Picking out their ice creams and a drink, Harry and Petunia headed over to the only free table in Fortescue's, just behind the girl with the bushy hair. Given how fast she was talking he wasn't surprised that table was still free as the other patrons seemed to be dealing with their own children. Just as he'd sat down at the table, and was about to start his Ice-Cream (it deserved the capital letters as it was the first time he'd had any flavour other than vanilla) his owl swooped down out of the sky and landed between him and the ice-cream and barked at him.
"Oh, come on… I'm sorry… We had a… Well I didn't know… Ok… Yes… But I was meeting… OK, I'll tell you next time I need to leave you behind… Yes, if it's possible I'll bring you along too… No you can't just ride on my shoulder, it's not something people do… I don't know… If you can find a way for me to do it out of the magical world, I'm all ears… Yes… Can I eat my Ice-Cream now?" As she hopped up onto his shoulder imperiously, he noticed that the whole store had gone quiet. The girl behind him broke the silence and suddenly everyone went back to what they were doing.
"Hi, I'm Hermione, were you really talking to her? How did you do that? What breed is she? Are you going to Hogwarts? What do you think of Diagon Alley?"
Harry looked more than a little overwhelmed, and somewhat startled that at some point during her questioning Hermione had moved to sit next to him with her own ice-cream.
"Hey honey, why don't you slow down a little, I don't think he's had time to answer your first question yet." Her father interjected, bringing her tirade of questions to a halt and causing her face to flush bright red.
Harry spoke up before she could get going again, "Hi, I'm Harry. She's my new Owl, but I've not given her a name yet as I only got her yesterday. Pleased to meet you."
At which point the conversation continued in a much more normal manner, though Hermione still seemed to be taking the scatter shot approach to interrogation.
Her parents motioned to Petunia to come and sit opposite them while they were talking.
"Hi, I'm Dan Granger, and this is my wife Emma, and we're that little ball of energy's parents. Though to be honest it's great to see her actually having a conversation with another kid rather than talking to us or reading a book."
"No problem, I'm a bit the same way with Harry, he hasn't had the… happiest life before now and I'm glad it looks like he's going to be able to make some friends at Hogwarts."
The adult conversation was some what more sedate as they covered a sanitised version of what had happened over the last week with Harry's letters, and what both parties did in the Magical world, as well as what they did in their normal lives. They covered everything from transport to Magical Guardians, and the map came out along with the goblin list of recommendations. The conversation was interrupted when Hermione came round and tugged on Emma's sleeve.
"Mummy, Mummy, can we get a bag like Harry's, as I can put my arm into it up to the shoulder, just imagine how many books I could carry around."
"They're not too expensive, they work out at around £25, though do make sure that you get a bag with runic enchantments rather than just cast, as we're going to have to go back later to get some of the charms redone on the bag that Harry bought me."
"Ok honey, we can do that later." Emma told Hermione and promptly got a vice like hug back.
The children returned to their conversation as did the adults for a while before they were interrupted again.
"Aunt Petunia."
"Yes Harry"
"Can you tell Hermione about The Dream, as she doesn't believe me."
"It can't be true as all the books say it's a fairy tale used to scare children into going to sleep!" Hermione interrupted.
"It is true, it's where Nixie found me when Harry took us there accidently, and I think it's why I'm magical now." As she was talking she placed Nixie onto Hermione's shoulder.
"But there's nothing there… Ohh… It's so furry, why can't I see it?"
"I don't know, she's perfectly visible to both Harry and I, try holding her and letting her suck on your finger."
Hermione giggles as she does just that. "That feels so funny, and it tickles. Look Mum!"
Dan shakes his head at being left out as his wife looks at her empty hand and then puts a finger on her palm.
"Hey don't do that you'll hurt her… How did you do that, you just put your finger straight through her."
Suddenly something occurred to her and she got a betrayed look on her face.
"If she came from The Dream, why do the books say it doesn't exist?"
Dan decided to field this one. "You know we've taught you about logical fallacies. Well one of those is treating speculation as fact, and it even happens in our world. Do you remember me saying the Sun wasn't allowed in our house? Do you remember why?"
"This isn't worth the paper it's printed on, all they do is make stuff up and say it's facts." She recited.
"That's right, so what have you learnt today?"
"Sometimes books lie?"
"Close enough."
Another thing occurred to her and she started crying, "Mum, Dad, can I learn to meditate as I don't want to disappear, and Harry said that he's learning to meditate so that he won't get caught in the dream."
Dan and Emma looked up at Petunia who nodded. "OK dear, we'll get you some books and you can learn."
She immediately cheered up, "Thank you, I'm going to get really really good at it, and then I'll take you into The Dream and bring you back so that you become magical like me."
Smiling indulgently they watched as she went back to their ice-cream and started talking to Harry again.
"Looks like we're going to have to visit each other sooner rather than later."
Petunia nodded, and pointed to her map. "Why don't we go to Globus Mundi Travel and see if we can find out about the Knight bus we were told about, I wanted to pop into the house-elf placement agency to find out what a house-elf is. On the way we can pop into Gringotts to make an appointment to see what your options are for Magical Guardians. I figure we can then drop those two into Whizz Hard Books, with some money and I might have time to do the rest of our shopping."
"Hey, no Nixie where did you go?"
"I've got her."
"My ice-cream glass isn't cold anymore."
"I think she ate the cooling charm."
"Oh, I should go and apologise."
"Mr, I'm sorry, but I think Nixie ate the cooling charm on your glass, I'm really sorry."
"I think we're also going to have to get you runic charms for any of the things that you've bought Hermione if she's going to be spending any time with us."
Not 5 minutes later their conversation was interrupted again.
"Aunt Petunia, Aunt Petunia, can I take Hermione to my room she wants to see my suitcase."
Smiling indulgently, she looks up at the Grangers who nodded. "Ok, go ahead, but wait there till we get there, we've got a few things to do first"
With that Harry drags Hermione off to the Hopping Pot and she can't help but laugh at seeing him behaving like a child for once. "Come on, let's go, the sooner we get done the less trouble they can get into."
Getting things done goes quite smoothly with the only wrinkle being when they visit the House-Elf placement agency, and all the available elves popped in and asked to bond with the lady with the "nice strong magic". After a couple of minutes trying to explain to a species that has learnt to weaponize puppy dog eyes, they managed to find out that house elves are a servant race, no they're not slaves they just need to live in highly magical places or to bond with a witch or wizard and share their magic. As all those places are either someone's home or somewhere like Diagon Alley and Hogwarts, they tend to choose to bond rather than overcrowd the few places that can support them.
When they finally get to the room, Dan and Emma are talked into getting Hermione a Travel Trunk, and laughing they agree and say that they can use her old trunk for books or something.
Even leaving the children in the book store doesn't quite go to plan, as they were banking on the fact that Hermione normally needs to be prised from one, instead they come back to find out that Harry dragged her to get a properly fitted wand, holster and then back to the bookshop.
Finally, two exhausted families, now linked by Magical Guardianship, have checked out of their rooms and are just flagging down the Knight bus to go home.
"I know you said that you needed to work tomorrow, if you'd like I could bring Harry round and take Hermione to get her second wand."
"I would really appreciate it if you could, I know it's not ideal but it's so hard to take time off when you're self-employed, even as Dentists."
Half an hour later Harry and Petunia were getting off the Knight bus while waving goodbye to the Grangers. Walking home they both froze as they crossed a sharp boundary that felt wrong, like fingers were crawling inside them and sinking their claws into their soul. They both nearly collapsed as there was a sudden draw on their magic and a sullen red glowing shield became visible to them. Leaning on each other they staggered to the front door and fumbled the door open and managing to get to the chairs before they collapsed.