05 March 2018. I wrote this little one-shot after pondering what could have lead Petunia Dursley to throw her nephew in the cupboard under the stairs for the first tine.

This was my take. I decided to add this one shot to a previous one shot that also featured Petunia. I hope to make this a series of unrelated short fics. Not all will feature Petunia. Some may be very AU. Some may be short drabbles. Will see whst the muse thinks...

...

Harry James Potter was born at the end of July in 1980 to two loving parents.

James Charlus Potter was a mischievous young man, an only child, born into a pureblood family who loved him dearly. Lily Potter (nee Evans) was a beautiful red headed witch, born to loving parents- who loved her even more once they realized why their little red-headed darling could do all the strange things that surrounded her.

Lily was the younger sister to Petunia Dursley (nee Evans). Once upon a time Petunia loved her younger sister, but never fully understood all the strange things that happened around her. Once the weird (freaky - a soft voice in the back of her mind whispered maliciously) boy that lived in their neighborhood explained the existence of magic to the two sisters, Petunia started to drift apart from her sister. Lily wasn't the same as her. She wasn't normal. In Petunia's mind the moment that letter arrived from that school in Scotland, just like the freak of the neighbourhood had predicted it would, her sister seized to exist. She wasn't her sister anymore. Lily was just a freak, an abomination... In Petunia's eyes her sister was not even human anymore.

Years passed and the sisters barely spoke. Summer and Winter holidays were spent at a distance. Lily trying to breach the gap, but Petunia spent this time throwing flames, thorns and stones in the ever widening chasm, trying her best to keep the freak that used to be her sister, away from her.

On 31 October 1981 it all came to a head. James Charlus Potter and his wife Lily were killed. And their only son, a survivor and saviour, was sent to live with a woman that could never, and would never, be able to love someone she did not deem human.

When Petunia found the baby on her front porch, she initially thought he had been abandoned on her doorstep because he was normal. She thought the freak headmaster had given him to them because he was not a freak, and as such, needed to be raised by humans.

She asked Vernon Dursley, her strong; capable; very normal husband, to arrange the spare room for the baby. He made a cot from some wood in the shed in their back yard, and they used some of their little Dudley's blankets and linen to line the cot for their newest addition. The first of Nobember 1981, would be the first and only time in 10 years, that Harry James Potter would sleep in his own room in Number 4 Privet Drive, Surrey. For the next morning, when Petunia woke, she found her nephew lying in the cot her loving, normal husband had made, playing with a soft toy that she knew she had not placed in the cot with him. A soft toy that had been placed in the cupboard under the stairs along with all the other things that had been placed with the boy on their porch. After speaking to her husband, ensuring he had not given the toy to the boy without her knowledge, Petunia could only come to one, horrifying, conclusion. Her nephew was a freak like his mother and father. He was unnatural. Inhuman.

Petunia raged.

She tore apart the cot her loving husband had built for the little one. She ripped the soft toy the freak had been holding in his little hands into tiny pieces.

Looking at the tiny pieces of ripped apart wool and cotton in her hands she stilled, before making her way to the cupboard it had originally been placed in. Opening the small storage space she threw the pieces of cloth and cotton inside with vehemence. Dusting of her hands on her skirt as if they burned. Staring into the small space an idea formed in her head. She could not kill the freak, for she feared what the other freaks would do to her son and husband. But he would not sleep in a room. He did not deserve such a thing. He had deceived her into thinking he was normal, into thinking he could be loved. That he was human...

That would not happen again...

And so it was that little Harry James Potter, a young boy that had known only love until that moment, was thrown into a cupboard under the stairs of Nr 4 Privet Drive, Surrey. A cupboard that would see the little boy grow up unloved, unwanted and in pain. A cupboard that would hear his tears and see his strength.

A cupboard that would shape and mold the hero of the wizarding world.

Dudley Dursley was just a little over two years old when his little cousin came to stay with them. He had seen his cousin crying in the cot his dad had made, looking sad and alone.

Dudley would never know, never realize, the chain reaction he set off when he climbed down the stairs of the little cupboard he had seen his mother exiting earlier that day, and removed a small soft toy from the bundle of things his mom had placed there. He could not realize the impact of one little action of love and caring, as he gave that soft toy to his younger cousin to play with.

For if Dudley Dursley had not given that soft toy to the young boy, his mother may have grown to love the little boy that had been placed in their care, before he started to show signs of magic. If Dudley had not given the crying child the soft toy, his dad would very likely have grown fond of the raven headed boy, and stopped his wife's venemous actions and words.

However Dudley Dursley did give the boy the toy, and his mother did assume his cousin had "freaked" it to himself.

He did start a chain reaction, that led to a young innocent child being thrown into a dusty, spider-infested hell-hole he would never truly escape.