The Summerfield Household

"There's also a strawberry shortcake to die for and..." Rachel suddenly sighed and sit down. "Every time my kids leave, I always start baking a lot... I think it's just to distract me. I always miss them."

"Oh, wow! Are you going to start Hogwarts next year then? I am..."

Amanda nodded with a sad smile, "Oh it's the same way with me. I'm baking these brownies for him, actually!"

"Yup! Mummy says Ill have a blast, but, I'm a bit nervous..." She said, trailing off.

"That's great!" exclaimed Rachel, admiring Amanda's handwork. "I think I'll bake them all a treat too, it will keep me busy for a whole afternoon, anyway. But, Matt is a Hufflepuff, right?"

"Me, too. I don't really want to go." he said earnestly. "I'd rather stay home."

Amanda shook her head. "Nope, but I thought he'd be in Hufflepuff. Gryffindor, actually."

"I'll miss my family a lot..."

"Gryffindor, how nice! That's the house my son Will is in... he's really happy there, so that's great for him."

"I'll miss my mum and dad. It's already kind of like your family is there, because you have all your brothers and sisters." he explained.

"Mh---" A loud beep started to go off, and Amanda's smile suddenly twisted into a silent string of swears as she dashed to the oven to grab the brownies. They weren't burnt, just, a bit more brown then the recipe had said. "The first batch are always a pain..." She said a sigh.

"Ooh... I didn't even-" The beeping completely distracted her, "Oh! You came at a good time. You'll get some peppermint brownies!"

Rachel laughed. "I know what you mean! I actually set the stove on fire once... I was baking some cookies for Church, and than I got caught up in something, and the next thing I knew I was putting out a fire."

Anthony perked right up, like a dog hearing the treat bag open up. "You have brownies?!"

Amanda nodded as she shoveled the brownies onto a plate to cool. "It's so easy to avoid all of the mess with magic, but, it's just not the same. Doesn't feel home cooked!"

Jennifer nodded, pointing to the plate. "My mom makes them all the time after my brother leaves for Hogwarts. There is peppermint and everything in them."

There was a knock on the door. On a different day, because, yeah.

Jennifer shouted upstairs, even though she was right near the door, "MUM! SOMEONE'S HERE!" A weary looking Amanda came down the stairs, skipping several as if still a little kid, and answered. "Hello?"

"Evening," said an equally-weary Olivia, walking into the den of her own accord. "You're looking lovely, got a haircut or something?"

Amanda's straight and tall posture fell into quite the 'oh it's you' slouch when she realized it was only Olivia during one of her many self invited walk in's. "Yeah, did a speed one with some spell before a conference yesterday. God only knows hat you can find in that little pocket dictionary of spells I got..." She smiled, "So why are you here?"

Trevor, sweetiepie he was, was off in the kitchen giving his wife a day off with the dinner-cooking duties. The smell of frying peppers hung in the air. "No reason," said Olivia with a shrug, "Nothing better to do; Bore isn't home yet, and... yeah."

Amanda nodded as Olivia spoke, "Ah, I get it." She leaned against the counter, purposefully sounding over the top dramatic, "I'm just a fill in at this point! I get it!"

"The walls weren't listening, either!" She laughed, taking a place on the nearest sofa. "Ohhh, I miss Weeze though. Wrote home last week."

"Awh, I forgot she was a first year!" Amanda plopped down beside her. "Calling her Weeze may lower her self esteem, Liv."

"Second," Liv corrected, "And I doubt it. She's pretty... dense, y'might say. Plus, I've been calling her that pretty much since she was born."

"Oooh..." Amanda nodded understandingly. "Do you want anything? Trevor could fix you up some of our leftover Chinese? He was sooo pissed when he saw it in the fridge from my late night!" She laughed, grinning. "Something about how he is the one to influence the culture-esque food in the family?"

"Smells like you've already got something going in there."

"I suppose that means you'll be staying for a bit?"

"If I can help it."

"Unless I kick you out!" Amanda said with a wink.

It was one of those few 'perfect' summer days. It wasn't too hot that you wouldn't want to leave your house. It wasn't raining so hard that Noah would be floating around while the unicorns went extinct. It was just... in the middle. It was about eighty degrees, a bit cloudy, and the sun was reflecting off the water of the Summerfield pool.

A rather lazy looking figure was stretched out across a pool floatie, brown hair askew in just a way that you could tell he had made sure it stayed that way. Yes, Matthew Summerfield was actually doing something productive. Productive in his eyes at least! Why waste such a day on chores and pre-reading for third year!? Ohoho, not him. Like his mother said, he had to go outside more. And this, this was the perfct day to do so.

Little did he know that the shadow around the edge of the pool was coming closer than normal. Jennifer had vowed to get revenger ever since he scared her by pulling her down into the water, and what better day than this! He wouldn't even see it coming! Conjuring up all her strength, little Jennifer clad in a black bikini with neon green spots, flipped Matt's floatie over.

The first thing Matt noticed was the translucent green of the floatie hovering over his face, and then the rush of water going into his nostrils. He flailed his arms for a second before realizing he wasn't drowning. What the hell had happened?!, he thought as he surfaced. But then his answer appeared in the form of a grinning face and a tight, curly pony tail.

"Jennifer, what the hell!?" Matt shouted, water still stuck in his head.

Jennifer's bottom lip trembled a bit as she cringed- she hated shouting. Quickly she bounced back, "Hey! You did worse on Monday! This is my revenge!"

Matt opened his mouth to say more, but he started to laugh. Nervously, Jennifer followed in his path, and the two started laughing for five minutes. It ended abruptly when Matt grabbed hold of Jennifer's shoulders and dunked her into the water.

As she resurfaced, Jennifer took a big gulp of air and then dived down again, grabbing hold of Matt's arms. The two quarreled in the water for ten minutes, taking turns 'attacking.' Slowly, they waded over to the edge of the pool turning this battle, each attack leading them closer and closer. Jennifer eventually was backed up against the pool wall.

"Matt, can we make S'mores?" She said, breaking the silence of their water war.

He ceased the attack. "Jen, you know mom doesn't want us starting fires!" This was one of the first times Matt was being the voice of reason.

Jennifer rolled her eyes, "Just use dad's microwave."

Matt shifted uncomfortably, "I... I don't know how."

Jennifer gasped, as if he said he didn't know how to breath. "Ma~tt! How do you not know!"

"I don't like muggle technology for cooking."

Jennifer took his hand, rolling her eyes, leading him to the kitchen.

Twenty minutes passed, and the two had chocolate covering their faces. Matthew had squirted chocolate sauced onto his hands, and rubbed Jennifer's face, giving her a beard. Jennifer had fought back by giving him a beard of melted marshmallows. The two only had consumed a third of the s'mores, the rest of it never made it past their faces.

Amanda had, thank god, not seen the mess her children were making. She was currently in her office upstairs, on the phone. Harry and her had decided once they got out of school to actually speak more, realizing that they were all the other had for family. Well, they knew all along, but realizing.. Usually, they had biweekly phone calls.

"Ooh, Harry the kids are fine. Doing whatever kids do, you know. Oh, how are your's?" Amanda paused, listening to quite the long explanation. Harry still had the tendency to gram the limelight.

Amanda's eyes then widened, she had skipped an important article in the paper. "YOU'RE GOING TO BE WHAT!?" She shouted, nearly dropping the phone. "Harry, how! Why didn't you tell me earlier! Oh my god!"

Pause. "Damn it Harry! You can't say I'm over reacting! This is amazing!"

Pause. "So, does that mean I'm going to be sister of the Minister of Magic?"
Pause. "Am I in any threat?"
Pause. Amanda laughed, "That's valid, I've always been."

Matthew sat in his pig-sty of a room, sprawled across the bed like he was so many other days. He was peacefully drifting off to sleep, counting winged sheep that resembled dragons... His door was flung open. Praying that if he kept his eyes closed whoever came in wouldn't disturb him, he didn't move. But, his hope was shot down.

"Matt. Wake up. We have guests! Clean!"

He sighed, "Mum, they are not going to come into my room." He groggily got up, and looked his mom. "Who's even coming over?" He was desperate for a reply, Matt knew that certain people his mother was acquainted with were down right scary. All he received was Amanda's Cheshire Cat grin.

"Phil." One word simply sent him dashing down the stairs to the living room. He had been lonely all summer till now; he and Jennifer had run out of things to entertain themselves with.

"Phil?"