Harry Potter and the Phoenix's Resurrection (cont'd)
A/N : Changed title, due to plot change. I'm too lazy to change the titles on chapter 1 & 2, so forgive me. I, um, forgot to put the disclaimer on chapter 2, I'm so sorry, oh great FanFiction.Net mods, and to JK Rowling too…so I'll put a double disclaimer this time to make up for it.
Sorry to those who think that chapter 2 was very boring, but if you want to read my fanfics, you'll have to put up with some ranting. I just can't help doing it sometimes.
And finally, thanks to those who reviewed! They're : Silvertongue, Elluxion, J.R. Ross and one anonymous person. Thanks!!
Disclaimer : All the Harry Potter characters and other HP-related stuff belong to JK Rowling. I own nothing but the plot. If you're writing a HP fanfic, and your plot is similar to mine, please do not accuse me of copying you…in fact I've changed my main plot just so people wouldn't think that I'm copying them, and I can't afford to change anymore. Thanks for understanding.
Disclaimer : All the Harry Potter characters and other HP-related stuff belong to JK Rowling. I own nothing but the plot. If you're writing a HP fanfic, and your plot is similar to mine, please do not accuse me of copying you…in fact I've changed my main plot just so people wouldn't think that I'm copying them, and I can't afford to change anymore. Thanks for understanding.
Chapter 3 : DudleyIt turned out that Harry was too late, and the Sneakoscope had woken up the Dursleys before he could manage to muffle it. Uncle Vernon was outraged, of course, although his fear of Sirius kept him from grounding Harry or locking him in the cupboard under the stairs. Instead, he just told Harry to never do the same thing again, and Harry smiled secretly to himself, feeling relieved.
Since it was already seven by the time they woke up, the Dursleys grudgingly decided to have breakfast instead of going back to sleep. Dudley looked as though he was going to have a tantrum, but surprisingly he kept quiet. Harry wondered whether it was a sign of late maturity, although it was more likely that Dudley was simply too hungry to complain much. He had been much quieter than he had been last summer, for Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia had long given up on Dudley's diet, so he could now eat freely. And since his school uniforms had grown far too small for him, Aunt Petunia had resorted to sewing extremely large knick boxers specially for Dudley's need.
To Harry's great surprise, Aunt Petunia told him to go wait at the table with Dudley and Uncle Vernon while she did breakfast for all of them. Usually, Harry had to do the eggs – not a very wise move, because he severely lacked cooking skills.
Harry realized all too soon, though, that some things just never change. As usual, breakfast consisted of several strips of limp bacon, runny eggs, and a glass of cold milk. And as usual, Harry's portion was much smaller than Dudley's, his bacon was much thinner, his eggs runnier, and his milk had long gone past its expiry date. However, as usual, he ate without complaint, very much treasuring the Dursleys' hard-earned civility.
He noticed something strange during breakfast that morning, though. It felt as though something had gone missing in the Dursleys' routine life. Something had changed, something was wrong – Dudley.
His obese cousin wasn't gobbling his food as usual – far from it. In fact, Dudley wasn't touching his meal at all. He was staring at it; his eyebrows creased, his face fixed in a tight frown. In any other person's case, it would have made the person look like a deep thinker, but in Dudley's case, it made him look like he was having constipation, or so Harry thought.
And then, slowly, as though with much resolution, Dudley pushed his plate away, and reached his large hand into the fruit bowl, grabbing a banana. And he sat there, peeling it gingerly, taking small nibbles out of it.
Harry stared at him in disbelief, along with Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia, barely noticing that he was sprinkling pepper into his glass of milk instead of on his eggs.
Once he was finished with the banana, Dudley got up from the table, mumbled, 'I'm full,' and ran upstairs to his room. Uncle Vernon's eyes followed Dudley's steps, then rested on Harry. Harry looked down on his eggs (rather surprised that there wasn't any pepper on them), fully aware of his aunt and uncle's accusing stares.
'Boy! What did you do?' Uncle Vernon snarled.
Harry looked up, trying his best to look innocent. 'I swear I didn't do anything. You know I'm not supposed to use magic during the holidays.'
Aunt Petunia gasped, clasping both hands to her ears, muttering 'I didn't hear anything' several times to herself. Then she ran upstairs, probably to go after Dudley, her hands fixed firmly on her ears. Uncle Vernon's face had gone livid, the whites around the pupils in his eyes clearly showing, and Harry knew that he had said something wrong.
'I'm warning you, one more funny word and I'll…' Uncle Vernon's words faltered.
'You'll…what?' Harry asked, enjoying the look of frustration on his uncle's face.
Uncle Vernon's face turned beet red, and Harry could almost imagine smoke coming out of his ears. He managed a grunt in reply, and left the table as well.
Pleased with himself, Harry finished his breakfast and even stole one strip of Dudley's fat, untouched bacon. Satisfied, he took a gulp of his milk and almost immediately spurted it out of his mouth.
'Eugh,' he muttered to himself, wiping his mouth with the sleeve of his (or rather, Dudley's) baggy shirt. He poured the sour-and-spicy milk down the kitchen sink, wondering how long exactly it had been sitting in the refrigerator before he was lucky enough to have to drink it.
~***~
The rest of the morning didn't go very well, as Harry suspected. His aunt and uncle stared down at him accusingly every time he passed by them in the staircase, or the living room, so he stayed in his bedroom most of the time, reading Quidditch Throughout The Ages, watching the players in it zoom around on broomsticks while throwing a red ball to each other. He kept lifting his eyes from the book every now and then, staring longingly at his Firebolt, tucked away safely in his trunk. There was no use in thinking about Quidditch if he couldn't even play it, it simply made him wish more and more that he was out in the Hogwarts grounds, practising with the rest of his team.
However, unfortunately, it was only late July, and there was still about a month to go before he would be returning to Hogwarts – a whole torturous month with the Dursleys.
Sighing, he put aside Quidditch Throughout The Ages and walked over to the window to look outside. As usual, there was nothing much going on. Not many people were up and about that lazy Saturday morning. The late morning sun was glaring down, the sky was clear. A typical morning, nothing different. Then Harry saw something white fluttering down towards him.
'Hedwig, you're back!' he called out, as a snowy owl swooped down to his window and perched on his outstretched arm, dropping a dead rat and a piece of parchment onto his other hand. He accepted her little gift gratefully, and she nipped his finger affectionately before rushing into her cage to drink from her water bowl.
He wasn't very interested in the rat though, and placed it on his desk carelessly. He smoothed out the piece of parchment and began to read the letter. It was from his friend, Ron Weasley.
Hey Harry,
Hedwig happened to stop by The Burrow while hunting, so I asked her to deliver this letter to you since Pig is so hard to get hold of. The Muggles aren't treating you too badly, are they? We'd love to have you here for the rest of the summer, but Dumbledore told us that you're supposed to be staying somewhere else. I don't know where, but I reckon you'll be pretty well off, unless you're supposed to stay with Snape or something.
You don't have to reply to this letter. I just thought I should tell you that you won't be with us this summer.
RonHarry read and re-read the letter with much disappointment. He had stayed with the Weasleys twice before, and both were probably the best summers he had ever had. He didn't think anywhere else could be better than The Burrow, with the exception of Hogwarts. The Weasleys were more like family to him than the Dursleys could ever be.
Feeling considerably worse than before, he hid the letter under the handy loose floorboard next to his bed. The hole was currently quite empty, except for a scroll of parchment which was his Transfiguration essay.
Unable to find anything else useful to do, he decided to finish up his homework (Write, in no less than 1500 words, the risks and complications of transforming oneself into an inanimate object). He was about to grab his quill and bottle of ink from his trunk, when, suddenly, he heard a knock on his bedroom door.
The sound took a while for him to recognize. No one in the Dursley household ever knocked before entering his bedroom. Dudley would usually just burst right in to grab something from his old collection of broken toys, while Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon never went in at all.
'Come in,' Harry said, rather warily. The door opened little by little, slowly revealing his cousin, Dudley. Harry stared at the unexpected visitor, his eyebrows raised.
'Sorry,' Dudley said. 'I didn't mean to disturb.'
'No, it's ok,' the words came out of Harry's mouth before he realized what he was saying.
'Um, I was just wondering…' Dudley mumbled, his words gradually getting softer.
Harry looked at him expectantly to show that he was listening.
'How did you get so skinny?' the words were almost inaudible, but Harry heard it all right, and he froze, numb with shock.
There was silence for a few seconds. 'Well,' Harry finally began, but his cousin interrupted him.
'I mean – I tried, I tried all kinds of ways. I tried to cut down on my between-meals snacks, and I didn't even touch my breakfast this morning,' Dudley looked genuinely depressed, 'but nothing works. I'm still – fat. The girls at school don't even dare go near me.'
Harry fought hard not to chortle. He wanted to say something mean, but for some reason, he couldn't bring himself to do it. He actually almost felt sorry for Dudley. But before he could utter a word, someone called him.
'POTTER! SOMEONE WANTS TO SEE YOU!'
It was undoubtedly Uncle Vernon. Harry managed a quick 'sorry, gotta go' to Dudley, left his room and ran down the stairs, wondering who actually bothered to see him.
As he reached the foot of the stairs, he saw who his visitor was – his old neighbour, Mrs Figg. She was beaming at him – something that she had never done before. Uncle Vernon was in the living room, barely acknowledging the presence of Mrs Figg and holding up the newspaper to block his view of Harry. Aunt Petunia was busy putting out some biscuits and a cup of tea, eager to impress the guest as usual.
'Well, got your trunk ready, Harry?' Mrs Figg asked, still smiling. Then, seeing Harry's bewildered expression, she added, 'Haven't your aunt and uncle told you? You'll be staying with me for the rest of the summer. I'll be taking you to Diagon Alley to get your supplies and to King's Cross Station on September the first.'
Uncle Vernon grunted once, as though saying, 'That's right, so good riddance.' Harry simply stared at the elderly woman in disbelief. Since when was she so happy to have Harry stay with her? How did she know about Diagon Alley anyway, was she a –
'Go on, Harry, get your trunk,' Mrs Figg said, interrupting his train of thoughts. 'We don't have all day.'
Almost robotically, he quickly went upstairs to pack, and came back down in less than five minutes with his trunk, cauldron and Hedwig's cage at his side. Aunt Petunia looked at these things disapprovingly, Uncle Vernon held the paper even closer to his face and Hedwig kept trying to grab a biscuit on the table with her beak.
'Come on then, Harry,' Mrs Figg walked towards him, and helped him with his trunk. 'I'll have just one biscuit, thank you,' she said, taking a biscuit from the table and nodding to Aunt Petunia politely, 'but no tea. We must be going.' And with that she half-dragged Harry to the front door.
'Well, bye,' Harry said uncertainly to no one in particular. Uncle Vernon grunted, Aunt Petunia forced a curt smile at him, and Dudley was nowhere to be seen. Probably still upstairs moaning about his weight.
Mrs Figg and Harry stepped out of the house, closed the front door, and Harry breathed the outside air. It had been weeks since he had last been out of the confines of the house. He looked up at the wrinkled face of the old woman next to her, and saw a tinge of kindness shining through her eyes that he had never seen before. Mrs Figg looked back at him, smiling benignly, and he thought that this summer might not be as bad as he thought after all.
