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Privet Drive, Surrey

August 2nd, 1995

Daisy

She hadn't stepped foot in her sister's house in six years.

Not since she graduated sixth form – an evening she remembered for making Petunia's voice so high that she was surprised that the celebratory flutes of champagne didn't shatter into a million pieces.

Now, Daisy Evans stood on her sisters doorstep for the first time in a very long time... Her hair was shorter now. Her long, waist-length hair had been hacked off shortly after leaving England and it now was kept up half-way in a short ponytail that would surely get Tuney sniffing with judgement. It'll give her something to do at least, she figured, wiping the sweat that was beading on the back of her neck. It was nearly 40 celsius that day. And not a cloud in sight, she thought grimly, giving the bright blue sky a near-frustrated glance.

"Stop stalling." Daisy muttered anxiously, staring at the plain door – she could have stood there all day, but the hot gush of air that traveled down Privet Drive forced her hand. She rapped on the door.

There was a shuffle behind the door and it opened to reveal not her sister or her husband – but their son, Dudley. Man, had that boy changed since she last saw him. What used to be a cute, round-faced boy with ears too big for his head was now a massively tall and robust teenager dressed in loose fitted basketball shorts and t-shirt.

"Aunt Daisy?" He questioned dumbly at the sudden sight of her.

No sooner did he speak did Tuney, who looked more lined and as skinny as ever, appeared through the crack in the door. She was dressed for the weather, in a way too tiny shift that closely resembled their Grandmother's curtains, and it was all too leggy for anyone bar her husband to see.

"Daisy." Petunia said stiffly, a tight grin on her face. She then looked over her, her eyes lingering on her shorts and mismatched socks, but restraining whatever comment she clearly wanted to say. Perhaps her neighbors had poked out of their houses just then. Or perhaps her sister had missed her that badly.

"As ordered. I deliver." The youngest Evans quipped, to her sister's neutral face. So, she looked at the large boy, still standing there, and said an even more awkward, "Hey Dudley. How're you?"

"He's just on his way to the park to meet his friends." Her sister replied for him before he could open his mouth. "Dudders – go along. Be back for dinner."

Her nephew looked between the two of them and slinked away, joining several other teenagers who had gathered across the street but were clearly too intimidated to approach.

"Come in." Petunia finally said, firmly. "I've made our guest room for you."

/~/

The only thing that had changed with Vernon Dursley was the color of his mustache. It had gone from blonde to grey – but his red face and bulk was all the same. Even his sweaty hands felt the same when they shook.

Petunia was making herself busy by breaking ice cubes for lemonade in the kitchen, coincidentally keeping herself separate from her sister while Vernon was left to make small talk by asking how her flight into Heathrow had been and using her short response of 'Fine, thank you,' as a jumping off point to talk about a work trip he had taken two months previously. Daisy was glad he was taking over the conversation though – it meant that she didn't have to focus too much on it, leaving her free to stare through the small opening in the wall, where she could see her sister's hand stabbing a butter knife through the tray.

But before long, the ice was free, and her sister was forced to return to the living room, setting a tray with a teal pitcher and a plate of cinnamon cookies onto the coffee table.

"Where's Harry?" Daisy asked, sick of the silence as Tuney proceeded to pour glasses of lemonade for the three of them.

"Out." Her eldest sister said simply.

She ignored the shut down attempt and pushed forward. "How are they, anyway? They're fifteen now, right?"

A flash of the true Tuney shown through her sister then. "Yes, they are. Dudders is on the wrestling team now. He led in competitions last year, he even won the silver."

"And Harry?" Daisy asked, guessing that both boys were a safe topic.

Her sister and brother-in-law shifted at the mention of their nephew. "He's fine. He's at – her school during the year." 'Her school.' She said it like it was an evil place.

'Hogwarts.' It was a very silly-sounding name for a private school, and they took themselves very seriously, as neither Petunia nor Daisy had been permitted to visit, not even for Lily's graduation. 'It's a stupid old castle that's overrun with filth and spiderwebs, Daisy.' Petunia had insisted once, the day before they were meant to pick Lily up from Kings' Cross for her final year there. She'd been twisting her long hair into twin braids, and at the mention of their sister's school, she'd yanked her long locks. Daisy could still remember the sting.

"His Dad signed him up, right?" It was meant to be a prestigious private school, her parents had told her. Lily got in via a raffle that was held for the school district, which was why she still had to attend the one Cokeworth. But the Potters apparently had been attending the school for centuries.

"Yes." Petunia said stiffly, weirdly. But then, she'd always disliked any talk of Hogwarts and Lily. Especially after the accident.

So, Daisy relented. She accepted a snickerdoodle.

Before long, her sister and her husband began what they'd rehearsed for her.

It was Vernon who began, prompted by Tuney's short throat-clearing cough. "So, Daisy. Will you be staying in England, or will you continue your vagabonding?"

She didn't look at her brother-in-law when she answered, because she knew it wasn't really his question. She looked directly at Petunia, who'd already been staring at her. "I'm not going anywhere. Not anytime soon, anyway."

Daisy heard Vernon attempt to speak, but his wife cut across him with, "What does that mean? Anytime soon?"

"Tuney, just, chill out for a second, okay? I don't have any plans to leave England right now. I am staying." She insisted to her sister, who'd risen to stand over her – a classic Tuney move, but it was touched by none of her common expressions. Instead it was a foreign one – panic.

Her words appeared to settle Petunia, just a little bit, as her expression now fell into a more comfortable big-sister haughtiness.

"I was thinking I'd find a place in London – I have an interview lined up in a pub there." She explained.

Her sister's expression twisted judgmentally. "Waitressing still, Daisy?"

Daisy couldn't resist rolling her eyes. "Actually, I'd be taking over the kitchen there. I have a buddy who knows the owner and he recommended me. Their current cook is moving to Wales at the end of the month and they're in a scramble. I'll be doing them a favor." She stressed, wanting that look on her sister's face to at least look a tiny bit proud.

Instead, all she got was neutrality, and Vernon asking, "What is the name of this pub?"

Disappointed, she answered, "The Nightingale. It's on Cheapside and Wood," and then broke her biscuit in two, shoving a half in her mouth.

"Hrmph." Vernon grumbled. "The Financial District. That's a busy part of the city. You'll – have a lot of business back there, I expect." He was trying. Even with how half-hearted his words were, he was trying, while Petunia stood silently behind the couch as if it were a peach-colored shield.

"Yeah, I think so. That's why they're in such a worry."

The large man looked briefly at his wife, whose shoulders were softer, less in a tense, but when her silence still showed no sign of breaking, he spoke again. "I'm not that way – that much, myself. But on occasion, I'm there for business with clients. I could – come over there for lunch, or a brandy some time?"

She was touched – even if all of his efforts were purely selfish, to keep his wife happy. He was reaching farther than he ever had with her, and she appreciated it, just a little. So, they agreed to get sandwiches at a deli he knew around the Financial.

"I'll help you find a flat, Daisy." Tuney finally said, arms still crossed, but her long face looking more suitably regretful. "Vernon and I can drive you next weekend. The Financial District is expensive but, perhaps we could help you with rent, so you could find someplace," She paused, seemingly unable to help herself from glancing at her up and down, not even approaching the word 'subtle', "Suitable. Until then, you're welcome to stay here as long as you need."

Daisy wished she could say no.

Luckily, she didn't have to, because just then, her nephews came through the door looking – wrong.

Harry was essentially carrying his much larger cousin, using his meaty arm to drag him in through the doorway while the three adults rushed over to the boys.

"Dudders!" Tuney practically shrieked, taking her son in her thin arms as the smaller boy gave an exhausted breath, slumping back against the wall as his burden was lifted away.

"Fuck, what the hell happened to you two?" Daisy exclaimed – keeping a short distance once she caught the sight of Dudley's face. He was sickly pale and covered in an unhealthy sheen. And then, just like the Exorcist, he vomited all over the floor while his Mother screamed.

There was a quick shuffle then, of Harry and Petunia working together to move Dudley while avoiding the large puddle of sick. It took a lot to finally get the large boy into the loveseat they had in the living room, and even more to get the boy's face to stop looking so green.

"God, what did he eat?" Daisy asked grimly, keeping in line with Harry as her sister and her husband crowded their son, putting a wastebasket in his arms and asking him and each other question after question. 'Should we call a doctor?' 'Have you been robbed?' 'Were you drinking any of Mrs. Polkiss' tea?' 'Have you been drinking with your friends?'

Harry seemed to realize just then that she was there, and looked a bit surprised. "Oh – hey, Aunt Daisy... Uh – Nothing, he didn't eat anything." He muttered.

"What happened to you?"

"Him." Dudley croaked from his parents arms.

Harry froze.

Vernon's voice boomed a dangerous, "BOY!" and instinctively Daisy took a half-step in front of her nephew.

Her brother-in-lawlooked like he was about to stand and walk right up to the boy, but at her interference, his cheeks merely became even redder. "What did you do?" He said menacingly, looking over her shoulder where Harry stood.

"Nothing." He said, sounding resigned.

'Liar,' might as well have been growled his way. Instead, Vernon took instruction from his wife, who was cleaning the sick off Dudley's shirt. "What did he do to you, Diddy?" She asked gently. "Did he – was it you-know-what, darling? Did he use his – thing?"

"His thing?" Daisy echoed astoundedly.

Horrifyingly, Dudley slowly nodded.

"I did not!" Harry said sharply as Tuney wailed and Vernon frighteningly rose his fist. "I didn't do anything to him, it wasn't me, it was – "

But he didn't get to finish. Because just then, an owl flew in through the open window, narrowly missing Vernon's head, it soared across the room towards her and an envelope was dropped on top of her, making her yelp with surprise as she caught it. Feeling a strange sense of deja vu, she flipped the envelope in her hands.

"OWLS!" Vernon was shouting now, his red face pulsing as he stomped about. But her attention was on the envelope. It read Harry's full name on the back, and was fit with a navy, wax seal.

With a shuddered breath, she held the envelope behind her – it was taken.

"OWLS AGAIN! I WILL NOT HAVE ANY MORE BLOOMING OWLS IN MY HOUSE!" Her brother-in-law continued, his face now purple, a new color for him. "I HAVE HAD IT WITH THESE PEOPLE! TOO GOOD FOR COMMON MAIL, ARE THEY!? I'LL HAVE THEIR JOBS, I SWEAR I WILL!"

Daisy turned around to look at Harry, ignoring the shouting for now, and found him staring numbly at the letter in his hands.

"Harry?" She whispered, concerned especially when he didn't respond. His only movement was to put the letter down and to pull a stick, a familiar looking thing, out of his pocket, and begin to back away.

"Where'd you think you're going?!" Vernon yelled, coming back to the real world once he saw the beginnings of their nephews retreat. "I haven't finished with you boy!" He stomped forward, but Daisy moved back to block his movements, glaring at him. Harry had stopped dead then, meeting the gaze of Vernon over her shoulder.

"You aren't finishing anything!" She snapped back, not letting this situation worsen.

And then, CRACK! Petunia screamed yet again, making her ears ring, while Daisy looked wildly around the room for the source of the noise. It was another owl, a barn owl this time, which had just slammed up against the window that had just been closed.

Harry snuck out from behind her and let the dazed owl in. The animal acted more intelligent than most dogs she'd seen, as it hopped inside the house and held out it's leg, where a scroll was tied there. He read it quietly.

"I'm not going anywhere." The boy said grimly, falling to sit into the empty armchair, facing Dudley and Petunia, who looked surprised that he wouldn't be leaving his home.

"What the hell?" She muttered to herself, watching the owl take off into the night.

"Who are all these ruddy owls from?" Vernon growled.

Harry glanced at her then, as she'd come to sit on the arm of the sofa, just beside him. "The first one," he then began. "Was from the Ministry of Magic, expelling me." His voice was calm, despite the crazy he was spilling. "The second one was from my friend Ron's Dad, he works at the Ministry."

"Ministry of Magic?" She repeated quietly, while her brother-in-law said a much more booming, "Ministry of Magic?"

Vernon continued to talk, even Dudley perked up again in between Harry's short explanations. But while they spoke, Daisy recalled how familiar this all felt. There had been talks like this one, back in the day. Petunia, not as an adult, but as a teenager, shouting and causing a fuss, even screaming at their parents while owls flew over ahead. Pretty, she remembered thinking of one of them. It was a barn owl two, with a heart-shaped face and pretty chestnut-colored feathers over it's white body. She hadn't paid much attention back then, really. She'd only been a child, small enough that she couldn't even run that far without tripping over herself.

'Magic!' Was spoken like a curse, via Petunia. 'Witch!' Was even worse, said evermore cruelly. To which their sister's face would ripple with hurt.

Lily had been a witch.

"And what the ruddy hell are dementors?" She finally heard, tuning back into their conversation. That was a word she knew that she knew. But how?

"They guard the wizard prison, Azkaban." Petunia and her said in unison.

Harry's head swiveled in surprise, from Tuney to her, and back again, his eyes wide. "How d'you two know that?" He asked, astonished. Daisy didn't know how she did – but once her sister had begun the explanation, it formed in her own mouth like she'd known all along.

"I heard that – awful boy – telling her about them – years ago."

This incensed Harry however, and he stared now purely at Petunia. "If you mean my Mum and Dad, then why don't you use their names?" He dared loudly, but she ignored him, retreating behind her veil of ignorance that she'd attempted to keep up for so long, but it was faltering. She looked flustered that she'd known anything about their sister's world at all.

Her sister's world. A Magical world. One with a school, a school for witches. A school where she met her husband, that Harry now attended... Harry was a wizard – and that stick he'd had was a wand, she realized with amazement.

Daisy's realization was interrupted for a final time then, by a third owl. She didn't jump this time, as the Dursley's had, as the owl flew towards Harry, dropping a letter that looked very similar to the first one.

Vernon cursed at the sight of the third owl, glaring after it as it flew away. He slammed the window it came through shut, clipping the latch so it would lock.

"What does it say?" Daisy asked her nephew once he appeared to have finished it.

He glanced at her, then back to the page. "It says I've got to go to a hearing."

"A hearing?" She echoed.

"They'll sentence you there?" Vernon asked.

"I suppose so."

"I won't give up hope then." He said, with such nastiness that it made a knot form in Daisy's belly. All these years she'd thought that Harry had been well taken care of in Petunia's house. Not that she'd ever been an option to take care of him before, she'd hardly been a teenager when Harry had been left on her sister's doorstep. I've not exactly been apart of his life though, she thought with a pit of guilt. All she'd ever done was send both him and Dudley presents on their birthdays and Christmas, with only a rare visit (at least until six years ago.) That was essentially Harry's entire life she'd missed, by leaving him with Vernon and Petunia.

Vernon was off shouting again, while Harry seemed to be taking it rather adult-ly, with only a face that showed how annoyed he was. He didn't even raise his voice to scream back at him, only speaking back at him through clenched teeth, speaking about something called a Patronus, when for the fourth time, an owl burst through the living room, this time from the fireplace, scattering heaps of dust all over the floor and furniture.

"FOR GOD'S SAKE!" He shouted, ripping chunks of hair out of his mustache. "I WILL NOT HAVE OWLS HERE, I WILL NOT TOLERATE THIS, I TELL YOU!"

But Harry was already taking the parchment off the owl's leg, and reading the words quickly. This was the shortest of all of the letter's he'd received this evening, but he read this one over the most.

"–a peck, I mean, a pack of owls, shooting in and out of my house and I won't have it boy, I won't –!" Vernon was blustering.

Irritated, Daisy snapped, "He can't control the owls any more than you could control the getting bills in the mail, Vernon!" This seemed to silence him, reminding him that she was there in the room with them, and he shifted back and forth, his mustache moving back and forth with whatever words he was mouthing underneath it.

"What were – Dementors – doing here in Surrey, Harry? There aren't any escaped prisoners out here, are there?" She asked the boy, who smiled.

"Not this year." He informed her. Then, he fell back into a concerned tone. "I don't know why they were here."

"It's you." Vernon said forcefully. "It's got something to do with you, boy. You're the only – you-know-what – for miles. Why else turn up here?"

"I. Don't. Know. Why. They. Were. Here." Harry repeated, looking frustrated. Then, quietly, he said, "He must have sent them."

"He?" Daisy questioned.

"Lord Voldemort." He said, which cleared up little for her. But, surprisingly, Vernon knew who this person was.

"That's the – what's his face, who – "

"Murdered my parents." Harry finished, sending ice down her spine.

"Murdered." Daisy repeated, her voice stony. Murdered.

'It was a car crash,' Petunia had told her as a teenager.

'Her husband had been drinking, they were at a party. No, you can't - you can't see her. It's a closed casket, Daisy.'

Petunia's voice echoed in her ears as she stood, using one of her sister's own moves. She took a step towards the Dursleys, feeling only now as she walked that she was shaking. "A car crash killed our sister, isn't that right? That's what happened all those years ago, Tuney?" Her voice was neutral and grim.

"Daisy – " Petunia began.

"No." She said sharply. "You've lied to me... for 14 years." Daisy met her sister's eyes with a look that almost made her feel guilty when Petunia flinched beneath it. Tears rose in her own eyes, and the sight of the Dursley's blurred. "You and Lily were all I had after Mum and Dad died, I was just a kid! And then -- Lily was murdered by some magic psycho, and you thought it was all kopacetic to lie to my face all these years?" The longer she ranted, the more guilty that Petunia appeared to her, but her flames were incensed hotter when Vernon attempted to raise his voice over hers with a, "Hey now–"

"I don't even want to think about what you two have done to Harry for all these years, what with your fucked up jealousy and desperate need to normalcy, Tuney!" Daisy shouted, a bit childishly.

"He's not staying here anymore." She said, wiping her tears away.

"What?" Harry said, looking younger than he had through the whole night.

"You're not living here anymore." Daisy informed both him, the Dursleys, and herself. "You're going to live with me from now on. We'll stay in a hotel until I find a flat next week, and I'll take you to your hearing, whenever it is."

"It -- it's the 12th." The boy said softly.

For the fifth time, an owl joined them. This time, it held a red letter. This seemed to alarm Harry, especially when it landed in Petunia's lap, much to her surprise.

"That's a Howler." Harry said to her as she stared at the letter in her sister's skinny hands. "It won't matter if you don't open it. We'll all hear what it says anyway."

But Petunia was shaking, holding the letter in her hands, saying aloud with horror that it had her name and exact location on it. She looked for a moment like she was about to make a run for it, even leaving her husband and son behind, when the red letter burst into real live flames, and a horrible voice sounded loudly in the living room.

"REMEMBER MY LAST, PETUNIA."

Then, it fell into ashes onto the carpet, while Petunia looked like she might faint.

"You can't take him." She whispered, grasping her belly, like she too might vomit over the rug.

"What?" Vernon and Harry both said, both with a tone of horror.

"No, you can't. He – he has to stay here, with us." Petunia said finally, to everyone's chagrin it seemed. "Get – get to your rooms. Both of you. Just, get out of my sight, I can't look at either of you."

this has been a long time in the making