I twisted the ring again to see if I could have some of that sandwich. I was missing breakfast here, and by the growl of my new stomach, I might have missed more meals than that.
God appeared and leaned over to touch my ring with his finger, acting as if the invisibility cloak wasn't there, and it shone white and hot before subsiding. "You may call on me once a day," he said and disappeared along with the sandwich.
Seriously? What if I was in danger? Was he going to help out or not? I twisted and twisted the ring, but nothing happened except for my thumb getting sore. That would be a no then.
Well, fuck him.
With the cloak on I could waltz into any convenience store and nab something for breakfast. I could go to a mall and get some shoes; it wasn't as if it would be frivolous stealing. Hell, I could live in a mall and get away with it—with my cloak I would be as good as the Invisible Man, it wouldn't matter that I was pint-sized.
As far as I remembered, the cloak could not be summoned off you, and it did not fade, but it was not infallible. Both Dumbledore and Crouch Jr. saw through it or saw it was there. So as long as I kept away from those two, I could throw a spanner in God's plan to put me in my place. There was no need for me to go the Harry Potter Self-Insert route. What did I care about this world? It was just a book, wasn't it? I could go on my merry way and let whoever else wanted to take care of the business do it.
What on earth had I said to piss him off?
The worst I could remember was telling my followers that the problems in the Harry Potter books were one dimensional: if you rid the world of Tom's Horcruxes then that would be the end of it. That if I were inserted, I would quickly and effectively resolve the main conflict with my future knowledge by telling someone.
I've read the books. I've read all the fanfics. There was no going to school and letting events play out, pretending I knew nothing. Who did that? Go through school again when they were an adult of all things, sitting between children the whole day. There were so many issues with that idea I couldn't begin to count them, and besides, you could learn anything you needed through a book.
But I wasn't going to do any of that. I would forge ahead on my own. There would be no preordained path throwing me into unnecessary danger. Especially not when I was a bloody preschooler. God might have put me here, but there was no way I was going to have him tell me what to do.
That decided, I relaxed. The morning breeze was fresh, I had no work to go to, and even though I was hungry, I found myself enjoying the unexpected freedom.
When God appeared again, I was swinging high, trying to do that thing where you flip over the top of the bar. The invisibility cloak was flapping in the rush, exposing my feet every time I went up but I couldn't care less, there was no one around to see.
"Harry," God said, standing smartly out of the way when I barreled towards him on the down-swing. He had changed his clothes, I saw, and was now wearing a long grey robe and a ribbon in his beard.
"I thought you weren't coming back."
"Excuse me?"
"I thought—" He was also wearing gold wire-rimmed glasses on an overly large nose and was sporting an odd pointy hat. "You're not God, are you?"
"Ah, no, I am sorry to disappoint you, my b—"
"Santa?" I prayed for a yes.
He had the same blue-eyed twinkle, which was disconcerting, to say the least; I was getting quite tired of being twinkled at. I stopped fooling myself.
"Were you expecting Santa?" Albus Dumbledore asked me with an amused little smile.
Having so recently made up my mind about my future involvement in this world—none—I jumped from the swing, uncaring how high it still was, fully intending to hit the ground running.
It was not to be.
I had yet to get used to this body. Misjudging the distance to the ground, and hampered by the cloak, the force of my landing jarred through my feet, and a dull crack accompanied by a mind-numbing sharp pain in my left ankle had me crumbling to the grass with a cry.
"Oh, dear." Dumbledore crouched next to me. "Let me have a look, Harry."
"No!" I tried to scramble away, but renewed pain flared through my leg, and I shouted in pain.
"Here now," Dumbledore shushed me, and raised the cloak to have a look at the damage.
I watched in horror as my foot flopped at an odd angle. And was that bone?
"Oh, dear," Dumbledore repeated, fussing around me. And instead of casting a healing charm on my ankle, he picked me up before I could protest, and apparated us from the park. The world tilted away and righted itself with a soft popping sound as we appeared before two ornate wrought iron gates, and he carried me across what could only be Hogwarts' grounds. The place I had vowed minutes earlier would never see me.
For an old man, he was very spry. As to myself, I hadn't been carried in years and did not know where to hide my head. What would a toddler do in such a situation? Scream for his mum, maybe, but Harry only had an aunt and as much as I didn't want to be here with Dumbledore, I didn't want to be there with Petunia, making breakfast of all things.
Somewhere, I am sure, God was laughing at me.
I forgot God, my woes, and even my throbbing ankle at my first sight of the castle and gaped at it, awestruck. It was nothing like the movies—which I disliked with a passion, by the way—and everything a Potterhead could wish for. The castle loomed over us, promising magic and adventure, and I was hard pressed not to give in to it and show God what I could do.
Inside, portraits moved, and faces looked curiously at us, but we passed the long halls without seeing a soul until Dumbledore put me in the infirmary on a high cot and called, "Poppy!"
"I swear, Albus, the holidays can't come soon enough," a small, grey-haired woman in a white petticoat said from the back and hurried over. "What is it this time?"
Dumbledore raised my cloak as if unveiling a gift, introducing me. "This is Madam Pomfrey, Harry, our school's Mediwitch. Poppy, meet Harry Potter. He's in dire need of your care."
"Harry Potter!" Her hand fluttered to her mouth in surprise, and a portrait behind her turned to peer at me, copying her. "Oh, it is you! What happened?"
Dumbledore answered for me, explaining the swing-mishap, and she touched my ankle with delicate fingers while he alternated between rubbing my head and patting my knee like a concerned grandfather.
"A small potion, and we will have you to rights in a minute," she said and joined Dumbledore in patting my head.
Did they think I was a dog? Was that something you were supposed to do with kids? I had never patted anyone's head, young or old.
"There you go, Harry. You heard Poppy," Dumbledore said. "We'll have you back at home as soon as you can say Hogwarts Express."
I instantly forgot their inappropriate fondling. Oh, hell no. I was not going back. And what was he doing still holding my cloak? If he was going to try and take me back I would need that to escape again. I grabbed for it just as Dumbledore moved aside, and a second time that day I tumbled off a bed.
This time it would have gone much worse had a hand not caught me half-way down. It belonged to a thin, sallow-faced man in a black robe, and the greasy shoulder-length hair said it all.
"Watch it," Snape said and deposited me unceremoniously back onto the bed, jostling my ankle enough that I cried out.
"Why do we have a toddler here, Headmaster? Poppy, I brought you two dunderheads that do not know a slug from a snail, kindly sort them please, before they melt away."
And indeed he had. Two boys sheepishly shuffled out from behind him, looking like they were wax statues left out in the sun; one was holding his hands under his dripping nose, and it was dripping skin.
It must have been as bad as it looked for the Mediwitch left me with a hurried, "I'll be with you in a minute, Harry," to herd them to cots, quickly pulling a curtain between us, blocking off the stunningly gory sight.
With that, I remembered Dumbledore. "That's my cloak."
"I think I'll just hold on to it for a moment longer; this is not a toy for little boys, Harry. I'll give it to your aunt for safekeeping when I take you back, or perhaps hold it until you attend school?" He gave the cloak an odd look.
I tried to imagine Harry's aunt liking that. Would God give me another one if she burned it? I doubted that. Damn him for making me a toddler; there was no way I could just grab it from Dumbledore with this body. Think, Harry Potter, think! Okay at least you still have the ring and the wand… I felt my empty pocket and my heart sank to me dirty little feet. Had I lost it? I must have or Dumbledore would have asked me how I came to have a wand that was supposed to be his, right? Where? At the swings? Or when he apparated us, if so I will never find it.
"Harry?" A potion stained hand raised my bangs from my forehead and dropped it in disgust before I could slap it away. "Why do we have Harry Potter here, Headmaster?"
"Harry Potter!" The shocked yell came from behind the closed curtains, and a drippy boy yanked it aside to gawk at me before being pulled back by Poppy.
Oh, hell.
I had hoped to pass under the radar.
Behind Snape, a portrait crowded with wizards and witches now trying to get a look at me, splashes of colourful paint mixing and unmixing as they sorted themselves, whispering in excitement.
"Harry had a little mishap when he wandered off," Dumbledore told Snape. "He'll be returned home as soon as Poppy fixed his ankle. Perhaps you would like to take him back after class, Severus?"
"I would not." Snape glared at me as if I was all that was wrong in his world, and I shivered, remembering how tiny I was now.
I had options.
I could pretend I was happy to go back to the Dursleys and escape from there. But that would leave the cloak in either Dumbledore or Petunia's hands, and I needed it if I wanted to survive as a child on the streets. And even then Dumbledore might simply find me again, putting me back to square one.
I could give up my idea of doing my own thing and tell them everything I knew, leaving it in their (adult) hands to sort. Would they let me go my own way once they knew I was an adult myself? That could be debated; something I'd like to say I was an expert at. I'd most likely become an oddity to be studied.
I could probably prevent that by going the fanfiction way and pretending I was a seer, giving Trelawney a run for her money, having visions of what was to come.
What I was absolutely not going to do was keep quiet and 'fix things' myself, no matter how much being here excited me. God could forget it.
"You don't have to bother," I told Dumbledore. "I am not going back to the Dursleys. I'm not Harry Potter, I was reincarnated just this morning from an alternate universe. Voldemort is coming back, and here's what you need to do to stop him."
Or that was what I wanted to say.
What actually happened was that God appeared next to Dumbledore as soon as I opened my mouth. "Ah, ah!" he said and raised his finger.
What came out of my mouth was this:
"I want my Mummy!"
God laughed.
Oh no, you don't! I took a deep breath and tried again, turning to Snape to try my luck with him. "My name is Jack White, and you are all characters in a book."
A second time my childish voice said something completely different, "I like you! Will you be my daddy?"
There was nothing like a shrill toddler's voice to pierce all the corners of a room. Stunned silence followed my words.
Except for God. God was bent double, wheezing so hard he could barely get the words out. "Try again!" He laughed, slapping his knees. "This is so much fun!"
None of the wizards heard him. Forgetting my broken ankle, I launched myself at God, and it would have come to a disastrous end had Snape not caught me and deposited me back on the cot. "Stay," he said. "What on earth is wrong with you? I will stick your bottom to the bed if I have to, Potter."
"I hate you," I hissed to God who stood cackling behind Snape, and of course this was the one he let pass, and Snape's eyebrows climbed up his greasy forehead.
"Did he fall on his head?" Snape asked Dumbledore.
"Albus, is it true?" a middle-aged witch said from the door, and God vanished. "Do we have Harry Potter here?"
Like Poppy before her, her hand went immediately to her mouth when she saw me.
"Oh, dear, what happened to you?" Minerva asked.
"He broke his ankle, Minerva. It's not the end of the world," Snape said.
"I don't mean that; what on earth is he wearing? It looks like a bag. He looks like a— Albus! I'd like to see you outside. Stay with him, Severus, so he doesn't get scared."
Scared! I would have said something about that if I wasn't too scared to open my mouth. No way in hell was I going to repeat that performance.
They left us, Dumbledore practically being dragged by her, and Snape crossed his arms to glower at me.
It had been quite an eventful day. I had died in the most frustrating manner, unable to get the last word in, been reincarnated, ran away, experienced my first apparating, met God, met some of my favourite characters from the books, my foot was throbbing to high heaven, all of that and it was not even lunchtime yet. And worst of all it looked as if I was in a Severitus fanfic. Be my daddy indeed. I was exhausted.
I ignored Snape, and after a while he stopped scowling at me and disappeared deeper into the infirmary. It was impossible to get away when I couldn't walk so I didn't need his 'Stay, Potter', to stay put. He returned holding a purple vial.
"Sit up and drink this, Potter."
There was no reason not to take the potion. Snape was well known for his 'Harry-hate' but at the very same time for protecting him, and I was tired of the pain. I was also curious to find out if potions tasted as vile as the books described.
It did. I wish I could say it tasted like moldy socks covered in troll snot but I hadn't tasted either of those. So I'll have to say it tasted like I thought moldy socks covered in troll snot would. It was beyond vile. I gagged at the first sip and only Snape's—Drink up!—snapped at that moment, had me gulping the rest.
"You need to lie down and let it work," Snape told me and settled a pillow under my foot.
I did as told. I could feel the magic coursing through my veins, buzzing straight to my foot, a cold, numbing effect replacing the pain. It was a relief.
So much so that I fell asleep.