Synopsis: Sirius has noticed that his godson is not living the way a Lord Potter fully deserves to live. He also noticed that a certain girl has a crush on the Boy Who Lived, which she hasn't admitted. He decides to solve both problems with one scheme, namely, setting Harry up for Hermione!
Chapter 1.
It was a warm summer morning, and Hermione had just woken up and rubbed the dust out of her eyes, when a colorful, tropical bird dropped a letter on Hermione's desk before escaping through her window, which she had left open to catch the cool night breeze. Hermione opened it, and a heavy silver key dropped out with a thunk. She unfolded the letter:
Dear Hermione,
Thank you very much for your efforts in securing my escape from Snape and the dementors. I'm in a safe place far from the British Ministry for Magic, where no British arrest warrants are valid, due to some recent scuffles between their respective Muggle governments, fighting over some islands or something.
Since my escape this spring I've been worried about Harry. I've noticed and heard from Moony, that Harry isn't living the way a boy with his social status ought to. He didn't seem to have any good clothes apart from his school robes, and I later found out from Moony that his muggle family are worthless people who treat him terribly.
As a result he lives as if he was a pauper and has no confidence. I'm certain you're aware of this but don't know how to help him. So I have a plan, but I'll need your help, and as you'll see, there will be benefits to my plan for you as well. I have enclosed the key to a small vault I have opened for this project. Gringotts, which for some reason is taking Harry Potter on his word that I'm innocent, has been helpful in this regard. I'm exonerated under Goblin law.
I want you to spend the money lavishly on yourself and Harry. Don't think of any of this as a bribe, but as thanks from me for saving me from the dementors and Snivelly. I'd like you to go and take Harry out to town with this money. Buy him and yourself fancy robes, as well as good Muggle clothes. I'm not sure what's in style nowadays, but no doubt those threadbare rags he wears aren't.
After that, take him out to dinner. Also let him know the following facts:
1. He owns a mansion in London. Gringotts knows where it is and has the key.
2. He has numerous prerogatives even as a minor, because he's the Lord Potter.
3. You like him, don't deny it, you want to snog him. You need to be assertive!
Love, Sirius Black III, aka Padfoot.
PS: He currently lives at 4 Privet DR, Little Whinging, Surrey.
Hermione put down the letter, her face a little pink, and quickly got dressed, and went to the bathroom to brush her teeth.
She was embarrassed because she had spent her last two summers with her parents wishing she could see her friends from school, and hadn't thought of asking Harry where he lived in the Muggle world.
She was also embarrassed for a more common reason; Sirius had hit the nail right on the head in implying she liked Harry as more than just a friend. He had even challenged her to take Harry out to dinner!
She supposed it would be fine for her to ask Harry on a uh... date. Modern times after all, she could be the one to ask.
She walked down to the second floor of her house, where her parents were, and mustered her courage as her face started to glow.
"Mom, Dad, I'm going out today."
"Oh? Where to?" her father replied.
"Um... to see Harry Potter, you know. On a, a DATE!" She could now feel her face glowing with embarassment.
Her father smirked a little. "Well, be back before midnight, please."
"What? You aren't going to object?" she asked.
"No, from what you've told me he's a fine boy," her father explained, "saved you from a ten foot troll and all."
"Um, ok, I'll be going out now then..." she grabbed her purse and dashed down the stairs, through the dentistry office on the first floor, and out the door before her mother, who was poking a bald man's gums with a pointy depth-measuring probe, could stop her work and turn around.
She walked down the street, then paused to jot down Sirius' suggested activities in her planner. (Which, as a matter of course, she had on her at all times.) Then she continued down a dead end alleyway where noone would see her, and stuck her wand out to summon the Knight Bus.
With a bang, it appeared, and she stepped on.
"Oi, it's you again is it? To Diagon alley?" Stan Shunpike, the conductor, asked.
"I'm going to Privet Drive, Little Whinging, Surrey, actually. Although we'll be calling you again." She replied.
"Wanna hot chocolate?"
"Sure!"
"Oi, really?"
"No. How much?"
"12 sickles." Stan replied, and Hermione counted them out from her purse.
The bus was, as usual, empty this early in the morning; it was normally used mostly by wizards after midnight too pissed to safely apparate or fly. Rather than sitting in a seat, she grabbed one of the handles on the ceiling and held on tight, as the bus accelerated, swerved and shimmied for a few minutes.
"Here we are, Privet Drive." Stan announced to the whole bus, as if there was a crowd.
She ignored him and stepped off, to see the most boring suburban street she could possibly imagine. She glanced along the rows of practically identical houses, to see that she was, in fact, in front of Number Four. She paused for a minute, steeling herself and forcing her blush down. When she felt she could stay calm, she strode down the concrete walk next to the driveway and knocked three times at the door.
A bony, horse-faced woman answered the door and snapped, "we aren't buying anything and we go to a decent Anglican church, no funny business."
"Don't worry about that, actually, I was hoping to speak with Harry Potter. I'm his friend from school." Hermione supposed they got a lot of door to door people in a place like this, and sympathized a bit.
The horse-faced woman was taken aback and gestured up the stairs without a word. As Hermione entered, she shut the door and then called up the stairs.
"Harry! Some... freak girl from your abnormal school wants a word with you! I'm sending her up!
She turned to Hermione and instructed her. "He's in the second bedroom down the hall. But. But no funny business, please." She looked like she was afraid Hermione would curse her.
Hermione said nothing more to the frazzled Mrs Dursley and quietly climbed the stairs and knocked on the second door.
"Come in, Hermione?"
She opened the door, noting the number of locks thereon, to see her crush. "Harry! I. I came because have something to tell, er, to ask you."
Harry was sitting on a shoddy bed, in a room that was far less well kept than the others, surrounded by junk. He was wearing grey, ill-fitting clothes and ratty shoes. His hair was unkempt and his glasses were once again taped together. But to Hermione, he was handsome and he shined.
"What is it Hermione? I can't imagine there's much I know that you don't."
"Er, I mean, I came to ask you, to come with me to Diagon Alley and some other places today, er, on a date, er, like a boyfriend date thing." She blurted out and went pink.
Harry's eyes went wide, but he managed to keep from blushing somehow, and then replied "Er, okay, I mean, I'd be honoured. How did you know where I live though?"
Hermione smiled and then broke into a grin. "Your godfather arranged things and sent me an owl, er, a tropical bird of some kind. He even suggested an itinerary which I've got summarized here."
"Of course you do. Well, first let's get out of this place. Aunt Petunia won't object, the Dursleys have been much less of a problem this summer for some reason. Maybe it's also Padfoot's doing. Let's go."
They went out of Harry's messy bedroom, and stepped smartly down the stairs together.
"Where are you freaks going now?" Petunia's voice conveyed derision, but her face betrayed fear.
"We're going to London, we won't need dinner." Hermione attempted to imitate Petunia's tone.
Petunia snorted like a horse and waved them both out the door.
Hermione led Harry to the kerb. "Hold up a moment, I'll summon the knight bus, don't worry, this doesn't count as underage magic legally."
She stuck out her wand and the knight bus appeared just where it was when she got off it.
"Brilliant, Hermione! I didn't know wizards had a bus." Harry stepped on, following Hermione.
"We didn't even go anywhere... anyway, where to?" Stan grumbled.
"Diagon Alley." Hermione instructed.
"That'll be 11 sickles, each, then."
"I have some, hold on..." Harry dug into the pockets of his loose jeans.
"Here, one galleon, five sickles." Hermione handed them to Stan.
"You didn't have to pay for that!" Harry protested.
Hermione grinned. "Wait 'til you see what Padfoot has planned."
Harry reflected that he hadn't often seen Hermione smile so much. He liked it, and decided he'd just trust Padfoot's plan.
"Now, this is gonna be a pretty rough ride. Hold on to that strap right there."
Harry held on firmly as the bus once again careened through unsuspecting countryside and then city streets, noting how it never actually hit anything, but rather obstacles jumped left right and up to make way.
The bus made a earsplitting screech, and then its engine backfired as it came to a stop in front of the Leaky Cauldron. "Leaky Cauldron and Diagon Alley." Stan Shunpike announced, calling over the heads of his two actual passengers.
"So er, Hermione, what's first on our plan?" Harry asked, as they both stepped off the bus and onto the kerb in front of the Leaky Cauldron.
"First, we should go to Gringotts. According to Padfoot, this key is to a vault containing a reward for us for helping him, and money to spend on our er, our dates. Also, he says you own a house in London and Gringotts has the key, so we should ask them about that. Maybe you don't have to live with that mean woman. After that, apparently you're a Lord, and have some sort of prerogatives, that means, special rights, because of that. So I want to get a book explaining the wizarding peerage system. Then we'll go to lunch I suppose."
"Sounds good to me. I'd love to be able to live away from the Dursleys."
The two walked into the Leaky Cauldron together, holding hands, and some whispering started, but Hermione led Harry through by the hand, and into the courtyard beyond, where she tapped the brick wall in the right place, and the bricks rearranged into the familiar archway leading into the Alley.
There were some young people in the alley, as school was out, and Harry vaguely recognized a few faces in Fortescue's Ice Cream Parlor's patio.
They walked down to the imposing columns of Gringotts and Hermione let go of Harry's hand as they entered.
"Go over to that clerk with the sign that says 'Estates'. I saw Malfoy talk to him once, you probably also qualify."
Hermione then got in line for the regular accounts.
Harry looked at her and back at the 'Estates' clerk. He might as well try it, he decided. He strode over to the goblin, who regarded him with the same indifference that goblins usually did, and asked "Mr Potter, how can I help you today."
"I've heard that I own a house in London, I'd like the key and i want to know where it is" Harry explained.
"Yes?" He got up and retrieved a file from a large cabinet behind him. "Indeed you do, Mr Potter. It is at 17 and a half Argyll Road in Kensington, London. If you would like the key, either I can have it fetched from the Potter vault or I can have a clerk take you to retrieve it yourself."
"I guess I'd prefer not to go down to the vault myself, if that's no trouble." Harry replied.
"Very well. Ratcook!" he barked to a smaller goblin standing by a small minecart on rails that led into a small shaft. "Go fetch item 75720 from the Potter vault, 704."
Ratcook pushed the cart and hopped in before it entered the mine shaft and disappeared.
Harry frowned. "Excuse me, isn't my vault number 618?"
"The vault for you personally, and formerly the personal vault of Charlus Potter, is 618. 704 is the Potter family vault, which as you are the sole living Potter, you also have full access to." The goblin explained this in a tone as if it was obvious, and he didn't understand why Harry wouldn't know already.
"I see." Harry stood in silence for a few minutes.
"Harry! Still waiting? I hope everything went ok." Hermione accosted him.
"It did. I'm waiting for them to fetch the key.
Do you have some paper? I need to write down the address and some other stuff so I don't forget."
"Of course I do!" She fetched a small notepad and biro out of her handbag, and waited for him to dictate.
"17½ Argyll Rd. Kensington" she wrote as Harry spoke. "Harry's pers. vault is 618, family vault is 704."
"...and that's all I found out." Harry finished.
"Interesting. A lot of rich people live in Kensington, so I suppose rich wizards might also." Hermione explained.
With a trundling sound, Ratcook reemerged from the mine shaft and hopped out. He handed a large key of shiny bluish metal to the Estates clerk, who inspected it, and then handed it to Harry.
"See the Potter sigil engraved on the bow." The goblin remarked.
On the handle of key, indeed Harry could see a shield, divided in two stacked parts, with a lion, red on gold at the top, and some sort of flower, gold on blue, in the bottom.
"Ok, thank you very much...um what was your name?" Harry asked the estates goblin.
"I am Bitpick." The goblin seemed to be smiling, although he showed a disconcerting number of teeth.
"Thank you, Bitpick."
"You're very welcome, Mr. Potter." the goblin replied.
"Shall we go?"
"Okay Hermione, where are we going next?"
"The bookshops." Hermione replied. "Actually, it's only 11, maybe we can get some clothes too."
END CHAPTER 1 DRAFT