On with the story! Please remember that if it seems as though everything is being drawn out without a purpose, it's not. I want you guys to feel the endlessness that Hope experiences daily. Things will be better soon. ;)

Enjoy!:)

P.S. I love reading your responses! Please review and let me know what you think about Hope!

The next several days were...interesting. Moving was not an option. There were a few times when Hope felt so restless that she had to shift her body around. Doing so always left her in pain, but it was worth it in her mind. She fluctuated between wanting to feel some type of physical pain to wanting to feel nothing at all.

To keep herself occupied, Hope began to mentally review spells, wand motions, and random wizarding facts. She always made it to her third year before she began to fall asleep. A door slammed somewhere in the hall, and Hope's eyes jerked open. There were loud footstep in the hall, which meant that it had to be either Vernon or Dudley. It was midday, so it had to be Dudley.

The handle to her door rattled. Dudley must have realized that it was locked. There was silence for a moment before all of the locks to the door were opened.

"Hey, Freak." Dudley greeted casually. He walked into the room, holding an opened can of soup.

Hope tensed all of her muscles, wishing she had the ability to push herself into the corner. Dudley rolled his eyes at the look in her eyes and put the can down next to her mattress.

"Mum said you needed this. What the hell happened to you?" He sneered. "I'm not your servant."

"Nothing." Hope mumbled so quietly that her voice was nearly inaudible.

Dudley rolled his eyes again and used the toe of his shoe to poke her in the ribs. Hope jerked reflexively as a bolt of pain shot through her sore back, strangling a groan.

Dudley looked at her bizarrely and glances around her room. His eyes fell on several dark stains in the opposite corner. Next to those were the torn and bloodied pile of clothes that Petunia had cut off of her body not three days earlier.

Dudley swore softly and looked back down at the figure of his cousin on the small mattress. For the first time in years, something that seemed to resemble guilt crept into his mind. He glared at nothing in general before turning around and slamming the door behind him. He needed to think about what he just saw. His cousin was a freak after all. She probably deserved whatever had happened. Probably.

Hope slowly let out the breath that she had been holding. She never knew what exactly her cousin was thinking. That worried her.

Her eyes fell on the can of soup by her side and quickly reached out and began to sip it from the side. She struggled to accomplish this task, and small drops of the precious food fell onto the slightly yellowed sheets under her. Hope blamed her shaking hands. Slowly, she consumed the soup over the course of the next hour, thankful that Hedwig wasn't locked in the room with her.

She put her head in her arms and shifted slowly, relishing in the pain. She deserved it after all.

It was a week and a half before Hope was able to move around without it being obvious to other people that she was in constant pain. Her body's magic had helped immensely with the healing process, and most of what remained was the deepest of bruising and the tender skin where the belt had cut it open.

The angry red lines crossing her back would never go away, and she knew it. Hope had spent hours in the Hogwarts library trying to figure out how to get rid of the scarring on her body. Finally, she came across a chapter in a thick medicinal tomb about the limits to a magical beings ability to heal. Scars were rare to the magical world. This was one of the reasons that the scar on her forehead stood out so easily. Her magic was responsible for healing her quickly. However, with her malnourishment and the severity of the damage done to her left her magic unable to properly heal Hope's body.

On the morning that Hope found she could stand walking around, she stayed in her room until the house was empty for the morning. At some point, Petunia had forgotten to lock her door again, freeing Hope to made silent trips to the bathroom in the hallway for more water in the middle of the night.

The house was dead silent as Hope took her time to walk down the steps. From somewhere, there was a faint ticking of a clock. As she moved, Hope took in the state of the rooms, noting that none seem to be any worse as a result of her absence. Hope made it to the backdoor and slipped outside. The wave of heat startled her after being inside for so long. She took a breath of the hot air and set out.

By the time that she had made it to the local park, there was a thin coat of sweat over her entire body. It didn't help that she was wearing a long sleeve shirt and pants. There was still too much evidence on her arms and legs to wear anything else.

There was a shriek of laughter. Hope frozen halfway through the gate to the park entrance. She looked up to see a small group of kids chasing each other all over the playscape. Upon further examination, Hope realized that during the time that she had been 'disposed', someone had leaned up the playground, using fresh paint to cover the explicit words and pictures, as well as getting rid of the shards of glass and nails that had been purposefully left everywhere by Dudley's gang.

Hope kept her eyes on the children playing as she moved to the shade of the tree that she often sat under for hours at a time. She almost ran into a young mother, who was holding a newborn baby, in her distraction.

"Sorry." Hope spoke softly and quickly skirted around the woman. Now that she looked around her, Hope realized that there were several adults in the park perimeters, chatting as they watched their children play.

Hope bit her lip when she realized that her usual spot under the tree was taken. She felt the eyes of the other parents notice her and began to feel panicked. She shouldn't have come here.

Hope turned around and walked as quickly as she could to the park entrance, eyes firmly on the ground. Just before she could reach the gate, a large group of kids ran in front of her, screaming at the top of their lungs as they played tag. Hope was stuck briefly, but she found that she didn't mind. She gave a soft smile.

One of the kids suddenly tripped, falling behind the rest of the group. Hope swiftly knelt down to made sure the little girl was alright.

"Hey, are you okay?"

Wide blue eyes stared up at Hope, tears quickly spilling out. Hope made a comforting sound. "What's your name? I'm Hope."

"E—Emily." The girl spoke in a watery voice, cradling her knee.

"May I see your knee, Emily?"

By the time that Hope had convinced Emily that her knee wasn't hurt that bad since there wasn't any blood, one of the parents had noticed the little interaction and was moving toward them relatively fast.

"Is something wrong?" The woman spoke sharply, and Hope found her voice wouldn't quite work. She hunch in a little, but Emily immediately piped up and began to ramble to her mother how she had almost lost her leg, but then Hope had made it better.

Hope looked at the child a little confused, but the mother seemed to expect such a response.

"Thank you for helping Emily." She spoke wearily. "We just moved here, and she has more energy than the rest of the family."

"Of course." Hope spoke softly, giving the woman a smile. That explained why she was even speaking to someone like her. Hope didn't know every rumor that her Aunt had spread about her, but she knew that no parent in their right mind would ever let their child speak to her with her reputation. Hope was about to leave, but the woman continued to talk.

"Do you happen to know of any older girls in the neighborhood that would be willing to watch Emily?"

"Well," Hope didn't really know how to communicate to the woman that no one would speak to her long enough for her to know. "I'm afraid that I don't know the other girls in the neighborhood right now."

"Mummm!" Emily tugged on her mother's shirt, speaking in a loud whisper. "Can—" She broke off and turned to Hope. "I forgot your name."

"Hope."

"Can Hope watch me? I'll be good! I promise!" Hope couldn't help smiling at the pleading way that the child spoke.

"Emily—" The woman rubbed her face.

"I—I don't mind." Hope felt a little bit of hope rise in her for the first time in a long time. "I can watch her here, or wherever? You don't need to pay me."

Maybe her reputation wouldn't be ruined with this family?

Hope felt herself open up a little more as the woman relented and told her to come over the next day. Hope happily agreed. Anything to stay out of the Dursley's house.

As for her reputation, Hope said nothing and sent up a prayer that the neighbors wouldn't ruin this chance for her.

By the time that Hope returned back to the Dursley's she could almost ignore the ache in her body completely. The smile that had stayed on her face for the past several hours made her cheeks hurt.

"Girl!" The smile was gone as soon as she entered the kitchen. Petunia was unloading several bags of groceries onto the counter. "Where have you been! Get the rest of this put away!"

Hope did as she was told, flinching when she bumped into her aunt while trying to go to the pantry. The second time this happened, Petunia raised a hand to slap her face, but Hope spoke quickly.

"There are new neighbors, and they are expecting to see me tomorrow."

"Excuse me?" Petunia spoke scathingly, but lowered her hand. "Why would they be expecting you?"

"They want me to do some work for them." She was careful to keep out that she was only babysitting.

Petunia looked a little angry, but didn't hit her. It wouldn't do for there to be any handprints on Hope's face tomorrow. "When and for how much?"

"Around noon, and they didn't say they would pay me."

Petunia pursed her lips, but nodded. "Very well. Start on dinner."

Hope bowed her head and got to work. Internally she smiled. Even freaks could be happy sometimes, right?