Buttons, Threads, and Tiles

Nearly a year and nine months had passed since that day, but the world had hardly changed. The sky shone brighter and bluer, and the birds were more lively. The sun had come alive to spread warmth through the entirety of Britain as well. But the people, the people were all the same. 

Everyone but the little boy under the stairs. He had long auburn hair, and his skin was smooth. His green eyes shone with a vibrancy and colour that could only come to be with magic, and his kindness shone upon all.

The boy -Harry Potter- had gotten quite a bit taller, and was now about 58 inches. He was no longer the shortest boy in class -in fact, he was one of the tallest. He knew that as he had snuck into the attic to measure himself against one of the wooden beams. 

He had also made it a habit to visit Lisa at the salon, sometimes only to say hello.

He had assumed his relatives would find out about him using beauty products within a month, but he had apparently been a little optimistic in the viewing of their intelligence, seeing as they still hadn’t noticed. Unobservant shits.

What they had noticed of course was the length of his hair. His wavy auburn hair reached down to his hips now, curling up into wisps at the ends. He had continued to take care of his hair, and from trial and error he had fallen into a routine that left him with the exact results he wanted to.

Hair that was soft like cotton, not satiny like silk.

His aunt had tried to cut it off multiple times, all in vain of course.

Her second and third try had resulted in the scissors breaking again, and the fourth time she had even been blown off her feet, slamming down onto the ground with a loud thud.

Harry couldn’t remember anything of that night other than the fact he was promptly thrown into his cupboard, which had later on been opened by his uncle who threw him out and onto the ground, completely red in the face. The next thing he remembered he was back in the cupboard with his hair tangled, a swollen eye and a broken rib, along with multiple bruises along his body.

To make matters worse, he couldn’t even manage to heal himself consciously with his magic either! He was lucky that his magic worked to heal him when he was sleeping, but he wished he had the ability to master it when he was awake as well.

One thing that he had noticed was that he could heal others with his magic. He had found a blackbird with an injured wing and a snake with a broken tail in his backyard on two separate occasions. 

The only con to this power was that any time he healed someone or something, he  himself took the brunt of said beings' pain. 

When he healed the bird it had been a burning ache climbing up his arm, and when he healed the snake it had felt like a double-decker bus had landed on his foot. 

But, the animals were okay in the end, and that was all that mattered. He didn’t mind the pain, because it didn’t linger too long. He had had worse, and if that was what it took to completely heal a tortured animal or person, he would do it a hundred times over.

He couldn’t speak with the bird of course, but it had nipped gently at his finger before it flew away. 

The snake was a different matter altogether. As soon as he had healed the snake’s tail and gotten over the searing pain in his foot, the snake started talking to him. Talking to him!

It thanked him for healing him and said it would “forever protect and guard him to pay the favor”.

Harry personally thought kindness was the bare minimum, and that anyone who’s in pain deserved to be put out of it.

Harry would have even helped his relatives if they were hurt if it wasn't for the fact that they would rather die than let him use his ‘voodoo practice’ on them.

The snake had stuck to its promise by curling itself around his arm and not letting go.

He had told it that his relatives were going to murder it if they ever found it, that food was very scarce and that winters were cold and dark, but the snake ‘shrugged’ and told him that those were already existing problems it went through.

Eventually Harry ran out of excuses, sighed and gave up, resigning himself to his new role.

He had taken the snake into his cupboard where he had started asking it questions. He had found out that the snake was a blue eyed leucistic ball python, which was a white snake with blue eyes that would grow to about 4 feet. The ball python was non-venomous, and relatively harmless.

-Although, that was only the non-magical kind. And as he had found out that the snake was in fact magical, he had no idea what to expect.

After a lot of back and forth, they had landed on the name Circe, as he had found out the snake was female. The name Circe came from the Greek goddess sorcerer who would turn her enemies and those who insulted her into beasts, which she thought was apparently very fitting, for some reason.

Circe was a prideful being. She demanded scratches often and would puff up pridefully at any compliment. She was fierce in her protection and any insult to Harry’s person made her snarl. Harry quickly grew to like her. She reminded him a bit of an older sister.

She would wrap around his arm when he was doing chores, and would follow him to the library. He would try to explain to her quietly what he was reading about, but he couldn’t do it too often as Mrs. Abbot -call me Alice dear- had given him confused looks whenever he was accidentally too loud in his hissing - not to mention the fact that it was also very hard to translate the English that stood on the page to Parseltongue.

Tomorrow was his 11th birthday, and Harry was practically bouncing with excitement. Not as if he ever got anything, and even though he wanted to, he couldn’t spend his birthday with Mrs Abbott in the library. That would make her suspicious and the last thing he wanted was for her to see how his relatives treated him. He knew she probably wouldn’t change her mind of him, but the risk was still there, and it was a risk he wasn’t willing to take.

So it was going to be yet another birthday spent with the Dursleys, but for once Harry didn’t think it was going to be so bad. If luck was on his side, he would be able to spend most of his birthday talking to Circe, practising magic and pretending the outward world didn’t exist.

He had gotten much better at his magic in the last two years, and he could now do many tricks flawlessly. He had found that it was often easier to master magic if he added an incantation to it. For example, if he wanted an object to fly, he would whisper ‘fly’ out loud. He didn’t think an incantation such as ‘fly’ had any real purpose, but it had a nice placebo effect that seemed to fool his subconscious as well as his magic.

After he had mastered a trick with an incantation, he would lose it and try without. Like using training wheels on a bike that you would eventually dismantle.

It was 5 o’clock on the 30th of July. Harry had woken bright and early as he did every morning, so that he could begin with his chores. 

He had had Circe in about a week, but he knew now that the snake wouldn’t wake up for at least another hour, so he gently unwrapped Circe from where she previously had been wrapped around his arm and placed her on the bed. 

He disguised Circe with his magic, so that if his relatives threw the cupboard door open, they would find nothing but dust, spiders, a cot, and cleaning supplies. 

He began with dusting the furniture. He always began with dusting the furniture so that all of the dust could fall to the floor to be vacuumed later. He did everything as silently as a mouse, not even a creak in a floorboard as he drifted through the house, dusting every surface. He didn’t mind cleaning really, it was a simple, non taxing chore that didn’t require him to think or stress about anything. He wasn’t to start cooking breakfast until at the earliest six thirty, as that was around the time his uncle woke up to start getting ready for work. 

He let out a sigh as he finally finished scrubbing the last of the living room table, and he looked up at the clock. 5:44. That meant he could begin on his chores in the garden and have something to eat before his uncle started waddling dangerously down the stairs.

He went into the cupboard to change his clothes. Circe had yet to wake up, and was snoring away peacefully on Harry’s hard pillow. He changed into a grey t-shirt big enough to pass as a dress and that often slipped off his shoulder and a pair of brown pants that he had to bring all the way up to his belly button so that he didn’t trip on them, which he tied off with a shoelace.

Fashionable, Harry drawled sarcastically.

He was just about to walk out the backdoor when he heard the tell-tale sound of post arriving through the mail slot. He looked confusedly at the clock. 5:46. Why had the post come this early? Didn’t the post usually arrive around nine?

He walked silently into the hall and looked down at the hallway carpet. There was a singular letter lying there innocently. Harry picked it up. It was made of thick paper, almost like parchment, and it was yellowed as if it was old. The front even had a detailed wine red wax-seal. He turned the letter in his hand to read the back of it.

Mr. H. Potter

The Cupboard under the Stairs
 4. Privet Drive
  Little Whinging, Surrey

Harry stared at it for a couple of seconds, completely frozen. He furrowed his brow and his lips pressed together in confusion. He darted his eyes around as if his answer lay with his surroundings.

A letter had come. For him. That had never happened before.

It hadn’t come with the post, which means someone had put it there manually. He snapped out of his daze to look out through the door window, but he couldn’t see anyone. Granted, the person would have walked away a long time ago now, but he was in such a state of shock that he had forgotten that.

The sender knew his room was a cupboard. That almost shook him the most. It could very well have been Dudley and his friends, as they were known for their pranking, but Dudley couldn’t write with such clever handwriting, and neither could his friends, and where would he have gotten his hands upon parchment like this? Learned proper letter etiquette? And with the way the pen strokes changed in size he suspected the letter was written with a fountain tip pen, which he knew none of them owned nor knew how to use. He also knew none of his friends would wake up at the ass-crack of the morning just to deliver him a letter, prank or not. 

So, who had sent it to him?

He looked up the stairs, almost as if expecting his uncle to come bulldozing down and taking it from him any second now.

He hugged the letter tightly to his chest and climbed into his cupboard to read in peace.

He created a ball of light. It was cold in his hand so he gently threw it up into the air so that it hovered over him, shining light upon the letter.

He tried to open the letter as gently as he could, but the paper ripped slightly in the corner as he tugged.

He smoothed out the letter and read the text inside.

HOGWARTS SCHOOL of WITCHCRAFT and WIZARDRY

Headmaster: Albus Dumbledore

(Order of Merlin, First Class, Grand Sorc.; Chf. Warlock, Supreme Mugwump, International Confed. of Wizards)

Dear Mr Potter,

We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Please find enclosed a list of all necessary books and equipment.

Term begins on 1 September. We await your owl by no later than 31 July.

Yours sincerely,

Minerva McGonagall.

This… was insane. The worst part was that a tiny spark of hope immediately lit up inside of him. He was suspicious, of course, of the fact that this may very well be a prank or even someone trying to lure them of money. But a thief would write a return address, or at least demand something from them, because what would be the purpose otherwise? 

He knew magic existed, but he could not have imagined that it was so widespread as to need an entire school.

He was still pondering on what to do when he heard a light ruse and a yawn beside him.

‘Whatcha’ got there ‘ry?’ Circe mumbled with an adorably tired expression.

‘You’d never believe me Circe’ he responded in Parseltongue. ‘I think there are other people who do -do magic!’ he whispered excitedly. ‘I got this letter, which was written in some old parchment type paper, and it’s way too -too elaborate to be something done by Dudley, and i think it might be real’

That woke up Circe substantially. ‘What!? Read it to me, read it to me!’ She slithered over quickly and landed herself in his lap.

Harry chuckled and read the entire letter to her, which was a hard feat as he had to translate it, but it got easier the more he read.

‘What do you think I should do?’

‘I think you should reply. No rabbits will be captured from not hunting you know!’ she said wisely. Harry had never heard anything like that before, but he understood what she meant. Kind of.

‘Alright- but it says reply by owl, where the hell do I get an owl?’ he cried out bewildered, throwing his hands in the air.

‘Maybe.. Maybe there is one! Outside! I mean, the letter must’ve come here somehow, and they seem to think using owls is a perfectly acceptable way of sending letters, since they just brushed past that  little detail.’

Circe gushed about how smart her owner was and wrapped herself around his arm. Harry’s face reddened as he opened the cupboard and snuck to the door, not a whisper above silent. 

He stood on his toes to spy outside and, just as proclaimed, a white and grey owl sat on his relatives mail post, looking all too disgruntled and shaking its wings.

He would’ve exclaimed in joy if it wasn’t for the fact that that was a definite death wish. He dismantled the lock and opened the door. A wave of heat hit him and he could hear birds chirping. 

Even though the other houses looked as gray and boring as ever, the sun was shining and the grass was practically vibrant, not really fitting the vibe of the neighborhood.

It was quite hot outside, and he was starting to understand why the owl looked so disgruntled. He walked quietly up to the mail post. The gravel from the driveway was grating on his bare feet, and the sun shone brightly even though it was such an early morning. He walked up to the owl and stretched out his hand as non threateningly as he could. The owl gently nipped his finger.

He bent over and asked gently “Would you like to come inside? It’s so hot outside and it seems bothersome. I could give you my letter at the same time” He felt silly talking to a bird, but then the owl gave a slight nod and jumped onto his outstretched arm. Thankfully it wasn’t the same arm he had Circe on, but she was moody nonetheless and muttered unhappily under her breath. 

He walked as quickly as he could back into the house and shut the door behind him. Immediately, the cool of the house hit him like a nice cool shower and he sighed gratefully. He walked into the kitchen and looked up at the clock. 6:20. Fuck he needed to hurry.

He placed the owl down on the chair and took out a piece of paper, a pen and an envelope. He clicked the pen and bent over the piece of paper. He thought for a while on what to write, but eventually settled on:

To Minerva McGonagall,

I gratefully accept my position at Hogwarts and look forward to hopefully seeing you on the first of august.

I have some enquiries about your letter, and I would be very grateful to have them answered. Where can I buy supplies? And how do I get to school on the first of september?

With gratitude,

Harry Potter

Simple, concise and straight to the point. Harry used more ‘fancy words’ to appear more professional, but his shoddy handwriting kind of ruined the effect. He shrugged and tied it to the owl's leg, which it had put forward when it realized he had finished writing the letter.

Just as he was about to pick up the owl and move towards the window he could hear a deafening thud, thud, thud on the stairs.

Shit, his uncle had awoken.

He rushed towards the window and clumsily tried to open the window with one arm. It took a few tries, and the longer it took him to open the window the more panicked his expression became. His head darted panicky back and forth from the window to the stairs. He prayed to whatever god was listening that the owl wouldn’t start shrieking from the jostling.

Finally he managed to force the window open, and the owl took flight. Just as the owl flew outside his line of sight, his uncle walked into the kitchen and slammed himself down into one of the seats.

“What're you doing over by the window boy! Get started on my breakfast and stop dawdling like an idiot!” he chortled, as if he had said the world's funniest joke and not insulted his niece.

Harry forcefully relaxed his shoulders and unclenched his jaw. He wrestled his expression into a ‘neutrally bored’ look, and not the ‘absolutely fucking panicked’ look he had sported a couple of seconds earlier.

“Of course Uncle Vernon.” he said subserviently. 

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩ ✶⋆.˚꩜ .ᐟ˙⋆✶

The next letter came the morning of his birthday, thankfully before any of his relatives had awoken. He was cleaning as it came, and Circe was still sleeping, so he decided to simply drop the letter in his cupboard, and would read it with Circe later.

The opportunity to read it came after breakfast, when his uncle had haphazardly thrown him into the cupboard by his ear, already on his way out to the car. His aunt was in the backyard gossiping with Mrs. Next Door, and Dudley was out doing lord knows what with his friends, seeing as it was summer break.

He opened the letter silently and started reading it. On it stood detailed directions toward something called ‘the Leaky Cauldron’ which was located at Charing Cross Road, where he was instructed to talk to the barman ‘Tom’ and he would let him into a place called Diagon Alley, where he could find all of his supplies. To get onto the train that led him to the school he had to run through a barrier that was between platform 3 and 4. 

The person who had written him back wasn’t Professor McGonagall as he anticipated, but the headmaster himself. Surely he wasn’t important enough for the headmaster of the school to personally pen him a detailed letter.

It all seemed surreal and hard to believe, but he had to believe it was real. After all, he knew magic was real, and just the day before he had sent a letter with an owl, and gotten a response!

So yes, he had no choice but to believe that maybe, maybe it wasn’t all a scam.

He decided that he would go to Diagon Alley a couple of days later though, just to be safe in the knowledge that no one with bad intentions would be waiting for him there.