Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (Harry Potter, #1)

by J.K. Rowling

and you’ll be in that cupboard from now until Christmas.’ ‘I’m not going to do anything,’ said Harry, ‘honestly …’ But Uncle Vernon didn’t believe him. No one ever did. The problem was, strange things often happened around Harry and it was just no good telling the Dursleys he didn’t make them happen. Once, Aunt Petunia, tired of Harry coming back from the barber’s looking as though he hadn’t been at all, had taken a pair of kitchen scissors and cut his hair so short he was almost bald except for his fringe, which she left ‘to hide that horrible scar’. Dudley had laughed himself silly at Harry, who spent a sleepless night imagining school the next day, where he was already laughed at for his baggy clothes and Sellotaped glasses. Next morning, however, he had got up to find his hair exactly as it had been before Aunt Petunia had sheared it off. He had been given a week in his cupboard for this, even though he had tried to explain that he couldn’t explain how it had grown back so quickly. Another time, Aunt Petunia had been trying to force him into a revolting old jumper of Dudley’s (brown with orange bobbles). The harder she tried to pull it over his head, the smaller it seemed to become, until finally it might have fitted a glove puppet, but certainly wouldn’t fit Harry. Aunt Petunia had decided it must have shrunk in the wash and, to his great relief, Harry wasn’t punished. On the other hand, he’d got into terrible trouble for being found on the roof of the school kitchens...