Harry Potter ~ Year 1 and the Alchemist Stone

Chapter 6 - The 1st of September

Harry's last month with the Dursleys was probably the best it had ever been. Dudley was now so scared of Harry that he wouldn't stay in the same room, so he avoided him like he had the plague. Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon didn't shut Harry in his cupboard, force him to do anything, shout at him, or speak to him at all. Half terrified and half furious, they acted as though any chair with Harry in it were empty. Although this was an improvement in many ways, it did become a bit depressing after a while.

Harry kept to his room so as not to tempt any of them to go back to how things used to be. He had his new owl for company and they slowly got to know each other better. He had decided to call her Hedwig, a name he had found in his A History of Magic textbook. As it was the latest edition, it also had the story of the battle between Albus Dumbledore and Geralt Grindelwald as well as the First Wizarding War against Lord Voldemort. It seemed that people were scared to even write his name as it referred to him as 'You-Know-Who' and 'He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named'. The inclusion of the war against Voldemort also meant that it talked about the night that Harry's parents died and his supposed defeating the Dark Lord.

He also spent almost all of his time reading his other textbooks in preparation for his time at Hogwarts. He lay on his bed reading late into the night, Hedwig swooping in and out of the open window as she pleased. It was lucky that Aunt Petunia didn't come into vacuum anymore because Hedwig kept bringing back dead mice. Every night before he went to sleep, Harry ticked off another day on the piece of paper he had pinned to the wall, counting down to the 1st of September.

On the last day of August, he thought he'd better speak to his aunt and uncle about getting to King's Cross station the next day, so he went down to the living room where they were watching a quiz show on television. He cleared his throat to let them know he was there, causing Dudley to scream and run from the room.

"Er...Uncle Vernon?"

Uncle Vernon grunted to show he was listening.

"I...uh...I need to be at King's Cross tomorrow to...to go to Hogwarts."

Uncle Vernon grunted again.

"Would it be all right if you gave me a lift?"

Another grunt. Harry supposed that meant yes.

"Thank you."

He was about to go back upstairs when Uncle Vernon spoke. "Funny way to get to a wizard's school, the train. Magic carpets all got punctures, have they?"

"Flying carpets were outlawed in England. They're only used in Egypt and Turkey now."

Uncle Vernon scoffed. "Where is this school, anyway?"

"I don't know," said Harry, realizing this for the first time. He pulled the ticket Hagrid had given him out of his pocket. "It's somewhere in Scotland. "I just take the train from platform nine and three-quarters at eleven o'clock."

His aunt remained silent and his uncle stared. "Platform what?"

"Nine and three-quarters."

"Don't talk rubbish," said Uncle Vernon. "There is no platform nine and three-quarters."

"It's on my ticket."

"Barking," said Uncle Vernon, "howling mad, the lot of them. You'll see. You just wait. All right, we'll take you to King's Cross. We're going up to London tomorrow anyway, or I wouldn't bother."

"Why are you going to London?" Harry asked, trying to keep things friendly.

"Taking Dudley to the hospital," growled Uncle Vernon. "Got to have that ruddy tail removed before he goes to Smeltings."