Daisy Dursley knew that she shouldn't have snuck away from her grandparents' house to walk home, but she also knew that she could not stand to be around Granny Petunia's incessant fussing anymore.
She was eleven, and she could take care of herself. She did not need the older woman hovering over her every move, and planning playdates with William Fitzgerald across the street, and practically crying when she got mud on her outfit.
The walk from Number 4 Privet Drive to 37 Magnolia Crescent was a short one, and it was one that the young girl knew well. Many times over the summer, she'd been forced to plan an escape much like the one she was in the middle of, and it seemed like the adults never learned. Her mother thought the whole thing was hilarious, laughing at 'that ridiculous look on Petunia's face- why, it looks like she's got a stick up her-' while her father merely shook his head and made her apologize to her grandparents.
She made good time on her escape, and was just rounding on the driveway leading up to her house when she noticed a strange looking bird sitting on her front porch. She walked closer to it, but slowed when it didn't fly away like most birds would. Instead, it tilted its head to the side, and studied her just as closely as she was studying it.
She was just about to take a step closer, when the familiar sound of a car rolled to a stop behind her. Distracted, she turned to see who it was, and saw her father appraising her with raised eyebrows and a look of bewilderment on his face.
She knew she would be in trouble for sneaking away from her grandparents', so she bowed her head and waited for him to get out of the car.
For his part, Dudley Dursley was no longer surprised when his daughter was waiting outside of their house at the end of the day, rather than at his parents' place. No, he wasn't surprised, but at the moment he was shocked by the bird resting on the porch behind her.
His little Daisy had been showing signs of magic for longer than he could remember, and Harry had warned him what it meant, but it was still a shock to see the bird sitting on his porch, much like one had done all those years ago when he was young.
After a few moments of her father not getting out of the car, Daisy started to grow confused. She looked up at him, just in time to see him spring to life again.
"Hello Flower," he said, opening the car door and climbing out of the vehicle, not sounding nearly as angry as Daisy had been concerned about.
"'Ello Daddy," she said tentatively. She was about to ask how his day was, when the almost-forgotten bird behind her made a shrieking noise, that startled her into turning back towards it.
"How long has that been there?" her father asked, closing the distance between them and resting a hand on her shoulder, but not moving any closer to the bird.
"I dunno, I just got home," she replied with a shrug. However her nonchalance was shortly lived, as she went back to studying the creature and, in doing so, noticed something strange about it. "What's that tied to its leg?"
"Looks like a letter to me," Dudley said, before moving around his daughter, towards the bird, who gazed at him warily but made no move to fly away.
A few more steps and Dudley was close enough to touch it, but choose not to. Instead, he reached out his hand and held it still in front of him for a few moments, before the owl caught on. It raised itself from where it was perched, and dropped the paper in his hand, before coo-ing once more, and flying away.
Returning his gaze to the paper in his hand, Dudley realized that his suspicions had been correct. "Here darling, it's for you."
Daisy's eyes widened as she took the paper from her father and saw that her name was in fact written across the envelope. She looked up at his unwavering gaze for a moment, before she looked back at the envelope and tore it open without a second thought.
"'Daisy Marge Dursley, You have been accepted to attend Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry?'" she read slowly, stumbling on a few of the words and, altogether, being more than a little bit confused by the whole thing. "What does that mean, daddy?"
Dudley swallowed the lump in his throat and looked down at his daughter's confused, hopeful face. "You remember Uncle Harry, right?" he asked, kneeling down so that the two of them were on eyelevel.
Daisy did in fact remember Uncle Harry. They went to his house for Christmas Eve Dinner every year. There were always lots of children, and lots of food, though the children all knew each other better then they knew her, so sometimes she felt left out. Still, she nodded her head and waited for her father to continue.
"Well, this is the school that he went to, and that his children go to," Dudley explained in the simplest way he knew how, trying not to let his fear detract from the excitement growing on her face. "It's a school where you learn to do magic."
"Like the boy with the hair that always changes?" she asked, hoping dreadfully that she would learn how to do that. Even at eleven, she was already tired of her dirty blonde hair that was a combination of her father's blonde and her mother's brown.
"Sort of, yes," Dudley said, knowing that he wasn't the best person to answer any of these questions. "I'll tell you what, darling. Let's go inside, and I'll send your Uncle Harry a letter- see if he can come over and tell you all about it. And while I'm doing that, you can give your Gran a call and apologize for running away again."
AN- SO if anybody is interested, I've already got about 5 chapters of this story finished!
While the prologue took place with Daisy as a girl, the rest of the story is going to start off in her 5th year and it's been a lot of fun to write so far, so yeah- I'm about 99% sure nobody's read this far which is why I'm still rambling on, so I'm going to stop that now...