Chapter 87
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To: Harry Potter email
From: Spencer Reid email
Tuesday 6/30/92 10:42 (PST)
I'm pleased and relieved that you warned Mr and Mrs Thomas about the potential problems with having you stay with them and let them make an informed choice. I'm also very glad that they agreed to let you stay.
I agree that email should be secure, it is possible to hack someone's email account but unless you know their password and email address or have access to the computer they use, it does take quite a lot of technical knowledge of computers, not just the regular users' knowledge. I can't do it but then again I haven't spent much time trying to learn to do things like that. I'm sure I could find a way to learn if I really needed to but I can't see much point. I don't want to invade people's privacy like that.
Hopefully whoever is so insistent on you being at the Dursleys' won't think to look for you at Dean's or at Seamus's houses. If it is someone at Hogwarts, they have to know that the three of you are roommates and friendly with each other even if they don't realise how friendly you are with people other than Ron and Hermione who hang around you constantly when they're not angry with you.
To: Harry Potter email
From: Spencer Reid email
Wednesday 7/1/92 10:39 (PST)
Hi Harry
Are you there?
Dinner last night went really well, the chicken was cooked properly and you the flour and milk stopped it from drying out, I didn't have any herbs to add to it so it was a bit plain, the potatoes were good microwaved in their skins though, Mom really enjoyed them with a little sour cream, and the salad dressing was a bit too salty but still good. Mom ate everything on her plate which was good to see, she often doesn't have a lot of appetite. Not just when I'm cooking but a lot of the time whether she's taking her medication or not. She says that it makes foods taste funny when she takes it and when she doesn't, I sometimes can't convince her that it's dinner time at all. It was really nice to see her enjoying food that I made for her that I knew was good for her.
Tonight I'm going to try to cook the spaghetti marinara from your book. It looks harder than broiled chicken but the instructions are clear enough. The beginner's cookbooks say spaghetti is cooked as soon as the piece will stick to the front of the refrigerator when you throw it at it which is no help at all. How do I know when to start trying to throw it at the refrigerator and I don't want to start throwing food and risk upsetting Mom. I'm pretty sure you never threw food at the refrigerator at the Dursleys either. Is there a better way to know when it's cooked other than tasting it to see if it's soft enough?
To: Harry Potter email
From: Spencer Reid email
Wednesday 7/1/92 10:56 (PST)
I guess you can't talk today. Hopefully I'll hear from you tomorrow.
I've been reading about Genetics. One of my friends from Biochemistry is doing it this summer and contacted me wanting some help with the math in her assignment. It is interesting to read about but I don't think it would hold my attention for the whole semester.
I have to go now to try to get Mom to the doctors on time. I'll try to talk to you tomorrow.
To: Spencer Reid email
From: Harry Potter email
Thursday 2/7/92 6:05pm (GMT)
Hi Spencer
Sorry that I didn't write to you yesterday, the Thomas's took us to the local visiting carnival. It was great fun though even the rollercoasters were a bit tame compared to flying my own broom and even the carts at Gringotts are faster. I didn't much like not being in control. Still they were a lot of fun, and I got to eat all the things Dudley and his friends talked about. Some of the jugglers and acrobats were amazing and we went early enough that we could sit in on a quick class to learn some of the acrobatics, not that we actually succeeded in doing any of it but it gave us a better appreciation of how hard it is. I did better on the trapeze than most of the others, I think it's because of the muscles I use to make tight turns and barrel rolls when I'm flying.
Dean, Seamus and I went to Diagon Alley today, it was a bit of a risk that someone has already noticed that I'm not at Privet Drive and is looking for me but we travelled the nonmagical way by tube and I stayed well away from Dean and Seamus from the time we got to the station so nobody will tell anyone who is looking for me that I was seen with them. I offered to stay home or spend the day at the local library to reduce the risks, but Dean wouldn't hear of it. Hopefully I wasn't followed back to Dean's home. I didn't see anyone I recognised or who appeared to be following me but that doesn't mean someone couldn't be using magic to change their appearance or to hide completely. After all, I can't have the only invisibility cloak in London and Dumbledore can't be the only wizard capable of being invisible without one. Though I couldn't use my cloak in the crowds at the station or on the train and hopefully the number of people on the trains in rush hour made it really difficult for anyone without experience on the underground to follow us.
I wore my cap to hide my scar and my hair and nobody seemed to know who I was except Mr Blott who I spent quite a bit of time with last summer so he actually knows me, nobody called out my name or wanted to shake my hand and nobody seemed to be actively looking for the-boy-who-lived, we managed to get several issues of 'The Daily Prophet' and I wasn't mentioned in any of them. I don't think that the general public, or Dumbledore knows I am missing, but maybe whoever did that to the wards does know but didn't think to look for me in Diagon Alley. It was great fun exploring the Alley properly, I wandered in and out of most of the shops. One thing struck me as odd though, there are no food shops. I mean there's a couple of restaurant type places and cafes and an amazing ice-cream parlour but no butcher or greengrocer or supermarket. There's a cake shop but not the sort of bakery that sells bread as well as cakes and pies. At least there isn't any shops like that on the part of the Alley where we were, we didn't go down Knockturn Alley, well we tried and someone grabbed us and told us it wasn't safe down there for children so we didn't go any further but surely the food shops aren't down there. There must be another magical shopping centre because I can't imagine any of the witches I saw today in their robes and cloaks and bonnets looking like actors in a telly program set in the eighteenth century popping out to Tesco or Woolworths or the local grocery store without being noticed. I know there's shops in the town of Hogsmeade near Hogwarts but surely every witch or wizard wouldn't go all the way to Scotland to buy groceries every week.
I took your advice and asked Mr Blott about different schools. He says Hogwarts is by far the best school in the United Kingdom, there are a couple of small local schools but they're mostly for kids who's magic isn't strong enough to get accepted at Hogwarts. I think with my habits of self study I could still learn enough at a school like that so long as I had access to the books I needed, but I'd stand out there too much and I wouldn't be far enough away from whoever's watching to stop them from finding and returning me to the Dursleys again with my memory wiped. I've been practicing my occlumency as frequently as I can but we have no way of knowing it will work.
Mr Blott didn't know much about the other international schools but he did sell me a book about them. It's several years old but I doubt that magical schools change all that much since all the schools in the book are hundreds of years old. There are rumoured to be two schools of magic in America. Salem Academy (which used to be Salem Witches Academy but apparently they do take boys too for at least the last hundred years or more) in Salem Massachusetts and Ilvermorny School of Witchcraft and Wizardry which is also in Massachusetts though not in the same part of the state. The book is a little unclear whether they're possibly the same school and it changed its name to Ilvermorny when it started accepting Wizards or if Ilvermorny was the wizarding school, and Salem the witches' school and they kept that name when they joined together or if they really are still two different schools. It doesn't make sense for a country as big as yours to have only two main schools of magic and have them both within just over 200 kilometres of each other, not that distances are as important with magical travel available. Then again, the witches and wizards I've met so far aren't gifted with much common sense so maybe I shouldn't use that argument. The book also then says that Ilvermorny School of Witchcraft and Wizardry is located in Lake Nipigon, Ontario Canada There's also a school of magic in Mexico which would actually be closer to you but the book said that most of the classes are taught in Mexican Spanish or Nahuatl one of their native languages and there's the Whitestar Academy of Magic, in the Laurentian mountains of Quebec that teaches classes in French.
Anyway I have written to the headmaster/headmistress of Ilvermorny and of Salem Academy if they're two different schools, asking if I can be a student there next year. I hope it isn't too late to enrol for next year. I sent the letter to Ilvermorney to both the addresses in the book so hopefully they get it, I have no real faith that either of the addresses is totally correct but I don't know what else to do. Wizarding post doesn't require addresses but I still don't want to risk harming Hedwig by trying to send her so far. We haven't got our supply letters for Hogwarts yet so it shouldn't be should it? Mrs Thomas says she will help me to get to America if they accept me and don't send some way for me to get there. There is a way to travel between continents by magic. It's called an international portkey. The book I got on magical transportation strongly recommends an anti nausea potion ten minutes prior to travel and again on landing so it sounds really rough but the portkey from London to Massachusetts or Ontario takes about half an hour. If magical travel is that easy and I get into Ilvermorny or Salem then maybe I could come and visit you one day, maybe spend one of the school holidays with you if that's okay.
Dean and Seamus are a little shocked that I don't want to go back to Hogwarts and I think both of them are a bit worried that their parents would think that changing schools was an excellent idea for them as well. Honestly, I would like them to come with me, but only if they want to. I wouldn't want them to resent me for making their parents decide to send them to a different school and without me there to be manipulated by Dumbledore and as bait for Voldemort, Hogwarts should be much safer for them than it was last year. Thankfully for them, Mrs Thomas isn't at all interested in having Dean go to school in another country, she couldn't afford it for a start and I think she would like him to come home and go to the local comprehensive if he could learn magic another way, but she'd never ask him to give up Hogwarts. She really misses him though, much more than I think Vernon and Petunia would miss Dudley for all they make such a fuss over him when he's home.
To: Harry Potter email
From: Spencer Reid email
Thursday 7/2/92 10:19 (PST)
Harry, I would love to see you. But it would be even better to know you were away from that crazy school where you nearly died too many times, and safe from whoever it is that is trying to control you. If Ilvermorny or Salem Academy can keep you safe then I hope you are accepted there. However if you were choosing a school just to be closer to me and they were otherwise equally good and there wasn't any other benefit to Ilvermorny over Salem then you should also consider that Lake Nipigon might be slightly closer in miles but it would probably take longer to get to Pasadena by nonmagical transport because of the border crossing. It's also further north so it would be a lot colder in winter and being in Canada would make it harder for me to visit you. However it would be worth checking out if magical Britain is on better terms with Canada or America when it comes to things like international students, or if there are professors at either school that taught at Hogwarts in the past, and might be influenced by Dumbledore. If Ilvermorny and Salem aren't the safest place for you then please don't come to America just because I am here. I am confident that we will find a way to keep in touch no matter where you go. As I'm sure you know, Ilvermorny and Salem are both on the other side of the country to Caltech anyway and definitely not in easy travel distance to visit from Nevada or California by non magical means. and remember that the East coast of the USA is nearly as far from California as it is from London, 2983miles compared to 3269miles, so while it's in the same country it might be nearly as hard to travel magically as well. In fact the school in Mexico would be a lot closer to me if there is a way to learn languages by magic or a charm you could cast on your eyes, ears and mouth so you would hear and read English and people listening to you would hear you speaking their language, and anyone looking for you might not think to look there.
It is fascinating to know that there is a magical society here as well, several slightly different ones in Mexico and Canada too from the sound of the descriptions in your book. I would love to be able to explore it with you one day though it's probably hidden from nonmagical people like Hogwarts and Diagon Alley are hidden and it sounds like it might be concentrated on the east coast of the country since both the schools are there. Of course, it makes sense that magic wouldn't just be a British thing. I wonder if they're as isolated from the rest of civilisation as the British Wizarding World is, or if they've embraced modern technology and blend in with our society. When you really think about it, they'd fit right in among all the others who practice non mainstream religions, cults, the doomsday preppers and the isolationists. There is so many fringe groups here that it would be easy to hide in plain sight without withdrawing from the world completely like they did in Britain.
I'm glad that you weren't caught going to Diagon Alley but it probably is a risk you shouldn't take too often, especially as it meant travelling by yourself where you were vulnerable to a lot more than just the people you're worried are looking for you. I know I sound hypocritical since I wasn't much older than you are when I first caught the bus to California to attend Caltech and the train home to visit Mom, but I didn't have any known enemies. It concerns me a little the idea that there could be somebody looking to return you to the Dursleys even though they know you're better off where you are now. But at least you can be fairly sure now that they don't have some magic way of finding you this summer or they already would have found you. Which means if you can get into another school you wont be dragged back unless they go to the effort of physically trying to find you and I would assume that your new school would take exception to its students being kidnapped.
To: Spencer Reid email
From: Harry Potter email
Thursday 2/7/92 6:15pm (GMT)
Your mention of the distances involved was disheartening, but no matter how bad the portkey is 25 minutes of hell each way would be worth it to be able to visit you in person and see all the things you've told me about for myself.
I have no reason to believe that Ilvermorny or Salem Academy will not be safe for me, or that one of the other schools would be safer. If someone was to come looking for me they would of course look into schools in English speaking countries first and there aren't so many of them that it would be impossible to check them all, but unless I find a good translation charm or a magical way to become fluent in another language in the next six weeks then I think I need to go to an English speaking school. I wish that I'd thought to ask Mr Blott about spells like that. The only way to be less easily found would be to not go to a wizarding school at all. To move completely into the nonmagical world and try to teach myself magic or to hire a private tutor. It can't be impossible but I don't have the connections to do that here in England let alone in another country. At least now I know more about what is possible with magic. What I learned before I started Hogwarts was mostly driven by building on the things I did the first time by accident or by things I desperately needed at the time. They were all charms, I never even knew that transfiguration was possible, let alone potions and defence. Now I know and I could stock up on the textbooks I'd use for the next six years before disappearing I'm sure I don't actually need to go to school to learn the things I want to learn. The only problem is finding a way to enrol in a regular school somewhere that I can't be found without a parent or guardian to sign the paperwork, and to find a place to live where people won't notice or take advantage of the fact I'm not living with an adult.
To: Harry Potter email
From: Spencer Reid email
Thursday 7/2/92 10:20pm (PST)
Harry, whether you go to a magical school or a nonmagical school you need a guardian for more than signing paperwork. If it were just that Mrs Thomas might be happy to enrol you in a muggle boarding school there in England but you would still need someone to look after you over the summer and other school holidays. It isn't normal for a child to spend all their holidays at school, and there are a lot more holidays at muggle boarding schools than just Christmas, it's normal for students to go home for three major term breaks and three half term weekends during the year as well. In addition to that, responsible schools require a legal next of kin to make decisions for you about medical care if you're ever sick or injured, and extra consent forms for camps and excursions. Not to mention that you should have an adult you can trust to look after you and go to for advice and assistance when you need it. I was just lucky that my mother was well enough to enrol me in school and that I learned to sign her signature for the days she wasn't well, I was constantly worried that she would be called in for a teacher conference or something on a day she wasn't well and it would be discovered that she actually wasn't capable of caring for herself, let alone a child and she'd be placed in an institution and I'd be sent to foster care, it was one of the reasons I was so keen to skip ahead as many classes as I could as quickly as I could after Dad left. I knew that once I entered the foster care system I may not be allowed to skip ahead again but surely they couldn't put me back into a grade I'd already tested out of.
If it was only to sign paperwork I would gladly do it for you, unfortunately I still couldn't pass as an adult in person and most schools would demand to meet with your guardians before accepting your enrolment, and I wouldn't recommend trying to live without a responsible adult to do the things you can't. I've been there and it sucks, I doubt the school would've been as apathetic about the level of bullying I received if my lawyer father was on the phone threatening to sue them over letting adult students beat up a ten or eleven year old.
A/N: Thank you to all those who reviewed followed or favourited this story for your support.
A/N2: I wish everyone the best in this time. Please stay safe and keep your distance, stay at home if you can. I'm very concerned that the UK and the US and some other countries are raising the restrictions too soon, putting the economy above people's health and lives.