Harry Potter was walking through the unurbanized part of Little Whinging, ignoring the coldness and strong wind piercing his exposed skin, mainly his face and hands. Surprisingly a cold front had come in a few hours ago and now it was getting to its worst. Normally, if he had been wearing a coat or long sleeve shirt, he might have been alright but as he was wearing neither and didn’t even have one, even at his relatives house, he was obliged to walk about slightly shivering in the cold afternoon.

"What are you doing?" The voice asked him and Harry, who was used to the voice, answered back.

"Taking a walk," Harry told it, but in his mind, where the voice was.

He wondered when all of the new houses, buildings and stores had been built. During the summer breaks, he had never really gotten out of Privet Drive or let alone Number Four so he had no recollection of anything being built. He remembered when he was little and used to go "exploring" all of the town and most of it was rural, but now, it was the complete opposite. There was a large mall where tall trees, vines and bushes used to be. There was a whole new neighborhood with black Cadillacs and carpet grass where a fifty acre corn field used to be. Harry remembered it was that particular cornfield where he used to go and lay in the middle of it, deciding what the clouds above him resembled. But now there weren’t any vines or clouds. There was nothing. Even though it had all been taken over by industrialization, it was completely barren to him now.

"It's all gone," Harry told the voice.

As he stood on a large, tall hill that overlooked the last remaining cornfield for miles around, he felt ironic. Being so high at elevation, but yet so low in mood. For weeks now, he had felt so alone, so miserable at home, causing him to just lay on his bed and stare at the ceiling. Or perhaps, even on a better day he would lay on his side, so numb that he thought about nothing. Nothing at all, he would just stare into oblivion and forget everything; who he was, what he was doing and why he was even doing it at all [not that he knew].

For a few moments, or even hours, he sat on a rock at the peak of the hill and watched the cars drive by on the highway wondering about the muggles driving them. Where were they going? What was their purpose there and who was going with them? Though trying not to admit it, he desperately wished someone would get into a crash, but not die though, so he could rush down and worry for them. At least, he would get to feel something today, and see something exiting at the same time. But nothing of the sort happened.

He decided that since it had already begun to drizzle a little, he might as well walk back home since his aunt hated it when his shoes got muddy and he walked all over the carpet. He knew he could never blame it on Dudley since his shoe was obviously several sizes larger and the one time he tried and his uncle found out, he was forced to clean out the basement, mow the lawn then repaint the living room.

However, as he was walking home using the alley shortcuts through town, he heard someone, or people behind him. It was a fairly damp and dark alley, if he screamed no one would hear him. He hoped they were just looking for someone to beat up since he didn’t have any money with him and he wondered if they were muggers and found no money, what they would do besides just beating him up.

"They're following you," the voice said.

When he heard someone kick a can out of the way, he began to quicken his pace holding his breath and counting, not really knowing why though, probably just to loosen the anxiety. He was almost in the light. One Two Three-

"Hold his arms!" He heard someone say as another grabbed him by the collar. He could smell the cigarettes and liquor on their breath. He could smell the sweat in their hair and he could hear the wheezy breathing coming from the boy, about 18, feeling around in his pockets.

"I don’t have any money-"

"Shut up," the bald boy with a tattooed head said and punched him squarely in the face. Harry was very much used to blows not only to the face but several other body parts from his cousin. Though Dudley never really hurt him bad, just to move him out of the way or make him shut up or calm down in the middle of the night when he would have nightmares and scream or cry loud enough to wake his cousin who was sleeping in the next room, he recovered quickly and glared at the empty handed 18 year old boy who now grunted as he pulled his hand out from Harry's pocket.

"Are you hurt badly?" The voice asked concerned.

"No," Harry told him reassuringly. "Not that bad."

"He's got nothing," he said disappointedly to his comrades and shoved Harry against the wall, making his head hit the brick hard, and spit on him. Then another boy, one he hadn’t seen came at him with a knife and held it at his throat but Harry closed his eyes shut...

"It's ok," the voice told him. "They're gone. Open your eyes now."

Harry, who was grateful that they didn’t stab him or beat him up, watched them go and it was only then did he realize how much bigger they were compared to him. He realized that they probably didn’t even feel him try to struggle or squirm from the headlock he had just received.

"Did you run into a little girl," Dudley laughed as Harry, who had finally made it home, came through the kitchen door for tissue for his bloody nose and aspirin for his throbbing skull.

"He's mocking me," Harry told the voice.

"Ignore him," the voice ordered.

He didn’t say anything to Dudley, he just browsed through the drawers and found nothing that would be any help to him. Frustrated, he marched out of the kitchen and went to the upstairs bathroom to see if there was any pain reliever in the cabinet. However, like his 18 year old friend, he didn’t find anything.

Realizing that there probably wasn’t any at all in the house, he washed his face and wiped the blood, dried and sticky, away from the bottom of his nose and leaned closer to the mirror and peered at his reflection.

The bruise wasn’t as bad as it felt. It was just a little red now and Harry, who knew the pain in this head wasn’t from the punch but from his head when it hit the wall, rubbed the back of his skull and found there was more blood on his hand when he looked at it.

"What happened to you," Dudley asked as he appeared in the doorway. Harry jumped and turned around and saw the smile on his face. He was smiling, not concerned. He wasn’t concerned that he came home with a bloody nose and a concussion. He didn’t care that he was almost stabbed. He didn’t care that he was punched and pushed and spit on.

"Get out of here, Dudley." Harry made his words strong and firm. He was angry and wanted to be alone. However, Dudley's smile widened.

"What, are you going to cry now?" He laughed. "Are you going to cry like you do at night? You really are pathetic-"

"SHUT UP!" Harry yelled and pushed Dudley out of the door. However, Dudley stopped laughing and marched back to Harry and grabbed his shirt.

"Don’t you ever push me," he said angrily, and then he punched Harry in the ribs so hard there was a small crack and Harry fell to his side and couldn’t breath for a little while.

"Get out," Harry croaked and Dudley gave one last kick to Harry's shin and walked out of the restroom and made his way down to his own room.

"Are you ok?" The voiced asked.

Harry was still on the floor, trying to get back up when he heard Dudley walking down to hall going downstairs. Then there was a click, a faint click that he felt more that he heard.

Something snapped.

He didn’t even know he was going to do it, it just happened. He didn’t even know he had pushed himself off of the floor just as Dudley walked past the door, not even glancing at him. Harry stumbled first a bit, but when he regained strength, he walked to where Dudley was right about to go downstairs...he was at the top of the flight and Harry didn’t even know what he was doing. He didn’t even know he had done it until he blinked and saw Dudley lying in an awkward position at the bottom of the stairs, a trickle of blood flowing out of his mouth.

It took several minutes for Harry to understand the entire situation. And when he did, the dirties feeling crept over him. He began breathing in uneven gasps.

"Maybe he isn’t dead," the voice told him. "You should check-"

Harry, who he himself didn’t really believe it would work, stood and looked around the hallway, making sure no one was there even though he knew there wasn’t anyone in the house. He looked at his watch, it was 2:08, his aunt and uncle left around eleven and it took thirty minutes to get to the mall, but Harry knew he had to do it fast if he wanted to be dead by the time they got home. But how? He walked to his aunt and uncles room and sat on their bed that was made up nice and neat with its silky sheets and clean scent. He laid back and thought of ways.

"Will you help me think of a way?" Harry asked.

"Fine," the voice said. "But there probably aren’t many ways that are painless and clean."

"Don’t forget quick, either."

"How about death by hanging? It’s clean and quick but it isn’t exactly easy and I don’t know if it was painless or not. What do you think happens in that split second your head breaks away from the spinal cord?

He tumbled off of the bed and began looking through her things. First the closet- nothing, then he began looking through her drawers.

In the second drawer, he pushed several of her shirts to the side but stopped when he hit something hard and it made a noise as if beads were in it. He dug his hands in the clean apparel and found an orange prescription bottle with white pills that filled to the top.

"What are those for?"

Harry knew they were the pills his aunt was prescribed after she miscarried her baby. He stared at it for a long while. "For me...No scarf."

He closed the drawer and took the bottle to their restroom. He scavenged around and found a cup and filled it with the water from the sink and went back to the bed and sat. He put the bottle and the cup of water on the nightstand and stared at it for a long time.

"I'm doing everyone a favor," he told himself more than the voice. Harry found himself crying again and snatched the bottle and opened it, 'push and turn' exactly like it said. He lingered for a moment wondering if he was being weak getting the easy way out, but dumped a pill on his hand anyway deciding that he wouldn’t care less when he was dead.

He put one pill in his mouth and tasted the bitterness of it, then swallowed and had a sip of water. He took two more and then two more then dumped a pile into his hand and threw them in his mouth and finished it off with some more water. Handful, then another then half of one, the last of them and after he drank the last of the water, he laid back in his aunt and uncles bed deciding this is where he wanted to do it. He wanted to die here since he had died all this summer locked away in his room and he had died in the cupboard when he was little and now, he wanted to die on the nice bed with its silky sheets and clean scent. It was almost comforting. It was something he had never done before; lie on a nice bed.

He had stopped crying now.

He closed his eyes and waited. He wondered if there really was a light at the end of the tunnel like they said or if it was all a lie to just try and make themselves feel better. He wondered if Death would even take the time to come and sever his head with he sickle he carried. He wondered what would happen to him once he died. Would he join the others on the other side of the veil or just vanish into oblivion. Either of the two possibilities would satisfy him, as long as he was dead and away from here.

"Yes," the voice said gently.

Then he felt a little strange, as if something were funny. His senses were tingling. It felt a little cold so he turned to his side, but found himself being dizzy as if he had fallen a few feet. He found it terribly difficult to open his eyes, but once he did, everything was blurry and he just waited for them to get heavier and heavier and eventually they shut. He shivered a little and then felt himself floating on a cloud. It was a wonderful floating feeling. He just stopped thinking all together and felt himself float away on the cloud, or even the raft as it went away with the receding tide out into the endless blue....

But someone was shaking him, trying to pull him off from the raft. He couldn’t make out who was screaming from far away or who was shaking him and crying. He couldn’t open his eyes to see who was disturbing him, but he did eventually see a light, it was bright and he saw it through his eyelids..... They were telling him to come back, who ever it was and he tried to move his lips, to tell them it was too late...but he was already gone.