Cruel Summer - Lily and James Potter

Chapter 2 - Attack of the gnomes

The first half of the summer went extremely fast to both James' and Lily's disapproval. Lily's mother had insisted on cleaning the house thoroughly against her daughters' orders not to.

'Lily, I'm not having the first wizard to enter this house seeing it as a tip!'

'He's not royalty Mum!' she had shouted at her Mother, but the decision was fixed.

Lily's parents were delighted with the fact that James was staying with them. They knew that Lily was a witch, but this, they felt, would help them understand it a lot better. James was a pureblood and knew nothing really about the muggle life that surrounded the wizarding one. It would be a lesson for him as much as it would be for Lily's parents.

The one member of the family that despised the idea was Lily's sister, Petunia. Both sisters were completely opposite when it came to appearance and also mentalitly and values. Where Lily's features were delicate, exuding charm, Petunia's seemed constantly distorted in a way of a bull-dog chewing a lemon. This was most probably due to the fact that there was always something that she had a problem with. The number one thing being that Lily was a witch. They did not get along at all and it seemed that Petunia was also finding it hard that her younger sister was having boys over before her.

'You and that...that freak,' Petunia had barked, 'will not go near my room or touch anything of mine! Do you understand?'

Lily rolled her eyes, 'No I don't, but please tell me again because it was so captivating.'

Petunia boiled as her sister walked away from her into her own room.

James would be staying in the guest bedroom to the order of Lily's Father. He had tried to tell her the reason but she dodged the embarrassing talk quickly. The last thing she needed was her Father assuming that there was something going on between her and the biggest prat in the school.

Lily was glad that James was staying in the guest bedroom as it was right next to Petunia's and she thought it was wonderful punishment for both of them. He had been expected to arrive at the Evans household at 10 o'clock that morning but Lily wasn't that surprised when he didn't turn up on time. She had tried to persuade her Mother not to take it personally and that he would be here soon, but she secretly hoped that he'd conveniently forgotten or something else just as stupid.

It was just gone 8 o'clock that night when there was a series of knocks on the door.

Lily sighed, 'Huh, that must be him, probably can't figure out how to use the doorbell.'

Lily had ordered her parents, and her nosing sister, to stay in the lounge and she smiled at her Mother who was fidgeting nervously. Moving towards the front door, Lily took a deep breath and reached for the handle.

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James apperated gracefully into the alien street of the muggle housing estate. He looked around the identical houses all in a row and frowned, 'This is so weird.'

Lifting up his wand he muttered a quick spell and the wand hovered in the air, awaiting its next command. Shooting a last glance around the strange and unfamiliar neighbourhood, he looked back at his wand.

'Which one of these things is Evans in?'

The wand just floated in the air for a few seconds then span around to point its tip at a large house in the corner of the street. James followed the direction with his eyes and walked towards the gate of the white picket fence.

Stopping in front of it he looked at the mechanism, he cringed, 'Ok, Muggle Studies. Think!'

James glanced at the house and imagined her laughing at him, just because he couldn't open a stupid gate. Looking around and acknowledging there was no one about, he apperated to the front door.