Love Enough for Both by Manwe Valarian



Summary: Harry heard a goblin speaking and he came out of temporary stupor. He was surrounded by witches and wizards all staring at him. The most shocking thing was he had his arms around someone. Who was she and how did they get here?
Rating: PG-13 starstarstarstarhalf-star
Categories: Alternate Universe
Characters: None
Genres: None
Warnings: None
Challenges: None
Series: None
Published: 2012.10.25
Updated: 2018.05.01


Love Enough for Both by Manwe Valarian
Chapter 44: Dealing with a New Reality
Author's Notes:

Petunia Dursley took a deep breath as she approached the front door of the hospital. The clothes she wore were not up to her standards. Her stocking had holes in them her dress was fortunately long enough to cover the holes. Thank goodness she had always bought the best clothes that would last, because the last year had been horrid.

Vernon had been put away in this hospital because he was defending her from those freaks. Grunnings Tool and Die went bankrupt and Vernon lost his job and his severance pay. They had some savings tucked away, but not enough to keep up with the mortgage or for Dudley to go to Stonewall.

She had been forced to leave their beautiful home at Privet Drive. Her and Dudley moved in with Marge, but that didn’t work out. When Marge started using the cane on poor little Dudders, she took her beloved son and moved into one of those low rent apartments on the outskirts of London.

Marge was such an unreasonable woman. She demanded that Dudders should work his hands to the bone to help pay for them staying there. Petunia was cleaning and picking up after Marge and her filthy dogs already, but she expected Dudders to clean out the dog’s pens. It was filthy work and demeaning to a boy such as poor little Dudders.

Marge didn’t have a telly at her house. She didn’t believe in them. Poor Dudley suffered so, because he couldn’t watch his shows. Petunia felt cut off from the world there, but at least it was a decent place to live, once one got used to the smell of dogs.

Marge wouldn’t even allow Petunia to use her car to see Vernon, the bank took Vernon’s lovely car along with the house. Marge herself never visited Vernon. She wouldn’t be caught dead in one of those hospitals. She was embarrassed that Vernon had ended up there. It didn’t matter that he was placed there wrongly. He was protecting her and Dudley from those freaks, while they were attacking all of England.

It only took a week for Marge to complain about how much Dudley was eating. She even had the audacity to restrict his food at meals. Dudley is a young active growing boy who needs his meals. Marge was trying to starve him by only allowing him one plate of food at each meal. After three months poor Dudders had enough of being starved. He complained to Marge. She called Dudders a “big lazy lump”. Dudders called her “a mean old hag”. That was when she hit him with her cane and told them to leave her house.

It took a week for Petunia to find a place to live and a job to pay for it. They were living just a few miles from the hospital where Vernon was being held captive. It wasn’t a very nice flat or a nice neighborhood, but it was all they could afford. She found a job cleaning at a local hotel making the minimum wage.

The flat didn’t even have furniture they slept on the floor. Marge kept all their lovely furniture in her barn and refused to give it to them until they paid her. She demanded forty pounds sterling a week rent from them. All the work they had done for her was for the food.

She needed to get Vernon out of that bloody hospital. She heard that Grunnings had started up again. Vernon had worked on the biggest deal in Grunnings history. They were going to grow to be the largest tool and die company in England because of the deal that he worked out. Then those bloody freaks attacked and ruined it all. He deserved to get his job back.

It bothered her that they didn’t qualify for help from the government. People whose houses were destroyed were getting money to rebuild, but they couldn’t get it because of Vernon’s condition. They were victims of that war just as much as anyone else.

Petunia focused back on the task at hand. Convincing the ruddy Doctor to let Vernon out of this hospital. They believe he was a danger to society.

“Good Morning, Mrs. Dursley,” said the receptionist. “I see you have an appointment. The doctor is waiting for you. You can leave your purse in one of those cubbies. You are not carrying any weapons or contraband on your person?”

“I most certainly am not,” she snapped at the rude receptionist. “I am not a criminal and neither is my husband.”

Petunia took off her shoes before stepping through the metal detectors. The metal buckle always set off the blasted thing. After passing through the detector, a guard opened the heavy door, so she could entire the East London Hospital for Mental Health. She almost laughs every time she sees that sign. It is a prison for the criminally insane, which Vernon is not, thank you very much.

She put her shoes on and continued to walk down the shiny hallway. This part of the hospital reminded her of an office building. There were small offices lining both sides of the hallway with curtained windows and wooden doors. She glanced in the occasional open door at the offices, only to see clutter on all these doctor’s desks. Couldn’t they clean their desks. It made her skin crawl to think about how dirty these doctors were.

She finally came to the end of the hallway. There was a door there. She pressed the buzzer to get the guards attention. A reedy voice came over the intercom.

“Yes, what can I do for you?”

“I am Petunia Dursley, come to see my husband, Vernon Dursley.”

“Yes, you are to meet in conference room two. Please come in after the buzzer sounds,” said the reedy voice.

There was a buzz and Petunia grabbed the door knob. It seemed difficult to turn, but it came free. She was glad to be able to see her husband. It had been two weeks after the last visit. She walked quickly without running. The sooner she gets out of the horrid place the better.

Conference room two was a large white room without windows. It had a large wooden table with grey desk chairs surrounding it. The doctor was sitting on one side of the table. She looked around when she entered the room and Vernon wasn’t there.

“Good Morning Mrs. Dursley,” said the Doctor. He didn’t even get up off the chair to greet her properly. “Please have a seat.” The doctor indicated the seat across from him.

Petunia took the offered seat and watched as the doctor looked through Vernon’s folder. She looked at the doctor’s name plate and saw his name was Williamson.

“Dr. Williamson, when is my husband going to get out of here?” asked Petunia.

“Well Mrs. Dursley, your husband must learn to deal with his anger and suspicion in a constructive way. Your husband is refusing to participate in many of the treatments we have tried.”

“I can assure you that Vernon is not … not unstable. He certainly doesn’t belong in here.”

“Mrs. Dursley,” said Dr. Williamson, with a sigh. He flipped the file open to the beginning. “Your husband was arrested at your home. He had been firing a shotgun in the air for almost two hours at…,” The doctor looked at the file again. “How did he put it, ‘those ruddy freaks’. He also threatened to shoot the bobbies that came to stop him from shooting into the air. They said he pulled the trigger, but he had run out of shells after shooting off more than 100 shells into the air.

“Since he has been in here, he has on multiple occasions confronted the staff. Then there is his reaction to the uncovering of the magical society that has been living among us for years.”

“They are the reason for Vernon’s state,” snapped Petunia. “They are unnatural freaks.”

“Look Mrs. Dursley, I am a man of science and the idea of the existence of magic was something that I scoffed at only six months ago. Even when Parliament was attacked, I thought it had to be terrorist using unusual weapons.” The doctor smiled before continuing. “I guess they were terrorists, just magical terrorists.

“It was also the magical society that stopped the terrorists and protected the Queen and the royal family. They are also helping us to rebuild our country. We must accept the magical society, as part of the human race, as equals with the same rights to live freely as the rest of us. Mrs. Dursley, calling them freaks and abominations is not acceptable behavior.

“Mr. Dursley mentioned in his treatments that you have a nephew that was magical. Yet, he never says his name. He just refers to your nephew as ‘that boy’. I find it rather shocking that he won’t even say his name.”

“Why should he?” snapped Petunia. “That boy was nothing but trouble to us since the day he was dumped on our doorstep. He ran off three years ago and we haven’t seen him since. Good-bye and good riddance, I say.”

“How old would this boy be right now?”

“Fouteen,” replied Petunia. “I don’t know why we must talk about him.”

The doctor leaned back and looked at her. He stared at her for several seconds, before speaking. “Your husband has a great deal of anger towards magical people. He shows a tendency to get violent when confronted with members of the magical society. I will not release him until he can control his fears of the magical community. We must accept them as part of the world.”

Petunia glared at the doctor for several seconds before speaking. “The magical community attacked us. Why should we forgive them?”

“Members of the magical community came to our rescue, Mrs. Dursley,” stated Dr. Williamson. “We have already discussed this; there are members of their society who are evil. There are many of them that are good and noble.”

The doctor leaned forward and stared at Petunia. “Mrs. Dursley, I am trying to help you and your husband. By firing off a gun within city limits he violated a half dozen laws. He also pointed a weapon at an officer of the law. He could be sent to prison for a minimum of ten years. By admitting him to this facility, he cannot be held responsible for his actions since no one was injured. I cannot allow him out of here until he can prove to me that he will not attack anyone. Do I make myself clear?”

Petunia stared at the doctor. He was being totally unreasonable, but she was sure that Vernon could control his temperature. “Yes, you have made yourself perfectly clear,” she sniffed and dabbed her eyes with a tissue. “This has been so difficult for all of us. I just want to get my family all back together.”

“I can understand your concern,” said Dr. Williamson. “I would like to help you get your family together again, but Vernon will need to change some of his views. It is acceptable to have differences with members of society, but it is not acceptable for him to resort to violence with any members of society because they are different.”

“I am sure Vernon can do that, doctor. Will I be able to see him today?”

“Yes, I was going to invite you into the social room to watch some telly with everyone. It is a show about the magical community. It is proven that the more familiar you are with different members of society the easier it is to accept them.”

Petunia wondered what this show on the telly was going to be about. She was nervous how Vernon would react, but she had to put on a brave face. Hopefully, Vernon will be calm and not react violently to seeing people preforming magic.

“I am sure Vernon will act appropriately,” Petunia said confidently.

The doctor gave her a small smile. “Well, any improvement would be welcome, Mrs. Dursley.”

The doctor stood up and walked towards the other door in the conference room. Petunia followed him out the door and down a short hall to an open social room. It was a large white-walled room with groupings of brightly colored furniture breaking up the room to five or six smaller sections. There was a large telly at one end of the room.

There were people moving in from the other side of the social hall. Most of them moved as though they were zombies. Others were acting rather unusual, by staring or talking to things that were not even there. It saddened Petunia to see all these crazy people that Vernon had to be around. It couldn’t be easy for him.

Vernon finally entered the room. He was pushing some loony away from him that was rubbing their hands on his shoulder and arm. Her heart broke for her husband. He looked so haggard and drawn. He had lost so much weight here, because they refused to feed him properly. He looked up and spotted her and broke away from the rest of crowd.

“Am I getting out of here today?” he whispered desperately, as he grabbed her arm. “I need to get out of here, Petunia.”

His grip was hurting her, but he had always been so strong that it was hard for him to control it. She looked up and saw one of the guards staring her and Vernon. To someone else it might appear that Vernon was hurting her, but she knew he didn’t mean it.

“Vernon, you need to let go of my arm,” she whispered to him. “The doctors here think you are dangerous. They won’t let you out unless you show constraint and calm down.”

“There isn’t anything bloody wrong with me,” hissed Vernon. “It is all these loonies that are causing me to lose my temper.”

“It is also concerning magical people…,”

“Don’t mention that unnaturalness around me.”

“Vernon, if you don’t make these doctors believe that you are accepting of those freaks, you cannot get out of here.”

“What do those quacks know? I am normal. I am not some whacked out blighter.” Vernon looked at her and chewed on his lip making his mustache twitch around. “All right, I need out of here. I will be calm.”

“Hello Everyone, I promised a bit of a treat today,” said Dr. Williamson. “Today the Queen will be Knighting two people who have been instrumental in stopping the attacks against our beloved country.”

The doctor turned the telly on and stepped back. The telly was so far away from them that they couldn’t hear what anyone was saying.

“Let’s move up a bit, Petunia. I am curious who will be getting Knighted.”

Vernon had always been fascinated by royalty and anyone being Knighted. He had once confided in her that it was his dream of being knighted by the Queen. As they moved closer to the telly many other people were also moving in closer.

Dr. Williamson approached them. “Good Morning Vernon, how are you today?”

“I’d be better if I was home, Doctor,” said Vernon icily.

“Yes, Vernon, I understand. How are you at managing you anger.”

Petunia gasped as a face came in focus on the telly. It looked like Lily’s dead husband. They were now close enough to hear the announcer.

“Here they are Harry Potter and his wife Ginny Potter, soon to be Sir and Dame Potter. They are the leaders of Britain’s magical world. They not only fought against the magical terrorist. They are also responsible for securing the loan for Britain to rebuild after the war….”

Petunia didn’t hear anything else. All she could see and hear was Vernon screaming “Boy” as he charged at the telly while shoving people out of the way to get to the telly before ripping it off the wall and smashing it.

She just shook her head as security and other inmates tackled Vernon to the ground. It doesn’t look like he will be coming home for some time.

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