Key:

(Y/N) - your name

(L/N) -last name

(W/N)- wrong name

(F/N)-fathers name

M/N-mothers name

Y/F/I- your first initial

Please let me know if I've forgotten to put anything in the key

The escape of the Brazilian boa constrictor earned Y/N her longest-ever punishment. By the time she was allowed out of her cupboard again, the summer holidays had started and Mary had already broken her new video camera, crashed her remote control airplane, and, first time out on her racing bike, knocked down old Mrs. Figg as she crossed Privet Drive on her crutches.

Y/N was glad school was over, but there was no escaping Mary's gang, who visited the house every single day. Becky, Jen, Layla, and Grace were all big and stupid, but as Mary was the biggest and stupidest of the lot, she was the leader. The rest of them were all quite happy to join in Mary's part favorite sport: Y/N Hunting.

Harry seems to have to endure the same thing with Dudley.

This was why Harry and Y/N spent as much time as possible out of the house, wandering around and thinking about the end of the holidays, where they could see a tiny ray of hope. When September came they would be going off to secondary school and, for the first time in their life, they wouldn't be with Dudley and Mary.Dudley had been accepted at Uncle Vernon's old private school, Smeltings.Mary had also been accepted into an all girls school mrs Bell went to.Piers Polkiss was going there too. Becky was going with Mary to the all girls school.Harry and Y/N, on the other hand, were going to Stonewall High, the local public school. Dudley and Mary thought this was very funny.

"They stuff people's heads down the toilet the first day at Stonewall," he told Harry and Y/N

"Want to come upstairs and practice?" Mary chimed in

"No, thanks," said Harry. "The poor toilet's never had anything as horrible as your heads down it -- it might be sick." Y/N finished Then Harry and Y/N ran, before Dudley and Mary could work out what she'd said.

One day in July, Aunt Brenda took Mary to London to buy her Persephone's :all girls school uniform,leaving Y/N at Mrs. Figg's with Harry. Mrs. Figg wasn 't as bad as usual. It turned out she'd broken her leg tripping over one of her cats, and she didn't seem quite as fond of them as before. She let Harry and Y/N watch television and gave them a bit of chocolate cake that tasted as though she'd had it for several years.

That evening, Mary paraded around the living room for the family in her brand-new uniform.the girls wore white blouses, a light blue and white striped bow around the neck,a light blue skirt, and a fancy little red had they call a beret . They also carried fancy little fans, used for hitting each other while the teachers weren't looking. This was supposed to be good training for later life.

As she looked at Mary in her new skirt, Uncle Richard said gruffly that it was the proudest moment of his life. Aunt Brenda burst into tears and said she couldn't believe it was her sweet princess , she looked so beautiful and grown-up. Y/N didn't trust herself to speak. She thought two of her ribs might already have cracked from trying not to laugh. There was a horrible smell in the kitchen the next morning when Y/N went in for breakfast. It seemed to be coming from a large metal tub in the sink. She went to have a look. The tub was full of what looked like dirty rags swimming in gray water.

"What's this?" She asked Aunt Brenda . Her lips tightened as they always did if she dared to ask a question.

"Your new school uniform," she said.

Y/N looked in the bowl again.

"Oh," she said, "I didn't realize it had to be so wet."

"Dont be stupid," snapped Aunt Brenda. "I'm dyeing some of Marys old things gray for you. It'll look just like everyone else's when I've finished."

Y/n seriously doubted this, but thought it best not to argue. She sat down at the table and tried not to think about how she was going to look on her first day at Stonewall High -- like she was wearing bits of old elephant skin, probably.

Mary and Uncle Richard came in, both with wrinkled noses because of the smell from Y/N's new uniform. Uncle Richard opened his newspaper as usual and Mary slaps her fan, which she carried everywhere, on the table.

They heard the click of the mail slot and flop of letters on the doormat.

"Get the mail, Mary," said Uncle Richard from behind his paper.

"Make Y/N get it."

"Get the mail, Y/N."

"Make Marry get it."

"Slap her with your Fan, Mary."

Y/N dodged the fan and went to get the mail. Three things lay on the doormat: a postcard from Uncle Richards friend,who is also Mr Dursley's sister, Marge, who was vacationing on the Isle of Wight, a brown envelope that looked like a bill, and -- a letter for Y/N.

Y/N picked it up and stared at it, her heart twanging like a giant elastic band. No one, ever, in her whole life, had written to her. Who would? She had no friends other than Harry, no other relatives -- she didn't belong to the library, so she'd never even got rude notes asking for books back. Yet here it was, a letter, addressed so plainly there could be no mistake:

Miss . Y/F/I. L/N

The Cupboard under the Stairs

5 Privet Drive

Little Whinging

Surrey

The envelope was thick and heavy, made of yellowish parchment, and the address was written in emerald-green ink. There was no stamp.

Turning the envelope over, her hand trembling, Y/N saw a purple wax seal bearing a coat of arms; a lion, an eagle, a badger, and a snake surrounding a letter "H".

"Hurry up, girl!" shouted Uncle Richard from the kitchen. "What are you doing, checking for letter bombs?" He chuckled at his own joke.

Y/N went back to the kitchen, still staring at her letter. She handed Uncle Vernon the bill and the postcard, sat down, and slowly began to open the yellow envelope.

Uncle Richard ripped open the bill, snorted in disgust, and flipped over the postcard.

"Marge's ill," he informed Aunt Brenda. "Ate a funny whelk. --."

"Dad!" said Mary suddenly. "Dad, Y/n's got something!"

Y/N was on the point of unfolding her letter, which was written on the same heavy parchment as the envelope, when it was jerked sharply out of his hand by Uncle Richard.

"That's mine!" said Y/N, trying to snatch it back.

"Who'd be writing to you?" sneered Uncle Richard , shaking the letter open with one hand and glancing at it. His face went from red to green faster than a set of traffic lights. And it didn't stop there. Within seconds it was the grayish white of old porridge.

"B-B-Brenda !" he gasped.

Mary tried to grab the letter to read it, but Uncle Richard held it high out of her reach. Aunt Brenda took it curiously and read the first line. For a moment it looked as though she might faint. She clutched her throat and made a choking noise.

"Richard ! Oh my goodness -- Richard !"

They stared at each other, seeming to have forgotten that Y/N and Mary were still in the room. Mary wasn't used to being ignored. She gave her father a sharp slap on the head with her fan.

"I want to read that letter," she said loudly.

"I want to read it," said Y/N furiously, "as it's mine."

"Get out, both of you," croaked Uncle Richard , stuffing the letter back inside its envelope.

Y/N didn't move.

"I WANT MY LETTER!" She shouted.

"Let me see it!" demanded Mary.

"OUT!" roared Uncle Richard , and he took both Y/N and Mary by the scruffs of their necks and threw them into the hall, slamming the kitchen door behind them. Y/N and Mary promptly had a furious but silent fight over who would listen at the keyhole; Mary won, so Y/N , her hair dangling in-front of her face, lay flat on her stomach to listen at the crack between door and floor.

"Richard ," Aunt Brenda was saying in a quivering voice, "look at the address -- how could they possibly know where she sleeps? You don't think they're watching the house?"

"Watching -- spying -- might be following us and possibly the Dursley's as-well," muttered Uncle Richard wildly.

"But what should we do, Richard ? Should we write back? Tell them we don't want --"

Y/N could see Uncle Richard's shiny black shoes pacing up and down the kitchen.

"No," he said finally. "No, we'll ignore it. If they don't get an answer... Yes, that's best... we won't do anything..."

"But --"

"I'm not having one in the house, Brenda ! Didn't we swear when we took her in we'd stamp out that dangerous nonsense?"

That evening when he got back from work, Uncle Richard did something he'd never done before; he visited Y/N in her cupboard.

"Where's my letter?" said Y/N, the moment Uncle Richard had squeezed through the door. "Who's writing to me?"

"No one. it was addressed to you by mistake," said Uncle Richard shortly. "I have burned it."

"It was not a mistake," said Y/Nangrily, "it had my cupboard on it."

"SILENCE!" yelled Uncle Richard, and a couple of spiders fell from the ceiling. He took a few deep breaths and then forced his face into a smile, which looked quite painful. "Er -- yes, Y/N -- about this cupboard. Your aunt and I have been thinking... you're really getting a bit big for it... we think it might be nice if you moved into Marys second bedroom.

"Why?" said Y/N.

"Don't ask questions!" snapped her uncle. "Take this stuff upstairs, now."

The Bell's house had four bedrooms: one for Uncle Richard and Aunt Brenda , one for visitors (usually mr bell's friend , Stacy ), one where Mary slept, and one where Mary kept all the toys and things that wouldn't fit into her first bedroom. It only took Y/N one trip upstairs to move everything she owned from the cupboard to this room. She sat down on the bed and stared around her. Nearly everything in here was broken. The month-old video camera was lying on top of a small, working tank Mary had once driven over the next door neighbor's cat ; in the corner was Mary's first-ever television set, which she'd put her foot through when her favorite program had been canceled; there was a large birdcage, which had once held a parrot that Mary had swapped at school for a real air rifle, which was up on a shelf with the end all bent because Mary had sat on it. Other shelves were full of books. They were the only things in the room that looked as though they'd never been touched.

From downstairs came the sound of Mary bawling at her mother, "I don't want her in there... I need that room... make her get out..."

Y/N sighed and stretched out on the bed. Yesterday she'd have given anything to be up here. Today she'd rather be back in her cupboard with that letter than up here without it.

Next morning at breakfast, everyone was rather quiet. Mary was in shock. She'd screamed, slapped her father with her Fan, been sick on purpose, kicked her mother, and thrown her tortoise through the greenhouse roof, and she still didn't have her room back. Y/N was thinking about this time yesterday and bitterly wishing she'd opened the letter in the hall. Uncle Richard and Aunt Mary kept looking at each other darkly. When the mail arrived, Uncle Richard , who seemed to be trying to be nice to Y/N, made Mary go and get it. They heard her slapping things with her fan all the way down the hall. Then she shouted, "There's another one! 'Mrs. Y/F/I. L/N, The Smallest Bedroom, 5 Privet Drive --'"

With a strangled cry, Uncle Richard leapt from his seat and ran down the hall, Y/N

right behind him . Uncle Richard had to wrestle Mary to the ground to get the letter from her, which was made difficult by the fact that Y/N had grabbed Uncle Vernon around the neck from behind. After a minute of confused fighting, in which everyone got hit a lot by the fan Uncle Richard straightened up, gasping for breath, with Y/N's letter clutched in his hand.

"Go to your cupboard -- I mean, your bedroom," he wheezed at Y/N. "Mary -- go -- just go."

Y/N walked round and round her new room. Someone knew she had moved out of her cupboard and they seemed to know she hadn't received her first letter. Had Harry gotten a letter like this? Surely that meant they'd try again? And this time she'd make sure they didn't fail. She had a plan.

The repaired alarm clock rang at six o'clock the next morning. Y/N turned it off quickly and dressed silently. She mustn't wake the Bells. She stole downstairs without turning on any of the lights.

She was going to wait for the postman on the corner of Privet Drive and get the letters for number five first. Her heart hammered as she crept across the dark hall toward the front door --

Y/N leapt into the air; she'd trodden on something tall and bony on the doormat -- something alive!

Lights clicked on upstairs and to her horror Y/N realized that the tall, bony something had been his uncle's face. Uncle Richard had been lying at the foot of the front door in a sleeping bag, clearly making sure that Y/N didn't do exactly what she'd been trying to do. He shouted at Y/N for about half an hour and then told her to go and make a cup of tea. Y/N shuffled miserably off into the kitchen and by the time she got back, the mail had arrived, right into Uncle Richards lap. Y/N could see three letters addressed in green ink.

I want --" she began, but Uncle Richard was tearing the letters into pieces before her eyes. Uncle Richard didn't go to work that day. He stayed at home and nailed up the mail slot.

"See," he explained to Aunt Brenda through a mouthful of nails, "if they can't deliver them they'll just give up."

"I'm not sure that'll work, Vernon."

"Oh, these people's minds work in strange ways, Brenda , they're not like you and me," said Uncle Richard , trying to knock in a nail with the piece of fruitcake Aunt Brenda had just brought him.

On Friday, no less than twelve letters arrived for Y/N. As they couldn't go through the mail slot they had been pushed under the door, slotted through the sides, and a few even forced through the small window in the downstairs bathroom.

Uncle Richard stayed at home again. After burning all the letters, he got out a hammer and nails and boarded up the cracks around the front and back doors so no one could go out. He hummed "Tiptoe Through the Tulips" as he worked, and jumped at small noises.

On Saturday, things began to get out of hand. Twenty-four letters to Y/N found their way into the house, rolled up and hidden inside each of the two dozen eggs that their very confused milkman had handed Aunt Brenda through the living room window. While Uncle Richard made furious telephone calls to the post office and the dairy trying to find someone to complain to other than Mr Dursley, who seemed to be having the same problems with Harry , Aunt Brenda shredded the letters in her food processor.

"Who on earth wants to talk to you this badly?" Mary asked Y/N in amazement.

On Sunday morning, Uncle Richard sat down at the breakfast table looking tired and rather ill, but happy.

"No post on Sundays," he reminded them cheerfully as he spread marmalade on his newspapers, "no damn letters today --"

Something came whizzing down the kitchen chimney as he spoke and caught him sharply on the back of the head. Next moment, thirty or forty letters came pelting out of the fireplace like bullets. The Bells ducked, but Y/N leapt into the air trying to catch one.

"Out! OUT!"

Uncle Richard seized Y/N around the waist and threw her into the hall. When Aunt Brenda and Mary had run out with their arms over their faces, Uncle Richard slammed the door shut. They could hear the letters still streaming into the room, bouncing off the walls and floor.

"That does it," said Uncle Richard , trying to speak calmly but pulling great tufts out of his mustache at the same time. "I want you all back here in five minutes ready to leave. We're going away.were going to be going with the Dursley's. Just pack some clothes. No arguments!"

He looked so dangerous with half his mustache missing that no one dared argue. Ten minutes later they had wrenched their way through the boarded-up doors and were in the car with the Dursley's , speeding toward the highway. Dudley and Mary were sniffling in the back seat; their father's had hit them round the head for holding them up while they tried to pack their televisions, VCR's, and computers in their bags.

They drove. And they drove. Even Aunt Petunia and aunt Brenda didn't dare ask where they were going. Every now and then Mr Dursley would take a sharp turn and drive in the opposite direction for a while.

"Shake'em off... shake 'em off," he would mutter whenever he did this.

They didn't stop to eat or drink all day. By nightfall Dudley and Mary were howling. They'd never had such a bad day in their life. They were hungry, they'd missed five television programs they'd wanted to see, and they'd never gone so long without blowing up an alien on their computers.

Uncle Vernon stopped at last outside a gloomy-looking hotel on the outskirts of a big city. Dudley,Harry, Mary, and Y/N shared a room with queen sized beds and damp, musty sheets. Dudley and Mary snored but Harry and Y/N stayed awake, sitting on the windowsill, staring down at the lights of passing cars together and wondering...

They ate stale cornflakes and cold tinned tomatoes on toast for breakfast the next day. They had just finished when the owner of the hotel came over to their table.

"'Scuse me, but is one of you Mr. H. Potter? And is another one of you Mrs. Y/F/I. L/N?Only I got about an 'undred of these at the front desk."

She held up two letters so they could read the green ink address:

Mr. H. Potter

Room 17

Railview Hotel

Cokeworth

And

Miss. Y/F/I. L/N

Room 17

Railview Hotel

Cokeworth

Harry and Y/N made a grab for their letters but Uncle Vernon and Uncle Richard knocked their hands out of the way. The woman stared.

"I'll take them," said Uncle Vernon and uncle Richard together.standing up quickly and following her from the dining room.

"Wouldn't it be better just to go home, dear?" Aunt Petunia and Brenda suggested timidly, hours later, but neither Uncle Vernon nor uncle Richard seemed to hear them. Exactly what they were looking for, none of them knew. Mr Dursley drove them into the middle of a forest, got out, looked around, shook his head, got back in the car, and off they went again. The same thing happened in the middle of a plowed field, halfway across a suspension bridge, and at the top of a multilevel parking garage.

"Daddy's gone mad, hasn't he?" Dudley and Mary asked Aunt petunia and Brenda dully late that afternoon. Uncle Vernon had parked at the coast, locked them all inside the car, and disappeared with uncle Richard following close behind.

It started to rain. Great drops beat on the roof of the car. Dudley and Mary snivelled.

"It's Monday," they told their mothers . "The Great Humberto's on tonight. We want to stay somewhere with a television. "

Monday. This reminded Harry and Y/N of something. If it was Monday -- and you could usually count on Dudley and Mary to know the days the week, because of television -- then tomorrow, Tuesday, was Harry's and Y/N's eleventh birthday. Of course, their birthdays were never exactly fun -- last year, the Dursleys had given him a coat hanger and a pair of Uncle Vernon's old socks and last year y/n got a paper clip and an old fedora Mary used to wear.Still, you weren't eleven every day.

Uncle Vernon and Richard were back and they were smiling. Mr Dursley was also carrying a long, thin package and didn't answer Aunt Petunia when she asked what he'd bought.

"Found the perfect place!" he said. "Come on! Everyone out!"

It was very cold outside the car. Uncle Vernon was pointing at what looked like a large rock way out at sea. Perched on top of the rock was the most miserable little shack you could imagine. One thing was certain, there was no television in there.

"Storm forecast for tonight!" said Uncle Vernon gleefully, clapping his hands together,uncle Richard beaming beside him. "And this gentleman's kindly agreed to lend us his boat!"

A toothless old man came ambling up to them, pointing, with a rather wicked grin, at an old rowboat bobbing in the iron-gray water below them.

"I've already got us some rations," said Uncle Vernon, "so all aboard!"

It was freezing in the boat. Icy sea spray and rain crept down their necks and a chilly wind whipped their faces. After what seemed like hours they reached the rock, where Uncle Vernon and Richard , slipping and sliding, led the way to the broken-down house.

The inside was horrible; it smelled strongly of seaweed, the wind whistled through the gaps in the wooden walls, and the fireplace was damp and empty. There were only two rooms.

Uncle Vernon's rations turned out to be a bag of chips each and eight bananas. He tried to start a fire but the empty chip bags just smoked and shriveled up.

"Could do with some of those letters now, eh?" he said cheerfully, uncle Richard nodding his head in agreement

They were in a very good mood. Obviously they thought nobody stood a chance of reaching them here in a storm to deliver mail. Harry and Y/N privately agreed, though the thought didn't cheer them up at all.

As night fell, the promised storm blew up around them. Spray from the high waves splattered the walls of the hut and a fierce wind rattled the filthy windows. Aunt Petunia and Brenda found a few moldy blankets in the second room and made up a bed for Dudley and Mary on the two moth-eaten sofa. She and Uncle Vernon went off to the lumpy bed next door, and Harry and Y/N was left to find the softest bit of floor they could and to curl up under the thinnest, most ragged blankets.

The storm raged more and more ferociously as the night went on. Harry and Y/N couldn't sleep. They shivered and turned over, trying to get comfortable, their stomach's rumbling with hunger. Dudley and Mary's snores were drowned by the low rolls of thunder that started near midnight. The lighted dial of Dudley's watch, which was dangling over the edge of the sofa on his fat wrist, told Harry and Y/N they'd be eleven in ten minutes' time. They lay and watched their birthday tick nearer, wondering if the Dursleys and the Bells would remember at all, wondering where the letter writer was now.

Five minutes to go. Harry and Y/N heard something creak outside. They hoped the roof wasn't going to fall in, although they might be warmer if it did. Four minutes to go. Maybe the houses in Privet Drive would be so full of letters when they got back that they'd be able to steal one somehow.

Three minutes to go. Was that the sea, slapping hard on the rock like that? And (two minutes to go) what was that funny crunching noise? Was the rock crumbling into the sea?

One minute to go and they'd be eleven.

Thirty seconds... twenty ... ten... nine -- maybe they'd wake Dudley and Mary up, just to annoy them -- three... two... one...

BOOM.

The whole shack shivered and Harry and Y/N sat bolt upright, staring at the door. Someone was outside, knocking to come in.