chapter 8

there were no news reports of a boy in ragged clothes caught wandering around anywhere in Surrey, as Petunia had feared at first would happen.

She didn't act at once. She knew that it was entirely possible that Dumbledore man had them under observation, and although nobody had ever confronted her about the freak not eating or living in a cupboard, they might know and not care as long as he was alive. So she continued to tear up when she spoke to the teachers, contacted the police and gave them the freak's description, and told Dudley that he would get extra ice cream for acting like he missed his cousin.

But days passed. Weeks. Nothing came up and no one said anything.

That was when Petunia began, quietly, to look at other options.

Harry laughed as he took the pan of roasted carrots and rabbit meat off the fire. It had taken him a long time and many, many tries to get it to perfection, but now it worked! He could even make soups!

The garden grew all sorts of vegetables and berries, although they were so wild that not all of them were safe. Harry had learned to take the food inside the doorway and hold it up so the house could look at it before he bit into it. It only took one night of vomiting for him to decide that he shouldn't just gobble down things out in the garden.