"Get out of my house, I don't want people seeing you in here! Out!" Vernon yelled, his face quickly turning purple. Harry didn't move. This couldn't be good. Dumbledore had never been to the Dursley's house, and McGonagall certainly had not either. Yet there they were, looking quite out of place in the front hall, with Dudley cowering behind his mother, who had gone completely white, just watching. Harry assumed they were here for the Order, but why had Dumbledore himself come?
Dumbledore looked at Uncle Vernon. "I am looking for Harry Potter, please." He said.
Vernon shook his head angrily. "No one here by that name! Sorry! Too bad to see you go!" He tried to usher them out the door, but to no avail. Aunt Petunia, who was standing beside her husband, Dudley cowering behind her, took a step back.
Dumbledore looked at her. "Good evening, Petunia." She glared at him fearfully and did not answer.
"I said there is no one here! I don't know how you know my wife, but I assure you-"
"Please, Mr. Dursley, I would like to speak to Mr. Potter." Dumbledore looked sternly over Vernon.
"He, uh, can't come down right now. Very sick." Vernon said quickly. "Caught a death of a cold cavorting out in the rain today."
Professor McGonagall stepped forward. "Well, let me see him then. I'm no Madame Pomfrey, but I'm sure I can help him."
Vernon looked from side to side. "No!" He said forcibly. "I forbid it!"
Dumbledore took of his small spectacles slowly. Vernon took a step back nervously, knowing that adult wizards could indeed use magic all the time. Dumbledore just wiped the rain off of his glasses and put them back on. "Very well." He said. "We shall be going then." He and McGonagall turned and walked towards the door.
"Wait!" Harry jumped down the stairs. "Professor, wait!"
Dumbledore turned quickly, a sparkle in his eye. "Harry, how wonderful to see you." He said.
Harry tried to come down the stairs, but Uncle Vernon blocked his path. "You get back into your room right now, boy, or you will be in there for longer than you can possibly imagine!"
Harry ducked under one of Uncle Vernon's beefy arms and dodged his blows, ending up in front of Dumbledore and McGonagall. McGonagall put a hand to her mouth to stop herself from laughing quietly, then quickly put it down, her mouth again a thin line.
"Harry, how delightful to see you." Dumbledore said with a smile. "I am sorry to come at no notice, but I must ask." His eyes twinkled again. "Would you like to come back to school early this year? We thought it might be right for you to come back with us."
Harry's eyes widened. Go back to Hogwarts a month early? He would love that! That would be amazing! Perfect!
"Absolutely not!" Vernon cried. "He stays here! That is final!"
Dumbledore looked down on Uncle Vernon. "Mr. Dursley, I believe that this is Harry's decision."
Ten minutes later, Harry had his trunk and Hedwig's cage in the front hall. Dumbledore held in his hand a glass from the kitchen. He touched his wand to the glass, and it glowed blue for a second. He handed it to Harry. He then turned to Vernon. "Thank you for your hospitality, Mr. Dursley. Goodbye." He and Professor McGonagall disapparated as Harry felt a tug somewhere behind his navel, and the world around him began to spin rapidly, until it changed into a completely different place.
But he was not at Hogwarts. He was in a small bedroom in a house somewhere. He knew the bedroom. He was in his bedroom in number twelve, Grimmauld Place. He opened the door. He could hear talking down the dark staircase. He silently stepped out of the room and the door closed with a click.
"Harry!" He spun around. Hermione and Ron were coming up the stairs. They ran noisily up the stairs to him. "We were wondering when you'd get here. Dumbledore and McGonagall were here almost an hour ago, and they just got back. They said you would turn up soon, we thought they meant that you were flying or something!" Ron said, clapping Harry on the back.
Hermione gave him a hug. "Welcome back, Harry! Happy Birthday!" She said.
Harry stared at them, a little stunned. He had been told he was going to school, and he had not been told that his two best friends, Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger, would be there. "What's going on?" Harry demanded.
Hermione shrugged. "What does it matter, Harry? They wanted us to come back here to help out, I guess. And to keep you safe, of course."
"But I don't want to be here!" It was true. All summer, he had asked to come, but now that he was here, it was all wrong. Everything in Grimmauld Place reminded Harry of Sirius, his godfather, whom had been killed just over a month ago by a Death Eater, one of Lord Voldemort's minions. He had been excited to go to school, but he wasn't even sure if he'd rather be here than at Privet Drive.
Hermione rolled her eyes. "Don't look a gift horse in the mouth, Harry." She sighed. "We know it's difficult, Harry, but-"
"We also know that you're better off here." Ron finished Hermione's sentence for her.
Harry grinned. "You've been practicing that!"
"We have not!"
"Oh, Ron, yes we have, don't try and fake it."
Harry laughed. Maybe it wouldn't be so terrible being at Grimmauld Place. Maybe this was where he wanted to be.
Harry ventured downstairs to find out what was going on. "I should've noticed something when they apparated instead of touching the portkey." He muttered. Again, he had a sudden thought that maybe he didn't want to be there.
Ron shrugged. "Doesn't matter, mate."
There was a crowd in the dining room when Harry got there. Lupin, Tonks, Mundungus, Moody, and all the Weasley clan were all clearing dishes from the dining room table.
"Harry! Wonderful to see you! McGonagall and Dumbledore said you'd be here any minute!" Lupin said.
Mrs. Weasley bustled over and hugged Harry, telling him how wonderful it was to see him home safely at last.
Harry stood still until Mrs. Weasley stepped back from him. "Will someone please tell me what is going on?" Harry demanded.
Everyone looked at him, flabbergasted. "Harry, dear, we thought you would like being here…" Mrs. Weasley started.
Lupin patted her on the arm and stepped forward. "Harry, we know how much you dislike being at your aunt and uncle's, so we thought this was the best…"
Harry cut him off. "They told me I was going back to school!"
"That was just because they can't say anything about Grimmauld Place, Harry." Moody said. "We can't be too careful, you know."
Harry shook his head. "You don't get it. I don't want to be here, I never want to be here."
He turned on his heel and went back upstairs. He did not go to his own room, though – he went to Sirius' room, or what had been Sirius' room when he had been alive. Harry paced around the small room. A small bed sat on one side, a double bed with a simple duvet on top. A dresser with, Harry found when he opened the top drawer, few clothes in it. Two ratty black robes and a few pairs of trousers were all that sat in them. A few paintings on the walls, that watched Harry as he paced around the room. A dead lantern sat on the bedside table, with a book, the Wizards History of Music, beside it. A fine layer of dust sat over everything, as if no one had set foot in the room since Sirius' death. Harry spun on the spot, staring at everything.
He walked over to the dresser and pushed against it with all his might. It fell over with a loud thud, a leg breaking off and splintering onto the floor. Dust flew into the air, making Harry cough. He drew open the dark curtains so he could see better, throwing more dust into the air. The dresser lay on the floor like a bug, its legs in the air, its innards pushed out slightly. Harry pulled out one of the drawers and hurled it across the room, the wood dented the wall and the clothes fell out of the drawer. He picked up the second drawer and hit it against the wall splintering the wood. He hit it over and over again until it fell apart completely, when he moved on.
He opened the book to the dogearred page. It was inane drivel about the history of music, something Harry was sure Sirius could not enjoy. He ripped out pages and hurled the book cover against the dresser, where it fell quietly to the ground.
"Well, that was rude!" One of the paintings said.
"Yes, this isn't even his room!"
Harry winced as the paintings spoke. He pulled one of them off the wall and, as the subject shrieked and ran out of the canvas, pushed it on top of the over turned dresser, stabbing one of the wooden legs into it.
He threw things around for a few more minutes until the air was thick with dust and the cries of the paintings, and Harry could see what he had done.
Probably the only part of Sirius that was left was now gone. The dresser was destroyed, the painting stabbed, the lantern broken and the book ripped, the duvet torn apart, feathers floating around the room with the dust.
Chaos surrounded him. Harry was sitting in his own destruction, and now he could not even come in and try to remember Sirius sitting on that bed, reading that book by the light of that lantern.
Coughing, Harry stood up and stepped out of the room. Ron and Hermione were leaning against the opposite wall.
Harry sighed. "I'm sorry, guys." He said. "It's just, I thought I'd want to be here. And now that I'm here, it's just not right. "
Ron nodded. "That's alright. You up for a game of chess?"
Harry grinned. Wizards chess, a game where the pieces played full contact, was one of the few things that Ron always beat Harry at. "Sounds like fun." Harry said, doing his best to forget about everything on his mind.
After a long game of chess, Harry was restless. He declined a second game and walked out of the room. As he walked down the hallway, he noticed that the door to Sirius' room was open. He took a step closer and noticed something odd: it was clean. The dresser was intact, the clothes, Harry assumed, folded up neatly inside. The bed was made, and though the pictures were back on the wall, they still had rips in them, and the residents of them were cluttered in a few of the less ruined paintings. They scowled at Harry when he stepped in.
"Sorry." He mumbled quietly, stepping out again. He didn't want to get yelled at by paintings. As he closed the door to the room, he could hear the paintings voicing their complaints loudly and vulgarly.
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Goddess Usagi: that is a good point. I only changed a few sentences, I can tell you what they are if you want. Basically, I just added in a bit of Harry trying to decide if he wanted to be back at Grimmauld Place or not. About two sentences. And I changed one of the exchanges between Harry and Ron; it was a bit weak.
Review, please!
-unolimbo