Teacups and Frogspawn: The Confessions of Petunia Dursley by Herminia

Rating: PG
Genres: Angst, Drama
Relationships: Lily & James
Book: Lily & James, Books 1 - 6
Published: 28/11/2005
Last Updated: 12/12/2005
Status: In Progress

Petunia Dursley may not be as callous and cold-hearted as she first appears. In this fan fic,
she reflects on her sister's life, loves, and premature death at the hands of Lord
Voldemort.




1. Prologue - A Procession of Seasons, Blooming and Wilting
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TEACUPS AND FROGSPAWN

Or, The Confessions of Petunia Dursley

AN EVANS SISTERS Fan Fic

PROLOGUE

The years have come and gone - a procession of seasons, each blooming and wilting in its time.
Every spring, the lilies come up in their many forms: the gaudy tiger lilies splaying their
freckled orange petals, the fragrant Easter lilies, the delicate lilies-of-the-valley like tiny
white wedding bells.

We were aptly named, Lily and I. Sisters, born in the spring - one breathtakingly beautiful,
dizzyingly sweet, the other unremarkable. You do not plant a row of petunias for the frivolity of
it. They are not the flashiest of flowers. They exist for the sake of practicality, and so do I.
They exist to fill the empty spaces where lilies cannot flourish…

* * * * *

She was the baby of the family, the happenstance, or - as my parents called her - `The
Miracle.' I should have loved her; I should have been charmed by her, as everyone else was.
Lily enchanted, I endured.

It was always the same after Lily was born. Family and friends would kneel down before my
perfect sister, fawning over her vibrant green eyes and pouffy red pigtails, while I hovered
awkwardly in the background.

“Oh, Lily!” they would coo. “This must be your big sister - Patty, Peony?”

“—Petunia.”

“Petunia, yes,” they would say distractedly, already forgetting my name and overlooking my
presence. I was but an overgrown weed, doomed to share the same garden plot with a beautiful
blossom. Worst of all, I knew it.

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2. Bearer of Grim Tidings
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CHAPTER ONE

November 1, 1981 dawned clear and crisp over the identical houses of Privet Drive. Frost nipped
the blades of the evenly-mown grass, but frost was not the only remnant of the night that had
passed.

The door to Number Four Privet Drive swung open and a cacophony of bawls and yells spilled into
the street, disrupting the stillness of the morning. A single tawny owl alit from his perch on the
rain gutter and soared away into the receding darkness.

A woman's voice issued from the foyer, though the child's incessant screaming nearly
drowned her out. “Quiet down, Diddy-Dinkums. Mummy will be right back. Mummy won't be but a
moment, Duddy.” The woman emerged from the house backside first, still plying with her wailing
toddler. “See, Mummy will be right-VERNON!”

All up and down what had moments ago been a quiet suburban street, bathrobe-clad residents were
throwing open their doors and stepping out into the morning chill.


A robust, red-faced man with a walrus-mustache appeared in the door way of the fourth house, his
sausage-like fingers still tugging at the zipper of his too-small trousers. He roundly rebuked the
now-silent woman, and the neighbors (now puttering about in their gardens or loitering by their
mailboxes) listened closely, each hoping for an earful of salacious gossip.

“Petunia - what is the meaning of this?! Calling a man out of his bed in the wee hours of the
morning! All I ask from you is a warm breakfast and a clean house-”

But the man stopped shouting abruptly as well.

“Inside,” he rasped, so quietly that tiny old Arabella Figg in Number Seven Wisteria Walk had to
scurry forward, on the pretense of chasing one of her mangy mixed-breed cats, in order to overhear
them.

Dazedly, wordlessly, the woman called Petunia bent low over the front stoop and lifted a
squirming bundle of blankets into her arms. Then, with as much dignity as she could muster, she
stepped over the threshold and into the tidy house that until so recently had been just as
box-shaped and boring as any of the others that lined the sunlit lane.

* * * * *

“Petunia…what is *it* doing here?” the man called Vernon Dursley demanded, his broad
forehead purpling in rage.

“Lily's…he must be Lily's…” The toddler in her arms lay utterly still, its vivid green
eyes wide in bewilderment.

“WON'T!”

A half-eaten bowl of porridge sailed past Petunia Dursley's left ear and hit Vernon squarely
in the face.

“WON'T, WON'T, WON'T!”

Vernon mopped his face clean on the collar of his shirt, cussing angrily under his breath.

“Vernon - there's a letter…” Petunia's voice trailed off; there was something eerily
familiar about the slanting handwriting, but Petunia couldn't seem to place it. With trembling
hands, she eased the letter out of the envelope. Her eyes scarcely moved as she scanned the sheaf
of parchment at fever pitch.

“I don't give a d*mn about any letters,” Vernon Dursley barked as he stormed from the
kitchen. “All I give a d*mn about is that I can make it to work by nine and still have time to
change my suit!”

“Lily's dead. Oh, Vernon. Lily's dead.” Her mind reeled; she found herself reading the
same line over and over again, trying to find a fault with it…some syntactical error that would
render the entire contents of the letter false. “This is her son, Harry…oh! It was never supposed
to come to this! My sister is dead.”

Vernon tramped back into the kitchen wearing a porridge-free shirt and suit coat. “I don't
care if he is your sister's son - I just want you to make sure he's gone when I get
back!”

* * * * *

What transpired on that fateful day did not come as a complete shock for our Petunia. Rather it
was the logical ending to what could best be viewed as a series of unfortunate affairs. If you will
recall the less-than-happy beginning of our poignant tale, you will remember that we endeavored to
tell the story of a cheerless girl who grew into the most pitiable of beings.

It follows - quite understandably, I might add - that our Petunia's troubles did not end
there, nor indeed did this deep-seated resentment sprout from any one instance. In all
truthfulness, much remains to be told. As the storyteller, my only design is to let the vines of
remembrance continue to untangle themselves so that you might grow in understanding.

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