‘The rumbling of the motorcycle got louder as they ascended into the cloudbank. The giant holding him tightened its grip on him, making sure that he didn’t get too cold as they got higher.

‘They had to get higher, otherwise the muggles would see them. That wouldn’t be good.

‘“Almos’ there ‘arry” the giant said to him.

‘‘Strange,’ He thought, ‘I understood that. And he isn’t a snake! This can’t be real.’’

And indeed it wasn’t, for as Harry thought that, his aunt was headed to his cupboard to wake him up so he could make breakfast. She never did and if it weren’t for the fact that she was the one who taught Harry how to cook, he would’ve thought that she wasn’t even able boil water.

“UP!” Aunt Petunia screeched, “UP NOW!”

Harry jolted awake and sprang to his feet so fast he forgot that he was no longer locked in the shed in the backyard and hit his already aching head on the stairs.

That was the fourth time in the past two days his head had, had an unwanted meeting with the stairs. Two of those times Harry had been startled while in his cupboard. The other two times, were from Dudley knocking him down the stairs.

After pulling on a semi-clean shirt, tying his hand-me-down pants up with a length of broken extension cord, and rubbing away the salt tracks from his face, Harry left the only place in the Dursley household that he could call his own and walked out into the kitchen. His only hope for the day was that he could get a bite to eat. And that all the packages that needed to be placed on the stoop were light weight.

His back was still sore from falling down the stairs.

Keeping his head bowed and his eyes down, Harry went through the well practiced motions of cooking the bacon and eggs, toasting the bread, and making coffee at the same time. Only seconds before his uncle entered the kitchen, Harry had a full breakfast setting on the table.

The table he was not allowed to sit at.

Taking his traditional place at the corner of the room to wait for instructions for his chores for the day, Harry couldn’t help but wonder exactly what the Dursleys were talking about. He could only understand bits and pieces of what they were saying yet this understanding was not enough to fully comprehend an entire conversation.

‘That’s odd,’ Harry thought, ‘They’re talking about me and Ms. Figg but their mad about it. Generally they like getting rid of me.’

It was then that Harry realized why his aunt had screamed at him to get up so early. Today was Dudley’s birthday. The packages that Harry was standing next to were not packages that were to be put out on the front step for the mailman.

Harry was suddenly glad that he’d realized this before placing them outside. It was a pity that he never got anything for his birthday, but then again he didn’t think that his parents would have even given him presents for his birthday.

He was a freak and that was all he was ever going to be. The Dursleys at least treated him like he was meant to be treated. They didn’t coddle him like the teachers at school, as if he would ever be less of a freak.

Freak. One of the few words that Harry knew. Other than that Harry knew about fourteen other words instantly, most of them being chores.

CRACK!

Dudley broke Harry out of his thoughts of his freakishness with one solid punch to the jaw. Something was wrong with the presents. After thinking a bit and counting the number of presents that Dudley had received, Harry realized that Dudley didn’t have the same amount of presents this year as he did the year before.

Unfortunately, there was nothing that Harry could do to remedy the situation so he did the only thing that he could think of to prevent the beating from escalating.

He stood stock still, tensed up his muscles, and waited for the next blow.

When the second blow didn’t come Harry dared to look up. Aunt Petunia was standing next to Dudley telling him something that Harry didn’t understand and Uncle Vernon was hefting himself out of his chair.

“Clean this mess up, Freak!” Uncle Vernon yelled, motioning to the table which was now covered in bread crumbs, jelly splatters, and bits of partially masticated food.

While Harry didn’t quite understand what his uncle had just yelled at him, he wasn’t stupid enough to stand there waiting for his uncle to repeat what he’d just said. Waiting would result in more chores, starvation, and, if Harry was lucky, only a few bruising blows to his chest. Harry had only waited for a repeat of something his uncle said once in his life, and that was when he was four.

Harry went over to the sink and grabbed a wet dish towel to clean the table, floor, and anything else that the Dursleys had managed to cover in partially masticated breakfast food and condiments.

‘Table first,’ Harry thought, ‘That way any crumbs that fall off will land on the floor. I only hope that Aunt Petunia won’t give me extra chores before I finish.’

Slowly Harry began to clean off the table, restraining the hiss that tried to escape as he bent over. His back must’ve gotten more injured during the last fall down the stairs than he thought. He knew he’d have to pay close attention to the chores he was given otherwise the pain that was knifing its way up and down his back would make it impossible to move, much less concentrate on what he was being told to do.

Just as he was finishing up, he heard his name being called.

“Freak, get over here!” Aunt Petunia yelled.

Coming over to where he’d heard her voice, Harry quickly became puzzled. Why was she standing next to his cupboard, holding the door open? He hadn’t done any of his chores yet, nor had he knowingly done something that was against “the rules” and it was to early in the day for him to be put in there for sleeping. If Aunt Marge was coming over, Aunt Petunia would’ve cleaned the entire house on her own for fear that Harry would break something.

“In,” Aunt Petunia said, pointing inside. She had long ago given up on trying to explain things to her nephew with words that were more than two syllables long. He was just too dumb to understand what she wanted to tell him.

Though Harry didn’t truly understand what his aunt had just said, he did understand the meaning of the gesture.

Jumping into action, Harry quickly dove into the cupboard, praying that his punishment would be given quickly and that he would be able to walk tomorrow. His back was really killing him.

As soon as he was on his bed, his aunt slammed the door shut and quickly locked it, leaving Harry to tremble in the darkness of the cupboard, fearing the next time the door was to open.

But as the minutes crept by, Harry soon began to realize that he was not thrown into the cupboard because of something he’d done wrong, but rather just so he wouldn’t be in the way. Listening closely, Harry could hear the sounds of Piers (who’d arrived mere seconds after Harry’s door was locked) and Dudley talking animatedly about something Harry couldn’t understand.

Though Harry was getting more and more confident that he would not be receiving a beating, he wasn’t able to calm down until he heard the muffled sounds of car doors slamming and an engine starting. Once Harry was certain that the Dursleys were gone, he opened the proverbial floodgates and started sobbing.

This had become a yearly ritual of sorts. The Dursleys would leave Harry either locked away or at Mrs. Figg’s house while they went and celebrated Dudley’s birthday. Every year, Dudley would get to go to a local attraction with a friend while his cousin would remain locked in a cupboard. Harry would remain in there until Dudley’s friend had left, then Harry would be let out to clean up the mess that Dudley and his friend had made during the few short hours they were celebrating at home.

Harry used to love spending his time alone sleeping or looking at the picture books he’d stolen from Dudley’s second bedroom, but not anymore. Not since Dudley had locked Harry in the truck of Uncle Vernon’s car.

That was when Harry was nine and it had taken all day for someone to realize that Harry was missing. Vernon had even driven the car to work and back with Harry still in the trunk, crying and trying to figure out how to call for help without being “freakish” like his aunt and uncle would always call him when things went wrong.

After they had finally found him, Harry was punished for having not completed his chores. He was then forced to do all of the ones from that day that night. This was made even more difficult by the fact that his “punishment” had resulted in a broken arm.

Since that day, Harry hadn’t been able to stand the dark enclosed space of the cupboard that was his bedroom. There was always a high possibility that his aunt and uncle would forget to let him out.

Just the thought made Harry start to cry harder.

They couldn’t forget about him, could they? The answer was obvious.

Yes, yes they could.

Within ten minutes of the Dursley’s departure, Harry was sobbing so hard that, had he been a normal child, his wails could’ve woken the dead. Finally, after almost an hour of constant sobbing, Harry fell into an exhausted sleep.

Severus Snape was not a happy man, nor had he ever been. His entire life seemed to be made up of failures, disappointments, and regrets. Successful potions master he might’ve been, but that did not make up for all his past transgressions. No, far from it.

After the fall of the Dark Lord, Severus had thought that his life would be better. No more spying or late nights making new potions that, had they been published in a potions journal, would’ve been undoubtedly been classified as “illegal” or “highly dangerous.” Finally, he was being given time to relax.

But even that was not true. Headmaster Dumbledore insisted that he teach potions to all those brats who’d never even use their brains without the proper amount of prompting. And now this. Eleven years of tormenting teenagers, and finally the one student Severus had least been awaiting the arrival of was to attend this year.

Harry Potter, the Boy-Who-Just-Wouldn’t-Croak. The boy who was undoubtedly a clone of his father, but with even more to lord over everyone.

The boy’s idiotic father was bad enough. Getting caught sneaking firewhisky into Hogwarts while underage was one thing. Getting caught by a fellow classmate hanging around a werewolf, on the night of the full moon no less, was asinine. Yet on both occasions, James Potter was not punished with anything more than one hundred lines.

Severus knew that any child of James Potter’s would, without a doubt, carry the same imbecilic genes as its father.

With the first, and thankfully only, Potter child set to arrive in about a month and a half, Severus was already preparing his traditional beginning of the year (read as: “I hope some of these morons get scared and leave now”) speech with the hope of scaring the child either to the point of wetting himself or enough that he’d leave the class. Either way, Severus would end up with information to antagonize the child with.

Severus had a very, very sick sense of humor.

With the thought of wounding the spawn of Potter as much emotionally as the Marauders had him, Severus turned back to the potion that he was brewing with a smirk on his face that could easily scare small children.

Harry Potter rolled over slowly on the cot in his cupboard, wincing as his broken ribs were jostled, yet smiling all the same. His birthday was only a week away! Even though he knew that he’d never get anything for it or get to bring any friends over (if he ever got any, that is), Harry knew that with each passing year he was getting closer and closer to escaping the hell-hole that was the Dursley’s.

Now that Dudley’s birthday and the days of celebration following it had ceased, Harry was back to his normal chores and routine. All during Dudley’s birthday week, Harry’s work load had tripled, as had the amount of times he had lost sleep, not finished or missed a chore when his aunt was saying them to him, and gotten beaten. Naturally in that order.

Now, though, Harry felt almost as if he’d been given time off. This past night’s sleep had been a good one, he’d managed to nick a light bulb out of Dudley’s second bedroom so his cupboard wasn’t dark all the time anymore (he’d partially unscrewed it so his aunt and uncle would think it had burned out), and he’d been given a piece of cheese last night as a dinner. Granted the cheese was slightly moldy, but beggars can’t be choosers. Harry was lucky to get a piece of bread a week, cheese was a rarity.

Suddenly the sound of Aunt Petunia’s footsteps broke Harry out of his thoughts of food. He quickly reached up and turned off the light, feeling the same jolt in his chest that he always did when faced with the dark, and closed his eyes, pretending that he was asleep.

“UP!” Aunt Petunia screamed, throwing open the cupboard door.

Harry sprung up as quickly as he could with three broken ribs and a concussion, remembering to duck this time so as to not hit his head, and ran to the kitchen to start breakfast. He wasn’t going to be allowed to use the toilet until after Vernon had left for work.

Thirty strips of bacon, two dozen eggs, fourteen pieces of toast, three cups of coffee, and two cups of orange juice later, breakfast was on the table, fully prepared to be devoured by the three Dursleys. Having accomplished this in under twenty minutes, Harry was feeling very pleased with himself. But rather than celebrating, Harry chose to go over to his corner and await further instruction.

Ten minutes into the meal, the mail came. Two bills, a letter from Aunt Marge, and one very strange, thick letter that had a wax seal holding the envelope shut lay on the door step. Harry couldn’t think of any reason why that would be there, so he assumed that it must have been one of those advertisements in a new and interesting envelope. It must’ve been for his uncle.

Harry quickly sorted through the mail, making sure that all of his aunt’s magazines were separate from the bills and the two letters for his uncle. As soon as he’d finished this, he nearly ran back into the kitchen to hand out the mail. He really hoped that his aunt and uncle would continue to be as nice as they had been the night before. He was already feeling the beginnings of hunger starting to gnaw at his stomach and really wanted something to stop the feeling.

But it was all for naught.

As soon as his uncle saw the strange letter, he nearly leapt from the table and, grabbing Harry’s hair, drug his nephew into the garage and proceeded to beat Harry until he was listless, then getting bored with this method of torture, grabbed the two dog leashes that had been left after Marge’s last visit and beat Harry with those until he was unconscious. During this entire fiasco Uncle Vernon had been screaming at his nephew about “freaks that should’ve been thrown into the gutter upon arrival” and how Harry had “brought this on himself for being born.” Vernon’s temper only flared more as Harry tried to get away using nearly every tactic short of biting and groin shots.

Harry, of course, didn’t know what was going on. His uncle was screaming words at him that he didn’t and would never understand. He was being beaten in the garage, which was odd ( he was generally beaten in the living room). And, to top it all off, after each hit with the clasp end of the leashes, Harry could feel the freakish pulling in his chest that generally signaled the beginning the weird occurrences that always happened around him.

After nearly fifteen minutes of continuous beating, Harry’s unconscious form was thrown unceremoniously into the trunk of Vernon’s company car. Several of Harry’s previously broken ribs were jostled so horribly, if he hadn’t been knocked out previously, the pain would’ve caused him to go unconscious.

A short car ride later found Harry someplace on one of London’s dirtier alleyways. Any passersby that might’ve been willing to help the small almost-eleven-year-old boy wouldn’t have been able to distinguish him from the other rags in the pile that he was left in.