Title: Meet Harry Potter
Summary: Starts out as expositional chapter that describes who Harry is how he was treated yadda, yadda, yadda.
Author: Property of Professor Snape
Rating: PG
Characters: Harry Potter, Sophia the Snake, Dudley, Vernon, and Petunia Dursley
Word Count:
Genres: Hurt/Comfort with some Angst
Warnings: Mentions of Child Abuse and attempted murder
Disclaimer: I do not, have not, and will not ever own Harry Potter. *Sniff* Great now you've gone and reminded me of that fact and that's a whole other set of issues I have to bring up in my next session with Bob my psychiatrist. BOB?!?!?! Bob is no longer available he has committed suicide, because he can no longer deal with PoPS seriously screwed up tortured mind.
~*~
Harry Potter was not a very important boy, at least that's what he thought. He didn't do anything except what he was told; he always tried his hardest to be what was expected of him, which wasn't very much. He did everything he possibly could to remain under everyone's radar out of trouble but no matter how hard he tried it was futile because trouble always seemed to have a way of finding him.
Take for instance when he was four and Dudley got a new bicycle he hadn't meant to fall on it he was always tripping over his own feet. Regardless he had fallen right on the shiny red bike causing it to become horribly scratched. Dudley had yelled and screamed and cried about how Harry was jealous and purposefully fell on his bike, which wasn't true but by the time Vernon had gotten done with him Harry had begun to believe this was true. Then there was also the time when Harry had turned eight and accidently stepped on his Aunt Marge's favorite dog Bruiser's tail even after the dog and bitten him Vernon still insisted on punishing Harry.
Harry hadn't walked straight for weeks.
It didn't take long for Harry to notice the difference between the way his guardians treated him and they way other parents treated their kids. When it was time for Harry to go to school he had to walk there, it was usually more like running since it always took him longer than he expected to finish all of the morning chores. Other parents however were reluctant to allow kids as young as five walk to school and home all by themselves, and on the rare occasions when Harry did get there early enough to have some down time he always got to see other kids parents drive them up to the school and watched them get hugged good bye.
Harry had never got hugged before something that always did seem to bother him; he couldn't ever remember being hugged by any other person before. It didn't take him long to deduce what he thought the answer to the problem was, Harry had never gotten hugged before simply because he didn't deserve one.
Harry was treated with no respect from the Dursely's because he had what Vernon had oh so affectionately named 'the badness'. This meant that whenever something went wrong no matter how trivial or ludicrous it seemed Harry had to be punished for it. He tried very hard to ignore the words they said to him tried hard to pay no attention to how the other kids got treated because Harry knew that the only reason he was treated this way was because he had the badness in him.
Things for him soon fell into a routine, in the mornings Aunt Petunia would yell at him to wake up and stop being so lazy and start the breakfast. Harry had to do get dressed quickly as he could and start the breakfast immediately otherwise he wouldn't be able to have breakfast of his own. Next he had to complete all of his morning chores and run quickly to school; otherwise he'd be late and be punished. After school he had to complete the afternoon chores and make the family's dinner, he was then instructed to wait inside his cupboard until they were finished eating. When he was let out he had to quickly wash up the dishes that were left over from dinner and complete any remaining chores they had for him in the time allotted otherwise it meant no dinner for him.
By the age of nine Harry's spirit was truly broken he'd become used to the mundane rituals of the life he spent living with the Dursely's. He'd become accustomed to the fact that they never acknowledged him save for some scathing comment or further instruction. He never even flinched when he'd broken some nameless rule (he was so sure had been invented just because they knew he would break it) and had been instructed to stand in his cupboard to await his punishments.
The only thing Harry had ever truly enjoyed doing was reading, he'd read anything he could get his hands on no matter what it was. He'd read old baby books or even Uncle Vernon's encyclopedias about things his young mind could just barely fathom. But his favorite book came from a kindly stranger he'd never seen before, and never seen again. He'd been dragged along on a shopping trip with his Aunt Petunia when he was no more than seven years old they hadn't trusted Harry to stay alone at home yet. She'd sent him to retrieve everything on the list while she gossiped with a woman that she called her friend, but Harry wasn't fooled he'd heard Petunia say many bad words about this woman many times behind her back.
He was in the process of getting Dudley's favorite cereal when an odd man stopped in his tracks staring at Harry in disbelief tears rolling down his cheeks. He'd been dressed completely from head to toe in green and had almost immediately dropped down to his hands and knees stuttering out a thank-you to the young confused boy. Harry didn't dare say a word for fear he might anger the man who was obviously having severe mood swings seeing as how he was laughing hysterically at nothing.
The man crawled over to him grasping a hold of Harry's hand continuing to bow before the very confused seven year old boy. "Please Mr. Potter sir never thought in all my years I'd see you I please except this gift. You probably received better ones from other people but I just please it would mean so much to me if you would accept my humble offering. You are a great man Harry Potter a great man." The man slipped a rather large book into Harry's hand continuously stuttering about something Harry had done but the small boy couldn't ever remebering doing any of the thins the man said he had done.
Something caught in Harry's throat a large lump seemed to set his throat on fire as he tried hard not to cry with joy, this was the first gift he had ever received from anyone. Words failed him as he looked over the book entitled "Sophia Saharan's Shrinking Beginners Guide to Charms Spells and Enchantments" he'd looked up to thank the man for this wondrous gift but he was nowhere to be seen and it seemed to Harry that the man had somehow disappeared into thin air.
Then something occurred to Harry something he hadn't thought of before, how was he to hide this from the Dursely's surely they wouldn't tolerate Harry receiving gifts from mysterious strangers, especially one about magic. Because that was his uncle's number one rule; "THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS MAGIC!!!!" He often heard Vernon yelling at him.
But before Harry could come up with a suitable lie or if need be dispose of the book it had begun to feel lighter and look smaller. There was a word for what was happening what was it again? Harry couldn't think straight. Shrinking! It suddenly came to him the book was shrinking.
"Just like magic" he whispered to himself cringing involuntarily as he said the accursed 'M' word expecting a blow from some invisible attacker for daring to utter such a forbidden phrase.
But it never came; instead Harry shoved the book into his pocket when he felt that it had been done shrinking. Then with numb shaking hands he grasped Dudley's favorite cereal and dashed out of the aisle hurrying towards his Aunt Petunia knowing how much she hated to wait. With each step he took Harry could feel his heart grow heavier until it was laden down with a gut wrenching fear that she would know, know about the mysterious stranger and know about his very first gift. She would somehow be able to detect from Harry's badness how he had tried to hide and keep something from the rest of the family, something involving magic.
"What took you so long boy" she snapped when Harry finally did reach Aunt Petunia and presented her with the grocery item slapping him upside the head. Now that her friend wasn't around she didn't have to pretend to be nice to him anymore. But at that moment the pain of the slap didn't even register for Harry because it seemed as though she hadn't even noticed the magical book inside Harry's pocket. He'd gotten away with it. Harry couldn't ever remember having to fight so hard to not smile in his life before; he never even remembered ever wanting to smile. But none of that mattered now, because he would get to keep the present from the mysterious stranger!
Like every other moment in Harry's life where he'd been truly happy this one to was short lived. The moment they had returned from the market Aunt Petunia had sent Harry straight to his cupboard which was fine with him because it gave him a chance to examine his book more closely. There he read the first page on simple charms for young wizards:
Lumos: This is a simple charm that will create a small burst of light to brighten you in dark situations; some warmth can also be gained from this charm.The incantation Lumos is derived from the Latin lumen meaning "light".
Nox: Is the counter spell for Lumos. It causes the light to be extinguished. In Latin, "Nox" means "night"
However he hadn't been given long to enjoy reading because soon Aunt Petunia had barked at him to come out and start dinner, so that it could be ready for when Vernon and Dudley returned home from their fishing trip. With his mind still on the new book and that first page he'd read Harry began performing his chores on autopilot not even listening as Petunia hollered at him to hurry up and some other harsh words that I can't in good consequence repeat.
When Vernon and Dudley did return home they could somehow tell that Harry was in a good mood as though it were some kind of palpable aura. This automatically put Vernon in a bad mood "Go stand in a corner boy and wipe that smirk off your face" he instructed gruffly. This surprised Harry because he had never even realized he was smiling but he did follow the orders none the less standing up straight in the corner not even daring to breath to loudly. Instead he allowed his mind to wander back to the book that had been stashed inside of a small hole in his cupboard that was normally used to store food.
After the family had finished eating Harry washed the dishes and returned to the corner standing there until Vernon allowed him to move. He'd been standing for hours when Dudley came by. "Still standing there I see" he sneered but Harry didn't even look at him "Hungry I suppose dinner was rather tasty today" Harry refused to acknowledge Dudley or the fact that they had again refused to feed him because he had not finished the dishes in a timely manner. Then suddenly without warning Dudley hollered loudly "Come look and see what Harry has done" and shoved Harry harshly in the side so that he knocked into his Aunt Petunia's favorite vase.
There was a loud crack as Harry fell against the vase and an even louder crash when the vase broke into a thousand different pieces. Harry felt as though his world had cracked along with the vase and he resisted the strong urge to break down and start crying for fear of what the people were going to do to him for breaking an expensive vase. By this time Dudley had already run all the way upstairs to tell an ugly story about how Harry had purposefully broken the vase and how he had tried to heroically save it but to no avail no doubt.
Harry could do nothing but wait standing perfectly still swallowing back any of his emotions and forcing them into a pit deep in the bottom of his stomach as he waited holding his breath for the punishment that he knew would be coming soon.
~*~
Harry was shaking all over when Uncle Vernon finally allowed him to go to bed fear still gripped him tightly. Looking back Harry could remember how sad and alone he felt at that very moment now cold it was and how hard he was shivering. He could remember how desperately he wanted to be warm again but the old thin holy sheets that they had given him to sleep on did little to keep him warm. He tried everything he could think of to get warm again when something finally occurred to him.
Lumos, the spell from that book!
With trembling hands cupped together he whispered "Lumos" his throat burned terribly still raw from screaming but that didn't even register for him instead he was focused on what was forming in the palm of his hand. To his amazement a small ball of light began to take shape in his very hands, growing larger and brighter until it was the size of his fist, and as bright as a rather large night light. He pulled his hands closer to his face enjoying the small amount of warmth he gained from the light.
Since that moment Harry began to break the Dursely's biggest rule of no magic. He read and reread "Sophia Saharan's Shrinking Beginners Guide to Charms Spells and Enchantments" cover to cover learning and practicing everything from that book. He learned how to use Alohomora to unlock his cupboard at night, and how to use Wingardium Leviosa to make things levitate and help him with his chores. He'd also began to strike up conversations with garden snakes when sent out to tend to his aunt's begonias, which sadly were young Harry's only friends.
Soon young Harry Potter would realized what exactly made him so different from the other kids. He would find out precisely what kind of badness the Dursely's were trying rather hard to unceremoniously purge from him. It was then that he found out just how truly powerful he could be. Unfortunately after all those years spent feeling like nothing more than a slave for those better than him it wasn't going to be all that easy to convince him that he ever did anything worth doing.
Lucky for Harry he would soon find out what it would feel like to have an entire Wizarding World backing him up. And that folks is where our story truly begins on our young heroes first day at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.
~*~
A/N: This is the first real chapter of "What If?" and I know it was like one giant filler of crud most of you already guessed, but it was important for you to see the difference between Harry's cannon abuse and my noncannon abuse. I haven't exactly explained it in great detail yet the abuse that he receives from the Dursely's but that plays a much larger factor in the plot and I can't give it away just yet. I also know that I never really explained very much but I hope all of you at least caught on to one main difference between cannon Harry and noncannon Harry, my Harry is a lot less confident which also plays a big role in this fic.
I'm asking you all to bear with me here because trust me it will take a long time for me to get to any couples yet because I really want to focus more on developing the relationship first. So don't be surprised if you don't get any as soon as you'd like it.
I'm sort of hoping that this will become a novel length fic and don't worry about how tiny this chapter was they will be getting much larger as the plot develops. This was sort of a little chapter and a taste of what's yet to come. Updates are going to be really slow because when I first started this fic it was very much different then how it is now, but now that I have taken out Sasha (Harry's basilisk) who played a significant role in my original rewrite all of my prewritten things can't be used. Please send me reviews on whether or not you liked it otherwise I'll just assume no one likes it and stop it writing for ever. (Wow that was a long A/N)