(I do not own Harry Potter!)
"Okay, then, who is reading first?" Draco asked Harry.
"I will," Regulus said.
"Okay," Harry complied, passing the book to Regulus.
"Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone," he read. "Chapter one is… The Boy Who Lived," he announced.
Said boy groaned inwardly.
"Mr. and Mrs. Dursley, of number four, Privet Drive, were proud to say that they were perfectly normal, thank you very much. They were the last people you'd expect to be involved in anything strange or mysterious because they just didn't hold to such nonsense."
"Wow, they seem like charming people," Sirius commented sarcastically.
"They're not," Harry confirmed, knowing that Sirius' words meant the exact opposite of what they meant.
"They sound familiar, though," Lily said, her nose wrinkled slightly in thought.
"Continuing…" Draco said after a moment of silence, waving to Regulus in a way that clearly said 'Continue now'.
"Mr. Dursley was the director of a firm called Grunnings, which made drills,"
"What's a drill?" Bellatrix questioned.
"It's a muggle tool that allows the user to make holes in things," Hermione answered.
"Oh."
"He was a big, beefy man with hardly any neck, although he did have a very large mustache,"
"Charming," James said sarcastically, his nose wrinkled in disgust.
"Mrs. Dursley was thin and blonde and had nearly twice the usual amount of neck, which came in very useful as she spent so much of her time craning over garden fences, spying on the neighbors."
"Oh!" Lily gasped in realization. "It's Tuney!"
"Your dratted sister?" Severus asked in disgust.
"Yes, it seems she hasn't changed all that much," Lily replied.
"The Dursleys had a small son,"
A snort escaped from Harry.
Questioning eyes looked at him. "Dudley's not what you could call little," was all he said as an explanation before he laughed silently.
"Continue, Regulus," Harry said after a moment.
"Called Dudley and in their opinion there was no finer boy anywhere.
The Dursleys had everything they wanted, but they also had a secret, and their greatest fear was that somebody would discover it. They didn't think they could bear it if anyone found out about the Potters."
"Oi! What's wrong with the Potters?" James pouted.
"Do you really want me to answer that?" Severus and Sirius asked sarcastically.
"No," James pouted. Sirius and Remus laughed at their friend's expression.
"Mrs. Potter was Mrs. Dursley's sister, but they hadn't met for several years; in fact, Mrs. Dursley pretended she didn't have a sister at all,"
"Now that's just harsh," Bellatrix said angrily.
"Yeah, but that's how she is…" Lily said quietly and sadly. Bellatrix, to both girls' surprise, gave Lily a comforting hug.
Harry smiled inwardly. Bellatrix was already changing, it seemed, and so was Severus.
"Because her sister and her good-for-nothing husband were as unDursleyish as it was possible.
The Dursleys shuddered to think of what the neighbors would say if the Potters arrived in the street. The Dursleys knew the Potters had a small son, but they had never seen him. This boy was another good reason for keeping the Potters away; they didn't want Dudley mixing with a child like that."
"A child like what, exactly, Tuney?" Lily asked dangerously.
"Uh, Lils, you're talking to a book and… MEEP!" James squeaked as he dodged a particularly nasty jet of light. "Sheesh, Evans, calm down!" he shouted.
"I for one agree with Lily," Bellatrix said. Alice nodded and so did Regulus.
"But – the book – not here – it's just a – oh, never mind!" James groaned exasperatedly.
"When Mr. and Mrs. Dursley woke up on the dull, gray Tuesday our story starts, there was nothing about the cloudy sky outside to suggest that strange and mysterious things would soon be happening all over the country.
Mr. Dursley hummed as he picked out his most boring tie for work, and Mrs. Dursley gossiped away happily as she wrestled a screaming Dudley into his high chair."
"Brat," Sirius, James, Severus, Bellatrix, Regulus, and Lily said while Harry, Ron, and Hermione chuckled silently.
"None of them noticed a large, tawny owl flutter past the window. At half past eight, Mr. Dursley picked up his briefcase, pecked Mrs. Dursley on the cheek, and tried to kiss Dudley goodbye but missed, because Dudley was now having a tantrum and throwing his cereal at the walls."
"BRAT!" everyone in the room minus Albus – though he said it in his mind – shouted.
"Little tyke," chortled Mr. Dursley as he left the house. He got into his car and backed out of number four's drive.
It was on the corner of the street that he noticed the first sign of something peculiar – a cat reading a map."
"An Animagus," the Marauders chorused.
"Bet it's Minnie!" Sirius said, excited.
"Does Padfoot have a crush on our dear Transfiguration teacher?" James mock-cooed.
"You're one to talk," he shot back, an embarrassed look on his face.
"Oi! I love Lily Evans and her only!" James shouted at Sirius before his face reddened as he realized what he said. Lily's face mimicked James'.
"For a second, Mr. Dursley didn't realize what he had seen – then he jerked his head around to look again. There was a tabby cat standing on the corner of Privet Drive, but there wasn't a map in sight. What could he have been thinking of? It must have been a trick of the light. Mr. Dursley blinked and stared at the cat. It stared back. As Mr. Dursley drove around the corner and up the road, he watched the cat in his mirror. It was now reading the sign that said Privet Drive – no, looking at the sign; cats couldn't read maps or signs.
Mr. Dursley gave himself a little shake and put the cat out of his mind. As he drove toward town he thought nothing of except a large order of drills he was hoping to get that day.
But on the edge of town, drills were driven out of his mind by something else. As he sat in the usual morning traffic jam, he couldn't help but noticing that there seemed to be a lot of strangely dressed people about. People in cloaks."
"What's so strange about wearing cloaks?" Regulus and Bellatrix asked.
"Muggles don't normally wear cloaks," Sirius said to everyone's disbelief and shock. At their looks, he said, "What!? I took Muggle Studies, you know…"
"And you actually listened?!" Remus asked, astonished.
Sirius pouted. "Of course! I tend to do that in class… every now and then. Now, Regulus, wipe that smirk off your face and read before I make you."
"Mr. Dursley couldn't bear people who dressed in funny clothes – the getups you saw on young people! He supposed that this was some stupid new fashion. He drummed his fingers on the steering wheel and his eyes fell on a huddle of these weirdoes standing quite close by. They were whispering excitedly together.
Mr. Dursley was enraged to see that a couple of them weren't young at all; why, that man had to be older than he was, and wearing an emerald green cloak! The nerve of him! But then it struck Mr. Dursley that this was probably some silly stunt – these people were obviously collecting something… yes, that would be it.
The traffic moved on and a few minutes later, Mr. Dursley arrived in the Grunnings parking lot, his mind back on drills.
Mr. Dursley sat with his back to the window of his office on the ninth floor. If he hadn't, he might have found it harder to concentrate on drills that morning. He didn't see the owls swooping past in broad daylight, though people in the street did; they pointed and gazed open-mouthed as owl after owl sped overhead."
"This can lead to problems," Albus said.
Harry nodded. "It could."
"Most of them had never seen an owl even at nighttime. Mr. Dursley, however, had a perfectly normal, owl-free morning. He yelled at five different people. He made several important telephone calls and shouted a bit more."
"This man is horrible!" Alice exclaimed.
"I know. I nearly feel bad for Tuney. Nearly, James" Lily added when she saw his expression.
"He was in a very good mood until lunchtime, when he thought he'd stretch his legs and walk across the road to buy himself a bun from the bakery.
He had nearly forgotten all about the people in cloaks until he passed a group next to the baker's. He eyed them angrily as he passed. He didn't know why, but they made him feel uneasy.
This bunch were whispering excitedly, too, and he couldn't see a single collecting tin. It was on his way back past them, clutching a large doughnut in a bag, that he caught a few words of what they were saying.
"The Potters, that's right, that's what I heard —"
" — yes, their son, Harry —"
"Oh no, what happened?" Lily asked nervously.
"Nothing big, I'm sure,"
Mr. Dursley stopped dead.
"Yay, he's dead!" Sirius and James rejoiced.
"As much as I wish that could be true, it's only an expression, Padfoot, dad," Harry told them.
They pouted.
"Harry James Potter!" Lily admonished.
"Sorry, mum, but it's true," he said.
"James?" Remus asked with an eyebrow raised and a smirk tugging at his lips.
"It's pureblood tradition for the child to have the his father's first name as a middle name," Regulus saved Lily, who was currently blushing bright red.
"Ah," Remus responded.
Fear flooded him. He looked back at the whisperers as if he wanted to say something to them, but thought better of it.
He dashed back across the road, hurried up to his office, snapped at his secretary not to disturb him, seized his telephone, and had almost finished dialing his home number when he changed his mind. He put the receiver back down and stroked his mustache, thinking… no, he was being stupid.
Potter wasn't such an unusual name. He was sure there were lots of people called Potter who had a son called Harry. Come to think of it, he wasn't even sure his nephew was called Harry.
"What kind of person doesn't know their nephew's own name?!" Bellatrix exclaimed, disgusted at the poor excuse of a muggle.
"Vernon Dursley," Hermione, Ginny, Ron, and Neville replied back sourly.
He'd never even seen the boy. It might have been Harvey. Or Harold.
Lily was beyond coherence. The only words that could be comprehended were "murder", "Petunia", "not even knowing his name", and "stupid, fat tub of lard".
There was no point in worrying Mrs. Dursley; she always got so upset at any mention of her sister. He didn't blame her — if he'd had a sister like that…
"OI! PEA BRAIN! LILY EVANS IS AMAZING, BEAUTIFUL, SMART, TALENTED, AND…" James shouted but trailed off when he realized what he was saying. His face turned red as did Lily's, who had stopped muttering death threats to her sister's family.
Snape looked less than pleased at James' outburst, as expected…
but all the same, those people in cloaks…
The purebloods still looked confused at the cloak thing, but didn't comment.
"I think he's starting to figure it out…" Sirius said.
"Thanks for stating the obvious, Padfoot," Remus said sarcastically. Sirius pouted.
A/N: Aha! I figured something out. I'll just split the chapter 'The Boy-Who-Lived' into two parts. (: So that would mean that you have something to read while I try to get the writing section of my mind in control. ^^ (Currently, the writing section of my brain has ideas for stories flying through it at sixty miles an hour.)
