Chapter Text
Harry had never been to the doctor before. He had been to the nurse at school a few times when he was sick or hurt after Dudley had caught him on the playground, but that was as far into medical care that he ever got. He was usually told to toughen up when he was sick and continue about his day or, if it was really bad and Petunia and Vernon didn’t want Dudley to catch it, he was locked in his cupboard until he was better.
The idea of a check-up was simply preposterous. Check-ups were something that children like Dudley got. Not Harry.
The Wizarding World must do things differently, because not even two weeks after Harry moved in with his parents, he was following them into a small, quaint little building that, according to James, was invisible to muggles.
Jack and Violet had been sent off to spend the day with Neville, as they both had check-ups recently, which meant that Harry was alone with his parents for the first time since he found out about them. This was already nerve-wracking, since he had quickly found his parents more likely to pry into life with the Dursley’s when Jack and Violet weren’t around, but adding the doctor on top of it?
“Madame Richardson is a healer, Harry. Not a doctor,” Lily reminded him as they walked up the steps, “And you don’t need to be scared. Madame Richardson is very nice.”
Madame Richardson certainly didn’t look nice at first glance. She was a short and stubby elderly woman with several scars across her face, including one that cut across a glassy, unseeing eye. She was frowning at a piece of parchment when they entered, and when Harry grew closer, he could see his name on it.
Her expression changed when she saw them, though. She smiled, the action pulling at her scars, and gestured them over.
“Oh, come in, come in. I was just looking over the information you sent over about young Harry here. No other medical records?”
“As far as we’ve been able to find, he doesn’t have any besides from when he was with us,” Lily answered, placing a reassuring hand on Harry’s shoulder, “So he’ll need a full diagnostic scan.”
“Certainly, certainly. Come over here, Harry,” Madame Richardson said, gesturing towards a nearby bed.
He slipped onto it and sat, hands gripping the bottom of his shirt nervously. James and Lily took nearby seats as Madame Richardson began to gather her things together.
“We’re going to start with a simple spell, Harry,” she explained calmly, “It won’t hurt, but you may feel a tingling sensation. It will tell me your heart rate, blood pressure, weight, blood oxygen level, and so on. Is that alright?”
He gave a short nod and forced himself to stand his ground as the woman tapped her wand against the top of his head. Like she said, an odd, tingling sensation spread over his body, sliding down from his head to his toes like water. He squirmed in his seat, uncomfortable, until the feeling passed.
A piece of parchment appeared in front of her, and Harry watched as her eye scanned the lines that had appeared before giving a short nod.
“As I suspected,” she said, mostly to herself, her lips pursed in disapproval. She glanced over at Lily and James, “He’s showing definite signs of malnourishment. We will need to get him started on some nutrient potions and a meal plan.”
Malnourishment? Harry wasn’t exactly sure what that meant, but his parents seemed to understand, as they nodded along. He could see an odd look in his mother’s eyes, and James squeezed her shoulder.
Madame Richardson turned back towards him, smiling as she jotted a few things down on a different piece of paper.
“Did you not eat much where you were, Harry?”
“At the Dursleys?” he asked. She nodded, and he continued, “I ate enough.”
“How much is enough?” she countered.
“I got three meals a day if I was good,” he said with a shrug, “I couldn’t have seconds, though. That food was for Dudley.”
She pursed her lips. Evidently, she didn’t like something that he said, but he couldn’t figure out what it was. He looked over at his parents for help, but they looked just as displeased.
“And if you were in trouble? What happened then? Did they withhold food from you?” she pushed.
“Depends,” he answered honestly, “Sometimes I was sent to my cupboard without dinner. Or I had to finish my extra chores before I could eat. If I was really bad, they would lock me in my cupboard for a few days without food, but I could get water from the sink when I was let out to use the loo, so it wasn’t that bad.”
“Wasn’t that bad?” James made a choking noise, and Harry furrowed his eyebrows in confusion. Lily looked like she was near tears. What did he say?
Madame Richardson stayed calm, though.
“Were you in trouble a lot?”
“When I did magic, usually,” he answered hesitantly, still not completely used to the whole magic idea, “But also when I fought with Dudley, or when Dudley said I did something that I didn’t do. Or if I didn’t finish my chores correctly or fast enough.”
He was in trouble a lot, but he didn’t think he should say that. He really didn’t want his parents to think he was a bad kid. Wanting to clarify it, he quickly added:
“Once, I accidentally made the glass at the zoo disappear when Dudley was annoying me, and a big snake got out. I didn’t mean to. Honest! But Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon weren’t very happy about that, so I was locked in the cupboard for a few weeks.”
“A few weeks?” Lily gasped.
“Aunt Petunia brought me food sometimes,” he was quick to add, “So I wasn’t starving or anything.”
“That doesn’t-” Lily cut herself off and looked away. Harry was dismayed to see a tear sliding down her cheek.
“Harry, what your guardians did was wrong,” Madame Richardson said firmly, “And it has caused some malnourishment, which can be dangerous if left unchecked. You are rather underweight for your age, and your blood pressure is lower than I would like, which is often a symptom. The nutrient potions that we’re going to put you on should help, but I would also like for you to make sure you’re eating at every meal. Can you make sure you do that for me?”
He nodded. He always ate if food was given to him. He wasn’t dumb.
“Okay, good. Now, what’s this about a cupboard?”
Oh, had he said that? He wasn’t supposed to talk about his cupboard, but no one usually asked. Whenever he slipped up about it at school, his teachers never brought it back up. He had been lucky so far.
Then again, he wasn’t with the Dursleys. It wasn’t like they could punish him.
“It’s where I sleep. Or, where I slept,” he corrected himself, “The cupboard under the stairs. I slept there until we started getting the Hogwarts letters, and then Uncle Vernon moved me to Dudley’s second bedroom.”
“Hmm,” was Madame Richardson’s only response, “Okay, I’m going to do another spell that will catalogue any injuries you may have.”
He nodded and closed his eyes as she tapped his head once more and another tingling sensation spread through his body. She hummed approvingly at the results.
“Ah, good, good. No current injuries aside from the usual bumps and scrapes I would expect from a boy your age. Nothing that I need to heal. How long have you been with your parents again?”
“Two weeks,” he answered.
She hummed to herself and nodded.
The appointment was much more extensive than he expected. Spell after spell trickled across him, though luckily none seemed to cause her as much distress as the first one that categorized him as malnourished. She finished by casting a few vaccine spells, which apparently were meant to protect him from both muggle and wizarding illnesses.
Before she could send them on their way, though, Lily spoke up.
“Madame Richardson, can you check on something for me?” She moved so that she was sitting next to Harry, and he watched her, confused, as she brushed his fringe back to reveal the scar, “He got this during the attack on Halloween. It looks like a curse scar to me, and I want to make sure it’s harmless.”
The healed hummed, beady eyes glued to the scar with interest. She moved a little closer to see it.
“It definitely looks like a curse scar,” she agreed, “Those are tricky. There isn’t much I can do to heal it, and it doesn’t show up on diagnostic spells. Does it cause you any problems, Harry?”
He shook his head, eyebrows furrowed. He self-consciously smoothed his hair back down over it.
“It’s just a scar. Why would it cause problems?”
“Ah, curse scars are a little different,” Madame Richardson said, “But if it hasn’t hurt you in ten years, it’s probably harmless. Let me cast a few spells to check, though.”
Lily moved back enough to give her room, and she lightly tapped her wand against his forehead, muttering something under her breath. There was no tingling sensation like before, but instead sudden pain erupted in his head, stabbing into his scar.
He cried out, pulling away and pressing his palm over the scar.
“Harry!” James and Lily were both quickly by his side, “What was that?”
“Oh dear. I didn’t expect that to happen,” Madame Richardson muttered. Harry blinked open his eyes as the pain faded away, enough that he could catch the concern painted on the woman’s face, “I’ve never seen that before.”
“What is it?” Lily demanded. She had her arms wrapped around Harry now, pulling him protectively against her, as if she was suddenly worried that Madame Richardson was a threat.
“I don’t know,” she admitted, “There is powerful dark magic embedded into the scar. It is definitely a curse scar, but it’s unlike anything I’ve ever seen. It’s like.. Like the curse is still inside of him.”
Harry turned to his mother with wide eyes. He didn’t know much too much about magic yet, and he certainly didn’t know anything about curses. It sounded bad, though.
“What do we do about it?” James asked.
There was a moment where no one spoke. Harry peered back to Madame Richardson, watching as she frowned and scribbled several long sentences down on a piece of parchment. She looked, for the first time since Harry had walked in, completely stumped. Whatever she had seen had obviously scared her.
“Madame Richardson,” Lily said sharply.
“I don’t know,” she admitted, letting the quill drop as she turned to them, “This is far beyond my area of expertise. I’ve never seen a curse scar like this, and one that is located on the mind… I am going to get in touch with a mind healer and a curse breaker, but I’m afraid I can’t give you any more information at the moment. I promise that the moment I know more, I will be in touch.”
“But what if it causes him problems before then?”
“It shouldn’t,” she said, and Harry could tell that she wasn’t sure about it, “If it hasn’t yet, it shouldn’t cause him problems in the time it takes me to find out more information. I wish I could help more, but I promise you that I will do everything I can to figure out what it is.”
Harry tentatively brought his hand to his forehead, touching his scar. All of his life, he had thought it was simply the result of a car accident. He had always assumed it to be caused by glass or metal scratching against his skin: painful at the time, but harmless once it scarred. When he found out that it was from magic, he had not had reason to believe it was any less harmless. Now, though, the lightning bolt embedded in his forehead felt malicious.
He felt Lily squeeze his shoulders gently. He glanced back at her, watching as she closed her eyes and took a few slow, deep breaths, before giving a short nod.
“Okay. Okay, I trust you,” she said, “Is there anything else you need today?”
“What? Lily, we need more-”
“James,” she said sharply, eyes drilling into him before pointedly looking over at Harry. She didn’t say anything else, but whatever she was trying to communicate, James understood.
Madame Richardson grabbed a few of the parchment papers that she had been writing on, tapped them with her wand to create a copy, and then handed the copies over.
“This is the prescription for the nutrition potion,” she said, pointing to one, “And here’s a referral to a wizarding optometrist if you want to see about some self-adjusting glasses. Here are the copies of his scans, too. I will owl you as soon as I have more information about his scar.”
Harry felt Lily pull him to his feet. He rubbed his scar and then stuffed his hands in his pockets to keep from doing it again. Any reassurances that he had gotten from the start of the visit had vanished, leaving him shaky and feeling just a bit ill.
For the first time since he had learned about it, magic no longer felt fun and exciting.
He barely noticed as his parents said his goodbyes and ushered him out of the office. His mind wandered from lightning bolts to broomsticks to an old nightmare of cackling laughter and bright green lights.