The Marauders - Order of the Phoenix - Part One

The Safe House

Regulus Black wore big, black sunglasses, and his thick woolen coat had the collar popped up, covering his neck and part of his profile, a knit cap had all his hair tucked up in it, and he kept his head down as he walked. His hand clutched his wand up in his sleeve, ready to use it at the slightest hint of an attack.

He looked closely at every person he passed by. They were mostly muggles, and the one person he suspected might be a witch hadn't paid him a lick of attention.

The grocery shop was at the end of a row of them, each selling various sorts of wares. There was a laundry and a photography studio, a shoe shop, and an old clocks store.  Regulus ducked into the grocery and took up a plastic basket by the door to carry his fetchings. He carried it in the hand with his wand so that the wand was in his fist against the handle of the basket - discreet, but easily armed.

The workers at the counter gave him funny looks as he passed, and he reckoned they suspected he would rob them or something. He felt bad making them nervous, so he took off his sunglasses and the cap, letting his hair shake free, a great clump of curly black shagginess. Mother had wanted to cut it to keep him from being noticed too easily - but Regulus has refused because he liked his hair, and more importantly to him was that both Maryrose Jenkins and Oni Lamm had said they liked it, too, at one point or another.

He walked up and down the aisles, grabbing food and greedily shoving it into the basket. Potatoes and cheeses, meats and boxes of porridge. A pound of bacon strips and two dozen eggs. He took bread and tins of beans. Whatever he thought would last for a good while so he could put off doing this again for a time. Blast whoever it was that decided food couldn't be conjured.

He carried his overfilled basket to the counter and impatiently waited while the girl behind it totalled up the order and put them into brown paper bags. She looked at him curiously when he gave her muggle money that he didn't know how to count, stumbling over how many of the funny coins equalled the paper ones. It didn't make sense that the 2p was bigger than the 5p, even if one was bronze and one was silver, and why did it take so blasted many of the pence to equal a pound? The bloody galleons system was so much simpler, if only muggles knew how complicated they'd made things! He faked what he hoped came off as a foreign accent (something that sounded like muddled German and Scottish mingled together is what came out of his mouth, though, so he reckoned she just thought he was mental more than anything).

"Have a good day," the counter girl said, as Regulus put his glasses back on, and struggled to pick up all the bags. He hated he had to pocket his wand in order to hug the bulging sacks to carry them off to a place he could disapparate from. He felt exposed and helpless as he stepped into the street and walked briskly toward the nearer alley, past different shops than before... a small diner, a small clothing store, a hardware store, and --

A record shop.

Regulus paused and took a couple steps back.

In the window of the record shop was a big picture of that muggle man that Sirius liked so much - Freddie Mercury. He was a most recognizable muggle, and Regulus thought he rather looked like somebody that Sirius would admire. He read the text that ran alongside the photograph. It was an advertisement for a new record. Jazz, it said, was available on November 10th - so it had been released for less than a month. He wondered whether Sirius had it yet or not?

Even though he knew he ought not to do it, he was in a rush after all, Regulus ducked into the shop anyway.

Loud rock music was playing and there were other kids his age looking at bins and bins of records. On the wall hung posters and instruments - guitars and drumsticks, a melodica and harmonicas and big brass cymbals. Regulus felt like he'd stepped into a whole other world.