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Italian Leather Loafers


Petunia Evans and Vernon Dursley were on a blanket beneath the boardwalk. The sunlight came in thin shafts through the boards of the pier, and the sand was soft and piled into small dunes, affording quite a lot of privacy to anyone who took the time to get there - which was a long walk along the beach from far off down the shore. They’d spent the morning walking together along the edge of the water, talking, and holding hands, and Vernon had talked of businessy things that Petunia didn’t truly understand, but thought sounded quite impressive. Vernon had carried a picnic basket and a blanket over one arm as they walked and they found a dune facing the water and set their blanket down in the hollow it created. Vernon, being older than Petunia, had purchased a bottle of wine and they shared it with tiny squares of cheese and crackers and tiny cucumber sandwiches that Petunia had packed in the basket and when they’d finished, they sat in the shade of the pier together.

“It’s hotter than Hell itself,” Petunia complained, fanning herself.

Vernon agreed.

Petunia leaned over and kissed Vernon, running her hand over his wide chest as she did it, slipping her fingers between the buttons of his shirt to feel the hair on his skin. She closed her eyes and nuzzled his nose with her nose and he brought his hands over her back, along her spine between the curve of her hips, where her shorts ended and the middle of her back, where her bikini top strings tied. Vernon’s hand was wide and his palms cool from having been holding the chilled wine bottle and Petunia kissed him all the harder as his fingers playfully twiddled with her bikini string, a low laugh against her kiss as she whispered into his mouth, “Oh naughty, Vernon…”

Suddenly there was loud barking and a big black dog came bounding over the dunes, dragging a rather large bit of driftwood, his tail wagging as he leaped about wildly, kicking up sand and shell. A spray of sand fell over Vernon and Petunia, like rain, and Petunia squealed in disapproval, her hands flapping as the dog tripped over it’s own stick, rolled down the dune and landed squarely in Vernon’s lap.

Petunia screamed.

The dog sat, dazed a moment, looking up at Petunia as she shrieked and dashed away, hiding behind one of the thick wood beams that supported the boardwalk above. He cocked his head at her as though he thought her quite odd, then looked at Vernon Dursley, who was shoving the dog off of himself. “Oh Vernon, Vernon, get it away from the blanket! It looks like it has fleas! Look how mangy it is! Vernon!!!” Petunia cried.

“Shoo!! Shoo, I say! Get away!” Vernon said, getting up and brandishing the dog with the empty wine bottle. “Get away!”

The black dog barked happily, dancing about, making Vernon turn and turn and wave his bottle at him as the dog’s tail waggled and then he spotted Vernon Dursley’s loafers and he bounded over, grabbed onto one of the shoes and ran away.

“WAIT -- MY SHOE! EXPENSIVE ITALIAN LOAFER THAT IS!” and Vernon went after him, shouting, waving the empty bottle…

Petunia came out from behind the beam, sniffling and snorting horribly in her distraught state. She was packing up the things they’d had when she heard Lily’s voice carrying under the pier.

“SIRIUS!” Lily was shouting, “SIRIUS COME BACK HERE!... Ugh, I really should have put him on a leash... Why in blarney didn’t I listen to Remus? Him and James both warned me and do I listen -- noooo…” Lily spotted the bit of driftwood Sirius had been dragging along and she shouted, “Sirius Black! You better be on the other side of this sand dune or I swear to Merlin I’ll ---” and she came over the dune then and spotted Petunia, freezing in her place.

Petunia stared up at her. Tuney’s hair was tousled from fooling about with Vernon and she knelt now on a very sandy blanket, putting empty glasses and tupperware containers that had held their cheese and crackers into the basket - her sandals and one of Vernon’s loafers beside her where she knelt.

“Sorry,” Lily stammered, flushing, and she started to go around, “Just looking for - for Sirius.”

“He hasn’t come by here,” Petunia said in an angry, harsh tone.

“Oh. Okay. Sorry. He was --” Lily paused, then, “He was chasing after a dog that we saw down the beach, concerned it might be an escaped pet.” Lily pointed at the driftwood, “Did uh… did you happen to see the dog that was pulling this?”

“Vernon’s gone to chase it now,” Petunia sniffed. “It stole his shoe.”

Lily turned red. “Oh dear. What way did they go?”

“I don’t know! Do I look as though I know everything? That way obviously as you’ve only just come from the other way!” Tuney’s voice had edge to it and she pointed violently away behind her.

“Okay. Alright. Thanks.” Lily tore away, running as quickly as she could, leaving Petunia there to muddle through the mess of what remained of the picnic she and Vernon had been having.

Across the beach, out from beneath the dark shade of the boardwalk, Snuffles the dog was running at top speed, carrying Vernon Dursley’s expensive loafer, Vernon a few meters behind trying to catch up, shouting. “You drop that shoe, you mangy mutt, or I’ll call the bloody animal control and have you put to sleep!”

Snuffles ran up a jetty of uneven rocks, knowing this would slow Vernon Dursley down and he stopped halfway down them on a particularly smooth rock and settled in with the leather shoe, his eyes watching as Vernon reached the jetty and considered it, looking for stones to climb upon to catch up to the nasty creature that had stolen his shoe.

Snuffles watched calmly as Vernon picked his way along, the waves crashing gently against the jetty at low tide, nearly drowning it out as Vernon Dursley cursed and spluttered his way over the rocks. He waited until the wide walrus of a man was nearly to him and then he circled the shoe calmly, sniffing… sniffing… pretending to consider… and then promptly lifted his leg.

“No! BAD DOG! BAD DOG!” Vernon cried, leaping and slipping on the rocks as the yellow stream spurted into his shoe.

Excellent aim, Sirius, Sirius told himself, grinning with his wide doggy lips. He remembered once back in second year, he and James had spent a good half of an hour in the toilet on the third floor after both taking a loo break from Flitwick’s class, having a contest of who could back the furthest away from the urinals and still hit their marks. He felt as though it was that training of champions that he needed to attribute this, his finest pee-moment yet. And to think Remus Lupin thought that was a vile, wasted effort! he thought, remembering when Remus had shyly poked into the loo to inform them that Flitwick was getting suspicious on why it was taking so long and calling them nasty when he saw what they were doing.

Sirius could still remember the appalled look on Remus’s face when, startled by his arrival, one of the boys (James said it was Sirius and Sirius said it was James) missed their aim and ended up making a mess on the wall. “You guys are sickos!” Remus had declared and run off back to class.

Sirius could still remember the feeling of James Potter’s high-five that day, too.

James would’ve high-fived him now, too, no doubt.

Finished with relieving himself, the shoe soaked through, Snuffles leaped away, slipping past Vernon, who tried in vain to capture him as he went, slipped, and tripped over backwards, scraping his knee on a rock and falling into the water, arms flailing as he tipped over the edge of a rock and splashing into a shallow tide pool. Snuffles went running back down the stones, barking merrily all the way, just as Lily ran up, her face appalled as she watched Vernon Dursley splutter and steam, coming up from the pool with anger flashing in his eyes.

“What’d you do?” Lily demanded of the dog, but of course there came no reply except barking excitement as he ran over and licked her hands before running off once more, up the dunes that led away to the boardwalk. Lily glanced over her shoulder at Vernon Dursley, then down the beach, where Petunia was running toward them, carrying the picnic things, her sandals, and the remaining loafer. She stifled a laugh and ran after Sirius.

By the time she caught up with him, he’d ducked behind one of the shacks that lined the boardwalk and changed back behind a few large rubbish bins, knocking their leds off as he stood up. He dusted himself off and laughed as Lily came over the dune, breathless and flush from running.

Sirius grinned evilly.

“What did you do?”

Sirius laughed, “I took a wee in his loafer.”

Lily said, “You didn’t.”

“Yeah. Let him almost catch me, almost get the shoe back, then I dropped it on the rock and peed all over it.”

Lily snorted, “Sirius Black, you horrid, foul thing.”

Sirius grinned, “Whatever will he do without his Italian leather loafers? I mean… Loafers on a beach, honestly!”

“Says the man in boots,” Lily said, waving a palm at Sirius’s thick boots.

Sirius grinned. “Boots are fashionable no matter where they are.”

Suddenly a back door of the shack they were standing behind opened and a man in a dirty chef’s apron leaned out and chucked a bucket full of nasty food bits into one of the rubbish bins. He spotted Sirius and Lily and snapped, “Get out of here yeh kids, this ain’t a make-out joint. I’ll telly the police if I catch yeh back here!”

“C’mon,” Lily laughed, grabbing Sirius’s wrist and tugging him away down the row of buildings until they found a gap to slip back out onto the boardwalk.




Vernon Dursley shuffled back along the sand barefoot, the loafers thrown away in a rubbish bin, and Petunia holding onto his arm as they walked along. Vernon was quietly stewing and so was Petunia. She wasn’t sure how but it was awfully coincidental that Lily had appeared just moments after that horrible dog had come and ruined their picnic. It had to have something to do with her! And Lily had always disliked Vernon. Surely she’d done it on purpose. Petunia wrapped her fingers through Vernon’s and fumed.




That night, Vernon had to go to the shop in flip-flops to buy new shoes. This left only Mrs. Evans, Lily, Sirius, and Petunia sitting about the dinner table that night when Mrs. Evans revealed a lovely fish dinner with potato jackets and great stalks of broccoli. They ate in silence for several long moments, enjoying the lemon pepper flavor of the cod. Sirius glanced at Lily as she cut up her broccoli.

Then --

“Mummy. You need ot tell Lily that she musn’t do magic on this trip,” Petunia announced suddenly. “And neither can her friend,” she added quickly, as though she couldn’t remember Sirius’s name.

Lily and Sirius looked up.

Mrs. Evans was spooning more broccoli onto Sirius’s plate insistently. Sirius had the look of someone who needed to eat more broccoli, Mrs. Evans thought. She stared at her daughter now, though, and put the bowl of green veggie back down. “Petunia, we’ve gone over this, as long as Lily’s magic isn’t harming you at all, then ---”

“But it is! She set a magic dog at us this afternoon, at Vernon and I!”

“A magic dog?” Mrs. Evans sounded confused.

“YES!” Petunia snapped, “A magic dog! She made a dog out of magic and sent it to attack us!”

“Attack you?” Lily cried, “Attack you! He was only playing with a stick, first of all, second of all, I did not make a dog out of magic. That’s not possible.”

Sirius laughed. “You could transfigure something into one, though.” He looked ‘round at Mrs. Evans, “Lilith is fabulous at transfiguration. Only person in our year better than her is our mate James.”

“Oh yes, James!” Mrs. Evans looked pleased, “He’s a nice boy. Whatever happened to James, Lily? Weren’t you dating him at Christmas?”

Sirius scoffed, “He wishes!”

Lily flushed.

“EXCUSE ME!” Petunia cried, “Hello, attack victim here!”

“I’m sorry, dear,” Mrs. Evans said. She looked at Lily, “No more attacking your sister with magical dogs.”

“She made it pee in Vernon’s loafers!” Petunia cried, “That’s why he’s had to go and buy new shoes! Because of Lily and her magical dog.”

Lily flushed even harder, but now it was from anger. “I told you already that I did not make a magic dog.”

“Yeah it was just a regular dog,” Sirius said.

“How would you know, you weren’t there!” Petunia said.

Sirius answered, “Because I saw the dog.”

“You weren’t even under the boardwalk like we were!” Tuney argued.

“Under the boardwalk?” Mrs. Evans looked about. “What were you doing under the boardwalk?”

“Chasing the dog,” Lily said. Then, “Sirius and I were walking and suddenly there was a dog and he was running and… and I was chasing him when I ran into Petunia.”

Mrs. Evans looked at Tuney, “And what were you doing under the boardwalk?”

Petunia flushed, “Nothing!” She stood up suddenly, abandoning her dinner, “I see I’m not going to get the understanding I deserve! Attacked by a dog and nobody cares it’s just all about Lily and Lily’s magic and how Lily and her no good friends so bloody wonderful because they’re witches and wizards and they go to magic school and ---”

Tuney stopped suddenly. Her face paled to ghostly white, eyes widened.

Lily, Sirius, and Mrs. Evans turned.

Vernon Dursley stood in the doorway, wearing brand new loafers and holding a small bouquet of flowers in one fist. He stood there, gaping for a few moments, then turned quickly away and went up the stairs.

The four around the table stared at one another.

“Perhaps,” Lily said after a moment, “Perhaps he didn’t hear it.”

Sirius murmured, “Walruses do have terrible hearing.”

“HE IS NOT A WALRUS, YOU NASTY BOY!” Petunia screamed and she said, “THAT MANGY OLD DOG WAS PROBABLY YOU IN DISGUISE! IT WAS FILTHY ENOUGH!” and she turned and stormed from the room.

They sat in silence for several long moments, then Sirius said, “What do you call a walrus in a phone booth?”

Lily looked at him.

“Stuck,” Sirius said.

Mrs. Evans started laughing in spite of herself and Lily hit Sirius’s arm.