Disclaimer:

I do not own the characters of Harry Potter, these belong to that wonderful author JK Rowling and the various publishing companies used to publish her works. I am however borrowing them, no not to make money but for fun and fun only. Only JK Rowling, her publishers, Warner Brothers and who JK Rowling says can make money and she has not given me permission for that, so no I do not make money off this, again it is for fun!

Summary:

A reporter from the American Magical world is sent to the British Magical world to interview one Harry "Potter". She learns far more about loving families, good friends and that things are not always the way they seem. My reporter is no Mary-Sue of course, it will come out that she is married, has children and is as normal as could be.

So this is more a response to all the bashing out there and an amusing and plausible way to explain things. In this story Harry is a hero but not without a lot of help and there is little bashing accept of what the characters do to themselves really. The timeline is shifted a decade back, so everything takes place a decade further in the past than in canon. Oh, and yes some last names are changed, as this is supposed to take place in our world, a few names were changed, not all but a few to throw off those who would try to find the magical world.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

Chapter One:

June 2008 Mildenhall, England:

It had been years, well over a decade to get this interview. Magical Britain after the last pureblood war was reclusive to the rest of the world. Not really, in a bad way, they still traveled and visited the world and allowed others to visit but they did not involve themselves in politics or wars outside their borders. The last pureblood war had seen many old families reduced to poverty and despair from being on the loosing side. The winner's lead by Harry Fleamont-Black had helped them get back on their feet and there was a thriving economy from what we could see, but they were tight-lipped about what was going on fully and never spoke about the war to outsiders.

The books about Harry Fleamont-Black, (Harry Potter to protect Mr. Fleamont-Black and his world) told all about those years and his part in the war, or so we thought. Now they wanted to share their side of the story almost a year after the last book had been published on one Harry Fleamont-Black. So here was I, a graduate of Yarrow School of Magic in Colorado, a reporter well liked in America and allowed to come interview one Harry Fleamont-Black. I was surprised at the home I was invited to; it was not Harry Fleamont-Black's home, but that of his aunt and uncle. They lived in Mildenhall, a small town in Suffolk England. The home I came on was a charming pile of Victorian stone three stories high charmingly called Rosewood Cottage. I rang the bell and a man answered the door, his hair was pure sliver, he had a large silver mustache and beady blue eyes and towered over my five foot four frame. He had a bit of a belly but still looked fit, this was Victor Thomas Yeoman (not Dursley), the uncle of one Harry Fleamont-Black who had raised him.

"Ah right on time!" He said grinning, "do come in, Li would have come and greeted you but she has been having a bit of trouble with the new oven I got her, will not let me help though, says I would just burn the scones and she is…."

"Uncle please don't talk off Mrs. Martin's ear, let her in." A man who only could be Harry Fleamont-Black himself said smirking behind him, "he is always like this, I love him but he is so childish at times."

"I am not, and you boy better behave after all you put me through raising you and all." Victor said with no malice in his voice, "You and David as thick as thieves the tales I could tell you…"

"Victor stop talking the young ladies ear off and let her in!" A very old man with pure white hair, very thin leaning on a cane said from behind them, "come my dear, I am Vernon Yeoman, the father of this young lout." This to Victor.

"I love you too dad." Victor said ushering me into the hall.

It was a lovely hall with oak paneled walls, a pretty blue and white tile floor with a combination mirror, seat and umbrella stand by the door. There was one long window by the front door to let light in that lit up the long hall that ended in a back door that mirrored the front. A lovely wide staircase led to the second floor, I hung up my overcoat on a peg and followed the men into the sitting room. It was like stepping back in time, the room was pure Victorian charm, and I thought the emerald green horsehair couches would not be comfortable but found that was not the case. They were nearly as comfortable as my couches back home. Seated on a settee was a pure white doll faced Persian cat that looked at me with solemn green eyes and came over to sit by me.

"The couches are replicas." Vernon said, "Li, that is Lilac found the pattern and I set to work on them, I was a carpenter for many a long year, since my youth and made good money in that trade. Over fifty years and retired for twenty now. There are a few things you need to know, great book series and all but hardly the truth much of it."

"They are good books, such a lovely writer and so kind and giving, to give away so much money." Victor said smiling, "she a dear."

"To start with dad rescued me from the brute that was my biological father, what happened to Harry in the series of books happened to me, only far, far worse." Victor said, "until I was ten I was treated less than a slave, and my twin sister was treated hardly better. I was vilified and the lies the neighbors were told, well they did not care one wit about me or my sister and heaped abuse on us as well."

"Are you a mage?" I asked.

"No, not at all, but my birth father was an evil man as was the woman he married, when he nearly beat me to death my sister tried to stop him and my birth mother attacked her with a knife. It was there we were sent to live with our grandparents who became our parents, we were a handful and there were many who said we would not amount to anything given how we were raised. Yet dad here and mum, may she rest in peace took us in and loved us and treated us as their own."

"They were, are, my so called son was evil and what he did, well, quite a few people went to jail, my son and his wife got life as it was found they had killed the one person that had come to the defense of my grand children now children. They died in prison and I am glad they are gone."

This was news to me, I, like a lot of people assumed that Harry Fleamont-Black had a rough childhood and that his aunt and uncle had not treated him at all kindly. To learn the truth like this was a surprise and showed how the mage world could still be bigoted against mundane. Then again I was here, twenty years after the battle of Hogwarts to set things straight. We knew that Ms. Rowling was a brilliant writer and that much of what she had written was her own work but even then, what was hers and what was the truth? Harry ran a hand through his messy black hair and looked at a point away from me, his green eyes seeing something not there, perhaps into the past at that moment.

"What you need to know miss is that we love Rowling, we really do, but all she knows is that there was a war, the names involved and Hogwarts exists, that is it. She changed certain names and locations" Harry said, "she made up a beautiful world, but that is fairy tales and such and the real world is well, not as much fun I am afraid. She has a wonderful imagination and had come up with a magical world before she was contacted and blended both into the wonderful books."

"But magic is real, there are magi and goblins, brownies and fairies, giants, mer-people and the like." I said.

"Yes this is true, but how she described them came from research into mundane lore and her own vivid imagination, which is amazing by the way, I love the books and enjoy reading them, I just read them all in fact again." Harry said smiling, "however fiction is fiction and the truth must come out, I was not kept in a cupboard, I had a room of my own and the cupboard was a refuge when things got hard for me."

Harry rose and sighed, something was bothering him and I waited, I am a good reporter, I can read body language and people very well. I put the truth in my stories and will not let the editor bend or shape my words just to make a story. I could see the nervousness in him, the tell of someone that had something hard to say. He took a seat and gave a small said smile.

"When I first came here and was dropped off by professor Dumbledore, on the death of my parents at their request, I seemed to be healthy despite the cut on my head that was scanned and healed of all dark magic. My two aunts, my uncle and granddad, accepted me into the Yeoman household. Yet, I refused the bedroom they gave me and retreated into a hall closet, as you can see here there is no cupboard under the stairs, need to be able to get to the basement after all. "

"We made him up a place in an old wardrobe in our bedroom." Victor said, "He slept there instead of his room for the first three years and after that was able to sleep in his own room but only with curtains around his bed."

"I still cannot sleep in an open room, not even with my wife there." Harry said, "The beds at Hogwarts were a lifesaver as they are four-poster beds with curtains, like home. So no I was not kept in a cupboard against my will, ever."

Before I could say anything more two women came into the room laughing about something, one had a tea cart loaded with a white teapot with dainty blue flowers painted on it with matching teacups, saucers and little plates. There were little cakes, cookies, finger sandwiches, scones and crumpets with little pots of jam and clotted cream. The women were a contrast, they were both older ladies, yet one was tall and very thin clad in an expensive gown of green that went well with her green eyes, her blond hair was short and curly. The other woman was tall too but was strongly built and this clearly was Marge Yeoman, a woman even I had heard of across the pond. She was clad in a long denim skirt that came to her ankles, a paisley blue shirt and navy waistcoat. She had long brown hair she kept back in a bun and on her feet instead of the dainty shoes her sister-in-law wore; she had thick comfortable black docs on.

"Hello dear I am Lilac Yeoman nee Evans." The tall blond woman said.

"I am Marge Yeoman, spinster and proud of it, and the one to keep young Harry in line." Marge said smiling widely at me.

"Ah hello." I said not sure how to deal with a nice Marge after all, "thank you for having me over."

"Not at all, we are glad you are here." Lilac said smiling, "we did like the books, amusing and really a how not to raise Harry really, as if I could be cruel to him with who his sister was, never a kinder woman in all the world."

"You loved your sister." I said.

"Of course, I had to comfort her when she found out she was going to Hogwarts and I was not, she did not want to go if I could not go with her, honestly I was glad I was not a mage, I see that shocks you my dear."

"Well yes, I thought you would be jealous of her."

"Oh my no! I have my own talents, she hers, I modeled for a bit, she was prettier than me but well, they don't want red heads I am afraid, and she hated the idea of dressing up and walking down a cat walk, I loved it, though I got out after a while but that is a story for a different day, you are here about our Harry."

"Yes I am, it seems you love and care for him." I said.

"We do, this is no act, we really do love Harry, and if you harm him, well you will be out of work faster than you can say boo." Vernon said eyeing me sternly, "I allowed you to come knowing how you report and all but you will not hurt my grandson."

"I could not do something that cruel, I believe in telling the truth and nothing but, and that is what I will do here." I said.

"That is all we can ask, dear." Marge said beaming, "first let's have tea, and get to know one another, that way it will be easier for all of us as this is going to take a long time I take it."

"I have a few days or weeks, however long it takes." I replied, "What do you wish to know?"

We talked much of that afternoon, I told them about my work and they and myself shared their lives with me. How Victor had started his own toy making company that had moved from selling toys to stores to online, and not a moment too soon as several large retailors wanted to buy him out and he did not want that. Going online meant he could still create toys that children could use throughout their lives and enjoy on all levels. Lilac had invested her earnings from modeling into the company as had Vernon from his work as a carpenter. Marge trained guide dogs for the disabled and lived with her brother sister-in-law and father, she had never moved away from home and never married but made a good life for herself as helping raise her nephews and now their children was her lives work.

A kinder and more humble family I had never met before and I really enjoyed being with them. They were who they said they were and were all well educated; well adjusted happy people, though that had taken years after the war to really get back to this point. As everyone knows the war did not end with the banishment of one Tom Marvolo but went into a kind of lull for a time before it came back with a vengeance, but not before Harry had a mostly normal childhood and schooling.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

Therefore, that is the first chapter of this fic, and this Yeoman family is more along the lines of normal here. Harry is not abused and treated rather well here in fact. Mildenhall is a small town in England that houses the joint RAF/US airbase; this agreement goes back to WWII. It is voluntary on both sides and both sides could agree to not have the base if they so chose to. This is not like bases are in Germany or any other occupied nation, this base is a base of allies as England was amazing in WWII and were grateful for our help in defeating the Axis powers, though they did defeat the German Air Force on their own.

They and the French who had escaped at Dunkirk really were the driving force in Europe to push back the Nazi powers, we Americans helped a lot but the real war for us was the Pacific as that was really far more personal than Europe was at the time. Pearl Harbor and all kind of got us a bit upset. Anyway, just a bit of history as I love history and could go on for days about history and stuff.

So do review please, no flames but an honest review on how you liked it would be great!