Harry was sat alone under the shelter of a tree in the Weasley's garden. The sun was setting now, casting blood red streaks across the pale lilac sky. Sirius's diary was spread out on his lap, he'd been reading it for the past hour. Harry heard foosteps coming his way. He looked up, squinting through his glasses; all of the reading had made him tired. Ron and Hermione were walking down the path towards him.

"Mum said dinner'll be ready in five minutes," Ron announced.

"Fine," Harry said shortly. He wanted to get back to his reading.

"So how is it?" Hermione asked, nodding at the diary.

"Weird," Harry said truthfully, "I'm reading it all, trying to imagine it all happening, and I can't. When he writes about my dad it's like I'm reading about a character, somebody who isn't real. And he's my dad. How can I feel like that?"

"Well," Hermione began tentaviely, "You never really knew him, did you?"

Ron shot her a look.

"I'm sorry but it's true! I didn't mean to offend you, Harry," Hermione said quickly.

"You didn't," Harry sighed, "You're right."

"Let's go in and get something to eat. You can tell us more," Ron suggested.

Harry nodded and got up, tucking the diary beneath his arm as the three of them walked back inside.

5th July 1977

"Oh God. My head. Sirius my head! I think it's been replaced with a bag of wet sand," James moaned, the first words I heard that morning. Me, still being half asleep, groaned and waved my hand to shut him up.

"Early. It's too early," I moaned. My stomach was churning.

"Sirius it's one in the afternoon," James announced.

I was all ready to get up after that, but James fell back asleep almost straight away. So I decided I might as well write whilst I wait for him to rise again. I can only remember half of yesterday. The sober half. But I'll see if I can stretch my memory far enough to conclude how we both ended up in this state.

We arrived at the train station near Alfred's around two o'clock in the afternoon. Lily was there to meet us. As soon as she saw James she ran over and jumped in to his arms, winding her legs around his waist. This, I felt, was too much. James looked positively gleeful at this greeting whilst Remus and I took a large interest in the ground. We'd already seen enough of James and Lily's tongue wrestling to last us a life time.

"Will you put her down now, Prongs? You don't know where's she been," I said.

Lily shot me a look over James's shoulder. She jumped down to shove me playfully on the shoulder. "Honestly James can't you come anywhere without the whole bloody Motley crew following?" She said, but she was smiling.

"You've missed me really Lil, don't lie," I said.

Lily rolled her eyes. We gathered up our bags then followed Lily out of the train station, across the humble little village, and down a winding country lane. It was quite a pretty place, really. You know, if you were into that sort of thing. I just wanted to go and get pissed.

"Who's joining us?" Remus asked Lily.

"Well I got the list you sent," Lily replied, "I had to be pretty brutal. I'm not really supposed to have anyone but me and James in the house so I could only choose a few. Alice and Frank are coming, and Andromeda."

"That's it?" James cried.

"That's enough!" Lily retorted, "There's nine of us then."

"Well I'm glad you invited Andy," I said, "I haven't seen her in a while."

"Wait, nine?" Remus said suddenly, "Don't you mean eight?"

"God Lil, we've only been away from school for two weeks. Don't tell me you've forgotten how to count already?" James teased.

"Oh I forgot to mention my cousin will be staying with us. I haven't seen her since we were six, mum and dad were hoping we'd bond again," Lily explained.

"Is she fit?" I demanded to know.

"I haven't seen her for eleven years, Sirius," Lily said with a roll of her eyes, "I honestly wouldn't know."

"So she's a Muggle, then?" Remus prompted.

"Oh yeah, I forgot," Lily said. She stopped walking rather abruptly and held out her hand. "I'm going to need your wands. Ava can't find out that we're wizards," She explained.

"What!" James cried, outraged, "So we can't use magic for the whole summer?"

"I'm afraid not," Lily said.

We all reluctantly handed over our wands.

The second half of this entry will be posted in the next chaper, as I feel this is getting too long. Please leave a review! :)