Escapes and Stones
Harry had always been a runner.
He loved everything about the sport. The wind in his hair; the freedom it brought; the moment when the adrenaline kicked in and his head was finally quiet. The rhythmic pattern of his feet hitting dirt kept him grounded, one after another after another. Harry could get lost in the endless sky, the rush, the pure joy of it all.
It almost felt like he was flying.
Dudley and his friends could try to catch him as much as they wanted after school, but Harry was made for the chase. Weaving between trees and under bushes, he felt alive. He was in control—like running away from the world was the only way to keep safe from it.
It wasn't that far of a stretch. Escaping was all he had ever done. Dudley wants to play a game? Run away as fast as you can. Petunia readying her frying pan? Dodge until your knees are creaking. Vernon looking at you with that glint in his eye? Escape to the darkness of the cupboard and pray he'll forget you ever existed.
All standard practice, really.
It was only logical that Harry's need to go, go, go slowly turned into an itch to leave that he couldn’t get rid of. He yearned, day in and day out, of the sky rushing past him and the ground flying beneath his feet. Like every seven-year-old, his dreams were a bit… out there. It was simply not realistic for him to soar among the clouds, no matter how much it helped make the pain go away.
But what he could do was escape. And Harry very much wanted to escape.
The Dursleys took him to the park. The Dursleys very much did not want him to be at that park, so he was told to sit on a bench and not move. Not if he knew what was good for him. Harry thought he knew what was good for himself, thank you very much, and it was the opposite of whatever the Dursleys said. But he was afraid. Afraid of what could happen, what would happen.
So he sat. And he watched. And he wished.
Other children were running and screaming; Harry was trying to pretend he didn’t exist. The playground was situated in the middle of a park, with a field next to it and some distant trees. They were nice, big trees, with lots of shade and hiding places. His fingers started to itch, his legs bouncing, and Harry knew what he had to do.
He was sprinting before anyone could notice he was gone.
The uneven turf propeled Harry forward, Dudley’s oversized clothes flying behind him in the wind. He was free! He was free! Nobody could stop him. The forest was so close, he could almost touch it. Ratty sneakers giving all they had, Harry kept running forward, desperate for escape, until-
Two sturdy hands trapped him, stopping him in his tracks. He was forcefully turned around until he was face to face with a stern-looking woman. She looked to be around Aunt Petunia’s age, with the same pursed lips and judging eyes. A mother, most likely of one of the screaming children.
“Now where do you think you’re going, young man?” she demanded, a haughty tone to her voice.
Harry, still in his adrenaline high, squirmed around before realizing escape was pointless and simmering down.
“Just running, ma’am,” he mumbled, ashamed to have been caught, “I like the exercise.”
The mother raised a thin eyebrow at him, questioning, “Why not run around the play equipment? What kind of a rascal are you that you’d run away, leaving your mother worried like that?”
There was a pang of hurt in Harry’s chest, a shame he couldn’t describe eating him up inside, “Don’t have a mother to worry, ma’am.”
A gasp, and the woman stared at him with a mix of pity and disgust, “Then what father raises you to be like this?”
“Don’t have a father either, ma’am,” Harry replied, trying his best to look pitiful so the strange woman would put him down, “They died in a car crash, so I had no one to ‘raise me to be like this’.”
“Well, I never!” the woman scoffed, appalled at his back talk, “Who do you belong to then? A child like you needs some good discipline to set you straight.”
Harry froze at this, his mouth gone dry. He couldn’t talk, not that he would, and his head felt like it was going to split open. The urge to cry was strong enough that he almost gave in, until he heard a shout.
“Boy! What do you think you’re doing? I told you to stay on that bench. When we get home–” Aunt Petunia’s shrill voice rang out, pausing only when she saw the woman holding Harry.
He looked over to where she was marching over, an almost devilish grin hiding under faux-concern.
“I apologize, Lucy, Harry here has no manners. He was dropped on his head as a child, you see,” Aunt Petunia explained with false pity, “We’ve tried our best, but he continues to be a troublemaker, as I’m sure you’ve seen.”
Lucy, as the strange woman’s name seemed to be, scoffed and held Harry out to Aunt Petunia like he was a dirty load of laundry. “I’ve never seen a more petulant child, you certainly do have your hands full Petunia.”
Aunt Petunia, malice in her eyes, looked down at Harry and snarled, “I sure do.”
—
The next few months were painful.
Harry felt like he was kept on a leash, restrained to his school and the four square walls of the Dursley property. And he didn’t even get that on the bad days, when he was locked in the cupboard, the space so tight he almost forgot how to breathe. The Dursley’s eyes were constantly on him, following him. Making sure he couldn’t run again.
It was all too much. And Harry wanted to go even more with each day that passed.
He was back to flinching movements and haunted stares. But still… he yeaned, he itched, he craved. Harry needed to go, and he needed to be gone yesterday. There was just one issue.
Running was no longer an option. Not with the limp he was sporting and the exhaustion dragging down his bones. His freedom would be laced with pain and Harry didn’t think he could go through that right now. It would ruin the one thing he had going for him. His gifts were out of wack, his entire body ached and his grades were dropping.
Harry was miserable.
He needed an out. He needed to fly again. But what if… what if instead of flying he just disappeared? They couldn’t catch him if there was nothing to catch. Like a shadow into the night, he could just disappear. Why hadn’t he thought of it sooner?
It would be so easy. Harry had nothing to care for, so he had nothing to leave behind. So the next day, after school, he just walked off in a random direction. He’d never been this far into town, but he figured that if he just kept going he’d eventually find a place to stay.
As he walked, Harry was hit by how monotonous the town truly was. Every house was the same—tidy, neat, not a blade of grass out of place. It felt almost claustrophobic. Like any street corner he turned onto could lead back onto Privet Drive and he would be shoved back into his closet.
Harry started to run. He didn’t know where he was going, but he needed to escape. This was a horrible idea, why had he ever thought the outside world was safe. Houses passed by in a flurry of pain and panic. He started to black out.
There were noises - yelling? Strong hands grabbed him. He was put in a small space, was it the cupboard? No, it was too soft. A seat cushion—the box was driving, he had to be in a car. There was indistinct chatter harshened through the static of a radio and all Harry could do was cry silently. His leg hurt so much.
More movement, more nausea and suddenly Harry really was back in the closet. There were flashes of pain—beatings? He could hear the crack of Uncle Vernon’s belt in the distance. He was back in his hidey-hole with his friends Mr. and Mrs. Spider and Tom the Loose Stair that made the noises in the morning.
Harry had to be delirious, but he just couldn’t help it. The world was so soft with the buzz of his gift working overtime to prevent an actual medical emergency. All he had to do was lie back and think of the Queen. Actually, why was he thinking of the Queen? What had she ever done for him?
He wished she would go away, actually, he wished the whole world to go away. But it wouldn’t. He was stuck, and it was not fair, not fair! Harry could feel hot tears threatening to spill down his face. Why couldn’t he just disappear? It was not fair. Everything would be better if he could just disappear.
—
When Harry woke up from his self-induced coma, he couldn’t see his body.
A weight spread all across him, but he could see nothing but the dirty cot on the cupboard floor. When he tried to move, he found he still could. He tried again, and with a ripple of light through the air his hand suddenly appeared. Scrambling to sit up, the invisible cloth fell off of him.
“What the…” Harry muttered to himself, reaching out to grasp the mysterious item.
It was soft, like one of Aunt Petunia’s well-made winter jackets. When not covering his body, it was revealed to be a black cloak that shimmered in the meager light through the door crack.
It was heavy when he draped it over his shoulders, like what Harry imagined a hug to feel like. It was almost like home.
Lost in his inexplicable fondness for the thing, Harry almost missed the fact that his body was once again invisible. He decided to call it The Cloak for ease of reference and then decided it was his new best friend.
Harry sat back against the cupboard wall, wrapping the Cloak around him, when suddenly he felt a lump brush against his leg. It was a pocket sewn into the inside of the Cloak, containing a strange rock and an even stranger stick. Hollows, his thoughts told him, They’re called Hollows. And he knew they had to be right.
The thoughts continued to swirl around his brain, whispering and prodding at him to do, to say, to live. Harry never knew what they wanted from him. It felt impossible to try to understand them. At one moment they could be the whispers of a concerned friend, at another the mockery of his worst enemy.
All he knew was they would cause him pain. Deep, stabbing pain where the slightest movement could make him vomit and any light was sent by the devil himself. A ‘migraine’—as the health book at the library had told him.
Hopeful mood already soured, Harry felt prematurely exhausted. He was still injured from Uncle Vernon’s whipping last night and there was nothing for him to do but endure the migraine. His hands gripped the Cloak as Harry started to cry. It wasn’t fair. What had he done to have to deal with so much pain?
Wrapping the Cloak tighter around him, he suddenly had an idea. A stupid, stupid idea. But it could just work. These so-called Hollows could make it all go away if he was right. While the Cloak radiated home, the Stone and the Wand both radiated power. The Wand told him of all he could achieve, while the Stone whispered of all he could change.
If Harry was interpreting the subconscious messages of these inanimate objects—and if he wasn’t going crazy—the Stone could help him change his circumstances. The Stone could make the thoughts go away. He just needed something to put the thoughts into…
What could hold his thoughts? What if he needed them for later? It’s not like he could write down an entire alternate universe he made in his head. Or maybe he could.
Maybe.
Clad in his invisible shield of dubious origins, Harry unlocked the door with little difficulty. It was quick work to get up the stairs and to his target destination—Dudley’s second bedroom. The entire house was asleep; nobody would notice if he just snuck in and…
Got it! Harry congratulated himself as he snuck back into his cupboard with his prize—a blank notebook Dudley had won in a school raffle a year ago. The larger boy hated anything to do with school, so it had gone into the room the same day. It was still in pristine condition! Sure, it was a little ugly with its bright pink cover sporting the words ‘Love Yourself!’ but it would do. Schools always had weird prizes for raffles.
At this point, the migraine was just getting worse by the second. If Harry didn’t do something soon he would barely be able to move. Setting down the diary in front of him, he placed the Stone gently in his right hand and just thought. He thought about everything: his frustration, his pain, the future his brain told him would happen and the past he never got to have. He thought of his weakness and cowardice in this other fictional life, unknown regrets that haunted his nights and memories that haunted his days. He thought of the overwhelming pressure he faced and his anger at it. He thought and then he pushed.
The air started to whirl around Harry, and even with his eyes shut he could tell the Stone was glowing. It was pulsing with his thoughts, feelings and frustrations, leaving Harry feeling surprisingly light. His mind was at a precipice, so close to a new beginning. With one final push of energy, Harry slammed the Stone into the diary and promptly passed out.
—
When Harry woke again, his mind was clear. It was sharp, like a razor’s edge. He knew what he needed to do. He could finally think, he could finally leave. None of those pesky thoughts held him back; his view was stripped free of the world he had known. A giggle escaped him, slightly manic, as he rocked back and forth.
He was finally free. He was free. He could leave.
It took a few hours for the jitters to fade, but Harry knew he had to run today. He would not get another opportunity. The Dursleys were all out—Dudley at school, Uncle Vernon at work and Aunt Petunia at some social event or another. His rucksack was already packed with everything he needed, so all Harry made to grab was some easy snacks, Dudley’s piggy bank, his new magical diary and the Hollows.
And like that, he was off.
One step out the door and Harry was running. He was running so far, so fast, so free, that he didn’t notice when the world around him started to spin. It was compressing in on itself, folding over and back. Suddenly the sun was gone. The houses were now giant lurking trees and Harry could sense something in the air.
Fear.
There was fear lurking in the air.