Right Out of a Movie
A quick, crummy little humour piece. Found the idea amusing and thought I'd share.
Disclaimer: Familiar Harry Potter characters, settings, events, and concepts all belong to J.K. Rowling; I do not profit from this piece. The film mentioned below belongs to the Walt Disney company.
Sirius and Regulus Black were perfectly pure-blooded children from a perfectly pure-blooded family. Their dinnerware displayed their family crest, ridiculously old portraits of long-deceased relatives hung in their hallways, and their parents were completely, undeniably committed to making sure that the Ancient House of Black remained ancient, black, and thoroughly, meticulously, undeniably pure-blooded. Therefore, it can be understood that they were highly anti-Muggle.
It could be counted as nothing less than a sin if so much as a Muggle grocery coupon should despoil their children's tender, magical innocence. They were careful to make sure that no Muggle games or toys entered the house, no Muggle food, no Muggle radio waves.
But then, of course, there was the matter of Uncle Alphard.
Uncle Alphard was a bit of a…dare they admit it?...film aficionado. This, of course, meant Muggle films, much to the horror of his relatives. He appeared to find some sort of inexplicable pleasure in watching the silver screen, patiently explaining that it was as though the Muggles had created a sort of magic all their own. He talked about Alfred Hitchcock somebody at dinnertime, a mysterious Hepburn or another at tea, and Mickey rotten Mouse at Christmas. It was disgraceful, it was pathetic, it was abhorrent…and yet the fact remained that Uncle Alphard was stupidly rich.
Therefore, when Uncle Alphard proposed taking young Sirius and Regulus on an outing for a very special treat, their parents deliberated carefully. Grudgingly, they agreed to allow their children to go to a Muggle film in the evening.
"It will be dark," Mr. Black calmed his wife, "No one shall see them enter such a despicable establishment."
They sat their boys down and gave them very firm instructions (after Sirius managed to refrain from poking Regulus and Regulus stopped kicking Sirius in retaliation).
"Uncle Alphard is taking you to a Muggle picture show," they explained, "A very low form of entertainment. Disgusting. We've no doubt you'll find it utterly boring, but you must go for your uncle's pitiable sake. Just remember that he has a terrible lot of money, and he may just leave it to one of you some day. Behave accordingly."
The day of the outing came, and Sirius and Regulus and Uncle Alphie had their ice creams, and bought candies at the sweetshop, and then proceeded to the movie theatre. They munched their Muggle popcorns and got their fingers sticky with the somewhat inferior Muggle sweets, and they watched the Muggle film.
Despite their parents' desperate hopes, both young boys returned rather gleeful.
However, the incident passed and all memory of the movie theatre was suppressed as Sirius and Regulus were once again plunged into the severely limited lives of upper-class, blood-obsessed wizarding children.
It has been well-noted on several occasions that the Black brothers did not get along well, and that as they grew older, they actually began to loathe one another. As young boys, however, Sirius and Regulus actually managed to agree about something on rare occasions every now and then.
One such incident, which oddly enough is directly linked to their experience at the Muggle movie theatre, occurred after the resignation of their governess. It was really no fault of the boys' that she left, except that Sirius had something of a penchant for pranks, Regulus for endless whining, and both for utter insolence. It had been decided long ago that the boys could not be left in the care of the house elf, since the idea of a mere elf supervising the precious (and devious) Black boys was an absolutely atrocious notion. Besides, they were of an age when small boys had to be taught to properly hold a quill, to do sums, and to sit still for infinite periods of time. This required the hiring of a new governess.
Each prospective candidate possessed some major flaw: this one was too lenient, this one too frumpy, this one smelled of horse-radish. There was a governess who had failed charms all through school, and another who had excelled and believed her skills ought to be used to entertain.
What Mr. and Mrs. Black wanted was a strict governess in strict black robes who would strictly ensure that their boys grew into straight-laced, upstanding young pure-bloods.
As Sirius and Regulus crouched near the banister (occasionally poking one another with the barely nibbled sticks of celery they were supposed to be munching on), the picture of a stern woman dressed all in black came to mind. In Sirius's mind, most likely she would have a large black hat tied under her chin, and in Regulus's a nasty black umbrella, and both boys imagined an excessively pointy wand (painted black, of course). They knew that dull days of doing primary potions worksheets lay ahead of them, days filled with Latin lessons and society luncheons and playing with their abhorrent girl cousins.
"We've got to find a governess for ourselves," Sirius whispered. He was not really whispering to his brother, since Regulus so rarely agreed to his schemes (he was more likely to rat on him, of course), but spoke the words as more of a promise to himself.
"Yes," Regulus nodded, abstaining from poking his older brother with his celery stick just this once, and instead sticking it into his mouth. He swallowed a particularly large and crunchy bite, "I want a nanny who will take us on real outings. Like to tea at shops and to the park."
"I should like it if she took us to Gringott's," Sirius gazed into his brother's eyes, a smile actually forming on his lips. There was a sparkle gleaming in his eyes, suddenly and oddly reflected in Regulus's. It was almost eerie to see the two boys agree.
"I want to ride a merry-go-round," Regulus whispered in return, almost choking up a piece of the celery stick in quiet excitement.
"Good then," Sirius crept silently towards his room, Regulus close behind, "We've simply got to write an advertisement, show it to Mother and Father, and get one of them to tear it up and throw it into the fireplace. I think a little floo powder would help, if one of us could toss it in when they aren't looking."
Regulus looked skeptical, "Mother and Father won't let us have her."
"Do you really think they have any choice?" Sirius scoffed, shoving Regulus off of his bed as he made his way to his desk, "She's got to be terribly powerful. All that wandless magic and getting away with everything. Remember? She could apparate through the ground and up chimneys and all sorts of things. And she used that gigantic, long spell."
"Don't touch me!" Regulus belatedly whined, then raised an eyebrow, "And you think she'd stop working for the Muggles?" He pushed himself back onto his brother's bed – quite prepared to kick him should Sirius object.
"The wind has to change someday," Sirius shrugged, already digging in cluttered a drawer for a quill and ink, "I think we need that Poppins woman more than anyone."
Note: Please excuse any Americanisms.
I can't be positive whether Disney's Mary Poppins played in London or not, but it did open in theatres in the mid-1960's.
I hate to think what would happen if they were to see Bed-knobs and Broomsticks.