Harry and the rest of the Potters landed around the corner of the airport after taking a portkey away from Privet Drive.
They were not allowed to go to the Potter's regular beach, out of fear that Voldemort would be able to trace them back to the area. They were, however, promised by Dumbledore that the location he had chosen was respectable and safe.
Although they could not travel to their wanted area, Lily and James had insisted that they at least be allowed to travel traditionally by Airplane. As for the past thirteen or so years that was what they had done, and they were not about to let the war completely control their lifestyle.
Dumbledore had in the end agreed, as he figured that Voldemort would probably not think to look out for the muggle way of transportation, and it would therefore be less likely for Voldemort to find out their location.
The Potters all feared that Voldemort would find them, but Dumbledore and the order ensured them that they were going to be well protected.
They walked quickly towards the entrance of the airport, as they were running a bit behind schedule.
Harry, himself, was a bit nervous. He had never ever ridden on a plane, the Dursley's had always left him home when they went somewhere abroad. But the way that Vernon and Dudley had always come back looking more green in the face, and Aunt Petunia looked as if she could faint, he was a little bit iffy about the whole flying situation.
He walked next to Brandon and Isabelle who looked absolutely gleeful as they entered the airport.
All at once a rush of noise hit his ears as he walked into an enormous building full of people from all over the world, it seemed. There were people talking at the telephone booths, and to the ladies and gentlemen behind the desks, and many little kids who were jumping up and down tugging on their mother's and father's sleeves as they stood in the long lines.
He followed his father who was in the lead of their group over to one of the less crowded lines. The sign above the desk read UNITED AIRLINES.
"So, where is it we are going, exactly?" Isabelle asked her mum.
"Albus found a place he said was just off the coast of South Carolina," Lily answered quietly, making sure no one overheard.
"United States!" Isabelle exclaimed, though she to keep her voice low despite her obvious excitement.
Lily confirmed with a smile and a nod of her head.
Brandon was just as excited. They had never been to North America. Usually they went to Spain or a local area, but never the United States.
Harry was delighted as well; this would be the first time that he had left Britain.
"Can I help you, Sir?" The lady from behind the counter asked James.
James reached into his pocket and pulled out five passports and tickets for their plane ride, and handed them to the lady.
"Ah, Mr. Sherman," The lady stated out loud, before turning to her computer to check them in and confirm their tickets.
James smiled at the lady and turned to his family to see his kids all wearing curious looks.
He whispered down at them, "Precaution."
They nodded to show they understood.
"Well then, Mr. Sherman, your flight departs in about an hour and a half from Gate D. Please make sure you are in that area when they call for seating. Do you have any baggage with you?" the Lady said a few minutes later.
"No, we don't" James replied simply. Dumbledore had already sent their belongings along, to save them time when they reached the U.S.
"Alright then! Thank you, and have a nice flight." She said, returning their passports and tickets back to James.
"Thank you, miss," James replied, before turning away from the line and walking towards the security check, followed closely by the rest of the Potters.
They spent the next half an hour going through the security before they finally reached Gate D.
"Hey, we have some time before the flight leaves, how about we go find a place to get something to eat? Plane food is not the best, and I don't know about you guys but I am starving." James stated.
"When are you not starving?" Lily and Isabelle stated at the same time rolling their eyes.
Though in the end they all ended up sitting at a small sandwich shop, just a minute or so away from the gate, eating sandwiches and drinking their sodas.
Before they knew it, they were being seated on the plane. Harry was even more nervous now then he had been before. Sure, he had flown before, but before he had been the one in control.
He was seated between Isabelle and Brandon in the middle row of seats, in business class, while Lily and James were seated by the window just to the right of them.
Isabelle seemed to notice that Harry was a little nervous and spoke, "Don't worry, you can trust an airplane"
"Most of the time," Brandon added.
Isabelle smacked her brother on the head after she saw that Harry looked even more afraid now, "Don't listen to him. The chances of this plane going down are, like, one in a million"
"Right" Harry said though he kept a firm grip on the arms of his chair and his seat belt was buckled extremely tight.
Harry looked over to see that James was much the same as him, buckled in tight and grasping Lily's hand. This, he thought, was curious, as he thought that his father had flown by airplane more then once.
This time Brandon was the one to notice Harry's curious stare directed at their father, "Dad has never really gotten used to the whole muggle flying thing, says he prefers a broom any day"
"Ooh" Harry said now understanding.
Then slowly the plane started to move, and two stewardesses came to the front of their section, and started to recite what seemed to be a speech they said quite often. Harry found himself ignoring it, much like he ignored the teacher's speeches at the beginning of the school year.
Five or so minutes after that, the airplane picked up speed and showed no sign of dropping it. In fact, the whole machine just started to tilt backwards and up into the air.
Harry had to admit his dad was right, a broom was better any day. A few minutes later the plane had leveled out, and Harry somewhat loosened his grip on his chair. He looked over to see his father was somewhat pale, and still grasping his mother's hand tight.
Lily herself looked ready to start laughing at James for being such a baby, but kept her mouth tightly shut.
He checked his new watch that he had received for his birthday to check the time. Noon had just passed, and they would be arriving in America in nine hours or so, as the flight attendants had said.
Until then, Harry decided to follow the example his siblings had taken, by switching on one of the offered movies and kicking back and relaxing.
(9 Hours Later)
"Ladies and Gentlemen, please make sure your belt is buckled, as we will be reaching our destination in the next few minutes. Please be sure to turn off all electrical devices and fold up your table trays. Thank you for flying United, we hope you had a pleasant flight. Enjoy the rest of your evening," One of the stewardesses spoke over the loud speaker.
Harry hastily rebuckled his belt tight and grasped at the arms of the chairs. He had experienced the lift off, and flight, and now came the landing.
Once again James had attached his hand to his wife's and shut his eyes tight, he hated landing. Landing in an airplane was not like the smooth free experience of landing off a broomstick, not like it at all.
Harry suddenly felt the plane go into a slow descend. A few minutes later they hit the ground with a great bump, it took all Harry's self control to not scream out loud, unfortunately James did not have such control, and screamed like a banshee, causing several heads to turn.
The rockiness lasted only a few more moments before they were smoothly riding up to their gate and parking.
"Ladies and Gentlemen we have arrived at our destination, if you will please take all your belongings and walk off the plane in an orderly fashion, once again thank you for flying United, and have a pleasant night" the perky stewardess spoke into the speaker.
Harry unbuckled his seatbelt, and followed Brandon and Isabelle over to his parents.
Lily was trying to pry her hand away from James, who looked positively frightened out of his skin.
"Are you alright, dad?" Brandon asked, with an amused smile.
"Yeah… yeah, just fine..."
"Well, then, how about we go, it's getting late, and I am exhausted." Lily said, stifling a yawn successfully.
"Yeah, that's a good idea." James said, looking quite glad to be getting off the muggle flying contraption.
Harry followed his family off of the plane, and out into the American airport. Even though it was somewhat late (nine o'clock), the airport was as busy as ever, and many people were bustling around, but this time Harry was too tired to really care.
He walked out of the airport into the warm breezy summer air of South Carolina, and followed his family around a bend, where James started looking around the ground.
"What are you doing?" Harry asked, curious.
"Looking for something to transform," James said, picking up a woodchip.
"Into wha-"
He was interrupted by James mumbling some words and flailing his wand about, until -poof-, right before them stood a mini van of quite good quality.
James smiled smugly.
"Show off" Lily muttered, while she climbed into the front seat.
Harry followed Isabelle and Brandon into the middle row, and buckled up (he may not know the rules to an airplane, but he had definitely been in a few cars before, even one that flew and could be invisible).
They rode silently for about an hour, (they were too tired to speak) until out of the blue James stopped the car.
"We're here," he called.
Harry looked up and saw, to his amazement, quite a spectacular house. It was a light green, two story house that had a homey feel to it.
"Whoa" Brandon exclaimed.
They all seemed to agree with that statement, and hurriedly left the car heading for the door.
"Where exactly are we honey?" Lily asked James.
"I'm not sure. Dumbledore gave me the directions, said it would be safe. He also said that there aren't too many muggles around, and there is quite a distance in-between this house and it's neighbors, so it should be fine to do magic." James rambled on.
"Well, I definitely could get used to this" she said, and followed her kids up to the front door.
They all spent the next half an hour exploring every nook and cranny of the house, before they sunk into their beds and fell asleep, exhausted and suffering from jetlag.
Day One in Paradise:
The following morning Brandon was the first up, he had always been an early riser (a trait he got from his mother). He walked out of the room leaving his brother sound asleep in his bed (Harry and him had to share a room, while Isabelle got her own but he didn't mind).
He walked down the stairwell and walked through the door, which he had discovered last night, that led to the kitchen.
He walked over to the refrigerator and opened the door, only to find that there was nothing in it yet. They would need to go shopping for some food before they all starved.
Scratching food off his list, he sat down on the stool that was placed at the island counter top in the middle of the fairly large room, and drummed his fingers against the shiny overlay.
He was sitting lost in thought, thinking about what had been on his mind for days now. This being none other than the huge shock of finding out his brother was alive. He had always wanted a brother, younger or older; it did not matter to him. When he found out from his parents that he did have a brother and that he was dead, it somewhat devastated him, but now he had a chance to get to know his brother again, he just didn't know how to approach him. From what he had been told from his parents, Harry's friends, and the display at the Dursley's yesterday, Harry had had a hard life. What did he have to talk to him about other than Quidditch? While that was a tasteful subject, that wasn't what he wanted his relationship with his brother to be based on.
Speaking of brothers, his just walked through the door; Harry stumbled tiredly into the room, rubbing his eyes from sleep. He looked up and saw Brandon already awake and sitting at the island in the middle of the kitchen.
"Hey, did you sleep well?" Harry asked awkwardly. Despite the fact that he was in a way the new addition to his family, he still felt that he was the one who needed to look after them, not the other way around. He was his sibling's older brother, even if only by a year.
Shaken from his thoughts Brandon replied, "Yeah. I was absolutely knackered from yesterday."
"Yeah, tell me about it. So, where is everyone else?" Harry asked, looking around.
"Still asleep, I'm afraid," Brandon replied, running his hand through his dark red locks, not having anything better to do with them.
There was silence that seemed to last forever, only broken by the door swinging open once more, admitting Lily.
Lily walked through the door to see her two sons standing awkwardly around the island table.
"Good Afternoon," Lily said, realizing that it was no longer morning.
"Morning," was their mumbled responses.
"Well, how bout some breakfast?" Lily asked them.
"There's no food," Brandon told his mum.
"Oh. Well then, I guess we'll need to go out. I'll go wake the others, they have been sleeping for far too long." Lily said.
"Can't we just magic the food up?" Harry asked.
"We can't use magic, for protection purposes. Plus, it's more adventurous to do it the muggle way." Lily said with a smile.
"I guess..." Harry muttered, remembering all those times in the past that he had cooked. None were very adventurous, just annoying.
Lily noticed that everyone seemed a little uncomfortable, but didn't press on it any further; it would take some time before things settled down and no situation this fragile should be rushed.
A.N. ANNOUNCEMENT: TIME WILL TELL is back up after its initial deletion so if any of you reviewers and readers who have been wondering what happened there it is back up and there should be a new chapter up (chapter 26) I would really appreciate some reviews (preferably long) for it as it lost a great deal of them.
Okay well I would write the rest of the vacation in this chapter but I decided that I really wanted to get it out since I have not updated for a while because of being sick and having trouble with the chapter, exams and having a new painting due. Tip never ever write a vacation chapter in the middle of the war there are to many things to take in consideration etc. well the next bit will hopefully be out at the end of the week fingers crossed.
Please leave a nice long review.
PS. This chapter has not been betaed yet but when it has thanks to Pontas Metallika for all her hard work.
Cheers
Petroleumjellydotone.
