Chapter Text
Could you love me while I hate myself? Because I don’t know how this works. I never learned how this works.
— could you love me while I hate myself, Zeph
…
Dudley’s pitying gaze burned into Harrie’s spine as she left the Dursley’s residence and approached the bus that would whisk her away to Hogwarts. She didn’t blame him. Hated him, sometimes, sure. But she didn’t blame him. He was still a kid, after all. Anyone else would do the same; keeping his parents’ secrets and cranking the music to drown out the sounds from the basement.
It didn’t make his lack of action hurt any less, though. It would always hurt. So she didn’t turn around to wave as she boarded the bus and found a seat near the back. Hedwig flicked her wings back in a stressed motion inside her cage as the bus jerked and began rolling down the street, and Harrie shushed her softly, tears in her throat as she pictured what would happen when summer returned and she’d be sent back.
Don’t think about it now, she told herself, shutting her eyes against the thought of spending another second in that dank basement with the stained sheets on the rumpled bed. It made her sick to picture it. I have a whole year ahead of me outside that house. I’m free.
Still, the thought of leaving Hogwarts and Ron and Hermione ever again made her shake, and she pressed her forehead to the window as a single tear rolled down her cheek and caught on the edge of her glasses.
Maybe Dumbledore would let her stay in the dungeons during summer break this year… just this once. The thought made her smile despite the way her heart felt stuck in a vice, eyes burning as she watched the scenery fly by her window.
…
Harrie felt her scars showing as she boarded the Hogwarts Express. Not the scar: the crooked lightning bolt that dragged across her forehead, but the other ones. The ones hidden under her turtleneck and sleeves from the collars and chains. Uncle Vernon insisted on using real ones with metal and locks— never the plastic or soft velvet lined ones. Much to Harrie’s dismay.
They were only scars now— they had been full blown gashes in her throat and wrists when summer started, lingering bruises like blooming flowers encompassing each mark. She’d grown calloused from the constant use of them.
Was it really only three months ago that I was innocent? Three short months of torture— and this is who I am now?
Harrie shuddered violently at the realization. Uncle Vernon had been grooming her for years for this purpose, she knew in hindsight that’s what it was. But apparently this year had been the year he decided she was old enough to actually be made useful in his house. Not just a waste of space anymore, he’d told her. Praised her. Rewarded her when she pleased the men he sent into her room in the basement—
And now she found a sick satisfaction when she made them happy. She craved Uncle Vernon’s approval and encouragement, like a broken puppy dog begging for scraps. Harrie felt sick and hung her head, pressing her shut eyes into her palms.
She was a shell of the girl-who-lived, now just an empty body who’d been spent on strangers in the dark of her uncle’s basement.
For some reason, she didn’t hate Vernon. She didn’t hate Aunt Petunia, even. She certainly didn’t hate Dudley despite their arguments.
The person Harrie really hated was the girl she saw in the mirror every single day.
The one with the horrible scars and glasses too big for her face.
…