We will meet again ~ Fred Weasley

- Unwanted Parcels -

"It's strange how the hands that once held me so gently now feel so far away, as if loving me was something that only belonged to my childhood."

________________________________

Privet Drive was the sort of street that prided itself on being perfectly normal.

Number Four, Privet Drive was the most normal house of them all.

Vernon Dursley liked it that way.

He liked the perfectly trimmed hedges, the identical driveways, and the quiet neighbours who kept to themselves. Everything was tidy.

Predictable.

Sensible.

Which was why he did not appreciate being woken at nearly midnight by the sound of a sharp knock at the door.

Vernon sat bolt upright in bed.

"Petunia," he muttered. "Did you hear that?"

Beside him, Petunia Dursley was already awake. She had heard it too. Three firm knocks that echoed through the quiet house.

Her heart gave an uneasy little thump.

No one knocked at doors on Privet Drive at night.
"Probably nothing," Vernon grumbled, though he was already reaching for his dressing gown. "Some idiot who's got the wrong house."

But Petunia didn't answer.

Because somewhere deep down, in a part of herself she had spent years carefully ignoring, she had a horrible, creeping feeling that she knew exactly what this might be about. Lily hadn't written a letter in almost two months, and that silence felt far more unnatural than any late-night visitor.

Lily had always written, without fail, one letter every single month, even when Petunia had never once written back, never once encouraged it, and never once admitted that she read every word.

Downstairs, Vernon opened the front door.

Standing on the doorstep was a tall old man with a long silver beard and half-moon spectacles.

And beside him, sitting calmly on the garden wall, was a tabby cat.

Vernon blinked.

The cat blinked back.

"Good evening," said the old man pleasantly. "You must be Mr. Vernon Dursley."

Vernon stared at him.

The man was dressed in what Vernon could only describe as a ridiculous purple cloak.

"Well, I certainly am," Vernon said stiffly, drawing himself up with his offended ego. "And who, exactly, are you supposed to be, turning up here at this hour, dressed like that?"

"Albus Dumbledore," the man replied calmly, as though the name alone ought to explain everything.

The name meant absolutely nothing to Vernon, but the calm certainty in the man's voice made him uneasy. Before he could say anything else, Petunia appeared behind him in the hallway.

She saw the old man.

Then her eyes dropped, and she saw what he was holding.

A bundle, wrapped carefully in blankets.

And her face went instantly, unmistakably pale.

"No," she whispered, the word slipping out before she could stop it, fragile and disbelieving.

Dumbledore looked at her kindly, his expression softening with something like understanding.

"Good evening, Petunia," he said gently, as though greeting an old acquaintance rather than a woman frozen in shock.