It takes Petunia the better part of the next six days to write her reply. She starts the letter over a dozen times, feeling ridiculous as she tries to convey her gratitude on parchment.

Dear Hestia,

I cannot thank you enough for your gift. I -

She shakes her head and starts again. She's writing on regular paper so as not to waste the magical parchment, and the plastic pen feels odd between her fingertips after writing with nothing but a quill for so long. The thought that Muggle things are becoming foreign to her makes her shudder, and when she starts again, she settles for something simple.

Hestia,

Thank you for your gift. It was wonderful and greatly
appreciated.

She rereads those sentences, considers them for a moment, and then reaches for the quill and carefully writes them on a clean bit of parchment.

If I may ask, when is your birthday? Do you have a family?
Do you work? I'm afraid that even after all this time, I know
very little about you...

Pausing there, her eyes flicker toward Vernon, sitting in his chair with his eyes closed. She turns back to the parchment and pens the last sentence, and in her imagination, she can almost feel her husband's disapproval.

Has there been any word about Harry?

~Petunia

That night, Petunia hears noises in the attic. They're scratching, clawing sounds, like an animal. She lies awake, grateful that Vernon is a sound sleeper, and listens to the sounds overhead, wondering what it could be. Maybe it's a bird,she thinks. She hopes. If it's mice, she doesn't know what they'll do. Vernon will be outraged if he has to live in a house with mice - and quite frankly, she's not too thrilled at the idea either.

So she spends the next day searching for a door into the attic, and finally finds it in the back of the spare bedroom, concealed in the wall with only small, rusted hinges to give away its existence and the slimmest of edges for her to grip with her fingertips in order to open it. The door sticks, and when she does manage to pull it open, dust billows out into the room. Jumping back and waving her hands in front of her, she waits for everything to settle before peering into the darkened doorway. Only the first few steps are visible in the dim lighting, and she has to dislodge a candle from its holder on the wall and take it with her just to see where she's putting her feet.

The attic isn't large, and there's enough dust and grime coating every surface that she's fairly certain no one's been up there in a while. Boxes and old furniture and every other manner of thing are strewn about, and she only gives the mess a precursory glance before turning and going back downstairs.