Hearing the noise coming from outside getting louder, a smiling Sirius stood. "I think we better go and curtail my godson before entire the orphanage gets invited to Italy for lunch today. We'll need time to get everything ready for your visit, and it will be the weekend at the earliest before we can cope with that. We can discuss anything else we need to while walking around."
It wasn't hard to find the cause of the disturbance and, as expected, Harry and Luna were in the very centre of it. Both were siting on the floor, surrounded by excited children of all ages. When one of them brought forward a battered Harry Potter poster and asked if it could be signed, there was no way Harry was going to say no. This really opened the floodgates though with most of the children running to their rooms to find something for Harry to sign.
Hermione spotted one little girl with long black hair sitting by herself on a bench at the very edge of the excitement with a picture book in her hand. She clearly wanted to go over and ask Harry to sign her book but was too shy to do so. Hermione headed straight for the girl and sat down beside her.
"Hello there, my name's Hermione. Don't you want to get your book signed by Harry?"
The young girl physically appeared about three, though sounded nearer six, as she sat there nervously swinging her legs under the bench while answering Hermione's questions. "My name is Joan, and it's not my book. This is from our small library and it wouldn't be right to get Harry Potter to sign it. I will also have to put it back when I'm finished with it so there's no point in getting it signed. I was sitting thinking if I had anything in my locker he could sign but I don't. Are you Harry's girlfriend?"
Smiling, Hermione shuffled closer. "Yes, we're betrothed. That means we'll get married when we're older."
Staring into her book, Joan's next sentence came straight from her heart. "It must be great knowing what you're going to do when you're older."
Hermione's arm snaked around the little girl's shoulders and gently pulled her closer. "Well, I know a little of your future." With that, she had Joan's full attention.
"You'll be coming to Italy for a holiday at our house while a building is made ready for the entire orphanage to move into." After hearing that, Joan's blue eyes were now sparkling like the Mediterranean Sea her Harry now loved so much. You could also see this girl's intelligence radiating from those sparkling blue orbs too, so Hermione then tried for a smile.
"While you're staying there, we'll get our picture taken with Harry, and then get him to sign it for you. Would you like that?"
"Would you sign it too?"
Hermione kissed the little girl's forehead by way of an answer and then got the smile she was looking for. Hermione was getting the impression that Joan usually didn't have much to smile about, she silently swore to change that. It wasn't as silent as she thought though as Harry picked up on it through their bond. He totally agreed and promised to join her and Joan as soon as he could.
Neville had sat beside Luna while Dan and Emma walked amongst the children, both were now promising to thank Sirius for getting them involved in this venture. Sirius watched the kids having fun so of course wanted to join in. Padfoot made an appearance and was soon surrounded by laughing children.
Barchoke was the only member of the group left standing beside Jillian and couldn't miss the tears running down her cheeks. He totally misread the reason behind those tears however. "I'm sorry that our meeting seems to have fallen apart…"
Jillian interrupted before the goblin could say anymore. "Oh please don't apologise. Watching this tells me more about the type of people these are than I could learn from a dozen meetings. Usually the rich pure-blood would have us round up a couple of the children so they could be in a picture for the press. The children were then used as nothing more than props to show those pure-bloods in a good light - barely spoken to and never interacted with. We always do our best for the children but there usually isn't a lot to laugh about around here. This is music to my ears, and certainly eases my worries over our future."
With Padfoot now drawing all the attention, Harry was able to make his way over to Hermione. He sat down beside Joan. "Hey, I see you've met Hermione. Isn't she wonderful?"
This drew a short giggle from Joan, and immediately broke the ice between them. Hermione then handled the introductions. "This is Joan. I was telling her about coming to Italy and staying there for a holiday."
"Do you like to fly?" Joan just looked at Harry in bemusement.
"We just bought new brooms for the school we're building. We're trying them all out so would you like to fly with Hermione and me?"
With her arm still draped around Joan, Hermione couldn't miss the shudder of excitement that ran through the little girl at the mere thought of Harry's suggestion. Joan was nodding like mad as Hermione whispered to her.
"Now wouldn't that make a good picture to be signed?"
Sitting between both of them, Joan's smile now lit the entire room.
Dan could feel his wife's mood change through their bracelets and asked what the matter was. "I was just watching our not so little girl instinctively know what that other little girl needed, it just hit me how much I had missed of her growing up."
Kissing Emma's cheek, Dan had the perfect cure for his wife's melancholy. "Look around you, Emma. We've just been given the opportunity to help a lot of these kids. We can look on it as practice for when our grandchildren finally make an appearance."
Looking at the way Hermione and Harry were interacting with the little black haired girl, Emma's answer somewhat surprised Dan - as did the sense of determination her words held. "Those two are going to make fabulous parents. Just look at the way they are dealing with these kids. We're going to need all the practice we can get, I'm bloody determined not to fail as a grandparent too."
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