Chapter three - Complex inferiority

Harry James Potter was used to having power. It had not always been this way. In fact he had just recently begun to feel comfortable with the fact. At one time in his life a mere seven years ago he thought he had no power at all and never would. He believed he had been born under the thumb of fate and fate had just passed him on. The small pleasure he could provide his Aunt and Uncle by displays of misery did not make up for the trouble he put them through. They informed him of this fact daily. He was worthless and worse yet everyone around him knew it.

Imagine his delight when one day a letter came for him. He didn't care if it was junk mail or not. He had gotten a letter! Imagine being worth nothing, being told you are worth nothing and then suddenly finding that someone thinks you are worth writing to! A half a pound for postage had been spent on him because some one wanted to. It had not been forced by the need to keep him alive or maintain appearances with the neighbors. It had been spent for him.

What he did not know was that the letter was to be the first in a long line of such acknowledgements. At first he had been thrilled (they like me! they really like me!) but then he began to have doubts. What did they know? He was worthless before, what had changed? They were all watching him now. They expected him to succeed. What would they say when he failed? He would be as bad as before. He would be worse then before! He would have ruined their hopes, but there was nothing he could do.

He waited for it to happen. The odds were against him for the first time against the troll. He expected to fail but he didn't. "Next time" he thought and there where a lot of next times. He kept coming back from the brink of disaster. It perplexed him. It frightened him.

Egypt was when it all changed. He had lived in doubt for six year it was time to end it. He decided then that there would be no "next time". He was going to go down to the tomb and face Voldemort one more time. There were two possible outcomes. He would be dead or he would be as powerful as they had always said he was. Luckily, it turned out to be the second. He was powerful.

"Fat lot of good it does me now." He muttered to himself. "One of my best friends is getting married tomorrow to a complete stranger."

If he knew how wrong he was he just might have ran for it.