Harry Potter is a Wizard
Harry Potter woke up at the crack of dawn, just as he always did. He sat quietly in his tiny cupboard, while he waited for Aunt Petunia to let him out to do chores. Harry wasn’t a naive child, in fact, years of his treatment at the hands of his relatives ensured he was extremely perceptive. Harry fully understood that he was, at best, abnormal. He could always do strange things, for as long as he could remember.
Whether it was turning his teacher’s hair blue, or teleporting onto a roof, something always happened when he let his emotions control him. Therefore, Harry had worked very hard on shoving emotions down far, far inside his mind. He hadn’t had such an incident with his freakishness in almost two years. The last incident being when he was caught having a conversation with a garter snake. The beating he received shortly after only secured his fear in his own abilities.
Harry was nearly numb to pain now, having to deal with the constant pain of improperly healed bones and belt lashings. Harry was covered in scars from his disgusting, matted mop of hair, to his toes. Harry disliked his scars, but he would never let himself complain about something as shallow as his appearance.
When Aunt Petunia finally opened the door to the cupboard, he stumbled out and waited politely, his head inclined towards the floor. “My name is Harry Potter. I am a freak and a mistake. My aunt and uncle are wonderful people who graciously took me in after the drug addicts that accidentally created me died in a car crash while drunk. I am a criminal and a burden. I will do as I’m told.” Since he was five, he’s been rehearsing the words the moment he stepped out of his cupboard. Harry’s aunt looked at him, a look of disdain plastered across her bony, horse-like face.
“Get going brat, your laziness is completely unacceptable in this household. Get to starting breakfast.” She says with a sneer.
Harry nods his head numbly, muttering “yes aunt Petunia” and quietly making his way into the kitchen to begin breakfast. Harry let his mind wander, as he completed his task with a level of automatic ease. He had been cooking for the Dursleys since he was five, after all, and it was well ingrained inside of him.
After his oaf of a cousin lumbered his way downstairs, Harry set the table and set out the food on the table and stood by the doorway. As he watched the family eat in silence, he heard uncle Vernon bark an order for Harry to retrieve the mail. Harry complied and walked over to the mail slot, retrieving the few letters and skimming them. Harry’s eyes nearly bulged out of their sockets when he saw a letter addressed to himself.
Mr H. Potter
The Cupboard Under the Stairs
4 Privet Drive
Little Whinging, Surry
Who on earth would write to him?!
More importantly, how would this person know where Harry slept?
Harry’s mind was reeling, and he quickly stuffed the letter in his oversized trousers pocket and made his way back to the dining room. He could vaguely hear uncle Vernon muttering about taking too much time, but his head was such a jumble of thoughts that he barely processed the words. The rest of the day passed in a blur as he did his chores, and it seemed like only minutes before he was shoved back into the cupboard for the night.
With trembling hands, Harry slowly took out his letter and admired the fancy wax seal. It had a sybal with 4 animals, which Harry couldn’t make out in the poor lighting. Harry’s eyes slowly widened as he began to read the letter. He had magic?!
How was he going to pay for the school, who had signed him up? It most definitely wasn’t his aunt or uncle. He contemplated for a moment that maybe this was simply a cruel joke. But the only person who knew about Harry’s cupboard were the Dursleys. Harry doubted Dudley even knew how to read, much less write something in such a neat tidy script. But regardless of that, something within the boy ignited when he got the letter. Suddenly, all the freakish things that he oh so hated himself for doing made sense now. It was magic. He was a wizard. Not only that, there were other people like him too! An entirely new world!
The thought made him grin, something he didn’t know he could do up until that point. Harry continued to read through the rest of the letter, taking time to analyze every single detail. He narrowed his eyes and made note of things that caught his eye.
First being that the attire specifically noted that they needed robes and cloaks. That must be proper wizarding attire, Harry thought.
The pair of dragon hide gloves had him gawking at the paper, (because- DRAGONS????) but he quickly regained his composure. In regard to the books, Harry took his time staring at titles. He could predict a few of his classes possibly based on the names of the textbooks, and it left him feeling giddy and excited. He made notes by each of the textbook names, using a partially broken pencil Dudly had thrown at him last year after demanding Harry do his homework.
The Standard Book of Spells (Grade 1) by Miranda Goshawk
-Spell class?
A History of Magic by Bathilda Bagshot
-magical history class then?
Magical Theory by Adalbert Waffling
-Probably applicable to multiple classes, unless its important enough to get its own class?
A Beginner's Guide to Transfiguration by Emeric Switch
-definitely a class
One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi by Phyllida Spore
-magical gardening class? So there are magical plants?
Magical Drafts and Potions by Arsenius Jigger
-So potions exist! Must be a class than, probably uses the magical plants
Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them by Newt Scamander
-are unicorns and other magic creatures real too? Will Hogwarts have a class about them?
The Dark Forces: A Guide to Self-Protection by Quentin Trimble
-magical self defense class?
After Harry finished making his notes by the books, he added his questions and observations on every part of the letter. He deducted the school also most likely has some sort of astronomy class based on the telescope. Another thing that had Harry’s heart racing was a wand. So witches and wizards use wands? Harry supposed it might be a tool to help with accuracy of spells and such.
Another thing that had the raven haired boy absolutely intrigued was the headmaster. Or, more the sheer amount of titles he held. Most of which Harry assumed were prestigious titles, he undoubtedly was important to wizarding politics. Wait- did wizards even have politics? Harry quickly resigned his thought, any functional society must have politics. Harry had many unanswered questions, but stopped to think hard after a moment.
The boy realized he was faced with a true dilemma. He was expected to send some sort of confirmation, according to the letter. Harry happened to have a white index card that was mostly untouched that he had kept under his thin mattress in case he ever needed it. No, this issue was he had no clue how to send it to the school. From what was stated it seemed that wizards possibly used owls for communication, (which Harry found both ridiculous and impractical) and as it stands, Harry has no access to an owl. He also remembered that the letter didn't exactly have any address in which to be sent to, other than the name of the school. He supposed they might have sent an owl with the ledger to wait on a reply. He had heard some strange hooting while gardening that afternoon.
Harry felt like he could fly (maybe he could? Could wizards fly?) but then after a moment his face completely fell as he remembered who he was, who he was with. The Dursleys absolutely refused to spend a single pent on their nephew, there was no chance they would give him anything for school supplies. Harry had absolutely no money, and as he realized with growing horror, he didn’t know where he was even supposed to procure any of these items. Not to mention the Dursleys wouldn’t let him go, he knew that for a fact. His aunt and uncle, while they despised the boy, still gave him a roof over his head and occasionally food to eat. They kept him alive, and if they kicked him out, he would have nowhere to go. He stared longingly at the letter, but decided he had to decline. Harry needed to stay alive, and he doubted he would last long enough to see his twelfth birthday if he was on the streets.
The pale boy hunched into himself and planned out the painful letter he would have to write. It was the responsible thing to do to make the school aware of his circumstances, so they wouldn’t worry when he didn’t show up at the start of term.
Determined to not let himself ruin over this, Harry takes the index card and starts to write in his attempt at a more legible font.
Dear Professor Mcgonagall,
I will be forever grateful for this letter, nothing like this has ever been offered to me. Thank you for finally making me understand what I am, and for telling me about the existence of magic. I have so many questions, but they will have to go unanswered I suppose. I have to decline the invitation to the school, and much as it hurts. My relatives would without a doubt send me strait to the orphanage if I told them I was magic, and I’m not sure the orphanage would even want to take me, and then I would have to go onto the streets. They strongly dislike magic and they are upset enough at me being in their care, and so I will most likely be punished for reading your letter in the first place. I don’t have any money, and my parents died in a car crash when I was a baby. I am grateful that I was taken in at all, and I would be made to regret it if I ever told them about something like this. There’s no one else who would ever want someone like me. I’m sure the school will be much better off without me, as I’m not very bright and I often make mistakes on school assignments. I would also be nervous that I might infect my classmates with my freakishness end up causing troubles for my classmates. I’m so sorry if I wasted your time professor, and I deeply apologize for any inconveniences this might have caused.
Sincerely,
Harry Potter
The next morning, Harry realized he was indeed correct about his assumption that an owl may have been waiting for his reply. He attempted to fasten the index card to its leg, and watched as it flew off with tears threatening his eyes. He took a few deep breaths, and let his mind go far, far away. Away from the pain, from the Dursleys, from magic. Just the static white inside his mind.