Listful Summer
By knuckz
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Summary: It's the summer after fifth year, and Harry decides that he's had enough, that he's going to break away and become his own man. Now if only he could get that damn list right. One-shot.
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In the smallest bedroom of Number Four Privet Drive, located in Surrey, England, at the northern hemisphere on planet Earth of the Milky Way Galaxy, Universe #1203314587 of which there are an extremely large, highly uncountable number of parallels, sat at his desk a fifteen-almost-sixteen-year-old boy by the name of Harry Potter.
Harry Potter was not a normal boy. Through no fault of his own, he wore overly-large clothing, cast-offs of his monstrously- enormous cousin Dudley Dursley, whom one might suggest carried hippopotamus DNA somewhere in his being. Harry wore round-framed glasses without which he could not see very well; they were certainly poorly built and out of style, but had somehow lasted him throughout his childhood and even now as he approached adulthood. His eyes were a brilliant emerald green, eyes as green as fresh pickled toad one might say, inherited from his similarly green-eyed mother, Lily Potter.
His visage however, was clearly that of his father, James Potter. His cheek bones were high and his nose was thin, straight and long, but not too long that it deformed his paler-than-most face. His chin was neither straight, pointed, nor exceedingly curved, but rather a combination of the three. Atop his forehead lay a thin lightning-bolt-shaped scar, partially covered by the bird's nest that was his dark hair.
Clutched in his right hand was an odd item for a person to be using; a quill. And with focussed emerald-green eyes did the boy gaze at the beige parchment before him. His hand moved, dipping the tip of his quill into a small bottle of ink that rest on his desk. Extracting the ink carefully, Harry wiped the excess on the edges of the bottle before bringing the darkened tip of the feather to the parchment.
And he scrawled.
No, Harry Potter was not a normal boy. Normal boys did not have oddly specific scars on their foreheads, normal boys did not use quills and ink to write, and normal boys certainly did not write on what looked to be old and frayed paper. Harry was a wizard.
Harry Potter was a boy that attended Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, a thousand-year-old school located nowhere in Scotland because no non-magical being could see it. Harry Potter was a boy who attended classes while wearing robes, a feat that would mark him incredibly brave if he were to wear them on the crowded streets of London, but alas was the norm for all the students and teachers at his school. Harry Potter was a boy that, to an unknowledgeable bystander, would look quite foolish as he waved around a wooden stick yelling phrases in Latin.
But even amongst wizards, Harry Potter was not a normal boy. Harry was the only known survivor of the normally unstoppable Killing Curse, a feat he accomplished at the age of one year and a quarter; a feat that sadly, his parents could not achieve. Harry was the only person that the Dark Lord Voldemort, better known to the Wizarding populace as You-Know-Who or He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, could not kill, the Dark Lord who then in turn was defeated. Thus, Harry Potter became famous in the Wizarding world who, with their love of hyphenated nicknames, appropriately named him the Boy-Who-Lived.
However, in Harry's fourth of seven years at Hogwarts did the Dark-Lord-Of-Whom-You-Know return, the result of a convoluted plan that pit young Harry against dragons, lakes, and mazes, a plan that resulted in the death of Harry's fellow schoolmate. And though Harry remarked and remarked that the Evil-Wizard-Whose-Name-Should-Not-Be-Uttered had returned, and quite angrily remarked at that, scorn, derision, and mocking was all that he received for his troubles. It was only near the end of Harry's fifth year did the Minister of Magic witness Voldemort himself, but the cost was too high.
The death of Sirius Black, godfather and closest thing to family that Harry had ever known, had undoubtedly affected the boy. Sirius Black was a man whom had unjustly been jailed for twelve years of his life, a sentence laid upon him without a trial. It was only for a few years that Harry had gotten to know him, and any hope of a family had been abruptly torn away.
And it was the same night that the truth of Harry's bleak future was disclosed to him. Albus Dumbledore, Headmaster of Hogwarts, to whom the middle names Percival, Wulfric, and Brian belonged, the only wizard that the Accidentally-Revealed-To-Be-Alive-Dark-Lord ever feared, and champion of ten-pin bowling, revealed to the angry and grieving Harry Potter a prophecy that foretold his fate of being the only person capable of defeating the Dark Lord.
And now, left alone with his unpleasant and uncaring relatives for the summer, Harry Potter decided that he had had enough. That no longer would he cater to the mistruths that he had been fed all his life. Harry Potter would become his own man.
And thus, he began his plan for independence. And it all started with a list.
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No life was without its problems.
Every human faced many trials and tribulations during their time on the earth, on any Earth rather. Troubles of many kinds are always present in any intelligent society, and for all the possibilities of that society were also the possibilities of trouble for that society. Of course, in a society capable of magic, capable of performing feats beyond the laws of physics that normal humans were subject to, the possibilities were even more endless. Exponentially more endless it could be said.
Therefore, it was quite plausible that young Harry Potter would go through many a quandary that a normal person would not like to live through. For Harry, it was more than plausible. It was the truth.
Perhaps had Harry's troubles occurred without influence, he would not be the frustrated person he was today. But that was not to be, because Harry looked back at his life, and saw too many machinations and manipulations behind those problems.
Every problem needed to be solved, and for this problem in particular, Harry Potter would need a spectacular solution.
Harry Potter needed to plan. And that was what he did.
Scribbled on the parchment in front of him was the beginning of Harry's plan to liberate himself from the overbearing and cagey watchers that remained distant and ever so watching. The list consisted of steps that the boy had devised, stages that when executed correctly would allow him to come into his own and grant him the independence that he so rightfully deserved.
And so Harry did stare down at his list, committing it to memory. And the list was as such:
Exercise.
Eat right.
Find a way to practice magic.
Observe schedules of watchers.
Escape.
And quite a list it was, each step masterfully devised in a process that, when taken, would permit any heavily guarded almost-sixteen-year-old teenager with a crazy mass-murderer after his life, escape from the protection provided for him into the wilds where, despite unknowing of many of the dangers of the world, he would supposedly thrive and become the survivor he knew he was always meant to be. And each step of the list was as important, if not more important, than any other step on the list, including itself. Thus, it could be said that allocated to each item on the list was a self-trumping, infinite importance that could not be ignored.
An important practice exercise was indeed. Through the use of exercise, young Harry would allow himself a body that would quickly be able to run away from any pursuing witches and wizards, and, should they not decide to safely spell him unconscious from a distance, he should be able to attack and defeat them with his greater strength. Of course, Harry's watchers did have superior numbers, and could use magic without fear of being expelled, not to mention had the ability to apparate (teleport, that is) to his spot instantly, but with his heightened reflexes, Harry would surely be able to at least call the Knight Bus and escape before they could catch him.
Eating right was very important for a growing boy such as Harry. Why, what good would exercise be if one does not sustain a proper diet to compliment that exercise? No, Harry would definitely be eating properly, never mind that his relatives would not give him the food he required. Of course, he could not just go to the grocery store, especially with galleons in his pockets and dark wizards after his life. So, Harry would have to rely on the food that he had secretly received from his friends; delicious chocolate cakes to compliment the sit-ups that he did, scrumptious treacle tarts to give him the energy for just another push-up.
And of course, finding a way to practice magic was extremely important, perhaps the most important of all the items on the least, not to mention as important as any other item on the list. Certainly, young Harry knew nothing about how he would go about hiding his use of magic from people who could use magic while he couldn't, people that could magically find out if he had been using magic or not almost instantly. And of course, Harry did not have any books containing magic advanced beyond anything he had already learnt at Hogwarts. But at the very least, Harry was able to pretend to use magic that he knew he was already capable of performing by practicing with his wand but not really using it.
Observing his watchers was an important aspect in his plan if Harry was ever going to find the opportunity to escape. While the Order of the Phoenix to which his watchers belonged expertly made themselves silent and invisible, not really revealing even the slightest truth of their presence, Harry would surely be able to figure out their randomized and erratic schedule for watching him. All he needed was to carefully watch for any signs of their presence, even the smallest upturned leaf was a viable reason of the truth of their existence.
And of the utmost importance the last stage was. If Harry didn't escape, however would he gain independence by escaping? It would defeat the whole purpose.
"Alright." Young Harry would mutter to himself. But alas, there was nothing right, not even some, and especially not all. Because quite frankly, Harry Potter hadn't the slightest clue what he was doing, and knew it he did.
Giving up, Harry decided that maybe it was best he wait for word from his protectors and act accordingly. Perhaps another list might help clear his mind.
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The End
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AN: I was going for whimsical and had the voice of Stephen Fry doing LBP as the narrator in my head as I wrote this.
Reviews are appreciated! Let me know what you think!