Diagon Alley was crowded today, and Aileen wished she could wave her wand and send them scurrying into all the open shops. She wasn’t shopping this afternoon, she just needed to get to her destination, but the sidewalks were full of people. Why couldn’t they go poof because she wanted them to? They should just know that she had somewhere to be.

She smirked a little at her own internal dramatics and tuned in again to the conversation going on in front of her. People watching was entertaining sometimes, and a little amusement trickled through her impatience. One of the women, the mother, was busy scolding the youngest for ruining her last set of clothes. The oldest daughter kept getting distracted by the window displays and begging to go into the designer stores. Aileen looked over the girl’s outfit critically. The teenager wouldn’t have any idea how to wear the clothes even if that family could afford them, she thought.

“But Mum, the seams are scratchy, and they always put the tags in the wrong place. I don’t see why I can’t just wear t-shirts. I hate robes!” The youngest whined.

Aileen snickered. If one was going to go over to the dark side of fashion, at least avoid the casual and grungy apparel. Not all muggle clothing lacked taste. Some muggle outfits were very nice, she admitted. But if the girl started talking about buying crockpots, or whatever that awful footwear was called, she would have to say something rude.

She finally grew tired of the family’s bickering and excused herself to walk in front of them, only to get stuck behind a group of teenage boys. She sighed and wished once again that she had apparated to meet her friends for lunch. Even the floo system wouldn’t be so bad compared to walking through this crowd. Aileen couldn’t blame them, so instead she blamed the nice weather and listened in on their conversations. She shifted her purse on her shoulder, checked to see that her wand was in the pocket of her robes, and kept an eye out for anyone she might know.

Since he left his childhood home, Simon Reid has been through many pitfalls and problems. First he was born into a family that he didn't belong in, nor did they make any room for the youngest son. So when he was struck with his lycanthropy one might think Simon's life was a dead end.  However he found it as his turning point.

Walking away from them all. Rejecting those who once rejected him and making his life something a little more. Simon now lived a life as he cared, sure there was not a steady pay scale or structure and no vacation time. But what he lacked in stability he gained in excitement and thrills. The thrill of being caught, of having to make excuses for what he was up to. Deception was part of the fun.

So when he was walking through the alley being deceptively innocent. The breeze was running though his hair as he kept pace with several groups of people. Looking through windows like so many of the others. Following a man in a brown set of robes it was almost child's play to slip into his pocket relieving him of  the gold and other loose coins that once lined his pockets.

It would be a while before he realized he was running light and by then Simon, wearing his usual black hat would be ducking into another store making small talk with the female clerks and charming the passersby.

The day was going rather well and usual, he even picked off a necklace for Kyrene which happened to contain no silver so he knew she could wear it without burning him. His black leather gloves rolled over the coins in his pocket when he looked over seeing someone he could have done with out. There with in a few feet of him was his oh so loving 'perfect' sister. She stood there looking every bit the perfect Reid child. A title that would never be his. Grumbling a bit Simon attempted to avoid her detection looking for a place to hide while she passed.

It didn’t take long for Aileen to decide that there was nothing entertaining about the conversation of teenage boys. She sighed at the group in front of her and scanned the streets for something else to attract her attention. Her eyes landed on a man in a black hat, stepping out of an alley. Maybe it was his build, what little she could see of his hair, or the way he moved, but she felt like she knew him. Aileen stopped walking for a moment, holding up the line of shoppers behind her. His head turned and she caught a glimpse of his face.

She sucked in a sharp breath. It was her brother, Simon, who she hadn’t heard from in years. He’d dropped off the face of the earth a while ago and she had come to terms with the possibility that he might be dead.

The man standing just a foot away from her was obviously alive and well. That long coat and gloves did not become him, however. He’d look much better with something more fitted, and if he bothered to shave his face…

Aileen shook her head and followed him down the alley, struggling to keep up even with her long legs. She hesitated, wondering if she’d mistaken him for someone else, or if she should have kept to the main street regardless.

Still, this was something she had to know. “Simon!” She called after him.

Her heart beat fast, hardly a result of her mini power walk. A mixture of emotions ran through her, but she tried to keep her face calm as she stepped towards him.

“What are you doing here?” In an effort to conceal her feelings, the question sounded cold and accusatory. This definitely was not the reunion of a loving brother and sister.

Hopefully she hadn't seen him. If he thought about it carefully he could apparate away from her avoiding the annoying reintroductions to his former family member. The only thing that connected them anymore was the putrid blood that tied him to his last name and nothing more.

Simon was no more a Reid than he was a vampire. The Reid's were proud, rich, and obnoxiously close minded. If he had to be forced into being around them any more than he was back in his younger years he would fight tooth and nail for freedom. Not that it mattered they cut him out shortly after he was attacked by a werewolf.

Slipping into the alley away from the crowds he hoped to lose her. However when he heard her shrill voice call after him he found himself frozen in place. He let out a deep breathe as she spoke his name. "Guilty..." The hiss in his voice was not hard to notice as he turned his darkening eyes and focused on her.

She stood there, Aileen Reid, the witch of an older sister he disliked immensely. She never cared for him, and treated him like dirt back in school. There was no feeling there other than anger. If she thought he was dead maybe it was better off that way. They didn't seek him out, or try to bring him home so he was fond of the lack of interaction he enjoyed all this time.

"What does it matter to you what I'm doing here? It's an alleyway and I am a simple patron," Simon wrung his hands in the leather gloves he stole from his father's estate so many years ago.

She stared at him. Why did he have to be so difficult, already? Couldn’t he have waited a few moments to annoy her?

Aileen swallowed, uncertainty flickering across her face. Maybe this was a bad idea. There must have been a good reason for him to go into hiding, especially from his own family, and the people he used to work with at the Ministry. She couldn’t imagine him giving that up for nothing, all those connections. Her gaze swept over him critically. He was thinner than she remembered; that’s why his clothes didn’t fit him as well. His face looked haggard and grim. There was an angry look in his eyes that hadn’t been there before the werewolf attack. Before his family shunned him, she thought guiltily.

No, he should have tried harder. If he had just kept a respectable job…

Aileen glanced at his fidgeting hands. There was something familiar about those gloves, too.

“It matters,” she met his eyes with a flat expression, “because we haven’t heard from you in years. I suppose you think it’s perfectly fine to disappear without a care in the world, leaving us to explain your whereabouts.”

Her face hardened. “Merlin knows what you’ve been doing.” It couldn’t be anything decent, or he wouldn’t skulk about in alleyways.

Under his skin, as always. They were a bloody sickness. Hearing his sister's voice was like a thousand nails being driven into his head. It was like he was eleven years old again and she was mocking him in front of all of his new housemates. The desperation he felt was similar to the anger he felt being cut out of their lives.

Not that he belonged with them before. They had their two perfect children and he was discounted from the word 'go'.

The anger in his eyes had only intensified over the years. She was one of the few who caused it to fester, their brother was no better. The ministry was also one of his hot buttons.

"So what of it Aileen?" His voice thick with venom. Simon hopped up onto a closed dust bin near by. "Tell me does father and mummy dearest miss me so? Honestly where do you get off questioning where I am?" His right hand tugged on a solid black pipe sticking out of the building pulling himself up so he was hovering slightly over the lid and still looking at her with disinterest.

Simon scoffed and rolled his eyes, "Tell you my whereabouts? Now that's rich. There has never been a time where you lot have given me more than a passing glance that is of course unless it is to criticize." He left his left hand go and hung from the pipe with just one hand.

Losing interest he dropped down and leaned against the wall again, "Only Merlin might care what I am up to."

"So what of it Aileen?" His voice thick with venom. Simon hopped up onto a closed dust bin near by. "Tell me does father and mummy dearest miss me so?

There was something about family that made her feel like she was fifteen again and back at Hogwarts. It wasn’t a good feeling. She’d always thought that she’d look back on her memories of childhood with no regrets, but sometimes, when she was honest with herself, she found her past actions superficial, vain, and only concerned with superiority. The younger Aileen hadn’t cared a bit who she stepped on. Now, it seemed like she was growing a slight conscience- even if that conscience was the size of a raisin.

She knew very well that they hadn’t missed him. They’d only half-heartedly searched for him to quell the rumors about his unsavory lifestyle. Her parents wanted him to be normal, or at least to fall in line. Simon failed to meet their expectations with every decision he’d made. It was easy, now that she looked at it, to cut him out of their lives. Of course it wasn’t fair. But that was how the Reid family worked.

She put her hands on her hips and scowled at him. Yeah, definitely fifteen again.

“…There has never been a time where you lot have given me more than a passing glance that is of course unless it is to criticize."

Her lips pursed because she knew it was true. “Don’t be childish.”

"Only Merlin might care what I am up to."

“Oh, that’s reassuring,” she retorted, watching him lean against the wall. A part of her wondered if he had anyone looking out for him, or caring if he came home at night. She couldn’t ask him that. So instead she reverted to sniping at him.

“You could at least send our parents a letter. You could try to make amends…” As if that would happen. He’d refused to make an effort to be a part of their family from day one. Aileen didn’t know if he thought himself above them, but it had always annoyed her.

She tried a different tactic, a shock tactic. She tried to be nice.

“I know that things might be a bit more difficult for you now,” she conceded, avoiding the word ‘werewolf’ as if it were a disease. “But you’re not going to make your situation better by hiding.”

Aileen looked at him, her expression torn between disgust and concern. Any other older sister might offer him help, but after decades of hating each other, the possibility didn’t even enter her head.

The relationship had never been puppy dogs and homemade cookies. When it came to how he belonged with his family it was always oil and water. Never blending together and he knew full well they were happy when he vanished. Despite what his sister, if you could call her that, was attempting to convey. "Aileen please spare me from your sympathetic nonsense I'm not foolish, I know you all better than you think. If you remember, if you care to, I was stuck in that home long enough to know how you all truly feel about Simon the lost cause."

It wouldn't of surprised him if they had erased him all together from their family. However the many times he went back into the estate to knick things for profit he saw his room was left exactly as he left it. Well until he took the things he could use for selling purposes. It laid there cleaned only by the house elves, kept like a time capsule for the child that should never have been born.

The mistake. Simon chuckled to himself knowing that he was the accident they never wanted and yet he was still the thorn in their side. He wasn't going to be expelled as easily as they wished.

"Why not be childish now? Never had a chance to before." He rolled his eyes, even now she was trying to tell him what to do. It fell upon deaf ears. Simon could honestly care less for any of them. He was cut out of their families fabric like an ink spot on a soiled carpet. Cut out and tossed aside for an incident he had no control over.

When she started making references about his werewolf state his eyes flashed. "Don't you dare for one moment think you have any idea what this is like. Your precious little life has never experienced anything like this so don't try to compare notes or hope to pretend you have experienced anything like this." His words were cutting and he hoped they would leave a mark deeper than the ones she made in him as a young boy trying to find himself. Lost in a world he wasn't meant for.

"None of you are worth the ink and parchment it takes to give you an update on my affairs." Simon glared at her pushing himself off the wall and moving more in view of her. Scars from silver were visible on his neck, not terrible ones but they were distinctive scars that would never leave him. Each one a badge of honor. Reid children never wore scars, it was undignified. Laughable.

"Don't you dare for one moment think you have any idea what this is like. Your precious little life has never experienced anything like this so don't try to compare notes or hope to pretend you have experienced anything like this."

Aileen had to admit for a moment that he was right, she didn’t have any idea what he’d been through. If she hadn’t been able to relate to him when they were younger, she certainly couldn’t now, not with his... condition. Of course, it was much easier to blame him for his lot in life than to think about his hardships- losing his job, his status, any respect from their parents. Considering his point of view, actually considering it, meant that Aileen had to take a hard look at her own actions when it came to Simon. How she’d made his life horrible at school, instead of looking out for him. How she’d ignored him the moment she graduated from Hogwarts, up until he was attacked, and her apathy towards him had lessened in a confusing way. However, she wasn’t willing to judge herself with the same high standards she put on her little brother. Aileen was afraid of what she’d find if she looked closely enough.

“I never pretended to understand,” she told him stiffly, glancing away to avoid his angry gaze.

"None of you are worth the ink and parchment it takes to give you an update on my affairs."

His next comment brought them right back where they’d started. She glared at him, noting the way he moved towards her, but refusing to be intimidated. Aileen quickly pushed away the trickle of unease that ran down her spine and lifted her chin up higher. Pride always won.

“Is that so?” She said icily. “And you must be worth so much more than the rest of us. What is it, I wonder, that sets you apart?”

Somewhere, in the back of her mind, she knew she shouldn’t push him. They hadn’t faced each other in years and there was no telling how he’d react. Still, once she was on a roll she couldn’t seem to stop.

“Is it your fashionable attire?” She took in his ratty clothes with a smirk. “Your charming, refined manners?” More like lack of social skills. “Or, perhaps it’s your ambitions, Simon. That amazing ability you have to hold onto your career, despite any obstacles, and aim high.”

It was a low blow, even for her, and the moment she said it her eyes widened with the knowledge that she’d gone too far.

His parents had created the monsters his older brother and sister had become. Though he was sympathetic for the squib younger sister they created he hardly knew her and therefor contacted none of them rather than just her. However much like they blanketed him with disapproval he shunned them right back. Why would he allow them the right to one up him anymore.

"You never pretended to care is more like it. I don't know why you are attempting to snow ball me now with this act like you have been worried. I'm not an arse Aileen so please drop the skit." He cracked his knuckles in annoyance. Knowing full well he was right.

The glare was just confirmation that she was realizing how wrong she had been all these years. He couldn't stand her and her smug attitude. The anger she spout at him was no long off putting, no longer struck a chord of fear within him. Now he was using it to his advantage. He thrived off it. He relished the anger he was causing.

"I'm not above you Aileen, I am just not one of you. I never have been you all made it perfectly clear so why fight it." Icy as ever he smiled a dark smirk. "What sets me apart is I no longer feel the need to kiss up to mummy and daddy. I have my own life, and it's much more thrilling than that boring excuse for a life I lived under lock and key."

She wouldn't get the better of him this time.

"Well if I can't hold onto a job you should look into the things you can't hold onto Aileen. Hows that marriage working out for you, oh right never quite stuck with it did you? Pity I can only imagine the spawn you could produce" an eye for an eye he muttered under his breath.

Taking a deep breathe he looked towards the corridor to where Knockturn alley met with where he was standing. "You know I would love to keep this little trip down memory lane but I have to say I would rather get back to something less painful. So if that is all of your questions, I think we can go back to you all thinking I'm dead and me wishing the same on your part."

With that Simon started to back away from her keeping his dark eyes locked onto hers. In case she decided to hurl an insult or better yet a hex his way his hand stayed on his wand.

If Aileen wasn’t angry before, she was furious now. Even though he was a grown man, she hadn’t expected her words to just roll off his back, or for him to actually insult her. The comment about her year-long marriage hit hard. That had been the first time she’d ever let their parents down and he knew it. One corner of her mouth turned up in mockery of a smile. Instead of raging at him like their mother was prone to do, she let the anger bubble up inside until she thought her skin would melt off.

Her hands dropped from her hips, subconsciously making it easier to reach for her wand.

“…So if that is all of your questions, I think we can go back to you all thinking I'm dead and me wishing the same on your part."

She glared at him coldly. The miniscule amount of sympathy she felt earlier simply withered away. No one talked to her like that, especially not her insignificant little brother.

“You go ahead and run, Simon,” she said scathingly. “It’s what you do best.”

She waited for him to leave, unwilling to turn around and show her back to him.

“If you ever need anything… money, a place to stay, a few meals,” she let her words hang there for a moment. “Don’t come to me.” He’d lost his chance. She refused to waste any more of her time wondering about him, now that they’d come face to face and nothing had changed. Aileen had been silly to think that a few years of distance would somehow ease the hostilities and grudges, but it only gave them more time to fester.

Ah, a direct hit. The arrow of bitterness and scorn had hit her right where it was meant to. In the place he never was able to before. She used to treat him like a door mat, a dog to be kicked. Now he was a dog, no better yet a wolf and she wasn't going to make him feel like he was a first year anymore lost and without anyone to go to.

She lost her chance to play the good sister the moment she turned her back on him the first time.

Barking a laugh he looked at her with a sinister smirk, "If I ever needed anything from you I would have died before it was offered over to me. So don't play the part of the wounded lass, you aren't going to pull the wool over my eyes." As if he expected her to extend an olive branch or anything of that sort. Since when did they have an ounce of compassion for Simon? Never for all he had known them. 

"I'm not running, I am just going where I belong. Besides what is left to discuss? Your attempt to cut me down for what I cannot control or the lack of my fashionable clothes as if that is a high priority." Losing his job had been a tiny hiccup in the long run. For as upset as he had been, he never once missed it because of how he was let go, how he was cut from the clothe.

Simon stood there, a barrier unmoved. There was no intimidation from her anymore. His lip twitched smirking and trying to keep the smirk from breaking out into a full smile, he was finally free of them and now he felt the full pride in having that.

Besides for all he knew she would smile and offer food with her left hand and poison it with her right.

Rubbing his brow he tilted his head, "On second thought... I best be going. I would love to stay and chat but I feel that being in your presence too long I fear I may lose the lunch I worked so hard to scrape together. So, be sure not to keep in touch." With that Simon vanished a sarcastic laughter still hanging in the air as he left his sister's view happy to be rid of her.