Petunia Evans Dursley, of number four, Privet Drive, deserved something more out of life, thank you very much. She'd been an astute child, prudish and quiet. A fast learner and an excellent test taker. She was dutiful to her parents and loving toward her grandparents. She baked pies, tended to the herb garden off the back porch, and took care of the family dog when her sister Lily grew bored with responsibility. Every day since Petunia was born, not a hair on her head or event in her life was ever out of place.
And yet, for all her diligence, Petunia was rewarded with a simple life. Married to a drill-obsessed man of little neck. Mother to a perfect baby boy. Co-owner of a nice patch of square lawn on a quiet street where nothing of note ever really happened.
Petunia's sister, Lily, however, received the dream life. One of adventures and epic loves. One of real-life magic. Lily, a flighty child of little responsibility. Who hid and snuck cookies instead of tending to her chores. Who played with the batty, sniveling boy in Spinner's End. And who had never worked hard for anything in her life yet received it, anyway. Lily, the girl who laughed.
Though no one ever asked, Petunia Dursley had laughed, too. It might have been more throaty and less bell-like, more like a cry of pain than a sound of joy. But she'd done it. Behind the four walls of the sisters shared bedroom, nestled under the covers while a nightlight sprinkled stars onto the ceiling, Petunia had smiled and chortled as she regaled her sister with make-believe about ghosts and pirates. Of warlocks and warships. Of a goblin who'd forgotten his underpants on the day of a very important meeting with his king.
But all that laughing stopped when Lily turned eleven and the letter came. Clutched in the talons of a brown owl and sealed with wax. It was from Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. An invitation for the Evans's youngest, welcoming her into the wizarding world. Petunia didn't get her letter. Unable to understand her grief, her vexation she lashed out and called her sister a freak. Once let into the world, words, she'd learned, weren't so easily taken back. Not long after their argument, Lily left for Hogwarts.
Petunia's life that year consisted much of the same: homework, studying, exams. After school, she tended to her chores. Making both beds, cleaning up her and Lily's room. Doing the family laundry. Making sandwiches for dad's lunches, pressing the trouser legs of mum's suits. At bedtime, with no one to listen to her stories, Petunia'd stopped telling them.
Their parents praised Lily during the school year, awaiting her post, delivered by a scowling barn owl, every week. Lily'd been sorted into Gryffindor. Lily was learning to fly a broomstick. Lily was a natural when it came to potions. Petunia swept floors and took out garbage. Meanwhile, Lily was becoming like the heroine of one of Petunia's stories.
If not evidently clear already, the Evans' loved their youngest - her effervescence, her spirit. They appreciated their eldest's effort, applauded her maturity. For a time, Petunia believed if she got accepted into Hogwarts, if she showed her parents she was magical too, they'd love her as much as Lily. With this in mind, Petunia set out to write a letter to the school's headmaster, one Albus Dumbledore, wherein she pleaded with him to accept her and promised not to take up too much space—if needed, she'd even sleep in a closet.
Dumbledore wrote back not long after. Told her a girl with no gift for the magical arts would find Hogwarts rather bizarre and dull. As Petunia watched the letter burn to bits in the fireplace, she agonized over the statement made. It was so preposterous. How could a magic school ever be anything less than wondrous?
Lily returned for summer vacation, every year more unrecognizable than when she'd left. Her third year at Hogwarts, she stayed for the holiday. Her seventh year, she came home prattling on about some pompous boy named James Potter. He'd sounded like a prat to Petunia, but Lily was charmed by him. Settled back into the room they shared, the pair didn't exchange a look, let alone words. The stories dried up on Petunia's tongue. And Lily's attention was always somewhere else. They weren't sisters anymore, just a witch and a Muggle.
James and Lily wed and then moved away. Petunia was left looking after her parents, paying bills, making dinners, retrieving her father's medicine when he contracted a cough that never quite went away. In her twenty-seventh year of life, Petunia met Vernon, a man of little neck and square jaw, who fawned over drills and was so prudish about his money, he had the check split on their very first date. Despite his flaws, and deeply vexing handlebar mustache, he was the first person in Petunia's life to make her feel wanted, who saw her for what she could offer, and not all she lacked. They got married, started a family. All was well for a time.
Then the knock came in the middle of the night. Petunia awoke with a drill hammering into her heart. She gasped when she saw it—the baby left on her stoop. Black-haired. Green-eyed. He had his mother's eyes. A lightning-shaped scar on his forehead. His face was a mess of wrinkled flesh, cheeks a bright pink. A letter came with him, the writing so distinct, Petunia knew instantly it was from Albus Dumbledore. Magic had killed her sister. And for all the endless prattle about magic and the possibilities it created, Petunia knew it simply could not bring back the dead.
When Lily's son, Harry, grew, it was always to Petunia's great displeasure. He took up more space than he ought to, borrowing much too much of the Dursley's kindness. He never contributed a lick to the household in any meaningful way. Meanwhile, her little Duddy had set to finger painting the living room walls when he turned three. "Little tyke's an entrepreneur in the making," Vernon had praised.
Petunia made Harry stay in a closet under the stairs, tucked away like an old bit of furniture or busted lamp. Though she saw him minimally, avoiding him when avoidance was an option, when her eyes landed on him, she wondered. If he would be like his parents. If a letter would arrive at their house addressed to him on his eleventh birthday. If he'd get welcomed into the world that had shunned Petunia so. And then, when she could no longer contain her contempt, and it poured from her ears like steam, she'd think about him dying. About his green eyes, empty and dull. About the world that welcomed him into the fold, being able to do nothing to save his life.
On a dreary, graying Tuesday when this story ends, Petunia slouched in front of the stove, sighing wistfully as she gazed out the window. It overlooked a trimmed patch of lawn, a healthy evergreen. Each blade of grass a perfect two inches in height. Beyond that, behind a row of brick, was a raised flowerbed. It was empty now, as the flowers had all died. Then Petunia saw shadows skirt between the slats of the fence separating her property from her neighbor's, and she wondered what they were up to. Later on, she'd make it a point to water the hedges so she could best eavesdrop.
Turning toward the living room, Petunia eyed the clock. It was time to wake Harry up. He'd help with breakfast; that was the least he could do. While tying her frilly apron around her waist, she ambled toward the staircase, each footstep heavy and weighted.
"Up!" Her voice was shrill as she addressed Harry through the door. Why couldn't she speak normally to him? He'd done nothing wrong except try to exist in the space given to him. Just like she had. Understanding their shared similarities made her cheeks flush. "Get up! Now! Up!" she screeched. She slammed a hand against the wall before rounding on the door and stomping back to the kitchen.
She needed a moment. A breath. A pause. Yanking open the cupboard doors, she pulled down a frying pan and plopped it on the stove. The gas ignited under it as flames flared up around the cast iron. She glanced at the clock again. It'd been what, one minute? Two? And that lazy, good-for-nothing boy still wasn't up? Furiously, she stormed back to the stair closet.
"Are you up yet?" she demanded. The words were thin and severe as she pressed them through her lips. She slammed her foot against the floor, the wood bowing inward.
After hearing shuffling from the other side of the door, it finally opened. He stood in the space back against the dark. Shoulders straight, not slumped. Green eyes sparkling up at Petunia from behind a pair of glasses perched on his nose. Petunia's eyebrows knit over her eyes as she strangled her apron ties between her hands.
This was why she loathed him, why she addressed him so harshly. Because he reminded her so much of Lily. Not just his eyes, but his spirit–how it persisted, endured and was so maddeningly warm. She stabbed a finger toward the kitchen. Harry sighed but did as he was instructed. She watched him as he began preparing Duddy's birthday bacon.
Petunia turned, rounded a corner, undid her apron, and stuck her head between her hands. She felt like crying or screaming. Doing both, doing one before the other. But before she could decide, Vernon was plodding down the stairs, a newspaper shoved under his arm.
p"Petunia dear," he said between sniffs, his mustache wriggling like a captive caterpillar above his upper lip. /p
pShe straightened, brushed her cheeks, and forced a smile onto her face. "Vernon, love," she purred, her fingers brushing along his elbow. He wore a tweed jacket, one he'd outgrown a year ago but insisted upon still wearing because mustard yellow was, in his words, 'the ideal color.' "It's Duddy's birthday, today."/p
pVernon beamed. "My boy's getting so big."/p
pHer smile widened. "Just like his daddy," she said, giving his elbow a gentle pinch, her gaze drifting to his collar, wherein there was the tiniest flash of neck. What was a head to balance on if not a neck?/p
pVernon puffed out his chest, his shirt straining against his bulk. The poor seams looked about to burst. Petunia made a mental note to reinforce them with a thicker thread on Sunday. "It's going to be perfect." He gave her cheek a kiss before disappearing into the kitchen. /p
pPetunia touched the spot, repulsed by the lingering wetness and heat. She shuddered before focusing on the rest of the /
It will be perfect, she thought. Duddy's birthday will be perfect. Tomorrow would be perfect as well. The day after. Everything would be perfectly normal. And though she would never be truly proud of that fact, she'd live like she was./p