Buffy is about to take a tour of her parent's life.
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Chapter 5
Through the Looking Glass
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The sun was just coming over the horizon when Buffy left her hotel room. She felt well-rested, as though she'd spent fourteen hours on a feathered mattress. She moved to stand at the corner of the street, digging in her handbag for a map she'd picked up at the front desk.
It was a map that had the directions to Goddrick's Hollow.
She waited for the cab she'd called to arrive and got inside. As the car sped off, she asked the driver if he knew the way to the old neighborhood. He said it would be a longer drive and Buffy replied that she didn't mind. It wasn't even seven in the morning yet and she felt wide awake.
Leaning over to the driver, she asked if he knew of any coffee shops on the way. He stopped and she quickly picked up a double mocha, while barely glancing at the tea list.
How she despised that liquid! It reminded her that she drank like Giles.
But the truth was, she was like Giles. She was English and she had never known.
The drive continued on into the late morning. Buffy leaned her head against the backseat, feeling her eyes start to slip shut. She slept as the cab rolled on.
Suddenly, her eyes snapped open. She was standing in the ruins of a once-beautiful home. Around her were many people, wearing long, flowing robes. One of them had long dark hair and was on his knees, screaming out. There was a larger man lifting a tiny bundle in his hands, "It's all right," the man said in a gentle voice. "Shh sh sh shh..."
Buffy walked behind the man and spied something on the floor. She moved a few tiles of ceiling aside and saw a photograph. She bent down and picked it up. The edges of the photograph were burnt and curled.
It was a picture of her parent's wedding.
She let out a small gasp and stood up, cradling the picture in her hands. "Mom? Dad?" she asked, feeling as though her heart was going to break.
No one else seemed to notice her standing there, holding the picture lovingly in her hands. It was a stationary picture, one that she could treasure forever...
The sound of a car door slamming pulled Buffy out of her dream, the images of a wedding photograph fading from her memory.
"We're there," the driver said, holding her door open. "I'll wait here if you wish. There isn't much to see. Just a bunch of wreckage."
Buffy got out of the car and saw a large concrete slab and the remains of a burnt wall. It was nothing like her dream. She moved onto the dry, dead grass and onto the charred slab, looking around. "What happened to it?"
"It looks as though several construction projects began here," the driver said from somewhere behind her, "but they never got them off the ground. The whole neighborhood's gone to shambles since the night this house burnt down. What's it to you, anyway?"
"It belonged to family," Buffy replied, walking over to the wall and holding her hand to it. She could sense a great power behind this wall, a great evil lurking. It was then she saw something in the dead grass behind the house. She moved toward it. "Can you see that?" she asked the driver, who was still following her, as though wanting to keep an eye on her.
"All I see is brown, brown, brown," the driver sighed.
But Buffy could see a blurry object sticking out of the ground. She bent down and reached for it. It was cold and solid as her hand clasped a silver cross. At the base of the cross was a silver frame. She picked it up. It was a fold-out picture frame. She carefully opened it and smiled.
It was the first picture she'd ever seen of her father.
Tears filled her eyes as her fingers brushed over the face of James Potter. He was exquisitely handsome and closely resembled her brother. In the picture next to him was Lily, her mother. In the center was a picture of James and Lily holding a blue blanket. "Harry," she whispered, folding the frame back up and setting it at the base of the cross. She kept low for a moment, brushing the tears aside before rising and facing the driver, who was starting to look impatient. His eyes glazed right over the spot where the cross was.
"Did you see that?" she asked him, her eyes wide with confusion.
"See what?" he asked, sounding perplexed as he looked right back at her.
She shook her head. "Nothing, really," she said, trying to sound as normal as she could. He was still looking at her as if she'd grown a second head or something. "Can we just go?"
As she trailed him on the way back to the car, she turned and glanced at the remains of a house lost in time. She could almost feel the presence of happiness and joy here. Something terrible had happened, along with the fire. It was too much to think about. She stopped at the edge of the wall and rested her forehead against the cool brick. It felt almost comforting to be here. It felt right.
"Miss, are you coming?"
The driver was sounding even more impatient now. It was borderline suspicion. "Yeah," she said, pulling away from the house and following him down to the car, her arms crossed. As soon as she was inside, she sorted through her purse and pulled out a second address.
"You want to go back to the Hotel?" he asked her as he quickly turned around in the driveway and began speeding back toward the city.
"Actually, no," Buffy said, gazing at the card in her hand. "Do you know the way to Privet Drive?"
"Little Whinging, right?" he asked, glancing at her in the rearview mirror. "We're actually closer to there than London anyway."
"Thank you," Buffy said with a quiet smile as the drive continued on into the early afternoon.
As it swept through the towns, her thoughts turned suddenly onto her brother. What type of boy was she to meet? Surely there had to be something to say about the school he attended and the fact he cowered at the might of his Uncle, who wore such a severe look in one of the photographs that even Buffy blanched. But there was an innocence in his face that she saw, an innocence that belonged to her... to their mother. In just a few hours she was going to meet the one surviving member of her family.
The thought almost left her breathless.
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"Thank you," Buffy said, getting out of the cab and handing over her fare. As the car drove away, she glanced around the street. "Privet Drive," she said, almost in relief. It had been a draining trip between Godrick's Hollow and here. She could almost feel the great power her parents once held as she stood there. Standing on the street corner, all she felt was a great sense of loss.
She moved down Privet Drive, glancing from house to house. It appeared to be a normal neighborhood, with normal children riding normal bikes and normal parents enjoying normal activities like hanging out the laundry and watering the lawn.
She finally spied Number Four and moved to stand on the sidewalk in front of the house. From what she could tell, this house was very different from the other houses she knew. She moved to step onto the driveway. A large black car was neatly parked in the driveway. It was the exact same car parked a year ago when the picture was taken for the newspaper.
As she moved closer to the house, she heard a muffled groan from somewhere to her left. She walked onto the lawn, ignoring anyone who would think she was strange otherwise, and found herself looking at someone who ladling fresh dirt into flower pots under the shade of high hedges, blocking the person from the sun.
"Who the hell do you think you are?" a voice demanded from behind her. Buffy whirled around to see a man standing there. He was even more intimidating than he had appeared to be in the photograph. She took a step away from him, her eyes narrowing dangerously.
"I was hoping I could see Harry Potter," she retorted, crossing her arms in front of her chest, not willing to move.
Behind her, Harry glanced up, nearly dropping his shovel. Who in the world would ever want to see him? He squinted, but the person, a woman from the sound of her voice, was standing in the bright sunlight and it was so difficult for him to see... He blinked and stepped into the light just as a shrieking voice came from the house.
"Who are you?" Harry asked, the shovel dropping from his hands. The girl turned around and stared at him, her eyes widening.
"Who do you think you are?" another woman started shrieking. Harry turned to see his Aunt Petunia standing next to his Uncle Vernon, pointing her finger accusingly at her nephew. "This is your doing! I know it!"
"Honestly," Harry said, swallowing hard and stepping back into the shadows, "I don't even know who she is..."
"All right," said Buffy, lifting her arms in the air. "Cool it, the lot of you."
Everyone was silent, except for Aunt Petunia, who was pointing indignantly in Harry's direction and making soft 'tuh' noises.
"Vernon Dursley, right?" Buffy asked, finally turning to the intimidating man who just happened to be her birth Uncle. "It's a pleasure to meet you. My name is Elizabeth Potter."
Petunia gasped from behind him, her eyes widening. Harry dropped his shovel for the second time and moved out to look closely at the woman. She said she had the same last name as his? What was that all about?"
But his Aunt Petunia seemed to have a clue. She moved and took Buffy's hands. She was staring very deeply into the greenish eyes, but deep inside, Petunia seemed to sense something as she pulled away. "You're Lily's, aren't you?" she asked slowly, meaningfully.
Buffy nodded, just as slowly.
Aunt Petunia seemed to understand as she settled back, a dark look on her face as she remembered a conversation eighteen years before. "Harry," she said, in a voice barely an echo to her own, "I want you to meet someone."
Harry moved next to his Aunt, trying in vain to brush the dirt and the grime from his clothes, which seemed to be too big for him. "Who are you?" he asked, trying not to sound too forthright, but not sounding shy either.
"My name is Elizabeth Potter," Buffy repeated softly.
Harry's eyes darkened in confusion as he turned to his Aunt Petunia. But she was staring at Vernon, tight-lipped. "Vernon, do you remember that night before we were married... the night I came to your house so late..."
"You kept telling me that freak sister of yours was..." His eyes suddenly widened. "Oh..." His eyes sought out Buffy. "Oh, my word..."
"What is going on here?" Harry asked, glancing from one blank face to another. "Who is she?"
"She's your sister, Harry," Petunia replied, her voice still quiet. It was very un-Aunt Petunia like to speak of such things even when the neighbors were, for once, listening. "She is the firstborn of James and Lily."
Harry found himself growing dizzy as he stumbled to the side. "No," he mumbled, the words getting locked inside his mouth. "I don't have a sister... I can't... I don't..."
Before they realized what had happened, Harry fainted dead away on the front lawn.
Buffy bent down and glanced at her brother with concern before lifting angry eyes onto her Uncle Vernon. "And I would rather have you address my mother properly. Hearing you call her a 'freak sister' doesn't really bode well with someone who has been considered a freak her entire life."
"Are you--?" Aunt Petunia gasped, eyeing Buffy closely. "Really a..." Again, the words died. She pressed her lips together and turned to Vernon.
At that moment, there was a clammor on the street. Both Vernon and Petunia turned to see their blonde, heavy son Dudley returning from an afternoon of terrorizing children in the park. He glanced at his parents who were hovering over a small blonde-haired girl. Next to them, Harry was lying on the ground.
"Who's that?" he asked, his piggy little eyes on the small blonde who was crouched over there, not moving. Her own eyes met his and he saw a gaze colder than ice. He withdrew his gaze, but his large hands the size of small hams balled into fists. "Is she a freak friend of that?" he asked, pointing rudely at Harry.
Aunt Petunia pressed her lips together again and glanced at Buffy. She didn't look happy. "Dudley, come here," she said, her voice very serious.
"No," Dudley said, not moving.
"I think it would be in your best interest if you listened to your mother," Buffy said, her voice cold, very cold. Dudley glared at her as he waddled to stand next to his mother.
"Who're you?" he asked again, smirking, his eyes disappearing into plump, pink cheeks.
"She's your cousin," Aunt Petunia replied.
This was obviously not the answer Dudley expected. He lifted his stunned face and glared at the blonde now, sizing her up. "She doesn't look that big to me," he said, slamming one fist into his open palm.
"Dudley," Vernon said, his voice holding a hint of warning. "We do not beat up guests into our home."
"So you're saying she's my cousin," Dudley said, abandoning all violent pretense. "In that case, I'm Dudley Dursley."
"You misunderstand him," Buffy said, grinning as she shook his hand. "I'm Harry's older sister."
The smile slid right off of Dudley's face. He turned to his father for an explanation, but all Vernon could do was nod. "How can you be... how is it possible... how?"
Buffy looked as though she would like those questions answered as well. But she could see that Aunt Petunia held some of the answers and she would soon divulge them. In the meantime, however...
Buffy bent down over her younger brother, gently slapping his face to wake him up. "Come on, Harry, wake up," she said softly, tipping his face into the sun. "That's my boy."
His eyelids slowly fluttered open and saw her face. It was a face he recognized to be partially his mother's. The eyes were different though. They held more brown in them, like Aunt Petunia's. "What?" he breathed.
Buffy helped him sit up gently. Sitting next to him, she faced him. He stared at her, trying to determine whether or not this could be some trick, some hoax. Perhaps she was a death eater, waiting to cart him off to Lord Voldemort. Maybe she was a spy for Voldemort. She could even be a spy for the Ministry.
"How do I know you are who you say you are?" he asked, his voice shaking.
"Because of this," Buffy said, turning to her bag. She pulled out three items. The first was a picture of a baby girl in a young woman's arms. Turning the photograph over, Harry saw that both his mother's name and the name Elizabeth Potter were written across the back. He accepted the second item, which was a framed photograph of his mother, although faded. The last item convinced him most of all. It was her birth certificate, adorned with the baby footprint along with the full name Elizabeth Anne Potter. He smiled when he saw his parents' names on the bottom, James Potter and Lily Evans.
He glanced up at her, grinning. "It's true?" he asked, not daring to hope.
Buffy nodded. "It's true," she whispered. "I'm your sister."
He practically threw himself into her arms, knocking them both onto the neatly trimmed grass. She laughed out loud as they both straightened up and then stood. Uncle Vernon was looking at her as though he'd never seen anything like her before. Aunt Petunia was glancing fondly at her niece, tears sparkling in her eyes. Dudley looked bored and was shuffling his feet, his hands jammed deep into his pockets.
Harry was staring at Buffy, with something pulling at his heart. He never even imagined how it would feel, just weeks after losing someone he'd gotten so close to, how it would feel to have someone come into his life again. And she was his sister, too. His heart swelled at the thought of finally having someone in his life that wasn't trying to hurt him. There was a genuine, sincere look in her eyes as she stared right back, a tear rolling slowly down her cheek.
"I can't believe I've never..." he started, before looking away, brushing back his own tears.
She leaned over and placed a hand on his face. "This has got to be a dream come true," she said, hugging him again. "Just yesterday I discovered our parents were dead... but now... I find out that you exist..." Her voice cut off as she choked out, "and it's like a part of me has been made whole again."
As he stared at the tears now streaming freely down her cheeks, he knew exactly how she felt.
"I really hate to break up this little family reunion," Aunt Petunia said gently, lying a hand on Buffy's shoulder, "but we're beginning to attract the neighbor's attention."
Tears splashed down Buffy's front as she turned to look at the neighbors, who surveyed Buffy with a curious, almost a suspicious look. What she didn't notice was a woman down the street, bending over to pick up her cat. Her hair was twisted up into curlers and she wore tartan carpet slippers. She bent her face down to her cat, frowning slightly as she saw Harry Potter hug the girl again before the five headed indoors.
"This is interesting," she muttered to the cat as they turned away and began walking down the street. "This is interesting indeed."
Once inside the house, Harry turned to Buffy. "So... do you have a nickname or do I have to call you Elizabeth?"
Buffy took a deep breath, trying to recall what she'd told the woman at the adoption agency only the day before. "My entire life, people called me Buffy," she replied with a soft smile, "but I guess I can get used to Elizabeth."
Harry grinned at her and she grinned right back. He led her into the Kitchen, where Aunt Petunia was putting a pot of tea out. Dudley had sit down in front of the television set in the Kitchen, his eyes hungrily eyeing the remote in his hand. Vernon was immersed in paperwork, or so he said, because every once in a while, he glanced up and gazed at the niece he never knew he had.
While the tea was brewing, Harry asked Buffy if she wanted to see his bedroom. This was what he wanted her to know about. This is what he'd been dying to tell her ever since he realized she was truly his sister. He wanted to tell her that he wasn't normal. He wanted to tell her that their father had been a Wizard, their mother a Witch. He knew that she had no idea. He knew that she didn't understand Aunt Petunia's question when she had asked him if she were one of them. She kept walking like she was on eggshells, looking at him as though she expected him to explode. Maybe she really believed he was dangerous.
He took her by the hand and pulled her up the stairs, stopping just shy of the room he was finally able to call his own.
And he pushed open the door and stepped back, letting her walk inside.
Down the street, a harried-looking woman was tearing apart her living room, looking for a small clay jar she'd left somewhere, but wasn't exactly sure where. She finally spotted it next to the litter box and grabbed a pinch of the fine green powder. Rushing to her fireplace, she tossed it inside.
"Albus Dumbledore!" she roared.
The fire cracked to life as green flames began to lick upwards. She smiled when she saw the too-familiar head pop into the flames.
"Albus," she said earnestly, gesturing down the street. "We have a problem."
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Chapter 6... Petunia's going to tell Buffy/Elizabeth what really happened to her mother... and Buffy is about to get the shock of her lifetime when she discovers her brother's secret. {will be posted upon receipt from beta}
Author's Note:
To the reviewers, thank you! Thank you! You guys have totally made my weekend.
AlixMM, I totally get what you're saying. The thing is, this story isn't about adoption or deportation or even age... it's about how evil the Council can truly be.
As for the Council, well... I'm sticking by what I said earlier. I found something in Goblet of Fire I'm using. So one person knows who Buffy really is. And that's all I'm going to say on the subject.
As for the next post, well... I just sent the next two chapters to my beta reader. I'm posting this 24 hours after my last post because I like the chapter. I'm very torn about which direction to go... I can bring a certain someone back, and I can just leave them there. So... opinions would be nice. :) My beta said to go for it... but I'm not sure. It could through the rhythm of this story completely off balance.
Lsatly, the Dursleys are going to get what's coming to them. I promise.