AN:

This piece was inspired in part by Paganaidd's story "Dudley's Memories," and so will where necessary conform to her story line. It is intended to be written as Dudley's memoir about growing up in a house hold where child abuse has taken place to someone else. As such, some of the details may be changed or omitted, as Dudley is a Muggle, writing for other Muggles. These changes are intentional on the part of the author. Assume that what J.K. Rowlings wrote in relation to Harry's childhood has still happened; this is just another lens through which to view it.

Fortunate Son

Growing Up in the Shadow of Abuse

By D. Dursley

To Harry

I'd like to try again to be a family.

Call me.

Chapter 1

The Arrival of Trouble

I remember the day that the boy came. I was only one and a half years old. I'm told that most people don't remember much from before they are two or even three years old, and in fairness I don't have any other memories of this time, but that morning is still etched on my mind.

I was a spoiled child; there are really no other words for it. My entire childhood, there was not a thing that I wanted that was not immediately given to me, nothing I wished for that was not immediately granted. My mother doted on me, encouraging my tantrums and my demands by telling me what a little angel I was and I believed her completely. I was denied nothing, except for the absence of the boy.

I was awoken that morning by my mother's scream, a loud piercing siren that filled me with dread. For the first time, no one came to answer my own screams. I lie alone in my room, sure that my demands would be met as instantaneously as always, but no one came. I'm sure that I wasn't ignored to too long, but to someone accustomed to instant gratification, it seemed an eternity. When my mother finally burst into the room, the look on her face silenced me. For the first time, she lacked the saccharine adoration that I always associated with her features. She was scowling as she burst into the room, but her features softened as they took in my tearstained face.

Content again with her attention and affection, it wasn't until she had strapped me into the high chair in the kitchen that I noticed it. The boy. A strange boy I had never met before was lying in MY pram, with MY teddy, in MY kitchen, being tended to by MY mother. Instead of serving me my breakfast, she was hovering over him, as though unsure of what to do now. This immediately set me off again, and I squalled my displeasure at the interloper defiling my home. He looked the same age as myself, but he never made a peep.

My mother offered me everything that she could think of, handing me porridge and sweets and toys, but nothing distracted me from the presence of Him. He had appeared in our lives as suddenly as if he had been dropped on the doorstep and I vented my rage. I promptly threw whatever I was handed at the pram, and I can still recall the small smirk that played around my mother's lips as she continued to hand me ammunition.

Even covered with flung food and surrounded by projectiles, the boy still didn't make a sound. He lie there like a doll, like he was not quite sure how he had come to this place, like he was in shock. He didn't even protest when my mother plucked him from the pram and placed him, soiled blanket and all, into a cardboard box on the floor like a recalcitrant puppy. Placed such in the corner, I soon forgot about him, as my mother set about cleaning up the mess that I had made of the pram and cooed to me sweetly about my throwing arm. Slipping me sweets for breakfast, she fussed and fluttered and doted until all was again right with my world. The boy didn't get breakfast.

AN: Thanks for reading. Please let me know what you thought. Is it good? Bad? Crap? Should I continue? Should I toss it out and forget it? I won't know unless you tell me.