Disclaimer – JKR owns everything, as it's right, and I don't own anything, except the plot and the sacred right to steal from real literature...
My story begins and ends in a time of 12 hours, after the end of the 5th book. I would have liked to set it before, because of Sirius, but he's gone, and I think it's better if even us people out here accept that.
My grammar is undoubtedly dreadful, sorry everyone, since English isn't my native language. But I've read all the HP books in English, and to imagine those characters speaking another language was simply impossible.
Read, review and have fun...
Chapter 1
7 pm – Is it my birthday?
Harry Potter was lying on his bed, not even remotely looking as The Boy Who Lived. In fact, he looked like someone who was barely surviving, without bothering about anything anymore.
What was left for him to survive for, anyway?
When Sirius had been killed...
Harry rolled on his stomach and buried his face into the pillow. He was not going to think about that again.
But what else was there to think about? There had to be something... Harry remembered something about leaving number 4, Privet Drive. Dumbledore had said he was going to send someone of the Order to pick him up. Ron and Hermione were already at the Headquarters, as their short and useless notes said. Harry had mixed feelings about being back at twelve, Grimmauld Palace: as much as he wanted to be with his friends, and be of use to the Order, he didn't know if he could bear to be in that house again.
The door of his room opened and Dudley Dursley appeared on the threshold.
"So, cousin, isn't it your birthday?"
Harry rolled on his back again.
"Is it?" he said, bored.
Dudley was taken aback, but recovered quickly.
"Yeah, I think it is. Haven't your freaky friends sent you cards?" he said, in a tone of mock concern.
"No," Harry replied flatly.
"What about your true family? That madman godfather of yours?"
Harry didn't answer.
"Forgotten you, has he?"
Harry looked at his cousin. Dudley hadn't changed, except that he was taller, larger and more menacing than ever. As for the shadow of idiocy in his eyes, well, that couldn't really go worse, could it? Nobody could get more stupid than that, in Harry's opinion, not even trying hard.
"He's probably a loser too, just like your parents," Dudley was saying. "He surely hasn't got enough money to buy you a cake – and probably doesn't care."
"Go away, Dudley."
"Don't you want me to talk about dear uncle Sirius?"
Harry jumped out of his bed, suddenly furious. When Sirius was mentioned, he felt either dead himself, either ready to kill.
Especially ready to kill one person that wasn't there at the moment – but squeezing his eyes, Harry could imagine Dudley in a black cloak, with long, greasy hair covering his shoulders...
Seeing the wand and the look on Harry's face, Dudley yelled and thundered back into the kitchen, leaving Harry standing there, breathing hard, the face of his Potions Master still hanging on the wall. Dumbledore could talk as much as he wanted to, but Severus Snape was second on his list of Sirius' killers, just after Bellatrix. The one thing he dreaded more than being in the Black's house again was being back at Hogwarts again, forcing himself to sit calmly in front of that man.
Harry forced himself to drop his wand before he performed an illegal curse on something, and buried his face in his hands.
Sirius...
