Harry3

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone   

The owl brought a letter.  A mystery letter.  The letter invited Harry to go to a school for wizards.  

Harry went to the wizard school.  At the wizard school, Harry found friends and magic in everything from classes to meals.  

But, first Harry Potter had to wake up.  Aunt Petunia's voice made the first noise of the day.  

"Up! Get up! Now!" 

Harry woke with a start.  His aunt knocked on the door again.  

"Up!" she yelled.  Harry heard her walking to the kitchen.  

But, he didn't get up.  Instead, Harry rolled onto his back and tried to think of the dream he had been having.  

Harry's dream had been a good one.  There had been a flying motorcycle in it.  He had a funny feeling he'd had the same dream before.  

His aunt was back outside the door.  

"Are you up yet?" she demanded.  

"Nearly," said Harry.  

"Well, get a move on.  I want you to look after the bacon.  And don't you dare let it burn. I want everything perfect on Dudley's birthday." 

Harry groaned.  

"What did you say?" his aunt snapped through the door.  

"Nothing, nothing .  .  ." 

Dudley's birthday - how could he have 0forgotten? 

Harry got slowly out of bed and started looking for socks.  He found a pair under his bed and, after pulling a spider off one of them, put them on.  Harry was used to spiders, because the cupboard under the stairs was full of them, and that was where he slept.  

When he was dressed he went to the kitchen.  The table was covered with Dudley's birthday presents.  Dudley got the new computer he wanted, and the second television and the racing bike.  

Why did Dudley want a racing bike? Dudley was very fat and hated exercise. But, he did like to hit. Mostly he liked to punch.  

Dudley's favorite punching bag was Harry, but he couldn't often catch him.  Harry didn't look it, but he was very fast.  

Harry had always been small and skinny for his age.  He looked even smaller and skinnier than he *really was because all he had to wear were old clothes of Dudley's. Dudley was about four times bigger than he was.  

Harry had a thin face, knobbly knees, black hair, and bright green eyes.  He wore round glasses held together with a lot of Scotch tape because of all the times Dudley had punched him on the nose.  

The only thing Harry liked about his own appearance was a very thin scar on his forehead that was shaped like a bolt of lightning.  He had had it as long as he could remember.  The first question he could ever remember asking his Aunt œPetunia was how he had gotten it.  

"In the car crash when your parents died," she had said.  "And don't ask questions." 

Harry Potter had no parents - he was  an orphan.  Orphaned as a baby, Harry Potter has spent 11 awful years living with his mean aunt, uncle, and cousin Dudley.  

Uncle Vernon entered the kitchen.

"Comb your hair!" he barked, by way of a morning greeting.  

About once a week, Uncle Vernon looked over the top of his newspaper and shout§ed that Harry needed a haircut.  Harry must have had more haircuts than the rest of the boys in his class put together. But it made no difference. His hair simply grew that way - all over the place.  

Harry was frying eggs by the time Dudley arrived in the kitchen with his mother.  

Dudley looked a lot like Uncle Vernon.  He had a large pink face, not much neck, small, watery blue eyes, and thick blond hair that lay smoothly on his thick, fat head.  

Aunt Petunia said that Dudley looked like a baby angel. Harry said that Dudley looked like a pig .

Harry put the plates on the table, which was difficult as there wasn't much room.  

Dudley, meanwhile, was counting his presents.  His face fell.  

"Thirty-six," he said, looking up at his mother and father.  "That's two less than last year." 

"Darling, you haven't counted Auntie Marge's present, see, it's here under this big one from Mommy and Daddy." 

"All right, thhirty-seven then," said Dudley, going red in the face.  Harry could see a huge Dudley tantrum coming on.  So Harry began eating his bacon as fast as possible.  He wanted to finish before  Dudley turned the table over.  

Aunt Petunia obviously scented danger, too.  She  said quickly, "Dudley, we'll buy you another two presents while we're out today.  How's that, popkin? Two more presents.  Is that all right?" 

Dudley thought for a moment.  It looked like hard work.  Finally he said slowly, "So I'll have thirty .  .  .  thirty .  .  ." 

"Thirty-nine, sweetums," said Aunt Petunia.  

"Oh." Dudley sat down heavily and grabbed the nearest parcel.  "All right then." 

Uncle Vernon chuckled.  

At that moment the telephone rang and Aunt Petunia went to answer it.  Harry and Uncle Vernon watched Dudley unwrap the racing bike, a video camera, a remote control airplan]e, sixteen new computer games, and a VCR.  

Dudley ripped the paper off a gold wristwatch.

U"What are we going to do with Harry?" asked Aunt Petunia.

"What about what's-her-name, your friend - Yvonne?" 

"On vacation in Majorca," snapped Aunt Petunia.  

"You could just leave me here," Harry put in hopefully (he'd be able to watch what he wanted on television for a change and maybe even have a go on Dudley's computer).   Aunt Petunia looked as though she'd just swallowed a lemon.   

"I won't blow up the house," said Harry, but they weren't listening.  

"I suppose we could take him to the zoo," said Aunt Petunia slowly, ".  .  .  and leave him in the car.  .  .  ." 

"That car'só new, he's not sitting in it alone.  .  .  ." 

Dudley began to cry loudly.  In fact, he wasn't really crying.  It had been years since he'd really cried.  But he knew that if he pretended to cry, his mother would give him anything he wanted.  

"Dinky Duddydums, don't cry, Mummy won't let him spoil your special day!" she cried, flinging her arms around him.  

"I .  .  .  don't .  .  .  want .  .  .  him .  .  .  t-t-to come!" Dudley yelled between huge, pretend sobs.  "He always sp-spoils everything!" He shot Harry a nasty grin through the gap in his mother's arms.  

Just then, the doorbell rang - "Oh, good Lord, they're here!" said Aunt Petunia frantically.  A moment later, Dudley's best friend, Piers Polkiss, walked in.  

Piers was a thin boy with a face like a rat.  He was usually the one who held people's arms behind their backs while  Dudley hit them.  Dudley stopped pretending to cry at once.  

kHarry couldn't believe his luck. Half an hour later he was sitting in the back of the Dursleys' car with Piers and Dudley, on the way to the zoo for the first time in his life.  His aunt and uncle hadn't been able to think of anything else to do with him.  But before they'd left, Uncle Vernon had taken Harry aside.  

"I'm warning you," he had said, putting his large purple face right up close to Harry's, "I'm warning you now, boy - any funny business, anything at all - and you'll be in that cupboard from now until Christmas." 

"I'm not going to do anything," said Harry, "honestly .  .  ." 

But Uncle Vernon didn't believe him.  No one ever did.  

The problem was, strange things often happened around Harry. It was just no good telling the Dursleys he didn't make them happen.  

Once, Aunt Petunia, cut Harry's hair.  She cut it so short he was almost bald exceptf for his bangs, which she left "to hide that horrible scar." 

Dudley had laughed himself silly at Harry, who spent a sleepless night imagining school the next day.  The other children at school already laughed at Harry for his baggy clothes and taped glasses.  Now they would laugh at his lack of hair. 

Next morning, however, Harry had gotten up to find his hair exactly as it had been before Aunt Petunia had sheared it off.  He had been given a week in his cupboard for this.  But even  he couldn't explain how it had grown back so quickly.  

On the other hand, he'd gotten into terrible trouble for being foVund on the roof of the school kitchens.  Dudley's gang had been chasing him as usual. As much to Harry's surprise as anyone else's, there he was sitting on the chimney.  The Dursleys had received a very angry letter from Harry's headmistress telling them Harry had been climbing school buildings.  But all he'd tried to do was jump behind the big trash cans outside the kitchen doors.  Harry supposed that the wind must have caught him in mid-jump.  

But today, nothing was going to go wrong.  It was even worth being with Dudley and Piers to be spending the day somewhere that wasn't school, his cupboard.  

While he drove, Uncle Vernon complained to Aunt Petunia.  He liked to complain about things: people at work, Harry,  the bank, and Harry were just a few of his favorite subjects.  This morning, it was motorcycles.  

".  .  .  roaring along li‹ke maniacs, the young hoodlums," he said, as a motorcycle overtook them.  

"I had a dream about a motorcycle," said Harry, remembering suddenly.  "It was flying." 

Uncle Vernon nearly crashed into the car.  He turned right around in his seat and yelled at Harry, his face like a gigantic beet with a mustache: "MOTORCYCLES DON'T FLY!" 

Dudley and Piers sniggered.  

"I know they don't," said Harry.  "It was only a dream." 

But he wished he hadn't said anything.  If there was one thing the Dursleys hated even more than his asking questions, it was his talking about anything acting in a way it shouldn't.  No matter if it was in a dream or even a cartoon - they seemed to think he might get dangerous ideas.  

It was a very sunny Saturday. The zoo was crowded with families.  

The Dursleys bought Dudley and Piers large chocolate ice creams at the entrance.   Then, because the smiling lady in the van had asked Harry what he wanted before they could hurry him away, they bought ∑him a cheap  lemon ice pop.  It wasn't bad, either, Harry thought.  He licked the ice pop.  Then he saw a gorilla who looked remarkably like Dudley, except that it wasn't blond.  

Harry had the best morning he'd had in a long time.  He was careful to walk a little way apart from the Dursleys so that Dudley and Piers, who were starting to get bored with the animals by lunchtime, wouldn't fall back on their favorite hobby of hitting him.   

After lunch they went to the reptile house.  It was cool and dark in there, with lit windows all along the walls.  Behind the glass, all sorts of lizards and snakes were crawling and slithering over bits of wood and stone.  

Dudley and Piers wanted Kto see huge, poisonous cobras and thick, man-crushing pythons.  Dudley quickly found the largest snake in the place.  It could have wrapped its body twice around Uncle Vernon's car and crushed it into a trash can. But at the moment it didn't look in the mood.  In fact, it was fast asleep.  

Dudley stood with his nose pressed against the glass, staring at the shiny brown snake.  

"Make it move," he whined at his father.  Uncle Vernon tapped on the glass, but the snake didn't budge at all.  

"This is boring," Dudley moaned.  He shuffled away.  

Harry looked intently at the snake.  He wouldn't have been surprised if it had died of boredom itself.  The snake had no company except stupid people drumming their fingers on the glass trying to disturb it all day long.  It was worse than having a cupboard as a bedroom, where the only visvitor was Aunt Petunia hammering on the door to wake you up.  

The snake suddenly opened its beady eyes.  Slowly, very slowly, it raised its head until its eyes were on a level with Harry's.  

It winked one eye.  

Harry stared.  Then he looked quickly around to see if anyone was watching.  They weren't.  He looked back at the snake and winked, too.  

The snake jerked its head toward Uncle Vernon and Dudley, then raised its eyes to the ceiling.  It gave Harry a look that said quite plainly: 

"I get that all the time." 

"I know," Harry said through the glass.  "It must be really annoying." 

The snake shook its head as if to say "yes."  

"Where do you come from, anyway?" Harry asked.  

The snake pointed its tail at a little sign next to the glass.  Harry peered at it.  

Boa Constrictor, Brazil.  

"Was it nice there?" 

The boa constrictor pointed its tail at the signÉ again and Harry read on: This snake was bred in the zoo.  "Oh, I see - so you've never been to Brazil?" 

As the snake shook its head, a loud shout behind Harry made both of them jump.  

"DUDLEY! MR.  DURSLEY! COME AND LOOK AT THIS SNAKE! YOU WON'T BELIEVE WHAT IT'S DOING!" 

Dudley came waddling toward them as fast as he could.  

"Out of the way, you," he said, punching Harry in the ribs.  Caught by surprise, Harry fell hard on the concrete floor.  What came next happened so fast no one saw how it happened.  One second, Piers and Dudley were leaning right up close to the glass.  The next second, they had leapt back with howls of horror.  

Harry sat up and gasped.  The glass front of the boa constrictor's tank had vanished.  The great snake was uncoiling itself rapidly, slithering out onto the floor.  People throughout the reptile house screamed and started running for the exits.   ã As the snake slid swiftly past him, Harry could have sworn a low, hissing voice said, "Brazil, here I come.  .  .  .  Thanksss, amigo." 

The keeper of the reptile house was in shock.  

"But the glass," he kept saying, "where did the glass go?" 

As far as Harry had seen, the snake hadn't done anything except snap playfully.  

By the time they were all back in Uncle Vernon's car, Dudley was telling them how it had nearly bitten off his leg.  Piers was swearing it had tried to squeeze him to death.  But worst of all, for Harry at least, was Piers calming down enough to say, "Harry was talking to it, weren't you, Harry?" 

Uncle Vernon waited‘ until Piers was safely out of the house before starting on Harry.  He was so angry he could hardly speak.  He managed to say, "Go - cupboard - stay - no meals," before he collapsed into a chair.  Aunt Petunia had to run and get him a large brandy.  

Harry lay in his dark cupboard much later, wishing he had a watch.  He didn't know what time it was and he couldn't be sure the Dursleys were asleep yet.  Until they were, he couldn't risk sneaking to the kitchen for some food.  

He'd lived with the Dursleys almost ten years, ten miserable years.  As long as he could remember.  Ever since he'd been a baby and his parents had died in that car crash.  

He couldn't remember being in the car when his parents had died.  +He couldn't remember his parents at all.  His aunt and uncle never spoke about them, and of course he was forbidden to ask questions.  There were no photographs of them in the house.  

When he had been younger, Harry had dreamed and dreamed of some unknown relation coming to take him away.  But it had never happened.  

The Dursleys were his only family.  Yet sometimes he thought (or maybe hoped) that strangers in the street seemed to know him.  Very strange strangers they were, too.  A tiny man in a violet top hat had bowed to him once while out sË›hopping with Aunt Petunia and Dudley.  After asking Harry furiously if he knew the man, Aunt Petunia had rushed them out of the shop without buying anything.  

A wild-looking old woman dressed all in green had waved merrily at him once on a bus.  

A bald man in a very long purple coat had actually shaken his hand in the street the other day and then walked away without a word.  

The weirdest thing about all these people was the way they seemed to vanish the second Harry tried to get a closer look.  

At school, Harry had no one.  Everybody knew that Dudley's gang hated that odd Harry Potter in his baggy old clothes and broken glasses.  And nobody liked to disagree with Dudley's gang.