A/N: Sorry for the long gap. I've been really busy with school and crud. We have our term exams this week and we had band practice everyday last week. And I was busy with practice for some cruddy presentation. Hope you like this chapter.
Disclaimer: I don't own any of these characters.
CHAPTER THREE
Harry's head was spinning when he got out of the fireplace at the Leaky Cauldron. Ron and Ginny went ahead of him. Mrs. Weasley, Mr. Weasley, Bill and Charlie Apparated and appeared the moment Harry stepped out of the fire.
"Where to first?" Mrs. Weasley asked.
"Gringotts," Mr. Weasley decided. It was pretty obvious anyway.
The five Weasleys and Harry walked to the tall white marble building.
"Do you mind if I go to my account alone?" Harry nervously asked Mrs. Weasley when the got past the dragons.
"Of course not. Oh, just take Ron with you," she agreed.
"Ok. Thank you."
Harry and Ron walked off to where the carts were. They got into one with a goblin named Hannin. Hannin was a very amusing goblin that had five children and a boarhound like Fang. He kept talking to Harry and Ron; he almost forgot to stop the cart at Harry's vault.
"Whoops. Here we are," Hannin said.
Harry and Ron stepped out of the cart and Harry unlocked the vault door. To his and Ron's amazement, there was more gold than the last time Harry had checked.
"Is this my vault?" Harry asked Hannin.
"Yes."
Harry stuffed his bag with gold coins. He wanted to forget the jealous look on Ron's face. He felt really bad for Ron.
Ron and Harry got back into the cart and went to where the desks were to meet the Weasleys but they weren't there yet.
While Ron sat somewhere, Harry went over to one goblin behind a desk and asked how much he had in his account. Only then did he find out that Sirius left him three million Galleons.
"Where on earth did he get that much money?" Harry's left-brain wondered.
"He did come from a rich family so he would have a lot of money," said Harry's right brain.
"That much? I don't think so," came the left-brain. Harry decided to shrug if off and put what he didn't need into the Weasleys' account. He, after all, didn't need that much money.
"What's up?" Ron asked when Harry finally found him sitting on one of the benches near the door.
"I'll tell you later," Harry softly said because he saw Ron's family walking up to them. Ron stood up.
"Ready to go?" Mr. Weasley asked.
"Yeah," Ron replied. "We're all done."
Harry and the Weasleys walked out of Gringotts and Mrs. Weasley started talking.
"Why don't we separate? Ginny and I will get your schoolbooks. Arthur has to meet someone at the Leaky Cauldron. Bill and Charlie are going with us to Flourish and Blotts. What are you boys up to?" Mrs. Weasley asked.
"Don't know. Haven't decided yet," Ron said.
"Ok. Not a step down Knockturn Alley! We'll all meet up at the Leaky Cauldron at seven-thirty," Mrs. Weasley said.
They all nodded in unison and walked off in different directions.
"Where do you want to go?" Ron asked.
"Have you ever been to Fred and George's joke shop?" Harry asked.
"Nope. Let's go!" Ron excitedly said.
Harry and Ron excitedly walked to Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes. The just followed the numerous signs that they saw. They finally got to the store. It was made out of stone and for some strange reason, it stood out.
"Looks kinda cramped, don't you think?" Ron asked Harry.
"Yeah," Harry mindlessly said, staring at the big red-and-gold (Gryffindor colors) sign.
Ron pushed the door open so that he and Harry could come in. It was really bright and cheerful. The space inside was really big, not small like they had imagined it to be. Suddenly, out of nowhere, a loud sound that said "INTRUDER ALERT! INTRUDER ALERT!" went off. The door was still open. The look on Ron's face was priceless.
"GOTCHA!" one of the twins shouted from the second floor. Harry didn't notice the second floor when he looked around.
"Harry! Ron! Splendid you see you!" the other twin greeted them when he came from the back room, carrying a box.
"George!" Ron grinned. "How've you been?"
"Fine. The store's doing great. Lots of customers as you can see."
Harry looked around and there were a lot of customers carrying a lot of things they got from walking shelves, crawling boxes and low-flying tables with no legs.
"Harry! How's your summer?" Fred asked Harry when he finally got to the first floor.
"Fine. Really boring if you ask me. But better than the last time. the Dursleys went to Tahiti for a week and left me alone in the house to do whatever," Harry replied. "Err... how's the business?"
"Superb. I've been seeing Hogwarts students everyday for the past month coming in. Ahh, there's Lee now," Fred said, pointing to the door from the back room where a boy with dreadlocks emerged from.
"Harry! Ron! How are you?" Lee asked them.
The boys talked for five more minutes because the lines for paying were getting longer and longer because there was no one to accept the money.
"I'll just check out stuff on the second floor," Ron said, pointing to the narrow staircase and heading towards it.
Harry nodded. He walked over to the tall, motionless shelves near the cashier, and browsed the joke books the store had for grabs.
Since Harry was right behind the cashier, he could hear whatever Fred or George or Lee said without being seen. He could hear Fred talking to a girl who was buying some Farting Food and Bloody Quills.
"Are you still with Harry?" Harry heard Fred ask the girl. Half of his attention was with Fred because he was deeply absorbed in the book he was reading. He couldn't really make out what Fred was saying.
"No. We were never together. We 'broke off' before the last term ended. He was acting all weird. I tried to get him back by 'liking' someone else but he didn't get jealous. Oh well," the girl said. Harry was really amused at their conversation.
"Do you still like him?"
"Yeah. I, do. Sort of. But he hates me."
"I don't think he does. By the way, he was here a few minutes ago."
"Really?"
"Yeah. He didn't stay long though. Dunno where he went."
Fred's and the girl's voices suddenly became softer. Harry didn't mind because he was really deeply absorbed with the Book of Pranks. He decided to buy it. Harry's nose was buried in the book when he walked away from the shelf to pay for the book. He finally looked up and saw who Fred was talking to. Fred's and Cho's jaws dropped at the sight of Harry.
A/N: Sorry for a lame chapter. I'll try to make it up. And I can't update soon coz I'm really busy at school but I'll try my best. Thanks for all your reviews. Ü
