This is a one-shot about Petunia Dursley - I've always seen her as a bit of an underrated and misunderstood character, being overshadowed by Lily and depicted as one of the 'bad guys' in the books, but personally I like her and I think everyone can relate to her in some ways like never getting our own Hogwarts Acceptance Letter, so I just wanted to write something from her point of view The title was inspired by a song by Florence+the Machine.

Disclaimer: Harry's wonderful world belongs solely to Jo Rowling

Heartlines

Dear Miss P. Evans,

I was delighted in receiving your letter, and sincerely appreciate your interest in the magical school of Hogwarts. I find not many non-magic folk with the knowledge of the wizarding world have a great deal of interest in details or education in magic. It is well a quality you should be proud of.

However, it is with deepest regret that I must decline your request of enrolling at the school. It is quite impossible for a Hogwarts student to be non-magic, and one needs to be born with the ability to perform magic; it cannot be directly taught. We do teach students to improve their skill; alas we don’t teach them to have it.

Yet you should know that magic is not merely found in witches and wizards and their intricate wand-waving and potion-brewing. It is found in everyone, in different mannerisms and hidden forms; in music, imagination and invention, to name a few.

With that, I must conclude – partly due to the fact that my fingers have been pecked to the bone by the post owl – and wish you the best of luck.

Albus Dumbledore signed at the end of the letter, rolled up the parchment, and tied it to the owl’s leg with a golden ribbon.

He had written quite a few difficult letters before; ones explaining a student’s unlucky injury or mischievous affairs to their parents, ones advising the Minister of Magic on a departmental issue, but never had he written back to an expectant eleven-year old girl with the realisation that magic indeed existed still fresh on her mind, to reject all her hopes and dreams so blatantly.

Albus Dumbledore had mulled over his words carefully, added the right amount of understanding and optimism, not wanting to upset the girl, but as the owl took flight out of the window into the cheerful summer sky, and Dumbledore turned around in his chair to watch it glide away, he wondered if it would have been wiser not to write back.

*

Among the other painful things she’d tried to wipe from her mind and failed, that letter stood out. Petunia Dursley remembered that day as clearly as if it stood next to her all her life, heckling repeatedly at her thoughts.

She remembered staring at the name penned in thin, curly handwriting at the bottom of the parchment, her mind blank and numb. Her mother had just entered her bedroom with some clean laundry, chattering away about some teacup Lily had just turned into a daisy.

‘...Dear, are you alright?’

She’d nodded fervently, still staring at the letter.

‘Well, breakfast is almost ready,’ her mother had said, placing the fresh clothes on Petunia’s dresser and leaving.

A minute had passed before Petunia finally jolted out of her blank daze as her sister’s voice rushed through the bedroom window.

‘Tuney! Come here, I want to show you something!’ Her voice had had a rhythm to it; she must have been dancing or jumping around.

Jumping off her bed, Petunia had stuck her head out of the window and looked below. Lily stood a few feet away from the front door, holding what looked like a purple toad in her palm.

‘Leave me alone!’ Petunia remembered yelling shrilly. ‘Why don’t you go show it to that Snape boy!’

She’d shut the window tight, bolted the bedroom door, her eyes suddenly very watery, and had spent the rest of the day locked up in her room.

The image of the letter swam back into Petunia Dursley’s thoughts. She had never felt so expectant and ecstatic, as her fingers had stretched out to meet the owl standing on her window sill, holding in its claws a response, almost a sure promise of being as Lily was; special, noticed, magical—

It’s not like Lily hadn’t always been the one to stand out – her vivid hair and her bright eyes opposed Petunia’s matte, ordinary features, and she’d always been the more confident one around neighbours and guests – Petunia was used to it, but the thought of Lily going to a great magical school, learning magic, meeting witches and wizards, having all that to herself – it had all seemed a bit too much to Petunia, and she’d resented it.

And now, standing outside her house on a Sunday morning, empty milk bottles in shards on the floor, her one-year old nephew snoozing peacefully in a bundle of blankets on the doorstep, Petunia realised... she really was gone.

She held a hand to her mouth to muffle the scream now escaping her. Her knees buckled and she knelt down. A letter was jutting out of the now waking boy’s blankets, the thin, curly writing on it familiar. It was addressed to her.

‘Petunia?’ her husband’s voice was calling from the kitchen. ‘Is everything all right there?’

Shutting her eyes tight, Petunia pocketed the letter and heaved a deep, shuddering sigh. She opened her eyes again and winced at the suddenly intense blur of sunlit sky and neatly-trimmed hedges, picking up the boy with shaking hands, his cheeks now wet with tears.

please be sure to edit your first post with a chapter index after your next update!

First, thank you for sharing your talents with us once again! Second...I AM IN LOVE WITH THIS STORY ALREADY! You really captured Petunia in a light that not many of us have been able to really see or imagine and it is fantastic! I can't wait for more updates from you

Hello, I just read your one shot and enjoyed it very much. Thank you for sharing your opinion of Petunia with us. I had empathy for her and it made me wonder if she had had friends would she have felt the same way about her sister.

Hi pixie! Thanks for that awesome review and I'm so glad you liked it! ^.^ I'm glad I could put that different light on Petunia without straying too far from her actual character... because she's still the jealous and resentful Petunia we know, but if you looked past Harry's POV you could really sympathise with her, so yeah I'm keeping this a one-shot for now... but who knows, I may change my mind

Thanks for reading and commenting! And about that... well, I think Petunia would've gotten on well with her classmates but in my head she always sort of stuck around with Lily, so when the whole magic thing came by I think she started hanging around other kids just to sort of distance herself from the magic. Anyway, I could go on forever about her because she's one of those interesting minor characters, but this is supposed to be a one-shot so I'll leave it at that Thanks again for reading!

NO! NO ONE SHOT! *points to the adding chapters bit* that was my intention of telling you to keep going


Please?

Oh fiiine I think I have a couple more ideas... gah, I'm so easy to persuade lol.

Really good........

*BEAAAAAAAAAMS* can't wait to read it

This is really good. I really like how you're portraying Petunia. Good job and keep up the great work.

Thank you everyone!

Wow!! that was a totally different take on petunia. All you see is the bitterness portrayed & i had never stopped to wonder why. Thanks for such a wonderful perspective.

Thankyou! I'm glad you liked the different POV and stuff I'm writing the next chapter currently, so stay tuned

Brilliantly written! You've developed Petunia's character well, and it's great to see what she might have been going through and why she had acted the way she did towards Harry and all. Very, very nice, can't wait for more

I've only just seen this comment! Thanks so much, that really makes me want to keep writing this fic. I do have some ideas now, but most are from Lily and Petunia's teen and young adult years, so yeah I think I'll do a lot of time skips with this.

OMG, this story is so brilliant. Petunia seems very nice after all. I'll look forward to more!

Last Updated: 22/07/2012