Disclaimer: I would really love to own Harry Potter, but all the wishing in the world won't make that happen.

Dear Harry,

I think that you deserve to know the truth about my sister, about me, about him. I've been thinking for this past year, and it's the longest I have gone without seeing you. I don't know if I will get the chance to actually see you and tell you face to face, so I shall write.

He was a scrawny, greasy-haired boy who lived in the dodgy side of town. He wore his dad's old clothes, and I swear he wore some of his mother's, too. That boy was completely mad, and he went on about this whole other world of sorts, with magic and wizards and witches and whatnot. Completely mad, I tell you. But Severus Snape was my sisters' best friend.

Years and years, we were inseparable, Lily and I. Then he leapt out from behind a bush, and a week later they were spending all their free time together. I tried to show her what Snape was really like, but she insisted that I didn't know the real him. How wrong she was. I admit I was jealous. Lily was the pretty one, the intelligent one, the popular one. Lily never had trouble making friends. All of her friends agreed with me, that he was a weirdo, a freak, a bad influence on her. She didn't listen. I began to shut her out of my life.

And then they went to that school for freaks. I wanted to go so badly, it was all that was important to me at that time. We were already growing apart, and I couldn't help but want to hug her and say that I was sorry, that I loved her. But I didn't, and I regret that now.

Every holiday they could, they'd come home. He'd always end up staying at our house in the spare bedroom. It was next to her room. I'd hear them whispering together, she sometimes giggled, but it drove me insane. I couldn't sleep, and I felt guilty. I began to hate myself, then hate her for making me hate myself, but hate myself for hating her. I was so confused.

Once, when they were out of the house, I snuck into Lily's room. Her diary was sticking out from under her pillow. I pulled it out and opened. She'd had it since Christmas, and that had only been a few days ago. There were only around three pages written on, so I read them. She was talking about me and him, mostly, as well as what she'd gotten for Christmas. I cried when I read what she'd written about me. She said that she loved me, that I was her sister, and that she'd do almost anything for me. She also said that I was cold and distant, and that I refused to have anything to do with her unless it was completely necessary.

And when I read what she'd written about Severus Snape, I didn't believe it. She wrote that he was a completely different person when it was just them together, and that he was kind, witty, intelligent, and that he'd tell her things, and she'd confide in him. I was jealous, I wanted to be like that with her, but I never could bring myself to apologize. It would have been like admitting that I was weak. I couldn't do that. And then, at the bottom of one of the pages, written so tiny that I'd almost missed it, there were a few words that I almost missed. Fine – I admit it, Penelope, I do like him! Not that I'm going to tell you or him that.

There was no doubt in my mind of who it was. I was disgusted, repulsed, revolted, completely and utterly appalled. I knew that she had a weird taste in friends, but to actually fancy him?! I'd forgotten to hide the diary, so she found out I'd read it. Things were never the same between us.

Then, when they were in their fifth year at that school for freaks, they parted way. She wouldn't talk, wouldn't say why, but she spent ages crying in her room. I wondered if that freak boy had gotten himself a girlfriend. I said to her one day, "I told you so. I told you it would go wrong in the end." She yelled at me, told me that I didn't know what I was talking about. It shocked me, it truly did. I'd never see her lose her temper before, not really. And then, a few days after that, she blew up at me again, and I began to really get angry at her. "I suppose fancying him like mad didn't help, did it?" My sister never forgave me for that remark. I don't blame her.

I was invited to her wedding, so I went, but only because my mother begged me to go. She was dying, so I agreed, to make her happy. That boy was older, colder, darker, but he showed up for a few minutes before the ceremony. I know, because I saw him run from the house when she was waiting inside. I wondered what he had been doing there. My sister wasn't getting married to him, after all. When she walked out, I saw she had been crying. She faltered just before she went to walk up the aisle, but set her jaw and continued anyway. She was whispering to herself –at least, it seemed that way. There was a shadow by the door. "I'm sorry," she whispered, then turned away.

When I heard she had died, I was devastated – not that I let it show, of course. My husband never knew just how close my sister and I had once been. I never planned on telling him, it was none of his business. You were left on our doorstep, and when you were a baby I vowed that I would look after you as if you were my own. I hoped that you would be normal, so then maybe you would be like my second son. Looking after you would be like repaying my sister, even though she was dead. But when strange things started happening, and you began to scare Dudley, you began to scare me. Vernon swore he'd stamp out 'all that funny business'. He couldn't, as you well know.

When you went to that school, just like Lily and her husband, James, had, and Lily's no-longer-best friend Severus Snape, who I believe you know, I was relieved that I wouldn't have to be constantly reminded of her every day. I'd see your eyes and they haunted my dreams; they were my sisters' eyes. When I had nightmares, I told everyone I was afraid of something happening to my family; that I had dreamt of terrible things happening, like some or all of us being murdered. In a way, my worst fears had come true.

Every Halloween, I'd sneak away and visit my sisters' grave. I'd tell her I was sorry, that I missed her, and that I loved her. I'd tell her what was going on in the world. I'd never stay more than an hour, before I left. I never let anyone know where I was going, just that I had to get some things from the store. I always made sure to bring back a few bags of sweets. No one ever suspected anything.

The one year I missed out on visiting her grave, it was when my family and I had to go into hiding. I shut myself in the library for an hour, crying. My husband thought I was just tired of being in the house, and Dudley didn't notice anything unusual. Then again, he spent most of his time in his room for days at a time. My boy, my son, Dudley, he didn't deserve to go through that. I would willingly have been there alone for three times the time we were there. I'd suffer that for my sister, thought I know it wouldn't do anything for her.

With Dudley, I knew, as he was growing up, that he bullied the other children, especially you, Harry. I turned away from it, trying to tell myself that he'd grow out of it and that it was just a stage and it wasn't as big a problem as everyone else said it was. I knew it was, and when he was seventeen, I was so glad that he tried to start again, to move on from his old ways. I was, and still am, so proud of him.

When those Aurors turned up on our doorstep months later to tell us that it was finally over, Dudley genuinely cried. He wouldn't like it if he knew I had told you this, of course. I don't remember him really crying too many times in his life, not really actually crying. They told us what you had done, what had happened. They told us everything they could. When Dudley cried, it was because he had learned that all these people had died. He will never admit it, but he is actually quite sensitive to things like that, even if he doesn't know the person who has passed on.

Harry, I want to know what happened. I need to know for myself that he won't come back, and terrorize the world again. You may not want to see me again, but I wish to see you, even if it is only one more time before we part ways forever. Dudley wishes to see you, and Vernon, however reluctant he may appear to be, does want to talk to you.

Love,

Petunia

Well, there you go. I just thought I'd write this, as this idea hit me and clung on until I wrote this. I'm thinking about writing a quick note from Harry, so I may or may not do that? Let me know what you think, and hit the review button!