Petunia cannot recall when exactly she realised that her parents were fallible.
It must have slowly accumulated and built throughout the years, like an invisible underground current gaining speed and traction, eroding solid structure one drop at a time until everything simply collapsed on itself, silently and inevitably.
If Petunia had to pick one moment where the realisation flared in her face it would have to be this one. Right now, sitting around their dining table, an envelope lying before them and her parents faces just as pale and helpless as her own.
They weren't the invincible figures of her childhood, all knowing and all powerful. They were humans, with faults and fears and worries.
They were muggles, just as powerless to do anything about this situation as Petunia herself.
Because this was a letter that didn't belong to their world of scrubbing dishes and working themselves raw, it wasn't a letter that fit with the lace stitched onto the kitchen curtains or the telly blaring sport's news in the background.
It fit with owls and wands and a whole government of wizards, making rules without anyone the wiser and relying on a secret, magical prison to keep people in line.
From the Ministry of Magic, it read on the cream-coloured envelope, Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures, Gethsemane Prickle, Per Bubonem.
And beneath that Petunia's name and address, glaring from the paper in clear, decisive lines of fine script.
And no one had dared open it yet. Not her father, usually boisterous and stoutly defensive of everything he connected with idioms such as 'bravery' or 'courage', not her mother who was always unconcerned when it came to her eldest daughter, not one to shy away from Petunia's flaws.
So in the end it was Petunia herself, with fingers that felt more like bone than skin, who carefully ripped it open and unfolded the missive inside.
Dear Ms Petunia Evans,
We have received intelligence that you illegally obtained a beast with the classification of XXXX without Ministry consent.
The severity of this breach of the Decree for Reasonable Regulation for Dangerous Creatures has resulted in a charge of Illegal Possession of Dangerous Creatures. Ministry specialists will be responsible for collecting the beast.
As this is a breach of not only the above but also Clause 73 of the International Statute of Wizarding Secrecy considering your status as a Muggle, we regret to inform you that your presence is required at a disciplinary hearing at the Ministry of Magic at 2 p.m. on the twelfth of August. In lieu of your special circumstances, Ministry representatives will be responsible for your pickup.
Hoping you are well,
Gethsemane Prickle
Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures
Petunia's head was too light. She read the words, but it was almost as if she couldn't comprehend them, as if they were written in a foreign language she could maybe pronounce for the shared alphabet but not understand in any way that mattered.
"What creature? What does this mean?"
Petunia blinked and glanced at her mother, stunned at the question. Did she really have to ask? Of course it could only be one being, the one that was at her side since she was twelve, the one that had changed her life ever since she first laid eyes on him.
Aspen.
And the fine membrane protecting her mind from fully digesting the information inside the letter burst with that one thought, allowing an avalanche of fear and panic to suffocate any rationality Petunia might have left.
It's Aspen, they want to take him, maybe they already took him, no, they can't ...
Her chair clattered to the floor, the noise loud in the shocked silence of her parent's wide-eyed stares but drowned out in the cacophony of Petunia's racing thoughts, barely registering as she already stormed off, her feet following a compulsion she couldn't and wouldn't fight against.
Please still be here, please don't be gone!
Please ...
❀
Shivers were wrecking her limbs, the cold penetrating to her marrow in such a way that Petunia almost expected slabs of her flesh to simply crack and break away, dead and numb. The air itself was balmy, a summer night with all the accompaniments of a concert of crickets and an aroma of blooming pollen, but Petunia could hear her teeth chatter and all she tasted was bile.
The cold came from deep inside her, spreading further and further with every futile step, with every hoarse shout.
She couldn't find him. She had lost track of time, the fully darkened sky the only testament to the hours that must have passed, and still she couldn't find him. She had searched the fields, the forest, even ran all the way to her empty school and through town.
And still, she couldn't find him anywhere.
He can't be gone, I simply haven't looked hard enough yet ...
I need help, please, someone, anyone, help me find him ...
But who should she turn to? Eugene was gone, far out of her reach, separated by an ocean she couldn't simply overcome in a matter of minutes or even days. And that was all she had, days, not weeks. The twelfth of August was looming threateningly close, its foul breath already whispering across her face and suffocating her in turn.
There is one other person who knows about Aspen, a small thought flitted through her mind, birthed from desperation, and he is a wizard as well.
Spinner's End wasn't far from where Petunia had been despairing and usually she would have avoided the area as if her life depended on it, especially alone and at night. But this time all her attention centred on Aspen and she barely registered the overturned trash bins, the boisterous voices slithering from open pub doors or the arguments echoing from narrow alleys. Her feet, clad only in her slippers and by now soaked through with mud and crusted with clumps of grass and rubbish, clapped against the broken street in a steady rhythm, unfaltering.
She couldn't give up. If there was any way to help Aspen, Petunia would do whatever it took, even beg the wretched boy - no matter that her pride, always polished and nurtured carefully in an effort to convince herself of its worth, would lie bleeding at his feet.
She'd much rather face humiliation than Aspen's absence.
The wretched boy's home looked as dilapidated as she remembered from her one visit years ago, small, dust-crusted windows staring unseeingly from the pockmarked facade of its ashen face, shingles broken or missing entirely as if flakes of skin had peeled from its head.
Petunia didn't bother with subtlety or politeness, she hammered on the door until the side of her palm smarted and pounded in tune with her head.
The door was ripped open, a slice of light spilling across her filthy feet and the cobblestones surrounding them. "He's not home yet - Petunia?"
The wretched boy was dressed in his usual rags, faded and with frayed hems, his hair just as stringy and oily as usual. But this time Petunia felt no derision upon his appearance, simply a small spark of relief at the familiarity, at the knowledge that she would have someone who could hear her out, who knew what she was talking about.
He's a wizard, his mother's a witch, they might know what to do, Petunia thought and her anguish and worry poisoned the night air with one hasty breath: "It's Aspen, I can't find him anywhere and I got a letter - it said they would collect him, as if he's something that can just be taken away - I don't know what to do ..."
Her voice petered out, the words lingering on her tongue like a bad aftertaste, as if she had bitten into something rotten. It had never been easy for Petunia to admit weaknesses, to show vulnerability, especially not in front of someone she had such a strange relationship as with the wretched boy. They weren't friends but there was some connection between them, forged through Lily but reinforced with every small interaction.
That same connection was the reason that Petunia now paused, something telling her that she needed to take a second and really look at him.
Stillness settled between them, both of them poised, him in the doorway, his fingers clawing around the handle as if it was in danger of leaping away, her with her weight left off her crookedly-healed toe, her breaths coming fast and flat.
And then, somehow, she just knew. Maybe it was the slight tremble of his flitting pupils, avoiding her gaze where usually he was ready to meet and combat it. Maybe it was the way he pulled his lips behind his teeth, chewing the white flesh as if to stop them from forming words that would give him away.
Maybe it was the fact that something had been nagging at Petunia ever since she had first seen the letter, something small but gaining traction now that they stood in front of each other.
We have received intelligence ... There is one other person who knows about Aspen ...
"It was you."
It deserved to be shouted, with rage and anguish, but instead the sentence slipped from her tongue in bland syllables.
The wretched boy flinched regardless and Petunia had her answer.
It really had been him.
From one second to the next she was combating so many differing urges that she simply froze. She wanted to scratch his eyes out, she wanted to scream until her throat burned, she wanted to simply let her self-control crack and allow the tears to run down her face, her chest cramping with sobs.
In the end she laughed. A hoarse laugh without any mirth.
The wretched boy flinched back again, as if she had actually hit him.
Did you really think anyone would help you? Did you think Severus of all people would? Of course not.
Of course he had hurt her, for reasons she had no wish to find out. Of course she was as alone in this as in anything else.
When Petunia turned around and left it was with the knowledge that she had lost too much that night. Maybe more than she could stand.
❀