DRARRY - Wonderful Wheezes

Chapter Four

When Harry called Hermione that evening, she was surprised to hear from him but supposedly grateful for the distraction.

"Solid orange?" she had asked repeatedly.

"Yeah."

"But what's the material? Plastic? Goo?"

"Just, er... just orange, really."

She deflated, but he was positive she would come up with something. Since bloody Malfoy wouldn't bother to tell him what charms would work.

In the end, she gave him a few spells to try, and he showed up at Wheezes very early the next morning to cast his first modified vanishing charm.

"Abstergeo," he said carefully, enunciating it the way Hermione had shown him, and swirling his wand in a tight circle.

At first, it seemed like nothing had happened, but then he peered at the ground more closely and noticed a blank spot about the size of a knut.

Well, that was... that was pretty unfortunate, really.

It was almost noon before he saw anyone else. Verity marched up to him and dragged him into the hallway, and he didn't put up much protest. By that point, Harry had taken off his robes and was sweating through his shirt, sleeves rolled up to his elbows and glasses fogging from the exertion.

"You're an angel," he said, feeling half dead.

"I know."

He accepted the food she offered him and stepped out into the hallway to sit and eat. Verity plopped down across from him, sipping on a fizzy drink and leaning back against the balcony railing.

"You're making progress," she said with false cheer.

He had less than a square metre of the floor clear, and he already felt like giving up.

"Ha-bloody-ha. Malfoy's going to be so ruddy pleased with himself when he sees it. 'I told you to hire a professional,'" he mocked, scoffing and breaking off a bit of crust.

Suddenly, he sobered, thinking about the possible repercussions of all this. "What am I gonna do, Verity? What if he says the shop has to close?"

"You could issue an appeal..."

He got the feeling that that particular idea sounded just as useless to her as it did to him.

"Right. There's always that."

They sat in silence for the rest of their lunch, Verity eventually leaving to go work the register again.

Harry got up slowly, brushing off his hands on his jeans and sighing. It looked like it would take forever to get the office clean, but he started up with his casting again.

Eventually, he got into a groove, shooting a spell at the floor or the wall every 10 seconds as he hummed along to the same The Weird Sisters song he'd heard Ginny blasting from her room the other day while she pretended to not be crying. Verity always had something going.

Now, believe
That magic works
And don't be afraid
Afraid of bein' hurrrrrt

No, don't let this magic die
Ooh, the answer's there
Yeah, just look in her eyes
And don't believe that magic can die
No, no, no, this magic can't dieeeee

It was catchy, really, and he found himself bobbing his head to the imaginary beat as he cast rhythmically at the room.

So dance "Abstergo!"