The engine snarled beneath Jinx's fingers, the entire chassis trembling like a beast raring for the hunt. Her grin stretched wide, teeth flashing under the flickering glow of the streetlamp, eyes gleaming with the kind of giddy anticipation that made Harry's stomach drop.
"Jinx—wait—"
Her foot slammed down.
The car lunged forward like a kicked broomstick, tires shrieking as rubber burned against pavement. Harry flinched, his entire body recoiling as the world careened sideways. The sickening crunch of metal meeting wood tore through the night. The garage door caved inward, folding like crumpled parchment, splinters and twisted beams groaning beneath the impact. The air reeked of scorched rubber, engine oil, and something acrid—maybe the stench of his own impending doom.
Harry staggered back, his fingers latching onto the open passenger door as the car shuddered to a halt. His pulse pounded at his temples, a relentless drumbeat of pure, unfiltered panic.
Jinx blinked at the wreckage. Then she laughed. A sharp, delighted cackle, as if she'd just pulled off the greatest prank in history.
"Alright, so—" She tilted her head. "—not forward."
Not forward?
Harry's breath left him in a strangled wheeze. Vernon's car sat half-eaten by the garage, its once-pristine bumper now a tangled mess of warped steel and cracked headlights. This was beyond reckless. This was suicidal.
Jinx glanced down at the pedals with mild curiosity. "Which one's the go-back one?"
"That's the gas!" Harry's lungs seized. "Get your foot off the gas!"
"This one?" She lifted her foot, the pressure easing off.
The engine grumbled, a low, menacing growl that vibrated through the air. The entire vehicle held its breath, caught between catastrophe and mere disaster.
Jinx shot him a smug, lopsided smirk. "See? Easy."
Harry pressed both hands against his forehead, fingers digging into his scalp as he stared at the wreckage. The garage door stood in ruins, Vernon's precious car permanently scarred, and standing in the middle of the carnage was her—completely unfazed, completely insane, completely certain that she could fix this with sheer confidence alone.
"This is a terrible idea," he muttered under his breath. "This is an absolutely horrendous idea."
Jinx waved him off, already fiddling with the gearshift, poking at it as if it were some sort of puzzle box. Her fingers curled around it, as if sheer force of will could make up for absolute ignorance.
"I've got this."
"No, you don't!" The words tore out of him before he could stop them. His nerves were shot. His patience, nonexistent. "You've never driven a car before! You don't even know how to put it in reverse!"
Jinx tilted her head, like he'd just started speaking in Parseltongue. "Reverse?"
Harry dragged his hand down his face. "The thing that makes the car go backwards! The gearstick! The R!"
Jinx's eyes flicked to the cluster of letters printed beside the stick shift. "…Ohhh."
Harry didn't have the strength to scream.
The gearshift sat in Jinx's grip like a trigger, her fingers curling around it with the casual possessiveness of someone who had just discovered a new way to cause mayhem. She turned toward Harry with a theatrical gasp, her mouth forming a scandalized 'O' before twisting into a lopsided smirk.
"Wow. Thanks for the genius explanation, Captain Obvious." Her voice dripped with mock offense, her knuckles tightening like she was debating whether to throw the entire thing into the next available setting just to see what happened. "Now stop being such a backseat—whatever-you-call-it—and get in the bloody car, Brilliant."
"I'm not getting in." Harry's breath turned to fire in his chest. His words hit the night air sharp, his frustration wound so tight it felt like a coiled spring was digging into his ribs. His pulse hammered at his temple, his heartbeat a war drum pounding out all the reasons why this was an absolutely horrendous idea. "You don't even know what you're doing! You've already smashed the garage—"
Jinx groaned, the sound exaggerated, like she was suffering some great injustice. She flung herself back against the driver's seat, limbs sprawled, eyes rolling skyward as if she were pleading for divine intervention. Then, just as suddenly, she snapped forward, lunging across the passenger seat with a whipcrack of movement. The door handle yanked back with a vicious clunk. The door flew open, swaying slightly on its hinges as she leaned back into her seat with a triumphant flourish.
"There." She dusted her hands off like she'd just solved a particularly difficult mystery. "Door's open. You can stop whining and get in before I figure this thing out without you."
Harry's nails dug into his palms. "Are you serious right now?"
He cast a frantic glance toward the street—more lights flickering on, more silhouettes shifting behind curtains. A shadow in the nearest window moved. Someone had disappeared from sight.
A phone call.
He could feel it. Someone was dialing. The shriek of the alarm had already set them on edge, but now, after this—after Jinx's demolition job on the Dursleys' garage, after the roaring engine and the unmistakable crunch of twisted metal—everyone would be calling the police.
Which would get the Ministry here even faster.
Jinx slammed her palm against the steering wheel. HOOOOONK.
The horn's wail shattered the night. Harry flinched, his spine locking as his stomach twisted itself into a thousand knots. Somewhere down the street, a dog exploded into furious barking.
"Come on, Brilliant! Live a little." She stretched her arms behind her head, utterly relaxed despite the chaos she'd just thrown into the world. "Or, y'know… stand there sulking while they come slap you in wizard jail or whatever you're so afraid of."
His breath caught.
The words slithered under his skin, coiling tight, squeezing at his ribs like iron bands. Wizard jail. Azkaban.
The image slammed into him before he could stop it—the ceaseless, soul-leeching chill of a hundred silent horrors standing guard over the condemned. The weight of it settled on his chest, cold and suffocating, an invisible hand gripping his throat. He had tried—tried—to keep that possibility locked away in the darkest corner of his mind, buried beneath logic and denial, but now Jinx had said it, and the thought had teeth.
It tore through him like a Dementor's grip.
Not only had the letter made it clear he was expelled, Jinx had now killed Vernon, and Harry had gone with her. He was an accomplice. The Ministry would descend upon him like a pack of bloodhounds and drag him off in chains before he could say 'Quidditch'.
Jinx lunged across the car again, her fingers locking around his wrist in an iron grip. Too strong. Too sure.
"Come on!" The night painted her in sharp edges, all frenzied movement and breathless urgency, a live wire sparking too close to an open flame. "I'm not sticking around for your magical cops or whatever, and neither are you. So get in, or I'll drive off without you."
Harry wrenched his arm free, pulse thrumming beneath his skin like a caged animal. "You don't even know how to drive!"
The street swam with shadows, houses standing like silent witnesses, every window a hollow eye staring into his soul. Curtains twitched. Another breath. Petunia's voice still echoing inside his skull. 'I never wanted you. You never belonged here.' The words cut like jagged glass, and suddenly, the decision wasn't a decision at all. His fingers curled into fists, nails biting into his palms. The world had already decided for him.
With a sharp inhale, he ducked inside.
The door slammed shut behind him, the sound a gunshot in the stillness. The car smelled of old upholstery and something metallic, tinged with the faintest traces of burnt rubber and gasoline. He braced himself against the seat, fingers gripping the edges as if that alone could tether him to reality.
"You're going to crash," he muttered, each syllable a bitter edge in his throat. "And then we're both going to end up dead."
Jinx shot him a triumphant grin, her fingers already dancing over the gearshift like a pianist about to tear through a symphony.
"Nah." The sheer confidence in her voice was more terrifying than her recklessness. "I've got this. Just sit tight and enjoy the ride."
Harry barely had time to suck in a breath before her foot slammed the gas.
The car howled to life, tires shrieking as they tore against the pavement. The seatbelt, which he hadn't even fastened, snapped uselessly at his side as the force of the car's movement threw him back against the seat. His stomach lurched, gravity flipping inside out as the vehicle jerked in reverse, barely missing the neighbor's flowerbed before rocketing into the street.
"JINX—"
She yanked the wheel, and the car swerved—too sharp, too fast—whipping Harry sideways so hard his shoulder cracked against the door. Houses blurred past in streaks of yellow-lit windows and warped brick, the engine screaming beneath them as if it, too, knew this was a horrific mistake.
Jinx whooped, her hands way too loose on the steering wheel, her entire body vibrating with exhilaration. "See? Piece of cake!"
Harry's entire life flashed before his eyes.
The car jolted over a pothole, rattling Harry's bones like loose dice in a cup. His fingers dug into the torn upholstery, knuckles white against the dim glow of the dashboard. Jinx whooped beside him, one hand gripping the wheel, the other slapping the gearshift like she was testing its limits. The speedometer lurched higher, the numbers spinning toward inevitable disaster.
"This is not cake!" Harry bellowed, voice cracking as they veered too close to a lamppost.
His pulse pounded at his throat, breath jagged, each second stretching like a rubber band about to snap. The world outside blurred into smeared streaks of orange and black—streetlights warping in their periphery, houses flashing past like warped reflections in broken glass. The tires shrieked. The car fishtailed. Jinx yanked the wheel, laughter spilling from her lips, high-pitched and electric. Panic clawed up Harry's spine, cold fingers tightening around his ribs, but beneath it—somewhere buried under the chaos—another feeling surfaced.
Memories.
Wind hammering his face, Ron's panicked yelp cutting through the roar of the Ford Anglia's enchanted engine. The ground spiraling below, the railway tracks a silver thread stretching into the horizon. The weightless rush as the car soared, ridiculous and impossible, chasing the Hogwarts Express through an open sky.
The past bled into the present.
For a split second, he wasn't in a stolen car barreling toward catastrophe with a lunatic at the wheel—he was twelve again, crammed into the front seat with Ron, knees knocking against the dashboard, the scent of oil and stale sweets clinging to the air. The thrill had been different then, edged with adventure rather than desperation.
Wild but never reckless.
Back then, excitement and the sheer absurdity of it all had swallowed the fear, by the sheer—two idiots stealing a flying car because they could. Even when it went wrong, when the magic sputtered and the Anglia nosedived toward the Whomping Willow, they'd come out of it with bruises and breathless laughter.
Mrs. Weasley's Howler had nearly taken their eardrums off the next morning, but even that hadn't been the worst thing in the world. Because they'd still had each other. They'd still been together.
Harry's chest clenched.
The summer stretched behind him, hollow and silent, a stretch of days filled with nothing but unanswered letters and the weight of isolation pressing down like a stone. Not a word from Ron. Not a single owl. Like the months between them had carved a distance deeper than mere miles.
The car bucked beneath him, slamming him back into reality. His breath came in short, uneven bursts, the seatbelt useless against the way Jinx wrestled with the wheel like she was wrangling a living thing.
"Merlin's bloody—WATCH THE ROAD!"
Jinx draped one hand over the wheel, fingers tapping an absentminded rhythm as if she were cruising through an empty park instead of tearing down a dimly lit street with all the grace of a drunken Hippogriff. Her other hand rested lazily on Pow-Pow, the oversized weapon balanced against her seat like some kind of unhinged co-pilot.
"Oh, relax," she drawled, voice carrying the same dismissive air as if he'd just complained about the weather. "You're still alive, aren't you? Barely even hit anything."
Harry's brain short-circuited.
A dozen responses clawed for escape, each more furious than the last, but all that came out was an inhuman, strangled noise somewhere between a gasp and a dying scream. His pulse hammered against his skull, his ribs, his throat, every nerve in his body waging war against the sheer insanity of the situation.
"Barely?" he sputtered, voice cracking like a shattered wand core. "You smashed into a garage!"
Jinx flicked a hand through the air like she was swatting a particularly annoying insect. The car drifted left—too far left—and Harry's stomach flipped as they veered toward the opposite lane.
No, no, no—
Instinct shoved reason aside. His hands shot out, gripping the wheel before they could plow headfirst into oncoming traffic. The car jerked violently as he wrestled it back onto the correct path, his heart hammering against his ribs like it was trying to make a break for it.
"Look—" Jinx barely spared him a glance. "—if you're gonna sit there whining, you might as well make yourself useful."
Harry's knuckles ached from gripping the wheel, his breath still ragged in his throat. "Whining?"
"I mean, you've got that big ol' brain full of magic stuff, right?" Jinx leaned back, utterly unfazed, her grin widening like this was the most fun she'd had all week. "Why not just magic us out of here instead of sitting there sulking?"
The car jolted.
Harry slammed against the seat as Jinx wrenched the wheel with reckless abandon. The engine's guttural roar swallowed the night, its vibrations rattling up through the floor and into his bones. A thick stench of burnt rubber seeped through the cracked window, mingling with the cool bite of the evening air. Another lamppost streaked past in a flash of gold, its glow carving sharp shadows across Jinx's face—the wild gleam in her eyes, the manic curve of her grin, the way she leaned into every turn like she was wrestling the car into submission rather than steering it.
"I can't just wave my wand and vanish us." Harry forced his breath steady. "The Ministry has this thing—the Trace—it's on every underage wizard. The second I try a spell, they'll track us. It'd make all this running off completely pointless."
Jinx flicked her gaze toward him for a fraction of a second, her expression caught somewhere between irritation and begrudging interest. The car veered left—too close to the curb, too close to disaster. Harry lunged for the wheel, yanking them back onto the road before they could clip the side of a parked car. His heartbeat thundered in his throat, his grip so tight his knuckles ached.
Jinx exhaled sharply, a half-laugh, half-huff that said 'Why'd I pick up the one wizard who can't wizard?'
"Even if I didn't have the Trace, I don't know how to apparate yet—that's, uh, teleporting, basically." The car jerked again as Jinx swerved past a van, its side mirror nearly clipping theirs. Harry barely swallowed down a curse. "I don't know how to make a Portkey either—takes advanced magic. And the Floo Network? We need a fireplace hooked into the system. We obviously don't have one here."
Every escape route collapsed before he could even finish considering it. His brain churned through the options, grasping at half-formed plans, but every single one led to a dead end.
Knight Bus? He had no idea who owned it, but it could be the Ministry.
A broomstick? Didn't have one.
Hiding? They were in a running car after making more noise than a professional quidditch match.
His jaw clenched, his frustration knotting tight inside him. No way out. No way out. No way out.
The realization hit like a hex to the chest.
I left my Firebolt behind.
It lay forgotten in his room away beneath the stairs, buried alongside his trunk, his books, his robes, his cloak. With all rush after Jinx killed Vernon, he'd completely forgotten to go pick up his things. Now it was all stuck in the one place he could never go back to.
Harry's breath stuttered.
The Dursleys had never wanted him, had spent years pretending he didn't exist, but they'd still kept his things. Hoarded them like trophies, like proof that even his belongings weren't his to own. And now, tearing down darkened streets in a stolen car with a half-mad girl at the wheel, those things might as well have been Gringotts vault-level unreachable.
His pulse pounded, loud and erratic, his heartbeat drowning out the growl of the engine. No broom, no books, no gold, no way to contact anyone who could help him. Even Hedwig was gone—somewhere out there in the night, hunting, flying free while he sat trapped in a situation spiraling further out of his control.
A bitter taste coated his tongue.
Everything had been stripped away, piece by piece, and now? What was left?
Nothing.
The word crashed through his skull, cold and absolute. Without magic, without his things, without anyone, he was just a boy in a car with a stranger who was ripping apart what little stability he'd had left.
Jinx jerked the wheel, sending the car skidding hard to the right. Harry barely noticed. His body lurched with the motion, but his mind spiraled deeper, thoughts tangled in the image of everything he'd left behind in Dudley's second bedroom. The trunk's worn edges. The Firebolt lying on top. The Invisibility Cloak folded inside, waiting for him to return.
Jinx's voice sliced through the storm. "Brilliant!"
Harry's head snapped up. Jinx flicked a glance at him, sharp and searching, her fingers flexing against the steering wheel. The neon glow of a passing streetlight cast jagged shadows across her face, her eyes narrowed in something other than irritation.
Something close to concern.
"You good over there?" she asked, her tone halfway between impatience and an unspoken don't make me stop this car. "Or do I need to slap you out of it again?"
Harry's breath shuddered past his teeth. His grip on the seat tightened.
Somewhere up ahead, the road stretched on, dark and endless.
He didn't have his Firebolt.
He didn't have a way back.
But the car wasn't stopping.
And neither was he.
That's a wrap for Chapter 7!
Let me know what you liked and disliked, I love and appreciate all constructive criticism, especially since I always keep editing and improving these chapters. I would love to hear all your thoughts!
Two more chapters, and the pace is going to pick up.
Check me out on p. a. t. r.e.o.n.. c.o.m. /TheStorySpinner (don't forget to remove the spaces and dots) for early releases of new chapters and bonus content.
The following chapters are already available there:
Chapter 8: I Told You So
Chapter 9: My Sidekick Is Having a Breakdown
Chapter 10: That Is One Ugly Gremlin
Chapter 11: Snackquisition
Chapter 12: Ka-Ching! (Maybe?)
Chapter 13: Side Effects May Include: Warmth
See you in Chapter 8!
