A/N: What if... the Dursleys had been nice to Harry? What if leaving them for Hogwarts wasn't a relief but treason? This story explores how Harry faces the dilemma of being loyal to the only family he's ever known, the one that has been with him through thick and thin, or Hogwarts and the magical world. What is he to do?

My first attempt at HP fanfic, ever, and I admit not being a great reader of the archive so... my apologies if this idea has been done before. All your comments are welcome!

This Privet Drive is more like a suburb in Connecticut than a real English town. Sorry about that.

I do not have my stories betaread by anyone. I publish them and then correct them and update them with comments, or as I read them again and spot inconsistencies. Feel free to point out spelling, grammar or plot mistakes.

Thank you for reading me, n-p

Life in Privet Drive was quiet and normal, as usual. The sun shone over the well manicured gardens, the gleaming two year old SUVs parked in the driveways, the two-and-one-third children families. Everything lined, in perfect order, right by the book. One would believe, and wouldn't be too far off actually, that birds and dogs didn't dare to poop outside designated areas.

Inside the homes, however, things were as normal as they can be. Nobody truly spoke of it, but everyone knew that Ms. Figgs had a leaky rooftop, and we're not talking about real estate here. And that the Joneses had started out as a teenaged middle daughter running away with a milkman, and then there was that weird adopted kid living with the Dursleys, Harry.

But as it was, nobody would have dared to mention this to their face. Yes, Harry was thin as a twig and his hair seemed to have declared war on all combs, and there was the little thing that his parents had died and he didn't remember them, but all things considered, he was one happy boy. Because Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia, perhaps not the brightest people on the surface of the Earth but nice enough people, had taken him in right after the accident, had raised him along with their son Dudley and had been one true family to him. No, people wouldn't dare to laugh at Harry or they'd meet with Dudley's fists, or the older Dursleys' knitted brows and squinting, gleaming eyes.

No, Harry couldn't complain and he never did, as Aunt Petunia was quite doting on both her son and nephew and that would have been terribly unfair. Dudley (quite surprisingly, in Harry's view) was very fond of sports equipment and he would always receive something new and shiny, either for his birthday, Christmas, first day of holidays, solstice, or just because. Harry wasn't too interested in stuff, but he had dearly wanted to have the nook under the stairs for his and his alone. It had been quite the negotiation with the Dursleys, as Harry did have a room for himself (the smallest one upstairs, true, but sunny and decently sized nonetheless) and that space was being used for storage, but Harry had accommodated everything under his bed and Petunia had relented. Harry still wasn't sure how he had managed to put all the camping gear, plus all the winter jackets, boots and ski gear, plus Uncle Vernon's toolbox of toolboxes, eight years worth of school artwork and a big box containing Aunt Petunia's wedding dress in such a small place, not even how he had managed to carry it all upstairs in less than five minutes, but he tried not to linger too much on it.

Because Harry's life was full of such little things, odd wee things that made him feel like an outsider, no matter how many fancy clothes Aunt Petunia got him or the belching contests with his uncle and cousin (in which he had no chance but was always welcome). And from time to time a feeling of strangeness, of inexplicable uneasiness, would flood him, and like a person waking up from a very deep slumber he would feel like there was something quite important he should know but couldn't remember, couldn't get a hold on. Harry would never share these thoughts with anyone, least of all the Dursleys, because he knew they wouldn't like it.

Although he didn't know exactly why.

oo0oo

Only after many things happened did Harry realize that some normal things in Privet Drive every day life weren't normal at all. One was that Petunia and Vernon closely screened everything that was watched or read by the members of the family, and quite covertly too. Sports and news were fine, as was war and historical fiction, but fantasy seemed to be beyond limits. At first Harry and Dudley would conjecture there was something naughty about it, or terribly inappropriate and were quite puzzled, disappointed even, when would watch some forbidden films at some friend's house. Thing was, if it had witches in it, flying animals that were not birds, or the merest hint at magic, then the Dursleys wouldn't like it. Lord of the Rings was so high in all lists of no-no's that even its title was forbidden.

Other peculiarity happened always at the end of October: they were almost always on a trip somewhere far, or a sad event was remembered, or just by chance someone was ill and thus the boys had never, ever, gone trick-or-treat'ing in their lives. Hallowe'en was something other people did, like going to Mass every Sunday or ice fishing in winter. Not wrong in itself, but foreign to them.

It later sort of made sense, but as I said, several things had to happen before Harry could understand any of this.

oo0oo

Harry didn't know much about his parents. His mother had been Petunia's sister, and her name was Lily. His father's name was James and his family was from Scotland, or so Uncle Vern said once. The Dursleys had met James only briefly (like, just once) and hadn't met with any other member of the Potter family, and Petunia and Lily hadn't been close so there wasn't much to be said. James and Lily had attended classes together somewhere, and from the scarce available information Harry had gleamed that they were probably jobless English majors, which was as far as he could think from what Vernon and Petunia would approve of. There were no assets to Harry's name, no house or valuable object or bank account, which reinforced the notion of his parents being quite the hipsters. Petunia's own parents were quite elderly and lived in an assisted living facility, and though Harry literally died for asking them about Lily and James, the few times they visited it didn't seem correct. Petunia said they might not remember them, as they routinely forgot about Dudley and Harry, but Harry suspected they might get irremediably sad.

Harry had made a decision, though. One day, perhaps not today or tomorrow, but soon enough, he would set out to find out more about his parents. When he were older and in charge of his own life, and in the meantime, he would work on making the Dursleys to be alright with that.