Title Pending

Monday,

August 20, 1996

London, England, United Kingdom, The Earth, The Universe

Stan Wyner sat down in his very hard seat with a very loud sigh. His head was hurting, his legs were hurting, and the muggle heater situated in his office would not turn off. He briefly contemplated blowing it to smithereens but thought best of it, lest some debris go through the wall and into his boss' office.

A stack of papers sat on Stan's rickety, poorly made desk. Grunge work. Stan was the dog in a prestigious company that handled millions of galleons worth in estates, royalties and family fortunes including but not limited to: family heirlooms, jewels of every size and shape, swords and suits of armor, moving paintings painted by the most famous of artists and piles and piles of wizard gold. Of course Stan, being the new guy had all the dirty work. His job paid the least. He was the least acknowledged. He was forgotten until work arose and he had been working at the company for nearly three years.

Mergo & Magnate was not a company to mess with and every employee took their work seriously, even if it was as horrible and rigorous as Stan endured day by day. While actually most employees enjoyed lavish offices with wonderful views of the London cityscape, Stan afforded an office strategically placed next to the owlery where he worked his days and sometimes nights. The more luxurious offices on the upper floors were of course, used to impress clients. What better enticement could be brought about than by one of a well to do company that gave even their most menial workers offices marked with gold, or so it looked. Prospective clients were of course, never brought to the owlery or even anywhere near the basement. Every company had its dirty little secrets.

Besides the conditions, Stan did enjoy ample monetary consolidation for his hard labor. After all, every lie and glamour had to have a simple shred of truth in it. As such, Mergo & Magnate was actually a very well to do company. In exchange for looking after the families' possessions, the families paid healthy premiums out of their own vaults to Mergo & Magnate vaults--of which they had many, stock piled very high with gold. Money well spent, most families would say.

Stan enjoyed the task of taking all the claims from the families, processing them and sending them upstairs. Just the same, he took responses from the people upstairs and mailed them off to the different families. As such, even though he was not important enough to the company to enjoy a big office, he did know most of what happened.

Stan reached across his desk and picked up the first parchment envelope and read it over.

"Mrs. Storbringer, that woman will never learn..." he sighed. He'd taken to talking to himself as he worked. There was no WWN in his office and it was rare that anybody ever came to chat with him. He shuffled the papers he pulled out of the envelope and picked out the two statements that Shirley Kourchovsky had written up in response. Reaching behind him, he pulled out two separate parchment mailing envelopes, placed a statement into each envelope and titled them Angela Storbringer and Jack Storbringer, respectively. He grabbed a piece of wax, melted it on to each letter and stamped the Mergo & Magnate stamp on each letter. He set the two letters at the upper right corner of his rickety desk and took the next letter off the pile.

The second envelope was much like the first, and in that respect, much like the third and the fourth and the fifth. Rich old families were intuitively obsessed with their money. It was perhaps a crime not to care about the money they possessed...at the very least so in the world of rich old pureblood families.

The sixth parchment envelope caught his attention. It was very old and the looked like it had been stuffed away in a desk for centuries. Excitedly, he glanced at the name on it but could not make it out. The ink had been wasted away from so many years of--what Stan could only assume--someone taking it in and out of said desk. Gracious for something to really captivate his time, Stan opened the very weak top to the envelope. It gave way as if it had been done many several times before.

Potter was the first name he found, right on the top of the first page. Stan spread the papers out in front of him and gave them a very thorough search. A fugiant had been placed and was awaiting mailing. Stan had never heard held a fugiant in his hands in the three years he had been working at Mergo & Magnate. When Stan was briefed by predecessor on what his job entailed, he was informed that a fugiant was neither likely nor possible to occur in his time working at the position. A quick run through of the facts with his predecessor brought about the detail that a fugiant had only been filed twice in Mergo & Magnate's four hundred and thirty two year history.

Truly, a fugiant was much more feared in paper than it ever was in name. The amount of paperwork that followed a fugiant was known throughout the company even if nobody working had ever really handled one. It really was all the matter of how tricky it was to deal with one that gave way to such hardship.

A fugiant, Stan went over in his head, is basically the trouble that arose when a pureblood family did not file any inquiries, or add any money, or add any materials to the estate. Basically, it was a period of stagnation in the families' involvement that lasted for fourteen years exactly. The reason so much paperwork trailed a fugiant was because many, many deeds would have to be changed for lack of any will. Owls would be sent out, one by one, to try to find any remaining blood family to take over. If none could be found, then the estates were divided amongst the people that married in, if there were any. If none still could be found, then all the money would have to be forwarded to the ministry and all premiums forwarded to Mergo & Magnate would cease to exist. Needless to say, the problem that came with a fugiant was major.

Hopefully they would be able to locate a family member of some sort that was associated with the Potter family, although it was well publicized that the last of the direct descendants were deceased. The problem that faced Mergo & Magnate in this was that the money then would have to be divided proportionally among any remaining in-laws. Because the money would be so spread apart, the company could not garner in as much in the way of premiums as before for a combination of reasons: One, the families might take their money to separate companies, two, the lower the amount the lower the premium could safely be charged without discouraging the family involved and three, typically when wealth was presented in smaller amounts it was much easier to spend. Newly crowned "rich" families were very prone to spending their money and Margo & Magnate was very aware of this. The paperwork arose not only form changing deeds therefore; it arose from trying to locate any blood relatives.

As such, Mergo & Magnate did employ one very useful, very powerful tool in their fight to keep their premiums rich. There was a magic created many centuries past that allowed one to track any single person in the world, regardless of how hidden they wanted to be. Mergo & Magnate had acquired the spell (which is believed to date back to Merlin's times) solely for its money making, through the use of an expert researcher who was killed very quickly after Mergo & Magnate acquired the spell. As such, the only person who knew the spell was Miss Margaret Mergo herself, great many times over granddaughter of Mercucio Mergo.

The spell worked simply enough from all that Stan could tell. It was cast on an owl, not particularly unique in design and coloring so as not to attract attention. This owl was kept simply in Miss Mergo's office but with a very powerful disillusionment charm placed on it. Mergo & Magnate was very cautious of its assets including the valuable spell it recovered at the life of one researcher (erased from the history books).

Stan was very shocked and dismayed at having received such a valuable and costly file. He did not trust his three years of experience to be able to handle the extreme amount of pressure, stress and concern that came along with the fugiant. Forgetting completely about his work stacked not so neatly at the top right corner of his desk, Stan very quickly ran of out his steaming hot office with the envelope in his outstretched hands and his shirt sticking to his back with sweat. He carried the parchment envelope as if he had a bomb on his hands and as he rambled his way up the stairs--people avoided him as if it were.

Two very muscular and powerful looking guards stood at attention before the double oak doors that preceded Margaret Mergo's door. Stan did not know the two guards and they paid a similar amount of recognition to him. Nonetheless, Stan new he had to get through the doors and into Margaret Mergo's office. So mustering up a calm courage, Stan billowed out his chest and spoke to the guard closest to him.

"I need to see Miss Mergo. It's very, very important that I do," his voice shook.

"Do you work here?" the guard asked a bored expression on his face.

"I do, and it's very important that I see Miss Mergo."

"What's so important that you have to see her for?"

Stan looked down at the tattered envelope that both guards were eyeing. He shifted it so that it rested against his hip while he brought up an accusatory finger and pointed it at the closer guard.

"This doesn't concern you. It's...god, I've said it's very important. Just trust me on this one. If you don't let me in to see her it will be very bad for me and I'll make it very bad for you."

The guard took two steps closer to Stan's finger and stared it down to Stan's face. Stan feared for his finger. The guard looked as if he would soon make a tasty snack of the finger and Stan contemplated taking it back. Instead, he brought his chest forward again, raised himself to a straight position and looked the guard straight in the eye.

"You don't scare me punk. And I'm going to have to see what's in the envelope before I let you go. We don't want anything...hurting our boss now do we? So we can make this easy or we can make this very easy."

What? No hard way? Stan thought. How horribly cliché

Stan finally gave in, slumped back and took his finger down staring at the ground. He extended the folder to the guard who broke out in a big smile.

"Fine, you win." Stan watched as the guard gripped the envelope in his spiny fingers and reached for the flap to open it. "I wouldn't suggest opening it though...it's a fugiant."

The guard dropped the envelope as if he'd been scalded. Of course, Stan thought again. Put on the big boy act and pretend to be worried about his boss but when the trouble might bite him, he runs away and whimpers. How easy it would be to sneak something sinister into Miss Mergo's office!

Stan shook his head and picked up the envelope carefully again. Without waiting for the guard's approval Stan opened the door and stepped into the anteroom of the big boss' office. Stan had never actually seen Miss Mergo and in the lower ranks of the building this was a good thing. If a lower ranked employee ever came to see Miss Mergo then there was only one conclusion.

They were roasted, toasted and fucked on a grill.

Miss Mergo kept no secretaries and he could hear her jabbing away into the fireplace(or so he could only assume) as he neared the door to double oak doors to her office(she had a penchant for double oak doors it seemed).

When he opened the door, Miss Mergo immediately closed the grate to the fireplace she was speaking into and gave Stan a glare that just about nearly caused him to wet his pants. Before she could open her mouth and fire him he said,

"I have an explanation!" She visibly relaxed and inclined her head slightly eyeing the envelope Stan had chosen to extend as he interjected. "It's...It's a fugiant ma'am. I found it on my desk. I didn't know what to do! I don't have the authority to handle this and I didn't want to mess it up. I had to make sure you knew about it ma'am."

Stan tried to stop his shaking and dropped his eyes quickly to the floor while Miss Mergo reached for the envelope.

"This...will be sent off this very second. Thank you for your work. Now get out."

Stan escaped Miss Mergo's office as quickly as his two legs would carry him.

***

Tuesday,

August 21, 1996

Monterey, California, United States of America

"And he just left...like that? All in a huff?" Jake asked.

"All in a huff," Harry said.

"I think he took mom's car. I heard the starter shriek twice before it started. Where do you think he's goin'?"

"I think it's reasonable to assume that your mother knows something about this Harry, maybe you can ask her?" Sharon asked.

"Yeah, maybe." Harry reached over and stroked Andrew's cheek. It was pale and lifeless. A steady beep echoed in the room from the monitor that kept check of his heart beat. The nurses and the daily doctor said that Andrew was nearing his last days. Harry kept vigil mostly all day with Sharon and sometimes Jake by his side. Their mother stayed holed up in her bedroom doing nothing but stare at the walls.

"Well...aren't you gonna ask her? I'm dying to know. Maybe it has something to do with the Yosemite shit that happened," Jake said.

"What Yosemite shit?" Jake covered his mouth quickly and stared at his brother. Sharon looked from Jake to Harry who was still looking at Andrew.

"It's ok Jake, she knows," Harry said finally tearing his gaze away from his sick brother.

"I know? How can I know if I just asked you?"

"You know about my healing ability," Harry said.

"Your healing ability? I thought it only cured headaches and...well...bumps and bruises. Shit is hardly bumps and bruises or headaches. What happened at Yosemite?" Sharon said.

"I'll tell you what happened at Yosemite," Jake said, bolstering up in his seat. "We were climbing some rocks and I was trying to get to the top really fast. Harry, of course, was really very slow and so I just kept going on without him. Then...accidentally I slipped on a rock. I wasn't looking down because well...I was so focused on getting up and I slipped. I broke my leg and Harry did this weird light thing and fixed it. It was the most...insane thing I've ever seen in my entire life! It was just as good as new after."

Sharon, who had kept her gaze on Harry as Jake spoke, said, "But...I thought it could only cure bruises and bumps. You've tried before. Remember? You tried it on Steve when his wrist broke when he was...well...when his wrist broke. You said you could do it and nothing happened. Then it seemed...as if it you didn't even know how to cure bumps and bruises anymore. What...how'd you figure it out again?"

Both Jake's and Sharon's eyes were focused on Harry whose eyes had gone back to Andrew laying in his bed with white pillow surrounding him.

"I don't know. Suddenly, I just knew what to do," was his only reply.

"Well...that's rich," Jake harrumphed.

"No...no! This is great!" Sharon said.

"What? Why's it so great?" Jakes asked, perplexed.

"Well...think about it. Maybe Harry can do it again. Maybe he can cure Andrew!"

Harry's eyes flickered up in surprise, why hadn't he thought of that? He pictured himself back in Yosemite, patching up his brother's ankle. He remembered how broken it was and he remembered feeling the crack in it. After he fixed it, it was as good as new. Perhaps the same principle could work with Andrew.

"Maybe we should tell dad first Harry. It's not something you should just start doing...to everyone. You don't know what could be going on. You might actually do something worse and Andrew could die right here," the voice of reason spoke in Jake's subtle baritone.

"He'll..." Harry was stuck. He could not come up with a counterargument that did not infer some of his own passion towards curing Andrew. Even though his brother was reasonable, and did understand Harry's cause, he was still right. There could be more damage that Harry would not be able to deal with, just lying in the shadows.

"He's right Harry. The little bastard is right," Sharon spoke softly at Harry's side.

"I'm hardly little. I'm much bigger than you and Harry, so don't go off calling me little," Jake said.

"I'm talking about your age you shit-head," Sharon countered.

"Age ain't nothin' but a numba' baby! Don't go calling me little when you know I could kick your ass in one second, hands down," Jake said speaking quite animatedly with his hands.

"Oh yeah?" Sharon reached across the bed Andrew was lying in and smacked Jake's left ear causing Jake to cry out.

"Owww...you stupid whore! Harry did you fuckin' see that?" Jake whined.

"Shut the fuck up," Harry said, very quietly.

"Yeah, yeah. Now I see which one you like best Harry. I tell you what. Why don't you go fuck your little whore and leave fuckin' Andrew to sleep ok? Then maybe you can shoot up with some really good shit and forget the world even exists. All right? That sound good to you?" Andrew stormed out of the room.

Harry made a half-hearted attempt to get up and follow his brother but Sharon quickly thwarted him.

"Yeah, I know," Harry said reading Sharon's nonverbal communication.

"He's right though. You...is it not enough to see that Greg died because of...Harry you gotta stop," Sharon choked out.

"Maybe," Harry said, taking his seat again and stroking his dying brother's chin. He followed the gentle angles of his jaw up to his smooth scalp. If the disease didn't kill him, Harry felt, the treatment certainly would.

"Maybe, that's all huh? You don't care do you, is that it? Think about this then mister, I'm-too-cool-for-you. Imagine you...I dunno, you do something! Okay? You do something and then you get caught or maybe even worse, you get killed. Don't think what happened to Greg is just an accident. Don't you dare think that it doesn't' happen all the time, okay? What you're doing is going to fuck up your life if it already hasn't. It's going to fuck up your family too, just watch. Jake isn't the only one who knows you know. When I said your dad sometimes looks in your room, I wasn't lying. He does, but that's not all he does. He searches through it. He knows what he's looking for and you what? I think I'm going to help him next time."

There was silence for a while and then he spoke, "Who are you to talk?"

"I'm you friend to talk. I don't...it's different between you and me," Sharon said.

"How's that?" Harry said.

"My family isn't going to have to bury two kids if something ever happens to me!"

Harry wanted to hit her, but stopped himself. He wanted to smack her across the face and make her bleed. He wanted to see his fist clenched and draw blood from the perfectly shaped nose on her face and the smooth white skin on her cheeks, but he held back. Sharon took precautions though, she stood up, she stepped back, and she walked out of the room without a single glance backwards.

Harry did nothing but stare back at his brother whose eyes were creased open.

"You heard that?" Harry asked. Andrew weakly shook his head.

"You hear any of it?" Harry again asked. Andrew again, shook his head.

"You just woke up then?" Harry said. This time, Andrew nodded his head.

Harry smiled at his brother and took his hand. Andrew quickly glanced at their grasping hands and his face visibly warmed.

Harry began to tell him a story,

"Long, long ago in Japan, there lived a poor woodsman. One day, he was cutting bamboo in a grove when he came upon one stalk of bamboo glowing a bright, golden color. Finding this mysterious, he approached it for a closer look.

"To his amazement, inside the bamboo was an adorable, tiny little girl. Since the old man and his wife had no children of their own, he decided to bring the child home with him, where he and his wife raised her with love and care. They decided to name her Kaguya Hime. From that time forward, whenever the woodsman went back to work in the grove, gold coins would come pouring out from the bamboo he cut. As a result, the old couple became wealthy.

"Amazingly, within just three months Kaguya Hime grew into a beautiful maiden. Her beauty soon became known throughout the country, and one young man after another came forth to ask her hand in marriage. Kaguya Hime refused all of her suitors, but there were five insistent young noblemen who refused to give up. In order to dissuade them, Kaguya Hime asked for a gift from each, and promised to marry the first one to bring her the gift she had requested. But these items were not things that could be found anywhere on this earth, and so the five young noblemen soon lost heart and gave up.

"In the meantime the Emperor, who had heard of Kaguya Hime's beauty, also began courting the girl to become his wife and Empress. He too was refused. When the Emperor tried to force Kaguya Hime to come to the palace, she disappeared right before his eyes. The Emperor then realized that there was something unusual about Kaguya Hime, and so he too gave up.

"Three years passed and Kaguya Hime became even more beautiful. Then, one spring, Kaguya Hime began to grow melancholy on moonlit nights. She would stare at the moon with tears streaming down her face. The old woodsman, worried, asked what was wrong. Gazing up at the sky, Kaguya Hime replied, 'Actually, I come from the moon. I was sent to live on the earth by my King, but now I have been told that I must go home. I will miss everyone here on earth, and that is why I am sad.'

"The old man was shocked, and not wanting to let his beloved daughter go, consulted with the Emperor to devise a plan. On the night of the full moon, the Emperor's guards hid Kaguya Hime deep inside the woodsman's house and surrounded it. Suddenly, the night sky became bright. Messengers from the moon dressed in brilliant clothes came down from the sky and descended to the earth on a cloud. At this sight, the guards become petrified and lost their courage. The messengers placed Kaguya Hime onto a palanquin and dressed her in a feathered robe. Leaving the heartbroken old couple behind, Kaguya Hime took off to the moon."

***

Sarah Chavez was half-Mexican and half-White. Harry was attracted to her the second he saw her. Not in a love struck, trashy romance novel style but in a lust filled, "I wanna fuck that girl" style.

It was the first day into the second semester of his freshman year at Monterey High School. He was still growing used to being a Matador and the utter lack of friends tensed him initially. His mother was of no help. Sometimes she was the bringer of more bad news than good news. Hazing never completely stopped being a problem for Harry. He doubted it ever would. When it started, Harry thought it was foreign and impossible to fathom. Being beat up once in a while was nothing to worry about. All kids would get beat on from time to time. It was just his time.

When it did not stop he began to reach out for help. His hands were bloodied and repaired. His face was bloodied and repaired. His torso, legs, ears, eyes, nose were all bloodied and repaired. But the inside of him was reaped with interminable damage; damage that no doctor could prescribe medicine to.

This was damage that was even too powerful for his unbeatable healing abilities. Unconsciously and unwillingly his broken bones would be set, cured, and good as new. There were also times when the healing did not take place.

On the first day of the second semester of his freshman year at Monterey High, Harry stumbled across Sarah Chavez on the field. He usually took the shortcut that was allowed through this field both to avoid people and to cut down the walking time--which really was obscenely short.

Sarah Chavez was kicking a soccer ball lazily into a netted goal post when Harry stumbled upon her--literally, of course, he actually lost his balance. Much to his surprise and slight chagrin she turned around and helped him up. She had a calm and suppressed laugh that caught his attention. It was not merely a giggle or a snicker and certainly wasn't a chuckle or a chortle but it couldn't just be called a laugh he deemed it much to special for that.

When she held out her hand and he took it she asked him if he was all right. He nodded of course, spellbound by her short brown hair and light skin. He eyes were very wide and alluring. Her ears were just the right size and looked pliable and soft. Her cheek had a tiny mole just below her left eye and Harry fought the urge to caress it.

"Want to kick the ball around? Season's already started and my goalkeeping is really the pits. It would be a great help if you could...you know...kick the ball around a bit? My dad's been pressuring me to get good. He says I'll never get into a good college if I don't get a sports scholarship. He says I don't have good grades. I don't see how I'll ever please that man," she said to him after he dusted off his pants.

And he fell in love with her that moment. It wasn't love at first sight, no, but it was love nearly at first sight. Perhaps one could call it love at first conversation or love at first large utterance of words. Her voice was just as soft and warming as her "laugh" was and it enticed him to further explore whom this Sarah Chavez was exactly.

Harry kicked the ball a few times to the goal. He wasn't very good but it did not seem that Sarah minded at all. She deftly caught the ball every time. She did not settle for swats or ill timed jumps. She wanted to catch the ball in her hands and celebrate the warmth of her victory with a gentle crushing.

They played until the day became night; as it was winter, that happened altogether too soon for Harry. He wanted to know more about the enchanting girl. As it were, after he finished he only knew her name and her ethnicity. He knew of her dad and his insatiability, much like his own father. He knew she liked soccer and that her grades were not that good but she had heart.

It was with courage that was nurtured by repeated ball kicking, grabbing and throwing combined with a little bit of gentle "laughter" that he asked her on a date. She responded with a small silence. She warned him that her father disapproved of her dating but that she was mad at him anyways. She agreed and Harry couldn't help but feel a bit left in the dust. He did not want to turn into the object of a daughter's spite. He voiced this to her gently and she "laughed" again. She wanted to go with him of course, the daughterly spite was just a side bonus.

As she walked away he could not help but notice how luscious her ass was.

***

Wednesday,

August 22, 1996

Harry's ears perked up when he heard the key turn in the lock. He sat up from the uncomfortable couch and pried his balls from sticking to the side of his leg. He extended one hand into the air and stretched the sore stiff muscles that dwelled in the small of his back all the while yawning a terrific yawn that woke the inner parts of his brain. His father stopped suddenly at the door as he caught sight of his son awake. It was the middle of the night, he couldn't be quite sure what time it was but it was either very late at night or very early morning.

"You're home," Harry said, eyeing the wooden box James held in his hands tenderly.

"I am."

"You've got a box."

"I do."

"Your voice. It's different. Say something," Harry said.

"Something."

"There! Your accent. It's..."

"British?"

"I suppose. I've never heard anything like it," Harry said running a hand through his own hair. Harry sat on the couch for a moment staring into the eyes of his father a man. He was different in too many ways to count. His eyes were deep but not menacing. They looked meaningless, like hot iron ore waiting to be molded. It sparkled with light but did not know it's own existence. What would it make? What would it be molded into? His voice was deeper and more brisk. The accent accentuated his utter devotion to its mother language and pledged allegiance to the country it originated from with total adoration. Britain.

"Are you going to tell me what's in it?" Harry motioned to the box.

James moved from his post at the door to sit beside his son on the couch. The couch groaned in protest as he settled himself into the old springs and cloth. He gently smoothed the fine grains of his hair back and smothered his eyes with a conceding scratch. James took the box and placed it in the lap of his son. Harry noticed briefly that his father's nails were very, very dirty like they hadn't been cleaned in months.

"Do I open it?" Harry asked. His father nodded. Harry quickly opened the top of the box to reveal a non-descript looking stick. Except for the fact that it was perfectly smooth and straight, Harry would not have mistaken it for a normal stick fallen from the willow tree that housed his tree house.

"It's a wand," James said, reading his son's mind.

"It's just a stupid stick," Harry said still only observing the "stupid stick" as it lay in the box.

"Pick it up," James said diverting his sight from the wand to the fireplace. Harry did as he was told and picked the wand up. At first he felt nothing but then a wonderful surge of heat swam through his fingers. The wand felt alive in his fingers; he nearly felt it would leap from his fingers and dance a tricky salsa step on the coffee table at his feet.

"It is a wand then, it's warm."

"Yes. It is. You don't seem surprised," James said leveling a look of trepidation on his son.

"That owl yesterday. It has something to do with this doesn't it?" he waved the wand in the air.

James quickly took the wand from his son's hand and nodded. "Yes, it does. But you're going to have to listen. It's...why are you handling this so well? This is not your ordinary occurrence."

"I don't know. How am I supposed to handle this?"

"I...I don't know. Are you...you have questions. I have answers. But first, I want to tell you what this is. What all of this is. I want to tell you who you really are."

"Is it going to take long?" Harry asked.

"I don't know. I suppose it could take a long while. It all depends on if I go un-interrupted or not."

Harry nodded and settled back into his seat. James nodded and told his son all about the wizarding world. He told his son of magic and wonder, about his mother and the gallant way she died. James told him about his own struggle to bring Harry away from the evil that was beset to kill him. James talked through the early morning hours about the inner workings of the world he had left behind in hopes that he may lead a better life. And then he told Harry of his true heritage.

"You are not Harry Brumnder. Brumnder was just a name I found when we both first came here. You see, when a wizard is born they are born into a certain social standing. You were...and are of the nobility stature. You command all of the muggleborns, halfbloods, fullbloods and even some purebloods that do not register higher than you on the money and wealth scale. Really, it's all much too complicating, I have to say, but it's been at work for several hundreds of years," he waved his hand at the issue, brushing it off the table with quick discourse.

"You, my son, are really a Potter. We Potters are very, very powerful. To put into terms the power that we enjoy let's take it against the Brit--no...I suppose that wouldn't work. Erm...well, let's just say for now, that the Potters enjoy an extremely lavish amount of wealth. Wealth that I thought was being taken care of. So it turns out, my parents died just days after we left here for America. Had I known they were in such danger I certainly would not have put those anti-tracking charms on you and me for we could have assumed all that money much quicker. I tell you, it's been hell living as a muggle and with so little money and power these last few years...hell. Bloody-fucking-hell."

"So...we have money...and power, but what does this all mean?" Harry said.

"Wh--what does it all mean? What do you mean what does it all mean? It's highly and very simple. We are moving back to the wizard world and I'm going to take over the estate that my father left me. You are going to go to wizarding school and learn to be what you should have been in the first place. This is the golden opportunity I have been waiting fifteen years to come my way for and I'll be fucked up a jackrabbits arse if I don't capitalize on it."

"So we're going to leave. Just like that," Harry said.

"Well, yes...I suppose just like that. We don't really need to take anything. In fact, if you want to, we can go right this very second. Oh but fuck. I'll need to obliviate everyone's minds. Fuck..." James massaged his chin with his forefinger and thumb. "Yes...yes, I suppose it may take a few days. Erm...but I do believe we'll be ready by Saturday. Yes, Saturday the wizarding world is going to know the wrath of the Potters once again."

"You...you're...I--hmm..."

"What? What is it?"

"Perhaps the fact that you've just told me that you're going to erase the minds of every human being I've known for the last fifteen years and that you and I are going back to a country and world that I've never in conscious mind been to. All of this, coming on the brink of my brother--rather, Half-brother's impending death and my stepmother's utter seclusion from the world and my best friend's brink of insanity. Forgive me, dear father of mine, if I'm not too...peachy keen on this idea of yours."

"I did not divulge all of this information for you to have a choice on it. If I wanted to, I could obliviate your mind too and just go myself but I will not because your mother would have not wanted that. Your mother was the most wonderful woman this world has ever had the graces of knowing. You will go back to the world that your mother grew to love and live in and accept as the world she would spend the rest of her life in. You will leave behind this phony family that I have created because it means nothing to you or to me. The only thing that matters right now is that we take all of the money that is rightfully ours and prosper."

"I will not."

"You will. Your mother died to save you from dying at the hands of that fucking monster that stole hers. Your mother would have wanted you to live in the wizarding world. Your mother loved you with all her heart. She died for you. She was stolen from this world, from me because of you. I'll be damned if you aren't going to the wizarding world for her. She died for you."

"But she didn't live for me. She didn't raise me. She is not my mother, the woman up there in that room that you have slept in for the last twelve years is my mother. And I will not leave to go anywhere."

Harry walked briskly and calmly up the stairs to disappear into the room that he shared with his brother. He was damned if he was going to move anywhere. He was damned if his father thought he could do something that he did not want to do.

He was damned if he would leave his sick and dying brother to die.

***

The first time they had sex was a moment to remember. Harry went by Sarah's house very late in the night on his bike. His bike was the best transportation he could muster, as he was not yet old enough to drive.

Sarah's house was a very old one-story house on Taylor Street. Harry had to pedal through old Monterey to reach the house and at the late hour it was very dark indeed. The traffic was non-existent and he made it to her house at sweaty mess but in quite a short time. When he went to her open window he could see the TV on and her in her bed sleeping peacefully. He couldn't help the coy smile as he climbed through the window. He knelt next to her bed and grabbed her hand softly as he watched her eyes for the first sign of rousing.

She woke very easily and after a few yawns and stretches, joined Harry by grabbing her own bike already ready at the side of her house. They peddled quietly up the hills and through the narrow roads. Their shadows mingled in the dark night. Whenever they saw a car they hid at the sides of the roads behind bushes and trees and houses. Every single person they saw they hid from behind bushes and trees and houses. It would only serve that they were the only ones gone or their weeks of planning would be all for not.

When they neared Seventeen Mile Road they peddled on through the guard post. The trek up was troublesome but they were rewarded with marvelous downhill slopes that let them put their feet up from the pedals and hold hands as they briskly flew down the road. The wind was in their hair, the breeze was licking at their ears and the air was caressing their eyes, watering them until they cried from joy.

There was nothing that would go wrong with their plan. When they reached the beach they sat down for a while listening to the water froth up onto the sand. The tide was on its transition downward and backward. The water was cold and billowing through their toes as they walked through the murky depths holding hands.

"We should just kill ourselves here, right in the water," Sarah said.

"Together you mean?" Harry asked. His sight was fixated on hers as they stood in the water.

"Yes. Let's drown together right here. Let's get away from that family. We'll be martyrs of love. They'll tell stories about us, the two teenagers from Monterey who died to protect themselves from their own families." She looked very serious.

He shook his head and laughed, "You can't be serious. We haven't even had sex yet, how do we know we love each other?"

She stopped her walking and stood in the water. He was caught off guard momentarily and continued walking; their hands separated and a wave spread through their legs.

"Since when did sex mean you love someone?"

"Well...since forever." He looked down at the peacefully placid water and into the moon's light reflected off of it as it stabbed into eyes like icicles.

She sat down into the water slowly. It was barely up to their knees when they stood and it reached just below her breasts when she sat down. She shivered briefly at the brisk cold of the water and then held up her hand for him to join her. He frowned briefly and stared at her hand for a good hard moment. It was hard to see in the moonlight but Sarah had beautiful hands--painter's hands. They were like the hands that a pianist could move perfectly--glide over every key with the ease of a robin taking to flight. They were smooth and gentle to the touch but nearly always cold. He contemplated the feeling of her hands on him, pleasuring him, teasing him, stroking him and feeling him. Loving him. He contemplated and then sullied himself into the ocean quickly. They held hands underneath the salty water as she took him and pressed him against her chest so that she could whisper softly into his ear.

"Has it only been two months?"

"I wonder. One...two...yes, two months and six days."

"That's a lot of time. You could write a book in that time. Or learn to ride a horse."

"You could read sixty books and learn to drive a car," he said.

"Yes, I suppose you could."

They sat listening to the waves lap up against their bosoms the salty feeling seeping into their pores.

"What does sex mean to you anyway? Why's it so important?" she asked him.

"I dunno," he said.

"Neither do I. It's stupid. Do we really need to have sex to know that we're in love?"

"It's what I've heard."

"What if it turns out that we don't love each other? What if we have sex and we find out that there's no love?"

"I guess we'd have to break up then," he said.

"I'd die if that happened...but I guess there's no turning back now. We have to do it. You know, we gotta find out."

"Yeah, I guess we do."

"Let's do it right here. Right here in the water. I want to feel the ocean all around me as you do it. I want to be able to look at the stars and ask them if it's love. If it isn't then I'm already in the water. I can drown myself and you can too."

He didn't know what to say. "Okay."

And they had sex.

Two days later Sarah Chavez washed up onto the shores of pebble beach golf course. The rocks caressed her gentle body as the ocean swam above her weeping, weeping. The cypress trees stood watch over her body like sentinels guarding an angel into the bottoms of a world that ceased to exist. Her hands rested on a patch of sand playing the grains like an expert cellist with inspiration and passion. Her eyes were glossy glue expressed in such a way that the ocean sky could be seen through them long after she was buried.

The citizens of Monterey spoke of her for many long years to come. They talked of the girl that had died of love. They talked of the girl that had drowned herself and the sad martyr she had become. Sarah Chavez was dead in spirit, body and mind but never in legend.