Chapter 4: The Abandoned One- 1
Harry Potter sat on a narrow bed, shivering feverishly, his arms wrapped around himself. His tears were already dry. His eyes were red from crying for hours. There were visible marks on his face and neck, where Uncle Vernon had hit him in the evening, a punishment for falling asleep while gardening. His ribs ached, where Dudley had kicked him earlier that night, before running off to bed. He had been starving since the previous night. Uncle Vernon had withdrawn his meals until he learned to “stop being a spoilt orphan.”
Harry’s lips quivered and drooled as he reflected miserably on his life.
He was to live in the cupboard under the stairs from June until Christmas. And it was still mid of June. He did most of the household work- cooking, scrubbing the floors, cleaning the dishes, gardening, and above all, washing Vernon’s new 1991 Vauxhall Vectra sedan. A minor delay or mistake meant corporal punishment for Harry. Not a day went by when he went to sleep without a smack. Once, Uncle Vernon broke Harry’s right arm with a kitchen ladle for overcooking the pancakes. Taken aback by the outcome of his act, Vernon blamed Harry for the injury and did not take him to the hospital. Instead, he called a nurse acquaintance of his, who patched the boy up for a small fee. When the neighbours complained about Harry’s wails, the Dursleys apologised, with the excuse that their nephew was bi-polar and was under medical therapy.
What did I do to deserve this? Harry wondered in the depressing light of his claustrophobic cupboard room.
Why do Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia beat me?
Why does my cousin despise me?
Why did my parents have to die in a car crash?
Why??!!
Harry had secretly looked for his father’s kin, inquiring about his lineage at the Surrey Register Office. The official, fearing that the child had run away from home, had summoned the Dursleys, who brought him back home. That afternoon the boy had the most brutal whipping ever.
A large part of his retribution came due to strange things that happened around him. Once, he thought he levitated onto the school’s roof. Another time, he believed he had filled a glass of water without approaching the water filter. Uncle Vernon had thrashed him on all such occasions and told him that he was mentally ill like his parents had been. And that, he was lucky that his Uncle and Aunt had taken him in, or he would have died as an infant.
Perhaps he was mentally ill because the peculiar things that happened around him made no sense.
A fresh bout of pain spread over him as the numbness faded. Harry opened his mouth to cry in anguish but made no sound for fear of attracting another beating.
But tonight was different. He was to have his freedom finally; his heart felt relieved.
Harry wiped his tears and shuffled under his bed for an object- he had kept hidden from his relatives. He produced it- a bundle of thick nylon rope. The boy carefully and meticulously tied the hangman’s knot, memorised from an old book. Next, he placed a stool at the foot of his bed. The ceiling was low for the cupboard, but there was a cavity at one end of the room, which went up to the fuse boxes. Harry climbed the stool and tied the rope to a beam that jut out from the wall.
Harry had run the scenario over and over many times in his head over the past month. And tonight’s abuse from his kin had tipped him over. He was going to put an end to all the pain. He was going to take his own life.