If Harry Potter had previously believed his aunt and uncle could never be more cross with him, his final summer at their home proved him completely wrong. Every time he showed his face downstairs, his Uncle Vernon turned bright purple and fumbled around until he either found something broken for Harry to fix or actually broke something and gave it to his nephew for repair. Aunt Petunia refused to speak to Harry outright, and made a big show of cooking or cleaning whenever he appeared. Dudley continued to please himself as he always had, either by eating, playing video games, or calling Harry nasty names. Harry, however, refused to rise to his cousin's bait. Some things just seemed trivial now that he was completely alone in a fight against evil.
This particular morning, Harry bounded down the stairs, determined to make the most of his last day ever at Number 4 Privet Drive. He arrived in the kitchen to find Dudley and Vernon polishing off the last of a large vat of scrambled eggs, dressed in their best collared shirts and slacks. They both looked at him nastily as he sat down at the table, but spared him any comments, as their mouths were too full to enunciate words properly.
Aunt Petunia bristled when she caught sight of Harry, but determinedly ignored him and piled fresh bacon on Dudley's plate. It was apparent that the family had given up on his diet over the previous school year. Dudley was wider and greasier than ever.
"Eat up, Dudders," Aunt Petunia said; ruffling his hair fondly, "You have been looking a bit thin ever since you came back from school." Harry snorted into his orange juice. Everyone at the table ignored him. "We must get you back looking healthy."
In his opinion, Dudley looked like a beached walrus on its deathbed, but no one ever asked Harry what he thought about things.
"Petunia, we're driving in around 11:00, we should be back by 10:00 tomorrow morning, at the earliest," Vernon said, reaching up to wipe a bit of egg of his mustache. He missed.
Harry glanced up from his orange juice. "Where are you going?"
Everyone continued to ignore his existence. "Do be careful, Dudders dear, those drill characters can be so dangerous. I don't want you getting in over your head! Vernon, you must watch out for him. I know you're trying to groom him to take over your business… But he is just a baby! Don't let those corporate monsters rip him apart!"
Harry seriously doubted that anyone without a very large sword could "rip Dudley apart" but he wasn't inclined to share his opinion. His Uncle Vernon seemed to have noticed the smirk playing on his lips, and he looked positively livid.
"Don't get smart with us, boy," Vernon said, shaking his large purple finger at Harry.
"I wasn't getting 'smart' with you. I didn't say anything," Harry said. Vernon spluttered for a bit, searching for a retort before Harry grew tired of waiting for him to find a comeback. "Don't worry, you won't have to put up with my cheek much longer. This is my last day here. I'm leaving tonight. At midnight."
Vernon humphed. "So we're not good enough for you anymore, eh boy? Getting ready to move on to something bigger and better? Just like your father, I bet. Just don't go impregnating a girl and dying. If you leave a baby on Dudley's doorstep, don't count on him to be as welcoming as Petunia and I were. And intimidation won't work either. Dudley's stronger than that. No sending some crazy old coot to force him into feeling bad for your illegitimate bastard."
The room grew deadly silent as Harry stared at his uncle, hatred evident in his emerald green eyes. "Don't you ever insult Albus Dumbledore," Harry said quietly. "You have no idea what you are talking out. Dumbledore was a greater man than you will ever be. He sacrificed his life to protect you and your family from a more terrible fate than you could ever imagine. That's why I'm leaving. At midnight tonight, the magic that Dumbledore placed on this house will be void and Death Eaters will be right around the corner, waiting to come and kill you and everyone here. Dumbledore died trying to prevent that from happening."
Vernon and Dudley sat in a stupor, scolded into silence. Dudley had stopped chewing his bacon and his mouth was hanging open, giving him the impression of a stunned animal caught doing something terrible. Uncle Vernon's face had changed from bright purple to stark white. The egg on his upper lip stood out, bright yellow against the palest of whites.
"Well I'll never… The boy is obviously completely barking mad, making up stories and expecting us to believe such crap. DUDLEY, LET'S GET OUT OF HERE!" Uncle Vernon suddenly bellowed. He stood abruptly, knocking a mug of hot tea onto a plate full of toast, eggs, and bacon. Dudley leapt up after his father, shaking the entire house as he landed on the wood floors. The pair stalked off together. Dudley ran (well, waddled) back when they had reached the front door, though. He grabbed a handful of bacon and stuffed it in his mouth.
"Bye Harry," he said nervously and then stuffed some more bacon into his mouth. Harry was too stunned to reply. Dudley glanced at him through beady eyes for a few seconds, and then moved as fast as he could out to his father and the waiting car.
Harry and his Aunt Petunia remained in the kitchen for several minutes, shocked into silence. Finally, Aunt Petunia moved around to Uncle Vernon's side of the table. She started to clean up the tea, but Harry reached over and stopped her.
"Let me," he said. "It's my last day here. I might as well do something useful."
Aunt Petunia stared at him as if he were some alien creature, and then moved aside to let Harry finish cleaning. "Make sure you get all of the food. I'll be right back down, I need to get something." She seemed to remember that she was treating Harry almost civilly. "If there's a speck left on this table, I'll be sure to make you pay," she snapped before positively running from the room.
Harry stared after her for a moment. The entire place had gone bonkers. He chuckled to himself, and then quickly cleared away the dishes. He snuck a bit of bacon before trudging back up the stairs to his room.
The door to his room was ajar. Harry raised his eyebrows in surprise, he distinctly remembered shutting his door before he went downstairs. Looking around suspiciously, Harry rolled up his sleeves and withdrew his wand from his back pocket. He kicked open the door quickly and was shocked to find a figure sitting on his bed. It wasn't a Death Eater, however, as he had originally thought, or even one of his best friends or Ginny. It was Aunt Petunia, perched delicately on the bed, flipping through a photo album.
"Um, Aunt Petunia? What are you doing on my bed? You haven't been in here since you fit my window for bars when I was twelve," Harry said. He lowered his wand.
She didn't look up from the photos. "You know, I was always jealous of my sister. She had everything… The pretty hair, the gorgeous features… And those eyes. She had our grandmother's eyes," Petunia said, looking at a photograph fondly.
Harry took a good look at the album. It was the present he had received from Hagrid at the end of his first year at Hogwarts. The book was open to the pictures from his parents' wedding. He noticed a homely woman in the back of the wedding party shot, looking quite out of place amongst the beautiful Lily, her smiling husband, and his handsome best friends. She had a distinctively long neck and pursed mouth that gave her the appearance of an angry horse. It was unmistakably Aunt Petunia.
"I can't believe I never noticed that you were at my parents' wedding," Harry said, sitting down on the bed next to his aunt.
"No one noticed I was there," Aunt Petunia said sadly, flipping the pages of the album. "I was always 'Lily's sister.' No one noticed me. I got used to it. It was only natural that I would be completely ignored at her wedding."
Harry felt a rush of pity for this woman, who had been cruel to him his entire life. He had never known Aunt Petunia to be truly a person. In his mind, she had always been an extension of evil at home, to remind him that he would never live a truly happy life. He was either fighting evil or having to clean for it.
"I don't really know what to say. I never thought of you and my mother as related, as odd as that sounds," Harry said.
"Most people didn't ever think of us as sisters. We were as different as night and day. She was beautiful, confident, and clever. I was ugly, shy, and dull. Our parents always claimed to love us both equally, but I knew they loved Lily far more than they ever loved me," Aunt Petunia said quietly. "I've accepted that fact."
Harry was tempted to reach out and put his arms around his aunt, but years of experience with her temper made him think otherwise. "You are a very special person, Aunt Petunia. You are excellent at er… cleaning and cooking and well, being normal," Harry said, finishing off rather lamely.
To his great surprise, Aunt Petunia cracked a smile. "I've tried to be normal ever since Lily was discovered to be a witch. I thought my parents would be frightened of her talents and rise me up and make me their prize. I was dreadfully wrong, they revered Lily because of her spark. She could get her way with anyone. Lily was always quite the firecracker."
Harry remembered seeing his mother in Snape's memories. His mood instantly darkened at the thought of his former teacher, who had just recently murdered Harry's mentor, Albus Dumbledore. Aunt Petunia caught sight of the unease on his face.
"What did I say Harry? I'm sorry; it must be awkward for you to talk about your parents. All the talk of you leaving just made me realize that you never really heard anything from my point of view about your family, in the entire time you've lived here," Petunia said awkwardly, rising to leave.
Harry held up a hand to stop her. "No, no. It's fine. I was just thinking of Dumbledore. You know, the man who came and collected me last year. He… he was murdered at the end of last year."
"Oh dear," Aunt Petunia said, her hand flying to her heart. "Do they know who killed him?"
"It was a man called Severus Snape. He was the Potions teacher at our school. I always thought he was fighting for the other side. Dumbledore trusted him, though. But Snape killed him in cold blood, right in front of my eyes, the same way Sirius died."
Aunt Petunia sniffled. "You've seen so much… I don't know how anyone your age could have possibly gone through something like that. Have you ever considered just giving up and joining the other side?"
Whatever warm atmosphere had enveloped the room mere seconds before instantly dissolved. Harry tightened his fingers around his wand. "What makes you say that, Aunt Petunia?"
"Oh, I don't know. They seem to be so much more powerful than you know… the good people. It seems so easy to just give into temptation."
"If you give into temptation, you're becoming evil. My job is to make sure the world is safe. I'm not going to give in to some Death Eaters. How do you know so much about this anyways?"
Aunt Petunia rose and walked towards the door. Harry flicked his wand and shut it. She jumped backwards, almost tripping over the big birdcage that contained Harry's owl, Hedwig. "What a charming bird," Aunt Petunia said, looking more and more flustered.
That was it. Harry threw aside the photo album and leapt to his feet. He kept his wand pointing squarely at his aunt, right between her eyes.
"Who are you? Who sent you?"
"Harry, it's me, your Aunt Petunia," she said. "What is all of this nonsense? Put your wand away this instant!"
"If you truly are Aunt Petunia, then you will be able to tell me what happened at Dudley's eleventh birthday party."
"Well, he had his friends over, of course, and we had a lovely time in the backyard…"
"STUPEFY!" Harry bellowed. A red jet of light burst forth from his wand and hit Aunt Petunia square in the chest. He glanced at the clock. They had been talking for an hour since the person posing as his aunt would have been able to drink Polyjuice at the breakfast. Sure enough, the dark hair that adorned his real aunt was fading to blonde from the roots and down. A short woman with stringy hair and chewed fingernails lay where his aunt had been just moments earlier. Harry angrily threw open the woman, and then levitated the women to the open hatch and dropped her out of it.
He waved his wand around the room a few times, packing up all of his loose ends. Spell books and loose bits of parchment flew across the room and into his open trunk. Hedwig squawked impatiently.
"Don't worry, girl, I'll let you out. I just have to finish cleaning up."
Harry quickly checked under the bed and around the house once or twice more before he was finally sure that he had all of his possessions. He waved his wand again and made the bed and vacuumed the floor of his room. It looked unlived in. It was as if he had never existed. The Dursleys, Harry assumed, would go on acting as if he had never been there in the first place. He was doing them a favor, making it easier on his real Aunt Petunia.
Hedwig squawked again, so Harry released her from her cage. "Meet me at the Burrow," he said, stroking her soft feathers. She chirped her approval, then spread her large wings and flew out the window that Harry had thrown the woman through just minutes earlier.
The room was neat and Harry had nothing left to keep him there. He would be arriving early at the Burrow, but he was sure that they would not mind. He took one last look around the house that had been his childhood. He had thought of nothing but escape for the first eleven years of his life. Since he had been accepted at Hogwarts, Harry had thought of Privet Drive as his jail, rather than a home. He couldn't wait to be out on his own.
Now though, the protection and familiarity of this place was causing Harry to feel some remorse. He would not miss his relatives and the home greatly, but he suspected he would be at least a bit sad for a while. Leaving Privet Drive meant he was truly leaving his childhood behind, and at the moment, Harry would have given anything to have the greatest one of his worries be about being beat up by Dudley and his gang of thugs at age eight.
Harry decided to dwell on the memories a different time, however, and quickly crossed over to his trunk. He put his hand on it, and concentrated very hard on the three D's. Soon enough, he felt a familiar tugging on his stomach and left Number 4 Privet Drive forever.