Inside the Leaky Cauldron.
The conversation had naturally drifted to Harry's guardians—the Dursleys.
"They locked Harry in his room," Ron was ranting, red in the face. "He said it was basically a prison cell. Then they only fed him watery canned soup with, like, three leaves of vegetable floating in it…"
Ron looked ready to Apparate straight to Privet Drive and stuff a handful of slugs down the Dursleys' throats.
Sean stayed quiet.
The Dursleys were definitely awful people—narrow-minded, mean, spoiled Dudley rotten, and treated Harry like garbage. Even without Harry in the picture, they wouldn't win any "Neighbor of the Year" awards. Dudley would still have been the kid who bullied anyone smaller than him.
But they weren't cartoon villains. They were more complicated than that.
Wizards had never exactly been popular in the non-magical world. Most of the time, Muggles saw them as trouble, evil, or straight-up terrifying.
Regular people tend to hate and fear what they don't understand.
Then there was Petunia. She'd once written to Dumbledore begging to go to Hogwarts, just like her sister Lily, and got turned down flat. All that longing turned into resentment. She hated magic because she could never have it.
Vernon? He was a full-on magic denier—arrogant, terrified, and disgusted by anything "freakish."
So yeah, they never should've been the ones to take Harry in.
He probably would've been better off in an orphanage…
…Okay, maybe not. At least with the Dursleys he stayed alive.
Fate has a twisted sense of humor sometimes. Dumbledore showed up, told them they had to keep Harry because of the blood protection, and that was that. Harry needed to live with blood relatives.
As much as they hated it, the Dursleys did the bare minimum. They gave him a roof (and a cupboard under the stairs) so the charm could keep him safe from Voldemort. Dumbledore even wrote it in that letter: "As long as he can call the place where his mother's blood dwells home, he is protected."
They technically did it—even if they made his life miserable while doing it.
Here's the weird part: Petunia, at least, wasn't completely heartless toward Harry. There's proof.
When the Hogwarts letters started arriving, the Dursleys could've just let him go. They should've been thrilled to get rid of the "freak" for nine months a year.
But Petunia especially freaked out. She actually thought they could "drive the magic out of him" or something ridiculous like that.
On Harry's eleventh birthday, when the letters kept coming by owl wouldn't stop, she and Vernon clung to that old superstition about witches not being able to cross water. Except Petunia had watched Lily hop across the stream on stepping stones when they were kids—so she really shouldn't have been shocked when Hagrid rowed through a storm to that hut on the rock.
When love and hate get tangled up like that, it's hard to say who's right or wrong.
The Dursleys were petty and horrible, but Harry's childhood didn't have to be quite that bad…
…if anyone had ever thought to send them a little child-support money from the Potter vault.
But nobody in the wizarding world, everybody thinks magic solves everything and money is for Muggles, so no one ever considered it.
Harry became this unwanted, probably-dangerous burden they couldn't get rid of.
Bad premise + bad people = one doomed childhood.
A fresh wave of noise rolled in from the street as the door to the Leaky Cauldron's door swung open, carrying the thump of music from the record shop next door.
"Oh my God, Harry, why didn't you ever tell us—?!"
Hermione's voice cracked with fury the second she stepped inside. She scanned the pub, spotted the group, and marched over.
"We have to call the police! Those people are—"
"Easy, Hermione," Justin said gently.
"Not worth getting worked up over," added Chest-pin (the little first-year with the badge obsession).
Hermione blinked at Sean, trying to figure out why those calm words were coming from such a young kid.
Justin glanced around. "Well, now that we're all here… what's the plan?"
He waited. Sean just gave him a blank look.
Justin sighed, half-laughing. "Let's go, then."
They piled into a stretched limo outside—somebody's parents had serious Galleons. Ron gawked at the polished mahogany interior and plush carpets.
"They can make cars this long?"
Sean was nose-deep in Soul Transfiguration. Neville kept his head down. Harry and Hermione sat stiffly, not quite sure what to say.
Harry opened his mouth a couple times, but nothing came out.
He was starting to understand what kind of "help" Justin had in mind.
Meanwhile, back on Privet Drive…
The Dursleys were in full panic mode because a huge potential client was coming over—one who was supposedly "related" to them and might order a massive shipment of drills from Vernon's company.
In the living room, Vernon cleared his throat importantly.
"We all know today is an extremely important day. This could be the biggest deal of my career.
Let's run through the schedule one more time. Two o'clock—everyone in position.
Petunia?"
"I'll be in here," Aunt Petunia answered quickly, "ready to greet them warmly."
"Excellent. Dudley?"
"I'll get the door," Dudley said, plastering on the world's fakest smile. "May I take your coats, Mr. Green, Mr. Finley, and Mr. Potter?"
The smile vanished the second he said "Potter." Same last name, but worlds apart—one was a rich client his dad was practically bowing to, the other was the freak nephew locked in the cupboard.
Back in the limo, the kids were finalizing their own plan.
"Okay, so here's what we're doing," Justin said slowly. "We're giving Harry a new identity in the Muggle world…"
Sean didn't care much for the dress-up game, but he had to admit Justin's idea was solid.
The whole plan boiled down to one thing: let Harry decide for himself.
Nobody else gets to choose Harry's life for him. All they were doing was giving him the power to choose.
A surprise inheritance from a "long-lost Potter relative" in the Muggle world—complete with ownership of two respectable construction companies—would be more than enough.
Justin was busy arranging the details. Everyone was buzzing with excitement.
Everyone except Harry, who turned toward the window real quick and quietly wiped his eyes.
Dudley was wrong.
At Hogwarts, there were tons of people who actually cared about him.