Evidently Zia had spent so much time thinking about her grief and how much she hated that this had happened, dark things and shadowy thoughts. Her hair turned brown, just like it had been all her life, just like it was supposed to be, just like the rest of her family. The remaining ones.

The normally hyper-active Ravenclaw knew she should have been studying. She hadn’t done well this semester, and she could pinpoint the plummet to a date. November 5th. No, it was not a day she was soon to forget. Since then, Zia hadn’t felt like very much mattered. Her family had always been her big basket of support and love… now that he was missing, everything felt off.

She twisted the 13 ring around her finger. Something in the back of her mind reminded her that she probably didn’t need this ring anymore. Now that she wasn’t lucky number thirteen anymore. They were down one, placing her at number 12. A 9-year-old Zia would have been ecstatic with this result, as she hated the number thirteen and all of the bad luck and superstition surrounding it. She threw a hissy fit over the whole thing. Ron had been the one to make up reasons why the number 13 was the best.

Tears pricked at her eyes, Zia’s thick lashes the only thing keeping them in place. She felt like she had done nothing but cry for weeks, but she couldn’t even think about anything else. No matter how hard she tried, Zia couldn’t keep her eyes on the book even when the professor was talking, nevermind trying to study outside of class. All the knowledge felt overwhelming, and there was a big sore on Zia’s mind at the moment.

So she found herself half-freezing by the lake. It wasn’t too cold, but Zia did make a little bubble of warmth around her. She stared at the lake, wishing Ronaldo would come out wearing a Giant Squid costume.

Marco had noted a change in his cousin, Zia-- it was hard not to. She wore her mood in the way she dressed and in the color of her hair. It had reverted to its natural brown. However, on Zia-- it did not look natural. Not even a little bit. He wasn't sure if it was curiosity or concern that led him to approach her by the lake. Marco supposed it didn't really matter why he was there, just that he was.

Family had always been important to Zia. Hers was put together, and everybody loved each other. There was never any resentment, as far as he knew. Marco was jealous of that-- although they were cousins, his upbringing had been different.

He sat down next to her and wrapped an arm stiffly around her shoulders, pulling her into a side hug.

"Everything falls apart and everything sucks." Marco stated, "Doesn't mean you need to freeze by the lake." He tried to be comforting, he really did.

As Marco looped his arm around her, Zia fell into the hug. She was the last of the Pisellis at Hogwarts and she was happy to have her cousin around to share some of the grief. Although Marco wasn’t exactly the ‘touchy’ type, Zia leaned her head on his shoulder and sighed.

”Everything falls apart and everything sucks." Marco stated, "Doesn't mean you need to freeze by the lake."

Zia’s lower lip quivered at Marco’s pessimistic philosophy. That was never the way she had viewed the world -- there was good in everything; bad things happened to bad people. Bad people could redeem themselves. But the dead stayed dead. A tear rolled down Zia’s nose and dripped off the end.

“S’not that cold,” Zia sniffed. “Besides, I cast a spell.” She adjusted the warmth bubble so Marco could enjoy it too. She looked down at her knees, her hands. Everything looked different, since this tragedy had torn her family apart.

From the recesses of her cloak she pulled out a bottle of wine she’d been saving. “Ronaldo made this for me,” she told her cousin, her voice cracking halfway through the sentence. Ron had been a talented winemaker. He had dabbled in all types of brewery, from hard liquor to ale, but wine had always been his strength. So a bottle of wine personalized to her taste from Ron was a very special gift indeed. It would refill three times, and she had already finished it once, leading her to eat an entire cheesecake and snog with Eli on the quidditch field. She looked at the label, so simple and artistic, then looked back at her cousin. “Should we?” Zia really didn't care about rules anymore; the arbitrary regulations just didn't have the same importance as they used to.

Oh god. She was crying. Marco never knew what to do when people were crying. Drink and smoke it away was usually his advice.

Zia adjusted the warmth bubble and it definitely took the edge of the chill off.

He tried to remember Ronaldo. Zia's brother had always been a decent bloke, easy to get along with. Marco had not been particularly close to him.. But he was also grieving in his own way. The permanency of death had a way of affecting people who barely knew the person who died. There were plenty of what-ifs and should-haves going through his head. He was not going to vocalize them.

Zia asked if they should drink the wine, he shrugged noncommittally in response. "It's your choice. What do you think Ronaldo would want?"

Marco wasn’t the type of cousin that the Pisellis always had over for the holidays, not the type to spend every moment together. In some families first and second and third cousins all partied together. Zia’s family was big enough and so was her house, so it was hard to keep track of who was there and who wasn’t sometimes. Big parties with the whole entire family was just a Piselli secret recipe for absolute chaos (and a lot of wine).

“It’s your choice. What do you think Ronaldo would want?”

Zia gazed at the bottle sadly, rubbing her thumb over the label that was starting to peel. She recognized her brother Ronaldo’s signature, among others -- his business associates, she assumed. Had they attended Ronaldo’s services? She didn’t even know. There was so much to her older brother that Zia never had the chance to find out.

She made her choice, wordlessly using magic to uncork the bottle in a very cool spin. Zia looked over at Marco, almost like she was challenging him to say something else. She held up the bottle and then took a long chug, enough until she could feel her skin tingling, then handed the bottle to her cousin. It was a rather big one, and by the end of it Zia, at least, would hopefully be in a happier, more tipsy state.

Marco sighed and shook his head. He rummaged through the pockets of his robes and pulled out two cigarettes, holding up one up to Zia, eyebrows raised in the offering. Marco pulled out his wand and lit his own cigarette. He smirked a little at her challenge. He didn't exactly expect her to offer her wine-- after all, it was the last bottle of Ronaldo's. Marco actually would have felt a little guilty if he had any.

"You uncorked the bottle almost as quickly as my mother can." He said wrly, bringing his cigarette to his mouth and exhaling smoke. "How pissed are you trying to get today?"

"You uncorked the bottle almost as quickly as my mother can."

"Well, we are Italian," Zia responded immediately. As if that excused her high emotions and sudden passion for wine. For years Zia had been a goody-goody; it wasn't until recently that she felt desperate to grow up. And now that everything had happened, she didn't know how to feel. Her family had flipped upside down, everyone having been unprepared for sweet Ronaldo's death. It was always a struggle for baby Zia to connect with her older siblings, some of whom had a well-established life long before she arrived. Ron had always been the best about it, looping her in with the siblings instead of the nieces and nephews.

"How pissed are you trying to get today?"

She looked up at her cousin who held out two cigarettes, implying she should take one. This year Zia had done many things she never thought she would. She skinny-dipped and drank and smoked gillyweed with her friends. She had felt rather immune to destruction. Now that the worst had happened, Zia felt like an emptier version of herself.

Tears welled up again, as they had been on and off for the past few weeks. To cover it up she chugged a bit of wine from the bottle, and it replenished itself instantly. Her heart hurt, because all she could think was why couldn't you do that, Ronaldo? If he could give a bottle of wine extra lives, why couldn't he do it to himself?

She knew why, of course. Zia plucked a cigarette from Marco's hand and waited for him to light his.

He lit her cigarette for her and took another puff of his, blowing the smoke out through his nose. Partially to show off to his cousin, and partially because he enjoyed the way it looked, and how... Harsh it felt. To be fair, he used cheap tobacco in his rolled cigarettes, not the nice stuff.

She didn't respond to his question, and she looked like she was about to cry again.

"Dammit, Zia." Marco shook his head, "Just let it out. I'm not going to punch you or anything. Your fucking brother died, you have a reason." He didn't mean to sound so harsh, and winced at himself as the words came out. "Get drunk and cry, it's cathartic."

Zia had never been the morose type - that sort of thing she left to others. Instead she was the relentlessly positive one, always with a big smile on her face and a bounce in her step. She’d never concerned herself with anything too serious, and could not understand people who were unhappy for weeks on end. It was the sort of thing she teased her cousin Marco about, as he did not share Zia’s tendency toward pep. He had always been very introverted and deep, He had his shit but Zia always tried her best to annoy him into a more perky and cheerful mood.

Regrettably Zia now had learned the type of things that could cause these kind of negative moods. After the tragedy of her brother’s death she realized that she had not experienced much grief in her life; being the youngest she had always been protected from any serious family issues. The most controversial moments in Zia’s young life had revolved mostly around her older sister Mimi, who was prone to recklessness and disappearing.

"Just let it out. I'm not going to punch you or anything. Your fucking brother died, you have a reason... Get drunk and cry, it's cathartic."

The bluntness of Marco’s words caused a stabbing sensation in Zia’s heart. Thinking about her brother’s death made her hurt, in a physical way that she couldn’t articulate. Her entire being was suffering from the shock of Ronaldo’s sudden departure from the living.

She took Marco’s advice and stopped trying so hard to suck her tears back into her eyes, letting a few fall silently down her cheeks. The tears left a path in their wake, providing evidence for Zia’s immense grief. “I just can’t believe it,” Zia half-sobbed. The entire Piselli family were still reeling from the sudden horror. To calm herself down she took a drag of the cigarette, which burned her lungs and throat but she refused to cough. Her face turned red and her eyes watered even more but she held her breath, embracing the feeling as it traveled through her respiratory system. Once the worst was over she took another drag, and the searing was not as bad. She was determined not to look foolish.

“Remember when he opened the winery?” Zia asked, her voice wobbly with sadness and a touch of nostalgia. The thought of the event made her lips curl upward just for a minute, recalling the chaos of the opening day only a couple of years earlier. It had been the first time Zia had been permitted to really drink, and her siblings were all very enthusiastic about that. Ronaldo had selected wines inspired by Zia’s taste palette. Not everyone had been pleased by the ultra-sweet spirits but she -- and Ronaldo -- had helped themselves to more than a sample’s worth from each bottle. And they certainly hadn’t spit it out after tasting, the way you were apparently supposed to.

Marco patted Zia's shoulder in a half-assed attempt to soothe her.

It was horrible. The entire poisoning situation was horrible. There was no excuse for it. So many people had died-- his dad had lost a good friend. He had lost a cousin, and Zia-- Zia lost a brother. Instead of 13 Piselli kids, now there were only 12. Still a hefty number, but not 13. He knew how much emphasis and importance Zia put on being lucky number 13. It was a magical number. 3, 7, and 13. Now they were imbalanced.

"I remember. He used to sneak me wine when i was underage." Marco laughed, even though it was hardly necessary. His parents let him drink wine with meals long before he turned 17.  "And harder stuff too."

"I remember. He used to sneak me wine when i was underage… And harder stuff too."

Zia laughed and rolled her eyes as her cousin joined her in the memory. Marco might have been her cousin, but cousins and aunts and uncles had always been considered part of Zia’s immediate family. For them the different titles of relation were simply organizational, not definitional. This made Marco’s presence at Hogwarts especially significant for little Zia, all alone without any of her sisters or brothers around.

“Oh yes of course, because you’ve been a badass since birth,” Zia teased, taking another drag on the cigarette her badass cousin had talked her into. It burned less and less each time, that first sputtering cough still stinging in the back of her throat. “Even then you were dark and brooding.” She smirked at the thought. “Now I might need you to teach me your ways,” she added, a heavy pang of sadness hitting the air. She’d been joking, but the statement rang a little bit too true.

Marco sighed and shook his head as Zia referred to him as dark and brooding. Even if it was true. He had been a broody child, even when he had been a little, happy, clumsy thing. Those days felt like so long ago.

"It'll come more naturally than you think." He replied, "But try to keep that..." Marco cringed a bit at what he was about to say, "That spark, or whatever, that you have. You can be dark and brooding, but don't lose who you are completely. Believe it or not, you're pretty okay the way you are." The closest thing to a complement he could give, really.

"It'll come more naturally than you think." He replied, "But try to keep that... That spark, or whatever, that you have. You can be dark and brooding, but don't lose who you are completely. Believe it or not, you're pretty okay the way you are."

Zia let silence fill the air for a moment before choosing to answer. For once she had time to pick her words wisely, not that she knew what to say. A morose look returned to Zia's face and she looked down at her feet. "I don't feel like me." Zia said simply. Her status in her family as the baby, lucky number thirteen, had always played a significant role in Zia's life. She idolized her older siblings, longing for the day when she would finally be admitted to their Grown Ups club. Ronaldo had always been so understanding of this, somehow. In many ways Zia considered him the bridge to the Much Older half of her sibling group.

"I have a spark, though?" Zia asked, already knowing that the answer was a clear yes. She had donned pink hair for the past four years, only recently returning to her natural brunette due to these miserable circumstances. It was like her hair didn't have the effort to be so vibrantly bright anymore.