Ch 2. The vanishing glass

Nearly ten years had passed since the Dursleys had woken up to find

their nephew on the front step, but Privet Drive had hardly changed at

all. The sun rose on the same tidy front gardens and lit up the brass

number four on the Dursleys' front door; it crept into their living

room, which was almost exactly the same as it had been on the night when

Mr. Dursley had seen that fateful news report about the owls. Only the

photographs on the mantelpiece really showed how much time had passed.

Ten years ago, there had been lots of pictures of what looked like a

large pink beach ball wearing different-colored bonnets -- but Dudley

Dursley was no longer a baby, and now the photographs showed a large

blond boy riding his first bicycle, on a carousel at the fair, playing a

computer game with his father, being hugged and kissed by his mother.

The room held no sign at all that another boy lived in the house, too.

Yet Harry Potter was still there, asleep at the moment, but not for

long. His Aunt Petunia was awake and it was her shrill voice that made

the first noise of the day.

"Up! Get up! Now!"

Harry woke with a start. His aunt rapped on the door again.

"Up!" she screeched. Harry heard her walking toward the kitchen and then

the sound of the frying pan being put on the stove. He rolled onto his

back and tried to remember the dream he had been having. It had been a good one. There had been a flying motorcycle in it. He had a funny

feeling he'd had the same dream before.

His aunt was back outside the door.

"Are you up yet?" she demanded.

"Nearly," said Harry.

"Well, get a move on, I want you to look after the bacon. And don't you

dare let it burn, I want everything perfect on Duddy's birthday."

Harry groaned.

"What did you say?" his aunt snapped through the door.

"Nothing, nothing..."

Dudley's birthday -- how could he have forgotten? Harry got slowly out

of bed and started looking for socks. He found a pair under his bed and,

after pulling a spider off one of them, put them on. Harry was used to

spiders, because the cupboard under the stairs was full of them, and

that was where he slept.

When he was dressed he went down the hall into the kitchen. The table

was almost hidden beneath all Dudley's birthday presents. It looked as

though Dudley had gotten the new computer he wanted, not to mention the

second television and the racing bike. Exactly why Dudley wanted a

racing bike was a mystery to Harry, as Dudley was very fat and hated

exercise -- unless of course it involved punching somebody. Dudley's

favorite punching bag was Harry, but he couldn't often catch him. Harry

didn't look it, but he was very fast.

Perhaps it had something to do with living in a dark cupboard, but Harry

had always been small and skinny for his age. He looked even smaller and

skinnier than he really was because all he had to wear were old clothes

of Dudley's, and Dudley was about four times bigger than he was. Harry

had a thin face, knobbly knees, black hair, and bright green eyes. He

wore round glasses held together with a lot of Scotch tape because of

all the times Dudley had punched him on the nose. The only thing Harry

liked about his own appearance was a very thin scar on his forehead that

was shaped like a bolt of lightning. He had had it as long as he could

remember, and the first question he could ever remember asking his Aunt Petunia was how he had gotten it.

"In the car crash when your parents died," she had said. "And don't ask

questions."

Don't ask questions -- that was the first rule for a quiet life with the

Dursleys.

Uncle Vernon entered the kitchen as Harry was turning over the bacon.

"Comb your hair!" he barked, by way of a morning greeting.

About once a week, Uncle Vernon looked over the top of his newspaper and

shouted that Harry needed a haircut. Harry must have had more haircuts

than the rest of the boys in his class put

together, but it made no difference, his hair simply grew that way --

all over the place.

Harry was frying eggs by the time Dudley arrived in the kitchen with his

mother. Dudley looked a lot like Uncle Vernon. He had a large pink face,

not much neck, small, watery blue eyes, and thick blond hair that lay

smoothly on his thick, fat head. Aunt Petunia often said that Dudley

looked like a baby angel -- Harry often said that Dudley looked like a

pig in a wig.

Harry put the plates of egg and bacon on the table, which was difficult

as there wasn't much room. Dudley, meanwhile, was counting his presents.

His face fell.

"Thirty-six," he said, looking up at his mother and father. "That's two

less than last year."

"Darling, you haven't counted Auntie Marge's present, see, it's here

under this big one from Mommy and Daddy."

"All right, thirty-seven then," said Dudley, going red in the face.

Harry, who could see a huge Dudley tantrum coming on, began wolfing down

his bacon as fast as possible in case Dudley turned the table over.

Aunt Petunia obviously scented danger, too, because she said quickly,

"And we'll buy you another two presents while we're out today. How's

that, popkin? Two more presents. Is that all right''

Dudley thought for a moment. It looked like hard work. Finally he said

slowly, "So I'll have thirty ... thirty..."

"Thirty-nine, sweetums," said Aunt Petunia.

"Oh." Dudley sat down heavily and grabbed the nearest parcel. "All right

then."

Uncle Vernon chuckled. "Little tyke wants his money's worth, just like

his father. 'Atta boy, Dudley!" He ruffled Dudley's hair.

At that moment the telephone rang and Aunt Petunia went to answer it

while Harry and Uncle Vernon watched Dudley unwrap the racing bike, a

video camera, a remote control airplane, sixteen new computer games, and

a VCR. He was ripping the paper off a gold wristwatch when Aunt Petunia

came back from the telephone looking both angry and worried.

"Bad news, Vernon," she said. "Mrs. Figg's broken her leg. She can't

take him." She jerked her head in Harry's direction.

Dudley's mouth fell open in horror, but Harry's heart gave a leap. Every

year on Dudley's birthday, his parents took him and a friend out for the

day, to adventure parks, hamburger restaurants, or the movies. Every

year, Harry was left behind with Mrs. Figg, a mad old lady who lived two

streets away. Harry hated it there. The whole house smelled of cabbage

and Mrs. Figg made him look at photographs of all the cats she'd ever

owned.

"Now what?" said Aunt Petunia, looking furiously at Harry as though he'd

planned this. Harry knew he ought to feel sorry that Mrs. Figg had

broken her leg, but it wasn't easy when he reminded himself it would be

a whole year before he had to look at Tibbles, Snowy, Mr. Paws, and

Tufty again.

"We could phone Marge," Uncle Vernon suggested.

"Don't be silly, Vernon, she hates the boy."

The Dursleys often spoke about Harry like this, as though he wasn't

there -- or rather, as though he was something very nasty that couldn't

understand them, like a slug.

"What about what's-her-name, your friend -- Yvonne?"

"On vacation in Majorca," snapped Aunt Petunia.

"You could just leave me here," Harry put in hopefully (he'd be able to watch what he wanted on television for a change and maybe even have a go on Dudley's computer).

Aunt Petunia looked as though she'd just swallowed a lemon.

"And come back and find the house in ruins?" she snarled.

"I won't blow up the house," said Harry, but they weren't listening.

"I suppose we could take him to the zoo," said Aunt Petunia slowly, "... and leave him in the car...."

"That car's new, he's not sitting in it alone...."

Dudley began to cry loudly. In fact, he wasn't really crying -- it had been years since he'd really cried -- but he knew that if he screwed up his face and wailed, his mother would give him anything he wanted.

"Dinky Duddydums, don't cry, Mummy won't let him spoil your special day!" she cried, flinging her arms around him.

"I... don't... want... him... t-t-to come!" Dudley yelled between huge, pretend sobs. "He always sp- spoils everything!" He shot Harry a nasty

grin through the gap in his mother's arms.

Just then, the doorbell rang -- "Oh, good Lord, they're here!" said Aunt Petunia frantically -- and a moment later, Dudley's best friend, Piers Polkiss, walked in with his mother. Piers was a scrawny boy with a face like a rat. He was usually the one who held people's arms behind their backs while Dudley hit them. Dudley stopped pretending to cry at once.

Half an hour later, Harry, who couldn't believe his luck, was sitting in the back of the Dursleys' car with Piers and Dudley, on the way to the zoo for the first time in his life. His aunt and uncle hadn't been ableto think of anything else to do with him, but before they'd left, Uncle Vernon had taken Harry aside.

"I'm warning you," he had said, putting his large purple face right up close to Harry's, "I'm warning you now, boy -- any funny business,

anything at all -- and you'll be in that cupboard from now until

Christmas."

"I'm not going to do anything," said Harry, "honestly..

But Uncle Vernon didn't believe him. No one ever did.

The problem was, strange things often happened around Harry and it was

just no good telling the Dursleys he didn't make them happen.

Once, Aunt Petunia, tired of Harry coming back from the barbers looking

as though he hadn't been at all, had taken a pair of kitchen scissors

and cut his hair so short he was almost bald except for his bangs, which

she left "to hide that horrible scar." Dudley had laughed himself silly

at Harry, who spent a sleepless night imagining school the next day,

where he was already laughed at for his baggy clothes and taped glasses.

Next morning, however, he had gotten up to find his hair exactly as it

had been before Aunt Petunia had sheared it off He had been given a week

in his cupboard for this, even though he had tried to explain that he

couldn't explain how it had grown back so quickly.

Another time, Aunt Petunia had been trying to force him into a revolting

old sweater of Dudley's (brown with orange puff balls) -- The harder she

tried to pull it over his head, the smaller it seemed to become, until

finally it might have fitted a hand puppet, but certainly wouldn't fit

Harry. Aunt Petunia had decided it must have shrunk in the wash and, to

his great relief, Harry wasn't punished.

On the other hand, he'd gotten into terrible trouble for being found on

the roof of the school kitchens. Dudley's gang had been chasing him as

usual when, as much to Harry's surprise as anyone else's, there he was

sitting on the chimney. The Dursleys had received a very angry letter

from Harry's headmistress telling them Harry had been climbing school

buildings. But all he'd tried to do (as he shouted at Uncle Vernon

through the locked door of his cupboard) was jump behind the big trash

cans outside the kitchen doors. Harry supposed that the wind must have

caught him in mid- jump.

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