The strap of her duffel resting on her shoulder, Taylor walked out of the train station into the bright mid-day sunlight, clutching the manila envelope full of the team's travel information tightly to her chest. She had already checked and double-checked the company name of the shuttle taking them to the airport, but so far she couldn't see it waiting on the curb anywhere.
Taylor turned around, ready to give instructions (some variation of "hurry up and wait"), and was frustrated to find that only half her teammates had actually followed her outside.
"It's like herding cats," she muttered, using one of her mother's favorite phrases. Nearby, Oliver looked at her curiously.
Rapidly shifting her weight from foot to foot, knees alternately jutting out and back again, Taylor recognized her usual I'm-irritable tick and tried to stand still. She was about to go back inside when Richard, George, Gary and Mel finally came into view. Gary and Mel both gave a start when the automatic glass doors of the station front slid open. They regarded it curiously, paused on the threshold, and then hurried through as the doors started to close on them.
Taylor grinned, wishing she had watched the rest of the team exit the building earlier. At the time she was too worried about leading the pack outside to catch the (now quite late) shuttle.
"What kept you?" asked Donna, who had set her luggage down on the ground and was sitting on it.
"Muggle paper," said Mel, breathlessly, looking cross. She glanced back over her shoulder at the automatic doors, which were now opening for an elderly couple entering the building.
"Look," said Richard, and most everyone gathered closer around him. "Saw the headline on one and had to grab a copy." He turned the paper to face the crowd and pointed to the headline.
CATASTROPHIC GAS MAIN EXPLOSION AT SALEM BOARDING SCHOOL, DOZENS INJURED
"It's what the Muggles think happened in the States," explained Gary. He was rubbing his face gingerly. Others were bending closer to Richard or were trying to pull the paper toward them to read it properly.
"They say anything about deaths?" asked Ann. She shared a worried glance with Donna, sitting next to her. "I think the Prophet's been keeping it quiet."
Taylor, however, was momentarily worried about something else.
"Which of you had the Muggle money to pay for that?" she asked.
The three boys all looked briefly at each other, and then said, simultaneously, "Umm..."
Oliver let out a low growl.
"If one of you," he began threateningly, "was actually stupid enough to—"
"Nothing magic!" George said, quickly. "Just...good old-fashioned pilfering…" His voice trailed off near the end.
Taylor could practically hear Oliver's teeth grinding from where she stood a few feet away.
"No one saw it," said George, defensively. "Gary and Mel came up with a distraction."
Mel made an angry noise through her nose and Richard seemed to be biting back laughter.
"He grabbed her—swept her off her feet, mind you—and snogged her proper," explained Richard, happily.
"And then she hit me," Gary said ruefully, still carefully massaging the left side of his face.
"And in the resulting ruckus, Richie and I got away scot-free," said George, evidently pleased with himself.
"Please don't call me that," Richard said, wincing.
Taylor was momentarily unable to be angry as she tried to picture the scene. She was having difficulty managing it, since Mel towered over Gary by a good six inches or so.
Out of the corner of her eye, Taylor saw Oliver moving forward to stand next to her. Still looking furious, he opened his mouth—but Taylor cut in before he could say anything, half-stepping sideways to block him with her shoulder.
"Next time, just ask me," Taylor said to the rest of the team, some of whom were looking worriedly over her shoulder. She tried to ignore Oliver at her back, and imagined his scowl looming down at them all. "I have Muggle money."
She had, indeed, found an envelope of Muggle money in the folder. At first she had been confused, but it was obvious to her once she thought about it that they would need it for plenty of small interactions just to make their way through the Muggle world.
"But seriously, we need to keep a low profile, alright?" continued Taylor, regarding the rest of her teammates solemnly. "The goal is not to be noticed or stand out at all," she finished.
Charles and the girls nodded at her, but the rest were trying to get a hold on the newspaper. Richard was pulling it free of everyone else's grasping hands, scowling.
"Easy, easy," he said, using his elbows liberally to hold them all off. "I'll read it out loud, yeah?"
Richard proceeded to do so, and as everyone else's attention was on him, Taylor turned to Oliver. He didn't look happy.
"Taylor," Oliver started, but Taylor held up a hand.
"I handled it," Taylor said quietly. "You put me in charge; let me handle it."
Oliver still appeared ready to further argue the point, but behind them the airport shuttle had arrived and Taylor turned.
"Not now," she said, quickly. "Here's our ride."
Around her, people were picking up luggage. Donna sighed again as she stood and recovered her slightly-squashed suitcase, and Taylor ushered her teammates toward the shuttle.
The driver, a hefty-looking man in a slightly-too-small uniform, stepped out and surveyed them all. He looked harassed and over-warm, sweat stains visible under his arms and across his back when he turned to open the back doors.
"Are you the University sports team?" he asked, over his shoulder.
"Yes," said Taylor. "That's us."
The driver started packing luggage into the back of the shuttle, and people started piling into the van. Taylor was last in, and it was a tight fit between the eleven of them plus the driver.
"Well this is comfy," said George cheerfully, as Kyle accidentally elbowed him in the face while trying to buckle his own seatbelt.