I was going to put this into the next chapter, but it was getting a bit long. I wanted to address some concerns of the reviewers and explain my line of thought and where I'm coming from. I'll post it at the same time as the next chapter, so if you aren't interested, you can just skip along to the next one.

About Ron: Harry did not just befriend Ron because he was starved for affection. He befriended Ron because he was the first person on the train that he really met, and they got along well. They were eleven year old boys—their friendships aren't going to get much deeper than that. Ron can be a bit dense, yes, but so can Harry (Read: the whole 'Cho' incident) Newsflash: They're teenage boys. You argue that Harry was abused and belittled all of his life by the Dursleys, but latched on to the first person that treated him differently. Then why would he stay with him? After about two months, he was close to Hermione, too. If Ron really treated the both of them that horribly, they would have ditched him. They didn't. Harry is not a saint either. Harry is short tempered, moody, easily irritable, and he spends a great deal of time snapping at his friends. Hermione is slavishly devoted to the rules, especially in the beginning, nagging, bossy, she's a bit of a know-it-all, which can be very annoying. They all have their flaws, but they do genuinely care for each other. And yes, one of those flaws that Ron has is jealousy. For a completely understandable reason! Ron has horrendously low self-esteem in Philosopher's Stone, Ron says: 'I'm the sixth in our family to go to Hogwarts. You could say I've got a lot to live up to. Bill and Charlie have already left — Bill was head boy and Charlie was captain of Quidditch. Now Percy's a prefect. Fred and George mess around a lot, but they still get really good marks and everyone thinks they're really funny. Everyone expects me to do as well as the others, but if I do, it's no big deal, because they did it first.' Ron feels that he can't ever hope to live up to The Head Boy, The Quidditch Captain, The Smart One, The Pranksters, or The Girl. Then Harry does all of these great things and he has everything that Ron's ever wanted and everyone loves him, and yes, he gets jealous. No, it isn't right, and you shouldn't treat your friends like that, but his feelings are understandable. For everyone that has the impression that Ron is a complete troll that uses Harry for attention and Hermione for his homework, I direct you to this link. In fact, I dare you to read it.

http:/tvtropes(dot)org/pmwiki/pmwiki(dot)php/Main/RonTheDeathEater

Just copy and paste the link. Go on, try it.

As for Christmases—in second year, Ron and Hermione stayed for Christmas because they had decided that that was the best time to interrogate Malfoy. Harry would have done the same. In first year, Ron would have been staying anyway, since his parents were going to Romania. Harry probably would have stayed to keep him company. If you say that he never would have been at the Weasleys' house, and Apolline and Jean-Paul would never have let him stay at Hogwarts after everything that he did and all of the danger that he got into: well, look at Hermione! Look at all of the time that she spent with the Weasleys, and look at what happened to her. She never had any problems. If that stuff was being washed out, and they didn't know as much about it, they wouldn't pull him out.

Also: Harry's parents' will—whatever gave you the impression that it wasn't read? They had to leave all of their money to him somehow. Some people argue that Dumbledore had the power to seal the will. That is illegal. Dumbledore may be misguided, but he is not evil, and he does not run around purposely doing illegal things. Probably, Harry's parents named several people as guardians that couldn't be for several reasons (Sirius was in Azkaban, Peter was 'dead', and I doubt that anyone was going to let the Boy-Who-Lived anywhere near a werewolf), and he was sent to his closest blood relatives by default. Since Harry is the last Potter, and James didn't have any living blood relatives, Petunia was it. Harry's name was down at Hogwarts since before he was born. That seems like a serious 'last wish' to me. And the Delacours wouldn't have wanted to disrespect the Potters' wishes for their son.

Now, what else. Houses—you saw in the beginning how he was determined to get in the way of anything happening to Fleur and Gabrielle? That sounds like Gryffindor material to me. You argue that if Harry had been raised differently, he would have been a completely different person. If Harry had acted meek and abused in canon, I would agree with you. However, Harry doesn't act like an abused child would. He stands up to Snape when Snape is a dick to him, he talks back to McGonagall when he's caught out of bed, he stands up to Malfoy on several occasions. Really, if we're talking about people who resemble abused children, Neville would be the top of that list. Maybe, if he had been raised by Professors, or a Ravenclaw family, he might be in Ravenclaw. But the Delacours raised Fleur. And Fleur stood up to a dragon, merpeople and grindylows, all of the things in that maze. Then she came back and married Bill Weasley, who would never be attracted to a weak nobody. He's a cursebreaker, a Gryffindor, and a Weasley, and helped fight in a war that was really none of her concern. If Fleur was at Hogwarts, I firmly believe that she would have been in Gryffindor.

Now, I think that I've covered everything. I hope that explains how I'm thinking in this. You can just move on to the next chapter now. But I refuse to bash Ron because you don't like him. I happen to like Ron, and I think that him and Harry would have ended up friends no matter what.