So how you guys taken to Jay? I think his the best. Ha, that just my weird humour. Sorry. Anyway, I'm trying to get this book out as fast as I can so we can get onto the good stuff. Hope you enjoy this chapter. Oh and I don't own Harry Potter, just Jay Potter.
Oh and I forgot to say in the first. Writing in italics means more meaning on that word or it's in some kinda letter style; you'll be able to tell the difference
– CHAPTER THREE –
The Letter from No One
The escape of the Brazilian boa constrictor earned Harry and Jay their longest-ever punishment. By the time they were allowed out of their cupboard again, the summer holidays had started and Dudley had already broken his new cine-camera, crushed his remote control airplane and, first time on his racing bike, knocked down old Mrs Figg as she crossed Privet Drive on her crutches.
Harry and Jay were glad school was over, but there was no escaping Dudley's gang, who visited the house every single day. Piers, Dennis, Malcolm and Gordon were all big and stupid, but as Dudley was the biggest and the stupidest of the lot, he was the leader. The rest of them were all quite happy to join in Dudley's favorite sport: Harry Hunting.
This was why Harry and Jay spent as much time as possible out of the house, wandering around and thinking about the end of the holidays, where they could see a tiny ray of hope. When September came they would be going off to high school and, for the first time in their life, they wouldn't be with Dudley. Dudley had a place at Uncle Vernon's old school, Smeltings. Piers Polkiss was going there too. Harry and Jay, on the other hand, were going to Stonewall High, the local comprehensive. Dudley thought this was very funny.
"They stuff people's heads down the toilet first day at Stonewall," he told the brothers. "Want to come upstairs and practice?"
"No thanks," said Harry. "The poor toilet's never had anything as horrible as your head down it – it might be sick."
"I wouldn't count on it," said Jay. "The stuff that comes out of Dudley's –"
"Come back here you two!" yelled Dudley has Harry and Jay ran off before Dudley could catch them.
One day in July, Aunt Petunia took Dudley to London to buy his Smeltings uniform, leaving Harry and Jay at Mrs Figg's. Mrs Figg wasn't as bad as usual. It turned out she'd broken her leg tripping over one of her cats and she didn't seem quite as fond of them as before. She let Harry and Jay watch television and gave them each a bit of chocolate cake that tasted as though she'd had it for several years.
That evening, Dudley paraded around the living room for the family in his brand-new uniform. Smeltings boys wore maroon tailcoats, orange knickerbockers and flat straw hats called boaters. They also carried knobby sticks, used for hitting each other while the teachers weren't looking. This was supposed to be good training for later life.
As he looked at Dudley in his new knickerbockers, Uncle Vernon said gruffly that it was the proudest moment of his life. Aunt Petunia burst into tears and said she couldn't believe it was her Ickle Dudlekins. He looked so handsome and grown-up. Harry didn't trust himself to speak. He thought two of his ribs might already have cracked from trying not to laugh. Jay looked like he was about to vomit.
There was a horrible smell in the kitchen the next morning when Harry and Jay went in for breakfast. It seemed to be coming from a large metal tub in the sink. Harry went to have a look. The tub was full of what looked like dirty rags swimming in grey water.
"What's this?" he asked Aunt Petunia. Her lips tightened as they always did if he dared to ask a question.
"Your new school uniform," she said
Jay peered into the bowl.
"We have to wear elephant skin?"
"Don't be stupid," snapped Aunt Petunia. "I'm dyeing some of Dudley's old things grey for you. It'll look just like everyone else's when I've finished."
Jay rolled his eyes at Harry, which meant, "I seriously doubted that." And Harry couldn't agree more. How were they going to look on their first day at Stonewall High?
Dudley and Uncle Vernon came in, both with wrinkled noses because of the smell from Harry and Jay's new uniform. Uncle Vernon opened his newspaper as usual and Dudley banged his Smeltings stick, which he carried everywhere, on the table.
They heard the click of the letterbox and flop of letters on the doormat.
"Get the post, Dudley," said Uncle Vernon from behind his paper.
"Make Harry get it."
"Get the post, Harry."
"Make Dudley get it."
"Poke him with your Smeltings stick, Dudley."
Harry dodged the Smeltings stick and went to get the post. Four things lay on the door mat: A post card from Uncle Vernon's sister Marge, who was holidaying on the Isle of Wight, a brown envelope that looked liked a bill and – two letters each for Harry and Jay.
Harry picked up all the letters and stared at his letter, his heart twanging like a giant elastic band. No one, ever, in his whole life, had written to him. Who would? He had no friends, no other relatives – he didn't belong to the library so he'd never even gotten rude notes asking for books back. Yet here it was, a letter, addressed so plainly there could be no mistake:
Mr H. Potter
The Cupboard under the Stairs
4 Privet Drive
Little Whinging
Surrey
The envelope was think and heavy, made of yellowish parchment, and the address was written in emerald-green ink. There was no stamp.
Harry looked at Jay's letter. It was the exact same, except for the name. He turned the envelope over, his hand trembling; Harry saw a purple wax seal bearing a coat of arms; a lion, an eagle, a badger and a snake surrounding a large letter "H"
"Hurry up, boy!" shouted Uncle Vernon from the kitchen. "What are you doing, checking for letter-bombs?" He chuckled at his own joke.
Harry went back to the kitchen, still staring at his letter. He handed Uncle Vernon the bill and the postcard. He sat down next to Jay and gave his letter to him. Jay stared down at the letter and began to open it, just as Harry was doing.
Uncle Vernon ripped open the bill, snorted in disgust and flipped over the postcard.
"Marge's ill," he informed Aunt Petunia. "Ate a funny whelk …"
"Dad!" said Dudley suddenly. "Dad, Harry and Jay have something!"
Harry and Jay were at the point of unfolding their letters, which was written on the same heavy parchment as the envelope, when Uncle Vernon jerked them sharply out of their hands.
"That's mine!" said Harry and Jay at once
"Who'd be writing to you?" sneered Uncle Vernon, shaking one of the letters open with one hand and glancing at it. His face went from red to green faster than a set of traffic lights. And it didn't stop there. Within seconds it was the grayish white of porridge.
"P-P-Petunia!" he gasped.
Dudley tried to grab the letter to read it, but Uncle Vernon held it high out of his reach. Aunt Petunia took it curiously and read the first line. For a moment it looked as though she might faint. She clutched her throat and made a choking noise.
"Vernon! Oh my goodness – Vernon"
They stared at each other, seeming to have forgotten that Harry, Jay and Dudley were still in the room. Dudley wasn't used to being ignored. He gave his father a sharp tap on the head with his Smeltings stick.
"I want to read the letter," he said loudly.
"I want to read it," said Harry furiously, "as it is mine."
"Get out, all of you," croaked Uncle Vernon, stuffing the letters back inside their envelope.
Harry didn't move.
"I WANT MY LETTER!" he shouted.
"Let me see it!" demanded Dudley.
"Why should you they're not your letters," said Jay.
"OUT!" roared Uncle Vernon and shoved the three of them out into the hall, slamming the kitchen
door behind them. Harry and Dudley promptly had a furious but silent fight over who would listen at the keyhole; Dudley won, so Harry, his glasses dangling from one ear, joined Jay on the floor listening though the crack between the door and the floor.
"Vernon," Aunt Petunia was saying in a quivering voice, "look at the address – how could they possibly know where they sleep? You don't think they're watching the house?"
"Watching – spying – might be following us," muttered Uncle Vernon wildly.
"But what should we do, Vernon? Should we write back? Tell them we don't want –"
"No," he said firmly. "No, we'll ignore it. If they don't get an answer … yes, that's best … we won't do anything …"
"But –"
"I'm not having one in the house, Petunia, let alone two! Didn't we swear when we took them in we'd stamp out that dangerous nonsense?"
That evening when he got back from work, Uncle Vernon did something he'd never done before; he visited Harry and Jay in their cupboard.
"Where's our letter?" said Harry, the moment Uncle Vernon had squeezed through the door. "Who's writing to us?"
"No one. It was addressed to you by mistake," said Uncle Vernon shortly. "I have burnt it."
"It was not a mistake," said Harry angrily. "It had our cupboard on it."
"Yeah, who else lives in a cupboard?" said Jay
"SILENCE!" yelled Uncle Vernon, and a couple of spiders fell from the ceiling. He took a few deep breaths and then forced his face into a smile, which looked quite painful.
"Er – yes – about this cupboard. Your aunt and I have been thinking … you two are really getting a bit big for it … we think it might be nice if you move into Dudley's second bedroom."
"Why?" said Harry.
"Don't ask question!" snapped his uncle. "Take this stuff upstairs, now."
The Dursley's house had four bedrooms: one for Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia, one for visitors (usually Uncle Vernon's sister, Marge), one where Dudley slept and one where Dudley kept all the toys and things that wouldn't fit into his first bedroom. It only took Harry and Jay one trip upstairs to move everything they owned from the cupboard to this room. Harry sat down on the bed as Jay set up the other bed. He looked around the room. Nearly everything in here was broken. The month-old cine-camera was lying on top of a small, working tank Dudley had driven over next door's dog; in the corner was Dudley's first-ever television set, which he'd put his foot through when his favorite program had been cancelled; there was a large bird-cage which had once held a parrot that Dudley had swapped at school for a real air-rifle, which was up on a shelf with the end all bent because Dudley had sat on it. Other shelves were full of books. They were the only things in the room that looked as though they'd never been touched. Jay pulled one down and began to read on the newly set up bed.
From down stairs came the sound of Dudley bawling at his mother: "I don't want them in there … I need that room … make them get out …"
Harry sighed and stretched out on his bed. Yesterday he'd have given anything to be up here. Today he'd rather be back in his cupboard with that letter than up here without it.
Next morning at breakfast, everyone was rather quiet. Dudley was in shock. He'd screamed, whacked his father with his Smeltings stick, been sick on purpose, kicked his mother and thrown his tortoise through the greenhouse roof and he still didn't get his room back. Harry was thinking about this time yesterday and wishing he'd opened the letter in the hall. Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia kept looking at each other darkly.
When the post arrived, Uncle Vernon, who seemed to be trying to be nice to Harry and Jay, made Dudley go and get it. They heard him banging things with his Smeltings stick all the way down the hall. Then he shouted, "There's two more! Mr H and J Potter, the Smallest Bedroom, 4 Privet Drive –"
With a strangled cry, Uncle Vernon leapt from his seat and ran down the hall, Harry and Jay right behind him. Uncle Vernon had to wrestle Dudley to the ground to get the letter from him, which was made difficult by the fact that Harry had grabbed Uncle Vernon around the neck from behind and Jay trying to get between him and Dudley. After a minute of confused fighting, in which everyone got hit by a lot of Smeltings stick, Uncle Vernon straightened up, gasping for breath, with Harry and Jay's letters clutched in his hand.
"Go to your cupboard – I mean, your bedroom," he wheezed at Harry and Jay. "Dudley – go – just go."
Harry walked around and around his new room. While Jay lay on one of the beds reading a new book.
"They know we've moved rooms," said Harry.
"Freaky."
"And they know we didn't get the first letter."
"Weird."
"So they tried to get us another one."
"They really want us to read those letters."
"Surly they would try again?"
"Probably."
"So we should help them?"
"Yeah, should help them."
"And I have a plan that won't fail"
The repaired alarm clock rang at six o'clock the next morning. Harry turned it off quickly and dressed silently with Jay. They stole downstairs without turning on any of the lights or making a sound so the Dursleys didn't wake.
They were going to wait for the postman on the corner of Privet Drive and get the letters for number four first. Harry's heart hammered as he slowly crept across the dark hall towards the front door –
"AAAAARRRGH!"
Harry leapt into the air and fell on top of Jay who was behind him – he'd trodden on something big and squashy on the doormat – something alive!
Lights clicked on upstairs and to his horror Harry realised that the big squashy something had been his uncle's face. Uncle Vernon had been lying at the foot of the front door in a sleeping bag, clearly making sure that Harry and Jay didn't do exactly what they'd been trying to do. He shouted at Harry and Jay for about an hour and then told them to go make a cup of tea. Harry and Jay shuffled miserably off into the kitchen.
"Your planed failed," said Jay quietly
"Are you on my side or not?"
By the time they'd gotten back, the post had arrived, right into Uncle Vernon's lap. Harry could see six letters addressed in green ink.
"I want –" he began, but Uncle Vernon was tearing the letters into little pieces before their eyes.
Uncle Vernon didn't go to work that day. He stayed at home and nailed up the letterbox.
"See," he explained to Aunt Petunia through a mouthful of nails, "If they can't deliver them they'll just give up."
"I'm not sure that'll work, Vernon."
"Oh, these people's minds work in strange ways, Petunia, they're not like you and me," said Uncle Vernon, trying to knock in a nail with the piece of fruit cake Aunt Petunia had just brought him.
On Friday, no fewer than twelve letters arrived for Harry and Jay. As they couldn't go though the letterbox they had been pushed under the door, slotted through the sides and a few even forced through the small window in the downstairs toilet.
Uncle Vernon stayed at home again. After burning all the letters, he got out a hammer and nails and boarded up the cracks around the front and back doors so no one could go out. He hummed "Tiptoe through the Tulips" as he worked, and jumped at small noises.
On Saturday, things began to get out of hand. No fewer then twenty-four letters addressed to Harry and Jay found their way into the house, rolled up and hidden inside each of the two-dozen eggs that their very confused milkman had handed Aunt Petunia through the living-room window. While Uncle Vernon made furious telephone calls to the post office and the dairy trying to find someone to complain to, Aunt Petunia shredded the letters in her food mixer.
"Who on earth wants to talk to you this badly?" Dudley asked Harry and Jay in amazement.
On Sunday morning, Uncle Vernon sat down at the breakfast table looking tired and rather ill, but happy.
"No post on Sundays," he reminded them happily as he spread marmalade on his newspaper, "no damn letter today, not one bleming letter –"
Something came whizzing down the kitchen chummy as he spoke and caught him sharply on the back of the head. Next moment, thirty or forty so letters came pelting out of the fireplace like bullets. The Dursleys ducked, but Harry and Jay leapt into the air trying to catch one –
"Out! OUT!"
Jay caught one and had to begun to read it but the letter got knocked out of his hands by Uncle Vernon, who seized him around the waist and then grabbed Harry by the scruff of the neck and threw them into the hall. Aunt Petunia and Dudley had run out with their arms over their faces, Uncle Vernon slammed the door shut. They could hear the letters still streaming into the room, bouncing off the walls and floor.
"That does it," said Uncle Vernon, trying to speak calmly but pulling great tufts out of his moustache at the same time. "I want you all back here in five minutes, ready to leave. We're going away. Just pack some clothes. No arguments!"
He looked so dangerous with half his moustache missing that no one dared argue. Ten minutes later they had wrenched their way through the boarded-up doors and were in the car, speeding towards the motorway. Dudley was sniffling in the back seat; his father had hit him around the head for holding them up while he tried to pack his television, video and computer in his sports bag.
They drove. And they drove. Even Aunt Petunia didn't dare ask where they were going. Every now and then Uncle Vernon would take a sharp turning and drive in the opposite direction for a while.
"Shake 'em off … shake 'em off," he would mutter whenever he did this.
They didn't stop to eat or drink all day. By nightfall Dudley was howling. He'd never had such a bad day in his life. He was hungry, he'd missed five television programs he'd wanted to see and he'd never gone so long without blowing up an alien on his computer.
Uncle Vernon stopped at last outside a gloomy-looking hotel on the outskirts of a big city. Dudley, Harry and Jay shared a room with twin beds and damp, musty sheets.
As Dudley slept, the brothers talked.
"So did you read what the letter said," whispered Harry when he knew for sure that the Dursleys were asleep.
"Only a bit of it."
"Well, what did it say?
"Dear Mr J. Potter, We are pleased to inform you that you have a place at – and then it got taken out of my hand."
"A place at what?"
"I'm guessing a school."
"When did we get put down to go to any school?"
"Maybe our parents put our names down for it when we were born? It would explain why the Dursley don't want us to go."
"Yeah, maybe…"
Harry turned his head and started too stare down at the lights of passing cars, wondering …
They ate stale cornflakes and cold tinned tomatoes on toast for breakfast the next day. They had just finished when the owner of the hotel came over to their table.
"'Scuse me, but are any of you Mr H. Potter or Mr J. Potter? Only I got about an 'undred of these at the front desk."
She held up two letters so they could read the two green ink addresses:
Mr H. Potter
Room 17
Railview Hotel
Cokeworth
Mr J. Potter
Room 17
Railview Hotel
Cokeworth
Harry made a grab for the letters but Uncle Vernon knocked his hand out of the way. The woman stared.
"I'll take them all," said Uncle Vernon, standing up quickly and following her from the dining room.
"Wouldn't it be better just to go home, dear?" Aunt Petunia suggested timidly, hours later, but Uncle Vernon didn't seem to hear her. Exactly what he was looking for, none of them knew. He drove into the middle of a forest, got out, looked around, shook his head, got back in the car and off they went again. The same thing happened in the middle of a ploughed field, halfway across a suspension bridge and at the top of a multi-story car park.
"Daddy's gone mad, hasn't he?" Dudley asked Aunt Petunia dully late that afternoon. Uncle Vernon had parked at the coast, locked them all inside the car and disappeared.
It started to rain. Great drops beat on the roof of the car. Dudley sniveled.
"It's Monday," he told his mother. "The Great Humberto's on tonight. I want to stay somewhere with a television."
Monday. This reminded Harry of something. If it was Monday – and you could usually count on Dudley to know the days of the week, because of television – then tomorrow, Tuesday, was Harry and Jay's eleventh birthday. Of course, their birthdays were never exactly fun – last year, the Dursleys had given them a coat hanger and a pair of Uncle Vernon's socks. Still, you weren't eleven every day.
Harry got a tap on his shoulder. He turned around to see a smiling face. Jay mouthed to him eleven, Harry smiled back.
Uncle Vernon was back and he was also smiling. He was also carrying a long, thin package and didn't answer Aunt Petunia when she asked what he'd bought.
"Found the perfect place!" he said. "Come on! Everyone out!"
It was very cold outside the car. Uncle Vernon was pointing at what looked like a large rock way out to sea. Perched on top of the rock was the most miserable little shack you could imagine. One thing was certain; there was no television in there.
"Strom forecast for tonight!" said Uncle Vernon gleefully, clapping his hands together. "And this gentleman's kindly agreed to lend us his boat!"
A toothless old man came ambling up to them, pointing, with a rather wicked grin, at an old rowing boat bobbing in the iron-grey water below them.
"I've already got us some rations," said Uncle Vernon, "so all aboard!"
It was freezing in the boat. Icy sea spray and rain crept down their necks and a chilly wind whipped their faces. After what seemed like hours they reached the rock, where Uncle Vernon, slipping and sliding, led the way to the broken-down house.
The inside was horrible; it smelled strongly of seaweed, the wind whistled through the gaps in the wooden walls and the fireplace was damp and empty. There were only two rooms.
Uncle Vernon's rations turned out to be a packet of crisps each and five bananas. He tried to start a fire but the empty crisps packets just smoked and shriveled up.
"Could do with some of those letters now, eh?" he said cheerfully.
He was in a very good mood. Obviously he thought nobody stood a chance of reaching them here in a storm to deliver post. Harry privately agreed, though the thought didn't cheer him up at all.
As night fell, the promised storm blew up around them. Spray from the high waves splattered the walls of the hut and fierce wind rattled the filthy windows. Aunt Petunia found a few moldy blankets in the second room and made up a bed for Dudley on the moth-eaten sofa. She and Uncle Vernon went off to the lumpy bed next door and Harry and Jay were left to find the softest bit of floor they could and curl up under the thinnest, most ragged blanket.
"Eleven hey," said Jay as they found a spot to sleep.
"Yeah what a fun birthday it's going to be," replied Harry. "Sleeping in a hut."
"Yeah but who cares? Not me, I'm turning eleven."
Harry laughed "And what are you getting for your birthday?"
"A 'Happy birthday Jay', from my brother."
"Fair enough, good night Jay."
"Good night little bro and don't forget to sleep ok."
"Yeah, yeah."
But as the storm raged more and more ferociously as the night went on, Harry couldn't sleep. He shivered and turned over, trying to get comfortable, his stomach rumbling with hunger. The low rolls of thunder that started near midnight drowned Dudley's snores. Jay just slept silently through it all with out a sound. The light dial of Dudley's watch, which was dangling over the edge of the sofa on his fat wrist, told Harry he'd be eleven in ten minutes' time. He lay and watched his birthday tick nearer, wondering if the Dursleys would remember at all, wondering where the letter-writer was now.
Five minutes to go. Harry heard something creak out side. He hoped the roof wasn't going to fall in, although he might be warmer if it did. Four minutes to go. Maybe the house in Privet Drive would be so full of letters when they got back that he'd be able to steal one somehow.
Three minutes to go. Was that the sea, slapping hard on the rock like that? And (two minutes to go) what was that funny crunching noise? Was the rock crumbling into the sea?
One minute to go and he'd be eleven. Thirty seconds … twenty … ten – nine – maybe he'd wake Dudley and Jay up, just to annoy them – three – two – one –
BOOM.
The whole shack shivered and Harry say bolt upright, staring at the door. Someone was outside, knocking to come in.