If you recognize it, surprise, I don't own it

In the town of Little Whinging, there was an appreciation for the norm. Husbands would go to work their 8 hour days, children would be sent to school, and mothers would take care of the home. All to reconvene at the dinner table, spread the stories of the day to one another, and go to bed dreaming of lives not their own.

Harry Potter did not fit into the norm.

At least, he didn't think he did, as he did the garden the first day of his first weekend of pre education. His first week with people outside his home was very eye opening in seeing what gets other kids into trouble, and how it seemed those punishments didn't match the crime. Malcom, one of the boys in the class, was sent to the time-out corner a lot, and while each time he would complain about it, he still went over 3-4 times a day.

Harry didn't want to seem selfish, but he couldn't help but to compare the corner of the classroom to his bedroom, tiny hole in the wall it is and want to chuckle every time the boy whined. He understood punishment very well at his 5 years of age, and knew why no time in the corner would work.

He remembered the first time a couple months ago his aunt and uncle locked him in his room, after he had gotten tired and fallen on one of Aunt Petunia's rose bushes. He was locked in with tweezers, a washcloth and a bottle of rubbing alcohol, and was told to take out each thorn while thinking about what he should have done better.

It had taken until dinnertime, but they had kept him in there, shouting that no dinner was his punishment for destroying the rose bush. And so his young mind was left to figure out the lesson himself, and he thought he did a bang up job, since he has been very careful around the bushes the next day. When his aunt came out that day, she didn't even say anything mean, she just asked if he had learned his lesson, and once he nodded had him clean up before helping cook dinner.

The difference between him and Malcom is that he took the time to learn the lesson, while Malcom explained it himself, he was too distracted by all the class activity behind him. Harry wasn't too sure he could do so either, sure he was gardening and thinking, but he doubted he'd get himself to focus on any one thing while doing nothing.

As the boy finished up with cleaning up the garden and started up the lawnmower, he realized he didn't fit into the norm, not in the way we discussed earlier, but that in the way of he'd not fit in the same way Malcom was able to make friends with almost everyone he seemed to talk to. He was different, and better for it.

Harry was enjoying the first day back at school, the teacher had started having them write their names. Since he had just learned his childhood nickname of boy wasn't his name, he felt he had a lot to learn just from today's class. Unfortunately for him, not everyone in the class was as excited for class, and were happy to play with the toys the teacher kept for those students.

It wasn't exactly what Malcom described sitting in the corner was like, in that he still had reason to focus on what the teacher was saying, but all the noise from the other children was getting to him. In his cupboard he had time and silence to think over what he was being taught, but here it seemed impossible to focus why he had to capitalize just the first letters. He had already asked the teacher and didn't want to bother asking why again, but it was really getting to him.

Harry could feel himself starting to tear up in frustration, and a weird little tingle in his back that kept on getting worse. The last time he felt it was when Aunt Petunia had cut his hair so awfully, and when he woke the next day with his hair all back he thought it was a nightmare, until he saw his aunt's reaction and knew something happened. Still focused on his frustration with class, he didn't hear the teacher come up next to his desk.

"Mr. Potter, do you need any help?" Startled out of his continuing downward thoughts, Harry looked up at the teacher, and before he could tell himself it was better to figure it out himself, he had already started.

"No sir, sorry, I'm just not used to I guess learning with all my classmates here. It's very distracting and I can't remember why it's just the first two letters that get capitalized when I know I just asked you." Harry felt like crying as he realized how sad he sounded to his own ears, knowing such a thing would've put him in his own time out corner at home.

The teacher, just one person who didn't want to see their student in such distress, proceeded to change the course of history.

"Harry, I want you to breathe with me quick, okay? Just like me, one in, two out, one in, two... There we go, it's okay to feel frustrated, it's just another chance to learn. When you feel that way again I want you to try doing that same thing we just did with the breathing. You have to be calm to think best, and getting upset just slows you down. Right?"

Looking into his teacher's eyes, after having to relearn to breathe from this man, he could only agree. "Right."

With a smile the teacher spoke again, "You'll get it, and I'm here if you need any help. Let me go calm down some of your classmates and I can show you why names get capitalized, you can't really tell when you're just writing the name itself."

As the teacher went to quiet the other students, Harry was left, to make up his own mind from what his teacher had taught him. A way to focus on the thoughts as he was feeling upset or angry, just focus on what's the problem and what he can do.

Never did he think about that tingle and what it could have meant. As the teacher got infront of the quieter ones, and explained how in a sentence, names were capitalized to show they were important, they'd understand as they learned to read more, and the teacher gave Harry a look to make sure he had understood, and as fate unwove, from what was supposed to be just another case of accidental magic and the start of his insolation at school, became a bright student, learning to take on the world.

And so history, and fate, changed.

Harry Potter, at five years old, did not just go to school and then tell his story to his family, as was the norm for children in Little Whinging. Instead he would go to school, and then go take care of the house he lived in, with hard working chores, ones his cousin never did, get his dinner as reward for a day well done, then go to his tiny room to think, alone and by himself in his only place in the world. He acted as a child, worked as hard as the mothers, and spent as much time learning as the men.

Harry Potter was very, very outside the norm, and in the world he would find himself in, he'd learn to appreciate that.

A.N. Hello!

So I'll admit, I think I actually have some ideas for this one, which is wild for me, but also I'll say right now I'm sorry for making a 5 year old sound 35, its how I write and narrate, and idk if I can jump totally into 5 yr old talk. I have to a bit more next chapter but yeah, Harry's thoughts are going to sound complex, but thats just me putting words his kid brain wouldnt have been able to if it was a autobio. Onto the Harry of this fic, or in my mind canon until canon starts, background Harry, that we only know so well after the fact.

He doesn't know it but he's been on survivor mode since day one consciousness, and I refuse to believe that he would've lost it as he did right in the books. It wasn't abuse the family did to him, otherwise he wouldn't have forgiven them at ALL in canon, but in his eyes at young age, as an orphan, he just was going to have a harder life. Will he get jealous of Dudley and his treatment compared to Harry's, yes. And in his eyes the only thing he should do is go into the cupboard, think through your emotions, and come out when you think you have an answer. That's what the Dursley's taught him, what he taught himself, and it'll take a whole 7 years to get to a healthy point, if he wasn't going to be tossed into deadly situations.

He will still feel emotions, I don't think even the best beaten horses turn into robots, and since he doesn't know any better, he'll instead be struggling trying to learn to let any emotions in when he "knows" the effectiveness of apathy. This will be like a child soldier raised Harry, but in a way I think will naturally line up with canon first year, 1-2 chapters away. Harry will struggle with a lot, as he's been running on that instictual thought only mindset for so long, and dependency other than himself is going to be worn out by the time he reaches 11.

Until Next Time,

TRHPRP