lovesick || r. lupin

¹all aboard

1 September, 1976

"Did you pack your toothbrush?"

"Yes, Dad," the two children told their father as they walked down Platform 9¾, trunks in hand.

"Your winter jackets?" The man asked again.

"Yes."

"Underwear?"

"Yes, Dad, we packed everything," Ayla moaned as she brushed away a drip of sweat from the hot summer air.

Going into her sixth year of Hogwarts, Ayla was rather excited. Only two more years until she was free and ready to be an adult, planning on getting her dream job as a magical engineer. With her honey blonde hair and aegean blue eyes, Ayla imagined how everything she had planned in her head would work out as precisely planned. She would show up to school, get straight O's, and finish her year off perfectly.

"I may or may not have left my underwear at home," Ayla's older brother, Avi, mumbled under his breath, his ash blond hair - similar to their fathers - shining from the beat of the sun and his brown eyes dulled from the horrible thought of going back to school.

"Av! This is your seventh year and youre still forgetting things?" Their father fummed, eyebrows furrowed. "I guess I'll have to send you them through post."

"No, no, no, its fine, really, Dad. I can just buy some at Hogsmeade."

Ayla looked up at her brother with an eyebrow raised, "Hogsmeade trips don't start until October and I'm not walking near you if your not having clean underwear for a month."

"I'll figure it out, okay?" Avi pouted, nearly moving in time so he wouldn't hit the many people on the Platform walking next to him. "People need to bloody watch where their going."

Ayla's father rolled his eyes, a small frown situated on his lips, then cracked a playful smirk at her. Ayla smiled back at him, then looked forward through the crowd and at the beautiful train which she would soon be boarding.

Ayla had always admired it, the brilliant ebony front of the train, the chimney that pressed out puffs of smoke, the ways the gears shifted beautifully in sinc, and the rest of the trains cars in royal red and golden accents (which Ayla believed was to show how much the school favored the house, Gryffindor).

"We should be hurrying, the trains about to leave," their father said, pushing each of their backs to make them walk faster.

"Calm down, Dad, there's a few more minutes before boarding. Its like you want us to leave," Avi responded sarcastically.

"I kind of do, saying how your mothers been getting angrier lately. This war is not helping this family and I want you two as far away from her as you can be," their father muttered under his breath as they stood in front of the Hogwarts Express. He turned the two around, giving a soft sad smile to them, his worry lines became more defined on his thin face in the past few years. His hair was greying from stress, and his chocolate brown eyes seemed to have lost the glimmer they used to have years ago.

"I love you both so much," he pulled the two into a hug, resting his head on Ayla's and running a hand through Avi's hair. "Write to me, okay? Every week?" He asked hopefully.

"Every week," the children answered, having had kept that promise through out all their years at Hogwarts.

"Now, go have fun. Get good grades. Stay safe."

"We will. Love ya, Dad." Ayla pressed a kiss to his cheek.

"Yeah, love you," Avi shook his dads hand, picking up his trunk that he had set down.