Set twelve years after the war.
Chapter 1-Amy's point of view
"Amy! Come down here! Now! Me and your father have been waiting for ages!" yelled my mom.
It was May 9th and was my birthday and sounds odd for an eleven year old girl but I'd managed to sleep late. I knew Mom was pretty mad at me for managing to sleep late because Aunt Marge and my brother were coming over for my birthday and I'd been warned to get up early.
"Just coming mom" I yelled.
"Amy, you know you are to call me Petunia and not mother!" yelled my mom.
I'd always been told to call her Petunia since I was little, my parents had always been very strict, they explained to me that it was because they didn't want to make the same mistakes with me that they'd made with Dudley but I didn't think it was fair! Dudley seemed fine to me, just a normal, annoying, older brother.
I slowly climbed out of bed and winced as I'd just stepped on one of my niece's toys that she'd decided to leave on the floor. Dudley's daughter, Lucy, really was a pain.
"Amy! Now!"
I quickly dragged on some clothes and some non-matching socks. Then I ran quickly down the stairs, managing to fall down the last two, and ran into the living room.
"Amy, you look awful!" said my mother, always being nice to me that woman was...
"Yeah I know. So what do you want?" I asked.
"Now as you know your brother and your aunt will be here in half an hour, but that is not what I want to talk to you about. I have just heard that Harry, your cousin on my side, will be coming with his wife to spend the day with you."
I looked at my mother, shocked, she had told me that I didn't have any other family on her side. I gave her a questioning look.
"Now is not the time for explanations Amy. Now be polite to him, this family needs to make up to him and I'm hoping you will follow suit. Now get upstairs and make sure you look presentable!"
"Yes mom" I replied, being relieved that I was being allowed to leave the room.
I ran up to my bedroom and thought about what I'd just been told. Why had mom kept it from me that I had a cousin? I knew that they liked to keep the past private, but just thought they were being strict with me like they were with most things.
I realised then that me having a cousin meant that my mother must have a sister, wow, I had another Auntie. Maybe she'd even be nicer than Aunt Marge. Although that wasn't hard, Aunt Marge was nice to me, yes, but I couldn't stand her or her stinking dogs, sometimes I wondered how it was possible that I was even related to her.
I decided that seeing this "new" cousin of mine and his wife was definitely worth looking presentable for so I decided to have a shower and quickly walked into the bathroom.
I winced as I walked in. I'd always hated our bathroom since I was a little girl; it was pink, in my opinion the worst colour in the world. And was way too tidy for my liking, I liked things messy, always had. I was the complete opposite to my mother, sometimes I felt I wasn't related to her or to my father and I looked different from them enough to pretend that I wasn't. When I was little I used to pretend I was a fairy, from another world, I was old enough now to realise that that wasn't true, but it was always a nice idea.
Another way in which I was different to both of my parents was that I had a shock of red hair, my Mom called it auburn, but it was definitely red. I got teased for it at my school. And was dreading the day I had to go to Lassendene, the Local Comprehensive School. Apparently it was almost impossible to survive until year eleven, completely impossible if you were different in any way.
Not that I cared about the teasing too much, I liked to think of myself as quite strong, it was just a big hassle having to put up with it. At my primary school they called me "mouthy", yes I said what I thought, but in my eyes that was just what I had to.
I didn't like to hurt people though so I tried to always help the people who couldn't help themselves, I rarely succeeded. As mom said, my ideas were good, I just didn't really think before I did the actions. And then got myself into trouble.
I snapped out of my thinking and got into the shower.
A while later I dragged a comb through my hair, put some neat clothes on and skipped hastily down the stairs, just in time to hear the doorbell ring.
