It was already the third lesson on mind arts and Harry was already bored - sitting beside him there was an almost purple-faced blonde boy - Draco Malfoy, seemingly so deep in focus while trying to protect his mind -  his surface thoughts, yet Harry could breeze through his defences without a problem.

 

Even during the previous class he could do so easily and it did not take him long to pick up the wandless version in today’s classroom.

 

Draco finally restored his defences and looked back into Potter’s eyes - it did not take even a minute for Harry before the blonde's defences were breached once again, his  surface thoughts appearing for Harry to see like an open book.

 

*Clap* *Clap* - the professors clapped enthusiastically - somehow he knew what had occurred, it also seemed he was a bit regretful of not being able to teach the talented boy more, legally at least.

 

Being a master legilimens himself the professor could see how amazing Harry’s defence was - he could count on one hand the number of people he have met having such strong defences - as if from a decade of practice - and the boy was the youngest of them all.

 

As for leggilmency - professor inwardly sighed - the regulations were very strict for that, he did not want to spend the rest of his life in Azkaban and yes that what one got for illegal spreading of such knowledge.

 

The surface thoughts spell was essentially the only legal legillmency spell these days, well unless one was placed under various magical contracts and practicing some legal profession that actually required such skills - the only ones being auror interrogator, a medi-witch or like him - a professor of mind arts, thought this one was less popular as you could see by abysmal amount of students he got each year.

 

The clapping was getting a bit awkwardly too long as the professor brushed his pondering thoughts aside and turned to his favourite student of this year - “Well done Harry, truly splendid”

 

He temporarily glanced at Malfoy who seemed exhausted - having one's mind defences broken repeatedly was not a pleasant experience, alas that was unfortunately quite an efficient training method for less talented folks, with enough repetition any one could become great at this.

 

“And that makes it three out of three, take a rest Draco, I would be giving you more personal lessons starting next time, as for you Harry - congratulations, you no longer need to  attend future lessons as I do not have anything else I am legally allowed to teach you.”

 

A long sight escaped the professor's mouth as his face looked somewhat regretful -  “If you truly wish to learn proper legilimency, come back after graduation, I will put up a good word for you, whatever legilimency career you would choose!”

 

“Thank you, professor, then I will be on my way then, goodbye” - Harry was sad of not being able to learn more legilimency from a proper tutor, still he did buy a few books on the topic, perhaps he should try learning that on his own - well as soon as he’s back in school and out of ministry’s Trace’s radar, he still remembered his expulsion and wand breaking warnings he received from the ministry, not wanting to ruin this ‘loop’ by triggering a restart or getting his wand confiscated.

 

Walking out of the door he mentally reviewed the list of classes in Green Alley studying centre, initially considering taking another one to fill in the extra free time, yet unfortunately after asking around he was told that they did not accept students mid-course.

 

 Harry just shrugged and walked out of the Green Alley, even going out of magical London - with some extra time on hand he just wandered aimlessly, before sitting at a bench in a deep shade, to hide from the heat of the sun,, then he focused his mind on what he learned today.

---

The streets were full of muggles, busily walking by - it was a lunch break for them so they had all various destinations in mind, ready to utilise the break as good as possible. 

 

Some were hurrying home for lunch with their kids, some rushing to nearby supermarkets for a quick bite and then chilling in a shade with some ice-cream, some more well-off folks were looking for a place to eat and finally some young teenagers were going to a pizzeria.

 

Harry smiled and sat up from the park bench - yes, he was reading the surface minds of others, he mentally thanked his mind arts teacher once again for that small slip of information - who knew wandless magic would not be tracked by the ministry? 

 

Apparently the tracker was placed into a wand - mainly to avoid the countless spam on the wards when kids were doing accidental magic, which happened a lot for some of them.

It usually took years to actually perform spells wandlessly, sure some talented students could do that with their wand in the pocket, but that was not true wandless magic - the wand still acted as a focus to help magic flow in these scenarios, so now Harry temporarily kept his wand in his pocket trunk, not in his wand holster as usual - that way he could practise surface thoughts reading, truly wandlessly.

 

Malfoy could have defended himself if he tried that in class, the boy mused - that’s how hard it was, he was only able to read muggle thoughts as they had absolutely no mind defences, and even then it was not very clear - blurry, sometimes he even failed to understand a single thing.

After an hour or so sitting on the same bench Harry’s mind felt drained from prolonged use so he decided to call it a day - perhaps he would try this ‘exercise’ again in the future, he figured being able to do this all the time on wizards and witches would be so useful for everyday life!

---

Various red sparks were shooting his way as Harry ducked to dodge them - another pair was incoming from another side - yet a flying chair managed to block them, the boy cursed in his mind - he could usually beat Draco in five minutes, so Tonks gave him a handicap on his spells and his assignment today was… to win against Draco using only wingardium leviosa.

 

Of course it was quite a versatile spell, and with proper intent could not only move things up and down, but also horizontally - following the caster's commands.

 

It was already their forth duel today and Draco was enjoying the experience - payback for the last two lessons where Harry beat him down, quite painfully in fact. Yet even he could feel - the boy was improving quite fast, during the first duel he was struggling with using objects with blocking - his spells could by-pass between chair legs with ease, yet by now his spells somehow kept being blocked, even the quick casted ones!.

 

The blonde boy sighed as another double expelliarmus shot was blocked again - now it seemed Potter was simply showing off as the first one hit one leg of the chair and another - another leg in the back, he did not believe his aim was that bad and seeing this happen for the third time during their fourth duel he knew it was not simply dump luck. 

 

Still Draco felt he was improving too - during previous duels the Potter dodged most of his spells, even the double shots, yet now he was forcing the boy to block, primarily the double shot spells as when only shooting one spell it was as if Potter knew where it was going as if he had eyes in the back of his head.

 

It all started with professor Tonks bringing some auror training dummies the last time and while Sue and Harry could pass the aiming mode exercise with flying colours - his aim was not so good, still at least Tonks explained to them how to shoot spells in quick succession - the double shots Sue used to beat both him and Potter the last time, there seemed to be some use to these lessons - thought blonde boy, preparing another double shot of red beams.

 

The fourth round finally ended - this time Harry did not lose, yet he did not win either - he was finally good enough with using random items around for blocking spells - and dodging the few ones he occasionally missed.

 

The class had come to an end so Tonks dispersed them. While the boys were duelling she was teaching Sue something on her own - Harry now pondered whether he would win against the Ravenclaw girl next time - so far their score was one to one - the boy already got accustomed to dodging her rapid fire during last lesson and managed to beat her - not a very elegant win in his opinion as Sue simply run out of stamina without being able to hit the boy, next time he wanted to win in proper way.

 

After parting ways with Sue, the pair of boys walked together to a nearby cafe for a snack and waited for their next lesson. 

 

Yes, prolonged classes together brought them somewhat closer - still far from friends, but not bickering fools jumping on each other's throat anymore - bearable acquaintances perhaps? Rivals? Harry did not really care, he was just glad not having to listen to random insults every time they met any longer.

 

Soon Daphne joined them and they chatted together while waiting for professor to arrive.

 

Last time the teacher brought various complex mechanical parts and weird items - like a 7x7x7 rubik’s cube among other weird magical trinkets, and they did a strenuous exercise of apparating from one side of classroom to another - no longer using the specific cross tiles, but going where the teacher indicated - various random locations like ‘below third desk on the right wall’, ‘one feet above ground in the centre’ while having to apparate together with those trinkets intact in same condition.

 

It was very hard, yet as soon as they managed to somewhat consistently accomplish the task without breaking the trinkets - the professor increased the difficulty. He messed around with the props as they teleported - shuffling the cube, removing some gears, casting spells to re-color the items - they never really managed to complete this exercise - always ruining one item or forgetting some other, yet professor did not mind, even saying they were decent even quite good compared to last years group.

 

The upcoming class was important to them - supposedly a ministry official would tag along and do the paperwork for their licences, of course providing they were still in one piece. Harry was especially excited - with this he could save some time in the morning for his usual ride to the magical Alleys of Britain, and visit his godparent more often - he even postponed further visits as he was waiting for the ability to skip that tedious half day bus journey, as Sirius forbade the use of knight bus to go to Grimmauld district, according to him Lucius was one of the main shareholders of knight buses and received statistical reports on visited places - and having married Narcissa Black he would connect the dots of where Sirius might be hiding.

 

As the class time arrived they found both the ministry person and professor already waiting near the door while chatting. Near them stood Jil, the house elf, with a bulky backpack - it seemed he would be coming along to provide medical first-aid in case of accidents.

 

The ‘test’ turned out to be very easy for all of them - they simply needed to apparate to Leaking Cauldron, order anything there and apparate back with food - compared to complex and changing trinkets they tried last time this was surprisingly easy - the official told them they would get their licences through the professor the next week and teleported away - turning back the professor was already gone along with Jil, leaving a note on the ground which basically informed them that today’s class is over.

 

Harry and Daphne parted with Draco, and seeing there was still quite some time before evening, when they usually took a scenic route with a knight bus, Harry turned to his friend with a smile - “So, what do you say about going out for some muggle food?”

---

Daphne’s clothes today  were a light green dress and a summer hat - quite fitting to mingle among muggles, while Harry himself only wore muggle-style clothes all the time, except at school - he found they felt nicer to the skin and were more comfortable somehow.

Together they were walking through the streets of London, looking for a pizzeria. Sure, they had seen quite a few of them during their scenic tours - yet unfortunately they did not have their apparition licences yet, not for another week at least.

 

Harry did remember that there was a pizzeria here… somewhere - he read a group of muggles' thoughts today, so he knew it was bound to be somewhere nearby..

 

While walking Harry occasionally read the thoughts of passersby - sometimes even sharing them with his companion. Daphne, having never lived among muggles, was quite curious about what they are doing everyday, what their everyday worries were and so on - Harry was happy to entertain her - he needed to find a pizzeria anyway.

 

It did not take too long for the boy to notice a group of people thinking of pizza, taking a turn after them he then met more and more people thinking the same - it was understandable as it was a few hours after noon - a common lunchtime for many muggles.

 

And just five minutes later, the pair already walked through the doors, and chose a seat near the window.

 

Just moments later, a young waiter girl politely dropped a couple of menus on the table.

 

“Do you want to order drinks now, or should I come later?”

 

“Some Coca-Cola please” - they boy just nodded with a smile, then turned to Daphne

 

“I will take this Coco … Cola thing as well” - the girl blushed as she mis-pronounced the name.

 

While the waitress kept her polite smile and walked away, having noted their order on her blanknote, Harry was already silently chuckling.

 

“It’s not made from coconuts, it's Coca-cola, Daphne” - he explained to his friend as he knew just how weird some of muggle product names could get - it was like another language for the ones hearing it for the first time. 

 

Opening the menu, they both flipped in silence, though Harry saw Daphne’s appreciation of all the pictures and ingredients, the menus in the wizarding world were quite outdated in this regard.

 

Before long Harry had already chosen his favourite pizza - mushroom and ham while also ordering a strawberry milkshake. Daphne, ordering a pizza for the first time, decided to mirror Harry’s choice - she did like mushrooms and ham individually, perhaps a pizza would not be too bad?

 

Before too long the waitress came back to take their orders and give them their drinks. Harry had an amused smile on his face as he drank his cola while Daphne was seemingly just staring at the bubbles - he checked his memory and noted that he kind of never saw any carbonated drinks in the wizarding world.

 

“Daphne” - the girl moved her gaze from the bubbles back to the boy - “You should at least give it a taste now - the taste is not the same after all the bubbles go out”

 

As the boy watched in anticipation, she put her glass to her lips and took a gulp - then almost spewed it out - not expecting the volume of her gulp to… grow as it foamed inside her, until eventually swallowing as a smile broke out on her face.

 

“It’s delicious! This is so much sweeter than pumpkin juice! And those bubbles… they feel weird in the mouth, yet I think it improves the drinking experience!” - her eyes seemingly had a sparkle in them.

 

“Told you so, wait till you taste a slice of pizza!”

 

As the duo drank and chatted, they did not notice the time pass, and before long their order finally arrived.

 

“Anything else or should I bring the bill?” - the waitress inquired once again as she placed wooden pizza peels on their table.

 

“No just the bill, please”

 

“Will you be paying together or split the bill?”

 

“We will split!”

 

 “Daphne, are you sure about that? Did you bring enough pounds with you?” - Harry glanced at his friend to confirm, emphasising the name of the currency.

 

The girl blushed, clearly catching her fault - not expecting to venture in the muggle world today, all she had was her galleons, sickles and knuts as usual, she lowered her eyes in embarrassment.

“It appears my friend forgot her wallet so there’s no need to split the bill, I will pay for her”

 

“OK!”

 

As the waitresses' footsteps faded away, Daphne turned back to the boy.

 

“Thank you Harry, I will… pay you back tomorrow”

 

“There’s no need, it’s not like it's expensive or I lack the cash or anything. If you truly wish to pay me back in some way, just treat me for a meal next time we eat out.”

 

“Next time…” - her cheeks took a cute pink hue - “That works for me, let’s eat together sometime in the future”

 

Before long the pair was already eating - and surely as Harry expected Daphne's list of favourite foods just had a new entry. They happily chatted while they ate, then went for a scenic route with a knight bus as usual. Both of them felt as if time had passed like a breeze. And came the usual stop for them to part ways.

 

“Thank you, Harry, for letting me to experience what muggle food is like, I enjoyed it a lot”

 

“It’s a pleasure, though it’s your time to treat for the next date! Goodbye Daphne!” - Harry teased her with a mischievous expression on his face as he quickly dropped off from the bus, dodging an incoming nab to the side by his friend.

 

Daphne felt blood rush to her face as she realised that it actually was like a date - two young teenagers eating together and chatting for hours, Harry even paid for everything! Still feeling quite shy she just waved back to the boy as the bus sped off. 

 

Through the whole journey home the girl pondered about their relationship, she reviewed her most recent memories and buried her head in her knees in embarrassment as she noticed her heart speeding up when they met, her glancing at the boy quite too often and even getting lost as if in a daze in his deep green eyes… 

 

How did she not notice this sooner? Did Harry notice? Is that why he was teasing her? Did he like her too? Would his friends even accept her, a Slytherin of all things as his girlfriend? Or at least a friend… What about her own friends? 

 

Her mind was overwhelmed by countless questions, even back at home. 

 

That night it took her ages to fall asleep, her thoughts troubling her. And during the night she dreamt of a young boy with messy black hair and beautiful green eyes.

As the morning came she had to face reality and admit that yes she might have a crush, a crush on her new summer friend.

---

Sirius home felt way more inviting on Harry’s second visit - it has been quite a  few weeks since that time. No longer was there a screaming portrait in the hallway and all the rooms looked so clean. Harry smiled - clearly Dobby was doing a good job.

 

Not long after the boy was sitting with his godfather in a study room on a pair of armchairs near a fireplace, there was also an open box of pizza and a tray of cookies and three large mugs of tea - Dobby was sitting with them, on the side of Harry's armchair - as armchair was so large it did not inconvenience Harry in any way.

 

Harry was recounting his more interesting stories to his godfather and Dobby. Having not met for all that much they had a lot to catch up on. 

 

During the previous visits, after he finally got his licence, he told them stories about his  life, which he was continuing to do today.

 

The boys life was quite an adventure - philosopher's stone, a possessed professor, infiltrating Slytherin common room, the basilisk, the diary, the journey to the school in a flying car - Dobby looked so sad during that one as it was caused by him, even thought he only had good for Harry in mind, still seeing his friend looking so down Harry skipped over the pie and re-growing arm bones incidents.

 

For the third year it was Sirius time to be embarrassed - who knew gifting a broom would cause so much trouble for the boy? And with him simply being out of the prison causing a horde of Dementors to torment his godson? 

 

Harry’s godfather even cursed at every mention of wormtail, he hated that thing - yes betrayed like that was no human in his eyes.

 

Harry seemingly abridged the time travel incident - his godfather was still recovering so he did not want to burden him with a bombshell  that his godson was a decade or so older mentally, at least not yet.

 

While his godfather looked cleaner and better during each visit - Harry knew that such prolonged prison stay left a deep mental mark on him - it would be a while before the man fully recovers.

 

Sirius was proud of his godson and told stories of his adventure with his father and Remus in return to the boy. Most of them were about pranks, soit  Harry was almost falling out of his armchair while laughing - it was so fun, he decided to try out pranking on his own sometime, or perhaps team up with twins?

 

His stay at godfathers place was getting late - yet it was no issue for Harry, just a step outside the wards of the house he waved back to Sirius - and disappeared with a barely audible pop - the latest lesson did cover reducing the sound of teleportation - Harry was still making some, though he was working on it, bit by bit.

 

Harry silently climbed up the stairs, then went into his room. Inside there was a fancy envelope on his table - one completely covered by postage stamps, one letter from Molly Weasley.

 

He briefly looked at the letter he got from the postman early in the morning - he remembered Vernon being quite embarrassed about it during the previous loop, so he just met the postman himself before the Dursleys came to know of it. 

 

Then he just forgot about it as he put it in his room and went to eat breakfast before popping out of the house to visit his godfather.

 

Wondering if anything has changed in the current loop he shrugged his shoulders and tore the envelope apart, quickly running his eyes on the all familiar invitation. It was exactly the same as in the previous loops.

 

The boy still had his final duelling and apparition classes tomorrow, then he could just drop off to stay at Weasleys? He did not visit them during the whole summer, instead opting out visiting his other friends - as he knew he could spend a whole week with them during the Quidditch world cup.

 

He wrote a quick reply, accepting the stay-over invitation, though mentioning that he would only arrive in the evening, then let Hedwig fly out in the night - he knew Ron’s sleeping habits and knew the boy would still be awake at this time.

 

Then he turned off the lights and went to his bed to sleep - it’s not like he needed any packing of items - everything he needed was already in his pocket trunk, in fact most of his possessions were inside.