AN: Written for a challenge on SAYS (JessiRose's 'Competitiveness!' challenge). Hope you enjoy it!
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"Coats, boys!" Ginny called from the doorway, and James scowled before pulling Albus back up the hill and into the arms of the coat that their mother held out for him. James pulled on his own and then grabbed Alby's arm again, running down the hill before Ginny could call for them to remember not to jump in puddles, not to get too dirty, not to climb trees without an adult around, not to have any fun.
"Wait up, James!" Albus panted, trying to loosen his older brother's grip on his small arm. James was only nine, a year older than Albus, which was hardly significant, Albus thought, but he was generally in charge of everything. Anyway, Albus never knew what to do for fun, so maybe it was a good thing.
"Hurry up, slugwart!" James said, grinning as he pulled them down the hill a bit faster. Albus knew, any second now, there would be a fall, because there always was, and he was always the one who ended up bleeding or crying or generally in pain, while James would stand over him in irritation, waiting for him to stop being a sook.
And, yes, there it was, the tumbling over in the leaves as they both lost their footing, and laughing and yelling as they fell down the hill; not hurting yet, but sure to have bruises and scrapes when they reached the bottom.
James sat in the leaves at the bottom of the hill, laughing, and counted his scrapes, while Albus couldn't decide whether to laugh or hit his brother. He settled on laughing, because he knew James was a better fighter.
"Wanna play chasies?" James asked, and Albus nodded, standing up.
"Ok! You're it!" James yelled, and sprinted off into the small park. Albus followed, running as fast as he could. James disappeared under a small copse, and Albus ran into it a few minutes later, only to find his older brother standing with a small group of boys.
"Whatchoo doing?" a blonde boy was asking James, who shrugged.
"Playing with my brother," he said, gesturing over his shoulder at the small figure of Albus standing at the entrance to the copse. Al ran up to James, moving to stand beside him. He grabbed onto James' arm, feeling a bit worried. The boys were quite big.
"Whatchoo playing?" a skinny, brown haired boy asked, looking interested. James shrugged again.
"Just chasies. D'you wanna play?"
The brown haired boy looked around at the other boys, who nodded and shrugged.
"Ok," said the blonde boy. "Who's it?"
James grinned, his pale face lighting up.
"Al is! Ready? You have to give us five seconds. He's a fast runner, is Al."
Albus grinned, feeling all warm inside. It wasn't often that James complimented him on anything, and Albus had been practising his running. He closed his eyes and started counting.
"One,"
The sounds of rapidly disappearing feet met his ears, and the shrieks and laughs of running boys.
"Two,"
The park wasn't very big, so he should be able to catch them pretty easily.
"Three,"
As long as they weren't as fast as James, who could outrun Albus any day.
"Four,"
The park had gone quiet, and Albus guessed they were all around, shushing each other.
"Five," he said, and opened his eyes.
He caught sight of the skinny boy almost immediately, and raced after him. There followed a loud and exuberant game of chasies, and Albus was glad they had met the other boys, because it was much more fun with more than two people. Eventually, however, James, as he was wont to do, became bored and pronounced his acerbic judgment on the game.
"This game is boring," he called from his position on the grass, and the other boys, unwilling to be seen supporting a game that was so obviously passé, nodded with him.
"Let's play Quidditch!" James yelled excitedly, becoming enthusiastic once again. The group of boys stared at him.
"What's Queerdetch?" one of the boys asked, looking sceptical.
"Der," said James, with all the eloquence of a nine year old. "Don't you know anything?"
The other boys muttered mutinously at the comment, which was really just boy speak for 'I dare you!' which, everybody knew, was utterly bad for the health.
"Fine!" the oldest boy, a tall freckled lad, cried, digging his hands into his pockets.
"Let's go play this…this…whatever you called it. I'll bet we can win against you!"
"How much?" James asked slyly, and the boy scowled.
"I'll give you a clout around the ear if you win, and you can have a punch in the stomach if you lose. How about that?"
James grinned. "Doesn't sound all that fair to me. How about I get to punch you if you lose?"
"Deal," the boy said, and they shook hands. Albus looked on in awe. Big boys were so cool.
"So…where do we play it?" the freckled boy asked, and James smiled.
"Well, come up to our house, we'll get the brooms. We can play out the back, its big enough."
"Brooms?" one of the boys asked, and the other children shrugged, following James back up to the house. When they reached the house, James immediately corralled Albus into bringing the brooms from the shed – Alby and James' new ones that they had received as Christmas presents only a month or so ago, and a few spare brooms that the Potters always kept around for other children.
James handed them around, winking noticeably at Al when he handed to slowest brooms to those on the opposing team. Albus sighed and shook his head.
"You ready?" James asked, holding his broom. The other boys looked sceptical.
"We still don't know how to play," the blonde boy pointed out, frowning, and James laughed.
"Der!" he said again, grinning. "It's only the most awesome game in the world! How don't you know? Alright, we'll have a practice game first. To be fair."
He grimaced at the word, and Al laughed.
"Get on your brooms, then!" he exclaimed, looking frustrated as the other boys stared at him, unmoving.
"What are you on about?" the skinny boy muttered, and James stared at him for a moment, looking to Alby for support.
"You…you get. On. Your. Broom. Easy! Oh, look, ok? You hover your broom – up!"
His broom shot up in the air and hovered obediently under James' hand. The group of boys stared, stunned.
"What's – how did – that's – I don't – you – man, what the hell did you do?"
James looked at them, confused and annoyed. "It's…a broom. It's what they do."
"No! They sweep things! They…they don't do that!"
"Sweep? With a BlackStar 3000? I don't think so! Maybe with a Firebolt, ha! Right, Al? Ha!"
Albus laughed, remembering how their father had said that it was the fastest broom back when he was seventeen…or maybe it was sixteen. But he was old now, nearly thirty, and the Firebolt was old hat and S-L-O-W. Plus, it broke down if you tried to go higher than two hundred metres, and everyone knew you had to be able to go up to three hundred if you wanted to play Decks. Maybe it was just something that happened to the broom nowadays, but either way, it was nowhere near as cool as the BlackStar 3000's that James and Al had.
The group of boys looked blank and James and Al's laughter tapered off, to be replaced by embarrassed coughing. James let his foot run through the dirt, making little circles, which he watched, because he didn't like looking at people who were possibly laughing at him.
"Look, you just…get on, ok?" Al said, wondering why the older boys were being so strange about the brooms. Everyone knew brooms were for flying, it was just a given that they did. But these kids didn't, and it was just…strange. And so now he was repeating himself and his adjectives. It was all a bit much for Al and James to comprehend, so they decided to ignore it as best they could; stick it in a muddy bucket in the corner of the living room, so to speak, and not look at it, because otherwise it might give them a headache.
They looked at the boys again, a little bit pleadingly, asking them to pick the muddy bucket up or…really, this is a terrible allegory, and I should have stopped talking about it the first time, or just not written it at all. Anyway. The other boys, looking to each other for support and shrugging in confusion, followed James' lead and yelled 'up!'
After a while – some of the brooms were being unco-operative and a certain amount of yelling at them was deemed necessary – each boy was on their broom, looking to James for the next instruction. Al bought out the rubber balls that they used to play their own version of Quidditch (Harry wouldn't let them play with bludgers or a snitch yet) while James explained the rules. When each boy had risen off the ground, there was a general confusion while they whooped and yelled, wobbling precariously as they attempted to fly in a straight line. James watched them, shaking his head slowly, and Al stared.
It looked as though they had never ridden a broom – which should have been obvious if they had never even seen one, but logic was not really either of the boy's strong points. The brothers shrugged it off, and a very confusing and ridiculous game of 'Quidditch' ensued. James commentated enthusiastically as he whizzed around the garden.
"And Potter has the quaffle, he is streaking up the pitch with it, oh yes, he is obviously a champion – this boy will go far! Absolute fluke as the other chaser, Healey, I think it is, takes the quaffle, there's no way he could have gotten it without…uh…a fluke…Anyway, yeah, he's totally untalented next to Potter, and it was an absolute fluke. Oh, that boy is one bad sport! Look at the faces he's making! What language! Aaand…concentration off the game, the younger Potter has taken the ball!
"What skill! Nothing on his older brother of course, who is smarter, faster, more handsome, cooler and generally more talented in every area, but the young Potter has gotten just an eence of his older brother's talent, which, when you think about it, is more than enough for the average person, because James Potter is so fantastically awesome...And look at that face! Honestly, you'd think I'd insulted him!
"Aaand, now the ball's going up the field with our young Potter, and can he…can he…? Yes! He scores! That's ten nothing to the Blazing Banshees! Quick victory dance, fellows, and then we're back on."
Al shook his head at his brother, but he was grinning. He loved it when he managed to score a goal. It made him feel fantastic, and James was always much nicer to him when he had. At least, if they were on the same team. James took another deep breath as the ball sailed into the middle, thrown by the keeper.
"Aaand we're off again! Ferguson has the ball, he's flying up the pitch with it….ohh…look at that swerve, I'm pretty sure he didn't mean to do that! Yup, that tree looks uncomfortable; I don't think it was the interesting tactic he wishes us to believe it was."
"Sod off!" yelled Ferguson, untangling himself from the tree branches. James grinned as another boy on his team picked up the ball from where the unlucky boy had dropped it, and immediately scored a goal, as the keeper had been examining the contents of his nose.
"Twenty nothing! The Banshees are creaming this ridiculous excuse for a team! What skill! Come, quickly, teammates, we must victory dance. Alright, fine, be boring. Ready for play then, comrades?
It was at about this point in time that Harry Potter, James and Al's father, walked past the window in search of elevenses, and spotted his boys playing Quidditch with the local Muggle children. He stopped. He opened his mouth. He turned an interesting shade of turquoise (which, apparently, is technically not possible, but let's not quibble over details).
He ran to the window and wrenched it open, yelling quite loudly, which had the amusing side effect of making Ferguson, who had just gotten himself out of the tree and was drifting lazily in the air in front of it, shoot up in surprise and launch himself into the tree again. Harry ignored him stridently, even though his legs were sticking out of a tight bunch of leaves, kicking feebly, which is usually guaranteed to receive at least some attention from a parent.
James made a point of disappearing quite suddenly around the corner of the house. Al watched him, a sinking feeling in his stomach, which was usually attributed to Being In Trouble, although in this case, Al wasn't really sure why they were. But it was still Rather Unpleasant.
Harry came out of the house, fuming, and the group of boys watched him, all feeling as if they had done something terrible, but unsure as to what exactly that was. Most of them landed, but a few felt it might be safer if they stayed up in the air. They didn't move. Harry ignored them anyway, and strode over to Al, his eyebrows looking rather stormcloud-ish.
"What do you boys think you're doing?" he whispered furiously, and Al uhm-ed and ah-ed for a bit, feeling confused and worried. James was still nowhere to be seen, no doubt lurking in the petunias.
The Muggle boys disappeared like smoke, and Al was left to try and appease his father, who was looking quite scary at that precise moment in time.
"Seriously, Al, what did you think you were doing?"
Al squinted into the sun, trying to look thoughtful.
"Er…playing a game?" he said, still wondering what could possibly be so bad about doing that. Harry sighed, pushing his glasses up his nose.
"Al, do you know who those children were?" he asked, and his voice was softer, but Al still had snakes in his stomach. Soft didn't necessarily mean he wasn't going to be In Big Trouble.
"No-o…" Al replied, looking confused. Harry sat him down on the garden bench and looked at him.
"You really didn't know? Truly, Al? You're not lying to me?"
Al shook his head. "No, I don't know."
Harry sighed again. "Well, just…Al, alright, your brother needs to hear this too. Would you please collect him from the petunias?"
Al nodded, feeling grim. James would never forgive him. He didn't really know why he wouldn't, but James was prone to blaming him for everything. And this was quite obviously Al's fault, because he hadn't run away when Harry had come outside. He found James, predictably, in amongst the petunias, pretending to be a garden gnome, and informed him gloomily that Harry wanted to Talk. James grimaced and they walked back to where their father waited, feeling rather as if they were on their way to the gallows.
"'lo, dad." James said, blinking rapidly. Harry raised an expert eyebrow.
"Hello. Now, I want to know, James, did you know who those children were?"
James looked confused. "Er…local kids? I dunno, we met them at the park."
Harry shook his head, staring at the ground. "Do you understand the term 'muggle', boys?"
The two brothers nodded in confusion. "Yeah," said James, "they're people who can't do magic. Right?"
Harry nodded. "Exactly. And do you know what muggles know about us?"
"Er…nothing?" James said. Harry nodded again.
"They're meant to know nothing about us. Unfortunately, by playing that particular game with them –"
"Wait!" James exclaimed, looking worried. "They were muggle kids?"
Harry nodded again, wearily. "Yes, and now I'm going to have to put a memory charm on them, because they're not meant to know."
"Know what?" Al asked, swinging his legs over the bench. James sighed exasperatedly.
"Duh! That we're wizards! Right?" he turned to his father. Harry frowned a little.
"Right. So what you boys are going to have to do is remember not to play wizard games with muggle kids. Make sure they're wizard children before you play Quidditch and other Wizarding games, because otherwise there will be trouble. Do you understand me?"
Al and James nodded. "Yes, dad." they chorused, and Harry smiled.
"Good boys. Now, go inside and help your mother make cake, while I-"
"CAKE!" both boys interrupted him, and ran into the house, laughing and pushing at each other. Harry watched them go and sighed.
"Memory charms," he muttered, standing up. "This is the third time this month that I've had to memory charm those bloody kids."
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AN: That review button? Yeah, you see it? It's not just there for decoration. Love you guys!