“Mr. Malfoy is the only one who’s ever actually seen any of us and quite honestly, I doubt he’d recognize us out of robes anyway. The others are just looking for two boys and a girl, all wizards in training. If you and I keep Ron quiet, we can pass as Muggle girls."

When Petunia Dursley refused to take Harry in she forfeited his birthright protection, so Dumbledore took the baby to the safest place he knew: Hogwarts. The applicable staff (mostly just… not Snape) took Harry in on a rotating schedule as he grew from baby to toddler to child. They traded extra credit for babysitting among the older students, and Harry grew up knowing a few dozen different laps that were safe and warm to nap in. This was a Harry who grew up among books, among old transient walls and learned professors. They gave Binns night duty sometimes, and let him talk young Harry to sleep. This was a Harry whose world changed, on principle, daily. The stairs moved. The walls became doors. You had to keep your eyes open–you had to pay attention. So he did. He grew up in a school. Knowledge was power, but knowledge was also joy. This was his sanctuary. There was magic in his world from birth.

What if, when Petunia Dursley found a little boy on her front doorstep, she took him in? Not into the cupboard under the stairs, not into a twisted childhood of tarnished worth and neglect—what if she took him in? Petunia was jealous, selfish and vicious. We will not pretend she wasn’t. She looked at that boy on her doorstep and thought about her Dudders, barely a month older than this boy. She looked at his eyes and her stomach turned over and over. (Severus Snape saved Harry’s life for his eyes. Let’s have Petunia save it despite them). Let’s tell a story where Petunia Dursley found a baby boy on her doorstep and hated his eyes—she hated them. She took him in and fed him and changed him and got him his shots, and she hated his eyes up until the day she looked at the boy and saw her nephew, not her sister’s shadow. When Harry was two and Vernon Dursley bought Dudley a toy car and Harry a fast food meal with a toy with parts he could choke on Petunia packed her things and got a divorce.

A collection of ficlet-like rambles and other HP-centric stuff from my tumblr. Ficlet-Ramble #1: Seventh-Year will put Your Name in GOF for a Sickle You’re a first-year who can’t cast Wingardium Leviosa yet? Whatever, sure, just pay up. There’s no way you're going to be chosen against Angelina “Can Probably Crush You With Her Thighs” Johnson, but at least you can tell all your eleven-year-old buddies that you Did A Cool Thing.

Once upon a time, Harry Potter hid for two hours from Dudley in a chemistry classroom, while a nice graduate student explained about the scientific method and interesting facts about acids. A pebble thrown into the water causes ripples. Contains, in no particular order: magic candymaking, Harry falling in love with a house, evil kitten Draco Malfoy, and Hermione attempting to apply logic to the wizarding world.