(Taps knuckles on glass) You'll still there?
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"I'm home!" Harry shouted, ringing the door bell.
Petunia opened the door to her nephew. "Welcome back and all that. We just started lunch."
"I'm sorry, Petunia. He won't be staying for lunch," Sirius said from the back of the door.
"Who's there?"
"Sirius Black, Harry's godfather and his new guardian." Sirius' lanky form emerged from behind the door. He laid a hand on Harry's shoulder. "Now, if you would be kind enough to show me to Harry's room..."
Petunia swooned on the spot. "C'mon Harry, we don't have much time!" Sirius simply stepped over Petunia's inert form.
They made their way up to Harry's room (Closing the door before they went. "No one wants to see your unconscious aunt near the door," Sirius had quipped, closing the door silently)
"Let me help you," Sirius said, picking up a few odds and ends and randomly throwing them in a suitcase. "Batman? Who's he?"
"He's a Muggle comic character," Harry replied, taking the comic from Sirius and putting it in the suitcase. "He's a bit of a sadist in my opinion."
"It looks so cool!"
"Read it then."
It took some time for them to pack, but they were finally done. "Goodbye, Durseleys!" Harry exclaimed, his gaze travelling about his now-empty room.
"PETUNIA! What happened to you?" Vernon Durseley suddenly exclaimed. "HARRY!" Our unfortunate hero gulped.
"I'm dead meat. Uncle Vernon thinks I did something to Aunt Petunia," Harry told Sirius.
"HARRY! COME DOWN THIS INSTANT!"
"I'll take care of him," Sirius put an arm in front of Harry and went down the steps.
"And who are you, my honourable sir?" Vernon questioned Sirius, his voice laced with sarcasm and arsenic.
"Sirius Black, ex-convict and Harry's godfather," He tipped a bow in Vernon's direction.
Vernon blanched. An ex-convict who was Harry's godfather? Bad combination. Very bad combination. Alarms went off in his head. It was better to comply with this fellow's requests. "Tell me, what is your business here?"
"I've come to take Harry away. Now, if you would kindly divert your mass away from the doorway..."
Vernon immediately stepped away from the doorway, fear written in every feature of his pasty visage. Sirius and Harry exited, Harry bidding them farewell with a light heart and a happy mind.
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"Here we are. It's not much, but it's my home," Sirius said when they reached Number 12, Grimmauld Place.
"It's...huge!" Harry exclaimed, looking on in awe at the sheer hugeness of the house, or manor, as it should aptly be called, in front of him. Sirius unlocked the front door and they entered.
"Master should not bring half-bloods home!" an old, wizened house-elf appeared in front of them and began to wail, blocking their way.
"Kreacher, this is my house and I shall do as I please! Now get out!" Sirius shouted. The elf disappeared with a crack.
An unearthly wailing filled the air, sending shivers down Harry's back. "Noooooo ooneeee shall contaminate my house by bringing half-bloods!"
"Wh-who's that?" Harry asked in a voice reduced to a whisper out of fear, tugging at Sirius' coat sleeves.
"That's just my mum. Don't worry; she's practically harmless. But first, let me put on the lights!"
Sirius pulled a lever. Like a magical chain reaction, the curtains drew back, revealing a dingy, fungus- infested living room and the source of that unearthly wail, a portrait of a regal-looking lady, who looked at Harry like he was this particular itch she couldn't scratch or this patch of dirt that never came off her clothes. He guessed that she was Sirius' mother; he could discern the family resemblance. The round grey eyes, the regal forehead, the lanky frame were common between mother and son. But there was a marked difference: while Mrs. Black's eyes pierced through Harry, Sirius' eyes gleamed with an amicable twinkle. She carried her frame severely, while there was an air of 'devil-may-care' and rebellion about Sirius.
"HALF-BLOODS! Not in my house!" The portrait wailed.
"Yes, he will stay. Now say goodnight, Mum," Sirius pulled down another cord and a curtain fell over the portrait, muffling her wails. "Sorry, Harry."
Harry could only look on in what resembled a mix of wonder, shock and fear. "We need to clean up, ASAP."
"With what?"
"Cleaning supplies. Haven't you heard of Prill? Or Mr. Muscle, for that matter?"
"Nope, never heard of these weird things. Sound like gibberish to me" Sirius popped the 'p'.
"Then, my dear godfather, it is time we went to a Muggle supermarket," Harry finished, with a look of determination on his face.
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The glass doors of the supermarket opened with a 'ping', letting Harry and Sirius in. Compared to Diagon Alley, Tesco's, with its stark beige walls, resembled a hospital. But Sirius looked around, a look of childish wonder on his face. For a moment, Harry had forgotten that barcodes, conveyors and the other gizmos that filled a supermarket were new to any wizard, let alone one who had been severed from all contact from the outside world for twelve long years. "Come along, people are staring," Harry said, tugging at Sirius' coat.
Pushing a trolley in front of him, Harry told Sirius what to get, and no, he couldn't Accio the bottle off the shelf in front of so many Muggles. Soon the trolley was filled with sponges, rubber gloves, brushes and cleaning agents of every kind. The lady at the cash register was surprised, to say the least. "Spring cleaning," Harry offered in way of explanation.
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"So, where do we begin?" Harry asked, back at the manor, pulling on his gloves.
"I don't know. The living room?"
A sudden thud on the window made them jump. "Boss-man! There's a letter for you!"
"Coming!" Harry exited the front door, just to see Errol, the Weasleys' owl sprawled on the ground, looking dazed.
"Here boy, let's get you inside. Just hop onto my arm."
"Ok." Errol took off with a flap of his dappled wings, and landed on Harry's head instead of the arm Harry held out.
"That works too," Harry sighed, pushing away the bit of parchment that was repeatedly going in his eye, and went inside.
"What are you doing with an owl on your head?" Sirius questioned Harry.
"It's the...fashion nowadays?"
"Jokes apart, let's see what this fellow has to say," Sirius lifted Errol off Harry's head and set him on the oaken coffee table.
"That's Louis XVI!" Sirius' mother wailed from behind the curtain.
Sirius conveniently ignored her and set about taking off the message from Errol's leg.
"It's from your friend, Ron."
"Give it to me!" Harry took the message from Sirius' hand.
'Dear Harry,' it read, 'hope the uncle and aunt are not giving you too much trouble. Everyone is pretty fine here at the Burrow. Would you like to come I say, I've got some pretty good news. In the raffle at work, Dad won tickets to the finals of the Kid Quidditch World Cup. Would you like to join us? Send the answer with Errol (did he bump into a window?).
All our love,
RON. P.S- George, Fred and Ginny say Hi. Mom asks if you're eating well. Dad wants to know how the fellytone works.'
Harry smiled at this letter, full of smiles and warmth. Heck, it even smelt like Molly Weasley's sugar cookies. "Sirius, can I go?" Harry asked his godfather.
"Where to, Harry?" Sirius asked.
"Ron's father got tickets to the Quidditch World Cup finals, and they are inviting me to go along with them."
"Hmmm...I'll think about it," Sirius said, and thought for some time. "You can go," he told Harry.
"Thanks, Sirius!"
"But first, let's make this house liveable," Sirius said, eying the mould-infested walls of the living room.
"Let's begin! " Harry said.
Over a period of four days, they managed to make three rooms clean and free of mildew and fungus. It hard been hard, not only because it had been tough to clean out the fungus, but also because Boggarts had made their homes in the wet and small nooks and crannies of the rooms, of which there was no deficiency.
Harry had encountered a Boggart, while he had been cleaning out one of the many bedrooms in the Black household, when he had opened up a cupboard that had never been opened for the twelve years Sirius had been in prison. The mildew-like scent of unused clothes hit him in the face like a wall. Harry was trying to recover from the dank scent he had inhaled, when it came.
It slithered across the floor, as a silver mass, then manifested itself into the thing he feared most-Lord Voldemort. Pale-white as chalk, with slits for nostrils, he carved a pretty intimidating picture. "Ri-ri-riddikulus!" Harry uttered, holding up his wand in front of him, trembling. The Dark Lord just sneered at him and was extending a clawed hand to his throat-
"RIDDIKULUS!" Sirius shouted, and the Boggart dispersed, Voldemort resembling Santa Claus in the characteristic red robes and white beard. "Harry, are you okay?"
"I'm fine," Harry replied mechanically, even though he felt the opposite of perfectly fine. He closed his eyes to stop the tears from slithering down his face. He- he had just stood there and let Voldemort try and throttle him, and again, he had to depend on someone else to help him out. Although it was just a Boggart, he still felt ridiculous and useless, like the spell.
"It's fine to cry, Harry. 'It is tears only, such as men use. Let them fall, Mowgli. They are only tears.'"
"Quoting Kipling, eh?" Harry smiled, despite the abyss of sadness in his heart.
Sirius just smiled and hugged Harry closer to him.
(Wiping Tears)How's it? Pls read, review and recommend! I apologise profusely for my tardiness!
Aayu10 out!