Nine years.
To some it might seem like a long time. To others that amount of time might just pass in a blink of an eye. But to a resident of Number Four, Privet Drive in a town called Little Whinging, in the county area of Surrey; nine years was the amount of time he'd been living with his Aunt and Uncle. This resident was currently awake and staring out of his second floor bedroom window and was seemingly in a rather pensive mood. The resident was a boy seemingly in the very early stages of his adolescence; his shoulders was just beginning to grow wider, and it was just the previous year that he had discovered a new lump on his throat, which the library books had called his 'Adam's Apple', he had messy black hair that was trimmed on occasion but was allowed to grow long at the back till it reached his lower neck, dazzling emerald green eyes shone out of his thin face, and he had an overall slender appearance, and though you could not see it now, (due to the fact that he was curled up on the bare desk pushed in front of the window sill) he stood at a respectable five foot one inch. But the most peculiar thing about our resident teenager was a scar in the form of a lightning bolt that loomed out of his forehead, just over his left eye.
Harry James Potter did not know how he got that scar.
If he was to believe his Aunt Petunia Dursley and Uncle Vernon Dursley then he had gotten it from the car crash that had claimed the lives of both his parents, Lily and James Potter. Harry had initially been skeptical of this claim; he could not see how the sudden deceleration of car and subsequent injuries and death could cause a scar in that shape and not leave any other sort of mark. So a visit to the local library and the school library later, and Harry knew that his Aunt and Uncle were lying through their teeth.
But then his Aunt and Uncle were practiced liars, it was of course the only way they could maintain that Harry was just a normal boy with a penchant for dark clothing. Uncle Vernon was the director of a firm called Grunnings, which made drills. He was a big, beefy man with hardly any neck, although he did have a very large moustache. Aunt Petunia was thin and blonde and had nearly twice the usual amount of neck, which came in very useful as she spent so much of her time craning over garden fences, spying on the neighbors. The Dursleys also had a son called Dudley and in their opinion there was no finer boy anywhere, and Harry stood next to him like night against day. This was due to the fact that Dudley had blonde hair and seemed a miniature version of his father.
The sun was just beginning to creep over the horizon, and it caused the dew that had accumulated during the night to emit yellow shining sparkles from each of the perfectly manicured lawns, in front of each of the perfectly identical houses. Already one could hear the cars beginning to rumble in the distance as those who had to get to work early drove through the town.
Harry swiveled on the desk he was sitting on, and flung himself nimbly and landed with his feet on the floor and stretched luxuriantly, deciding it was time to get ready for the day. He surveyed his room quickly to check that there was no mess about it. It would not do to give his Aunt impetus to decide that he needed to go back to his 'other' bedroom, because he could not keep this one in a perfectly normal shape. This 'other' bedroom was the cupboard under the stairs, and it had been his until he figured out a way to blackmail his Aunt and Uncle into giving him Dudley's second bedroom (which was actually just used for storing his broken toys). He had been seven years old at the time and all it had taken was nicking a fifty pound note and the small Instamatic camera off one of the substitute teachers at the local Primary he and Dudley attended. Harry had photographed his own body after one of Dudley's beatings after school and of course the cupboard under the stairs itself; hiding a set of copies in the tool shed, he had then threatened his Aunt and Uncle to either show them to a teacher or even better…mail it to the Surrey Advertiser newspaper; effectively ruining the perfect reputation the Dursley's tried to maintain.
He walked over to his dresser and pulled out a black sleeveless shirt with a cool looking dragon on the front and black jeans and headed out of his room to the upstairs bathroom. In the shower, Harry again observed the changes he had begun notice in his body, the most surprising of which was the hair that was slowly beginning to grow between his legs. He experienced a weird thrill of satisfaction at that moment…
I'm beginning to become a man.
After toweling off and getting dressed, he headed back into his room to put on his thick-soled black leather boots (which were a gift from a good friend) and headed down the stairs. Harry's feet thudded satisfyingly on the carpeted stairs, and another thrill of satisfaction passed through him…it's as if I'm above that horrible part in my life and stepping on it like dirt, he thought.
Harry walked into the kitchen on the right, and on the table top he found all the ingredients for the breakfast. Aunt Petunia always set them out in the evening just before bed, so that he could just come down the stairs and start cooking. It was one of the compromises that Harry had agreed to when the Dursley's asked him to do chores after he had blackmailed them; before then he'd been a virtual slave to them; he would do breakfast and the evening meal, and make sure the front lawn was in good shape, and that was it.
Today, Harry was whipping up some French toast, served with bacon, and a side of a fruit salad. He'd come to enjoy preparing food…it was oddly relaxing. He was now idly mumbling a rock song as he put out single portions onto his own plate and quickly devoured the meal, and downing a glass of orange juice. He quickly washed the cutlery that he had used and then organized the breakfast setting in that perfect manner that his Aunt wanted.
Honestly, if the Dursely's were any more normal…they'd be abnormal, he thought sarcastically.
Harry glanced at his digital watch on his wrist.
"Shit! I'm going to be late," he mumbled. He rushed out of the kitchen and grabbed a single key from the key rack pinned on the wall and hurried out of the front door, locking it behind him.
It's going to be a sunny Saturday, he thought, as he walked down Privet Drive at a brisk pace.
It took fifteen minutes of walking to reach Little Whinging's only shopping mall.
"Hey the', Harry," greeted the private security guard in his green uniform from his little podium next to the main entrance of the mall.
"Hey, Eric," said Harry kindly. "Everything well?"
"Yeah, nuttin's wrong, tha'll bother ye," smiled Eric, he reached his hand out of sight on his little podium and the electric doors opened. The mall would not officially open for another hour. "In ya go."
"Thanks," waved Harry and headed into the mall. He was quite relieved that someone had decided to switch the air-conditioners on a little earlier than normal, as he wiped some sweat off his brow. He walked in the silent corridor with bright window displays from various shops around him. There was the clothing store where most of his clothes came from…there was a pet shop…a health shop…a pharmacy…and on the list went. And finally, he arrived at his destination…
A bright red flashing neon sign marked the shop called 'THE FANTASY EMPORIUM' In the window display was all sorts of posters featuring dragons, tall and busty she-elfs, roguish looking dwarfs, dashing knights in shining armor…all were renderings done from the Dungeons and Dragons role-playing phenomenon. But this was not the only thing that the shop sold…also in the display were the latest computer games, and most prominent among these was a large display, advertising 'DOOM'; a game which Harry loved playing as he imagined each demon wearing a Dudley face, as he happily blasted away with a shotgun.
The doors of this shop were already open and Harry hurried into it.
"Harry! There you are, you're almost late, and we've got a ton of stuff that needs unpacking."
The owner of this voice, who was incidentally also the owner of the shop itself, was standing behind the till counter near the door of the shop. He was a young man in his late twenties, with a tall strong build. He had slick black hair like Harry's own, but it was dyed to this color. The young man was wearing a black long sleeved shirt and black pants and both his ears were pierced with studs.
"Sorry, Daniel, lost track of time while I was cooking," replied Harry.
"Hummphh," snorted Daniel, "what will the Dursley's do when you leave them behind I wonder…starve?" He asked with a scathing grin.
"I suppose," shrugged Harry.
"I don't see why you just drop the cooking altogether Harry," said Daniel, "you've got them on a leash, they can't do a thing to you if you say no."
"I like it," said Harry nonchalantly. "And using the blackmail to get myself out of the house will not work. I'm not going to an Orphanage."
"Well, it still seems like the lesser of two evils," said Daniel with a frown. "Those relatives of yours must be made to pay for what they did to you." Harry had, of course, shared his home life with Daniel… as it was the only way to get him to be sympathetic and allow him to work in the shop, despite the fact that it was technically illegal for Daniel to employ Harry. As a result there was no mention of Harry in the books, and Daniel did not pay Harry in money, but rather in possessions…the clothes Harry wore, the watch, the good school books, and the contact lenses for Harry's short sightedness and so on. Daniel had also taught Harry a great deal.
Sometimes he would pick a Fantasy novel from the shelf in the shop and told Harry to read it and then Daniel would ask pointed questions about the morals and choices the characters had in the book. The most common question was: What would you do Harry, if you were in that situation? And why? It sometimes made Harry think that Daniel had studied philosophy at whatever Uni he had gone to, but he never elaborated much on his past.
Daniel had also had enough of Harry being late when Dudley and his gang of friends practiced their favorite sport during weekends: Harry-Hunting. (The blackmail only worked on his Aunt and Uncle, as they were the only ones to comprehend the threat of it.) So, Daniel had emptied one of the packing rooms in his shop and padded the concrete floor with a white dojo mat, and taught Harry the basics of defending oneself, Daniel was an Aikido adept (roughly translated it means: Way of Peace). It was a Japanese martial art that used the momentum and weight of your opponent against them; as such it was a favored art amongst small people and women. He also showed Harry how to hit in way so that even a fully grown man would take note and double over in pain. It amazed Harry that it was simply a matter of technique to achieve the power to properly hit someone with a hand.
"They will pay," said Harry grinning. "But not now, what proverb was it that you taught me…'All good things…ummm…'
"…come to those who wait," finished Daniel. "Yes, but don't forget about it. Now off with you…we've received new shipment of DOOM that I want you to unpack, the game is flying off the shelves."
"Sure," said Harry and walked off into the back of the shop, where no customers were allowed.
It was a rather uneventful day after that. Harry merely unpacked the boxes that 'DOOM' came shipped in and entered the bar codes into the shop computer system and placed them in the ready pile, from which Daniel could simply come and collect them. Daniel had also taught Harry how to do inventory, which took the most time to do. When that was done, Harry would always go into the small dojo room and practice his falls, rolls, and katas, and would also work lightly on one of the punching bags hanging from the ceiling. It was just before lunch, as Harry finished a kata and rolled to avoid an imaginary opponent that a clapping startled him.
Standing in the doorway was a tall teenage girl. She had long blonde hair that reached past her shoulders and hazel eyes framed with a soft heart-shaped face. She was wearing a white string top that exposed her nicely tanned shoulders and arms; it also gave Harry a good idea of the small bosom that lurked beneath, and jeans that hugged her hips that would, in a few years, be rounding into womanhood. Harry knew her age to be slightly older than he was, by a few months, but that didn't faze him.
"Hey Har," she greeted cheerfully. Harry realized abruptly that he was staring at her in a daze and blushing; due to the fact that he had taken off his shirt to stop it from getting all sticky and sweaty.
"Hi Amanda," he said, trying to be nonchalant and reached for his shirt to put it on.
"Aaaah," replied Amanda in disappointment, mock pouting. Harry showed her his middle finger but the grin on his face showed it was a teasing gesture.
"So…what's up?" asked Harry rubbing a towel over his face and through his hair, making it even messier than usual.
"Oh, I'd just thought I'd ask my on and off boyfriend to lunch," she grinned at Harry. Said Harry merely raised an eyebrow at her in consternation.
"So that's what I am now," said Harry in mock wonder. "An on and off boyfriend."
"What do you expect Harry…you're turning eleven in nine months and I'm nearly eleven, we're still spring chickens," said Amanda exasperated.
"I know…it's just that…I dunno, maybe I've read one too many romantic fantasy novel, I just didn't know what to expect when I asked you out," he huffed in annoyance. "But, oh well, let's go then." He threw the towel onto a nearby chair and he gestured with his hand, "Ladies first."
Amanda grinned and walked out, Harry following in her wake. He made his excuses to Daniel for lunch who gave him an exaggerated knowing wink. Soon Harry and Amanda were walking hand in hand in the mall towards a nice pizza restaurant on the far side of the mall. Halfway there Harry was distracted by Amanda sniffing the air around him.
"Do I stink?" asked Harry amused at her antics.
"Amazingly enough, no," said Amanda frowning. "In fact you smell normal, as if you'd not worked out at all." Harry shrugged it off. It was something he could not explain per se; perhaps he just did not have the propensity to smell awful after training like that, unlike most other people. In fact, Harry could recall many incidents during his as yet short life that was unlike what most other people experienced that could only be explained in terms of the very fantasy books that The Fantasy Emporium sold. One memorable incident occurred in only his second year of elementary school. He'd got into terrible trouble for being found on the roof of the school kitchens. Dudley's gang had been chasing him as usual when, as much to Harry's surprise as anyone else's, there he was sitting on the chimney. The Dursleys had received a very angry letter from Harry's headmistress telling them Harry had been climbing school buildings. But all he'd tried to do (as he shouted at Uncle Vernon through the locked door of his cupboard) was jump behind the big bins outside the kitchen doors.
Harry replayed those events again and again in his mind over the years and could only conclude that he'd somehow Teleported (he only had the Dungeons role-playing game as a frame of reference). This opened a huge can of worms in his head. Was magic real then? Was the ancient myths and legends that all these fantasy stories were based on, sprung from some sort of fact?
Another incident occurred when Aunt Petunia, tired of Harry coming back from the barber's looking as though he hadn't been at all, had taken a pair of kitchen scissors and cut his hair so short he was almost bald except for his fringe, which she left 'to hide that horrible scar'. Dudley had laughed himself silly at Harry, who spent a sleepless night imagining school the next day. Next morning, however, he had got up to find his hair exactly as it had been before Aunt Petunia had sheared it off.
Again, he could only relate this to the fantasy novels, where people had the power of altering their appearance at will.
Another time, Aunt Petunia had been trying to force him into a revolting old jumper of Dudley's (brown with orange bobbles; which was the final straw for him, he'd gone and stolen the teacher's camera the next day). The harder she tried to pull it over his head, the smaller it seemed to become, until finally it might have fitted a glove puppet, but certainly wouldn't fit Harry.
There was also a time just last year when Harry was doing the garden and a small brown house snake slithered through his Aunt's roses and Harry could distinctly hear a hissing muttering. "Bloody lawnmowerssss." He put this down to his own imagination at first, but the following day Harry saw the same snake passing through the roses again and thinking he was losing his mind, said, "Hello there." And to his utter surprise the snake stopped and slithered back to him and raised its little head into the air.
"Did you ssspeak to me?" asked the snake in what seemed like an amazed voice.
"Yeah," answered Harry. And before he knew it he was having a full blown conversation with the small snake.
This brought a startling realization to Harry in time. It was as if logic and something as illogical as magic just clicked in his mind. And if there was one common theme to the fantasy magic written by various authors it was about belief. You don't think you could do something, you knew you could do it.
"I'll have a Hawaii pizza and a coke…" said Harry to the patient waiter.
"…and I'll have the Regina and a coke as well," said Amanda, the waiter ticked off the selection on his writing pad and off he went.
"So how's your family?"
"Well, my mother can't wait for her pregnancy to be over, she misses her work," said Amanda, her mother worked as a Public Relations Manager of the British branch of BMW. "And father is off doing whatever he does for that Exporting Company in London." Harry had met Amanda's father only once as he came home from work and he looked as if he'd been put through the wringer. He had glanced at Harry vaguely and mumbled a hello before stomping up the stairs of their home to presumably fall asleep, even though it'd been midday.
Soon they were tucking into their pizzas and fell into an easy conversation. Discussing things like school, teachers, things that had been happening in the news, like the American ultimatum to Iraq to withdraw from Kuwait, the possibility of a war, in which the United Kingdom would surely participate. Amanda liked to discuss intellectual things of the like and she was just as much a visitor to the library as Harry was. It was one of reasons he liked her. She might be blonde, and there were girls at school that was much prettier than her, but she had a brain on her shoulders to match Harry's own and in some aspects even surpass him.
But like all good things, it had to eventually end, as such the lunch break was over and Amanda led him back to The Fantasy Emporium and back into the dojo room.
"We definitely need to grab a movie or something when you're not working," said Amanda uncertainly.
"Yes," said Harry, not seeing her brightening the instant he said it. "It'll take some doing." Harry was thinking of the problems involved, his Aunt and Uncle of course being the biggest. He was surprised though as he was abruptly hugged.
"I'll look forward it," said Amanda excitedly.
"Why the excitement?" he asked her with an amused smile returning the hug.
"Because, you dolt," said Amanda with a sigh, "it's just I was nervous you would say no. I've been worried our friendship might suffer because of the dating thing…"
"Hey, no matter what we will always be friends," stated Harry confidently. "Oh!" said Amanda wiping a tear from he