Reading the Will

Disclaimer: Not mine.

Reading the Will

Chapter 7

London.

Harry took the train, traveling like a Muggle and taking the time to assimilate back into their culture, which was getting more and more difficult with each year he spent away. He thought of Snape, who would dress with such care, and wondered if he was ever confused between the two worlds. Was that the reason he was never without his robes and buttoned waistcoat? Did the clothes help to ground him and hold his feet to the world that he must stay in even though he must have wanted at times to run away? Did it make it impossible to run away and to leave this all behind?

He watched the land slip away from his window as he approached Little Whinging, and thought of Snape living as a Muggle. He wondered what it would have been like to grow up in the Muggle world, knowing that you held magic in the palm of your hand. Would it eventually leave you feeling better than the rest, or less? Would the power you held in check ground you or give you flight?

No Muggle-born that Harry knew had been aware of their gift until their letter confirmed it. Gift. He almost snorted at the thought. Then he wondered what it would feel like to be left behind as Petunia had been.

Harry glanced down at his jumper and pulled it off, quickly shrinking it to fit in his pocket. Mrs Weasley's handiwork was accepted in Hogwarts and at Grimmauld Place but he didn't think it would work too well in Petunia's sitting room. If he was even invited into the sitting room.

He looked out of the window again and thought that perhaps he wore the jumper instead of a waistcoat to ground him to the place that he wanted to be, not trusting what he'd held in the palm of his hand to be enough. Putting his hand into his pocket, he felt the rough wool to reassure himself that home was with him.

He had planned what to say, how to greet his cousin, how to smile at his aunt, how to do exactly what they would expect to garner the information he wanted. Now his plans felt foolish and straight out of a late night Muggle movie that he used to listen to through the walls of Number Four.

She had been left behind. He frowned as the thought came to him unbidden. She did not have the gift. What did she wear to ground her to the house on Privet Drive? Perhaps it was holding her too hard to the ground. Perhaps, Harry thought, she needed to be un-tethered.

He ran his hand through his hair and wished it were Ginny that sat next to him instead of an empty seat. He would ask her how she might feel if one of her brothers was born a Squib and sent away to school. Would she be jealous of the freedom the Muggles offered? Would a wizarding child feel jealous of the movies, shopping and endless streets of nameless people? He thought of Petunia in his world and Ginny in this.

He walked off the platform and down to Privet Drive, wishing again that Ginny were with him. He found he did that more and more. Wish that she were near so that he could look up and see her scowl at him. He didn't need a button-up waistcoat to be grounded or a Weasley jumper. He needed her eyes not to turn away from his.

He looked up from the spot on the pavement that he had been looking at for the past few minutes and saw again the house where he had grown up. The neat lawn and trimmed shrubs belied what lay inside. He remembered sleeping in the cupboard under the stairs, and the bars Vernon had anchored to his window. He shook his head and began to walk up the drive as the memory of Ron's rescue flashed into his mind, and the almost-goodbye from Dudley on that last day.

His knuckles banged on the wooden door three times before he let his hand fall to his side. Then the sound of footfalls hurrying down the short hallway and stopping at the door came from inside. The peephole darkened before whoever it was looking at him stepped away and slowly opened the door, ending any hope of flight.

"Blimey, Harry, I never expected to see you come walking in." Dudley stepped aside to give Harry room to enter.

"Ummm, Dudley?" Harry peeked around the hulk of his cousin to see down the hallway.

"Come on in, Harry, it's ok," Dudley said quietly. "Mum's in the kitchen."

"Where's your Dad?" Harry glanced back up the drive, expecting him to arrive any moment.

"Nah, he's at work. Won't be home for hours."

"Well, if you are sure it's no problem, okay," he squeaked and nodded as if he was twelve years old again. "Thanks, Duds."

"So," Harry licked his lips and shoved his hands in his pockets to grip the woolen jumper. "What have you been up to?"

"More like what have you been up to? I heard 'bout it, ya know, we got some of those funny papers, right funny, those." Dudley grinned. "Come on in, Mum has fresh cookies and was just putting on a pot of tea when you knocked."

"What do you mean, you heard about it? Heard about what?" He chased Dudley down the hallway and grabbed his arm, pulling him back.

"Tell me what the fuck you are talking about," he hissed.

"Hey, come on." Dudley pulled his arm away, a confused expression on his face. "What's this? You came here, remember? I didn't go all soft and look you up. We just heard about the medal and everything they gave you. Some kinda hero now, or what?"

"Harry?" Petunia stood looking down the short hallway from the kitchen, wiping her hands on her apron. "I figured you would come around sooner or later. He said you would."

"Who?" He looked from Dudley to his aunt and back at Dudley.

"Your mother's friend. That one from the old neighbourhood. Snape."

"Yeah right." He licked his lips nervously and looked back at the front door. "He came here?"

"Of course not, he sent me a book," she snipped as she reached around her back and untied her apron. "You can sit on the stool at the counter. I've already set the table for dinner and don't want it messed up."

Harry heard Dudley's sigh and grinned as he walked over to the stool. He took his place, surprised that Dudley took the seat next to him.

"She doesn't really mean to sound so mean, Harry, she just..."

"Don't make excuses for me, young man, and of all people not to him."

"Mum, he hasn't been here for five minutes and already you're..."

"It's fine, Dudley, really, it is." Harry smiled at his cousin and started to chuckle. "Sorry Aunt Petunia, but this is just getting too bloody funny."

"And what, young man, do you find so funny?" Petunia planted her hands on her hips and glared at him.

"That I still feel like a kid here. I rather expected it, but then again I didn't. It's like I grew up but here I am, the same as before." He paused and looked around the small house. "I guess ... I don't know... now that I see it again, I don't feel like I ever lived here. Not really. I used to be scared of you, you know, when I was a little kid."

"Me?" She put her hand to her throat and nervously walked back into the kitchen and put her apron back on. "Why would you ever be scared of me?"

"Oh, I don't know, Aunt Petunia." He smirked, watching her hands shaking as she moved the teapot to the counter in front of him. "Maybe when you locked me under the stairs. I guess it started then."

"You were in that cupboard for a reason," she snapped at him. "Not that you ever asked, not that you ever thought about more than yourself, but there was a reason. Then when you went off to that school, you came home worse every summer. What was I to do with you?"

Harry stopped laughing and looked at the floor as he clenched his fists, not wanting to show his anger. "Excuse me, but what possible reason could you have for locking a child under the stairs? What possible reason did you have for treating me like that?"

"When you were two, only two and you could open up every door in the house. Twice I found you outside in the middle of the night. You could have been killed. When Vernon decided to nail the doors shut, you would ... well... I don't know what happened but the glass would disappear from your window and out you would go again."

Harry lifted his head and grinned at her, forgetting his anger. "I've heard that can happen sometimes. Kids, you know, kids can't control their magic when they are little."

"Well, we had to find someplace with no windows and the cupboard was as good a place as any."

"But you kept me there."

"Well, yes. Harry, I didn't know how long it would last. I didn't know if you had outgrown it, or if it was safe. Your mother would have episodes from time to time when she was young, episodes she never outgrew."

"What kind of episodes?" His eyes locked on hers. "Please, Aunt Petunia, you never really talk about her. Not really, you only talk about the later part, the part that you didn't like, my Dad and that I..."

"It was never a matter of like, boy," she sighed and shook head. "You just never understood. You always acted as if it were my fault. If it wasn't for us you wouldn't have had a place to live, remember that."

"Mum, he was a kid...blimey, I don't even understand why you treated him that way. I mean, he was a prat, always butting in where he wasn't wanted, always better than everyone else, but ... well, you were, Harry. Always have been. Sorry 'bout that." He looked at Harry sheepishly.

"It's ok, Duds, I guess I was something of a prat." He grinned. "And you were sort of a bully. Not that it bothers me now, just... well, you know."

"Yeah, when you were real little you used to try and follow me around all the..."

"Dudley, we don't need to go into all this now. Harry, exactly why are you here?"

"I just wanted to...I don't know, see you, I guess. I hoped that we could get past everything that happened. My mother would have wanted me to know you, to sort of keep in touch."

"If she was so worried about that, she should have stayed put instead of going off like she did." Petunia turned back to the sink and started to wipe at the already clean surface.

"You were saying she had episodes."

"Yes, well." She stopped wiping and looked at the wall in front of her. "Mirrors would break, and sometimes the lights would go out when no one touched the switch. Other things, little things."

"Did they, your Mum and Dad, lock her up?"

"Of course not!" She spun around and glared at him. "She wasn't dangerous to herself. She wasn't like that, not like that Potter who took her away from here for good. Not like your father, who didn't care what happened to either one of you."

"He was not dangerous," Harry spat.

"He kept her there. She should have been safe and at home. She would have been if he hadn't married her and kept her where there was a war going on. He should have known better, he should have sent the two of you home."

"She was home, in her home." He raked both hands through his hair. "Listen Aunt Petunia, can we not do this? Can we not argue about him right now? It's something we will never agree on, can we just let it go for now?"

"Good idea Mum. Show him the book." He grinned and nodded at her. "She's been writing in it on and off ever since she got it about a year ago."

"Dudley," she pouted, wrapping her arms around her waist. "This is not the time."

"Sure it is, Mum." He sighed and got up to walk into the sitting room. "You wouldn't be writing in it if you didn't intend to give it to him."

Silence spun between Petunia and Harry as they waited for Dudley to come back from fetching the book. Harry looked at her and smiled, knowing that her apron was her waistcoat and wished he had left his jumper on.

"I will thank you to take this and leave." She took the red journal from Dudley and forced it into Harry's hands. Then she looked at his eyes, surprised to see them higher than her own. Without thinking, she reached up and laid her hand on his cheek.

"You are not as tall as Dudley. Must take after the Evans' side in that," she said softly, then quickly pulled her arm back as if scalded. "I thank you for coming, Harry. Dudley, dear? Will you please see him to the door?"

Harry watched her back as she walked down the hallway, then disappeared up the stairs. He brought his hand up to his cheek and placed his fingers where she had touched, trying to remember if this was the first sign of affection she had ever shown him.

"Harry?" Dudley opened the door and shuffled his feet in embarrassment. "She really did spend a lot of time writing in that. Dad would yell at her and tell her to stop, had terrible rows about it, they did."

"Tell her I appreciate it." Harry walked to the door, stopping at the bottom of the stairs and looking up. "Listen Duds, give me a minute. Okay?"

He stepped onto to the first stair and looked back at Dudley. "I'll be right down."

He climbed the stairs and remembered the last time he had walked down them. He thought of Tonks, and Moody and nighttime rides on racing brooms. How far that all seemed now. How a lifetime away and in the realm of dreams it all seemed now. He turned at the sound of sobbing and saw Aunt Petunia on her knees in front of a cupboard holding a small bundle of letters tied in a blue ribbon.

"Aunt Petunia?" he asked hesitantly. "Is there something I can do?"

"No." She looked up at him with tears in her eyes. "It's time to get rid of these, I guess. I told Vernon I had burnt them."

"Are they from my Mum?"

"No, they are from him. He is the only one that told me about her, you know," she mused as she wiped her nose on her apron. "Oh, she would write about how wonderful everything was, and how much she loved it and how much she would show me. But he wrote about her. He told me... well, things."

She pulled a letter at random and held it up to him. "See? Go ahead, it won't bite."

Harry slid his back down the wall until he was sitting with her. Taking the letter, he unfolded it and looked at her in surprise when he recognized the tight handwriting.

Petunia,

Thank you for the birthday card and your kind wishes. I was surprised to get it. Lily gave me some sweets from the shop in Hogsmeade. She said she would bring some to you when term ends because the ones with raspberries are your favourites.

She is sad that you do not write to her. If you want me to, I can send an owl to you. All you have to do is tie the letter to his leg and then shoo it off. It is easier than mailing these letters. I have to wait until I get home or someone is going to London.

Severus

Harry grinned and looked up at Petunia, who was leaning forward to see which letter he held.

"That must have been from her second year." She looked up at him, chewing her lip. "They are all like that. Nothing really, just little... I don't know, little things kids write."

He took another and opened it.

Petunia,

I have sent the quill you wanted. It should be there in time for the holidays. I am sure she will like it. She always admires it in the window.

I will be staying here. As much as I appreciate your kind offer for coffee, I must decline.

Severus.

"Fifth year, I think, or maybe fourth," she sighed, leaning back. "By fifth year he was already rather more formal."

"Why did you keep them?"

"It's all I had," she sighed. "Foolishness and child's play. If you want them, they are yours."

She stood up and waited for him to join her. "I have something else you may as well have. That and the journal is all I really have of hers."

She walked into her bedroom and opened the closet, lifting down a small box from the shelf. Sitting on the edge of her bed, she pulled out a silver chain with a heart-shaped locket. Sighing deeply, she snapped it open and smiled up at him, patting the bed next to her.

"This was the last thing he sent. It was hers, your mum's."

Harry held out his hand as the small, cold piece of silver fell into his palm. Looking down at the picture, he saw his father smile back at him on one side, and a young girl with dirty blond hair smirk from the other.

"You?" he asked, looking up in surprise.

"Graduation," she nodded. "The locket was my mum's. I have one just like it. Mum had it made especially for me so we would each have one."

Petunia reached under her collar and pulled out a matching locket, slipping it over her head and opening it to show Harry. Hers held a picture of Dudley on one side and a green-eyed witch on the other.

"Mum?" he breathed as he sat beside her on the bed.

"Her confirmation." Petunia nodded, taking the locket back, snapping it shut and putting it back over her head.

He stood and walked slowly to the door before turning back to her.

"Aunt Petunia." He pulled his brow together in concentration. "When did he send this?"

"It came with the journal." She shook her head then stood and smoothed her apron. "I have often wondered why he kept it all this time only to send it like he did. I think he was saying goodbye."

"Did you write back?" He suddenly needed to know that Snape had at least one person outside of Hogwarts and the Order. Someone who may have at least pretended to care.

"Oh heavens no, why would I do that?" she snorted in nervous laughter. "I hadn't heard from him since before she was married, then out of the blue he sends that empty book and her locket."

He turned and started down the stairs with the letters and locket clutched tightly in his hands. He pulled out the journal and tucked the letters inside the cover, dropping the locket into his pocket.

"You coming back?" Dudley waited at the bottom of the stairs.

"I don't know, Duds." Harry looked at his cousin and grinned. "I would like to keep in touch. You know, sort of ... umm..."

"Yeah, me too." Dudley grinned. "Maybe we could catch a soccer game or... or that thing you used to play."

"I'll send an owl," Harry laughed as he stepped out the door. "Make sure Uncle Vernon doesn't shoot it."

Turning back as he reached the curb, he wondered why it had been so hard to come here and whether what he felt now was closure or a sort of beginning. Then, looking down at the red journal, he realized that perhaps he had come full circle. He smiled, knowing that it held stories of his mother that he no longer needed.