Author's note: This is written for the Quidditch League Fanfiction Competition Season 4 (Round 9). Okay, so this time we have to base stories on Disney films (which is awesome!) and I've got Peter Pan. So this is based on the bit preceding the song 'You can fly, you can fly, you can fly!" I rarely stray into next gen, but here we are. Please leave me a review!
Task: Base a story off of a classic Disney film – Peter Pan.
Disclaimer: I, unfortunately, do not own Harry Potter.
James, Albus, Rose and Hugo sat together on one of Ginny's picnic blankets on the green lawn that spanned most of the Potter's back garden. The sun shone down on the children, who were finishing their second jug of Pumpkin juice and their third plate of homemade sandwiches, making both the day and the atmosphere around them fairly bright. But unfortunately, that didn't stop them from having a bit of a problem.
"I'm bored," James said, lying on his back on the blanket, tracing the outlines of the cloud with this finger.
"Yeah, me too," Albus and Rose agreed, both sitting cross-legged next to James.
"We could play Wizard's Chess?" Hugo suggested, taking another sip from his cup.
"Nah," James replied, sitting up and leaning on his elbows, "I want to do something more exciting."
"You know our parents are sat just over there, right?" Rose said, clearly not quite believing her cousin's desire to be potentially reckless.
"Exploding Snap?" Albus asked, only half joking.
"We could have a go at flying…" James mused, looking at Albus and Rose with a glint of mischief in his eyes.
"But James, we've no idea how to fly!" Rose shouted as her cousin ran towards the shed where his small selection of 'training brooms' was kept, along with his parents' ones.
He grabbed the four that were in there, which were all various sizes, and ran back towards the others. Hugo looked at him, childish excitement evident on his face, whilst Rose and Albus looked slightly more sceptical.
James grinned as he passed out the smaller brooms to his cousins, holding onto the largest one for himself. He mounted his broom easily and kicked off, flying a couple of metres into the air and then coming to hover in front of the others.
"Alright then, James, how do we do this? I've only ever flown with dad's help…" Rose said, looking at her broomstick with interest.
"Well, you have to… you've got to…" James looked around thoughtfully, clearly thinking about how he'd just managed to get five metres into the air.
"James, you just did it!" Albus said, getting a little impatient with his brother, "You've got to know how!"
"Of course, I know, but it's just that I've never really had to think about it, so it's difficult to explain," he said, lowering back to the ground in order to try and demonstrate slowly.
"So…" Albus and Rose said at the same time when James spent another minute in silence.
"Alright, alright," James replied, "you've got to kick off from the ground with power and then when you're up there, just direct the broom where you need to go. It isn't that difficult when you get the hang of it."
He kicked off again, slower this time so that the others could watch, and then hovered a metre above the ground in front of them.
"Oh, and dad told me that if you ever get scared of the height, to just think of happy thoughts and that would help you," James said, as the others prepared to have a go themselves.
"Alright, so kick off well and we should just go upwards?" Albus questioned as he swung his leg over his broom.
"Yeah, that's it," James replied with a smile.
"Okay then," Albus said. He kicked off hard from the ground, the evidence of it written in the partially shredded patch of grass, but instead of flying upwards, he only jumped off the ground slightly before landing in a heap only a couple of feet from where he'd started.
James held back a snigger whilst Hugo and Rose hid large grins behind their hands.
"It's not funny!" Albus cried, green stains now present across his t-shirt.
"It is a little funny, Al," James said, earning a glare from his brother in return.
After they had stopped giggling, Rose and Hugo both had a go but ended up on the floor just like Albus. All three of them looked at James with annoyance, wondering if he'd done anything to tamper with their broomsticks, but he looked as puzzled by the lack of success as the rest of them.
"Come on, guys. You must not be doing it right," he said, but quickly held his hands up in surrender when he saw the look on Rose's face. "Okay, okay, sorry. But I don't understand… All you need is a good kick off, some faith to get you up there and… Ohhhhh."
"Yes, James, you need the safety spells taken off the brooms," Harry said, moving towards from where he, Ginny, Ron and Hermione were all sat drinking tea next to the house, whilst their children played on the lawn.
"I'd forgotten you'd done that," James said, looking sheepishly at his cousins and running a hand through his already messy hair. "I'm sorry, guys, you were doing it fine all along."
Rose glared at him again but then turned back to Harry.
"Uncle Harry, would you help us fly. Please."
"Oh, yes, please Uncle Harry," Hugo said, joining in with his sister's pleas.
"Yeah, come on, dad," Albus and James both pleaded.
"Alright then," Harry said with a smile, relenting easily with the children smiling so excitedly at him, "but only for a little while because if Teddy comes home and sees you up in the sky, he'll have you playing Quidditch quicker than I can say 'Dumbledore', and I don't think you're quite ready for that yet."
The children nodded their agreement, although James did let out a noise of protest, so Harry took out his wand and quickly undid the spells that prevented the brooms from lifting into the air and fetched his own from the shed. His Firebolt was considered old nowadays, but Harry refused to part with it for the newest broomstick in the world; it held far too much sentimental value to ever be replaced.
"Okay, so James was right," Harry said, hovering above the lush grass with his son, "you were all doing it correctly, it was just the spells that were stopping you."
"Right, let's all give it another go," Rose said, sounding a lot more confident now that there was nothing stopping them from actually getting into the air.
She, Albus and Hugo all kicked hard against the ground and flew up into the bright blue sky with James and Harry. Hugo was wobbling slightly, so Harry helped to encourage him to stay only a few metres from the ground, should he fall. Rose and Albus though, seemed to have some natural talented, racing each other, albeit slowly, around James' stationery broomstick.
"We're doing it!" Albus yelled, still circling James, "We can fly! And by ourselves as well. This is great!"
Harry grinned at him, glad that he seemed to like flying as much as he did. He circled around Hugo to clasp his son's shoulder, trying to tell him that he was proud.
A few minutes later, the group spotted Ginny, Ron and Hermione, who were now coming over from their seats, having seen the five figures soaring about over the flowerbeds.
The adults took seats on the blanket that their children had previously occupied, though Harry eventually managed to encourage Ron to join him as a chaperone when Albus and Rose began to get a little more adventurous with height.
And as Harry had expected, when Teddy returned home, he was almost immediately in the air, passing a small Quaffle between himself, James, Rose and Albus, while Hugo still got the hang of balancing.
But as the sun began to set an hour or so later, the evening air was filled with the sounds of the children shouting:
"We can fly! We can fly! We can fly!"
A/N: Sorry the ending is a bit lame, but please leave a review!