Terry Boot and the Masochist's Boulder

After the incident with Grudley and the sausage, Terry was punished for a long time. Well, it was supposed to be a long time, but then Nonny and Diddle Bardus just kind of forgot that Terry was supposed to be punished. In fact, they forgot he existed.

"Didn't we used to have a monkey around here?" Diddle asked one morning over a breakfast of eggs and bacon.

"You're right!" Nonny exclaimed, sniffing the air and catching a whiff of burning porridge. "A certain odor is gone, but I can't place it."

"You're right, my dear," Diddle said, beginning to sniff the air himself, and gagging on his own bodily stench. "But what was it?"

"Good morning!" said Terry, as cheerfully as he could muster, while he limped his way slowly into the kitchen. Every morning Terry awoke refreshed and eager to start a new day, almost forgetting that he was deformed, that his grandparents hated him, and that he lived in a hole, and not that nice hole in the garden, either, as Diddle so often reminded him.

"Oh yes," said Nonny disdainfully. "It was the reek of deformity."

"What's for breakfast?" asked Terry, still trying to be cheerful, but not succeeding. He didn't like displeasing his grandparents, but that was all he ever did. It really wasn't his own fault, it was his stump's, but with a missing leg, you can't hide a stump. It's like trying to hide baldness on a middle aged man, or stupidity on a teenager.

"You're having phantom food to go with your phantom leg, boy!" Diddle shouted, as Nonny flipped through some of that morning's mail. Bills, bills, junk mail, you could be a winner, bills, death threat.

"Something for you, Terry," Nonny said. "It's from the neighbors. It appears you've been keeping the neighborhood up with your handicapped nightmares and uncontrollable sobbing. Knock it off, or it's doomsday for you, according to the people at number four."

Terry looked abashed. He had tried to keep his crying quiet, but with worms crawling into his pants and bodily orifices, it was hard to concentrate on other things.

"Oh no, Diddle," said Nonny suddenly. Grudley, who had been sitting at the table eating slops, stared at her with large, brown eyes, as his meal dribbled slowly down onto his new tuxedo, and slid into his top hat, which was next to his monocle and walking stick. Grudley was dressed to the nines with no where to go.

"What is it, dear?" Diddle asked, slowly burning puzzle pieces over the stove. He liked to get an early start on his work day. Diddle was the one who brought home the bacon in the family, raw and still breathing, but he did drive it home. Actually, Nonny drove, but he bought it.

"Pier-1...they're out to get me. I knew the internet wasn't a safe place to cheat people!" Nonny screeched, suddenly realizing that Ebay might be setting a death trap full of untimely death for her at that very moment.

"What'll we do, Nonny?" Diddle asked, brought out of his puzzle burning trance at the sound of worry in his dear wife's voice.

"You could always pay your Pier-1 bill," Terry suggested. "Then they'd leave you alone."

"Get out of here, boy, you're ruining my breakfast with your absent leg!" Diddle said, swatting at Terry with his newspaper. He really hated when that crippled grandson of his made even a little bit of sense, which wasn't often, but often enough to make him mad.

So Terry slid off the kitchen chair and headed outside to his hole in the ground, clutching a piece of toast in one hand. Just as he had made himself comfortable in his little dug-out, something plopped onto his head, and slid to the ground. It was owl feces. But when Terry looked up to see where this owl had come from, he got a piece of paper right in the eye.

"Ouch!" Terry exclaimed, holding a hand over his eye as he tried to grab for the letter with no depth perception. As soon as his eye stopped hurting, he clutched at the letter, excitement filling his every being. No one had ever sent him a letter before, except the Special Olympics.

"Oh, it's a mistake," said Terry. The address said:

"To Mr. Harry Potter

The Cupboard under the Stairs

4 Privet Drive

Little Whinging

Surrey"

"Oh!" said Terry. "I forgot all about that little boy living next door." For indeed, Terry lived at 5 Privet Drive. "I can take this over to him! Maybe I'll make a new friend! Diddle will be really pleased if I'm friends with a famous person. I wonder why he's famous?" Terry wondered to himself, as he dragged his body out of the hole, and slowly limped across the yard.

Suddenly, Diddle knocked on the patio window with his cane. "You, boy!" he shouted through the glass. "Where are you going with that stump?"

Terry walked back into the house with the letter. "I got a letter from Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry."

"You?!" said Nonny, aghast. Hogwarts was letting anyone in these days. "Why would they give you a letter, except for the fact you have all that magical blood running through your veins. Your mother got one, I remember, but she had all her limbs."

"Magical?" Terry asked. "I'm magical?!"

"No! You're a disgrace to human kind," Diddle said. "Now what about this letter?"

"It's not for me. It's for Harry Potter," Terry explained.

"Harry Potter!" Diddle and Nonny gasped together.

"Yes, he lives right next door!"

"Of course he does. Give me the letter," said Diddle. "I'll deliver it. I don't want the neighbors seeing our disgrace, and by disgrace, I mean you, and by our, I mean all your own."

"But I thought you wanted me to be Harry Potter's patsy?" Terry asked, confused.

"I did? Must be my Alzheimer's kicking in, thinking you were normal. Of course I don't want you to visit Harry Potter. He'll just laugh at you, and then us, because we own you, I mean support you."

"Who is this Harry Potter, and what makes him so special?" Terry pressed.

"Don't get your hopes up," Nonny sneered. "He's not crippled. He just saved the entire Wizarding world from a terrible fate."

"What?" Terry asked, mouth agape.

"Terry, I have to deliver this letter, but I'm sure sometime I'll tell you about the Wizarding world to which you belong," Diddle said, and then forgot completely about what he had just promised. "Go to your hole, Terry, and stop being nosy. I have to deliver this letter to Harry Potter. It needs to go to Harry Potter."

And so he delivered it. Diddle slipped it right through the mail slot, and no one was the wiser, except for Terry, and no one ever asked him how Harry Potter got his first letter from Hogwarts.

Later that evening in the hole Terry laid awake, thinking about his life. It didn't take him that long to think about, considering that most of his life took place in a leaky shower where he contemplated his mysterious past.

No one had ever told Terry about how his parents had really died- and it wasn't like they were trying to keep it some big secret, they just basically forget Terry even had a past to be told about. Which was easy to do with a one legged boy. There is just less body matter to remember. Any two legged boy would be memorable, but Terry had no such luck.

Diddle had told him at the tender age of seven that his parents had basically just walked into traffic one day, which explained why they were dead, but not why Terry only had one leg. Sometimes his grandparents almost forgot that he had only one leg, and almost loved him- almost.

All of a sudden, as Terry rubbed his stump in frustration, a load of letters fell onto his small, deformed, yet delightfully adorable- but deformed mind you, body. The impact of the letters crushed what little leg he had left- which was a scary thought. If he lost his other leg he didn't know what he would do. Actually, sometimes he wished he would lose the other limb- that way he would get a wheelchair and look like a real handicap, not just some deformed wannabe with one leg.

Because, if it was one thing Terry wanted it was pity. He also wanted another leg, but he thought that pity might be a little easier to attain. Then again, what does a deformed boy know?

Terry burrowed his way out of the pile of letters. "One of these has to be for me!" thought Terry, getting terribly excited. They were all for Harry Potter. Terry was about to go sit in his hole and have a good cry when a crow flew over his hole and dropped another letter in. This time it was for Terry.

"To Mr. Jerry Bot

The Hole Where He Belongs (But Not The Nice One In The Garden)

5 Privet Drive

Little Whinging

Surrey"

"Yay! I got a letter!" Terry shouted into the night.

"Shut up, boy!" Nonny screeched from her bedroom window. She threw an old shoe at poor Terry. It landed where his leg should have been, and he had phantom pains in his stump.

Silently, Terry crept back into his hole to read the letter by moonlight. So he was going to Hogwarts after all! His invitation to that magical, wonderful place had finally arrived. The letter read:

Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry

Headmaster: Albus Dumbledore

(Order of Merlin, First Class, Member of the AA, Supreme Mugwump, Academy Award Nominee for Best Computer Effects Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, First Lieutenant of 56^th Infantry War of the Worlds, Author of "The 500 Best Pubs in Britain", and President of the Albus Dumbledore Fan Club)

Dear Mr. Bot-

We are surprised to inform you that you have been accepted at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Find enclosed, or else, a list of all necessary books and equipment.

Term begins on September 1^st. We await your owl by no later than July 31^st. Good luck trying to fit in.

Yours Reluctantly,

Minerva McGonagall

Deputy Headmistress

Deep down inside Terry always knew he was magic, despite the fact that he didn't have a leg. Also, the fact that his grandparents had been trying to convince Terry it was impossible for him to be magical had something to do with his disbelief.

Later that morning, Terry asked Nonny and Diddle what they knew about Hogwarts, because he thought that maybe they'd actually tell him something this time. After all, it had to do to the world in which they truly belonged, and indeed, Terry did coerce a bit of information out of his reluctant grandparents.

"Well, your father was in Slytherin, and your mother was in Gryffindor. The Slytherins are all pureblooded, trust fund brats, and the Gryffindors are full of themselves, may our daughter rest in peace," Nonny explained.

"Does this mean my father was rich?" Terry asked.

"Oh yeah, as rich as those Canadians can get," said Diddle, idly flipping through a magazine, trying not to look suspicious.

"So where's all his money?"

"That's a good question, Stumpy," said Nonny, fingering her Harry Winston.

"Well, it doesn't matter, because I'm going to be in one of those two houses, I betcha anything!"

One of Terry's favorite pastimes was filling himself with false luck and lost hope.

"Now stop trying to make us forget that you only have one leg, I'm not in the mood for it this evening," Diddle said snidely, swatting the boy with his magazine. Terry sighed and promptly hopped out of the house into his hole.

He stayed in his hole alone for a few days, as his grandparents had somehow hooked up the electric fence again, and one false move would give him the shocking of his life. After a few days of eating dirt, he heard some yelling from across the way. He poked his matted head over the top of the gaping hole and watched in astonishment as the family next door made a scene on the lawn. They were forcing a small black haired boy into a vehicle and yelling like a bunch of overworked banshees.

"That must be Harry Potter," Terry thought, clutching his Hogwarts letter in his hand like a homeless man clutching a five pound note walking into a liquor store. Terry decided that now would be the time to make friends with the Harry Potter. He also thought he might be able to help him, seeing how his family was almost as bad as his own. "But I bet they didn't make him sleep in a hole behind the wood shed and then try to fill in the hole when they thought I was asleep."

Indeed they hadn't. Harry had it far better than Terry, but who cares- Harry had a scar. Poor Harry.

So, Terry hopped out of the hole, grabbing the electric dog collar that was around his neck and hoping he didn't step out of line.

"Hey you!" Terry called to the boy, who was muttering something along the lines of "Won't any one help me?"

"I can help you!" Terry shouted excitedly.

"Who are you?" Harry asked.

"I know who you are! You're the savior of the Wizarding world!" Terry said, beaming at his supposed new friend.

Harry looked at him, smiled, then looked at his leg or lack there of, grimaced, and jumped into the awaiting car.

"I guess he didn't want to talk to me," Terry thought.

Later that evening, they let Terry back into the house so he could shampoo the carpets.

"Nothing like kicking someone when they're down," Diddle said, smoking his pipe, and hitting Terry with his cane.

"Especially the disabled," Nonny said in agreement. Terry, on his hands and knees, let out a sigh of discontentment and scrubbed harder.

Suddenly, there was an urgent rapping on the door.

"Answer that monkey, er, Terry," Diddle boomed.

Terry hobbled over to the door, and opened it to reveal an angry looking man in a grey suit.

"Oh God, it's a disgruntled postmen," Terry thought, recoiling and promptly falling out the door into a hole.

"That's what you get for showing emotion," Nonny yelled, grabbing a bag of cement. "Time to fill that hole."

But, before she could suffocate Terry with the thick cement, she bumped into the postman. He thrust a letter at her, and she winced. It was from Pier-1.

"These are dangerous people, Ma'm, I reckon you shouldn't get messed up with them," the postman said, trying to be helpful.

"Oh, go on strike why don't you? This isn't America, we don't care about how you carry our packages. It isn't like you're dodging anthrax," Nonny said in a harsh tone. The postman tried to apologize, but she threw a shovel full of cement on him and that was that.

"Who was that?" Diddle asked, as Terry hopped back into the house.

"It was the postman with another bill from Pier-1!" Nonny said disdainfully. "I knew I shouldn't have ordered that three hundred pound mauve slip cover for Grudley's day bed...using Terry's credit card."

Terry gasped.

"Yeah, we already spent all of the money in his account," Diddle said, picking at his beard.

"You... you!" Terry tried to say, but was hit with the cane again.

"Shut it Limpy McStub," Diddle yelled crazily. "It isn't our fault you have bad credit."

"Yes, it is entirely your fault!" Terry replied, his stump quivering.

"How dare you!" Nonny barked. "We took you into our home, gave you the food off our table, forced you into a hole in the ground, put a dog collar around your neck, and maxed out your credit card, and this is how you repay us?"

Terry blinked. "Yes!"

"That's it, boy," Diddle yelled. "I'm going to give you the thrashing of your life!" And he would have too, had he not forgotten about Terry's existence again when there was another knock at the door.

"Please do get that Nonny, if only we had some sort of grandson to get the door for us," Diddle bemoaned.

Nonny got up to answer the door, and gasped.

The postman was at the door again. He had a very large package in his hand and a clump of cement in his hair. He backed slowly away from Nonny, and threw the package inside the house.

"Damn shifty postal workers," she muttered, looking at the package. It was unmarked. "I wonder what this is."

She opened it only to find to her horror a large puke green faux fur lamp shade from the Euro Store, where everything's a Euro. "It's hideous!" she screamed, blanching white. Attached to it was a small note.

"Dear Mr. Boot,

By the time we are through with suing you, this will be the only interior decorating you'll be working with!

-Pier-1"

Nonny screamed and fainted.

"This has gone too far," Diddle said. "The only way to get out of this it to-"

"Pay off the bills?" Terry asked, attempting to be remembered.

"No, you ungrateful excuse for a grandson, that is the most cockamamie scheme I have ever heard. We shall drive off to some isolated hut on a large rock in the middle of an ocean so they won't be able to reach us. Gawd."

Terry rolled his eyes.

A few hours later they had reached the hut, and Terry was actually surprised that Diddle was being literal about the idea.

"This beauty has a costly timeshare," Diddle said, breaking the door off upon entering. It was dank inside and dilapidated. There wasn't much space, but a second floor allowed for more space, which wouldn't matter to Terry anyway. He didn't deserve things like space, or air, or other intangible things.

Just as they settled into the hut there was another knock on the door. Grudley, who was eating dirt, squeaked and hid behind the couch, while Terry tried to climb out of a broken window.

"Animals always know when something bad is going to happen," Terry thought, because Diddle had once told him that just to give him false happiness of actually knowing something.