Julie Anne Dursley

Goblet of Fire Part 2

This summer was a particularly good one for Harry. He had indeed told the Dursleys that the escaped convict from last summer was actually a wizard and his godfather. They were sceptical at first, but Harry showed them one of Sirius's letters. "You know, he likes to make sure I'm doing okay," Harry said pleasantly. After that, the Dursleys mostly ignored him, which he was fine with. He did his homework and corresponded with his friends, who (unlike the Dursleys) gave him nice birthday presents. Sometimes he even took dips in Julie's pool, to which she did not (dare to) object. The days went by peacefully, until one morning in August.

They were having breakfast when Julie came walking into the kitchen with the mail. "Aunt Marge sent you a letter, daddy," she said, handing her father a letter. "And Harry," she said, looking at him, "the Weasel family is inviting you to the, er..." (she looked at the letter) "'Quidditch World Cup'. Did I pronounce that correctly?" She smiled at him.

"Give me that letter!" Harry said at once, but Julie held it up, revealing an exorbitant amount of post stamps.

"Look at this! I bet this came from the same lunatics who made that phone call last year."

"Julie, give me that letter!" Vernon demanded immediately while Harry looked at Julie angrily.

"Why did you open someone else's mail? Where are your manners?"

"In my butt," she said, still smiling, "you can't blame me for wanting to know who sent it, after that." She pointed at the stamps.

Vernon had finished reading. "Who are these people?" he asked his nephew, but it was Julie who responded.

"I've seen them at the station, daddy. They all have red hair and were dressed in rags. They're one of those families with more children than they can afford. There are ways to prevent that, you know."

"There are also ways to mind your own business!" Harry said angrily, but he knew Julie was immune when in the presence of her parents.

"You," Vernon said, looking at Harry, "living room, now." Julie smirked; she was sure Harry was about to be told off and she loved it. A few minutes later her father and Harry came back into the kitchen. Much to Julie's shock, Harry seemed ecstatic about something. "All right, so, some family is going to take the boy to some World Cup nonsense. As I don't have time to drop him off somewhere, they'll come and get him tomorrow." Petunia and Julie looked shocked.

"Those people? In our house?" Petunia asked incredulously.

"It's all right, they'll take the boy and go," Vernon said.

That evening Harry already packed all of his stuff. He could not believe his luck; he was actually going to the final of the Quidditch World Cup! At first Vernon had been hesitant to let him go, but when Harry casually mentioned his godfather his uncle no longer dared to say no. He wondered how the Weasleys would make their way to Privet Drive. Mr Weasley would probably borrow a car from the Ministry again, that would make the most sense.

He went outside where he found Julie doing laps in the pool, sat down in the chair he had made her fall off of three years ago and smiled to himself. "Hey!" Julie called. She had come to a halt with her arms resting on the edge of the pool. "How are those people going to get here?"

"I don't know," Harry said truthfully.

"Let me guess, they drive some old banger that'll break down in the middle of nowhere. Actually, that's more of a hope than a guess."

Harry said nothing, he had too good a mood to let her spoil it.

"Don't get me wrong, though. I don't mind you leaving so soon. What is that World Cup thingy exactly?"

Harry sighed. "Quidditch is a sport, played on broomsticks. Why do you care, though?"

"Just curious, that's all," she said, and she turned around to swim a few more laps.

The next day all three of the Dursleys were very nervous and they could not sit still or focus on something. Petunia had cleaned the house about three times and Julie had made sure that all of her precious belongings were safely tucked away in her room. The letter the Weasleys had sent had mentioned five p.m., but at about three p.m. they were already as ready as they could be. Harry found their nervousness strangely amusing.

Vernon had put on his best suit, but Petunia and Julie had not made a special effort. Julie contemplated staying in her room all the time, as her last encounter with a wizard had resulted in her arms being covered with feathers and her parents having to pay for a removal at a private hospital in London. However, she did not want Harry to think she was scared and so she decided not to hide. She was also not afraid to admit that she was kind of curious about Harry's friends, considering she had made sure that he never had any in primary school. She wondered if they were just as weird as he was.

It was a quarter to five and everyone was sitting in the living room, waiting anxiously for the Weasleys' arrival. Harry felt he could cut the tension with a knife, and therefore he went to sit on the stairs in the hallway. He hoped that the Dursleys would not be too rude to the Weasleys. At five p.m. he went back into the living room, where the Dursleys sat in front of the TV without it being on. Vernon and Petunia kept looking out the window, while Julie nervously took sips of her tea. There was no sign of the Weasleys, however, and soon it had become a quarter past five. Vernon and Petunia started mumbling. "No consideration... maybe they think they can join us for dinner..."

BOOM! An explosion came from behind the electric fireplace, that subsequently shattered into pieces. The Dursleys started screaming and a man and three boys appeared, all red-headed. "Ouch! Sorry about that, it didn't occur to me that we'd face any obstacles. Don't worry, I'll fix it before we go!" the man said. "You must be Harry's uncle and aunt!" He stretched out his hand, but Vernon and Petunia were too scared to shake hands; they backed away a bit. Ron, Fred and George were examining the living room with benign interest, until their gaze rested on Julie, who was sitting on the couch and determined not to look back. "Hello, Harry!" said Mr Weasley happily, "are you ready to go?"

"Yes, my trunk's upstairs," Harry said.

"We'll get it!" Fred and George said and they quickly left the room. Julie looked after them, worried they would enter her room. She had recognised the boys as the same who had come to pick Harry up with the flying car two years ago. She looked around and her eyes met Ron's, who turned a little red. She inadvertently smiled at him before she looked away. Mr Weasley did a brave attempt to break the awkward silence.

"Well, nice place you got here," he said as he looked around. Harry knew he would have loved to examine the television and the video recorder. Mr Weasley pointed at them, as the Weasley twins re-entered the room with Harry's trunk. "They are powered by elicitytrek, aren't they? I can see the plugs. I collect plugs." The twins rolled their eyes and Vernon still did not say anything. He clearly thought Mr Weasley was out of his mind. "I work with that kind of stuff, you see, to prevent people from misusing those kinds of things."

Suddenly Julie snorted. "Ha! That's supposed to be a job?" she asked mockingly with a nasty smile. She earned herself angry looks from all of the Weasley boys, while Mr Weasley actually went slightly red.

"You're Harry's cousin, right?"

"I am."

"Are you having a nice holiday?"

"Er, it's all right, I guess."

Seeing that this conversation was also going nowhere, Mr Weasley turned to Harry. "Well, let's go then." He took out his wand (the Dursleys again backed away a bit), and made flames appear in the fireplace.

"You first, George," he said.

"Okay, oh no..." A bag of sweets fell out of his pocket and within a second the entire living room floor was covered with them. Harry and Julie instinctively got up to collect them all, and Fred moved close to the couch to collect the last toffees. Julie quickly handed him the sweets; she wanted the Weasleys out as soon as possible. The Weasleys then moved to the fireplace. Fred, George and Ron had already disappeared in the flames and Harry was about to, when suddenly everyone heard a loud popping noise followed by the breaking of a tea cup. Julie started screaming; she had taken a sip of her tea, and now her nose was growing at a rapid pace. Within seconds her nose was about five feet long, and it did not stop there.

"Not to worry, I can sort her out!" Mr Weasley screamed, moving closer to Julie with his wand out. Vernon bellowed and Petunia, who was screaming almost as loud as her daughter, tried to shield her from Mr Weasley. "It's a simple process! My son Fred must've poured something in her drink, but I can fix it in a jiffy if you just let me!" Her nose kept growing; it started knocking stuff over and Julie screamed worse than ever. Vernon lost control of his emotions and started throwing china figures at Mr Weasley. "Please stop that! I'm trying to help! Harry, go, I'll sort this out!" Harry hesitantly stepped into the fire (he would rather have stayed and watch the fun), casting the scene one last look. Julie's nose appeared to have stopped growing, but it was now about sixteen feet long, Petunia was still on top of her and Mr Weasley dodged another ornament thrown by a furious Vernon.

"The Burrow!" Harry said loudly and he disappeared.

"All right, do whatever you need to do to fix this," Vernon said about a minute later. He had calmed down a bit and realised Mr Weasley was probably their only hope.

"Finally, thank you," Mr Weasley said annoyedly; it did not happen every day that someone threw ornaments at his head. Petunia let go of her daughter, who looked terrified, but she too had stopped screaming. Mr Weasley had been right; it only took about two seconds to get Julie back to normal. She felt her nose and involuntarily mumbled 'thank you'. Relief was one of world's best feelings.

"Don't thank him, his rotten kids did this to you!" Vernon said.

"I'm really sorry, I'm sure it was just a joke, they're always doing stuff like this," Mr Weasley said apologetically.

"Then raise them better!" Vernon snapped. Julie gave Mr Weasley one last look of terror before she quickly walked out of the room. Mr Weasley then fixed the damage that had been done when he arrived and was more than happy to leave Privet Drive through a curtain of green flames.