Permanent (Temporary) Vacation

Harry was dropping by Weasleys Wheezes on his day off to pick up another shipper of daydream potions, when he bumped into Greengrass coming out of the shop, carrying an entire carton of Wonder-Witch product.

"Potter?" she asked, sounding incredulous. Harry helped her with the door, and she stood in Diagon Alley looking well rested, if a little plumper around the eyes. "Why that horrible shirt?"

"It's my day off. Every day is a Hawaiian holiday if you believe," he said.

"You look… happy. What the hell? Did you actually listen to me and get treatment?" she asked. And how she managed to cock a hip while carrying an entire carton of makeup. Well… probably that she was very fit, with good upper body strength, and… overall muscle tone.

"Um yeah," Harry lied. Not looking at the daydream charms stand in the shop at all.

"Really?" she said, "because you look like a junkie about to get a fix."

Harry sighed, "daydream charm potions. I like the ah, Hawaii Holiday one."

"That… that did that to you?" she asked. "How much are you using?"

"It's non-addictive and doesn't have any significant toxicities," said Harry. That sounded miles better than an incriminatingly factual 'five or six a day.'

"Are you currently off your head?" she asked "At work?"

"Of course not at work," said Harry, "I need to concentrate for my job."

"Hold this," she said, and thrust the carton into Harry's arms, and turned on her heel and went back into the shop, leaving Harry standing around like … someone's boyfriend being roped into shopping. Which he totally was not; he'd know. She took ages, and came out with an entire carton of Daydream charms.

"Right" she said "I've used them before, but how do you take more than one?"

"Don't mix them," urged Harry. Having an entire afternoon hallucinating that he was on a tropical island where people played quidditch with coconuts riding on squealing pigs had been less amusing than either of the base potions; Quidditch Match and Tropical Island, respectively. The monkey umpires didn't keep score properly, and it totally ruined the game. The stupid primates made the snitch only worth fifty points.

"Only an idiot would mix potions," she said. Harry felt that idea was best left alone.

"When it wears off, you take another," said Harry. "Or when the sand starts to look like carpet again."

And Harry went in and got a shipper of 'Tropical Holiday' daydream charm potions. For free because he was an owner. Greengrass was waiting outside expectantly. With her two cartons.

"Right. Show me – side-along me" she said, holding out an elbow.

He apparated to Grimmauld place, and led her upstairs to the parlour, and put his carton down, and stood around awkwardly. His impromptu fitness test told him nothing about her health, she'd managed the stairs fine behind him. But she looked around the parlour, shook her head and sighed, clearly being judgemental, and sat on the couch, crossing her legs. "So tell me how this stuff actually helps?" she asked. "Not with interior design, clearly."

Harry ignored her judgemental little snipe and threw her a bottle of Tropical Holiday daydream charm. "Right, you're going to drift off to be not quite asleep, so get comfortable first," said Harry, he picked another bottle out of the shipper, and took the top off. "As I said, you take another when you can see the carpet again."

"Given the dire need for a new rug, that makes perfect sense," she said, lay back a bit and drank.

And that's how Daphne Greengrass ended up at his house, with two large cartons of Weasley's Wheezes products, sitting on his parlour couch and taking a Hawaiian holiday daydream draught.

"Oh… it's so nice here," she said, looking a bit out-of it.

Harry shrugged, sat on the good chair, and had one too. It was nice once Grimmauld place faded out.

The thought, oily and poisonous and, well blood-bigotry flavoured rose up into Harry's addled mind that Daphne Greengrass had married a bloke who'd been an actual Death Eater.

"Oy, Greengrass?" he asked.

"Wot?" she said, around a paperback book she was reading.

"Not that it matters" said Harry. "But the second man you married was a Death Eater."

Greengrass sighed. "He didn't meet me and say 'hello, I am wanting to talk about blood purity, do you have ten minutes."

"But," said Harry.

"He didn't even mention it before we were married, all right. I'm a pureblood, my half-blood friends were not in Romania; they weren't hiding at my grandmama's crappy castle. They had better plans. It just didn't come up. He knew I'd been married to his cousin, that his cousin had died of a heart attack."

Harry tried not to think about that too….hard.

"So the only time he even said purity, he was joking around. He was… he had an edge. I thought he was just a little bit dangerous, you know. The sort of wizard a witch can push out of bed if there's a bump in the night and know that unlike, say my father, he would come back, say 'don't worry it's all sorted' and get back into to bed."

"Unlike your father?"

"My father was in Ravenclaw. Mummy finds tall, dark handsome men attractive." Greengrass said dismissively.

"So he's…"

"His boggart is the paperwork catching on fire." said Greengrass drily.

Harry tried to sit up, to concentrate. He'd never heard of someone having an inanimate boggart.

Greengrass was looking over at him in a … she looked amused for some reason. "Are you having trouble sitting up."

"Not in the least," lied Harry.

"Fire is practically alive," said Greengrass. "Though I put it in my OWL's answers for Defence Against the Dark arts, and I only got an acceptable, so I guess."

"So um?"

"Valenko started reading the Daily Prophet. At first I thought he was just working in his English." Greengrass blushed.

"What?"

"I asked, are you working on your English?" said Greengrass. She blushed harder.

"And?"

"He said no, but lift up your hem and I'll get right on it," said Greengrass.

Harry resisted the urge to … well the bastard was already dead anyway. How dare foreigners marry half-English witches and take them away. Bloody foreigners.

"And that's when you found out he was a fan of old no-nose?"

"Basically, yes. What I'd taken to being a strong, confident wizard who could protect his family was actually a muggle-baiting thug who just wanted to so somewhere that allowed muggle hunting."

"Ugh." said Harry.

"Now, could you shut up – I'm reading a book" said Greengrass. Harry had another daydream charm potion and let the sound of the surf soothe him.

Two potions later Harry was thinking it was about time for a luau. He opened his eyes to see Daphne Greengrass in her underwear, lying on his couch on top of her robes, reading her novel.

"Have you got any sunscreen Potter?" she asked, and Harry tried not to stare at her bra. "It's so hot," she said. Something certainly was.

"It's um… not really sunny," he said, his left hand shaking.

"Do you think the chef will mind if I have seconds of the delicious feast?" she asked "It's just I'm still peckish – and I had an entire plate-full."

"I'll see," said Harry, swigging more Daydream potion, and padding downstairs to put some pork on in the Hawaiian themed kitchen. Thankfully, charming the roast to hurry it along wasn't going to ruin it. Well, not after the first three times he'd exploded them working out the charms. That was pulled pork, technically. All in bits, at least. Today, though it looked like dinner was in twenty minutes. A flesh-boiling curse, followed by flame spell that crisped up the skin nicely, and it was quick and easy. Also, Harry was salivating from the smell. He glazed it and re-flamed it gingerly to make it nice and caramelized.

Then he carried it all back upstairs to the topical beach, to eat it.

Harry had seconds; he'd earned it. Greengrass ate some food that wasn't imaginary, and she came back for seconds too. Harry wasn't sure about that, but she was wearing a swimsuit, so there was that.

Harry finished off some pork and pineapple and sat back in his chair, feeling warm, and looked over at Greengrass, who was lying there in her tropical print bikini, reading some ridiculous novel. He got up and read the title, and she glared up at him – which would have worked better is she didn't look so relaxed and semi-naked. The title of the novel was 'Not With a Half-Blood!' and below that on the cover was a painting of a huge bunch of red roses.

"What's that about?" he asked, sitting back down and wondering if he should go to the broom rental place and rent a broom for a sunset fly over the ocean? It was quite nice, and only a few sickles.

"Um," she said, "It's um… a um, historical novel about um… blood bigotry and how it's all a load of bull."

"Right," said Harry, mentally updating his little mental file on her to say maybe not blood bigot. His mental file for Daphne Greengrass was mostly pictures anyway. "Well, it's getting late, you'll have to get a cabana key from the shop."

"A what"? She asked.

"The cabins down by the ocean are the best – they aren't hot all night and the ones by the waterfall sound nice, but there are mosquitos." said Harry.

She put the book down, and sat up. "You do realize we're hallucinating," she said.

"You say that, but if you tried this for a month… oh god it's bliss. I work long hours, but I spend all my spare time here."

"All… your time?" she asked, "that's how you got … mellow?"

"Are you not mellow?" asked Harry. "Nice bikini print – where'd you get it?"

Daphne Greengrass jumped up and pulled on robes, cussing.

"Try the coconut drinks they're awesome!" said Harry to her back as she left the room carrying two cartons.

The sun wasn't setting for ages, so he wiggled his toes in the sand and enjoyed the warmth.

Maybe he'd rent the broom tomorrow.

-=0=-

It was several weeks of perfect (hallucinatory) Hawaiian weather later, when Greengrass stopped Harry as he came off shift.

"Potter, have you been to see the accountant yet?" she asked.

Harry wondered if there was a better way of saying no. Something quick, as he wanted to get back to the resort for a luau before sleeping the night away in a cabana by the sea.

"I did owl what I knew, and they replied saying I needed to supply more information," said Harry. It sounded hard, and involved doing extra things.

Daphne Greengrass twisted Harry's arm behind his back with surprising ease – strength potion, his brain reminded him, and side-along apparated them to a shop.

And that was how he was dragged, with an arm behind his back to Terrance Prewitt and co.

'And Co.' seemed to include a pretty red-headed witch in office robes.

"Mafalda," said Daphne "Terrance. This is Harry Potter, a healer who needs an accountant very badly."

Cousin Mafalda Prewitt didn't look like Ginny. She looked more like much a younger, lean Molly Weasley, but with hooded eyes.

Harry stared at her skirt – which showed her knees. They were familiar looking knees, he'd seen knees before, obviously.

And when she turned around Harry's um, heart, lurched. He'd seen a bum like that before. Ginny had one just like it. Harry had inappropriate thoughts. And, Oh god, he needed to ask her out.

Mafalda was talking "...So I went to see Aunty Molly, of course, and she said that Harry Potter was a dangerous no-good, and I shouldn't talk to him. Of course, I find him with my cousin Daphne twisting his arm behind his back. And he's a healer. Totally solve the family financial woes."

"No it won't," said Terrance Prewitt, reading from a file folder "His finances are a disaster area. No record of who's renting what, Gringott's won't – "

"Like I said," said Daphne, "meet your new best customer."

"And you and he are?"

"Nothing," said Daphne hastily, "He's… "

"The health professional you see most often," said Harry snidely. "I'm the one that referred – "

Harry stopped talking because Daphne had stuck her hand over his mouth. "Shut up about that." she said.

"Mmmmh!" said Harry, around her hand.

"It's not for them to know," said Daphne, with a severe glare.

"So the mystery illness Astoria's got … he's got her a cure?" asked Mafalda.

"A referral. The muggle specialist is treating her and her counts are getting better. Whatever that means," said Daphne. "You, shut up about it," she said to Harry, and took her hand off his mouth.

"Referred her to the muggle medical system," said Harry. "I take it by the way I was manhandled – "

"Witch-handled," said Mafalda.

"That you don't tell your cousins. Anyway, between that and work-related injuries, I've seen Daphne rather often," said Harry.

"It was your stupid idea," said Daphne. "And he's doing daydream potions all the time."

"I work in London at St Mungo's, and eat and sleep in Hawaii. It's nice, I get a good nights sleep." Harry said, and realised he also tended not to have nightmares. Ever. Not in months. And he ran on the beach, instead of seedy bits of Islington. The beach still had dog poo and broken bottles, but it wasn't anywhere near as seedy. His imagination, helped along by the potions, turned the taxi-cabs into rickshaws.

"And it's helped with … recovering from the war," he said.

"And given you terrible dress-sense" said Mafalda.

"He always had terrible dress-sense, it's just now it's Hawaiian shirts," said Daphne. Harry tried not to scowl at her direct attack on his lifestyle choices. She was unreasonably judgemental, jumped to conclusions, and seemed to be convinced the world revolved around her. Well, she did have a tragic history, he grudgingly admitted to himself.

But… he loved his shirt. "Well I wasn't the one reading a trashy novel on my couch in her underwear," said Harry.

"It was hot. It's Hawaii," said Daphne defensively.

"Why his couch?" asked Mafalda.

"The imaginary luau isn't filling – but he does roast pork with pineapple," said Daphne. "And keeps his hands to himself… well he dozes off in the chair."

"Are you saying," said Mafalda, crossing her arms huffily, "That you and Harry Potter are having drug-fuelled orgies?"

"Potion fuelled holidays," said Harry, "It's not addictive." Harry felt it was important to say that.

"You could stop any time you wanted," said Daphne snidely "And he's not shagging me."

"Nobody's getting hurt," said Harry. "And you're eating half of all my roast pork. Swine-napper."

"How on earth do you fit that in around all your hobbies and a job?" asked Mafalda.

"I go riding in Hawaii, I have a shop in Hawaii… I go swimming in Hawaii," said Daphne. "It's harmless."

"Are you mentally in Hawaii right now?" Mafalda asked, frowning.

"No, I needed to drag 'mister can't be bothered getting an accountant to work out my finances' to Terrance." said Daphne "And frankly, I expect he's going need a solicitor to deal with property and tenant issues."

Terrance and Mafalda made him sign forms for them, but as it got later and later, did send out for takeaway butter chicken and naan, so that was okay, he admitted grudgingly to himself later.

-=0=-

A few weeks later Harry got a letter from his accountant. It was better news than he'd expected. He wasn't anywhere near broke, and, if he okayed some payments to the law firm Mafalda Prewitt worked at, they could politely, legally, hassle tenants of the properties he'd inherited. They expected to make several thousand a year, all he had to do was pay several hundred.

Harry took the risk, and dashed off a reply before work. They looked trustworthy, and had fed him. And besides, he wanted to see Mafalda Prewitt again. He'd dreamed about her, after all.