Prologue Pt. 1 - Sherry Stained Snow
Everything outside the car window was a flurry of gray and white.
Sharp green eyes followed a snowflake as it melted down the frosted glass. Then another, then another, and another. The monotony was soothing to the young boy pressed almost entirely against the car door in a desperation to get away from the rest of its occupants. It was suffocating, the way his cousin lounged as if to take up as much of the backseat as he could.
Harry sighed quietly, once again moving further away from Dudley in a futile attempt to preserve his personal space. The two of them made an odd pair - though neither would appreciate the effort to group them together. In fact, they couldn’t be more opposite one another in every possible way.
Harry was scrawny, almost fragile looking with his thin limbs and unsure gait. Bright green eyes peered out at the world through crooked circular frames. A small assortment of freckles dotted his tan skin. Dimples accompanied a rare yet toothy smile and uneven black curls fell into his face. When he was around others Harry hunched over, trying to collapse an already small body into something miniscule. He was fear and fire, each brewing with equal ferocity behind his tired gaze.
Dudley walked through the world like a king - which, in the Dursley household, he might as well have been. He was bigger than Harry in every way that mattered. Even at only 10, Dudley had grown heavy with years of his parents’ over indulgence. Harry privately thought this reflected more on his Aunt and Uncle’s shoddy parenting, but he couldn't help but resent Dudley for it when the other boy used his mass to pummel Harry into the ground. Dudley walked around with hatred in his eyes and a sneer twisted into a malicious smirk that no child should wear.
Though it wasn’t hard to see where he got it from.
All Harry had to do was look up into the car’s rear view mirror to see Uncle Vernon’s hateful glare and Aunt Petunia’s sneer reflected back at him.
“What’re you staring at, boy?” Aunt Petunia’s shrill voice rang out in the cramped car.
Harry quickly broke eye contact and resumed staring out the window, but not before Dudley whined to his mom in response, “Harry’s being weird, Mum. He’s muttering under his breath and hogging all my seat space!”
Snapping his head towards Dudley in disbelief, Harry could only catch a vicious smirk on his cousin’s face before Harry’s attention was fully on Aunt Petunia who had turned around in her seat to glare at him. Her face was flushed and scrunched up in anger as wild blonde strands fell in her face from the movement. Splotches of red were starting to form on her cheeks and Harry could smell the sherry on her breath.
“Don’t you dare bother my Duddykins, you hear me, freak?” Aunt Petunia spat, a hand gripping the bottle she was drinking from while her other dug her nails into Uncle Vernon’s arm to steady herself, “If I even see you breathe near him, you’re going to regret the day you were dumped on our doorstep.”
Flinching from the venom in her words, Harry swallowed his nerves and steadied himself. He wasn’t used to a not-sober Aunt Petunia and part of him believed that maybe, just maybe, he could reason with her.
“But– but Aunt Petunia, he’s–“
“Not. Another. Word. Brat.”
“But Dudley’s taking my-“
Harry heard the slap before he felt it. In a moment he was recoiling against the seat, clutching his face in pain and Aunt Petunia was leering over the center console, inches away from him.
“Listen here, freak,” she all but growled, the overwhelming scent of sherry suffocating Harry, “It’s bad enough that I have to wake up every day and see my waste of a sister in your eyes. I won’t have you ruining my Dudley’s life like she fucked up mine. You freaks are all the same and I know it down to my very soul.”
Aunt Petunia paused to take another swig from her bottle before continuing her tirade, “You all think the world is going to bend over backwards for you and give you everything. Lily was so perfect, with her perfect life and perfect husband, but I saw past her facade. Your freakish world ruined her. Ruined her!”
Harry remained frozen in his position squeezed next to Dudley, who had stopped moving as well. As Aunt Petunia stopped for a breath it was like the entire car was frozen except for the miniscule movements of Uncle Vernon‘s hands on the wheel and the scenery outside.
“And then here you come!” Aunt Petunia yelled, the end turning into a harsh whine. Her movements were getting sloppy and her posh accent was slipping with every passing second, “With your stupid eyes and your stupid freakishness and the reminder that every day that you live, my baby sister is dead. You killed her.”
Another swig from the bottle and Aunt Petunia leaned back into her seat for balance, her free hand digging into Uncle Vernon’s skin so hard that even Harry could hear the man’s pained grunts.
“You should’ve died when you were a baby! Should’ve… should’ve bloody perished with that waste of a space you call your father. Maybe then I could’ve shown that cunt the error of her ways. She’d never be as good as me, but she would have reason…” Aunt Petunia trailed off, losing more coherence as her rant went on.
Her body slumped forward for a second, Uncle Vernon reaching out a hand to steady her before she jolted back up again with a fire in her eyes, “You… freak… you- you infected her! I oughta beat the freakishness out of you!”
Before anyone could react, Aunt Petunia was lunging forward towards Harry with a mangled screech. Both Dudley and Harry jumped out of the way and Uncle Vernon momentarily let go of the steering wheel to steady his feral wife, muttering to her, “Not in the car, pet. The freak isn’t worth it.”
No one but Harry saw the bright headlights of the oncoming truck, nor did anyone else seem to feel the car violently swerving to the right and then off the road. All any of them could process was yelling, crashing and pain. Then, darkness.
It was the last moment any of the Dursley’s would be seen alive.