Every day the same
The third step from the bottom creaked, so Harry learned to avoid it.
It was one of those things you learn over time, like holding your breath when Dudley hurled insults in his direction or walking on tiptoe so the glass didn’t vibrate when Uncle Vernon was sleeping.
Living with the Dursleys was a dance of silences and careful steps. An invisible choreography that, if done wrong, led to screams, slaps, or—on the worst days—a punch that left marks where no one could see.
That morning, like many others, Harry had been woken by a sharp tug on the blanket.
“Out of bed, lazybones!” Vernon had yelled, his deep voice making the walls vibrate. “The hedge doesn’t trim itself.”
Harry got up without answering. Not because he agreed, but because arguing meant earning the first bruise of the day. He had learned quickly as a child: the Dursleys didn’t want responses. They wanted obedience.
The sun beat down hard on the garden, and Petunia’s cough could be heard from the kitchen while he bent under the weight of the trash bag. His hands trembled a little. He hadn’t been eating well for weeks. Stale bread, when there was any. Scraps. Aunt Petunia had started serving his meals directly on the porch, to avoid him “contaminating the air” in the dining room.
“You’re not a guest here,” she had told him. “Never forget that.”
Harry didn’t forget. Not for a second.
While he trimmed the grass with the old, rusty shears—Dudley had broken the lawnmower months ago and no one had bothered to replace it—he felt the sweat running down his thin back. Occasionally, he would stop to look at the sky. But even that seemed farther away, less blue.
For a moment, he wondered if anyone at Hogwarts thought of him. Not Hermione, not Ron—they were surely still writing. But Dumbledore? McGonagall? Lupin?
He wondered if they knew that the Dursleys had locked his letters in the laundry cupboard. That Vernon had thrown a plate at him one day for a wrong word. That he slept with his wand under the pillow not because of Death Eaters, but to protect himself from his uncle.
Once, Dudley had hit him with a cricket bat. Just once. Then he stopped. But not out of guilt.
Harry had laughed.
Not loudly. Not happily. Just… laughed.
That sound had frightened Dudley more than any threat.
In the afternoon, while he was organizing the garage, he tripped over a beam and slammed his shoulder against the metal door. The pain made him stagger, but he didn’t scream. Just a dry, restrained sound, like a stifled cough.
He stayed still for a few seconds. Short of breath, eyes closed.
Don’t cry. Don’t move. Don’t give them the satisfaction.
Then he got up. As always.
That night, in bed, the pain pulsed dully in his shoulder. Maybe he had sprained something. Maybe not. He no longer had a sense of things. The body had become just a shell to drag around.
The sky darkened slowly, and the streetlights cast shadows on the wall. A moth flapped its wings against the window.
Harry closed his eyes.
He thought of Sirius. Of his warm voice. His crooked smile. The hand on his shoulder. The unspoken promise that, one day, there would be a different home. A place of his own.
Sirius was dead.
And with him, every promise.
Tomorrow will be the same. Maybe worse. But it will still be tomorrow.
And Harry Potter would open his eyes.
Again.