Disclaimer: I don't own anything that you recognise. Characters, places, spells – anything from the Harry Potter books are not mine. I am simply a poor student who had an idea that begged to be written!

With thanks to leiselmae, LuciShadow, Slytherin Rogue, Danz and Nikki101.

Tanya

James' Duel

Life on the Lake Wave

James wasn't bad at driving the boat; it was only when he decided to go at breakneck speed that he narrowly avoided a huge cruise liner and also death. After the first day of sailing he stopped the boat at an island so that he could buy a world map and get some rest.

Rendakadavra wasn't on the world map. James hadn't expected it to be. Instead, he found the place where he currently was and then found England. He plotted his route on the map and settled down for a nights sleep.

As the waves gently swayed the boat from side to side, James tossed and turned, thinking of what his previous life may have been like. What if something terrible had happened to his family? What if they didn't want to know him? He thought of thousands of 'what if?' questions and felt his stomach give a sick lurch. What if he was evil? He sincerely hoped he wasn't. He hoped that evilness would be felt in one's heart – he couldn't feel any.

When he eventually fell asleep it wasn't for long. He slept only a few hours at a time and woke from each feeling just the same as he had before he had slept. In the end he got up and made himself a small pot of tea. He poured the whole pot into a huge mug and poured some milk in afterwards. He sat sipping slowly and found himself relaxing. The tea reminded him of something – maybe he had drunk tea at home. Whenever he had drunk tea on the island it had felt somewhat familiar to him. Until recently, it was the closest he had ever been to remembering any of his past.

With the tea finished, sleep took over. His dreams were happy, made him smile throughout the night and allowed him to wake up with a picture of Lily in his mind. Why they had been in a castle he couldn't quite fathom.

James set off the next day smiling and whistling to himself. He tried to turn his thoughts away from his destination and thought of living at sea instead. He imagined himself as a pirate onboard a ship that had Waltzers and sang some pirate tunes that he found he knew from somewhere.

He carried on through the night and the next day, and docked the boat in a small bay. He dipped some of his clothes in the water and draped them over the sides of the boat to dry before stripping and diving into the water. Unfortunately, this was when the next flashback happened.

James found himself in a four-poster bed. He rolled over sleepily and felt himself drift off again. Less than a minute later, he felt somebody shaking him frantically. He pulled himself away from the shaker and tried to get back to sleep again.

James!" Someone said, in an urgent whisper.

Apparently James knew who this person was and replied with: "Piss off Sirius."

This did no good. "James? Have you forgotten the bet?"

James thought, couldn't remember any bets and tried to yank to curtains shut to block out Sirius.

"Hey!" Sirius wasn't going to be got rid of that easily. He let out an obviously heavy sigh and took it upon himself to explain to the sleepy James. "Does skinny dipping ring a bell?"

Uh-oh thought James. That was when he realised that he was still wearing all of his clothes and that he felt quite less than sober. He remembered the bet of roughly ten minutes ago, when the girls' had bet him twenty Galleons that he wouldn't go skinny dipping in the lake, in the middle of winter, with the giant squid.

James was no fool. He thought that he might as well have the extra twenty Galleons that the girls' had offered, so he had agreed and shook on the bet.

He catapulted himself out of bed, strode down to the common room, through the corridors (taking a few secret passageways of course) and out to the lake. The girls where already there waiting and thinking, from the looks on their faces, that there was no way that he'd actually do it. Boy, was he going to prove them wrong.

He took off his coat, jumper, shoes and socks first, then his t-shirt and jeans, at which he received a series of impressed wolf whistles from the girls. Not being shy, he couldn't resist turning round and waving at them. He saw Lily slowly turning a bright crimson.

He took off his boxers to a chorus of loud wolf whistling and dived into the lake.

When James resurfaced from the memory, he found that he had sunk to the bottom of the sea. He came to his senses and quickly swam to the top, spluttering and gasping for air as his head broke the sea surface. He noticed that the striped fish swimming around him seemed to be wearing puzzled looks on their faces and wondered if he was going mad. Shaking his head violently, making salty water spray in all directions (the fishes looked amused), he swam back to the boat and hoisted himself over the side just in time for a boat packed full of tourists to be able to see him in all his glory. He gave a quick wave, grinned to himself and entered the cabin to redress.

It was just his luck to encounter an evening tourist boat at just the wrong moment. Ah well, James decided not to dwell on it – from the looks on their faces, they had been impressed by his package. He just hoped that none of them had taken photographs. He settled down for a nights sleep. This time he slept soundly, content with the progress that he had made and the fact that it would only take a few more days sailing and sleeping in the little boat before he reached his destination.

James got up the next morning and sailed, full throttle, towards his destination. A few boring days followed in which he had no more flashbacks and managed not to expose himself to any more innocent tourists. He rechecked the route on the last morning and was relieved when he saw his destination on the horizon. There were a lot of small boats around and he found that people kept waving to him. He waved back and wearily steered the boat into dock at Portsmouth Harbour.

Here, he packed his essentials and valuables into a large backpack, walked out of the cabin (making sure to lock the door behind him) and stepped ashore. Needing money in the form of pounds sterling, he managed to sell his boat – The Searching – for a large amount of said pounds. The buyer marvelled at the unique qualities of the boat and was pleased of the free bonus of the items contained within.

James got through customs using a fake passport from Rendakadavra. Now he wasn't sure where to go. He could've lived anywhere. He thought about just asking people if they knew him, but he knew that it would probably be useless – who'd remember him after nearly fifteen years? If anyone did remember him they'd probably have assumed that he was dead by now anyway. He couldn't look people up in a phone book because his memories had yet to reveal to him any surnames – he didn't even know his own surname.

So James wandered around. He found the pebbly seashore and finally hurled pebbles into the calm waves of the Solent, smiling to himself as he did so. As he thought about where to go, fate seemed to intervene. A leaflet flew towards him and got blocked from flying any further by his bag.

James picked up the leaflet and read.

TRACK TRAVEL

Fancy a day shopping in the capital, but don't fancy driving?

Come to one of Portsmouth's train stations for the cheapest fares to London on one of our fast-track trains.

Fate, thought James, is there any such thing? He grabbed a few more pebbles, hurled them into the sea in one throw and took off towards the address advertised on the leaflet.