Yet Another Snape Meets the Dursleys Story: by rabbit
Disclaimer: Still not mine. Still belongs to JKRowling. Still.
Chapter 20 : The Breakfast
Summary: Food glorious food.
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Dudley Dursley was frustrated.
He'd tried shouting. He'd tried screaming. He'd tried kicking at the door. He'd knocked things over. He'd broken things. He'd shrieked until his throat started to hurt.
And no one was paying attention to him.
He sighed and flopped down onto the bed, inhaling the wafting scent of bacon with a wistfulness that he normally only felt at Smeltings. Why didn't Mummy come and fix everything? Send Harry and Snape away and let him eat a proper breakfast? Well, no, even if she sent away the freaks she'd still want him to stay on his rotten diet. Mummy didn't have very many things she wouldn't give in on, but the diet had proven to be one of them. Dudley turned over and buried his face against the pillow, trying to block the tantalizing smell.
"I've just got big bones," he mumbled into the softness. "It's puppy fat." It was awful not being able to hear yourself. "The school should let me bring a uniform from a tailor."
So what if he couldn't play any of the outdoor games without wheezing? He didn't want to play them anyway. He'd rather sit on the side and yell for Piers during a rugby game than play himself, thank you very much. What was the fun of being knocked down? And so what if his heart sounded a little overworked to the doctor? The doctor was the one who wanted him to exercise more, and everyone knew that exercise made your heart work all the harder, so what was all the fussing about?
Something touched his shoulder, and for a wild moment, Dudley thought his heart was going to stop altogether. He flipped over so fast he fell off the opposite side of the bed, taking the covers with him. He struggled free of them finally, and sat up to find that someone had left a tray on the nightstand.
Someone invisible.
Or already gone.
Dudley got to his feet and went around the bed to look at the tray.
Bacon. Eggs. Kippers. Fried potatoes. Toast drenched in butter and an entire pot of jam.
Dudley backed away from the laden plate with panic in his eyes. "They're trying to kill me!"
******
Harry pushed the remains of his breakfast around on the plate with his fork, wishing that he felt like eating it. Dobby, once he'd figured out the 'fridge and the stove, had set to work with a will. He would have cooked enough food to feed a dozen people, if Harry hadn't stopped him.
Dobby had cooked enough for six. Which was just enough, if you included Hedwig, who had flown down to find Harry. It was good food, too. Harry had heaped his plate, but between being tired and nervous, he'd found that he couldn't manage more than a few bites of anything without starting to feel ill.
He picked up a piece of bacon and snuck it over to Hedwig while Dobby investigated the pot cupboard. It would be a shame to waste any of it.
And he had to admit, the food was helping in that it mollified the Dursleys somewhat. Uncle Vernon had shut up about having to eat in a toilet pretty quickly, anyway. Heaven only knew what Dudley and Aunt Petunia thought. Harry had told Dobby to just slide Aunt Petunia's food through the doorflap, but the elf had had to go inside the guest room to feed Dudley.
Harry wondered if Dudley had seen Dobby.
That would have sent Dudley into hysterics, probably. Not that anyone could tell, since Dobby hadn't waited around to find out, and the silence spell was still working.
It was nice, not having to listen to Dudley having a tantrum. Or clomping around upstairs. But it was strange, too. And kind of creepy. Harry had never realized before how much he depended on sounds to let him know where the Dursleys were in the house. Dobby moved very quietly, when he wanted to. Which made sense, if you thought about it. House-elves didn't usually want to be noticed much. Snape moved quietly too. When he moved. If he ever moved again.
It was too quiet.
That had to be what was making him think creepy things. Snape wasn't dead. McGonagall had said so. He wasn't even dying.
Probably.
Snape wouldn't want to die. He wouldn't want to miss all those chances to be awful.
Except that he could come back as a ghost, couldn't he?
Uncle Vernon would go spare.
All of a sudden, Harry wanted noise. He got up from the table and scraped his plate, putting it into the sink and starting the water into the basin. He'd squirted in some of the dish soap when Dobby popped up beside him. "Oh, no, Harry Potter, sir! You is not to be washing up. That is Dobby's job."
"It's all right, Dobby," Harry said. "I don't mind. I do it all the time."
"But," Dobby frowned and his ears sagged floorwards. "Dobby is here to help."
Harry sighed. "Well... if you really want to..."
The house-elf perked up immediately and pulled over a chair, somehow sizing it so that he could stand at the right height to wash the dishes.
Harry wandered out into the living room and flopped onto the couch. Something square and hard jammed into his back and he groaned as he fished around for it and pulled out the television remote. Television. That would make noise. Even on a Sunday morning. He hit the power button and started flicking through the channels. Static. Static. Static. Static.
Maybe the storm put it out. "Rats." Harry tried to think back to the little muggle science he'd had in primary school, but he couldn't remember much of it. Something about needing a circle for electricity to work, which didn't make any sense. The television was at the end of the wire from the wall.
Uncle Vernon could probably fix it.
Harry thought about how angry Uncle Vernon probably still was, and shook his head. Bad idea. Uncle Vernon might be frightened of Snape and Dobby, but he wasn't afraid of Harry.
Dudley on the other hand... Dudley was terrified of magic. Harry could get a twig from the back yard, claim it was a magic wand, and Dudley would believe it, he was that dumb. The only things Dudley bothered to learn were the things he cared about. And Dudley loved television.
And if he got Dudley out of the guest room, he could put Uncle Vernon up there, which would let his Uncle stretch out a little, and let Harry use the loo without climbing all those stairs.
"Dobby! Dob..." Harry called.
The house elf popped up beside him, dripping wet, with dishsoap bubbles clinging to one ear. "Yes, Harry Potter, sir?"
"I want you to help me with something..."
******
Harry stepped cautiously into the master bedroom. Cornflakes crunched soundlessly under his feet. He stopped at once, glancing apprehensively at Snape, his shoulders tightening against the inevitable sarcastic comment.
No sound. No movement. Snape still looked dead.
People in comas had tubes and things, didn't they? Wires and monitors and stuff, like in the movies. Maybe Dobby knew what kind of thing Snape should have. No. Better send a note to Professor McGonagall, once Hedwig felt better.
Harry hurried over to the nightstand and took a deep breath before cautiously taking up Snape's wand. It still felt awkward, with that peculiar sense of something sliding inside it, but he needed it to get Dudley's door open. Dobby had to stay downstairs and keep an eye on Uncle Vernon.
What kind of a center would make a wand feel like this? It was easier to consider the wand than consider Snape's condition. Unicorn hair... phoenix feather... manatee teeth...mercury? Harry had a feeling that the wand didn't like him. No surprise there.
"Sorry, it's an emergency," he told it, as he went back to face the guest room door. The wand couldn't hear him, of course, but maybe it could tell what he was saying. He wondered if it would blow the guest room door right off the hinges just to be uncooperative. "It's just for one spell. It's an easy one. Standard book of Spells. Chapter seven." Harry wished Hermione were here. She'd know whether or not an incantation would work under a Silence spell. But then again. Maybe Snape's wand didn't like silly incantations. Snape didn't need one to clean up a potion spill anyway. It felt stupid, talking to a wand, and stupider talking to a wand when you couldn't hear yourself talking. "Maybe I'm getting sick again."
Harry put his free hand on his forehead, wondering if he could tell if he were feverish. He felt funny, anyway, and his breakfast was sitting lumpily inside him. "We've got to work together. It's an emergency," he tried to convince the wand. "You helped me last night. And I'll give you back to Professor Snape when I'm done."
The wand slewed sideways, dragging his hand with it, and Harry felt a sudden, refreshing chill.
"Okaaay," Harry said to it, tightening his grip. "Uh... thanks."
It was hard to tell if the wand moved, or that was just his hand shaking. Harry aimed it at the doorknob, hoping that Dudley wasn't just behind the door. "Alohomora," he said.
To his great relief, the doorknob turned, and the door stayed on its hinges.
Harry breathed again.
He touched the doorknob.
It didn't crumble.
And Dudley didn't seem to have noticed. Good. He could take a minute to get rid of the wand.
Harry went back into the master bedroom and hastily set the wand beside Snape's pillow. He didn't want to touch Snape's hand again. It had felt like stewed slugs gone cold the last time. He looked around, in case he needed to do anything else, but all he could think of was taking the animated chair downstairs. Dobby could clean up the cornflakes later. And the snowglobe was safer where Dudley wasn't going to touch it.
The animated chair didn't react when Harry asked it to follow him, which was a shame, so he added it to his list of things for Dobby to do later. He hurried into the hall and faced the guest room door, drawing the stick Dobby had gotten from the yard and holding it like a wizard from a cartoon. He felt a right git, but Dudley ought to be impressed and intimidated.
Harry kicked open the door, rushing inside like a tv cop.
Dudley hadn't even noticed him. Harry's cousin was sitting on the floor by the bed, twisted up in a blanket, reading something. His face was all red, and wet, and his shoulders shuddered every once in a while, the way that shoulders did when you'd been crying for a long time and were finally calming down. Another tear slid out of his eye and he smeared it sideways before it could drip off his nose with a clumsy hand, still unconscious of any observer.
Harry stared, forgetting his ruse.
Dudley was crying. For real.
And he hadn't eaten his breakfast.