Sisterly Affection Was Even Flimsier Than Plastic Flowers

Harry knew, of course, why Veratia had come to Hogwarts, but... when Veratia enrolled, he didn't recognize that the stunningly beautiful and radiant girl was Veratia herself.

It's not Harry's fault, after all, he really didn't expect that a Squib could turn the tables—in fact, even the Grindelwald family back then never expected this.

Ancient Magic, isn't it amazing?

Suddenly, a rustling sound came from behind them.

"Look, it's Petunia," Veratia said, pointing over there.

Harry looked in the direction Harry was pointing and saw Petunia lying behind a tree, clearly having fallen because she lost her footing.

"Petunia!" Lily said, her voice filled with surprise and welcome, but Snape jumped up.

"Who's spying on us now?" he yelled. "What do you want?"

Petunia was so panicked when she was discovered that she could barely breathe.

Harry could tell she was racking her brains trying to say something hurtful.

"Then tell me what you're wearing?" she said, pointing to Snape's chest. "Your mother's clothes?"

With a snap, a branch suddenly fell from above Petunia's head.

Lily screamed as the branch hit Petunia on the shoulder, causing her to stagger back a few steps and begin to sob.

"Petunia!"

But Petunia ran away.

Lily snapped at Snape.

"Did you do this?"

"No," Snape said, sounding both defiant and frightened.

"It was you!" Lily stepped back in front of him. "It was you! You hurt her!"

"No—I didn't!"

However, Lily did not believe his lies.

She gave him one last angry look, then ran out of the grove to chase after her sister, leaving Snape looking pained and confused...

"Oh dear," Veratia said gleefully. "Look, Professor Snape seems to have suffered an innocent misfortune. I can vouch for him; that branch really wasn't knocked down by Professor Snape— "

"Look, I now know why Aunt Petunia hates Professor Snape," Harry said, scratching his chin. "After all, it's really unpleasant to be wrongly accused."

"Let's go, let's move on to the next scene," Veratia suggested.

They walked together along the forest path, and at the end of the path was Evans family ' house.

An owl also came with them to Evans family.

"Daddy! Mommy! Petunia!"

Lily, waving her acceptance letter, ran downstairs to the Living Room to happily show it to her family.

"Look, it's Hogwarts! Severus wasn't lying, Hogwarts really exists!"

"That's wonderful, Lily, that's wonderful!" Mr. Evans congratulated Lily with a smile. "My daughter is about to become a real wizard!"

Mrs. Evans was also congratulating Lily, and although Petunia was also congratulating her, she clearly had something on her mind.

In the afternoon, there was a knock on the door, and someone Harry recognized came in.

It was Professor McGonagall, who at this time did not look as old as when Harry first met her.

She received a warm and grand welcome from the Evans family.

Harry and Veratia followed Professor McGonagall and Lily for a stroll around Diagon Alley.

The atmosphere and culture of Diagon Alley the 1970s were significantly different from that in the 1990s. At that time, the Death Eater were not a universally hated organization. Harry could even see people in Diagon Alley openly proclaiming that they were members of the Death Eater and feeling very honored about it.

"He could never have imagined," Harry sneered, "That just over a decade later, the Death Eater would become universally hated and no longer as arrogant as they were then—even their master, Voldemort, would be killed by a baby."

When Harry noticed that as Lily passed by Petunia's room, she saw Petunia tiptoeing around and doing some subtle things.

When the scene changes again, Lily is chatting with Snape in an amusement park.

"Severus".

Lily's voice was very soft, and as she spoke, she craned her neck to look around.

"I've discovered a secret—"

"What secret?" Snape asked, both interested and honored, as he held onto the swing with both hands.

"Yes, my sister Petunia— " Lily whispered, "I've discovered that although she scoffs at magic, she still... well, deep down she still has a deep longing for it."

"How did you know?" Snape asked, intrigued.

He couldn't help but be interested. He had always thought Petunia was pretentious. She desperately craved magic, yet she pretended to be nonchalant.

Snape's second biggest interest now is to expose Petunia's dead persona.

Lily smiled and said to Snape, "I've discovered that Petunia is writing a letter—to Headmaster Dumbledore."

"Ha ha," Snape laughed, "That's impossible. She's just daydreaming—it's common knowledge that Muggle can't write to Dumbledore, and even if she did, she couldn't mail it."

"But I clearly saw that she received a reply!" Lily retorted.

Snape looked completely unconvinced. He shook his head and said, "Impossible, absolutely impossible—I bet Petunia won't receive a reply from Dumbledore. You have to believe me, Lily, how could Muggle possibly deliver a letter to Dumbledore?"

Seeing that Lily disagreed, Snape rolled his eyes.

"How about we make a bet?" Snape said confidently. "I bet Petunia won't receive a reply at all—"

"How do you prove it?" Lily asked, intrigued.

"You could sneak into her room," Snape said with a laugh. "Why don't you just take a look at the letters she received?"

"This... this isn't right, is it?" Lily said hesitantly. "That's Petunia's privacy, after all. Isn't it inappropriate to do this?"

"Isn't it wrong to do that?" Snape said dismissively. "When she called you a monster, didn't you feel anything wrong with that? Or do you enjoy being insulted like that? Listen, if you knew the truth, you'd have something to say in the future, instead of standing by secretly wiping away tears! Lily!"

Lily fell silent.

She admitted that Snape was right.

Why can Petunia keep calling me a monster, while I have to just take it all?

We must find a way to fight back.

With this in mind, she finally made up her mind.

"Tomorrow, Mom and Dad are taking us shopping, but I can say I'm not feeling well and don't want to go," Lily said, her eyes sparkling. "You wait here for me, and after they leave, we'll sneak into Petunia's room to see if there's a reply from Dumbledore, okay?"

"Why don't you go see for yourself?" Snape's voice was deep, but it wasn't as slow as Harry remembered—it seemed that when Snape was with Lily, he never spoke in a drawn-out and greasy voice like he did when he was with his classmates.

"Hey, come with me, Severus," Lily said in a sweet, soft voice. "I can't do bad things all by myself, can I? You know what I mean? I need someone with me so I'll dare to sneak over there..."

"Okay." Snape raised his hands in surrender.

"Wow." Veratia shook her head and exclaimed, "I never would have guessed there was such a thing? No wonder, no wonder you said Aunt Petunia was so resistant to the mention of magic... No wonder she and your mother don't get along. If I'm not mistaken, this might be the beginning of their falling out."

"Maybe so." Harry opened his mouth, anyway, he felt that his aunt was really in the wrong - who would call their own sister a monster?

Someone else once spoke to Harry like that; it was a member of the Ashwinder Party.

Harry's reaction was also quite reasonable.

How dare you talk to me like that?

Is your mom a wholesaler?

"By the way," Harry said to Veratia without turning around, "If Gellert had read my reply to you, what would you have done?"

"Sneaking a peek at the reply?"

Veratia laughed, a laugh that seemed so bright, but Harry found it eerie and chilling.

"I'll make him regret being born."

Harry shuddered.

This woman is terrifying...

A day passed in the world of memory. The next morning, as expected, Lily used the excuse of feeling unwell and did not go shopping with her parents and Petunia.

After the Evans couple left, she went out of her house and went to the amusement park.

"Come on, Severus," Lily invited Snape. "Mom and Dad are gone, and Petunia went with them. Let's go to her room and see what happened!"

Harry and Veratia followed the two to Petunia's room.

Just as Snape was about to start searching, Lily stopped him.

"I'll look for it," Lily said. "Petunia will be furious if she knew I let you go through her things."

Snape said "Oh," and stood to the side with his hands at his sides.

A short while later, Lily found the letter.

"Look," Lily said to Snape, picking up the letter, "I found it— Dumbledore's reply to Petunia."

Lily and Snape were holding the letter together, while Harry and Veratia peered behind them, getting a full view of Petunia's secret.

"I must say," Veratia whispered to Harry, "Dumbledore's wording was indeed very tactful. If it were me, I probably wouldn't have replied to Petunia at all."

"That's what makes Dumbledore different," Harry said, shrugging.

"But actually it's better not to reply at all." Veratia shook her head helplessly and said, "Dumbledore... really, even the most tactful wording is no different from scolding her, and it will make Petunia feel desperate."

Harry thought about it and realized that it made sense.

Just then, the scene shifts again, and he and Veratia arrive at King's Cross Station.

On Platform Nine and Three-Quarters, Snape stood beside him, slightly hunched over, close to a thin woman with a sallow complexion and a gloomy expression who looked very much like him.

Snape was staring at a family of four not far away, with two girls standing away from their parents— Lily seemed to be pleading with her sister.

Harry and Veratia leaned over to listen.

"... I'm so sad, Petunia, I'm so sad! Listen to me—" She grabbed her sister's hand and held it tightly, while Petunia struggled desperately. "Maybe once I get there—no, listen to me, Petunia! Maybe once I get there, I can find Professor Dumbledore and persuade him to change his mind!"

"I—don't—want—to go!" Petunia said, struggling to pull her hand away from her sister's. "Do you think I want to go to some ridiculous castle and learn to be—a—"

Her light-colored eyes gazed at the platform, at the cat meowing in its owner's arms, at the owls flapping their wings and calling to each other in their cages, and at the students—some already dressed in black robes, carrying their luggage onto the bright red steam locomotive, happily greeting their classmates after a summer of separation.

"—You think I want to become—a monster?"

Petunia finally pulled her hand away, and Lily's eyes were full of tears.

"I'm not a monster," Lily said. "That's a really harsh way to put it."

"That's where you're going," Petunia said enthusiastically, "A school for monsters. You and that boy named Snape... freaks, you're both freaks. It's good that you're separated from ordinary people, for our safety."

As she said this, Petunia's face was contorted in extreme pain, making her look as if she hated Lily to the core.

"She deserves it," Veratia said gloatingly. "Even if she gets into Hogwarts, she probably won't get along with Lily much."

Harry didn't say anything, but agreed with Veratia's point of view.

Lily glanced at her parents, who were watching the scene on the platform with genuine joy, thoroughly enjoying the view.

Lily remembered the letter she had seen a few days ago—the letter Petunia had sent out, and Dumbledore's reply.

She turned back to look at her sister, lowered her voice, and her tone became very intense.

"When you wrote to the Headmaster begging him to accept you, you didn't think of it as a monster school."

Petunia's face turned bright red.

"Beg? I didn't beg!"

"I saw his reply; it was written very tactfully."

"You shouldn't have peeked—" Petunia's face flushed crimson. She said angrily, "That's my privacy—how could you—?"

Lily glanced at Snape, who was standing nearby.

Petunia immediately understood what was going on, and she gasped.

If it were just Lily seeing it, it would be fine, but with Snape, an outsider, also witnessing it, Petunia immediately felt betrayed.

"That boy found out! You and that boy sneaked into our room!"

"No—it wasn't sneaking in—" Lily was now defending Lily. "Severus doesn't believe Muggle can contact Hogwarts, that's all! He said a wizard must have infiltrated the postal system and was secretly watching over them—"

"Looks like you freaks just love meddling in other people's business!" Petunia said, her face, which had been flushed, now deathly pale. "Monster!" she spat at her sister, then abruptly turned and ran towards her parents...

"I think," Harry suddenly commented, "My mother's relationship with Aunt Petunia isn't as good as yours with Cassandra's."

(End of this chapter)