This story is an excerpt from Harry Poter: Zero

START

It was friday morning when Neville sat down next to Harry at breakfast. "The Yule ball is next week. You got your dress robes?"

"Oh, shoot. No. Maybe I should ask Parvati to help me get some at Hogsmead."

"You can't ask your date!" interrupted Luna, who had appeared as if out of nowhere. "That would be totally inappropriate. It would be against the Exeter Accords!" She continued, horrified. "You will have to ask Neville. Yes. He's a stolid sort." She gave a decisive, very un-Luna-like nod.

"I don't know anything about clothes!" protested Neville, "Gran does all my clothes shopping for me!"

Luna sighed, "very well. I guess there is no alternative. I'll take you shopping."

Harry glanced at Luna in horror. This was the girl who wore mismatched… everything. who made jewelry out of radishes and bottle caps. And she was going to offer him fashion advice?

Seeing his look, Luna added quickly, "Oh, don't worry, I'm not going to go on some all day orgy of girl shopping. We'll shop like a guy: We'll dart in, find the robes you want, defeat them in fair combat and dart back out. It won't take more than an hour, I promise. And if it does, I'll buy you ice cream."

Harry wasn't certain what to say. But Luna usually had that effect on people. "Ok. I guess."

Luna beamed "Great! It's a da.. a plan" she corrected herself quickly.

*/\*

Harry finished his breakfast and took a look at his watch, 'Do I really want to do this?' Harry was supposed to meet up with Luna for their 'guy-style' shopping trip. On the one hand, Harry wasn't shy about admitting that he needed help. On the other, it was Luna. 'Well, she's a girl - she probably not going to be ready for another half hour. I'll just sneak back to the dorms' As Harry stood up, Luna skipped into view. She was wearing a yellow sun dress, and had a parchment wadded up in her left hand. She was dressed remarkably normally. If it had been summer, instead of mid winter, that is.

"Are you ready to go? Great! let's go!" She blurted, not letting Harry say a word. She was much more high energy today than her usual moon-child self. She grabbed Harry's hand as if to pull him along, but immediately let go, glancing at a corner of her badly wrinkled parchment.

"Um, ok" Harry grabbed his winter cloak from the back of the chair as he followed Luna out of the great hall. He felt like he was being dragged along in her undertow.

They walked out the main gate. Well, Harry walked. Luna was skipping along along like a girl half her age, "So, how about them Chuddley Cannons?" she asked brightly.

"You mean, why do they stink?" Harry asked puzzled. It was a unseasonably warm day, but most of the other students they passed were dressed in warm robes and some wore overcoats. More than a few cast puzzled glances at Luna.

"Well, that's probably because they don't bathe. You know how jocks are - they need a personal trainer just to tell them what to eat. I mean are they good this year?"

"No, I meant that they suc.." Harry stopped himself. He didn't want to hear how Luna would misinterpret that - it would scar him mentally, "They are playing poorly this year. Just like last year and every other year in recorded history." Harry paused, "and of course they need a personal trainer to help them stay fit. If they aren't fit, they won't win games"

"Girls know what to eat and what not to eat to stay skinny without needing a personal trainer." Luna responded amiably, "and if the personal trainer is supposed to make them fit so that they can win games, yet they keep losing, maybe they should fire their personal trainer."

"Maybe they should fire the whole team, burn the clubhouse to the ground and start from scratch." Harry replied, "I didn't know you were interested in quidditch"

"I'm not, but I wanted to start a conversation about something that YOU enjoy. After all, the point of today is to have fun, so that shopping will no longer seem like such a traumatic experience."

"Ooh-kay" Harry smiled, bemused.

As the pair walked into Hogsmead, Luna glanced quickly at her parchment, "Ok, business first! let's go find you Gladrags Wizardwear." Luna again consulted her parchment, straightening out a section that appeared to have a tiny map sketched on it. "This way!"

They soon entered a clothing shop. It had a wild array of clothes, from the sedate to the neon red. "Uhm, which of these are the dress robes?" asked Harry.

"Beats me," shrugged Luna, "I have no fashion sense. Ask anybody." As Harry opened his mouth to ask the obvious question, she called out "Pardon me!" as she flagged down a passing sales person, "we are looking some men's dress robes."

The young bald man led them to small back section of the store, near the mens dressing rooms.

"How come if you have no fashion sense.." began Harry as he browsed through the selection.

"It's not that I don't have fashion sense," replied Luna defensively, "it's just fashion makes no sense. Why wear clothing that is uncomfortable, tight in all the wrong places, when you can wear something comfortable. That's just makes sense."

"Wearing that," Harry pointed to Luna's sun dress, "makes sense?"

"YES! It's bright and cheerful, as opposed to 'fashionable' clothing, which usually comes in some shade of black or possibly grey."

"But it's winter, and that's a summer dress!"

"Exactly!" beamed Luna, "what better time to wear it?"

"I think… I understand. Which scares me," Harry replied. Usually when he was talking to girls, he spent half his time trying to figure out what the right thing to say was. But with Luna, he gave up. half of what she said made no sense, so he figured as long as his replies kept scoring above 50% on the sanity meter, he was doing better than she was, so it was all good.

It was actually kind of fun.

"Uhm, how about this one?" he held up a set of dress robes that matched his two criteria - they would fit him and they would fit his budget.

"Hmm. I like them! very cheerful and friendly." Luna took the robes from Harry's hand and tossed them back on the rack, "That means that they won't do. Look for something snarlier, like what your friend Malfoy wears"

Harry lost track of how long they were looking at cloths, as Luna made witty or silly comments about every piece of clothing, finally, as they were reaching the end of the rack, they were left with two pieces that Luna had not discarded out of hand. "So, which one?"

"Hold them up for me to take a closer look." Harry held up one in each hand. "Hmmm - this one radiates kindness, but this one matches your eyes…" Luna stood with her right hand rubbing her chin while her left supported it by the elbow. "Oh, I have no clue. Sales Person! Where is he? Did a Blibbering Humdingers eat him? Oh, sales person. Here sales person, sales person, sales person…" she chanted singsong.

"Yes, miss?" the bald salesman appeared, with a long suffering sigh.

"Which of these two is more fashionable? We are looking for dress robe that would be appropriate to go to the Yule Ball in."

"Well, the green one is more stylish, but honestly, neither one have been hot sellers this year. This one over here, and this one as well, are very much in vogue" He pulled out two robes that they had discarded earlier. Luna took the two robes from Harry's hands and draped them over the sales person before taking one of the ones he had indicated at seeming random, "This will do! Thank you so much!"

Sigh. "Very well. And would miss like to try on some matching robes while she is here?"

Harry blanched, "Oh, I'm not going to the Yule ball with her!"

The sales person quirked an eyebrow and gave him a puzzled look. "Very well. I will ring this up. come this way."

'He thought we were dating!' As Harry paid, he glanced around to see if there were any other patrons in the store who might be under a similar impression. Especially fellow Hogwarts students.

Harry picked up his parcel and started haltingly, "Uhm, I'm going to go to the quidditch shop. I figure you're going to want to head back to Hogwarts, I'll be seeing…"

"Oh, Look at the time!" Luna interrupted, "Your Wrackspurts must have made me lose all track of time." She leaned in and added conspiratorially "You should have the colony that is nesting in your head taken care, you know, before they do permanent damage to your mind." Luna grabbed Harry's hand and pulled him along "Come on! There is not time to waste!"

"What? Where are we going?" Harry replied, completely lost. He held on tight to his package as Luna pulled him through the people strolling the shopping district.

"I promised that if it took longer than an hour to buy you your robes, that I would treat you to an ice cream."

"You don't have to."

Luna stopped and whirled to face Harry, for the first time looking annoyed, "Are you saying I don't have to keep my word?" Her voice had dropped an octave. "Is that what you are saying?"

"Um, no, I didn't mean that" Harry staggered back.

"Good. Come on, then!" she skipped away. Harry followed, He wasn't certain what had just happened, but he didn't want to hurt Luna's feelings.

As Luna led the way towards The Three Broomsticks, a light snow began to fall. Luna carefully crossed to the other side of the street when passing in front of Madam Puddifoot's Tea Shop.

As they entered the the eatery, Luna again consulted her now almost destroyed parchment, "For the ice cream, I was thinking of of screaming cherry for me and a chocolate swamp for you, right?"

"That would be great! I love chocolate ice cream."

Harry took a booth as far away from the other students as he possibly could while Luna placed her order. The Three Broomsticks was packed with Hogwarts students, but they were all in cliques that were chatting animatedly, completely oblivious to everybody else. He felt vaguely guilty about all the work that Luna was doing - first helping him shop, then ordering (and paying for) ice cream. But he wasn't certain what to do about it.

When Luna sat down with their ice creams, he commented, "You know, you haven't been as, you know, scattered today as you usually are." 'Oh, god that came out wrong. She's going to kill me.'

Luna's shoulders hunched up and she dug at her ice cream for a bit, "After my mom passed away, dad got a little,.. I don't know" she shrugged again. Her shoulders were almost up to her ears. There was a long pause as Luna searched for words. She finally finished with "I'm too young to be the responsible one in the family."

"Well, I don't have that problem. My aunt and uncle certainly don't think I'm responsible at all. They treat me like a particularly stupid House Elf. I try to avoid being at home as much as possible."

"It doesn't really sound like much of a home."

"I guess not." Harry dug his spoon into his bowl of bubbling brown sludge and ate some of the ice cream, "This is good. Thank you. It's really sad, but Hogwarts feels more like a home."

"And the students as a family. That explains Draco - he's the idiot brother."

"Hey, Draco's my friend."

Luna froze and quickly consulted her parchment. "So.. how is your martial arts training with Professor Loew coming?"

"Great. It's a lot of fun, and I get to beat up on Ron - he's taking the class with me" Harry barely managed to restrain his glee. It was rare that he was better at something than his peers.

They chatted amiably, with Luna steering the conversation to 'safe' topics with many glances to her parchment.

As the two teens finished their ice cream, Luna crumpled up her parchment and tossed it into the trash. "we should probably get going."

"Aren't you afraid somebody will read all your secret plans" asked Harry with a smirk.

"No, I wrote it in gobbledygook…" Luna's eyes got big, "I mean, it's not anything like that - it's just some notes on conversations starters, because, you know, I'm not very good at that sort of thing. I tend to say what's on my mind, and that annoys people or makes them think I'm crazy. That would have been bad, very, very bad. Though usually I don't mind - it keeps the boring people from talking to me."

Harry smiled and nodded. He wasn't certain what Luna was babbling about, but it was amusing watching her. He swirled on his cloak and held the door for Luna. As they stepped out into the swirling snow, Luna gave a sudden shiver "It's cold out!"

"Um, yes. It's WINTER. So nice of you to notice" Harry replied acidly.

"Yes, well, my warming charm has worn off" Luna pointed to her sun dress.

"So cast another one." Harry sighed.

"Hello? Do you see any pockets?" Luna gestured at her dress, "Where do you expect me keep my wand?"

"You don't have it with you?" Somehow, that did not surprise Harry. "I can cast a warming charm, but it's not going to be powerful enough to do anything in this weather."

"No, I left it back in my room, but you can search around for it if you wish." Luna held her arms up at her sides and thrust out her chest while closing her eyes.

"No, that's ok. So what are you going to do? You could buy a cloak, I guess."

"No pocket, so no money. Sun dress remember?" Luna's face lit up ""I know, I'll share your cloak!" she darted in under Harry's cloak, pressing in close.

Harry froze. While he had gotten somewhat inured to Luna's brand of Luna-cy, this was.. this was.. Actually, it was kind of nice. He glance to the left and to the right, but with the increasing snow, people were huddled inside their robes and not looking around. He pulled up his hood 'Nobody will recognize me' he rationalized.

The two teens made their way back to Hogwarts. As they came within sight of the main entrance, Luna stepped away, "I think my heating charm has a little life left in it" She smiled happily at Harry,

And they entered as they had left, walking separately.