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The boy doesn't know what to think when the door to his cupboard swings open and it isn't one of the Dursleys standing there. The gray-haired woman's face contorts in anger and disgust, and he scoots back on his bed, not even caring what spider might crawl over him as he presses his back against the cupboard wall; Aunt Petunia is at least a known danger, and he has no idea what this new woman might do to him.
Then the rage vanishes, and she almost looks as though she might cry. "It's not you with whom I'm angry, child," she says, her voice old and infinitely weary. "You poor, poor thing... You poor, dear boy." She extends her arms, like Aunt Petunia might do towards Dudley. The boy has no idea of what to make of such a gesture aimed towards him. "Come here, Harry."
Harry? He supposes that's his name. He's heard it mentioned once or twice; he thinks the old lady next door, the one with all the cats, might have called him that. He gives a mute nod, used to following orders, and pushes himself forward; swinging his legs off the edge of the cot, he prepares himself for the pain that he knows will come when he puts his feet down. He tries to keep it off his face, but -- the lady notices.
"Harry? Are you hurt?"
A spike of fear goes through him; he knows adults hate any sign of weakness. "It's not so bad," he hastens to assure her, cursing himself for not hiding it better. It really isn't, if he can keep his weight on the good foot. It only hurts badly when he steps on it. "Dudley, uh -- it's my fault, I twisted it when we were rough-housing -- I'm, I'm really clumsy, you know -- anyway, it's mostly healed-up, it's all in my head by now, really--"
Against his will, he remembers the crack, his own scream, and his cousin's laughter. But it really is better now. The pain when it first happened was so much worse.
"Let me see," the woman coaxes, and the boy's heart skips a beat again. He knows what comes next. She'll put on a falsely-gentle act, just enough to get him to let his guard down, then "give him something to really cry about" -- He doesn't need to be taught that lesson again, he shouldn't have shown that flinch of pain, he knows better than that --
When he freezes up, she gives a deep sigh, that rage flickering across her face again, and kneels down to examine him. Then he's truly afraid to move, keeping his whole body rigid and fixing his gaze on the floorboards -- she'll be mad if he looks away, calling him a sissy and a weakling, but she'll be mad if he looks at her, too. If he just puts on a brave face, maybe she'll go easy on him, and --
But rather than grabbing his ankle roughly and squeezing, she takes out what looks like a long stick -- some sort of fancy doctor's instrument, like the sort they have on the telly? -- and taps it on his ankle. There's a funny buzzing feeling, and then a sharp intake of air. "Twisted? This ankle was broken!" Without warning, she reaches up and pushes him back onto the bed. "Good heavens, child! You shouldn't be standing on that!"
"Broken?" he says vaguely, without thinking. "No, it just looks like that -- it looks worse than it is," he explains to her calmly, glad to be able to pass an adult's test. "Like the time when D-- the time with my arm, see? If it had really been broken, it wouldn't have healed on its own, but Uncle Vernon just forced it back into place and it healed up after a while." It took a few weeks, and occasionally he still felt a twinge, but it had healed. Aunt Petunia attributed his healing-up to making him work with it rather than sit around and whine; he supposed that, if that were the case, he ought to be grateful to her. Even if it hadn't felt that way at the time.
A look like thunder crosses her face. When she gets slowly to her feet and reaches down to him, he instinctively recoils, but the expected blow never comes; instead, he finds himself cradled in her arms. He goes quiet and still, like an animal trying to evade the detection of a predator. What is she doing? Why is she doing this? No one has ever done anything like this to him anymore... His aunt and uncle might have done it to his cousin, but he isn't like his cousin -- thank God, some rebellious part of him adds, but that isn't the point -- he doesn't have parents, he's a freak, he's a burden who ought to be grateful to be tolerated at all --
"Harry," she says gently, "you'll never have to worry about your uncle ever again. Nor your aunt, for that matter." She shifts her hold on him and pets his hair gently with one hand. The gesture is bewildering. He wants to shy from it because of its unfamiliarity, but, at the same time, it feels... nice? No one has ever held him like this before. Not that he can remember. Maybe his parents, when he was a baby, but -- they were a pair of worthless drunks, so probably not. No one has ever held him and touched him like... almost like they cared about him. No one...
While he's wondering at the gesture, the grey-haired lady raises her head and turns. "Severus?"
A grunt comes from the living room. The boy cranes his neck, but can't see around the woman's torso.
"Harry is injured. It could be worse, but -- I'm taking him to a Healer now." The woman's voice is tight with anger; Harry reflexively freezes at the sound of it. She relaxes, a motion that seems forced, and strokes his hair again. "He..." She licks her lips, then says in that sort of falsely-calm voice that's more terrifying than outright fury, "I'm not entirely sure he's ever seen a doctor in his life."
"I see." The unfamiliar man's voice has the same sort of deadly calm. "Very well. You see to the boy, and I'll see to Tuney."
"Severus, nothing that--"
"Nothing that won't be entirely excused, once others learn of what they've done." The unfamiliar man lets out a little snort. "Never fear, Minerva. I'll do nothing that would offend your sensibilities."
"There's not very much that wouldn't be within my sensibilities right now," the lady says, her voice growing tight again. Then she sighs, looking back down at the boy, and rocks him in her arms.
Is this a dream? It must be a dream. He'll wake up any moment now to Aunt Petunia shouting at him to get up, or Uncle Vernon seizing him by the arm and dumping him straight out of his cot, and it will be back to his normal life. But, in the meantime... This is nice. Her warm arms enfold him, and her hand strokes his cheek. This might be what his life would have been like, if his parents weren't selfish, stupid drunks. It's nice, it really is nice.
"Harry?" she says gently. He looks up at her, into her kindly old face. "We're going to be going somewhere in a moment -- somewhere very, very far from here. But I'm going to have to turn about a bit, so you might get a little dizzy. Is that all right?"
Turn about a bit? Does she mean she's going to be taking sharp turns in her car? Well, the boy can handle that. He had to -- his relatives got so mad if he got carsick. He gives a short nod, and she gives him a reassuring smile in return. "Good. Now, take a deep breath, this will only be a moment--"
She turns and spins on the spot, and that's the last he ever sees of Number Four Privet Drive.