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It was a completely normal morning at a completely normal household on a completely normal street. Although it was just a tad unusual, Mrs. Petunia Dursley (and oh, three years as Mrs. Dursley instead of Miss Evans, but she still smiled sometimes at her good fortune) woke up at sharply five in the morning each day. The other housewives, as they'd told her at their weekly teas, rose at eight, and Petunia had smiled and agreed. Since then, she'd been quite careful to never show her face outside before eight, but she hadn't quite been able to break her habit of rising early.
Her husband slept on, and she left him to his sleep. The poor dear would only get an hour more before the alarm forced him awake and Petunia wouldn't wake him, even though she would've liked some quiet company this morning.
She was strangely unnerved this morning. Petunia didn't have magic, and she'd cut all the strangeness out of her life with her estrangement with Lily and her parents' untimely deaths, but she did get feelings. Nonsense feelings, to be sure, but ones that lined up too closely with strange events. Usually, when she got these feelings, she would simply retire early and fall asleep, ignoring whatever was happening outside. Later, Vernon would read her the news, and they would quietly not talk about it.
The mail hadn't wouldn't have come yet, but Petunia peeked out of the mail slot in order to make sure Mrs. Dolton from number twenty-three hadn't been by with her dog. The woman was a neighborhood menace, never cleaning up after her yapping thing, and this time, Petunia really would cause a scene if she found excrement on the lawn once again. Why, she would pick it up with a newspaper, knock on Mrs. Dolton's door, and hand it to her! All the while lecturing her on...
Petunia's thoughts trailed off, and she quite forgot her train of thought. Actually, for a moment, she even forgot Mrs. Dolton, and Mrs. Dolton's little dog, and Mrs. Dolton's very attractive husband (not that Petunia would ever think such things, of course). Because right there, on her front porch, clearly visible through the mail slot, was a child. The mail slot clanged shut as Petunia opened the door just enough to stick one long, thin arm through the gap and pull the basket through. Once the door was closed again, she took a long look through her peephole. It seemed as no one had yet woken and noticed this child on her doorstep. Good, she decided, trying not to think of the scandal it would cause if even one neighbor saw the child. Why, she could almost hear the things Mrs. Florris would say: It was the child of Mr. Dursley's mistress! It was the child of one of their cousins, born out of wedlock and to a vagabond! It was Petunia's child, forgotten outside for the night!
Petunia shuddered. Once she regained her wits, she stared down at the sleeping infant. It looked healthy, maybe one year old, and was sleeping soundly. Noticing something tucked into the child's side, Petunia carefully lifted it out, trying not to touch the child. Who knew where it had been? Perhaps she shouldn't have even taken it inside, but she knew the talk would have been worse had a neighbor been the first to see it.
The object was an envelope, and Petunia carefully opened it to revel the letter inside. It was addressed to her. Usually, Petunia enjoyed receiving letters, but this had not come the usual way. The normal way. And neither had this baby, this child that the letter claimed was her darling sister's. Albus Dumbledore was a name Petunia had seen and heard many times, but he'd never written to her. He'd written to her parents to tell them of Lily's end of year marks and the occasional detention, but she, a muggle, hadn't mattered to him the slightest. Numbly, Petunia realized he didn't even attempt to console her on the death of her sister. The letter simply stated that Lily and her no-good husband were dead, and that Petunia was to care for this Harry as though he were here own.
It took Petunia exactly one minute to decide what to do. Her husband and son were asleep; they would not need to ever know.
She took four minutes to think about whether she was doing the right thing. She tried to scrounge up a barest hint of love for her sister, love that could be transferred to this child on her floor. She tried to consider that maybe, Dudley might like a playmate. She tried to imagine how her son would grow up alongside a child who could create flowers from weeds and spontaneously combust birthday cakes and do wonders Dudley would never be able to do. She didn't have to think very long.
Petunia plucked the child from the basket and looked inside to make sure that there were no distinguishing marks before she placed him back inside. The blanket was a simple white one, and the boy's clothes bore no wizarding strangeness. The letter she placed into the dresser, making a mental note to burn it soon. Then she observed the world outside from the windows, not seeing a single soul awake. It was a quiet morning. The child was quiet, too, still sleeping in its basket. For a moment, Petunia almost thought he looked sweet. Then, citing the hesitation as a moment of madness, she picked the basket up, stepped outside, and walked the few meters to number five Privet Drive. The Greens liked children, after all, and would know what to do with an unwanted baby.
Her heart only began to beat as normal in the minutes after she returned home and began to make breakfast. She had two people to feed, to care for, to love, and not even Albus Dumbledore could make her take on a third.