• Serena Black •

„Mr. and Mrs. Dursley, of number four, Privet Drive, were proud to say that they were perfectly normal."

The tension was high at number four Privet Drive. The imminent arrival of several wizards made the Dursleys irritable and nervous, and Vernon Dursley in particular almost had a stroke when he learned that someone would be coming to pick up Harry at five the next afternoon. At least, that's how Harry had described it in his letter, so Serena was very excited to finally meet the messed up part of his family.

At five o'clock sharp, Remus finally pressed the doorbell of the neat terraced house. Serena let her eyes wander over the small front garden, where small beds of pink flowers had been planted. It actually looked quite friendly. If she didn't know any better, she would probably have assumed that a nice family would live in the small house.

There was silence for a while, with only a bird singing its song, before the door was opened by a man as broad as he was tall. Harry had not exaggerated when he said that his uncle looked like a walrus. There were large sweat stains on his black suit. Although he had obviously dressed up just for them, Serena couldn't help feeling that he was just trying to impress them and thought he was better than they were, the way he looked down on them.

Harry didn't hide his surprise when he saw his former teacher at the door instead of one of the Weasleys or even his godfather.

"You must be Harry's uncle!" Remus eyed him for a moment. Serena credited him for being able to hide the revulsion in his gaze so well, but presumably that had been the very reason why he, of all people, had been sent to fetch Harry. Finally, he held out his hand to Mr Dursley.

Hesitantly, and with a very firm handshake, as if he were about to smash his counterpart's hand, he shook his hand and let him into the house with a rather reluctant expression. Only now did the family seem to notice that he had not come alone, for just before Serena entered, Mr Dursley was about to close the door. Serena grinned at him. "Hello, I'm a friend of Harry's. Serena Black."

She emphasised the surname deliberately, because Harry had told her that his relatives had only let him go because he had threatened them with his mass-murdering godfather. Serena assumed that the news from last summer had not passed them by either, and the Muggle news never reported her father's innocence.

Mr Dursley made a move not to let her in, but it was too late, she was already at the stairs and together with Remus greeted Harry. "Are your things all packed?"

"My trunk's upstairs," he replied, running up a creaking staircase to fetch it. Stealthily, Serena began to look around the entrance hall. It was rather narrow and almost too cramped for the number of people gathered outside. It smelled of cleaning products and flowers. Almost as innocent as the exterior of the house had suggested. But appearances were deceiving. Serena knew for a fact that Harry had lived behind the small, white-painted door under the stairs until he was eleven.

Unobtrusively, Mr Dursley's massive body shifted in front of it as he must have noticed Serena's gaze. With a half-inviting gesture, he gestured towards the living room. But he pulled a face as if he would have liked to chase the visitors back out the door. Serena followed Remus into the rather kitschy room. She was blown away by the peach-coloured furnishings and discovered that Harry's uncle was far from the oddest of the house's inhabitants.

Dudley Dursley stared at her, meanwhile running his hand over his fleshy bottom for some not entirely obvious reason, which he tried to hide from her by sliding along the wall and finally hiding behind his father. Mrs Dursley, meanwhile, with a pinched expression, adjusted the reddish cushions on the same-coloured armchair, which was decorated with a floral pattern. Serena merely frowned as Dudley sewed past Mr Dursley's elbow. Hadn't Harry told her that Hagrid had given him a pig's tail? She had to hide a grin at the thought. That was probably why he was grabbing his bum the whole time.

"You must be Harry's cousin," Remus made a valiant attempt at conversation, smiling benignly at the boy. But he merely opened his pale blue eyes and seemed relieved when Harry re-entered the room. "Yep," he replied for him and exchanged a fleeting glance with Serena. He had told her so much about his cousin that they both found it hard to keep a serious expression at that moment. "This is Dudley."

Dudley was still clutching his bottom as if afraid it might fall off. Or that someone would get the idea of trying to decorate it with yet another pig's curl. Remus, however, who knew nothing of his teething troubles with the magical world, seemed a little worried. "Enjoying your summer break, Dudley?" he asked in a pointedly friendly manner.

The boy merely whimpered and clenched his hands even tighter around his backside so that his knuckles turned white. Meanwhile, Serena pulled a bag of sweets from her pocket. It was a little amusing to see the family that had made Harry's entire life miserable cowering before someone like her and Remus.

"All right," Remus finally broke the awkward silence. "We'll be on our way then." At the same moment, a fat toffee bean suddenly rolled out of Serena's bag onto the floor. She saw the eyes of those present follow the bean's path before it came to rest in front of the sofa. "Oops," she said, bending down to give the appearance of picking up the bean.

"Well then... Goodbye," Harry said half-heartedly to the Dursleys and was already one foot out the door when Remus stopped him. He looked reproachfully at his relatives. It was obvious that he had to pull himself together to keep from raising his voice. "Aren't you going to say goodbye to your nephew?"

"It's all right," Harry murmured with an emphatically indifferent expression, but it was written in his eyes that he had long since become accustomed to such behaviour than to feel disappointment. Serena was beginning to feel sorry for him. Now that she saw with her own eyes how he was being treated, it was something completely different than just listening to his stories.

But Remus kept his hand vehemently on Harry's shoulder. "You won't see him again for another year. Are you sure you don't want to at least say goodbye? By Mer... For God's sake, he's your nephew and he grew up with you!"

Restless, Harry's uncle's eyes darted to the wand in Remus's pocket to Serena, who stood beside Harry with raised eyebrows. His little pea-brain seemed to be working at full speed. Serena could hardly believe that he couldn't even bring himself to say goodbye. That really didn't hurt anyone. Finally, he muttered a pained "Goodbye, Harry".

"See you," Harry said, the corners of his mouth twitching, and now he too put his other foot over the threshold. Serena wanted to do the same. At that moment, however, a terrible screaming sounded behind them. Serena tried to put on an innocent face as she turned around. She was getting the hang of it.

By now, Dudley was no longer standing with his parents, but was kneeling beside a coffee table with a brightly coloured toffee paper lying on the floor in front of him. His head, meanwhile, had swelled at least twice its size and resembled a melon more than before.

Serena would have preferred it to be his tongue or even his bottom, but the twins had not explained to her the different colours of the toffees. Mrs Dursley threw herself to the ground next to her son, grabbed the huge skull and tried to squeeze it back down in a panic. Meanwhile, her husband barked a few words and waved his arms wildly.

Remus tried to shout over his loud screaming. "Don't worry, I can help him!" he shouted and walked towards the boy with his wand outstretched. Mrs Dursely began to shriek and threw herself over her son like a blanket to protect him from the supposed attack.

Serena looked at Harry, who was biting his lower lip. She had felt guilty at first, but after seeing how they treated him, she had had no choice. Remus continued to placate the Muggle family. "That was just a simple Swell Charm, I could reverse that in less than a second."

But Harry's relatives did not relent. On the contrary. Mr Dursley grabbed a porcelain figurine on the side table and hurled it with all his might in Remus' direction. With a loud crack, the piece of jewellery shattered against the fireplace, missing its target by only a few centimetres. Serena drew in a sharp breath and tugged at Harry's sleeve. "Come on," she whispered, pulling him outside as his uncle reached for the next figurine.

"What was that?" asked Harry after the two couldn't hold back their laughter and stumbled into the sunny front garden.

"Fred and George..." Serena couldn't continue as she was again shaken by a fit of laughter. She gasped for breath. "...Wanted me to give this to Dudley, they developed it themselves."

At that moment, Remus stormed out the door as well. His amber eyes narrowed to slits and flew searchingly over the small front yard before they latched onto Serena. She had never seen him so beside himself. Now she did feel guilty again. "I hope you have a good explanation for this, young lady."

"Apparently his parents didn't teach him that you shouldn't eat anything off the floor," she stubbornly stuck to her point. After all, strictly speaking, she hadn't given it to him at all. In fact, it was his own fault. "Besides, he deserved it."

"Come on," her godfather finally sighed, shaking his head, and seemed to want to leave the Privet Drive as quickly as possible. He held out both his arms for the teenagers to hold onto. "We apparate."

The next thing Serena felt was that everything around her went black and she felt as if she were being squeezed through a tight rubber tube. From all sides, an unknown force pressed violently against her and tightened around her chest, making it difficult for her to breathe. As quickly as the feeling had come, however, it had disappeared and the Gryffindor noticed that people were already staring at her intently.

"Did he bite?", Fred asked her impatiently.

"Yes," Serena replied with a grin, demonstrating with her hands the extent of Dudley Dursley's swollen head. "His head was the size of a melon."

The twins laughed, but Remus still didn't seem to find it funny. To all three of them he began to give a stern lecture, which even Mr Weasley didn't stay out of when he found out about the situation.

"What's going on here?" asked Sirius irritably as he entered the room to greet Harry.

"Fred and George put your daughter up to giving Harry's cousin one of their toffees," Remus enlightened him. "You know, the kind they gave you. In his case, however, it was the head that swelled up. Apparently they thought it was very funny, since he's a Muggle."

He gave a barking laugh before noticing Remus' indignant look and quickly cleared his throat. "Well, I think you'd better refrain from using Muggles in your target groups. Although he certainly deserved to have his head blown up."

"Besides, we didn't want to give it to him because he's a Muggle!" defended George indignantly, crossing both arms in front of his chest. Serena nodded. "You saw for yourself how they treated Harry!"

"He's done much worse to me," Harry agreed with her quietly. Remus merely sighed, but looked troubled. Nevertheless, he seemed to want to let it go for the time being. After all, he knew about his family situation.

"Oh, hello, Harry dear!" Mrs Weasley had just stepped into the room and happily put both hands to the newcomer's cheeks. But as she looked around, the mother seemed to sense immediately that something had happened. Her eyes narrowed and remained fixed on the twins, probably out of habit. "What happened?"

Before anyone could answer, Serena had grabbed Harry by the arm and was hurriedly pulling him up the white marble stairs. "Come on, I'll show you your room."

After tempers had gradually calmed down in the course of the afternoon, the teenagers passed the time until evening with a few rounds of Quidditch. It was already dark when Mr Weasley finally sent them to bed, shaking his head. After all, they would have to get up very early the next morning to be in time for the worldcup final.