Petunia Dursley opened the door to fetch her newspaper, and was shocked to discover a baby girl asleep on her porch. The child was the spitting image of her sister Lily, and Petunia gasped. She kneeled down and collected the letter that was pinned to the child. Moments later, Vernon Dursley came to the door to see what was taking his wife so long, and was shocked to find her sitting on the porch sobbing. In one hand she clutched a letter, and in the other she held a baby girl with bright red hair close to her chest. After a few failed attempts to choke out an explanation, Petunia finally handed the letter to her husband.
The couple argued about what to do with the child. Vernon, who strongly disliked anything out of the ordinary, worried that the child had inherited her parents’ oddities. Even so, he quickly realized that although his wife had grieved the loss of her sister previously, this was a different kind of grief – one that came from knowing a reunion would never be possible – and there would likely be no talking her out of holding onto the only piece of her once beloved sister that Petunia had left.
The little girl reminded Petunia so much of her sister it was uncanny. In fact, there were times when Petunia almost wondered if perhaps the girl was her sister reincarnate; the only thing that would pull her out of that thought was getting a good look at her niece’s eyes. Instead of Lily’s bright green eyes, the girl had inherited her father’s hazel eyes, and the spark of mischievousness they always held. In addition, she had a small scar on her forehead. For years, Petunia’s nightmares were full of ideas about what might have caused that scar; the letter had not given specifics about her sister’s cause of death or how this baby girl managed to escape.
Although Vernon wanted nothing to do with the child, Petunia couldn’t bear to treat the girl with anything but love and affection. At first this came out of a place of grief and guilt; the sight of such an innocent little thing with her sister’s features only served to remind Petunia of the way she had treated Lily while she was alive. As the years passed, Petunia’s affection for the girl became more genuine, and Vernon couldn’t help but catch it too. He tried hard to hold onto the grudge he held against her parents, but the girl had no knowledge of those things, and it’s hard to hold onto misplaced ill will towards a child forever.
Dudley Dursley took an instant liking to his little cousin. Although only about a month younger than him, the little girl was much smaller, and Dudley grew up unable to remember a time that he didn’t have a little sister to play with. (Vernon’s reminders that “she’s your cousin, not your sister” grew less with time.) As they grew up Dudley’s size and strength combined with his cousin’s speed and agility complemented each other well, and their refusal to play on a team without each other made them unstoppable in their playground games. The children agreed not to tell their parents about the unexplainable things the girl sometimes seemed to cause; Vernon may have loved his niece, but his distaste for the unusual was as strong as ever.
Just before his cousin’s eleventh birthday, Dudley excitedly came running in to announce a letter had come for her in the mail. Vernon quickly snatched it away, saying it was a mistake. He and Petunia had worried this would happen to their niece the same way it had to Lily, and they were determined to protect her from meeting her parents’ fate. The children couldn’t understand how so many letters could come in for a little girl by mistake, and were even more confused when their parents moved them to a little shack on an island soon after. At midnight, Dudley shook his cousin awake so he could be the first to wish her a happy birthday. Moments later, an alarmingly large man knocked the door down and the children learned the contents of all of the letters. Vernon had no choice but to allow the girl to read her letter, but firmly told the man called Rubeus Hagrid that he would not be intimidated into making a bad decision regarding either of his children, and sent the man away.
A few days later, with the family back in their home, a more distinguished woman knocked on the door. She introduced herself as Minerva McGonagall, the assistant headmistress of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. After a private conversation amongst the adults, Petunia called her niece into the room and together she and this McGonagall woman told the girl about her parents and their alma mater, which she was now invited to attend. The girl was hesitant at first – she didn’t want to leave her family – but was finally convinced when the professor knew about the strange happenings she and her cousin were unable to explain.
At Professor McGonagall’s suggestion, the family met up with a man called Remus Lupin in London. The man was clearly several social classes below their family, and Vernon almost insisted they stand him up when he first saw him, but this man had been close friends with James and Lily, and Vernon realized they would have to have someone’s help in finding the supplies his niece needed for her new school, so he resigned himself to putting up with the man for the day. Remus showed the family how to get into Diagon Alley, and the children were amazed at the fact that there was a hidden world behind a pub that most people would never know about. Remus didn’t talk much about his deceased friends, and the family didn’t ask; the man was full of information that helped with their transition to this new world, and that was enough for now. At the end of the day, he offered to help them find their train on the first day of school, but Vernon assured him he knew his way around King’s Cross well enough without assistance.
When arriving at the station, Vernon was sure their ticket must have been a misprint. There’s no such thing as Platform 9 ¾, after all. Just as Dudley was starting to suggest that they should have let that man help them after all, Petunia remembered her sister saying something about “running straight into the wall to a hidden platform”. A man with greasy black hair pipes up that that’s right, startling them all with his presence. Although he looked familiar, Petunia didn’t connect him with the boy her sister once played with as a child. The man demonstrates how to run through the platform, but when the family goes to thank him on the other side of the wall, he’s nowhere to be found. They don’t know that the man had been watching all day, unsure of whether or not Lily’s daughter would know how to get to the platform. The rumors that she looked just like her mother proved to be true, and Severus Snape was glad he showed up to help her.
As his cousin waves at him from the window of her train compartment, Dudley notices another girl with bright red hair standing on the platform. The girl is saying goodbye to several older siblings, but doesn’t appear to be boarding herself. Once all of her siblings board the train, he introduces himself and asks her if saying goodbye ever gets easier. She tells him that it doesn’t get easier, really, but that you get used to it. Besides, there are always letters.
Although the girl is sorted into Gryffindor, Severus Snape looks after her from afar. He catches onto Professor Quirrell’s scheme early on, and is determined to protect the little girl from meeting the same fate her mother met. Throughout the year, he watches her from a distance, and the Gryffindors notice early on that he seems to go easier on her than he does the other students not in his house. This is beneficial for them, as she has inherited not only her father’s eyes, but also his mischievous nature, and she’s constantly getting into trouble with her friends. The Weasley twins take her under their wing almost immediately, noticing someone with an eye for pranks that they deem almost as good as their own.
A few weeks into the school year, an owl arrives at Dudley’s window. The bird is carrying two letters, one for someone called Ron Weasley, and one for Dudley. “Hi Dudley,” the letter reads. “Mum mentioned that muggles don’t use the owl post, so I thought I’d send Errol to you first in case you wanted to send a letter to your sister. Just attach your letter to Ron’s, and Errol will drop it off for her! Sincerely, Ginny Weasley.” Dudley is delighted, and quickly pens two letters, the second one a thank you to Ginny for thinking of him. Soon after, a reply from Ginny comes with some other helpful tips to teach Dudley about the magical world, and a postscript from her father with a few questions about the muggle world. The two become pen pals, and when Vernon learns what has been happening, he makes his way back to Diagon Alley immediately to buy an owl for each of his children. No child of his will be relying on charity from strangers.
After it’s announced that the Gryffindor quidditch team has a new seeker, Severus Snape takes the time inform the excited child that while her father was also a talented quidditch player, she should make sure to focus on her mother’s talents as well. He offers to give her private lessons in any subject she’s interested in, telling her that he gave her mother the same crash course into the world of magic when they were children. She takes him up on this, and soon after Draco Malfoy begins spreading rumors that the Potter girl only makes good marks because Professor Snape feels sorry for her being an orphan. Hermione Granger fiercely defends her best friend against these rumors; the two girls have spent many nights in the library, eagerly sharing their findings with each other as they try to navigate this new world together.
During Gryffindor’s first match of the year, Hermione sees her best friend struggling to stay on a broom that seems to have a mind of it’s own. She scans the crowd, and while she notices Professor Snape maintaining eye contact and seeming to mutter something, she knows that there’s no way he would do anything to hurt his favorite pupil, so she continues scanning until she notices Professor Quirrell doing the same. She lights his cape on fire, breaking his concentration, and Gryffindor goes on to win the match. As they study in the library that night, Hermione mentions what she saw, and in the next private tutoring session Professor Snape tells his star pupil that she shouldn’t worry, because he’s going to see to it that she’s kept safe.
At Christmas, the family receives presents unlike any they’ve seen. The children spend the morning chasing chocolate frogs around the living room, and the whole family laughs when Vernon tastes a lemon jellybean that ends up actually being rotten egg. He pretends to be annoyed, but secretly he’s just happy to have his whole family together. Petunia tears up when her niece shows her a book of photographs that Professor Snape has helped her assemble. The photos, which move, are of Lily throughout her years in school. Some of them are even in their neighborhood and include Petunia, and she finally remembers where she recognizes the man from the train station from. Petunia remembers Lily telling stories of Severus turning dark as he grew older, and while she worries, she decides that a man who has helped a little girl fit into a new world and learn about her parents must not be the same man from her sister’s stories, and perhaps Lily’s death changed him the way it changed her.
After school resumes, Petunia sends a letter to Professor Snape along with her usual weekly letter. The letter thanks him for taking her niece under her wing, telling him that while she had often shared stories of Lily as a child, she didn’t know as much about her sister once she began attending Hogwarts, and she was glad the child was now able to fill in the gaps. One of her biggest regrets in life was not making up with Lily before she died; she’d never imagined Lily would die so young. Severus responds saying that he knew Lily had forgiven her, even if the two had never had a chance to make up, and through their conversations in the weeks following the two are able to grieve Lily more thoroughly together, which proves healthy for them both. It’s only after these exchanges that Professor Snape is able to start seeing Lily’s daughter for the individual she is, and not just as a replica of her mother. This brings another layer to their relationship, and his love for her becomes more genuine and paternal, and less like the lost love he used to believe Lily was.
When Hermione Granger comes to Professor Snape saying that she believes Professor Quirrell is going to go after the philosopher’s stone, he is only momentarily surprised that she knows about the stone. She’s always been bright, so it shouldn’t come as any great shock that the girl who spends most of her nights in the library has figured this out. When he asks who else knows, she says that of course they figured it out together, but that her best friend doesn’t know that she’s coming to him now. Hermione is scared, and she knows that Professor Snape will do anything to protect his favorite student. She’s not wrong, and Professor Snape instructs Hermione Granger to do what she needs to do to keep her best friend in the Gryffindor tower for the night.
Hermione obeys, and the children are only slightly less shocked than the rest of their schoolmates when they learn the next day that Professor Quirrell has left early. This shock is quickly replaced by the announcement that Gryffindor has won the house cup for the first time in years. No one is surprised: over the year Professor Snape seems to have lost the favoritism that has won Slytherin the cup since he began teaching, and with things more fair the Gryffindors are easily able to earn the most points.
As the school year ends, the daughter of James and Lily Potter can’t wait to see her family again. On the train ride back to King’s Cross, she promises to keep in touch with all of her friends over the summer, and there is no doubt in her mind that those promises will be kept. The biggest surprise will be when she learns that Dudley and his pen pal Ginny have already cooked up a scheme to get the families together over the summer. Petunia is already working on planning a trip for her niece’s twelfth birthday, and when the Dursleys reached out to the Grangers to invite their niece’s best friends, Vernon was pleased to learn that they were dentists and all-around respectable people to spend time with. When the Grangers tell the Dursleys what their daughter told them about how Professor Snape averted disaster and protected her best friend from Voldemort, they are delighted to know that their niece has a protector even when they can’t be with her. With that in mind, they decide that they made the right decision in sending her to Hogwarts after all.
