Author's Note: Takes place five years after the prologue and chapter one.
Chapter Two: For Her Sister's Sake
"It'll be fun!"
Molly shot her husband a withering look.
"How is standing in line for hours for a pair of eyeglasses easier than having a medi-witch at St. Mungo's fix his eyes?" she demanded, gesturing to Harry, who was playing happily with his older brothers and Ron.
"I didn't say it would be easier," Arthur said. "Only that it would be more fun."
"And how could it possibly be more fun?" Molly asked.
"We'd be just like Muggles!" Arthur exclaimed. "It'll be a wonderful experience for him, Molly, to be exposed to Lilly's world."
"Plenty of magical people wear glasses, Mum," Bill offered. "Dumbledore does, after all."
"Glasses made by the people at St. Mungo's," Molly insisted. "Not by Muggles."
"Muggle-born kids wear them," Charlie spoke up, and his father beamed at him.
"You see?" he said. "It's only natural for Harry to wear Muggle-made glasses."
"I give up," Molly sighed, after a moment. "It looks like we're going to London."
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Half an hour later, Molly sat with Harry, Percy, and Ginny in the crowded waiting area of Harrod's optometry department. Arthur and the other boys had disappeared as soon as they'd entered the department store.
Molly looked at the people milling around, and sighed in exasperation.
"Thank you for staying with me," she said, turning to Percy, who was juggling Ginny on his knee.
"No problem, Mum," Percy said, as he made a face at Ginny. The four-year-old squealed in delight, and Percy grinned.
"You're going to make a great father some day," Molly said, wistfully, and her nine-year-old son shot her a panicked look. But before he could reply, a voice called their names.
"That's us," Percy blurted, jumping to his feet and dragging Ginny with him. Molly chuckled as she stood up, and she and Harry went into the open exam room.
"So, this Harry's first eye exam?" the doctor asked, kindly, shutting the door behind them.
"That's right," Molly said. "Our family medi-wi- doctor," she corrected herself, stumbling over the unfamiliar language, "thinks that Harry may have a vision problem."
"Well," the doctor said, cheerfully. "Let's see if we can figure out what that is."
"Are you ready to get your eyes looked at, young man?" she continued, speaking to Harry as she swung him into the exam chair.
"Yeah!" Harry exclaimed, catching onto the woman's enthusiasm.
The doctor put Harry through a battery of test, including covering his eyes one at a time and having him name objects he saw on a piece of paper. She did the same thing with a series of letters projected on the far wall.
While Harry dutifully recited the letters, Molly wrung her hands, not able to help the nervous feeling in her stomach.
"He'll be fine, Mum," Percy whispered, sensing the reason for her discomfort. "Glasses aren't the end of the world."
Molly smiled weakly at him, and turned her attention back to Harry. Fifteen minutes later, the doctor had finished her examination, including something called 'eye drops', an ordeal Harry had screamed his way through, with Molly wanting to join him. Percy finally had to hold his little brother on his lap to calm him down while the doctor dripped liquid into Harry's eyes.
"His eyes should be fully dilated in about twenty-thirty minutes, and then we can finish the exam," the doctor said, cheerfully unfazed, as though she dealt with toddlers screaming bloody murder every day.
"Finish the exam?" Molly asked, weakly.
"The last part is the fastest," the doctor assured her. "And the easiest on the children. Now, if you'd like to go back out to the waiting area, we'll call you when it's time."
At the dismissal, Molly stood and fled the room, clutching Harry's hands convulsively.
"That was positively barbaric!" she hissed to Percy, as she sank into one of the hard chairs. "How could Muggles do this to one another?"
"Mom, hush," Percy whispered, looking around nervously as people shot them curious glances. "Someone might hear you."
But someone already had. A tall, thin woman, with a short, chubby child in tow, snapped her head around at the word Muggle, a look of fear etched plainly on her face. Then, she got a good look at Harry, sitting dutifully in the chair besides Molly's, and her eyes widened. Giving her child over to her husband standing beside her, she set her face in thin lines and marched over to where they sat.
"Can I help you?" Molly asked, warily, noting the woman's apparent and sudden fury.
"Yes, you can," the woman snapped. "You can tell me what the bloody hell you're doing with Lilly Potter's son!"
Even as Molly gaped in amazement at the madwoman standing before her, she found herself rising defensively to protect her children.
"Who are you?" she demanded.
"I," the woman gritted, "am Petunia Dursley. And that is my nephew." The last word was ground out from between her teeth, as though it was painful for her to say.
"Now," Petunia repeated, after a long, shocked silence, "what are you doing with Lilly Potter's son?"
"I'm his mother," Molly told her. "His adoptive mother," she amended, seeing the murderous look in the other woman's eyes. "Lilly Potter is dead."
"No," Petunia stated flatly, denial evident in her tone. "It's not possible."
"Mum, I'm going to take Harry and Ginny over there," Percy whispered, jerking his head over to a display.
"All right, dear," Molly replied, still not taking her eyes off Petunia.
"It's. Not. Possible," Petunia snarled, repeating her earlier statement. "Lilly cannot be dead."
"She died five years ago," Molly told her. "And then her son was left in your care, and you abandoned him on my front step."
"I would never," Petunia snapped, staring briefly off into space. Then, she snapped her head around to stare at her husband and son, who were coming towards them.
"I assume that you can Apparate?" she hissed, softly, keeping a wary eye on her approaching family.
"Yes," Molly said, wondering what she was getting at.
"I live at Four Privet Drive, Little Whinging, Surrey," Petunia continued, quietly. "Vernon is going to take Dudley to the zoo at three o'clock. I want to hear more about Lilly."
"I'll be there," Molly promised.
Petunia drifted away to join her husband and child. As they walked away, Molly heard her faint voice, "Vernon, it's been a long time since Dudley's been to the zoo, hasn't it?"
"Mum?" Percy whispered, coming back with his siblings in tow. "Was that really Harry's aunt?"
"Yes," Molly replied, but the rest of her answer was cut off by the doctor's summons.
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Exactly at three o'clock, Molly found herself standing outside Four Privet Drive. There was an air around the neighborhood, more than the sense of complete order that the immaculate houses and lawns showed. This was a feeling that everything in the area was fake, and that reality was deeply hidden.
Shaking off a foreboding feeling, Molly squared her shoulders and knocked firmly on the door. It opened almost immediately and Petunia stood back, an unspoken invitation to enter.
"Tell me about Lilly," Petunia commanded, without greeting. "How did she die?"
"So, you believe me, now?" Molly asked.
"How did my sister die?" Petunia repeated, unwilling to be distracted from gettingthe information she wanted.
"There was an attack, five years ago," Molly began, "on Halloween. Lilly and James were betrayed by one of their closest friends, and they were murdered by You-Know-Who. You do know who that is?" she asked, suddenly, interrupting her narrative.
"I am well aware of who Voldemort is," Petunia said, and Molly flinched at the name. "Go on."
"You-Know-Who then tried to kill Harry," Molly continued. "But it didn't work, and Harry survived while You-Know-Who died. Harry was rescued from the ruins of Godric's Hollow, and brought here the next night, because Dumbledore feared for his safety from any surviving Death Eaters."
"The morning after he would have been left here," Petunia said, without any visible reaction to Molly's recitation, "Vernon went to work early. He would have been the first one outside, and so the one to find a baby on the doorstep."
"And then he decided to abandon Harry without ever telling you that he'd even been there," Molly guessed, and Petunia nodded, stiffly.
"Most likely, Vernon would have told himself that he was protecting me in some way, and that what he was doing was right," she said.
Molly found herself unable to reply to that, but found that she didn't have to, as Petunia continued speaking.
"Did Dumbledore leave anything with Harry," she forced the name out with difficulty, "when he left him here?"
"A letter, telling you what I just did," Molly said.
"Anything else?" Petunia prompted, impatiently.
"He mentioned the blood bond that would protect Harry within these walls," Molly told her. "Your blood, because Lilly died protecting him."
"What is needed for these blood protections?" Petunia asked, her face becoming more pinched than before at Lilly's name.
"Harry needs to be in this house, with you, or another of your blood, at least once during the calendar year," Molly said. "That was one thing that worried Dumbledore about my family adopting Harry, that he wouldn't have the blood protection thathe would here."
"Vernon goes fishing for a week every summer," Petunia replied, lapsing into one of her strange tangents. "Harry can come here during that time, so that the blood protection will be renewed. It is the least I can do."
"Thank you," Molly gasped, surprised. "But, why would you do this?"
"I saw Lilly in a dream, Halloween night, five years ago," Petunia said, quietly. "She begged me to protect her son, and I promised that I would. Now, I know that was no dream. I do this for Lilly, no other."
"Thank you," Molly repeated, gratefully. "How did you recognize Harry?" she asked, a moment later.
"He has Lilly's eyes," Petunia said, shortly.
Shescrutinized Molly for a long second beforeturning away, a clear dismissal. Molly took that as her clue to leave, and Apparated away, arriving in her kitchen. She arrived in time to see Fred limping his slow way up the stairs, his hands surreptitiously rubbing his bottom.
"Do I even want to ask?" she asked Percy, who sat at the table, nose in a book. Charlie, sitting beside him, smirked.
"Dad caught Fred trying to make Ron swear an Unbreakable Vow," he informed his mother. "It was almost as impressive as if you'd been here."
"You're not going to go after him?" Percy asked in amazement, a few seconds later, when Molly started getting dinner ready.
"I trust your father's judgment in discipline," she said, simply.
"Wow," Percy marveled. "Your meeting with Harry's aunt must have gone really well."
"Yes," Molly said, softly. "It did."