AN: My dream-cast for Albus would be Asa Butterfield (Ender's game etc). Slightly cliché but I think he fits. Unlikely James' I think they did ok with Albus in the film. I still don't like him as much as I would like Asa Butterfield but *shrugs* he's alright.

Dream-cast for Scorpius Hyperion Malfoy?

Chapter Five
Of Options and Avoidance

Sam had always lived in a rough area. Normally when she told people this, they scoffed and rose their eyebrows. Sam couldn't exactly change the fact that she looked more French than Jayna (well she supposed she could now with the whole magic thing but she wasn't going to), so she understood why they didn't believe her.

In reality, she lived in a place where no one bothered to get to know their neighbours as one of them would inevitably get stabbed at some point. She didn't just live there because they had no money either; she knew Alex could have just about afforded for them to move somewhere nicer, but Alex's family all lived around here, and with Billy being away most of the time she wanted to stay within walking distance of her remaining family while her girls were at school.

She supposed she ought to have emphasised the likelihood of them getting at least mugged if they came round to her house before she invited them, but it was too late now. The four of them, herself, James, Lydjah and Jayna, were lounging in the sun in her sad excuse for a park, chatting, half-excitedly, about school.

The swings no longer had actual swings in them though Sam had learnt how to backflip using just the chains years ago. The roundabout was graffitied with such vulgar language that most parents never let their children anywhere near it (Alex was not one such parent and had found it secretly hilarious when Sam and Hayden's head-teacher rang to say that language had been used by them that should never have been said by an adult, let alone a five and seven year old) and the small slide was so covered in gunk that no-one had voluntarily gone down it in years (there was quite a fun game that involved picking the stupidest kid and convincing them to walk up the small hill till they were ambushed and thrown down the slide at the top though). Sam liked her park despite all this. This was where she'd first learnt to play football with the older boys, learnt how to fight (by learning how to dodge first, before learning how to punch back), had her first kiss stolen (that guy got kneed where it hurt), stole someone else's (that guy got kneed there too, but that was because of something else), broke her first bone (her thumb from a badly thrown punch) and where she'd first earnt respect.

She understood why Lydjah and Jayna had given it slightly weird looks when they first sat down; it wasn't exactly aesthetically pleasing. James had given the place an once-over and then looked at her, saw her looking slightly anxious at his perusal, grinned and said he loved it. She thought he meant it to.

"What's everyone taken for their options then?" Sam threw in lazily.

"Muggle Studies and Care of Magical Creatures." James answered. Jayna wrinkled her nose at the latter.

"What?" He asked.

"Animals." She said with a disgusted expression. James burst out laughing.

"I'm sure Rowena would be very offended."

"My owl knows that I like her because she requires little attention from me."

"Of course she does."

"Anyway, what are you taking Lydjah?" Sam cut in.

"Study of Ancient Runes, Magical Theory, I'm continuing with Spanish and…"

"And?" Jayna already knew of course.

"Divination." She sighed, bracing herself. The two Gryffindors blinked at her.

"What?!" They exclaimed in unison.

"But that subject's a load of shit!" James added.

"I know! But it'll give me access to the crystal balls whenever I want and it might help me focus my visions. At the moment they're just a load of random bollocks about who's going to snog who. Not that I want any more scary prophecies but-"

"Any more? How many have you had?" Jayna joked. It was a good thing Lydjah had loved Drama in Primary school.

"None, I meant you know ones like Harry Potter's." Jayna didn't pick up on the lie, for which she was grateful.

"Oh right."

"Anyway, yeah I'm going to take it this year and see if it helps any and if it doesn't I'll drop it before OWLs. What are you taking Sam?"

"Care of Magical Creatures and Arithmancy."

"Arithmancy? I wouldn't have thought you'd take that." Jayna said, surprised.

"I actually quite liked Maths in primary. Apparently they're similar so yeah."

"Well I love maths; I'm taking Arithmancy as well. And Ancient Runes and Magical Theory and Muggle Studies and Spanish."

"Are you even allowed to take that many?"

"I've got some extra lessons after dinner where some of them clash in my timetable."

"No way are you going to be able to take all of those up to OWL year." James scoffed. Jayna's eyes narrowed. Lydjah sighed exasperatedly.

"Why did you say that? Now she's actually going to take them all."

"What?" Jayna and James asked.

"Don't set Jayna an academic challenge. She'll do it with a smug grin and beat you by a mile. Watch now; she'll get Os in all of those subjects just to spite you." Jayna considered this and then shrugged with a grin, knowing it was true. Put her in a social situation and dare her just to say to hey to someone and she'd stare at you like you were an idiot, but ask her to do something like find all the rooms in Hogwarts and somehow she'd hand you a map in a fortnight (not that James needed another one).

"Ee are? Sam? Yuh cock! I've not seen you in ages! Footie with the dick-squad was this year. We did well shit without yuh." The four of them turned their heads round to see an older boy leant against the park 'gate' (it was missing both of its hinges) with a lit cigarette in his mouth. Sam's eyes widened and she grinned, standing up and grabbing the boy into a one-armed back-slapping hug.

"'Ey up Will! Fuck man, it's been too long. Not since what? Last Christmas?" As she spoke she nicked the cigarette out of the boy's mouth and stamped it out on the ground. He rolled his eyes lazily and took a second from the back pocket of his keks, lighting it in a practiced move.

"Yeah think so. Yuh got any chuddy? Mi stomach thinks mi throat's cut. Or a drink? I'm gaggin' for one."

"Yeah I got some chud." Sam reached into her jacket pocket, where she had a pack of Drooble's best blowing gum. Knowing Will as she did (stealing someone's first kiss meant nothing to her little gang of mates, but for some reason it had brought her and Will closer, mostly because he didn't want her to tell anyone that had been his first kiss), and that he couldn't blow a bubble to save his life she figured she was probably safe.

"Nice one." He stubbed the cigarette into the gate and took the proffered gum. "Awh that's well mint that. Gettit? Coz it's-"

"Minty? I gettit. Stop being such a daft 'apeth."

"Awh Sam yuh know Chris?" Will said, after a moment.

"Yeah?"

"What it is right, yeah; the dibbles gone 'nd got him couple of months ago."

"Nah man! Stop ya chattin'."

"Swear down Sam. Went 'nd visited him and everythin'."

"Awh fuck. What for?"

"Sellin' Angel Dust course."

"Shittin' Hell, the prick. What the fuck's he doin'? And yuh! What did they cut your hair with, a knife and fork?" Will scowled and ran a hand over his short choppy hair that he'd obviously cut himself, judging by the strange lengths on each side.

"Fuck off yuh cock. Ya hair's full o' lugs." Sam shoved him lightly, leaning against the gate with him. "Yuh wanna come to me gaff? Liam just got back."

"No shit."

"Er, Sam?" James asked hesitantly. Sam looked up and caught his eye, before colouring slightly.

"Oh right yeah. Dwp," James scowled at the new nickname that Sam was so proud of; she knew some welsh from Billy and was currently calling James 'stupid' all the time, "Jayna, Lydjah; this is Will Saylor, one of me- my mates from home."

"Sup." Will said, jerking his head.

"Will, James Potter, Jayna Blackwood and Lydjah Dawson; they all go to my school." Will gave them a look over as they all smiled politely and then snorted. Sam punched him in the arm.

"Oh come on Sam. What the fuckin' hell's kind of name is Jayna?"

"Ignoring the grammatical inadequacies of that sentence; it's French." Jayna said, bristling. Will gave her the finger.

"Will, fuck off I've got friends over. Yuh gonna be here tomorrow?"

"Maybe."

"Then I'll see you then. For ya brother, course." Will rolled his eyes again and stopped leaning against the 'gate', shaking his head at her disappointedly.

"Didn't think yuh'd be the one to go soft cock." Sam punched him in the face.

Lydjah, Jayna and even James gave a gasp of shock. Will spat red into the grass and grinned bloodily at Sam before swinging his own fist. Except unlike him Sam dodged, and was coming back at him in another second. Her head plunged into his stomach and he fell backwards, dragging her with him so they were tumbling through the grass-shaped broken glass green with red in their eyes and danger in their fists.

Neither Jayna nor James had any idea how to separate the fight without using magic and Lydjah had no interest in getting punched herself, especially as Sam seemed to be the one who was winning. The fight was not elegant, like swordplay, or pretty, like a wizard's duel, or in any way entertaining for the spectators; it was blunt and harsh and fast, just like Sam herself.

After a few furious seconds the fight stopped abruptly, with Sam pinning Will's arms with her knees while sat on his chest, her fists ready to punch him again. Will burst out laughing and a moment later she joined in, clambering off him and giving him a hand up. Her nose was bleeding and Will appeared to have lost a tooth. The stunned three stared at the two of them with suspicion, waiting for them to start fighting again. When they did nothing but continue to laugh, Jayna began to wonder if perhaps she needed to take them both to have their heads checked.

"Awh in a bit yeah Sam?"

"Yeah."

"Right." He nodded his head again to the other three, still looking thoroughly unimpressed with them, and swaggered off the way he'd come in, lighting a new cigarette as he did so.

"What the actual fuck mate?" James asked, finally coming out of his shock to hand her a tissue.

"What?" She asked, holding the tissue to her nose.

"You were speaking an entirely different language with him!" Jayna exclaimed, still looking for signs of concussion.

"It wasn't a different language. Just a different way of speakin'- Speaking English."

"Is that how you usually speak?"

"Nah. Just when I'm out with my mates. At home I speak like this because Alex does. Don't know why actually seeing as she's lived here her whole life but yeah."

"How old is Will?" Lydjah asked.

"Er… What is he… 18 now? He's still in Year 11 though because he keeps failing his mocks."

"Year 11?"

"Fifth year."

"Oh."

"Bit of a tosser really but he's a good guy."

"And who's Liam?"

"His brother. He's 21, just got back from uni. Liam was the head of our gang till he went. Course it's not really my gang anymore but I still know them all."

"You're pretty damn good at fighting." James admired. Sam rolled her eyes.

"Please. Growing up around this lot? Even Jayna would be good at fighting." Jayna narrowed her eyes in mock-annoyance.

"How are my favourite celebrities by the way?" Jayna asked mischievously. "The Chosen One's son and 'Sami' had a very interesting article in the Daily Prophet."

"Oh it's so irritating!" Sam said furiously, her anger slightly muffled by the tissue.

"I do think it's a bit harsh that they said you were a bad influence just because you told them to piss off. Surely they must get that all the time. I mean, they are the press."

"Oh I don't care about that bit. It's the fact they call me 'Sami'."

"That's your name isn't it, Samantha dearest." James grinned. Sam had her wand at his throat a second later, in full view of the admittedly empty park.

"You'd better watch your step Dwp. It's Sam, just Sam, and you know it."

"So Sam's the name on your birth certificate as well?" Lydjah asked.

"Yeah. That's my full name."

"Oh! That's what I forgot to ask." Jayna said quickly.

"What?"

"Potter, seeing as Fred's your cousin do you know anything about-" Jayna was cut off as Lydjah tackled her and squished her into the ground.

"Please ignore her, she has no idea what she's talking abou-" Lydjah shrieked as Jayna tickled her, leaping away from her friend.

"What about Fred?" James asked, amused. Lydjah sighed, knowing there was no point in resisting further.

"Do you know why he would randomly come up to Lydjah here in the middle of the Quidditch World Cup, snog her, and then disappear back into the crowd?"

"He did what?"

"I told you; I gave him my number at Roxanne's party, we've met up a couple of times and we're sort of going out. What's the problem?" Lydjah said exasperatedly, with the air of someone who had repeated the same thing many times before now. James frowned.

"See?" Jayna said.

"What?" Sam asked. "That's a pretty normal explanation."

"Yeah if you're the most boring sod on the planet. Details Lydjah! Details!" Jayna looked as if she was on the verge of strangling her friend. With a little prayer and the half-formed thought of 'why-on-earth-was-he-doing-this-to-himself' James flung the worm he'd found sliding through the grass onto Jayna's lap. There was a beat of silence and then Jayna screamed, so loudly that the fat pigeon that had been sat near them was startled into flight (something Sam claimed was later physically impossible as it was that huge), and stood up, stopping only long enough to fling the worm off her skirt before lunging for James' throat. Luckily he'd had the foresight to already be running by the time she'd realised it was him.

As they ran round the park Lydjah shot James an 'I-owe-you-one-look' to which he seemed to reply with 'yes-you-fucking-do'.