"Rose, rose, rose, red. Will I ever see thee wed?"
The harsh ringing in Neville's ears numbed and soothed to the chant-like singing he picked up nearby. A voice soft as falling petals, and the wind chimes that sprinkled into the light breeze that cooled the hot tears trapped between his lashes squeezed tightly shut against his rosy cheek.
"Rose, rose, rose red."
The sing-song cadence of that voice felt like a ritual being cast.
And when it came to small comforts like roses and magic rituals, Neville Longbottom, of course, felt right at home.
Giving him the courage to finally open his eyes.
He was soaked, and he was shivering, but he wasn't at the pier anymore. Gran and Great Uncle Algie were no longer standing above him, arguing about whether or not he was a squib, and what should be done about it.
Nor was there a rolling stormy ocean below him, hungry to drown him before he ever found out.
Only soft, freshly cut dewy grass that smelt refreshingly green.
And flowers.
Loads of them.
He didn't know the names of them all, but they kept the most peculiar company.
A garden gnome...and a toad?
Not like the menacing, Chinese Cabbage eating gnomes his Gran made him chase out of their garden every evening before tea, but a rather cheery, petrified-looking chap with rosy cheeks who appeared like he'd never hurt even a Griffith fly.
The toad was only slightly more disturbing.
The swish-swish of a strange contraption ticking away at Neville's brown converse, peculiarly resembling the same matter of petrification as the gnome, spitting out water all over Neville's tube white socks and brown pinstriped shorts from the belly of its open mouth in a jerky mechanical motion.
Broomsticks!
What on earth had happened to him?
Was he dead?
The last thing he remembered was near drowning, and wishing he was smart enough to make something useful happen, like turn himself into a boat, or a sink, or a garden hose?...
Neville glanced again at the ticking plastic toad sprinkler hissing at his ankle.
"No," he thought in denial, shaking his head. "It couldn't have been me...I hadn't even done anything."
Then how, exactly, had he gotten here?
And where in Godric's hollow was he?
Where was Gran and Uncle Algie?
Had they decided they were done with him at last, and disapperated him into a strange dimension of petrified toads and gnomes, where he could disappoint them no longer?
And then he heard a heavy frustrated sigh out of a feeling Neville Longbottom knew all too well.
"Why isn't it working? What am I doing wrong? I've practiced this spell a hundred times."
It was that voice again.
Drawn to the word spell, Neville slowly turned to chase the voice over his shoulder and search for the one it belonged to, squinting in the golden late afternoon sunlight glowing behind her.
Was she only a trick of the light in his eyes, or could she really be...magic?
And only after his eyes adjusted to the sunlight after being ripped out of a dark cold sea, did he finally find her.
A girl, no older than he was, sitting cross-legged on the grass opposite the garden toad sprinkler. Her waist length, curled hair, brown like rich Honeyduke's toffee, melted over her shoulders out of what seemed to Neville the strangest witch hat he had ever seen. The hat being comically black and pointed in the same petrified style as everything else in this strange garden.
She sat in front of a large elaborate book with lots of colorful pictures opened on her knee, and a very petite dinky cauldron filled with red rose petals that didn't appear to be ministry-certified for any manner of potion brewing. Tapping the tiny pot with some matter of "stick" and swishing it back and forth over the rose petals.
And it didn't take a particularly skilled wizard for Neville to know that there lay her biggest problem.
'Does she honestly think that tree branch is a real wand?' Neville wondered, befuddled.
But who was Neville Longbottom to call anyone out when it came to the proper way of doing magic?
Perhaps, this strange witch was onto something important he didn't yet understand, she needed her full concentration for whatever it was she was doing. So, Neville reckoned he'd just keep quiet and watch.
The girl set her eh-um-wand-aside, and closed her eyes to put the finishing touches on her spell.
"Double, double, toil and trouble!" she declared grandiosely to the garden around them. "Fire burn and cauldron bubble!"
Neville's brow rose quizzically.
He wasn't one much for remembering spell incantations, but he knew that most definitely wasn't a real one.
Something was off.
"Fillet of fenny snake, in the cauldron boil and bake! Eye of newt and toe of frog...Wool of bat and tongue of dog...Cauldron, cauldron..."
She sighed deeply, and seeing that the red rose petals in her little cauldron still remained untouched by any magic, her shoulders gradually slumped in defeat.
"I just don't want to be the odd one out anymore," she whispered to her cauldron. "I don't care what friend you pick...As long as they are kind, aren't afraid of frogs, and don't care if I dump all my chips in mint chocolate chip ice cream."
And with her morale suddenly rallied, she picked up her wand again, lightly tapping the cauldron, and cleared her throat.
"Rose, rose, rose red," she chanted her little song again.
"When will we meet again?
"When the nights are cold and lonely,
"We will meet again."
Finishing up her world-class spellcasting for the now 101st time, the girl must've decided she'd worked hard enough to take a break, and stood up to dust her hands of dirt and grass.
And when she picked up her little cauldron from its wire handle, the sound of his voice stopped her.
"Are...are you trying to cast a transfiguration charm to turn those roses into a person?" a softly spoken Neville at last found the courage to ask her. "I-I don't know much about spells, but my Uncle Algie told me transfiguring people into things, and things into people, is something even the best of witches have trouble with sometimes. You shouldn't be so hard on yourself."
And realizing suddenly that she wasn't alone, her curious maple brown eyes wandered into the summerly green eyes of the rosy stout-faced boy across the water wall of her sprinkler, who stared back equally curious at her.
A quirky boy about her age who she swore hadn't been there when she she closed her eyes to cast her spell only a second ago.
Her big brown eyes only got bigger with her excitement, turning her head to check her backyard gate and make sure he hadn't just walked into her yard without her noticing it.
The lock was still secure on the latch.
Her wide eyes slowly shifted back to Neville.
"Er, um, hello there?" Neville awkwardly greeted the stunned girl with the stunned witch hat.
"Did you just..." She hesitated and stopped herself for a moment, knowing how demented it actually sounded. "Did you just come out of my garden sprinkler?"
"I'm really sorry about that, I didn't mean to do it. I don't know how it happened," Neville swore to her, afraid he'd somehow get in trouble for this. "I was out with my Gran and Uncle Algie, and she was trying to force me to use magic, and I-I-I was scared. I wished for anywhere else to be but there. Somewhere cozy and safe. And the next thing I know, I came here...B-but I'm not really sure where here is, h-honestly-"
"Wait, wait, did you say magic?" she stopped him. "You came here...because of magic?"
"Er, well yes. Um, well no," Neville stumbled to understand the truth of it. "I don't think it was me who actually...I'm not exactly sure what happened."
"You mean, you're a wizard?" she asked him gingerly.
"Not if you ask my Gran," Neville lamented. "That's the problem, you see. I don't actually know if I can really use-"
The girl dropped her cauldron suddenly without warning, the rose petals spilling out across her cobblestone patio walkway as she ran inside her house.
Of course, she'd run from him, Neville thought sorrily.
What else would she do after watching a boy appear out of a comical cheeky toy toad that shoots water everywhere?
Neville was used to other children wanting nothing to do with him, especially when they found out where his parents lived.
He wasn't even sure his own family wanted him half the time, for being "nothing but a squib".
So, of course, whatever friend this strange girl had wished to conjure up in her backyard, Neville was sure he was the last person she'd wanted in the end.
Only...why did she sound so excited about it?
"Dad! Dad!"
Neville's miserable thoughts were drowned out by the girl's eager cries from inside the house.
"I did it, dad! I found a wizard!"
"A what, sweet pea?"
"He's a wizard, dad! Come and look! He's in our garden!"
"A wizard? That is something, isn't it?" Her father could be heard chuckling as she pulled him by the arm toward their backyard door. "Just don't let him turn you into a rabbit, eh. I reckon I'd miss you to bits if you went and hopped away."
"It's no joke, dad! He really is magic!" she insisted to him. "I'm telling you, he appeared out of thin air from our sprinkler! That's what wizards do!"
"Appeared out of the sprinkler, eh? Alright, Marigold, I'll have a look, if you insist. Not every day folks come to visit us, especially by sprinkler," he gave in to her lightly. "But after that, it's dinner for you and washing up for bed. You have school in the morning."
Then an eccentric, sunny fellow with slicked brown hair, thick glasses, brown slacks, and a pink apron over his dress shirt that resembled a strawberry jam jar, appeared on the porch with the girl.
"Hello, wizard!" he waved warmly at Neville, obviously humoring his daughter. "Edmund Bronte, at your service. It's good to see Marigold's finally found a friend around here. We're new to the neighborhood. Do you live next door?"
"Of course not, dad," Marigold corrected him. "He lives in an enchanted forest. Because he's a wizard."
"Ah, yes, of course," her father nodded. "Well, how about some dinner before you go away on your broomstick, oh Great Wizard of the Enchanted Forest. We got plenty of Shepherd's Pie left to share."
"I-I'd like that, sir," Neville blushed bashfully. "If it's not any trouble..that I-I am actually very hungry."
"No trouble at all," Mr. Bronte strongly assured him. "I'll set you two up right here in the greenhouse patio. I'll be off to the kitchen then, fetch you pair some plates and silverware. It's my honor to serve a wizard, after all. Not every day a wizard drops in to our home."
And then Mr. Bronte turned to walk purposefully back into the house.
Only to stop again suddenly at the back door in a prolonged heavy pause. Turning back around to the children again.
"Sorry?" he apologized, his brows scrunching in deep confusion. "Where was it I said I was going again?"
"The kitchen, dad," Marigold reminded him.
"Oh, that's where it was!" He turned back around on his hunt for his cupboards. "Kitchen. Plates. Shepherd's Pie. Right."
Neville curiously watched Mr. Bronte's odd behavior as he disappeared into the house again, mumbling that list over and over to himself, as if he were afraid to forget the whole thing again.
Marigold, however, seemed more taken by her garden gem and how cold the "wizard boy" looked with his clothes still dripping wet.
Reaching for the coat hanger hung near her back door, her Mary-Jane flats stood on ballerina tip-toe to Neville's slightly taller height, as she tied the warm sleeves of her colorful over-sized jumper around his neck.
"There," she said, once she was satisfied with how snugly Neville looked wrapped inside of it. "I'm Marigold, by the way."
"Neville," he introduced himself to her shyly. "Neville Longbottom."
"Neville Longbottom?" she thought his unusual name over. "You must be a wizard then. That name is totally out of this world."
But the way she smiled when she said it, in the prettiest way to him Neville had ever seen anyone smile, Neville wouldn't have even cared if she was actually teasing him about it.
He might have said something about her own name, had he not been so tongue-tied with bashfulness in front of her.
Like how pleased he was to find out, that even if she hadn't actually turned out to be the sun, the name Marigold suited her just perfectly.
"I still can't believe my wish came true," she breathlessly told the boy from the magic world she somehow knew always existed. "I'm really glad you came to me, Neville."
And Neville didn't fully understand why it mattered to her so much that he had, and why she was treating him so nicely just for being...well, Neville.
But did he need a reason to understand it?
"Come on, Neville," she invited him, grasping his hand in hers as she hurried him to the white patio bistro round table, seated for two by the sunflower beds. "Dinner's almost ready, and I can't wait to ask you about everything. The most important question first being...What's your favorite ice cream flavor?"