Harry Potter And The Summer Of Surprise- Chapter 21

Talking To Petunia

Disclaimer: I own nothing of Harry Potter.

Harry tapped his foot and looked at his watch as he leaned against the phone box. Twenty till eight. His bus was going to be coming along within the next twenty minutes and his aunt still hadn't phoned him. He had memorized the number in the first place in case he had reason to contact the Dursleys before he returned to school. He didn't want to give away where he really was staying, so when he saw the phone box near his bus stop, he decided to use that number instead. He sighed heavily, then jumped as the phone began to ring. He grabbed the reciever.

"Hello?"

Silence for a second, then his aunt's voice softly replied, "Hello, Harry." He was surprised. Petunia very rarely called him by his name. She usually referred to him as you or boy.

"All right. You've got me on the phone, now what is it that you wanted to talk to me so badly about?"

Petunia lowered her voice to a whisper that Harry had trouble hearing over the traffic that came when a nearby light changed. When it cleared, he asked her to repeat what she had said.

"I can't talk here. Dudley is home. Is there anywhere we could meet, maybe this afternoon?"

Harry thought for a second. Hermione and Laura were going to the movies later, so they wouldn't be home when he got there. But he still didn't want to give away his exact location.

"How about you pick me up at the store at three? We can talk then, but the things I insist on is Uncle Vernon doesn't enter into this, and I get dropped off where I say."

His aunt agreed and Harry, seeing his bus, said, "All right. Then I'll see you this afternoon. I have to go. My bus is here." Petunia said good-bye and hung up. Harry boarded the bus and paid his fare. He took a seat in the middle, thinking hard about what could be so important to his aunt. It bothered him all day long. He found himself checking his watch and the clock above the door repeatedly after his lunch. The time seemed to have stopped.

Finally, three-o'-clock arrived and when Harry stepped out of the store, his aunt was waiting for him in his uncle's car. He walked over to it and stood by her window for a second before she looked up and gestured for him to get in.

"I told Vernon that I had made an appointment to get the oil changed," she said as he closed the door. She pulled the car out of the parking lot and headed south. "So I had to drive him to work and sent Dudley off to Piers' house for the day. Then of course, I had to actually 'make' the appointment for the oil to be changed, and I had to make it for after I picked you up, and..." Harry covered his ears.

"Aunt Petunia, you're rambling on and on about stuff that really has nothing to do with anything. Now, what did you want to talk to me about?"

She looked nervous, her knuckles turning white as she gripped the steering wheel harder than was neccesary. She pulled into an automobile repair shop's lot and when the attendant came over, she told him that she had made an appointment for an oil change at half past three. He nodded and she and Harry got out of the car so that he could take it inside the building. Petunia led the way into the office and told the man behind the desk that they would return for the car in an hour or so. Then, with a frustrated Harry beside her, she started walking to a nearby park where she sat on a bench and motioned for him to join her.

"How are you doing, Harry?" she asked when he had sat down. He snorted.

"I'd be doing a lot better if you'd just tell me what's so bloody important," he replied. "But other than that, I'm just great." Petunia smiled and nodded.

"That's good. You deserve to be happy after all we've put you through." Another snort from her nephew.

"That's the understatement of the century." He rolled his eyes heavenward.

"Harry, I know that this could never make up for all that we did, but I'm sorry. I'm sorry that we put you in that damnable cupboard for ten years, I'm sorry we made you wear Dudley's cast-offs, I'm sorry that those locks were put on your door when you did get a bedroom, but most of all, I'm sorry about not telling you the truth about who you were. I think that at the time, I believed that if you didn't know about who your parents were, then maybe your powers wouldn't show up. Or if they did, they would remain unused or fail you. Like mine did." Harry turned shocked eyes to his aunt.

"Like yours did? What do you mean?" Petunia smiled ruefully and leaned over to pluck a blade of grass.

"Your mother wasn't the only Evans to go to Hogwarts, Harry. I did, too." Harry's jaw fell into his lap.

"You're a witch?" he asked incredulously. Petunia shook her head.

"No. I failed miserably during my first year. Either my powers were not developed enough, or they just died out as quickly as they came, but I wasn't accepted back for second year. Your mother went two years later, and I was so jealous, that I called her a freak. I was mad because she displayed stronger talents in every class that I had struggled hoplessly at. No, Harry, I'm not a witch. I'm a Squib." She let a soft breeze take the grass from her hand.

Harry shook his head to clear the shock out. "How...? How can you be a Squib? Grandmother and Grandfather Evans were Muggles," he said. His aunt smiled as she looked at him.

"That's what I told you. They decided when they started their family that they wanted to try living as Muggles for a while. They were so used to it by the time Lily was born, that they forgot their powers. Then when they went to use them years later, they didn't even get a fizzle. They had lost their ability to use magic entirely." Harry remembered his mother's information on his birth certificate.

"But then how is it that she listed her birth status as Muggleborn?" Petunia's eyes widened slightly.

"You know about your birth certificate?" she asked. He nodded.

"Professor McGonagall somehow put it into my trunk when I was...um..." He stopped as he realized that he was giving away that he had broken into the Dursley's house. She smiled and patted his hand.

"It's alright, Harry. I'm not going to tell Vernon that you used magic to get into the house. And as for your mother's information on your birth certificate, she thought that she 'was' a Muggleborn. Even I didn't know about Mum and Dad being purebloods until Lily had died." Harry nodded and shrugged.

"Well, I didn't use magic to get into the house. Hermione did. I just let her. I was mad at all of you for leaving me with nowhere to go for a week after all that I had been though with you over the years. But why didn't you tell me all of this sooner? It definitely would have made my life a little more bearable." Petunia frowned and shrugged.

"I wanted to. But I couldn't risk Vernon finding out about my... abnormality. Fortunately Dudley didn't seem to have any powers at all." Harry narrowed his eyes at the mention of his abilities to be an abnormality from her once more.

"It's not abnormal to be able to use magic," he said, standing up and looking down at her. "It's just the way that some people are. Like being a genius. You wouldn't call that an abnormality, would you?" His aunt flinched slightly at his scathing tone.

"Harry, I didn't mean to offend you. It's just that Vernon doesn't care for anything to be different than he is. He considers himself to be normal, and anyone who seems the slightest bit odd to him is immediately offensive. I can't tell him that I had the same abilities that you do. If I did, I would be out on the street with no money and nowhere to go. And there's another reason that I decided to tell you all of this now." Harry resumed his seat and faced her.

She waited a minute before softly saying, "My powers are coming back."