Okay, this is more of a just-for-fun chapter. It doesn't move the plot along much, just kind of lets them enjoy each other. Anyway, the Scrabble game is an actual real game that could be played. I tried to give enough hints that you could actually play the game if you were so inclined. It was a fun chapter to write. Hope you all enjoy reading it.



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Chapter 27

How Do You Spell W-I-Z-A-R-D?

The first few minutes inside the Robinson home were a little awkward for Harry as he watched Mrs. Robinson and Cassie bustle around the kitchen preparing dinner. He wanted to offer to help but was kind of shy about asking. He had no idea what he could really do to help as his very fledgling cooking skills were probably inadequate. They did seem to be doing a lot of chopping, though. Harry was pretty good at chopping things - lots of potions practice - but he wasn't sure that being qualified to cut dragon liver into equal mince would win him a lot of points at dinner tonight. Well, he sincerely hoped not.

He also had to admit that watching Cassie in the kitchen was enjoyable. Of course, watching her do anything was enjoyable. He flushed a little remembering how he had been caught staring at Cassie earlier that afternoon and tried to make sure that he was not looking at certain parts of her anatomy as he did not want her to get mad at him again and certainly would have been completely embarrassed if her mother had noticed him staring at her . . . Well, it just would be too humiliating. The fact that she had walked out onto the porch a few minutes ago when Harry was kissing Cassie did not help alleviate his nerves. Harry hoped that Cassie's parents did not think he was being too forward with her. She had said her parents wouldn't mind as long as they behaved themselves, but Harry wasn't sure exactly what that meant. All he knew is that when he was with her, he kept wanting to kiss her and hold her. It was probably best that they stayed at her house this evening.

Just when Harry had decided to stay in a corner of the kitchen and try to be as inconspicuous as possible, Mrs. Robinson smiled at him and asked if he would be willing to set the table. Cassie helped him find all the plates and glasses and Harry stepped into the dining room.

When the Robinsons and Harry finally sat down to dinner, they enjoyed a large chef salad (which explained all the chopping Harry had witnessed) and some sort of multi-grained rolls. Harry was a little hesitant to try them, fearing they might taste like Hagrid's rock cakes. They kind of looked like them. However, he decided to be brave when he saw the boys eating happily. After all, if a 7-year-old could eat them, how bad could they be? He was pleasantly surprised after his first tentative bite, and was buttering his roll when Mr. Robinson looked at Cassie and asked, "So, what did the two of you do today?"

Cassie said, "Well, we had lunch at the pizza place and then went and bought Harry a VCR. He didn't have one, you know. Then we went to his house and set it up. It works great."

"Well, that's nice," Mr. Robinson remarked as he reached for more salad.

"While we were there," Cassie continued, "Harry wrote my name with his quill pen. He doesn't have any regular pens, just a quill pen -- and a bottle of ink." Harry swallowed hard, choking down a bite of his roll that suddenly felt like the size of an entire loaf of bread. He wished that Cassie had not brought that up. It just emphasized again how different he was from "normal" people and he was trying not to let them know exactly how different he really was. Cassie's mother wanted to see what the writing looked like, so Cassie got up from the table and ran into her bedroom to get it. Harry noticed that she only brought out the one piece of paper - the one that had her name written on it. She had done as he had asked and kept his secret. He relaxed slightly. She passed it around the table and everyone admired it. Harry thought they were making a big deal of nothing; his handwriting was usually criticized by his professors as being careless and sloppy. Of course, he had done his best and there were no ink blots or smears. He normally did not worry that much about his homework parchments. He blushed under everyone's praise and concentrated on eating while she ran the paper back into her room.

Both of her parents looked at Harry with odd expressions. Mrs. Robinson was the first to break the small silence when she asked, "Does everyone use quill pens and bottles of ink at your school?"

Harry nodded and said, "Yeah. That's what all the students and teachers use."

"Why?" asked Cassie's mother.

Harry replied, "I really don't know - that's just what we use." And this was the truth. He wasn't sure why they used quill pens at Hogwarts rather than ball point pens. That's just the way it had always been, he supposed. Cassie returned after this comment, sliding into the chair next to Harry with a smile.

She continued on with her description of their day as though she had never left the table, "Plus, you're not going to believe what we had to do to get into Harry's house . . . ." Cassie began, but Harry realized what she was about to say and he gave a small shake of his head. Cassie sucked in her breath and bit her lip. To Harry's relief, no one noticed what she had begun to say as Matthew and John had started arguing about a game they had played earlier in the day, apparently not as enraptured with the idea of quill-pen writing as the adults. Their parents had given their full attention to the boys and had missed Cassie's statement completely.

Harry turned his attention back to his dinner, smiling at Cassie reassuringly. He finished his roll and was helping himself to some more salad when a sudden familiar sharp pain shot across his forehead. Completely taken by surprise, Harry dropped the salad tongs, caught his breath in a sudden cry of pain, and pressed his right hand tightly over his throbbing scar. He immediately felt foolish as every eye at the table turned toward him, staring as one at his hand still pressed over his face. Harry lowered his hand quickly, knowing there was no help for it now. He assumed they already knew about the scar, but that did not mean he wanted everyone to be staring at it. "Sorry," he muttered quietly, staring down at his empty plate, and feeling warmth creep up his neck.

"There's no reason to be embarrassed, dear," said Mrs. Robinson gently. "Cassie told us that you had a scar that hurts all the time. Can we get you something for it?"

"No, thank you. It will feel better in a minute." Harry was really embarrassed now.

"I think you should take something, Harry," Cassie interjected.

"I really don't think it will help." Harry had been experimented on more than he cared to remember by Madam Pomfrey who had tried every pain remedy known in the wizarding world when last year his scar had hurt him to the point of insanity for one week straight. Nothing really helped. He had even been desperate enough to try a potion Snape brewed for him on that occasion, even though he had sincerely feared he may not survive the experience. So he had come to the unwelcome conclusion that nothing helped curse scar pain except time and distance. He was used to a fairly steady low level of tingling all the time now, and the only reason he had even reacted a few minutes ago was because he was surprised. He had not felt the sharp stabbing pain for about a week or so, and it caught him, as always, unprepared for it.

Harry suddenly jumped in his chair. Cassie's cool fingers brushed his bangs, and she trailed them gently over the jagged lightning bolt on his forehead. He automatically grabbed her wrist and pushed her hand away from it. She looked a little hurt at his abrupt rejection of her touch, but she put her hand back in her lap and tried to smile at the rest of the family like it had been her own idea. Everyone was still looking at him. Harry also plastered a smile on his face. "The pain's all gone now. Sorry to disturb dinner like that." After a moment or two, everyone except for Harry and Cassie went back to eating their dinner and talking. Cassie picked at the salad that she still had left on her plate, smiling faintly when anyone asked her anything. Harry felt terrible. He hadn't meant to hurt her feelings - it was more of a gut reaction than anything. Most people didn't like to really touch his scar, stare at it, yes, but not touch it. She had caught him by surprise and he had reacted badly. He wanted to talk to her, to tell her he was sorry but this was not really the best time or place for it.

Dinner was finally over after what seemed to Harry like an interminable hour, although he supposed in reality it was only a few minutes. After dinner, everybody started helping to clear the dishes and Harry took his own plate and silverware off the table and carried them into the kitchen. He was about to go back for a second load when Cassie's mum firmly pushed both Harry and Cassie out of the kitchen into the family room. "You do not need to help with the dishes tonight, Harry. You go relax in the other room. Cassie, see if you can convince him to take something for his head." They stood in the other room awkwardly for a moment or two. Then they both spoke at once.

"Cassie, I . . . ."

"Harry, I . . . ."

They both laughed nervously and tried again, "I didn't mean to . . . ." Again, they spoke together.

"All right." This time it was just Harry. "I didn't mean to hurt your feelings. You just surprised me, that's all. And I embarrassed you and I really feel bad."

"I feel bad I embarrassed you. I didn't mean to." Cassie tried one more time, reaching up gently to brush the dark hair off his forehead. This time, when her cool fingers traced gently over the mark, he stood still and let her touch him. It really did feel nice. Harry had not been strictly truthful about the pain in his scar. It was still there, although to a greatly decreased degree, and her soft brush against it actually made it feel a little better.

However, something was still bothering Harry. "Do your parents think I'm some kind of a freak? They know about the scar and everything . . . ."

"No, I'm sure they don't think you're a freak. It's just a scar."

Harry felt a lot better. He decided he would be brave and reached for Cassie. She came willingly into his arms and they stood there for a couple of minutes before they were interrupted by her brothers, who ran into the room straight toward Harry. As they were forcefully separated by the two boys, who wanted to play with Harry, Cassie laughed and asked, "So, can you stay for a little while?" Harry thought for a moment and realized he had spent a good amount of time at home that day and was, therefore, he decided, justified if he stayed out for a while longer. "I think that would be great." Harry started tickling John while Matthew climbed on his back.

"Well," Harry said a few minutes later when John had run into the other room after Harry had tickled him into submission, "What do you want to do?" Personally, he wouldn't have minded just sitting and staring at her all night, but he decided not to suggest that option.

"Would you like to play a game?"

"Sure. Do you play chess?"

Cassie looked a little embarrassed and said, "No, I've never learned how. But I wouldn't mind learning sometime."

"I'll keep that in mind. I love playing chess. Ron and I play all the time at school." Cassie opened a cupboard where Harry could see a selection of board games, none of which he recognized.

"Do you like Monopoly?" Cassie asked, and it was Harry's turn to look a little embarrassed.

"Well," he hesitated and then mumbled, "Not really." He had played the wizard version of the game once and had not enjoyed it at all.

Cassie thought for a moment, looking over the selection, and then smiled, "Hey, how about Scrabble?" Harry had never heard of Scrabble.

"What is it?"

"It's a word game. You spell out words. It's really easy to play and fun, too."

"Oh, a word game, great," responded Harry with visions of Hermione dancing around in expectation of entertainment like this. Harry hoped he knew some words. At the moment, any that he once knew were gone out of his brain.

Cassie laughed and grabbed the game off the shelf. They quickly set up a card table, laid out the game, and Cassie gave a quick explanation how to play. As she was explaining Matthew sauntered over and asked if he could join in. Harry could tell that Cassie was not too excited about the idea, but she seemed to swallow any sharp retort she was going to make and she said instead, "Sure." As they sat down, Cassie said, "I should warn you, Harry, I'm pretty good at this game. I hope you don't mind if I beat you."

"Don't mind at all. Since it's my first time playing, I have no pride."

They all drew a tile to see who played first and Matthew won by drawing an A. Everybody started drawing at once, then, until they each had seven tiles on the little tray in front of them.

Harry stared at his tiles and tried to think of words he could make with the horrible collection of letters he had in front of him. He had drawn the letters Q, R, N, G, A, O, and an F. Somehow, he thought to himself with a grin, he did not think they would accept goranfq as a word. Unless something good happened before it got around to him, he would have to settle for rag as his word; not too great. Matthew went first and tried with a word "angr."

"ANGER. And that is 10 points for me."

"Well, it would be, but that is not how you spell anger," said Cassie gently.

"Yeah," said Harry. "Do you have an E or a Y? You could use those to make a real word."

"I have an E."

"Okay, then, put it between the G and R."

"Okay, then I get 12 points."

Cassie added a D to the front of Matthew's word to spell DANGER.

Harry sat and looked at his letters again. He could go ahead and spell RAG like he had planned off the R but thought he could maybe be a little more adventurous. "Oh," he said, suddenly seeing an alternative. He used the D and spelled DRAGON. There, that was better. He got 16 points for it and took the lead temporarily. Maybe this wouldn't be such a disaster after all.

They each took another turn, with Harry spelling ELF after Cassie used the N in dragon to spell the word ZEN. Matthew got stuck after that and called for his mother to come help him. While they were waiting, Cassie stood up and came to stand behind Harry. She put her hands on his shoulders and bent down to his ear. He felt shivers down his back from the feel of her breath on his ear.

"How are you doing? Really?" Harry laughed and hid his tiles behind his hands. He didn't want to answer the question. His scar hurt like the blazes. He didn't want to lie to her, though.

"Spying on me, are you? I thought you said you were very good at this? Don't tell me you have to cheat to win?"

"Oh, honestly!" Harry was teasing her, of course, but Cassie flounced back to her chair, nose in the air. "I can beat you blindfolded. I don't need to cheat." Just then her mother came in to help Matthew.

"Um, how about using the P to spell APE?" She stayed for a minute and glanced at the board, her eyebrows raising slightly at the words. She left the room a moment later, not saying anything more.

Matthew got 10 points for APE and then Cassie added S to Harry's ELF and got 18 points for the two words together, SO and SELF. Harry had a rather motley collection of letters on his tray. He still had the Q from his first draw which was essentially useless. He thought about spelling LION and was just about to play that off of the N from DANGER when the G caught his eye. Could he? Yes! He spelled out GOBLIN easily and got 10 points for it. He was now in second place, which he thought was pretty decent. Another round started with Matthew who turned his APE into SCRAPE which thrilled Cassie as it gave her a free S. She used it to spell the word KISS for 18 points which she was thrilled about. Matthew, however, started giving her a very bad time about choosing that particular word. Both Harry and Cassie were blushing a few seconds later as he announced that he had seen them kissing, a few times, and that he thought it was rather gross.

Then it was Harry's turn and he stared for a long time at his letters. He couldn't really see anything to spell with his tiles which now consisted of the blasted Q, which Harry despaired of ever being able to use because there was no U on the board yet and he hadn't drawn one, two Os, two Ls, a B, and an R. He was just about to pass and turn in his Q for a new letter when he suddenly saw an option. He used the F from his ELF and spelled FLOO. He sat back, feeling relieved, and counted up his 7 points.

"Hey, that's not how you spell flu." Cassie was smiling. "You're as bad as Matthew."

"Are you sure? I thought this was a fireplace chimney, you know?"

"No. That is flue. Then you've got flu, the sickness, and of course, flew, as in the bird flew away, but I am positive there is no word floo."

"Oh." Harry knew that the word was spelled that way for floo powder, as he had seen that word written many times, but could not really argue the point. "Sorry." Great. Now he had not only embarrassed himself but he also still needed to think of a word. He removed his L, O, O and started looking. He could just use LOO on the L right above his F, except that Cassie had ZEN there, and his DRAGON and it wouldn't work. He looked toward the top of the board and saw Cassie's K there from KISS. He was going to do BOOK, but then changed his mind at the last minute and spelled BROOK. There, that was a word for sure. Plus, because he put the B on a double word square, he got 20 points for it.

When he drew this time, he got that elusive U and immediately tried to figure out where he could use his Q to the best advantage. Both Matthew and Cassie played and it was Cassie's spelling the word NETTLE that finally gave him an idea. Laughing, he spelled out QUILL and both Cassie and Matthew groaned. Harry was especially pleased because with the 28 points from that word he moved into first place, only two ahead of Cassie, but still . . . .. At least he wasn't being too humiliated.

The next round went smoothly and both Matthew and Cassie took yet another turn without incident. When it was Harry's turn, he tried really hard to think of a good word. He still had the lead even before this turn, but he knew this was probably only temporary. He hoped that he could place a really good word and increase his lead. He debated for a couple of minutes about this particular word - he didn't want to put any strange thoughts in Cassie's head. But the double word score was too tempting. Finally, he bit his lip and put it down. WAND. He got 16 points for it which gave him 118 to her 96. He watched her a little nervously. She looked at his latest addition, looked again, and then looked up at him. Her eyes narrowed a little, and then she shook her head and Harry could see her visibly relax. He hoped he hadn't just made a big miscalculation. He really did not want her to connect that word with the stick he carried around with him at all times and even now had tucked into the waistband of his jeans.

Matthew was completely stumped for his next word and even though both Cassie and Harry offered him help, he refused, saying that they would just use his word to give themselves a good set-up for their next word. Instead, he hollered for his mother again, who hollered back that she would be there in a few minutes. So Cassie and Harry started talking as Matthew ran into the kitchen to find her and beg her to come sooner.

"Harry, I can tell that your head is still hurting. Please let me get you something."

"It won't help, Cassie. I've tried stuff before."

"What have you tried?"

"Well, you know, the usual . . . . uh, aspirin. Besides," he said, trying to divert her attention, "it just hurts a little bit, now." That was the truth. The pain had receded to its usual dull ache and Harry wouldn't have noticed it at all if it weren't for the concern in the back of his brain about what was happening in the wizarding world. The fact was that when he had pain in his scar, something was going on. He would need to try to figure out what. But that was something for tomorrow. Tonight, he just wanted to enjoy being with Cassie. Besides that, he was winning. This game was more fun than he had expected.

"Aspirin? Harry, I could at least. . . ." she continued, but Harry really wanted her to drop the subject. He reached over to her, pushed his hand through the thickness of her hair and pulled her face close to him.

"Hey, we may only have a minute." Then he kissed her, which satisfactorily got her mind off the subject of his curse scar. Very satisfactorily.

Matthew and his mum came back a minute after that, and Harry hoped his blush didn't give them away. Mrs. Robinson looked at Matthew's tiles and the board. "Quid, dear."

"Where?"

"Use the Q."

"Oh, yeah. That'll work."

Harry thought that he could certainly play off one of those letters and started desperately trying to figure out a good word. So he missed completely what Cassie did until she let out a victory whoop and stood up to do a little dance about her word. He looked up to the top of the board to see what she had done. She had used his W from WAND to spell WAVY which wound up being a 26-point word and put her back ahead of him. He couldn't be too disappointed. It was an excellent word. She really was very good at this. He hoped that he could come up with a word to put him in the lead again. He saw a word that would work but he really didn't want to use it. He tried several different possibilities in his head, even putting letters down on the board once before he realized that the word ran off the side and would not work. Finally, because he was desperate, he went ahead and used it. It was a nice normal word, GIANT. Nothing wrong with it at all. It was only 8 points, but he was back in the lead.

Mrs. Robinson had been standing behind Matthew to help him in the next round since he had not gotten very good letters in his last draw. When Harry put that word down, he noticed that her eyes got fairly round in surprise. "I say, Harry. I'm starting to see a definite trend on this board. So far you have used elf, dragon, giant, and goblin." Harry felt a very distinct sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach. He had not realized how incriminating all these innocent sounding words were when you put them all together. And that was not even counting the words wand and quill. How stupid could one person be? Mrs. Robinson continued, "You must read a lot of Tolkien."

"Who?" Harry was not quite sure what she meant by that, but she at least hadn't said anything about witches and wizards.

"You know, JRR Tolkien."

"Um, no, sorry. I haven't read anything of his." Harry hoped he didn't sound like a completely uneducated idiot. "What has he written?"

Cassie answered his question this time. "The Hobbit, Lord of the Rings, you know? His books are full of giants, wizards, elves, goblins, orcs, dark magic, curses, etc. You may want to . . . ." Her voice trailed off but Harry didn't notice. He felt faint. He was going to be sick. She knew. She obviously knew. All this time . . . . Had she just been playing with him? What was he going to do? How was he -

"Harry, you look sick. Are you okay? Mum, I think Harry's going to pass out. Oh, . . .Oh. Here, let's help him lay down on the floor . . . . No, come on, Harry, lay down. Stop fighting me. Matthew, get a blanket. Well, fine then. Be stubborn." Harry had refused to lay down on the floor or use a blanket or anything else. He concentrated on breathing steadily. He looked fully into her eyes. They were clear and steady. There was no mocking in them at all. Was it possible that she really didn't know? He sat down again in the chair.

"Sorry about that. I just suddenly felt sort of light-headed."

"Are you sure you're okay?" At Harry's nod, they continued the game and when it was Harry's turn again, he used the innocuous word HIM. When it was his turn again, he tried and tried to think of a word that wouldn't be too strange. He really tried. He had a blank, and could have maybe done several different things, but he had a slim 6 point lead which he really wanted to keep. Hoping he wasn't dooming himself, he put down his letters.

POTIONS. "Sorry, I seem to have a one track mind tonight." Harry was thrilled to note, however, that he still had a narrow lead - it was only four points, but he was still ahead and he could tell the game was almost over.

"I guess." Cassie was concentrating hard. She really wanted to win, Harry could tell. Maybe he should let her. Naah.

His next word was HAM. Nothing wrong with that. And he was five points ahead. He just might manage.

Matt emptied his tray with RIB. Then it was Cassie's turn. She smiled, a truly (in Harry's opinion) vicious smile. "Ha! Gotcha!" She put the X down to make the word AX. "Nine points, and I win!!!"

It actually wound up being more than a four-point victory because Harry had a letter V still on his tray that he could not figure out what to do with so he wound up losing four points for it. Cassie was positively beaming. Harry didn't begrudge her. He had plans for when he taught her to play chess. He was certain to win that. He pulled a very happy girl over to him and down into his lap. "Well, congratulations. You really are very good at this."

She blushed a little bit. "You played really well, though. You had some really, uh, interesting words." His arms tightened around her and she leaned against him.

After a minute or two, Harry glanced down at his watch. It was after 10. "I guess I better get going, Cassie. It's been really fun."

"When do I get my homemade biscuits?" She asked a few minutes later as they stood by the door. He really didn't want to leave and she didn't want him to go, so they kept coming up with another thing to talk about. His arms were looped comfortably around her waist and she was tucked against his shoulder.

"Biscuits?"

"Yeah, there was the matter of a bet last night, remember?"

"Vaguely." Harry chuckled warmly.

"Bring them over tomorrow."

"I can't make you biscuits."

"Why not? I gave you a shopping list, remember?"

"Fine. I have a shopping list, but no recipe and no idea what I am doing."

"You are so funny sometimes." Cassie pushed away from him far enough to look up into his face. "Fine. You buy the ingredients and then come over here and I'll find you a recipe and show you what you're doing."

Harry liked that idea. Maybe she would even wind up making them. He wouldn't complain about that. "Come shopping with me tomorrow."

"No way. What's the point of you making me biscuits if I do all the work?"

"I like shopping with you. Please . . . . It's more fun if you're there."

"All right. All right." Cassie had a disgusted look on her face but Harry could tell she was trying not to laugh. "Tomorrow then at, what, 2? At our favorite store?"

"Yeah. Two. I'll see you there, then."

Harry kissed her again and reluctantly left. He looked back at least three times as he walked down the street. He could hardly wait until he could see her again.