274 Harry Potter and the Abusive Household...

Elsewhere at a little known house : 4 Privet drive...

Harry Potter sits in his room looking out the window as Dudley leaves with his goons, the fat prick had been throwing small pebbles at his window along with his friends in an attempt to crack or even smash them and get Harry in trouble. Thanking whatever gods that may be out there he sits on his bed and strokes Hedwig who's resting in her cage nearby, it'd recently been his 14th birthday, not that it really mattered... He'd only noticed when he recieved cards from the Weasleys and Hermione, he looks himself in the mirror to see if he's changed at all, his body was lanky, almost anorexic due to the Dursley's treatment of him throughout the years. He'd only been slowly gaining weight due to the large amount of fatty food he'd been eating at Hogwarts, of course the fact that he was properly getting fed caused his \"Family\" to restrict how much food he was allowed to eat, for a \"diet\" they said. He knew they just wanted him to suffer, before going to Hogwarts every day of his life was hell, obviously he didn't know this as he'd never had a good thing in his life, so he just made due with what he had. When he'd finally attended Hogwarts he knew what it was like to have freedom, friends... Comfort. This only caused his time with the Dursleys to become worse as he now knew they shouldn't be treating him like this.

He sighs, either way he doesn't really have a way out. He'd tried to get help via social services but everyone he talked to eventually told Vernon who thoroughly \"beat some sense\" into him, unfortunately after every beating his body never had any scars... Whether this was due to his magical constitution or some other plot against him, it meant that he couldn't show any evidence to people that could help him... Eventually he gave up and resigned himself to this life, oh, how he wished he could do to them what they did to him, alas he was a minor and not allowed to use magic outside of Hogwarts, he has tried to fight them off physically before but that always ended in him waking up the next day, feeling sore all over.

There was one good thing in his life recently however, his God-Father had made himself known as Sirius Black, the escapee of Azkaban. Although he was innocent he was still a wanted man, if not Harry would immediately ask the man to gain custody over him, so he didn't have to live with this awful Muggles any longer... No, he shouldn't refer to them like that. He almost sounded like Riddle or Malfoy for a moment. One thing that'd struck him as odd though was that he'd received no Birthday letter from Sirius, this was incredibly unusual as the man had even bought him a Firebolt broomstick last year. Hopefully he was ok, he didn't know what he would do if his only remaining family were to disappear like the rest.

His mind slowly moves on to Remus due to the line of thought, last year he'd been surprised to find out that he was a close friend of his parents... It was only until now that he'd realised the man had essentially abandoned him here, the only reason he'd actually met him was because of a job, not because he wanted to see him. This caused his emotions towards the man to become more negative the more he thought about it, yes, he understands that being a werewolf is hard... But Harry mused at his willingness to be infected just to get away from the Dursleys, it was only during the full moon he'd be affected... Compared to the years he had to stay with these vile people that sounded like a bargain.

That brings him to his friends, Ron and Hermione. The two people that ground him, if he had not met that he'd likely be off his rocker and friends with someone like Draco Malfoy, he shudders at the thought. Ron was a lazy guy who had a slight inferiority complex towards his more successful brothers, Harry didn't really mind it as long as his jealousy was not directed towards him. Ron usually pulled Harry away from his homework to play chess or talk about Quidditch, this irritated him occasionally as he was usually behind on his work due to this. He did ignore it to appease his first friend however.

His other friend Hermione was almost completely different to Ron, she was smart, strict and studious... Ever since saving her from the Troll in first year she'd been a close friend even during the dangerous situations he finds himself in. Compared to Ron, Hermione was different in that she encouraged him to focus on his studies and improve himself, most time than not however he sided with Ron and bunked off to do some other inane activity. This caused a great deal of stress for Hermione as she'd always tried to help him, even to the extent of doing Ron's homework for him, as someone who lacked friends in his earlier life he understood her mentality, she was afraid to be alone and thus put forth her maximum effort in appeasing them completely and utterly. This backfired on her last year when she snitched to Professor McGongall about his Firebolt, she believed it would be prudent considering the many life threatening situations he'd been in to have it checked. This had caused him to ignore her for months causing them both a great deal of stress, as Ron had sided with him both of their studies had suffered as without Hermione's constant reminders and help Ron literally couldn't complete most of the tasks.

Just thinking of how he had treated her last year made him physically sick, a friend only looking out for his well being and he spat on her efforts as if she meant nothing to him, the first person to show him physical affection and concern for him. He suspected that the only reason she forgave him was her lack of friends and stress of constantly using the time-turner, if Ron had acted like that towards him they would definitely no longer be friends.

With him not being allowed out of the house the majority of the time he had a lot of time to think and ponder. This has his thoughts being drawn to his bad decisions and inadequacies in the past, he'd never really considered them before but maybe it was time to change?