The Spider-Man Burglar.
"These were very hard to get," Harry was saying as he pushed forward the small collection of little toys in front of him, making the three slightly older boys look down at them curiously before they looked back up at him.
"Why?" one of them asked.
"My cousin has this problem. If he doesn't get what he wants, or some other stupid thing, he has a temper tantrum and throws it around. I've also got these," Harry went on, moving on from speaking about Dudley while he slipped out four Batman comics out of his schoolbag. One by one, with a flourish, he placed them on the small cardboard box which had been fashioned into a crude table ideal for his business.
"All of them in good condition," Harry said, his eyes flicking from one boy to the next. "What do you think, worth anything?"
The boys looked at the toys and the comics and they pulled out some cash from their pockets. Harry watched them carefully before he took their cash out of their hands, mentally counting it quickly before a teacher turned up and tried to find out what was going on.
"Good doing business with you," Harry said to them shortly. He had learnt very gradually that most of the kids he did this sort of thing with preferred being quick. He had no problem with that since he didn't want to get into trouble with the teachers, who had it out for him given how he had arrived here in the first place.
One of the boys was looking at him funnily. "You know, we've been doing business with you for the last few months, and we've heard things about you."
"Oh?" Harry's voice was curious although there was a sliver of danger entering into his tone. "Like what?" he asked.
"We heard you were stealing food from your last school, and now you're here," the boy went on, blissfully unaware of how Harry was taking that.
"Yeah," one boy interrupted, "my parents said I shouldn't speak to you."
Harry lifted a brow. "Oh, but you like doing business with me."
The boy flushed.
Harry studied him closely, wondering if the idiot would tell his parents about what was going on. He hoped not, but if he did then there would be nothing he could do about it.
A smirk crossed Harry's face as he tried to act casual. "You shouldn't believe everything you hear," Harry went on conversationally, relaxing slightly; there were so many things going on about him that he had long since stopped caring.
He had only been worried something else had been talked about him, though what it could be he didn't know since there were so many rumours circulating around it was hard to tell fact from fiction, but that was life in Privet Drive for you.
"You're saying it's not true?"
"No. Everything you've heard about me is true. I did steal food from the classmates at my old school," Harry said, not concerned about what was being put out about him; in a way it was good to have a bit of notoriety to go with his reputation, and since Dudley hadn't moved with him to this new dump, he wasn't concerned about what the school thought about him.
But still…
Harry stood up and walked away, hoping to avoid this conversation; while he genuinely did not give a damn about what the Dursleys, the school, or the students thought about him, Harry didn't like giving them too much. "Good doing business with you," he called over his shoulder. "I hope to do it again soon."
Aunt Petunia's pinched face looked even more pinched while she looked through Harry's schoolbag and his lunchbox, but all she found was nothing, though he was relieved that he had already sold off everything he had stolen out of Dudley's room - second bedroom, that is. Harry watched her silently, knowing she wanted him to make some smart-aleck remark so then Vernon would need an excuse to beat him up again, but he wasn't going to give her the satisfaction.
The Dursleys had been like this for the best part of a year now. Ever since that little bitch Granger grassed him up, all of his days were spent waking up with a yell from Petunia, threatened by Vernon, and spending the day at school and then coming back to the House of Horror where his bag and his lunchbox would be searched.
"Get out of my sight!" Petunia snapped at him; Harry was only too happy to leave, and as he slipped into the cupboard under the stairs and he slipped off the clothes he had on and put on Dudley's cast-offs. Harry hated the oversized clothes with a passion, and he swore when he got out of here, he would burn the clothes and watch them go up in flames.
As he got changed, he had time to think.
When Granger grassed him up, life at the Dursleys had been unpleasant, though much of it came from the neighbours' outcry. Harry had been right - the neighbours would have eventually found out what had happened at the school, beyond his relatives' control. Truthfully he wasn't sure what the Dursleys expected. They had shoved him in the cupboard after the second beating after a few of the bastards had gossiped about it, and he had been forced to recover for a couple of weeks, though Petunia had forced her husband to carry on beating him which only slowed his recovery.
The reason?
The neighbours had heard from their kids' friends or their children - whatever the combination was - and they had begun talking. If there was one thing Petunia hated with a passion, it was neighbours gossiping about her.
Harry closed his eyes and tried to exorcise (not literally - he remembered the last time the Dursleys had tried exorcism on him, for his freakishness; he honestly did not understand why the Dursleys kept on about that, but truthfully at this point, he didn't care although he knew there was something about him that made no sense, but he absolutely despised the term exorcism) what happened next out of his mind, he still remembered the pain even now.
But seriously… what did the Dursleys expect? There was only so much they could control, surely it had occurred to them the other kids would have talked?
Harry shrugged. It wasn't his problem. In any case, Aunt Petunia shouldn't stick her abnormally large nose into other people's business and gossip all the time, and besides what did have to do with them? The neighbours around him meant nothing to him. He hated them, hated everything about them. He despised them and their mundane, worthless lives. They were the Dursleys' neighbours, not his.
In any case, what gave them the right to look down on him? Why did they ignore the pain he was in? They took one look at his appearance, judging him before they even knew him, so why should he care about proving them right? In any case, he had been trying to survive when he had stolen that food. He wasn't hurting anyone, was he?
That had been about a year ago now.
Harry closed his eyes and rested his head against the support of the stairs. When the Dursleys had found out what he was doing, courtesy of Hermione Granger, he had gotten a terrible beating. This time both Vernon and Dudley took part. Vernon told Dudley it was a "father and son bonding moment," and he had made a joke saying it was a pity they couldn't have had Harry's own father there so then they could beat both Potters.
When he had heard that, Harry had felt hatred surge through him.
Hatred for his own father, a bastard whom he had never even met for dropping him into this hell with the Dursleys, and hatred for the Dursleys and all members of the family. After the Dursleys had finished with him - for now - Harry had spent the next two weeks trying to recover, but it wasn't helped because the Dursleys still expected him to do everything.
When the neighbours began to talk, well the Dursleys had beaten him even more. The damage was done. There was nothing the Dursleys could do about it, and Harry had a feeling they knew about it but they were simply beating him up for the sake of it.
In the meantime the Dursleys had problems.
Changing schools. Harry had been expelled from the school where he'd stolen the food from. The Dursleys had to send him to a new school, one that was considered to be shit, in Vernon's own words. The Dursleys had spent the best part of a week searching for schools "suitable for a criminal" and they had deemed the current school he was in as perfect since it was smaller than the one Harry had attended with Dudley; Harry didn't know what criteria the Dursleys had been looking for in the school, and truthfully he hadn't cared much either.
One of the first things the teachers had done as soon as he had sat down was to lecture him, saying they would not tolerate theft of any kind. Harry had only stared at them emotionlessly, knowing that if there was even one pencil sharpener missing, he would be the first person to blame. They had been watching him like a hawk hunting for a rabbit, always ready to swoop down and snag him. They were keeping watch for any activity from him, any stolen items, any complaints about any stolen food. They were wound up so tightly Harry was amazed they didn't snap.
But they needn't have worried.
If they thought he was going to commit another theft so soon, so clumsily like he had done before, they were in for a very long wait. He had no intention of stealing food from anyone. Not now. He acknowledged his earlier mistakes, he had been so stupid to pinch food too frequently, and it had landed him in hell. He had no intention of going down that route again, he didn't need anymore Hermione Grangers grassing him up.
He wasn't going to steal from the school anymore.
Not now.
He had a better source of income. His cousin was a pig, and his main bedroom resembled something you'd see only in a landfill site, while the second bedroom he had with all the junk he had accumulated over the years was so full the Dursleys would never be able to tell if anything was missing since Dudley only paid a small amount of attention to a single item for a short amount of time.
As he settled down on the cot and shifted a little bit on the uncomfortable bed, Harry had to admit the new place wasn't so bad. Every cloud had a silver lining, as they said.
The Dursleys had sent him to this new place on his own, which meant he didn't have to brave Dudley or his gang of neanderthals. That didn't mean they couldn't have a go at catching him whenever the weekends came around. The Dursleys had refused to send their son anywhere near this school, believing it to be a lower class-dump and so he stayed where he was. Dudley, proving he was not so incredibly stupid, had realised what was going on. Dudley may love making his cousin's life a hell, but he didn't want to leave his gang although it never occurred to the fat bastard they might still hang out with each other. It didn't help Dudley went on and on and threw tantrums saying he didn't want to go anywhere near such a place. He needn't have worried.
Harry waited in the cupboard for three hours until the Dursleys went to bed. When he was positive they were asleep, Harry sat up and turned on the light and he looked at the small stash of cash he'd collected for the day and he looked it over for a minute before he placed it under the mattress. He wasn't worried about the Dursleys finding it; they never expended the time to look into his living space, and even if they tried to search the cupboard they wouldn't find the cash he had. He had other hiding spaces.
The bell rang and the teacher, Miss Ross looked up irritably at first. She was one of those teachers who would have preferred to have her pupils in her class for longer, but fortunately for the class that was not possible.
Harry gladly stood up and packed his things quietly before he silently walked towards the door. He had been stared at again by the teacher, and they were starting to creep him out.
"Wait a moment, Mr Potter," Miss Ross' voice cracked like a shotgun shell shattering glass. Her voice went through Harry with the same effect, and his brain felt like the glass while his eardrums were shattered shards.
Harry stopped and looked at the teacher.
"Come over here, please," he said.
Harry walked over silently and stood in front of the teacher's desk.
Miss Ross stared at him silently with an expression Harry recognised as contempt.
"What can I do for you, Miss Ross?" Harry asked, tired of the game.
Miss Ross blinked in surprise, but she recovered quickly. "I have said nothing for the past year," she announced, "I've been content with my other colleagues doing it for me. But I have been watching you for a while."
Harry lifted an eyebrow, wondering where this was going but he kept silent.
"I know what everyone has been saying about you," the teacher went on, "so I know about you…"
Harry couldn't help but laugh softly.
"Is something funny?" Miss Ross' expression became pinched. She almost resembled Petunia and he wondered if they were distant cousins.
"Yeah, you don't know anything about me," Harry whispered, but his voice was loud enough to be heard in the otherwise silent classroom. "None of you do. You only pay attention to what you want to listen to."
He knew it was a bad idea to say that, especially if it went to the Dursleys.
But he didn't care.
He had just about had enough of people gossiping about him and making unfair assumptions although many of them were true. But he wished they would just get lives and ignore him as if they'd never even met.
Miss Ross leaned forward, staring at him with a dislike that said she only disliked him based on what she had heard, and not with any real experience of him, ignoring everything the young boy had just said though Harry wasn't bothered since he'd had the same thing all of his life. "I'm still watching you. Now get out."
Although he was worried about what she had just said before she dismissed him, Harry just walked away, only too happy to leave. Truth be told he had already noticed the woman following him around the quad outside, but he had always made sure none of the teachers were in the line of sight of wherever he made his sales. And he never used the same place twice in a row. For a moment Harry wondered if the woman was getting any information from one of his customers.
He closed his eyes irritably and fought the urge to punch the wall as he walked out of the classroom and into the corridor so he could head out into the quad, his mind racing as he tried to work out if the teacher was deliberately laying down some sort of trap for him to fall into and was warning him so then he would follow a specific path so by the time the teacher was ready, there would be no way out for him.
Harry blew out a breath as he walked out into the quad and went to a fairly deserted corner and took out a library book he'd checked out. He wished he could take them away from the school, but the Dursleys really did not like books or anything to do with reading unless it was the newspaper or the TV guide. He couldn't understand the point, though, but the last time a book passed over the threshold of Number 4 Privet Drive it had been torn to bits and Harry had gone to bed with a headache.
As he read the book, Harry let his mind wander around. He was still wondering what Miss Ross was up to although he was curious about what he was going to do now. Harry wondered if he should stop for now, and lie low and not sell any more toys but while the idea was attractive, he didn't see much point. The woman could have just been warning him she was watching him generally. He lifted his head and looked around the quad for any tell-tale signs of the teachers. He saw a couple, but they were looking elsewhere.
Am I being paranoid? Harry thought to himself as he looked around closely, studying every single window surrounding the quad. The school circled the quad like a horseshoe, so it was easy for him to look around and see if there were any faces in the windows looking specifically at him. There weren't any.
Okay, so she isn't watching me right now, but I'll keep an eye out all the same. I'm not doing anything wrong in the school, but if the Dursleys get wind of what I'm doing with Dudder's old toys because of her or one of the other teachers, then my life won't be worth living. Then again, maybe its a good idea to lie low for a little longer than usual? he thought to himself.
Once he had reached his decision, Harry felt much happier. When the bell rang and the school resumed, Harry returned to his class, much more clear-headed than before, But he was still wondering what he could do about any teacher that poked their noses into his business. He doubted the other kids would tattle even with his reputation, though a few of them had asked about where he had gotten the toys. Still, their desire for high-quality toys (some of them at least) had won out over any thought of grassing him up. But that didn't mean he had to trust them.
For three weeks Harry avoided doing any business with any of the kids at the school because of two reasons - firstly he wanted to prove to the students and to the teachers he was not a thief and truly didn't care what they thought about him, and because he wanted to make sure his paranoia was nothing to be worried about.
Unfortunately, his worst fears were confirmed.
He had seen Miss Ross and a few of the other teachers watching him. He couldn't believe it; he had been at the school for a year now, and they still thought he was going to do something as stupid as to steal from the other students and the school. Did they really think he hadn't learnt anything after what happened last time?
Miss Ross continued to send him looks in class. Harry ignored her each time, though he was frustrated she was only proving to him his worst fears were confirmed.
During the fourth week, however, Harry was back with his customers.
"We were wondering what was keeping you, Potter," one of the boys commented. "What happened?
"I wanted to lie low in case any of the teachers were spying on me," Harry replied shortly; he knew it wasn't really a good idea to tell them what happened, but they only needed the basics. If they knew Ross had confronted him, it would make them hopefully take precautions in case the busy-body bitch or one of the other teachers looked like they were paying more attention than they should.
He smirked inwardly when the boys shared a look. Well, that worked.
One of the boys picked up a small action figure and expertly looked it over; Harry was reminded of David Dickenson or one of those other experts off of one of those antique programs he had caught glimpses of when he was clearing the table at Number 4. "I'll give you…two quid for this," he said.
Harry nodded. He would have preferred a lot more than that since coins were harder to conceal than notes, which made no distinctive noise whereas a coin made a clanging sound if bashed against something, but he knew better than to press. "Okay," he replied while he mentally prepared his secret weapon as he was keeping the rest of the quad under observation.
Next to go were a few Batman comics, which went for considerably more than a few quid. After that, a few Spider-Man figures went, and next a couple of toy cars. By the time he was finished, Harry had successfully collected £15 off of the others and he walked away from them. Out of the corner of his eye, he spotted someone trying to stay hidden and would have succeeded if he hadn't noticed her earlier. He sighed inwardly and walked inside the school.
Later at lunch, the Headmaster himself came into the hall followed closely by Miss Ross and the deputy headteacher, eliciting a few stares and whispers while the entourage looked around the hall for someone specific before they marched over to where Harry was sitting and eating his food slowly.
"Potter?"
"Has he been nicking things?"
"Always knew that kid was a freak."
Harry closed his eyes when he heard the whispers. Great, this is really going to go down well with the Dursleys, he cursed as he continued to eat his meal while the headteachers and his own form tutor approached. He wasn't going to give them any respect whatsoever especially since he knew this would inevitably get back at the Dursleys. While his relatives weren't friendly with the parents of the kids here, that didn't mean the kids wouldn't talk and word would reach the Dursleys.
He closed his eyes and hoped he could get some peace, and just as he was thinking that the entourage appeared by his shoulder. "Well Mr Potter," the Headmaster said with some thing in his voice Harry couldn't understand at the moment because he was too busy wrapped up in his own worries about what the Dursleys would do to him. "I seem to remember telling you any thefts in this school would see you in trouble."
Don't I know it.
"I haven't stolen anything," Harry didn't take his eyes off of his food.
"Look at me when I'm speaking to you!" the Headmaster's sudden bark made Harry look up at him in surprise for a moment before he relaxed slightly, though the loudness of the man's voice had reminded him momentarily of Vernon when he was in an awful mood, but fortunately it wasn't Vernon Dursley.
"Miss Ross here saw you taking money off of kids. You are going to hand the money to me." The Headmaster moved slowly away, clearly intending to take this to his office where he and his fellow teachers would be in control.
But Harry had no intention of doing that.
If he was led away then the rumour mill would start up and the Dursleys would catch wind of it, but if he did it here then hopefully the teachers would be humiliated enough to back off… Then again they might not. It might make them nastier.
Well, he'd cross that bridge later, but he was not leaving.
Putting on a long-suffering expression, Harry sighed and he pulled out his pockets. They were empty. Then he turned around and showed off his back pocket. But there was nothing there either and he turned around to gauge their reactions.
The teachers looked at each other in shock. It was clear they had hoped they could pin something on Harry, but with this development, they'd been knocked off-kilter. Harry sweetened the humiliation by opening up his book bag and showing off the contents. He flicked through the books, showing nothing but the pages. There were no pound notes or coins of any kind. Finally, Harry repacked them and looked up at the teachers.
The Headmaster was now looking at Miss Ross with a glare though there was a kind of petulance there Harry would have expected from Dudley. It was clear the old fool had wanted to get Harry for something today.
"Miss Ross, my office, NOW!" the Headmaster barked and he swept out of the hall, Miss Ross protesting every step of the way as she walked out.
Harry just sat back down and continued to eat while he was masking his satisfaction just barely. He had just humiliated the teachers in front of the entire school, made them look like idiots, though he had no idea what was going to happen next. He didn't know if the other students would talk, or Miss Ross herself would tell the Dursleys what he had supposedly done out of a sense of spite.
He wouldn't put it past her either, but he had succeeded.
After all, what teacher would demand they search the sock he was wearing?