Chapter Text
“Get up! Hear me, you lazy freaks? I said get UP!” The rapid fire banging on the attic trap door was more than enough to awaken the pair of siblings, even without their Aunt Petunia’s additional screeching.
Heather Potter let out a yawn as she reached for the curtain that divided her and Harry’s sleeping mats, clumsily rubbing at her eyes with the other hand. At the same time, her brother fumbled for his glasses where they sat on the crooked shelf just above their heads, nearly knocking off a pair of battered chess pieces as he did so.
“You send Sir Knight and Her Majesty crashing onto my head again and I promise I’ll drop a worm down your shirt.” Heather’s mumbled threat was lessened, however, by her teasing grin. Harry responded by simply putting on the glasses and rolling his eyes.
Moving so that they were hidden from one another by the former bedsheet serving as a makeshift curtain, the siblings quickly swapped their respective sleepwear for day clothes that were in barely better condition. Heather grabbed a comb that was missing half its spines to tug through her dark red tresses, though when she tried to use it on Harry’s black mop he managed to evade her efforts by darting to the trapdoor. It usually was a coin toss whether she’d successfully get a chance to sort out her brother’s messy hair, so Heather didn’t bother arguing with him about sitting still for her.
The pair parted ways once they’d descended from the attic: Harry went to collect the morning mail and do a quick clean-up of Uncle Vernon’s car while Heather got started cooking breakfast. Dudley woke up soon afterward, attracting his parents’ dual attentions as he made a big fuss about his upcoming birthday. When Harry entered the kitchen with that morning’s letters, he shared a discrete look of exasperation with Heather, who was in the process of serving. Both of them had grown up forced to listen to their cousin whine about how he needed a bigger party every year, with more presents, more food, more more more. As the unwanted orphans who were born twelve months and two days apart, and therefore received a single, joint birthday gift every year with no fanfare, the Potters had long since grown tired of his ridiculousness.
But, it was the double standard of the Dursley household, and they knew speaking up about it led to Bad Things.
As soon as the food was all properly arranged on the kitchen table, Aunt Petunia sent both Potters out to the back step with a glass of water and two slices of toast for their own meal. They weren’t let back inside until after Vernon had left for work and Dudley was in his usual summer morning position - on the floor of the family room, surrounded by snacks, eyes glued to a cartoon playing on the telly. Their aunt gave the siblings their list of chores for the day before returning upstairs to the master bedroom.
“Dishes, dusting, windows, upper hall vacuuming, full works for the bathrooms, weeding and pruning, painting the back shed, and both lawns mowed.” Heather grimaced as her brother read out the list.
“I’ll take outside if you handle in,” she offered.
“Deal.”
With that, the two divided to conquer. Heather was able to keep working on the yard when Harry had to stop to fix lunch for Petunia and Dudley, and so got done before him, coming inside to help finish washing all the house’s windows. They were just putting away the last of their supplies when Vernon arrived home, his car door slam being the signal to hurry up and get dinner started.
While Harry grilled his way through a selection of seasoned chicken breasts, Heather assembled the potatoes for baking and peas for boiling. Their relatives spent that time in front of the telly, enjoying some slapstick comedy from across the pond and discussing plans for the following week.
Petunia entered the kitchen when the food was just about finished, and stiffly nodded her approval. “Alright, both of you upstairs. Five minutes each to shower, and then I don’t want to hear any disturbances for the rest of the night, understood?”
“Yes, Aunt Petunia.”
“You can take a plate of food with you.” Under their aunt’s careful watch, Heather took the smallest two pieces of meat while Harry got a bowl of mushy peas. Meal in hand, they happily fled.
After eating, washing, and getting settled into bed, Heather retrieved their torch with the broken lens while Harry pulled out a rather beaten and battered book of fairy tales. Safely alone, the pair took turns reading aloud to each other in whispers. They’d reread the stories often enough to memorize them over the years, but the ritual was still soothing nonetheless.
As usual, being a year younger, Harry dozed off first. Heather continued to just stare at the book’s pictures for a while, before she too grew sleepy. The girl quietly put aside the book, slipped Harry’s glasses off of his face, and turned off the flashlight.
The next morning, they started all over again.
-HPx2-
Both Harry and Heather blinked. “We’re... Going too?” The girl asked, baffled.
“Mrs. Figg broke her leg and can’t babysit,” Aunt Petunia said with a huff. “So rather than risk leaving you here by yourselves, you’ll both be accompanying us, but I expect you freaks to be perfectly behaved with no funny business.”
And so, the Potter siblings got to go spend Dudley’s tenth birthday at Thorpe Park, watching as the rotund boy and his pack of friends went on rides and stuffed themselves with sweets. Even as the elder Dursleys spent the morning keeping them away from going on any roller coasters or other big attractions, the pair still enjoyed being out in a new setting, looking at all there was to see.
There came, however, one strange moment when a park worker seemed to become fixated on the oddly-shaped scar that marred Harry’s forehead. He didn’t explain, only smiled at the siblings and gave each of them a free ice cream treat.
“Consider it a compliment of Merlin Entertainments, the company which owns this park,” the man said when they first tried to protest. “And I do hope you have a pleasant day, young Potters.”
He disappeared again before either Heather or Harry could ask how he knew their last name.
After that, every time a park worker manning the gates for the rides saw them, Heather and Harry were ushered straight to the front of the line, despite the disapproving glares from their relatives.
They paid for it that evening, of course, being sent straight to the attic with no supper, but neither of the siblings regretted their short bit of fun.
-HPx2-
Miss Heather Potter
Right Side of the Attic
Number Four Privet Drive
Little Whinging, Surrey
Baffled, Harry tucked the letter in his back pocket, and hurried to take the rest of the mail to Uncle Vernon. It was as he served his relatives their breakfast alongside his sister, though, that Dudley spotted the cream colored envelope and snatched it.
“Dad! Freak Number One got a letter!”
“I did?” Heather asked, pausing in pouring Petunia’s coffee.
“You did,” Harry confirmed, shoulders slumping as he sent the girl an apologetic glance.
“Poppycock!” Vernon rumbled, taking hold of the letter. His face lost all trace of amused disbelief upon examining it, however. Petunia gasped when she too looked closely at the envelope. Before anyone could say anything, she’d plucked it from her husband’s meaty fingers and strode to the rubbish bin.
“No, no, no,” the woman muttered, ripping the thick paper to tiny shreds. “I refuse to let it happen, not in my house!”
“It won’t, pet,” Vernon tried to reassure her. “We won’t send a reply, and that will be the end of it, I promise. Now, you two!” Heather and Harry snapped straighter when their uncle turned his ire in their direction, ordering them to get back to work.
As they sat on the back step later, sharing a few burnt lengths of bacon, Heather insisted on her brother describing the envelope to the last detail. Neither of them was able to figure anything out about it, but both hoped that something else might come of the strange occurrence.
There were two letters the next day, identical to the first.
Four the day after.
Then sixteen.
Then more than thirty.
And on Sunday, more than either of the siblings could count: letters came flying down the chimney and utterly filling the house in a great, chaotic mass. Both Potters attempted to grab at the envelopes, only for Vernon to grip the backs of their shirts and bodily haul the pair up to the attic trapdoor.
“We’re going away!” He shouted at the top of his lungs, battling through the swarm. “Far away! Where they’ll never find us!”
Within an hour, each Dursley had packed for a week’s vacation, while Harry and Heather stuffed a spare change of clothes each and their two chess pieces into the elder’s school knapsack. Then the lot of them slipped and slid through a house with floors covered over in a layer of letters to the front door, Vernon watching like a hawk to make sure neither of the Potters picked up one of the envelopes.
For the entirety of the following drive, Heather leaned against the left side door, Harry curled against her while Dudley took up the entire rest of the backseat with his toys. Even the spoiled boy remained subdued, though, still not quite over the shock of that morning’s invasion by paper and recognizing that his parents were severely upset.
They drove the entire day, only stopping briefly to get more petrol and allow everyone a chance to use the facilities. As night began to fall, Vernon pulled into a small boat rental place at the edge of a rocky shore. Harry and Heather spent the few minutes of waiting by watching the crashing waves with awe, as they’d never gone with their relatives on a beach excursion before. Petunia then screeched at them to hurry up, despite the fact she was still struggling to convince Dudley to get out of the car.
One of the rental place’s employees took them all out in a decently sized boat, easily maneuvering alongside a little rock close to the mouth of the bay. Upon it was a two story shack, wood stained by the sea spray to resemble the grey stone beneath.
“Alright Diddikins, you get to sleep on the settee,” Petunia crooned as the five of them got settled in the place. “The freaks will be on the floor, but don’t you worry about them.”
Dudley sneered at Heather and Harry - he obviously didn’t care for the old sofa of indeterminate color, but he’d manage as long as his sleeping arrangements were better than those of the siblings. As for the pair of Potters, they didn’t care one way or another, having slept together on the floor (first in the broom cupboard and then the attic) for as long as either could remember.
“I bet the next carwash that he steps on one of us in the morning,” Harry murmured as he and Heather brushed away some of the dust that coated the floor.
His sister’s lips twitched up into a quick smile. “You’re on.”
Heather ended up winning the bet, for the simple reason that both siblings were already awake and outside by the time Dudley got up the next morning. They enjoyed watching the sea, and laughing every time a wave threw spray up high enough to spatter across their faces.
The pair didn’t have to be responsible for cooking breakfast, either - Vernon had arranged for the boating place to deliver groceries out to them for the week, most of which were pre-cooked meals in boxes or packaged junk food. Granted, the siblings still had to share their usual small portion, but it was a nice break nonetheless.
There wasn’t much in the way of chores to do, either, so while their relatives hid inside the shack all day, Harry and Heather enjoyed themselves out in the sunshine and fresh air. Even when a storm started to build overhead, turning the atmosphere dark and grim, they kept away from the Dursley family as long as possible; only the inevitable downpour forced them back indoors.
“Is it just me, or has this actually been pleasant?” Heather whispered to her brother as they laid down that night.
“Definitely not just you,” he muttered back. “Though I haven’t been able to give you your usual birthday present.”
Every year, July twenty-ninth saw Harry handle whatever was on their chore list that Heather found to be most unpleasant, just as the thirty-first saw her do the same for him. Without any work to do on the rock, however...
“That’s alright,” Heather reassured him. “We can do it when we’re back at Privet Drive.”
“Still...”
“Don’t worry about it, Harry.”
“Fine then.”
The two of them were just starting to doze off to the sound of Dudley’s snores when there came a great pounding on the door that was definitely not thunder.
-HPx2-
“I’m not leaving without Harry,” Heather insisted. She refused to tremble, staring up at Hagrid’s face with a rigid stance while waiting for his response.
“Well, of course not!” The huge man said affably. “Be good fer th’ both a you t’ see things t’gether fer the first time, Pr’fessor Dumbledore said so.”
Sighing in relief, and nearly falling over as the tension in her muscles vanished, Heather shot her brother a grin. He beamed back, already moving to grab the backpack their things were in. Still huddled together on the rickety staircase, Vernon and Petunia glowered, but didn’t bother to contest the decision. Dudley didn’t even notice at all, seeing as he was stuffing his face with what had been Heather’s birthday cake.
When Hagrid spotted the fat boy, his expression darkened, and he pointed his umbrella at Dudley too quickly for his parents to scream a warning. In moments, there was a coiled pig’s tail emerging from his rear.
Heather and Harry were hard pressed not to burst out laughing, instead making their escape while the Dursleys screeched, bellowed, and overall descended into a mad panic. Hagrid followed them outside into the rain, his expression both pleased and apologetic at once.
“Sorry I didn’t notice him doin’ that earlier,” he said to the siblings. “That cake was s’posed t’ be fer you two t’ enjoy.”
“It’s okay, Hagrid,” Harry told him, reaching up to pat the man’s arm. “We’re used to not getting cake on either of our birthdays anyway.”
“Ah, that’s right! You’ll be ten in just a couple days, won’t you Harry? Perfect, I’ll make a new cake then!”
“Thank you Hagrid,” Heather said, smiling.
“Yer very welcome. Now, c’mon, right over here’s our transportation...” He led them over to a motorbike sitting a few meters down from the shack’s door. Considering the magic they’d already seen within the last ten minutes, neither child said a word as they clambered into the sidecar together, Hagrid’s umbrella still held overhead to keep them mostly dry. As soon as they were settled, their new friend got onto the driver’s spot, and started the vehicle up.
Once the engine got going, a strangely pleasant tingle crept its way over the three of them, and Hagrid was able to set the umbrella aside - the rain bounced away as soon as it got within a foot of the bike.
“Wicked,” Harry breathed.
“Right then, here we go!”
Both siblings flinched when they drove forward to the edge of the rock, only for the trepidation to vanish when they lifted off into the air. In no time at all, Hagrid had flown them up high enough to be above the storm and see a vast map of stars overhead.
More than once, Heather had to clap a hand onto her brother’s shoulder to keep him from leaning halfway out of the sidecar, eager to see everything he could. She, on the other hand, was quite content to sit still and simply gaze up at the magnificent night sky.
Neither would deny, though, that the same bubbling sense of excitement filled them over the strange new truth:
They had magic.
Same as their parents.
And there was an entire new world that they were on their way to join.