Circi | 2

TWELVE

"It's not the Irish"

August 1994, 1 month later

Since her birthday, a visit from Christian was often offered to Circi but the idea felt sour in her mind and she declined the offer. Draco had told her, one day after snapping at an elf delivering yet another request, that is she kept turning them away their father would stop giving her whatever she asked for if she was going to reject it the day after. Circi had tossed the cushion from the chair next her at him and resumed her homework.

If anything, her opposition to the Riers made Lucius more liable to granting her wishes.

Over the course of the month he had bought her brand new planters, crates of seeds, piles of gardening handbooks and even offered her a herbology tutor. His enthusiasm in fixing the greenhouse excited her daily and he even assisted her in rebuilding the planters the moment she asked him to. Draco was in dismay at the amount of time the two spent together and, when he learnt that Lucius was bringing Circi to the Quidditch World Cup with them aswell... he could not bring himself to talk to his sister until the day arrived.

As a compromise, Lucius had agreed to let Draco bring Carmen with them aswell. The party seemed to grow as his children began to compete. He had to draw the line when Circi wanted to invite Leslie and the two were considerably huffy with each other for a day and a half.

But, the night of the game, they were tiresomely excited. He was thankful Carmen was older than Draco because she was the only one of the three of them to provide sensible conversation befor they were to head to the stands.

Draco and Circi were dashing between their designated bedrooms in the expanded interior of the tent. Circi was chasing Draco, yelling as he applied her face paint in a way she despised. In truth, she did not care too much for the teams playing- a fact Carmen and Lucius could agree on- but she cared that Draco was messing up her facepaint.

In the moment before Circi was sure to begin crying, Carmen intercepted them and removed the facepaint from Draco. His love was half complete and refused to use a different paint. Circi had already vacated the room. Muttering something about 'unfairness', Draco turned his back to her and wiped at his face with his sleeve.

While the two of them got ready, Circi was already wrapped in her coat and house scarf and dashing in and out of the tent entrance. Her anxiousness made Lucius busy and he caught the hood of her coat with the teeth of the snake on his cane. The anchor whipped her backwards to a halt and she stood still by the entrance, bouncing on the balls of her feet and rearranging her hood. Finally, Draco emerged with a clean face followed closely by Carmen in a hat and gloves.

Their seats were in the Minister's box, Lucius had been invited by the minister himself. It was evident Draco thought very highly of himself due to this but Circi was simply missing Leslie. She always watched the house matches with him and, while Carmen was here, she felt off being without him; not to mention Mica wouldn't be stood in the stands opposite.

As they finished their final flight of stairs, Circi was a few steps behind when she heard a loud yet familiar voice. They had exclaimed at the height of their seats and, of course, her father had to say something.

"Put it this way," he raised his voice to the next flight up and Circi finally joined them, "if it rains you'll be the first to know."

Looking up, she noticed Hermione Granger glaring at them over the railing. Through lack of better judgement, Circi waved at her and caught herself within the same moment. Her friend, the youngest Weasley boy whose name she never cared to learn, was scowling at her and Draco. There was an older boy visible behind them, clearly not a Weasley and assumed he was part of their larger party as well as the girl beside him holding her gloves in her mouth and tying back her curly hair.