I'm Evan, this is my best friend and girlfriend, Lauren, and that's my sister…Isabelle, over there." He pointed to his sister and she came out of her stupor long enough to say hi and shake hands. Like her dad did, Lily had to look closely at Isabelle. She looked strangely familiar.
"You look really familiar, Isabelle. Do I know your mother?" Isabelle's eyes quickly shot from her mother to her older self.
"You might."
Lily shrugged slightly and said to her mother, "I've got some good news, Mum."
"What's that?"
"Guess who's coming for Christmas?"
"Blake?" Lily snorted and laughed.
"God no, I wouldn't even let him in my house." Isabelle and Evan looked at each other uneasily.
Hermione said in a subtle scolding way, "Lily."
"What? I'm serious, I wouldn't let him in my house, the guy's an asshole."
"Despite what he's said and done, he's still your brother, your twin brother even. But no, who's coming?"
"Jules flooed over her this morning on her way to work and told me that she and the kids are coming over tomorrow. They're going to stay in England until the kids go back to school. But they'll be going back and forth between families, hers and ours."
"That's wonderful! We haven't seen them in years!"
"I know, that's why she said she's coming. She hasn't been home in years and is getting homesick."
"Where's Will?" Harry asked.
Lily's expression fell and she said shortly, "Work."
"Is something wrong?" Lily looked as though she was going to go into the whole story, but changed her mind.
"No. Nothing's wrong." Lily's parents weren't convinced, but decided to ask her later. After everyone was settled in, that night Isabelle ventured downstairs, and heard her parents talking with her older self. She stood outside the kitchen door, listening to the conversation.
"So, what's going on between you and Will?"
"Nothing."
"Come on, Lils, there's something going on, what is it?"
"No, that's the thing, there's nothing going on between us. Anymore."
"What's wrong?" Lily shrugged.
"He's having an affair with a woman from his office." Harry and Hermione's mouths fell open slightly at the same time.
"Does he know you know?" Lily shrugged.
"I don't know."
"What happened?"
"I don't know, we sort of just…fell apart. It was like one day I was thinking I had a great family, loving husband and everything, and the next day I'm at home by myself waiting for my husband to come home, after hearing another one of his lame excuses, then having to hear from his best friend the next day that Will's cheating on me with a woman almost fifteen years younger than me, and she's pregnant with his baby." Hermione's jaw dropped and she put a hand to her mouth. Harry looked as though he was about to hunt down a certain son-in-law of his and kick his butt. Isabelle silently gasped.
"How long have you known this?"
"A month or so."
"When does he come home?"
"He won't be home for a while. At least until midnight or later."
"I'll be waiting for him when he comes home."
"Dad, don't get involved. It's not your battle."
"I'm trying to help you, Lily."
"I know, but I can take care of myself, I'm not your little girl anymore."
"No matter how old you get, Lils, you'll always be my little girl. And that's why I'm trying to help."
"Like I said, I know. This is something I need to do by myself."
"She's right, Harry, it's not our business to get involved." Harry sighed.
"You're right. You're both right. I'm sorry." Lily looked at the clock on the wall.
"Well, it's getting late, I think it's time to turn in. I'm going to bed." She stood up and gave her parents a hug and a kiss on the cheek. Isabelle hid so her older self wouldn't see her. Once Lily had gone, Isabelle heard Harry say to Hermione,
"It's a weird thing, Hermione, remember how when we were young that people had problems staying together, and now this generation has more problems with it. There's more divorce and separation now than there used to be."
"Pretty soon it'll be uncool to still be married."
"Well, if that's the case I'd rather be uncool then."
"Me too. Cuz' I don't plan on letting you go."
"I'm not going to let you go, either." Isabelle heard them kiss.
"Lily's right, it is getting late," Hermione said. "I think it's time for bed."
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The next morning, the trio came downstairs to find loud conversations going on throughout the house. The trio looked at each other, then they saw a Weasley red head come out of the living room and go into the kitchen.
"You must be here, Jules," Evan said to Lauren. In the living room, Julia was sitting in a chair, two of her four children there too. One was sitting on the floor leaning against his mother's legs, and the other was sitting on her grandfather's lap. Julia saw the trio right away.
"Hello. You must be the new guests. I'm Lily's sister-in-law, Julia."
"I'm Lauren, this is my boyfriend Evan, and his twin sister, Isabelle." Julia's third child came back into the kitchen, nodded a hello to the guests and sat next to his aunt.
"Well, this is my son, my second oldest, Michael, he's thirteen," She motioned to the son who was sitting next to Lily, then to the one by her feet,
"This is my third oldest, Brandon, he's nine, and there is my youngest and only daughter, Adriana, who's almost three." All of Julia's children had red hair. James had to have been the only person with Weasley blood not to have red hair. All of the boys looked almost a lot like Blake, and Isabelle noticed that Adriana looked like Lily Evans Potter when she was little, judging from the pictures she had seen. Every single one of the children had green eyes.
Isabelle smiled and playing the part, said, "Are green eyes a hereditary thing this family? I've noticed that everyone who has Potter blood has green eyes."
"At least it's a beautiful color, not some plain and dull color or something," Lauren said. "I have this uncle who has icy gray eyes, it's really creepy, but it's a really cool color."
"I have an uncle with eyes that color too. Especially since his and my aunt's kids have that color of eyes, and they have silvery red hair, it's…interesting, and really beautiful."
"Your daughter is beautiful, Mrs. Potter," Evan said.
"Oh God no, don't call me Mrs. Potter. Just call me Julia."
"Well, your daughter is beautiful, Julia." Julia beamed with pride. "She looks like her great-grandmother on her dad's side. I've seen pictures of Lily when she was that age, and Adriana looks exactly like her." Being the shy one that she was, Adriana tried to hide in Harry's arms. Julia smiled like any mother would at her daughter.
"She's a little shy."
"Well, I'm going to get breakfast going, someone want to go upstairs and get the girls up?" Lily said, standing up. Brandon and Michael looked at each other and grinned mischievously.
"We're on it." Julia and Hermione stood up too.
"We'll help you, Lils," Julia said. When everyone had left, all that were still in the living room were Harry, Adriana and the trio. The trio sat down on the couch.
"So what are you all going into after you finish school?"
"We're all studying to be Aurors."
"Except for Isabelle here who'll be a teacher."
"I'm not going to be a teacher, for the last time."
"Well, that's what I always said growing up, Isabelle. I never wanted to be a teacher; that was something Hermione would most likely do, but now, here I am, I've been teaching for I think…twenty-six years." He nodded confirming the question to whether that was the right number or not. "Yeah, twenty-six years, because Lily and Blake were ten when Hermione and started teaching. And they're thirty-six now." Evan was about to say something but didn't when Adriana climbed down from Harry's lap and toddled over to Evan and held her arms out like she wanted to be held. Evan picked her up and set her on his lap. She put her hands on his cheeks and said in her sweet little baby voice, "Daddy." Evan smiled.
"I'm not your daddy sweetie."
"Daddy," Adriana said again. Isabelle glanced nervously over at her father, and noticed his mouth was open slightly and his brow was furrowed in surprise.
"That's strange, Adriana doesn't usually take to strangers right away." Adriana put her thumb in her mouth and leaned against her future dad. Evan kissed her head and leaned his chin lightly against his future daughter's head. Michael and Brandon came into the living room and Michael said to Harry, "Grandpa, we need your help, Bree and Beth won't get up." Harry smiled.
"Alright," he said to the trio, "I'll be right back."
"What's with her?" Evan said once Harry had left. He motioned at the toddler in his arms.
"She recognizes that you are Blake Potter, and you are her dad, just not that you're seventeen and from the past."
"But why doesn't she recognize Julia as her mother?" Isabelle shrugged.
"I don't know, maybe you have a bigger impact on your daughter."
"But I don't live in the same house as her in the future."
"I don't know, Blake," Isabelle said defensively. "I'm just throwing stuff out here."
"Maybe because she misses her dad and recognizes the connection and instantly knows he's her dad," Lauren said. "Whereas she sees her mother everyday and knows who she is." Evan self-consciously started swaying from side to side, rocking his daughter. Soon she had fallen asleep. Isabelle smiled.
"You'll make a good dad someday, Blake."
"If I'm there." Lauren was about to say something when Lily came back into the living room. She was about to ask the trio some things about what they wanted with breakfast and how they wanted their eggs, but she stopped when she saw her niece sitting on Evan's lap.
"You got her to sleep?" Evan nodded.
"She just crawled down from Professor Potter's lap and wanted to be picked up by Bl…Evan, and soon she fell asleep," Isabelle said.
"That's odd, she never likes strangers." Evan shrugged. Lily asked her questions and went back into the kitchen. The trio got up and went into the kitchen. They heard the tail end of what Harry was saying to his daughter-in-law and wife.
"…just crawled right up on his lap. Even called him Daddy." Everyone turned when they saw the trio come in, Evan carrying Adriana.
"That…is just unusual." Lily closed her eyes for a second and saw a flashback. It was a few years ago, when her brother held a three-year-old Michael. He looked almost exactly like Evan standing there holding Adriana. It was like deja vu.
"Evan, if you want, you can take her upstairs to her bed and put her down until breakfast. It's the second door on the left," Julia said. Evan nodded and left the kitchen. There was an awkward silence until Isabelle said to Lauren, "Should we go see if the boys got Beth and Bree up yet?" Lauren nodded and they both left the kitchen.
"There's something weird about those three," Lily said as soon as Isabelle and Lauren were out of ear shot.
A/n: Oh, trouble's a brewin'!! Hope you enjoyed this chapter. I'm not doing as well on this story as others, usually I have the next like two or three chapters fixed already after updates, but with this one I'm not. Oh well, I'll get it out, eventually. My goal, though…to get all of this story posted, and all of The Tip of the Knife written and posted before I start my first day of classes as a college freshman on August 30th! Anyways, please review!!!
Husker-fan-2006
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