[1] Exie Attia is one of the Boys ✓ | LILY EVANS

Chapter Twenty Seven

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[ CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN]
Home Alone: The Siriusly Fucked Up Edition

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Her parents had promised to always drop her off for the first day of school but sadly work didn't allow them to pick her up all the time too. Luckily her ever prepared father, Salim had called a taxi weeks in advance to collect her and bring her home. She would have been fine with floo powder or getting a lift with Sirius who didn't live too far but Salim loved muggle things and  insisting. Knowing he'd no doubt ordered it with a huge smile on his face meant she was happy to allow it. Plus, sitting in the back of a nice car with cheesy disco music on the radio really wasn't the worst thing in the world.

As they drove away from the station, the car being pioneered by a sallow faced man who looked suspiciously like a zombie, the sadness of the fact it would be a while until she saw everyone hit home. Everyone else, other than Sirius, had seemed so excited at the prospect of Christmas with the family. After their extended goodbyes, Peter, James and Remus returned to their parents with beaming smiles. Lily, after planting a furtive, fleeting kiss on Exie's cheek had practically tackled her Mum and Dad to the ground.

Yet Exie had felt nothing even vaguely akin to that level of happiness.

It's not like home was even too bad or anything, especially compared to someone like Sirius. The house was by all accounts beautiful: an ornate, white Victorian terrace in Primrose Hill with a delicate magnolia tree in the front garden. The whole thing looked like it had been ripped out of a magazine which it practically had thanks to Cassandra's perfectionist attention to detail. Thanks to the 7 year age gap, the twins did get on her nerves quite often but they were alright really. Besides, most of their time was spent out with the au pair, Lena, going on museum and gallery trips to enrich their tiny brains. She got on really with her parents too; Salim and Cassandra were pleasant to be around - when they were actually there.

Truthfully, that was the main reason she didn't look forward to going back.

A nice, airy house quickly became empty and hollow when there was nobody to fill it. It was hard to blame her parents for travelling so much, it was their job. You couldn't be a foreign diplomat without well, going to foreign places. Working from home just didn't cut it. Plus they'd given her so much for her narcolepsy and just in general, she was very grateful. Still it was hard not to feel sad about it sometimes especially after the driver dropped her off and the only greeting she got was the sound of her own echoey footsteps.

Things used to be better when her grandpa had lived with them. Up until the twins were born, he'd basically raised her. His health had got a bit bad soon after and he'd had to move out, leading to Salim swooping in and sending her to the horrendous muggle prep school against her will. Her Grandpa had been gone for some time but it was times like this, returning to a lonely home that it would have been nicer to have him round. Not that she'd want to do the things they did when she was little anymore, her interests were a tad more sophisticated than picking apples and romping in parks now. But no doubt he'd have a home cooked meal and a smile on his face had he been there.