(A/N: This is a series of drabbles, inspired by ViolentArtista's Slytherin Harry A Series Of Drabbles, which I highly suggest you check out. As noted in the summary, this chronicles the adventures of Dudley Dursley's Muggleborn wizard son - because we all know it was too ironic NOT to happen. Hufflepuff, yes - it needs more love, and you couldn't expect a Dursley to go anywhere else. This is set 20 years after the series' end - that is, one year post-Deathly Hallows epilogue. Expect a story with fairly unique, flawed characters - the rabid one-eyed rat-beasts to contrast all these Mary Sue-creatures we've been seeing - and above all, enjoy.

Or else.

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. Or J.K. Rowling. I don't care what the media told you.)

Durell Dursley: Hufflepuff Ordinaire

Chapter One

In a pretty little house somewhere in London (I can't be bothered to think exactly where) a 10-year-old boy sat on his bed and watched the telly. His pigmentation successfully acknowledged all three primary colors - blue eyes, yellow hair, red skin - and his horrendous clash of patterned clothing proceeded to acknowledge the secondaries green, purple and orange as well. All these colors stretched out over a squat, ballooning frame gave him the appearance of a fantastically tacky beach ball - perhaps one that was still filling with air, as he was working on adding to his girth by glutting himself from a bag of fruit candies. Said candies rivaled his own rainbow so much that this act bordered on cannibalism.

In one final act of vengeful fury, one of the candies attempted to crack one of his teeth. The boy winced and issued a silent cry, along with a long, sticky strand of colorful saliva. A bout of canned laughter burst forth from the telly's speakers, as if deriving mirth from his pain. But the boy paid it no mind, and only swallowed the rogue sweet and dug back into the bag, searching through masses of empty wrappers until his fingers hit gold - or more accurately, a white mystery candy. Drawing it out and seeing what he had, the boy's babyish eyes bulged.

For you see, the makers of these fearsome little candies had started a contest - correctly guess the flavor of the mystery candy and mail that guess in, and you would recieve a wobbly-headed rendition of the candy's mascot. Truthfully, the boy (whose name, you should know, was Durell Dursley) had no love for the mascot itself, a purple bird with a wide grin. Birds do not have teeth, and that fact alone made that immense grin all the more disturbing, so that actually seeing that grin on a bobbling head would probably give Durell nightmares for nights on end. In spite of this, Durell longed for that bird bobble-head terribly; he had never won anything in his life, and thrilled at the thought of adding something to the family trophy case. He never stopped to think how out of place the bit of mauve plastic would look among his father's gleaming gilded bowling trophies.

Steeling himself for the climactic moment, Durell slowly unwrapped the candy (slightly ripping the wrapper where the candy had melted at one point and affixed to it), placed it upon his tongue, and commenced chewing. It was as fitful a chew as its predecessors; Durell felt as though the centers of his teeth were being ripped out with every mastication, and wondered if he would need fillings later. He banished such thoughts and thought hard instead of what flavor candy this could possibly be. It was familiar, so familiar, a tropical fruit he KNEW he had tasted once and promptly spat out, but he couldn't remember the name. It was either papaya or mango, he knew that...

At that fateful instant the door to his room burst open, breaking Durell's concentration and nearly causing him to choke. In the doorway stood his father, Dudley Dursley, a large man, nearly as tall as he was wide. He thumbed to the hallway behind him and commanded, "Get off your arse. No more of this sissy-footin' around; we're going outside for some rugby like real men."

With a sigh, Durell deposited his wad of chewed candy into its (slightly ripped) wrapper and set it carefully on the edge of the TV stand before standing up and lumbering out the doorway after his father. He would return for more guessing later.

Fortunately, the game of rugby didn't last long. They hadn't been tossing the ball back and forth for more than five minutes before Dudley was doubled over and panting, soaked all over in sweat. Declaring in a pained voice that they had sufficiently proven their manliness, Dudley waved Durell ahead inside. After all, Durell's mother had just made chocolate cake.

Sure enough, there at the kitchen counter bordering the dining room/kitchen and the living room was the cake in all its massive dark glory, accompanied by his mother, Darla, in all her tiny, pale, not-so-much glory. (If there was anything the Dursley family had, it was a surplus of blonde hair and D-names.) She was a scrawny little lady, with long curls, buggy blue eyes and high cheekbones, giving her the appearance that she was constantly sucking her cheeks in around something sour. This effect was embellished by her lips, red and puckered. People often described Darla's lips as "kissable"; however, Durell had these exact same heart-shaped lips, and no one had ever once called them kissable on him, not even doting Aunt Gertrude.

Darla had scarcely doled out the first slice before Dudley crammed the brunt of it into his mouth with an ecstatic moan, taking the rest a bit more slowly so as to enjoy it all the more. Darla set Durell's piece out on a glass plate beside a lacy napkin and a fork entwined by silver vines, as he was patient enough to wait for it.

"You ought to wait for dessert, sweetums," she noted in her usual high, piping voice, "but you can have it now, if you'd like."

"Dessert's alright," he responded with a smile, getting one in return. In his experience, it tasted better for the wait. Not so his father's policy, as Dudley was still licking clean his chops as he reached for another piece. Darla eyed him surreptitiously with a grimace, then told Durell gently that supper would be ready soon and he could do what he wanted in the meantime. Joyfully, Durell bounded back up the stairs (as joyfully as any overweight person can stair-climb, that is; and it was more drudging than bounding), made it to his room and plopped belly-first on his bed, stretching out to the TV and grasping his wrapper. Unpeeling it, he popped it back into his mouth, crumpling the sticky wrapper back up slowly and closing his eyes as he thought and chewed, chewed and thought.

Then, like magic, the answer came to him and his eyes popped open.

"Papaya," he decided. "Definitely papaya." At that instant his mother called him downstairs for supper. Food-lover he was, he wasted no time in responding to the call. Sadly, when supper was done with he had entirely forgotten the matter of the papaya candy. He never did get that bobbly-headed bird.