Chapter 9 – First Days of School

Harry was walking hand in hand with both marauders on his way to school, he was tired after not having much sleep the night before and it had taken Remus and Sirius a while o get food own it. Each marauder telling the young boy that is only half a day and he would be home before he knew it. When they got to the school the three were greeted by the headmaster.

"Prynhawn Da Harry, you are just in time, afternoon lessons are about to start, say goodbye and you a come with me" greeted the headmaster smiling. His kindness seemed to work for Harry ho said goodbye, hugged each marauder before going with the headmaster into the school. Harry thought if he didn't go in straight away that they would shout at him or punish him if he did anything wrong.

The two went down the corridor past the secretary who waved at him, Harry waved back politely. They went further past Mr Bevans office and turned into the corridor which was plastered with brightly coloured artwork, shelves full of books and a musical instrument trolley. They walked up to the first door on the left, the door was blue and had the words 'Year 3' painted on the top.

"This is the junior corridor, and this is your classroom for the year" said Mr Bevan knocking on the door.

"Come in" replied a cheery voice" and Mr Bevan opened the door. A young woman stood at the front of the class, she had bond hair and blue eyes and smiled kindly. All eyes turned to Harry, obviously smaller than the rest of the class, he felt like he was being cornered by Dudley's gang again he tried to back out but bumped into the headmaster's leg. "Hey, it's okay" said the lady teacher. "Boys and girls, this is Harry Potter, he is joining our class today, let's all make Harry feel welcome, Michael can you come over here and show Harry where all his things are"

A boy with light brown hair stood up from the table closest to the front came over and lead Harry to the pen and pencil pot and took out a clean exercise book for Harry and passed it to him before leading him to the seat next to him. The headmaster then left leaving Harry in the new classroom. Now he was sitting down the butterflies in his stomach seemed to ease off a little bit and he could look around the room, it too was decorated in different displays all different colours, red, blue, yellow, orange, green he lost count after a while. He focused on the sounds in the room it wa very loud with everyone chattering to each other and Michael tried to make conversation with him but it was hard to focus.

"Right pawb, now we have everyone here let's pick up where we left off yesterday with our spelling. Now, who can tell me how to spell the word 'straight'?" Harry had no idea, they only had covered things like 'look', 'gate' and 'happy' in his old school. A girl with black hair which had a red ribbon tied in the hair raised her hand. "Yes Grace"

"S-T-R-I-G-H-T" she spoke aloud.

"Very good Grace! You've been practicing" the girl smiled with glee "Now today we are going to be learning to spell five new words, they are 'answer, busy, minute, often and perhaps'" the teacher went on, Harry looked at Michael next to him, he smiled back at Harry, and when they were assigned to practice their spellings by reading them out to one another they both giggled when they said the same sentence at the same time. At 2.10, Mrs Owen asked them to pack away their things into their trays (Michael showed Harry his new tray) and the class lined up to go outside to play.

…

Meanwhile back at the cottage Sirius was pacing back and fore in the sitting room, Remus reading a defence book.

"Padfoot, calm down, Harry will be fine, he has shown us enough control over his new ability"

"Its not that Rem, can't you see he was a nervous wreck"

"But Padfoot its best we get all the changes done now, it will take a while before he is comfortable in this new situation, can you even imagine what he is even going through, suddenly moved to a new house with two complete strangers, finding out he is magical and now has an ability he wouldn't have a thought was imaginable. Moving into a different school with no one he knows. It is going to take a while and all we can do is be there and support him through it"

"You are right Moony, I just can't help think about the poor lad"

"I'm sure he is having a good time now he hasn't got Dudley ganging up on him"

…

At 2.15 Mrs Owen opened the door and let them out. "Come on Harry!" cried Michael "I want to show you our den" Michael ran towards some trees and into them, they ran for a bit before coming to a large tree with some cool branches. Harry smiled there was never anything like this at his old school the boys played together all break and when the bell rang to go back in the boys raced inside. The rest of the day went well but Harry was very happy to go back home.

When they were let out to meet their parents Harry saw Remus and Sirius right outside is classroom, Harry ran and jumped into Sirius' arms "Little Wolf! Looks like you had a good day" Harry nodded and smiled. "Are you ready to go home" Harry nodded again

The three walked back to the house when they got back Remus went to cook food leaving Sirius and Harry play a game. Harry had yet to speak about school so Sirius tried to prompt him "So how was your first day?"

"It was fine" replied Harry

"Did you learn anything?"

"Spelling and maths" replied Harry

"did you like it"

"It was ok" he replied and continued playing. Harry didn't want to say anything wrong, his mind was shouting at him like it had been all day, be good, don't do anything wrong, don't say anything wrong, you'll get punished, he thought about the Dursleys punishment and images flashed before his eyes. Uncle Vernon was cornering him screaming his name he reached out his hand aiming for Harrys throat. Harry tried to escape but he couldn't he was trapped. Then suddenly it was all over.

Turns out Sirius had been calling his name, "Harry! Harry are you alright"

"yeah I'm fine" Harry replied.

"Moony called us for food that's all" Harry nodded and practically ran into the kitchen. Over dinner the marauders couldn't get anything out of Harry who was now so tired he nearly fell asleep in his food. In the end Remus picked the boy up and tucked him into bed.

Sirius tried to hammer in to Remus something was up with Harry. But Remus repeated what Dumbledore had told them, it is going to talk a while to get used to things here. Sirius sighed but knew Moony was right, hopefully tomorrow would be a better day.

Harry woke up in a better mood that next day, Sirius even managed to get Harry to transform into wolf Harry while he was getting changed into his school uniform. It took Remus casting sparks with his wand to stop the pair messing around.

"You are going to be late at this rate" Remus exclaimed Harry panicked, he couldn't be late, he was bad if he was late, he jumped at that moment and he was downstairs and ready to go within five minutes. Remus and Sirius were soon ready too and they walked down to the school with plenty of time to spare.

" Do you want to go and play with the other kids?" asked Sirius. Harry shook his head vigorously and hid behind the marauders legs again. Sirius picked the boy up. "Its okay Harry, you don't have to, remember its just like yesterday, same people, same classroom, you've got this"

At that moment the bell rang for the children to go inside, Sirius put the boy down and both gave him a hug and an encouraging smile. Harry ran nervously into the classroom. The two marauders went after they saw that Harry was safely inside they left to go back to the cottage.

Inside harry put his coat and bag away where he had yesterday, today he noticed his name underneath his peg, it was laminated with stars either side of his name. This made Harry smile, he then went back into the classroom and took his seat.

Harry found the day Hard, they were having a welsh lesson with a different teacher and he didn't understand anything, he found it easier to just sit and try not to get angry with himself and let all the new sounds and things overwhelm him. However, he was losing a battle to the overwhelming surroundings, until he felt himself about to lose control and transform. Sirius had told him what to do if that happened, so he stuck his hand up and asked if he could go to the bathroom.

"Can you ask me in welsh please?" she asked. Harry panicked, he couldn't control his breathing and he as trying so hard not to transform but letting off some young wolf sounds. Luckily there was a teaching assistant in the class aware that Harry was new and didn't know any welsh and she stepped in.

"Of you go son, take as long as you need" she said and watched him out the door before talking to the welsh teacher sternly.

Harry looked either side of the corridor, he couldn't control the transformation and let it happen as he ran to the boy's toilet. His legs and arms turning into paws and his ears getting longer and longer his nose and mouth turning into a snout. He scampered into the boy's toilet and went straight into one of the stalls and curled up in a ball whimpering like a puppy.

Harry didn't know how long he was in there for but heard a familiar voice coming from the door. It wasn't Sirius or Remus, but it was a man's voice. "Harry? Harry Potter? Are you in here?"

Calmer than he was before, he could control his transformation after he had transformed back he came out of the stall and came to the door, slowly but surely, he opened the door to see Mr Bevan crouched down on his level, his face concerned but wore a smile.

"Thank you for coming out Harry, would you like to tell me what happened?"

Harry knew he had to tell, bad things happen if you lie, lying is for freaks, you re a freak, you are pathetic, his head taunted. "Ss-orry Sir, I didn't mean to be bad, I promise I wont again, I promise to try harder at welsh"

"Harry, its okay not to understand, you are new to everything here, its okay to be frightened or scared. I know you are trying your best and you did the right thing to excuse yourself when you felt upset." Harry nodded unable to get any words together.

"Now Harry, can you do something for me please?" Harry nodded again as a reply "Next time you feel too scared or upset to go back to class can you knock on my door?"

"Yes Sir" replied Harry

"That's a good boy. Are you ready to go back?" Harry nodded. "Alright let's go then" the older man walked back down the corridor with Harry and knocked on the door.

"Nodwch chi" the welsh teacher replied. Mr Bevan didn't say anything but let Harry go back to his table and he left. There wasn't much time left in the lesson and soon they were lining up with their coats on to go out and play in the yard.

They were soon out in the yard, they weren't allowed to go onto the grass and into the small wood today because it was too wet. Michael was trying to cheer Harry up and didn't leave his side all through play time.

The rest of the day went smoothly with Mrs Owens back teaching them and an assembly right at the end of the day. They did something odd well it seemed it for Harry, they were handing out awards, one person from each class and then a pebble count where the class with the highest amount of pebbles earnt to go for lunch first on Monday and have 10 minute of extra play time.

After the assembly had finished it was home time, Harry was very happy to go home for the weekend and practically jumped on Remus when he saw them waiting.

"Good day at school?" Harry nodded and didn't want to speak. When they got home though the three played a game of exploding snap, Harry fond this very amusing because the cards exploded at any time.

It turned out Harry was a natural and quickly grasped hold of the game, beating both Moony and Padfoot on one occasion. After their game which seemed to go on for ages, Moony made all three of them one of his famous hot chocolates well by Marauders standards anyway. Harry soon became sleepy after that, especially after his moment that morning. Sirius carried Harry to bed and told him a story about his Dad. But he didn't think Harry heard it because he was quickly fast asleep.