A/N: Completely new chapter. Trying to fill in the gaps in the timeline. There was a larger time skip type thing at the start of chapter 6, and the idea of this chapter and the next few is to fill in those gaps.

A/N: For those who are wondering, the chapters in this story are going to be quite short. The average so far is 2000/2500, with the longest being just over 4000. In time, I'm hoping to get my chapter length closer to the 4000/5000 mark, but that probably won't happy just yet. Short and sweet is the goal.

Chapter 10: Stretching Responsibility

School term ended on the 21st July. Hayden had thought that he'd be forced to stay inside the Dursleys house for the first week of the summer holidays, but in the end Petunia and Vernon decided that he was needed in the house too much to be allowed to escape to the library for two weeks.

Number Four Privet Drive used to belong to petunia's parents and, since she'd inherited the family home, she had remodelled the front and back gardens, the office, Dudley's rooms and the nursey/second bedroom. Beyond updating the furniture, she had not updated the decorations in her home and with the ladies' club all talking about the latest home fashion she'd made the decision to change several rooms of her house.

Or rather, Haydon was ordered to change several rooms of the house.

The first room that he was ordered to handle was Dudley's spare bedroom which was being turned into the library and would also have a thin single bed/lounge reading chair. In preparation to do this, Haydon had already been ordered to collect all the books in the house and bring them into the room. However, he hadn't emptied the room of the mattresses that had been stored there nor all of Dudley's toys and the furniture for the room was due to be delivered on the 22nd July.

With Marigold playing quietly in the corner, Haydon set to ordering Dudley's toys into plastic boxes to take into the attic or plastic bags to take to the dump. Then he was carrying everything up into the loft except for the mattresses which he took into the nursery.

When the room was empty, he tore the carpet up and threw it out before replacing it with the soft blue carpet that Petunia had selected. While working on the carpet, Marigold was in the nursery but Haydon kept a close ear on her and he was slip into the nursery to check on her whenever he heard one of the Dursleys coming up the stairs.

With the carpet down, he laid down a mat and then painted the walls white. For the rest of the day, he was working in the garden – Marigold playing in the grass next to him – as he couldn't put up the bookshelves until the walls had dried. Between his tasks, he would speak with Marigold – encouraging her to talk or telling her stories since he was responsible for her learning for the next six weeks.

On the 23rd, a day after the bookshelves were delivered, Haydon started putting them together. Petunia had brought enough that they lined the walls, she even brough two smaller ones – one to be slotted under the window and one to be hooked above it. As he was dealing with lots of pieces of wood, as well as thick glass panels for doors Haydon kept Marigold in the nursery for the morning, although he moved her back into the room to play when he was sorting the books out in the afternoon.

Petunia didn't care about what system he used to order the books, so Haydon used the same as the library. He divided by subject, then alphabetically by author and title unless it was a series in which case, he placed them in order with the first book in the series in alphabetical order.

After the library, Haydon was then ordered to move to the living room, hallways, staircases and finally Petunia and Vernon's room. By the time he'd finished redecorating their house, he was an expert at carpeting and painting, as well as hanging pictures straight on the wall.

But, eventually, the house was redecorated and spotless and Haydon was able to escape to the library where he scanned the pages of his diary that he had selected to send to the police and child protective services. After getting his proof prepared, he spent the six hours working in the library – grateful that the librarian hadn't questioned his two weeks of absents without notice.

"Will you both be back tomorrow?" the Librarian asked as they were locking up the library to leave that night. Hayden had stayed much later then he normally would, as the Dursleys were going out for a family dinner.

"We should be here every day from one till four, unless something comes up. Is that okay?" Haydon checked to make sure the hours he proposed was okay. Now the remodelling was done, he should be able to get his daily chores done in the morning but he would have to return in time to make the Dursley's dinner.

"Of course, we'll just log the hours that you start and end, just like we've always done." The librarian assured him. "Now, you should get that little one home, she's had a long day."

"Thank you, ma'am. We've got bath time tonight, and Mari loves water time." Haydon smiled as Marigold immediately started giggling and babbling happily having recognised the words 'water' and 'bath'.

Normally, Haydon washed her using a jug of water that he filled with water and slowly poured over her while whipping her with a soft cloth. Once a week, he would fill the bath tups a few inches so that she was submerged up to her hips and wash her that way.

"Well, that certainly sounds like a fun evening." The librarian laughed as they separated paths as they lived in different areas of the neighbourhood.

"When you're older, I'll have to find a way to take you swimming." Haydon promised Marigold even though he hadn't tried swimming himself.

He would have to teach himself how to swim before even attempting to let Marigold near the water, because he couldn't rely on the once-a-week school lessons which started when students reached year 4. But if he did go swimming while he was still under the 'care of the Dursleys' then he needed to find a way of hiding or covering all or the majority of his scars or he and Marigold wouldn't be able to swim in piece.

His father, Haydon remembered, used to tell him tales about his adventures with the Giant Squid in the Black Lake at Hogwarts. The stories he'd told him as bedtime tales had been very exaggerated, but his dearies had been more realistic and truthful. During the hot days of summer, he used to go and swim – being lifted and thrown by the squid. He'd also started many a water fight with his friends. Perhaps, swimming could be the connection to his father that he was looking for – or sports in general. His father had been very athletic.

Count: 1,105

A/N: For anyone wondering, there isn't a lot of speech at the minute or in general for my stories because I struggle to write series of paragraphs and have them interrupted with speaking. Also, I struggle to have speaking done in characterisation. I'll get there in time, but I need more practise.