Across To Elsewhere

Part One: One - Before Everything

It was not a good day for one Harrietta Potter. Her face was red. Green eyes all blotchy from tears. Her cheeks hurt from all the salt on her skin, which became obsolete when compared to the black and green mark in the form of a hand that had formed on her arm.

Uncle Vernon was not a kind man by any means but when he thought that his and his family's 'normalcy' was being threatened he became especially volatile.

Harri had gotten home from school long after her cousin Dudley had arrived in order to avoid as much 'Harri Hunting' as she could. It didn't always work. Sometimes if Dudley was feeling especially clever he'd lay in wait for her somewhere and jump out at her with his friends in an ambush. She was getting faster but she wasn't always the fastest.

Instead of her stick thin Aunt Petunia waiting for her with a list of chores that Harri was meant to do around the house effective immediately, she was met with her walrus sized Uncle and dear cousin. The moment that Dudley's small eyes met Harrietta's tired green his already red face became redder. Immediately she knew that even though she'd managed to dodge 'Harri Hunting' today she was still going to be punished for something.

"Harri did it, father!" Dudley had cried, fat crocodile tears running down his face. "At school I went to sit down on my chair- and it slid right out from under me! I was so scared!"

Just like that the dread Harri felt at the sight of her cousin and Uncle turned to ice. Uncle Vernon had turned to her with a stormy expression. He'd taken her by arm with an unyielding grip and dragged her over to her cupboard under the stairs, all the while he yelled about how there was to be no 'funny business' at school just like how it was not welcome within the house. When she landed hard on her bed her glasses tumbled off and her vision immediately went blotchy. Then the door slammed, causing the girl to yelp in pain when it had forcefully slammed her foot against an old paint can.

"There will be no dinner for you!" Uncle Vernon's rage filled voice shouted from the other side and the bolt was slid shut. Tears had begun to fall from Harrietta's eyes even as she listened to his heavy footsteps thump away, and her body shook from the emotion.

"It wasn't me..." she whispered into the dark space desperately, needing to say the words aloud even if no one was there to hear it. "It was one of Dudley's friends who'd played a prank on him...!"

It was unknown to Harri how much time had passed as she let herself grieve at the injustice. Eventually the darkness in her cupboard became all encompassing as the light of the day faded from the small crack under the door and Harri found herself calming down, the hurt in her chest slowly going numb as she boxed it all away. Dust fell from above as her relatives all made their way upstairs to their rooms one by one. Finally when Uncle Vernon had gone back up a second time, after fetching his usual nightly glass of water, Harri turned towards the exposed rough wooden planks of the stairs. She lifted her hands to the closest one, focused with all her might and called the name of her friend with all her heart and soul.

~

There was a soft tune that carried on the clear mountain wind, chipper and light.

The source was a young boy of about eleven who dragged along a rather large carcass- at least four times the boy's own body size- behind him. Curious night animals that heard the tune poked their heads from behind branches of the forest's trees to stare down at him as he passed but didn't utter a word.

Even without the dinosaur being dragged along by it's snout behind him the boy could easily be described as odd. Inky black hair upon his head stood out in every direction, three large sections of it standing up on end nearly perfectly and rigidly, yet it bent with the wind easily. His eyes were nearly as dark as his hair, being so brown they could easily be mistaken as black from afar. Perhaps the oddest thing about this boy though, was the long brown monkey tail that swayed behind him and emulated his emotions.