It was still early afternoon when she left her hotel in London, so she'd decided to do the first round of shopping in Diagon Alley today. As soon as she stepped out of the entrance hall, she had to pull her cloak closer as she felt the chilly wind which was typical for London. She entered the Leaky Cauldron, a pub which marked the connection between Muggle London and the wizarding world as the entrance to Diagon Alley is situated at its backyard, and immediately felt like being taken into a completely different world. Having lived amongst Muggles, she was used to do everything the Muggle way, even at home. Now, she was surrounded by people who used magic for nearly everything. There was a rather shabby looking man reading his newspaper while his tea was stirring itself and dirty plates and mugs were floating into the kitchen on their own – just with a whip of the waiter's wand. She must have looked rather stupid to the other costumers because she wore a broad smile on her lips and couldn't take her eyes off the simplest spells that were performed around her. After a few more minutes she was able to get herself to move on. She stepped out in the backyard, took out her wand and tapped the bricks on the wall in a certain order, as her father had shown her more than ten years ago. After she had touched the last brick, the bricks started to move and soon left a big gap in the wall which revealed the crowded street behind. Though she had been in Diagon Alley last year, she was impressed like it was the first time. The mismatched colourful store fronts were definitely a sight to behold. There were all kind of shops along both sides of the street – shops for books, school robes, pets, potion ingredients and even one for Quidditch supplies, a sport played on broomsticks which was very popular in the wizarding world. As the serious shopping business could wait a little longer she decided to head for the latter. She had never played or even seen Quidditch, but her father had told her a lot about it as he had been Keeper for his house team at Hogwarts. From what he had told her it reminded her somehow of rugby, one of the sports she used to play in the Muggle world, but as she saw the moving pictures of different Quidditch teams moving around in Quality Quidditch Supplies she realized that it was a lot different than she had expected it to be. She was utterly fascinated how natural it seemed for the players to fly around on broomsticks like it was just part of their body. She had never had the chance to try it but she imagined it to be rather difficult, even more when you also had to concentrate on passing a ball. Moreover, the brooms she discovered in that shop looked rather uncomfortable to sit on for hours, but she guessed there had to be some sort of spell to change that. Wondering about all that Quidditch stuff made her realise again how little she actually knew about the wizarding world.

After she left the Quidditch shop she took out the supplies list for the coming term and scanned through the items again. She needed several books for her subjects, quill and parchment, school robes, but, first of all, money. So she went to Gringott's to take some money from her very own vault for the second time in her life. She had inherited a decent amount of money from her parents, which would be more than enough to buy all her school supplies and even a broom – she came to fancy the idea of trying to ride one of them and was sure someone at Hogwarts would volunteer to show her how to do it. But she had to make sure to get her school supplies first.

People kept throwing curious glances at her in almost every shop as she was asking some stupid questions usually only a first-year would, but after two more hours she'd finally bought everything she needed. Her arms were now loaded with tons of new books from Florish & Blotts, potions ingredients that rattled in their bag at the tiniest move of her arm, and a huge bag with her new school robes. For a few minutes she thought about just going back to her hotel, but she then decided she could no longer avoid taking a look at her once favourite shop. She expected to be immediately reminded of the amazing times she'd spent there, but when she went around the corner she realised with indignation that the now abandoned shop almost wasn't recognizable. The once colourful windows, crammed with the most curious things she had ever seen, were covered in a thick layer of dust and were even damaged at some parts. With a deep sigh she let herself fall on a bench opposite the shop. She let her mind drift back to the time she first passed this exact place.

She had been standing in front of it, staring with her mouth open at the all those funny looking, colourful sweets with strange names like "Pukin Pastilles" or "Nosebleed Nougat", when suddenly someone tapped her on her left shoulder. "Do you need help? You look quite lost to be honest." a boy asked her. Her gaze met his eyes. They were a bit wrinkled at the outer ends because he was smiling at her, but what caught her most was the colour. She completely lost herself in the smooth dark brown that was occasionally intervened by amber lines whenever light fell upon them. "Excuse me? Do you speak English?", he asked again and she suddenly realized with a shock that she had just been staring at him without answering his question. She immediately felt her cheeks turning a bright shade of red and looked at the floor. "Ehm…Yes…Yes, of course. I mean…I'm sorry. Yes… Yes it would be great to get some help…actually", she stammered. His smile broadened, which caught her even more than his eyes…

"I wonder when they are going to sell that shop. It's been abandoned for some months now." Jane nearly jumped as she got drawn out of her thoughts by two elderly witches passing her bench and talking to each other. After their first pretty embarrassing meeting, they had spent a quite funny day walking through the various shops in Diagon Alley. She still remembered how her muscled had hurt afterwards due to all that laughing. She usually was quite a shy person, but, somehow, she had felt like he was just a long forgotten friend. "It's such a shame, isn't it? The two boys running it looked quite promising. I wonder what happened," the other gentlemen continued the conversation, which was gradually fading from Jane's hearing.

Hearing those two men talk so casually about something that seemed to rip her heart out everytime she risked a glance at the faded orange façade made it even worse. Jane had to close her eyes for a second in order to fight back the tears that were already burning in her eyes. But there was no point in torturing herself any longer. She didn't even know what she had hoped to find here. After all, he wouldn't just magically appear in front of her like last time. However, there was one more thing she needed to do. The girl walked over to the shop. Putting a shaking hand on the doorknob, she turned and pushed. Nothing happened. Apparently, they hadn't forgotten to lock the door when they last left the shop. Through the dusty windows, she was able to get a better glimpse of the inside. Everything looked dull. Empty and half-unpacked boxes were scattered across the floor, as well as some broken glass and various once colourful items. All the magic that had surrounded the place seemed to have left with its owners. This was when reality hit her, probably for the very first time. Wherever she'd go. Whatever she'd do, there was no way she'd every see him again, ever laugh with him. Jane turned around and let herself fall against the door. There was no stopping her tears now, which were silently streaming down her cheeks.

After a few deep breaths, she finally took her bags, threw a last longing look at the shop and went back to her hotel. She'd spend one more week there before she'd take the Hogwarts Express from King's Cross Station, the main train station in London, which was also the location of the strange Platform 9 ¾. One more week to prepare herself for the year ahead and get accustomed to the new language, she'll be using.