Boy and the Begining

Harry James Potter was of the opinion that he was not Normal.

Of course, when referencing "Normal" when it came to the opinion of his family, the Dursley's ("family" being of the little "f" in the loosest sense of the term) it is with a big capital 'N,' as his family often emphasized just how "Normal" they were. So when they felt something within their presence that was less then capital "N,"  that thing that lacked the all important distinction of "N" was definitely the more abominable, agonizing, and Agh! what will the neighbors think?! "Abnormal" with a capital 'A.'

As far as his little "f," capital "N" Normal family was concerned, Harry was decidedly a great big capital "A" Abnormal. 

Harry, who had been metaphorically branded with his scarlet "A" since he could toddle, had accepted the reality of being Abnormal, and had noticed differences to the natural state of living as either a Normal and Abnormal.

For example, Harry Potter was, by nature, a rather quiet child, who was often as scarce as a shadow at high noon when he could be. He took being a non-entity as a matter of course, and was often proud when an adult that did, on the rare occasion notice him, seemed baffled by the sudden appearance of a small bespectacled boy with knobby knees and horrendous glasses in their midst, usually during roll call in new classes or with substitute teachers.

Harry Potter lived in a cupboard under the stairs, unlike Normal kids, and strange freakish things didn't happen around them, such as teacher's hair turning blue, or hair in general growing back overnight, even if Harry didn't understand how it happened, or why he was specifically at fault.

Abnormals had to be as seen and heard as little as possible, or else others would notice that there was something different about you from regular, Normal folk, which Harry knew was a VERY BAD THING as far as the Dursley's are concerned.

The Dursley's meanwhile, a decidedly Normal, perfect family, were loud, opinionated, and of two of the three, took up much of the available space within a room whenever possible. They endorsed their Normalcy through respectable careers (such as selling Drills), pass-times (such as spying on the neighbors), and how perfectly perfect their Duddikins was in every way, despite what school nurses said about obesity and report cards said about below average grades.

Having a status such as Harry's also meant that he had to earn the Dursley's gracious keep, and often did many chores when not seeing to school related matters. He was not always successful in his endeavors to appease his relatives and often he was either locked him in his cupboard and/or not given anything to eat.

As a result of his status, Harry had to develop a decent hand at scavenging and nicking things from other peoples window sills, garages and yards. Though he wasn't a greedy boy and usually only took the odd useful knick-knack, like a skipping rope from a fellow classmate's backpack as a belt for the latest season's hand-me-downs, the oldest grimiest winter gear from a neighbor's open garage, a cooling pie on Mrs. Number 7's window, or a piece of meat from an untended BBQ or a garden of tomatoes.

He'd been occasionally caught in the act by neighbors, and thus, Harry compounded his Abnormality even more. After all, thievery is not an activity that Normal people engaged in.

Then there happened upon such a day, like many other, where Harry had been sent outside to wander around the neighborhood while his aunt held her weekly get-togethers with those in the neighborhood (usually the wives) who came as close to the big "N" standard as possible in Petunia Dursley's vision.

It was he was meandering past Number 12 that his eyes happened to trace over a box at the end of the driveway, a box filled to overflowing with a wide variety of books. His inherent practicality, remembering that his Uncle's sister Marge, whom hated Harry in particular, would be visiting in a few weeks and thus he would be staying in his cupboard for the majority of the visit. He knew he would likely need something to occupy himself, and thus seeing a source of material that would occupy him during the long stretch and alleviate his boredom (which he considered to be a rather cruel fate for anyone really) he helped himself to the crooked box of books.

After his Aunt's friends had left, and the woman had retired upstairs to watch her stories, Harry used the short window to sneak himself and his prize back into his cupboard under the stairs where he safely squirreled them away in a dark corner behind an old vacuum cleaner.

As he set about peeling potatoes for dinner, he congratulated himself on his good fortune.

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Despite what it might look like, Harry's big pile of books did not automatically mean that he was some sort of bookworm super-genius. Harry had a decent mind, he'd picked up reading and some basic math at a fairly early age, but that was only out of necessity when he had been assigned the cooking once deemed old enough to be coordinated to handle a stool and the cooking implements. He was not remarkable in school (which was proper, given his status).

Books were the only methods by which he was allowed to understand the world at large. He was not allowed to watch TV or movies, nor listen to the radio, or go on the computer, and since he didn't have any friends, and he Dursley's abhorred any sort of question coming from him, and had transferred this expectation for any other adult, that word of mouth was not an option.

Harry did know a fundamental truth recognized in the world, for all his enforced isolation, and that was that knowledge is power.

Harry wanted a future away from the Dursley's someday, and he had long heard the speeches made in class and in gyms, or overheard on the telly through his cupboard door, that you need an education, knowledge, to make something of yourself in the world. Without a good education he would not be able to escape them, and since knowledge can be found in books, the more he could gather to himself secretly, without adults potentially taking them away from him, the box he had found was a potential gold mine of knowledge that would help him in the future.

Still, he decided to wait to explore his haul until Aunt Marge arrived, as he also needed to stave off that most dreaded of enemies, boredom, during the long haul in his cupboard.

One of the things that separated the everyday normal people with a small 'n' from the more exemplary big 'N's like the Dursleys was that they absolutely abhorred anything fantastical in nature being even mentioned in passing in their presence.

There was no fantasy stories, no make believe, things that were a common theme in many "n" children's lives such as fairy tales, myths, and legends, even the Tooth Fairy and Santa Clause, were never mentioned in the Dursley household.

Fantasy is Abnormal, and words like "magic" are considered the foulest of terms as far as "N" people like the Dursleys were concerned.

The Dursleys also made sure that the teachers of the boys never talked about unnatural things that were usually found when teaching things, emphasizing the protection of impressionable youth, that stories like dragons that breath fire will give children ideas and soon the entire neighborhood would run wild with hooligans setting fires, kidnapping women, and stabbing people through the chest with various sharp instruments. The campaign was backed by a fair few of the big "N" crowd of Vernon Dursley's acquiescence, including a few that were big donators to the school district. This, and because the school board was of the most unimaginative sort anyway, it was accommodated easily.

Because of this, he had never come across fantasy stories before.

So when Harry picked up the book at the very top, a slightly large, dog eared book filled with fairy tales, he was amazed, and a little nervous, once he got over his bafflement, at the sheer rich unnaturalness he was faced with in the words of the Normally forbidden book. His wide hungry eyes traveled over words that painted distant fictional countries, folktales of fantastical creatures, and stories of mighty heroes, gods, and all sorts of forbidden subjects that the boy had not realized existed until that moment, and oh! so deliciously taboo.

Harry enjoyed the stories as he passed the time, feeling a distinct sense of excitement at his naughtiness, curiosity over the foreign concept, and an odd reliability and kin-ship with the fictional characters and creatures within the pages, but he had to ask himself, at the end of a chapter or story, if these works of forbidden fantastical fiction -having never seen dragons, or dwarves that mined diamonds, or mad hatters drinking tea with mice and hares -what knowledge he possibly obtained that could help him in the real world? (1)(2).

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In the school year after Harry turned 8, Harry's confused but avid forbidden relationship with those books were put into a whole new perspective.

He had been running from his large cousin and his friend, having the misfortune to accidentally be noticed by his cousin on the playground. Dudley and his cronies were bored, and decided that a spot of Harry Hunting would liven things up tremendously.

Harry, being smart, of course ran. He was usually nimble and rather quick, but that day he made the bad mistake of running into a dead end between two buildings on the school grounds. As he ran towards a dumpster, panicked at his situation, knowing he was in for a world of pain when he was caught by his cousin. Then he thought, suddenly, of his favorite story, Peter Pan, and wished dearly in that moment, that he could just fly away into the sky and hide in the clouds where no one would reach him.

That's when a sudden rushing sensation filled him, a feeling of intense, though not uncomfortable warmth and weightlessness filled him, and then the world around him tilted.

Harry wasn't there to see his confused cousin and friends as they rounded the corner, finding nothing but a lone dumpster and grimy walls.

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When Harry regained his equilibrium, he was treated to the terrifying sight that only the school pigeons were graced with.

Wisteria Primary School spread beneath him like a tiny toy set.

Only years of having the urge to scream forcefully repressed in him kept from that very thing happening and thus attracting attention ot himself, though given his location and current level, there wasn't anyone that would have heard him.

His cloths were drenched from the nearby clouds all around him, and he shivered in the wind and high altitude.

It took him quite a while to calm down.

When he was calm enough for some coherent thought, he considered his situation.

He was hovering, quite high above his school. No machine of any kind was supporting him, just open air all around him, as if gravity had sort of half-forgotten him.

He applied his hard earned rationale to the situation.

He had been running, high on emotion and worry, he had turned into a dead end, he was panicking, danger closing in, he'd tried to jump for the top of the dumpster... then suddenly, he was up in the air.

Okay...maybe he couldn't rationalize this

...Then he remembered the wish he had before that strange, weird rushing warmth happened.

He had wished, fervently, and with all the longing of a child in a frightful situation, hoped for the ridiculous, impossible possibility, fresh fed from his box of stories, in particular, his most recent read, Peter Pan.

It suddenly clicked. An epiphany that would completely change everything for one boy.

His books! The fairy tales! The legends, the myths, etc. they had talked about people that could fly!

Peter Pan, though fictional, was at the character's most basic level just a boy who could fly.

Harry, in this moment, at his most basic level, was a boy who was currently flying, well hovering at the moment, but still up in the air.

That was it!

His stories actually did have an application in the real world! They applied to him! They must be part of the capital "A" that Harry sat under. That was it! it all seemed so clear to him now!

The fantasy stories he had read were filled with things that were not part of the Normal world. Therefore, that must mean they Were opposite, the Abnormal world. After all, Peter Pan was a flying boy, and Harry, who was Abnormal, could fly like Peter-Pan. Therefore, Peter-Pan was an Abnormal story, as were other stories like it.

He had another thought: could Harry do other things that were mentioned in the stories?

For the first time ever, Harry felt a strong wave of excited expectation, glee, and purpose.

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Harry used his time floating among the clouds to figure out what he was going to do. He was a child who knew the values of setting goals and having plans. While he didn't have a really detailed one yet, just a sure notion of something to do, he decided that his first goal was figuring out how to get down.

It took him an hour, fits and starts, and near plummets, to figure out that this flying, while definitely harder than Peter made it seem, was all about wanting to be in a particular place or direction, at the same time, wanting it to happen at a particular speed. That last part he had learned the hard way after nearly crashing into the school roof.

By the time he had touched ground, he was exhausted and the sun was almost down.

He groaned and hoped no one had called the Dursleys about him missing.

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He was lucky.

They had a substitute that day, and Harry's unobtrusive nature had made it so the woman didn't remember he was even a part of the class. Further luck was with him, in that the Dursleys didn't care that he was missing, so long as he was home to do chores, and that evening, he had been excused from cooking, as the Dursleys were invited to a dinner party for his uncles business, leaving Harry locked in his cupboard for the evening as soon as he walked into the door.

He used this boon of quiet to fine tune his thoughts.

He was very tired. He figured that whatever it was, magic he supposed, a word mentioned so much in the books, obviously needed some work. He reasoned it was like an unused muscle, something he had read about in a health book once, that needed practice to become stronger.

Since flying was the first thing he had done, and practical for the forming plan in his young mind, he decided that he would work on this flying until he would no longer be as tired as he was, and could do it with the same ease as Peter, or as close to it anyway.

Nodding to himself, he settled into a deep sleep.

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A/N: (1): Snow White, (2) Alice in Wonderland.

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