I'm a very distracted person.

When the Dark Lord takes over, is he going to care how many O.W.L.s or N.E.W.T.s anyone’s got? Of course he isn’t. . . . It’ll be all about the kind of service he received, the level of devotion he was shown.

It's best to know what the enemy are saying.

Where are you heading, if you’ve got the choice?” James lifted an invisible sword. “‘Gryffindor, where dwell the brave at heart!’ Like my dad.” Snape made a small, disparaging noise. James turned on him. “Got a problem with that?” “No,” said Snape, though his slight sneer said otherwise. “If you’d rather be brawny than brainy —” “Where’re you hoping to go, seeing as you’re neither?” interjected Sirius.

There was a brief silence in which the distant echo of Hagrid smashing down a wooden front door seemed to reverberate through the intervening years.

Just then Neville caused a slight diversion by turning into a large canary.

Well, hello, Peter,” said Lupin pleasantly, as though rats frequently erupted into old school friends around him. “Long time, no see.