Disclaimer: As I think we've all figured out by now, I do not own the
characters or plot Harry Potter, for if I did, his fifth year would have
gone more like this, now wouldn't it? And that wouldn't be good because we
wouldn't have been graced with the masterpiece that is The Order of the
Phoenix.
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Harry's winter holiday was going great. He truly felt part of a family. He helped pick out, put up, and decorate the Christmas tree, something he had never been allowed to do before. There was always hot chocolate, hot apple cider, or eggnog being passed around. Despite Harry's objections, there were even a few presents under the tree with his name on it.
Hedwig was in and out of the house, each time coming back with a gift with warnings not to open until Christmas written all over them. He happily put these gifts under the tree as well.
Finally, Christmas morning arrived, starting with Kota racing in, yelling for him to get up. Harry was up in a flash.
When everyone was downstairs, Harry took aside the presents from him and told the Stensons that they would have to be last because they required a bit of an explanation. He then looked at the Christmas tree with the Stensons searching for presents with their names on it, laughing with joy as they began to open them, and realized that he had no idea what to do. He had opened presents when they were on the end of his bed, but he couldn't help but wonder if there was a special way to go about opening presents under a Christmas tree. Was he supposed to just grab his presents and start opening? Was there a special order that he was supposed to open them?
"Harry, open this one, it's from me," Kota said handing him a present.
'Well, that solves things,' Harry thought as he took a seat on the floor beside Dakota and began to unwrap his present. It was a picture frame that contained a Muggle picture from a day when they had both been on a mad sugar rush as a result from attempting to cook brownies. They had made a huge mess and in the photo, both were covered in flour, cocoa powder, and the dark batter in general. Kota had jumped onto Harry's back and they were both sticking out their tongues at the camera. Harry laughed out loud and said thank you.
"Thanks Kota. It's great! I don't have very many pictures or picture frames. This is fantastic!"
"Well I'm glad you like it. Everyone ought to have pictures. Now you can show all your friends at that school of yours what a cute neighbor you have. You could show it to George Weasley. See if you can set us up!" she laughed. Kota had announced that she thought the Weasley twins were cute on the way home from King's Cross and chosen George since he was single. (Fred was dating Angelina.)
"Now Dakota, you know you're too young to date. You're not allowed to date until you're married," said Mr. Stenson, as he had many times before. Kota rolled her eyes in response and handed Harry the present from her parents, a very small box.
Harry unwrapped the gift. He had been wondering what it was ever since he had seen it under the tree. He opened the box to see a key. He turned his questioning gaze to Mrs. Stenson.
"Harry, that is a key to our house. You can use it any time you want as you're always welcome here."
"Th-thank you," Harry said somewhat stunned. "Are you sure?"
"Of course we're sure, Harry. Just don't let your Oompa Loompa uncle get his hands on it." Everyone laughed as Mrs. Stenson playfully hit her husband with a ball of wrapping paper. Harry thought there could be no greater gift.
The Stensons soon finished opening their presents. Harry had refrained from opening his until he could explain properly.
"So Harry, when are we going to get to open the mystery gifts?" Kota asked eyeing the gifts in the corner eagerly.
"All right, well as I said before, my gifts need somewhat of an explanation. I need to tell you something very important." Harry saw Mr. and Mrs. Stenson give each other a confused look. "Well, you see, a few years ago."
He paused and figured that wasn't the right way to say it. "Well, the school I go to."
That wasn't it either. He sighed, giving up on cushioning the blow. "What would you say if I told you that I was a wizard?"
The Stensons all laughed.
"Well I'd check to make sure nobody slipped any alcohol into the eggnog," Mrs. Stenson laughed.
"I'd tell you to use your powers to clean up all of this wrapping paper," said Mr. Stenson, "this place is a disaster."
"I'd tell you turn that ugly sweater I got from Aunt Carline into something less scary." Kota said holding up the horrific neon orange and green polka- dotted sweater that she had opened earlier.
Harry took out his wand and used a banishing charm to send the pile of discarded wrapping paper into the garbage can and then transfigured Kota's sweater into a scarf and changed the color to blue.
"I can't really help you with the eggnog, Mrs. Stenson, but I can assure you that I am telling you all the absolute truth."
At this point all the Stensons were gazing at Harry, eyes wide and mouths open in shock. All was silent for a very uncomfortable minute until Harry sighed and gave them all their gifts.
"Go ahead, open them," Harry instructed. As if in a trance they all slowly unwrapped their gifts from Harry.
Harry hadn't been quite sure what to get them, especially the two adults, as he had never had to Christmas shop for a family. Hermione and Ron helped him pick out some things in Hogsmeade. He knew he wanted to give them slightly magical gifts, but had to find ones that were easy and safe for Muggles to use, so Hermione was most helpful in this area. He ended up getting the adults a blanket that will always keep you at the temperature you want to be, whether it warmed you up or cooled you off, and got a bunch of different magical candy and small pranks for Kota. The Stensons still seemed to be in a stupor when Harry explained what the gifts were. After a long pause, Harry sighed.
"Are you guys going to say anything?" he asked hopefully. Kota looked from him to the scarf to the trash in the trashcan to the strange candy in her hand and back to Harry.
"Oh. My. God." she breathed. Harry laughed bringing a smile to Kota's face.
"So the school you go to...." Mrs. Stenson started but seemed to not be able to finish. Harry finished for her.
"Is Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry."
"So the Weasleys...." started Mr. Stenson.
"Wizards and witches. That's why we had trouble with his occupation. In reality he's the head of the Misuse of Muggle Artifacts Office in the Ministry of Magic."
"Muggle?" Mr. Stenson asked.
"Non-magic people."
"Like us," Kota stated. Harry nodded.
"Wait, the Dursleys can't be..."
"No they're Muggles. That's why they hate me so much. My mum, Aunt Petunia's sister, was a witch born into a Muggle family. My aunt hated her so much, was so jealous of her, I guess that just got passed on to me when I had to go live with them. They don't want me to ruin their picturesquely normal family by being different." At this Mrs. Stenson got up from her seat on the floor and sat next to Harry on the couch, putting her arm around his shoulders.
"Listen, Harry, the Dursleys have no excuse to hate you, no matter if you're a.... no matter what. What they did to you was wrong and there's no excusing it. You're a great person. It's not something wrong with you, but something definitely wrong with that family you unfortunately got stuck with. Do you understand that?"
While she had spoken, Harry had found a sudden interested in knees to avoid the gazes of all three of the Stensons. He nodded still looking down. Mrs. Stenson put a finger under his chin and gently lifted it so Harry was looking into her face.
"You deserve so much more than that, dear."
Harry didn't know what to say. He didn't really want to talk about it so he just gave a weak smile and nodded his head again.
"One thing though. You can't tell this to anyone. If you do, I could be punished very severely."
They all promised with all their hearts that they wouldn't breathe a word of it to anyone.
"Too bad you didn't tell only me," Kota said. "I wouldn't have minded having you put a spell on my parents to let me date." Everyone laughed as Mr. Stenson glared at her.
They spent the rest of the day opening Harry's presents and having Harry explain everything about the wizarding world to them. Everyone tried pieces of candy and had fun levitating or talking like mice or daringly trying Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans, with a garbage can nearby filled with ones that had been too disgusting to swallow. Harry showed them many charms and spells to their great delight. Harry wondered if Hermione and Ron were doing something similar with their families. It was a very great day.
.
That night, Harry caught Mr. Stenson alone in his study.
"Er...Mr. Stenson? I was wondering if you had a moment," Harry began peering into the cluttered room.
"Of course Harry, come in and have a seat," he said looking up from some paper work taking off his reading glasses to show that Harry had his complete attention. Harry closed the door behind him and sat down in the chair across from Mr. Stenson.
"All right. I'm going to tell you something, but I don't want you to get your hopes up because along with the pros there are some possible cons." Harry paused and Mr. Stenson nodded for him to continue. "Well I found a very rare and old spell that might take away your cancer, but there are some risks. First of all, it hasn't been performed in many years so I'd have no one to instruct me in it, meaning that I could only do the best in teaching myself. Second of all, if anything goes wrong, it could result in your death, so if you have a good chance of recovering you might not want to try it. It's an extremely complex spell that would require your total trust in it."
As Harry had talked Mr. Stensons face began to shine with a hope that Harry hadn't seen in months. It seemed that he had been expecting death from this and now he might have another chance at life. He closed his eyes and kept moving his hands from covering his mouth to massaging his temples, looking as much in shock as he did at Harry's announcement of his magic earlier that day. Finally he looked with a look of such joy that his eyes seemed to be wet with threatening tears.
"Harry, you don't know what this means to me. There is no way I could ever thank you enough. This means another chance with my family. How far along can I be before you perform the spell?" He asked. Harry noticed that he was shaking a little bit, especially his hand as it went to run through his hair. Harry smiled at seeing the usually composed man so vulnerably happy.
"It can be performed at basically anytime, as long as you're...er...alive," Harry mentally cursed himself at how bad that last part sounded but didn't know how else to put it. "If you want to wait until it closer to...er...February, just in case, that's fine with me. You may have to pretend you're the Dursleys to get me out of school, but I'm sure it can be arranged."
"Wow, Harry. Yes. I'll do it despite the risks. In fact there seems to be no real risk. The treatments weren't working. I don't know if Dakota told you, but I stopped chemotherapy treatments a few weeks ago. Damn things almost brought me to an early grave. I had no hope until now. I.... thank you."
"It's the least I can do since you and your family have helped me so much. You basically saved me, so I can only hope that I can save you in return."
"I can't wait to tell Dakota and Kathryn. I'll wait until morning so that you can get some sleep tonight."
Mr. Stenson walked Harry up to his room in silence. There just seemed to be nothing else to say. But the silence wasn't awkward at all, but instead peacefully right somehow. As Harry said goodnight, changed into his pajamas, and slipped under the covers, he even forgot what doing this spell would mean for him, and fell into a blissful sleep.
.
The next morning, Harry woke and dressed. On his way downstairs for breakfast, was met by two crying females rushing up the stairs towards him. Harry briefly considered running the opposite way of the approaching stampede, but before he could turn around, two pairs of arms wrapped around him and he had Kota and her mother weeping into his shoulders crying out "thank you" every time they paused in their crying. Harry was altogether very stunned by all this and was very thankful when Mr. Stenson pulled the two girls off of him. Mrs. Stenson ran into the kitchen, wiping her tears on her sleeve promising to cook up a huge feast in celebration. Now Harry really felt the pressure for this spell to work.
"Harry, I was wrong. I guess maybe you can change the world," Dakota said to him with a huge smile. Harry only hoped that he could.
.
That night, Harry and Kota were watching a movie she got for Christmas when suddenly, the front door burst open with a bang as it crashed against the wall. Harry jumped and looked over in horror to see his worst nightmare. Uncle Vernon was standing in the doorway.
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A/N: Hey guys. Thanks to those of you who are sticking with this fic. Just hang in there and it'll pick up really soon! And remember to review!!
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Harry's winter holiday was going great. He truly felt part of a family. He helped pick out, put up, and decorate the Christmas tree, something he had never been allowed to do before. There was always hot chocolate, hot apple cider, or eggnog being passed around. Despite Harry's objections, there were even a few presents under the tree with his name on it.
Hedwig was in and out of the house, each time coming back with a gift with warnings not to open until Christmas written all over them. He happily put these gifts under the tree as well.
Finally, Christmas morning arrived, starting with Kota racing in, yelling for him to get up. Harry was up in a flash.
When everyone was downstairs, Harry took aside the presents from him and told the Stensons that they would have to be last because they required a bit of an explanation. He then looked at the Christmas tree with the Stensons searching for presents with their names on it, laughing with joy as they began to open them, and realized that he had no idea what to do. He had opened presents when they were on the end of his bed, but he couldn't help but wonder if there was a special way to go about opening presents under a Christmas tree. Was he supposed to just grab his presents and start opening? Was there a special order that he was supposed to open them?
"Harry, open this one, it's from me," Kota said handing him a present.
'Well, that solves things,' Harry thought as he took a seat on the floor beside Dakota and began to unwrap his present. It was a picture frame that contained a Muggle picture from a day when they had both been on a mad sugar rush as a result from attempting to cook brownies. They had made a huge mess and in the photo, both were covered in flour, cocoa powder, and the dark batter in general. Kota had jumped onto Harry's back and they were both sticking out their tongues at the camera. Harry laughed out loud and said thank you.
"Thanks Kota. It's great! I don't have very many pictures or picture frames. This is fantastic!"
"Well I'm glad you like it. Everyone ought to have pictures. Now you can show all your friends at that school of yours what a cute neighbor you have. You could show it to George Weasley. See if you can set us up!" she laughed. Kota had announced that she thought the Weasley twins were cute on the way home from King's Cross and chosen George since he was single. (Fred was dating Angelina.)
"Now Dakota, you know you're too young to date. You're not allowed to date until you're married," said Mr. Stenson, as he had many times before. Kota rolled her eyes in response and handed Harry the present from her parents, a very small box.
Harry unwrapped the gift. He had been wondering what it was ever since he had seen it under the tree. He opened the box to see a key. He turned his questioning gaze to Mrs. Stenson.
"Harry, that is a key to our house. You can use it any time you want as you're always welcome here."
"Th-thank you," Harry said somewhat stunned. "Are you sure?"
"Of course we're sure, Harry. Just don't let your Oompa Loompa uncle get his hands on it." Everyone laughed as Mrs. Stenson playfully hit her husband with a ball of wrapping paper. Harry thought there could be no greater gift.
The Stensons soon finished opening their presents. Harry had refrained from opening his until he could explain properly.
"So Harry, when are we going to get to open the mystery gifts?" Kota asked eyeing the gifts in the corner eagerly.
"All right, well as I said before, my gifts need somewhat of an explanation. I need to tell you something very important." Harry saw Mr. and Mrs. Stenson give each other a confused look. "Well, you see, a few years ago."
He paused and figured that wasn't the right way to say it. "Well, the school I go to."
That wasn't it either. He sighed, giving up on cushioning the blow. "What would you say if I told you that I was a wizard?"
The Stensons all laughed.
"Well I'd check to make sure nobody slipped any alcohol into the eggnog," Mrs. Stenson laughed.
"I'd tell you to use your powers to clean up all of this wrapping paper," said Mr. Stenson, "this place is a disaster."
"I'd tell you turn that ugly sweater I got from Aunt Carline into something less scary." Kota said holding up the horrific neon orange and green polka- dotted sweater that she had opened earlier.
Harry took out his wand and used a banishing charm to send the pile of discarded wrapping paper into the garbage can and then transfigured Kota's sweater into a scarf and changed the color to blue.
"I can't really help you with the eggnog, Mrs. Stenson, but I can assure you that I am telling you all the absolute truth."
At this point all the Stensons were gazing at Harry, eyes wide and mouths open in shock. All was silent for a very uncomfortable minute until Harry sighed and gave them all their gifts.
"Go ahead, open them," Harry instructed. As if in a trance they all slowly unwrapped their gifts from Harry.
Harry hadn't been quite sure what to get them, especially the two adults, as he had never had to Christmas shop for a family. Hermione and Ron helped him pick out some things in Hogsmeade. He knew he wanted to give them slightly magical gifts, but had to find ones that were easy and safe for Muggles to use, so Hermione was most helpful in this area. He ended up getting the adults a blanket that will always keep you at the temperature you want to be, whether it warmed you up or cooled you off, and got a bunch of different magical candy and small pranks for Kota. The Stensons still seemed to be in a stupor when Harry explained what the gifts were. After a long pause, Harry sighed.
"Are you guys going to say anything?" he asked hopefully. Kota looked from him to the scarf to the trash in the trashcan to the strange candy in her hand and back to Harry.
"Oh. My. God." she breathed. Harry laughed bringing a smile to Kota's face.
"So the school you go to...." Mrs. Stenson started but seemed to not be able to finish. Harry finished for her.
"Is Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry."
"So the Weasleys...." started Mr. Stenson.
"Wizards and witches. That's why we had trouble with his occupation. In reality he's the head of the Misuse of Muggle Artifacts Office in the Ministry of Magic."
"Muggle?" Mr. Stenson asked.
"Non-magic people."
"Like us," Kota stated. Harry nodded.
"Wait, the Dursleys can't be..."
"No they're Muggles. That's why they hate me so much. My mum, Aunt Petunia's sister, was a witch born into a Muggle family. My aunt hated her so much, was so jealous of her, I guess that just got passed on to me when I had to go live with them. They don't want me to ruin their picturesquely normal family by being different." At this Mrs. Stenson got up from her seat on the floor and sat next to Harry on the couch, putting her arm around his shoulders.
"Listen, Harry, the Dursleys have no excuse to hate you, no matter if you're a.... no matter what. What they did to you was wrong and there's no excusing it. You're a great person. It's not something wrong with you, but something definitely wrong with that family you unfortunately got stuck with. Do you understand that?"
While she had spoken, Harry had found a sudden interested in knees to avoid the gazes of all three of the Stensons. He nodded still looking down. Mrs. Stenson put a finger under his chin and gently lifted it so Harry was looking into her face.
"You deserve so much more than that, dear."
Harry didn't know what to say. He didn't really want to talk about it so he just gave a weak smile and nodded his head again.
"One thing though. You can't tell this to anyone. If you do, I could be punished very severely."
They all promised with all their hearts that they wouldn't breathe a word of it to anyone.
"Too bad you didn't tell only me," Kota said. "I wouldn't have minded having you put a spell on my parents to let me date." Everyone laughed as Mr. Stenson glared at her.
They spent the rest of the day opening Harry's presents and having Harry explain everything about the wizarding world to them. Everyone tried pieces of candy and had fun levitating or talking like mice or daringly trying Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans, with a garbage can nearby filled with ones that had been too disgusting to swallow. Harry showed them many charms and spells to their great delight. Harry wondered if Hermione and Ron were doing something similar with their families. It was a very great day.
.
That night, Harry caught Mr. Stenson alone in his study.
"Er...Mr. Stenson? I was wondering if you had a moment," Harry began peering into the cluttered room.
"Of course Harry, come in and have a seat," he said looking up from some paper work taking off his reading glasses to show that Harry had his complete attention. Harry closed the door behind him and sat down in the chair across from Mr. Stenson.
"All right. I'm going to tell you something, but I don't want you to get your hopes up because along with the pros there are some possible cons." Harry paused and Mr. Stenson nodded for him to continue. "Well I found a very rare and old spell that might take away your cancer, but there are some risks. First of all, it hasn't been performed in many years so I'd have no one to instruct me in it, meaning that I could only do the best in teaching myself. Second of all, if anything goes wrong, it could result in your death, so if you have a good chance of recovering you might not want to try it. It's an extremely complex spell that would require your total trust in it."
As Harry had talked Mr. Stensons face began to shine with a hope that Harry hadn't seen in months. It seemed that he had been expecting death from this and now he might have another chance at life. He closed his eyes and kept moving his hands from covering his mouth to massaging his temples, looking as much in shock as he did at Harry's announcement of his magic earlier that day. Finally he looked with a look of such joy that his eyes seemed to be wet with threatening tears.
"Harry, you don't know what this means to me. There is no way I could ever thank you enough. This means another chance with my family. How far along can I be before you perform the spell?" He asked. Harry noticed that he was shaking a little bit, especially his hand as it went to run through his hair. Harry smiled at seeing the usually composed man so vulnerably happy.
"It can be performed at basically anytime, as long as you're...er...alive," Harry mentally cursed himself at how bad that last part sounded but didn't know how else to put it. "If you want to wait until it closer to...er...February, just in case, that's fine with me. You may have to pretend you're the Dursleys to get me out of school, but I'm sure it can be arranged."
"Wow, Harry. Yes. I'll do it despite the risks. In fact there seems to be no real risk. The treatments weren't working. I don't know if Dakota told you, but I stopped chemotherapy treatments a few weeks ago. Damn things almost brought me to an early grave. I had no hope until now. I.... thank you."
"It's the least I can do since you and your family have helped me so much. You basically saved me, so I can only hope that I can save you in return."
"I can't wait to tell Dakota and Kathryn. I'll wait until morning so that you can get some sleep tonight."
Mr. Stenson walked Harry up to his room in silence. There just seemed to be nothing else to say. But the silence wasn't awkward at all, but instead peacefully right somehow. As Harry said goodnight, changed into his pajamas, and slipped under the covers, he even forgot what doing this spell would mean for him, and fell into a blissful sleep.
.
The next morning, Harry woke and dressed. On his way downstairs for breakfast, was met by two crying females rushing up the stairs towards him. Harry briefly considered running the opposite way of the approaching stampede, but before he could turn around, two pairs of arms wrapped around him and he had Kota and her mother weeping into his shoulders crying out "thank you" every time they paused in their crying. Harry was altogether very stunned by all this and was very thankful when Mr. Stenson pulled the two girls off of him. Mrs. Stenson ran into the kitchen, wiping her tears on her sleeve promising to cook up a huge feast in celebration. Now Harry really felt the pressure for this spell to work.
"Harry, I was wrong. I guess maybe you can change the world," Dakota said to him with a huge smile. Harry only hoped that he could.
.
That night, Harry and Kota were watching a movie she got for Christmas when suddenly, the front door burst open with a bang as it crashed against the wall. Harry jumped and looked over in horror to see his worst nightmare. Uncle Vernon was standing in the doorway.
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A/N: Hey guys. Thanks to those of you who are sticking with this fic. Just hang in there and it'll pick up really soon! And remember to review!!