The apothecary that Rowan's father owned was nestled into Diagon ally between Wiseacre's Wizarding Equipment and Fortune's and Luck. The store's glass front let plenty of light in, perfectly illuminating a bored girl's head buried into her sleeve.

Her mother was on break, doing a little book shopping, so Rowan had dragged herself away from several summer assignments to help her father who was completely occupied by a plump witch, whose face was in a scowl from the price of bundle of blessed thistle. A small bell tinkled and Rowan dragged her head up with a soft groan at defiance before a smile came onto her face.

Rubeus Hagrid took up most of the small store and Rowan could hear him curse after he hit his head on one of the hanging pots filled with herbs. She cleared her throat louder than intended, but managed to bring the attention of Hagrid and the skinny boy he was traveling with to her.

"Hello Rowan," Hagrid greeted brightly. He maneuvered around the large table in the middle of the store to the back where Rowan was playing the part of the cashier. Rowan said a happy "hello" in return. She quite liked Hagrid. He was very nice and welcoming and willing to overlook some of the rules, like being out after curfew, if a student really needed it. The few detentions she'd had last year had all been with Hagrid and she usually had quite a bit of fun.

"Harry," Hagrid called. The boy had originally been staring at the wall that was nothing but small drawers from floor to ceiling, he made his way over to the back as well and Rowan was able to get a better look. Harry had very untidy black hair that completely covered his forehead and wore a round pair of overly taped glasses over very pretty green eyes. His skinny frame was only emphasized by the too big, hand-me-down clothes he was wearing. He looked nervous. Hagrid cut into Rowan's observations.

"Harry this is Rowan Evergreen, she's a second year Ravenclaw at Hogwarts. An' Rowan, this is Harry Potter," Rowan smiled and held out a hand which Harry was soon shaking.

"It's very nice to meet you Harry, if you have any questions about Hogwarts, feel free to ask me."Harry gave her an odd look, "what?"

"You're not-" Harry stopped, took a breath, and started again. "You're treating me like a normal person, do you come from a norm- Muggle family?"

Rowan shook her head 'no' and watched the hopeful expression fall off his face "I just thought you would like to be treated as a normal person." He smiled widely,

"thank you."

It turned out Mr. Potter had loads of questions about Hogwarts and the wizarding world in general. Rowan tried to answer as many as she could while Hagrid began shuffling around getting the list of basic potion ingredients for Harry.

"What's Ravenclaw?"

"It's one of the four Hogwarts houses along with Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, and Slytherin." Harry nodded along as Rowan explained each house and what they stood for. Hagrid had tried to explain it earlier but hadn't gone into much depth. Rowan stopped suddenly and eyed Harry carefully.

"You'll be in Gryffindor," she promised

"With my luck I'll be in Hufflepuff, or Slytherin," he said glumly but Rowan was quick to counter,

"Both are great houses, Harry," and the young boy looked a little confused.

"Hagrid said all the bad wizards come from Slytherin."

Rowan let out a long-suffering sigh. "Merlin is one of the greatest wizards of all time, even Muggles know of him, and he was good and from Slytherin." Harry didn't look convinced. "Slytherins are ambitious and cunning Harry, these aregood traits and loads of good wizards come from Slytherin, we just focus on the bad ones."

Harry gave a tentative smile and decided to change the subject, "What do the wands look like?" Rowan's face lit up and she told him to wait still while she dashed up a set of small spiral stairs that led to the break room where her homework laid forgotten. On top of that however, was her wand, and she then ran back down the stairs after grabbing it.

Harry stared at the wand with awe and fascination, it was a very light wand overall and looked to be made of two types of woods. The slightly darker wood was carved to look like vines slowly overtaking the lighter base wood. It bunched up at the thick bottom to form a handle before wrapping around the rest of the wand, slowly getting thinner as the wand reached its point.

"The wand is eleven and a half inches, sturdy, the base wood is sycamore and the handle is made of hazel, the core is an augurey feather and a fairy wing," she said this all very quickly.

"Can you do some magic?" asked Harry excitedly, wanting a preview of what he would learn at Hogwarts, but Rowan said no.

"We're not allowed to do magic outside of Hogwarts until we're seventeen," Harry's face fell. "However, if you find me on the train, I can do magic then." Harry's grin was back and he asked if she had anymore advice for him.

"Avoid Peeves, listen to all of your teachers, stay out of the forest, and be nice to your peers."

Hagrid had finished up the shopping and paid for the small order, (Rowan suspected he took extra-long so she and Harry could talk) and Rowan waved goodbye to both as they exited the small shop to find Harry a wand. Her father had finally managed to come to an agreeable price with the witch and made his way back to his daughter.

"A friend from school?" he asked. He had not been able to hear the conversation, just caught the two children talking animatedly.

"No," Rowan answered simply. "Not yet. But he will be." And she smiled much to her father's confusion

Hello wonderful people who are presumably following this story. So Rowan met Harry yaay. I am actually super excited for this and have many many plans so I hope the 5 people reading this enjoy what I've written so far. Any questions, comments, concerns, hopes? I'm actively trying to avoid clichés that we have come to know and expect so I hope this was different ish.

That's all folks

*VTTN*