Courage

-27-

Book: Courage
Chapter 27
Word Count: 4880

"Dad!" Layla called, rushing down the stairs one summer night with a small telephone that Harry had instructed her to buy at a muggle shop so they could talk more regularly. "How do you work this thing again?"

"You're lucky one of my old best friends was a muggleborn," chuckled Remus, grabbing the phone from her and dialling Harry's number into it as Layla told him what it was. "Lily adored you."

"You never show me any photos of your old friends," said Layla. "Do you have any? Can I see them?"

"One day, honey," said Remus sadly. "One day."

He handed the phone back to her as it started ringing. Layla thanked him and rushed back upstairs, holding the phone up to her ear like she was apparently supposed to do. Eventually, the ringing stopped. Layla furrowed her eyebrows in confusion.

"Dad?! I think I broke it!"

But she jumped when a voice spoke through the phone.

"Dad? I'm not your dad, girl."

"Who are you?"

"Vernon Dursley. Who are you?"

"Oh! You're Harry's uncle! I'm Layla Lupin, a friend of Harry's from school. Can I speak to him please?"

There was silence on the other end before Vernon started to practically scream through the phone, causing Layla to wince.

"THERE IS NO HARRY POTTER HERE! I DON'T KNOW WHAT SCHOOL YOU'RE TALKING ABOUT! NEVER CONTACT ME AGAIN! DON'T YOU COME NEAR MY FAMILY!"

The call ended. Layla frowned, sighing.

"Maybe that wasn't Harry's uncle," she thought aloud to herself. "Maybe Harry gave me the wrong number. But I never said Harry's last name..."

With wide eyes, realisation dawned on her and Layla rushed to grab a piece of parchment, a quill, and an ink pot, writing out a letter to Harry.

Harry,
I'm so so sorry!!
I forgot that your uncle is against magic.
I won't call again! We'll just talk through letters like normal.
Oh! And happy birthday for tomorrow, Harry! I've attached your birthday present!
With love,
Layla x

Layla then grabbed Harry's birthday present from on top of her bedside table. It was a magic wrist watch that lit up and would start singing every year on Harry's birthday, and it would light up and shoot confetti into the air at midnight of his birthday. It also spoke the time aloud every hour on the hour with a robot-like voice and say, 'it is now three o'clock pm' for example. It was already wrapped in Gryffindor wallpaper that she'd got from Diagon Alley over the summer.

She called for her dad's owl and sent the letter and the present off to Harry before walking over to her bed, placing Peaches on her lap and softly stroking the beautiful cat.

That was when she heard tapping. Layla frowned, wondering if Remus' owl had come back for some reason, until she looked up and saw three owls by the window, one of them looking like it was about to pass out. That one was clearly Ron's owl, Errol, and he held a letter and a newspaper clipping, and the other two owls owl were two that Layla didn't recognise. She knew where one of them had come from since in the owl's beak, there were two letters with the Hogwarts crest on them. She didn't know who the other owl belonged to, though, but it had a single letter in its beak.

Layla grabbed some water and treats for the owls and then grabbed the letters and the newspaper clipping, opening Ron's letter first. It was a short letter, most of it in caps.