The next few weeks were rather gleeful for Florence, due to the fact that she was not holed up in some creepy pureblood family house with shrieking portraits and windowless walls. Nicolai and Xander, per usual, made everything much more fun considering the fact that they branched out and thought of other places that they could go to, now that they were all allowed to apparate whenever they pleased. On a particularly bright and sunny day, Xander decided to take the two to a carnival.

"A what now?" Florence frowned, tickling her own nose with her quill as she half listened to her friend and half tried to compose a letter to send to Fred. Alexander had a look of exasperation on his face, "See, this is what purebloods like you are missing out on."

"And her," she gestured towards Nicolai, "She's a pureblood too."

"Look," Xander began, not quite sure how to explain the joys of a carnival minimally, and without getting too deep in to muggle terms. "My nan used to take me there almost every summer before I started going to Hogwarts. There are booths, games, rides, a giant wheel that takes you up, up, up..."

"Like riding on a broomstick?" Florence asked, "I mean, why would they use wheels?"

"Yeah. If your talking about the wheels on those mobileautos that they use to get around in." Nicolai chipped in, "Those—ah—what do you call them...? Cars! Yes, cars. Are you talking about car wheels? That levitate?"

This made Florence frown even more prominent, "Maybe because they're more comfortable to sit on...?"

"I can't..." he sighed, flopping down onto the couch in defeat, "Okay, first off, its automobile. And no, I don't mean car tires. Why the hell would it be car tires? I'm saying it's shaped like a wheel, but instead of it being the regular sized ones, they're gigantic. It's called a Ferris Wheel, and it has compartments fastened around the wheel for carrying people when it rotates..."

"Are you trying to visualize this in your head?" Nicolai asked Florence, who nodded. "Yeah, so far I've got nothing but a headache."

"It would be better to see it in person, yeah? Come on, you two," he clasped his hands together, "Change out of your pajamas and wear something comfortable. I'm going to show you the joys of my childhood—well, part of my childhood, that is."

Jane was rather wary at the idea of them strolling around in a place rather far from her and with a questionable security system, but said yes, nevertheless, due to the fact that nothing bad would quite happen when they were surrounded by masses of muggles.

After making sure they had enough muggle currency to last them the whole day, the three of them apparated, holding on to Xander as he transported them from a dim alleyway to a place of great color, music, and festive streamers.

"Did a rainbow throw up here?" Nicolai said out loud, eyes wide as she swiveled her head around from side to side. Florence was pointing at what looked like a gigantic wheel, "So that's what you were trying to get us to visualize... Honestly, you could have done better at describing it."

"Xander, Xander!" Nicolai tugged on his arm, "That child looks like a tiger!"

"Face paint, Nic, they use face paint." he pointed to the stand, "They get it done over there. You like?"

"No," she grimaced, "That's rather nasty to put on your face."

"No, its special paint. Muggles have a lot of different paints, some for walls, for art, and ones that are for the skin." Xander explained, only to realize that Florence was nowhere near them, "Where did she go?"

"Xander, I change my mind, I want to get my face painted!"

"Wait!" he huffed, "We need to find Florence. Merlin, I told you two not to wander away—oh, there she is, by the popcorn stand."

"Oh hey, Xan," Florence smiled, as the two came in to view, Alexander practically wrenched Nicolai away from the face paint stand, "Flo, I told you to stay close to me. What if you get lost?"

"I know my way home," she retorted, "I can always apparate." Florence pointed at the popcorn stand, "I was hungry, too. I figured I should get something to eat before we went around. This place is massive."

"It is... You'd better finish your popcorn before we get on the ferris wheel."

After getting the biggest container of popcorn, the two accompanied Nicolai to get her face painted. She chose a blue butterfly with a rainbow trailing behind it. They thanked the artist and payed, before making their way over to the games.

"Stop touching your face," Xander reprimanded Nicolai, "You're going to smudge the paint before it even sets."

"It's feels weird. And my cheek. It's itchy."

"Well you'll have to live with it. Come on, I'll show you my favorite game of all."

It was a rather old looking stand, clear glass bottles lined up in near rows and columns, stuck close together. Florence watched in curiousity as one girl tossed a ring-like object at the bottles, swearing rather begrudgingly as the ring clanks against the bottle and disappears under the playing area. "What's she trying to do?"

"The objective of the game is to get those rings to land around the neck of one of the bottles. Any one of them, really. And if you do," Xander pointed at the gigantic plushies hung against the wall across from them, "You get to choose a prize."

"That's it?" Nicolai half laughed, "Just toss a ring onto a bottle? And I get a stuffed animal?"

"Sounds easier than it really is, Nic. But by all means, please do give it a try." He handed the person in charge a paper bill, "A dozen rings, please."

Nicolai stepped infront of the bottles, one red playing ring in hand. She eyed her chosen direction, tongue caught between her teeth in concentration. And with one swift toss, the ring went hurtling above a couple bottles, bounced on the mouth, before disappearing under the table.

"What?" she gawked, a smug look on Xander's face. "I told you, easier said than done. You still have 11 tries left."

"I'm aware," she muttered, "I just thought I'd get it on the first try."

Nicolai didn't get it on the second, either. Or the third, or the fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh time. She was ready to pull out all her hair from her repeated tugging of frustration when her tenth ring failed to land around the neck of a bottle. Florence stepped forward as Nicolai held her last ring tentatively.

"Can I have a go?"

"Sod off, Flo, it's my last shot."

Florence rolled her eyes, "Yeah, and you've had what? Zero luck on the previous eleven tries? What makes you think this one's any different?"

"Well how do you know you can get it through?"

"Uh, Chaser, remember? I'm pretty good at tasks which involve hand-eye coordination."

"Whatever," she handed the last ring to her best mate, "But I'm still going to get the prize, alright?"

"Yeah, okay." Florence squinted, arm ready in a throwing position. She waited for the breeze to clear up, counted to three, before tossing the ring forward. It landed with a clank on the mouth, and for a few seconds it looked as if it was going to topple off of the bottle, but slid itself perfectly onto the neck.

"Yes!" Nicolai cheered, pointing at what looked to be a gigantic rainbow caterpillar stuffed toy. "I want that one!"

"You're welcome," Florence chortled, before they moved to the other game, grabbing her popcorn from Xander as they went.

They played Darts, bean bag toss, all of which Florence was able to win for the three of them. Xander purchased balloon hats for them to wear, before proceeding to ride the carousel, which intrigued both Florence and Nicolai as they argued on who should ride the white horse. It resulted to another round of the carousel, as Florence did not want to leave unless she had a turn.

The ferris wheel was the most exciting part for all of them, as they got to ride it as the sun started to set slowly in the horizon. The sky was a blazing orange, darkness starting to set all around them. Overall, the day was well spent, and Florence smiled, happy to be in the company of the two greatest friends she could ever have.

                                            --------

Like all good things, their summer vacation also came to an end. And being the great procrastinators that they were (mostly Nicolai, who had momentarily influenced her friends), they had to endure the crowd lumping together in Diagon Alley to do their school supply shopping. Apparently, a lot of other people did things in the last minute as well. The summer sun, now not as hot as it was a few weeks back, was beating down on them as they attempted to squeeze past people as politely as they could, heavy books in hand.

"Agh!" Nicolai groaned, clutching her books tighter as a boy nearly knocked them out of her hands. He scurried away without even apologizing, leaving her to scoff at his lack of manners. Florence couldn't help herself, and had slipped into the Quality Quidditch Supply to buy new gloves for herself, as she still had a few galleons to spare.

"It just occurred to me," said Xander, watching Florence emerge from the shop with the biggest, most enthusiastic grin on her face, "That you'll finally be able to use your broom on the Quidditch pitch this year."

"I know, right?" Florence gushed, showing them the new gloves, "Which is why my sweet, new not-so-new ride deserves these equally sweet, spectacular quality gloves." she waved her leather gloves around, "I got the priciest ones they have."

"Please, you'd buy gloves even if you didn't have a new broom." Nicolai chortled, making Florence crack a smile, "You know me too well, too well I tell you."

"Looks like the team will have to do screening, yeah? I mean, both our Beaters have graduated... Samuels and Inglebee. Grant left last year... It's only you, Roger, Jeremy and Cho left."

"Right... After Professor Flitwick picks a captain, I'm sure that will be the first priority." Florence said,
"I hope we can bag the cup this year, though."

"You bet. Kick all their asses. Especially Slytherin. Kick their ass real good."

"Thank Merlin that Marcus Flint is no longer in Hogwarts. I couldn't stand his face..."

"Definitely. Good thing he didn't flunk his seventh year the second time." Nicolai snorted, before readjusting her grip on her books, "These are bloody heavy. Can we go sit in the shade somewhere?"

"Well, I don't know about you two, but I think I could do with an ice cream scoop or two," said Xander as Floreen Fortescue's Ice Cream Emporium came to view, the blond boy licking his lips. Florence gave him a look, "But Xander, we've had ice cream almost every other day for nearly a month now."

"And you're complaining because...?" Nicolai asked, her brows raised questioningly.

"Yeah, Flo, what's so bad with always having ice cream?"

"For one," she started off, "I feel like a turkey getting plumped up for slaughter. At this state I'm pretty sure I won't be able to run one lap around the bloody pitch."

"Well, guess Xander and I will have to go there ourselves..." said Nicolai slowly, "Without you."

"Yeah," Xander quipped in, seeing what Nicolai was trying to do, "And we'll have to share a bowl of caramel and fudge ice cream ourselves...without you..."

"Hm, or perhaps, the new chocolate mint flavor that's in your top three favorite flavors..." Nicolai grinned, "Without you...I guess."

"Okay, fine," Florence groaned, "I'll have one scoop. Just one."

"Stop saying it like we're forcing you to eat ice cream." laughed Nicolai, "If you really don't want to then don't."

"I'm not saying it like you're forcing me. I'm saying it like that because you two just kickstarted my cravings that I was trying to suppress! Thanks a lot."

"You're welcome."