Harry's Dragon

Nora: What does he look like?

Pete: Just a plain, ordinary dragon.

Nora: How plain? How ordinary?

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A young Harry Potter awoke with a start as his overly porky cousin, Dudley jumped on the stairs above his head.

"Get up." Dudley sneered. "You're going over to your--" he scrunched up his nose, "girlfriend's."

Harry sighed. Today was his cousin's birthday. Dudley and his best friend this week, Malcolm, were going to the fair today, leaving him with the crazy cat lady, Mrs. Figg.

As Harry walked into the kitchen, he looked up at his large uncle, who watched with excitement as Dudley surveyed his presents. His cousin's face slowly changed colors until his blonde hair clashed with it. "FIFTEEN!!!!" Harry jumped. Dudley came nose to nose with his mother, his eyes narrowed.

"Oh, Duddybumkins, that doesn't include the ten extra presents you'll get from the fair, no limit on price." Harry's Aunt Petunia patted Dudley's round head and smiled before turning to Harry, her expression souring immediately. "Boy, straiten your hair, and march over to Mrs. Figg's. You're late."

The six-year-old boy tried in vain to flatten his hair, then walked out the door and down the street to Mrs. Figg's, hanging his head. He wanted to go to the fair with the Dursleys, but he knew there was no hope. He wiped the tears from his eyes, stepped over a skinny ginger cat, and rang the doorbell.

Mrs. Figg opened the door holding a black and white cat. She handed it to Harry, and picked up a Calico that had been rubbing against her leg. She looked down at the scrawny black-haired boy, "What do you want to do today?" she asked, than added, "I don't suppose you've eaten."

"No ma'am."

"Well, in with you then," she said as she slopped something hot and brown into a bowl and set it in front of Harry. "Eat up."

Harry ate the slop, which he later realized was oatmeal.

"How about a video then?" She pulled out an old Disney film. "Pete's Dragon"

Harry watched the film about an orphan boy adopted by horrible people in awe and understanding. In the video, Elliott the dragon turned himself invisible and caused things to happen for Pete. Suddenly things started to make sense! He had a dragon friend too. That was what was happening to him. His dragon must be the one causing things to happen around him. By the end of the film he had convinced himself that not only did he have a dragon, his dragon was Elliott. Elliott had left Pete for him. Harry was evidently unaware of the smile on his caretaker's face as he watched the film.

He watched the film a total of three times that day. Ignoring the cats around him, and hanging on every word.

"Elliott! Elliott! You can show yourself now! I know about you," Harry excitedly called out to his new friend, but no dragon appeared before him. "Ok, maybe later!" Elliott must have been very shy, but he was Harry's best friend, and he wouldn't pressure him.

That night as he crawled into his cupboard he whispered to Elliott, "Just stay invisible till morning."

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Nora: You can't have him. You don't love him. All you've done up 'til now is break his heart. You'll abuse him. And just use him. Watch out, or I'll take you apart.

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"MUMMY! DADDY! HARRY TRIPPED ME!"

Mr. Dursley's face turned purple as he pulled the groggy Harry out from his cupboard. "I didn't!" Harry cried as he woke up and realized what was happening.

"What happened Dubbydubbydoo?" Petunia asked her son.

"I was walking past his room," Dudley sneered "and I fell."

"I was sleeping. How could I have tripped you?" Harry cried desperately. Elliott, he thought as soon as the words left his mouth.

"Shut up, boy!" Mr. Dursley snapped. "You'll stay in the cupboard for the rest of the day for that."

Harry was shut in the small space. "Elliott, please don't do that again, this is worse," he said as he put his head down and cried himself to sleep.

That night he was let out, and he sat at the table with the Dursleys for dinner, only to be shut away again before dark.

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Pete: Now we're together and life is perfect, don't ever disappear.

Eliot: Boo bm bm boop (Oh Really?) Boo boo boody boop (Oh you're just saying) Boo do boo dee dee dooo. (Is it true?) Clicky click click (I love you too.)

**********

The small boy skipped down the street a few days later. He kept looking behind him, watching the cement crack as Elliott stomped behind him.

"Harry, how're you doing that?" Harry hadn't noticed Dudley coming behind him until then.

"I'm not, my dragon is."

"There's no place for a dragon to hide! I don't see a dragon."

Harry had been waiting for this moment, "If there's room for a chowder-head like you, then there's more than enough room for a dragon," he quoted from the film. Then he ran into number four, Privet Drive.

"MUMMY! HARRY CALLED ME A CHOWDER-HEAD!" Dudley screeched as he slammed Harry into the wall and punched his face.

"What's this?" Mr. Dursley inquired, coming into the room.

"Harry was telling me about his dragon, and..."

"THERE'S NO SUCH THINGS AS DRAGONS!" Mr. Dursley roared.

Harry wiped his bloody nose, "Y-yes there is. Elliott's my dragon, he makes things happen."

Mr. Dursley grabbed Harry's collar, and pulled him close, his vinegar breath in Harry's face. He drew in the air and let out slowly, "There's...no...such...thing...as...DRAGONS!" Dudley laughed as Mr. Dursley picked Harry off the floor, his feet dangling below him. Then he threw Harry into the cupboard, where Harry passed out on his cot.

When Harry woke up there was a plate of food next to him, and Mr. Dursley was yelling at him through the cupboard door. "BOY! You will come out when you are willing to swear that the whole thing was made up. And THERE ARE NO SUCH THINGS AS DRAGONS!"

Two days later, the thin boy emerged from the cupboard. He looked up at his uncle with red-rimmed eyes. "I made the whole thing up. I swear it. There are no such things as dragons." And he knew it was true, for if it hadn't been, Elliott would have rescued him.

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Nora and Pete: It's not easy, to share somebody's dream. It gets easy, when you work as a team.

Nora: You've got to tend it, fan it.

Pete: That's what I plan to do.

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Almost five years later, at Hogwart's School of Witchcraft and Wizardry Harry Potter stood looking at a real life baby dragon. No, he thought, Elliott was false, the imaginings of a young boy, but dragons. Dragons are very real. Then he looked at Ron, Hermione and Hagrid. So are friends.

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Nora: It's not easy to find someone who cares, it's not easy, to find magic in pairs. Now that you have him, love him, treasure him from day to day. And it's so easy.