Seeing Fred

The Tawny Owl

"It's Stella, tapping on your window." Fred said, pointing to her kitchen window.

"Oh!" She jumped up and hurried to the kitchen. When she opened the window, the owl flew in and landed on the bar, where Fred was already sitting on. "What do I do?" She asked Fred.

"Just untie the letter and the parcel. She won't bite."

"Alright." She stroked the owls headfirst. "Hi Stella." Before she went to her paw and untied it. "This is so weird." She whispered, getting a chuckle out of Fred. She opened the letter and read it out loud.

Leah and F

I'm sorry it took so long, but Minnie and I have been owling back and forth between in each other. She has allowed us to visit this Saturday, and yes, I mean us; you can come. A lot of students will have gone to Hogsmeade so it will be quiet. Can you meet me at the leaky, Saturday at 10? We'll floo over there together.

The parcel contains a book about Hogwarts. Muggles who don't know about it, only see ruins, so read up. There is also a bag of owl treats, you can give one to Stella, otherwise she gets a bit... nippy.

Send a reply with Stella, so I know it arrived well.

See you Saturday.

George

She quickly grabbed a pen and paper and wrote down her reply, rolling it up and placing it on Stella's leg. She opened the parcel and first gave the owl a treat before looking to Fred. But Fred was staring at the owl, he didn't even see her when she waved her hand.

"Fred?"

"Stella... She's –" He cocked his head to the side and the owl copied him. She ran past the bar and stood next to Fred, watching the owl mimic his movements. "- watching me."

"This is getting weirder by the day." Leah muttered under her breath, and Fred couldn't disagree. Leah took the note back from Stella's leg and wrote the new development on it before retying it. She took her notebook from the coffee table and filled in what had happened. Stella looked back to Leah and gave her a hoot. "Fred, try calling her."

"Stella." Fred called for the bird, and she turned her head again, watching a wide-eyed Fred. Leah looked between Fred and Stella before writing it down. Stella flew up and landed on Leah's shoulder, making her jump a little.

"What now?"

"Just tell her to bring it to George."

"Can you bring this to George?" She asked the owl on her shoulder; she hooted softly and stretched her wings before flying out the window. "We'll research this when we're at Hogwarts."

"Yeah, another thing to add to our list." Fred sighed.

"The more we find out about how you are different from other ghosts, the easier it will be to find out what's going on."

"I know. So, we have five days. What are we going to do?"

"I need to work on my game. You don't mind, do you?" She asked sitting at her computer.

"Are you mad!? I want to see how it works!" He said already standing behind her. But that didn't last long, he was confused when he didn't see a fully formed game, like the one she played earlier. So, he retired to the bedroom where she could hear him sing along to some of the more popular songs on the radio.

Leah was running after her sister Addie, on the cobbled streets of Otters River, the town her grandmother lived in. They had been trying to catch fish in the river below with their bare hands, but the two 9-year-olds, had no such luck. When Addie threw some mud at Leah, she ran away laughing as Leah followed her out of the woods, mud dripping down her back.