A/N This is the chapter I was having trouble with but I'll let you be the judge. Give me your thoughts please.
Ch. 14
Wednesday 24 June 1998
"Well, it looks like an early day for us." Sirius grinned as he looked at his watch. "It's only 4.30, why don't we go to the Madhouse for dinner?"
"Sounds good." Hermione responded. "But Minerva's coming over for dinner too. We're going to go over the changes to the curriculum, taking into account what she's done already."
"Okay. I assume you made these changes this afternoon?" Sirius asked.
"Yes." Luna confirmed as they stepped on the lift.
"So, Augusta, which committees did you sign up for?" Sirius asked the older Lady.
"Budget for the Coming Year, Hiring Guidelines, and Department of Child Services Changes." She responded as they came to the floos. She took a pinch of powder and called out "The Madhouse." As she floo'd away. Everyone else followed suit.
The older adults decided to sit in the drawing room, while the younger went to the game room. Hermione brought her computer up. She had developed a spreadsheet to organise the information she had.
As Nev and Harry played pool with Teddy, the women were finalizing their proposal to Minerva.
Headmistress McGonagall arrived at six o'clock with the four youngsters meeting her at the floo and taking her to the study.
"We've taken out all of the items you have already changed." Luna began. "With the inclusion of muggle history to our history classes, we were thinking about having another mandatory class which would be Wizarding and Muggle Etiquette and Culture. We were thinking of this instead of Muggle Studies. It would be taught by someone living on both sides, like Andromeda Tonks."
"We are thinking of having her put a curriculum together for each year and starting the actual class next year. That way she would have plenty of time to figure out which books to use and what she actually wants the students to know." Hermione added.
"Actually, I was concerned about starting a whole new class in less than two months." Minerva sighed. "I was going to talk to you about that."
"Andi is a good choice for this role." Augusta commented. "She's a pureblood the board cannot have a problem with, yet she has lived in the muggle world as well."
"Has anyone talked to her about it?" Minerva asked.
"I have. She'd love to do it if she's asked." Dora answered.
"As to the introduction of new sports, Luna and I believe that we should have one of the first Saturdays be a Field Day, like they have in primary school. Each sport has a tent with a cornered off area where a student who is familiar with the sport can teach the rules to interested students. For instance, Dean is as football crazy as my dad. He would set up a field and start a game." Hermione suggested. "Since we'll be putting a basketball court in the Chamber, we can have someone there who can teach the rules. We can do the same for Cricket and Rugby as well as Swimming."
"Nev and I thought that house teams for the popular sports could form and we could play each other like quidditch." Harry offered.
"Can you find students to run these?" Minerva asked.
"Dean's into football, Seamus plays rugby, Dennis Creevy is really into Cricket and, if I remember right, Melinda Bobbin is a basketball fan. I can write to each and get their help." Hermione said.
"Please get on that soon."
"I found correspondence courses for those that want them this year to keep up in English, Maths and Science. I would suggest you look for squibs or others that know about our world that can teach these subjects. We are also suggesting that you take the year to look for the best candidates." Hermione continued.
"If you can, have an outline of a typical correspondence course for the board members Friday. They'll want to see it." Augusta added.
"Dinner is served." Dobby popped in and they went to the kitchen.
HP
The next two days went by very fast for the quartet. Because the girls had decided to open on Saturday instead of Monday, everyone pitched in to get the store ready. On Thursday the girls conducted 6 interviews and hired 5. On Friday they interviewed 5 and hired 3. With the addition of Ang as manager and Katie as assistant manager, they had a total of 13 people besides Luna and Hermione on staff.
The three they hired on Wednesday, came in on Thursday to convert equipment. Out of the five hired Thursday, three stayed to help convert more equipment.
Fred saw how much they were buying and suggested they buy in bulk from the store or the manufacturers. So, Friday Angie arranged for the stores to start delivering loads of mobiles, tellies, VCRs, Nintendo 64's, computers, printers, kitchen mixers, toasters, vacuums, can openers, washers and driers, and dishwashers to the Madhouse for the time being.
Then she hired Dora to shrink the boxes, bring them to the shop and store them in the warehouse behind the lab. That in itself took Angie all day Friday—and the first shipment wouldn't arrive until the next Friday.
Friday 26 June 1998
Friday afternoon, after all the merchandise was put either on the floor or in the store warehouse, they decided they were done and there was nothing more to do.
"Okay, I think we're ready." Hermione announced at about 2.00 when everyone was gathering in the game room. "I don't think there is any more that we can do, so we should go home and rest up everyone. Tomorrow's going to be a big day. Please be here at half seven and we'll open at 8."
"When will we close?" Richard asked.
"Either at 6 or when we sell out." Ang said. "Brian's been selling out around four every day. I believe we have more stock now, so we'll see."
"Okay." Richard got up. "I'll see ya tomorrow." It took about twenty minutes but the quartet plus Sirius, Dora and Teddy floo'd home by half two.
HP
Instead of heading to the game room, like everyone else, Hermione said, "I'm going to go rest for an hour. I'll see you guys then." She kissed Harry and Ted and went to their room as everyone else went on.
"Did you check which Committees you're on?" Harry asked his godfather.
"Yeah. I got on the Creature Laws and Hiring Guidelines." He groaned.
"Gran got on all her three." Nev said. At the raised eyebrows, he explained. "I got a call from her earlier."
"Is Gran okay with the workload?" Harry asked.
"Yeah. She's only 78. She loves this stuff." Nev laughed as he took a shot.
"That woman will never give in." Sirius offered.
A little while later, Harry was playing with his godson, when he asked, "What do you think, little man, do you want to go swimming?" Teddy nodded and cooed at Harry. "Nev, Luna, want to go swimming?" He asked his friends.
"Sure." They said in unison and laughed.
"Okay. I'll get him into swim nappies and get my trunks on. Meet you out there." He got out of there before Dora could say no.
Less than 10 minutes later, he and Teddy were getting into the pool. He put Teddy in his inflatable seat and hooked him in. Harry started dunking himself and coming up on different sides of Teddy. They were both just laughing together as a big splash hit them. Harry turned around and there was Sirius as Padfoot.
"So you don't really enjoy swimming but you'll come in as Padfoot, do I have that right?" Harry rolled his eyes at the doggie nod. Padfoot grabbed one of the handles on Teddy's inflatable with his teeth and started to drag him around as Teddy laughed.
Soon, they were all in the pool, even Hermione, and were fighting over who got to play with Teddy. When Harry knew Teddy was safe, he started doing laps.
Eventually, Teddy got crabby and tired. Harry went over to take him from Nev. "Come here, little man, you need a nap. Let's go." He turned to everyone else. "It's 4.30, we should probably all get out soon and get ready for the Board Meeting."
HP
At 5.45, Minerva came through the floo. "Hello Minerva." Harry greeted as he helped her out of the floo. "Would you like to set up the study the way you need it?"
"Yes please. That would be very much appreciated." She returned as Harry took some of the piles of parchment she was carrying.
"You know, you should get a computer to help you run the school. It'd be much simpler than all this parchment." He commented.
"I'm at least buying a phone for every teacher on staff." She smiled. "I'm coming to MIT tomorrow." She transfigured the desks into one large table, conjured enough chairs for all, and arranged her notes.
By 6.05 all the Board members were there and they began. The inhabitants of the house left them to their work and went up to the game room.
"I wonder what they're talking about?" Hermione asked.
"I have no idea. Gran never tells me." Nev answered. "She does say that some of their discussions get extremely heated."
"She told me she thinks that's going to happen tonight." Sirius grinned.
Hermione kept going through the presentation they'd put together. She was walking around the room muttering to herself as she looked back and forth to the computer.
HP
Dinner was very polite and restrained. As each member had come out of the study, they looked really upset. However, Hermione noticed the polite masks they wore as they shared a meal. A lot of the conversation was about what they thought would happen in Wizengamot. As most of this group was made up of Heads of pureblood families, most were very concerned about the planned changes. However, three of the members were Gran, Lord Greengrass and Lady Bones.
Unfortunately for Harry and Hermione, the Headmistress took it upon herself to fill the Board in on some of their more interesting adventures such as Norbert, the troll, finding Neville in the body-bind curse—things like that.
Everyone got a good laugh out of the car verses the Whomping Willow story as well.
"You know, Daph has told me some of these stories but I was hard pressed to believe them before now." Silas remarked.
"Yeah Harry and Hermione tend towards trouble." Sirius smiled.
"We don't go looking for it!" Harry protested.
"No, you don't. It comes for you." Minerva laughed.
At the conclusion of dinner, everyone went into the study. Hermione handed out an outline of the changes they were suggesting to every board member. She went back to stand at the top of the table.
"Now, Minerva has made some changes to the curriculum that will impact the changes we are suggesting. She has hired a living, breathing History teacher" Hermione began as everyone laughed. They had all been put to sleep by Binns. "that will teach both Muggle and Magical History. With this done, we are suggesting getting rid of Muggle Studies entirely, as it is at least 70 years out of date, and bringing in a Wizarding and Muggle Culture and Etiquette class. This will be instituted next year with Andromeda Tonks, who has also lived in the muggle world, so she has practice in both, creating the curriculum and getting the Board's approval for it. This will be a required class like Charms or Transfiguration that everyone takes. We want to do it this way because we want muggleborn and purebloods alike to learn about the opposite culture. That way they can interact with both worlds and be less noticeable. It also gives muggleborns a chance at not offending anyone at the beginning of their school career by unknowingly offending magicals. Do you have any questions about this?"
"How much will it cost to institute?" Amelia asked.
"Well, there will be an initial outlay of 15000 G a year for salary. As Professor Tonks will be creating the curriculum and text as well, we believe the initial outlay for that will be 2000 G. So overall, this course will cost 17000G this year and 15 next."
All the members looked at each other. "We'll need to talk about this. Why don't we continue and then we'll discuss it after your presentation?" Silas asked. They nodded.
"So what's next?" Ms. Brown asked.
"Well, the next item has to do with school fitness." Nev began. "We feel there should be more sports than just Quidditch. Muggles have many different sports in school. We want to bring those to Hogwarts. We suggest having a Saturday where the sports are demonstrated by those who know how to play them. If there is enough interest in one, we can have house teams form. I personally know we have muggleborn or half-bloods that are aficionados of basketball, football, cricket and rugby. We'll have these people captain and coach the first years' teams and choose someone to hand the badge over to the following year. Once we have enough players, the Head's can choose the captain like they do for Quidditch. It won't cost anything except the refurbishment. We've arranged for the Chamber of Secrets to be refurbished into a swimming pool, basketball court and workout area. The money, 2 million galleons, will be put into an account by a donor that insists on anonymity."
"Who is this?"
"We can't just take someone's money."
"We need to know who would do this."
Nev looked at Harry while this was going on and he slightly shook his head no. "Sorry but this person does not want any more celebrity. He will not relent on this."
"How does he have so much money?"
"Let's just say that he did a favour for someone and they helped him profit from it."
"Ah. A deal with the goblins." Mr. Richards said. Nev remained stone faced although he was terrified they'd figured it out.
"I can have him bring the account information to Minerva tomorrow so you can see the money is ready if you wish." Nev prompted.
"Let's conditionally accept this on the theory the money's there and we can get the refurbishment done before the school year." Amelia suggested as everyone nodded in assent.
"What's next?" Ms. Carlyle asked.
"Muggle classes." Luna stood. "Most muggleborns stop their muggle education when they start Hogwarts. However, they realise after graduation that they can't get a job in the wizarding world because of the prejudices in hiring purebloods first. So they take another two to three years extra schooling before they can even get a low-paying job in the muggle world. They need a total of nearly 7 years to finish their university degree after Hogwarts. We suggest that both purebloods and muggleborn take muggle core classes while at Hogwarts. With a group of students who has had muggle and magical history, Wizarding and Muggle Culture class, and the core muggle classes, any student, pureblood or muggleborn, can choose which culture they want to live in."
"Why would any pureblood want to live with filthy muggles?" Ms. Carlyle asked nastily.
"Maybe to get away from the prejudiced society that turns out people like Voldemort and Malfoy. Or my personal favorite, my bloody cousin Bellatrix." Sirius snarled. "You're in a mainly muggle house right now." He laughed as he saw the shocked faces of some of the members. "Yes, I'm Lord Black and I live in a muggle city in a mainly muggle house."
"That's just a disgrace." Ms. Carlyle sneered.
"Your personal beliefs aside Ms. Carlyle, we will discuss this later" Minerva used her stern, Professor voice.
"What's next?" Mr. Richards grumbled. His was one of the two votes against the muggle courses.
Harry and Hermione stood. "There is nothing else. We thank you for implementing these plans that will help students at Hogwarts." Harry said formally.
Everyone got up to leave.
"Minerva, we'll be in the kitchen when you're done. Just come and get us please." Sirius nodded to his old Head of House.
HP
The four students and Sirius and Dora sat in the drawing room next to the entrance to the study. Sirius took out a few pairs of Extendable Ears and handed them around.
Hermione rolled her eyes and shook her head as she took hers. Everyone else just laughed as Harry smiled. "Only you Padfoot would think that far ahead to get enough for everyone." He smirked as he took his own.
HP
They heard Gran say "I think we should take each point and discuss them." She handed each member an outline of changes.
"I think you should recuse yourself Augusta." Mr. Richards suggested in a haughty tone. "After all, it is your heir that is proposing this."
"Fine." She looked irritated at the pompous windbag.
"So let's discuss each item one at a time." Minerva said as she looked at her sheet to give everyone time to take a breath and calm down. She was not looking forward to this debate. She had taught everyone on the Board from their first year at Hogwarts, so she could predict—without any divination training-how they would react. "Let's discuss the Wizarding and Muggle Etiquette class."
"As long as it's a Wizarding Etiquette class I have no problem." Mr. Richards said. "There's no way my pureblood grandson is going to learn about muggle culture."
"So we should allow a new Voldemort in by ignoring how we got into these wars in the first place." Augusta asked.
"If we don't start fostering a sense of inclusion and understanding of all people, magical and muggle, we may as well make muggle-baiting a class at Hogwarts." Amelia said sarcastically.
"Fine by me." Ms. Carlyle mumbled.
Unfortunately for her Minerva's ears worked just as sharply as her brain. She stood abruptly "How dare you Melissa!" Her normally sky-blue eyes flashed with anger. "That goes against everything a Hogwarts governor should stand for. How do you Mr. Roberts would feel about hearing that from you as he is muggleborn?" She said in her 'disciplinarian' voice.
"Yes ma'am." Ms. Carlyle nearly whimpered.
At the whimpered response, Nev and Harry slapped hands and grinned at each other. They then left the drawing room when that was only drama they heard.
HP
Minerva came into the kitchen about 45 minutes later with Augusta.
"Come back into the study." She invited as they got up and filed back into the study and took their seats.
"Well, we've come to a decision." Gran smiled. "We will provisionally accept the new class and do a trial run next school year. We decided to pay Mrs. Tonks her salary for this year as well and decided to give her a classroom and office to use at the school. That way she has a place to work on this."
The four teens showed their age as Harry and Nev said "Brilliant!" together and gave high fives. The rest of the room laughed.
"We also agreed on everything else, including the remodel and muggle classes." She smiled.
"What had Ms. Carlyle whimpering?" Sirius asked. "Mr. Roberts?"
Minerva smirked. "You—learn things- as a teacher. Things your students don't want you knowing. I find it useful to store these away for future use."
"How very-Slytherin of you." Sirius grinned as Minerva went rigid.
"Mr. Black, do I need to put you back in detention?" she lifted an eyebrow.
"No ma'am." He whispered grimacing as he had flashbacks of polishing trophies.
HP
The family went into the drawing room after Gran and Minerva left and sat down. "What's the time?" Luna asked
Nev looked at his watch. "10.30"
She groaned as she got to her feet. "I've got to go to bed. We should be at the store by 7 tomorrow."
"Yeah. Me too." Hermione concurred as she got up. Within 10 minutes, everyone was in their rooms.
As Hermione and Harry were doing their nightly routine, Hermione commented. "I hope it all goes well tomorrow. Fred explained how good the fact that we got a lot of people coming in to talk about what we were selling was but I'm still nervous."
Harry chuckled as he finished brushing his teeth. "You wouldn't be my Mione if you weren't."
She slapped his arm and laughed softly as she walked out of the bathroom. "Want to go outside and relax for a few?" Harry asked when they were in their bedclothes.
"Sure." She took his hand as they went outside as she curled up on his lap. She took a deep breath. "All we need is the smell of the ocean to put me right to sleep." She mumbled into his chest. They both just relaxed. They hadn't been out here in weeks. And Harry really was comfy. She rested her head on his chest and she promptly fell asleep. When he heard her cute little snores, he decided to put her in bed and go to sleep himself.
Saturday 27 June 1998
The next morning, Hermione woke up before Harry cuddled up to his side, her head resting on his chest as she listened to his heart. Boy, if she could wake up just like this every morning, she'd be extremely happy. She looked at the clock and realised if they wanted to get showers before Teddy woke up, she'd better wake her love up now.
She shook him. "Harry, love, wake up." She kissed him until he kissed her back. "Wake up love." She smiled down at him.
"No fair waking me up like that. Now I need a cold shower." He groaned as he got up. She just laughed.
As they traded places about 10 minutes later, Harry heard Teddy. "Bloody hell. I can't even get dressed." He grumbled as he went to pick Teddy up in his boxers. "Hi little man, let's go to my room and we can both get dressed." He whispered to Teddy.
They went back to Harry's bedroom where he got the both of them dressed and ready for the day. They then went down to the kitchen where everyone was nursing coffee or tea—even Dan and Emma.
"Hey Dan, Emma." He smiled as Emma held her hands out for Teddy. "Here ya go Emma." He handed his godson over before sitting down.
"So, it's 6.15 right now, we can floo over at 7 so we can make sure everything is alright." Luna let everyone know.
"We should have plenty of stock until at least Monday, so we probably don't have to worry about it till then." Hermione added, sighing. "I'm hoping we won't have to deal with the day-to-day drudgery after today so I'm hoping to help you two with your architect interviews next week.
"That would be nice." Harry smiled at his girlfriends
HP
At 7.00, everyone floo'd or apparated to MIT—except Dora, who floo'd Teddy to her mum's for the day.
As Hermione floo'd into the public floo at the back of the shop, she looked around. Everything looks good, she thoughtoptimistically. Maybe things will go right today.
"Hi Hermione." Katie Bell, the Assistant Manager of the store, greeted her boss. She smiled. "Don't look so nervous. You look like you do before end of term exams. The too tired, anxious look isn't going to make this day go better. Relax."
By this point everybody was in the store, including Ang and Fred. Once the regular staff arrived, Angie started giving out assignments. Harry and Fred looked at each other and grimaced. She had that tone in her voice. The one she used as Captain of their Quidditch team. It was the one that said 'do what I want, now or I'll hex you into oblivion.'
"Bloody hell! I forgot she had that tone." Fred whispered to Harry. He just nodded and smiled, thinking Fred is brave to even think of interrupting when she's in this mood.
"Fredrick Fabian Weasley! Shut up while I am giving directions!" Angie looked like her eyes could kill. At least that was Harry's opinion. "Like I was saying, I went and bought more stock last night. So, Richard, Audrey and Amber, please go to the lab and convert the items. When you've finished that, please come help out in the front. I will start a rotation of lunch breaks at about 11. I know all of you are very familiar with the products, if you don't know the answer to a guest's questions please come to Hermione, Luna, Katie or myself and we will help." She smiled at her staff. She couldn't believe she had a staff. She'd always thought if Quidditch didn't work, she'd do something like this. She knew how important giving her staff room to grow was, her dad owned a software company himself, so she knew the importance of staff. "If you need us for anything, let me know. Now, I'm going to open the doors as there is a waiting crowd out there. Everyone ready?" At all the nods, she went to the doors with a bright smile. "Welcome everyone to MIT or Magically Innovative Technologies. That's a mouthful though so we call it MIT. Come on in. Look what electronic equipment you can now get in your home."
And in came a horde of people, mostly muggleborn or their parents seeking ways to communicate faster during the school year. The quartet could spot who was raised in a muggle house and who wasn't by the questions they asked and the expressions on their faces as they watched the tellies.
Minerva did come in and buy 15 new phones and computers for her staff. Other business owners thought the mobiles were a wonderful idea and bought them for their employees.
The owner of Twilfit and Tattings explained his purchase of mobiles by saying "If an employee needs to call in sick, he either floocalls, which means you have to be in the room to answer it, or he sends an owl which can take a while. With these, they can call me and let me know right away."
"That's exactly why I worked on the charms and runes! An owl takes too long from Hogwarts to London." Hermione replied.
It went on like this for everyone on the floor. Mums were eying the washer and dryer, vacuums and other appliances. They did sell many washers and driers that morning. However, the tellies were not selling. People were just staring at them in wonder.
The quartet and Sirius and Dora spent a good chunk of time explaining the telly to wizards but they just didn't seem to understand its significance. However, every student understood the boom box and Harry saw some of his classmates beg their parents for one.
At 11 employees started taking lunch breaks. After all the paid staff went on breaks, the quartet, Sirius, Dora and the Grangers went out to lunch to see whether the regular staff could handle everything on their own.
They decided to go to a more elegant restaurant further down the alley called The Golden Goblet.
They were eventually seated at a table. Sirius sighed. "It's nice to sit down after all that running around we did."
"Yeah. I'm exhausted." Dan leaned back in his chair as he looked at the menu. After everyone ordered, he said, "I didn't think the store would be that popular but it hasn't slowed down all morning and it doesn't look like it will."
"I hope not" Luna replied. "We do need more items to sell."
"I was thinking of Mrs. Weasley's kitchen." Harry said. "Remember those self-stirring spoons and the pots that fill themselves to the right amount of water?"
"Yes?" Hermione asked.
"What if we charmed spoons to do that so the person using it only has to say a starting incantation? Is that possible?" He responded.
"I think so." Luna said with what Nev called her 'thinking face'. "When I cook, I put a spell on those things I need constantly stirred but I do it each time. We'd have to research and see."
"We might be able to create a pan or something that won't let you turn out a bad meal or something like that." Hermione took the idea from Luna.
"Okay, okay." Sirius laughed. "Enough talk of that. We should be enjoying the fact the store seems to be a success—not how to expand, at least not today. You have a lab, you can experiment with these ideas—later."
Everyone but Luna and Hermione laughed at the twin looks of disappointment on their faces.
"Look at it this way girls." Sirius said. "When you come up with an idea, you can test it at the store first. There will be no need to start a new store."
Hermione and Luna both grinned. This had been a horrendous week of stress and insanity. They weren't doing it again anytime soon. Since they had all finished lunch, they had decided to go back to the shop.
When they walked in, it was controlled chaos. They had two people at registers and lines to the front door. Ang was at one of the registers. "Ang, do you still need us?" Luna asked. It was almost 4, they had two hours till the store closed.
"I don't think so." She cocked her head as though thinking things through. "Could Katie and I come over after closing to talk over some things with you?"
"Sure." Sirius agreed quickly. "We eat at 7, so that should give you enough time."
"We'll see you then." Ang smiled as the family floo'd away.