Peter awoke early that morning. Looking around the room he sat up and rubbed his eyes. He checked the date. It was July 15th. Today he was going to go to the Weasley's to stay at their house for the rest of the summer. He had discussed it with Aunt May who agreed to let him go, after all Ron had offered to have his friends stay at his home at some point during the summer. Peter was excited to see how Ron lived. Peter was technically pureblood, but he was raised by his Aunt and Uncle. Aunt May's non magic origins made it so that he spent most of his childhood exposed to non magic life. He was interested to see how a proper wizard house was run.
He gathered what he'd need to finish his potions homework. He was assigned to write an essay about ten common poisons and how to treat them. He had written several rough drafts and he was working on the final draft now. He needed this paper to be perfect. He knew the Hogwarts Potions Master Professor Snape would take any excuse to shave points off his grade. After all he wasn't a Slytherin student, he'd get no slack from the bitter teacher.
He went downstairs, May was cooking breakfast. She was also an early riser. She and Uncle Ben had been the ones to teach him the importance of getting up early and seizing the day. After a quick breakfast of Wheatcakes he went upstairs to continue packing. Around noon there was a knock on the door. Aunt May opened the door to see Ron and a balding man with red hair standing there.
Peter came downstairs and walked over to Ron. "Good to see you, Red." He said.
"You too." Ron said with a smile.
"Merlin's Beard, a proper muggle house." The man said.
"Oh that's my dad. He's obsessed with everything muggle." Ron grimaced.
"Look at this. These lights use things called Electricity right? And your fireplace. It's so small, how does that work?" Mr. Weasley asked.
"It's a gas fireplace. It burns gasses instead of wood, The wood that you see is ceramic, it's more for aesthetic than actual function." Peter answered.
"Don't encourage him." Ron Whined, Arthur however was extremely pleased by Peter's answer.
"Fantastic, the way muggles get on without magic." He said. He looked at May,
"You lot are Fantastic you know that?"
May chuckled. "Oh my, you're such a flatterer Mr. Weasley." She said sweetly. "Now Peter you be good, and if Mr. Weasley has more questions, you do your best to answer them okay?"
"Yes ma'am." Peter said with a smile.
Soon after Peter was led to Arthur Weasley's Ford Angelina. The moment he opened the back door he knew that it had to have been bewitched. The interior was far larger than the exterior frame would have allowed for. Ron got into the seat next to him with a mini wizard chess set between them.
"Care for a game?" Ron asked.
Peter smirked. "Always." He said.
The two of them spent most of the trip playing chess against one another, with the two of them fairly equally matched, though Ron still outplayed Peter more often than not. When Ron complained about being hungry Peter mentioned to Arthur that he had some non magic money and there were some places that they could eat quick and cheap.
They stopped at a McDonalds. Peter knew the food was only so-so certainly nothing special. But he couldn't help smiling seeing how excited Arther was to eat in an actual muggle restaurant. He got everyone the Quarter Pounder and sodas. Arthur was ecstatic to see how the soft drink machines worked. Despite Peter's warnings about not drinking too much soda he kept going back to see the machine at work. At one point he shook a worker's hand and congratulated them on their ingenuity.
"He just really likes the food." Peter said, quickly to the confused worker before pulling Arthur back to the table.
Ron was trying to avoid being seen with Arthur at this point. He had his face in his hands trying to avoid looking at anyone. Peter wondered if Ron was more embarrassed by his own lack of knowledge of how to use most of the restaurant's tech or his father's absolute joy in being in a place that was so non-magic in its function and purpose. Peter thought with a smile that this was going to be a great learning experience all around. He thought wizard society could use a bit more modern culture, and he was still excited to see what life was like in a wholly wizard family with wizard values.
After lunch Arthur looked a little pale. "I told you not to drink so much, soda's not very good for you." Peter said.
Despite looking as though he would rather not be driving, Arthur managed to remain cheerful the rest of the way to their house. "Peter," Ron said, "Welcome to my house."
Peter looked out the window and was awestruck by what he saw. A tall thin house that seemed to just keep going up. The other rooms seemed added to the house as needed, mismatched to the base, it looked as though it had to be held up by magic. It probably was held up by magic.
"Looks… sturdy," Peter quipped as the car stopped. "I like it, it looks like a fun place to live."
"Actually most days it's kind of boring. Most of the time we're just doing chores for mum, and dad's never around cuz he's always working, But Fred and George are always up to something so there's that." He said.
Peter was led inside. They entered into a dining room and kitchen, the interior was as magical as magic could be. From the dishes that were doing themselves, to a clock on the wall with a hand for each Weasley saying where they were. Most of the hands were at home except for two. Charlie's said Romania, and Bill's said Egypt. Peter remembered Ron talking about these two during their first year. Charlie studied dragons in Romania, and Bill worked for Gringotts in Egypt as a cursebreaker.
"Molly dear!" Arthur called out. "We're home!"
Peter heard footsteps above them and a middle-aged woman with hair as red as anyone else in that family appeared. She saw Peter and gave him one of the kindest smiles he ever saw. "You must be Peter." She said walking over to him.
"It's very lovely to meet you dear. Ron tells me that you're a very special boy." She said,
"Yes Ma'am I'm a spider. So you know if there's anything I can do to help out around here just let me know." Peter replied.
"Oh? Such a thoughtful boy, but don't let another thought about chores cross your mind. I have enough help as is." She said, with a sweet smile.
"Um…" Peter said, looking at Ron and then back at her. "I guess… Thanks for having me Mr.s Weasley."
"Come on, you'll be staying up in my room." Ron said.
"I thought I was supposed to be with Fred and George, and Harry would be in your room." Peter said, a little confused.
"Right well, that was our plan but Harry's not returning any of our owls." Ron said, a little grimly.
"Really? You know, now that I think about it, he hasn't returned any of mine either." Peter commented thoughtfully. "I suppose that family could be keeping him from answering us."
"Really? Why would they do that?" Arthur asked.
"I don't think they care for him much, I only met them once but they seemed like unpleasant people, definitely didn't seem like the kind of people who wanted anything to do with magic." Peter answered.
"I see." Arthur said with a small crown. "Anyway don't worry too much boys. Ron, why don't you show Peter around the house?" Ron nodded and led Peter up the stairs.
They entered Ron's room. The room was unbelievably orange and there were posters covering his walls all over of his favorite quidditch team, the chudley cannons. Many of the posters had different members of the team flying around. One caught eyes with him and waved.
"I knew you were a quidditch fan but I didn't know you were this enthusiastic about it." He said.
Ron shrugged with an enthusiastic grin, "They're the best team ever. Some of them are even being scouted for the UK national team." He said.
"Good for them." Peter said as he looked around the room. "By the way. That Owl of yours needs to be replaced."
Ron grimaced. "Errol, he's rubbish, but he's all we've got. We can't afford another family owl anymore." He spat.
"Anymore?" Peter asked.
"Mum and Dad did buy a new owl last summer. When Percy became a prefect. Hermes. But Percy never lets anyone use him. He's been hold up in his room all summer. Hasn't said a word to anyone except Mum and Dad all break."
"We've wondered about that." George said, suddenly opening the door.
"There's got to be a reason. I mean how many times a day can he polish that perfect badge." Fred said.
"Oh here's trouble." Peter said, turning to face them. "Fred George, how's the comedy game going?"
"Oh it's going great, We just got a new order of dung bombs delivered from Zonko's in Hogsmeade, Mum doesn't know about them, if she did she'd have them off us before we got to do anything with them." Fred answered.
"Anyway we're here for business not pleasure." George said.
"Don't you two know how to knock?" Ron asked irritably.
"Oh calm down darling. You're part of this." Fred said,
"Okay so what's the business?" Peter asked.
"We're going to go get Harry." George answered.
"You're what!?" Ron asked loudly.
As if in response to his own outburst there was a loud wailing and banging sound. Peter looked around. The noise was directly above them. "That's just the ghoul in the attic. He likes to bang on the pipes if he gets startled or if he decides it's too quiet." Ron said.
"Well we were listening to your conversation when you guys got here, and if Spidey's right then Harry wouldn't be able to tell us if he was in trouble or needed help in the first place would he?" Fred asked,
"Well, assuming that uncle is as bad as he seemed, that's a reasonable conclusion." Peter said.
"So, tonight when everyone's asleep we're gonna take the car and go and get him." George explained the plan.
"And seeing as you two are his best friends we thought we'd invite you along." Fred said.
Ron seemed hesitant. "If Mum and Dad find out they're going to kill us." He said.
"Come on Ron, you went and faced a three headed dog last year, you won the greatest game of wizard chess in a century. You weren't worried about getting in trouble then." Fred urged.
"There's a difference." Ron said, "None of the teachers are Mum are they?"
"I think it's a good idea." Peter said, "I feel like if he was able to, Harry would have answered my owls a long time ago."
Ron looked at Harry and then the other two. "Oh… Alright, but Mum and Dad better not find out." He said.
With the plan in place they decided to go a few hours after dinner.
During dinner Peter found himself sat next to Mr. Weasley, who had loads of more questions about how muggle life and technology worked. Peter was only too happy to answer these questions as he waited for the other Weasley's to come down.
"Alright Peter? Welcome to our home." Percy said coming downstairs.
"Perce." Peter nodded watching the prefect boy load up his plate and go straight back to his room.
"Perfect Percy is too good to eat with the rest of us?" George asked.
Percy scowled at George as he went upstairs.
The other Weasley to come downstairs was a little girl that Peter recognized but didn't know the name of. She walked right up to him with a bright smile and held out her hand. "Hi My name is Ginny. You're Peter right? Ron has told me so much about you, You're both friends with Harry Potter right? Isn't that wonderful. I think that's wonderful. I'd love to get to know Harry more." She said excitedly.
Ron rolled his eyes some. Peter guessed that Ginny liked to talk about Harry. "Uh.. Yeah. I am friends with Harry, and it's alright. Harry's a good guy, he's just like you and me, well not exactly like you and me." Peter said.
"Really?" She asked,
"Yeah, he's down to Earth, doesn't really care about the attention he gets. In fact I think he'd rather not have so much attention."
"Now Ginny, don't bug our guest," Molly said as she set a plate with a sizable helping of shepherd's pie in front of Peter.
"I don't mind." Peter said, "Honest."
He spent dinner talking to the Weasley's about all kinds of different things. Molly was especially interested in how devoted he was to his studies, Fred and George and he had strong comedic talent constantly bouncing jokes off of one another. He and Ron talked about all kinds of things from Quidditch to who their new defense against the dark arts teacher was gonna be. Arthur continued to ask about muggle culture and Ginny absolutely loved to talk about Harry.
A few hours after dinner and after the sun had set, Peter, Ron, Fred, and George all met up near Mr. Weasley's Ford Anglia. Fred had the keys in his hand. "Alright everyone in the car." He said unlocking it and getting into the driver's seat.
Ron and Peter went into the back seats and George got in the front passenger seat. Fred started the car. The Engine roared to life and Fred pressed the gas pedal. He pushed a button on the car and it started to rise into the air. Peter looked out the window. The Weasley's Ford Angila could fly. Peter guessed that Mr. Weasley had probably put all sorts of enchantments onto the car.
"Do you guys know how to get to Harry's Place?" He asked.
"Little Whinging surrey? Oh sure George's got a map. We just follow that and we'll be at 4 privet drive in no time." Fred said, as George pulled out a map from the glove box.
"How do you guys know where Harry lives?" Peter asked.
"Oh, didn't Ron mention? Harry got in trouble a few days for using magic outside school. Dad was talking about it." George said.
"Really? Doesn't sound like something he'd do." Peter mentioned, "I mean he's broken the rules before but never without a good reason. And I can't imagine he'd risk not being able to come back to Hogwarts."
"Maybe he got sick of those muggles he lives with and he jinxed them." Fred guessed.
"Harry's got more self control than that. I think. There are plenty of times he could have jinxed Malfoy but he usually managed to control himself… then again, he did sneak out that one time when Malfoy challenged him to a midnight duel." Peter said, thinking back to when they had all snuck out for the first time.
Back then Hermione had not been friends with them and had been quite adamant that they shouldn't have been out of bed in the first place. Peter was pretty sure, or at least hopeful that Harry hadn't lost his temper with the Dursleys and used magic on them. Either way he imagined that if magic had been used in Harry's vicinity the magic hating muggles weren't happy about it.
The trip was mostly silent. Little Whinging was quite a distance from the Burrow. Peter guessed that by the time they picked up Harry and returned the sun would be rising.
"Alright here we are." Fred as suburban houses came into view.
"Looks like the people here all live cushy." Peter said, looking down at the homes below.
"Keep an eye out for Harry's house." Ron said.
"Down there." Peter said, pointing to a house. "One of the windows is barred shut. I bet you three sickles that's Harry's bedroom window."
Fred flew the car down next to the window. The room was tidy, but there was no sign at all that the young boy in there was a wizard except for the large snowy owl on the dresser. Peter saw Harry stirring. He knocked on the window.
"Not now…" Harry said, rolling over.
Peter kept tapping. "Stop it, Please. I'm trying to sleep." Harry suddenly opened his eyes and reached for his glasses.
Putting them on he looked out the window and opened it. "Peter, Ron, Fred, George? What are you all doing and… what is that?" He asked, looking at the car.
"It's a flying car foureyes. Pay attention." Peter said, "Your windows are barred, have you been naughty?" He asked with a smirk.
"Shut up and get me out of here." Harry said.
George reached back with a rope and hook but Peter simply reached out to the bars and pulled them off the wall. He stopped for a second as he heard Harry's uncle in the next room mumble something in his sleep.
"Ron take the wheel." George said as he and Fred climbed through the window into Harry's room. Ron climbed to the front seat and grabbed the wheel to keep the car steady.
Harry began packing clothes into a bag in his room. He handed it to Fred and George who passed it back to Peter. "Alright let's go." Fred said.
"I can't, all my stuff is locked under the stairs." Harry asked, "And I can't get out of this room. The Dursley's locked me in."
Fred, George, and Peter all crawled into Harry's room through the window. Peter looked around the room, apart from the bed, the dresser, and the desk there wasn't much of anything in the room. The most decorative thing here was Hedwig's cage. Hedwig was watching them all, keeping completely silent.
George went to Harry's bedroom door pulling out a hairpin. "Most wizards think it's useless knowing this kind of muggle trick." He said sticking it into the lock of the door, "But we think they're skills worth knowing, even if they are a little slow."
The lock clicked open and he opened the door. Peter heard a low cough from the room at the end of the hall. The four of them snuck down the stairs at the other end of the hallway and to the cupboard. George took the hair pin and began to pick the lock again.
"So Harry, Mr. Weasley says that you got a warning for using magic outside school? What's up with that? I mean I wouldn't blame you if you turned that grumpy old guy's mustache pink or something but… well you'd know better." Peter asked.
"It wasn't me. I'll explain later." Harry said as George opened the door showing the trunk full of Harry's wizard belongings.
"You guys get the car ready to receive. I'll take the trunk." Peter said, picking the trunk up as if it was an empty cardboard box.
He hauled it up the stairs silently behind the others and took it to the car. Fred, George, and Ron had backed the car up so that they could put Harry's things in the trunk of the car. Harry was standing off to the side waiting for them.
"Don't forget your owl." Peter said, as he passed the trunk into the car's own trunk.
Harry nodded and ran over to Hedwig's cage. "Her cage is still locked," He said.
Once Peter had finished with the trunk he went over to Hedwig's cage and grabbed the lock pulling it apart easily. Harry opened the cage door and Hedwig immediately flew out of the cage and out the window.
"She hasn't had a chance to fly for ages. She'll stay behind us." Harry said.
Peter took the cage and handed it to Ron before he and Harry climbed through the window in the back of the car. Fred had returned to the driver's seat and drove the car through the air back into the clouds. Harry looked back at the house and smiled.
"I wonder how long it will be before they realize I'm gone." He said with a laugh, the others joined in on the laugh.
"So," Ron said, "How come you haven't been responding to any of my letters, I've asked you to stay over dozens of times, and how come Dad says you got a warning for using magic outside school?"
Harry launched into an explanation. A story about Dobby the house elf, who had been stopping Harry from getting letters, warned him not to go back to Hogwarts, and then used a levitation charm to drop a pudding on top of a muggle lady during his Aunt and Uncle's dinner party.
"Weird…" George said.
"Definitely dodgy." Fred agreed.
"What do you mean?" Harry asked,
"House elves are servants to wizard families, usually very old, and very rich they have strong magic but usually can't use it without permission. Seems like someone was pulling a mean joke. Do you know anyone who might have a grudge against you?" George asked.
"Yes." Harry and Ron said at once.
"Draco Malfoy, he hates me." Harry said.
"It does seem like something short, blond, and pasty, might do." Peter agreed.
"Draco Malfoy, not Lucius Malfoy's son?" Fred asked.
"Must be. It's not a very common name is it?" Harry said.
"We heard Dad talking about him the other day. One of those old fashioned wizarding families." George said. "Was in with You-Know-Who, but he got off, said he was bewitched. Dad reckons he was right in You-Know-Who's inner circle."
They continued driving through the air. As they approached the burrow they could see pink on the horizon. The beginnings of daylight. "We're cutting it real close," Fred said.
"When we get in everyone go to your rooms quietly and we'll act like Harry just arrived overnight." George explained the plan.
Peter thought that it was kind of a lame plan but he couldn't really come up with a better explanation of how Harry got there. Rather in his mind they didn't need to come up with an excuse. It's not like they broke any laws. They hadn't used any magic themselves, and Harry had been in trouble. In Peter's own mind what they did had been the right thing to do given the circumstances.
"Right." Ron said, walking toward the Burrow. "Come on Harry. I sleep at… at the top." He trailed off as they saw someone walking down toward them.
"Oh dear," said George.
"You know your Mom is remarkably Tiger Like when she's angry." Peter commented awkwardly.
Then she was upon them. "So…" She said with her hands on her hips.
"Morning Mum," Fred said, trying to sound jaunty and innocent.
"Do you have any idea how worried I've been!" She snapped at them.
"We had to Mum. Harry was in trouble you see and-" George started talking but he and the other Weasley boys fell silent and, despite all being taller than Mrs. Weasley, shrunk under her gaze.
"Bed's Empty! No note! Car Gone! You could have died, or been seen, or you could have lost your father his job!" She yelled at them with fire in her eyes. "Never got this kind of behavior from Bill, or Charlie, or Percy."
"Perfect Percy." Fred muttered.
"You could take a leaf out of Percy's book!" She snapped at him before rounding on Peter.
"And you, I would have hoped you would try to talk them out of it, the way Ron spoke about you as being such a respectful boy. I can only imagine what your Aunt would have thought." She scolded Peter though in a slightly less harsh tone that she was her own children.
"Sorry Mrs. Weasley, we should have told you we were gonna take the car." Peter apologized.
Molly looked as though she thought Peter had missed the point, having gone out at all but she instead just sighed and looked at Harry who looked ready to get scolded like everyone else.
"Hello Harry, dear." She said with a smile. "It's very nice to see you again, come on. Breakfast is cooking."
