A/n: Apparently, this story was very well received, so here is chapter 2 as a present to all those who added me as a favorite and reviewed. Note: Everyone always make Vernon or Dudley the evil "crazy" one. I wanted to try something a bit different.

He had spent his summer much the same as all his others. His trunk taken and locked away, with him locked away following. He was allowed to keep his wand simply because his relatives feared what would happen if they tried to take it.

They knew he would not be able to use it, and so did he. It was irrational, but he still feared his family. He knew what it was like to starve, to be beaten for the smallest of existing fractions, and even those that did not exist. He knew that a life full of boredom locked in a room was far better than a life spent having the "freakishness" being beat out of him.

His favorite moments were spent looking out of the window, now unblocked by brick ("What would the neighbor's think Vernon!?"), staring at the rising and falling sun. The rays spoke to him in a way nothing and no one else could. They spoke to him of hope, happiness, and a life worth living. Things he had only dreamed about since coming to the wizarding world.

Harry's POV

The darkness littering my thought, as it seems wont to do more and more often, is lifted as Aunt Petunia screams my name in that shrill voice of hers. That voice means business. Why the woman was named after such an open and beautiful flower I will never know.

"HARRY! Get down here and make my poor Diddikins his breakfast!" she shrieked. I'm sure "Diddikins" was wasting his fat arse away sitting at the table playing with some video game I would never be allowed to see, let alone touch.

sigh I just have the worst luck

As lethargic as I was, sleepy is just not enough to describe such a feeling, I stumbled out of bed and stayed in "my room" long enough to put on some trousers and a jumper. It was oddly nippy out for August.

My aunt and uncle were smart enough to leave the door unlocked. It seems that the Order has managed to strike a bit of fear, not respect, into their hearts.

Yawning widely I stepped into the whiter than winter kitchen. Aunt Petunia must have cleaned again.

"Boy, my precious Diddykins wants some Bacon," Petunia baked roughly, "make yourself useful and make him some,"

I set about it knowing any words about Dudley's own uselessness would only serve to make my situation worse. It was best to just go with the flow. After all, I'm tired of fighting and I can't bring myself to give up anything else I love.

"You are burning the Bacon! Idiot, you useless freak! After all the things we do for you and you can't even manage to make bacon?" Petunia shrieked.

In her anger, all I could see was the pale white of her face. The exact opposite of Uncle Vernon, her face mesmerized me. I had managed to save the bacon moments before her fit, dumping the strips onto a plate. The grease, however, was still popping in the skillet.

I realized to late what was happening, so preoccupied by watching Aunt's nostrils flare, imagining her to be a rather malnourished horse. Her hang gripped my arm and I knew. Mere milliseconds later, still in shock, my arm was plunged into the grease.

I screamed. The pain was fierce, though it was no Cruciatius, but the shock of hat had happened needed physical actualization.

The only thing scarier than the abuse I had just suffered was the manic look in my Aunt's eyes. They flitted frantically around the room, anxiously searching for some sign that she would be magically punished. There was none. The deranged look in her eyes magnified.

I had been running, hiding, and fighting all my life. I knew the look of someone who had lost sanity. I just never thought it would grace the eyes of my "normal" family. Petunia was no longer a mother, an aunt, a muggle; she was someone who had lived in fear for 16 years. She was angry.

I saw the pan I had used to fry my cousins breakfast and then…the sun. The pink rays of early morning had faded to reveal blood red stains running across the sky. If those rays would be the last thing I would ever see, I could die happy.

Unfortunately, my death was not in my Aunt's plan. There was something far, far worse.