Thank you guys so much! I love how you're so into this! Yeah, so Percy'll make one singular appearance in this story. Get ready for – 'The Memory'!

I've just discovered that Ginny's real name is Ginevra and not Ginerva. Honestly, I'm not sure of the difference, but now I'm writing it as Ginevra.

Disclaimer – Any and all characters and scenes recognized are owned by J.K. Rowling. I mix my plots into the characters under the permission of the author.

Words –2078

"Yeah, I missed you too." Harry Potter replied and that made little Elsa Wilmanson very happy. She leaned in to see how he displaced all the weeds from the front garden to the backyard.

Sanya never really liked to talk aloud in Harry's presence. She had lost much of her courage during the past year leaving her sisters to lead on.

"So…" Leila dragged out the word. "What are you doing?"

"Gardening." Harry replied, taking out another clump of weeds and putting it in the wheel barrow. Harry had never destroyed the weeds. Just because it didn't have flowers and didn't look neat enough, the muggles thought they were of no use. Of course, Aunt Petunia had let him put them in the backyard, thankfully.

Without harming the roots, he carefully pulled out the entire weed and placed it next to the previous one on the barrow.

Harry tried not to sigh. The fierce sun was harsh and it had taken little convincing to get the girls to sit in the shade of the only tree in the front yard.

"Here." Sanya muttered, blushing as she handed Harry a small pink water bottle.

"Thank you, Sanya. So tell me girls, how has your year been?"

Leila and Elsa launched into elaborate explanations while Sanya leaned back as though trying to hide herself.

Harry listened to their details attentively. It helped relieve his loneliness. Other than his letters, pet owl, his familiar dog and his reflection (who couldn't shut his mouth), he was facing the most boring summers ever. He almost wished that something would happen. Of course, knowing his luck, he'd burn down the house.

His previous summers had never been this dull. Waiting for the Jacksons to come back and wishing every moment that Dudley would disappear was close to nothing now that he had a place he could call home. It wasn't this house. Not House no. 4 of Privet Drive. It was Hogwarts. A school for magical educational training all wizards and witches from everywhere across the world.

Well, except for North America and Antarctica.

"He made Callie say sorry and he became my best friend!" Elsa continued. Harry nodded patiently.

When school term had ended, Harry had bid goodbye to Ron and Hermione, his two best friends with a heavy heart. He didn't show it of course. He met Ron's parents and his little sister, Ginevra. She was small and her whole face was glowing when she saw Harry. Her hair had seemed even brighter than her family's. Harry had expected it go on flames any second.

He adjusted his cap to lessen the sun on his face which was already smudged with dirt. He couldn't wait for a nice cold bath…

"Then he played with us for the whole day!" Leila chirped.

Harry turned his mind over the latest letter DJ had sent. He wasn't sure why, but his cousin had also sent the Potter Family Book. By reading the letter, which seemed off, Harry was sure that DJ had read something that had spooked him.

Harry never found anything disturbing in the book. In fact, he took to reading the Potter Family book late at night trying to go to sleep by knowing facts about his family.

For example, no girl born or wed into the family ever inherited black hair. Random, but fun.

DJ had also sent Sherbet Lemon to Harry, knowing that it was Harry favourite muggle sweet. Harry received many things in his mail today. A copy of the new Quidditch Facts and False Fiction from Hermione. Ron had sent a set of goggles for Harry if it rained during a Quidditch Match.

Ron's mother had sent another Weasely Jumper which was black with red designs of snitches. Ron must have told her that Harry favoured black.

"And then Josh kissed me on the cheek!" Elsa squealed.

"What?!" Harry shouted. He dropped his spade and looked at Elsa.

"Josh kissed you?"

"Yeah! He was so sweet!"

"Elsa, what kind of boy is he?"

"I told you! Weren't you listening? He's cute and nice and funny and he's my best friend!" She said and Harry tried to calm down. This 'Josh' was a boy of her age! No need to get worked up over it. It's not like he was a teenager or something…

"Elsa, don't let him kiss you too much, okay?" Harry tried to say this without too much force.

"Why not?" She looked completely confused at that along with her sisters. Harry tried to take deep breaths. The girl was four for Merlin's sake!

"Well… you know…" Harry said trying to grab on strings that would make her think boys weren't nice.

"Boys aren't like girls." He said lamely.

Leila nodded looking very wise, "Yeah, boys are dumb. They're yucky."

"Exactly!" Harry exclaimed and then stopped to think that sentence properly.

"But Josh is nice!" Elsa said.

"Josh is okay." Leila conceded but Harry shook his head.

"No, look, Josh can be your friend, but no kissing."

"Why not? It's not like they have cooties, right?"

"Uh…"

"Mum says boys have cooties. It's not nice." Leila said, as though just remembering her mother' warning.

Harry grabbed onto that, "Yes! She's absolutely right!"

Harry tried to ignore four pairs of round eyes gaped at him. His head snapped up.

Four pairs?

Harry froze. Right behind Sanya, in the hedges, there were two tennis ball eyes stared at him. He stared back. The eyes disappeared and Leila screeched. Harry jumped, "What? What?!"

"Boys have cooties?!"

"Oh, that… yeah. Yeah, they do." Harry sat down wondering what just happened. He connected with his Core and explored the hedge in question.

There were two squirrels at the edge, stuck in the brambles, there was a monarch on one of the leaves and a cluster of ants at the base of the main shoot, but nothing else.

"Boys have cooties?!" It came out as a shriek.

"Yeah." Harry muttered absentmindedly. The girls got up and ran away shouting, "Bye, Harry!"

Harry was about to get up when Sanya took her little water bottle and whispered, "Happy Birthday, Harry."

"Thanks, Sanya."

"I don't think you have cooties." She said and quickly ran away.

Harry stood up and brushed his hands together. He walked to the hedge and freed the tangled squirrels. They sniffed his hand and scurried up his arms to sit on his shoulder. One of them explored his cap.

Harry couldn't understand the eyes.

'It must have been some kind of normal animal.' Bolt suggested yawning.

"No, it was too intelligent. It's eyes were focused." Harry muttered. The squirrels pushed his cap of and ran through his hair. Harry was too deep in thought to stop them.

"What are you doing?" A snide voice asked from behind.

"Thinking." Harry replied. He had no mood to talk to Dudley, now.

"About a plant. Mum's right, you are a freak." He laughed and Harry frowned.

"Better a freak than….uh, whatever you are." Harry shot back and Dudley glared at him. The muggle was a bit shorter than him but also larger, horizontally.

"You have squirrels in your hair."

"Yes, yes I do."

Harry pushed the wheel barrow over the small footpath to avoid crushing the grass. Dudley followed him, obviously trying to irritate him.

"I know what day it is!"

"Congratulations, you have finally learnt the days of the week."

"Haven't you got any presents from that freak school of yours?"

"The building doesn't give gifts, Dudley. The people in it do. Why are you so interested in that? Your Mum wouldn't like to know how much you talk about magic."

Dudley gasped. He stared at Harry as though the latter had threatened him with crime. Harry rolled his eyes and started planting behind the house.

"You said the M-word!"

Harry looked up at him and got up, "Mayhem, muggle, mobster, madam, mad, mud, mead, mike, mill, movie. There, I said lots of M-words. What are you going to do about that?"

Dudley glared at him, "Mum! Harry's doing some bad things!"

Harry stared at him, confused. He looked into the house to see a frying pan hurtling towards him. He dodged it and caught it by the handle within a second.

Aunt Petunia appeared in the window and glared at him, "What did you do?"

"I was talking. I wasn't aware that it was banned."

"Show some respect!"

"For what?"

She glared at him and shouted at Dudley to get in the house.

Harry collapsed on the bed and sighed as the squirrels jumped out of his hair and started exploring his room. His school trunk was closed and stuffed under the bed and his guitar was on the table, some books were carelessly strewn around and his clothes were pushed into the shelf.

He usually wasn't this messy, but he didn't want to get up at the moment. The evening sun was starting to cast long shadows across his room and Harry sighed when his uncle's shout hit his ears.

"BOY! GET DOWN HERE, NOW!"

Harry waited.

"PLEASE!"

He casually walked out his door, jumped over the railing and landed easily like a cat on the ground floor. He never took the stairs while going down.

Uncle Vernon stood there with a purple face. His huge body had been forced into a dinner suit similar to what Dudley was wearing now. Aunt Petunia wore an orange cocktail dress with a small apron tied neatly.

His uncle looked at him with disgust. His tiny eyes going over the expensive clothes caked with mud, over Harry unruly hair (never mind he had just gone to the barbers), his slanted glasses and the squirrels. One was sitting on his shoulders, and the other was in his hair. Harry twirled the cap around his fingers and said, "Yes?"

"As you very well know, " Uncle Vernon said, his body convulsing as he struggled to make his voice polite, "The Masons are due to arrive within five minutes."

"I'm not keeping the time. You are." Harry reminded him. A vein in his uncle's forehead seemed to pulse.

"During the entire evening and night, you are to stay in your room."

"I know that. You told me every day."

Uncle Vernon took another breathe and turned to his son, "When the Masons arrive, you will be?"

"At the door, waiting to invite them in and take their coats." Dudley said putting on a fake polished tone.

"Good! And Petunia?"

"Waiting to invite them graciously into our living room." She said, in a happy high pitched noise. Harry wondered how the bats in the attic survived that.

"And, you?" Uncle Vernon asked looking at Harry as though daring for him to forget.

"I'll be in my bedroom, making no noise and pretending that I don't exist." Harry said looking at the pink and white cake with elaborate frosting. It was right next to the radio and Harry could have sworn that a spark came from it.

"Right you will, this is one of the biggest days of my career and you-will-not-mess-it-up!" He snarled and turned away.

Harry suddenly piped up, "Aren't you going to wish me?"

The Dursleys stopped and stared as though he had decided to do an Irish jig.

"It's my big day too." Harry said. Bolt was sniggering at their expressions.

Uncle Vernon knew he wasn't getting out of this. You couldn't stop Harry once he got started.

"Happy…birthday." His uncle grunted so low, that Harry almost had to strain his ears to catch it.

"Do you know how old I am?"

"You're younger than Dudley!"

Harry looked at Dudley who was scratching his head as he practiced his moves and talked to himself.

"Let's agree to disagree then. Would you mind doing me something? For my birthday?"

Uncle Vernon looked as though he was going to explode. As much as Harry would have enjoyed that, he immediately said, "Put the radio in the corner. If it blasts, it's not my fault."

Harry couldn't trust the spark he had seen at the time. Suddenly, there was a sound of a car on their footpath and Aunt Petunia hissed at him to go up.

Knowing his luck, Harry was sure that the radio would blast.

'You aren't very optimistic, are you?' Bolt asked. Harry shrugged and locked his door. He sat on his bed and almost jumped up again.

There was someone in his room.

Just starting, the real thing is in the next. Stay tuned!

Cabba.