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Published:
2024-04-03
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2025-10-03
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30/?
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I've Never been Anywhere as Cold as You

Anonymous

Chapter 2: The Butler

Summary:

In which we meet our protagonist, and he makes a rather unique job application.

(He may have done it under the guise of heat stoke....but we will never know).

Notes:

Hi everyone! How's everyone been? Just so we are all clear, this is an insanely fast time for me to update on a regular day. However, the love for this fic has blown me away completely. The number of bookmarks and subscribers especially has been such a shock, because while it has around half the views of my prankster fic, we have hit over double most of the stats (and with one chapter as well!)

Now, onto the actual chapter information: This is shorter than most of my chapters will be, I like to average them at 3000-ish words, with 2000 being my shortest. This is where we launch into the main timeline of this story, obviously starting quite a few months before the events of Chapter One.

I hope I keep everyone's interest going, and as always remember to tell me what you like or want in the comments, so I can try and fit in in somewhere :D.

(FUN FACT OF THE DAY: I wrote and edited this entire chapter today, something that is becoming increasingly more normal for me, despite being a slow writer. Fanfic and your support has honestly changed the game for me).

Chapter Text

It was the beginning of summer, and Harry Potter was already looking for an escape. The air was sweltering and thick, enough so that even Aunt Petunia deemed it too much of a risk to have him outside doing chores.

Instead, they had shut him in his room. He spent a considerable portion of his days lying boneless on the bed in Dudley’s second bedroom. He had become uncomfortably familiar with feeling the slight bend in the wood from where a younger Dudley had jumped on it and snapped it clean in two.  

As always, Hedwig was allowed, but only if she stayed in her cage in the corner. It had taken Harry around four days before he started to completely ignore this rule and let her out at night, both to pick up his copy of the Prophet (something about owl shortages and security concerns) and to prevent her from passing out due to heat exhaustion.

The coldness of the night air seemed to be offering some protection.

As always, Hedwig hopped back in through the open window (they hadn’t even tried to argue around that one, probably out of fear that his Godfather would come and try something. He hadn’t bothered to tell them he was gone - dead for over a year. They never bought him up, and every time Harry wanted to broach the topic - not to them, but even to himself - he felt rather like the Great Squid had settled within his chest and was having a rather nice lark ripping apart his internal organs).

Nobody from the Order had reached out, not even once. Barring the letter sent to him from Gringotts bank with Sirius’s passing on of assets and acknowledgement of his innocence (also almost a year late), it rather felt like everyone had forgotten he even existed. As he had no guardian, the will stated that the money and assets would be held by the bank until he turned twenty.

The Order had been kicked out, and he couldn’t even use the property or elf himself.

He pressed his forehead against the cold window and allowed Hedwig to nuzzle up to his face. Despite the cold air managing to breach her feathers, the skin underneath was painfully warm.

Harry took the paper and led his owl to her cage, before he poured the remainder of his water glass into her tray. He left the door open. He never wanted her to feel as trapped as he was, at least when he could avoid it.

He pressed the cold paper into his bare chest and hoped it wouldn’t end up covered in horrible sweat stains.

An escape, he pondered once more. That’s what he needed.

He allowed those words to flit around in his skull, barely thinking of anything in his heat-struck haze. He moved the paper to his face.

Once he thought he better actually look at something contained within the pages, he lifted it from his head and made an effort not to sniff at the thing.

That was another thing he had been taught rather recently.

A large, shaky picture of an empty Ministry atrium greeted him, ‘Will He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named Be Seen again Soon? How to Protect Yourself in Three Easy Steps, according to ministry officials.’

He’d forgotten about the part where they had apparently turned into a teenage girls magazine.

He flipped straight past it.

A vanity piece, something about attacks in Diagon Alley, some men claiming about stolen Thestrals and blaming it on “that man”.

And then, taking even his foggy brain by surprise, ‘Live in Work Opportunities to become Increasingly Common among the Wealthy During Crisis, see more on page 17 under the subsection’.

Live-in work opportunities for the wealthy.

He flicked to the page without even thinking about his actions.

It wasn’t like he would be underqualified. He did have some rather recent experience.

For you see, in his will (no matter how delayed - apparently the ministry was running a massive backlog) Sirius left him with one piece of advice. “Make sure you do something that you know I would not approve of and know that I love you enough to trust you with that.”

So, Harry had.

He had taken a mail-order Pureblood Etiquette course.

He’d, naturally, done it as a joke, had seen it in the paper after one too many hours by the window and thought it would be a bit of a laugh. The closest thing he could get to teenage rebellion before his wizarding childhood was officially over. 

It was only by his twenty forth lesson that he realised he may have gone too far, but he was only three away from his bronze award.

He hung his silver qualification alongside the first.

And to think, it might be the very thing that rescued him from this Hell Hole at any rate. (Not Dumbledore and the Order, who could take him into a different, colder safe house, who could give him some notice for what was going on or comfort after he lost the only family he ever had. It still felt to Harry like it had all happened just the day before). 

Job Positions, Section: “Live In Roles”.

Maid Nurse for young children ages 6 months-6 years. Female preferred. (Harry scoffed at that one, changing the last word to “required” in his head).

Personal Valet and Gardner (In this heat, Harry would rather die).

Butler for Large Household, relevant experience or matching qualifications. Animal care, minimal cleaning and caretaking, correspondence, management and event planning. Willing to work during challenging conditions and circumstances. Board, private bed and full access to the kitchen and subsequent amenities. Must be available immediately, and on-call full time for emergencies. Temporary contract and strict privacy clause to be agreed upon. Please send personal letter if interested.

Harry paused.

That…almost sounded like a good offer. Sure, “Challenging conditions” didn’t sound immediately positive, but that could come from anything really, such as the current crisis.

It was better than calling themselves and their staff ‘like a family’.

And then again, challenging conditions could simply refer to raising a child as two working parents, or something along those lines. And, as for the “strict privacy clause” that almost worked in his favour. The last thing he needed was to draw attention to the poor family who unknowingly hired him.

His heat-frozen mind finally remembered to look at the wage attached to the side of the sheet.

His eyes went wide, and he pulled off and cleaned his glasses to ensure he had gotten it correct the first time.

For a Butler position? For basic manual labour and assistance?

At that point it would almost be a shame to pass up the opportunity.

It only took him another minute to locate his parchment and ink.

Dear Employee manager for position #01223 (he ensured to print that number incredibly clearly).

I am applying for your advertised Butler position and find that I meet all the needed criteria. I have eleven years of experience cleaning without magical assistance, and a full year cleaning with. I also have a Silver Level award in “Pureblood Culture, Organisation and Etiquette” and am intending to go for my gold within the next couple of months.

I have an OWL qualification in ‘Care Of Magical Creatures’ at the Grade Exceeds Expectations, and I spent some time where I was placed in charge of both a Hippogriff and a newborn Dragon, both of which I was able to care for appropriately and deliver them to the needed locations.

Harry scanned the job notice again to ensure that he had covered all of his basis. He was quite sure this was not what a standard formal job letter would look like, but he had nothing to compare it too.

I also am a more than competent cook, and have been cooking for a family of four plus for nearly seventeen years. (He rather thought that his uncle and cousin could count for at least two different people, but he didn’t bother to try and explain that.) I am also more than adept at dealing with emergencies, and keeping cool under extreme amounts of pressure and stress. I am available immediately for the course of a one-and-a-half-month temporary contract.

Sincerely,

Hadrian J. Evans

He had no idea where that name had come from, barring the fact it was the same one that he had used for his course. (He may or may not have sent a letter out to a baby name consultant somewhere in Norway to ask for ‘fancy versions of the name Harry’ but they didn’t need to know that). And the surname sounded better, and less obvious than Potter.

He read the letter over again, trying to spot any locations that might encourage him to re-write the entire thing from scratch.

He praised himself on his penmanship, using the loopy pattern that his instructor had insisted that he practised, after receiving the first progress entry from him. Apparently, the course was ‘designed to be changed and altered to meet the needs of the client’. Whatever that meant.

Either way.

Harry neatly folded the letter and sealed it with the specialised wax and signet ring he had ordered off another wizarding catalogue that he was subscribed too.

He went over to Hedwig and gently rustled her feathers, trying to determine if she was awake. He almost felt bad asking her to go out again, but despite what his instructor might say, he was completely incapable of learning patience.

“And at least you’ll be out of here for a bit Wigs,” Harry gently persuaded. To his astonishment, it was unneeded, as his owl had drunk her fill of water and was ready to go.

We both are, apparently.

Even with his gentle stroke he knew she was gaining heat far too quickly, to the point even he could feel it through his sweat. Going out in the late and cold, even to exercise and fly would be better.

“You can stop if you need to, slow yourself down a bit. In fact, maybe don’t come back until tomorrow night, let yourself breathe a little.”

While Harry fussed, she leant her head against the back of his hand, before shortly deciding that she had enough and giving his hand a good peck and snatching the letter.

Harry gave a hiss and a laugh, lifting his sore finger into his mouth and wincing at the added heat on his injury.

Hedwig flew straight out of the window.

And now, he only had to wait.

But that didn’t mean that he could sit still, he knew he had things to do before his relatives woke up. He went to the bathroom and wiped himself down with a cold flannel (the shower was too loud, and the bath took too long) and took a secondary cold flannel back to his room. He brushed his teeth and had a good go at his hair.

He rushed down to the kitchen, filling up a few glasses of water and carrying them up to his room. He also managed to snatch several breakfast bars and a bowl of leftover lasagne from last night. If it was something with vegetables, he knew they would not notice.

He managed to shut and lock the door before anyone else awoke.

Who knows, maybe this level of preparedness would work in his favour with this new job, if they even wanted to interview him at all.

Not many people wanted to hire some unknown person without actual references (unless they counted his instructor), especially for a job that could be deemed as almost wide scoped in both ability and tasks. Especially not a seventeen-year-old teenager at that.

For the first time, Harry started to think that he might have made a mistake.

The add didn’t list any childcare responsibilities that he would be completely incapable of doing. Perhaps they were an elderly family (did wizards have retirement homes?) who needed help for things like correspondence?

At this point, Harry didn’t really care.

Even if it all went horribly wrong, or he had to apply to a different add, then he could simply laugh about it later. Sirius would have found it hilarious.

For a second, he got a vision in his eyes, of his Godfather standing with his parents, smirking down at him from wherever the hell he went. I hope I don’t make you proud, and I hope my teenage rebellion was more traitorous than yours ever was. I do have a legacy to live up too.

Harry smiled at the thought, and wondered if the heat really was corrupting his brain.

There was no way his situation could get any worse than it already was.  

Afterall, it was his seventeenth birthday today.

Officially an adult, and nobody even trusted him with the truth.