Chapter seventy-one; Pins and letters
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A particularly chilly wind swept Lily's red hair up and made a mess out of it as she carried blankets outside to the backyard of James's house. Night has fallen and the group decided to make a bonfire to sit around in the summer evening. None of them anticipated for it to be really cold, hence why Lily carried blankets to the boys who were already sat around the fire on even more blankets.
''Hey, where's Jasmine?'' asked Lily as she passed a blanket over to Peter before settling down beside James.
Her eyes went to Remus but he was sitting alone. James nudged her softly for her attention and she looked at him. He nodded towards the house where light was pouring out of a kitchen window. Inside Jasmine was standing by the sink cleaning something with a familiar smile on her face, beside her stood James' mum, deliberately talking about something.
''She almost seems to be so cosy in any kitchen she finds,'' James observed with a laugh. ''And my mum totally adores her. As far as I know, they were baking together before.''
A knowing 'ah' escaped Lily as she nodded understanding. It was the same when Jasmine came to her house, she somehow was able to woo her parents the second she stepped foot into her house. As far as the group was concerned, everyone's mothers loved to cook and bake and that's something Jasmine had in common with them.
''I'm telling you guys, Jasmine has the parent charm,'' James said shrugging, eyes settling on the fire in front of him.
''The parent charm?'' Remus asked confused.
Lily took it upon herself to explain. ''No matter which parents she meets she gets along with them and it's all so natural to her. She could bake with any mum probably.''
''Not with my mother,'' Sirius commented with an easy laugh.
It produced a few chuckles from the group, each knowing stories about Walburga but none of them said anything further. Remus glanced at the house as well, seeing Jasmine through the window laughing and nodding at something James' mum said. His own lips curled into a small smile as a peculiar thought crossed his mind. Maybe he should invite her home once to meet his parents. He wondered how she would react, but considering everyone agreed that she's natural with parents, he hoped it wouldn't scare her away. He was certain that his mum already knew something was going on even though he never spoke a single word about Jasmine. That Christmas gift was enough of a hint despite that back then Jasmine and he had nothing going on at all.
''I hope you are craving something sweet.'' Jasmine was carrying a platter of muffins before passing it to Lily who looked at the dessert with new hunger in her eyes.
Jasmine chuckled lightly at her reaction, urging her to take one before passing the platter on so everyone would get a taste of it. Her light eyes travelled across the group until they settled on Remus and she circled around the fire to sit down beside him. On her other side was sitting Sirius, next to Remus was Peter and across from them, James and Lily. Jasmine pulled the sleeves of her jumper over her hands before she leaned into Remus seeking warmth.
Remus looked from the fire down at her and noticed that she was in fact wearing his jumper and not one of her own. It was a lot bigger on her smaller frame but he must admit that it looked good on her. He slowly wrapped an arm around her shoulders pulling her even closer if that was possible. They smiled at each other before their eyes settled back on the raging fire in front of them.
''Who's ready to open the letters?'' asked James eagerly protruding a wand from his back of the pocket.
A series of mixed sounds came from the group, some excited, some not so much. They received the Hogwarts letters this morning but they didn't feel like opening them right during breakfast ruining the whole day by it. So they rather waited for the evening. The letters contained their end of term exam marks as well as prefect pins for the next year. Most of them had nothing to worry about, but Jasmine was pretty anxious to open hers.
Receiving marks was her least favourite time in the summer, but in the previous years she was always in the same room as her father when she opened it. Anyone can already imagine that those times didn't go exactly well when she didn't reach his expectations. Maybe surrounded by friends calmed her nerves down a bit but when she received the letter that had her name written on it after James accioed them into their hands, she couldn't bring herself to open it immediately. She looked up to check if anyone was looking at her but luckily to her, no one noticed her hesitation. Her eyes then rather observed the others as they opened their letters first.
She leaned into Remus to check on him when a prefect pin dropped in his hand meaning he would be a prefect another year. ''You didn't get Head Boy?'' Jasmine frowned and raised her eyes to him.
Remus shook his head emotionlessly as the P on his badge flashed red when he turned it towards the fire. Jasmine furrowed her eyebrows in confusion as she was clearly convinced he would get it. The next thing Remus checked his grades and a smile curled at his lips, clearly satisfied with his results.
''WHAT?!'' The obnoxiously loud question came from the other side of the fire and Jasmine straightened her posture to look over it.
Lily was smiling down at her hand and once she felt eyes on her, she turned the Head Girl badge to the rest of them to check out. The more peculiar thing was James next to her who stared down at his hands with wide bulged out eyes.
Sirius let out a loud laugh. ''No way! James is Head Boy!''
Jasmine thought she heard him wrong. But when she looked closer she really did see a badge laying on James' palm. He hadn't been prefect in the past two years which was even more confusing why he became Head Boy. It was weird why Dumbledore picked James over Remus for that position.
''How's that possible?'' Peter asked, leaning towards the badge.
''I don't know,'' James answered not being able to tear his eyes away from the badge.
Lily finally got over her 'awe' moment and she looked over to James. She couldn't believe her eyes and it seemed like she couldn't decide on which reaction to use either. ''Head Boy and Quidditch Captain?'' A hidden question was what Lily wanted to come across as can you handle both?
''Since you'll be Head Girl I think there should be no problem,'' Jasmine answered her.
''This should be good, it's a perfect balance. James has our back and no one will believe that goody two shoes Lily would help us too. We'll get away with anything and you two will cover for us.'' Sirius said pointing between Lily and James.
James nodded agreeing with him but Lily shot him such a look that Sirius might as well dropped dead on the spot. James and Sirius went on by joking around and random planning for the future. Lily was clearly getting more and more annoyed by it and once she couldn't handle their ridiculous ideas she stood up and circled around the fire before plopping down next to Remus. She leaned over and her eyes settled on Jasmine's still sealed letter.
''What's the matter?'' she asked the brunette with concern in her voice. It made Remus look at his girlfriend as well only then noticing she hadn't touched her letter.
Jasmine let out a deep breath and looked at it before picking it up with shaky fingers. ''I don't want to know what's inside. What if I didn't pass the exams?'' She voiced her concerns.
''Of course you did.'' Remus nudged her softly and smiled trying to encourage her.
It didn't help, the frown on her face didn't disappear. The more Jasmine stared at the letter, the more the memory of her father's booming voice grew inside her. His yells were unbearable and his strict rules made horrible memories come back in her mind. She closed her eyes and sighed through her nose again. When she looked back up again her eyes travelled to Remus.
''Can you do it?'' She offered him the letter.
Remus nodded wordlessly and took a hold of the letter. Jasmine looked away from him when she heard it being ripped open. Lily and Remus were completely quiet for a while and Jasmine became even more anxious because of it. She started fiddling with her hands and couldn't decide if she even wanted to know.
''You're still a prefect.'' Lily said and offered the badge to Jasmine. The girl smiled lightly and took the badge but the horrible feelings didn't seem to cease.
''Will you look now or should I just tell you?'' asked Remus.
Jasmine let the silence seep in for a while. ''Just tell me.'' She muttered quickly.
''You passed all of them.'' A smile could be heard through Remus' words.
Jasmine widened her eyes as she stared at the fire. ''I did?'' Again she thought she heard it wrong. Repeating her OWL's the year before will forever be engraved in her mind. The crash of a broken glass, which her father threw at the wall at the news that she failed was still too clear. It also meant she had nothing left of the summer, she had to study or worry about studying and retake the exams to be able to go to the sixth year. Her father wanted her to have E's in everything when Jasmine barely passed certain subjects as it was.
Her curiousness got the better of her and she grabbed the parchment away from Remus to look for herself. A soft laugh escaped her when she realised she'll get into the next year with all of them just fine with passable marks and subjects for the NEWT exams. Another wave of uneasiness appeared in her stomach at the thought of the seventh year exams and the fact that older students had so much to complain about them. Loud laughter from across the bonfire shook her trance and she remembered that it was summer and not time for school thinking. When she folded the parchment to store it away she realised that she had a big smile on her face and when she looked to her left and both Remus and Lily were beaming at her.
''Thank you.'' That is all she could say at that moment.
''For what?'' asked Remus curiously.
''For helping me get through this. You did tutor me for most of the year.''
Remus only chuckled softly and brought his arm back around her in a side hug. Lily looked at them with a certain sparkle in her eyes before she turned her head away and most certainly, at least Jasmine saw it that way, she looked at a laughing James sitting not far off. Jasmine looked at their friend group and thought for a minute. James and Lily being Head Boy and Girl the next year, she and Remus prefects, all of them have NEWTs and will soon have to start thinking about their future after Hogwarts, which was another scary thing. And then she got the feeling of something not being right.
She looked at each of their smiling faces, they all looked so happy, but something didn't feel right inside Jasmine. When her smile disappeared the first one to notice was Lily and she tilted her head to meet her eyes. They shared a look, one of those best friend telepathic conversations and suddenly both knew what was missing. The group didn't feel complete without a certain half Spanish speaking Hufflepuff.
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