Chapter 37: End of Term

A/N: This is going to be the last chapter. There's some unanswered questions, but I'm going to write a sequel starting in the holidays.

A couple of days later, Dudley was preoccupied. He was frequently seen reading a piece of paper. Not parchment. Paper. It arrived by owl at breakfast. Dudley had read it, and then read it again. He hadn't sent back a reply. He just read the letter over and over. He spent a lot of time that day thinking about it. He got it out to read during class, in Potions as it happened. Snape put two and two together and didn't say anything, he just watched the boy read his letter again. He would love to know what was written on it. He made a mental note to ask the Healer tomorrow.

The Healer told him when he asked, that as expected he'd got a letter from his parents. He often got them from Petunia, but this one was the first one he'd got from Vernon. It hadn't said much, Dudley had even shown it to the Healer. It just said that Vernon hoped he was well after the incident. There was no mention of the chamber, or any details. Just a short letter hoping he was well.

"I'm actually pleased it's not any longer." said the Healer. "This letter might actually be genuine. If it'd had any wizarding references in it it would definitely be forced, but its brevity and content suggest it might actually be real. I've arranged to visit Privet Drive once a week on Saturday evenings. Vernon will be there. I've been once, this weekend just gone. Vernon was uncommunicative, but he wasn't openly hostile. I wouldn't hold my breath, but there's some hope for summer."

The exams came round quicker than any student wanted. Except Hermione, she liked exams. Once again her friends nearly strangled her whenever she wanted to talk about them in detail. She seemed most disappointed that she'd have to wait most of summer for her exam results.

Harry got through his exams. There hadn't been anything really awful in them, although he knew he'd never get a good grade for History of Magic. Ron had a near meltdown trying to get last minute revision done. He decided he'd completely screwed up History of Magic and Astronomy, and his transfiguration practical had been pretty abysmal. Neville was pleased he'd managed to complete and submit a Potion. Snape had even nodded at him when he'd handed it in, which in itself caused Neville to be ecstatic for the afternoon.

During the last two weeks of term, after the exams had finished, they had a lot more fun lessons. They learnt things that weren't on the syllabus, things that their professors found interesting.

They had most fun in Charms as Flitwick taught them things that certainly wouldn't be found on any exam. He was very specific about not wanting to see many of them around school. Anteoculatia was a spell that made people's hair grow antlers. He also taught them how to make ink invisible and then how to reveal it. He showed them a Cheering charm and had everyone in hysterics for an hour, Harry thought he'd pulled a muscle in that lesson. The prettiest charm he showed them was a snowflake creating charm. He'd made the classroom into a bubble of cold for the lesson and told them all to bring gloves and scarves. It had been fun to make winter in the middle of summer. He'd ended the lesson with a snowball charm that pelts the receiver with snowballs. Flitwick had cast the charm and gone out of the room for a couple of minutes until the chaos died down.

Soon it was the end of term. Gryffindor won the house cup and the great hall was decked out in red and gold for the farewell feast. Slytherin came a close second, there'd been only twenty points in it. But there'd been a big jump to third and fourth place. It seemed the quidditch cup had had an impact.

Harry was nervous. He had the whole summer back at Privet Drive to cope with. Dudley had been weird for the past couple of weeks. Harry had seen Dudley come towards him more than once and then at the last moment turn away and go somewhere. He'd chased after him the last time, to find out what he wanted, but he'd lost him on a moving staircase.

After his exams he'd had a final weekly meeting with Snape, where he had asked him if he'd talked to Dudley at all. Harry had shook his head, but he did wonder what was going on there. Knowing Dudley, he'd find out.

Too soon the Hogwarts Express rolled into Hogsmeade station. Everyone got on and Harry shared a compartment with his friends. They played exploding snap, and Fred and George let off the last of their fireworks into a carriage of mainly Hufflepuffs.

When the train pulled into King's Cross Harry gave Hermione and Ron a piece of parchment with his phone number on it.

"Ron, owl Hermione and ask how this works. Hermione, ring me sometime. I'll try to owl you both, but I can't promise anything. Please don't owl me unless I owl you. I'm not sure what they think of owl post."

"I'm going to France with my parents, but I'll ring you when we get back." promised Hermione. They put their trunks down after they were through the barrier and Harry gave Hermione, Ron, the twins and Neville hugs.

When Harry's friends left him, Dudley caught up with him as they headed towards where Vernon and Petunia were waiting. They stopped in front of the adults and there was an awkward silence. The boys put their trunks down for a second.

Harry caught sight of something out of the corner of his eye. They were being watched. Snape and Healer Jones were standing across the station concourse. They'd not been seen by the Dursleys. There was a tabby cat sitting by their feet. All three were watching them.

"You grab the owl, I'll bring the trunks, Harry." said Dudley, as he picked up an end of each trunk and headed out to the car park. Three sets of eyes watched them leave of the station.

Perhaps summer wouldn't be as bad as Harry thought.

A/N: Thank you for reading my story, and thank you for the reviews and constructive feedback. A special thank you to RainCityWriter and Toraach for reviewing pretty much every chapter and making me think about my characters more. And I hope I didn't too bad a job for my first story.