Glasses and Red Hair
The grass snake Hagrid gave him was named Asclepius by Harry, and he became an irreplaceable friend to him. He was the second friend of Harry's life.
Before Harry parted from Hagrid, he begged for all kinds of stories about his parents. When he heard that both his mother and father had mastered all sorts of magic, including Potions, and that they had been among the very top students at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, Harry felt pride rise in him like nothing else. For the first time in his life, he started to feel good about himself.
Wanting to become a wizard his parents would not be ashamed of, Harry spent the time before school started reading his textbooks closely, doing his best to understand them. Wizarding world theory was different from the math and science Harry had learned, and it confused him, but there was no wizard around to answer his questions. For the first time, he regretted not getting an owl from Hagrid.
Back at the Dursleys', Harry went back to the same life as always. He helped with the household chores, and he ate poorer food than the Dursleys did. If Hagrid had not sent him food because he thought it would be terrible for Harry to be a starving child, Harry might have died of hunger. Harry decided that when he got to Hogwarts, he would thank Hagrid properly, from the bottom of his heart.
Since what happened at the hut, fear kept showing on Dudley's, Petunia's, and Vernon's faces. Harry regretted it badly, but he did not have the courage to apologize, and part of him was stubborn enough to think, do I really need to apologize? So he lived with the Dursleys with almost no real conversation at all.
"...Hey, Ask. Do you think I'll make friends at Hogwarts?"
Harry's only emotional support was Asclepius, the Kusushi snake. At night, Harry talked with Asclepius as he swallowed thawed baby mice with his small body.
If Dudley or Petunia ever found out Harry was talking to a snake, there was no telling what they would do to Asclepius.
"That depends on you, Harry. ...But still, humans are a pitiful bunch. You can't even get by unless you've got this thing you call friends, and you're not even a pair."
Snakes did not seem to have a concept of friendship, but Harry did not care. For Harry right now, if someone talked with him, that was a friend.
"People can't live without friends. ...My only friends are you and Hagrid."
"Yeah? ...Then when you see other humans, try talking to them yourself, like you do with me."
"I will. Thanks, Ask."
Late at night, after everyone in the Dursley house was asleep, Harry had that kind of conversation with Asclepius.
He was counting the days until he could go to Hogwarts. The first thing he wanted to do once he got there was use Transfiguration to turn his old clothes into new ones.
The inheritance he got from his parents was enormous by wizarding world standards, or so Hagrid said. But if he exchanged it into Muggle pounds and spent it, the Dursleys would get suspicious for all the wrong reasons. That would only make Harry's treatment worse, so he could not use it freely.
Unable to return to Diagon Alley, Harry waited and waited for the day of the start of term.
Harry did not notice that Petunia Dursley was secretly keeping in contact with someone.
And then, the day he left for school.
Harry loaded his trunk, with Asclepius's case on top, and boarded the Hogwarts Express at Platform Nine and Three Quarters.
Quietly grateful to the red haired big family walking ahead of him, Harry looked for an empty compartment. But he could not find one easily.
(I can't tell people to move...and asking if I can come in takes guts...)
To be more accurate, if he had worked up the courage to say, let me join you, there would have been room for someone as small as Harry.
But Harry had spent ten years alone, and he did not have that kind of courage.
Then, near the very back of the train, he finally found a compartment with an open seat.
"Can I sit here? If you don't mind, I mean..."
Harry asked, and realized the boy sitting there was one of the kids from the red haired big family he had seen earlier.
"Of course! Honestly, I've been bored out of my mind on my own. Scabbers is the only one I can talk to."
The red haired boy wore old hand me down clothes, and he looked just as shabby as Harry did. Seeing that, Harry felt a sense of closeness.
This was not someone like Draco, who had clearly never had to worry about clothes his whole life. Harry wanted someone who could share that feeling of inferiority about his circumstances.
"Actually, for me, my pet is my only friend too."
"Haha, nice joke. I'm Ron Weasley. You?"
"Harry Potter."
"No way. Seriously? Merlin's beard (oh my God)."
Harry laughed a little at Ron, who could not hide his shock in a wizarding world saying. Harry could feel Ron's curiosity, but he did not feel excessive fawning or shallow fascination with a celebrity.
Harry and Ron talked for a while after that, and as they ate wizarding sweets, they started getting along. When Harry saw Ron looking sick of the corned beef sandwich his mother had packed, jealousy welled up in him.
"This Chocolate Frog Card has Dumbledore on it."
Trying to change the subject, Harry picked up a card, and among the great witches and wizards listed there was Albus Dumbledore. Harry realized it was the headmaster's name, the one Hagrid praised at every opportunity.
"Oh, Dumbledore is a lucky pull. Me, I got Agrippa again. I've already got five of him."
"Then it's a rare card. ...It says he made the Sorcerer's Stone and defeated Grindelwald."
"That's what they say. Percy told me before, the Sorcerer's Stone makes gold, and it makes the Elixir of Life that gives you long life. I wish it would trade places with a rock in our garden."
"Can't you make as much gold as you want with magic?"
"Apparently not. I don't know the theory either, but..."