In the few weeks since Samantha had been home, much had changed. For one, Samantha had gotten glasses. They did not look like Harry's, but instead were black and square. For another, things seemed to be working out nicely for Lauren and Harry. All either of them could equate this to was Samantha coming home.
It was Dudley's birthday, and Samantha sat glumly at the table staring at the mountain of presents for Dudley. Harry and Lauren had been put to work making eggs and bacon, but seeing as Aunt Petunia had failed to find a different food Samantha could make, she was forced to let Samantha instead sit at the table.
Harry and Lauren had just finished cooking when Dudley was led downstairs by Petunia. They piled food onto plates as he counted his presents.
"There's only thirty six. I had thirty eight last year," Dudley said, examining the presents.
"No, dear, thirty seven, you forgot this one," Petunia said lovingly.
"That's still one less," Dudley said. His face reddened, and Samantha braced herself in case he started throwing anything at her. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Harry scarfing down his bacon, probably afraid Dudley would flip the table as he had done many times before.
Dudley scrunched up his face and wailed just as Harry pushed the last piece of bacon into his mouth. He wasn't crying, simply faking it to get his way, but it always worked.
"When we're in town today, we'll buy you two more! Then you'll have thirty nine!" Aunt Petunia said hastily, evidently also wanting to avoid the table being flipped.
"Fine," Dudley agreed. He started eating as he unwrapped presents. About halfway through, he decided to taunt the Potters. "I'm going to the zoo today and you aren't," he said haughtily.
Samantha looked appraisingly at her aunt as if daring her to contradict Dudley. Just then, the phone rang and she hurried off to get it.
She returned a moment later looking angry. "Mrs. Figg's broke her leg and can't watch them" she told Vernon.
"What!?" Dudley roared. Samantha glared at him.
"How dare she?" Vernon asked as if Mrs. Figg had broken her leg on purpose. "What will we do with them?"
Petunia though for a moment. "Marge?" she asked.
"Don't be silly, she hates them," Vernon said. "What about that friend of yours?"
"Yvonne? No, she's on holiday..." Petunia said.
"We could stay here," Harry suggested.
"And come home to see you' three have burned the house down?" Uncle Vernon asked.
"I suppose we could bring them to the zoo... and they stay in the car..." Aunt Petunia said slowly.
"No, we just got the car, they'll wreck it," Vernon said.
Just then, there was a knock at the door.
"Oh, that must be Piers..." Petunia said, and got up once more to answer the door.
Thirty minutes later, with all seven of them crammed into the car, Harry, Lauren, and Samantha could hardly believe their luck. Even listening to their uncle complain about various things was worth it. Thankfully, he had chosen to complain about motorcycles instead of them.
"I had a dream about a flying motorcycle once," Harry commented.
Uncle Vernon almost crashed the car in his rage. "MOTORCYCLES DON'T FLY!" he bellowed.
Harry pulled his head back, looking shocked. "It was only a dream..." He muttered quietly.
When they got to the zoo, the first thing they did was buy ice cream.
"Two double-scoop chocolate ice creams," Uncle Vernon told the kind looking woman working there.
"Of course. Would these three like anything?" she asked as she scooped the ice cream.
Samantha looked at Petunia and raised her eyebrows.
"They'll have..." she quickly scanned the menu for their cheapest item. "Three lemon ice pops," she ordered, then looked back at Samantha and flared her nostrils.
The lady handed over their ice cream and the group walked in to look at the animals.
"That gorilla looks like Dudley, except they're not blonde..." Samantha told Harry and Lauren, making them laugh.
Soon enough, it was time for lunch. Dudley ordered a knickerbocker glory.
"Da-ad, it doesn't have enough ice cream! I want more ice cream!" he yelled.
Vernon quickly summoned the waitress. "Another knickerbocker glory with extra ice cream, and quickly, my son doesn't like to wait," he ordered. The waitress, looking scared, scampered back off to the kitchen.
Soon, she came back holding an even bigger dish of ice cream. "Sir, what would you like me to do with this one?" she asked, pointing to the barely touched first one.
Samantha perked up, looking eagerly at her uncle. He shot her a nasty look before telling the waitress "Leave it here, these three can finish it."
Samantha couldn't believe her luck. She, Lauren, and Harry finished Dudley's original knickerbocker glory quickly, and had been done for a while when Dudley finally finished the enormous one that sat in front of him.
After lunch, they went to the reptile house. Piers and Dudley had wanted to see large, poisonous animals and were disappointed when most of the animals were small and relatively harmless. They quickly found the largest snake in the place, a big boa constrictor in the back. But however harmful it could be when it was awake, it didn't look very harmful while asleep.
"Make it move!" cried Dudley.
Uncle Vernon tapped on the glass, but the snake didn't move a muscle. He tapped again, and still nothing happened.
"This is boring, I'm leaving," Dudley said, and walked towards a different reptile.
Harry, Lauren and Samantha, who'd been watching this play out, walked towards it.
"He looks very lonely, doesn't he?" Lauren asked.
"I suppose," Samantha said. "That does seem like a very lonely existence."
The boa constrictor seemed to have awoke, and now rose up to stare at the three children. And it winked. Well, made its face look like it was winking.
Harry winked back.
The snake made a low hissing noise, and Harry made a similar sound back. Samantha looked at Lauren, who stared bewilderedly back. They looked between Harry and the snake, the former of which made another strong hissing noise.
The snake responded by jabbing it's tail at the sign reading Boa Constrictor, Brazil.
Harry made another noise, and the snake again jabbed it's tail at the smaller print, This specimen was bred in the zoo.
"Can you understand it?" Samantha asked Harry.
"You can't?" Harry asked. Just then, a deafening scream interrupted Samantha's reply.
"DUDLEY! YOU WON'T BELIEVE WHAT THIS SNAKE IS DOING!" Piers cried. He and Dudley ran to the snake, shoving Harry and Lauren to the ground and pushing Samantha so she stumbled.
Samantha watched as Dudley and Piers put their faces against the glass, and then there was no glass, and they were falling into the enclosure and the snake was leaving. It made one last hissing noise before slithering away.
"What-," Samatha started. Her aunt, uncle, and the keeper of the reptile house had rushed to the boys to help them out.
"The glass!" the keeper cried. "Where did the glass go?"
The zoo gave the Dursley's a full refund on admission and apologized profusely. In the car, Dudley and Piers recounted their stories that the snake had almost bitten their legs off, but as far as Samantha had seen, the snake had bit playfully from two feet away.
However, once Piers could think of nothing more to add to his story, he started talking about why he had called Dudley over in the first place.
"Harry was talking to the snake, weren't you, Harry?" he told everyone in the car.
Samantha thought she heard Uncle Vernon's breathing get heavier, but he didn't speak. Instead, Dudley and Piers taunted Harry the rest of the way about how his only friend was a snake.
Samantha would have stopped this, but figured Harry would be in big enough trouble already, and it would do no good for all three of them to be without any privileges. She knew it would be Harry and not her or Lauren in trouble, because he was the one accused of talking with the snake.
They dropped Piers off, and once they got home the yelling started. Uncle Vernon's face was deep red, and he was yelling nonsense words at Harry, too angry to speak. "GO- CUPBOARD- NO DINNER-" he shouted, and Harry scampered off to his cupboard.
Then he rounded on Samantha and Lauren. "ROOM! DON'T COME UNTIL DINNER!" he told them, and while Lauren ran straight to their room, Samantha strolled casually up the stairs, taking her time.
She and Lauren sat in their room for a while, both reading. Samantha could've sworn she heard something rustling outside, but ignored it. Lauren went to use the bathroom, and Samantha was startled by the owl that appeared at her window. She recognized it at once as Max's.
"Come back when Lauren is asleep, please, so I can reply," Samantha told the owl. It hooted to show it understood, then flew off.
Samantha opened the letter and began to read.
Dear Samantha,
That story about the shrinking sweater was amazing. I'm glad no one got punished. You should savor the time you've got before Lauren and Harry are at Hogwarts and you can still do magic at home. Do you know when you'll go to Diagon Alley? If you do, tell me so we can meet up. My parents like to go midsummer so that no books are sold out. They usually go within a week of the book lists being delivered. I could probably convince them to let me go later though. I hope everything is going well for you.
Sincerely, Max
Samantha smiled. She tucked the letter in the small box she kept all of the letters she'd gotten from her friends this summer. She then pulled out a piece of parchment and a pen and began to write her reply.
Dear Max,
I'm doing fine, I think. It was my cousin's birthday today and we went to the zoo. Harry accidentally made the glass disappear from a snake enclosure and set the snake free. He's in a lot of trouble. I don't yet have a date for when I'll go to Diagon Alley, but I'll tell you as soon as I get one. Harry will have to go this year. I have a feeling the Dursleys will try to stop him going, but they'll definitely fail. Lauren'll probably find out this year too, I think. Hope to see you in Diagon Alley.
Love, Sam
Samantha was halfway through her letter when Lauren came back, and tucked it under her pillow once she finished it so she could give it to Max's owl later.
That night, Samantha waited until she heard Vernon snoring to sneak downstairs and get Harry some food from the kitchen. She went back upstairs and could hear the faint ruffling of feathers outside her window. She and Lauren talked for a while, and when Lauren finally fell asleep, Max's owl Grey came in and she attached the letter to him before he set off for Max.
Remus hadn't seen anyone from the Muggle school since his sudden departure at the graduation ceremony, and rather wanted to keep it that way. He had gone to work at yet another Muggle bookshop, avoiding the first one because of Issy.
She was the one he missed most, other than Harry and Lauren. He had liked her, really, truly liked her, but knew being with her was impossible. Yes, wizards marrying Muggles was common, but Remus had yet to meet a werewolf who had married a Muggle. In fact, he had yet to meet a werewolf who had married at all.
One lonely Saturday, Remus was working at the store when a familiar face walked in.
Issy met his eyes, but didn't smile as she usually did when she had seen him. Clutching the backpack she had over her shoulders tightly in one hand, she walked towards him.
"Ah, Issy, funny running into you here," Remus said nervously.
"Remus, what happened?" demanded Issy.
"What do you mean?" Remus asked, playing dumb.
Issy eyed him. "You know what I mean, Remus," she said. "Graduation party, you show up and tell us you're excited for next year, only to leave in the beginning and not contact anyone for weeks except for sending a formal letter of resignation."
Remus sighed. "Oh, right," he said. "Teaching's just… not my passion, I guess."
"But it is. Remus, you love teaching. Why'd you really quit?" Issy questioned.
"I'm sorry, Issy, it's complicated," said Remus.
"Whatever it is, you can tell me," said Issy.
Remus shook his head. "I can't, Issy, you have to understand that," he told the girl.
"Why not, Remus? Why show up out of nowhere for nine months before disappearing again?" she asked.
"I just moved here, nine months ago," Remus answered. It was true, at least.
"Why disappear? After nine months, I thought something would happen!" Issy shouted. Remus was thankful no one else was in the store.
"Happen like what?" Remus asked roughly, staring at her.
"I don't know! I thought you liked me!" yelled Issy.
"I do!" Remus shouted.
"Well then what the hell is going on?" Issy asked, panting in rage.
"Shit, Issy, I can't tell you! Haven't I made that clear?" Remus asked.
"Very clear, thank you, but I don't care that you can't tell me, I feel I deserve an explanation!" Issy yelled.
"I don't care what you feel you deserve, you-," Remus started, but had to stop, because Issy had collided into him, pushing her lips into his, and then they were making out, arms wrapped around each other.
It took a few minutes for Remus to realize what he was doing, and he immediately pulled out of the kiss, stumbling a few feet back.
"I can't do this, Issy," he said softly.
"What's stopping you?" Issy questioned.
"I can't-"
"Tell me. So you've said." Issy stared at Remus, tucking her hair behind her ear. "Why not, Remus? Why are you pushing me away like this?"
"It's- it's complicated. Bigger than you could understand," Remus said.
"Don't tell me what I can and cannot understand," Issy said.
Remus took a deep breath. "There's a lot, Issy."
"A lot of what?"
"A lot I can't tell you," he said. "I want you to leave."
"You're kicking me out?" asked Issy, looking hurt.
"It's for the best," Remus told her.
"I don't see how it can be for the best," Issy said, walking towards the door.
"You can't, and you won't," said Remus. "I don't want to see you again."
"You said you like me," Issy said.
"And that doesn't change anything," Remus said painfully. "Stay away from me, please. Don't come back, don't go looking for me, promise me that."
"Why, Remus? Why?"
Remus shut his eyes. "Just go, Issy. Please," he choked.
Issy glanced at him one last time before departing from the store for the first and last time.