Reset.

Harry stood in the clearing and waited to die. Voldemort, all manic smiles and illuminated red eyes rose up, his chest swelling as he sucked in the air for the words that would kill him.
The rock slipped from his fingers. Despite everything the ghosts had said, he didn’t want them to see this. He didn’t want to see them when he died. Harry closed his eyes, and thought of the people he would long for after he died. The Weasleys. Hagrid.
Ron. Hermione.
He’d miss them most of all.
As the start of the curse burst forth from Voldemort's lips, Harry wished that he could be with them again. Just one more time.

“Avada Kedavra!”

Harry Potter opened his eyes on the 21st of July, 1991, to his aunt banging on his cupboard door.
“Up! Get up you stupid boy!”

He lay frozen for a long minute. Was this the afterlife? Had he been sent to some kind of purgatory? He’d thought the afterlife would be with his parents, Sirius, Lupin. Was he wrong?
Sitting up and completely forgetting that he would hit his head against the sloped roof, he yelped and clutched at it with bone thin arms and blistered fingers.

“Yes Aunt Petunia!” Harry said, his voice the meek and squeaky little thing it was when he was younger. His mind was racing a mile a minute, trying to figure this out. He pulled on clothes and shook the spiders off of them, which scurried away into deeper and warmer corners, and hurriedly pushed his taped glasses up his nose. Had he dreamed up Hogwarts? Was all that he had been through, all he experienced and fought for just been his imagination.
It couldn’t be. His scar was throbbing painfully, and it was oozing when he touched it. He didn’t have time to dwell on it, because Petunia ripped the door open and dragged him out by his ear.
“Lazy wretch. You’re lucky Vernons already gone, or you’d be in far more trouble than you’re worth.”

Her voice was as grating as ever, and it stirred up that tightness around his lungs that had happened whenever he was made to talk about her. Hermione had said it was trauma- Hermione! He needed to contact her or Ron. He needed to know that they weren’t a figment of his own delusions. If this was a magical incident, and he had somehow come back in time, they would be there. Even if they didn’t remember him. She let him go and pushed him towards the kitchen.
Harry trotted obediently over, and began cleaning up the breakfast mess, not saying a word even as Dudley jeered, and shot a rubber band into the back of his head. He needed a plan. There was a phone booth a few blocks down, and he could nick some change from Dudleys piggy bank to pay for it. Ron's family only started using the phone after second year, but Hermione would definitely have a landline. He still remembered her number, although he did doubt that if his life had been a dream the number would be correct.
Harry finished drying the big frying pan, and set about putting them away, as his aunt fussed over Dudley. He was dressed like he dressed for school, so that probably meant that he was also expected to go.
“Aunt Petunia?” Said Harry in his self described ‘well behaved voice.’

“What.” She snapped, looking at him like an unsavory stain on her wall.

“I’m sure that Dudley wouldn't want me to sit next to him on the way to school. I can walk. It is nearly his birthday after all and he should be happy.”

The calendar didn’t lie, and the huge explosion of stickers and bright red ink proclaiming ‘Dudders birthday’ indicated that it was in only a few days. Her eyes narrowed, knowing something was off and clearly annoyed by it, but her son almost tripped over himself falling for the bait. “Oh please, mummy! You know I hate sitting with him.”
She melted like butter. “Of course, diddykins. Anything for you.”
Harry forced himself not to grin. The glare she sent his way quashed the urge instantly. It frustrated him how she scared him. He’d seen horrors beyond any comprehension and not blinked, but his aunt made him freeze to the spot and go cold with anxiety.
“Well hurry up. If you wish to walk you’ll have to go now. Any funny business and you’ll be scrubbing the bathroom with bleach and bare hands.”

He scurried off to get his bag, per her barked order, and went up to his cousin's filthy bedroom on excuse of using the bathroom. He unscrewed the bottom of the bank, and a healthy chunk of assorted coins fell into his palm. Harry stuffed them in his tightest pocket so nobody would hear them rattling.
Quickly leaving and making sure it looked exactly how it had before, he raced back downstairs.

“I’m leaving.” He called out, and got no response. The door slammed on the way out. Good goddamn riddance.
His eleven- ten- year old body was weak and unstable. Of course, Harry had never been bulky or even well fed in his possibly dream life, because even though he spent the majority of his years at Hogwarts where he could eat whenever and whatever he wanted, it’d been easier to stick to the few foods that didn’t scare him. Ron had cheerfully taken on the attitude that as long as Harry was eating something, he was happy, and a few tasteless nutrition potions supplied by Hermione kept him fit and well. He hadn’t been to Hogwarts, or out of That House yet, so his body had barely survived off of a few meals a week. All his bones protruding out of his skin was evidence of that.
Looking at himself, Harry thought it was weird that nobody thought there was anything wrong. He looked abused.
Well, he was, but not a soul other than his best friends and surprisingly Neville, had ever said anything.
In a moment of self care, Harry stopped at a dairy on the way and bought himself a bag of milk bottle marshmallows. There was enough money left for a call, so it wasn’t a big deal. And they tasted good.
Chewing on one as he walked added an extra spring to his step.. The phone box was red, and a man with a rat tattoo on the back of his neck was using it. Harry waited, about halfway through his candies, and eventually the man stepped away.
Rats set Harry on edge after Pettigrew, but he couldn’t judge a random guy for getting a tattoo of one. If the traitor was real. If any of it was real. He’d find out soon enough.
Harry fed his change into the slot, and put the grangers number into the machine. He took the phone and pressed it to his ear, listening to the ringing, until somebody picked up.
“Hello, Granger residence.” It was Paloma. Hermione's mum.
Harry's heart leapt into his throat. It was their number. That added a lot of credibility to his theory that this was not a dream and something more magical.
“Hi, can I please speak to Hermione?”
A moment of silence, before a significantly more cheery voice answered again. “Of course, dearie.”
It was presumably a hand that muffled the receiver, but he still heard a faint. “Nee-nee, there's someone on the phone for you!”
Muffled noises, and then Hermione. Squeaky, tiny Hermione who sounded like she had a cold. “Hello?”
“Mione?” He whispered, having wanted to be a little more tactful but growing emotional real fast.
“Harry?” She gasped. “Oh my goodness, Harry! I thought- I was so worried! I had no idea what happened!”
He nearly collapsed with relief. It wasn’t a dream. She was real, which meant that Ron was real, and if she remembered he probably did as well!
“So did I. Well, no, okay I thought it was a dream, but you’re here, thank merlin you’re here.” Words were gushing out uncontrollably now, and Harry wasn’t a crier but his eyes were burning with tears.
“It must’ve been a time travel accident, but we’re in our younger bodies. No, I’m sorry, we shouldn't talk over the phone.” Hermione said, lowering her voice so that it was barely distinguishable over the static noises that accompanied the call. “We need to meet. And get Ron.”
“Do you think he remembers?” Asked Harry. Ron needed to remember. They couldn’t do it without him.
“He must. We both do, so he has to.” She sounded nervous. “Have you tried your…you know?”
The question took him aback. He hadn’t. “Have you?”
“I did. I think we took our magical ability with us. I apparated across my room earlier.”
Huh. It didn’t really make sense, but magic was closely intertwined with self and the mind. It didn’t have to make sense.

“That makes things easier. And- shit, wait, we don’t have the trace on us, do we?” His eyes widened in realisation. Their magic didn’t register with the ministry.
“Ron does, I think, he’s already eleven.” She mused. “I’ll apparate to yours tonight, on the street. Could you get out to meet me?”
Harry nodded, although she couldn’t see him. “Yeah, I can. I’m going to try to find an owl, try to contact Ron.”
“Be vague. Just in case.”

“I know, I know. I will. I love you, Mione.”

“Love you too, Harry. Stay safe.”

“I always do.”

She hung up before he did, and he slowly placed the receiver back onto the rack. Hermione was real. Everything that happened was real. They were in the past now. Nobody was dead, Sirius was still alive. Remus. Fred, Tonks, Cedric, Dobby, Dumbledore, Mad-eye, they were all still alive. He could save them. Unfortunately that meant that Voldemort was also still alive, but attached to the back of Quirrell's head. Not about to kill anyone but Harry.
Work needed to be done, and one of the first things he wanted to do was get Sirius out of Azkaban, then probably start the horcrux hunt. Voldemort wouldn’t do anything serious until Pettigrew unleashed him, but Harry would make sure that he never got the chance, whether Ron remembered or not. But for now, he needed an owl.

Any owl could deliver mail, another wizarding that had never made sense to him. How did they know to do that? Why were owls, one of the slower flying birds in Britain, used to deliver mail that was sometimes meant to be urgent? Whatever the case, he needed to get a message to Ron.
Harry wandered the streets, peeking into the hollows of trees, getting a few odd looks from other people on the streets. He wished he had Hedwig.

Hedwig.

She was alive, and if things continued on as they had the first time, she wouldn’t be sold until the day he went to Diagon alley, which was the day after his birthday if he remembered correctly. And that wasn’t for ten days. He could have his owl back.
The added spring in his step was obvious, and he ate the rest of his candy without throwing it up. He found an owl nestled in the hollow of a tree about 30 minutes from the telephone, and it did not look very impressed by him. He sat down on the grass and took out a piece of paper from his bag, and scribbled on it with a pen. Using a pen felt odd after so long of using quills.
The note read. “I solemnly swear I am up to no good. Privet tonight.”
Vague enough, he supposed. If Ron remembered, he’d understand. If he didn’t it was perfectly innocuous.

“Here, girl” He said, standing up and looking at the owl, who reluctantly stuck out its leg. It looked like a girl, maybe. “Take this to Ron weasley. Him only. Okay?”

He tied the note to its leg, and it clicked its beak at him, before spreading its wings wide and taking off, sticking out like a sore thumb in the daytime. He hoped it would get there safely. He hoped that Ron was back with them, because he needed them both.
He needed Hermione, needed her worry and constant care. He needed Ron and his special way of making Harry feel safer, needed his warm hugs and humor.
They had a second chance to make things right,all three of them.
Harry wouldn’t waste it.