Protégée (George Weasley)

Chapter Thirteen

Callan and Maisie had been bouncing around excitedly the night before, when their parents had promised to take them to the beach in the morning, to which Lisa turned down. She was still feeling slightly jetlagged, and decided to spend her morning in the premises of a fancy townhouse that had been rented out by the Australian Ministry for them. The twins had finished their breakfast in their colorful swimwear, and, twenty minutes later, Lisa was home alone.

She dug around the many drawers for a piece of parchment, a quill and a bottle of ink, deciding that she really didn't have anything better to do apart from writing a letter to Noel about how miserable she was. A post owl was perched on one of the trees outside, also lent to them for their convenience.

But as soon as she had returned to the kitchen table with her materials, she heard the front door creak open and shut loudly, Lisa panicking at the prospect of it being a burglar. Muggle burglars? Can't be. They can't get through all the protective spells. Death Eaters? Were there even any Death Eaters in Australia?

Her hand flew instinctively toward the kitchen island, grabbing her wand as the footsteps grew louder and louder. She was about to send a hex flying when the twins had emerged, making her sigh in relief, "You two nearly scared me to death! Couldn't you have knocked or something?"

"Lis, it was charmed to open up to either us, you, mum or dad. Don't be stupid." Callan said rather snippily, throwing his duffel bag aside before he sunk down on to the couch, a crestfallen look on his face. Maisie was gripping rather the picnic basket—which they had packed for their beach trip— rather angrily, setting it down on to the table before mimicking her twin brother's actions.

"Where's Mum and Dad? What happened?"

"Halfway through our hike to the service car. Halfway bloody through." Callan grumbled, "They remembered they were running late for another stupid delegation."

"Huh," Lisa said, crossing her arms over her chest and leaning back at the wall that divided the kitchen from the living room dramatically, "Why am I not surprised?"

"Please don't tell me our whole vacation will be comprised of them walking out on a family outing all the time." Maisie pouted, tears of frustration welling in her eyes. Lisa couldn't help but sit down beside them to give them comfort. As much as she knew that they should have expected this exact thing to happen, she did not really want to rub it in their face.

"Well if I told you that, then I'd probably be lying."

"Wow. Real comforting, Lis."

"Okay, I'm sorry. But you shouldn't have expected too much from them. You'll only disappoint yourselves." 'I thought you said you weren't going to rub it in their faces?' Her subconscious mocked.

"If you need me, I'll be in my room, potentially trying to drown myself under those ridiculously fluffy pillows," Maisie said, hopping off of the couch before begrudgingly trudging towards her bedroom. Lisa watched her go with a sigh, before turning to her brother, "We could always do indoor activities. I found some wizard's chess in the supply room—"

"I'm going to pretend that you didn't just say something extremely boring." he cut off, before hopping off of the couch and disappearing into the hallway.

"Why are they acting like their beach trip being cancelled is my fault?" Lisa complained to no one in particular, realizing seconds later that she was talking to herself, "I am definitely going to go insane after all of this."

Her parents did not come back home until late at night. They were left home alone with a variety of food in the cupboards, so starving to death was something that Cynthia and Martin didn't have to worry about. Lisa passed out on the couch roughly three times during the whole day out of sheer boredom and jetlag, only waking up to check on the twins or to beckon them to eat something, which was rather difficult due to the fact that they were still holding grudges against their parents.