Standing on the street of Privet Drive, Harry scratched his hair in frustration.
He had long since had his fill of the Dursleys.
Yet he had no choice; at the end of every school term, he had to return to 4 Privet Drive and stay with the Dursleys for a period of time.
This was what Dumbledore required of him.
According to Dumbledore, on the night Voldemort attacked his family, his mother Lily had placed a remarkably powerful ancient protective magic upon him to keep him safe.
This magic carried certain restrictions: before Harry came of age, he had to return to his blood relatives each year and stay for a time to ensure the protection remained intact.
Reluctant as Harry was to admit it, Aunt Petunia was indeed his only living blood relative left in the world.
Fortunately, he had now stayed at the Dursleys long enough to finally escape this place, which could barely even be called a shelter.
Standing by the curb, Harry raised his holly wand.
In less than five seconds, a three-story bus painted in vivid purple tore through the air, bringing with it a gust of wind so wild that it nearly sent Harry rolling backward two and a half times before landing flat on his face like a fallen wild goose.
"Welcome to the Knight Bus..." Ticket Inspector Stan Shunpike reeled off the exact same opening line, which hadn't changed by a single word since Kyle's first year.
Ignoring the rambling Shunpike, Harry counted out eleven silver Sickles from his pocket and slapped them into the man's hand.
"Grimmauld Place." Leaving it at that, Harry boarded the bus, found a spot for himself, and lay down.
When it came to running away from home, practice makes perfect.
A moment later, the Knight Bus screeched to a halt in the middle of a small square on a patch of untidy, desolate grass.
Harry hauled his heavy trunk out, atop which sat Hedwig's cage—though the cage itself was empty.
Right after leaving the Dursleys, Harry had released Hedwig into the wild.
Owls kept by wizards were exceptionally intelligent; Hedwig knew the way to Grimmauld Place on her own and would fly over in another ten or fifteen minutes without Harry having to worry.
Stepping off the grass and crossing the road from the pavement, Harry arrived before a dilapidated house.
Ignoring the stench of rotting garbage emanating from the bulging trash bags piled by the dilapidated front door, Harry stood between the two houses and silently recited the location of 12 Grimmauld Place in his heart.
Soon enough, a battered door materialized out of nowhere between number 11 and number 13.
Immediately following, filthy walls and gloomy windows emerged as well, appearing as though an extra house had suddenly expanded into existence, shoving aside the buildings on either side.
The house rumbled loudly, yet the Muggles inside the adjacent houses seemed to notice nothing at all.
Stepping up the battered stone steps, Harry walked up to a somewhat aged door whose black paint was peeling and covered in crisscrossing scratches. The silver knocker was forged in the shape of a coiled serpent.
Tapping the door with his wand, it swung open with a creak.
Before Harry could even step through the threshold, he heard a flurry of hasty footsteps echoing from the hallway, as his godfather, Sirius Black, emerged from a door at the far end.
"Harry!" Old father Sirius's voice betrayed deep surprise and joy as he hurried forward to take the heavy trunk from Harry's hands.
Handing the trunk off to Kreacher, the household house-elf, Sirius scrutinized Harry closely. "It seems you didn't have a very good time at the Dursleys. You look quite a bit thinner than when you were at Hogwarts."
Harry let out a helpless sigh. None of the Dursleys liked him; he was lucky if they gave him a bite to eat, so expecting meals as lavish as those at Hogwarts was out of the question.
Father and godson hadn't seen each other for a long time, and reunited at last, they had an endless stream of words to share.
It wasn't until darkness gradually settled over the sky that Harry remembered his original plan upon arriving at the Black ancestral home: writing letters to his friends to invite them over as guests.
After finishing dinner, Harry immediately scurried up the stairs and returned to his room in the Black house.
Sitting before his desk, Harry gnawed on his quill in deep conflict. How could he express himself in the letter to Cho Chang subtly enough to convey his feelings without being overly blunt?
Ahem, "friends" was just a cover; in truth, Harry simply wanted to invite Cho Chang alone to be a guest at the Black house.
If something could happen between the two of them—say, an exchange of romantic sparks—that would be even better.
However, his relationship with Cho Chang wasn't particularly intimate, and if he were to invite her alone, his intention would be far too obvious.
After racking his brain for half a day, Harry's agonizing lack of literary talent failed to yield any poetic prose, producing only a stumbling paragraph that even Harry found embarrassing to read.
What was written on the parchment was pretty much a cheesy line of this caliber:
"Babe, I went to get an IV drop today. What kind of drop? Drop-dead crazy missing you every night."
In the end, Harry bit the bullet, stuffed that parchment into an envelope, and had Hedwig deliver it to Cho Chang.
Who knew how Cho Chang would react upon reading it—perhaps her kitchen wouldn't have to worry about running out of cooking oil anytime soon.
Having finished writing to Cho Chang, Harry turned to write to his other friends. This time, the contents of the letters were far more normal, though Harry found himself in a dilemma again when deciding whom to invite.
Kyle, who had done Sirius a favor, had to be invited, followed immediately by Harry's best buddy, Ron.
If Kyle accepted the invitation, Hermione could be invited along as well.
Only... should he invite Draco?
Although Gryffindor and Slytherin were arch-nemeses, it didn't affect the relationship between Harry and Draco; the two got along quite harmoniously and pleasantly.
It was just that whenever Ron and Draco collided, they would inevitably tear into each other, frequently leaving Harry stuck in a awkward position.
Setting aside the fire-and-water relationship between Draco and Ron, Draco's identity as a Slytherin student also posed a conundrum for Harry.
His godfather was a classic Gryffindor, and Harry had previously heard from Kyle bits and pieces of the love-hate drama between the Marauders and Snape.
Hence, Harry was incredibly anxious: how would Sirius view Draco, who came from Slytherin?
If he invited Draco over as a guest, would his godfather give Draco a cold face?
If so, both he and Draco would end up extremely embarrassed.
Yet if he didn't invite Draco, would Draco think Harry was intentionally distancing himself?
Harry might end up losing Draco as a friend then.
Harry wasn't a social butterfly like the Weasley twins with friends across all four houses; every single friend was precious to him.
Inviting him felt wrong, but not inviting him felt wrong too. The more Harry thought, the messier his mind became, dropping back into a total deadlock.
Whatever, screw it.
In the end, Harry bit the bullet and sent off a letter to Draco, inviting him to come to the Black house as a guest.
When Hedwig, the overworked errand bird, flew off carrying the final letter in her beak, Harry collapsed back into his chair and let out a long, heavy breath.
Writing a few invitation letters had somehow turned out more exhausting than fighting an Ace Dogfight against Hufflepuff.
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