by
Catherine King
Potions that afternoon was far worse. They had been given an extremely tough testing the last lesson, and test scores were given out. Harry, Ron, Lavender Brown, and Parvati Patil had each gotten a C+, Dean and Seamus had both gotten C’s, and Neville (poor guy) received an F+. Hermione nearly swore at Snape for giving her a C++ (she’s used to A++’s).
When they walked out Ron muttered, “That @#$!*^ is so dumb! I cannot wait ‘till I’m free of him…”
That night (that phrase is getting really common, isn’t it?) Harry was skimming through the scrapbook of pictures of his mother and father. He was near the end of the book when he realized that two pages were stuck together. He unstuck them and looked at the photo. It appeared to be a group of people. On the end - Harry’s left side - was a pudgy boy who bore some resemblance to Neville Longbottom. Though it wasn’t. It was… Peter Pettigrew. He had been a friend of Harry’s father from school. Now he served Lord Voldemort. Next to him, a boy who was much taller, with dark hair. Sirius Black, Harry’s godfather. And next to Sirius was Harry.
Harry blinked and looked closer. The boy in the picture was identical to Harry. But his eyes were…they were a dark, ocean-like blue. Harry’s were bright green. The boy in the picture was none other than James Potter. There was a girl next to him, with eyes that shone like jewels, even in the faded photograph. This girl was Harry’s mother, Lily. Next to Lily, a girl with chocolate eyes, brown hair, and pale skin. She was unmistakable. She was Professor Gradison. But in this picture, Professor didn’t suit her. No, her real name, Arla, belonged to this younger girl. A boy who looked familiar and also embarrassed was next to Arla… Remus Lupin, Harry’s former Defense Against The Dark Arts Teacher. (Key Word: Embarrassed) This was taken when all of them were children. It was almost like looking through a time machine (Wizard pictures always moved).
On Saturday morning, Pig, Ron’s owl, brought him a tiny parcel, which Ron immediately began rubbing between his fingers.
“How’d you do that, Ron?” Harry asked, curiously.
“Oh, Fred and George invented it for Pig’s sake,” said Ron, as a pop indicated that the letter had gone to normal size. “They call it the American way, Mini-Mail.”
He read the letter, chuckled, looked at the picture, chuckled some more and gave it to Harry, whispering, “You can put a charm on the photo, if you want.”
Harry first read the letter.
“Dear Ron,
Hi! It’s me, Bill. I just wanted to say hi, tell you how everything is going. Now, the other day, I was just going into this hidden entrance to Nefertiti’s tomb. You know, the Mother of King Tut? And I’m just getting into the hole when this Jeep comes rolling along, it stops, and the driver jumps out and waves her arms, screaming, “What the heck d’you think you’re doin’? If you walk deliberately into a hole like that, there could be extreme dangers!” and I say, “Of course. That’s why I’m going in.”
Next day we saw each other again. Her name is Amy, and she’s really cool. I got so pulled into our conversation that I accidentally mentioned that I’m a wizard! She asked to see some magic, and really liked it when I destroyed the tarantula that was crawling up her leg.
With love, and wishing you all the best,
Bill”
Harry looked at the photo and grinned. Bill, Ron’s oldest brother, was 25 and starting to form a slight goatee. The young woman who was standing next to him must have been Amy. She was rather thin, and came up to Bill’s shoulder. Her bushy, almost black hair was tied back in a ponytail, and she had dusky skin and steel-rimmed glasses. Then Harry saw that Bill had his arm around Amy’s waist.
Harry chuckled as he sprinkled little pink hearts above the two.
