This isn't quite the place for it, but it's the best place. I'm in the middle of writing my fic, and I'm sort of stuck on the 3rd chapter. I'm trying to keep Petunia close to canon but am failing miserably. In my defense, I'd like to think that given the state of affairs that Dudley has gotten himself into, she'd snap but I'm told by all 3 of my betas that she's out in left field. I desperately need suggestions on how I can keep her in character without sacrificing the effect of the chapter. The following is the last paragraph of the second chapter and the third. Comments please!

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However, before Ron could ponder longer on the strange occurrences of the evening, another voice, slightly muffled yet loud enough to be heard pervaded their ears as they swiveled to look at the source of emanation, the front door. “Down! Down, you stupid mutt! Oh, for heaven’s sake quit it, get! Get out of here!” The door opened with a click, and slammed shut, and Harry very suddenly found himself face to face with his Aunt Petunia and cousin Dudley.

Chapter 3: Confrontations

The look of surprise had barely died away from Petunia’s bony, horse-like face before it was replaced with a look that was equal parts anger and annoyance at seeing her nephew before her. Contempt was thinly veiled in her voice, and she spat out her words in a manner that would have caused Snape to recoil in horror, “What are you doing here?” The malevolent glint in her eyes was practically poisonous to behold. The most surprising of all, however, was the look of terror in Dudley’s eyes.

Harry sneered, any respect for his aunt long lost with the neglect and abuse she and her family had heaped on him during the past 15 and one half years of his life. “Let’s see – I live here, not by choice mind you, but I do live here.”

She looked at him, the glint now shining dangerously, as though it were close to jumping out of her head and seizing Harry by then neck. “I meant what are you doing home so early, you little ingrate? You weren’t supposed to be home for another week!” She was turning redder now, and Harry could see a vein starting to bulge in her neck, reminiscent of Vernon.

“The Headmaster was killed by one of my Professors, so they sent everyone home early. They’re not sure if they’re going to reopen it, either,” Harry finished with a shrug, not really caring anyways. He had hidden Horcruxes to hunt; he hadn’t planned on going back anyways. “Why’s Dudley home, then?” he asked, noticing his cousin trying to sneak quietly off while his mother was raging at himself.

She whirled around, and caught him trying to sneak past the kitchen and upstairs. If the look of fury she had on her face for Harry was designed to injure, then her look for Dudley would certainly kill him on the spot. “SIT!” she hollered at Dudley, who, looking like a deer caught in the headlights, obeyed, flopping onto one of the chairs which creaked dangerously. Turning back to Harry, she responded, practically spitting with anger. “He was caught beating another child up. It was serious enough that they sent him down to the station and called me to come get him. Not only that, but they had tape of him smoking marijuana and assaulting other children. He’s been trumped up on two charges of assault and one charge of possession.”

Dudley let out a strangled yelp and obviously tried to exclaim his innocence, but it was interrupted by Petunia, her voice rising above his grunting. “I don’t give a damn – I’ve turned a blind eye to everything you’ve done long enough. This time it stops here, you’ll serve your time, and then you’ll get a job like everyone else and finally pull your own weight.” She whirled about and walked to the stairs. “VERNON!” she shouted, calling for him, and Harry cringed, knowing that he had to speak up and once again draw her wrath upon himself again.

“Erm… Aunt Petunia… Vernon is outside,” he stuttered, and she turned to look at him blankly, the anger on her face reminding Harry unpleasantly of the 60-foot basilisk he had killed in his second year.

“What in cotton is he doing outside, it’s pouring buckets!” she said, not even noticing Harry’s knowing look or his damp clothing.

Harry paused, not quite knowing how to avoid saying something to earn Petunia’s ire. “Well, when he hit me, we – that is to say – I – I transfigured him into a dog,” he equivocated, trying to protect Ron and Hermione from reproach.

“You transformed him into a – did you say he hit you?” she started, her eyes again whirling. “Come here, boy!” she yelled as she reached for his face, grabbing it roughly and observing the bruise that was rapidly forming, dark blue and forbidding. Harry winced as she placed her thumb on it, pulling his chin up and to the side to better view it. She paused, frowning, “Vernon did this to you?” she asked.

Nodding, Harry pulled away, watching Petunia carefully. She seemed galvanized by the news, giving Dudley a piteous look, yet a look filled with no less anger than before. “I should have done this a long time ago,” she muttered to herself as she strode over to the door, yanking it open, and yelling as loud as was humanly possible, “VERNON DURSLEY!”

A very pudgy bulldog, slug ectoplasm trailing down its’ chops, came waddling up very slowly, stepped inside the house, and shook itself free of rain, soaking everyone else from head to toe. Turning slowly towards Harry, Petunia intoned, “Turn him back. Now.”

Harry stuttered slightly, then looked over at his shoulder to Hermione, who with a nod of her head and a flick of her wrist shot a blue pulse at the dog, who slowly morphed back into Harry’s Uncle Vernon, who, like a bat out of Hell, shot out his arms to hit Hermione.

There was a loud crack! and Vernon found himself sitting outside on his bottom, looking shell-shocked. As the sudden gust of wind died down and Harry’s breathing returned to normal, he realized that he had again perpetrated an act of accidental magic, his first since his 3rd year when he had accidentally inflated Vernon’s sister Marge like a balloon. “Never,” he breathed, “Never hit one of my friends.”

Petunia grayed and stared at Vernon. “Vernon,” she spoke quietly, her voice shaking with an emotion that Harry supposed was anger: “Did you hit the boy?”

Vernon had obviously misinterpreted the same expression, and responded angrily, “That ruddy boy is ungrateful, thinks he can push us around. I’ll show him a thing or two,” he said, starting to get up, fists clenching angrily, as if readying them for a quick shot into Harry’s gut.

Evidently this was all the evidence that Petunia needed, because her eyes narrowed dangerously and her voice became very hoarse again. “Vernon, our son… your son was arrested today. He hit another child. He smoked marijuana,” she spat this with utmost vehemence, “The school says he’s a menace. Smeltings has expelled him.” Vernon spluttered at this, trying to say something but Petunia continued, unrelenting. “The police say that if he commits any other crime he will serve time. They say the parents of the students he assaulted are thinking of pressing charges.”

At this, Vernon did manage to get some words out. “Nonsense – Dudders? He wouldn’t harm a fly, he’s vicious, but he wouldn’t harm a fly. I don’t want him turning out as a nancy-boy anyways. Even if he did, he’d be a real man, it’s practically the code of the School at Smeltings, they encourage that sort of thing!” he exploded, droplets of spit flying everywhere, clinging onto his moustache, “Survival of the fittest and all. I bet they just made that rubbish up, anyways.”

Petunia’s face twisted into a strange twisted smile that was perhaps more venomous than any other creature alive. “Oh, no, they have video evidence, and there is no doubt about it, it was Dudley.” Her eyes lit up, now ablaze, and she placed her hands on her hips, the illusion of icy anger now gone and replaced with a look of a pot about to blow its lid. “I agreed with you that Dudley was the perfect child, Vernon. I thought, that, compared with… the other, he was the best child alive. When they said he was fat and bullied people, I looked the other way. I thought I knew him better than that, thought I had raised him better than that.” She paused, “He came back again, and he was larger than a whale. It was hard to miss. Still, I thought, ‘He’s just a growing boy, it’s normal for a growing boy to fight with his peers.’ And it kept coming, and I kept denying it, thinking that I had raised him poorly. And finally, when Albus – when the other’s Headmaster came, and told us we had been abusing him, I even ignored that. I was blinded by my inability to accept that I had done something wrong.” She stopped, and the wind stopped outside briefly, creating a hollow, echoing effect that all sound seemed to seep into, before exploding outward in a violent display of anger.

“We made a vow that we would raise a child that would be better, better than one of them. I grew up thinking and being told I was not as special, not as good as her because I wasn’t given any magical powers, and so we vowed – I vowed, and you did too, when I married you, that we would both raise a child that was smarter, better mannered, stronger, someone better than any witch or wizard, to prove for my parents once and for all that we were better without any abnormal condition.”

“And you know what, Vernon? I did my best. I raised the boy the best I could, AND YOU MADE HIM A CRIMINAL! I did my best to be a mother, and you taught him how to hit people. Vernon Dursley, tonight you sleep outside!” she screamed, slamming the door shut in his face. Harry took a step back as she pivoted, walked to the closet, grabbed an impermeable, and strode back to the door. Opening it, she tossed it on the still-shocked Vernon, then slammed it again, flipping the deadbolts and latching the door. Still raving angry, she turned on Harry.

“You’re just as bad as… James… or that awful boy she brought home that once. If you value your life you won’t touch that door,” she said in a threatening tone, before drawing the curtains closed and plunking down on one of the armchairs.

Harry blinked twice, trying to take in what had just happened. His aunt had just kicked his uncle out of the house, mentioned his father, and, most disturbingly in his opinion, mentioned that his mother had brought home another man at one point in time. Harry was not too disturbed that Petunia had said his father was bad; he knew to take whatever she said with a grain or two of salt.


...

From here it goes on, but I'd really rather only give the information that is relevant to the section.

 

very very amusing... i thnk its POSSILE for her to act this way since the neighors would undoubtedly find out and theyd ruin her little act of being a perfectly normal family... itd put her in the same catagory as james and those lot in the neighors opinion ...

 

She was totally out of character. Vernon might have been the one to encourage the violence, but she was the one to spoil Dudley. She loved him more than she loves her husband or herself. She'd never think badly of him. She would not just changed her opinion of him suddenly just because he was kicked out of school. She'd say that the other boy antagonized him. She'd say that he smoked the pot because of peer pressure. She'd blame everything she could before she'd blame her Diddy Dumpkins.

And she should not be so upset about Vernon hitting Harry. She herself hit him with a damn frying pan in CoS.

 

I personally think it may be in character for Petunia... it's reminiscent of her tirade about Lily in PS. We actually don't know very much about Petunia in canon, so anything that is even vaguely similar to how we see her in the books could be interpreted as in character.

 

But you're forgetting that she HATES Lily. She even mentioned how inferior she felt to Lily in Elias' post. She hates Lily and Magic with ever fiber of her being!

She does not, however, hate Dudley or Vernon. Their family, although strange, is very tightly-knit. They have a constant enemy -- Potter and his Freakishness -- and it drives them closer. Don't you remember how far Vernon went to protect his family from Magic? He almost drove himself insane in trying to defend them from it's influence.

Petunia loves Vernon and Dudley. They're her anchors; they keep her sane. She needs them, and she would not give them up over something as worldy as Dudley being expelled from school.

Petunia was way out of her field. However, I don't think it would be possible to make a rift in the family without a lot of OOCness, so Elias, don't strive to keep your Dersleys IC if you want to have a rift in the family. I've never seen it done well, and I very much doubt that it ever will.

 

Well, I have a feeling that regardless of how hard I fudge the story trying to get it to stay IC, someone is going to say 'hey, Petunia is OOC,' and I'd probably agree with them. I guess what I'm trying to get it to the point of is where the skeptics can say, 'OK, under those circumstances, Petunia might snap.' I've tried to give her a bit of a deeper thing, one perhaps we don't see from the first six books, as maybe a sign that Harry is maturing as a character, namely that there was a bit of favoritism (or at least in Petunia's eyes) between their daughters and she has a resultant inferiority complex from that. As a result she (and Vernon, although maybe not wholeheartedly) agreed to raise a child trying to make him better than any wizarding child could be to prove vicariously that Petunia wasn't inferior. This is my justification for why she may have treated Harry so harshly - the added combination of her intense hatred of Lily and the fact that she wanted to see her child succeed over her marvelous sister's. Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to overly humanize Petunia - she's still far in the wrong for hitting a child with a frying pan, but it changes a problem which is 'just because' into a deeper more meaningful thing.

 

Look, the Dersleys beat, starved, and worked Harry, and then rewarded him by locking him up alone in a dark cupboard for weeks on end. They aren't humans. They're wolves.

And wolves stick together, don't they?

The reason that they treated Harry like that is irrelavant. Petunia's sister was at a boarding school, and she went to a local school, and because her parents showed a lot of affection towards Lily when the girl was at home, Petunia felt like she was inferior. She wasn't seen as inferior, though; she was just a more common sight.

She's demented for making Harry suffer for her oh, so awful childhood. It's obvious that her childhood wasn't miserable at all -- I would go as far as to guess that she was spoilt in her youth. But because Lily was even more pampered on the rare occassion that she was at home, Petunia feels like she got a very raw deal.

Petunia should die a very slow and painful death. Don't humanize her. Don't say that it's society's fault that she's the way she is. She's a fucking rabid wolf and she needs to be put down.

 

For starters, I'm not trying to make you mad, and apologise if I am. I do appreciate this very much - doing it in advance will save me having to respond to 8 billion reviews saying that Petunia is largely OOC. It's also something that I've been debating with myself, and there have been a couple changes made already, and I'll post it the next post I make.

Agreed. It's inexcuseable, and people like this deserve to be locked away and have the key thrown away. Unfortunately, I can't do this right at the start of my story, especially when the main theme is 'Fixing the world starts one step at a time'. They'll get what they've got coming to them eventually, but I'm not going to do a huge leap from canon and have an anvil fall on their head, dropped by Harry.

Petunia wasn't probably treated unfairly. She was most likely loved very much by the way her parents are made out. I don't think this would stop Petunia from feeling very jealous of Lily, and perhaps having a self-induced inferiority complex. You say that I shouldn't make it society's fault, and I couldn't agree more, I don't want to do that. This is not really anyone's fault - It's what happens when one sibling in a family is very talented or gifted and the other isn't. I see it with my cousins - the little one is always overshadowed by his older brother who is a very talented artist. The poor little kid is always being stepped on, and he's very smart and cool in his own way, but he's not a genius at anything, really. This isn't to say that Petunia isn't responsible partially for her inferiority complex - I'm sure, like I said, she had a caring home life, but I think canon is pretty clear when it comes to it that Petunia was very jealous and posessed at least a mild inferiority complex.

Yeah, she's pretty demented for doing that to anyone, let alone Harry. Like I said, abuse of anyone isn't excusable, and the last thing I want to say is 'zOMG, let's forgive Petunia because she's had a shitty childhood!'. The point I'm trying to convey with that particular bit of writing is that Petunia had alterior motives - specifically, trying to prove to her bitter illusioned self that she was better (or at least equal) to Lily. In this way, trying to make her son succeed, she'd be very likely to beat down the standard he had to match up to (Harry), and most likely wouldn't feel a pang of regret. Now that the neighbours will know that Dudley is a criminal, they may doubt her word about Potter, and although she may know, deep down, perhaps where the very tiny human bit of her remains that Harry has always been better than Dudley (ironically, because of her mollycoddling of Dudley), now the neighbours know, and for Petunia that is irrevocable and heads must roll.

She should, I'm not intending to, it's not society's fault, and she should be put down, agreed. Her treatment of Harry is inexcusable, but that's not to say there's not a reason for it.

I don't really want to get into Vernon yet. He's driven by totally different things than Petunia, although a common thread is a hate for magic and anything that represents it it (Potter). I'd go even a step farther, and argue, if this was my english honours dissertation (which, thank god, isn't for another 3 years) that Petunia doesn't hate magic so much as she is jealous, although I suspect I might get a lot of people riding me for that thought. She does say in canon, I'm aware, essentially that 'I hate magic', but would she ridicule music if Lily were a child prodigy at cello?

Anyways, stepping back, because that's not important, I do think you're right that they are pulled together by their hate of Harry, or at least allows them to ignore their own dysfunctionality in favor of Harry Hunting. I don't think Petunia would be phased by Dudley being expelled, because that could be covered up as just a hateful teacher or something. However, Dudders getting arrested would creep out and I think she would be ashamed that Dudley was actually labeled as a criminal while Harry was just going by reputation.

I think one of the downsides of the excerpt I've given you is you can't see (and probably won't see in the finished version) how Petunia passes it off - I think when she's not within her own house, when she's out in the community, and she was confronted with it, she'd either lie or say that Harry's uncureably criminal behavior rubbed off on Dudley. However, the fact that her world is in jeopardy from the inside would be more than enough for her to take steps to protect it - such as trying to fix Dudley. Throwing Vernon out for the night would be harsh, but she's notably pissed off and she's just found someone to blame for Dudley's shortcomings. In this way it's sort of a defense mechanism - she's able to protect her self-worth, especially as a mother, and cling to her desperate hope that she is not truly inferior (which once again, has been fabricated by herself).

*breathes again*

 

actualy... according to the UK version, which has a lot more aout lilly james and petunia and all them, she WAS spoiled but then her parents found out Lily was a witch and pretty much ignored her not COMPLETELY mind you but nothing she could ever do was better than lily, so she resents her and inturn Harry

she is, in other words, the female counterpart to snape, without the whole killkillkill bit,,,

 

No, I'm not mad at all.

She could just as easily say that the Policeman was jealous of her perfect little Diddydums.

I just can't see Petunia ever repremanding Dudley for anything. If he was found guilty of rape, Petunia would say that the little harlet was a golddigger.

I also think that she'd perhaps say that Potter's freakishness contaminated him rather than blame herself or Vernon. They're perfectly normal people, after all, how could they possibly make such an awful mistake as to raise a criminal? She wouldn't tell Vernon to sleep on the lawn, at least -- what would the neighbours say about that?

From what I've read of the Dersleys, I've noticed that all negativity in the Dersley household inevitably comes to smack Harry painfully in the face.

 

(Longer Version) Edit:

My personal goal in this fanfic is to rectify what I felt was wrong in HBP, and tie up some of the loose ends in the series sufficiently. I'm trying to write in the general style of JKR - obviously I have a very different style of writing, I mean, hell, I'm Canadian - but I'm not going to jump off into the deep end soon. Things will be a slowl logical progression and I hope to add to the world in the same style rather than just introducing a new character that is a new race or super-powered. Super-powered Harry has always seem contrived to me - we only know of Dumbles and Voldie who are very powerful wizards (and I'd be hesitant to group Snape in there but I do think he belongs there) and they have been studying for 50+ years. Rest easy though, the date of this particular chapter, according to my notes is Tuesday, June 18, 1996 - and within 2 months the trio is no longer a trio technically. More details to follow but I don't want to spoil too much.

I see what you're trying to say, although I don't know if a policeman would be logically jealous of Dudley. The point is she'd try to rationalise Dudley's behavior, and I totally agree with that. However, I don't think she's unintelligent - not the smartest cookie in the jar, but not dumb by a long shot - and I'm pretty sure she'd recognise she couldn't do that in a court of law. It's the threat of persecution that really messes things up for her.

This is kind of where I diverge from your thoughts. I think Vernon, especially would take this route - let's blame someone else. I don't see Vernon as nearly as smart as Petunia, and I think he would honestly believe that Dudley was truly in the right. I think Petunia would try to, but I don't think she would think that way, and under pressure I'm sure she would show her true colours, so-to-speak.

I have no doubt - and the downside of this excerpt is you can't see anything after it, yet - that although she may not blame Harry, she may take it out her anger on his hide. I just don't think Petunia, smart as she is, can rationalise away Dudley assaulting 2 people (which, btw, have been changed to be a student and his headmaster!). However, she'll try and make it easier on Dudley to appear better by being extra harsh on Harry. She's angry at Vernon because she has sort of snapped - she can't blame Potter, because he wasn't around last summer or this summer yet, and she's not dumb enough to actually think that he's corrupted Dudley. She won't blame Dudley because he walks on water in her mind, like you said, the crime is serious enough she can't blame the people who were attacked, and so she feels it is her fault that she's been a bad mother or something, but when she finds out that Vernon has hit Harry she seizes upon that like a wolf to roadkill and uses him as a scapegoat to avoid her true issues.

So true, it's so unequivocably true, and so will this. Harry will be treated more harsh than ever before, but he's got Ron and Hermione for a bit until he's 17 so he will fight back a bit.

 

I can't promise it immediately - I hate Ron and Hermione as a couple so much; the concept of a relationship based on argument isn't a relationship, it's just unresolved sexual tension. That being said, JKR has chosen to have Hermione and Ron look at each other google-eyed for a while. She said in her interview, somewhat paraphrased,

Well, hello, ambiguity at it's finest. Even if we think she's talking about Ron and Hermione getting together she's made no comment about them splitting. Additionally, everyone who loves H/G has made the comment about their split at the end of the year:

...to which my fervent reply is 'This ain't Spiderman.'

I don't think any couple that was in HBP will be around for good in HPOC (my book, no relation to the show on FOX) with maybe the exception of L/T and B/F, and I wouldn't be surprised if I killed one of those four off, at least. I do whatever I think would play out. Most people write extensive plans; I write a basic outline of plot events and let everything play itself out, like life.

Oh, and for the trio, there will be a death, yes, even though it won't be who you expect and it won't be how you expect it.

 

Elias, you and I see Petunia very differently. You seem to think that she's intelligent. I, however, think that she's completely delusional.

 

Elias, where are the first two chapters of the story?

 

Not here, obviously. I believe he was just posting that much to outline the problem with the OOC-Petunia and to recieve insight. I wish there was a link, or when it is posted he leaves a note on where to find it. *hint to author* I'd like to take a look.