Chapter 59: More Hippos

March 14th, 1994

Venice, Italy

"Lily?" James asked. "Come on, the ship's almost at dock."

"One second!" she called back. "I need your help."

"Why?"

"I have no clue what to wear. We're in Venice, right?"

"Yeah."

"Where are we going to go? What should I wear?"

"It's up to you," James replied. "Anything you want. We can go wherever, it doesn't matter."

"It does! If we're going to the beach, I'll need beachy clothes. If we're going somewhere formal, like a concert, I have to wear a dress. If we're going sightseeing, I'll need something pretty but normal. So it depends on where we're going!" Lily replied hurriedly. "Now, what should I wear?"

"I don't know where we're going," James told her. "Just wear a simple dress."

"I can't decide! Should I wear the dark red with designs? The simple light blue? I really don't know."

James sighed and walked over to where she was standing. She was looking at all her different clothes, put up on hangers. Merlin, she had a lot of clothes. "Er… Wear this one."

He tossed her a light blue, floral shirt, and then threw her a dusty rose light jacket. "Is this good?"

Lily looked down at it. "Wait for a second." She closed her closet door and then opened it a few minutes later. She had put on the top and jacket. "What do you think?" she asked. "Does it really suit Venice?"

"Forget Venice," he said slowly. "It suits you."

She rolled her eyes, blushing furiously. "Stop. Whatever. Be honest. Does it go well with each other?"

"I definitely think so," he responded truthfully. "You need a pair of light sunglasses and a floppy white…"

"Hat?!" she asked incredulously.

He smirked.

"Hey, Remus!"

Remus stopped and turned around. It was Septima Vector.

"Hi," he responded kindly. "Do you need something?"

"No. I was just on my way out of the ship, but Minerva told me that Filius had some papers to deliver to Professor Dumbledore…"

"Okay," replied Remus. "And?"

"And, well, Aurora is calling me so we can go on a bus tour, and I really need to be there right now… and you look like you're free, so…"

"You want me to deliver these papers to Dumbledore?" Remus finished for her.

"What? Oh, no, of course not! You don't need to-"

Remus sighed. Lazy people. "I'll do it."

"Good," replied Vector, relieved. "Oh, I mean… thank you! It was completely unneeded for you to-"

"Where are the papers?" he cut her off.

"Here." Vector shoved a pile of papers into his hand. "I don't think he's expecting visitors, so you'd better knock first. He doesn't get up this early, I don't think…"

Remus rolled his eyes. "Okay." He turned and started making his way towards Dumbledore's room. He came to a halt outside the door and knocked on it. Nobody responded. He knocked again, then paused, trying to see if he could hear any sounds. He heard the running of water, and a… low growl. It sounded as if there was an animal in his room.

Remus gently pushed open the door.

"Headmaster?" he called.

Then he stopped.

The bathroom door was open, and there was… in the middle of the bathtub… a hippo. A baby hippo, by the looks of it. That itself would have shocked Remus, but that wasn't the end.

The bathtub was filled with soapy water, and right next to it was Albus Dumbledore in his swimming trunks, watching the hippo and nodding, pouring soap into the bathtub.

"Headmaster?" Remus asked again, horrified.

Dumbledore whipped around and stood up suddenly. "Ah! Remus! What are you doing here? So early in the morning? Did nobody teach you to knock?"

Remus blinked. "Is that a… hippo?"

"Yes, yes, it's a hippo. That's not the point. Why are you here?"

Remus's eyes widened. "What's a hippo doing in your room?"

"She is my pet," Dumbledore replied defensively. "What's your problem?"

"You can't hold an animal captive-"

"CAPTIVE?" he thundered. "Why, Remus, I'm not keeping her captive!"

"Where did you get her from?" Remus asked him.

"Er… somewhere off the coast of Western Italy? I got her on a Sailing Day after Genoa," Dumbledore answered.

"All the way on the other side of Italy?!" cried Remus. What the heck was Dumbledore thinking?!

"Yes. Anyway, will you go? It's Magnolia's bath time."

She had a name, too?!

"'Behold the Venice Canal… The most wonderful and famous canal of all of Italy, perhaps the entire world!' It sounds pretty cool," Hermione said, flipping through the pamphlet. "Should we go?"

Ron leaned over her shoulder, sending tingly feelings down her back. "Looks nice," he said. "Let's go."

"Yeah, sure," said Harry. "Let me go back to my room and get my shoes…"

Ron cast a glance at Hermione. "Actually, Harry, do you want to hang out with your roommates for a change?"

Harry looked up, surprised. "Like, you don't want me to join?"

"No. Duh." Ron rolled his eyes. "I just heard Neville saying that he wished you spent more time with them."

Hermione frowned. She'd heard nothing of the sort.

"Oh." Harry frowned. "I didn't know that."

"Of course you didn't, mate. That's why I'm telling you." Ron clapped him on the back.

"Then… What do I do? Go hang out with them?" Harry frowned again. "I don't know… I'll be ditching you guys."

"You won't 'ditch' us," Ron assured him quickly - a little too quickly. Hermione narrowed her eyes in suspicion.

"Are you sure?" Harry didn't look convinced. He looked a little suspicious.

"Yeah, we're sure," Hermione jumped in to help with whatever Ron was trying to do. "We don't need you here all the time, anyway."

An expression of hurt crossed Harry's face.

"Hermione!" whispered Ron.

"I didn't mean it that way…" Hermione faltered. What had she meant? Why had she said that?

"I get it," Harry mumbled, trying to keep a smile on his face. "I'll go hang out with Neville."

"Yeah, sure," Hermione told him brightly. Ron cast her a look which had confusion and shock mixed into it.

Harry left, slamming the door a little too loudly for him to be okay.

Ron turned on Hermione. "What was that?"

"I'm sorry, I-"

"Are you kidding? 'We don't need you here all the time'? That was really mean, Hermione. Why did you say that?" he asked her.

"Well, you're not any better!" Hermione retorted hotly. "You were the one who lied about Neville wanting to spend more time with him!"

Ron fell silent. "I…"

"Why did you say that?" she asked him.

"I dunno… I just wanted to have more time to spend between us, you know? Instead of Harry being here?"

Hermione paused, frowning. "What do you mean?"

"I want to spend time with you," he said, rolling his eyes. "I don't want to make Harry feel like a third-wheel. Sometimes, with three people, we have that. And I spend lots of time with Harry on my own. And you spend time with Harry, just between you two. For a change, I want to have time to spend with you. Without Harry, so he doesn't feel left out when we sort of… exclude him."

Hermione thought about that. How could Harry feel left out? She thought about the times that they'd excluded Harry without meaning to. She could think of plenty of times… times when they wanted to talk to each other and him being there, kind of messing up the whole thing.

"Oh."

He gave her a small smile. "Anyway, should we go? To the Venice Canal?"

"Yeah, sure. Let me just go back to my room and change."

"Take your time."

In around five minutes, the two of them were ready and were leaving the ship (accompanied by a very amused Sprout, who was supposed to be their guardian so they didn't get questioned by the authorities). From there, they took a bus to the Venice Canal, where Sprout caught up with one of her teacher friends.

"It looks nice…" Hermione started, "but it's just a canal."

"You can't see the whole thing from here," Ron told her. "We need to go on, like, a boat tour or something."

Hermione checked her watch. "I mean, sure. We've got all the time in the world. Let's go on a boat tour."

Tonks donned a dark velvet purple dress and let her pink hair down in waves. She looked around, waiting for Remus. He should be here…

"Hey," he said, appearing out of his closet. He was wearing a black sweater and dark blue jeans. His hair was brushed to the side.

"Ready?" Tonks asked him.

"Yep." Remus ran a hand through his hair. "Let's go."

The two of them left the ship and made their way to the Concerts Collegium Ducale Palace. They were going to watch some sort of concert… Tonks couldn't remember who the composer was. It was a formal, fancy concert, which was why she was so decked up. She hated long gowns otherwise.

"Remus?" she asked.

"Yeah?"

"What song are we going to listen to?" she asked him. "Some Vivo dude, right?"

Remus laughed. "Vivaldi. It's called 'The Four Seasons'. It's really, really nice."

"Have you listened to it before?"

"Yeah. My mom used to take me to these concerts when I was little. She loved classical. I learned to love it, too."

Tonks nodded. "That's sweet. My family never really was the classical kind. We like listening to pop or rock. I'm for the Weird Sisters, though. They're my favorite."

He laughed. "I know. My mother listened to pop music too, but I just followed my mom's taste in classical music. I like pop too, though."

They reached the theatre and took a seat in the third row. The lights dimmed.

For a few seconds, it stayed like that. Then two spotlights flashed on either side of the front. There was a woman on each side, and they were playing the double bass. Two more spotlights flashed on, this time two men with what looked like a cello. Then viola. Then violin. Then other instruments, including a man at the piano. They started playing a tune, presumably 'The Four Seasons'. It was honestly really nice. It was peppy, then became slow, which made it very peaceful.

The music continued playing, and halfway through, Remus nudged Tonks gently. "What do you think?" he whispered. "Do you like it? If not, we can leave…"

"I like it," Tonks assured him. "It's honestly really nice. What season are we on?" she added, as a new tune started up. She could just tell they moved on. "Autumn?"

"Yeah. We just finished Summer."

"I liked Summer," Tonks mused. "And Spring. And this one."

Remus laughed. "I was worried you wouldn't like it."

"Well… no more worries. I love it," Tonks replied in a whisper.

They fell silent as the music went on. After around eleven minutes, a new beat started up. "Winter?"

"Yep."

The music started at a steady beat, and then it got faster. She could see the violinists drawing their bows across the violin much faster. She liked the Winter portion a lot. It had an aura of suspense, speed, and it was just… peaceful. It was probably her favorite of all the Seasons.

The music sped up again, and then slowed. It would give suspenseful music which sped up with every note, then gradually stopped. Tonks was glad she'd come to this concert…

… even if it required wearing a gown.

Ginny was crouched behind two pillars.

She had seen Ron and Hermione lie to Harry and tell Harry that he had to spend time with Neville.

Of all people, Neville!

Then she'd seen Harry walk around the ship and find Neville, who was leaving the ship with Dean and Seamus. Now, she was watching Harry ask Neville if they wanted to hang out.

"I'm sorry, but I'm going with these guys," Neville told him. "The three of us have already booked tickets on a bus tour. Maybe you can…"

"It's fine," Harry replied, running his hands through his hair (Ginny noticed he did that a lot when he was nervous, upset, or angry.)

"Thanks." Neville patted him on the back as he departed with Dean and Seamus.

"If Neville wanted to hang out with me, then why would he refuse to let me hang out with him?" Ginny heard Harry ask himself. "I don't get it."

Ginny grimaced. She felt bad for Harry, but Harry was no longer her business. If Harry was upset, Harry was upset.

She had nothing to do with him anymore.

Severus was wearing a full-sleeved black shirt and dark black trousers. He couldn't imagine wearing any other color. Except grey. Grey was acceptable.

He was at St. Mark's Square. There were lots of people passing by. It was a square enclosed by St Mark's Basilica around it. There were quite a lot of pigeons, actually. And performers. Lots of performers. Sometimes the accordion, sometimes the violin, but there was always someone performing.

"Fancy seeing you here," came a voice.

Severus whipped around. It was Charity. They kept bumping into each other these days. Severus was starting to wonder if one (or more) of them was doing this on purpose. He hadn't bumped into, say, McGonagall this much. Or Sprout. He hadn't seen Pomona at all on this trip, except for the moment when she had been scooping ice cream into her bowl at dinner and it had launched off right into Severus's soup.

He had been quite angry.

But he and Charity kept meeting each other these days! It was so weird.

"Hello?" she asked again. "Are you in there, Severus?"

Severus blinked a couple of times and shook his head. "Yes."

She smirked. "What are you doing here?"

"I'm off for a walk around the square," he replied.

"Nice," she replied. "I like this music, by the way, who's playing?"

Severus looked over at the people playing a jazzy number on the violin. "I don't know. Random people who perform for money."

"That's not nice. They play because they don't have food or homes."

"They don't have money to buy that, but they have enough money to buy that outfit and a violin?" Severus returned. "I don't have a problem with them playing or asking for money, but people idolize them."

"We don't idolize them, Severus, we pity them. We feel sympathetic for them. Not all people are emotionless, you know."

He raised an eyebrow. Was she calling him emotionless? That stung.

"I mean… I didn't mean it like that. I'm just saying, we feel bad for them."

"Yeah, yeah." Severus rolled his eyes and turned his head back to the musicians on the street.

The next musicians came up, a singer and someone one a portable piano. They played a slow classical song.

"I like this one," Charity muttered, "but I like jazzy better."

"I like this one more," Severus disagreed. "It's peaceful. Calming."

Charity rolled her eyes. "I knew you'd like these boring songs better."

"You're only calling it boring because you're used to those peppy songs. Those don't connect to your emotions as well. These do. That's why I like them."

Charity looked up at him, looking thoughtful. "Peppy is nice, though."

Severus wanted to facepalm.

"Seriously? They ran out of pasta?" Liana asked in disbelief. "I loved the pasta."

"They'll refill it, you know," Draco told her. "Don't worry."

She grimaced and waved over a waiter who was walking nearby. "They ran out of the pasta," she told him. "Can you refill it?"

"Sure," replied the waiter, walking away and returning with another waiter a few moments later as they refilled the pasta.

"Cool. Thanks," Liana said, filling a bowl with pasta. "Ready, Draco?"

"Yeah."

Liana, Kylie, Candice, and Draco were all going to go for dinner together, but then Kylie had lost one of her pants and therefore was still in the room looking for it. Candice opted to stay back with her, and they would be here once Kylie found her pants.

The two of them head to a table which was in sight.

"Anyway, what did you do in Venice today?" Liana asked Draco.

"I hung out on the ship, actually. I went surfing with Pansy."

"Ooh, the windsurfing thing?" Liana asked. "I was going to go with Candice tomorrow."

"You should. It's fun," Draco told her. "The cruise is ending in a couple of days, anyway, so you're going to need to try out everything before it ends."

She laughed. "I'll keep that in mind. Were you good at surfing?"

"I mean, nobody was. It was my first time, and I… sucked."

Liana snorted.

"I mean, you have to put your knees in… some position… and then they push you down, and it just sort of tosses you back and forth. The current, I mean. And then the dude tells you to do something. And you have to do it, but like… it doesn't make sense. They just say to do it and you don't know it. Not even how. Because they're just saying something you don't get and then you fall because you didn't know it or how to do 'it' in the first place. What is it, you'll be wondering the whole time. You know?"

Liana blinked. "That… made absolutely no sense."

Draco rolled his eyes, then he smirked. "Well, you'll be given those instructions while windsurfing. Because it won't make sense, what they-"

"I got it, I got it," she interrupted. "Don't start blabbering again."

He laughed. "What about you?"

"I went to a museum with Luna," she replied.

"Luna? Luna Lovegood?"

"No, Luna the Donkey." Liana rolled her eyes. "How many other Lunas are on this cruise?"

He rolled his eyes. "I just wanted to make sure. Are you two friends?"

She frowned. "No. We're just in the same room, so the two of us went to a museum together. It was kind of boring. Luna found it fascinating, though. She blabbered about the 'Uncle Conspiracy'. Any clue what that is?"

"Nope."

"Yeah, she was saying some nonsense the whole time."

"She tends to do that a lot," he remarked thoughtfully. "I think she-"

"Hey!" exclaimed Kylie, plopping down in the seat.

"Did you find your pants?" Liana asked her.

"You lost your pants?" Draco asked.

Kylie glared at Liana. "I told you not to tell."

"We found her pants," Candice answered, sinking down next to Kylie. "They were in the mini-fridge."

"Why were they in there?"

Draco waggled his eyebrows. "Who knows."

"Oh, come on… no! Don't eat me!" James cried.

Lily turned to James's screen, where the little yellow dude - was his name Pacman? - had died and the screen blinked black.

"Great. Now I'm only fourth in the tournament. I was second before this." James rolled his eyes and looked over at Lily's screen. "How you doing?"

Lily had been playing some sort of variation of Snake, and she was actually doing… horrible. "Not that good."

"You can't do it like that, Lily, you have to go until you eat the apple and then turn. You can't hit the tail."

"Yeah, but I'm not fast enough," Lily replied.

James smirked and reached over to her dials, turning her snake and it went towards the next apple. "It's simple. When you hit the apple, turn it."

"I have a little intelligence in me," Lily told him, raising her eyebrow. "I just can't do it against the wall."

"Hey, these are my first time with Muggle arcades, and I can do it," James returned. "You grew up with muggle-borns. You know how this works. Have you never done it before?"

"I mean… they only came out when I was in first year, James."

"Really?"

"Yep. They came out in 1971. I was eleven then." She grimaced, adding, "But well… I did go play them in the summers with my parents-"

"Lame!" exclaimed James, grinning. "And I'm still better than you?"

She rolled her eyes. "Just forget it, James."

A/N: Just some more light-hearted fluff! The rest of this fic is written, so more chapters are on their way soon!