"Fools rush in
Where wise men never go
But wise men never fall in love
So how are they to know
When we met
I felt my life begin
So open up your heart and let
This fool rush in."
-Fools Rush In (Bow wow wow)
A tall, hovering figure wearing a dark cloak was advancing on him, drawing in rasping breaths and reaching up to grasp him by the throat. He felt himself being slammed against the ground and tried to cry out for help, but no sound escaped his throat. Everything around him was growing cold and distant, as though he was losing consciousness. Suddenly, a voice rose in his head, harsh and petulant.
"Look, it's Potty Potter!" the voice jeered, as laughter sounded behind it. "What happened to your glasses, Potter? Did you break them tripping over your big ugly feet?"
Suddenly, he recognized the voice. It was his voice, echoing words he had spoken years ago. The moment this realization came to him, he was surrounded by images to match the voice. He saw himself, standing at the center of a knot of yelling children and facing down a small boy with untidy black hair and glasses.
Out of nowhere, he shoved the boy, causing him to fall to the ground. When the boy got up, he punched him unceremoniously in the face, breaking his glasses. The crowd of children laughed unkindly. The boy's eyes burned with anger and shame.
The scene changed. He was now standing below a tall tree with a growling dog at his side, howling with mirth. The same green-eyed boy had climbed to the top of the tree and was throwing frantic glances to the dog below him.
"You won't last long up there!" he shouted to the boy. "Soon you'll fall and break your skinny neck!"
The scene changed yet again, and now he was delivering swift kicks to a boy much smaller than himself, while his friend held the boy's arms behind his back. The boy was crying and sniveling.
Another change. He was crying loudly, screaming abuse at his mother and throwing all his possessions around the room.
Another change. He was holding a young boy's head in a toilet and jeering at him.
Another change. He was stealing an entire sackful of candy from a store, shoving an elderly lady out of his way as he sprinted out the door.
In the gathering gloom, the cloaked creature reached for its hood to draw it back and reveal its face.
Dudley Dursely awoke from his dream screaming at the top of his voice. His forehead was glistening with sweat, and his heart was racing. It had been nearly two years since he had come out of hiding and started his life anew, and still the same dream plagued him almost every night.
Sighing, Dudley reached across his pillow and turned on the lamp that stood on his bedside table, glancing at his alarm clock. It was four thirty in the morning. If the dream persisted, he was apt never to get a good night's sleep in his entire life.
There was a soft knock at his bedroom door and a whisper of, "Are you all right Popkin? What's wrong?"
Dudley groaned. It was bad enough to be twenty years old and still living in his parents' house. But did his mother have to come check on him at the slightest disturbance?
"I'm fine!" he called. Under his breath he added, "Go away."
The sound of Petunia Dursley's footsteps grew fainter as she returned to her room, and Dudley closed his eyes once more, breathing deeply.
Ever since that fateful evening in the summer after his fifteenth birthday, things had begun to change for him. It had happened at an impossibly slow, gradual pace, so that at first he did not even notice that anything was different. But as the months passed and his subconscious refused to let him forget what the cloaked figures had made him see, he had been forced to face facts. Because there was no denying the images that lingered in his head. Dudley had been haunted by these images into the early hours of the morning, unable to rid himself of the impression that there was something horribly wrong with him. Yes, the Dementoids, or whatever they were called, had put everything into perspective for him, all right.
But the dreams had not started until after Dedalus Biddle and Hestia James (or was it Hestia George? So many things he could not remember...) had gotten him and his family out of hiding, bringing news that Harry Potter had triumphed magnificently over the Dark Lord. Though this meant very little to him, Dudley wished he could have congratulated his cousin. He had not seen Harry since then.
It was after that day that Dudley began to sink into a depression that nothing, not his father's blustering speeches or his mother's incessant doting, could help. What Vernon and Petunia failed to grasp was that their son's problems were beyond inadequate meals or insufficient birthday gifts. They had no idea what was going through his mind.
As he had become increasingly withdrawn and brooding, Dudley had also lost a considerable amount of weight, so that his muscles now stood out clearly beneath his overlarge clothes. When he looked in the mirror, he no longer recognized himself. He was nothing like the person who appeared in his persistent dream. He hoped that counted for something.
The only truly enjoyable part of his life during that time had been boxing. Something about the sport took away his worries and replaced them with a sense of accomplishment. But then, almost six months ago, his short, albeit successful career as a boxer had ended when he had dislocated his shoulder during a match. After that Dudley had taken a position at his father's drill company, simply for want of anything better to do. Vernon Dursley had closed some important deals in the past few years, and his firm was now one of the foremost drill-making companies in the world. Somehow, this cheered Dudley very little.
These days Dudley traipsed through his days in the office with as much enthusiasm as he could muster, and at night took classes from a nearby school over the computer to attempt to complete his education, which had been cut short by his going into hiding. The classes he found excruciatingly difficult. He had never been a really intelligent person: he knew and accepted that, now. But he hoped that by earning an education, he could make something of himself that somewhat atoned for his past misdeeds. Maybe that counted for something, too.
The alarm clock on the bedside table now said that it was five in the morning. Resigned to the fact that he would not get any more sleep, Dudley got up and dressed in silence, weary of waking his mother again. He then descended the stairs into the immaculate kitchen and poured himself a bowl of cereal, grimacing as he read the words "Low In Sugar" on the front of the box.
An hour later, having packed and repacked his briefcase four times, Dudley decided that there was really nothing to do but go to work. He normally drove to the Grunnings office in the morning with his father, but the latter had yet to come downstairs. When Dudley walked outside and entered his car, the sun was just beginning to rise. He fiddled with the radio, looking for a song that did not make him feel that his life was a failure. After searching through the entire FM dial in vain, he became frustrated and banged on the radio with his fist.
Something odd happened then. The radio emitted a sort of high-pitched whistle, and suddenly a song completely unknown to Dudley began to play. It was unlike anything he had ever heard; the music was punctuated by the sounds of strange and probably foreign instruments.
"... Oh come and stir my cauldron... And if you do it right... I'll brew you up some hot strong love... To keep you warm tonight..."
Now why on earth would someone be singing about cauldrons on the morning radio? Dudley had a vague impression that a cauldron was a sort of pot, which did not make sense in the slightest. He must be going out of his mind.
When Dudley drove his car into his usual spot in front of the office, the rest of the lot was deserted- no, almost deserted, with the exception of one other vehicle parked at the far end, in a spot reserved for company executives. And yet Dudley knew for a fact that none of the executives were driving around in a violet 1931 De Soto with a hood ornament that looked suspiciously like the needle from an antique record player. This joker was likely going to return to find his car towed away, and good riddance.
Only one other person had arrived in the office earlier than Dudley. Mark Jenkins, a mousy old man with a shining bald patch, was sitting at his desk with a steaming mug of coffee, already typing up some sort of pretentious report. Dudley gave him a halfhearted wave and hurried to his cubicle. He did not care for Jenkins: the man had twice reported him to their supervisor for coming in to work late. Dudley had almost punched him out cold the second time. It had taken all his self control simply to apologize for being late and go about his day as usual. The part of his life in which he settled his problems with his fists was over, now.
Sitting down at his desk, Dudley considered calling a friend for an early morning chat. After all, it was far too early to start doing any work, really. Then he remembered that he no longer had any friends. That part of his life had also been forfeited when the dream started to haunt him.
For one brief, shining moment, Dudley considered marching into the office at the end of the hall and declaring his resignation to Mr. Hall, his supervisor. But then he pictured the look that would appear on his father's face if he ever did such a thing, and immediately thought better of it. He shook his head, glancing wistfully at the office door nonetheless. And that was when he saw her.
"Bloody hell!" he muttered, leaning around the side of his cubicle to get a better view of the office down the hall. Its door was ajar, and through the gap Dudley could distinctly see a young woman pacing back and forth and pointing a narrow wooden meter-stick at an eagle feather, which was racing back and forth of its own accord on a desk.
"What the hell?" Dudley muttered again, shrugging. "Why not?"
He crept across the hallway and placed himself directly behind the door, so that he could observe the young woman without being seen. She had long, lustrous dark hair and was wearing a rather eccentric combination of pinstriped trousers and a lime green parka. Yet somehow, she still looked quite lovely.
Secondary to this, Dudley also noticed that what he had at first mistaken for a meter-stick was in fact a rounded piece of wood that looked incredibly familiar. After a few seconds of thought, Dudley realized that Harry had carried an identical piece of wood in his pocket for years, claiming that it was his magic wand. Could this girl possibly be one of that lot?
The wand she was waving appeared to be causing the eagle feather to write words on a yellowed sheet of paper. There was no other explanation, then. It must be magic.
Dudley's first instinct was to run away as fast as his legs would carry him. Unconsciously, his hands moved to cover his lower back where a curly pig's tail had once sprouted, humiliating and unnatural. But the girl was very pretty and there was absolutely nothing threatening about her. She was humming to herself, and after a few seconds Dudley realized that she was singing the song he had heard on the radio while driving to work.
How had his day taken such a bizarre turn so early on?
Without pausing to think, Dudley pushed open the door and did his best to look surprised at finding the office occupied. When he thought back to that moment in the days to come, he reflected that, had he stopped to reconsider his decision, he would probably have turned around and gone back to his own desk. Sometimes, acting on impulse could still be a good thing.
"Oh, I'm so sorry," he said humbly, turning to leave.
"No, please, it's not a problem!" the girl replied with a smile. Watching her smile was like watching dawn break across the sky. Dudley realized that he had temporarily lost his voice. "You don't have to leave," she went on. "I didn't realize that anyone would be here so early, I don't mean to disturb you."
But out of the corner of his eye, Dudley saw her hastily stuff her wand-if that was what it was-and eagle feather quill into a bag. The unfinished page remained on the desk. Dudley tried to read its headline upside down, and thought it said: "Department of Muggle Liaison Research Unit: Assessing the Self-Fulfillment of Employees In Technomology Based Companies."
Good heavens, what was that supposed to mean?
"I was just looking for... a pencil," Dudley invented to excuse his entry into the office, glad that he was once more able to speak.
"Well as long as you're here, would you mind if I asked you a few questions?" the girl said. "My name is Parvati Patil. I've been sent in by the bureau of, er... human resources, to investigate the job satisfaction in this office."
"I- Yes, that would be fine," Dudley replied, somewhat lamely. His brain felt as though it had jammed up, the gears working improperly, the springs bent sideways. Shouldn't he be trying to escape this place? All evidence pointed to this Parvati Patil being a witch.
But was he sure that that was such a bad thing anymore?
"Excellent," said Parvati. "Let's begin. How often would you say that you handle eclectronic devices in the context of your job?"
"I think you mean 'electronic'," Dudley mumbled, unsure whether he should laugh or bolt out of the office while he still had the time. "I s'pose I use electronic devices every day."
Parvati flashed him another blinding smile. "Really?" she asked, sounding almost surprised. "Fascinating. And would you say that employing these devices brings you self-fulfillment?"
Most of the rest of the question were in a similar vein, and it was all Dudley could do to come up with coherent answers as Parvati questioned him. Her voice made him feel a little giddy, and also a little reckless. He still had no idea what he was even doing speaking to her, but leaving was now out of the question.
"Well, I think that's about all," she said after about fifteen minutes. "Oh! Of course, I forgot to ask your name! I have to check it against the roster of employees."
"Dudley Dursley," Dudley muttered, trying to think of a way to draw out the conversation so that he could spend more time with her. "My father owns this company."
Parvati suddenly gaped at him, surprise and something a little less easily definable in her expression. Could it possibly be awe? Surely being the manager's son was not as impressive as all that.
"Did you say Dudley Dursley?" she exclaimed.
"Er, yeah. It's not a very common name, is it?"
"No, it's not that, it's just- Are you by any chance related to someone named Harry Potter?"
It was Dudley's turn to gape, taken completely by surprise. After taking a moment to collect his thoughts, he replied, "Yeah, I am, actually. How could you know that?"
"I know him!" Parvati cried excitedly. "I haven't seen him in almost two years, but I used to know him really well! He spoke about you, I remember."
"He mentioned me?" Dudley asked, more shocked than ever.
"Just in passing. This is incredible, of all the people for me to interview my first day on the job... But- hang on! Do you... know?"
"I do know that you're a... witch, yes," said Dudley. It was difficult to force out the word without cringing, but he managed it reasonably well.
Parvati smiled again, and looked intently at Dudley, seeming to really see him for the first time. A strange gleam came into her eye.
"Would you like to go with me to get a cup of coffee?" she asked. "I know it's early, but-"
"I'd love to," Dudley told her. The words were barely out of his mouth that he regretted them. But when he really contemplated it, the prospect of going to get a coffee with Parvati was rather... nice. He had never felt quite so strangely about someone before. It was enough to make him wonder whether he was falling ill.
So Dudley Dursley left his office with a beautiful young woman who was also a witch, knowing full well that she could turn him into a frog at any moment, and that he had surely taken leave of his senses. For the first time in as long as he could remember, he felt fully alive.
"I've always wanted to work as a reporter for the Daily Prophet," Parvati told Dudley as they sat in a small coffee shop near the Grunnings office, cradling steaming mugs of coffee in their hands. "But there were no available positions when I left Hogwarts, so I ended up at the Ministry instead. It's not so bad, really. I just wish I could get some more interesting assignments every once in a while."
Dudley nodded, hoping this weak response would suffice. He had no idea what Parvati was going on and on about. It didn't matter, because he felt he could listen to her talk for hours on end without losing interest.
"I'm the one doing all the talking, here," Parvati complained. "What's your life like? Do you ever wish you could do magic? I've always wanted to ask that to someone who could tell me what it was like to live without any magic at all. But of course I could never ask a squib, it would be much too rude."
"What's squib?" Dudley asked, trying to feign interest in a subject he understood absolutely nothing about.
"A squib is someone from a Wizarding family who can't do magic, of course," Parvati said.
Dudley gave her a blank look.
"You see, there are plenty of pure blood wizards who don't have any magic at all," continued Parvati, who was clearly under the impression that she was providing a clear and helpful explanation. "It's essentially the opposite of a Muggle-born witch or wizard." When Dudley continued to stare at her in confusion, she said, "Didn't Harry ever explain to you about the differences between pure bloods and Muggle-borns and squibs and all that?"
"I guess I didn't speak to him that much," Dudley admitted, looking down.
"Ooh, were you jealous of him?" said Parvati, unabashed by her direct question. "Didn't he want to tell you about any of it?"
"Not exactly," Dudley stammered, before subsiding into embarrassed silence. In truth, he had taken many of his cousin's old abandoned school books and hidden them under a floorboard in his room, a secret he guarded from his parents with extreme caution. He could only imagine their reaction if they found out that he had kept items related to magic all this time rather than throwing them in the rubbish bin as they had asked. But he had not read any of the books, only stowed them in his room for safekeeping, for reasons he could not quite explain to himself. So he had no more notion of the magical world than ever.
"I guess I didn't like magic much," Dudley finally told her, still looking down at his hands. He couldn't understand how she managed to pry these confessions from him, seemingly without effort. It was almost mesmerizing.
"But you're here with me," said Parvati. It was a statement, not a question. So Dudley nodded.
"You're a little odd," Parvati said in a low voice. "But that's what makes you so charming, I think."
"You... think I'm charming?" said Dudley quietly. Nobody had ever applied that word to him before. He didn't quite know what she meant by it.
"Yes, I do," she replied simply.
There was a pause-not awkward but peaceful-in which Dudley became aware that he had actually reached across the small coffee shop table and taken Parvati's hand in his. Their fingers wound together, fitting comfortably. Parvati did not look at all put off. Instead, a small grin was playing on her lips, leaving Dudley feeling winded.
When he'd gone to school, he'd had a large group of devoted friends, or perhaps followers might have been a better word. But none of them had been girls. Girls in those days laughed at his behind their hands and ran away from his glances. So Dudley had absolutely no experience with this sort of thing.
"Would you like to walk me to my car?" Parvati asked softly. "I do still have a lot of work to do, and I left one of my Quick-Quotes-Quills in the glove compartment."
Dudley nodded. His mouth was very dry.
They walked together to the car lot in the rising morning light. A dozen or so more vehicles had arrived in their absence, but the De Soto was still the most conspicuous by far. It was no real surprise to Dudley when Parvati made right for the violet car. She was a witch, after all.
The two of them entered the car on either side, so that Dudley was sitting in front of the steering wheel and Parvati was facing the glove compartment. Before she could begin her search, however, there was a loud pop, and another young woman appeared in the back seat. It was as if she had materialized out of thin air. Dudley wondered where she could possibly have been hiding, to take them so by surprise. The interior of the automobile was not exactly vast enough to allow for many hiding places.
"Morning!" the strange girl called brightly. Then, catching sight of Dudley, her eyes grew round and she turned to stare at Parvati in reproach. "You should have warned me you would be doing interviews in your car. Do you think he-"
"No, don't worry," Parvati assured her. "This is Dudley Dursley, Harry Potter's famous cousin. He's a... friend of mine."
"Ooh!" exclaimed the new girl with interest. She and Parvati exchanged a meaningful glance and giggled, leaving Dudley feeling thoroughly confused.
"I'm sorry, Dudley," Parvati added for his benefit. "This is my friend Lavender Brown. She works for the Ministry as well. I forgot that I'd asked her to meet me here. I hope we didn't scare you, but you see it's not usually permitted to Apparate out in the open."
"So he knows everything?" asked Lavender Brown.
Parvati shrugged. "More or less. Are you all right, Dudley?"
Magicians with moving feathers and girls who jumped out of nowhere in ugly antique cars... How could he be all right?
"Where did you come from just now?" he asked Lavender, hoping that it wasn't a rude question. He could not think of anything else to say.
"Well I was just in Wales," Lavender told him matter-of-factly. "I was working with a celluliar phone company. But I needed to ask Parvati here a question, so I thought I'd pop by."
"How did you get here from Wales so fast?" Dudley asked stupidly.
Lavender looked taken aback, but Parvati made a small gesture with her hand, as if to indicate that she should not ask questions. Lavender shrugged and turned to speak only to her friend.
"Have you heard the news, then?" she asked.
"No, what news?" demanded Parvati, her interest immediately piqued by the possibility of gossip.
"That's what I came here to tell you. Harry Potter and Ginny Weasley are getting married!"
"Oh really?" Parvati squealed. "Well of course it was going to happen sooner or later. And did you know that I heard Hermione Granger is also getting married to Ron Wea-"
But she stopped abruptly, and Lavender scowled.
"I'm sorry," Parvati muttered.
"It's fine. You know, I've been seeing Seamus for a few weeks now."
The rest of the conversation was lost on Dudley, as it consisted mostly of squealing and giggles. He continued to ponder the question of how someone could possibly get to the center of London from Wales in such a short time. Had Lavender done it by magic?
That night, Dudley went home with Parvati's words echoing in his head. "I'll be coming back to this office all week," she had promised. "We'll see each other again." In spite of everything- of her magic wand and her ugly car and her giggling friend, and the inescapable fact that she was a witch- Dudley fervently hoped that she would come back.
"Did you have a nice day, Diddykins?" Petunia asked when Dudley walked through the front door.
"Yes, it was magical," Dudley muttered, smiling in spite of himself. What a clever thing to say...
For possibly the first time in his life, Dudley refused dinner and locked himself in his room, where he dug out the pile of dusty books residing under his floorboards. The titles jumped viciously out at him. One Thousand Magical Herbs And Fungi... The Standard Book Of Spells: Grade Six... Flying With The Cannons...
Maybe he was dreaming. Maybe he would wake up in his bed in a few hours, and the madness would have passed. He would go on with the sad remains of his life without interference from any hocus-pocus nonsense.
One could always hope.
But in the meantime, if he was ever to carry on a normal conversation with Parvati Patil, he would have to learn a little more about her world. Dudley shuddered.
When he did finally go to sleep some time later, his head filled with disturbing, nonsensical terms he had painstakingly read in the terrifying books, something remarkable happened. Something he had given up hope on many many months ago.
He was haunted by no nightmares. He did not wake up screaming. He had no dreams at all.