Disclaimer: Harry Potter and all related characters and ideas are the whole intellectual property of Ms. J.K. Rowling and are hers alone to sell. I do not receive, nor would I accept any compensation for any of the owned intellectual property of Ms. Rowling (nor that which she has licensed to WB etc.). What follows is just a wacky little ditty I wanted to get out of my brain. It only got there because I so love that which Ms. Rowling created. No copyright infringement is intended.

Home and Diagon Alley

When the portkey deposited the two of them at the bottom of their front steps, luggage and all, the only thing Severus wanted to do was sleep for several days – or maybe just the rest of today so he could get into his lab and start tweaking some of the potions he'd heard discussed at the conference. Harry, however had other ideas…

'See you…' he called, bolting up the stairs.

'Freeze!' Severus stopped him mid leap. 'Luggage – upstairs,' he instructed. 'Everything unpacked, your bed made up, and the holiday work you've finished put out for me to read. Then, and only then, you may go flying.'

'Aww, Dad…'Harry whined, stomping heavily back down the stairs to grab his luggage. 'It's been ages!'

'And it'll be a few minutes longer.' Severus gave him a light, good-natured swat on the behind to start him back up the stairs. 'The sooner you get that lot put away, the sooner you can get up in the air.'

'Yes!' Harry cheered, running, luggage in tow, into the house. Severus could hear him cheering as he bounded noisily to his room: I'm going flying!!

'Hey, Dad?' Harry peered into his father's room about a half an hour later.

'All done already?'

'Yeah, most of my clothes were dirty anyway. Can I Floo Ron?'

'I thought you wanted to go flying.' Severus smiled as he put away the last of his own luggage.

'I do, but I want to let him know we're home.' Because of the security, they hadn't been allowed to say exactly when they'd be returning from the conference, so all Harry's friends knew was that he'd be unreachable until 'around mid-August'.

'Alright,' Severus relented. 'My office Floo – I'll be down in a minute to open it.'

'Thanks, Dad,' Harry called as he ran out of the room.

When Severus entered his office a few minutes later, he spotted Harry right away – he was sitting cross-legged on the floor in front of the fireplace, his broom hovering in front of him as he clipped a few stray twigs from the end with a tool from the broomstick servicing kit his father had given him for his birthday.

'This works a lot better than the ordinary scissors I was using,' Harry smiled, showing Severus the specialty clippers from his kit. 'See? Smooth, clean edges!'

'Great,' Severus smiled. Pointing his wand at the fireplace he first lit a small fire and then spoke the charm that reopened their Floo connection after their time away. 

As Harry instantly threw in the Floo-call powder and announced his request to the flames 'Burrow – This is Harry Potter for Ron Weasley', Severus seated himself at his desk and began to read through three weeks of accumulated post. He was so wrapped up in the many parchments littering his desk that Harry had to shout to get his attention. 'Dad!'

'Sorry?' Severus looked up finally from a letter from a parent asking if there was any way that he could insure that their son would be sorted into Slytherin. 'What…?'

'Da-ad,' Harry laughed. 'Earth to Dad… I said Ron and his family are going to Diagon Alley today for their school things – can we go today too? It would get it out of the way before you have to start thinking about going back to school… and I could see everyone…'

'I don't know Harry…' Severus began wearily, but Harry quickly offered a temptation too good to resist.

'Didn't you need to get some special ingredients for some of those new potions from the convention…?'

Which is how he found himself, with Harry in tow, barrelling through the tunnels under Gringotts a half an hour before they were to meet the Weasleys. It was only the prospect of being able to procure the obscure ingredients he needed that allowed him to stomach the idea of spending time with the Weasley twins during the holiday. Speaking of which… Severus groaned audibly as he spotted a sea of red-heads emerging from another tunnel when they re-entered the marble expanse of the bank lobby.

'Ron! Fred! George!' Harry called, smirking at his father's reaction to the twins. Harry's voice also caught the attention of Hermione (whom they'd also arranged to meet), who was with her parents at the end of the counter, exchanging Muggle money.

As they all went their separate ways outside the bank, Severus politely declined Mr. Weasley's invitation to come back to the Leakey Cauldron with him and the Grangers while Molly took Ginny to get her things and all the boys went off to get their things. 'Thank-you,' he said seriously. 'However, I require some rather obscure potions ingredients that are only available in one shop – it's a bit of a walk… Harry?' He turned to Harry who was trying to slip away with Ron and the twins without his father noticing.

'Come on, Dad,' he practically whined. 'Can I go with them? I'll be with Ron and the twins…'

'Do you have your wand with you?' he demanded, nodding once when Harry showed him. 'Alright, I want you to promise to be with at least one other person at all times. In a pinch, even Ronald here could be counted on to go for help.'

'Promise, Dad,' Harry smiled, starting off with the three youngest Weasley boys. 'See you…'

'Be at Flourish and Blotts within an hour!' he called after the boys retreating backs. The only indication that he'd been heard came in the form of a quick wave.

***************

'Break it up there chaps!' The scene that Severus met with when he entered the bookstore an hour later was bedlam. Hagrid was pulling Lucius Malfoy, and Arthur Weasley apart, while Harry and the other children, including Draco Malfoy looked to be trying to blend in with the crowd.

Lucius said something typically rude to Arthur before dragging Draco out of the store, shooting a brief glare in Severus' direction on his way past.

'Really, Arthur,' Molly was admonishing her husband. 'Brawling…'

'Alright Harry?' Severus asked, moving over to his son and tuning the others out.

'Yeah,' Harry replied, looking annoyed. 'It wasn't my fault, Dad.'

Severus just looked at him confused for a moment – of course it wasn't his fault that Arthur and Lucius were fighting – that went way back…

'But he just grabbed me and pulled me up there, and before I knew it they took a picture… I gave Ginny the books he gave me though…'

'What?' Severus demanded, thoroughly confused. 'What are you talking about Harry?'

'Lockhart – now I know why we had to get all of his books. He's teaching Defense this year.' Harry said, sounding annoyed. 'He spotted me, dragged me up there… gave me a set of his books…'

'Picture?' Severus asked, starting to catch up. 'Who took a picture?'

'The Prophet.' Harry scowled.

'Don't worry, Harry,' Severus forced a smile for Harry's sake. Harry did know that one of his father's standing rules was no contact with reporters, but Severus knew that in this case, it was certain that Lockhart would not have given Harry any chance of escape. 'It's not your fault. I should have been here sooner.'

Harry gave a sigh of relief, smiling at the parcels Severus was carrying. 'Did you get all the stuff for your new potions?'

'Yes, and a restock of your potions kit for school. So, your books?'

'Yeah, then we're done.'

After the excitement of the fight between Mr. Weasley and Mr. Malfoy in the bookstore, no one was in much of a mood to stop at the Leakey Cauldron – the Dentists Granger were looking completely horrified as they ushered Hermione toward the door out into Muggle London, and Mrs. Weasley was scowling openly at her husband as she pushed her group toward the Floo to go home. So with a promise to see them all one week before the start of classes, Harry watched them all leave before gathering his own packages to head home himself.

Stepping out of the hearth himself, a moment later, Severus nearly tripped over Harry's discarded parcels. 'Harry…' he groaned in exasperation. Harry stopped, halfway out the door, his broom in hand. 'I'm quite sure you didn't mean to just leave this lot here in the middle of the floor…'

With a heavy sigh, and rolling his eyes at his father's smirk, Harry set his broom aside again and began gathering up his parcels to take them to his room. 'I'm never going to get to fly at this rate…' He did though – for a couple of hours before Severus called him back in for dinner. Thoroughly exhausted from a very long day, as well as the tiring effect of flying so long after having been away from it for a while, Harry stumbled to the table, dragging his broom (which Severus took and leaned in the corner while they ate). In spite of his most valiant efforts though, Harry was nodding off in his chair by halfway through the pudding.

'Harry, you're exhausted, why don't you head to bed?'

'Hnnnn…' Harry mumbled, his eyes trying to flick open, but only managing to make it halfway. 'Five more minutes…?' he asked, seemingly just on principle.

'Come on, Harry.' Severus smiled at Harry's feeble attempts to stay awake, and got up to help him stand up. 'You've been up since five o'clock this morning, and you didn't get to bed very early last night. It's been a full day, it's almost nine o'clock, and you're obviously dead tired.'

'Yeah…I can do it!' he insisted when Severus helped him to his feet, but when he instantly stumbled into the side of the table, Severus merely smiled, and bent to pick him up.

'That's what I thought,' Severus smiled when Harry offered no resistance, instead, falling almost instantly to sleep. 'You can fly more tomorrow,' he said quietly to Harry's sleepy comment about wanting to go back out flying after supper. After carrying him upstairs to his room, Severus got the effectively unconscious boy changed into his pyjamas and into bed. He couldn't figure out how to brush Harry's teeth without him choking on the toothpaste, and any tooth cleaning spell, would likely startle him awake, so Severus decided to let that go this one time – he'd get him to brush really well in the morning.

'Good-night, Son,' he whispered, bending to steal a kiss on Harry's forehead before he left.

'Don't worry,' he heard Harry muttering in his sleep as he closed the door. 'We don't even have Transfiguration today…'

TBC