Harry was used to being ignored. After his eleventh birthday, when the truth about magic came out, the Dursley's had ignored him for the rest of the summer. Before that, there were several occasions when he was left in his cupboard and forgotten about. But that was the Dursley's. This was a different kind of being overlooked. Ever since June, when he had come back to Privet Drive for the summer, the letters he'd gotten from his friends had been less than satisfactory. Ron's letters were mostly the same monologue reworded, "I might go out for quidditch this year, maybe we can meet up before the end of the summer." Hermione's letters weren't much better than Ron's, "Stay safe, and remember to do that potions essay!" Sirius's letters were worse. "Don't do anything rash, and maybe I'll see you before the end of the holidays."
It was rather discouraging. Based on the letters from Ron and Hermione, they were together somewhere and Sirius was there as well. The worst part, however, was having to listen to the muggle news to try and figure out if Voldemort had struck. Someone had decided that Harry being in the loop was unacceptable. (He suspected Dumbledore, personally.) That was why Harry now found himself in his latest hiding place. He was hiding in the hall closet, on the shelf above the rack for clothes. His aunt and uncle had kicked him out of the living room after the second day of the summer, because listening to the news was "disturbing, and Dudley would never do it!" The important news was over, and Harry was relieved to hear nobody was dead or tortured or missing from the muggle world. Now he had to find a way down and back to his room without alerting the Dursley's.
He wondered now just what people he knew would think if they could see him now. Ron would laugh at his attempts to listen to the news, but end up trying to help him. Fred and George would invent something to help him listen from a much more comfortable distance and position. Snape's reaction would probably be the most undesirable. Maybe not. At the end of the year the professor hadn't been as hard on him as usual. Harry supposed it was because of Cedric and the third task. Because of Voldemort. Voldemort, or Tom Riddle, had managed to completely ruin ten years of his life. At Hogwarts, Tom had become involved with Harry in some way, shape, or form every year. It was tolerable, because Harry had friends, a family really, to help him through whatever Voldemort threw at him. This year school hadn't even started yet when something odd began to happen. It started as dreams. The dreams would begin when Cedric and Harry ended up in the cemetery. The dream would play out like it had in real life; the death of Cedric, the rise of Voldemort, and the moment their wands had connected. After several nights of those dreams, they got even worse. Instead of waking up in a cold sweat after the dream, it would change. Suddenly Harry would be in a place he'd never been before doing powerful magic of some sort. Magic that Harry knew was evil. Realizing the dream Harry was doing evil magic was not the only frightening thing Harry got out of this dreams. Something told him these dreams were real.
Don't think about it, Harry thought. Don't go there right now. He pushed the thoughts out of his head and slipped out of the closet. He walked straight into Aunt Petunia.
"What were you doing?" She shrieked loudly, drawing Uncle Vernon into the hall. Harry hastily muttered an excuse about getting a coat but having the door shut behind him. Then he turned on his heel and walked out the front door, fully aware that Aunt Petunia's gaze of distaste and Uncle Vernon's arrogant look followed him out the door. He was down the street in no time, making sure to get far away from the house he hated. It was not his home. He had lived in that house for as long as he could remember, besides being away at school, but it was not his home. Harry ended up at the park, his usual haunt this time in the evening, because all of the normal children were at home, being fed dinner and getting ready for bed. Harry was not normal.
He stopped at the swings and sat down, even though at fifteen he was much too old to be swinging. The other boys played football now, or some other popular sport. None of the boys had probably ever heard of quidditch, Harry thought, and would laugh if he bothered to break the law and tell about the sport. He'd been tempted plenty of times this summer, because Dudley's group of friends had turned into more of a gang than anything else. They terrorized the younger kids, and used threats to keep their activities secret. Dudley's gang was almost as feared as himself, supposedly a hardened criminal who went to a school for criminal teens. The Dursley's had come up with that themselves, in yet another attempt to isolate him from their neighbors, and make sure Harry's secret stayed a secret. Because Harry had been away at Hogwarts when the story had been spread, damage control had not been possible and the lie spread like wildfire. So now Harry was left completely alone. In past summers he could endure the sudden silence when he entered the store, or the whispers that started when he left it, but this summer it was getting to him. Without decent letters from the people he was the closest to in the world, stomaching the rejection was harder.
The slap of feet against pavement brought him out of his thoughts. He looked up to see Dudley's gang veering off the road and heading toward him. Harry touched his back pocket, reassured himself his wand was there, and then told himself not to use. Self-control, Harry, self-control. The last thing he needed was to be arrested and expelled for using underage magic and assaulting a muggle. A muggle who would deserve it, but nevertheless, a muggle. Dudley was leading five other boys, all large, but none quite as large as Dudley, toward the swing set.
"Potter." It was another of the large boys, not Dudley, who said this. Dudley stood slightly off to the side grinning that big, stupid grin he tended to get when something he considered exciting was going to happen.
Harry didn't answer the first boy. He looked at Dudley instead. "Hello, Big D. Aren't you late for supper? I thought I heard your mummy call." Harry said this in the offhand, almost sarcastic way that he knew would make Dudley angry.
"Shut up, Potter."
Harry raised one eyebrow and smirked, trying to get Dudley angry and throwing self-control out the window in the process. He could see the wheels turning slowly in Dudley's brain, trying to think of an appropriate comeback that would impress his gang and hit Harry hard.
"Who's Cedric?" Dudley said hastily. "The one you moan about in your sleep?" He spoke more certainly. "Cedric, Cedric! Don't kill Cedric! Mum, Dad help me!"
Harry felt as though the breath had been knocked out of him. "I don't know what you're talking about," he said quickly. Too quickly. Dudley's gang began to laugh. Harry felt the anger he'd bottled up for the whole summer rise to the surface. The joke about Cedric had been a low blow, too low. Harry reached into his back pocket, about to whip his wand out and curse Dudley; but he stopped. The fingers curled around the wand slowly loosened and the fight went out of Harry. Dudley was the only person who had realized what was happening and his sigh of relief did not go unnoticed by Harry.
"Get out of my way," Harry said quietly, almost dangerously. Dudley was quick to step aside, and Harry pushed his way through the rest of the group of still laughing boys. He walked rapidly through the park, but slowed when he got to the road. He didn't want to leave Dudley only to go back to being around his rather unpleasant aunt and uncle. When he did get back to the house, his aunt was swift to inform him that he'd missed supper and would have to eat a sandwich instead and do the leftover dishes on top of his other chores. When Dudley got in about a half hour later, Aunt Petunia got the ham and side dishes she'd made for supper out and, smiling, wordlessly fixed him a plate.
Later that night, after sneaking a bit of ham from the refrigerator, Harry lay in bed. He was reluctant to go to sleep and experience the dreams that had plagued him for a month now. The first half, seeing Cedric die and Voldemort rise, didn't even bother him now. It was the dark things the dream Harry did afterwards that scared him. He'd killed two people who he thought looked familiar and used dark magic to do something to a ring in the past week; but last night's dream had taken the cake for the worst nightmare since they'd started. Last night he'd found himself in what looked like a fancy entryway to a home somewhere, but torturing a kid his own age. Torturing someone he recognized. Torturing Draco Malfoy. Harry was panicked, hoping that it wasn't some part sick part of his mind that made him torture an enemy. Hoping it was just a dream. Eventually the soft patter of rain lulled him into an uneasy sleep.
Hours later Harry woke to something hitting his window repeatedly. "I'm up, Aunt Petunia, I'm up," he said, still half dreaming. A forceful hit to the window brought him out of his stupor. Harry rolled out of bed and landed on his feet. Hedwig hooted softly, as though she was telling him to be careful. Wand out, he walked toward the window, wary of who was out there. The last time this had happened he was kidnapped from the Dursley's by three wizards with a flying car, although that had been welcome. He opened the window, unable to see into the yard because of the now blinding rain. There was no flying car, and for a second Harry thought he had dreamed of the noise. He pulled his head back into the house. Before he could shut the window a voice called out from the darkness outside.
"Wait!"