Holly walked down the book aisle at the small BX RAF Croughton boasted. One hardback caught her eye, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, # 1 best seller. So Harry Potter had hit America. Of course she had read this book months before when it had come out in England, as Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, many times in fact. She still couldn't believe it, she could have gone to school with Harry Potter, Harry Potter! She sighed, and continued down the aisle. Her aunt had told her all about J.K. Rowling, and how she had decided to turn Harry's years at Hogwarts into a fantasy series for muggle children. It had been a big hit, with all that had happened at Hogwarts that year.

Holly herself had been going to a school in Banbury, with some other American kids. Only two other people new how close she had been to not going to a muggle school at all. She smiled at a tall girl in the next aisle arguing with a boy with a mass of dark hair. Here were her two best friends, the only people who knew the school that Rowling exposed to so many children really existed.

"Hey, holly, help me out here. Tell Cory that he should come back to B.G.N." the girl said.

The truth was none of them really liked Blessed George Napier, but it was a heck lot better than the school on base. Talk about lowering your IQ level.

"Cory, me and Rach really miss you! It's hard being the only Americans in school, besides do you actually like going to the American school?!"

Cory just shrugged and grinned, "Oh stop freaking out you two! I'll be back at school on Monday."

And with that he turned and walked off. She and Rachel just stared at each other, and smiled. "Well I gotta go, but I'll ride over at about one, k?" Rachel grinned, "Sure, if my mom will let me out of the house!" Holly just smiled.

It never failed, the weekends were always so sunny and filled with fun riding up and down the streets of Caversfeild, but when Monday rolled around, it was an entirely different story. Waking up early, shrugging into the navy blazer, and trudging up the street to find the sky gray and cold. And it was raining. Not the nice pleasant sort of rain showers that came, poured, and went, but the awful endless drizzle that seemed more like mist than rain. We all meet up on the corner, the three of us, standing boldly out on the edge of the street, waiting for our bus in the drizzle. There was a bus stop, but the one time we had waited out our vigil in there the bus drove right past us (when it finally came) so we gave up that idea real fast. We sure had some wild times on the way to school, once the window fell out and almost took with it a conceited jerk by the name of James Craig. That was before we even got to school! Don't get me wrong, we had some good times too, but most of the time we just couldn't tell, we wanted to be out of there so bad.

The time finally came that we had all been waiting for; their three years in England were up. The realization of what this meant dawned, they would be split up. Cory was the first one to go; his family had been reassigned to Italy. The morning they left was a sad one; Rachel was out of town, so it was just Holly, her mom, and her brother, Kipp, to see them off. She hugged Cory and Lauren, his sister, one last time as they took last minute photos. Holly had no idea when she would even see them again if ever. As they drove away, she shed the tears that had not fallen during the goodbyes. It was going to be a long, sad summer.

It was even worse when Rachel left. They stood out in the middle of the street and hugged, "You have to visit!"

"Yeah! Then you can come to D.C. with me!" they smiled weakly at each other as their parents said their goodbyes.

The two girls hugged again. This time the tears did come as she stood embracing her best friend in the whole wide world. They only broke apart when Rachel's mom gently pulled Rachel away. Holly watched as they disappeared round the corner, tears still streaming.