Replay

Replay

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Chapter Eleven

Full House

"Slow down!"

"I'm trying! I'm not used to this--ow!"

"Sorry. I said slow down, not stand still. Did I get your heel?"

Tilda grunted in pain. "Erm, just a little," she lied, still whispering.

They continued to inch along awkwardly under the Invisibility Cloak. Little Whinging seemed to have been specially created to promote The Joys of Suburban Living on this July day, with the summer sky perfectly cloudless and achingly blue above the neat identical houses, lush full trees and endless green lawns. When they'd stepped outside in the Cloak Harry had been relieved to see neither Aurors nor members of the Order outside Mrs Figg's house and he was especially glad not to see Moody. It was the first time Harry had been out-of-doors since he'd run off the night Aunt Marge had come to stay. Were it not for the fact that he and Tilda went together with the Invisibility Cloak like a dotty old woman, a bath full of water and a plugged-in radio he might actually have enjoyed himself.

When they finally arrived at number four, Privet Drive, feeling out-of-sorts and cross with each other, Harry was greatly relieved. It was his Cloak and he was accustomed to manoeuvring in it, but she was the older person and a teacher and therefore accustomed to being in charge. Everything each of them said to the other seemed to be in an exasperated tone of voice and Harry was growing tired of this, but although he could tell that she was also tired of it, he had scant sympathy for her. I bloody well know what I'm doing. When will she stop treating me like a child? It seemed impossible to break out of the cycle of being cross with each other once it started.

When they reached the front door, Harry crouched down and picked up a stone sitting in the flowerbed beside the door; it was actually a plastic imitation of a stone with a little slot in the bottom for hiding a key. Harry removed the key and carefully lifted the Cloak to unlock the door, taking care that no one should see what he was doing from the street. When the door was open he returned the key to its hiding place and shuffled inside, Tilda shuffling obediently beside him at last.

Once inside Harry gazed around in horror; he wondered what his Aunt Petunia would think when she saw the place. Her reaction to the living room being blown up by the Weasleys was bad enough; he expected her to end up in hospital again upon seeing this.

Tilda started to remove the Cloak but something in Harry's gut told him this was a bad idea. "Not yet," he whispered, wrapping his hand around her wrist again. "Wait until we're upstairs."

She nodded and they made their awkward way up the stairs; Harry flinched when she put her arm around his waist so that they were closer together under the Cloak. "I won't fit next to you, otherwise," she mumbled; he could see that her face was very red, even under the Cloak. When they reached his room and closed the door she abruptly pulled her arm from around him and threw off the Cloak, taking deep breaths, leaning on his desk chair. Rather than being quite red, he saw now that she was chalk-white.

He frowned. "Are you all right?"

She shook her head. "Sorry. Should have said: I sometimes get a bit claustrophobic. Being under that--it started to make me feel more and more closed in--and then I get a bit irritable, I'm afraid...."

He snorted, but stopped when he saw her face. Well that explained a bit. He nodded, saying, "Yeah, try using it to carry a crate with an overgrown baby dragon up to the tallest tower of a castle."

"An overgrown baby dragon?" she said, picking up from his desk a book that was barely bound by a cracked leather belt. She started trying to unbuckle the belt, but Harry leapt to her side, snatching the book from her hands.

"What do you think you're doing? This is The Monster Book of Monsters! Do you want to get your hand bitten off?" he demanded in an angry whisper.

She glared at him and Harry felt a jolt in the pit of his stomach for a moment before he reminded himself that this was one teacher who could no longer give him detention.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

"Aren't we supposed to go to Swansea?"

"We shall do that also. Later."

"You couldn't do this by yourself?" Bill asked Snape, smirking.

Snape glared at him as the lift continued to rise. "I could have. But this way we can go straight to Swansea afterward, with no complications about meeting. And I find the woman to be quite--irksome."

Bill nodded. "Ah. Don't trust yourself not to curse her. You know, in your line of work, you really should consider learning to control yourself a little bit better," he said amiably, rocking back and forth on the balls of his feet, grinning to himself as he virtually felt the anger rise off Snape in waves. It's just too much fun getting him wound up, he thought, feeling just a little--but not nearly enough--shame about doing this.

"Hmph. Have you ever met her?"

Bill shrugged carelessly. "No, but I've met plenty of Muggles."

Snape snorted. "She's one of a kind. And hasn't changed since she was a girl, either."

Bill turned to him in surprise now, narrowing his eyes. "How did you know her when--"

"Eighth floor," Snape interrupted him calmly as the lift slowed to a stop. When the doors slid open, he strode out of the lift quickly, not waiting for Bill, who suddenly felt at a distinct disadvantage, which he did not care for. How did Snape--?

Bill knew an answer would not be forthcoming even if he did ask his question aloud, so he let Snape handle the nurses, as he could tell he hated doing so. Bill also wanted to look around a bit. Unlike Snape, Bill was not uneasy in a Muggle hospital but intensely curious, staring around at the busy people walking the corridors, at the patients being wheeled past, either reclining or sitting. Like his father, he enjoyed learning about how Muggles got by without magic, although he was also painfully aware of how foolishly enthusiastic his father sometimes appeared about his pet subject. In contrast, Bill made a concerted effort to be low-key about his interest.

After seeing an old man hobble past wheeling a shiny metal post bearing a bag of clear liquid that seemed to be entering his body through a flexible tube, Bill nudged Snape. "Look at that," he whispered. "Clever, isn't it? Sending the potion right into the body like that..."

"It's not potion, you dunce. And keep your voice down," Snape said, barely opening his mouth, keeping one eye on the nurse to whom he'd just been talking; she was on the telephone now, nodding and making noises of agreement.

"I am keeping it down. No one heard me. How soon will she be ready, anyway?"

"You again!" a sharp voice cried, making Snape and Bill spin around.

Petunia Dursley sat in her wheelchair as though it were a throne. She looked Bill up and down distastefully, her mouth twisting. "And you've brought either a criminal or someone from a rock band with you because...?"

The young nurse pushing Petunia's chair smiled at Bill appreciatively, but as pretty as she was, Bill forced himself to focus on Mrs Dursley instead. She's not as pretty as Fleur, though...

"How do you do, Mrs Dursley? I'm Bill Weasley," he said, extending his hand to her, which she took very reluctantly; releasing it as quickly as possible. "My youngest brother, Ron, is your Harry's best friend." He gave her his most ingratiating smile, which had never failed to charm women of any age. There is, however, a first time for everything.

"Hmph! He's not 'my Harry.' Never was and never will be, thank heavens." She glared up at Bill with icy hostility. "Well, don't just stand there! I've been waiting for you for the better part of an hour! This wheelchair isn't going to push itself to the lifts! I want to go to my house and tell you exactly what I want done with it!"

Within a minute of meeting Petunia Dursley, Bill Weasley had a very, very strong urge to suggest that they use the stairs instead of the lift; he thought her wheelchair would look quite nice tumbling down flight after flight with her in it....

He shook himself, coming out of his reverie. "Yes, Mrs Dursley," he said, with a great show of self-control. "That is why we are here. You can tell us exactly what you want done with your house."

As he pushed her wheelchair to the lifts, Snape smirking beside him, Bill thought, You're just lucky I'm not the one telling YOU what you can do with your bloody house, you old cow, as you probably wouldn't like it one bit...

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Tilda pulled her hands back quickly as though the book were on fire and turned to Harry with her fists on her hips. "Now listen, you, I don't care for the tone you've taken with me since we left my house--"

"What are you going to do?" he said sarcastically, putting the book back on the desk and going to a trunk in the corner. "Give me detention? Trust me--you can't outdo Umbridge for punishments."

"Of course I'm not--ooh!" she said in frustration. "I know I'm not your teacher anymore. It would be nice, however, if you didn't act like you were my teacher now. I know you must think I'm the stupidest person on the planet, but--"

"It's not that," he said, failing to contradict her, which she noticed. "It's just--I know about this, okay? I've been sneaking around under the Cloak since I was eleven. I was able to take a bleeding bus to New Stokington without anyone being the wiser--"

"--except the dark wizards who attacked your house while you were gone," she interjected, crossing her arms. At the guilty expression on his face she was immediately feeling a pang of guilt herself. "Oh, I'm sorry, Harry. I didn't mean--"

"Yeah, well you should. You're right, after all." His voice was very hard as he took in the damage to the room; over his bed there was a large hole in the ceiling, singed at the edges, that seemed to go clear through to the roof. Birds had clearly been flying in and defecating on his sheets. "All this--it's my fault, isn't it?"

She clamped her mouth shut, not trusting herself to respond. She cleared her throat and looked around, deciding to change the subject. "All right, we've got two backpacks and four carrier bags. Anything that doesn't fit into those will just have to wait--"

However, she saw him cradling something in his arms that he'd removed from the trunk, something that clearly would not fit into a backpack or carrier bag. It seemed, nominally, to be a broom, but it was unlike any broom she'd ever seen before. She realised that it was designed to be more aerodynamic than a typical broom for floor-sweeping, and her suspicions were confirmed when Harry gazed up at her, his eyes all misty, and said, "My Firebolt," in that voice she knew that men reserved for truly beloved cars. He might as well have said, "My baby."

"We can't take that," she said quickly, knowing that he would object.

"Sure we can! It'll fit under the Cloak with us without a problem..."

"And if you're carrying that, how are you going to carry more than one other bag?"

He shrugged. "I can put two in one hand."

Tilda opened her mouth to protest, but the expression on his face told her that he would brook no argument about this; he would be taking the broom come hell or high water. She sighed, opening the desk drawers, putting parchment, ink and quills into a carrier bag.

When they had stuffed all of the bags nearly to the breaking point, Harry wandered out into the hall again, silently. Tilda didn't know what he was about but she followed him to his aunt and uncle's bedroom. He opened the door to the room and gasped; half of the room was just gone, and the other half was blackened with soot but smelled damp rather than burnt. A large tarpaulin covered the gaping hole where the other half of the room should have been. He backed away quickly and slammed the door, shaking visibly. She put her hand on his arm.

She whispered, "Harry, don't--"

He shook her off angrily. "Why not? I should see what I've done, shouldn't I?" he said in a low, angry voice. But she knew the anger wasn't directed at her; it was directed at himself. He strode back toward his own room, but then turned abruptly, opening another bedroom door; he disappeared inside the room and a moment later she heard what sounded like a pillow being hit very hard, repeatedly. She ran to the doorway, finding Harry in what could only be Dudley's room, given that its decor was Early Overindulgence (or perhaps "Gluttony Revival").

Harry was hitting a punch-bag very fast, his face screwed up in rage, grunting with the effort. She couldn't tell whether the moisture on his face was tears or perspiration. She longed to tell him to stop but instead stood silently, watching him hit it over and over. When he finally tired out and collapsed on the edge of Dudley's bed she dared to walk into the room, sitting next to him. Smirking at the sight of the slightly messy but otherwise unharmed-looking room, she remarked dryly, "Well, isn't Dudley just the deprived little boy?"

He shrugged. "I never wanted any of that," Harry whispered, sounding like this was difficult for him. "Well, maybe a little," he admitted, "but mostly I wanted my parents."

Then she looked at the punch-bag, seeing the crude cartoon of Harry drawn on it. She thought of the expression he'd had on his face when hitting it repeatedly. "Oh, Harry! Did you--"

"Let's go," he said abruptly, standing and leaving the room, as though she hadn't spoken. She followed mutely, but when they reached his room, an appalling noise met their ears.

Someone had opened the front door.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Ginny leaned against the drawing room door and looked dolefully at the twins.

"You know how he is, Ginny. Snape can handle himself," Fred said, trying to reassure her, smiling valiantly.

"Yeah, he'll be back torturing all of you in no time," George said brightly. "Perhaps, if you ask nicely, he'll even double your summer homework," he added with a grin, before putting his hand across his brow melodramatically. "Ah, our long-lost--"

"You were in school, too, up until recently!" Ginny said irritably.

"--glorious school days," George finished. "How we--DON'T--miss them--"

The twins grinned at each other, obviously very pleased with themselves for having dispensed with the rest of their formal education. Ginny sighed, wishing she'd just completed her fifth year rather than her fourth, so that she might also leave school. Other things seemed so much more important right now than learning about goblin rebellions and staring at the sky through telescopes. And she'd learned more in the D.A. during the previous year than in any of her assigned lessons. But no, she thought, her stomach clenching, I still need to take my bloody O.W.L.s....

She jumped suddenly as a shout of triumph and one of anguish went up simultaneously from inside the drawing room. Still trying to calm herself, she stopped Fred from opening the door by leaning against it again. "Don't bother. It just means that Ron and Hermione are having another row. You know how they've been lately--snog, row, snog, row."

George made a face. "Poor Ron. I think he needs a little more snogging and a little less rowing," he added with a smirk, putting his elbow in Fred's ribs.

Ginny cried out as the door behind her back suddenly disappeared, having been pulled open violently by Ron. She stumbled, then righted herself, prepared to see her brother storming out of the drawing room, having had yet another disagreement with Hermione. Instead he was waving a parchment with an official-looking seal on it, doing a jig, and jumping so high he was in danger of cracking his head on the door's lintel.

"They came! Theycametheycametheycame!" he screamed, waving the parchment some more.

Ah, thought Ginny, speaking of O.W.L.s....

"Blood traitors! Vile Mudblood scum, sullying the Noble House of Black!" Mrs Black screeched upon hearing Ron's voice.

"So," Fred asked his younger brother with a perfectly straight face, raising his voice only slightly to allow for Mrs Black's diatribe but otherwise ignoring her. "Didn't do very well on your exams, did you? Whatever will we do with you, Ickle Ronnikins?"

Ron laughed and pulled Ginny to him in a painful hug, kissing her soundly on the cheek as Mrs Black continued to spout invective against the intruders in her house. "I won't let you get me wound up this time, Fred. I'm too bloody happy. You were never made a prefect, and you never got bloody ten O.W.L.s!" he cried, shoving the parchment at his brother and grabbing Ginny's hands, twirling her in a circle that was very quickly making her dizzy.

"Stop, Ron!" she said, tugging her hands away from his, feeling like laughing and spewing at the same time, plus Mrs Black was making her head feel like it wanted to explode. "That's fantastic. Can I see?"

Ron snatched the parchment from the twins, who'd been staring at it with open mouths. "Thought I'd take it to Mum, so she could decide what my reward will be this time...."

Fred's mouth was twisting now; he looked quite dangerous when he was like this, Ginny thought. "I think he needs taking down a peg or two, don't you?" she heard him whisper to George, who nodded and said one word in response:

"Percy."

Ginny sighed, following the three of them, but at a distance. If they're going to treat him the way they treated Percy, then there's going to be trouble... Maybe if the twins had treated him a little more nicely he would never have turned on the whole family.... I don't want that to be Ron, as well....

However, as Ron was passing Mrs Black's noisy portrait, he parted the curtains hiding her, grinned broadly and declared, "I don't bloody care how much you bellow, you old harpy! I got ten O.W.L.s!" And with that, he kissed her squarely on her painted mouth, grinning like the devil afterward, before dancing along the corridor to the basement stairs. Fred and George watched in amazement, then burst into uproarious laughter, patting him on the back, giving Ginny hope that they might go easy on him after all.

Mrs Black stared open-mouthed after him, no longer making a sound, and Ginny couldn't help saying to her as she passed, "Well, now we know how to shut you up, don't we?" She grinned wickedly at the appalled portrait.

When she reached the kitchen her mother was already holding the parchment, reading it with a glowing face, after which she pulled Ron into a hug. "That's wonderful, Ron!"

Behind her, Fred was hugging George in an exaggerated imitation of his mother, mouthing the words, That's wonderful, Ron! along with her, but accompanied by additional histrionic gestures, round eyes and an open mouth. George was doing an extreme version of Ron, his chest puffed out, as proud as if he'd scaled Everest, achieved world peace single-handedly and just been elected Minister for Magic. Ginny wanted to scowl at them, but it was very hard to think about this when she was having such difficulty preventing herself from laughing at their pantomime.

"Oh, I know it's not twelve," Mrs Weasley said, harking back to Bill and Percy, "but it's nothing to sneeze at, either." She had that braggy tone in her voice Ginny hated; in the past it had usually been reserved for Bill, Charlie or Percy, as though she was at some garden party, trying to impress strangers. Now it would be the voice she also used to discuss Ron. She thought longingly for a moment of joining the twins in whatever they had planned for Ron's comeuppance.

"Well, read it out," Mrs Weasley said, sitting at the table and urging Ron to sit next to her. "A pity your father went to work already! We'll have to Floo him at the office...."

Ron cleared his throat. "All right, I'll start with the fairly insignificant ones first," he said in a pompous voice that made Ginny want to hit him. "An 'A' for Care of Magical Creatures... an 'A' for Herbology... an 'A' for History of Magic..."

Ginny wanted to choke with rage. The only reason you scraped a pass in History was because Hermione helped you with your revision, she thought irritably.

"...an 'A' for Charms--practical exam. An 'E' on the written exam.... Another 'A' for the practical exam in Transfiguration and another 'E' on the written.... An 'E' for both the written and practical exams in Defence Against the Dark Arts..."

And that, Ginny thought, was because of the D.A. and what Harry taught you. Somehow this didn't irritate her the way Hermione helping him with History of Magic did.

Ron paused, looking up and grinning. "And an 'O' for Potions! Outstanding! That means I can apply to be an Auror if I get a N.E.W.T. in Potions!"

Unable to resist puncturing his happiness, especially as she felt she had no chance of getting anywhere near so many O.W.L.s in a year's time, Ginny said sweetly, "What happened? Nothing in Divination?"

"Er, well--" Ron stammered, glancing furtively at his mother.

"Oh, that's right," Ginny said, as though her memory had just been restored to her. "Didn't you tell the examiner that you saw an ugly man with a wart on his nose when you were gazing in the crystal ball? And why was that again--?"

"It was because it was the git's reflection!" George crowed, doubling over in laughter. Mrs Weasley glared at him, then turned a gimlet eye on Ginny while speaking to Ron.

"Don't you listen to them, dear. Although I'm surprised you didn't get Astronomy--"

Ron grimaced. "I probably should have done. I'm not interested in going back to St Mungo's with more broken bones, though, so I'd really appreciate if you didn't bring that up when Hermione--"

"MUDBLOOD SCUM! DIRTY, VILE--"

"Not again," Mrs Weasley sighed as the screeching travelled down to the kitchen.

"I think you need to go give Mrs Black some more snogging, Ronnikins," Fred told him.

Mrs Weasley stared at him. "What?"

"OH, SHUT UP, YOU IDIOT WOMAN! YOU'RE JUST A BLOODY PAINTING!" a familiar voice carried down the stairs.

"Oh dear," Ron whispered. Ginny frowned at him in confusion.

"It's a travesty!" Hermione cried, entering the room, waving her parchment in the air. Her wild hair was even wilder than usual and she was clearly incensed. Ginny had forgotten all about Hermione, who hadn't emerged from the drawing room at the same time as Ron.

Mrs Weasley could tell that Hermione was not happy, but she smiled in an effort to calm her and said, "So! Hermione, dear, how many O.W.L.s did you get?"

"Only twelve!" she wailed, throwing herself into a chair by the fire, looking very much like she wanted to throw the parchment into the fire.

Mrs Weasley beamed at her. "Twelve! Wonderful! Bill and Percy each got twelve--"

"I said only twelve! I was taking an extra class! I should have had thirteen! There is something very very very wrong here!" she insisted, her voice going up and her eyes wild. Crookshanks had been about to jump onto her lap, but glanced up at his mistress and thought better of it, slinking away furtively. Ginny swallowed.

"Well, Hermione, I really don't think you should be upset about getting twelve O.W.L.s..." Mrs Weasley started to say reasonably. "We should have a party!" she declared, putting her arm around Ron. "A celebration!" She eyed Ginny. "And you never know, perhaps soon we shall learn whether we have another prefect in the family...."

Ginny grimaced. I bloody hope we don't, she thought.

"Astronomy! Hermione screeched, as though Mrs Weasley hadn't spoken. Ginny fought the urge to put her head in her hands; she thought she might actually prefer the sound of Mrs Black's voice to Hermione's at this moment.

"What's that, Hermione dear?" Mrs Weasley said, also in her own little world.

"I didn't get Astronomy! And neither did Ron. I could believe that he forgot too much to get a pass--"

"Oh, really?" Ron shot back hotly. "I revised my fingers to the bone, when I wasn't busy winning the Quidditch Cup for Gryffindor..." Ginny stifled her laughter.

"--but I should have had an 'Outstanding' for Astronomy!" she insisted, ignoring him. "And instead I didn't even get a pass!"

Mrs Weasley nodded. "You know, I seem to remember hearing that you all were in the Astronomy tower, taking your exams, when they were hounding Hagrid out of the grounds and Minerva--Professor McGonagall--went to his aid. I wonder whether, in the confusion, some exam papers were lost..."

Hermione stood angrily, pacing before the fire. "Well, they'd bloody well better be found!" she exclaimed, striding angrily toward the door. Ginny was both surprised at Hermione for what she'd said and surprised that her mother didn't chastise Hermione for her use of 'bloody.' But then again, given Hermione's stormy expression, her mother probably realised that this wasn't the time to give warnings about 'language' to someone who wasn't even her own child. Hermione's anger was reminding Ginny of one of the twins' unpredictable fireworks: you never knew when it would explode in a different direction, change colors or multiply.

"Can I use Pig to write to the Ministry, Ron?" she shouted at him suddenly. He nodded, looking rather frightened of her. "Thank you!" she said loudly, and was heard a moment later stomping up the stairs.

They all looked at each other in relief, now that Hurricane Hermione had passed through. Mrs Weasley started talking excitedly to Ron again about the celebration, but Ginny saw that the twins had very mischievous looks on their faces as they left the room, deep in conversation. Ginny followed, watching them shrewdly, and when she stopped them in the front hall and looked at them expectantly, they turned and glared at her.

"Go away, Ginny," Fred said tersely.

"Yeah," George agreed. "We're busy."

She crossed her arms. "Busy, are you? She is my best friend. If anyone is going to have a part in taking her down a peg or two, shouldn't it be me?" Ginny raised her eyebrows, and after a moment, the twins burst out laughing. Fred patted her on the back.

"A lass after me own heart," he said cockily, doing a dead-on imitation of Moody.

"So, what did you have in mind?" Ginny whispered. "Sending her an official-looking letter telling her that a mistake was made, she actually got fewer O.W.L.s?"

Fred laughed. "Oh, that's much better than what I was thinking. You're good, Gin. I'll see if I can find my old letter; we can make a copy of it and alter it just a bit...."

As she followed the twins up the stairs, she felt a sudden pang, wondering how Harry had done on his exams, whether he would be able to study N.E.W.T.-level Potions as she knew he wanted to in order to apply for Auror training. And then she froze as a horrible thought occurred to her.

"Wait!"

They turned and shrugged. "What?"

"Harry!"

"Um, you seem to have me confused with someone else, Ginny," George said innocently. "Harry has darker hair and wears glasses. Has this scar thing on his forehead, although I've always thought he'd be rid of it if he just had a proper wash...."

"Yeah, different person altogether," Fred chimed in. "Let me do the introductions--"

"Oh, shut up, the pair of you! It's just--Harry's O.W.L. letter. Will it still go to him wherever he is? Will it give away his hiding place?"

The twins looked at each other in horror.

"Bloody hell," Fred shouted, racing back down the stairs, George and Ginny scrambling after him as Mrs Black, hearing the noise, raised her voice again in protest.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Harry motioned for her to return to the bedroom and pantomimed that she was to stay there. He put on the Invisibility Cloak, his heart pounding painfully, and crept into the hall, peering over the rail at the front door. He only just stopped himself from gasping, actually putting his own hand over his mouth when he saw Snape, Bill Weasley and his aunt enter the house. She was walking with the help of a cane. He wanted to heave a sigh of relief but settled for whistling silently. She's all right, he thought, the guilt about what he'd done making his chest feel tight. I never meant to--

"All right," she said imperiously, as only Petunia Dursley could, "let's start with the hall. First, a new chandelier. Second simply must be a new carpet, and one on the stairs as well--are you writing this down?" She looked expectantly at Bill and Snape.

What on earth is going on? Harry wondered. He wished his aunt weren't present. If it had been just Bill and Snape he could have turned himself in (it was especially comforting to see Bill), but if his aunt still thought he'd attacked the house himself, he could find himself in a complicated situation. And then there would be explaining Tilda and how she came to be sitting in his bedroom surrounded by bags containing his wizarding things...

"I have just the thing," Bill said quickly, pulling a piece of parchment and a Quick-Quotes Quill out of what appeared to be a dragon-skin jacket. With his ponytail and single bone earring Bill was still the epitome of cool as far as Harry was concerned; it was clear, however, that Petunia Dursley thought that proximity to him might result in her contracting a dreadful disease; she cringed from him whenever he stood too close to her.

"Now, there's also this cupboard under the stairs. It was never really properly cleaned when Harry stopped using it. We locked up his school things in there a few years ago, but--"

Bill blinked, as though he didn't quite believe what he'd heard. "What do you mean when Harry stopped using it? Surely you don't mean--this wasn't his bedroom?"

Petunia looked at him as though he was unspeakably stupid. "Why are you so surprised? I thought you knew all about it! That first letter he got--it was addressed to him in his cupboard. You lot were obviously watching the house," she snapped, her eyes flashing. "And then when we moved him up to Dudley's second bedroom--"

"Wait," Bill said, holding his hand up with the quill in it. "Are you--are you telling me that you didn't move him into a bedroom until he'd got his Hogwarts letter? That until then he was sleeping in this ruddy cupboard?" He flung open the cupboard door. Harry knew what he would find there: his old flat mattress, a tatty blanket, a lot of cobwebs and marks Harry had made on the wall when he was being confined for several days on end as punishment for doing something he didn't think he'd done, or at least, something he'd done but didn't understand how. (Such as turning his teacher's wig blue or making his own hair grow back after a haircut.)

Harry had never seen Bill angry; he was forcibly reminded both of Ron and Mr Weasley, especially when Mr Weasley had tried to get the Dursleys to bid him goodbye before he'd gone off with them to the Quidditch World Cup.

Petunia Dursley suddenly looked very small to Harry as she cowered before Bill's fury. It was difficult to tell what Snape's expression meant; he was surveying Aunt Petunia through narrowed eyes, as though working out a puzzle. Fortunately, she seemed to be adequately distracting him so that he was unaware of Harry watching the three of them from under his Cloak.

"Well--but you don't understand! Once we put the cot in the cupboard, we couldn't hear him anymore! We finally had some peace at night, except when Dudley needed us--"

"Are you telling me that you put him in there when he was still a baby?" Bill roared at her. Snape put his hand on Bill's arm now.

"Weasley--let us remember why we are here," he warned him in a low voice, although it seemed that the warning might also be for Petunia Dursley's benefit.

Unfortunately, they hadn't closed the front door completely and an unexpected visitor now pushed it open and strode into the front hall as though she had every right to do so.

Harry groaned inwardly. Aunt Marge. She wore a neck brace that, for the first time in Harry's experience, gave her the appearance of having a neck. She was obviously highly annoyed. "I stopped by the hotel to speak to Vernon, Petunia, and he said you were out here. And who, pray tell, is this?" she said, eyeing Snape and Bill with equal distaste. The feeling was clearly mutual as soon as Snape and Bill laid eyes on her.

"Erm," Petunia Dursley stalled; "our architect and carpenter. We are discussing repairs to the house."

Marge Dursley sniffed disdainfully. "Shouldn't you leave that to Vernon? He's had a little to do with manual labourers," she said, assessing Bill's clean hands suspiciously. "That drill factory of his and all. I must say, though, you don't look like you do much work with your hands," she told Bill, reaching out and holding up one of his freckled hands for inspection. Bill snatched it back.

"I'm, erm, a master carpenter. I'm the boss; my men do the work."

"Hm," she said, continuing to look at him appraisingly. "In that case, don't you think you'd project a greater air of authority and respectability if you got a proper haircut? To say nothing of your hair," she said, her mouth twisting as she regarded Snape. "You're not one of those celebrity architects, are you? Have you designed anything I'd know?"

Snape appeared to be counting to ten--or a hundred--in his head. "No, madam. I doubt that I have," he said dryly.

Harry crept back to his room, closing the door quietly. He took off the cloak and sighed. "This may take a while," he said to Tilda, feeling rather hopeless.

"Maybe this wasn't such a good idea--?" she suggested tentatively. Harry snorted.

"Maybe?"

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

The day was half gone when Snape, Bill, Aunt Petunia and Aunt Marge had finally all departed from number four, Privet Drive. They hadn't bothered coming into Harry's room, to his relief. Just in case, he and Tilda had been standing in a far corner the entire time, the Cloak hiding them, while his belongings, in the backpacks and carrier bags, were stashed in his trunk again. He could tell that Tilda was growing more and more distressed from being under the Cloak; he tried to help her with her claustrophobia by suggesting that she close her eyes and picture wide open spaces, but that seemed to make her shake even worse and huddle closer to him.

He was finding it to be a strange experience, standing with a woman under his Invisibility Cloak for hours, his arms around her waist and her head on his shoulder while they waited for the sound of the footsteps leaving the house. He hadn't had the opportunity to think about what it was like being under the Cloak with her while they were walking from her house; now he had quite a long time to think about what it felt like having her body pressed up beside his, her breath close to his neck, her arm around his waist.

What it felt like was torture.

Fortunately, Marge didn't stay for long. After she'd taken a brief tour of the disaster that was the ground floor of the Dursley home and offered a lot of unsolicited advice about what she'd do if it were her house, she finally left. When she was gone, Bill started to put his parchment away and said, "Well, that's it, then...."

However, Petunia Dursley informed him that she had no intention of doing a single thing Marge had suggested; she proceeded to spend an interminable amount of time cataloguing every bit of work she wanted them to do on the house instead.

Standing under the Cloak with Tilda, Harry forgot to breathe a couple of times as he wondered whether he was sweating too much, or his breath was sour, or his palms damp. It was entirely too nerve-wracking to just stand under the Cloak, minutes stretching into hours, when Tilda was so pretty and also so distressed about the enclosed space. He wanted to comfort her somehow, but he felt as inept as he had been when Cho was crying on him after their kiss under the mistletoe. He had no idea how to do this sort of thing with charm and grace, how not to seem like an utter prat or idiot. A couple of times he patted her on the back and muttered, "There, there," when he could tell she was in distress, but he didn't repeat this when he heard how stupid he sounded.

Snape, Bill and Aunt Petunia finally left and he felt like his heart started again. Tilda, however, thought it prudent to wait for about half an hour before moving from their hiding place, which surprised and impressed him; he could tell that she was practically climbing out of her skin. When the half hour was up, however, she quickly threw off the Cloak, pulled the backpack she was going to wear out of his trunk, collected two of the carrier bags, and started to march out of his room.

"Tilda! You'll be seen leaving the house!"

She stopped short, then sighed. "All right, all right, I'll get back under there for a little bit. But I want us to duck behind that high privet near the corner so I can get out from under the Cloak and walk home in the open. It'll be easier to get back into my house, anyway. If someone happened to be passing by it'd look awfully queer for the door to open and close by itself. This way it'll just be like I've gone out and come home."

He agreed and when they were able to extricate her from the Cloak, the look of relief on her face made his heart clench; being in enclosed spaces very obviously terrified her to the core. And yet she had stood there with him, hour after hour, while first Marge and then Petunia had passed judgment on what should be done with number four, Privet Drive. Hiding in his room had turned out to be the safest thing to do; he doubted its treatment would be anything other than an afterthought. He'd been right, luckily, and didn't have to worry about Snape being in the same room with him and detecting his presence.

Harry thought he'd never been so relieved in his life to arrive someplace when he and Tilda were in her house once more, putting down the carrier bags, backpacks and Harry's Firebolt. He collapsed on the stairs and closed his eyes wearily.

"Harry! Wake up! It's only lunchtime," she laughed, fully recovered now that she'd been walking in the fresh air again. She looked reborn and happy, and he had to smile at her.

"I know. But that was the most tiring morning I think I've ever spent not in History of Magic. And at least in there I can catch up on my sleep..."

She laughed. "So, falling asleep during the exam was just your way of being consistent? After years of sleeping through that lesson, why stop now and all?"

Harry flushed. "I'm just happy to be done with it. Ruddy stupid goblin rebellions...."

She laughed, and Harry smiled at her, glad to see her happy again, although another part of him had also not entirely minded being pressed against her for a long time.... It was not without its charms, he had to admit. Which was why it was also torture...

Tilda made sandwiches, and as they ate, Harry could tell she wanted to ask him something; she looked like she was screwing up her courage to broach a touchy subject.

"Harry," she finally began tentatively; Harry braced himself, wondering what it was going to be this time. "Why didn't you ever tell me--or anyone--that they were keeping you in a cupboard under the stairs?" Her voice disappeared in a horror-stricken whisper. He wondered whether part of her horror was due to her fear of enclosed spaces, a fear he had never had the luxury of developing.

He shrugged. "I was embarrassed. Still am, if it comes to that," he added, feeling his face grow warm. "And I didn't think anyone would believe me, anyway. You still teach at the primary school; you know how Old Soberley is. Do you think she would have believed me?"

Tilda drew her lips into a line. "No, I suppose you're probably right. About her, anyway. But I would have liked to know! There are--there are things that could have been done. The police could have taken you out of the house--"

"And put me where? In a foster home? An orphanage?"

She sighed. "Someplace without Dursleys, at any rate," she spat, as though their name was the foulest language. Harry shook his head.

"Last summer, my uncle tried to kick me out, and as soon as he said I had to go, all hell broke loose. Dumbledore sent a Howler to my aunt, something about an agreement."

"Sent a what?"

Harry explained Howlers to her and soon had her laughing at his description of the one Ron had received from his mother after flying the old Ford Anglia to school, but she sobered again when Harry told her about the ancient magic that had protected him for years, the spell that required him to make his home where his mother's blood was.

"If someone tried to take me away from Aunt Petunia, I reckon Dumbledore could have just stepped in and made sure no one in the Muggle government remembered any reason why I couldn't go on living with the Dursleys. It's possible, though, that Dumbledore might have also mentioned something to Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon about the cupboard, if he'd known about it. It doesn't really matter now, does it? It never occurred to me to say anything."

She put her hand over his. "You never learned to trust adults, did you? I know how that can be. For years, when dad was in prison, my mum kept telling us, 'And when Daddy comes home, it'll be just like it was before.' She failed to mention that she was planning to leave him, that it wouldn't be anything like it was before.

"And then when it was just me and Dad and Jack, Dad tended to be a bit, well, scattered. Forgot to pay for the electricity. Or to go to the shops for food. Or we wouldn't even have electricity for a time, while he worked on the house we'd just bought, so we couldn't keep food fresh in a fridge and had to make sure we went to the shops every day--which he forgot about as often as he remembered." She sighed. "In some ways I think he never grew up, you know? Went from living with his mum to my mum. And from there into prison, where I reckon one of the trade-offs of not having your freedom is not having to pay your rent and electric and worry about where your food's coming from. And then when he got out, suddenly Mum wasn't around any more to cook for him and clean up after him and call his attention to the little details he always let slip through his fingers.... I'm amazed that he got through prison all right."

She was still holding Harry's hand, and he squeezed it, looking at her closely. Her eyes seemed very large and reflective at this moment; he could see his own bespectacled face mirrored in the large, dark pupils. And then, after a dumbfounded moment he realised that she was looking back. They pulled their hands away simultaneously, abruptly standing and bustling around too haphazardly, cleaning up the lunch dishes.

During the afternoon they worked on cleaning out one of the junk rooms again, getting it about two-thirds done by the time they were hungry enough for dinner. However, while Tilda drove off for some takeaway Chinese (they'd finally tired of curry), he continued working. It still wouldn't be ready for him to use that night (he reckoned he could go back down to the couch), but perhaps after their birthday they could finish it, he hoped. It would be nice to sleep in a bed again.

He didn't fancy leaving things under the bed; they'd found some examples of taxidermy that her dad had bought and they made his skin crawl. (He was half-afraid that Mr Harrison might have got his hands on some wizarding artefacts and he didn't fancy being around if the stuffed hedgehog started talking to him.) Harry definitely didn't want to risk anything like that still being in the room when he was ready to sleep in it. So he reached under the bed, his hand coming into contact with a heavy burlap bag, which he dragged out into the light with quite a bit of effort. Wondering what was in it, he examined the bag for a moment before opening it, with a great deal of difficulty, and peering in, thinking, Please, no taxidermy, no taxidermy...

He saw only blackness, so he took a chance and thrust his hand into the bag, pulling out a heavy piece of metal that turned out to be an elaborate fork, very dark in colour. He polished part of the handle with the edge of his shirt, but this had very little effect. Reaching into the bag for more, he realised that it was simply full of the stuff, knives, forks, spoons, in the same elaborate pattern.

But then, as he continued to examine the fork, he spotted something; after his attempt at cleaning a mark on the back had become somewhat clearer, although the fork was still a long way from being a sparkling silver colour. On the back of the fork's handle was an R entwined with an N. Something about this seemed familiar to Harry, but he couldn't be certain what it was....

The front door slammed and Tilda called up the stairs, "Are you still working? Come out of that bloody room. I got chopsticks, so we can drop food down our fronts for the next half hour. Come on, it'll be fun. And no ruddy knives and forks to clean."

Clean. Suddenly it was like a light had gone on in Harry's brain. The fork wasn't just a dirty silver-colour. It was tarnished silver. A special cleaner was needed for it; he'd seen his aunt cleaning her good silver (which she wouldn't let him near), but it was never as darkly tarnished as this.

Now he realised what the entwined 'N' and 'R' on the silver fork meant: Northrop-Reese. It was the missing silver Tilda's dad was supposed to have stolen, the silver that was never found.

It was the reason that Jim Harrison had gone to prison.

---