Silent All These Years

*~*~*~*~*

Chapter 1: Remember

Sensation washes over me

I can't describe it

Pain I felt so long ago

I don't remember

Tear a hole so I can see

My devastation

Feelings from so long ago

I don't remember

Holding on, to let them know

What's given to me, given to me

To hide behind

The mask this time

And try to believe

Blind your eyes to what you see

You can't embrace it

Leave it well enough alone

And don't remember

Cut your pride and watch it bleed

You can't deny it

Pain you know you can't ignore

I don't remember

Holding on, to let them know

What's given to me, given to me

To hide behind

The mask this time

And try to believe

If I can

Remember

To know this will

Conquer me

If I can

Just walk alone

And try to escape

Into me

Holding on, to let them know

What's given to me, given to me

To hide behind

The mask this time

And try to believe

If I can

Remember

To know this will

Conquer me

If I can

Just walk alone

And try to escape

Into me

*~*~*~*~*~

It was a bright, sunny morning in early July when Petunia went into Harry's room to awaken him. Brilliant gold-orange streams of light were bursting out from the small nooks the window blinds neglected to cover. They reached across the room and came to rest upon Harry's sleeping form. The house was quiet and still, as it had been for most of the summer.

Almost immediately after Harry returned to Number Four Privet Drive in June, his cousin Dudley had left for the States to attend a boxing camp. Then a couple of weeks following Dudley's departure, his Uncle Vernon announced that the company he worked for, Grunnings, was starting a new foreign campaign to sell drills overseas and had appointed him the company's representative. This entailed extensive traveling in North and South America over the next few months. Unfortunately, Grunnings was only footing the bill for Vernon; family wasn't included. Vernon had tried to persuade Petunia to come with him, saying that they could drop Harry off with his sister, Marge, or pay old Mrs. Figg to keep him for a few months, but Petunia declined. This of course, shocked Vernon.

It wasn't that she hadn't wanted to partake in the exotic comforts and luxuries a place like, say, Brazil, had to offer, but every time she looked at Harry's face, from somewhere deep in her conscience, a voice called out to her, telling her to stay with the boy. Now, it could've been that she was simply having a bad day when she thought she heard this voice, or perhaps it was because she hadn't a decent night's sleep since her nephew had arrived home (since Dudley had left for camp, she watched him like a hawk to make sure he didn't steal or use any of her Diddykin's things). Neither explanation satisfied her completely or eased her conscience in the slightest bit. It slightly alarmed Petunia that she couldn't explain the ominous, pleading voice within or the nagging feeling it brought with it. To ease her anxieties she tried to chalk it up to her imagination, but alas, she wasn't entirely convinced that that was what it was. After reluctantly telling Vernon that she had more pressing things to do at home, he'd left for Argentina and had been gone ever since.

Though Petunia missed her husband and son, she was relieved to finally have some time alone. She'd never been separated from them for this long and truthfully, she relished the thought of being able to focus more on her cleaning than worrying if Vernon's grey suit was going to be back from the cleaners in time for him to go to work or if Dudley was getting enough to eat (after all, he was a growing boy, it was difficult cooking four course meals five or six times a day!). It was a full time job keeping her family happy and content, so she decided that the little vacation away from them would give her a chance to thoroughly clean and polish every nook and cranny. Not a spot in her house would be spared her wrath for she had decided to wage guerilla warfare on dirt. She wouldn't be fighting the battle alone, however, for her nephew, Harry, would be helping her. For the next couple of weeks, the two had spent many silent days mopping, sweeping, vacuuming, dusting, polishing and rearranging until Petunia was somewhat satisfied.

If there had to be a downside in staying in Surry, it was being stuck alone with Harry. Petunia did have to admit, he hadn't been as bratty as he usually was. Since Vernon and she brought him home from the train station, he'd barely spoken two words. He'd done his chores without being told to, gotten up in the mornings without her having to wake him and basically just stayed out of her way. For once in both their lives, his aunt became concerned for him. The Saturday after Vernon left, Petunia was feeling particularly lonely and decided to cook a big dinner. She even relented in her animosity towards Harry and told him to join her. Politely, he refused and she was stunned. Her Dudley would never have declined such a feast! These days, he just didn't seem to want to eat much and preferred to be aloof than be stuck at the dinner table with his aunt.

Harry seemed to like being off on his own. His favorite hiding spot was the flower bed just outside the kitchen window. For hours at a time, he'd go out there and lay in the cool shade it offered from the hot summer sun. Though he thought that his aunt was oblivious to his whereabouts, she knew exactly where he was. One afternoon she'd been looking out the window at a neighbor when she happened to glance downward and saw him laying there, his hands tucked behind his head. When she was sure he hadn't seen her, Petunia continued to watch him, trying to figure out as his behavior as it puzzled her to no end. What reflected in his face was that of utmost anger and sadness. His eyes were dull and joyless and his posture was slacking, but Petunia refrained from saying anything when at any other time she would've been quick to criticize. Ever since the night last summer when Dudley was attacked by the dementors, her icy demeanor had slightly thawed towards the boy. To her surprise, though, this summer, it was remarkably easy to get along with Harry as he was completely compliant and obedient. She hadn't even worried about him doing anything involving the "M" word.

So, on this particular mid-July morning, she had decided to move her war on filth from the house to outside in her garden. She'd decided that it had been neglected too long, especially since the dry summer heat had shriveled up many of the flowers and much of the greenery. Also, she noticed a few weeds popping up here and there, and if there was something that she hated more than a messy house, it was weeds (not including the "M" word)! It would also make for a nice change to work outside in the sun rather than to be stuck inside all day, again.

Harry, of course, would be assisting her. So, at exactly 6:30 AM, dressed in tan khaki capri pants, a short-sleeved light blue t-shirt and wearing a large straw hat, she went into Harry's room and awoke him.

She stood with her hands on her hips, mere inches between her and her sleeping nephew, and shouted, "Get up!! Get dressed quickly and come outside to the garden!" Just as swiftly as she entered, she exited.

Startled, Harry shot up barely in time to see his Aunt Petunia leaving the room. Without making a sound, he obeyed his aunt's orders and hurriedly dressed. Rushing down the stairs, he threw on an old t-shirt and tried to smooth his wild, morning hair with no luck. Exiting through the back door of the house, he saw his Aunt Petunia already to work: squatting in the midst of her begonias, wearing dirty brown gloves, trying to shovel weeds that didn't seem to want to be uprooted.

When she heard the door close, Petunia looked up at Harry and snapped, "It's about time! Come over here!" Harry moved to stand in front of her. She stopped digging at the weed long enough to give him instructions.

"You see these weeds?" She pointed to a few scattered weeds around her as Harry mutely nodded his head. "I want you to pull them all out of the ground. I want the little nuisances all gone! There's a shovel next to the door. Try to pull them out first. If that doesn't work, then dig them out, but only as your last resort. Make sure you've removed all the roots, then refill the holes with dirt. I don't want to see any holes in my garden! Understood??"

Once again, Harry nodded and set off to get the shovel and started to work. For nearly an hour, both labored to remove the dratted, troublesome weeds. Sweat dripped down Petunia's back and her hair was soaked, but she was no stranger to sweating as it was a sign of hard work. Periodically, she would glance up from her task at hand to see her nephew hunched over and digging away at a weed, his face scrunched up in concentration. Every few seconds, he'd have to stop and push his glasses up his sweaty nose, but then he'd go back to shoveling as if he never stopped.

When the weeding was finished, Petunia then gave orders for Harry to search for and pick off any shriveled and brown leaves from the flowers and plants. In the meantime, she would be pruning the unruly and grossly overgrown rose bushes.

As she approached the bushes with pruning shears, she scanned them, appalled that they had ever grown so out of control. She hoped the neighbors hadn't seen them... What kind of person would they think she was, who couldn't keep her bushes groomed?? Well, Mrs. Madison down the street couldn't say anything as her bushes had long withered in the dry heat and were nothing more than skeletons. The roses it produced had been pitifully mediocre to Petunia's blooms. Every summer, people from all over Privet Drive came to admire the Dursley rose bushes as their roses were the most vibrant, varied in color and the largest. An exorbitant amount of energy on both Petunia and Vernon's parts were taken to ensure only the most beautiful roses. They'd been trying every year since 1986 to win first place in the Little Whinging Garden Association's "Best of the Best Roses" contest, but always lost to Mr. and Mrs. Tate who lived two doors down. Now those were the kind of people she was afraid that would see her struggling garden as they were notorious for spreading nasty little rumors! Mrs. Tate was one of the worst gossipers Privet Drive had ever seen! If they'd happened to see Petunia's pathetic looking bushes.... oh God, what havoc those Tates could create! Why just last year...

"When did you plant these?"

Petunia was abruptly torn from her thoughts by a soft voice. A voice so soft that she almost didn't hear it.

Turning around, she eyed her dirty, sweaty nephew who was kneeling by some white flowers looking up at her with an unreadable expression on his face.

Frowning, she asked him, "What did you say??"

A little louder, he repeated himself, "I said, when did you plant these? I'd never seen them before and..."

He didn't get to finish his sentence as his aunt sharply cut him off. Petunia went back to pruning and tersely, she said, "Don't ask questions."

A few more minutes went by in which neither person said a thing. The only noise to be heard was the sound of Petunia's pruning shears cutting more rapidly and louder than before. Harry, however, didn't move, but kneeled in the dirt looking curiously from the flowers to his aunt and back to the flowers.

Unnerved by Harry's question, Petunia almost jumped out of her skin when he spoke again.

"I know what these flowers are. Why did you plant them? You've never grown them before."

Angrily, Petunia whirled around and pointed her shears in Harry's direction. "I thought I said no questions?!"

Harry shot up and furiously stomped over to his aunt. "I think that's a stupid rule! Why can't you talk about her?! I just spent a year asking questions that no one would answer! You don't know how it feels to wonder and wonder because people think you're better off not knowing!" He was breathing heavily now due to his outburst. His hands were clenched at his sides and his eyes were burning with resentment.

"Don't you speak to me like that! And hush or the neighbors will hear you!" she hissed in a lowered voice. Scanning the parameter of the yard in her typical paranoid fashion, she wanted to make sure that no one was trying to peep over the fence to gawk at the scene Harry was making.

"I don't care if the neighbors hear me!" His voice was slightly softer than before, but it had lost none of its intensity.

Petunia's eyes pierced through Harry. He'd never seen her this irate before. Even at her angriest, she'd never looked the way she'd looked at this moment: like she would suddenly stab him with the shears.

"Well, I do care what the neighbors think. I don't want Harriet Jones next door spreading vicious rumors about how my ill-behaved nephew back-talks me!" she spat. Threateningly, she inched closer to Harry with her hand in midair ready to slap him; her stony face was frozen in the fixed glare with which she looked at the intolerable little deviant before her.

Though his fists were clenched and his eyes were narrowed, she just knew that he was using every last scrap of courage he had to stand up to her like this. As she got nearer, to her surprise, her fury seemed to lessen. The look in his green eyes was so very familiar to her and in that moment she backed off. Stopping in her tracks, Petunia saw something in the boy's eyes that found a minute part of her heart that she kept hidden from the world.

She lowered her now trembling hand until it was at her side. A few seconds passed allowing her heartbeat and breathing to return to normal. The rage disappeared from her face and was replaced by a weariness that comes from years of deceiving oneself and depriving oneself of the truth which frees the soul. Calmly, through gritted teeth, she said expressionlessly, "Go back to work."

Turning, she walked back to her rose bushes. Raising her pruning shears, she begin clipping. Harry ignored her instructions and kept talking, his tone laced with bitterness.

"I wish my mother and father were alive! I hate you! If my godfather hadn't died, I wouldn't have come back here at all!"

Petunia stopped pruning, but did not turn around. She did not shout or yell or feel a proclivity to drag Harry by the hair of his head and lock him in his room until September. In fact, she slightly felt as though she deserved those words. If Harry had said those things a year ago or if Vernon had been around, the boy would've been dead. But the thoughts, feelings and words that originated from her nephew didn't bounce off her like they used to. Instead, they stabbed her and she felt pained, not only for herself, but for Harry.

Not moving from where she stood, she turned her head to the side, looking at nothing in particular. With a sigh, she managed in a breaking voice, to ask, not tell, Harry, "Please Harry, go back to work."

Yet again, he defied his aunt's request. As if he were taunting her, he kept talking. "You know, I don't hate Uncle Vernon or even Dudley as much as I hate you! You know why?! Because you were suppose to love me and want me! You are my aunt! My mother's sister! That's why I had to come live with you! But you never talk about her, you can't even bring yourself to mention her name!" In a quieter voice, he added, "All I ever wanted was for someone to want me. Why didn't you just tell Dumbledore to take me somewhere else??"

His voice faded with that last sentence. Petunia was sure there were tears running down his face as his voice cracked, but she just couldn't look at him. Unshed tears clouded her own eyes. Nosy neighbors and cultivated gardens didn't matter so much any more. God, how she all of a sudden wished Vernon were here!

Then she did something unprecedented. Setting her shears down on the grass, she went over to where her nephew was. He was now sitting cross-legged, his elbows on his legs with his head in his hands. She knelt down in the warm dirt across from Harry, separated only by a row of flowers. Realizing that she was going to have dirt stains on her pants, she winced slightly. Oh well. They were bound to get dirty anyway. With a fond expression, she glanced down at the white blossoms at her knees. Her deft fingers reached down to trace a silky white blossom in front of her. Using her free hand, she wiped the burning, lingering tears from her eyes. Either Harry didn't notice her or he didn't care because he didn't look up.

With a wavering voice, Petunia said gently, "I wish your mother hadn't died, either. Not because I didn't want you, but--" She stopped and hesitated. Nervously, she licked her lips before continuing on. "But because she was my sister." She awaited Harry's reaction, which he swiftly gave.

Without looking up, he retorted dryly, "So? You've always denied you even had a sister. You've always talked bad about her, like she was some kind of monster. You've even called her names. You didn't care that she died, you hate her."

"I didn't hate her. It may have seemed like I hated her, but I didn't. Angry? Yes. Bitter? Yes. People don't always say what they mean--" Harry cut her off before she could go on.

"Yeah, well, what I said about hating you? I meant it."

"Don't interrupt me!" she snapped. Harry didn't say anything else. It wasn't a revelation to Petunia to learn that her nephew hated her, so she wasn't exactly shocked that he felt that way. She just felt... awkward and uncomfortable discussing these things with him. Then the little voice in her mind appeared again out of the blue, urging her to talk to Harry.

She didn't know what to say, so she said the first thing that came to her mind. "You were right, you know. I've never had these flowers in my garden before," she acknowledged, referring to the white flowers that lay between them. "They remind me of your mother. Lilies were her favorite flower because she shared her name with them." She paused to collect her thoughts. Taking a deep breath, she knew she was rambling, but couldn't help it. Maybe if she didn't stop think about what she was saying, then she wouldn't be embarrassed. "Every April, when the first blossoms appeared, she would cut a few and put them in a vase in her room. It sat beside her bed. She sat them there so that in the morning, their scent would wake her up."

Harry then raised his head to look at his aunt, whose voice was faltering. The last word had been almost inaudible. Her hat cast a shadow over her face, so he was unable to see her clearly.

When his eyes met hers, she gazed almost hypnotically into them--his almond shaped, green eyes...

Almost in a whisper, she gasped and said, "Lily used to look at me with those same eyes. Every time I look at you, I sometimes wonder... if she can somehow see me... through you..."

Unable to take anymore, she jump to her feet just as the tears began spilling down her cheeks. Into the house she fled, not caring that she was traipsing dirt on her clean floor. Frantically she looked around for her handbag. She looked by the couch, in the hall closet, on the kitchen countertops, but to no avail. Harry had run into the house right behind her, alarmed by his aunt's behavior.

Exasperated, Petunia ran up the stairs (losing her hat along the way) to her and Vernon's bedroom where she saw it sitting on her bureau. Grabbing it, she spun around to go back downstairs when she came face to face with Harry. Diving her hand carelessly into her purse, she retrieved a couple of twenty-pound notes. Grabbing Harry's hand, she thrust the notes into them.

"Here," she said. Her voice had returned to its familiar frigid tone. "Spend the day in town. Take the bus, walk, fly--I don't care what you do, just get out of my sight and don't come back until tonight. Eat dinner in town. I want to be alone."

Harry kept his mouth shut and didn't ask any more questions, though Petunia was sure he wanted to so very much. She didn't want to have to look into those eyes of his anymore. It felt as though she was talking to two people--two people who she hurt very much. Two people who hurt her, as well.

Ushering her nephew down the stairs, she practically shoved him out the door, which she quickly locked behind him. As soon as she was alone, Petunia walked from the door to the kitchen where she fell to her knees and sobbed. Since last summer, she just couldn't get Lily out of her head. Her dead sister haunted her like a restless ghost. The voice in her head distressed her immensely! Was she going mad??

In between her sobs, she saw all the dirt that she and Harry had tracked in from outside. Tears were still rolling down her face, mingling with the sweat, when she got up to get a dish towel. On all fours, she scrubbed frantically at the dirt on the floor, trying not to think about anything else. The more she tried not to think, the faster and more vehement her scrubbing became.

She hadn't been cleaning the kitchen floor for more than thirty minutes when she heard the doorbell ring. Mortified at the state of her house, she paid no attention to the bell and hoped whoever it was would go away. Company was the last thing she wanted right now, first she had to get this damned dirt up. If she only hadn't have lost her head and run in here like a ninny...

The bell rang a second time.

Petunia's arms and wrists began to hurt from the amount of force with which she held the dishtowel and moved it rapidly back and forth across the surface of the tiled floor. She couldn't stand the sight of all this dirt! It had to go!

Just then, she heard a sound between a pop and a crack and suddenly a person appeared before her. Letting out a bloodcurdling scream, she threw her dishtowel to the side and instantly leapt to her feet. Visibly shaken, she backed up into the refrigerator.

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE?!" she shrieked at the top of her lungs. Her voice reverberated throughout the house. All the blood in her body seemed to have dropped to her feet as she felt dizzy and numb. He'd given her a fright appearing out of nowhere right in front of her!

"Hello again, Petunia," he addressed her softly but with a cold countenance. An arrogant smirk played at his lips. "I knew I'd eventually be running into you again, being Potter's aunt. Although, I thought it would've been long before now considering his tendency towards shamelessly flouting the school rules and his careless acceptance of the poor marks he receives in my class. How long has it been, now? Twenty years?"

But Petunia didn't hear him. Whether it was from the sheer shock of having someone appear right before her eyes or the exertion that the events of her morning had caused her, she couldn't exactly say. She didn't have time to think about it before the world went black. Fainting away, her body landed lifelessly at the unexpected guest's feet.