Dear Jo

Dear Jo,

I hope you don't mind me calling you Jo. We've never met, I know, but, like half the world, I feel as though I know you through your books.

The purpose of this letter - it's silly, really - but the purpose of this letter is to be sure. It's my husband, you see.

The purpose of this letter is to be sure that your Harry Potter series is in fact fiction, that you did indeed make it up. I know you receive thousands of fan letters everyday, but please, it would mean the world to me if you could write back to me and confirm that Harry is pretend, because it keeps me awake at night. I am crazy, I know, but it's my husband, James.

James has black hair, you see, and such green eyes. He wears contact lenses, and his hair is quite tidy after he has gelled it in the morning. But on his forehead, there is a faint silvery scar, and I can't seem to ignore it.

He says his name is James, and he's never lied to me about anything, so I have no real reason to doubt him. But I am afraid of his rages whenever he sees you on television. He is a gentle man, but when he saw me reading the Philosopher's Stone, I was scared that he would hit me. He didn't, but I think he came close to it.

My suspicions are ridiculous, I know, but I have to be sure. Obviously children's stories do not suddenly come to life, but I can't eat, can't sleep, can't concentrate on anything except the wondering, the eternal wondering if the impossible could in fact be the truth.

Please, Jo, I need your answer for my sanity.

Yours truly,

Mrs Julia Black

*

Joanne Rowling set down the letter on the table, gently. She did not usually read the hundreds of letters that were sent to her everyday, but this morning she had decided - against her better judgement - to dip into one or two.

So, Harry had found a wife. An intelligent one, too, it seemed, although perhaps little intelligence was needed, since Harry had never been very good at lying.

Jo glanced at her reflection in the glass of the picture hanging over her desk. In the shadowy, unclear glass, it was easy to pretend that her hair was still red, not lightened by disguising charms, and her face was still smooth, freckled, and sixteen.

So often, Jo remembered those days, a world away now, when she had been known by another name, when she had been a heroine of the wizarding world, when she had laughed and cried and faced such great challenges with her brother and his best friends. It was so long ago, now, and after the wizarding world had crumbled, they had all gone different ways, all needed time and space and disguise to reconcile themselves with the way their lives had turned out.

They had vowed to forget, to live as though the War had never been, but she could never forget. Writing had been a catharsis for her, an important healing process, and she did not regret it, but she hoped she had not spoiled the others' peace, wherever they might be.

Jo put the letter back into its envelope and sighed. Best to pretend she had never read it. She went into the kitchen to make herself some tea, shedding only two small salty tears over little Ginny Weasley's dreams of marrying the Boy Who Lived. Any woman could marry him, after all, but she, Jo, had immortalised him, and she was quite content.