Harry Potter and the Deep Dream

[Darkphoenixlady]

Prologue

Letter found on Harry's pillow on his 11th Birthday

Son or Daughter,

As I write this letter, your father and I are still arguing about your name, and occasionally even if you'll be a boy or a girl. You should be born in around two months time, and I hope to any gods that are listening that I can burn this letter. However, we are in a war, and you may be an orphan by the time this letter is needed. I'm trying to imagine what you look like, reading this letter. Do you take after me, or James, what are your favourite hobbies and foods. Are you excited to get your Hogwarts letter, are you even living in Britain now?

The only thing I do know is that you will have just reached your 11th birthday and should also have reached your first magical maturity, or only be a few weeks at most away from it. If you are reading this at that time, then I didn't make it through the war, and there are some things you need to know about our family. About my family.

What you read in this letter shouldn't be shared with anyone that isn't related to me, as it could put yours and others lives in danger. Though, most of the things you'll learn here you may already have heard in the way of fairy tales. But not even your father knows the truth.

You may have noticed that there are no truly nocturnal magical creatures, even the owls sleep at night. This is because our world is not alone in space. Instead, it is accompanied by a myriad of other worlds that breach the aether every night during the witching hour. My Great Grandfather theorised that the reason for this was to equalise the magical pressure across the worlds. Whatever the truth, the important thing is that any magical person or creature that is awake, and using their magic, during this time will be carried away from this world to other worlds that are more heavily saturated with magic. What does this mean for us, for you? Magic is a type of energy, if we are awake, then we are using magic. Not only when we are casting spells, but while we are doing any activity. Normally, the only time that magic becomes quiescent is while we sleep.

It's funny, when I found out about this from grandma, I was so jealous of Tunie. When she grew up, she'd be able to go out partying all night without a care in the world. While I'd forever need to be careful of the time, unless I vanish into nowhere.

I digress. If you've been raised in the, I hesitate to say normal, but I can't think of a better term that isn't insulting. If you've been raised in the normal world, you may think you can just power through, and tough it out for an hour. Magic doesn't work like that, out there, time is not linear, not entirely. The further away from our world you go, the faster time flows. To the point that you could live an entire lifetime in the time it takes for that hour to pass. On top of that, the further you travel into the dream, our name for what is beyond earth during that hour, the more magical the worlds become, and the less hospitable to life from our world it becomes. Out there the worlds are wild and untamed, and our modern technology doesn't work.

When I started school, I wasn't sure I believed grandma, but if you read the papers, you start to read about the odd disappearance now and then. It's always the same, someone disappears from their room at night, and is never found again.

Because of Great Grandfather, all of this is especially important to us. He was born in 1870, and was what the magical world call a squib. Someone that has just enough magic to see past the protections around the magical enclaves, but not enough to use a wand and be part of their society. He was lucky, as his family placed him with a rich patron, rather than dropping him on the street, when they discovered his lack of magic. Because of this, when he grew up, he considered himself to be somewhat a scientist, and in 1895 he read about an experiment where dogs were prevented from sleeping. According to grandma, on the 23rd June he performed his first, and last experiment. Neither of them would ever tell me what the experiment entailed, but during the experiment he met grandma, your Great Grandmother. Whatever happened out there, resulted in him bringing her back to earth, where they were soon married. Together, they had four children. Your Grandmother Trudy was the youngest, and a miracle child when she was born in 1918. Her older brothers, twins Simon & Fredrick were born in 1899, and her older sister was born in 1903.

Both of your Grand Uncles were conscripted during the first world war, and disappeared during a sustained bombardment in 1916. Officially, they were marked AWOL, though letters grandma received from their comrades claimed they disappeared from the bunker in front of them during the night.

Susan married, and had one child in 1923, eight months later she and the baby disappeared from the marriage bed during the middle of the night.

My mother, Trudy, married a doctor towards the end of world war 2, she died giving birth to me in 1959. Father remarried, and Tunie was born from that marriage.

All of them were taught to make their magic quiescent by grandma, just as I was, and I hope I will be able to teach you. However, this l have written this letter just in case I can't teach you.

Before now, you were safe, as your magic wasn't mature enough to be active unless you're stressed. But now you are now reaching your first magical maturity, your magic will be starting to stabilise. This is the time that you need to start learning how to feel your magic, and how to coax it into quiescence even when you're stressed. If you don't learn, then as you approach adulthood, and your second magical maturity at 17, your magic will remain longer and longer after you've fallen asleep, until it never quiets unless you make it.

I've made your father promise to give you my journal if I don't make it. I've blood locked it to my direct line, so only you, or your children, will be able to read it.

If neither of us have made it, get a book on occlumency, or a book on meditation that doesn't use a breathing technique. Practice the starting exercise to allow you to calm your mind, and once you've done that you should be able to find your magic.

Once you've found your magic, you'll need to work out how to make it quiescent on your own.

If you are an orphan, know that both of us dearly wanted you, and wish we could have raised you as your parents.

From your loving Mother

Lily Potter.

 

[Darkphoenixlady]

Chapter 1

After he's made breakfast for his Relatives, and been shooed back to his cupboard, Harry re-reads the letter, that appeared on his pillow this morning, for the 3rd time. As he hears Dudley slam the door on his way to meet up with his gang at the park, Harry reverently folds the letter neatly, and carefully puts it behind the support for the third step, behind all of his other treasures. Before pushing his door open, he moves his head around to make absolutely sure that it can't be seen from the door, or as far as Vernon could squeeze into the space. He feels the extra effort is warranted after Vernon destroyed the second letter he's ever had addressed to him at breakfast of all things.

Once he's happy it can't be seen, Harry sits back against the wall of his cupboard and begins to smile broadly, long practice enabling him to stop laughing out loud. He has magic, and so did his great grandparents! He's not a freak, he's just special like them, and there's an entire world of people like him out there! And he's going to get a Hogwarts letter!

His smile vanishes when he remembers the fate of his grandmother's brothers and sisters, and that he might disappear one night. Poof, gone, and his name in a small article in the paper asking if anyone has seen him. Ruthlessly, he clamps down on the shivers that threaten to start, as his mind begins to run away with the idea. Quickly pushing his excitement and fear down into the blank apathy he wears whenever Vernon has that smile on his face, Harry crawls out of the cupboard into the living room.

Quietly closing the door behind him. Harry quietly goes around the house and wipes down all of the surfaces outside the bedrooms, and then cleans up the kitchen. As he's washing up, Aunt Petunia makes herself a cup of tea, before going into the living room, and switching on the TV.

As he puts the last plate away, he carefully wipes his hands and walks into the living room to wait for a suitable break in the program Aunt Petunia is watching.

As the program goes through a short transition, Harry politely asks, "Aunt Petunia, I've finished the cleaning, may I go to the library please?"

Petunia looks up at Harry, then back to the TV as the transition ends. Huffing, she says, "Go on then, be back by 5 as we're cooking for guests tonight."

Sitting on the stairs, Harry quietly puts on his worn shoes, and grabs his ratty backpack. Then he opens the front door as quietly as he can, before closing it with a soft click from the lock. As soon as the door is closed, he runs for the corner of Privet Drive, just in case Aunt Petunia decides she needs the flower beds weeded. When he can no longer see the house, he slows down to a fast but cautious walk, and takes a circuitous route to the High Street, rather than the short walk through the park.

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After walking for a couple of miles along the streets, he reaches the library. Carefully wiping his shoes on the mat, in the room between the library and the outside, Harry ensures that his shoes are clean before walking into the library.

As he walks through the door into the actual library, the librarian glares over her glasses at him, and he self-consciously pulls up the sleeve of the jacket, that's fallen down over his hands. He feels like defending himself, and saying it's not his fault that Dudley is the size of a baby whale, or that Dudley ruins the only clothes his Relatives buy him, leaving him to wear Dudley's castoffs. Instead, he ducks his head down, and sullenly walks past and to the book stacks.

After half an hour of fruitlessly searching for books on meditation, he screws up his courage, and walks up to the Librarian.

Fully expecting to be thrown out, Harry timidly asks, "Excuse me, would you be able to help me find a book please?"

The librarian turns her stern gaze towards him, and glares at him. Then, in a surprisingly kind voice, replies, "Of course, what book are you looking for?"

Harry squirms under her gaze, "Erm, I was, er, trying to find a book on meditation. I was, um, told it might help."

A smile blooms on the librarians face, and Harry relaxes as he can now see that she's not angry with him, "Sure, we don't carry much, but what we do have will be over here in the section on religions."

Harry follows the librarian through the shelves until they come to a section labelled religions – 200. There she takes a book off the top shelf and hands it to him.

As he struggles to read the title, she crouches down, and reads it out, following her finger, "Mahāyāna Buddhist Meditation: Theory and Practice. This might be a little hard for you to read, but it's about Buddhism, and talks about meditation. If you want to read it, there's a table near the counter. If you get stuck, you can ask me for help."

Harry nods, and she leads her back to the front desk and points at the table.

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Several hours later, Harry has been constantly surprised every time the librarian has come over to help him with the book, and even praised him for persevering with the book. Over the last hour, Harry has even hesitantly asked some questions on his own. Every time, he thought it would be the moment where she would kick him out. Instead, a smile bloomed on her face, and she came to help him. Even with finding out what Aether and Quiescent mean.

He's around half way through the book when he suddenly looks up at the librarian, when a persistent beeping comes from her direction. With wild eyes, he looks around for Petunia or Vernon, and tries to remember what might be cooking. When the librarian presses a button on her watch, his heartrate starts to slow, and he turns back to the book.

The librarian sits down on the other side of the table, "I'm afraid that it's 4:30 so I need to close the library."

Harry looks up with alarm, and quickly picks up his bag, and then looks at the books and the door, torn between tidying up here, and running home.

The librarian solves that problem, buy taking the card out of the front of the book, and using it as a bookmark, "I'll put this behind the front desk, and you can come back tomorrow to continue reading it."

Smiling at the librarian, Harry bobs his head, "Thank you. And thank you for putting up with me."

He has already run out of the door by the time the librarian can reply. As being late home means no dinner.

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Once he reaches the road that would take him to the park, Harry pauses. Go on the roads and be late, or go through the park to be on time, and run the risk of running into Dudley. Ultimately deciding that it's better to risk Dudley and be on time, than it is to be late, Harry heads towards the park, his head on a swivel.

When he gets to the park, he thinks he still has 10 minutes left to get home. From this entrance, he can see Dudley and his gang monopolising the swings, and chasing a couple of other kids around. That means no adults. Turning to the right, he skirts the edge of the park, and follows the fence between the park and the woods, keeping his face and hands carefully hidden.

He's just passed the point where the woods end and back gardens begin, and the fence runs behind a few houses before turning onto the street, and the exit, when he years a shout from the swings.

Not even pausing to look, Harry breaks into a sprint for the exit and, a few streets away, home. As he get onto the road, the sound of laughter and pounding streets seems as loud in his ears as his pulse. Just as he's breathing is turning laboured, and his legs are beginning to turn to jelly, he catches sight of the house. A few strides later, and sounds of pursuit die away, and Dudley shouts something like, "He's too close…"

Harry doesn't care, he simply focuses on coming to a normal walk, and getting his breathing back under control. When he reaches the front door, he pauses for a count of 10 while he regains his composure, before pulling the door key, on it's string necklace, over his head, and calmly opening the door.

Walking in, he carefully cleans his shoes off, before taking them off and placing them with the other shoes in the porch area. As he walks into the living room, he spots Aunt Petunia ironing the tablecloth.

Petunia puts the iron on the end of the ironing board, and glances up at the clock before turning to Harry. "Just in time, go and get washed up and then start peeling potatoes. We're cooking for 5 tonight. Oh, and I spoke to Vernon at lunchtime, and we decided that you needed to move, as you're getting a little big for the cupboard. So I moved all your stuff into Dudley's toy room. You'll be eating up there later, as you've got no good clothes for the guests."

Harry searches his aunt's face trying to gauge her mood, not being able to see any hint of happiness, he decides to take the sensible route, and heads up stairs to wash up.

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A few hours later, Harry puts his empty plate on the three legged desk that's wedged into a corner, to stop it from falling over. Looking around the room, he winces again when he spots the pile of old toys hastily pushed against the wall to make space for Harry to use the bed and desk. He just knows that he's going to be told to keep the pile tidy at some point in the future.

Heading to his new bed, he sits on it, leaning against the wall, and closes his eyes to think about what happened at the library.

It was nice having an adult praising him, confusing though, as not even the teachers at school did that. On top of that, the librarian said he could go back tomorrow, adults just didn't do that. On the other hand, he could see the annoyance on her face whenever he asked a question. It didn't matter how quickly she smiled afterwards, he still saw it. So maybe he should leave it a couple of days before going back. But he doesn't want to disappear, so he has to go back tomorrow.

Nearly an hour later, Uncle Vernon shouts up the stairs, "Boy, come down and do the washing up!" At the sudden, unexpected, sound, Harry jerks out of his spiralling thoughts by hitting his head against the wall. Scrambling off the bed, he hurries out the door and has taken the first few steps before he remembers his own dirty plate. Scrambling back to his room, he grabs the plate, and hurries down stairs. Pausing at the bottom of the stairs, he calmly walks around the corner and into the living room, where Vernon is settling into his favourite armchair, his cheeks and nose slightly reddened, indicating that he's been drinking. Hunching his shoulders, and ducking his head, Harry tries to make himself look smaller and harmless so that he doesn't set his Uncle off.

As he walks through the door to the dining room, Dudley shoulder checks him on the way to the living room, and Harry has to scramble not to drop his plate. Once he's rescued the plate, he looks around the living room, and spots his Aunt staring at him from her spot at the dining table. Taking that as a sign he's taking too long, Harry hurries into the kitchen, and starts the washing up.

While he's drying up, a loud barking laugh from the front room makes Harry jump, and one of the clean plates jumps off the drying rack heading towards the door. Panicking, Harry leaps to catch the plate before it falls on the floor. He just about manages to get a grip on the edge of the plate before it hits something, and shatters. As he holds his breath, Vernon shouts towards the dining room, "Keep it down in there!"

As Harry puts the plate back on the rack, the sound of the TV switching on accompanies the thumping sound of Dudley going up to bed. With the sound of the TV in the background, Vernon's laughs become more predictable, and Harry is able to finish the washing up, and cleaning down of the kitchen, without any further incidents.

Once he's folded the tea towels, and hung them on the towel rail, Harry quietly makes his way through the dining room, where Aunt Petunia is still sitting, and staring at him. Through the living room, where Vernon is surrounded by empty beer cans, and laughing at the TV. And up the stairs, avoiding the creaky steps, into his new room.

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After trying to sleep for what felt like hours, Harry sits up on his new bed and tries to start the meditation he read about earlier. However, every time he tries to clear his mind, thoughts of Dudley kicking open his door and beating him up, or Vernon marching in with his belt, keep intruding and making him open his eyes again.

This becomes even harder when he hears Vernon shout, "Where's my beer woman?... Well why didn't you buy more then?" Harry tries to block out the sound of flesh meeting flesh, and Aunt Petunia's crying as Vernon takes his frustration out on the closest target. It's still better than the sounds he sometimes hears in the middle of the night when Vernon drags his Aunt up the stairs and wakes him up.

Trying to meditate again, Harry closes his eyes, and tries to block out thoughts of being sucked into the sky, or falling through the earth, or just fading away until he no longer exists. Eventually, he gives up trying to meditate, and grabs his old blanket, and wraps it around himself.

Once he's heard the heavy footsteps of Vernon walking upstairs, followed by the toilet flushing twice, Harry creeps to the door, and opens it a crack. When he sees that the light is off, he takes his blanket, and climbs down the stairs to his cupboard. There, in the familiar darkness, and his blanket for protection, he shivers in the corner until sleep finally claims him.

 

[Darkphoenixlady]

Chapter 2

"Harry! Harry! Where are you boy!"

His Aunt's hissing shout wakes Harry up with a jerk and he kicks the cupboard door as his legs straighten out in surprise. Pulling his legs back he pulls the blanket tightly around him, and stares at the faint light around the door. Shivering in fear at the possibility that the world outside the door isn't the world he went to sleep in.

The soft footsteps of his Aunt come down the stairs above him.

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Petunia winces as she quietly heads down the stairs following the thump she heard. She winces as her ribs twinge from Vernon's 'gentle reminder' to ensure there's enough beer available when he decides to drink. Her fingers find their way to her eye and cheek, where she's skilfully covered a bruise with makeup.

Walking round the bottom of the stairs to the cupboard door, she wrenches it open, and ducks down. Her pain fuelled angry words die on her lips as she sees the raw fear on her nephew's face. Not the usual fear he gets when Vernon's in a mood, absolute terror.

When he doesn't respond to her presence, she crouches down properly and puts her pain to one side, "Harry. Harry," she waves her hand in front of his face, "Harry!". With the last call, Harry blinks at her.

Now that he's responding, she softens her voice, "Harry, what's the matter?"

"I don't want to disappear." As if speaking aloud makes things more real, Harry bursts into tears, in great wracking sobs.

Somewhat at a loss of what to do, Petunia reaches out halfway to do, something, comfort or slap, she's not sure which. But with the same soft tone, she asks, "Why do you think you're going to disappear?"

Harry says something completely unintelligible that might include the word sleep. Shaking her head, her irritation with the boy starting to rise again, she fights to keep her tone soft, "What do you mean?"

After trying to form words around his crying, Harry blindly leans over, and pulls the letter from its hiding place and shakily holds it out to his Aunt.

With a huff, Petunia opens the letter and glances at it dismissively. A flash of light distracts her momentarily and she glances to the front window muttering, "Bloody early morning drivers."

As she glances back to the letter, it's like her emotions have been doused in ice water as she recognises Lily's neat handwriting. As she starts to read, her legs give out, and she collapses to the floor as her hands start to shake.

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Harry watches cautiously over his knees while he cries helplessly. Learned survival instincts crying out that something's about to go wrong while his Aunt reads the letter.

Instead, as he watches, Aunt Petunia starts to cry, and says, "Oh Lily… Lily, why didn't you tell me, you stupid cow. I could have helped, we could have meditated together. But you had to ruin it. We could have spent time with grandpapa together."

Try as he might, Harry is still crying when Petunia finishes reading, and he flinches when she reaches her hand out to him, "Boy, come here. Come on."

Knowing that not going will lead to a worse beating, Harry clambers out of the cupboard to where his Aunt is sitting, with her own tears. When she pats the floor beside her, he obediently sits down, and braces himself.

Instead of being hit or berated, Petunia instead pulls him closer and hugs him gently, for the first time he can ever remember. "You stupid boy, I don't want you to disappear either. I care about you, and I've always tried to protect you."

The two of them sit there for nearly half an hour before Vernon's heavy footsteps inform them that he's awake.

Gently, Petunia shakes Harry, "Come on boy, I'll help you with breakfast today, and once they're gone we'll talk."

Harry turns to look up at his Aunt as if she's a stranger. Gently, he reaches up to touch her eye where her tears have washed away the makeup. "Does it hurt?"

Petunia smiles gently, "A bit, but it wasn't you or Dudley, so that makes it ok. Come on, we need to get breakfast made before he comes downstairs."

Together, they make quick work of the breakfast, and even have time to clean up the evidence of their tears. With Petunia using the makeup she keeps in her handbag to re-conceal the bruise on her eye. Throughout the entire process, Harry keeps sneaking glances at his Aunt, expecting her to return to normal at any moment.

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When Vernon starts to walk down the stairs, Petunia takes her seat at the table, and Harry starts to bring the food out to the table. Instead of taking his customary place at the head of the table, Vernon instead goes to stand beside the letterbox.

As he's bringing the last dish out, Harry spots his mothers letter, lying on the floor by the back of the sofa. Panicking slightly, he places the dish on the table, before hurrying over and grabbing the letter. As he runs to the kitchen, Harry's movement catches Vernon's attention, and he starts to follow Harry, "What's that boy? If you're hiding something from me you'll…"

The clatter of letters being pushed through the post box interrupts whatever threat Vernon was about to make, and he hurries back to the letterbox. Leaning down with a groan, Vernon stands up triumphantly and marches to the garden, depositing the normal post on the table as he walks past.

While Vernon's distracted, Harry slips Lily's letter into the towel drawer, underneath all the towels, before joining Petunia and Dudley at the table.

As the smell of burning parchment wafts through the open door, Vernon crows, "No freaks live here, the boy is going to Stonewall High, and his freakishness will be beaten out of him."

As the last of the parchment turns to ash, Vernon walks back inside with a look of satisfaction. As he squeezes his bulk around the table, he jogs Dudley, causing him to spill juice down his t-shirt. Petunia immediately starts to fawn over Dudley, while dabbing at the stain with a napkin. "Oh Dudders, are you ok?... It's ok, you can have more juice…" Looking at Harry she calls, "Boy! Get more orange juice for Dudley!" Before turning back to Dudley, "You poor thing, let's get that t-shirt off you, and into the wash, and get you into a clean one."

With a glance at Vernon, who has started to help himself to breakfast, Harry slips out of his chair, and quickly takes the mostly empty glass to the fridge, and refills it. At the same time he grabs a cloth, which he uses to soak up the worst of the spill on the table. As he sits back in his chair, Vernon's hand lashes out, and cuffs him around the ear, "Next time, be more careful not to job the table."

Hunching over, Harry meekly replies, "Yes, Uncle Vernon."

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As he's sitting at the table trying to understand how his Aunt could have been such a different person this morning, Vernon's hand catches him around the ear again, "Stop wool gathering, and clear the table!"

His head reeling, Harry slips off his chair, and automatically starts to clean the table, wash the dishes, and put them all away. As soon as he's done, he unobtrusively retreats to his new room, and curls up on the bed, with his back to the wall.

There he stays, still trying to understand everything that's changed, even when Vernon's footsteps come up the stairs. A few minutes pass, before Vernon slams open his bedroom door.

"Now boy, you do everything your aunt wants you to, or it's back to the cupboard with you. You hear me?"

Harry doesn't uncurl from the bed, as he knows it will be seen as defiance. Instead he answers, "Yes, Uncle Vernon."

Vernon nods, "Good, and if I hear you've been causing trouble in the neighbourhood again, you'll get the belt."

Meekly, Harry replies, "Yes, Uncle Vernon."

When Vernon leaves without fully closing the door, Harry just lies there, thoughts running through his head. Down stairs, the sound of breakfast television can be faintly heard, and Dudley stomps up the stairs and into his room.

The sounds of some game starting up clearly audible in Harry's room. But still he lies there.

Sometime later, Dudley throws something against the wall, and screams, before stomping downstairs. His shout of "I'm going to meet up with Piers and Dennis Mum!" Clearly audible through the house, and still Harry doesn't move.

A few minutes later, there's a soft knock at his door. When there's no answer, Petunia pushes it open, and walks over to the bed to sit beside Harry.

As she pushes Lily's letter into his hands, Harry opens his eyes to look at his aunt.

Petunia can't bring herself to look at Harry, so instead, she looks down at her hands, "I suppose you want to know what's going on. I think I would in your shoes. When I met him…"

Petunia swallows hard as she thinks back to those early days, "When I met him, he played rugby, boxed, and was charming." Her voice turns bitter, "Oh yes, he was so very charming."

"I met him when I was doing an evening job at the student bar to cover the cost of my secretarial course. He flattered me with pretty words and gifts. He really knew how to make a girl feel special. At the time, he was doing his final year of his degree in Business and management, and Grunnings had offered him a job based on his gap year performance.

"I was in love, and the world was rosy. I couldn't hear any of the criticisms levied against him. And so the year went by in a whirlwind of dancing, parties, and dating. Then, on the day he graduated, he proposed to me still wearing his graduation robes. It was beautiful."

Harry uncurls, and cautiously sits up to listen to his aunt talk about her past.

Petunia slips off her wedding band, and starts to twist it in her hands, "Then we got married, and Lily, your mother, bought us this house as a wedding present. We'd been looking at it during our engagement, as they were new-builds. I'd imagine that Lily saw the brochures and bought it for us. But that's when it changed."

Petunia shakes her head, "Looking back, it didn't happen overnight, and it seemed quite reasonable at the time. Things like, 'Oh, don't you think it's a bit far to meet your friends in London?', or 'Weren't we having so and so around that night?'. It then moved onto things like, 'I need to meet a client next week, would you mind cooking for us?"

"I was pregnant with Dudley when he first hit me. He broke my jaw when I told him I was going to see my sister in… in… I used to go there every month, why can't I remember where she lived?"

Petunia sniffs, as she starts to cry again, "I hated her, did you know that. For the longest time I hated her. I hated her for how much time she spent with grandpapa and grandmere. I hated her for being able to do magic. I hated her for marrying that hansom hunk. But she was still my sister, and she was so beautiful when I went to see her after… after…"

Petunia shakes her head as the memory refuses to come, "Then her husband came to see Vernon, and something happened, and it went back to the way it used to be. It was wonderful, and I dismissed the solicitor… Why did I have a solicitor?..."

Petunia shakes her head again as thinking start to become hard, "Anyway, Dudley was born three weeks before you were, he was such a beautiful baby, and Vernon loved him. He looked so proud holding him in his hands."

Petunias face twists into a rictus of hate, and her voice turns harsh, "Lily and that wastrel of a husband came round shortly after you were born, and she was so happy. Looking down at us plebs, as if marrying that drunkard gave her airs and graces. I sent her right out with a flea in her ear I did."

Surprised by the sudden shift in tone, Harry scoots to the end of the bed furthest from his aunt, just in case she decides to take it out on him.

The sudden jostling of the bed causes Petunia to pause, and her face relax again, as tears to start falling, "A year passed, and Lily… Lilly contact… contact… why can't I remember?"

Harry reaches out to touch his aunt when she starts staring into space, only to snatch his hand back when she starts talking again. "Then on the 1st November, I opened the door to bring in the milk, and there you were, sitting on the doorstep. You were in a basket, and wrapped in your blanket. Tucked in the side of the basket was a letter saying that… that…"

Petunia struggles to get the right words out, as she knows what she wants to say, but the wrong words keep coming to mind. Once more, Harry slowly reaches out to touch his aunt again, only this time she doesn't start talking again. Instead, she jumps, as though she'd forgotten he was there, and turns to look at him, "It's in the drawer with my tights, underneath the lining. Be a good boy and go and get it."

When Harry doesn't move, Petunia snaps, "Well, go on."

At the familiar tone of voice, that implies an or else, Harry scoots off the bed, and runs into his Aunt and Uncles room. It doesn't take him long to find the letter and return.

Before he gets back to the bed, Petunia sadly looks up, "Read it then, you deserve to know."

Pulling the chair out, Harry sits at the desk and carefully opens the letter.

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Mr and Mrs Dursley,



It is with great regret that I must inform you that your sister Lily and her husband James died during an attack on their home on the 31st of October. As you are the sole remaining family still alive, I have no choice but to leave their son, Harry, in your care. During the attack, the leader of the terrorists was killed signalling the end of the war.



While the means of his death is unknown, I can tell that your sister laid very powerful protections on Harry. I have extended these protections over your home and, for as long as Harry can call it home, you will be protected from any wizards that seek to harm you.



Obviously, I understand that an extra mouth to feed is not cheap. To that matter, James and Lily left details for Harry's caregivers to receive a stipend every month. If you would send a letter with your bank details to me at Hogwarts, I will arrange to have this money transferred to you.



Condolences



Albus Brian Percival Wilfric Dumbledore

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As he finishes reading, Harry turns around to where Petunia is still sitting, "What's a stipend?"

Rather than answer, Petunia collapses in hysterical laughter, driven by despair. Once she's recovered, she pushes herself back up, and dashes the tears from her eyes, "A stipend is a small amount of money used to cover someone's living expenses. If we'd have been able to get it, life might have been easier. But no! The stupid backwards arse world needs to use owls to deliver post. I sent letter after letter with different variations on the name and location, but they all came back unknown address. I even tried going through mum and dads files for the address. But they'd all been destroyed in the.. attack…"

Petunia's eyes unfocus as she starts to mumble, "Why couldn't I remember that? Why couldn't I remember the attack?..."

After a moment, she shakes her head, and seems to forget all about the letter, and last few minutes as she continues from finding Harry on the doorstep, "It was all good to start with, I was still breast feeding Dudders, so an extra mouth wasn't hard to adjust to. But it was when Dudders started teething that money became tight, and Vernon started to change. Oh, it was little things to start with, shouting at me to shut you up, or telling me to stop feeding you as he needed his breakfast before going to work. Then he started hitting me and shaking you. That's when I put you in the cupboard, you were all I had left of my sister, and I couldn't let him hurt you. So I hid you away."

Petunia inspects the back of her hands again, "It seemed to get better after that, but it got worse if he saw me caring for you. So I learned. Oh, how I learned. What set him off. How to set him off early. How to keep you hidden, and how to keep you quiet."

Quietly Harry asks, almost afraid of the answer, "Why didn't you leave?"

Petunia laughs bitterly, "I tried, oh how I tried. I got to a shelter on my own once. Another time I took Dudley with me."

Petunia glances up, and at Harry's confused look, says, "A shelter is a place where people that need help can go to live for a while."

Her eyes drop back to her hands, "But, whenever I took you with me, I forgot what I was doing, and things didn't seem so bad." She laughs humourlessly, "I even called social services, and with every visit, the social workers were very sympathetic while they were here, and agreed that the living situation was bad. But, as soon as they got back to the office, they all wrote glowing reports about our home. Last time I called them, they told me I was suffering from hysteria, and to see a doctor."

Looking through the small window, out over the forest, Petunia sits for a moment. Then she shakes her head and looks at Harry, "Now you know. I've tried to protect you. I sent you to do the gardening whenever Vernon's angry. Worked you so hard that you sleep soundly, and even belittled you so that Vernon doesn't think I'm playing favourites. I even went to far as to encourage him to spoil Dudley. But now the letters are coming, and it's going to start all over again." Petunia shakes her head, "They won't stop, they'll keep sending letters until we answer them, but we can't answer them."

After a moment, she looks up from her hands with a vulnerable expression and asks, "Can I hug you?"

Harry searches his aunt's face for a long time, trying to understand the emotion she's showing. Long enough that her expression drops, and she turns her head away. Just as she puts her hands down to stand up, Harry decides to take a chance, and says, "Please."

Petunia looks back up at Harry, hope in her eyes, and holds out her arms. When Harry crosses the room and climbs onto the bed beside her, she hugs him gently as they both cry. For time lost, and pain endured.

 

[Darkphoenixlady]

Chapter 3

Harry relaxes as the hug seems to go on forever. The only thing he can compare it to, is curling up in the corner of the cupboard, right under the stairs, where Vernon can't reach him. But this feels better. This is something he's wanted for years, and only ever seen Dudley or other children receive.

When the sun starts to shine through the window, Petunia stirs, and gently pulls away from Harry, "I'm sorry Harry, but I've got housework that I need to do before Vernon comes home."

Harry looks up at his aunt, as his basic intelligence is still there, and she's said enough to understand the end of the sentence, and the tensing of her hand as she said it.

Hesitantly, he asks, "Can I help?" Silently amending, 'Protect us from his anger'.

Petunia shakes her head, "No boy, not with this. But do you want to make us sandwiches while I make the tea. Then you can go out for the afternoon."

As he looks back up at her, he recognises the look on her face from the mirror, even if he can't put a name to it. "Sure… I think that would be nice."

As Harry starts to stand up, Petunia places her hand on his arm, "Harry. Before we go, we should put Lily's letter away somewhere safe. You can keep the other one too."

Harry turns back to the bed and picks up his mum's letter. As he's looking around the room for somewhere to hid them, Petunia sits down at his desk.

"Harry, you can put it behind the drawer in the desk here. There's a trick to it, so come here and I'll show you."

As Harry watches her, Petunia pulls the drawer most of the way out, and starts to feel around inside, "Vernon bought this for Dudley, and started to put it together. However, he gave up when he couldn't understand the instructions, and stormed off to the pub." Her eyes tighten at the memory while she continues, "I put it together while he was out, so that Dudley could use it. Ah, here it is. Put your hand in here, and feel for my hand."

Harry does that, and Petunia guides his hand to a cold metal catch, "This catch stops the drawer from coming out when you open it. Can you feel the lip there? If you pull that down with your thumb, you can then pull the drawer out with your other hand."

It takes Harry a few tries to get it, but once he does, Petunia gives him a broad, sad smile, "Well done. This drawer is only about ¾ the width of the desk, while the hole runs the full width of the desk. So you can put anything you want behind the drawer, and Dudley and Vernon won't be able to find it."

Together, they both put the letters in the back, before replacing the drawer.

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As Harry works beside Petunia in the kitchen, he's surprised to find himself smiling. When he glances at his aunt, while he's getting the beef from the fridge, she smiles back at him.

The two of them have just put the sandwiches, and Petunia's tea on the coffee table, when the sound of a key in the door draws both their attention.

At the same time Harry's shoulders and head hunches, he sees Petunia's face drop into the haughty expression she always wears. His jaw goes slack as he realises that they're both doing the same thing in different ways.

A moment later, Dudley walks in, and calls, "Hi Mum."

Petunia positively gushes, "Oh Dudleykins, I was just thinking about you, and had the boy make sandwiches."

Dudley walks forward, and pushes Harry out the way before he takes the sandwich, "Great, I'm starved. Cool, beef and mustard, my favourite."

Petunia snaps at Harry, "Boy! You've done all your chores; I don't want to see you hear until six, when you need to start dinner."

Years of conditioning has Harry grabbing his bag, shoes, and key, and bolting out of the door.

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As he sits on a low wall to put his shoes on, Harry tries to fit the hug in the bedroom into everything else he knows about his aunt. Standing up, he puts the key around his neck, and grabs his bag before heading off in a random direction.

As his thoughts wander, so to do his feet, and it's only when he trips over a stone in the park that he becomes aware of himself again. No closer to fitting those two aspects of his aunt together, Harry looks around for Dudley or his gang, before leaving the park towards the high street.

When he catches sight of the library, he grins. He has that book to finish reading. Setting off at a jog, he makes his way to the library and carefully cleans off his feet before going into the main library again.

As he opens the door, the Librarian looks up from her work and turns her stern gaze on him, "Good afternoon, I see you came back."

Nervously, Harry nods, "Would I be able to read that book again?"

The librarian pulls the book out from behind the counter and hands it to him, "You can use the same table as yesterday."

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Harry looks up with a start when a chair on the other side of the desk is pulled out with a slight scrape, that seems loud in the silence of the library.

Sitting down opposite him, the librarian asks, "What's the matter?"

Harry turns his eyes back to the book, "Nothing."

Gently the librarian says, "I know it's not nothing, as you've taken an hour to read three pages. Yesterday you were reading as though it was the most interesting book in the world."

Harry looks up at the clock above the library counter in surprise, "But. I mean, it wasn't." Harry looks back down to the book and mumbles, "It's my aunt, she… I shouldn't talk about it… It will only make it worse."

The librarian gives him a long, searching look, as he tries to read the same line he's been reading for the last five minutes. Giving herself a nod, she stands up and walks to the back of the library for a few minutes.

When she comes back, she places a small bundle of pamphlets on the desk beside Harry. The top most one is red, with ChildLine written in white across the top. "I know you don't want to talk about it. But these are for you. The phone number for ChildLine is a free phone number, so you can use any payphone for it if you want." [If you feel you need to call Childline because of your own situation, call 0800 1111 from any land line or mobile. If you're on O2, call 116 111 until they fix the problems with their systems]

As Harry slides the bundle into his bag, as though someone might take them away, the librarian puts a loosely bound hardback book, with a plain white cover. Printed in black on both the front and side is, 'A Family that Fights. Sharon Bernstein. Review copy only, not for sale.' [This is a real book aimed at children, and it is about domestic violence and how to spot it]

"This also came in last week. It's a pre-release copy of the book for review, I sometimes get them because of one of my degrees." Harry looks up at her questioningly, so the Librarian smiles, "I can't let you take it home, but maybe it would be something easier to read than a textbook on Buddhism. Then you could come back tomorrow after a good night's sleep, and continue reading about Buddhism."

Not having a better idea, Harry reluctantly puts the index card in the book on Buddhism, and opens the new book.

This book is much easier to read than the one on Buddhism, and Harry devours three chapters in the time it took him to read three pages. It's on the forth chapter that he has to stop, and discretely wipe his eyes, as the book describes a situation just like the one he experienced this morning. Swallowing hard, he pushes the feelings down, and continues to read in a slower, but much more focused way.

By the time the librarian's alarm goes to signal it's time to close up, Harry feels like he's been worked over more thoroughly than Dudley and his Gang have ever done. Even so, he desperately wants to finish the book.

Reluctantly, he allows the librarian to put the books behind the counter as he leaves. Knowing he's got over an hour to get home, Harry ducks into an alleyway between shops. Once there, he crouches down behind a bin, making sure not to get his clothes dirty, and lets himself express the emotions the book brought up.

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As Harry gets home, he can hear the sound of Dudley's game through the open window to Dudley's room. As his shoulders slump, he braces himself for whatever aunt Petunia will say to him.

Almost as soon as the door closes, Petunia shrill shriek fills the house, "It's about time you got here! Go upstairs and get cleaned up. Then start peeling potatoes."

Harry flees upstairs, and pushes open his door. Before he can close it, Dudley comes out of his own room and pushes the door to Harry's room open.

In a low voice, Dudley growls, "Ha! I knew it was you. I don't know where you've been hiding, but you know you're just making it worse for yourself. If we don't get to play Harry Hunting soon…" Dudley thumps his fist into his open hand, "And now you're in trouble with mum too."

With his threat given, Dudley turns around and walks back into his room to resume his game.

Swallowing hard, Harry closes the door and leans against it for a moment. Shaking his head, he pushes up from the door and puts his bag on the desk while he pulls the drawer out.

As he's putting the pamphlets at the back of the drawer runner, his hand brushes across something that wasn't there before. Curiously, he pulls the thing out, and gasps as he sees a MarsBar with a note attached to it.

Happy Birthday Harry, I'm going to take you shopping tomorrow.​

Tears start to form in his eyes, that he quickly dashes away, before returning the treat to its space behind the drawer, along with the pamphlets. With his treasures secured, Harry quickly washes up and rushes downstairs to the kitchen.

When he sees Petunia in there, he gives her a quick hug, and mouths 'Thank you' before they both start on dinner.

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At 6:30 on the dot, the sound of Vernon's car pulling onto the driveway floats through the living room windows. In the kitchen, both Harry and Petunia glance at each other worriedly. As their eyes meet, they widen in surprise, before they both go back to preparing dinner.

Harry violently flinches as the front door opens with a loud thump where it crashes into the wall, and Vernon storms into the house.

Leaving the briefcase by the door, Vernon throws his suit jacket over the banister, and marches through the dining room, into the kitchen. There, he reaches into the fridge and pulls out a can of beer. Staring at the can, he comes to a decision, and puts it back in the fridge and slams the door.

As he turns around, Harry has just enough time to put let go of the knife he's using, before Vernon roughly shoves him to one side and opens the cupboard. From the top shelf, he pulls out a bottle of scotch whiskey and grabs a glass tumbler from the bottom shelf.

Walking back to the dining room, Vernon sits in his chair, and pours himself half a glass of whiskey.

In the kitchen, Harry quickly returns to his task, and the two of them quickly and quietly finish cooking dinner.

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As Harry sits at the table eating his dinner, Vernon keeps drinking glass after glass of whiskey. Not even Dudley makes any sort of fuss, as everyone knows not to get Vernon's attention when he's like this.

Halfway through the meal, the silence is broken by Vernon slapping his hand on the table.

"How dare they. What does Steve have that I don't? I've been there longer, I've got more clients, I bring in more money, and they promote Steve to Senior Manager over me?"

Harry hides his wince when he sees Petunia flinch at Vernon's sudden outburst. As Vernon continues to eat, he'll occasionally slap the table again, and give another outburst. Each and every time, Petunia flinches. And each and every flinch hurts Harry as he knows just what she's afraid of now.

Once dessert has been eaten, Harry quietly clears the table while Vernon continues to drink in his seat. Neither Petunia, nor Dudley dare move from their seats as he starts to wash up.

While he's drying up the plates, Vernon pounds the table and roars unexpectedly. As Harry jumps in fright, a plate jumps out of the drying rack, and Harry scrambles to catch it. As he's reaching out to catch it, he catches sight of Petunia sitting ramrod straight beside Vernon, and just, doesn't close his hand.

As the plate crashes to the floor, Harry knows what's going to happen next, and he's already tensing himself when Vernon pushes the table away and storms over to him.

Harry doesn't even resist as Vernon grabs him by the back of his neck, and drags him into the living room. There, he is unceremoniously dumped across the back of the sofa.

As Vernon takes off his belt, Petunia and Dudley both walk into the living room, and stand there silently. Then Vernon folds the belt in half, raises his hand, and brings it down hard across Harry's backside.

As he builds up a rhythm, Vernon starts to shout, "Stupid fucking freak, break our fine china will you? Do you think we're made of money?"

The beating and diatribe continue in a similar vein until Vernon starts to get tired. Then his aim starts to slip, and the belt hits Harry's back and legs as often as it does his backside. Near the end, the buckle slips out of Vernon's grip, and catches Harry across the back, leaving a deep and bloody gouge where it passed.

That's when Vernon finally stops, "Off t' y'r room boy, an' don' get blo'd on t'e carpet."

Harry slips off the sofa, and holds himself up while the pins and needles leave is legs. As soon as he can walk, he grasps the sides of his t-shirt, and pulls it down so the fabric is pressed against the wound while he staggers upstairs on unsteady legs.

While he's doing that, Vernon sways and staggers round to his armchair, before falling into it and turning the TV on.

Once he's made it to his room, Harry pulls his blanket off the bed, and lies face down on the mattress, his face a mask of indifference.

There, he lays, his back burning with agony, while thoughts fly through his head. About what he just did, about the book he read earlier, and about the pain in his back.

The sounds of snoring soon reach Harry's ears through the floor, and he picks up the sound of the creaky stairs as Dudley makes his way to bed.

Some time later, he can hear Petunia shaking Vernon awake, "Vernon, Vernon, you need to come to bed as you have work in the morning… That's it, let's get you upstairs, come on."

As Petunia leads Vernon upstairs, Harry stuffs the corner of his blanket in his mouth so that he can't accidentally make a sound. It seems to take forever for Vernon to go through his nightly ablutions. But eventually Harry can hear his drunken snores through the walls.

Once he's sure that everyone's in bed, Harry takes his blanket and creeps back downstairs to his cupboard. Shutting himself in, he props himself up in the corner where he can hear anyone that comes downstairs.

 

[Darkphoenixlady]

Chapter 4

After a restless nights sleep, Harry's eyes snap open as he wakes up to the soft tread of his aunt walking down the stairs. At some point during his dreams, he decided that he has two aunts. The nice one, and the nasty one. As her footsteps reach the bottom of the stairs, Harry holds his breath, and waits silently to see which aunt is going to open the door.

As the door opens softly, Harry's heart tries to jump happily, but he clamps down on it. As she crouches down outside the cupboard, he tries not to smile.

Petunia turns the small light on in Harry's cupboard, and gives him a wan smile. "Why?"

Harry stops clamping down, and allows himself to smile sadly as he crawls out of his cupboard. Once he's close enough to Petunia, he reaches up and touches her eye, "Because I heal faster than you do."

Petunia gives him a soppy, sad, smile and opens her arms in a silent invitation. As he hugs her, she stands up with a grunt, and frowns at how light Harry is. Walking around to the sofa, she sits down with him sitting in her lap, and she starts to stroke his back. "Oh, you stupid boy. I'm supposed to protect you, even when it hurts, not the other way around."

When Harry flinches for the second time, Petunia runs her hand under his pyjama top and continues rubbing his back. The next flinch comes when her fingers cross a long scab.

Taking her hand off his back, Petunia softly says, "Go and get washed up. Then bring back the TCP and some cotton pads so I can clean up that wound."

As she watches Harry softly walk up the stairs, Petunia whispers, "I'm sorry I didn't remember sooner Lily, but now I do, I'm doing my best."

With practiced haste, Harry does his ablutions before stretching on tiptoe to take the TCP from the bathroom cupboard. It takes him a moment to find the cotton pads, as they're an item he's not usually allowed to touch.

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In the kitchen, Petunia puts the kettle on for tea before turning to Harry as he walks in with the TCP.

"Lean against the counter by the window, I need to get a good look at that wound."

Petunia winces as Harry silently leans where she asked him to. Gently, she pulls up the back of his t-shirt and looks at the angry red scab that runs across his back. Her eyes can't help but pick out the scars from similar wounds that went untreated, and they'd they're drawn to the faded yellow bruises that should be a vivid black.

"Harry, I need you to take your t-shirt off, as the wound is infected. Can you do…"

Petunia trails off as Harry just shucks off the t-shirt without a word.

As she rummages around in the drawer for a suitably blunt spoon, Petunia mutters, "I love you, you stupid, stupid boy."

From his position leaning against the counter, Harry smiles broadly, but otherwise pretends he didn't hear her.

With the spoon in hand, Petunia purses her lips as she looks at the scab, "I'm going to have to take the scab off to clean the wound. I'm sorry, but it's going to hurt."

Harry just nods as Petunia uses the edge of the spoon to pull most of the scab off in one clean pull. A couple more scrapes and pulls has the entire wound clear. As she watches, a yellowy red mixture of blood and pus well to the surface. Damping a cotton pad with TCP, she wipes off the wound until only red blood wells up as she presses the inflamed sides.

Once she's happy that the wound is completely clear, she soaks a pad in TCP and gives it one last gentle clean, and marvels at the fact it starts scabbing over almost immediately.

Gently, she touches Harry on the shoulder, "I'm all done, you can put your t-shirt on again now."

As Harry does that, Petunia makes a pot of tea, and pulls out the pot of honey, before carrying them through to the dining room, "Harry, could you bring a couple of mugs and the milk with you?"

Slightly surprised, Harry does as asked, and is surprised when Petunia puts two coasters out on the table. "Um, are you sure?"

Petunia nods, "I'm sure, as we should have about half an hour before we need to start breakfast."

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While Petunia is on the phone to Mrs Polkess, Vernon comes down the stairs almost athletically, and leans over to kiss her on the cheek, before making his way to the front door, and waiting for the post.

Harry is just putting the last of the toast and bacon on the table when Vernon walks through carrying four letters, and doesn't even say anything to Harry.

Harry tries to hide the amazement on his face a few minutes later, when Vernon carefully squeezes around the table to his chair. Then he leans over to Petunia and gives her a chaste kiss, "Good morning Poppet. Sorry about last night, yesterday was a hard day."

Petunia just smiles before she tucks into her small bowl of cereal. Even Dudley seems to be well behaved.

As Harry is almost ready to admit that he must have disappeared in the night, Petunia looks at Dudley. "Dudley, I need to get some new clothes today, as well as the food shopping for the weekend. So I've arranged with Mrs Polkiss that I'll walk you round at 10, while I take the boy with me to carry the bags."

Dudley's face immediately screws up, and he whines, "But mum! I wanted to play Sonic."

Placatingly Petunia offers, "You can still play Sonic until we leave."

Dudley's face starts to turn red, and his whine begins to become a shout, "But I wanted to finish the game today."

Vernon's low voice cuts through the conversation, "Dudley, listen to your mother. You've got all weekend to play Sonic, and you can play with Piers at his house too."

Dudley's eyes widen as he remembers Piers has a console too, "Can we go earlier please mum?"

Petunia shakes her head, "The housework still needs to be done, and I need to get ready to go out."

As Dudley starts to sulk, Petunia turns to Vernon, "While we're out, I was also going to get the boy's things for Stonewall. Would you be able to take Dudley out tomorrow? For his own uniform, and maybe you could also explain the purpose of each bit while you're doing it."

Vernon just smiles sweetly, "Anything for you Pet."

A few minutes later, Harry masks his confusion by clearing the table.

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Once they've dropped Dudley off at the Polkiss', Petunia takes Harry to a café on the High Street.

"Can I have a pot of tea, Harry, is there anything you want?"

Harry looks up at Petunia with wide, blank eyes, and then looks at the menu in surprise before looking back at Petunia, "I don't know, I'm sorry."

Petunia gives Harry a brief one-handed hug, "Can we also have a coke float please?"

The cashier smiles, "That will be £2.30 please."

Petunia takes a few coins out of her purse, before pocketing the change. "Come on Harry, they'll bring the drinks over."

Harry looks around as he follows Petunia to a table by a wall. As he sits down he asks, "What's going on?"

Petunia looks down at her hands, "I'm treating you for your birthday. It's something I should have done a long time before this."

Harry gapes at her, before shaking his head, "No, I mean you're the nice aunt today…" His mouth snaps shut, as he realises he might be pushing his luck.

Instead, Petunia reaches out and takes his hand, "Is this about this morning?"

As the cashier brings the drinks over, Petunia lets go of Harry's hand briefly to take the drinks off the tray with a smile.

Once they're alone again, Petunia sighs, "It's because of last night. Normally, I'd give you and Dudley some medicine to help you sleep with a mug of hot milk. But last night you broke that plate. He always does this occasionally, has a 'bad day' at work. Comes home to drink, and then takes it out on someone." Petunia's eyes go distant with remembered pain, "If I'm lucky, he'll get violent before we go to bed. Then the next morning, he's like the man I married, sweetness and light, and so very apologetic. Then he buys me flowers on the way home from work."

Harry's face blanches as his most treasured memories are tarnished with that information, and he blurts, "But you're the good aunt today."

Petunia puts her hand on Harry's, and she smiles, "It's easy to be the good aunt when you're not in pain. Once you went to bed, Vernon fell asleep in his chair. I'm glad it wasn't me for once, but never do that again. It's my job to protect you and Dudley, not your job to protect me. I haven't done a very good job so far, but I'm going to try and do better."

Harry shakes his head, "I don't understand…"

Petunia interrupts, "It's ok, you're only 11, you're not supposed to understand yet. One day you'll have children of your own, and then you'll understand. Lets get off this subject, as it's supposed to be a day where I treat you. I brought something I wanted to show you."

Confused, Harry sits back and takes a sip of his drink through a straw.

Petunia reaches into her handbag and pulls out a large brown envelope with 'Do not bend' printed on it in red letters. Taking a sip of her tea, she reaches in and pulls out a bundle of papers and cards.

Taking the top card she turns it to face Harry, "This is your first ever report card. I was so proud of you when we received it in the post. I even made your favourite dinner." She swallows hard before she continues, as she starts to choke up, "Then you came in with Dudley, and I remember pulling out his report card. I wanted to tell him how disappointed I was in him, but instead I got so angry with you." Taking a napkin from the holder she carefully dabs her eyes, "I don't know why, but suddenly the fact that you'd scored higher was an affront to me… I thought it was insulting. I'm sorry for taking it out on you, I don't know why I did it. All I know is that something broke in me yesterday when I saw you so terrified in the cupboard yesterday, and I remembered."

Petunia takes another sip of tea to help calm herself, "What I'm trying to say, is that when you go to Hogwarts. That's the school that Lily went to, I want you to do your best. Not for me, Christ knows I don't deserve it after everything I've done to you, but for your mother. For my sister, Lily. She always excelled at everything she did, and I want you to too, for her."

When Harry just stares at his report card with an unreadable expression, Petunia shakes her head to clear it. "I know that you're not going to Stonewall. But we still need to buy you clothes so Vernon doesn't get suspicious. So we're going to buy you some new clothes to wear to school. But you have to promise that you won't try them on until after you've left for school."

Harry looks up from his report card as everything sinks in. It's clear that this isn't the same aunt that he had last week, but she's still there occasionally. Glancing back at the card, he look up at Petunia, "I promise auntie, I won't try on the clothes so that Aunt Petunia doesn't come back."

Petunia feels as though she's just had the most wonderful massage when Harry calls her auntie. Though it's quashed when he adds the rest.

Shaking her head, Petunia smiles at Harry, "I hope that side of me doesn't come back too." She glances up at the clock, "It's almost lunchtime, so I think we should go to BHS once we've finished out drinks, and then grab some lunch, we can do the food shopping on the way home this afternoon. How does fish and chips sound for lunch."

Harry can't help it, his mouth drops open in surprise, as his eyes widen in cautious desire. Then his aunt starts laughing, a clear laugh that sounds happy, rather than the barking laugh she normally uses. Looking around wildly, harry tries to see if there's any cameras around, like the ones they use in 'Beadle's About'.

Petunia puts her hand on Harry's arm again, "It's ok, this isn't some sort of joke. I'm not setting you up for anything."

Harry can't help it, he turns back to her and asks, "What's going on? Why are you so different?"

Petunia shakes her head, "I don't know. I know it doesn't help you much, but it's all I've got. As I said before, it happened yesterday morning, you were terrified and you handed me the letter from your mum, and it was like something inside me snapped, and. I don't know, I feel freer than I have in years. I know I've not been a good parent to you for years and, whatever the reason, that's something that I'm going to need to live with for the rest of my life. But now that I'm free, I'm going to do my best to do right by you, for as long as it lasts. I can't promise it will last, but while it does, will you promise to do your best as well? Now, is there anything else you'd like to do this afternoon?"

Harry stares into space as he tries to process everything while Petunia finishes her tea. As she's standing up, he squeaks out, "Could we go to the library?"

Petunia sits back down, and Harry grabs his now melted float, and sucks for all his worth, "Sure, we can do that straight after lunch. But if we're there for long, we won't be home in time to make dinner. That will mean I have to go out to eat with Vernon and Dudley. Is that alright?"

Harry hums and nods around his straw.

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As the two of them are walking to BHS, Harry looks up at his aunt, "Could it be depression?"

Petunia looks down, "Could what be depression?"

"The reason you're so different. It was in a book I was reading yesterday about families like ours, that fight. It said that some people that are abused often suffer from it. It also said that they can have P… T… something."

Petunia shakes her head, "Sorry, I don't know, it could be. Your mother would have probably known, as she was always the reader in the family. Do you like reading? Is that why you wanted to go to the library?"

Harry looks down at the floor, "I don't know. I went to the library to learn about meditation, cause I don't want to disappear. The librarian was nice and helped me with the complicated bits, so I went back again yesterday. Then she gave me a book about families that fight and leaflets for ChildLine."

Fearing the answer, Petunia asks, "What do you like?"

Harry hesitates before he answers, "I, don't know, cooking maybe?"

Putting her hand on Harry's shoulder in a comforting gesture, Petunia sighs as she realises just how badly they'd raised Harry. Looking at the store ahead of them, she softly says, "Come on, let's get you some new clothes."

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With two baskets full of t-shirts, jumpers, two pairs of shoes, socks, shorts, and trousers, Petunia and Harry head towards the checkout.

Just as they're about to enter the queue, Petunia spots some stuffed toys in the children's section. As she walks away from the counter, Harry looks confused and follows her.

"Auntie, I thought we had everything."

Petunia reaches to the top shelf of the stuffed toys, and picks up a stuffed fox, before handing it to harry and crouching down.

"I just saw this, and it reminded me of your mother. It was the last time she came home to mum and dad's before she got married. I remember she was so excited that she'd finally learnt this new skill she dragged me up to our room. Once we had some privacy, she wedged a chair under the door handle, smiled at me, and promptly turned into a fox with the greenest eyes you've ever seen. Her fur was a slightly darker red than this, but she was a fox. I screamed when she changed, and she collapsed on the floor laughing. Until then, I didn't even know foxes could roll on the floor laughing. I just thought that maybe you'd like it?"

Harry stares at the fox in wonder, and clutches it tightly to his chest. His mother could turn into a fox. Belatedly, he realises that it was a question, and nods eagerly.

Petunia holds her hand out with a smile, "You'll need to give it back to me so that we can pay for it, then it will need to stay in the bag until you leave. After all, we don't want Dudley or your Uncle to find it, do we. Do you think you can do that?"

Reluctantly, Harry hands over the fox, and Petunia puts it into a basket. As they head back to the checkout, Harry dashes his tears away with his sleeve.

After a half hour wait for the bank to authorise Petunia's debit card, the two of them get to the fish and chip shop, and Harry is allowed to order what he wants from the children's menu.

 

[Darkphoenixlady]

Chapter 5

Emboldened by his morning, as soon as the library comes into view, Harry grabs Petunia's hand and hurries as fast as he can to the doors.

As they pass through the outer doors, Harry carefully wipes his feet, and waits for Petunia to do the same. Then he rushes into main library and stops eagerly at the counter.

The librarian looks up in surprise, as the bubbly child in front of her is barely recognisable to the downtrodden child that has visited the last couple of days. When an adult follows him in, her eyes narrow slightly.

Harry interrupts the librarian's inspection, "Hi! This is my auntie Petunia. She's the nice one. I'm sorry I never got your name, but this is the librarian auntie."

The librarian's eyes lose their suspicious cast, and she puts on a smile, "Hi, I'm Karen, are you ok?"

Petunia hesitates before answering, "I'm doing ok, I think."

Karen nods sceptically, "Let me get his book out, and I'll be right with you."

Karen pulls the book from behind the front counter, and hands it to Harry. As soon as he's got hold of it, he runs off to his desk, and starts reading it.

Once Karen's sure Harry's occupied, she pulls out her review copy of 'A family that fights', "Look, I don't know what's going on in your home life, but I do know that either you or Harry are being abused by his reaction to this book. Now, I'd report it, but I don't know where you live."

Petunia slumps against the counter as her legs threaten to give way. In a defeated voice she says, "Yes, we both are. Something happened yesterday, and I think it knocked something loose. I…I pretended to be someone I'm not because it stopped him from taking it out on the boy. On Harry. I got stuck in that role for a long time, and, and I think I might have hurt Harry more than if I hadn't."

Karen looks at Petunia for a long moment, before looking at Harry and how happy he seems today. With a nod, she goes over to a display of pamphlets and takes two from the stand. "I don't know anything about that. But Harry seems to be happy with you. We do carry leaflets for local services that could help you." She slides the pamphlets across the counter, "This one is for a support group and counselling service, and it's a no questions asked service. This one is for the local shelter. You don't have to do anything with them now, but please keep it in mind."

Petunia looks extremely uncomfortable as she slides the pamphlets into her handbag, "Thanks. Um. Listen, could I get Harry a library card?"

Karen smiles supportively at Petunia's change of subject, "Sure, let me get the forms."

The two of them spend the next few minutes filling out the forms, and at the end of it, Petunia is the proud owner of a library card in Harry's name.

As Petunia turns the card over in her hands, she glances at the book Harry's reading, and then up at the clock, "Would we be able to borrow that book Harry's reading?"

Karen shakes her head apologetically, "Sorry, but that's a reference book. We can reserve them for people, but they aren't allowed to leave the library."

"Do you have any other books on meditation?"

Karen shakes her head, "I don't think so, but I'll double check."

While Karen is looking at the card catalogue, Petunia slides Harry's library card in front of Harry's book, and watches amused as Harry doesn't even notice.

Returning to the counter, she waits while Karen finishes her search.

Karen checks a few books out for a customer, and then returns to Petunia, "No, sorry, we don't have any other books on meditation, or that might contain meditation exercises. There might be some in the main library in Guildford though." As Petunia's face drops Karen adds, "We do have a new video lending service though. There's a selection of Open University videos on the display that you could look through. Why is he so interested in meditation anyway?"

Petunia's surprised at how smoothly she lies when she says, "He heard that it helped clarity of thought, and calmness, and decided it would help him at his new school."

Karen just smiles, and nods knowingly.

In order to escape that look Petunia walks over to the video section on the opposite side of the library, in clear view of the front desk, and starts to flick through them. Most of them seem to be for popular films from a few years ago. Walking around to the other side, Petunia finds the section for educational videos and starts to look through them.

After a few minutes she finds a couple that look promising, the first one is an introduction to religions, and the blurb on the back says it has a section on Buddhism. The second one is completely dedicated to Buddhism. Picking up the empty cases, she carries both of them back to the front desk.

Once Karen has dealt with a customer bringing a stack of books back, Petunia pushes the videos over, "Can we check these out please?"

Karen nods, "Sure, you'll need to leave a £5 deposit, that you can get back at any time, as long as there are no videos outstanding."

Petunia checks the money in her purse, and purses her lips. It would make food shopping a bit tight, but she could do a midweek shop next week when they return the videos.

With a final nod, she takes out a five pound note and hands it over before grabbing the library card from Harry's desk, where it has remained untouched, "Here you go."

Karen smiles, "Thank you, you need to return the videos by Friday next week, or come in to renew the loan."

Petunia nods and puts the video's in her handbag. Walking over to Harry's desk, she touches him on the shoulder and winces as he jumps violently, "Harry, we need to go sweetheart, otherwise we'll be late home."

Reluctantly, Harry marks his place and hands the book back to Karen, "Thank you for letting me read here."

Karen smiles, "You are always welcome here. We also have a children's library if you're ever interested in looking, it's through the first door on the left as you go through that door."

Harry shakes his head, "I couldn't go in there, um, I just couldn't."

Karen walks around the counter and crouches down, "If you did want to go in there, you could find a book you wanted to read and then come back in here. But only if you tell the librarian that's what you're doing."

Harry nods doubtfully, before following after Petunia as she leaves.

In the entrance room, Petunia turns round with the library card, "Harry, I've got this for you. It will allow you to borrow up to seven books from the library to bring home. I want you to use it if you find anything you want to read in your room."

Harry takes the card and turns it over. His eyes widen in surprise when he sees his name and address written on one side, "Auntie, are you sure?"

Petunia nods, "I'm sure. I also found a couple of videos on Buddhism, and I thought we might watch them together in the mornings." With an unusual vulnerability in her face and voice, she continues, "I wondered if you'd also like to practice meditating together too."

Harry looks up from his card and nods, "I think I'd like that."

Petunia smiles, "Well, put the card somewhere safe in your bag, so that you can't 'lose' it. Then we need to go."

Harry quickly slips the card into the lining between the back and the inside, and puts the bag back over his shoulders.

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By the time they've got home with Dudley, Petunia's mask is back in place. As he trails behind the two of them under the load of all the bags, Harry muses that he much prefers the other aunt, than the one in front of him.

As she opens the front door, Petunia turns back to Harry, "Leave the food here and put your uniform away. Be quick about it, as you still need to help me put the food away."

Harry ducks his head at her tone, and answers, "Yes Aunt Petunia."

Without any further prodding, Harry puts the Bejam bags down, and runs up the stairs with the clothes bags. The bag that contains Petunias clothes, he hangs on the door knob to their bedroom before he heads into his room and closes the door.

Tugging open his drawer in the chest of drawers, Harry carefully folds his new clothes and pushes them behind all of his older clothes. When he gets to the bottom of the last bag, he lifts out his fox reverently, before giving it a hug, and squeezing it in the back of the drawer with the rest of his new clothes. At the bottom of the bag, where the fox was, Harry finds a pre-packaged sandwich and a bag of salted crisps. Swallowing hard, as tears come to his eyes again, he pulls out his desk drawer, and carefully rearranges everything so that the sandwich and crisps won't be squashed when he puts the drawer back.

As the drawer clicks back into place, Harry realises how much time he's spent putting things away, and rushes downstairs to the kitchen to help with the unpacking.

As he arrives, he can see that Dudley has already 'helped' with the unpacking, as all the bags are in the kitchen, and Dudley has found a pack of chocolate bars, and opened them in the kitchen.

Together, Harry and Petunia both finish putting the food away just as Vernon's car pulls up on the driveway.

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As the front door clicks open, Petunia grabs a washcloth and quickly rubs the chocolate from Dudley's face. Throwing the cloth into the sink, she wipes her hands on her apron and walks out to greet Vernon.

In the living room, Vernon presents Petunia with a bouquet of Petunias, Tulips, and Roses, despite the fact that tulips are out of season.

As she takes the flowers, Vernon leans forward and kisses her on the cheek, "These are for you my pet."

Petunia looks down at the flowers and almost throws up. Instead, she makes a happy sound, "Aww, they're beautiful. Boy! Put these into water, I'll deal with them in the morning." As she blindly holds them out, Harry takes them from her hand, and she caresses Vernon's cheek, "Vernon Honey, we've only just got home. So how about we take Dudley to Beefeater and have a meal out?"

Vernon smiles broadly, "That sounds like a grand idea." Turning to Harry he snaps viciously, "Boy! Head up to your room, we're going out for dinner. Because you made your aunt late, you can go without."

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As the rest of the household get ready to leave, Harry sullenly walks up the stairs to his room. As he opens his door, he remembers the sandwich and stuff that Petunia gave him.

Slumping on his bed, he buries his head in his hands while he tries to think. Is this auntie Petunia trying to protect him again? Did she know this would happen? What was it she said at lunchtime?

When he can't come up with any good answers, Harry pulls the sandwich out from behind his drawer, and slowly munches on it for dinner. He almost eats the crisps and chocolate bar too, but he stops himself as he recalls other nights he's been sent to his cupboard without food.

Once he's finished the sandwich, Harry carefully makes his way downstairs without turning on any of the lights, just in case his Relatives come home early, and buries the empty package under the rubbish in the bin.

That done, he returns to his room just as carefully, and closes the door with a relieved sigh.

Not daring to touch the toy pile, and with nothing else to do, Harry sits on the bed and tries to meditate without much success.

After a while, he's forced to give up, as his mind just keeps wandering from subject to subject, and his mother's letter said not to use a technique that focuses on breathing.

As he looks around the room with so much stuff, and so little he can do, Harry wishes he was still in his cupboard, where it wasn't so busy.

It's not much later when the sound of the car pulling up on the driveway catches his attention. The sound of it subtly wrong for Vernon. Now fully alert again, Harry strains his ears for the sound of anything.

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Tiredly, Petunia pushes the driver's seat of Vernon's car back, and gets out of the car. Walking around to the passenger door, she pulls it open and takes Vernon's hand.

"Come on Vernon, let's get you inside."

Vernon tugs his hand back and slurs, "I'm fine pet, I know you don't like to drive, so I'll get us home."

Petunia tugs his hand again, "No Vernon, we're already home, see. You just need to get out of the car."

Vernon looks at the house owlishly, "That's home? How did we get home? There better not have been any freakish stuff going on."

As Vernon undoes his seatbelt, and falls out of the car, Petunia puts her shoulder under his arm and starts to lead him to the front door, "No freakishness, I drove us home, and you fell asleep in the car. Just turn around, just a little more, that's right, now this way."

With her spare hand, Petunia holds out the keys, "Dudley, can you lock the car and get the front door please?"

Dudley takes the keys and turns back to the car, "Yes mum."

Vernon pulls his own keys out of his pocket, "Don't worry, I can get us in."

With a tired sigh, Petunia calls to Dudley, "Can you grab your father's keys and wallet from the floor too."

Dudley grabs both, and Petunia pretends not to notice him taking a £20 note from the wallet, and putting it in his pocket.

While she's steadying Vernon through the front door, Dudley thunders up the stairs, and she hears him slam Harry's door open.

"You better watch out freak, Dad said that we're getting my uniform tomorrow, and it includes a beating stick. He said that he's going to show me how to use it, and that I can practice using it on you."

Petunia's heart drops at that dire threat, and she starts to wrack her brain for a way for Harry to avoid that fate. Unfortunately, Vernon's drunken bulk quickly pulls her attention back to the hear and now.

Petunia frantically tugs on Vernon's arm as he lurches towards the sofa while undoing his fly, "Vernon, no! That's the sofa, the toilet is upstairs, come on, it's not far."

Fortunately, either Vernon listens, or he gives way to the tugging, and she manages to get him onto the stairs. Slowly, one step at a time, she manages to get Vernon up the stairs and into the toilet.

When he sits down on the toilet without taking his pants down, she lets out a despairing sigh, and grabs an old nappy bag from the cupboard, and manhandles the soiled underwear off of Vernon while he continues obliviously. When he lurches to his feet, and leans heavily against her, petunia peers around his bulk to make sure there's nothing solid in the toilet.

Heaving another sigh of relief, she struggles to guide Vernon into the bedroom, and undress him before he collapses onto his side of the bed.

Looking at the clothes on the floor, Petunia walks out of the room, and carefully opens Harry's door. When she sees him staring sightlessly at the doorway, she glances back to her bedroom nervously.

Once she's sure that Vernon's not going to move, walks through Harry's room and kisses him on the forehead, "Good night sweetheart. Sleep well."

As she leaves, she turns the light off before returning to her own room. There, she picks up Vernon's clothes and softly walks out, shutting the door behind her. From the bathroom she gets the nappy bag and flushes the toilet, before going down to the kitchen.

As she's putting the washing in the washing machine, on a quiet wash, she pretends not to notice Harry coming downstairs and slipping into the cupboard under the stairs. Instead, she cries silent tears at the fact she seems to be so good at pretending not to notice things, and waits for a while so that Harry can go to sleep.

 

[Darkphoenixlady]

Trigger warning: abuse, for the last half of this chapter.

Chapter 6

The next morning, Harry's eyes flick open at the soft sound of Petunia walking down the stairs. Slightly confused about what he's feeling, he opens his arms and is surprised when his fox falls into his lap. Remembering what auntie said about not taking the fox out, Harry panics and quickly wraps it up in his blanket.

As Petunia reaches the bottom of the stairs, Harry crawls out of his cupboard with his blanket wrapped bundle, and hurries to the stairs. Just before he passes his auntie, he pauses, and impulsively gives her a quick hug, before softly running upstairs.

Petunia smiles at Harry's retreating back, and pretends not to notice the tail of the fox hanging out of the blanket.

Shaking her head she walks into the kitchen muttering, "When am I going to stop pretending not to notice? When am I going to be the mother both boys need?"

Petunia is just moving the clean clothes from the washing machine to the tumble dryer when she hears the toilet flush, and Harry comes back downstairs.

As Harry walks into the kitchen, Petunia looks up, "Harry, could you dust and polish the pictures and furniture, and I'll mop the floor in here. He won't wake up till around nine, as it's Saturday."

Harry nods silently, and grabs a couple of dusters and the jar of polish.

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Harry is perched, nervously, on the edge of the sofa next to Petunia as they both enjoy a cup of tea in the living room. He can't help himself, as he turns to look at the stairs and front door when another car drives past, as prior to his birthday, he's never been allowed to sit on the living room furniture unless it was absolutely unavoidable because they had 'guests' round. When the toilet flushes upstairs, Harry jumps from the sofa and quickly takes his cup into the kitchen.

Behind him, Petunia looks into her teacup and sniffs sadly, once, before pushing herself off of the sofa and joining Harry to begin breakfast.

Once she enters the kitchen, Petunia glances up at the clock with a frown, Vernon should still be asleep after last night.

The two of them are almost done with breakfast, when the reason for Vernon's early rising becomes apparent with the sound of multiple letters being pushed through the front door.

While Harry is laying out the crockery and cutlery for breakfast, Vernon storms through the dining room with a bundle of letters at thick as one of Vernon's wrists.

As he passes, Vernon takes a swing at Harry, "Out of the way you, stupid freak, it's your fault there are so many letters."

Harry shies away from the fist, and it only clips the top of his hair, rather than sending him, and the bowls his holding, flying. While Vernon is burning the letters, Harry quickly places the rest of the crockery before retreating to the Kitchen.

As Harry looks at her with pleading eyes, Petunia steps away from the frying pan, and allows Harry to take over while she gets the cereal and milk from the fridge.

As the smell of smoke wafts into the house, Dudley comes thundering down the stairs and takes his seat at the table. Putting on her Aunt Petunia persona, Petunia takes her seat opposite Dudley, and sits patiently for Vernon to come in.

Almost as if he timed it, Harry pauses in the door to the kitchen, holding the plates of bacon and eggs, as Vernon stalks past with a dirty look. Once Vernon's sat down, Harry puts the plates on the table, and Petunia's sharp eye spots a single burnt corner of bacon.

While Harry is fetching the toast, Petunia spears the bacon and holds it up, "Boy! What have I said about burning the bacon?"

Harry quails as he brings the toast in, "I'm sorry aunt Petunia, it won't happen again."

Petunia frowns, "That's not good enough, no breakfast for you. Now get into the back garden and start weeding. Maybe that will teach you not to burn the food."

As Harry scarpers for the garden, Petunia places the bacon on her plate, along with a single slice of toast, and an egg. Across the table, Dudley looks at Harry's retreating back with a sneer.

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Despite taking her time, Petunia has finished the washing up and cleaning up after breakfast well before Dudley and Vernon leave for Guildford. All the while she's holding onto her haughty expression while her heart breaks as she watches Harry through the kitchen window.

Half an hour after Vernon and Dudley have left, Petunia makes a cheese and pickle sandwich, before taking it into the garden with one of the cans of coke that are usually reserved for Dudley.

"Harry," she calls softly, "you can stop now, they've gone."

When Harry doesn't seem to hear her, Petunia calls out louder, "Harry, you can stop now, they've gone. I've brought you a sandwich and a drink."

Harry leans back on his heels and looks at Petunia, tear tracks visible down his face. With the slightest hint of anger in his voice, he asks, "Why? Why me?"

Petunia shakes her head, "I don't know. I wish I did, but if I ever did, I don't remember it now. Here, you can eat it out here, or you can wash up and eat inside."

Harry looks torn at both options, before saying, "Could I have half now please?"

Petunia smiles, "Of course. Would you like the other half while we're watching the videos from the library?"

Harry's eyes widen comically, "But the sofa?"

Petunia smiles, "You can't be messier than Dudley, and his mess comes off the leather easily enough."

As Petunia holds the plate out towards Harry, he has to fight not to snatch the sandwich and gobble it down. Instead, it's merely eaten quickly.

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A few hours later, Harry is sat comfortably on the sofa cuddling one of the cushions while the credits of the second video roll to the sound of Indian music and a view of a temple. Thoughts of how comfortable the chair is along with the videos they've just watched are running through his head. Even if there was only a small segment in the second video that spoke about the different ways Buddhists meditate.

In her own chair, Petunia looks over at Harry, "Would you like to practice meditating with me in the mornings, before the other two get up I mean."

When Harry doesn't answer, she speaks a little louder, "Harry." And a bit more loudly, and sharper, "Harry!?"

Harry throws the cushion on the sofa as he throws himself off the sofa in surprise as Petunia calling his name pulls him out of his thoughts. Looking around wildly, his eyes settle on Petunia's face as he tries to work out if she's upset with him.

Instead, Petunia asks, "Are you ok?"

Reflexively Harry answers, "I'm fine."

Petunia nods, "Ok. I was just wondering if you'd like to practice meditating with me in the mornings? Before the other two wake up."

Harry shakes his head, "It's ok, I don't want to bother you. I can do it in my room."

Petunia hides her disappointment, and instead explains, "I'm asking because it's something I'd like to do with you. I couldn't share it with your mum, so I'd like to share it with you."

Harry looks at her with a confused expression, and he answers, "Uh, ok?" Though his tone of voice suggests he doesn't understand why she'd want to.

Petunia starts to cry at another reminder of how badly she's failed Harry. After a couple of sniffs, she squares her shoulders, "Right, we still have the chores to do. Harry, could you get the sheets from the bed and I'll put them on to wash while you're getting the clean bedding out. Then I'll help you put the clean sheets back on the bed. After that, we can work on the front garden together."

Harry sighs as he trudges upstairs and brings the first lot of sheets down, before going up and getting the rest of the sheets. He's half way through making Dudley's bed when Petunia comes into Dudley's room, and takes other side of the top sheet, and helps him lay it out evenly.

As he starts to tuck the corners in at the bottom of the bed, Petunia says, "Wait, watch me."

Harry watches in surprise as Petunia goes step by step through how to fold the corners the way she wants them. As he tries to fold them the same way, she nods, "Close, you need to get the side pulled tighter around the end before you tuck it in, that way it's harder for it to be pulled untucked, meaning it will stay made longer."

As Harry tries it again he asks, "Should I do this with the bottom sheet too?"

Petunia nods, "Not for yours and Dudley's sheets, as they're fitted sheets, but for the guest room and our room you should."

"Auntie, why are you helping me?"

Petunia smiles at him,

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It's mid-afternoon when the whole day comes crashing down around their ears. Petunia and Harry are both kneeling in the front garden weeding the flower beds together as they quietly chat about their favourite plants, and share gardening tips.

Another car goes past the house, and even though the sound of the engine slows down, and stops Petunia pays it no mind as it seems like all of their neighbours have decided to go out today.

As the door to Vernon's car slams shut, Petunia immediately starts to berate Harry for making her come out to make sure he's doing the weeding properly. However, she knows, and by the set of Harry's shoulder, he knows too, that it's far too late for this. As she stands up and walks into the house, leaving Harry to do the weeding himself, Vernon shouts at Harry.

"Boy, grab the bags from the boot, and make sure you don't get any dirt on them."

Numbly, Harry gets up and wipes his hands off on his t-shirt. Almost robotically, he walks to the boot of the car, not even noticing as Dudley leans in and sneers, "You're in for it now freak."

Once he's wiped his feet off, and carried the bags inside, Vernon closes the front door behind him, "Boy! Put the bags down, and wait in the back garden." In a reasonable voice he then says, "Dudley, take your school stuff up to your room, and bring your stick back down."

Head down, Harry trudges into the garden, and stares at the sky while he tries to bury his feelings again. When Vernon and Dudley come out, Harry is still struggling to achieve this.

"Now Dudley, you need to be very careful with a stick like this. If you use too much force, you could break bones or even kill someone. That's something that will get the police involved, and at that point there's nothing I could do to help you. Instead, you need to learn how to strike to incapacitate your opponent. If you strike the back of the knee like this, it doesn't matter how large they are, they'll collapses to the floor just like that."

As Harry collapses to the floor as his knee gives way, his jaw clenches, and he's back in that mindset from before his birthday, and he seems to float outside his body while Vernon shows Dudley how to work someone over without leaving a mark.

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At dinner time, Petunia takes a mouthful of the mash she made, and makes a face, and dashes Harry's fork from his hand. "Boy! My mash is lumpy, what have I told you about undercooking the potatoes! For that, you'll get no dinner. Now off to your room, and don't let me hear a peep out of you."

Her heart sinks as she watches Harry limp from the table out of the dining room. It sinks even further as she hears his footsteps climbing the stairs.

Vernon doesn't seem to notice, or care, as he chats amiably with Dudley about their day out together.

After dinner Vernon sits on the sofa with Dudley, instead while the three of them watch the Saturday evening film on ITV, even though it doesn't finish till after 9pm, well after Dudley's bedtime.

When the film ends, Vernon sends Dudley up to bed with a playful swat, "Come on you, it's past your bedtime."

Petunia and Vernon both stay in their respective seats while the news is read out. As the News finishes, and the next film starts, Vernon pats the sofa beside him, "Come on pet, come and sit next to me."

Petunia's eyes widen in fear, and she shakes her head mutely.

Vernon's eyes narrow, and he growls, "I said, come and sit next to me!"

Meekly, Petunia stands up and shuffles over to sit on the sofa. As she sits down, she buries her hands in her skirts to hide how much they're shaking.

Vernon leers at Petunia before hooking one arm around her waist and pulling her to sit right next to him. There they sit, the picture of a romantic couple until the first advert break.

Once she's stopped shivering, Vernon lifts his arm over her head, and places his hand on her knee. As she tries to shuffle over, his hand tightens on her knee and he growls, "I thought we agreed that we wanted nothing to do with the freak. And that we would only do what we needed to do to prevent social services from stopping by."

Mutely, Petunia shakes her head.

Vernon squeezes the joint harder, "Didn't we."

Petunia squeals, "Vernon, you're hurting me."

Vernon squeezes even harder, "Didn't we!"

Petunia squeezes her eyes shut as the words are forced from her mouth by the pain, "Yes Vernon."

Vernon lets up on the pressure, though he doesn't let go of her knee, "See, it doesn't look like you remembered. I think I need to give you another lesson tonight, and I'll show you why, 'It's not muggle baiting when you're defending your family' doesn't wash. Do you understand?"

Petunia nods desperately, "Yes Vernon. I understand."

Vernon shakes his head, "No, I don't think you do." Leaning forward, he grabs the remote and turns the TV off, "I think it's time that I showed you."

Swiftly, he lets go of Petunia's knee, and grabs her hair in a strong grip. Then he pushes himself to his feet, and drags her upstairs, heedless of her screams and cries.

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In his bedroom, Harry wakes up when Vernon comes upstairs, and shivers in his bed when his aunt starts to scream. Softly climbing out of bed, he walks to his clothes drawer, and pulls the fox out as a shield before curling up under his blanket, and eventually falling into a nightmare filled sleep.

 

[Darkphoenixlady]

Chapter 7

Harry wakes up abruptly and looks around wildly as the pre-dawn light streams under the curtain in his bedroom. Panicking, Harry thrashes around in his bed until his brain catches up, and he realises that he's in his new bed. Mt Dudley is faintly visible in the early morning light, even without his glasses.

Patting around the bed, Harry eventually finds his glasses on the floor, and looks around the room cautiously for anything that might have woken him up.

When his eyes settle on the desk, the empty crisp and mars wrappers stare at him accusingly. Shivering from the unfamiliar amount of space, Harry gathers his fox and blanket, before carefully scrunching up the wrappers. As the sound of the wrappers seems so loud in his ears, Harry freezes for a moment to check if anyone heard him. When there's no angry shouts from outside, he silently moves to the door and slowly turns the knob until it won't go any further.

As he opens the door, he freezes again at the faint sound of muffled sobbing coming from downstairs. Alarmed, he looks between his aunt's bedroom, and the stairs, and almost closes the door again. Instead, as he turns his head, the ears of the fox brushes his chin, and he looks down at it.

Turning back to the doorway, Harry gently releases the inside handle before reversing the process outside, and closing the door with only the faintest 'click' as the latch seats itself. Carefully, he makes his way downstairs until he can see that it's his auntie sitting on the sofa.

Moving a little more quickly, he looks at the pile of tissues on the floor in dismay. As he walks quietly to the end of the sofa, his stomach drops when Petunia doesn't respond to his movement, even though she's moving, and clearly crying.

Softly he says, "Aunt Petunia, are you ok?"

When she doesn't respond, he walks to the front of the sofa in front of her, "Auntie, are you ok?"

When she gives no sign that she's even heard him, Harry looks at the plushie that he's hugging tightly. Placing his blanket on the coffee table, with the wrappers, he turns back and gently pushes the fox into her lap.

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Petunia's crying on the sofa after she woke up after a short sleep, and everything ached. When she went to the toilet, the blood from both wipes tells her just why she hurts there. That's when she put a pair of knickers and a pad on under her nightdress and went downstairs to cry it out. She's not sure how long she's been there, but the feeling of something fuzzy on her hand makes her pay attention to her surroundings.

Standing in front of her is Harry, and, as she looks down, he's trying to give her his fox. As she looks back up, he hesitantly asks, "Can I hug you?"

Not trusting her voice at the moment, she just nods and drops her current tissue over the side of the sofa, before pulling another one from the box in her lap.

When he clambers onto the sofa, she raises her arm and he shuffles in underneath it. When his arm lands on her belly rather than her breast, she smiles at how much nicer Harry's hugs are compared to Vernon's. Gently, she kisses him on the top of the head and hugs both him and the fox.

After a few minutes she starts to feel pleasantly warm, and Harry's breathing starts to even out.

For a moment, Petunia debates sending Harry back to bed. Ultimately, she decides that he needs the hug as much as she does. With a sad smile she gently takes his glasses off and reaches out with her leg to snag his blanket from the table. Folding the glasses neatly, she places them into the tissue box for safe keeping, then drapes the blanket over Harry's shoulders.

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A couple of hours later, Petunia wakes up as the morning sun streams over the house across the street, and through the front window onto her face.

Blearily she looks around as she tries to work out why she's downstairs, and so comfortable. As she spots Harry sleeping against her side, she smiles at his hair. How could she have ever resented his presence in the house.

Leaning her head back against the sofa, Petunia allows herself to bask in the sense of peace she's feeling, even as the clock on the wall ticks towards six am.

As the clock turns six, Petunia gently shakes Harry until he wakes up.

"Good morning sleepy."

Harry looks up at Petunia owlishly, "Huh?"

Reaching into the tissue box, Petunia removes the glasses and puts them into Harry's hands, "It's morning, so I'm afraid we have to move."

Once Harry's put his glasses on, he looks around the living room in surprise. Then the events of yesterday come back in a rush, and his eyes snap back to Petunia's, "Auntie, are you ok?"

Petunia ruffles his hair, "Hey, we're both still alive, and that's what counts right?"

As Harry sits up, he mulls her answer over for a moment, before he nods, "We are."

Petunia gently takes Harry's hand, "Harry, thank you for coming to find me earlier. It really helped."

Harry shakes his head, "Thank fox, if it wasn't for her I'd have gone back to bed."

Petunia smile, and lifts the fox up, "Thank you for persuading Harry to come and find me earlier. I really needed the company, and I even got some decent sleep."

Harry smiles at his aunt, "You mean that?"

Petunia looks back at Harry, "Yes Harry, I do."

Harry nods and says in a small voice, "I think I needed it too."

Petunia smiles again, "I think we both did. Now you should go and get washed up. Then we can do the breakfast prep before we practice meditating. Is that ok?"

Harry nods enthusiastically and grabs his blanket. As he's heading for the stairs, Petunia holds up Fox and softly calls, "Harry, don't forget Fox."

Harry turns round and grabs Fox in a hug as he heads upstairs.

Working together, it only takes them a few minutes to lay the table and get the pans out for a Full English breakfast, with scrambled eggs rather than fried.

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With the prep done, Petunia grabs the egg timer from the kitchen counter on the way into the living room. Then, with Harry's help, she moves the coffee table right up against the TV.

"Harry, it's quarter past 6 now, I'm going to set the timer for 45 minutes. That way we can put everything back before Vernon has ever woken up. Is that ok?"

Harry nods, and sits on the floor.

As Petunia sits opposite Harry, she glances at the ceiling for a moment, "Lily's letter said we shouldn't use a meditation that focuses on breathing. You're doing this to find your magic, so maybe we should be focusing on that. Looking inside us for something. Does that make sense?"

Harry looks at the floor, "Um, I've just been trying not to think."

Petunia smiles at Harry, "Hey, we're doing this together, so it's not the end of the world if we don't get it right. Once they finally get bored of sending letters, I'm sure someone will be along to take you shopping. When they do, you can see if you can find something on that other thing Lily mentioned."

"Occlumency."

"Yes, that. But it seems to me that if you're looking for something, you don't just stare at the wall. You look around carefully to see if you can see it somewhere."

Excitedly, Harry adds, "Like when we were looking for weeds, and we had to ignore the flowers yesterday?"

Petunia nods, "Shh, not so loud. Yes, let's try it like that, and our thoughts are the flowers."

Harry smiles and tries to settle down. When he closes his eyes, Petunia does the same and tries to look past her thoughts to find something that's beneath or behind them.

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When the egg timer goes off, both Harry and Petunia jump. As, despite opening their eyes several times when it felt like they'd been doing it for ages, they both still had moments where they were able to focus on their task, or got lost in a thought or memory.

The two of them stand up, though Petunia uses the coffee table as a support, and her joints creak and click as she does. Wordlessly, they both move the coffee table back into the dimples it's worn into the carpet.

As she stands up again, Petunia yawns, "Oh god, that was harder than I expected it to be."

Harry nods, "I kept getting distracted by different thoughts."

Petunia nods in agreement, "Me too. I'm going to do myself a mug of tea, would you like one?"

Harry smiles shyly, "Could I have some lemon in mine?"

Petunia considers it for a moment before shaking her head, "Not today, as we don't have any lemon. But we could buy the ingredients for pancakes when we take the videos back, and save half a lemon for teas after that."

Harry smiles, "That sounds good. I'd still like some tea if that's ok, as I like drinking tea with you."

Petunia reaches out and ruffles Harry's hair playfully, "I like drinking tea with you too. I know your no longer at school, but why don't you grab one of your school books, and we can start going through the problems together. I was serious when I said I want you to do your best."

Harry gives Petunia a shy smile as he softly heads back upstairs to get a book from the chest of drawers in his room.

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Once they hear Vernon moving around upstairs, Petunia puts Harry's school book into the cupboard under the stairs while Harry goes into the kitchen to get started on breakfast.

With the two of them working together, the cooked breakfast is ready just as Vernon comes down the stairs. Together, the two of them slip their masks on and Petunia heads to the table while Harry starts to bring the different dishes out.

Vernon intercepts Petunia with a broad smile and sweeps her into his arms to give her a kiss on the lips. "Good morning poppet. It looks like you've outdone yourself this morning. And do you want to know what's even better about today?"

Petunia shakes her head, "No?"

Vernon escorts Petunia to the table, "It's Sunday. What's so good about Sunday? There's no post."

Harry has just finished bringing the food through when Dudley joins them at the table.

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Around halfway through breakfast Vernon is planning the day, "It looks like it's going to be a lovely day pet, how about I take you and Dudley down to Brighton…"

Vernon trails off when there's a sudden clatter at the front door. As he abruptly stands up, pushing his chair over in the process, dozens of letters pour though the letterbox, leaving a small pile against the door.

When he reaches the dining room door, Vernon's face goes bright red, and a vein visibly starts to pulse in his head. With an audible growl, he storms to the front door and grabs an armful of letters and carries them through the dining room, into the garden, and to the incinerator by the shed.

On his third trip, Harry stands up to help and Vernon rounds on him, his fist lashing out to catch the boy around the cheek. Leaning down, he bodily picks Harry up and forces him down onto the seat. "Sit there and don't move. I'm going to burn all of these bloody letters, and then we are going to have a perfectly normal day where absolutely nothing freakish is going to happen. Do you understand?"

Harry can only nod, as his jaw hurts too much to talk for the moment.

As Vernon continues to troop backwards and forwards, and the smell of burning parchment fills the air, even Dudley starts to look at his father warily.

As soon as Vernon stops coming back in from the garden, Dudley mumbles, "I'm just going to see is Piers is around." Before running out of the front door.

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During dinner, Harry looks at the glass of beer that Vernon poured himself while they were cooking. When he's sent for a second, and then a third can, Harry comes to a decision.

Once dessert has been had, and Harry is cleaning up the crockery, he reaches out a touch too fast and 'accidentally' knocks Vernon's glass. Not enough to spill it, but enough that, on a good day, he'd get a cuff round the ear.

Instead, Vernon growls and pulls him into the living room, where he has to suffer through the belt while Vernon exhausts himself.

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On Monday, Petunia finds Harry in his cupboard at first light, and they both sleep on the sofa until dawn. As with Sunday, they do the prep for breakfast, before meditating for the remaining time. This sets their early morning routine for the rest of the week.

During breakfast, there's a clatter at the door as a couple of letters drop through. Standing up from the table, Vernon walks comfortably to the door, and he hasn't got past the sofa when a deluge of letters starts to come through the letterbox, like snow in a blizzard, and piles up in the porch area until it's nearly knee deep.

That day, Vernon goes to work and books the rest of the month off as holiday. On his way home he buys some wood and screws to nail the letter box shut.

That evening, Petunia sends Harry to bed before he can do something 'stupid'. Petunia then proceeds to do something 'stupid' when she 'slips' on one of Vernon's cans, and drops the can she's holding into his crotch.

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On Tuesday, the letters appear inside the fresh eggs.

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On Wednesday, Vernon wakes up 20 minutes early, and watches Harry cooking breakfast. Then the letters slip out of the orange juice carton that was opened that morning.

Later that day, Petunia leaves on her own to buy more beer and food. At the same time, she returns the videos, and buys the ingredients to make pancakes for dessert.

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On Thursday, Vernon opens his morning paper, that he picked up from the step, and there's two or three letters between each page.

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On Friday, they're eating breakfast, and they hear a rumble from the boarded-up fireplace in the living room. As Vernon gets to the dining room door to inspect it, the plasterboard blocking the flue gives way and collapses onto the small electric fire as a cloud of dust and letters force their way into the living room.

With a roar of rage, Vernon turns back to the dining room, "Everyone, pack a bag, we're leaving!" Pointing at Harry he visibly shakes, "And you, don't you dare touch anything. Even better, once you've packed your bag, go and sit in the car!"

Silently, Harry goes upstairs and pulls his drawer out. Mournfully, he looks at Fox as she lies at the back of the drawer. Picking her up, he gives her a hug while he's holding his backpack, before finally deciding that she can't come with him.

"I'm sorry Fox, but if I bring you with me Dudley or Vernon will find you. Then you'll either be taken from me, or destroyed."

Kissing the plushie on the head the same way Petunia does for him in the mornings, he pushes the plushie back into the drawer before stuffing his clothes into his bag.

As he makes his way downstairs, blinking tears from his eyes, Vernon smirks as he imagines it's because Harry won't get anymore letters.

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Petunia makes her way upstairs and into the guest room, where they keep their suitcases on top of the wardrobe. As she comes out with a suitcase, she spots Dudley leaving his room with a bag full of toys.

With a sigh, she says "Dudley, did you want to take some games with you? Just in case it's a long drive."

Dudley looks down at the action figure he's holding, before rushing back into his bedroom to pick up his game boy. A moment later he stuffs a couple of handfuls of game cartridges into his pockets before running downstairs to put his bag and cartridges in the car.

After packing clothes for both Vernon and herself, along with the hygiene essentials and a handful of nappy sacks. Petunia pulls down a small suitcase, and packs a bag of clothes for Dudley.

Finally, she looks at the book case in Harry's room that's full of books they bought for Dudley, before deciding on a puzzle book that's never been touched, as well as the copies of Dune and Amtrack wars that Vernon bought Dudley because of the covers.

As she puts each suitcase at the top of the stairs, Vernon climbs the stairs to grab it, and takes it to the car where Dudley is already absorbed in the Gameboy.

Lastly, she heads to the kitchen, and makes a thermos of tea, as well as picking up the pack of coke and what's left of the sweets. After doing one last check around the house, Petunia finally walks out to the car while Vernon locks the front door.

When she spots Dudley playing on the Gameboy, she turns back to Vernon, "We need the plug for Dudley's Gameboy, and more batteries too."

Vernon walks up to her, and kisses her on the forehead, "There's no electricity where we're going. But I'll buy batteries when we stop for petrol."

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Several hours later, Vernon swears as the radio reports a crash on the M4 bridge into Wales. Seeing a sign for the A46, he snaps at Petunia, "Petunia, I'm taking the A46, grab the map and find a way to the M5."

When she doesn't respond immediately, he grabs her knee and squeezes, until she squeals.

Petunia jerks awake with a scream as Vernon squeezes her knee. As the pressure leaves her knee, Vernon says, "Petunia, I'm taking the A46, grab the map and find a way to the M5."

Blearily, she reaches for the map under the chair. "I thought we were going to your brother's lodge."

Vernon growls, but does nothing as she opens the map, "We are, but there's an accident on the M4 bridge, so the already bad holiday traffic is just going to get unbearable."

They're off the motorway by the time Petunia has found the route, "You want to stay on the A46 until you reach the A4135, Then we follow that through Dursley…"

From the back seat, Dudley looks up from his game, "Dursley, that's our name."

Petunia calls back, "I know Dudley, it's also the name of this town."

"Dad! Can we look around Dursley please…?"

Vernon glances in the rear-view mirror, "I don't see why not, there's no way they could expect us to stop here."

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An hour later, Harry finds himself 'watching' the room in a Bed and Breakfast in Dursley while the others walk around the historical town.

Of course, this is a family suite with its own bathroom, and a separate bedroom for Dudley. Harry's own room is in the attic, and it's a dinky space with a single bed under the window. Honestly, he'd prefer to be up there than down here, as you can see the forest from his room.

While he's waiting, he decides to practice meditating for a while.

By the time the others get back, Harry has started reading one of the books that were left in the room. A book called Flatland, and seems like it was placed there because of the plain hardback cover. Inside the book is a little card that says it can be bought for £1.50 and all proceeds go to a local charity.

He's so engrossed in the book that he doesn't register the door opening until Vernon rips it out of his hands. "Where did you get this?"

Harry shrinks into the chair and points to the shelf, "It was on the shelf there."

Vernon looks at the shelf, and the other books on there, before growling, but otherwise subsiding. "Very well. It's time for your bedtime. Here's your key."

Carefully, Harry gets out of the chair, making sure to keep out of arms reach of Vernon. As he's getting to the door, Petunia calls out. "Boy! Don't forget your toiletries, I will be checking to make sure you've bathed in the morning."

That's when Harry notices that they have multiple Sainsbury's bags with them. Taking the offered bag, he's surprised at how heavy it is, but says nothing.

As he gets into his room, he opens the bag to find a new toothbrush, toothpaste, a flannel as well as a rolled-up comic, sandwich, and a drink. On the back of the receipt is a note from Petunia.

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The next morning, Harry wake up with the sun, and looks around a little confused about where he is. Once he remembers, he looks out of the window with a smile on his face.

As he can't hear anyone else, Harry slips out to the bathroom, which is separate from the toilet, locks the door, and has a sinfully long shower. Well, sinfully long for him anyway. That done, he carefully packs his bag, placing the comic at the bottom, and his toiletries above it in the bag.

With his ablutions done, Harry heads down to the small sitting room so his Relatives don't have to find him. There, he tries to meditate sitting in one of the chairs. Something he only manages to succeed at for a short while, before he dozes off.

This is where Petunia finds him shortly before the owner of the B&B starts setting up the dining room.

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Petunia smiles down at Harry sleeping in the armchair, his shoes kicked off in front of the chair. It's clear that someone put a blanket over him after he fell asleep.

With a smile, she puts the book she's holding into the bottom of his backpack, before taking the small card inside to the dining room.

As she walks through the doorway, the woman who checked them in walks out of the kitchen, "Sorry, we don't start serving breakfast until seven."

Petunia smiles, "I know, my nephew was reading this last night, so I figured I'd buy it for him."

The woman takes the slip, "Flatland eh. I haven't read that one. That'll be £1.50. Which one's the nephew?"

Petunia nods to the living room as she hands over the money, "Harry, he's asleep in your living room."

The woman gives her a critical look, before she notices the swollen eye under the makeup, "If'n you want, there's a shelter just down the way. I can tell your man that I gave you directions to the station if you want."

Petunia touches her eye self-consciously, before taking a mirror out of her handbag to double check the makeup.

The woman puts her hand on Petunia's arm, "Don't. You did a good job. The shelter I mentioned, that's the charity we give the proceeds to. Course, it's really only a halfway house. The main shelter's in Gloucester, and a minibus does a run once a week, especially at this time of year. They'll get two or three new people a week, as the smaller places round here slip a card into their handbags."

Petunia looks back towards Harry, "I wish I could. I really do. But I've gone down this road before and someone always drags me home if I take him. That scar is just too distinctive, and I can't leave him alone with him."

The woman nods understandingly, "Have you considered having it removed?"

Petunia shakes her head, "Vernon would never hear of it, and arranging that sort of thing takes time and money I never had."

"Look, I still have a lot of prep to do, so if you want a cup of tea I can do you one. And you can lean against the kitchen door, or take it into the sitting room."

Petunia smiles, "Tea sounds nice. Is there anything I can do to help?"

The woman shrugs, "Conversation would be nice, gets a mite lonely this time of the morning."

So, Petunia leans against the kitchen door and talks. Before long, she's talking about her life at home, and how she got lost in her role until they found a letter from her sister. As she starts to cry, the woman hands her a napkin, and tells her that she's not the first, and unlikely to be the last, woman to do that.

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At seven on the dot, Petunia walks into the sitting room and gently shakes Harry awake. As he comes to full alertness in seconds, he thrashes around in the blanket until he realises that it's Petunia.

"What? How? How long was I asleep?"

Petunia smiles at Harry, "It's now seven. Come on, lets get you some breakfast before the other two come down."

Obediently, Harry slips his shoes on, then folds the blanket before following Petunia past the check-in desk, where a man is now sitting, into the dining room.

The woman that's running the kitchen comes out with a smile and a menu, "Hello sleepy. You must have really needed it, as you didn't even stir when I put the blanket on you."

Harry shakes his head, "I never sleep that deeply."

The woman slips the menu in front of him, "Ah, but ya ain't at home now are ya. And, them wastes of space weren't around neither. So you felt safe. Anyway, what would you like for breakfast?"

Harry looks down the menu, then up at Petunia, "Um, are you sure?"

The woman smiles, "Don't look to your aunt, the food there is covered by your room. So you can eat anything you want."

Harry looks back down, and first of all he thinks about a Full English, but then he remembers all the times he's cooked it himself. In the end, he looks up, "Um, would I be able to have the porridge and the fresh fruit salad with honey."

The woman smiles, "Would you like the fruit on top of the porridge?"

Harry looks over his shoulder at the door, before nodding shyly.

"Hey kid, why don't you come and sit in the kitchen and keep me company. If your relatives come down, I'll tell them I've got you washing up. How does that sound?"

Harry nods enthusiastically, "I can wash up."

The woman gently guides Harry to a stool that's out of sight of the dining room, "Now, there won't be any talk of washing up. You're a paying guest, so you get treated the same as any other guest. I've got a granddaughter your age, and she sits right there where you are whenever she comes to stay."

Petunia smiles sadly at the doorway, before walking back into the sitting room. With Harry's key.

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While they're eating breakfast, Vernon and Petunia both look up when the man from the desk walks in holding a familiar looking letter. As he walks around the tables checking the key fobs, Vernon's face gets redder and redder.

When he reaches their table, he sees Harry's key and says, "Good morning, the postman just delivered this for the young man that was staying in room 34."

Vernon puts on his salesman smile as he looks up, "That's my nephew. I'll make sure he gets it."

The man nods and puts the letter on the table before going back to the desk.

As soon as he's out of sight, Vernon yanks it off the table, and proceeds to shred it into so much confetti. Then he hisses at Petunia, "Where is the boy?"

Petunia looks behind her, "The woman that runs the place said something about washing up."

Vernon sits back with a grumble, "Well, I suppose that gives us time to enjoy our bloody breakfast, as it's clear we can't stay here."

Petunia just nods, and goes back to eating her fruit salad to the background noise of Dudley's Gameboy game.

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As soon as Harry has 'finished washing up' Vernon bundles the entire family back into the car, and sets off in a frenzy. After around half an hour, they pull over into a Tesco petrol station in Gloucester while Vernon fills the car up with petrol and bins the letters.

When he comes back to the car, he has two packs of mini cigars in one hand, and a crate of beer in the other.

Worriedly, Petunia says, "Vernon, you promised you'd never smoke again."

Vernon shouts back, "Shut up! I bet you planned that, sending us through Dursley because you knew Dudley would be interested. Just so they boy could get his letter."

Petunia crowds against the door, "I didn't Vernon, I promise, I just picked the easiest route to the M5."

Vernon puts his hand in Petunia's abdomen as he leans over to pull the map out from under the passenger chair. Then he finds the route they took and flips over a few pages, "I knew it, I knew it. We could have got to the M5 much quicker. But you took us up the long way."

Petunia shakes her head, "I didn't Vernon. Please, you have to believe me."

Vernon sneers, "If we get post tomorrow, I'll believe you. Until then, I'm keeping the map as I can't trust you."

After a long and gruelling drive around the Riven Seven, and across Wales. A tired and grumpy family finally pull over at a layby near where lake Rhyd-Ddu should be. Though it's hard to tell, as there's only the faintest sliver of moonlight to see by.

Vernon turns on the overhead light and looks at the map, and then at the hills that are only just visible around them. Swearing loudly, he gets out of the car and looks around for a few minutes before poking his head back in, "We're here. I have no idea where driveway to the boat house is, but I can see the lake and the island. Boy, grab the camping bag, and don't let it drag on the floor. Pet, grab the sleeping bags. Dudley and I will have the torches."

As he get's out the car, Harry puts his backpack over both shoulders. Then he walks around to the boot of the car and stares in horror at the large canvas bag that could fit him comfortably. At the same time Vernon pushes down on his back as he reaches past, and takes a gas lantern from the inner corner of the boot. As Harry is trapped between Vernon's bulk and the canvas bag, Vernon turns a knob on the lantern and then uses a cigarette lighter to ignite it. As Harry flinches at the woof of flame, he laughs cruelly and picks up a flashlight that looks like it could do double duty as a police truncheon. A minute later, Harry's got his breath back, and heaves the bag out of the boot.

After a few tries, he manages to get the shoulder strap over his head, and stand up. As he's doing that, Petunia wordlessly leans in and grabs the two sleeping bags.

That's when Vernon closes and locks the car, and suddenly their only illumination is the pale crescent moon, and the light from the gas lamp.

As his eyes adjust, Harry is able to see that the sky is still slightly blue, and the hills surrounding them are outlined like giant shadows cut out of cardboard. In the distance, he can see the glittering reflection of the moon on a lake. In the centre of the lake is an inky black silhouette of an island. While he can just about see the straight lines of a building in Vernon's direction.

Then Dudley switches on his torch and shines it in Harry's eyes.

Harry can't help it, he screams in pain, and staggers to one side with a metallic clatter.

Vernon looks back, "Boy, if you drop that bag, you will feel my belt when we get to the cabin."

Harry gasps out a, "Yes Uncle Vernon, and slowly starts to follow after Vernon."

Slowly, Harry picks his way across the uneven field as the rest of the group get further and further ahead of him. Initially, his aunt started to hang back, but a growl from Vernon put paid to that.

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Harry staggers into the single room stone cabin as Vernon is talking to Dudley, "…chemical toilet around the back if you have to go in the night. Otherwise the boat house has changing rooms with toilets."

Vernon turns at the sound of the door swinging shut, "Boy! Put the bag down in that corner by the table. Pet, would you do the honours and prepare our beds?"

With visibly shaking hands, Petunia takes a couple of mats from a shelf and unrolls them on the floor. Then she unpacks a double sleeping bag, and a single sleeping bag.

While she's doing that, Vernon hangs the torch on a hook by the door, before turning the key and locking it.

Harry swallows hard as he watches this, and he looks around the cabin for where he's going to sleep. Because of this, Vernon catches him off guard and roughly shoves him into the corner on the other side of the door to the table.

"That's your corner boy. I better not hear a peep out of you, otherwise you'll be sleeping outside. It's supposed to rain later."

Shivering, Harry sinks down into the corner and takes his backpack off.

One by one, the other three silently get into their sleeping bags. Then Vernon turns the lamp off, and plunges the cabin into darkness.

Harry sits there, staring into the darkness, well after Vernon's started snoring.

Suddenly, it's morning and Vernon is stalking towards him, holding the torch like a club.

Harry doesn't even hesitate, he scrambles out of the corner and yanks open the door. He's barely got five paces outside, before he hears the roar of Dudley and his gang running towards him.

Desperately, he sprints away from them, but he's not fast enough, and they catch up and grab him from behind.

 

[Darkphoenixlady]

Chapter 8

Petunia wakes up shortly after they've all gone to sleep. She lays there for a couple of seconds as she tries to work out what woke her.

A thump from the corner drawers her attention, when a mewling sound comes from the same corner, her heart leaps into her mouth. With a level of panic to her motions, she wriggles her arm out of the sleeping bag, and starts pulling the zip down. An activity that is hindered by Vernon's bulk squeezing her against the edge of the sleeping bag.

After almost a minute, the zip finally gives way, and she spills out of the sleeping bag with a sigh of relief. Carefully she pulls her legs free, even though she knows it would take far more than an accidental kick to wake Vernon.

Now free of her confinement, she turns over onto her hands and knees and crawls forward in the pitch-black room towards the sound Harry's making.

Shaking him gently, she whispers, "Harry, wake up, you're having a nightmare."

When that doesn't work, she taps him gently on the face. With none of the normal methods working, Petunia moves so that she's sitting against the wall, before bodily pulling Harry into her lap and resting her chin on his head.

As she does the faint green glow of her watch catches her attention, and she watches with morbid fascination as it ticks over to 1:22 [note BST is one hour ahead of GMT/UTC, which reflects solar time. Additionally, solar noon/midnight is later or earlier the further you get west or east of 0 degrees east.]

As she breathes a sigh of relief, the room starts to brighten. At first she assumes that the moon has just come out from behind the clouds. But as the light continues to grow, she can see it coming through the walls. Incongruously, a large bolder appears sitting where Vernon's head should be. A fact that forces a hysterical giggle from her mouth. Slowly the wall behind her begins to feel less and less solid, pulling her out of her laughter.

Pushing herself upright, she looks around more seriously, and starts to sing a lullaby that she used to sing to both the boys.

Once the last of the walls disappear, she looks around fearfully, while keeping her voice steady. Behind her, the moon hangs heavily full in the sky, clearly illuminating the desolate landscape she's sitting in. As the faint silhouettes of trees starts to appear, movement from a rock draws her attention. There, a six-legged lizard scampers onto Vernon's head, well the rock that took its place.

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She's not sure if she's imagining it, but as the trees become more solid, they seem to be doing so faster than the walls disappeared. Soon enough, the clear moonlight is replaced by darkness, lit only by the faintest hints of moon light that comes through the canopy. As her eyes adjust to the darkness, she looks around in wonder as fireflies and luminescent fungi give the forest a soft, otherworldly look.

Suddenly, her nightdress becomes soaked with water, as it stops feeling like she's sitting on stone, and instead, she's sitting on moss.

A hooting monkey runs across the forest floor in front of her, though it seems to have a beak rather than a snout. Chasing after it is what seems to be a common house cat.

While she continues to sing, the sounds of the forest come alive around her as the animals and wildlife decide it's not a threat.

She's almost disappointed when the faintest hint of white appears along the floor, and moonlight once again starts to illuminate the area.

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As the new landscape becomes clearly visible, Petunia's singing dies on her lips. In front of her, about 50 yards away, is a large shaggy white bear with a spiral horn protruding from its nose.

Beyond the bear is a deserted tundra with ice and snow covered rocks dotting the landscape. The scant vegetation only shadows against the moonlit snow.

Suddenly, the feeling of damp moss disappears, to be replaced with a bone chilling cold. A few seconds later, the last of the forest disappears, only to be replaced by the shadows of the next world.

However, that is poor comfort for Petunia, as she can't help but squeeze Harry harder as she begins to shiver. As she does, he lets out a piteous whimper in his sleep, and tries to thrash around.

In front of her, the bear turns in their direction and sniffs the air. As it's horn locks onto the two of them, it starts to lumber towards them, and the ungainly movement quickly turns into a rapid run.

Screwing her eyes shut, Petunia stifles a scream in Harry's hair and waits for death to find them.

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Once she can feel her damp skirt dry out, Petunia opens her eyes once more, and begins to sing again, a song that fades in intensity as her eyes widen in wonder.

All over both herself and Harry, streamers of wispy light float in the air. As she watches, a bird with tentacles instead of a beak launches itself from a tree with blue, paper like, bark, and latches onto one of the wispy lights, and flies off with it. As it does, her head rocks back as she remembers Lily walking into the living room when she made a mistake with dinner, and Vernon was beating her.

A couple more birds fly down and snag their own streamers from both of them even while the trees seem to smoothly become a denser forest.

A memory of standing as the maid of honour at Lily's wedding is quickly replaced by one of Vernon being repeatedly hit with stinging hexes while he's held on the floor with a body bind jinx.

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One of the birds that's pulling a streamer from Harry's head squarks as another bird flies through Petunia's head, and the wispy streamers seem to solidify in visibility, and become part of a general aura that surrounds both of them.

As her eyes follow the bird as it flies off with a squealing howl, to land on one of the new trees. A feeling of something climbing on her hand causes her to look down. As she lifts her hand, she sees that a small marsupial, with tentacles instead of a mouth, is deftly holding on. Its large soulful eyes look at her for a moment, until a loud screech fills the air, and it jumps from her hand, to her shoulder, and finally buries itself under the hair at the base of her head.

At the same time, Petunia's gaze snaps to the source of the noise, and watches as a large raptor swoops down on another marsupial. The event having an even more surreal property given it's happening while they're transitioning to another world. Leaving it looking ghostly and translucent.

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As the next world passes in a bare few seconds, Petunia's attention is split as a ghostly lily flower starts to form around both herself and Harry. At the same time streams of light flow through the sky, like rivulets of water running down a window.

Petunia can't even bring herself to speak as the rivulets fill out into streams, and then rivers. At the same time, Harry starts to calm down and their progress almost comes to a halt.

Petunia shivers in fear as she watches one of her fingernail's dissolves into motes of light, and the flower around them shines brilliantly.

The flower, and the world around them is starting to fade away when Harry wakes up briefly. He looks around for a moment and says, "Pretty" before looking up at Petunia and kissing her on the chin.

Before Harry's eyes close once more he says, "I love you auntie."

As his eyes close, Petunia starts to cry softly as the world becomes more solid again. Abruptly, Harry's breathing falls into a deep and restful sleep, and Petunia feels like the world has been pulled out from underneath her, even though she hasn't moved. The flickering of the different worlds going past faster than she can make them out.

Suddenly, they come to a stop in the pitch-black cabin. As she sits there staring into darkness, a flash of light illuminates the room followed by a roll of thunder a few seconds later.

As she lets the tension out of her body, and leans against the wall. Petunia falls into a restful sleep while the marsupial on her neck munches on the magic surrounding her head.

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As the late summer sun fills the cabin, Petunia wakes up with a contented yawn. Her sleep filled with dreams of spending time with Lily and James, and promising that if anything happened, they would be welcome at her house.

As she's smiling at the dream, the memory of what happened a mere week before they died drives itself through her brain, and how she seems to have become a parody of herself when she turns Lily away in the middle of the night with harsh words and invectives. As she doubles over on the floor as she tries to drive heave. A sharp pain in her forehead causes her eyes to fly open as she lets out a squeak of pain. Lying on its back in front of her is the cutest little marsupial with tentacles instead of a mouth. Tentacles that seem to be chewing on something delicious. As she watches it, the memories of last night come crashing back.

Behind her, Harry wakes up to the sound of a pained sound. Lying motionless, he listens to the room before he opens his eyes. All he can hear are the deep snores coming from both Dudley and Vernon.

Suddenly someone jerks behind him, and he quickly rolls over and puts his back against the other wall, his heart beating a rapid tattoo in his ears. As a Petunia shaped blur turns over at his rapid movement, he thinks he sees something climbing over her shoulder.

As he opens his mouth to say something, Petunia softly says, "Shh, you're safe, we're safe."

At the sound of her voice, Harry lets out a long breath he didn't even know he was holding. As he opens his mouth again, Petunia uses a large motion to point to Vernon, and he closes it again with a snap.

Harry stays silent as Petunia looks around for Harry's glasses, before finding them under his backpack. Taking his hand, she places them on his palm.

While Harry's cautiously looking around the cabin, Petunia softly gets to her feet and walks over to the door before picking up her shoes.

As she stands up, Harry nods in understanding before picking up his own trainers.

Slowly, she turns the key in the lock, and winces at the seemingly loud Ch-thunk as the bolt springs back. As she opens the door, Vernon snuffles in his sleep and they both freeze until his snores even out again.

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On the small stone patio outside, they both lean against the cabin as they put their shoes on. The morning sun chasing the chill from the night off.

As Harry finishes first, he walks a few meters away from the cabin, and stops to just look around.

In front of the cabin is the lake, with a short, grassy incline that leads to a muddy bank. Around 20 yards away from the bank are the ruins of an old stone wall cutting off access to the rest of the lake, except for a narrow channel halfway across the wall. As his eyes follow the wall, he first spots the boat house Vernon was complaining about, and then he spots the road almost a quarter mile away. Between the car and the cabin are a couple of ruined stone walls, that caused him so much trouble in the dark. Looking the other way, it becomes clear that the cabin is a restored building that used to be part of a larger compound. As he can see another two walls that used to be buildings.

Petunia walks up behind Harry and gently taps him on the shoulder. Quickly, he spins around before relaxing when he sees who it is. Wordlessly she walks around the cabin away from the road, and up the rather steep hill towards an old rockslide.

Before they reach the rockslide, she stops at a partially fallen wall and sits down facing the lake.

"I always loved it when Vernon brought me here before we were married. It's so peaceful and picturesque. He stopped coming when his parents died, even though his brother gave us permission to keep coming. They didn't see eye to eye on a number of things…"

Sitting on the wall beside her, Harry has to agree. With the cabin down below, and the curls of morning mist still clinging to the lake, the place looks almost magical. After a moment, he asks, "What happened last night?"

Petunia puts her hand on Harry's thigh comfortingly, "You had a nightmare. Do you remember any of it?"

Harry nods, and describes what he remembers, "…And then I woke up in my dream, and the sky was full of rivers. You were hugging me, and we were surrounded by a giant lily. So I kissed you and snuggled in while you sung me a lullaby."

Petunia smiles softly, "That part wasn't a dream. Though I was trying to sing the lullaby before…" she then goes on to describe what she saw while she tried to calm Harry down. As Harry looks at her in disbelief, she laughs freely and reaches behind her neck to gently pull the marsupial out and hands it to Harry.

While Harry is looking at the creature in disbelief, the creature waves its tentacles around in agitation before it seems to catch a scent. Then it's tentacles move with more deliberation, before, suddenly, it leaps at Harry's chest and hangs onto his t-shirt while it grabs something.

Harry laughs as its tentacles tickle his hand, and then his chest. His laugh briefly pauses as it feels like it wrenches something from his chest, and it tumbles down into his lap, and onto the floor happily munching on something.

"Ow! That hurt."

Petunia can't help herself, as she bursts into laughter at the offended look Harry gives the creature. Bending over, she scoops it off of the ground and puts it in her lap.

When the creature seems to fall asleep in her lap, Harry reaches out to stroke it, "Auntie, what are you going to call it?"

Petunia looks down, "What's that?"

Harry smiles at her, "What are you going to call it. I mean, it seems to be attached to you."

Petunia shrugs good naturedly, "I don't know. I suppose as it came to us at night, we could call it Nyx after the Greek goddess of night." At Harry's look she laughs again, "Hey, I did pay attention while Lily talked about her favourite subject at school. Anyway, I think that might be a bit dark, as she supposedly wasn't the nicest goddess. How about Nixie. It sounds similar, but it doesn't have the same…"

Harry laughs, "Nixie sounds nice."

The two of them sit there in peace and quiet as nature goes about its business around them.

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As the faint sound of a car going past reaches their ears, Petunia shifts and wakes Nixie up. As Nixie scampers up her arm, and behind her hair, she stands up to stretch, "Come on Harry, lets go and see what we can put together for breakfast. Then we can wake up the two lumps."

As Harry giggles at the description and heads towards the cabin, Petunia frowns at her words. Wracking her brain as referring to Vernon as a lump feels so familiar, like it's a pet name.

As she thinks, back she starts to cry with great wracking sobs as all of the bad memories of the last 10 years come back in a rush. Of a man with a white beard waving a wand at her as she comes home from her last visit with Lily just after Harry was born.

Of the same white bearded man watching as she happily signs a document in blood shortly after Harry came into their lives, and that feeling of happiness turning into a desire to please Vernon.

Of running away to a shelter with Harry and Dudley because she's pregnant again. Only for the white bearded man to take her home. Then Vernon beats her, and there was blood, so much blood.

On and on, the memories come, though that was the last time she remembers the white bearded man.

When she starts crying, Harry spins around and runs back up to his aunt. "Aunt Petunia? Aunt Petunia? Are you ok auntie?"

When she doesn't respond, he reaches out to touch her on the shoulder. As soon as he does, she lets out a piercing scream full of fear and sadness, before curling into a defensive ball.

When Nixie climbs out from under her hair and hisses at him from her shoulder, Harry backs away a few steps and raises his hands. "Ok, ok, I get it. I'm not going to hurt her."

As Harry sits on the grass looking at Petunia, Nixie circles around a couple of times, before lying down on her shoulder.

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Harry is so concerned about his aunt that he doesn't notice Vernon's faint shout from the cabin. That means he's blindsided when Vernon grabs his shoulder hard and hauls him to his feet.

Roughly, Vernon turns him round and holds both shoulders, "What did you do boy! What have I told you about using your freakishness around us?"

Harry stammers, "But I-I didn't do anything sir. She just collapsed."

Vernon lets go with his right hand, and clenches it into a fist before punching Harry in the stomach, "Don't lie to me boy! It's always you, you and your freakishness that causes trouble. What did you do to your aunt!?"

Harry tries to answer, but he can't draw in the needed breath. Helplessly, he is unable to protect himself as Vernon throws another punch with the same question. And so begins the worst beating Harry has ever experienced in his life.

On the floor, caught in a vicious cycle of flashbacks, Petunia starts to hear the sounds of Harry's whimpering cries. This takes her back to the first night she found Vernon shaking Harry, and the cries he made then. As her past self jumps at Vernon to make him stop, her eyes flick open, and she does the same in real life.

"No Vernon! Stop! You're killing him."

As she clumsily gets close to Vernon, he casually backhands her down the hill a little way. As the shock of the hit pulls her out of her flashback, she tries to get to her feet and watches as Harry coughs out a mouthful of blood.

Pulling herself to her feet, she screams at Vernon before running at him. As she reaches him, she shoves him with over a decades worth of pent up anger and fear, "Stop it! Get away from him!"

Rather than the ineffectual push that Vernon would have expected, he is instead sent cartwheeling up the hill until he lands heavily against the wall.

As he tries to push himself up again, Vernon looks at petunia the way someone might look at a tiger, they've just been throwing stones at, when it finds out the gate is open.

Collapsing to her knees, Petunia sobs as she pulls Harry's head into her lap, "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry I couldn't protect you."

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A trio of whip cracks rend the air, as three robed figures appear by the wall. As Vernon angrily tries to get to his feet, one of the figures points his wand and a red bolt of light spits out and hits him on the arm, and he falls back to the floor unconscious.

As Petunia realises that it's over, she cautiously looks around for someone with a long white beard. While she doesn't see anyone like that, she can see Dudley staring up the hill. By his body language, he looks terrified, even from this distance.

Her attention is brought back to the three figures when a man says, "No wands, so it looks like it's the kids first serious accidental magic. Standard procedure, obliviate the two muggles, and heal up the kid. Then write up the report when we get back. Peterson, you've got the man, and don't half arse it like last time. We don't want to come back and find out it wore off, and he beat them to death. Marsden, you've got the kid down the hill, be gentle."

While she's still cradling Harry's motionless head, and trying to understand what's going on. The man that spoke walks over and crouches down beside her, "Hi, I'm Auror Williamson. Is it ok if I cast some spells on your kid?"

Mutely Petunia nods, afraid that she was too late. As he's casting spells, Williamson says, "It will be alright, he's still alive and he doesn't have any broken bones. That means that we can have him up and about today, rather than an overnight in St Mungo's. What's your name love?"

As Petunia sags in relief, she answers without thinking, "Petunia."

Williamson smiles as he starts to cast spells to get rid of the blood and heal the few cuts Harry has, even the one inside his mouth. There's a few more that don't have any obvious effect, before he cleans off the blood again.

"Ok Petunia, I've done what I can here. Make sure he doesn't do any heavy play or running around for at least a day, and his bones will be good as new. What we'd normally do is obliviate the memory of an event like this from the kid's mind. That way, it doesn't cause them undue stress which makes their magic act out more later. Is it ok if I do that now?"

Not trusting her voice yet, Petunia just nods.

Less than a minute later, Williamson looks back up, "Ok, that's done. You've done really well, would you like me to obliviate you too?"

Mutely, Petunia shakes her head, and Williamson nods approvingly, "That makes things easier. With the statute stuff out the way, is there anything we can do to stop this from happening again as soon as we leave."

"Co…" Petunia swallows hard a couple of times, before licking her lips, "Could you get those two back into their sleeping bags in the cabin?" She points at Vernon, and then down the hill where Dudley was, "I also need to get Harry down there."

Williamson smiles, "Is that his name. I bet you named him after Harry Potter, there were a lot of boys born after that called Harry." Williamson stands up before casting a spell to make Harry levitate, "I've got a kid starting school in a few years, and Harry's all he can talk about. Did you know that Harry Potter is supposed to be going to Hogwarts this year?"

Not trusting her voice, Petunia just shakes her head, and the two of them walk down to the cabin.

As Harry's lowered to the floor, Williamson asks, "One last thing before I wake them up and leave. For our records, what's your last name?"

Petunia frowns, "Could you wake up Harry and leave the others to wake up on their own?"

Williamson nods, "Sure, now I do need your last name."

Petunia smiles in relief, "Dursley, it's Dursley."

Williamson smiles at Petunia as he waves his wand, "Have a nice day, and pop into the DMLE if you need help getting your wand back. There's a public Floo in the nearby town."

Petunia nods as he disappears with a quiet crack.

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While Harry's coming around, Petunia reaches under the table and pulls out a padded cube. With a little wiggling, a stool slides out of one side of the cube, and she sets it down before she takes a seat and starts to think. Occasionally, Nixie will find something small still attached to her, and pulls it out with the return of a memory or two.

Groggily, Harry wakes up on the floor of the cabin. As he starts to move, he groans, as it feels like he's been worked over by Dudley's gang. Once he adjusts to the pain, he sits up and realises that he's wearing his glasses.

With a frown, he looks around and spots Petunia sitting on a stool, an obviously sad expression on her face. Pushing himself to his feet he asks, "Auntie, are you ok?"

Petunia looks up at Harry, "I don't know. Maybe yes?"

"Do you want a hug?"

Petunia nods, "Yes please."

With her permission, Harry throws himself into her arms, and the two of them give each other comfort the same way they have been for the last week.

While they're hugging, Nixie climbs onto Petunia's shoulder, their tentacles waving in the area. With a sudden lunge, she's jumped onto Harry's shoulder and grabbed something that's attached to his head.

In her arms, Petunia feels Harry suddenly stiffen while Nixie chews something on his shoulder. Her eyes widen in understanding and she quickly grabs Nixie before putting a finger over Harry's lips.

As she's struggling to control a writhing animal, her thumb somehow ends up inside it's tentacles, and Nixie bites down. Petunia doesn't even notice the bite, only that Nixie had wrapped her thumb in their tentacles, and is now suckling it.

With the moment of shared comfort broken, Petunia directs Harry to pull a folding table from under the same table she got the cube from. Then they set up a small single burner camp stove on the patio outside and starts a kettle on to boil using a bottle of water from the bag.

 

[Darkphoenixlady]

Chapter 9

As she sits on the patio while Vernon and Dudley are bringing a small motor boat back to the cabin with the larger gas canister from the car, Petunia smiles softly. The morning since the Aurors came has gone very smoothly. Though, Harry is still as quiet as he always is the day after a massive beating. When no post arrived, she even got a rare apology from Vernon, just for the accusation in the petrol station, nothing else.

When Harry doesn't reappear as the sound of the boat comes closer, Petunia curses under her breath as Dudley jumps out and runs up to the cabin with a large smile on his face. His smile turns even wider as he notices that Harry's not in the cabin and he runs around behind the cabin.

A moment later, Harry comes sprinting around the other side of the cabin with Dudley hot on his heels. Petunia can't even say anything as Vernon is walking easily up to the cabin carrying the gas canister as if it weighs nothing.

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A few hours later, Vernon's perched on one of the cubic stools and he lets out a satisfied yawn.

"This is just perfect, don't you think Pet? No freakishness, and no way for them to find us."

Before she can reply, the obnoxiously loud sound of a motorcycle starts to echo across the lake. As the two of them watch, the motorcycle drives past where they parked last night, before pulling into the boat house.

As Vernon catches sight of the riders build, and the fact they're not wearing a crash helmet, his face starts turning red.

When the man walks over to the upside down boats, and lifts up a wooden rowing boat as if it's a kayak, Vernon swears, "What the bloody hell is that doing here?"

When Dudley waves at the man, and the man waves back, Vernon explodes. "Dudley! Get back here, don't let the freak get close to you."

As the man gets in the boat and starts to row across, Vernon clips Dudley gently around the ear before walking into the cabin, "What have I told you about freaks?"

Harry, Dudley, and Petunia all watch as the man uses strong and practiced strokes to cross the lake at a surprising clip. Vernon comes out of the cabin once the boat reaches around halfway across the lake. Hung over one arm is a double barrelled shotgun, in the other hand is a box of shotgun shells.

Angrily Vernon fills each barrel with a shell, before clicking the barrel closed with a loud clunk. As it does, Harry looks back and blanches before moving to stand behind Dudley. As Dudley elbows him in the ribs, Harry's very much of the opinion that it's a fair trade for not being in Vernon's line of fire.

At the rate the man is pulling the oars, it only takes another few minutes before the boat runs aground on the muddy bank. As the man stows the oars, Vernon shouts, "Bugger off you freak. If you come any closer, I'll give you both barrels."

As the man ignores the warning, and stands up in the boat, Dudley and Harry both gasp in awe. What seemed to be a large man on the far shore turns into a veritable giant in the boat. His hair hangs wild and wiry in a triangle around his face and back, and his beard falls down to his chest with the same wiry look. Stepping out of the boat, his leather boots sink up to his ankles in the mud, and with one sucking step at a time, he walks towards them.

Vernon's face is bright red, even though his hands are shaking, as he walks off the patio, "Didn't you hear me? I said bugger off you freak. If you come any closer I'll give you both barrels."

The man keeps on walking, "Oh, shuddup you stupid muggle. And put that down afore you put someone's eye out."

As the man gets close enough to make out what his coat and trousers are made from Dudley lets out a low, "That jacket looks so cool."

Vernon glances at Dudley, before shouting back, "I mean it. Don't come any closer, I'm warning you!"

The man continues to walk up the grassy hill to the cabin, as he pays Vernon about as much attention as you might pay a toddler that's waving a foam sword at you.

As soon as he gets to around 10 paces from the patio, Vernon opens fire with both barrels. As the cloud of smoke clears, the man can be seen waving the smoke out of his face. "Now that weren't nice."

While Vernon is staring at the man who seems to have suffered no ill effects from the shot, the man reaches out and snags the shotgun from Vernon's unresisting grasp. With barely any effort, he bends the barrel nearly in half before he puts it back into Vernon's grasp again. "There you go, can't hurt anyone anymore."

As he walks past, he pats Vernon on the shoulder, before stepping onto the patio.

Dudley cranes his neck to look up at the man who's at least twice as tall as he is, "How are you still alive? That should have killed you!"

The man pats his jacket proudly, "It would take more than a pea shooter to get through this. It's made out of Peruvian Vipertooth dragonhide leather. You'd need som'ing a lot stronger than birdshot to even scuff it."

Dudley looks suitably impressed, "Woah, cool."

The man gently pats Dudley on the head, "Now where's me manners. I'm Hagrid, Grounds keeper of Hogwarts. Which one of you is Harry?"

From behind Dudley, Harry gingerly raises his hand.

Hagrid's eyes seem to sparkle as he smiles at Harry, "I haven't seen you since you were a wee babe in arms. Anyway, I have something for you."

Reaching into his pockets, he starts pulling out stuff, including a couple of live mice, something that's wrapped in a handkerchief, and finally a parchment letter.

Once his stuffed everything else back into his pocket, he hands the letter to Harry, "Right, this is for you. Sorry I'm late. The thingy that the headmaster gave me stopped working just after dawn. So, I had to land and go by road."

Coming out of his stupor, Vernon turns around and tries to snatch the letter from Harry's hands, "Now listen here, Harry's not going to any freak school. He's signed up for Stonewall High, and that's final."

Hagrid gently pushes Vernon behind him as he shakes his head, "Not going to Hogwarts? I'd never hear such a thing, both his parents went, and his grand parents too. No, he's been signed up since birth, and he's going. It's just the way it is."

Sharing a glance with Petunia, who nods subtly, Harry slips his finger under the wax seal and opens the letter. When nothing happens, Harry looks down and spots an additional sheet of folded parchment.

As he's putting that bit of parchment under the letter, he idly turns the letter over to check the address. Much like the others, this one is addressed to his current location, the cabin behind him.

Turning the letter back over, Harry reads it carefully before handing it over to Petunia to read while he looks at the other sheet of parchment.

Petunia skims over the letter, as it's much like the one that Lily got. However, as she reaches the last line, her eyebrows rise and she looks up at Hagrid. "Hagrid? If we'd opened one of these letters before you arrived. How exactly would we have sent a reply?" She turns the letter around and points to a line, "It says here that you expect our owl."

Hagrid scratches his beard with one hand while the other fends of Vernon the way someone might fend off a playful puppy. "Ah don't rightly know, sorry. The headmaster just told me that Harry hadn't received his letter yet. And that this one needed to be hand delivered." He looks up at the sun, "Anyway, it's getting late, so we need to get going if we're going to get your supplies from Diagon Alley."

As Vernon realises that Harry's read the letter, he subsides.

At the same time Harry looks at Petunia, and back at Hagrid. As he sees Vernon's shoulders slump behind Hagrid, his decision is made. "Hagrid, would it be ok if Aunt Petunia came with us?"

Hagrid shrugs, "Ah suppose it don't make no difference. So if you're sure, then she can come."

Vernon leans around Hagrid's bulk, "But Pet, you can't go. They're all freaks."

Petunia lets out a put upon sigh, "I'm going Vernon, it's probably our only chance to sort out the stipend stuff. Why don't you spend the next week or so here with Dudley. Show him the things that you used to do with your brother. Maybe take him to the beach. If you do that, I'll make sure the boy doesn't damage anything at home."

Dudley's eyes light up, he looks at Vernon with a pleading expression. Harry can almost see him shouting, 'A whole week being spoilt? Count me in.'

Once he sees the look on Dudley's face, he turns back to Petunia with a look that promises a reckoning when he gets back home. "I suppose that would be ok. We'll see you at home in a week. Just make sure you keep the freak under control."

Completely ignoring the subtext, Hagrid claps his hands together and turns towards the boat, "Right, now that's sorted, let's go."

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Once they get back to the boat house, Hagrid sits on the jetty to clean off the prow of the boat and his boots.

As Harry looks at him curiously, Hagrid says, "It's only polite to return the boat in the condition ah found it. Now, the sidecar's not really big enough for two people, so one of you'll need to ride behind me."

Despite her nervousness, Petunia immediately answers, "I'll do it, as Harry's to small to get a good grip."

Hagrid laughs good naturedly, "There's no need to worry about that, each of the seats has a sticking charm so no one can fall of while the bikes moving."

Petunia sets her jaw, "I'll still do it."

Hagrid laughs, "Sure, just be careful about your skirts."

Once Harry and Hagrid are both sat in the side car, and on the bike, respectively. Petunia nervously hands Harry her handbag, to sit next to his backpack on the floor. Then she takes Nixie from the back of her neck, and hands them to Harry to hold.

Swallowing hard, she puts one foot on the rear stirrup, before swinging her leg over the back seat.

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Harry winces as Hagrid starts the motorcycle, only to look over in amazement as he flicks a switch that silences the engine. After flicking a couple more switches, Hagrid turns the throttle and pulls back on the handlebars.

Instead of the feeling of acceleration Harry was expecting, the motorcycle instead rides up into the air, and over the boat house.

Quickly, Harry leans over the side of the sidecar and gapes as the ground falls away, and they can see for miles in every direction. Even Petunia can't help but gape at the passing countryside.

After a couple of minutes, Harry shouts, "What happens if someone looks up?"

Hagrid laughs, "There's no need to worry about that, this here bike has built in invisibility. Ain't anyone down there that can see us."

As they pass over mountains and rivers, towns and villages, and farmland as far as they eye can see, Harry imagines that this is what a bird must feel like.

However, as with everything, all journeys must eventually come to an end. After three or four hours of riding, their own journey comes to an end as Hagrid takes the motorcycle down into central London.

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Once the three of them have dismounted the motorcycle, both Harry and Petunia walk around a little uncomfortably to get the feeling back in their legs. At the same time, Hagrid lifts the seat of the motorcycle and takes a pink umbrella out of a storage compartment.

After a moment, Harry hands Nixie back to Petunia, before looking up at Hagrid. "Um, I don't suppose there's a toilet somewhere near here?"

Hagrid chuckles, "Can you hold it for five minutes, as I'm sure Tom won't mind you using the bathroom in one of his rooms."

Harry and Petunia both nod.

Hagrid smiles, "Well then, follow me, it's only a couple of minutes walk down this way."

With that, Hagrid leads the way out of the small, almost deserted, carpark they landed in. As they pass the entrance, Petunia shivers despite the heat while Harry only feels a mild tingle.

Frowning, Harry takes Petunia's hand, "Are you ok Auntie?"

Petunia nods, "It just felt like I walked through a massive spiderweb or maybe through one of those heat things they have at shop doors. Except cold instead of hot."

Harry glances back, "That's odd, I felt a tingle, but that's all."

Petunia looks down, "I'm sure we'll figure it out, together."

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As promised, it only takes them a few minutes to walk up Charing Cross Road to a dingy pub. As they approach the pub, Hagrid stops abruptly and turns around.

"Right, Harry, ah just remembered, you probably want to grab your aunts…"

He trails off as he notices Petunia standing on her own, looking at the pub with a wistful expression. "Blimey, never mind then. Um, this is the Leaky Cauldron. Don't mind the interior, it's so that the odd muggle that makes it past the protections doesn't want to stay. It's actually perfectly clean inside."

Petunia nods, "That makes sense. When I came with Lily it seemed odd compared to the rest of the alley."

Hagrid looks surprised for a moment before realisation crosses his expression. "Oh, right. You would have been a kid then."

Petunia smiles and nods, "I was 9 and a half. The half was very important then."

Hagrid laughs, "I bet it was. Well, come on, time's a wasting."

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A man with pitch black skin reaches an unremarkable location on a world where the rivers run through the sky. Looking around, he seems to sniff for a moment before he disappears.