Yet Another Snape Meets the Dursleys Story: by rabbit
Disclaimer: Still not mine. Still belongs to JKRowling. Still.
Chapter 22 : The Friends
Summary: Visitors mean trouble.
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At first, Harry thought he'd only dreamed the sound of the doorbell, or that it was something from the television, but Dudley's exclamation of dismay and a hand shaking his shoulder made him reconsider. "Harry," Dudley was whispering frantically. "Harry, what am I supposed to do?"
"What is it?" Harry asked, forcing his eyes open. He felt like he was sleeping in glue, and his mouth tasted like it, too.
"It's Piers, and Dennis, and Malcolm, and Gordon. I saw them through the window. Mummy will kill me if they see that on the floor!"
"See what?" Harry took the glasses that Dudley was pushing into his hands and set them on his nose and then blanched. "Oh, no!" Dobby was curled up sound asleep in front of the television. By the look of things, the little house elf had sat down cross-legged to watch the screen for so long his ears had drooped, pulling him forward until he'd gone to sleep with his face on the rug and his ears splayed out on either side of his head like rumpled socks. The noise and motion didn't appear to be making the slightest impression on his slumbers. " Not Dobby too!"
The bell rang again. "I can't pick it up," Dudley blathered, jigging nervously from one foot to the other. "It might bite!"
Adrenalin cleared Harry's head a little. "All right," he commanded. "I'll take care of Dobby. You answer the door before they wake up Snape. And get rid of them!"
"How am I meant to do that?" Dudley wailed, scuttling towards the door.
"Think of something!" Harry called, and scrambled over to collect Dobby in his arms. The small figure felt horribly limp, but snored reassuringly. Harry ran for the kitchen, letting the door swing shut behind him just as he heard Dudley turning back the front door bolt.
"It's about bloody time!" Piers's voice sounded horribly loud to Harry, and it must have done to Dudley too, because his cousin was quick to hush his friends.
"Harry's... I mean, my Mum... Harry's given her… she's got a terrible headache," Dudley couldn't seem to settle on a lie. "I can't come out, and you've got to... Gordon!"
"Didja hear about the big lightning strike?" Gordon's voice was a lot nearer to the kitchen than the front door. The only place big enough to hide Dobby in the kitchen was the oven. No. Definitely not. Harry dashed for the door that led to the garden shed.
"Gordon! You can't just walk in!" Dudley protested. Harry could hear him puffing heavily as he came into the kitchen after Gordon, and the clumping of more feet in his wake.
"Got the central telephone tower. Took out every mobile phone in the south of England," Gordon's cheerful reporting went on blithely, in spite of Dudley. Harry could hear the refrigerator door being opened. "I expect that's why you didn't answer when we called, hey, Dudders?"
"Anything good in there?" Dennis had followed Gordon. Harry bit back a groan. Obviously, Dudley was going to need help getting rid of his friends. And Harry's wand was upstairs. Snape's wand was upstairs. He couldn't Memory Charm anyone even if he knew how! He'd even forgotten the stick he'd been using to impress Dudley. It was probably stuck between the cushions on the couch.
"Dobby, wake up!" Harry whispered, shaking the elf gently. "Wake up!" He shook a little harder, but all it did was make Dobby snore a little louder. "What's wrong with you?" He set Dobby down carefully in a basket of laundry, tucking dangling limbs up so that he could cover everything with a towel, and then went to listen again at the door.
"...thought we'd come over here and try it out. I've got the codes for everything but the final boss, and he ought to be easy with all the armor on and an extra powerblaster apiece," Gordon was saying. "All I need to do is install that new graphics card your dad bought for you and we're good to go. At least until it starts thundering again. But that won't be for hours yet."
"Pass me some of that ham, Gordo," Malcolm sounded impatient. "I'm starving."
"You ate at Dennis' house," Piers said. "Hey, Dud, aren't you having any ham?"
"No," Dudley said. "And neither are you. It's for my Dad."
"Oh, your mum'll buy him some more," Dennis said. "She always does."
Harry hoped he was doing the right thing as he opened the door and stepped through quickly, shutting it behind him. "You heard Dudley: Aunt Petunia's not feeling well."
"Well, well, if it isn't Potter, come to get beat up," Piers Polkiss had put on nearly eight inches of height and a lot more muscle than anyone who had been that scrawny as a child deserved. Harry remembered suddenly that Piers was on the Smeltings rugby team, and had a reputation for roughness. Not that getting hit by Piers could be worse than being hit by a bludger, but Harry didn't feel up to it just now. He set his jaw and tried to look as if he didn't care what Piers said.
"Harry?" Gordon blinked at him. "What's wrong with you?"
"Maybe his bird died," Dennis chortled, tipping back his chair. "Is that it, Hair-Head? Didjer birdie eat a bad mouse? Hey, Piers, birdie ate a bad mouse, musta been from your house!"
Harry would have turned his glare on Dennis, but Piers was in the way, and the bit about the bad mouse had put a smile on his face that Harry longed to wipe away. He thought of several really good hexes, including one that would turn Piers into a ferret.
"What do you know about my owl?" he said, in the lowest register he had.
"You shouldn't feed birds bad mice, Potter. Going to get a bad grade at that school of yours, now, aren't you?" Piers sneered. Harry felt his face getting flushed as he knotted his hands into fists and glared at Piers, waiting for the larger boy to start something. He didn't need a wand to rearrange a face like that, just one... more... reason...
"He's not pinin', he's passed on! He has ceased to be! He's expired! He's a stiff! Bereft of life, he rests in peace! He's off the twig! He's kicked the bucket! This is an ex-parrot!" Dennis chanted cheerfully.
"Lay off about the bird!" Dudley growled, shoving Dennis off his chair and into Piers's back. Both boys went down in a tangle onto the floor. "And get out! Before you wake my mum!"
"Since when do you care about the freak's bird?" Piers came up, belligerently, only to stop when he was confronted with the unusual sight of the cousins standing shoulder to shoulder.
"Since it's bloody expensive to replace an owl!" Dudley shouted back. "I told you it belongs to his school!"
"Easy," Harry said quickly, remembering the danger. "You'll wake up... everyone upstairs."
Dudley grimaced, and turned red with the effort of not shouting again, but he didn't stop scowling at Piers.
"Are you sick too, Dudley?" Gordon put a hand over his mouth. "Is it contagious? Is that why you're acting so strange?"
"Probably," Harry said, seeing an opening. He stepped a foot or so away from Dudley. "Sorry, Dudley. I know I'm supposed to keep my distance. Still, I haven't vomited for hours." He tried to look contrite. "I haven't breathed on you, so you're probably all right if you wash your hands."
"Vomited?" Even Piers took a step back.
"Yes, and Uncle Vernon threw up for hours last night," Harry said with relish. "I think that's why Aunt Petunia's so ill from taking care of him. I've been scrubbing things clean all morning. It'll take hours to get the laundry done at this rate."
A light finally showed up in Dudley's small eyes. "That's right," he said. "So if you don't want to all end up sick, you'd better get out of here, like I said."
"Gee, you could have told us before we came in," Gordon said, pushing away from the table and getting to his feet. "Malcolm, leave that, it's contaminated."
"Confaminatet?" Malcolm asked around a mouthful of sandwich.
"I thought you said the ham was for your father," Piers said suspiciously.
"Oh, it's probably all right," Harry said with a flash of vicious inspiration. "I rinsed it off before I put it back into the refrigerator. And it wasn't right next to Uncle Vernon."
"Rinsed… I don't think I feel so good," Dennis whimpered, pushing away the sandwich he'd not tasted. "I'm going home."
"Me too," said Gordon. "Send me an e-mail when you're over the plague, Dudley, and I'll come over and put in that graphics card." He grabbed Malcolm's collar and tugged the larger boy to his feet. "Come on, Malcolm," he said, batting bread and ham to the floor. "Leave that."
"But…" Malcolm let himself be led off, still confused.
Piers lingered the longest, but in the end he sauntered after the other three, muttering to himself. Dudley and Harry followed him to make sure that he really left.
When they were finally gone, and the front door was latched behind them, Dudley turned with a relieved grin. "That was brilliant, Harry."
Harry grinned back. "Did you see the looks on their faces?"
"Except Piers," Dudley said, sobering a little. "I don't think he believed us."
"No," Harry sat down on the stairs, suddenly aware of how tired he was. He looked up at his cousin, wondering if this unusual sense of camaraderie was enough for a straight answer. "How did they know about the mice?"
Dudley blushed and looked at the floor. "It was Piers's mouse poison," he said. "And Malcolm and Dennis thought it would be funny. Gordon didn't though."
Harry nodded to acknowledge Gordon's relative innocence. "And you?"
Dudley shrugged. "I... I thought you'd just let the owl go outside to hunt, the way you did last summer," he offered, and then shrugged again and looked up at Harry with an uncomfortable twist to his mouth. "I hoped she'd fly away and not come back. Or that she'd die, I guess."
"Why? Hedwig's never hurt you." If he'd felt better, Harry might have gotten angry, but now he just wanted to know.
"None of my pets ever lived this long," Dudley said, with a touch of his usual petulance. "Not even the turtle."
Harry could have pointed out that turtles tended to live longer when they didn't get thrown through a plate glass window in a fit of temper. And wasn't it just like Dudley to get jealous because Harry had anything at all? But he could almost understand. And it might have been Piers's idea to begin with. And besides, with the adrenalin worn off, he didn't have the energy to get mad at Dudley for something that Dudley had already apologized for. "She's all right now, and that's what matters, isn't it?" He yawned and rubbed at his eyes.
"Why's everyone so sleepy?" Dudley asked querulously. "Professor Snape, that Dobby thing, you... and Mum and Dad aren't making any noise either."
"I don't know," Harry admitted. "Are you sleepy?"
"Not in the least," Dudley said. He bit his lip, thinking ponderously while Harry leaned his chin on his hands and tried to work out how much effort it would be to move over to the couch. "Maybe coffee would help. Would you like me to make you some?" At Harry's stare he smiled nervously. "I've watched Mum make it. I know how."
"I'd like that," Harry said, wondering if he'd already fallen asleep. Dudley being nice had to be a dream. Probably. But coffee was a good idea. It always smelled good, even if he'd never been allowed to taste it. And being left alone for a few minutes would give him a chance to think about what kind of spell Snape had put on Dudley and whether or not it would work on other people.
"All right," Dudley turned to go to the kitchen, and then hesitated. "Harry?"
Harry opened the eyes he'd let drift closed. "What?"
"Would you... would you help me with my feet? The ones about the book? I'm kind of stuck." When Harry didn't answer right away – because he was flabbergasted at the request – Dudley even added, "Please?"
Harry nodded hastily, "Of.. of course," he stammered. "I... I don't know how much help I can be, but I'll look over it."
Dudley nodded and left. He really did waddle, Harry decided, watching his cousin's awkward gait from behind, but so would anyone with that much extra weight. For the first time it occurred to him that Aunt Petunia hadn't done Dudley any favors by indulging him with all his favorite foods for years. And that was uncomfortably close to the idea that maybe Dudley had been ... well... mistreated in a way, and maybe that was why he was the way he was. That and a mean streak. Harry thought about the turtle, and Hedwig and shook his head. Maybe his temperature had gone up again. He'd actually started to feel sorry for Dudley: the boy who got everything, and usually by making sure that Harry didn't get any at all!
Dudley poked his head out from the kitchen door. "I'll make us some lunch too," he said. "And some for Dooby, if you can wake him up. He does eat people food, doesn't he?"
"Dobby," Harry corrected automatically. "Yes, he does." Maybe Dudley was sick or something. Although he didn't look it. "Thanks," Harry added belatedly, and Dudley nodded and disappeared back into the kitchen. He must really want help with that paper for Snape.
Harry pulled himself upright using the banister. First things first. Visit the loo. Get Dobby out of the shed. And then, somehow, try to figure out how on earth he was going to help Dudley with his homework without starting a fight.
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Dudley put the ham away, feeling virtuous because he didn't snitch any off the plate. The coffeepot was on, and the water was beginning to make small noises, so it wouldn't be long before it was ready. A glance at the clock showed him that it truly was well and truly past noon, in spite of how hot it was, so he opened a couple of cans of soup as well, and dumped them in a pot. Soup would be hard to get wrong. And it was good food for someone who was sick.
Only... He remembered that the being sick part was just something he and Harry had made up. Except Harry really did look like he was sick. When he'd come through the kitchen to fetch the house elf out of the back shed he'd been much too thin and pale, with his green eyes duller than they usually were. Small wonder Gordon had believed that he was ill. Though the green eyes had gotten a lot brighter when he'd been glaring at Piers.
Dudley hugged the thought of Piers backing down to himself. Piers thought he was such a big shot now that he was on the rugby team. He needed to be taken down a notch. Maybe Harry could get some of that horrid candy that made your tongue so big, and Dudley could sneak some into Piers's bookbag. That would be fair revenge for the mice, too.
Toast, butter... Harry didn't eat enough. That's what made him so thin. Dudley sliced the other half of the melon from breakfast and put three of the slices on Harry's plate and kept one for himself. It's not like Mum's a bad cook. Harry just doesn't appreciate good food. A brief vision of the highly polished plates Harry normally passed back out through the cat flap countered that notion, and Dudley frowned. It must be the doctor's fault. He's the one who told her that the diet was the right one for a fifteen year old boy. He should be able to tell that Harry's different from me.
Of course, that was the problem. Mum wouldn't want the doctor to know that they were related. She'd always taken Harry to the National Health clinic when the school had wanted him to have shots. Still, doctors had to know about all sorts of shameful things and keep them secret. They studied weird diseases and all, and knew how to do stuff. It wouldn't hurt to let the doctor know that Harry was a freak, probably. Maybe there was a blood test for magic. Maybe there was even a cure. Dudley hesitated over the cake on the top shelf of the refrigerator, and then decided to give Harry a slice. Maybe there was only a treatment, after all. He'd have to check for a website.
When he went out with the tray to the living room, Harry was leafing through Oliver Twist. He had Dudley's written work laid out across the coffee table, but he'd propped up the doodle page against the flower vase. Dudley blushed. He'd forgot about that page. Now Harry would know how much time he'd wasted this morning when he should have been working.
"Lunch?" he said, hefting the tray to a more comfortable position.
"Great." Harry flashed him a brief, grateful smile and cleared the papers to one side. Dudley put down the tray and tried to sneak away the sketches. "Wait," Harry said, before he could crumple the paper. "Don't mess it up."
"It's just messing around."
"Yeah, but it really looks like Dobby. I'd like to keep it." Harry took the paper from Dudley and smoothed the edges. "I thought you only drew cartoons."
"Manga aren't cartoons," Dudley began. To his surprise, Harry listened to him through lunch as he talked about drawing, and how good a character Dobby might make for a videogame. Dudley liked having Harry pay attention to him. It made up for the look he got on his face when he drank the coffee.
"Maybe it'd be better with milk and sugar," Harry said, getting up to go to the kitchen.
Dudley took a sip from his own cup, and grimaced. "It sure doesn't taste the way it smells, does it?" He followed Harry. He wasn't allowed sugar, but there were packets of artificial sweetener in the cupboard.
They tried sugar, sweetener, the last of the milk from the pint, and some evaporated milk that Aunt Petunia had got for baking and finally added some hot water from the tap to the mix. Even that didn't make it taste right to Dudley, but Harry drank it anyway. "It helps," he croaked, wiping water from his eyes, and looking far more alert. "Just the thing."
They went back to the parlor and Harry tried to wake Dobby up enough to drink a spoonful of sweetened, cooled coffee. Dudley watched from a safe distance as the great googlyeyes blinked open.
"Dobby," Harry said urgently, setting aside the spoon so that he could shake the elf by the shoulders. "Dobby, are you all right?"
"Dobby forgot not to eat the eggs, Professor McGonagall," Dobby said sleepily, his eyes closing as his head flopped sideways.
"The eggs? What's in the eggs?" Harry said. "Dobby, what did you put in the eggs?"
"The whole bottle would knock out an elephant, so only use three drops at a time," Dobby's voice came out like an old lady's, and Dudley stepped farther back, sure that the thing had been possessed. "It will keep things calm until Professor Snape is awake."
Harry, hearing this, fumbled through the jumble sale layers of the doll-sized creature, checking pockets. He came up with a small purple bottle which he uncorked, and then sniffed at. "Whew," he said, pushing the cork back in to the neck of the bottle hastily.
"What is it?" Dudley asked, imagining poison.
"A concentrated sleeping potion." Harry said, fighting a yawn. "Just breathing it is enough to make you drowsy." He rubbed at his eyes fiercely. "Dobby must have put some in the scrambled eggs."
"So I didn't fall asleep because I didn't eat any eggs," Dudley concluded after a moment's thought.
"And I didn't stay asleep because I didn't eat all of mine," Harry agreed, tucking Dobby back onto the couch, and then yawning hugely.
"Maybe if you had more coffee," Dudley suggested, seeing that Harry was beginning to sway sleepily.
Harry reached for the cup, chugged the rest of the coffee down, and shuddered. "Blech!" he said, his eyes streaming, but open. "And Uncle Vernon likes this?"
"Should we give coffee to Mum and Dad, then?" Dudley wondered.
"If we wake them up, we'll just have to feed them," Harry pointed out. "And explain. They're probably just as happy asleep. And you've still got to work on your paper."
Explaining would be bad.
So they started to work on the paper. It wasn't easy to concentrate, as hot as it was. Harry had a lot to say, and he wasn't very patient. Dudley felt worse and worse as Harry kept making him change sentences, telling him that things were obvious that weren't obvious at all. He could feel sweat trickling down his back from the effort. And Harry kept pushing. Finally, Dudley burst out, "You're making me sound stupid," and slapped his pencil down on the table.
Harry jerked back like he had expected a blow. "Sorry," he said after a moment. Carefully, he eased forward again and began to fiddle with the empty coffee cup. "I shouldn't expect you to just know things. I guess this what be what Hermione feels like when she's trying to help me."
Dudley didn't know that Harry needed help at school. He picked up the pencil again, and erased the sentence Harry hadn't liked from the paper. "Is Hermione your tutor?" he asked, hoping that if they talked about something different, they might not fight.
"No, she's a friend of mine." Harry said.
"A girl? You've got a girlfriend?" Dudley didn't believe it. He turned his head sideways to look at Harry's messy hair and thin strange face. Did freaks... wizards ... even have girlfriends?
"I've got a girl who's a friend anyway," Harry said, his ears red.
Dudley guessed that they did. "What's she like?"
Harry considered the question. "Really smart. I mean, really smart. She reads all her textbooks before the class even meets for the first time, just because she's interested. She gets the best grades of anyone."
"No, I meant is she pretty?" Dudley said, impatiently. Trust Harry to not mention the important things.
"She is when she wants to be," Harry smiled at a memory. "You should have seen her at the Yule Ball. She was almost as pretty as Cho."
"Cho?" Now Dudley was very curious. Harry's voice was much different when he mentioned Cho than when he talked about Hermione. And his blush was much deeper.
"Cho Chang. She's really pretty. All the time. But she was dancing with..." Harry's face changed all at once and he reached for the paper again with grim determination. "We're getting distracted. And you really have to finish this before Snape wakes up, or he'll make you do one twice as long."
Dudley didn't think he could get Harry to talk about girls again, but he needed a rest. "Couldn't we take a small break? Just a few minutes. A couple of rounds of Nintendo? I'll let you use the red controller. It's too hot to work without getting cranky."
Harry leaned back, less nervously this time. "It is hot," he agreed. "And a break sounds good. But let's play something that works better when we work together, instead of a game where we fight each other, all right?"
Even with a game like Ms. Pac-Man, though, Harry wasn't practiced enough to keep up with Dudley. He kept using up all his lives and leaving Dudley to go on. Dudley didn't mind playing alone. Harry even said things like, "good move!" a few times, and he got a little better each time they had to start over. Then Dudley had a streak of really good levels. When he finally lost his last life he turned to ask if Harry wanted to try another game and discovered that Harry had fallen asleep again, a soft sheen of sweat on his flushed face.
It was too still hot to go back to working on Oliver Twist. And the videogame sounds weren't waking anyone up. Dudley could hear his father snoring upstairs. He decided to play a little longer.
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&^^^^^^^^^end of chapter 22