Chapter 5: Reminders
"I need my trunk." Harry said aloud, to no one in particular. Ron and Hermione looked up at him from where they sat on Ron's bed.
"Where is it?" Hermione asked.
"Privet Drive. Has Kingsley said anything about my Aunt and Uncle being brought home?"
"I don't think so, no. Why don't we stop off there on our way to Number Twelve?"
"Yeah. I hope the Dursleys aren't there, it would be a bit... awkward, don't you think?" Ron shrugged.
"I suppose."
"Um..." Hermione began, hesitantly. Harry looked at her quizzically. "I need to go to Australia. To bring my parents back."
"Oh yeah..."
"When should we go?" Ron asked.
"Not we, Ronald. Just me."
"No. No way." He told her, firmly.
"They're my parents, Ron!" She stood up, angrily.
"So? There are still Death Eaters out there; I'm not letting you go." He, too, stood up. They glared at each other, arms crossed.
"You're not letting me?" Hermione's hair seemed to crackle with electricity, and she appeared to grow several inches, but Ron refused to back down.
"No, I'm not letting you. It's too dangerous."
"Too dangerous?" She all but screeched. "Too dangerous? The year we've just had, and you're not going to let me go to Australia because you think it's going to be too dangerous?" Ron's ears went crimson. Harry decided that now would be a good time to intervene.
"Err, guys, stop." They stopped glowering at each other, and turned to face him, looking as if they had forgotten he was even there.
"Hermione, I think we should go with you. Not-" He cut her off, as she opened her mouth to release her fury on him instead, "-because it won't be safe, but because we know it will be difficult for you, we want to meet your parents properly, and I, personally, want to go to Australia." Hermione's anger seemed to dissipate.
"Well... okay. But we're going to have to go by plane." Harry had never been on a plane, and the prospect was exciting. Ron, however, did not seem to think the same way. He had turned a faint greenish colour.
"What? Those big metal things that fly in the sky?" He asked, trembling slightly.
"Yes, Ronald. And it'll be a long flight, too. About twenty-four hours I think." Ron whimpered. Harry and Hermione exchanged glances, and burst into peals of laughter.
"What?" Demanded Ron, recovering his surly demeanour. Clutching his sides and gasping for air, Harry choked, "You spent the last year hunting down dark objects and destroying them, and fighting Death Eaters, and you're afraid to go on a plane?" before collapsing in stitches again. Ron recrossed his arms, and flopped down onto his bed, an expression of annoyance on his face.
Harry finished scrubbing the last of the dirty plates, and passed it to Hermione, who rinsed off the suds and passed it to Ron, who roughly dried it and handed it to Ginny, who stowed it away in a cupboard above the sink. They had been working like this for thirty minutes now, in silence.
"Remind me why we didn't use magic for that?" Ron asked, leaning against the kitchen counter, tea towel draped over one shoulder. They all looked at each other.
"No idea," admitted Harry, with the feeling of having wasted half an hour.
"Anyone up for a game of Quidditch?" Ginny suggested.
"Sure, but I don't have a broom..." Harry suddenly became very interested in a hangnail on the side of his thumb.
"Well, I can use Charlie's old broom, and you can use mine. It's only an old Clean Sweep 7, I'm afraid."
"That's fine. I suppose I should get a new broom at some point." And a new owl, he thought.
They trooped out of the back door, Hermione with a couple of books tucked under her arm, one Harry recognised as Dumbledore's copy of Tales of Beedle the Bard.
"Reading it again?" Ron asked, incredulously.
"No," She held out the other book, "I'm comparing the original to the translation I found in your living room."
They strode across the grass to the paddock. Hermione kept walking, so as to find a nice spot to sit. After a moment's hesitation, Ron followed her. Ginny and Harry exchanged glances.
The door of the shed opened with an uncomfortable metal screech. Ginny disappeared into the darkness. After a moment of silence, there was a loud clatter, and a shriek of pain.
"Ginny?"
"Ow, blast it!" She cursed. Harry lit his wand and entered the gloom of the broom shed. Ginny stood by the back wall, clutching her arm, several old cobweb covered brooms lying at her feet.
"What happened?"
"Must have caught my arm on a nail or something. I'm fine, honest."
"Let me see."
"No, Harry, it's fine, don't worry."
"Let me see." He repeated. Reluctantly, she held out her arm. A jagged line of red crossed the pale flesh, and a couple of trickles of blood wound their way down to her wrist. Luckily, it wasn't too deep.
"Episkey." He muttered. The wound began to heal, flesh and skin knitting back together, until all that remained of the cut was a thin white line. Silently, Harry siphoned off the rest of the blood, before releasing her. Ginny examined her arm.
"Thanks."
"Sure." Harry directed his wand light at the crumbling stone wall. Sure enough, a jagged, rusty nail stuck out from between the chunks of rock. He directed his attention back to the brooms, which Ginny was hastily picking off the floor. He grabbed a couple and propped them against the wall again.
"I'm, uh, just going to ask Ron something," Ginny suddenly gabbled, before dropping the broomstick she had been holding, and dashing out of the shed. Harry watched her go, bemused, and leant down to pick up the broom she'd dropped. A scrap of parchment had been spell-o-taped to the handle.
F. Weasley
Harry's stomach flipped, and his heart seemed to be beating in his throat. He felt as though something was pressing on the backs of his eyes. Hastily, he rested the Cleansweep 5 against the wall, and grabbed Ron's Cleansweep 11, Ginny's Comet 260, and a Cleansweep 7, labelled C. Weasley. Fumbling with the three broomsticks, he ran to catch up with Ginny.
As it was late spring, there were no apples around to use as quaffles, and Hermione refused to transfigure rocks for them, telling them that if they needed them that badly, they should do the transfiguration themselves.
They sat in a circle on the grass, wondering what to do.
"Well this sucks," grumbled Ron.
"Oh shut up." snapped Ginny.
"Guys..." Harry began, frustrated with their bickering.
"Gnomes!" He shouted, suddenly.
"What?"
"Gnomes!"
"What about them, Harry?" Ginny asked, tiredly.
"Well, the garden needs degnoming, right? You haven't been living here for over two months now; it's about time you got rid of them." He stated matter-of-factly. A light seemed to go on above Ron's head as he cottoned on to what Harry was suggesting.
"Yes!" He cried.
"WHAT?" Ginny demanded. "What on earth are you talking about?"
"We can use the gnomes as quaffles! We can throw them over the wall to score a goal, the further the better. We're killing two birds with one stone, so to speak." Ron and Harry stood up, grabbing their respective brooms. They kicked off the ground and sped off back towards the house. Within seconds, Ginny was behind them.
"You guys are mental!" She yelled through the wind that whistled past their ears.
"I know!" Harry shouted back. When they neared the house, he went into a plunging dive, targeting a gnome that was pottering along the little stone path of the back garden. He snatched it up by its potato like head, swerved, and sped back to the orchard, Ron and Ginny hot on his heels. Ginny tried to snatch the struggling gnome away from him, but he dodged out of the way and continued to race towards to crumbling stone wall that marked the end of the Burrow's land. On reaching it, he pulled his arm back and let the gnome fly. It tumbled through the air, and fell onto the grass a good fifty feet away with a soft thump.
"GOAL!" Harry roared.
They took turns to be the gnome fetcher, fighting off the other two acting as chasers on an opposing team to score goals. Having to avoid the gnomes' sharp teeth just added to the challenge of the game.
"Well, it'll be a while before they come back." said Ron, panting heavily as they tramped back to where Hermione sat under an apple tree, pouring over the two books.
"Gin, have you asked your mum about staying with us at Grimmauld Place for a couple of nights?"
"Uh, yeah. She's not too happy about it, but she'll let me go. I'll make sure of it," she added, a mischievous glint in her eyes.
"Ron?"
"Err... she can't really stop me. Anyway, it'll only be for a few days, surely; we're going to Australia on Thursday."
"What?" Cried Ginny, "Why? And why wasn't I told?"
"We need to go and get 'Mione's parents. She altered their memories and sent them to Australia to keep them safe. Now that the war's over, we're going to get them back."
"Can I-?"
"I don't think so, Gin. We'll be back in about a week." Harry promised her, pulling her closer, but she tugged herself away and stood up. Without a word, she turned on her heel and stalked away.
"Ginny?" Harry called after her. "Should I...?" He asked Hermione.
"I'd leave her for now, if I were you," she advised, her eyes still glued to her book. Harry continued to watch the retreating figure of his girlfriend, her hair dancing like flames in the sunlight.
And so returned the silence that they had all worked so diligently to repress, the silence that seemed to throb in their ears, pulse in the air around them, turning their thoughts away from all distractions, pointing them towards tomorrow. Tomorrow. They didn't want to think the two words, but they was there, taunting them, the words that made it all so real. Fred's funeral.
It was the reason behind the washing up, the packing, the bickering, games of Quidditch that they put more effort into than they would ever have put into a unimportant match, a match that didn't mean anything. But it did mean something. It was the reason why Hermione refused to look up from her books; to hide her red eyes, though she couldn't hide the tears that wet the pages, splashing over the old paper.
"Ron," Harry shook him again. "Ron!"
"Mmwhat?" His friend mumbled, rolling over and tugged the Chudley Cannons duvet with him, wrapping himself up even tighter in the orange spread.
"You need to get up... It starts in a few hours." Ron's grumbling stopped. He lay still, but Harry knew he was now awake. Quietly, he slipped back out of the room.
The atmosphere in the Weasleys' kitchen had never felt bleaker. The days spent planning it were nothing compared to this. Mrs Weasley shuffled around the kitchen; head bowed, and was constantly overturning things, spilling drinks. Mr Weasley's face was grey, and he repeatedly checked his watch. Percy and Charlie were staring into space with morose expressions, Charlie seemed to be drawing something in the air with his index finger, and Percy was drumming his fingers on the table. Ginny sat with her knees pulled up to her chest, rocking slightly and blinking rapidly, a mug of cold tea clutched in her hands. Unsurprisingly, George was not present. His bedroom door had been firmly shut when Harry passed it on his way downstairs. He wasn't sure what to do. He couldn't remember feeling less like eating. Timidly, he took the seat beside Ginny, clasping his hands in his lap.
"Oh, Harry dear, you're up." Mrs Weasley noticed his appearance at the table. Her voice shook as she spoke. She laid a plate of toast and bacon in front of him – at least, Harry thought it was toast and bacon; it had been charred almost beyond recognition.
The weather couldn't have less suited the occasion if it started raining buttercups. The sun danced overhead, and it was comfortably warm. Sparrows darted through the air, looping and diving, singing all the while. Harry had changed into black dress robes, and sat on the wall of the paddock, waiting for people to arrive, to get this all over and done with. A twig cracked behind him, and he glanced back to see Ron and Hermione approaching. They sat down on either side of him, and silently they watched as the first of the guests began to trickle through the gate. It was going to be a long day.