Silent All These Years

"...cause sometimes, I said sometimes, I hear my voice and it's been here silent all these years."

She just couldn't sleep. It was now two o'clock in the morning and Petunia Dursley was wide awake, a thousand thoughts running through her mind, warding off any possibility of falling into a restful slumber. Laying on her back, next to her snoring husband, she stared up at the ceiling where she saw shadows of branches, belonging to the tree just outside the bedroom window, swaying back and forth. For hours she'd laid there, just thinking.

The evening had not gone well at all. First off, her poor Dudders's soul was almost taken by a dementor, then she'd gotten that horrid, smoking letter that was addressed specifically to her and if that wasn't enough, those filthy, dirty owls had invaded her clean home to drop off messages from those freaky friends of her nephew's. Then her nephew told her that the man who'd killed her sister and brother-in-law had come back and Vernon had lost his temper and she'd let it slip that she knew what dementors were and Harry had so many questions... Oh God....

She let out a soft groan and shut her eyes tightly.

Petunia Dursley loathed magic and some would say that she also hated her wizard nephew, Harry, just as much if not more. He was the mutant spawn of her freakish sister and that awful man that she'd married. Her nephew bore the brunt of her prejudices and hatred towards magic because, in her eyes, he and his "kind" were antagonists to the ideals she perceived as being normal and therefore wholesome and acceptable. Petunia wanted nothing to do with that magic stuff. It was a threat to her home, her family and her belief that nothing good could ever come of it.

Given her immense disliking of the subjects of Harry and magic, it was very odd when in bed that night she began to realize that her attitude towards Harry had somewhat changed. When she let it slip that she knew what dementors were, she felt a sort of nexus between herself and her nephew that she couldn't explain. A month ago or even yesterday the thought of such thing would have abhorred her, but tonight this feeling of closeness to her sister's son just plain baffled her. Of course, she didn't speak to her husband, Vernon, about it. She didn't feel that she could, after all, together they'd despised the boy for nearly fifteen years. There was one matter in particular, though, that weighed on her mind that night, something that she hadn't thought about in decades.

She averted her gaze from the ceiling and looked over at the sleeping form of her husband, who was still snoring. Whenever she had these rare moments to herself in bed, after Vernon had already fallen asleep, she took the time to think about general, but important things such as what she was going to pack for Vernon and Dudley's lunch the next day or what she would be wearing to the neighborhood council meeting or what to make for dinner, but tonight she ventured into areas of her memory that she'd locked up a long time ago, memories that were better left unspoken as they would be sure to perturb her husband and create even more havoc than mere mention of the "M" word could. These were things she'd never spoken about to him or anyone else--things having to do with her sister.

When her mind had drifted onto the burdening thoughts of her sister, being paranoid, she once again glimpsed at her husband to make sure he was asleep. Though she knew she was being silly, she couldn't help but feel uncomfortable thinking these things next to him. Worried, she bit her bottom lip and wondered, What if he somehow finds out what I'm thinking?

Oh nonsense!

she chastised herself. People can't read minds! Well, normal people, anyway...

The fact was, when Harry saved her son, she was reminded of a time in her girlhood in which her sister Lily had illegally used magic outside of school. Lily had been twelve and she'd been thirteen. The two of them were out of school for the summer holidays, and Petunia, irked with her younger sister, decided to play a prank on her. One afternoon, she climbed to the top of the giant oak tree that grew in their front yard, with a bag of water balloons in hand. It was difficult trying to climb single-handedly, but Petunia managed. She remembered finally getting to the top of the tree after a particularly arduous ascent and then hearing a loud crack. Everything happened so fast that she couldn't clearly recall what transpired next. The only thing she remembered was closing her eyes in preparation for the inevitable pain that would come upon impact. But that pain never came, for when she opened her eyes again, she found herself levitating just inches from the ground. Close by stood a frightened Lily, her wand gripped tightly in her shaking hand. Her face was pale and her bright green eyes were wide with fear and moist with tears. Once she saw that her older sister was all right, Lily ran over to where Petunia was floating and hugged her, thankful that she wasn't hurt. Not a concern entered her mind that she'd broken the rules for the Restriction for Underage Wizardry.

Petunia hadn't even been grateful. Later that same day, she'd stolen her sister's wand and threatened to break it unless Lily did everything she'd asked which included cleaning Petunia's room and surrendering to her sister her enormous stash of chocolate. Eventually, her parents found out about the situation and Petunia had gotten into trouble. It seemed like they always treated her like she was the bad egg of the family. In her parents' eyes, she just couldn't compete with their darling Lily.

A surge of bitterness shot through her veins and suddenly she felt quite restless. Realizing that sleep was not going to overtake her anytime soon, Petunia quietly got up and stepped into her house slippers, put on her bathrobe and tip-toed out of the bedroom. She was careful not to shut the door too hard so that she could avoid waking up Vernon or the boys. Creeping downstairs, she cautiously steered clear of the steps that creaked (Vernon should really fix those) and went into the kitchen to start some tea. She had a feeling that it was going to be a long night and doubted that she'd get any sleep at all. It was unthinkable that she'd allow herself the luxury of sleeping in as she didn't trust Harry to be alone. There's no telling what he would do or what kind of trouble he'd get into if no one was around to watch him. Besides, what would the neighbors think of her sleeping the morning away! They'd think she'd been out all night, up to no good, that's what they'd think! It was hard enough trying to look and act normal when one abnormal boy lived under her roof... At the thought of this, her mind immediately jumped to the memories of her sister that she'd kept only to herself the last twenty years. Tonight, there would be no escaping them as they surfacing like dead fish in water.

While the water for the tea was put on the stove to boil, she went to the tiny cupboard that Harry used to occupy, quietly unlocked the door and opened it. Inside, she found the old trunk of her father's that she'd received upon his death. It was where she kept her precious mementos--pressed flowers from high school sweethearts, pictures of long forgotten friends, her dried up bridal bouquet, the clothes that Dudley wore home from hospital, her parents' wedding rings--and hidden at the very bottom, wrapped inconspicuously in brown paper, was a framed picture of herself and Lily when they were little girls. It was the only picture she had of her sister.

Petunia blew the bit of dust off it to get a better look. A simple moment in time preserved forever--a seven-year old Lily with her long red hair in pigtails, her green eyes shining brightly and Petunia, aged eight, her brown shoulder length locks swept up in a ponytail. Gently, she caressed the silver lilies and petunias that decorated the frame and gazed at a younger version of herself. Interrupting her reverie, the tea kettle began to whistle and so Petunia jumped up, picture in hand, and hurried into the kitchen to take it off the burner.

Once she'd fixed herself a cup of tea, she sat down at the kitchen table, the picture frame sitting upright in front of her. She remembered when she had first gotten it, about twenty years ago. At that time, years had gone by without the sisters saying a single word to one another. Once Lily had graduated, she'd made a life for herself with those weird friends of hers. Petunia had met Vernon who shared in her conviction that nothing good could come of anything associated with magic. The sisters had never been particularly close, but by the time Lily had graduated, the pair had drifted so far apart that their was little hope for a reconciliation. Their ideas and values were just too different. Of course, the main issue at hand was magic, that was the divider, and Petunia was neither willing to accept it nor Lily. To Petunia, her sister had simply ceased to exist. Sure, Lily had attempted to contact her sister through letters and cards, which were promptly thrown away.

Then the day before Petunia and Vernon's wedding, a package came by post for "Miss Petunia Evans." The bride-to-be didn't see a return address and when she opened the parcel, she found not a card nor a letter, but instead a picture of herself and Lily in an ornate silver picture frame of lilies and petunias. Petunia immediately knew who it was from. Disgusted, she tossed it aside and never thought twice about it--until after her mother's death.

As most sisters serve as maid-of-honor or bridesmaids in their sister's wedding, Lily hadn't even been invited. Lily hadn't yet graduated Hogwarts when Petunia decided that she was better off not associating with her sister's "kind." They were decidedly odd, going around in those bizarre clothes, saying words that didn't make sense, making things happen with a wave of a wand... Instead, she found her satisfaction by being an ordinary woman--a faithful wife and devoted mother in the "normal" world apart from the abnormality and strangeness that followed those like her sister.

Not long before she'd found out she was pregnant, her mother died, leaving everything she had to her daughters. Not wanting to run into her sister, she had visited her mother's house just after dawn one day following the funeral and claimed a few items for herself, mainly knickknacks and jewelry that held some significance for her. Just before leaving her mother's house, she'd gone into the room that had once belonged to her and sitting on the nightstand beside her old bed was the girlhood picture of the two sisters that Lily had given her as a wedding present. She stopped to pick it up and took a good look at it, but she remembered that she was on a fixed schedule and promptly sat it back down. There were other, more important items that she'd wanted to take--things that didn't remind her of the sister that she didn't have. Like a vulture looking for food, she searched every closet, every drawer, every shelf and even under the bed for keepsakes to take home with her.

She'd gathered up everything that she wanted and had almost walked out the bedroom door when once again she noticed the picture in its silver frame sitting there on the nightstand. Impulsively, she grabbed it and stuffed it roughly into her purse and left. On her way home, she thought about how she was going to hide it from Vernon. He hated Lily even though he'd never met her. Heck, she hated Lily, but something about that picture grabbed her attention. Thankfully, when she arrived home, her husband had already left for work. She had the whole day to find the perfect hiding spot. And so it remained in the bottom of her late father's trunk for nearly sixteen years. Not once in all that time had she ever taken it out to look at it--until now.

Now, almost thirty years after Lily had saved her sister, her son had saved his cousin using magic that he wasn't suppose to be using outside of school. Harry didn't have to save his cousin... but he did, just like his mother. Almost immediately, after explaining the dementors to Vernon, Petunia looked at her nephew with new eyes. In one moment they shared an understanding that came from their common bond: Lily. It was in his eyes that she saw her baby sister and the memory of Lily saving her from the fall that had been safely tucked away into the far reaches of her mind was revisited. For a brief few seconds, she and Harry connected, aunt to nephew, nephew to aunt, as they never had connected before and for the first time she felt the blood in her veins flowing in the veins of the fourteen year old boy in front of her--her dead sister's boy.

Unable to contain her emotions any longer, Petunia sat her tea cup down in it's saucer and the tears that flooded her eyes began streaming down her cheek. She was at the same time angry, sad, bitter, sorrowful and sorry. Putting a hand across her mouth, she tried to muffle her cries so that she didn't wake anyone. It puzzled her as she didn't know where all this emotion was coming from, and it felt as though never before did she have such a need to cry as she did at that moment. It was a cry that was long overdue--for her, for Lily and for Harry.

From those wee early hours of the morning until just before daybreak, Petunia sat at the table, the tea she made grew steadily cold as it lay wasted in it's pot. The picture frame sat vigil before her, a shrine to what she'd lost and a reminder to what she'd thrown away. It was the only witness to the tears she'd shed. But the truth that only the dead of the night can bring didn't last for long. By dawn, she had dried her tears and cleaned up her mess in the kitchen. Before anyone else had gotten up, the pretty frame and it's picture were once again wrapped in brown paper and placed at the bottom of her trunk. After locking it in the cupboard, she went upstairs to get washed up and dressed. Today was a new day, there was breakfast to cook, groceries to buy, clothes to wash and iron, rooms to clean, a garden to weed, floors to sweep, a car to wash...

And once again, magic was a dirty word in the Dursley house.