Chapter Number: 05
Chapter Name: Vacation
Vernon Dursley was seemingly staring out the window, when he saw his nephew get into a shiny, newish looking BMW. His nephew, was, of course, Harry Potter, the boy who lived. Most witches in his age group (and several outside of it as well) had taken a shine to this fine specimen of a wizard.
"Look at them, Petunia. Them and their kind!" Vernon grumphed. "I bet my set of 2000 drill bits that they never did an honest day's work in their lives." He turned around to look at his wife. She realised she was supposed to do something, and gave an emphatic nod to express her similar opinion. Vernon continued on. "I say...Hawaii. Sun, surf and the sand. Days spent relaxing, nights filled with fun. This is what we love. You work hard, you pour your blood and sweat into your work and you get rewarded."
As a director the only hard work he'd ever done was on the day his secretary was out sick, and he'd had to make his own coffee. Aunt Petunia, in the meantime, had gone to the kitchen to prepare their dinner. She answered Vernon's question of "What's for dinner, sweet pea?", "Steak and kidney pie" over her shoulder.
The drive to the airport the following morning was a quick and uneventful one. They had borrowed a stretch limo taxi to take them there, partly so their luggage could fit in, and partly because Dudley couldn't squeeze into anything smaller.
They arrived two hours before boarding was scheduled to commence, and to Petunia's delight, they visited all the duty free shops, but to her dismay, didn't buy anything..
Once on board the plane, they found Dudley was quite a bit larger than the standard First/Business class seat. As the seats were arranged in groups of four, Dudley occupied two, and his parents had one each. During the seating adjustments, Dudley, being the hormonal teenage boy that he was, noticed how nice the stewardesses all were, and their trim, pert and generally pretty bodies.
After cluing in on the little button on the control panel on his armrest, he kept asking them for small items, just so he could feast his eyes on the women, as they approached, leant over him to make sure he was happy, and left. After noticing his piggy eyes following their every movement, the stewardesses had had enough.
On the eighth call, the young ladies called Martha in. Martha was the head of all the stewardesses, the one who kept things running smoothly in the background.
She was 65 years old-and *very* experienced. She also had a body that could almost, but not quite, rival Dudley's body mass.
"The girls were commenting on the fine young man up in First class, and I thought I'd take a gander meself." she said, smiling. "What would ye like, m'dear?" she leered at him, fluttering her eyelashes.
"Uughh.." Dudley whimpered
"Come on, tell Martha, darling." Martha winked. "You don't need to be shy, y'know."
Dudley managed to form some words, but they were still a little squeaky. "W-w-which way is the b-b-bathroom?" he whispered.
Martha's face fell. "Oh." she said, "Is that all you wanted? The bathroom's that way." she pointed to the back of the cabin. Then, she politely excused herself and made her way back to the little room where she managed the food, drinks, and customer relations. On the way back, she was heard muttering "And there I was, thinking he wanted some more food and drink..."
After that particularly scarring experience, Dudley did not dare call on the services of the flight attendants again, in fear of the return of Martha. However, in the stewardesses' cabin they broke out the party food and opened one of the bottles of champagne reserved for the First Class passengers. At the end of the flight, Martha was found drunk in her cabin, when there was a *small* dispute between two large ladies, a bag of duty-free perfumes, and a large box of Belgian chocolates. Dudley, however, was perfectly sober. A little shaken, but sober. His parents were surprised at his expression, having had a lovely flight with nice food, champagne, chocolate and a lovely romantic movie.
The plane was delayed, arriving at Honolulu three hours behind schedule-mostly because of weather problems, although there were some rumors about the plane being overloaded.
The Dursleys were as mad as hell, as they had hoped to sleep it off. It seemed as though they were cursed-when they reached their hotel, their room had been given away to another group, as they didn't show up at the expected time. Although the concierge had apologized profusely, he couldn't very well kick the poor people out of their room, and thus, the Dursleys had to take another room for the night. They were definitely not pleased with the new room, either. It had two ("Only two?!?" Dudley had complained) double beds, only one small window, and about the only upside to the room was that it came free, complements of the Management. Since the room was pretty small, and they had virtually nowhere else to go, the Dursleys decided a trip to the beach was in order.
Halfway through the day, Dudley met a young woman (he thought she was around 16, or 18) by the name of Serena Blake. He immediately latched onto her, trying to be a ladies' man. He bought her whatever she wanted, whenever she wanted. Serena was very "impressed" with the way Dudley so wisely spent his money. For the next five days, people staying at the same resort would wonder what the girl saw in him, since she was a shapley, lithe, blonde, tanned woman, who looked as though she'd stepped straight out of Baywatch. Right down to the bright red bathers. Some slightly more worldly (and cynical) folk would have said "money", others who were more romantically inclined thought that the pair were so cute.
On the Sixth day, though, God created man. or rather, two men, who were quite underhanded in their ways, which included conning people out of money. Serena was one of the few they recruited to get a little bit more cash on the side than what their current car "minding" job did. And so, after Serena met with the two shifty characters, she went over to Dudley's room, and found him sitting on the sofa.
"Hello, Dudley.You're looking fine this morning." she said in a low voice
"Oh. Hi." Dudley replied dejectedly, staring out the window
"What's the matter, my sweet?" Serena asked, putting one hand on his shoulder.
"Oh. My parents have stopped giving me money." Dudley said, showing his empty wallet to her.
"Oh, Dudley! What will we do?" Serena sobbed, wrappering herself around him, and giving Dudley a hug.
"You mean, what will I do. I'm the one with no money and no lunch." Dudley said in a monotone.
"Come with me, Dudleykins, and I'll take you out for a ride. After we do lunch, we can stop by that motel on the beach, and we'll have some special fun...you want to have fun, don't you?", she said, batting her eyelashes. Serena wrapped her arms around Dudley's thick neck once more, and started to move her fingers in small circles on his shoulder. Dudley couldn't resist temptation, and jumped off the sofa.
He barged into his parents' room-luckily, they weren't in there. He opened the drawer that he had seen his mother deposit the money in.
"Wow..." he breathed in reverently as he saw the piles of green notes, just waiting to be taken. He heard a noise coming from the ensuite.
"Oh, sh-" he exclaimed softly, and grabbed a few bundles of notes." Then, he "tiptoed" out to his room, where Serena was waiting.
"Quick!" he said, "my parents are coming!" Dudley pulled Serena out of the room, and together they went downstairs to the foyer.
On arrival, he flicked through the bundles of notes, and roughly estimated that he had about $3000 US. Serena looked around hurriedly.
"Here come your parents, I've got to go." she said, and quickly joined a group of passing tourists. So, Dudley was left alone in the middle of the foyer, next to a (fake) palm tree, clutching a helluva lot of money. He whimpered, and looked for somewhere to go. Then, he had a bright idea. He, too, would join a group of passing tourists and pretend to be one of them as he snuck out of the hotel. Once out the door, he wondered what to do next. He obviously couldn't go back in, and he had no idea where to find Serena. Then it hit him. Well, actually, it pulled him off the sidewalk and stuffed him in a car. Dudley looked at his new surroundings in terror.
"Where am I?" he whimpered, looking at the two muscular, black-suited men sitting on either side of him. He instinctively wanted to get out, even though the car was expensively furnished, in good nick, and had a bottle of champagne thoughtfully iced. Then, the blonde (which Dudley didn't previously notice) who was sitting in the front seat turned around. It was Serena.
As soon as he saw her, Dudley's fears were soothed, and he began to calm down.
"Did you bring the money, Dudley?" asked Serena in a husky voice.
"Oh, yes." he said, trying to sound sexy, but actually sounding rather like a five year old.
"Can we see it, then?" she said, smiling.
"Anything for you, my sweet." he said, as he opened his meaty fist and showed her the wad of money. Then, he deposited the money into her outstretched hand.
"So. Are we gonna go to the motel now?" he asked, after a few moments of silence, when she was counting out the cash.
"Yes. Of course we're going to the motel." Serena smiled. At first, Dudley thought she was looking at him. Then he realized her eyes weren't exactly focused, and that he had two *men* sitting on either side of him.
"However, it'll be with these two guys, Dudley. I'm sorry." she smiled. "We had a nice time together, and you're a sweet guy, but these two promised me a good time." Serena gave Dudley another regretful smile.
"Hey! But you promised!" an angry Dudley tried to jump out of his seat and grab Serena, but the two men restrained him. They gave him one good right hook to the chin, and he was out like a shot bulb.
One of the men grunted and asked Serena "How much is there?"
She grinned and replied, "Three, three and a half. Not bad. Last week it took us a month to get this much."
"Yeah."
"So do you two want your share now, or in the morning?" asked the girl, hinting that maybe they should spend the night doing something other than sleeping
"Split the money here and now, then we go back to our places. You know the rules-no contact for at least three days before the next JOB." Said the taller one, obviously the leader of the group, who regularly preyed on tourists.
When Dudley woke up, he was in the Honolulu General Hospital and it was the day before they were due to leave. Both Vernon and Petunia were furious at finding him in an alleyway in the back streets of Honolulu, and would not stop scolding him. But then, Dudley did what he did best. He started whining about how his parents didn't appreciate him enough, didn't love him enough, and what's more, didn't give him enough money. By the time he was finished, both parents were apologizing and coddling him once again.
Whether or not it was fortunate that the Dursleys had just enough money to get to the airport after they paid the hospital and hotel bills, the Dursleys didn't leave their streak of bad luck behind when they left the USA. Not only did they lose their luggage, they also managed to board the wrong plane (which was bound for Siberia). And then, arriving home after spending two days in subzero temperature, they found their house covered in graffiti, though, by some miracle, not burglarized.
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Constructive Reviews are really Welcome.
PS: Thanks Nate for the beta :)