Аннотация: The end of summer in the Burrow. Flying on Ford England. The displeasure of Snape and McGonagall.
Summer vacation ended too quickly. Of course, I missed Hogwarts, but the month I spent with Harry was the best of my life. We walked around the neighborhood of the burrow without going far into the magical world. My friend was interested in everything. The twins were in their room, cooking something. Jeanie kept a diary for herself and constantly wrote in it.
On the last night, my mother had a huge dinner: She cooked, fried, and baked all of Harry's favorite dishes. There was molasses pudding for the sweetmeat - you can lick your fingers! The evening ended with fireworks, George and Fred lit sparklers, and for almost half an hour red and blue stars danced on the walls and ceiling. Then everyone had a cup of hot chocolate and went to bed.
We gathered for a long time in the morning. And even though we woke up with the roosters, it seemed like we wouldn't have time to do anything. Mom was in a bad mood, rushing around the house in search of feathers and clean socks, the other inhabitants of the "Hole", half-dressed, with toasts in their hands, bumped into each other on the stairs, munching on the move, and my father almost broke his neck, tripping over a chicken as he hurried across the yard to the car, dragging Ginny's heavy suitcase.
Bulky suitcases easily fit into the trunk. Finally, everyone was seated, and Ginny and Mom sat in the front seat, which was as long as a garden bench. Turning back to where Harry, Fred, George, Percy, and I were comfortably ensconced, she was surprised:
Muggles aren't as stupid as we think they are. Such a roomy car! But you'd never tell by the look of it.
My father turned on the ignition, and the overloaded Ford rolled heavily out of the yard. Harry turned back, apparently wanting to take a last look at the house. Before I could say goodbye to the house, the car backed up: George had forgotten the box of firecrackers.
Five minutes later, there was another stop, and Fred took off after the broom. Finally, they reached the highway safely, and then Ginny threw up her hands: she had left her diary at home. I had to go back for the diary. We looked at the clock, and it turned out that we were late for the train. The situation in the car was tense.
My father looked at my mother pleadingly.
"Molly, dear..."
"No way, Arthur!"
"But no one will see us. This is the little button from the invisibility device, I inserted it myself. Let's turn it on just for the duration of takeoff, then we'll bury ourselves in the clouds. And we'll be there in ten minutes. No one will know anything..." my father swore to my mother.
"I said no, Arthur. Especially in broad daylight!"
At a quarter past ten we stopped at King's Cross Station. My father rushed across the road to get the luggage carts, and soon our whole company was almost running to the platform.
"Percy goes first," Mom ordered, nervously glancing at her watch.
There were five minutes left before the train left, and there were eight of us, plus this barrier.
Percy took a sharp step forward and disappeared. Dad followed, followed by Fred and George.
"I'll take Ginny," Mom said, "and you're right behind us."
Grabbing Ginny's hand, she rushed forward. And in the blink of an eye, she and her daughter disappeared. Harry and I followed them.
"Let's go together," I suggested, "there's only one minute left."
Harry made sure that Hedwig's cage was firmly seated on the suitcase, and steered the cart straight at the barrier. We walked bent over the cart, aiming at the barrier and increasing our pace by the second. A few steps before the barrier, they started running, and...
boom!
The carts hit the barrier and bounced back. My suitcase fell with a crash, Harry was knocked off his feet, the cage bounced on the floor of the platform, and Hedwig flew out with indignant screams. The surrounding people stared in amazement at the incomprehensible incident.
"What are you doing!" One of the station attendants attacked us.
"I couldn't handle the cart," Harry thought up an explanation, getting to his feet and rubbing his bruised side. I rushed to catch Hedwig, which caused the indignation of onlookers who were outraged by the cruel treatment of the bird. Harry's cage is really too small for such an owl.
"Why didn't we manage to break through the barrier like everyone else?" Harry asked me in a whisper.
"I can't imagine..." I looked around in disbelief. Half a dozen onlookers were still staring at us.
"We're going to miss the train," he said in a sinking voice. "I don't understand why the entrance didn't open...."
I tried to break through again. He aimed accurately, rolled the cart to the barrier and pushed it forward with all his might. The metal barrier did not budge.
"That's it," I said, stunned. "The train left. What happens if Mom and Dad come out on the wrong side and we part ways? Do you have any Muggle money?"
"About five pounds." Harry said gloomily. "Do you remember when we went to the bank? But I wanted to buy lenses in the summer, as that healer advised."
"Is that a lot?"
"It's definitely enough to live for a couple of days."
I pressed my ear to the cold metal of the barrier.
"I can't hear anything," I muttered, confused. "What should we do now? How long will the parents be looking for us?"
We looked around - we're still attracting attention, mainly because Hedwig keeps screaming loudly.
"It's probably best to get back to the car," Harry suggested it. "Everyone's looking at us here"...
"Harry!" I exclaimed, and the joyful lights flashed in my eyes again. "The car!"
"What is a car?"
Exactly. Most of the road will be in the magical world, so the main thing is to fly through London, and then we'll dive for the train.
"We can fly to Hogwarts in our car!"
"But I thought..."
"We're in a desperate situation, aren't we? We have to go to school! In an emergency, even underage wizards are allowed to use magic. Paragraph nine of the Code, I think...."
"Can you drive a flying car?" Harry asked.
"Easily." I turned the cart towards the exit of the station. "Let's go quickly! Let's hurry up and catch up with the London-Hogwarts express. And we'll get on his tail."
We pushed the carts through the crowd, went out onto the forecourt and turned right into an alley where an old Ford Anglia was parked.
After tapping my wand a few times, I opened the roomy trunk, and we loaded our suitcases into it, put Hedwig's cage in the back seat, and settled ourselves in the front. Grimacing, I took out a package of sandwiches. Damn, beef again. What about Harry? About the pork leg. We exchanged packages of sandwiches made by Mom and got into the car.
"Make sure that no one notices anything." I said, and with another stroke of my wand, I turned on the ignition.
"It's all right," he said.
And I pressed the tiny silver button on the dashboard. The Ford disappeared into thin air, and so did we. I could feel the seat vibrating beneath us, hear the sound of the engine, feel the steering wheel in my palms. Apparently, I turned into a pair of pupils hovering two meters above the ground in an unattractive alley filled with cars.
"Let's go," I said.
And the alley, along with the reddish-brown buildings on both sides, fell through somewhere. In a few more seconds, the whole of London lay in plain sight below us, partly sparkling with lights, partly shrouded in smoke. No one seems to have noticed our takeoff.
Suddenly, something fired softly, and the car gained visibility along with us. I pressed the button with all my might. Damn it, what the fuck? Everything worked last time.
"It's stuck somewhere," I said, confused.
They hit the button one at a time. The car disappeared again. And then she reappeared, as if nothing had happened.
"Hold on!" I shouted and pressed the accelerator pedal sharply: the car soared up, got inside a dense layer of clouds and flew blindly, as if in a thick fog.
"Where to now?" Harry asked, peering into the milky whiteness that enveloped the car from all sides.
"Now we need to find the train."
"Come on then hurry down..."
The car broke out of the cloud zone, and we twisted in our seats, each in his own direction, hung down.
"There he is, ahead! I can see him!" Harry was delighted.
I looked in the direction where my friend was pointing. The London-Hogwarts express was writhing below like a long crimson snake.
"It goes due north," I determined it by the compass on the control panel. Which is logical. The school is located in the north of Scotland. In one of the corners of the magical world of Earth. "We will check it every half hour. Now hold on tight..."
The car pierced through the clouds and found itself in a haze of sunlight. The world has been transformed. Under the wheels there is an endless sea of puffy snow-white clouds, boundless blue all around, and a dazzlingly bright sun above everything. Well, the charms of a temperature pleasant to people are installed in the car. My brothers and I checked. It's the same in the sun as in the evening.
"Here," I said, "you only have to be afraid of airplanes."
I remembered my experience of flying on a broom when I almost crashed into an airplane that flew into us through the passage in the village. It's not clear who was more scared. Me or that girl.
Harry and I looked at each other and started laughing nervously. They laughed and laughed and couldn't stop for a long time.
It was like we were in a magical dream. Towers and domes of cumulus clouds float by, the car interior is flooded with hot radiance, a pot-bellied bag of toffee with a bag of sandwiches in the glove compartment. And ahead is a triumphant landing on the green lawn running around Hogwarts Castle, and the envious glances of the twins Fred and George.
We flew north, dived down every half hour, checked the direction. And each time we saw more and more new paintings below. London had long been left behind, well-tended green fields had gone, which were replaced by pinkish-purple moorlands, here and there villages with old toy churches could be seen. A huge city floated by, with tiny cars scurrying through the streets like colorful ants. Damn, it's been a long time since we've been diving into the magical world. We don't want Muggles to notice us. I thought the train would leave the Muggle part of the world sooner.
A few hours of monotonous flight, however, noticeably reduced our enthusiasm. The toffee made me very thirsty. I looked only at the front and checked the compass. Harry offered to hold the steering wheel while I ate the sandwiches, but I didn't dare. How great it would be to ride now in one of the cool carriages that rolled along the rails far below, and drink a glass of icy pumpkin juice delivered by a kind chubby witch! But why couldn't we get to platform nine and three quarters?
"We're probably coming soon, aren't we?" I croaked, a few more hours later. The sun was already sinking into the cloud fields, brightening them with all shades of red. "Should I go down again?"
The train was still below us, crawling down the side of a snow-capped mountain. It was much darker under the clouds that hid the sun.
I stepped on the accelerator and the car took off again, but then for some reason the engine howled ominously. Damn, did she run out of gas? Or are we just flying too long?
Harry and I exchanged nervous glances.
"He's probably tired," I suggested. "So much work without a break!"
We pretended that nothing special was happening, and the howling grew stronger. It was getting dark fast, and the stars were already starting to light up in the dark. The wipers on the car began to shake for some reason. As if they were expressing dissatisfaction.
"We're very close now," I said, more to the car than to Harry. "At all." He tapped the panel lid with his fingers. Soon they began to descend again, peering into the darkness, looking for familiar signs.
"Look at that!" Harry suddenly shouted. "Right ahead!"
High on the cliff overlooking the lake, the towers and turrets of Hogwarts Castle stood out against the dark night sky. Well, finally. Now the main thing is to reach the castle. But the car was already shaking violently, and it was rapidly losing speed.
"Just a little more," I begged her, yanking on the steering wheel. "We're almost there."
We've never ridden it for so long. The engine was roaring. Thin jets of steam flew out from under the hood. We were already approaching the lake.
The car rocked violently. I gripped the steering wheel tighter, so that my knuckles turned white. The car rocked again.
"Just a little more," I breathed. We were flying over the lake, right at the castle. I stepped on the pedal.
There was a loud clang, several exhaust emissions, and the engine finally stopped.
"Yeah," I said into the silence. The hood of the car dived down. We started to fall, gaining speed, and in another minute we would crash into the solid castle wall.
"Wait a minute!" I yelled, twisting the steering wheel.
A couple of centimeters from the wall, the car turned into a high arch and flew inside the castle. The greenhouses were dark below, followed by garden beds, and then the lawn began. The car continued to descend. I let go of the steering wheel and took my magic wand out of my back pocket.
"Stop! Stop!" I shouted, banging on the windshield with my wand, but the car kept falling vertically to the ground.
"Be careful, tree!" Harry yelled, throwing himself on the steering wheel. But it was too late.
Kr-rak!
With the heart-rending sound of metal hitting the bark of a tree, the car crashed into a thick trunk and fell to the ground, bouncing like a ball. Thick steam was pouring out from under the flattened hood. Hedwig was screaming in a horrified voice. Harry slammed his forehead into the windshield, and an egg-sized lump popped up. I crashed into the steering wheel. Damn, not again! I let out a cry of despair.
"Are you alive?" Harry asked, startled.
"My wand," I said shakily. "Look what happened to her."
The wand split into two pieces, held back by a thin splinter.
Harry opened his mouth to comfort me: the magic wand can be repaired at school. At the same moment, something hit the left door with the force of a cannonball.
"What's happening?" I looked out the windshield and gasped. A branch as thick as a good python whipped against the glass. The tree we crashed into was striking back. The glass is well enchanted for impenetrability, and the body of the car is reinforced with magic, otherwise it would have crushed us already.
Another twisting branch lashed at the right-hand door. The windshield shook with the rattling of knuckle-like branches, and one huge branch, twisted like a ram's horn, struck violently at the roof.
"This is too much!" I exclaimed. "Let's get out of here!"
I put my whole body against the door, but a powerful uppercut threw me into Harry's lap.
Another huge branch hit the ceiling of the car with a deafening roar. The damn tree. How long will the enchantment on the car last?
"We're lost." I was ready to cry. The car suddenly began to vibrate, and the engine turned on by itself. Well, thank God.
"Reverse gear!" Harry shouted, and the car jerked back. Damn, did her father make her a controlling personality like a golem? What the fuck? And the willow tree kept trying to reach the offenders with snake branches.: We could hear its roots cracking. The brawler almost tore herself out of the ground, wanting revenge.
"We were on the verge of death." I said, barely catching my breath. "Well done, Ford!"
Ford, however, seemed to have run out of patience. With an indignant clang, both doors flew open, the seats threw us to the sides, and we fell flat to the ground. A loud knock from behind announced that the car had emptied our suitcases out of the trunk. Hedwig's cage flew overhead. The door opened, and Hedwig broke free. Making long, angry screams, the bird flew smoothly towards the school. And the scratched Ford, emitting steam, rumbled into the darkness, expressing the strongest indignation with the red lights of the taillights.
"Come back!" I shouted after him. "Come back! My mother will kill me!" My father will be more forgiving. But Mom can even take up the rod.
But the Ford, with a final snort of exhaust, disappeared into the darkness.
"We were really unlucky," I said dejectedly, and bent down to pick up the rat Skabers.
"Wow! Of all the trees here, crash into the one that fights back!" And I turned back, glancing at the old weeping willow-it was still waving its branches vindictively. But I still have to write home about a runaway car and a broken wand. The parents will be furious. Especially Mom. She generally gets turned on quickly, just like her sister.
"Yeah, bad luck," said Harry unhappily. "Let's go straight to school."
I put on my jacket. And he went with Harry to the entrance to the castle. The return was not at all as victorious as it seemed. Exhausted, stiff, and bruised, we grabbed our suitcases by the handles and trudged up the hill to the huge oak doors of the school. It's good that our suitcases are enchanted, and weight relief makes them much lighter at Hogwarts than in the ordinary world.
"The grand opening is probably already underway," I said, dropping my suitcase at the front stairs. He quietly approached the brightly lit window and looked inside.
"Come here, Harry," I called. "The distribution has already started!"
Harry came over and we watched the ceremony taking place in the Great Hall. I kept looking for my little sister. Will she get into Gryffindor or will she go to her friend Luna in Ravenclaw?
A multitude of burning candles hovered over four long set tables, making the golden dishes and goblets sparkle and shimmer with all the colors of the rainbow. And above the candles all over the ceiling-its magical property was that it mirrored the state of the sky-the familiar constellations burned brightly.
Through the forest of black pointed hats, I could make out a long line of terrified freshmen entering the hall one by one. Ginny was one of them. I recognized her immediately by the bright red hair that distinguished our whole family. Like Ginny and Bill, I was the owner of fiery red hair, like all the Pruits. And the rest went to take after Dad. Professor McGonagall, a bespectacled witch with a tight knot of hair at the back of her head, was putting the famous Hat on a stool, distributing the newcomers to the faculties.
At the beginning of each school year, this ancient Hat, dirty and full of patches, whispered to the new students who would study in which of the four houses (Gryffindor, Halfpuff, Ravenclaw and Slytherin). I remembered well how exactly one year ago I put on this Hat and waited with bated breath for the decision of my fate. And of course he got into Gryffindor. Last year, Harry and I helped our house win an inter-house competition. Slytherin was left behind for the first time in seven years. Although Malfoy told me before he left that we were crooks. They say we were awarded unfairly. To which I told him that our dean had taken away 150 points from our faculty, which was also unfair.
A little boy with mouse-colored hair came up to the stool with a Hat. Professor Dumbledore, the headmaster, was overseeing the distribution from his seat at the faculty banquet table. His white beard was silvery, and the lenses of his half-glasses glittered from the wavering flames of hundreds of candles. Gilderoy Lockhart was sitting a few seats away from him, wearing an aquamarine raincoat. And the very end of the table was decorated with the mighty figure of the hairy forester Hagrid.
"Look," Harry whispered to me. "There's an empty seat at the teacher's desk. There is no Snape. I wonder where he is."
Professor Severus Snape was his least favorite teacher. And Harry wasn't one of his favorites, either. The tough, sarcastic Snape taught potions at school; the professor was revered only by students of his own Slytherin department. Whom he always protected in conflicts with other teachers.
"Maybe he's sick," I suggested hopefully.
"Or maybe he's completely gone? Because he didn't get the defense against the dark arts teaching position again?"
"Or maybe he was kicked out?" I said enthusiastically. "Everyone can't stand him...."
"Or maybe," said an icy voice from behind, "he's standing right now waiting for you two to tell him why you didn't take the train back to school."
I turned around. Severus Snape himself stood two steps away, his black robes billowing in the wind. He was very thin, with a yellowish-gray face and a hooked nose; Her black hair, oiled with a special compound, fell over her shoulders. When I saw his smile, I realized that Harry and I were in big trouble.
"Follow me!" ordered the formidable professor.
Not daring to look at each other, we followed him up the steps and entered a huge hall, where the slightest sound echoed loudly.
The hall was illuminated by the flames of torches. Delicious smells wafted in from the Great Hall, but Snape led us away from the warmth and light and down a narrow stone staircase leading to the dungeons.
"Come in." He opened the door on the first landing.
Shivering from the cold, we found ourselves in Severus Snape's office. The empty, cold fireplace did not promise a pleasant conversation. In the semi-darkness, I could make out shelves along the walls lined with large glass jars, in which floated a hideous-looking incomprehensible thing that did not arouse the slightest curiosity in me, at least for now. Snape slammed the door shut and looked at his prisoners.
"So the train," he began in a low voice, "is not good enough for the famous Harry Potter and his faithful backup singer Ron Weasley. You want to show up to school with a bang, huh?"
"No, sir, it's the barrier at King's Cross Station...."
Harry began to defend himself.
"Shut up! So what did you do with this car?"
I sighed heavily. The professor opened today's issue of the Evening Prophet newspaper, and I understood what was going on.
"Muggles saw you," he hissed, pointing at the headline. "Muggles were amazed by a Ford Anglia flying in the sky," he began to read aloud. "Two Londoners claim to have seen an old Ford fly over the post office tower... at noon in Norfolk, Mrs. Hetty Bayliss was hanging laundry in the yard..." And there are six or seven such messages. If I'm not mistaken, your father works in the department of "Illegal use of Muggle inventions?" He turned to me, grinning maliciously. "No, just think... his own son..."
I wanted to swear dirty. What if they find out that my father enchanted this car? What will happen then? I wish I'd thought of that before!
"Looking around the park," Snape continued, "I discovered that significant damage had been done to the priceless Rattlesnake Willow, the rarest specimen of the subspecies of weeping willows."
"This Rattling Willow of yours has done much more damage to us!" I blurted out.
"Shut up!" Snape barked again. "To my great regret, you are not in my faculty, and I cannot expel you. But I'm going to go get those who have these lucky powers right now. In the meantime, you will wait here."
We turned pale and stared at each other in despair. I didn't feel hungry anymore. If Snape went after Professor McGonagall, the head of the Gryffindor faculty, don't expect any relief. She is, of course, a more fair person than Snape, but she is also very strict.
Ten minutes later, Snape returned, and, of course, accompanied by Professor McGonagall. I've seen her angry once, but either I've forgotten how thin her lips can be when she's angry, or she's never been so angry in front of my eyes. When she entered the office, she immediately waved her magic wand, we recoiled in fear, but she only lit a fire in the fireplace, which immediately hummed encouragingly.
"Sit down," she suggested.
We both sat down on chairs closer to the fire.
"Now tell me!" McGonagall demanded, her glasses glinting angrily.
And I began to describe our misadventures, starting with the barrier that refused to let us onto the magic platform.
"...we just had no other way out, Professor, we couldn't get on our train in any way."
"Why didn't you send a letter with an owl? You had an owl, didn't you?" The Professor looked at Harry sternly.
Harry lowered his head. Damn, I'm so used to the Arrow barely dragging. She would have been flying for a couple of days.
"I... I didn't think..."
"It's very clear."
There was a knock on the door, and Snape, beaming with happiness, unlocked it. The headmaster, Professor Dumbledore, entered the office.
I cringed into a ball. Dumbledore looked extremely serious. He looked at us with his hooked nose hanging down.
After a long silence, Dumbledore finally said:
"Please explain why you did that."
It would have been better if he had shouted at us, such disappointment sounded in his voice.
Harry described everything in detail, omitting one thing - that the enchanted car belongs to my father. According to his story, it turned out that we were lucky: there was a flying car in the station parking lot. Dumbledore didn't seem to believe him, even though he didn't ask anything. Finally, Harry finished the sad story - the headmaster continued to stare silently through his glasses at the pitiful defendants. Oh, we were unlucky. We've only been at Hogwarts for a year and we're getting kicked out. I hope Dad will put us in a simpler school to finish our studies.
"We'll go pack our things," I said very quietly.
"What are you talking about, Roland Weasley?" Professor McGonagall asked sternly.
"You want to expel us from school, don't you?"
Harry cast a quick glance at Dumbledore.
"Not today, Mr. Weasley," the headmaster replied. "But I'm giving you both one last warning. You have committed a very serious offense. I will write to your families today. And if this happens again, I will have to expel you."
The glee drained from Snape's face, as if he had heard that the Christmas holidays had been canceled. Clearing his throat, he turned to the director:
"Professor Dumbledore, these youngsters have violated the Law restricting Underage magic, caused serious damage to an old, very valuable willow tree... this act of vandalism..."
"It's up to Professor McGonagall to decide on their punishment," Dumbledore spoke calmly. "They study at her faculty, she is responsible for them. So I went to the banquet, Minerva," He turned to the learned lady. "We need to make some announcements. Come on, Severus. What a delicious cake awaits us!"
After giving Harry and me the look of a venomous snake, Snape followed the headmaster out of the office. We were left alone with Professor McGonagall, who looked at us with a stern but fair eye.
"You'd better go to the infirmary right now, Weasley, you've got a cut on your forehead that's bleeding."
"Not very much. Besides, everything grows on me quickly." I hurriedly wiped the scratch above my eye with my sleeve. "I would like to see, Professor, how my sister will be distributed."
"The distribution ceremony has already ended. Your sister got into Gryffindor too."
"Great!"
"And as for Gryffindor..." McGonagall began.
"Professor," Harry interrupted her, "when we got into that car, the semester at school hadn't started yet. So... I guess... they won't deduct points from Gryffindor?" Harry asked with concern.
Professor McGonagall looked at him intently, and it seemed to me that a smile touched her lips. Anyway, they weren't so thin anymore.
"No, I won't deduct any points from the faculty. But you will not be able to avoid punishment, you will do socially useful work after school."
A letter to parents. The Ford is gone. The wand is broken. The father is awaiting trial at work. Nightmare.
Professor McGonagall waved her wand over Snape's desk. And out of nowhere, a plate full of sandwiches and two silver cups of pumpkin juice appeared on it.
"Eat," she said, "and go to your bedroom. And I still have to go back to the banquet."
When the door slammed behind her, I whistled loudly and long.
"And I already decided - goodbye to school! We're going to finish our studies at the Welsh School as some kind of weaklings." I exclaimed and greedily grabbed a sandwich.
"And me too, are you sure they would have taken us there?" Harry followed my example.
"Half of the Weasley clan went to school there. We often have weak magicians. Dad's two older brothers graduated from that school. We attacked the sandwiches with hunger. Damn, I caught my mom's when Ford was throwing them away. I'll give it to Percy. He likes beef.
"Well, how unlucky we are!" I said, munching on a chicken sandwich. "Fred and George flew this Ford about five or six times, and not a single Muggle noticed. I swallowed and took another big bite. "But still, why couldn't we get to the platform through this barrier?"
Harry shrugged his shoulders.
"Now you have to weigh your every step." Harry said, happily sipping pumpkin juice from a silver goblet with ice floes floating in it. "It's a pity that we weren't allowed to attend the banquet.... It's my favorite treacle tart.
"She just decided to hide us from everyone," I suggested. "So that no one would say on a night like this: but still, it's cool to fly to school in a Ford!"
After eating to the brim - the plate was a self-made one - we left the office and went the familiar way to Gryffindor Tower. Everything was quiet in the castle, and the party was over. We walked past mumbling portraits, clanking knights' armor, climbed a narrow stone staircase, and finally reached a passage where there was a secret entrance to Gryffindor Tower, masked by a large portrait of a very plump lady in a pink silk dress.
"The password?" the lady asked, seeing us very close.
"Mmm..." said Harry, as if remembering. We didn't know the new password, because we hadn't seen Percy yet. But help arrived immediately. There were quick footsteps behind us, and we turned to see Hermione chasing after us.
"It's you! Where have you been? There is a ridiculous rumor that you were expelled for allegedly crashing a flying car."
"No, we haven't been expelled," Harry assured her.
"I hope you're not saying that you flew to school...."
Hermione sounded like Professor McGonagall.
"Save the lecture for another time. Tell me the password instead!" I demanded impatiently. I don't feel like sleeping.
"Turkey, but that's not the main thing..." Hermione was clearly angry.
Her words, however, were drowned out by the thunder of applause: the door with the lady opened, and we found ourselves on the threshold of the Common living room. The entire faculty seemed to be awake. The room was crowded, and there were even rickety chairs and rickety tables. They've obviously been waiting for us for a long time. Dozens of hands reached out to us and dragged us inside through the entrance marked by the portrait. Hermione squeezed in after him.
"Amazing!" Lee Jordan shouted. "Brilliant! What a comeback! Crash into a Rattling Willow tree! The school won't forget this for a hundred years!"
"Well done!" some fifth-year student praised.
Someone tapped me on the shoulder. Fred and George made their way to the front row through the crowd.
"Why didn't you invite us? We could easily come back!"
I blushed and smiled guiltily. Harry nudged me in the side and nodded at the prefect. Percy was moving toward us, ready to tell us what he thought of us. I immediately assessed the situation.
"We're very tired, let's go upstairs." I said, and our couple, pushing aside the crowd, rushed to the end of the hall, to the door to the stairs leading to the bedrooms.
"While." Harry waved at Hermione, who looked almost as reproachful as Percy.
Accompanied by enthusiastic cheers and friendly pats on the back, we finally reached the landing. The door slammed shut behind us, and a blissful silence enveloped us. We almost ran upstairs. Our bedroom was right under the roof, and now there was a sign on the door that read "2nd year." We entered a familiar round room with tall narrow windows, in which there were five beds under velvet curtains. The suitcases had already been brought in, and they were waiting for the owners at the foot of the beds, I looked at Harry in embarrassment.
"I know there's nothing to be happy about and all that... but..."
The door flew open, and three sophomores ran into the bedroom: Seamus Finnigan, Dean Thomas, and Neville Longbottom.
"Unbelievable!" Seamus beamed.
"Fantastic!" Dean chimed in.
"Amazing!" Neville finished, his eyes burning with horror and delight.
My mouth opened into a satisfied smile of its own accord.