Entry Number One

[Harvey Branden]

Dear Haven,

My first letter home. A letter that it kind of sucks to write actually. But never mind. You wont forget me. Even if it is just thinking of me as that annoying but very cute boy who wont stop sending me endless letters. Because I will, I warn you. Even if you do not reply I do plan to send you a letter every single day. Because life here in America is completely sucky and the only thing getting me through is my plan to force Aaliyah to love me again and writing to you. I have made two friends over here. One boy who wears all black and thinks he is some kind of vampire, and one girl who never stops talking. So of course as I also never stop talking and we both talk endlessly about ourselves I find that it does not work so well. In fact it does not work at all because neither of us ever listen to the other person. We both just walk along talking. Though admittedly the vampire boy is cute, so at least I have that for consolation.

Plus my Robert, you know Pa's secretary that we picked, is still around. At this school in America it is not boarding. We go home every night. So Robert cooks me dinner every night and then lets me look at his tattoo's. It is slightly weird he does not find this strange at all. But who am I to complain? I do not remember the last time someone who was not a house elf cooked for me every night. Though Libby is still here and she makes sure that she makes her presence known. She is lucky she does not get paid though. Pa has been making big cut backs. I was gutted when my quidditch pitch had to go. I cried all week. But apparently it is super dangerous here. Pa is in trouble with the law, for some reason, so we have to remain on the low down. That means no expensive house, and things.

But admittedly our house is gorgeous. It is underground in a load of tunnels built purely for people who are trying to remain hidden. It is not too big, in fact compared to my old home it is tiny, but Robert has been decorating and he did an amazing job. How it works is Robert, with the help of some builders, turned the kitchen / dining room / lounge into one giant lounge. He then turned the tiny utility room into a kitchen. Then on top of that there are a few other rooms downstairs including a playroom. Upstairs he turned two of the bedrooms into one big bedroom for me which is large enough for two people. Then there are two other tiny bedrooms upstairs. Plus Pa's study. My bedroom also has a slide which goes down to the playroom instead of stairs. Robert did most of the decorating for me, because he is desperate for me to like him, so its mostly a kids house which my Pa is not happy about but has not asked to change as yet. That means I could have people come stay if anyone was willing to come out here. Pa says he would pay, but a lot of parents would think it was too dangerous to send there child out to visit us. Since what Pa did. Even though he will not tell me what he did. I probally should not have written so much about it in this letter. So back to my house. Next letter I am going to send you pictures of every room. Are you excited? I know I am!

I cannot write too long a letter because my new owl, after Aali unfortunately was involved in that accident, Leona cannot carry big letters. As you can see she is a tiny little barn own. But very sweet. Though warning do not try and pet her because she will bite. I have to wear gloves when handling her. Pa thought it was endearing. I think it is just plain annoying but as long as she carries my letters and looks pretty then I cannot expect much of her. Plus she resembles the person she is named after. My grandmother Leona, she used to bite too. She also was small and could not carry heavy objects but we will not go into that. Pa is doing a run this morning but he will be home soon.

Hope you get your enclosed Christmas presents,

love

Harvey