Reading Harry Potter books 5-7

Dudley Demented

The hottest day of the summer so far was drawing to a close and a drowsy silence lay over the large, square houses of Privet Drive. Cars that were usually gleaming stood dusty in their drives and lawns that were once emerald green lay parched and yellowing; the use of hosepipes had been banned due to drought. Deprived of their usual car-washing and lawn-mowing pursuits, the inhabitants of Privet Drive had retreated into the shade of their cool houses, windows thrown wide in the hope of tempting in a nonexistent breeze. The only person left outdoors was a teenage boy who was lying flat on his back in a flower bed outside number four.

"Who would be outside in that heat?" Emmeline wondered.

"Wait... Harry lives at number four. It's probably him!" Sirius realized. 

"Is he mental? Going out in that heat would be dangerous!" Tonks said, worried.

He was a skinny, black-haired, bespectacled boy who had the pinched, slightly unhealthy look of someone who has grown a lot in a short space of time. His jeans were torn and dirty, his T-shirt baggy and faded, and the soled of his trainers were peeling away from the uppers. Harry Potter's appearance did not endear him to the neighbors, who were the sort of people who thought scruffiness ought to be punishable by law, but as he had hidden himself behind a large hydrangea bush this evening he was quite invisible to passerby. In fact, the only way he would be spotted was if his Uncle Vernon or Aunt Petunia stuck their heads out of the living room window and looked straight down into the flower bed below. 

"They sound like lovely people," Remus commented sarcastically, annoyed that the neighbors seemed so obsessed with neatness.

On the whole, Harry thought he was to be congratulated on his idea of hiding here. He was not, perhaps, very comfortable lying on the hot, hard earth, but on the other hand, nobody was glaring at him, grinding their teeth so loudly that he could not hear the news, or shooting nasty questions at him, as had happened every time he had tried sitting down in the living room and watching television with his aunt and uncle.

Tonks frowned. That didn't sound good. Being forced to lay outside just so he could watch the TV? 

Remus was having a similar train of thought. Dumbledore had assured him that Harry was safe, but this really wasn't shaping up to be good.

Almost as though this thought had fluttered through the open window, Vernon Dursley, Harry's uncle, suddenly spoke. "Glad to see the boy's stopped trying to butt in. Where is he anyway?"

"I don't know," said Aunt Petunia unconcernedly. "Not in the house."

Uncle Vernon grunted. 

"Watching the news..." he said scathingly. "I'd like to know what he's really up to. As if a normal boy cares what's on the news - Dudley hasn't got a clue what's going on, doubt he knows who the Prime Minister is! Anyway, it's not as if there'd be anything about his lot on our news -"

"Oi!" Tonks cried, indignant. "What's he mean, his lot? He's talking about witches and wizards, isn't he? What's wrong with us?"

"I suspect that something's wrong with him, not us," Kingsley said in his slow, deep voice.

"Calm down, Nymphadora," Alastor admonished.

"Don't call me Nymphadora," she growled.

"Vernon, shh!" said Aunt Petunia. "The window's open!"

"Oh - yes - sorry, dear..."

The Dursleys fell silence. Harry listened to a jingle about Fruit 'N Bran breakfast cereal while he watched Mrs. Figg, a batty, cat-loving old lady from nearby Wisteria Walk, amble slowly past. She was frowning and muttering to herself. Harry was very pleased that he was concealed behind the bush; Mrs. Figg had recently taken to asking him around for tea whenever she met him in the street. She had rounded the corner and vanished from view before Uncle Vernon's voice floated out of the window again.