Harry Potter and the New Bloom (A Marauders AU)

Spark Plugs

"Why don't you start him on a collection of chocolate frog cards?" Ron Weasley asked. He was laying on his back in his bed, his part of the magic mirrors propped against a fish tank full of frog spawn so he could talk with Harry without holding up the mirror. He was tossing an old, worn-out quaffle into the air and catching it. "I have a load of doubles I could give you to start him off with."

Harry sighed. He was sitting at his desk in his bedroom in the cottage in Godric's Hollow, Rodger the cat seated by his elbow and nuzzling against Harry's arm as he doodled with frustration on a notepad, brainstorming. "Nah, I don't think chocolate frog cards are the sort of hobby my Dad needs, Ron. I think he needs something more... active... like jogging, but not quite that active."

"Oh, right, yeah. Charlie used to jog."

"Did he?"

"Yeah, Charlie's a nutter though," Ron said. 

"Yeah," Harry agreed.

"Said he had to learn how to outrun dragons if he had to when he went to that nutter uni! Imagine having to run faster than a dragon?" Ron's brother, Charlie, was positively obsessed with dragons and could rattle on for hours on any given dragon species with absolutely nobody having asked about them. "Fred told him not to worry much about it because he doesn't have to out run the dragon, just has to outrun the next slowest guy at the school." 

Harry laughed. "Good one."

Ron paused, then laughed too, "Oi I've just gotten the joke."

Harry laughed even harder at that. 

"Hey... Could get your Dad going on dragons, then Charlie might at least have someone to prattle on with?" Ron suggested.

"Nah." Harry didn't fancy his Dad going on and on and on about a Wafflekneed Snorfblatter of East Osh Kosh. "What's your Dad into?" he asked.

Ron hesitated, pulling a face, and holding the quaffle while he thought about it. "Spark plugs?"

"Like in a car?"

"Is that what spark plugs are? I'll bet my Dad doesn't even know. Loves muggle odds and ends. Goes 'round the charity shops and buys junk all the time. Mum calls our garage his rubbish bin."

Harry said, "At least he has a hobby."

"Yeah I s'pose, but he has so much broken muggle stuff..." Ron shook his head, "Bloody hell. The way that man wastes money!" He rolled his eyes and Harry could see and hear so much of Ron's Mum in him at that moment, he couldn't help but feel a bit of jealousy... and he wondered if anyone ever watched him say stuff and think he reminded them of his Mum or if it was always just his Dad that he was the spitting image of.

Focus, Harry, he told himself.

"Well hang on. Maybe spark plugs could be something, though," Harry said thoughtfully. 

"Yeah?" Ron asked.

"Dad's always having to get Mum's old car fixed. Maybe he could fix cars. Loads of muggles like doing that for fun, don't they?"

"Dunno," said Ron, "Do they?"

"Sure," Harry said. "It's like that one movie, the Love Bug."

Ron shrugged. The Weasleys didn't have a telly so Ron only saw telly when he was at the Potters, which wasn't very often. Usually Harry went to the Weasleys on Full Moon nights when Uncle Moony went... well... Moony. "But innit easier to just..." he waved his arm like he was doing magic with a wand, "Presto presstar, fix this car!"

"Is that another of Fred and George's spells?"

Ron laughed, "It does sound like the one they gave me to turn Scabbers yellow, dunnit?"