Mallory opened her eyes slowly. She heard birds chirping, and looking around, could see a fine mist rising from the pond. The sky was gray, and you could just barely see the sun behind the clouds. It had just recently risen. Mallory felt warm. Matt's strong arms were wrapped around her, yet her uncovered legs were quite cold.
Wait…Matt's arms around her?
She mentally smacked her forehead. She shouldn't have let this happen. But she had to admit she'd enjoyed it. She could clearly remember the sweet taste of his kiss, and found herself wanting more. But could she possibly risk their friendship? Well, she already had. She was quite sure that after last night Matt would expect something of her…and he would surely be disappointed if she did otherwise. And she had to admit that she would be disappointed too. In herself. She figured there was no turning back now…not that she wanted to.
Mallory turned around and gave Matt a light kiss. He didn't wake up.
IHe's so cute when he's sleeping/I she thought, watching him fondly. Unable to resist, she ran her fingers through his messy hair. Only now did he wake up.
"Mmm, Morning." He said sleepily. He stretched, then pulled Mallory back into his arms.
"Wait." He said suddenly, his voice sounding fearful, "What time is it? We need to Floo into London by 6 AM their time!"
Mallory sat bolt upright. Judging by the angle of the sun it was at least 8 AM. They were four hours ahead of London time. That's mean's in order to be in London on time they'd have to Floo by 10 AM…and it takes at least 2 hours to get to L.A from Apple Valley.
Mallory jumped up and started running towards the truck, Matt right behind her.
"Shit! Glenda!"
Mallory turned around and searched for the horse. Nowhere in sight.
"Damnit!"
She ran towards the stables. Unbelievably, Glenda had returned to her pen, and all Mallory had to do was shut the gate. She mumbled a hurried goodbye to the horse before sprinting back to the truck. Matt had already started the engine and was seated in the passengers seat. Mallory hopped in and floored the gas. She took off with a loud screech, skidding across the unpaved dirt. Matt was thrown back in his seat and had one hand gripping the door and the other gripping the side of his seat. His knuckles were white.
Mallory was back at her house in 2 minutes. Matt ran next door to grab his things, and Mallory rushed inside. She could tell her grandmother wasn't home so she quickly scribbled down a note, grabbed her trunk and levitated it out the door and into the back of the truck. Matt appeared walking out the door of his house, carrying his trunk, obviously doing it the hard way. Mallory ran over to him, conjured the levitating charm and scolded him for not doing so himself. She was back in the truck and starting up the engine, while Matt loaded his trunk along with hers in the back. He hopped into the truck and before he'd even shut the door Mallory was pulling out of the driveway at breakneck speed.
"Mallory you're going to get us killed!" Matt shouted, as she drove, nearing 90 mph, swerving slower cars and nearly running red lights.
She barreled towards the Freeway onramp, completely ignoring Matt's pleads for her to slow down just a bit.
Matt stopped after a while ( especially after Mallory yelled at him to shut up ). He simply stared moodily out the window at the blur of scenery. He'd be lucky to see anything at all at the speed Mallory was going. After a good 90 minutes the freeway sign finally said they were nearing Los Angeles. But, as expected, nearing Los Angeles wouldn't be an easy thing. The traffic soon crawled to a halt and this left Mallory squirming impatiently in her seat.
"Move it people! There's no reason to stop!" Mallory shouted, as though it would help. She growled and banged her fist on the steering wheel, causing the horn to beep. Matt gave her a dirty look and continued staring out the window.
10 minutes later, they'd only moved half a mile. The sign said 1 mile until Rodeo Drive exit. At that rate, it would take them another twenty minutes.
"We…don't…have…TIME…for….this!" she mumbled, trying to keep her voice down. The traffic started moving….good…keep moving…
Ten minutes later and they'd traveled ¾ of a mile. She could see the exit…come on…just a bit closer…Mallory repeatedly stepped on the gas, causing the truck to lurch impatiently….if only this car would move over they could slide over and exit…yes, just a bit further…NOW!
Mallory hit the gas and exited the freeway.
"Look for an old Bank of America Matt! The International Floo Headquarters is located there." Mallory said.
It was supposedly on Rodeo Drive, near Downtown Hollywood. Mallory spotted it first. It was sitting at the corner of Rodeo and a second street. She quickly switched lanes, cutting off numerous cars in the process and ignoring obscene gestures from the other drivers. She pulled in to the rundown Bank and hopped out. The bank seemed to be obscured from sight of passerby by large overgrown bushes. Mallory quickly levitated both trunks into the air and, making sure not to be seen, set of quickly to the ready teller.
"I think I'm supposed to type in 'Floo'…" Mallory muttered to herself…she typed in the digits, and on the screen writing appeared.
'Welcome to the International Floo Headquarters. If your destination is in the same nation that you are currently in, press 1.
If your destination is in the same continent that you are currently in, press 2.
If your destination is overseas, press 3.'
Mallory quickly pressed 3. A new mass of writing appeared on the screen.
'Please enter the number of the Continent you wish to visit.
1-North America
2-South America
3-Asia
4-Africa
5-Europe
6-Australia
7-Antarctica
Mallory pressed 5...once again a new message appeared.
'Please choose the city you wish to visit.
1-Paris
2-London
3-Barcelona
4-Dublin
5-Milan
6-Vienna
7-Budapest
8-Helsinki
9-Athens
10-Lisbon
11-Sicily
12-Copenhagen
13-Berlin
Mallory pressed 2, hoping she wouldn't have to press anymore buttons. A final message appeared.
'Please step through the doors at your right and sign in with one of the secretary's in the front. Have a wonderful day and thank you for traveling with the International Floo Network.'
"Finally!" she motioned for Matt to follow her and stepped inside the double doors of the bank, and what she saw couldn't look less like a bank:
There were flashing signs above them, Some flashing London, some flashing what she assumed must be London in another language. On the left were hundreds of fireplaces, all lined up one next to the other as far as she could see. Above each fireplace was either a red or green light. The green ones were being used by people to leave Los Angeles. The red ones were hosting new arrivals. The right side was host to a long row of employees, each signing in the travelers. The first 10 employees were for English speaking travelers, the next few for Spanish, then French, all the way down through hundreds of languages to where mermish, troll, and gobbledegook brought up the rear. Mallory rushed up to the nearest open line and waited for the employee to speak.
"Flooing to London today are we? All right then I'll need you to sign this form. Do you have a vehicle that will be staying in our underground lot until your return? If so we'll need the keys and the license plate number." she said in a bored voice, "And your friend will need to fill one out too." she said nodding towards Matt.
"Yeah, yeah…I have a truck. Lemme fill this out then and I'll get you the keys."she said distractedly
Neither Mallory or Matt took their time in filling out the form. Mallory jotted down her license plate in the space provided and handed the woman the keys along with her form.
"That'll be 5 galleons each." The woman said. Mallory pulled out a handful of coins while Matt began to unpack his trunk to search for his money.
"Don't bother Matt, you can pay me back later. We need to go!" Mallory gave the woman ten galleons.
"You're all set, head to any one of the empty fireplaces with a green light over it. Just throw in the powder and hop in. No need to shout your destination, these fireplaces are hooked up to London only."
Mallory ran down the rows of fireplaces looking for an unused green one. She found one and quickly grabbed a handful of the powder. She threw it into the flames and they instantly sparkled emerald green. She grabbed onto her trunk and stepped into the flames. She instantly began spinning around and felt as though she was being smothered by a warm wool blanket.
Then suddenly it was cold.
She'd stopped spinning too.
She was on the icy tile floor of the London Floo Station. She looked up just in time to see Matt's trunk hurtling out of the fireplace towards her.
She didn't have time, however, to move out of the way. She closed her eyes and braced herself for the hit…
...any moment now it would come down on her and crush her…
...why didn't it hit her?
She looked up to see a strange boy holding the trunk up, just inches from hitting her. He had messy brown hair and silvery blue eyes. Hell, even his brown hair had a silver glow to it.
Mallory slowly stood up, rubbing the shoulder that hit the floor as she did so.
"Thank You." she said sheepishly.
"Not at all." The boy was expressionless. He turned, grabbed his own trunk, and headed towards the door.
Mallory openly stared at the boy, utterly perplexed, scratching her head.
"Uh, Mal, you ready to go?" Matt's voice came from behind her. She wasn't even aware he was there.
"Umm, yeah. We're supposed to go to umm, the Leaky Cauldron, I think it's called. There's supposed to be shops for us to get all our new books and stuff for school. We're supposed to get our supply list when we arrive to the Leaky Cauldron," Mallory said, getting back on track. "It should be just down the street, it's supposed to be a small dingy building."
Mallory grabbed her trunk and began dragging it along behind her. Matt followed her, not saying a word. They exited the doors and entered into a cold and rainy street.
"Oh my god Matt, it's raining! I've only ever seen rain once before!" Mallory exclaimed, awestruck. Matt, however wasn't as impressed.
"Yeah, ok, can we please just hurry up? It's freezing!" Matt hissed, obviously in a bad mood.
"Fine, geez!" Mallory's happiness had been punctured by Matt's rudeness.
They found the Leaky Cauldron, with a bit of help from a passing witch who, noticing their large trunks, had asked if they were Hogwarts students. They thanked the kind woman, and quickly ran inside. The pub was buzzing with a bit of light activity. Most of the occupants were just waking and were intent on having a nice warm breakfast before heading into Diagon Alley to do their shopping.
Upon their arrival they were promptly greeted by the owner Tom. Mallory was at first shocked by his strange appearance and demeanor.
"Hogwarts students eh? You'll be wantin' a room? I'm afraid for tonight I've only got one room available, with one bed. You two'll have to be roomin' together." He croaked, eyeing the pair suspiciously.
"And if ye know what's good for ye, she'll be gettin the bed! You'll be on the floor, sonny." This last part was directed towards Matt.
He then clapped a gnarled hand on Mallory's shoulder and begin, not so gently, pushing her towards the stairs. Mallory hurried, quite uncomfortable with his touch. Once up the stairs Tom walked in front of Mallory and led them to a room.
"Room 12, this here's yours for the night." He said, thumping the door with his fist. "And here's your Hogwarts letter complete with supply list. Arrived just an hour or so ago. You two'll be Matt and Mallory, I'm guessing?" he said, handing them their letters. Mallory took hers. It read:
Miss Mallory Davae West, The Leaky Cauldron, London
Mallory ripped open the envelope and began reading…underneath her acceptance letter was her list of classes and supplies.
"Hey Matt, They teach divination here…that might be interesting." she said.
Looking up, she saw that Matt had already gone in the room and had left Mallory standing in the hall. She rolled her eyes and walked in as well. She was surprised to see their trunks lying in the middle of the room. Hadn't they left them dowstairs when they were rushed up to their room? Mallory didn't dwell on it. She didn't really care.
Matt was sprawled on the bed, eyes closed. Mallory decided to check out the bathroom. The last thing she wanted was a disgusting bathroom. At first glance, the bathroom appeared clean, but upon looking in the shower she was disgusted. The enamel had once been white, but was now an ugly brownish yellow.
"Ugh! My God!" Mallory shouted, thoroughly disgusted. "This shower is filthy!"
"Well it's either that, or you don't shower, Mal, and I know better than to think you won't take a shower." Matt called from the other room.
Mallory just became aware of the state she was in. In her rush to get to London she hadn't done anything with her hair (which was still in the same messy bun she had in the pool yesterday), she hadn't changed clothes, and had no makeup on.
"Ugh! I look like shit!" Mallory exclaimed, leaning towards the mirror.
"You just figured that out?" Matt said, jokingly.
Mallory was out of the bathroom in a flash. She snatched up the pillow from under Matt's head and began beating him with it. Hard.
"You know what? I'm in a right mood to kick you're ass so don't play with me!" Mallory shouted at him, finally ceasing her pillow beating. Her usually light eyes had turned a dark menacing shade.
"Geez, calm down! Can't you take a damned joke? You've been acting like a complete bitch since we first left this morning! What the hell is wrong with you?" He said, knocking the pillow out of her hand. He stood up and walked towards the door. He opened it, and without a look back slammed it hard. A decorative mirror nearby fell from the wall and smashed into pieces.
"Fuck!" Mallory yelled, kicking her trunk over.She threw herself onto the bed and screamed into the pillow.
A knock came from the door. It was Matt again, Mallory just knew it.
"Go away Matt! You're lucky if I let you back in here at all!" Mallory shouted
"No..it's umm…" A girls voice came from behind the door.
The door slowly creaked open and the girl peeked her head in.
She had long, curly, dark brown hair and chocolately eyes. She looked about 5'1, 5'2, whereas Mallory was about 5'5.
"My name's Maria." She said, opening the door a bit wider and leaning against the door frame.
"I heard some yelling and wondered if everything was alright." Maria took in the state of the room. Shards of glass scattered across the floor, the trunk Mallory had kicked had sprung open and it's contents had flown in every direction, many feathers were still floating in the air from Mallory's fierce abuse of the pillow, and Mallory herself, with her bun now flopping to one side of her head, clothes wrinkled, and mouth open in a mildly surprised expression. Maria tried not to smirk.
"Uhh…yeah. Just a bit of an argument…." Mallory scratched her head, causing more strands of hair to come loose and add more to her wild appearance.
"I'm Mallory by the way." She stood up and began walking slowly around the room. She took out her wand and held it in her hand, not sure where to start. Maria beat her to it.
"Reparo." She said, pointing her wand at the mirror. Another flick of her wrist and all of Mallory's clothes folded themselves and flew back into the trunk.
Mallory stood there dumbfounded. "Thanks." She finally managed to say.
"No Problem." said Maria, walking into the room and sitting down on the feather covered bed. She picked up a feather and twirled it in her fingers.
"Do you go to Hogwarts?" Maria asked suddenly.
"No, err, Yes…Kinda. I'm an exchange student so it'll be my first year.
Maria's chocolate eyes lit up. "Really? I'm an exchange student as well. Are you from the U.S?"she asked hopefully.
"Yeah. California….I've never heard of wizarding schools doing foreign exchange programs before. Not that I'm complaining. I'm really happy to be taking new classes that I've never had before. What year are you in?"
"I'm in 6th. How bout you?" Maria replied
"6th." Mallory grinned.
"So…have you gotten your supplies yet?" Maria asked cautiously
"No…me and my friend Matt, the one who stormed out a minute ago, were gonna get all that done with today." Mallory said, furrowing her brows and looking towards the door as though expecting Matt to come bursting in.
"Well I haven't gotten mine either. Do you wanna go get them with me?" Maria asked.
"Sure." Mallory replied. "I should find Matt though. He needs to get his supplies too." She said, rolling her eyes.
Mallory quickly changed clothes, magicked on her makeup, and fixed her bun. Once she was decent enough for public they decided to leave to look for Matt. They didn't need to look far.
"Well, well, well." Mallory said, smirking. "What do we have here?"
Matt was sitting on the floor right next to the door, back against the wall, with on leg sprawled into the hallway and the other bent to use as an armrest.. He did not look happy at all.
"Hey Maria, we'll meet you downstairs alright?" Mallory turned to her.
"Huh? Oh…alright then." She said. She'd been hoping to watch them fight.
She descended the staircase into the small pub. Nearly all the tables were filled with chattering families and mothers bickering with their children. She noticed an empty table and quickly took advantage of it.
Meanwhile upstairs
Mallory sat down on the floor right next to Matt. He turned his head away from her.
"Matt, I'm really sorry." she said softly. "I know I was awful to you today. I was just so preoccupied with making sure we got here."
Matt still didn't look at her. He pretended to be extremely interested on a spot on the floor.
"Matt, look at me." she said gently, she reached a hand over to cup his cheek and pull him to face her. "What's wrong? There's something bothering you and I know it's not just this."
She looked into his eyes and saw a mixture of things: Hurt, lust, and…confusion?
He looked away from her gaze and continued to stare angrily at the floor.
Mallory shifted over so that she was kneeling on the floor between his knees. She held his face in her hands.
"Matt, talk to me, come on, we just got here! We don't wanna spend our first time in England mad at each other, do we?" she gently stroked his cheek with her thumb.
"Matt, please." She moved her hands to run her finger through his hair and brought her face down close to his.
He let out an angry sigh and closed his eyes. "This is what's wrong Mal!" He got up and leaned against the wall.
"What do you mean?" she asked, hurt. She remained on the floor.
"You're too confusing Mal! I don't understand what's going on with you. First, there's what happened last night, and now all day you've been acting like nothing happened and it meant nothing! What am I supposed to do?" He pounded his fist against the wall.
Mallory stood up and took his hand. "Come on, let's go inside and talk." She led him into their room and closed the door.
Back Downstairs
Maria had sat downstairs for about 15 minutes. She'd found some thorough entertainment from a family of fiery redheads. There were quite a few of them, all of them boys except for one girl, who seemed a bit younger than the rest. The woman Maria had assumed was their mother was in a right state over something, Maria could only guess what.
Then she remembered that Matt and Mallory were still upstairs. She decided to go see what was up. Or rather make sure that Matt wasn't dead, unconcious, or suffering a concussion.
They were no longer in the hallway. Maria figured they'd gone back in their room. She walked up to the door and knocked.
No answer.
She opened the door and gasped.
Mallory and Matt were on the bed, Mallory on top of him, and both of them kissing very passionately. They both looked up when they heard the gasp.
"Oh my gosh! I'm sorry I'm really sorry! I wondered where you were and I didn't think you would be doing that and Oh I'm sorry!" Maria said all in one breath, half covering her mouth, half flailing her arms and looking wildly around. She quickly backed out the door and shut it.
She quickly hopped down the steps, ran to the table and sat down, her face red with embarrassment.
"Something wrong?" An old witch at a nearby table asked.
"Nope nothing." she said nodding her strangely. "Nothing at all."
Matt and Mallory came down the stairs, Mallory looking at the floor, her cheeks flushed, and Matt looking rather like a child who'd just had his candy taken away.
"So, ready to go shopping?" Mallory said brightly, as though nothing had just happened.
Once they were out the door Matt finally spoke for the first time since meeting Maria.
"So…how do we get there?" He asked.
"Erm…" Mallory muttered.
"Uhh, I think we're supposed to tap our wands on the bricks and it lets us in. I watched a few people do it." Maria said.
"Ok, well you do it. We don't have our wands. We don't usually carry them around with us." Mallory said.
Maria stepped up to the brick wall. "Ok…" she readied herself, put her feet shoulder width apart, and suddenly flung her wand out and tapped the bricks.
Nothing happened... except for Matt snorting and attempting to turn his laugh into a fit of coughs.
"Erm…hold on! I can do it, I saw them do it…I think I need to tap more than one." Maria said, remaining confident.
She repeated the process but this time flung her wand at 4 different bricks.
Still nothing.
" I give up! I'm so blonde!" Maria said, flinging her arms in the air and shuffling away from the brick.
"Here, let me try. Maybe there's a pattern." Mallory offered.
She awkwardly stepped up to it. She examined the bricks and bit her lip in concentration. Then she timidly tapped certain bricks and amounted in nothing but an eye roll from Matt.
Suddenly the door behind them flung open and 3 people exited the pub.
Mallory first noticed a boy, with messy raven hair and emerald green eyes behind a pair of glasses. With him was a taller boy with a mop of red hair and freckles. Walking huffily behind the pair was a rather angry looking girl with thick brown curly hair.
"Ooh do you know how to get through the barrier?" Mallory asked the trio. "We can't figure it out."
"Yeah. Here I'll show you." The raven haired boy smiled at her.
He stepped up to the wall and tapped a pattern on the bricks. They rearranged themselves until an archway was formed.
Mallory, Matt, and Maria all stood there dumbfounded.
(A/N I would like to add that YES Harry is quite happy because in my story Sirius will NOT be dead! I love him too much. You can interpret it anyway you like, Sirius came back out of the veil, it was really just someone else with polyjuice potion that fell through, whatever. In my book, he's ALIVE. Thank you)
"Thanks." said Mallory. "I'm guessing you 3 are hogwarts students. My name's Mallory."
"I'm Harry." said the boy with black hair. "And these two are Ron and Hermione." he said pointing to the pair behind him.
"And I'm Maria. Nice to meet you." She offered her hand to Ron, who she seemed especially interested in.
"Are you guys new? I haven't seen you 3 around before." Harry asked.
"Oh, we're exchange students. We're in our 6th year." Mallory said.
Hermione lit up. "Oh wow, exchange students. That sounds so exciting. Is it nice where you come from?"
"YeNo."
Mallory and Matt had both responded at the same time, Mallory saying yes and Matt saying no.
"What do you mean No? It's absolutely Beautiful!" she said staring at him incredulously.
"It's a damned oven that's what it is. I don't know how you enjoy that god forsaken place!" Mallory glared at him before turning back to Harry.
"So are you guys going in to buy you supplies?" Mallory asked.
"Just Ron. He hasn't bought his yet." said Hermione icily. She obviously was unhappy with Ron's lack of responsibility.
"Would you mind showing us around? We need to get all our supplies and would love to know where to get the best items." Maria said, still directing it towards Ron. She gave him her sweetest smile.
Ron gulped.
"Ye- yeah. I'll show you." He squeaked out. His ears turned red. Hermione smirked and rolled her eyes knowingly.
"Well how about we start out with the bookstore? Then we'll head down to the apothecary to stock up on potions supplies." Harry said.
"Sounds great." Mallory smiled and began walking alongside Harry, and Hermione followed behind the two, pulling a book out from her ever present book bag and began reading. Maria grabbed Ron by the arm and pulled him along. Matt was left standing there forgotten.
