Chapter 2
Anger and Distance
That sound again! Harry clenched his teeth grinding them in irritation. His cousin, Dudley had acquired a girlfriend. She was an exact copy of Harry's Aunt Petunia down to the horsey face and a fawning attitude toward his bulky and overbearing cousin. Her constant braying laugh caught on Harry's nerves like nails on a chalk board.
It had been days of listening to her say, "Of course you're right, Duddy", or "They deserved to be beaten, Duddsy." Apparently these phrases were the only things she knew how to say, since that was all he had ever heard come from her mouth.
He had never actually met her because the family had never introduced him. When she came to number four Privet Drive, Harry was forcibly shoved into his upstairs room for the duration of her stay. He had heard them tell her that his room was just a storage area for Dudley's massive collections of toys and the noises inside from Hedwig were old electronic games whose batteries hadn't died yet. Harry smirked with that outlandish lie, but being forced to stay inside his room for longer and longer hours tolled on the boy. But he was both bored and grateful not to be outside in the searing heat to do the gardening. At least it wasn't the cupboard! Mr. Dursley tried to push Harry underneath the stairs but he didn't fit! He had definitely shot up over the summer.
The Dursley's household ran efficiently from their standpoint. Harry knew his position as cook and maid was demeaning, but years of forced labor and strong-arming the boy had beaten him down and he performed these services without question. Days and years would pass before Harry realized this wasn't a normal family. Other families actually showed love to each other; even nephews who weren't meant to be loved. Vernon Dursely had pounded that concept into Harry's brain early on. He was pounded in the literal and figurative manner as well. The good for nothing boy was worthless Harry had been told. Only the most gracious people would endure company of such a shiftless and lazy specimen of life. Harry had held these concepts tightly within knowing that somehow, even though friends and mentors had indicated these were vicious lies, that he truly didn't deserve love. The day he received his letter he knew that there was something better and greater than this life for him.
His new life as a wizard and knowing what he was had allowed him to endure what was normally harsh conditions at his relatives' home. He cherished his homework in a way that would have stunned Professor Snape. He would portion out his readings in History of Magic with such delight that even Hermione would be shocked.
Every summer he loved to sneak out his broom and use the broom servicing kit she had given him one year for his birthday. His broom had been definitely badly treated down in the dungeon where the previous Headmaster, Miss Umbridge, had stolen it away from him. This year, though, Harry didn't feel like any of it. He would stare at his opened book and re-read the first paragraph over and over until giving up in disgust.
All Harry's thoughts eventully led back to that night and seeing the only father figure he'd ever known fall soundlessly through a veil and out of his life. The loss of Sirius tortured him. The older man was more than a friend and Godfather; he was his connection to his family.
Sirius had happily shared stories of his mother and father that made them come alive to him in a way he had never imagined. Stories of the Mauraders and of Lily as a young girl delighted him. He could picture them clearly and perfectly in his mind. They loved and cared for him. Dreams of his parents holding him and playing with him were laughingly detailed by the man so that Harry could manage to believe it. If he had seen it then it must be true! He was loved! Harry was able with his Godfather's help, to crush that kernel of self-loathing and doubt that had been bred at the Dursley's. However, with the loss of Sirius, the picture of love evaporated into thin air. He was caught listlessly drifting without an anchor. Harry knew that his death was his fault.
Harry Potter had cried all he could cry. Eyes clear and painfully dry, he would endure the day of drudgery with the Dursleys before trudging upstairs to relive over and over that horrible night in his dreams. June came and went. July arrived with stifling heat that Harry suffered upstairs with cobbled together fans and cracked windows. He had to sleep on top of the covers and be glad of the top broken window that caught a breath of air. With the broken window he would have frozen to death in the winter, but luckily he had never lived there during those months.
Hedwig reveled in the freedom of flying in and out of the upper window at night. The boy had to be careful that his uncle caught no wind of Hedwig's nightly escapades, or he would be locked up tight to swelter in the airless room. Vernon Dursley was deathly afraid that the neighbors would see something unusual. Therefore, Harry had been instructed to keep the bird locked up. He was pushing his chances, but Hedwig couldn't survive on the little bits of leftover food Harry could barely manage to give her from his own meager meals. One thing Harry loved was his owl, and Hedwig unconditionally loved him. She was the one thing he would dare to bring Mr. Dursley's wrath over.
The Order still checked on him, so his living had improved somewhat. It wasn't perfect, but the family generally left him alone. Harry always had to be sure not to anger Mr. Dursley, however. His temper had caused more than one black eye over the years.
If the members of the DA could see the boy now, they wouldn't have recognized him. A few years ago, subtle jabs and pushing Dudley's buttons kept him sane. He could laugh and joke with Hermione and Ron about the whole farce of his `family' armed with the knowledge that soon he would be out of here and rid of them forever. Harry used to endure the summers with the Dursley's knowing Hogwarts and his friends were only a few days away. Sirius was reachable by letter and Ron or Hermione would send something funny to keep him going. Now Harry felt he didn't deserve any better.
Ron had sent several owls that thankfully had been missed by his uncle. Harry had stared at them unopened. It was too much work to deal with Ron. The letters piled up on the dresser unanswered until Harry couldn't stand to look at them. He shoved them into a drawer but would still wait anxiously for the next one to arrive. The letters could have been horrible attacks by his friend's family yelling at him for letting Ron and Ginny be so terribly hurt. They might have been telling him he was no longer welcome to the Burrow and that he could never be with his friends again. He couldn't muster up the courage to find out.
One day his anxiousness, worry and lack of sleep had pushed him to the breaking point. He had received nine letters from Ron and nothing from Hermione. It was July 31st and his birthday and he hadn't received anything for eleven days from anyone. It was proof. They were hate letters and both Ron and Hermione didn't want to see him again. He could almost understand Ron forgetting. He was just a bloke, and such things as birthdays sometimes didn't stick. Hermione, however lived for such moments. She really was angry with him. It sent his heart plummeting. Harry had always looked to his best friend as his resource for calm joy and approval. Not when she was yelling at him for something, of course, but usually, he could turn to her and feel understood. She was different from Ron in a way Harry didn't quite have a handle on. Their relationship had grown over the years to become something singular.
Harry got mad. He couldn't help it. They were abandoning him just like all the others! He was furious! The sounds of furniture breaking and glass shattering were hard to explain by the Dursley's to Dudley's girlfriend, but she wasn't terribly smart so the lie about squirrels in the attic had sufficed.
When Vernon had finished berating Harry, the boy, locked in his room, nursed his wrenched shoulder and battered face with almost satisfaction. Harry was still radiating anger at himself and his friends. Without a thought, Harry spelled a howler off to the Burrow to finally stop the letters. He didn't care if the Ministry walked in at that moment and snapped his wand. Maybe now Ron will leave him alone, he thought tiredly before pulling the threadbare sheet over his body and falling into dreamless sleep.
When Harry awoke the next morning Fawkes was perched on his bedside table watching the boy sleep. The dark haired boy eyed the bird warily then rolled over to ignore him in obvious insult. The phoenix had brought a letter from Headmaster Dumbledore in his claws. The bird dropped it onto the bed trilling unsurely at the boy who had always been the older wizard's defender. Harry curled up tighter into a ball and squeezed his eyelids shut. Fawkes hopped over the broken bed frame and perched on Harry's sore shoulder. Scarlet head feathers rubbed softly against his arm releasing a feeling of well-being, peace and comfort. His arm stopped aching and Harry did feel better. Chirping lightly, Fawkes landed next to Harry's face and looked him in the eye very closely.
"Thank you, Fawkes." Harry whispered.
The bird graciously nodded before flying out the window in a burst of rainbow colors.
Thumping feet on the stairs outside his door told Harry his Uncle was furious about something. It was usually something Harry did or didn't do that set the man off. Sometimes for no reason what so ever the overly angry man would explode at his nephew. For the first time in months Harry felt good. For the first time in a long time Harry felt like fighting back. All the accumulated aches and pains of boxed ears or being shoved against the wall were now gone. His head seemed unclouded and he was still very, very angry.
The door burst open as Mr. Dursley came in yelling about breakfast and ungrateful leeches.
"Get up, you lazy oaf! Do you think you deserve a lie-in or something?" The man shoved at the bed that had been busted by Dudley's heavy frame, knocking the precariously put back together bed off its legs. Harry landed in a heap on the other side of the bed knocking his head against the old scarred side table.
"Hey!" Harry angrily scrambled back upright holding the back of his head gingerly.
"What do you think you are, get your arse up!" Dursley yelled pulling sheets off the boy's fallen frame.
"Get yourself downstairs. Your Aunt Petunia has been waiting for five whole minutes for you!" The older man's eyes gleamed as he approached the boy menacingly with his beefy fist raised. The he struck. The pain hit roughly against Harry's face sending stars skittering across his vision.
"NO!" Harry yelled and he instinctively threw back his own punch before the man could see what was coming. Mr. Dursley's beefy body knocked hard against the wall and he gave a `whoosh' as his breath pushed out in pain and surprise. Harry had never responded before. Mr. Dursley had always been able to rough up the boy with little reaction. The child had been too scared to try to defend himself when he was younger. Vernon didn't like this new change in his favorite punching bag.
The man's face closed harshly into an even uglier expression. He pushed back off the wall and launched himself toward the boy.
Harry stood his ground. He pulled himself at his full height, locked both his legs apart front and back and prepared to defend himself. Vernon Dursley looked slightly startled but didn't stop even when he saw the determination and steely ferocity in his nephew's eyes. Harry didn't stop to think about using Magic. He didn't have his wand, anyway. The only response his body knew was to physically throw everything he had at the attacker. With a yell, Harry shoved his shoulder into the coming fist and threw his own sharply connecting right hook. The surprised man fell onto the ground in pain and disbelief clutching his jaw. Harry stood over him in anger and shook slightly with the strength of his angry emotions.
"Never hit me again!" Harry yelled as the room shuddered magicly.
Harry's uncle's eyes widened to take in the now tall and forbidding figure. Harry looked more like an angry man than a cowering boy. Vernon scrambled up throwing himself at the door. Rattling down the stairs, Mr. Dursley muttered about ungrateful wretches under his breath. In reality, he was afraid. They had to get out of here.
The tousled-haired boy stood shakily, pale and shivering even in the heat of the upstairs room. He didn't know he had been holding his breath until it whooshed out involuntarily. It was over. Harry understood that now. He didn't feel good or bad about it, just resigned. He had lost the only protection he had had against Voldemort because he couldn't keep his temper in check. He had also lot his only home. Dumbledore would be so disappointed in him. The thought of the kind man turning away from him in anger sent Harry spiraling in dismay.
"Damn."
He wasn't unhappy with the thought of leaving, but he didn't know where he could go. The burrow was out. So was Hermione's. That thought made him sigh.
He was still shaking from the adrenaline rush. He had stood up for himself, finally. He remembered the glance of fear in his uncle's eyes. That look directed at him made him feel low and dirty. He didn't want to see such things in the eyes of his relatives; even after all that had happened he only wanted them to love him. At this stage, Harry had to admit that he knew that wasn't going to happen. He was never going to have a family that cared for him. Harry dropped himself down onto the tilted bed and placed his face wearily into his hands.
Hours passes and shadows fell across the disheveled room. Harry had crawled back onto the bed after pushing it off its frame and settling in onto the floor. He fingered the letters he had pulled out of the drawer and had laid them out in front of him in sequential order. Fear of rejection, fear of being hit, fear of loss; all had been controlling him since that day at the Ministry. Harry's heart thudded in his chest and he forced himself to pick up and open the letters one by one.
Each letter was heart-wrenching for Harry. They were all in Ron's handwriting asking about him and wanting him to spend the summer at the Burrow. The letters in succession became angrier at his lack of response. If Harry had just answered the letters to begin with he would have been with his friends a month ago. Ron spoke little of his injury, but Harry could read in the red head's writing that his thoughts were becoming clearer and more his old self. Ginny was better and flying Quidditch with her brothers as well. By the time Harry read the last letter he wanted to kick himself. After that scathing Howler he sent Ron, there was no way his friend would forgive him.
A clattering in the front yard caught his attention. Looking out the broken window, he saw his Aunt, Uncle and Cousin Dudley throwing their baggage into the family car. It was a conservative indiscriminate colored car that Mr. Dursley was sure stated taste and quality. Harry had always hated that car. It always smelled of cheese and Dudley's sweaty uniforms; both of which Dudley often left in the back seat on Harry's side. Uncle Vernon was swearing at the blond overweight boy and grappling the car door as if to force the car into submission. Dudley looked very subdued and wide-eyed. The slowly blooming black eye on his face made Harry wince in sympathy. Apparently his angry uncle had found a new subject on which to vent his frustrations.
Harry's uncle followed his son's eyes and looked up to see his nephew dispassionately watching their departure.
"You will be in school when we get back from our vacation. Well, maybe you will, I have no idea how you will get there!" he grinned evilly liking the idea of the boy stranded without anyone to help.
Mrs. Dursley looked alarmed and confused by the week-early rush to their vacation resort. Vernon hadn't acted this rashly since the day Harry's acceptance letter came in floods of envelopes carried by those dirty owl things.
"Don't bother to come home next summer! The locks will be changed!" The man's voice hissed loudly enough for Harry to hear but low enough the neighbor's wouldn't notice.
The metallic doors slammed pointedly and the car squealed out of the drive leaving black marks that made Mrs. Dursley squeal with dismay. Harry could see but not hear the man berating his wife and son all the way down the drive and into the street and out of his life.
He paused for a moment then padded in his socks down the stairs, out side and onto the brick patio. The breeze was slight, but cool. He settled down into the reclining deck chair he had never been allowed on before and sighed. This was nice. No one to think about and three weeks before term, Harry thought. He was relieved. He just had to get to Hogwarts in a month. He'll never have to see the Dursley's again. He didn't know where he'd go or what he'd do, but for now things were decided beyond his control. His brain fogged again and he slipped softly into a light doze rather that stopping and examining his real feelings.
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