Chapter 2 The Glass That Quietly Disappears (Part 2)
Uncle Vernon giggled.
"This stinky boy is counting his income, exactly like his father." Have yours, good boy, Dudley!" He rubbed Dudley's hair.
Just then the phone rang and Aunt Petunia ran to answer the phone. Harry and Uncle Vernon watched Dudley unpack the package, a racing car, a video camera, a remote-controlled airplane, sixteen new computer game discs and a tape recorder. He was tearing open the wrapping paper of a gold watch when Aunt Petunia returned from answering the phone, looking angry and anxious.
"Bad news, Vernon," she said, "Mrs. Figg broke her leg and can't come and pick him up." She nodded to Harry's side.
Dudley was so frightened that his mouth was broken, but Harry's heart was pounding with joy. Every year on Dudley's birthday, his parents would take him and another friend out for a day, amusement park, hamburgers or movies, but left Harry to Mrs. Figg, a crazy old woman who lived two streets away. Harry hated where Mrs. Figg lived, and the house was full of cabbage; Mrs. Figg also insisted that he look at pictures of several cats she had kept in the past.
"What now?" Aunt Petunia looked at Harry angrily, as if he had orchestrated it all. Harry knew he should feel sorry for Mrs. Ferge for breaking her leg, but he couldn't feel sad when he thought it would be a full year before he saw Kick, Cher, Mr. Paw, and Mao Mao (all cat names).
"Let's hang up Maggie." Uncle Vernon suggested. "Don't be silly, Vernon, she hates this child."
The Dursleys often talked about Harry in person as if he weren't there at all, and even thought he was a very nasty thing that didn't understand what they were talking, like a slug.
"What's her name, your friend, Yvonne, how's it going?" Went on 1 vacation to Majorca. She snapped.
"You can leave me at home." Harry interjected hopefully. (That way he can watch the TV shows he wants to watch, change his taste, and maybe try playing dudley's computer.) )
Aunt Petunia looked like she had just swallowed a lemon.
"So let's come back and see that the whole house has been destroyed?" She yelled, "I'm not going to blow up the house," Harry said. But they didn't listen at all
"I think we can take him to the zoo," aunt Penny said slowly, "..... Then leave him in the car..."
"It's a new car, and you can't leave him alone in the car..."
Dudley burst into tears. In fact, he didn't really cry, he hadn't really cried for many years. He knew that as soon as he cried and screamed, his mother would fulfill any of his demands.
"My kind liver baby, don't cry, Mom won't let him mess up your good days!" Petunia shouted and took him into her arms at once.
"I..... No...... Want to want to..... he...... go..... Go!" Dudley was crying intermittently as he gasped, "He always breaks everything!" He hid in his mother's arm and smiled at Harry with ill will.
And just then, the doorbell rang --
"Oh my God, here they come!" Aunt Petunia said panickedly. After a while, Dudley's best friend, Pierre Porkys, came in with his mother. Peele was skinny and had a face like a mouse's face. People like him always cut the beaten man's hands behind his back when Dudley hits people and firmly grasps them. Dudley immediately stopped pretending to cry.
Harry couldn't believe he was so lucky. Half an hour later, he, Peele and Dudley sat in the back seat of Dursley's private car and headed for the first time on the road to the zoo. His aunt and uncle couldn't think of any other way to place him, but before they left, Uncle Vernon called Harry aside.
I warned you, and he leaned over to Harry with his big red face and said, "I warn you boy now, as long as you do a little stupid thing -- do anything -- then you stay in the storage room and come out again for Christmas." ”
"I'm not going to do anything," said Harry, "really..." but Uncle Vernon didn't believe him. No one ever believed his words.
The problem is that strange things often happen around Harry, and even if you wear your lips and say to the Dursleys that those things have nothing to do with Harry, it's in vain
Every time Harry came back from a haircut, it was as if he hadn't cut it at all, and once Aunt Petunia couldn't help but take a pair of scissors from the room and almost cut his hair, leaving only a lock of hair in front of him to "cover his terrible scar" Dudley smiled and leaned forward and backward. But Harry couldn't sleep all night and didn't know how to go to school tomorrow, and his classmates had already joked about his loose clothes and glasses that were glued with tape. But when he woke up the next morning, he found that his hair had returned to the way it had been before Aunt Petunia cut it, and although he could not figure out why it had grown so quickly, they locked him in the storage room for a week.
On another occasion, Aunt Petunia insisted that Harry wear an old pullover sweater worn by Dudley (this sweater was ugly brown with orange hairballs). The more she put it on Harry's head, the smaller the sweater shrank, and finally shrunk to the point that it could only be worn by the palm puppet, which Harry certainly did not wear properly. Aunt Petunia concluded that she had shrunk during the wash, so she did not punish Harry, who was greatly relieved.
Once Harry was found on the roof of the school room, which caused him a lot of trouble. Dudley and his gang chased Harry as usual, and Harry actually sat on the chimney of the gang room, which made him no less frightened than the others. The Dursleys received a letter from the headmistress, who were angry and told them that Harry had climbed to the top of the school. But he was just jumping behind the big dumpster outside the room (as he said when he yelled at his uncle in the locked storage room). Harry guessed that the wind had probably carried him up halfway up.
Nothing can go wrong today. He felt that as long as he didn't stay at school, in his locker room, or in Mrs. Faig's cabbage-scented living room, it would be worth spending the day somewhere with Dudley or Peel
Uncle Vernon was driving while complaining to Aunt Petunia. He liked to complain about the people who were sent at work, Harry, the meeting: Harry, the bank, Harry, it was one of the few topics he liked to complain about, and what he complained about this morning was the motorcycle.
Crazy yo yells all the way, these little bunny cubs," he said when a motorcycle overtook
"I dreamed of a motorcycle," said Harry, suddenly remembering his dream, "and the car is still flying." ”
Uncle Vernon almost crashed into the car in front of him. He turned from his seat, his face like a big beet head with a big beard. He yelled at Harry, "Motorcycles don't fly!"
Dudley and Peel laughed
"I knew motorcycles couldn't fly," Harry said, "and that was just a dream."
He thought that it would be better if nothing had been said. What annoyed the Dursleys more than asking questions was that he always said something counterintuitive, whether it was dreamed of or seen in cartoons—they thought he always had dangerous thoughts.
It's a sunny weekend and the animals are packed with family-goers. In the area of the population, the Dursleys bought Dudley and Peel a large chocolate ice cream each: before they could take Harry away, a smiling lady on the ice cream truck was already asking Harry what he wanted to eat, so they had to buy Harry a cheap lemon popsicle. Actually, popsicles aren't bad either, Harry thought to himself. While licking the popsicles, he watched a head-scratching gorilla that looked very similar to Dudley, except that its fur was not golden.
It had been Harry's happiest morning in a long time. He carefully kept a short distance from the Dursleys, in case Dudley and Peel arrived at lunch.
Tired of watching the animals, they turned back to play their best game--- chased him. They're in the zoo
At lunch in the restaurant, Dudley felt that the one he had brought him was not big enough, so he lost his temper and Uncle Vernon quickly ordered him a large one and let Harry eat the original one.
In hindsight, Harry felt he should have understood that good things wouldn't last long.
After lunch, they came to the Reptile House. The museum is cold and dark, with bright glass windows along all four walls. Through the glass, I saw all kinds of lizards and snakes crawling around on wooden blocks or stones. Dudley and Peel want to see the venomous cobra and the aggressive python. Dudley soon found the largest python in the museum. It could wrap its body around Uncle Vernon's car twice and squeeze it into a pile of scrap iron... But at this time, it seems that it does not have such a mind, and it is sleeping soundly.
Dudley stared at the shiny brown python with his nose pressed against the glass.
"Let it move." Dudley hummed and begged his father. Uncle Vernon knocked on the glass, but the python didn't move.
Knock again," Dudley commanded. Uncle Vernon tapped the glass hard with his knuckles, but the python continued to nap.
"It's annoying," Dudley thought. Dragging his feet slowly away
Harry moved his feet in front of the python's large cabinet and looked at the python carefully. It wouldn't be strange if it was happy that harry would eventually die here. Because it has no partners, only some stupid guys who knock their fingers on the glass all day trying to wake it up. It was more exquisite than using the storage room as a bedroom, and although the only thing that came to visit him every day was Aunt Penny who knocked on the door to get him out of bed, at least he could walk around the whole house.
The python suddenly opened its small sparkling eyes and slowly, slowly, raised its head until it was as high as Harry's.
It blinked.
Harry was horrified. He immediately glanced around quickly to see if anyone was paying attention to them. No one noticed. He looked back at the python and winked at it as well.
The python jerked its head toward Uncle Vernon and Dudley, then looked up at the ceiling again. Its eyes were clearly saying to Harry, "I always run into people like them."
"I know." Harry whispered through the glass, though he wasn't sure if the python could hear him, "That must have bothered you." ”
The python nodded vigorously.
"If nothing else, where did you come from?" Harry asked.
The python flicked its tail and slammed a small sign on the glass window. Harry took a closer look.
Python, Brazil.
"It's good over there, right?"
The python flicked its tail again and slapped the sign, and Harry continued: This is a breeding sample from this zoo.
"Oh, I see—so you've never been to Brazil?"
As the python was shaking its head in reply, a deafening shout suddenly came from behind Harry, and both Harry and the python were startled. "Dudley! Mr. Dursley! Come and see this snake! You would never believe what it was doing!"
Dudley swung and hurried toward them.
"Don't get in the way." He said it was a punch in Harry's chest. Harry was amazed and fell heavily on the cement floor.
What happened next, because it came so suddenly, no one could tell what was going on. Only to see Peel and Dudley clinging to the glass at once immediately panicked, shouting and jumping backwards.
Harry sat up and gasped; The glass in front of the python cabinet was gone. The python quickly stretched out its coiled body and slipped to the floor—the whole reptile hall screamed and ran toward the exit.
As the python slipped past Harry, Harry clearly heard a sizzling voice whispering, "I came here from Brazil... Thanks, I'm gone. ”
The administrator of the Reptile Hall was deeply shocked.
"But this glass," he kept nagging, "where has this glass gone?"
The zoo director apologized repeatedly and personally brewed a cup of strong tea with sugar for Aunt Petunia. Peele and Dudley were just talking nonsense. In fact, as far as Harry saw, nothing was done except that the python slipped past them, played with them, and slapped their heels. But when they got into Uncle Vernon's car, Dudley said how his leg had almost been bitten off by the python, and Peele was betting that the python wanted to strangle him to death. And, worst of all, when Peel calmed down, he suddenly said, "Harry is still talking to him, isn't he, Harry?"
Uncle Vernon waited until Peel had left their house safely before he began settling accounts with Harry. He was so angry that he could hardly speak. He reluctantly said, "Go -- stay in the storage room--- -- no food." Collapsing on the armchair, Aunt Petunia rushed to bring him a large glass of brandy.
Harry had been lying in the black hole's locker for a long time, hoping to have a watch. He didn't know what time it was, and he wasn't sure if the Dursleys were asleep. When they were asleep, he could take the risk and sneak into the kitchen to find something to eat.
When he was a baby, his parents died in a car accident. He remembered that from then on to now he had lived in Uncle Vernon's house for almost a decade, a decade of misery. He no longer remembered that he was in the car when his parents died, and he sometimes lay in the storage room for a long time desperately remembering, and then a wonderful illusion appeared. A dazzling lightning-like green light. A fiery pain in the forehead. He guessed it was the car accident. But he didn't know where the green light came from, and he didn't remember his parents at all. My uncle and aunt never mentioned them, and of course, he was not allowed to ask. There are also no pictures of them in the house.
When Harry was young, he often dreamed of a relative suddenly coming to pick him up, but his dream never came true. The Dursleys were his only relatives. But sometimes he felt (perhaps hopefully) that strangers on the street seemed to know him. Moreover, they are all very strange strangers. Once he went shopping with Aunt Petunia and Dudley, a small man in a violet top hat bowed to him. Aunt Petunia angrily asked Harry if he knew the man, and then threw him and Dudley out of the store without buying anything. On another bus, a bohemian old woman dressed in green smiled and waved at him. On another occasion, a bald man in a purple mop coat ran up to him on the street to shake his hand, then walked away without saying a word. And the most incredible thing was that when Harry tried to look at them more closely, they disappeared without a trace.
At school, Harry didn't have a single friend. Everyone knows that the dudley gang hates harry potter the weird guy who wears loose old clothes and a pair of broken glasses. No one wants to go against Dudley's gang.