The Park

"It's been more than an hour," a quiet voice was stating simply, as if that implied something more.

"Shh, I think he's waking up," a female voice murmured.

Harry blinked and sat up. He seemed to be slumped in some sort of very soft chintz-covered easy chair, which was standing in the corner of--a kitchen? And a very old-fashioned kitchen, at that.

A rather expansive aproned bosom lowered itself to reveal the face of a tired-looking woman whose curly red hair was pinned up on top of her head. Sue?, Harry thought, but before his mouth responded he saw that the red of this woman's hair went right to her roots, and that, although motherly, her face was quite unlike that of the woman he'd met earlier that day.

"Do you recognize me?" asked the woman, steadying his shoulder with a careful hand.

"No," croaked Harry, straightening his glasses. "Who are you?" The circumstances of his fainting were fitting back together in his mind. "Where's Uncle Vernon? Where am I? What happened?" He swallowed, gripping the squashy arms of the chair.

"It's all right," the woman reassured him, and then stepped back to make way for the old man from his relatives' house. Before Harry could say anything, the blue eyes were looking deeply into his, in such an intimately personal way Harry fell speechless from surprise.

"Do you remember me?" asked the old man, still looking right into Harry's eyes.

"Yeah," managed Harry.

"From where?"

"My aunt and uncle's house." Harry felt his vision graying again and his heart began to thump. "Look, who are you?"

With an inscrutable expression on his face, the old man turned a kitchen chair around and sat opposite Harry. "I'm afraid your aunt and uncle may have given you the wrong impression," he began slowly. "We represent an alternate legal guardian for you."

"But I don't have any other relatives," said Harry.

"That is true, Harry. You have my deepest sympathies. However, you do have a godfather. It was your parents' wish that you be placed under his care, should any tragedy befall them."

The unobtrusive, worn-looking man knelt in the corner of his vision. "Here, drink this," he said softly, handing Harry a glass of water.

"Thanks," said Harry to his knees, and sipped. If the strangers had wanted to harm him, he tried to reason, they'd had every chance to do it while he was unconscious.

"Most unfortunately, however, your godfather has been extremely ill since not long after your parents' deaths," the strange old man continued, as if he was telling Harry a story. Despite his light-hearted demeanour, though, Harry felt that the stranger was restraining very strong emotion indeed. "Upon his recent recovery, he endeavored to discover what had become of you. Your relatives did not answer his missives."

"Oh," said Harry, looking at the water glass he was holding on his knee. He explained, "They're sort of suspicious of anything to do with me or . . . my parents."

The old man nodded. "Therefore, your godfather--who is still somewhat too ill to travel--felt it necessary that you be paid a visit, and sent us. We are close friends of his--and your parents." At Harry's involuntary glance up, the man confirmed, "Yes, we knew them." He paused, but Harry's throat seemed to have closed up. He truly felt he might pass out again at any moment.

"Unfortunately, again, your aunt and uncle responded to our visit with . . . . unanticipated hostility. As you described, they mistrusted us as soon as we mentioned our connection to your parents and to you. Although we had met before, long ago, your aunt did not remember us. This led your uncle to conclude that our true purpose was to extort money from him."

Harry again felt the embarrassment at his guardians' behavior. "Sorry," he said to the water glass.

"There is absolutely no need to be sorry," said the old man firmly. "In any case, at this juncture your relatives wished us to leave. We, however, were concerned that someone of your age was out alone at such a late hour, and hoped not to depart until you had arrived home."

Harry nodded. "Then . . . I got home, and, um . . ."

"After your loss of consciousness, our friend Mr. Shacklebolt managed to convince your uncle and aunt that we desired nothing more from them than to remove you from their custody permanently. They acquiesced, and we bought you here, to your godfather's house. Mr. Lupin collected your belongings. They are here as well." The old man was examining Harry more intensely than ever. "Now, we wish to make it quite clear that, should you desire to return to your relatives rather than remain here, you are entirely at liberty to do so."

Finally unable to avoid the gaze any longer, Harry looked up. The blue eyes were twinkling, and the old man reached forward and placed a hand over Harry's own. "I feel compelled to admit, however, that we and your godfather hope that you choose to stay."

"Yeah," said Harry at last. "I want to stay." And he buried his face in his sleeves, which, being part of Dudley's old sweater, were far too long for him.

It was exactly, exactly as he'd always dreamed it: the fantasy he'd enacted a thousand thousand times in his cupboard. Wonderful people, strangers had come to take him away, and as soon as he'd seen them he'd known that he liked them. And it had happened instantly. One moment, he'd been stuck there in Privet Drive, in that lifeless life, forever. The next, all of that had vanished. He might take his GCSEs. He might take his A-levels. He might . . . he might have someone who . . .

It was as if he had instantly learned to do magic. Suddenly, anything was possible.

"Come here, sweetheart," the red-haired woman was saying, and suddenly her arms were around him and he was trying to wipe away his tears before they reached her blouse.

Harry took a steadying breath, and the woman let him go again.

"I'm sorry," he said, scrubbing his eyes under his glasses with the corner of his sleeve. "Um . . . what's your name?" It sounded too blunt, especially considering he'd just wept all over her shoulder. Harry couldn't imagine what she thought of him, a fifteen-year-old boy behaving like that.

"I'm Molly Weasley, dear," she said. "I'm a friend of your godfather's. And, like Albus said, you don't have to apologize to us. We're as good as your family," she added, with conviction.

"So . . . you are . . ." began Harry, looking up at the old man.

"Albus Dumbledore, Harry." Harry wondered how his godfather knew such an odd-looking person. For all that he appeared to be ancient, he moved like a twenty-year-old, and now Harry noticed that he was wearing a suit of plum-coloured velvet. That alone, thought Harry, would have been enough to edge Uncle Vernon very near to a heart attack. "I was your godfather's teacher. We've kept in touch," Mr. Dumbledore explained. Although he was smiling kindly, that tint of storm-like emotion, strongly repressed, remained in him, and in fact coursed throughout the entire room.

Trying not to tremble, Harry stood up to look for the man who'd given him the glass of water. Mr. Dumbledore and Mrs. Weasley parted to allow the worn-looking man to introduce himself.

"I'm Remus Lupin, Harry," he said quietly. "I'm a friend of Sirius'."

Harry didn't remember anyone introducing themself as Sirius. "Sirius?" he repeated.

"That's your godfather," Mr. Lupin explained. "His name is Sirius." He seemed to have cut himself off just before saying something else.

Harry nodded, trying to keep all the names straight. Harry's parents had known some people with quite unusual names. Perhaps some of them had changed their names, or went by nicknames. It was just another thing Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia would have taken personal offense at: being called something unusual, even if it wasn't the person's fault.

But Harry liked it. He wouldn't have minded being called something more interesting than Harry Potter, even though the quite ordinary name Harry was bad enough, according to his relatives. Sirius Potter would have been cool . . . although there had been that escaped convict with the name Sirius, too, which must have been quite awkward for his Sirius.

His Sirius.

"Where is Sirius?" he asked, feeling awkward using the first name, as if he knew him.

"He's having a slight relapse at present, I'm afraid," said Mr. Lupin, "but he very much wants to see you and will come down as soon as he's able. Tomorrow morning, we hope."

"Okay," said Harry. He almost didn't mind not meeting his godfather right away. It was like . . . . well, this had never happened to him, but it was like having a big and mysterious and wonderful-looking present waiting for him under the Christmas tree and savoring the anticipation of finding out what was inside.

He wavered a little on his feet again. Instantly, Mrs. Weasley drew out a kitchen chair for him and pressed him into it. "Have you had any dinner yet, dear?" she asked him, frowning.

"Not really," said Harry. "I got to have some crisps on the way home."

"Have you had any lunch?"

"Um, not really," admitted Harry. "We were quite busy, and the manager--"

"Have you had breakfast?"

"I had some grapefruit. Um."

"Right," said Mrs. Weasley, suddenly looking quite terrifying. Harry must have shrunk back, because she clasped his hand for an instant and said, "I'm not cross with you, sweetheart. Now, if you could just get him some milk to be going on with, please, Remus, I'll just whip up some soup for you, dear. Just you sit tight and don't worry about a thing."

Any protestations Harry might have had at Mrs. Weasley's cooking for him so late were quelled by the fiery determination in her eyes. "All right," he said, pulling his chair in to the empty, but very long, table. It could have seated fifteen people, easily.

"I'll leave you to Mrs. Weasley's very capable care," said Dumbledore, smiling at him again in parting. "We'll meet again soon."

Before Harry could catch Mr. Dumbledore leaving, though, Mr. Lupin had appeared again at his elbow with a glass of milk. "I'll say goodnight, too, Harry," said Mr. Lupin, "since I have an unavoidable appointment tomorrow morning, but I'm very glad to have seen you."

Trying to remember his manners, Harry said, "Thank you, Mr. Lupin. For coming to my uncle and aunt's house and everything--" He swallowed. It looked as if he'd somehow just hurt Mr. Lupin's feelings.

"Please, Harry, call me Remus," said Lupin, looking even more worn than ever.

"Oh," said Harry. "Then -- goodnight, Remus."

"Goodnight, Harry," said Lupin, and rushed out of the room.

"Here you are, sweetheart," said Mrs. Weasley, setting a huge bowl of some sort of beefy vegetable stew and about half a loaf of bread in front of Harry. "It looks like we're somehow out of butter again--those wretched boys--but you're to eat as much of the bread as you want."

"It's wonderful," said Harry, trying not to end up crying all over her shoulder again. "Thanks--thank you so much, Mrs. Weasley."

"It's nothing at all," she said, pressing a spoon into his hand. "This is your house now, you know. Will you be all right for a few minutes? I've got a few things--"

"Of course," said Harry, and Mrs. Weasley hurried out. As soon as she was gone, Harry gulped the milk down in one go and set into the bread and stew. Perhaps it was just that he was so hungry, but even the bread here seemed to taste of more than Aunt Petunia's bread. It was obviously home-baked, actually, but even so--everything here, the people, the house, the names were more . . . vibrant. More real.

As he chewed, he looked around the kitchen. It really was like a kitchen out of a BBC adaptation. It was practically medieval. Harry couldn't spot a toaster, or a blender, or even a refrigerator or a phone. Nothing electrical at all. Perhaps it was one of those kitchens that hid the appliances behind fake cupboard doors and that kind of thing.

Hearing the kitchen door swing open, Harry turned, but he couldn't figure out who had come through it until he heard the gentle padding of feet around the corner of the table. An enormous black dog had sat down just by his ankle and was staring up at him with intelligent brown eyes. Its tail swished back and forth across the tiles.

"Well, hello," said Harry, leaning over. Its tail wagged even more rapidly. Feeling quite touched by the dog's immediate trust in him (didn't dogs usually bark at strangers in their houses? Of course, Harry hadn't been in the houses of many people with dogs, except Aunt Marge's), Harry tried petting the dog on its head. As he did, he became vaguely aware of raised voices from behind the kitchen door.

"I don't ever want to catch you with one of those again! And you can tell Fred and George that I know you got it from them, and if I ever see a single one--" That was Mrs. Weasley, sounding as intimidating as she'd looked back in the kitchen. Harry couldn't make out the rest of what she was saying.

"Yeah, but, Mum --"

"I'm warning you, Ginny Weasley!"

"All right, Mum: I'm sorry." Ginny Weasley didn't sound very sorry at all.

"All right," said Mrs. Weasley. "You can come down now and have some dinner. I made Harry some stew, and the pot's on the stove, so you can help yourself. But don't--"

"I know, Mum."

There was a sigh, and then Ginny was stomping toward the door. It swished open.

"Hello, Harry," said Ginny, who had stopped dead in the doorway as soon as she'd caught sight of him. She seemed about Harry's age. Like her mother, she had flaming red hair, but hers was straight and pulled back into a ponytail, except for a few fine wisps around her hairline and ears.

"Hullo," said Harry, putting his spoon down carefully.

Striding over to him, she said, "I'm Ginny Weasley." Harry stood up hurriedly and introduced himself; she took his hand and shook it firmly.

Then she noticed the black dog by Harry's feet, and her eyebrows sprang up. "Oh," she said, looking amused.

"Is he yours?" asked Harry, biting his lip. "He just came in here and sat down by me."

"Oh, no. He's not mine," said Ginny, hunkering down on her heels to face the dog. "He's Sirius' dog, aren't you?" She ruffled the top of the dog's head. The dog bore it stoically.

"What's his name?"

"Snuffles," said Ginny, grinning.

"Really?" said Harry. "Oh." It was rather a huge dog for such an odd name as Snuffles, but Harry supposed it had, perhaps, been a very small puppy.

"He's not really supposed to be in here," said Ginny, ladling some stew into a bowl for herself.

"But I won't tell on him." She plopped herself down in the seat next to Harry's.

Harry nodded. "Do you live here, too?" he ventured. Sirius had a lot of friends, apparently.

"Sort of," said Ginny, flicking a bay leaf to the brim of her bowl. "Everyone comes to be with Sirius, so it's sort of a meeting place, and Sirius has tons of rooms. We Weasleys have our own house, but Professor Lupin lives here." She shrugged.

"Sort of like a commune," said Harry, trying to understand.

"Sort of," said Ginny again, noncommittally. "My brothers and I go to boarding school, though, so we really spend most of our time there."

"Do you, really?" said Harry, almost flipping over his bowl. "I've never met anyone who went to a boarding school. Is it great?"

"Oh, it's amazing," said Ginny, her brown eyes shining. Harry was transfixed. Nothing about Ginny's face itself--her mouth, her nose, her cheekbones--was particularly pretty, although nothing was particularly ugly, either. The form of her face was quite ordinary.

But everything about her was completely . . . natural. Nothing was affected. Nothing was fake. She sat in her chair, one leg curled up beneath her, in only a T-shirt and jeans and holey socks; no makeup, no jewelry, nothing extra at all, and looked as comfortable as if she'd been there all her life. Ginny was herself like earth was earth, inherently itself and nothing else, wholesome and clean and fresh and--Harry almost wanted to say pure, but the word seemed somehow cheap.

"What's it like?" asked Harry.

"It's in Scotland," Ginny began. "It's not terribly big, so we're all very close. That is, we're divided into four houses, so there's some rivalry, but we all know one another. Professor Lupin teaches there."

"Wow," said Harry.

"There's a huge lake, and a forest by the grounds," Ginny described, gesturing to indicate the hugeness of the lake, her stew forgotten. "We're not allowed in the forest, but some people go in anyway." She smiled. "And it's actually in an old castle, so there's lots of towers. And dungeons. And ghosts."

"Really?" said Harry. Was this girl having him on? He didn't want to seem stupid. He really didn't want her to end up laughing at him.

"No, really," said Ginny with ardent seriousness.

Feeling a little reckless, Harry decided to trust her. "Have you ever seen one of the ghosts?" he ventured.

"Oh, yes," said Ginny, chewing on a piece of beef. "Have you? Ever seen a ghost, I mean."

"No," admitted Harry. "I've never really seen anything like that, except--" He had been about to mention the dreams he'd had when he was little, about a flying motorcycle and things like that, but instead said, "one time when we were at the zoo and I thought a snake talked to me. But, obviously, it didn't." His cheeks burned. Why had he said that?

"Maybe it did," Ginny assured him, turning in her chair to face him.

"Like a magical snake?" said Harry.

"Why not?" said Ginny. She leaned forward and, resting her palm flat on the table just by his elbow, whispered, "My school is a school for witches."

He had felt her breath on his cheek.

Automatically, he laughed. "Like the Worst Witch? All right, you had me there for a while." He felt sick.

"It's real," said Ginny, still leaning toward him. "I'll show you." She reached down into the pocket of her jeans and pulled out--well, it was a wand. It was clearly supposed to be a wand. The odd thing about it was that it didn't have any sparkles or extra carvings or anything on it to show that it was a wand. It was merely a slim, long piece of wood. "Don't tell my mum."

"I won't," said Harry, finding himself leaning forward, too, just to hear her.

"All right," said Ginny. She held the wand so that its tip was positioned exactly halfway between them. "Lumos."

The wand glowed, humming with creamy light. Without thinking, Harry moved his hand toward it, letting the light filter through his fingers. It wasn't warm in the slightest. Light without heat.

It was unlike anything he'd ever experienced before. Although Ginny might have been able to fake the effect somehow, the sensation of the light on his fingers felt . . . well, magical. It was impossible to describe, but it wasn't the pinch of Dudley's sly fingers, or the itch of a scab, or the brush of Aunt Petunia's silk dress as he brought it back from the dry cleaners', or any other sensation he'd ever experienced.

"It's magic," said Harry, turning his fingers in the light.

"Yes, it is," said Ginny.

But wasn't this just something else he'd always dreamed of? Magic. All those dreams when he was little: the flying motorcycle, the fluttering golden ball, the flash of green light. That time when he'd jumped up onto the school roof . . . but that had all ended before he'd gone to high school.

The sick feeling in his stomach got twistier. Perhaps Uncle Vernon was right about him. Perhaps there was really something wrong with his mind.

But . . . this light felt more real than all the illumination of all the John Lewis lamps in Aunt Petunia's house, all the streetlights on Privet Drive, all the flickering microwave clock numbers and TV screens in the world . . .

"How do you make it go out?" asked Harry.

"Nox," said Ginny, and the light was gone.

"Can you--" Harry began, but before he could finish, they both heard Mrs. Weasley's steps rushing toward the kitchen door. Ginny was wearing short sleeves, so hiding her wand up a sleeve wasn't an option. She gripped his elbow, pressing the length of the wand along the inside of her arm and the outside of his, and covered his hand on the table with her other hand, so that they were locked facing one another.

The door swung open.

"Sirius is a really nice person, I promise, Harry," Ginny reassured him. "You'll love living here."

"You think so?" said Harry, trying to play his part.

"Definitely," said Ginny, smiling at him.

"Haven't you two finished your dinners yet?" said Mrs. Weasley suspiciously.

"I'm full," said Ginny promptly.

"I'm almost done," said Harry.

"Off to bed with you, then," Mrs. Weasley shooed her daughter. While Mrs. Weasley was occupied with clearing away her daughter's bowl and spoon, Ginny stood up and casually pressed her arm to her side, allowing (Harry thought) the wand to slip back into her pocket.

"Night, Harry," said Ginny.

"Night," said Harry.

Her ponytail bobbed around the door, and then she was gone. Remembering himself, Harry began gulping down the last of the stew from his bowl.

"Things are a little hectic around here," said Mrs. Weasley unnecessarily, "but don't think we're not very glad to have you. We just didn't expect to have you quite so soon, so we didn't have your bed ready yet. But we've made a bed for you in the dining room, just for tonight. You'll have your own proper room tomorrow. Are you done, dear?" Harry had emptied his bowl.

"Yes, Mrs. Weasley. Thank you," he added again.

"I'm sure Sirius can't wait to see you tomorrow," Mrs. Weasley reassured him, whisking away his dishes. Realizing that Snuffles was no longer by his feet, Harry snuck a look under the table. Indeed, the dog was there, lying very flat with its nose on its paws, as if by doing so it could become invisible.

"I'll just show you where the bathroom is," said Mrs. Weasley. "I've put out a new toothbrush for you, since I don't think Remus brought yours." His godfather's house, Harry noticed as Mrs. Weasley led him through its corridor and up its stairs, was everywhere much like its kitchen: very large, dark, ancient, and devoid of any concessions to the current century, such as electrical outlets. He also noticed that every door he passed was closed, but perhaps such a large old house had some rooms closed off for preservation. Or perhaps people lived in them. Mrs. Weasley had told him to be as quiet as possible in the hallway. Privately, Harry thought that his uncle's assessment of Mr. Dumbledore as a hippie might not be so far off (although Harry, unlike Uncle Vernon, didn't consider that a bad thing).

Then Harry realized that, if Ginny was a witch, it was entirely possible that Mrs. Weasley was one, too. In fact, Mr. Dumbledore had been exactly what he would have pictured if he'd been told to imagine a wizard. Harry gasped.

"Are you all right, dear?"

"Dust," coughed Harry.

As Harry was brushing his teeth in the bathroom, which looked as though it had been built during Queen Victoria's reign, he pondered the idea that Ginny might not be the only witch in the house.

He crept back from the bathroom and found that Mrs. Weasley had been serious when she'd said they'd made a bed for him in the dining room. There was, indeed, a double bed in the corner of the very long room. There was no sign of a dining table, although Harry did spot a chandelier with stumps of candles in it.

Mrs. Weasley still looked worried as she left Harry there. Harry felt she had wanted to tuck him in. He knew he was more than a little too old for that, but he still wasn't sure he was completely glad she hadn't. He'd never, ever been tucked in--not that he could remember.

His eyes nearly closing by themselves, Harry put on the pajamas she'd left him (which, appearing to date only from around 1960, were practically brand new by this house's standards) and slipped into bed, wondering whether the bed had actually been created by magic.

If Ginny went to a school for witches, and Mr. Lupin taught there, then he must be magic. And hadn't Mr. Dumbledore said that Sirius had once been his student? Perhaps . . .

If Ginny was magical, and Mr. Lupin was magical, and Sirius was Mr. Lupin's friend and lived in a house with cold milk but no fridge, then Sirius might be magic, too.

Harry sat up in bed.

And if Sirius was so close to his parents that they'd named him as Harry's godfather, then . . .

Harry's parents might have been a witch and wizard.

And if Harry's parents were a witch and wizard, then . . .

Harry wouldn't let himself think it, not even to imagine it, because to imagine something was to wish it, which was to want it.

And Harry couldn't possibly want more than this.