The next Sunday, at dinner, Harry was eating his dinner and glanced at Bill. Bill gave him a thumbs up and reassuring smile, so Harry stood and said, "Um. I-I have some things I need to tell you all. It-it's about..."
He stopped when he saw Bill put his hands on his own bony shoulders. Harry smiled.
"I have a lot of secrets I've been keeping. And, since you're all basically my family, I thought I should tell you guys. Everything. So...if you wanna listen, meet me back here in an hour."
Harry still looked nervous. He turned to go and saw Hermione had caught his wrist. She leaned into his ear and whispered, "I'm really proud of you."
He smiled and left the kitchen to get cleaned up.
•••••••••••••••An Hour Later•••••••••••••
Harry reentered the kitchen and sat down at the empty table. He laid his head in his arms and exhaled. He sat there, doing his best not to have a panic attack when he felt a strong but gentle hand on his back. He jumped and drew his wand, pointing it at the so-called intruder.
"Oh, sorry Arthur. Force of habit."
He smiled sheepishly.
Arthur smiled back kindly.
"No problem m'boy. Are you okay?"
Harry shrugged. "To be honest, I'm scared."
Arthur smiled sadly as more people came in.
When they were all sitting Harry started.
"Um-okay. How do I start?"
"Childhood?" Percy suggested.
"O-okay. I don't remember much about before the Dursleys, but they've hated me s'long as I can remember. Th-they wo-uld l-lo-loc"
Harry could feel his heartbeat racing dangerously. Bill saw this too and whispered something to George who, in as quick as a flash, picked Harry up and plopped him onto his own lap.
Harry rolled his eyes, but George knew he was thankful.
"Th-they wo-uld l-lo-loc"
"Calm down Harry. You're going to make yourself sick. Calm down." Bill coached.
George whispered, "In. Out. Iiin. Ouuut. In. Out."
Once Harry was calm, he again said, "They locked me in a-a...in a cupb-board."
If Harry wasn't so worked up, I'm not sure the family could've held their anger in. Dad looked like he might kill someone, and he didn't look like that often.
Harry took another deep breath.
"I-I cooked and cleaned everything. I-if I didn't...I got p-pun-I-shed."
Everybody was now also nervous because they’d never seen Harry like this. He looked so miserable and looked like he was hyperventilating.
Bill gave him a look that asked, Are you okay?
To which Harry rolled his eyes but nodded.
He took a deep breath.
He tried to talk but couldn’t form the words. He turned in George’s lap and whispered.
“I-I can’t do it. It’s too hard. I want to…it just won’t come out!”
He whispered to George and Bill spoke.
“Want me to tell them, Harry?” Upon receiving a nod, he continued. “Those…relatives of Harry’s thought good punishments were starvation…locking him up in cupboards…and-they”
Harry winced, waiting for all the looks of pity and questions.
“-left bruises.”
There was an intake of breath and then a sob.
But it all stopped instantly when Bill motioned to Harry, his face hidden by George.
He came out of his hiding place and said, “Look, I-I know you’ll wanna t-talk about this, but there’s more. So let’s move on. For the rest of my childhood, when I turned eleven, I accidentally set a snake on my cousin. And then when my Hogwarts letter came…well they hid it from me. Several more came. Vernon moved us to a hut on an island place. Hagrid knocked the door down and said, ‘Harry yer a wizard’ So that was my childhood.”
There was a stunned silence. George snickered. This was the first time he’d laughed since Fred died.
Then everyone else laughed too.
“a snake! You let loose a snake!”
“it was an accident!”
Bill didn’t want to interrupt, but he knew they needed sleep.
“Guys, we can continue tomorrow. Let’s get some sleep.”
And that’s what they did.