A/N: Sorry I haven't updated sooner, but at least im sticking to my promise of at least one chapter a week, right? So I'm fairly likely to get a chapter written on either Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday because I'm stuck at my nans house and there's no internet there which means I can't get distracted by any fanfictions to read.
DEDICATED TO: CATHERINESMACKAY! THANKS A LOT FOR REVIEWING1 I REALISED YOU HAVE REVIEWED BEFORE AND I WAS READING IT AND THOUGHT HMM… MAYBE GRACIE AND SIRIUS SHOULD BE COME HEADMASTERS AGAIN FOR A BIT. SO LOOK FOR TO THAT!
DISCLIAMER: I ONLY OWN GRACIE AND NO ONE ELSE. JK ROWLING OWNS HARRY POTTER!
-CONVERSATION OF THE CHATPER-
ME: Hi Tom!
TOM THE BARMAN: Hello. What can I get for you today?
ME: Oh, a Firewhiskey!
TOM THE BARMAN: Wait a minute, you're not of age yet are you?
ME: Yes? No? I am of age… huh huh.
TOM THE BARMAN: I know you're lying.
ME: No I'm not.
TOM THE BARMAN: Tell me the truth or I'll never serve you again.
ME: I'll just go to the Hogshead!
TOM THE BARMAN: Really?
ME: Okay I'm not of age. I'll just have a butterbear.
TOM THE BARMAN: Hear you go.
*Tom passes me a butterbear*
ME: Cheers.
TOM THE BARMAN: I have to go now to serve my customers.
ME: Okay bye.
TOM THE BARMAN: Bye!
*Tom disappears*
ME: I can't believe I couldn't have any firewhiskey! *sigh* ON WITH THE STORY!
25
'No.'
'What? Why not?' James asked.
'Because Potter, I am not skiving school.'
'Oh c'mon Evans. Live a little.' Sirius said.
Lily glared at him.
'I don't even understand why we have to go tomorrow anyway.' She huffed.
'Because it's Valentine's day tomorrow Lily.' Emmeline said with a dreamy look on her face.
James gave her an odd look.
'So?'
'Sometimes you can be so clueless Lily.' Marlene rolled her.
'I am not clueless!' Lily protested.
'Right,' James said. 'When are we going then?' He questioned.
'Tomorrow.' Sirius, Marlene and Emmeline said.
'Today.' Lily said.
'What?'
'We go today. Today is a Sunday, therefore if we go today we do not miss any classes.'
'Lily! Why are you bothered about classes?' Sirius groaned.
'Because I care about my education Black. You wouldn't understand.' She snorted.
'And what's that meant to mean?' He narrowed his eyes.
'That you are an-'
'You two! Please be quiet!' Marlene shouted.
Everyone turned to stare at her in shock.
'We'll gotoday.' She said firmly.
James and Sirius immidately were against her decision.
'What? No!'
'You can't get there without floo powder! We have the floo powder so we decide when-'
'You haven't got any floo powder.' Marlene stated.
'What? Yes we have!' Sirius said loudly.
'No you haven't. Gracie's got it in her cabinet upstairs in our dormitory. Which you can't get up to because your boys.' Marlene smirked at their faces.
Sirius and James had lost. They need one of the girls to get the floo powder for them. They couldn't get up the girls' staircase.
'Fine,' Sirius growled. 'We go today. Go and get the floo powder then.'
'What?'
'If we're going today we're going now.' Sirius said firmly. He was obviously pissed off.
'Fine.' Lily went upstairs to get the floo powder.
She returned a minute later.
'Got it.' She held up a small pouch that was filled with the green powder.
'Good. Now put these on.' Sirius said, holding up 3 blindfolds.
'What?'
'No!'
'Why?'
'Because we found the secret passageway out of the school and we decided that we didn't want to share it, sorry.' James said bitterly. He was annoyed as well. Sirius was meant to spend Valentine's day with Gracie and he was going ask Lily out as well. Now they couldn't because they were going on the 13th so they didn't miss school.
'You better not ditch us.' Marlene said.
'We won't. Hold on to our arms then.'
So the girls held tightly on their arms as Sirius and James led them to the four floor to the mirror.
Of course, they got a few strange looks and nearly had to give an explanation to Professor Wonderstruck but they made it.
Sirius opened the mirror and the closed it.
'We're nearly there now. When we get into the actual passage you can take them blindfolds off.'
Sirius opened the door and James ushered the girls in before closing the door behind them.
'You can take the blindfolds off now.' James said.
The girls took them off.
'Well it's nice…'
It wasn't really. It was rather like the room. It was dark, cold and dusty. Cobwebs were on the walls and there were no lights.
'Lumos.' Sirius said everyone then copied his idea afterwards.
'Let's go. Sirius will lead. I'll go last.' James said and they began walking down the passage.
They walked in silence for most it.
20 minutes into the walk James realised that they had only guessed where the passage led. What if it led somewhere else?
They really should've checked it out before they actually used it to visit Gracie.
It was too late now.
The passage was going downwards which it needed to do obviously because they had started out on the fourth floor, and then it levelled out and then suddenly.
'Ahh!' Sirius said ahead of them was a slope going downwards. Sirius hadn't seen it and had stepped forwards and fell down it.
'Do we have to?' Lily asked.
'What do you think?' Emmeline said and slid down after Sirius.
Lily hesitated them went after Emmeline, then Marlene went and then James.
'Ow!'
'Get off!'
'You're crushing me!'
James landed with a flop on top of Marlene.
'Do- you- mind?' Sirius groaned he was at the bottom of the dog pile.
'Sorry.'
James stood up first as he was at the top and then was followed by everyone else.
'Where do you think we are?' Emmeline questioned looking around the basement they had landed in.
Crates and boxes were scattered in the room and there was a staircase leading upwards.
'Zonko's.' Sirius said quietly.
'How did you know that?' James looked at him in surprise.
'It says on the boxes.' Sirius shrugged.
Then Sirius and James went wide eyes and rushed towards the boxes.
'Yes! Yes! Yes!' Sirius cried out happily when he found that the boxes were full of prank items.
'Look at these! We could-' James said happily.
'No Potter! You're not stealing!' Lily shouted at him.
'Keep it down.' Marlene hissed glancing upstairs worriedly.
'The shop is obviously above us and we still need that fireplace to floo from… an office! Where would an office be…? Above the shop!' James mumbled to himself.
'Right. Let's just go. Stick with each other closely. If anyone asks we start Hogwarts in September.' Sirius said.
'Start in September? I'm sorry but I don't think-'
'Shh.'
They started slowly up the stairs to the shop.
'Sirius opened a tiny bit of the door leading to the shop and looked.
He sighed out in relief.
'On the other side is the office! There's another door that must lead to the shop.'
'Well that saves us going upstairs.' James shrugged.
'And there's a fireplace!' Sirius said, fully opening the door.
'Lily floo powder.' James demanded.
Lily reached in and took the floo powder out of her pocket.
'Lily you can go first, wait for us on the other side.' James told her.
'Where am I flooing to?'
'The Leaky Cauldron.' James and Sirius said.
'The Leaky Cauldron!' Lily said, throwing the floo powder in the fireplace and disappearing.
James could hear the noise from the shop on the other side of the door. Children's and adult's laughter, things exploding or making weird noises and,
'Yes, I'll go and get some more now from storage. I'll be back in a minute.'
'Quickly!'
Luckily Marlene and Sirius had already gone.
'Go Emmeline. Someone's coming!'
'The Leaky Cauldron!'
Emmeline disappeared just as the door began to open-
James grabbed a handful, threw it in the flames and-
'Hey! What-'
'The Leaky Cauldron!' James yelled and he began traveling to his destination with his eyes closed and his elbows tucked in.
He stumbled out of the fireplace a few seconds after.
He looked around the leaky cauldron. Drunks sat in one corner and Tom the barman stood behind the counter, washing some mugs. A couple were holding hands and eating at another table and his friends were crouched down in the corner.
James walked quickly over to them.
'Why are you-?' He was going to ask why they were crouching down and nearly hiding under a table when Sirius slapped a hand over his mouth; silently pointing to two people James hadn't spotted before.
His parents.
James cursed.
Why today of all days did his parents decide to visit Diagon Alley?
Just his luck.
'We have to crawl. I'm dead if they see us her. Follow.' James began crawling and working his way through the tables.
They had to go slowly or the floor boards would creek which would alert people of their presence.
Unluckily for them, they had to go right past where his parents were sitting to get to the door.
Holding his breath he crawled past his parents like he used to do as a toddler.
Which was kind of awkward…
He had nearly made it past when his mother dropped her napkin.
James froze as she reached down the pick it up. His mother's hand felt around for it and nearly touched his own hand.
'No, no, no, no!' James said inside his head and cheered silently inside when his mother picked up the napkin without discovering her only son that was meant to be at Hogwarts at this very moment in time wasn't there and was under the table her and her husband were eating at in The Leaky Cauldron.
He crawled passed and opened the door on his hands and knees and prayed no one would see it opening.
James did a mini victory dance when he made it outside. The other 4, Emmeline, Sirius, Marlene and Lily, turned up soon after him.
'C'mon then.' He began walking.'
'We need to get Texi or is it a Cabe? Or a bus?' James looked at Lily.
'You mean a Taxi or a Cab?' She asked.
James nodded.
'Where can we get one?'
'Well first of I hope you have some money.'
'I do.' James said proudly, reaching into his pocket and finding pulling out some Galleons.
'You idiot,' Lily face palmed. 'You need Muggle money.'
James frowned.
'Well that's a bit stupid isn't it? I'll just change it at Gringotts.' He shrugged.
'Gringotts in Diagon Alley so don't we need to go back to The Leaky Cauldron?' Emmeline pointed out.
'No way am I going back there and risking my life again.' James said firmly.
'Your life? That's a bit dramatic don't you think?' Marlene chuckled.
'Not really.' James shook his head.
'I have an idea.' Sirius spoke up.
'Please share then.' Lily said sourly.
'We confound the tanki driver so we don't have to pay!' Sirius suggested.
'I like it!' James said immediately, high fiving his best friend.
'No! That's stealing! It's wrong! And what about if the spell goes wrong and he gets confusedon how to drive and then we die?'Lilyprotested against the idea.
'He won't forget to drive! We'll confound him afterwards!'
'Sirius, I never thought I would say this but you are a genius,' James said, wiping away a fake tear. 'I am so proud.'
'Why thank you James.'
A/N: I think I have an immediately spelt wrong in there somewhere so sorry and I have 18 reviews now! Yay! So last chapter I asked if I could make it 20. So please review! Thank you! Also, I'm so sorry for posting a day late! So this chapter is last week's chapter, you'll still get another for this week. My excuse is, I started writing this last night, got halfway through and then my dad wanted to go on the computer so I had to give it to him and dint finished it until today1 So I'm very sorry about that! I'll try and get the next chapter to you earlier than usual to say sorry. Okay?