Chapter 2

The Vanishing Glass

Nearly ten years had passed since the Dursleys had woke up to find their niece and nephew on the front step, but the household had barely changed at all. The house still looked like all the other houses, the lawn was still cut the same way, and the Dursleys still lived as plain and boring as they could. The only difference was there were two more occupants than before, but one look at the photographs on the wall, and it didn't look like there were two other children there at all. Along the walls you see many photos of the pudgy fat baby turn into a pudgy fat kid, family photos of the horse face woman, the round purplish man, and the fat child all together. But there was not one photo of the two children who mysteriously showed up all those nights ago. But they were there, despite there being no proof of it. Both of the children had been forced to share a small cupboard under the stairs for all these years. A cupboard filled with only a small mattress and a few worn down old clothes they had to wear. As they grew the only possessions they had either had belonged to Dudley, whose clothes were much too big for Harry, or some of Petunias old gowns which were far out of date, and some of the ugliest floral things you would ever see on a child. Over the years each one had changed and grown looking both similar and different at the same time. Harry had grown to have a thin face, skinny body, and knobby knees. His hair was pitch black and always messy, often falling into his emerald green eyes and over the lightning shaped scar on his forehead. These eyes were covered with round glasses that were held together by multiple wraps of scotch tape as a result of getting hit by Dudley so much. Hope had grown to have an equally thin face and skinny body but strong legs and arms, better to defend Harry from Dudley with. Her hair was a very dark auburn that in the dark looked black, but bright in the sun. Her eyes, instead of green, were a light hazel and sparkled with humor and curiosity. This morning the twins were woken up by a banging on their cupboard door and the shrill voice of their aunt.

Hope POV

"Up! Get up! Now!"

I felt Harry jump up awake while I just groaned and rolled over. I started to return to sleep when another loud bang and screech woke me up again

"UP!"

We heard her walking to the kitchen and Harry laid back on the bed we shared. I put my pillow over my head and groaned.

"Must she shrill like a banshee every day? My poor ears can't take it much more."

Harry gave a slight chuckle, but then we heard her retuning and once more banging on our door.

"Are you up yet?"

Harry was the one to respond knowing if I did, I would get us in trouble.

"Nearly"

"Well, get a move on, I want you two to look after the bacon and pancakes. And don't you dare burn them, I want everything perfect for Duddy's birthday."

I rolled my eyes and groaned.

"What was that?"

"Nothing we're getting up, now stop screaming."

"Watch your mouth girl, I will have none of your sass today."

We heard her walk away and started to get up when Harry turned to me.

"You really need to stop doing that, you're going to run your mouth one day and get in too deep, then what."

"Easy they lay one had on me, I scream and yell and have the whole neighborhood come running. The last thing they want is to look bad to everyone."

Over the years I've developed an attitude with my aunt and uncle that would usually lead to me getting locked in the cupboard for a day or two, but I couldn't help it. If they want to be horrible people then they should be treated horribly as well. Besides, it's not like this birthday will be unlike any other one of Dudley's birthdays. She always says it needs to be perfect, he complains he doesn't have enough presents so they go get him more, he and a couple of his friends will go somewhere cool while me and Harry go to a stinky cat lady's house, then Dudley comes back and tries to beat on Harry which causes me to beat on him, and I end up locked in the cupboard with Harry and no dinner. We both get dressed in what clothes we can find in the small space. Hope found one of Petunias old and worn flower dresses and eyed it with distain. Hope was what you would consider a tomboy and hated all things girly. She would always put her hair up in a messy ponytail and wore an old pair of Dudley's trainers that he grew out of, instead of the frilly shoes she had gotten from her aunt. The best part about the shoes was that it annoyed Petunia to ne end when she wore those with her floral outfits and always commented,

"Must you always dress as a boy?"

But Hope loved it and didn't plan on changing any time soon. Once the both of them were dressed, they clambered out of their cupboard and walked to the kitchen. The kitchen table was barely visible under all the presents Dudley had received. By the look of it he had gotten everything he asked for, as usual. A new computer, a second television, a racing bike and many more. While Harry and Hope got practically nothing for their birthday. One year they each got one half of a pair of Vernon's socks. They both went to the stove and worked on breakfast. Harry was frying the eggs and bacon while I worked on the pancakes. Once cooked we placed all the food on the little room that was left on the table. Meanwhile Dudley as usual started a fuss about how many presents there were, saying there was less than last year, even though some where huge and made up for the missing ones. The tantrum led to Petunia and Vernon promising him they will get more presents wile out to make up the difference and praising him on his awful behavior. As everyone finally sat down and started to eat, the phone rang. Petunia went over and picked it up. As she was talking, a grave look came over her face. As she hung up the phone, she came over and spoke to Vernon with worry and anger in her voice.

"Bad new Vernon, Mrs. Figgs broken her leg. She can't take them."

Yay! We don't have to deal with the smelly cat lady. All that woman does is show us photographs of all her stupid cats. For once we may be able to do something fun. Unfortunately that idea didn't work for Vernon or Petunia because they kept trying to come up with horrible ideas for us to go while they have fun.

"We could phone Marge?"

"Don't be silly Vernon, she hates them."

Well the feeling is mutual. Marge was Vernon's fat sister who came to visit regularly. She was just as big as her brother but twice as mean. When she was here all she could talk about was that the Dursley's should throw us out, or that we need to be beaten more. The number of times I want to kick that woman's arse was unbelievable, but that didn't stop me from running my mouth off to her.

"What about what's-her-name, your friend-Yvonne?"

"On vacation in Majorca."

So far things were looking good for us. At this rate they may just leave us here and we can finally watch some television or something fun. That was until Harry opened his mouth.

"You could just leave us here."

The two of them looked at us as if we were something disgusting.

"And have you burn the house down? I think not."

Well that idea went out the window. But the good thing is, there was only one option left.

"I suppose we could take them to the zoo with us."

Yay!

"And leave them in the car."

Not Yay!

"That car is new, I'm not leaving them alone in it!"

Yay again! As the discussion continued Dudley's face began to get redder and redder until he let out a loud wail. Petunia immediately came over and started coddling him to try and get him to stop what was probably fake crying.

"Dinky Duddydums, don't cry, Mummy won't let them spoil your special day!"

But Dudley continued to scream the way he does when he doesn't get his way.

"I…don't…want…them…t-t-to come! They always sp-spoil everything!"

But his cries were forgotten as the doorbell rang. Petunia went to get it and behind it was Dudley's just as bad friend Piers Polkiss. Dudley immediately stopped crying and went to go greet his friend. Peirs was a scrawny, rat-faced boy who loved to pick on Harry as much as Dudley. Piers however learned not to mess with Harry in front of me because last time, he was holding Harry for Dudley to punch him when I came over and royally handed his arse to him. Since then he has been petrified of me. Half an hour later all six of us were crammed in Vernon's car heading to the zoo. The back was cramped since the seat held three people, and Dudley was big enough to count as two, but I was able to fit on my brother's lap to avoid being anymore mushed than we already were. Of course before we left Vernon had decided to pull us aside and warn us that if anything were to happen we wouldn't be outside the cupboard till after Christmas. We tried to reassure that we wouldn't do anything, but Vernon was not convinced. To be honest, we did have a track record of strange and unusual things happening to us. For example, in Harry's early years, Petunia would always cut his hair by herself and it would look absolutely terrible. Harry would go to bed with some of the worst hairdos you would see on a person, and wake up with it back to normal. For me, there were a few times when Petunia would try to force me into something horribly girly or flowery. Anytime she would try to force it on me, it would mysteriously shrink to the size of a dolls the more she tried to force it on. The strangest was when I and Harry were running from Dudley and his gang. Most times like this I would fight, but this time there was just too many, so we ran. We had jumped behind some trash cans to hide, and found ourselves on the roof of the cafeteria. We got into some major trouble for that one, Vernon locked us in the cupboard for days for that stunt. This time however, we were going to do our hardest to not let anything go wrong. This was the first time is our short lives that we got to do anything fun, and we weren't going to chance it. On the way Vernon had been complaining about some people on motorbikes.

"…roaring along like maniacs, the young hoodlums."

There was nothing unusual about this, he often complained of anything that was not plain o boring like him. That was until Harry decided to break the silence.

"I had a dream about a motorbike once, it was flying."

The car swerved in traffic as Vernon reacted to Harry's statement.

"MOTORBIKES DON'T FLY!"

Strangely enough, I've had similar thoughts. But for me, instead of it being a dream, it was more like memories. I've been able to remember thing from very early in life, earlier than almost anyone. Of course what feels like memories from before Vernon and Petunia seem too impossible to be memories, and its mostly big bits and pieces, instead of a full memory. My clearest two however, were one of a bright green light followed by a maniacal laugh, the other is an old man with kind, sparkly eyes telling me to look out for my brother. Since then, I have done everything to protect my brother from things that could harm him. I'm pulled out of my thoughts by everyone exclaiming that we arrived at the zoo. As we all clambered out of the car I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, enjoying the bright sun and fresh air of a lovely Saturday morning. Me and Harry made sure to get a good eyeful of everything we could, knowing this may be the only time we would get to see the zoo. While at an ice cream stand, the Dursley's were buying Piers and Dudley some chocolate ice cream and had to buy us some as to not look bad in front of the woman selling the ice cream. It was just a simple lemon ice pop, but it was the only sweet either of us have ever had. While walking we made sure to stand a distance away from the Dursley's so that we wouldn't get messed with and properly enjoy the animals. When we ate at the zoo restaurant, Harry and I got to share a Knickerbocker Glory that Dudley didn't want because it wasn't enough. It was when we were in the reptile house that things went wrong. As we were walking, with Dudley trying to find the biggest and deadliest snake of the bunch, he decided on a big python that, unfortunately for Dudley, was fast asleep. Dudley's nose was pressed against the glass as he kept trying to make it move by banging on the glass and yelling. Finally, after giving up on making the snake move, Harry and I moved over to the front of the glass. As we were watching it, it decided to wake up. It slowly rose its head to our height and gave us a wink with its beady black eyes. After looking around to make sure it was us he was winking at, I looked back at it with a smirk and winked back at him. The snake almost seemed to smirk as it gestured with its head towards the rest of the Dursley's as if to say,

"I get that all the time"

"I bet, it must be really annoying to have a bunch of people press their ugly faces at you."

The snake nodded vigorously, then turned to Harry as he started in on the conversation with the snake.

"Where do you come from anyway?"

The snake pointed his tail to the plaque displayed next to the glass. It read,

Boa Constrictor, Brazil

This specimen was bred

in captivity.

"I'm sorry, I guess it's hard only knowing this for your life."

I nodded my head

"Sounds a lot like what we live with."

Just then before we could talk to him more Piers started yelling.

"DUDLEY! MR. DURSLEY! COME AND LOOK AT THIS SNAKE! YOU WON'T BELIEVE WHAT IT'S DOING!"

With that came a waddling Dudley who pushed Harry down to get a better look. Seeing him push my brother, I felt my face get red and my anger starts to boil. I went up and turned him around.

"DON'T YOU DARE LAY A HAND ON MY BROTHER!"

Dudley and Piers just laughed, Dudley crossed his arms and replied smirking.

"Oh and, what are you going to do about it?"

I opened my mouth to respond but I looked behind them, the shine and reflection of the glass was gone, as was all the glass itself. I looked at the snake and he was as mad as I was. I just smirked and crossed my own arms back at Dudley.

"Oh I'm not going to do anything. He is."

I pointed behind them at the snake and they slowly turned around. When they saw the snake was mad and ready to strike, the fear in their eyes was immeasurable. The snake took one strike at them and they ran away screaming. The snake smirked and slowly uncoiled itself and slithered out of the enclosure. The people around us were screaming and running afraid of the loose snake. As he was leaving I heard him hiss,

"Brazil, here I come…Thankssss, amigos."

The keeper of the reptile hose came running in as the snake slithered out. He looked and saw Dudley and Piers shaking in Petunia's arms. He started apologizing over and over to my aunt and uncle. Probably hoping they wouldn't sue. He had taken us to his office where he gave my aunt a cup of tea and continued with the apologies. By the time we left l, Dudley and Piers couldn't stop going on about how the snake had almost bitten their legs off and tried to eat them. What they were sprouting was nothing but rubbish. The snake only lunged at them once and snapped playfully at their heels. We were almost home when Piers decided to get Harry and me into trouble.

"Harry and Hope were talking to it. Hope even commanded it to go after us, didn't they Dudley?"

A smirk grew on Dudley's face.

"It's true, all of it."

That is when Vernon's face turned the darkest shade of purple I had ever seen on him. He stayed that way till Piers was out of the house. He could barely talk as he shoved us into the cupboard and ruled that we would have no meals. It was hours later before we could sneak out and get something to eat. As we sat in our cupboard eating the small portions we could find we couldn't help but hope and dream that one day someone would come and take us from here. We didn't know that the day would come so soon, that our wish was granted.