Harry Potter and the Dream of Fate

Uncle Vernon chuckled, "My Dudley! What a fine boy! Only a fine boy like Dudley could win a disciplinary award from Smeltings!" Then he turned to glare at Harry. "Unlike some boys who happen to be prats!" Harry was used to this. A week from today would be Dudley's birthday. The day Harry hated the most. Well, second-most, because the last day of school was the day Harry dreaded the most. Aunt Petunia squealed. "Dudley growing into such a fine man! Pretty soon all the girls will want a chance with him!" She clapped her hands together at the oinker of her son. Harry gagged.

If there was something Dudley was growing into, it was a medium-sized cow. He had grown almost twice his 'normal' size, yes, it is possible, and his fat was almost touching the floor. It was quit disgusting, but Harry couldn't help not staring. He wondered if Dudley's weight had reached a world record yet. The wasn't the worst of it either. Dudley reeked. Harry figured it was because he probably couldn't reach into all the spaces of his bulging body in the bath. But none of this happened to matter to Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon, as long as his blonde hair was plastered to the top of his piggy head, he was absolutely radiant.

Because of Dudley's abnormality, Harry thought a bit highly of himself. He was in good shape and his hair was in style now. He had looked through one of Aunt Petunia's throw away magazines and saw that the messy look was in. How convenient. While thinking all of this, his thoughts where cut in two by Aunt Petunia's shrieking voice.

"And you," she said with her nose pointed to the ceiling, "You go clean your room! It's nasty in there!" Harry got up, pushed in his chair and headed to his room not a moment too soon. He opened the door and noticed that his room was very untidy indeed. He started to pick up a pair of socks off the floor when he heard a tapping at his window. He jumped up to see what it was. A small owl, no bigger than an apple was bobbing up and down carrying a package that was much too big for it. He leapt across the room and opened the window. Immediately the owl dropped the package on his bed and flew off without much further ado. There was a small square package attached to it. Harry opened the envelope first:

Harry read the letter three times before putting it down. He then was hit with a grim reality he had forgotten about until now. The fact that Voldemort had risen once again, and was no longer a meek spirit wandering, but a man. Harry could see the red eyes and horrific face and horrible fake hand of Pettigrew. He could still feel his skin being sliced and the fear burning through his scar. He couldn't take it, just the thought that he could now rise to power made his head spin. He knew it wouldn't be hard for Voldemort to find some support, Harry had seen all the Death-Eaters that had returned to him.

He shook his head. "Not now," he thought to himself, "I can worry about that later." And he turned to his package. He ripped it open and found a baseball with a note attached to it. "They play a sport with this ball and a stick. It's like Quidditch except grounded. Maybe you can use it for practice on your broom." Harry tossed the ball around with a renewed happiness in his heart. He just couldn't wait until the first day of Hogwarts and his boring summer was over. But he couldn't wait even more for the moment to come where he would see his friends again. "Come on Voldemort." He muttered under his breath. Anything could come now, just as long as he had his friends.

* * * * * * * * * * *

Dudley's came by too soon, however, it wasn't as bad as he intended. This year Dudley was too old for the zoo, even though he couldn't get through the doors if he wanted to. This year Dudley had a little ceremony in a restaurant. How else are you going to accommodate the caravan of people Dudley invited? Harry laughed a bit himself when he saw the faces of Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia when over 40 people entered the guest hall. It was quite a party, and there was only one girl that showed up. She was round and quite rude, but she seemed to lighten up when it came to Dudley. All the other guests reminded Harry of Crabbe and Goyle, so he just stood to a corner and tapped his feet to the music. Once the party was over he had gotten one good meal and lots of exercise by carrying all of Dudley's presents to the car. Forty-four presents, honestly, and they all consisted of video games, computer games, dvd's and other electronic stuff. They were all heavy too. Harry figured they all got him presents out of fear. After all, you didn't get a disciplinary award from Smeltings for nothing.

The few weeks after Dudley's birthday were boring, Aunt Petunia screaming her head off at Harry was usually the highlight of the day. Once and a while he would finish his very tedious chores early and get lost somewhere in the garden. He would then lay down and stare at the sky and imagine how much better his life would be if he was living with his Godfather, or playing Quidditch with Ron or even looking up charms in the library with Hermione. He also thought of Cho Chang and how pretty she was, and how she would never be his. But for some reason he wasn't as charmed by Cho as he was the year before. Maybe it was the look on her face when Cedric was found dead, but she just didn't seem the same to him. Proud to be moving on, Harry patted himself on the back and decided to go back inside the hellhole and threaten Dudley with "magic". How he wished he was in Hogwarts right now, and not in this bloody garden. "Ouch!" he said one day, for he had been out in the sun too long and he had a minor sunburn on his cheeks.

Before he knew it, he had gone through the pitiful summer days and nights, and the alarm clock went off and Harry woke up to his own birthday. "Congrats Harry, your 15!" He got out of bed and walked to his closet, humming the happy birthday song. He got dressed, having trouble pulling his striped shirt over his out of control hair, and headed downstairs, as if something was going to happen. But to his surprise, something did happen, or did NOT happen. No one was in the kitchen, the living room, or any of the bedrooms. The bathroom was clear, and Harry even went out and checked the garden. He couldn't smell the usual bacon frying on the stove, and the kitchen was way too neat to be an ordinary morning. "Oh, wonderful" Harry started, "Now they just decided to stop living on my birthday." He walked towards the window once again and noticed a small piece of paper on the refrigerator. Angry that he hadn't noticed it before, he decided to read it. Scribbled on it was Aunt Petunia's messy writing as if she was in a hurry. It read:

Even though this note was pretty depressing, Harry was filled with excitement. It was only Friday morning, a whole weekend with no Dursleys! Harry did find it quite odd that they had left the house to him, they wouldn't even leave him in the car all by himself. But this didn't matter. A whole weekend by himself beat a smelly sock or a toothpick any day. Maybe they were starting to warm up to him after all. "Best present ever Aunt Petunia!" And he searched those newly wonderful cabinets with a grin. Chomping down his cereal, he thought of all the things he could do. He came up with nothing, except of course sitting out in the garden, but that wasn't fun anymore considering his face was sunburned. "Oh, there's a thought." He started. "Number one on my to-do list, take care of bloody sunburn."

When he finished his breakfast he paced the house. "What to do, what to do.." he whispered. His instinct was to bust up the house in bittersweet revenge for all that the Dursleys had done to him. But he knew that if he did that they would never leave the house to him ever again, and he would probably be sent to clean it up anyways. So he did the second best thing he thought of. Which was of course, write to his friends. First he wrote to Sirius. Dear Sirius, He began. He told him about how his summer had been really lame, how he would much rather be a fugitive with him than a "prat" with the Dursleys and how they had left the house to him. He also asked Sirius about some advice about Voldemort, what he should be doing to prepare for him, if anything at all. When do you think he'll strike next, Sirius? Was one of his questions. He also couldn't resist asking Sirius about the "old crowd". There was a name in there that had been bugging him all summer. Arabella Figg, could that possibly be Mrs. Figg, a.k.a, Cat Lady? He had so many questions he was surprised he fit it all into one sheet (and a half) of parchment.

After revising his letter, Harry put it into a nice clean envelope and walked towards Hedwig's cage. Hedwig was sleeping and was a bit angry to be woken up. "Sorry girl, but I have a new mission for you!" At these words Hedwig got professional looking and stuck out her leg. "Thata girl!" Harry said, followed by, "Once you come back, I'll give you some food, alright?" He opened the cage, she stepped out, nibbled him affectionately and took off. Harry looked out the window until he couldn't see her anymore. He loved his little owl.

Then he went back to his desk and took out a new clean piece of parchment and began to write to Ron. He told Ron just about everything he told Sirius, except for the whole fugitive thing of course, and he added a few more things to give his letter some real content. More along the lines of "does New York have any Quidditch teams?" and "Why are you so concerned about Hermione liking the book? and a little more of "Wish you were here so I could get out of this damn house, but don't worry about me, your awesome present is keeping me alive". He really wished Ron was here instead of in America, but he couldn't help feel happy for him. This was one of the few vacations Ron went on with his family and he must be having a blast. Still thinking about how cool it would be to visit NY, Harry folded up the letter as well. As he put it into an envelope, he heard a tapping. The tiny owl was there again carrying yet another package. This time Harry got a hold of it before it flew away, and stuffed his letter into his beak.

"Make sure this goes to Ron..." But the owl was too busy chatting away and fidgeting to listen to Harry. He raised his voice. "Ron Weasley, you know, your owner! Weasley, you stupid git, a red-headed Ron Weasley!" The bird bit him and he let it go. He ruffled his feathers angrily and flew off.

He tackled the envelope first. It was, of course, a birthday card, signed by all the Weasleys and a note attached to it by Ron. He smiled then opened the present. It was all glittery and at first it took a while for him to figure out what it was. It was, in fact, a picture frame, and it was handmade too. The picture inside it, however, was what got Harry's undivided attention. it was a collage, and Harry could tell that Ron had made it. It had a picture of him, a picture of Hermione and of Ron. Ron was smiling and waving at Harry, and Hermione was beaming at him, blushing (Harry suspected this was because of getting her picture taken) and waving also. This collage also contained pictures of the whole Weasley clan, Hagrid and Dumbledore. Everyone else was waving, except for Harry, who was blushing and combing through his hair. He found it kind of strange to see himself moving in a picture. All this magic stuff was still so amazing to him, even after 4 years.

He just kind of stared at the picture with loads of new feelings running through him. One was the desire to see his friends again. He really missed them, almost too much. The thought of losing them was too much for Harry to bear, even with the reality that it really could happen, and that it was probably going to be his fault too. Before he knew it he felt a tear roll down his cheek. "Oh, dammit Harry!" He scolded himself. He couldn't let this happen, was he that weak that simple thoughts would trigger this much emotion? "Pull yourself together!" He had to discipline himself if he ever wanted to defeat Voldemort. Imagine what it would be like if he started bawling in the middle of a battle with him? He would be humiliated, even worse, this rush of waterworks could cost him his, and other people's lives. "It's like the dementors." He thought, "I've just got to pretend that Voldemort is just another one of those dammed dementors. Face it and make it go away." It was hard, considering he thought of Voldemort when he saw the dementors, but he had a good motivator.

The thought of his father's glowing stag flared in his brain and washed away all the other thoughts. "Yeah." he said softly, "We'll fight him together Dad." And he looked back down at his present. "Me and my Dad and my Mum, and my friends." He said, a tear hit the sparkly frame, it was the best present Harry had ever gotten.