A Life More Ordinary

The Leaky Cauldron--June 1985

Harry glanced uncertainly around the dark pub and back again at his godfather.

"Are you sure?" he asked as he made sure his fingers were wound tightly around Sirius'.

"I'm certain," Sirius said with a smile. "This is how we get into Diagon Alley... straight through the back there."

Harry stepped out of the fireplace with Sirius; after all, Sirius hadn't lied to him once, not even to convince him to use the Floo--and it had made him rather dizzy, just like Sirius had said it might.

The people in the pub stopped talking as soon as he and Sirius entered. And then people were whispering to their neighbors, all of them looking rather excited.

"Harry Potter," he heard them saying. "...and look, he really is with Sirius Black..."

"... you heard he was acquitted, didn't you?"

"After all that time..."

" Veritaserum and a Pensieve sorted it, I heard..."

"Peter Pettigrew..."

"I know, can you imagine how the Potters must have felt..."

Harry couldn't keep up with all the whispered words and he didn't even know what most of them meant anyway. Sirius had told him that people would probably point and stare--something to do with the scar that looked like a lightning bolt on his forehead and Harry being very brave... and something about that bad wizard who had died when his parents were fighting him.

Harry hadn't really understood Sirius' explanation, but he'd nodded anyway, not wanting his godfather to think he hadn't been paying attention.

And nobody in the pub really looked unfriendly he supposed, but he pressed himself close to Sirius nonetheless.

"It's all right, Harry," Sirius soothed him in a low voice. "We'll just go through to the back..."

"Sirius Black!"

Harry and Sirius paused. A woman with a pointy black hat and spectacles was coming toward them. Sirius smiled at her though, so Harry relaxed his death grip on his hand.

"Professor McGonagall," Sirius greeted the woman with a grin. The Professor lady smiled as well.

"Now, none of that, Sirius," the woman scolded. "It's Minerva now... How are you? Albus told all of us the wonderful news, of course. And we all saw the papers." She looked down at Harry. "And this must be Harry..."

Sirius prodded Harry's shoulder blade gently. "Yes, this is Harry," he answered when Harry just stared up at the brown-haired woman. "This was one of my teachers at Hogwarts, Harry... Professor McGonagall."

"You're a witch?" he asked timidly. Professor McGonagall laughed softly.

"I am indeed, Mr. Potter. And you are a handsome little wizard. You are the spitting image of your father... quite a mischievous little devil your father was." She said it with a smile though. "You have your mother's eyes, has anyone ever told you that? Well, yes, I suppose your aunt must have..."

Aunt Petunia never had, but Harry didn't correct the professor.

"What are you two doing here today?" McGonagall went on with her questions.

"Just a bit of shopping," Sirius said. "We don't have much furniture... and Harry needs toys," he added with a wink for Harry. Harry smiled shyly; he still didn't quite believe he'd have toys of his own.

"Of course," McGonagall agreed. She patted Harry on the head. "Now, you be good for your godfather, Mr. Potter. And you, Sirius, don't be a stranger around Hogwarts. The rest of the staff would like to meet Harry as well, I am certain."

"Of course, Minerva," Sirius said with a nod and with another quick smile, the professor bid them farewell and Sirius and Harry continued on their way to the back of the pub.

"She was nice..." Harry murmured as they stepped through an unmarked door and on outside. Sirius glanced down at him.

"Most people you meet here will be nice," he assured his very worried-looking godson. Harry nodded, but it was in that jerky way that signaled he didn't quite believe him.

Sirius knelt down as they came to the brick wall. "Here," he said quietly as he withdrew his wand. "You get into Diagon Alley by tapping the bricks in a certain pattern; watch."

Sirius smiled a little when Harry's eyes widened as the bricks dissolved. Since his first demonstration of Wingardium Leviosa, Harry had been captivated.

"There will be a lot of people here," Sirius explained as he adjusted Harry's collar, "so stay close, all right?"

Harry nodded solemnly, but Sirius already knew the warning wouldn't be necessary; Harry was still much too nervous to let Sirius out of his sight for any extended length of time. After years spent alone in a cell in Azkaban though, Sirius didn't mind his new shadow.

He smiled, taking Harry's hand as he stood up. "All right, then, Harry. Let's go."

Harry's grip was tight as they walked along the cobbled streets; his wide eyes took in every sight and Sirius almost didn't mind the ever-present stares and whispers.

"See that, Harry?" Sirius pointed to the dozen owls waiting in Eyelop's display window. "That's how we send the post... Owls carry letters all over England."

"It's a post office?" Harry asked, his dark eyebrows scrunching up.

"There is a post office in Diagon Alley," Sirius said with a nod as he tried not to think too hard about all the letters he'd recently written--or the lack of letters he'd received. "We'll stop there later. But this is a shop called Eyelops. They sell owls so that wizards and witches can send letters without visiting a post office."

Harry's eyes lingered on the window as they passed. "How come you don't have an owl?"

"Grimmauld Place doesn't have much space for an owl; they prefer to hunt outside."

"Oh."

Sirius glanced down at his godson; it was the first time Harry had sounded disappointed about anything. He was still gazing at the front window of the owl emporium and Sirius was surprised at his sudden fierce wish that he had a huge plot of land more suitable for keeping an owl as a pet. But Harry's attention was soon diverted elsewhere--to Fortescue's, most especially.

"Would you like to have lunch there when we've finished with our shopping?" Sirius asked, pausing in front of the colorful window; Harry nearly ploughed into him. Sirius steadied him by an elbow with a smile. "Yes, then?"

Harry nodded quickly. "Yes sir... I mean, Sirius."

They'd almost mastered that one... only when Harry was really excited or nervous did he resort to the title.

"Well, we'd best hurry along then. We want to have enough time for ice cream after lunch."

Harry's stared at him with those huge green eyes, and Sirius' smile faltered. It couldn't be possible that the kid had never had ice cream...

Sirius cleared his throat; he squeezed his godson's hand and decided that a sundae was definitely in order--with as much chocolate sauce and marshmallows as Fortescue had.

"The wand shop is just across the way," Sirius said, more gruffly than he would have liked. Harry squinted up at him, nodding after a few seconds. "Come on," Sirius said with a quiet smile.

Ollivander greeted them with a scattered wave and an entreaty to wait as he scuttled around the crowded shop; Sirius had sent a post to let the shopkeeper know he would be coming.

"What's he doing?" Harry whispered.

"Looking for a wand, I think," Sirius said, just as softly. They watched the graying man opening and closing long boxes until finally he pulled a long, dark wand from a stack of boxes in the far corner.

"Ah," he said with a reverent nod. "I do believe this one will do nicely, Mr. Black."

Sirius took the wand and immediately felt the rush of magic from his core, coming up to connect with it. He gripped the wood tightly and grinned. "Feels just right."

"Give it a try," Ollivander encouraged.

Sirius swished the wand. "Lumos." Magic tingled against his palm as the tip lit up. "Perfect," he said with a grin.

Ollivander smiled triumphantly. "I thought it might be." He turned to Harry and said, "I'm Ollivander. And you must be Harry Potter."

"Yes, sir," Harry murmured.

"I remember both of your parents--the day each one came in for their wands. This one here is made of mahogany, the same as your father's," Ollivander said. As Harry pressed himself close to Sirius' leg, Sirius laid a reassuring hand on his godson's shoulder. "Its core is thestral hair, which is extremely hard to come by..."

Ollivander turned around, a sudden frown on his face as he stared at the row of shelves behind him. A messy pile of boxes along the top shelf was shaking. Unsure of what to make of it, Sirius tucked Harry against his side.

"How unusual..." Peering with narrowed eyes, Ollivander hurried forward. His open palm waved in front of the long boxes, his fingers moving as if he were playing a piano, and then with a smile, he plucked one of the boxes from the pile. The box in Ollivander's hand continued to tremble even as the shopkeeper discarded the top on the floor.

"Do you mind?" the old wizard asked.

"Mind?" Sirius echoed, his brows furrowed.

"I do believe this wand has found its master." Ollivander pulled the wand from its home with two fingers and extended it toward Harry.

Harry stared at it.

"He's not even five..."

"The wand wants him," Ollivander said; his eyes were dancing with excitement.

"But he can't use it," Sirius said, mostly because he had no idea what to say.

"Nonsense," Ollivander tutted. "Most pureblooded children are trained in at least basic spellwork well before they ever step foot onto the Hogwarts' Express."

"Well, yes, but..."

Ollivander smiled at Harry. "Go ahead, Harry. It's for you. Made just for you, I believe. Holly, with a phoenix feather."

Harry looked to Sirius. And not having any reason to deny him, Sirius nodded. "Go ahead."

As soon as the wand was settled in Harry's palm, his eyes popped open and Sirius nearly fell over as a rush of magic engulfed the room.

"I can feel it," Harry said, his voice rising with his excitement.

Of course, Harry could have no idea what he was feeling, but the magic pouring from him was instinctive; raw and more powerful than Sirius had ever felt before. Not even in Dumbledore's presence had he felt this.

"Beautiful," Ollivander whispered.

Sirius could only stare down at his small godson, too awed to speak. Harry was grinning and Sirius realized as he gazed at him, that he had never felt so proud.

Ollivander wrapped Harry's wand and placed it back in its original box, while Sirius slipped his new wand into his sleeve.

"The phoenix who gave me the feather for Harry's wand gave me only one other," Ollivander said. "It makes sense, I suppose..."

"What makes sense?" Sirius asked as he handed over enough galleons to pay for both wands.

Ollivander glanced down at Harry, whose attention was still on his neatly wrapped wand.

"Its twin," the wandmaker said pointedly, "is in his wand; You-Know Who's."

A cold chill seemed to run through the room.

Ollivander smiled down at the little boy as he handed change to a dazed Sirius. "He is the only one who has managed to defeat You-Know-Who. You have an extremely powerful little wizard here, Mr. Black."

The words stuck with Sirius as they left the shop and continued on their errands.

Their last stop before breaking for lunch was Flourish and Blotts, a shop which excited Harry just as much as Fortescue's and Ollivander's had. His fingers trailed over the covers of the books with more care than seemed natural for an almost five year old to exhibit.

"We have an empty bookcase at home," Sirius told him as Harry was studying a cover with an orange dragon on it. "I'll hold that one while you look for others." He had no idea how many books a child should have. "We should probably have twenty," he finally decided. Twenty sounded like enough that Harry wouldn't get bored too quickly. And they could always come back to get more...

"For me?" Harry asked with a squeak very like the one when Sirius had first mentioned a bedroom; the orange dragon book was already tucked into his chest.

"I don't see any other boys around here," Sirius said as he made a show of looking around the empty shop. He smiled at Harry's confusion. "Of course for you, kiddo. Here, I'll get a basket..."

Harry ducked his head, but not before Sirius caught a smile. He watched Harry poring over the books, and made a mental note to buy one of those overstuffed chairs that his godson was settling into, the dragon book already open in his lap.

"Adorable boy you have there," a short witch with white hair said as she came from the back of the shop. "Your son?"

Startled, it took Sirius a moment to answer. "Yes," he finally murmured. The lady smiled at him as she put several books onto the counter to ring out.

"Looks like my grandson. Black hair as well," she said. Sirius nodded absently. "No, Richard," the lady said sternly to the young man behind the counter, "that one with the red binding is for my niece, so wrap it up separately, would you? She likes the author--Lupin, his name is, but he hasn't written anything in years-"

Sirius drew in a sharp breath as he turned around.

The clerk was holding Remus' book in his hand. The Dark, the novel Remus had sent off to his publisher only days before Lily and James had been murdered.

"Are you certain he hasn't written anything since?" Sirius asked in a strained voice. Both the witch and the young man glanced at him, but neither seemed to find anything odd about the question.

"I think his third book is due out in a few months," the clerk said. "The Dark is his second novel. He wrote another one the year before that; I think it was called-"

"Demons," Sirius said quietly. The clerk nodded.

"That's right."

"Oh, do you know his books then?" the old lady asked. "I'd never heard of him but my niece adored the first book."

Sirius shook his head. "Excuse me..." He wandered back over to where Harry was still sitting in the chair. His eyes were glued to the pages as he scanned them, and with each new page, the lump in Sirius' throat grew.

It wasn't supposed to be like this.

Even when Albus and Poppy had refused to let him get up, telling him over and over that he wasn't recovered enough to see Harry--much less secure the necessary paperwork to make the whole thing legal, Sirius had asked for Remus. Remus could have seen him like that. But neither Poppy nor Albus had seemed to know where he was.

And as soon as Sirius was sitting up and could use his hands, he wrote letters. One every single day. And Poppy had promised that she'd sent them off. But there had been no reply. Not even one.

Poppy had tried to reassure him that Remus might not be replying for dozens of reasons, but Sirius hadn't wanted to think about what the absence of a response might mean. And now, to hear that Remus was well--at least well enough to have his third book coming out...

Sirius tried to feel relieved that Remus was all right, but his chest was too tight to feel anything.

"Are there really orange dragons?"

Sirius straightened and pushed the dull ache away as he found his godson's bright green eyes. Smiling, he walked over to Harry and sat down on an identical overstuffed chair. "There are red dragons as well," he said, lowering his voice and leaning forward as if telling a great secret.

"Really?"

"Really. Gold ones too. Would you like me to read that to you?"

Harry hesitated, but he did finally slide the book across to Sirius.

"Would you like to sit here?" Sirius asked, patting his knee. "So that you can see the pictures better?"

It took even longer for Harry to hop off his chair, but they were only on the third page before Harry leaned up against Sirius' chest, just as if he'd been doing it for years.