Chapter Text
"Mr Dursley, do you know why you're here?"
Dudley wasn't fond of the school nurse. She had a perpetual frown between her eyebrows and a way of tsking whenever she saw him.
"End of year. You're meeting with everyone," Dudley said boredly.
"I'm meeting so we can discuss your health."
Dudley heaved a sigh and looked at a crack on the ceiling.
"Your weight has gone up a number of pounds this year."
"You mean I'm fat," said Dudley bluntly.
The nurse sighed. "Your weight is the biggest issue on the table, yes. Quite frankly, you're putting yourself at risk for heart attack."
"Yeah, whatever," Dudley said. "Give me my recommendations so I can get out of here."
"I'm not sure you understand how serious this is, Mr Dursley. This has gone beyond a simple recommendation. Despite having been an active child in the past, your teachers inform me that this year you've skipped PE entirely along with a number of your other classes. You even quit the boxing club."
"I got tired of boxing," Dudley said.
"Did you?" the nurse asked. "I heard you were good at it."
"I'd rather be fat than skinny," Dudley burst out suddenly. "Your 'recommendations' are bullshit. You want to starve me. I won't have it."
The nurse nodded. "I understand your concern, Mr Dursley. And I by no means want to starve you. How about we make a deal. I can't force you to follow the regimen I've put onto this piece of paper or to care about your health. I certainly have no ability to make you skinny. All I want for you is for you to be able to walk around easily on your own feet and participate in a sport. I'm not talking about running or swimming," she added when Dudley opened his mouth to protest. "I'm talking about joining the boxing club again. You're in the heavyweight category, and that's fine. I won't bother you about your health as long as you're able to box. If you can lose enough pounds and exercise enough to rejoin the club when you come back after summer break, I won't trouble you with any more recommendations. How about it?"
Dudley closed his mouth and looked at the floor. He was quiet for a long time.
"Do we have a deal, Mr Dursley?"
Dudley pulled himself to his feet. It took a huge heave to do, and when he had done so, his heart was pounding and sweat had covered his forehead.
"Fine," Dudley said. And he dragged himself out of the room one shuffling footstep at a time.
Dudley had been telling the truth when he said he didn't care if he was fat. But he missed boxing. He didn't know when and how it had suddenly gotten so difficult to even travel a few steps, or why his heart pounded so much at the simplest motions. He didn't think he'd been eating any more than usual, but when Dudley thought about it, he didn't know how much he usually ate in the first place. He simply didn't think about it. When there was food in front of him, he ate it. Dudley liked food. No one had ever dared to call it a problem except his enemies. Dudley was more intimidating now than he'd ever been and his right hook was legendary, but even going after skinny kids who looked at him the wrong way now seemed more trouble than it was worth. He sent his friends to do it instead, and just cracked his knuckles to seem scary. It had been a long time since he'd been able to look at himself in the mirror.
On the day he left for summer break, when his trunk had been packed and he'd sat down, panting at the exertion, at the end of his sagging bed, Dudley said to Piers, "the school nurse said I'm fat."
"Why do you think we call you Big D?" Piers said, and Dudley smirked. He knew as well as Piers the real reason his friends called him that.
"She's right, though," Dudley said. There was no one else in the room and that was the only reason he was able to say, "I lied about being done with boxing. I just couldn't do it anymore."
Piers let out a sigh.
For a moment the two friends just sat there in the empty dorm, sun streaming through the open windows. Finally Piers said, "How're things at home?"
"Fine," Dudley said.
"You haven't heard from Harry?"
Piers had heard a very eclipsed version of Harry's dramatic exit. As far as he knew, Dudley's cousin had just decided to run away for no reason at all.
"He'll turn up," Dudley said.
Piers made a noncommittal sound.
"Are you looking forward to it?"
"What, Harry?" Dudley said. "Don't be daft. I hate Harry."
"Summer break, I mean," Piers said. "I mean, me, I can't wait to be old enough to get out of Privet Drive. It's where people go if they want to spend the rest of their lives shriveling up."
"Where're you gonna go?"
Piers shrugged. "London, maybe."
"Yeah, 'course you'd like it there," Dudley said.
"I'll rent a flat. I'd even invite you to the scene if you want," Piers said, and Dudley made an exaggerated gagging noise.
"You can enjoy your pansy parties on your own, thanks."
Piers laughed. "Give it up, Dudley. We all know you don't actually give a shit about me being gay."
"I wouldn't be your best friend if I gave a shit about something like that," Dudley said.
Harry was unusually cheerful when he came home. This might've had something to do with the fact that he had a godfather now; the escaped convict Black, who had murdered thirteen people without blinking. He grinned on the other side of the table as mum and dad went over Dudley's school report, finding excuses for Dudley's bad marks.
"My Duddikins is a very gifted boy!" mum insisted. "His teachers don't understand him!"
Dad scoffed, slamming his fist down onto the report card. "I don't want some swotty little nancy boy for a son anyway," he blustered.
When the report card accused Dudley of bullying it brought mum to tears. "He's a boisterous little boy," she insisted, "but he wouldn't hurt a fly!"
Dudley was fourteen, and his school friends would've fallen over in shock if they saw the Terror of Smeltings petted like a three year old by his sobbing mother.
But the school nurse's report couldn't be ignored.
It was hard to remember how much Dudley wanted to go back to boxing when mum taped the diet sheet to the fridge, when all his favorite things—fizzy drinks and cakes, chocolate bars and burgers—were thrown into a big trash bag to be replaced with fruit and vegetables. Even his box of moral support donuts had been found and confiscated.
"If my Duddikins has to go through this, we're going to support him," mum decried, and that was the end of the matter.
The Dursleys were on a diet.
Mrs Across-the-Street had come over for tea, and she brought biscuits with her.
"Oh, you're so kind, Yvonne," mum said, looking like she was about to swoon. "But I'm on a diet… in fact, we all are… I've sworn off these kinds of things for good…"
"Oh, really?" Mrs Across-the-Street said. "I thought you'd appreciate the new recipe…"
"I wish I could," mum said. "But I've been reading up about health, you know…" she gestured to the pile of magazines on the counter that sported names like "clean living" and "easy low-fat desserts," "heart disease and all… Vernon's family suffers from it…"
"Ah, well, more's the pity," said Mrs Across-the-Street.
"In my day we never worried about things like cholesterol," dad blustered. "A good steak never hurt anyone, Petunia."
Mum glared at dad across her salad. Dinner had recently become a rather tense affair, owing chiefly to the arrival of large green leaves on everyone's plate and the disappearance of steak night. Dudley chewed on his kale morosely.
"We're standing up for our Duddikins," mum said sharply. "Remember?"
"Yes, of course, but dessert is one thing…" dad tried. "This is rabbit food!"
"It's full of vitamin K!" mum said.
"Vitamins? There's nothing to it!"
"It's salad, Vernon!" mum said. "There's not supposed to be anything to it!"
For a minute mum and dad watched each other across the table, grinding their teeth.
Finally dad hunched his shoulders and stuck a great wad of kale into his mouth, chewing ferociously.
"You're such a good role-model for our Diddy-widdy," mum crooned. Then she glanced over the table and her eyes narrowed on Harry. "You, eat your greens," she said.
Harry, who had been looking at his kale with a nauseous expression, muttered, "yes, Aunt Petunia," and finally braved the salad, taking large gulps of water between each bite as though trying very hard not to gag.
Petunia Dursley's garden parties were legend. Punchbowls glittered, puddings glistened, and snacks piled the gleaming countertops. It was a summer tradition that mum marked off weeks in advance: only this year there was a small hitch in the process.
"How shall I ever do it, Vernon?" mum said, paging through her well-thumbed book of recipes as she sat on the living room sofa one evening. "Butter, cream, sugar, all of my signature dishes out the window… I'll never live it down…"
"It's a special occasion," dad rumbled beside her, keeping one eye on the television. "Give Dudders a break. He doesn't need to keep to that nancy diet all the time."
"A break!" mum shrieked. "Didn't you hear what the nurse said! He might keel over! I'm not going to murder my Duddy just to throw a garden party!"
"Then tell him not to eat the stuff!" dad said.
Mum gasped. "How could you say such a thing! Let Duddikins go hungry!"
Dad groaned. "Give him his own plate of food then… label it so he knows it's his…"
"It's too cruel to make him look at treats he can't have. No, I can't do it…"
Dudley sat quietly on an armchair. This whole diet business had left him feeling more and more like some kind of vaguely unwelcome trouble. He wanted to say that it was fine, mum could do what she always did, but he knew that the moment he saw those platters of sweets all his good sense would disappear and he'd sneak as much food as he could… then mum would feel worse than ever…
"Then… send him off with his friends?" dad tried. "I'm sure he's not interested in a garden party anyway, Petunia… I wasn't, when I was his age…"
"He will not be exiled!" mum wailed.
"THEN CANCEL THE RUDDY THING!" dad shouted, banging his fist on the coffee table. Mum burst into tears.
Dudley looked down at his breakfast, a measly grapefruit quarter, and his stomach rumbled. He dug one section out with a spoon and ate it with a sour look. Mum passed a smaller grapefruit quarter to Harry, who looked at it in despair before finishing it in three bites.
The doorbell rang. Dad heaved himself out of his chair and set off down the hall. Quick as a flash, while mum was occupied with the kettle, Dudley stole the rest of dad's grapefruit and began to scarf it down.
When dad came back he looked livid.
"You," he barked at Harry. "In the living room. Now."
Harry followed dad into the living room and dad shut the door behind them sharply. Gulping down the last of his stolen grapefruit, Dudley pulled himself to his feet and crossed the hall, putting his ear to the door.
"So," he could hear dad saying. "So. This just arrived. A letter—" there was a sound of rustling paper "about you."
Dad started reading aloud, slowly,
Dear Mr and Mrs Dursley,
We have never been introduced, but I am sure you have heard a great deal from Harry about my son Ron.
As Harry might have told you, the final of the Quidditch World Cup takes place this Monday night, and my husband, Arthur, has just managed to get prime tickets through his connections at the Department of Magical Games and Sports.
I do hope you will allow us to take Harry to the match, as this really is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity; Britain hasn't hosted the cup for thirty years, and tickets are extremely hard to come by. We would of course be glad to have Harry stay for the remainder of the summer holidays, and to see him safely onto the train back to school.
It would be best for Harry to send us your answer as quickly as possible in the normal way, because the Muggle postman has never delivered to our house, and I am not sure he even knows where it is.
Hoping to see Harry soon,
Yours sincerely,
Molly Weasley
P. S. I do hope we've put enough stamps on.
When he had finished reading, there was another rustling sound. "Look at this," dad growled.
"She did put enough stamps on, then," said Harry brightly.
"The postman noticed," dad said. "Very interested to know where this letter came from, he was. That's why he rang the doorbell. Seemed to think it was funny."
There was a long silence inside the living room. Finally, Harry said, "So—can I go then?"
"Who is this woman?" dad asked.
"You've seen her," said Harry. "She's my friend Ron's mother, she was meeting him off the Hog—off the school train at the end of last term."
"Dumpy sort of woman?" dad growled finally. "Load of children with red hair?"
Harry stayed quiet.
"Quidditch," dad muttered under his breath. "Quidditch—what is this rubbish?"
"It's a sport," Harry said shortly. "Played on broom—"
"All right, all right!" dad said loudly. He fell silent for a minute and then spat, "What does she mean, 'the normal way'?"
"Normal for us," said Harry. "You know, owl post. That's what's normal for wizards."
"How many times do I have to tell you not to mention that unnaturalness under my roof?" dad hissed. "You stand there, in the clothes Petunia and I have put on your ungrateful back—"
"Only after Dudley finished with them," said Harry coldly.
"I will not be spoken to like that!" dad shouted.
"Okay, I can't see the World Cup. Can I go now, then? Only I've got a letter to Sirius I want to finish. You know—my godfather."
"You're—you're writing to him, are you?" dad said in a strangled voice.
"Well—yeah," said Harry, casually. "It's been a while since he heard from me, and, you know, if he doesn't he might start thinking something's wrong."
"Well, all right then. You can go to this ruddy… this stupid… this World Cup thing. You write and tell these—these Weasleys they're to pick you up, mind. I haven't got time to go dropping you off all over the country. And you can spend the rest of the summer there. And you can tell your—your godfather… tell him… tell him you're going."
"Okay then," said Harry brightly. He walked out of the living room, grinning at Dudley's shocked look.
"That was an excellent breakfast, wasn't it?" said Harry. "I feel really full, don't you?" He laughed, spun on his heel, and took the stairs three at a time.
Dudley began to wonder when Harry had gotten better at playing mum and dad than he was.
Dudley had thought that he'd gotten over his fear of wizards. He talked to Harry all the time, and when the two wizards had shown up to puncture Aunt Marge, he hadn't been scared. But he thought now he might have been "in shock" when that happened. Because the minute Harry announced that his wizard friends would be arriving to pick him up at five o'clock the next day, Dudley felt a familiar terror in his throat.
"I hope you told them to dress properly, these people," dad snarled at once. "I've seen the sort of stuff your lot wear. They'd better have the decency to put on normal clothes, that's all."
Harry looked doubtful, but didn't say anything.
And for the rest of the day there was nothing Dudley could do to take his mind off of it. He couldn't eat because mum had stripped the fridge and kept as close an eye on it as a general. Dudley sat himself in front of the television, but he kept imagining wizards appearing from the corner of his eye, and it made him jump. Even the eight-sided diamond that Dudley put together from his origami book couldn't calm him down.
On the day the Weasleys were to arrive Dudley couldn't sit still for a minute. He walked from room to room, jumping at shadows and clutching at his bottom. Any friend of Harry's would have it out for the Dursleys. Dudley knew this for a fact.
Lunch was an almost silent meal. Dudley didn't even protest at the food (cottage cheese and grated celery). It didn't have to be good to take his mind off things. Mum wasn't eating anything at all. Her arms were folded, her lips were pursed, and she seemed to be chewing her tongue. She'd spent an entire half an hour on the scale that morning, Dudley knew, because she'd announced it—along with her own lost pound—to dad in a pleased whisper when she thought Dudley was watching TV.
"They'll be driving, of course?" dad barked across the table.
"Er," said Harry. "I think so."
He disappeared upstairs as soon as lunch was over, as though to avoid as much of the unpleasantness as he could.
In the living room, dad held the paper stiffly in front of his face. Mum compulsively straightened the cushions. Dudley crammed himself into an armchair with his hands firmly over his bottom. He knew it wouldn't help, but he didn't know what else to do.
Five o'clock came and then went. Dad, perspiring slightly in his best suit, opened the front door, peered up and down the street, then withdrew his head quickly.
"They're late!" he snarled at Harry.
"I know," said Harry. "Maybe—er—the traffic's bad, or something."
Ten past five… then a quarter past five… mum and dad began to speak in tense whispers.
"No consideration at all."
"We might've had an engagement."
"Maybe they think they'll get invited to dinner if they're late."
"Well, they most certainly won't be," said dad, standing up and starting to pace the living room. "They'll take the boy and go, there'll be no hanging around. That's if they're coming at all. Probably mistaken the day. I daresay their kind don't set much store by punctuality. Either that or they drive some tin-pot car that's broken d-AAAAAAAARRRRRGH!"
Dudley jumped out of his seat faster than he thought possible and flew into the hall where Harry was waiting.
"What happened?" said Harry. "What's the matter?"
But Dudley couldn't speak. He sped for the kitchen in a terror and turned on the TV to keep his mind off the terrible banging and scraping that had suddenly made its way from the fireplace. It worked for a minute or two, when—BANG!
Dudley jumped, remembering the way the giant had burst into the hut on the rock so many years ago.
"Ah—you must be Harry's aunt and uncle!"
Dudley edged his way to the kitchen door and peered into the living room, which was now filled with an assortment of gingers, two of which he recognized from the Flying Car Fiasco.
"Er—yes—sorry about that," said a tall, thin, balding man who could only be Mr Weasley, lowering his hand and looking over his shoulder at the blasted fireplace. "It's all my fault. It just didn't occur to me that we wouldn't be able to get out at the other end. I had your fireplace connected to the Floo Network, you see—just for an afternoon, you know, so we could get Harry. Muggle fireplaces aren't supposed to be connected, strictly speaking—but I've got a useful contact at the Floo Regulation Panel and he fixed it for me. I can put it right in a jiffy, though, don't worry. I'll light a fire to send the boys back, and then I can repair your fireplace before I Disapparate." The man turned to Harry and smiled brightly.
"Hello, Harry!" he said. "Got your trunk ready?"
"It's upstairs," said Harry, grinning back.
"We'll get it," said one of the boys from the Flying Car Fiasco. Winking at Harry, his two friends left to go upstairs, and Dudley ducked back into the kitchen, heart pounding, until he was sure they'd gone by.
"Well," said Mr Weasley. "Very—erm—very nice place you've got here."
As the usually spotless living room was now covered in dust and bits of brick, this remark didn't go down as well as it might.
"They run off eckeltricity, do they?" Mr Weasley said knowledgeably. "Ah yes, I can see the plugs. I collect plugs," he said to dad. "And batteries. Got a very large collection of batteries. My wife thinks I'm mad, but there you are."
Dudley decided he was more at risk from the two boys that had gone to retrieve Harry's trunk than the crackpot in the living room, and edged himself into the living room, sliding along the wall in mum's direction.
"Ah, this is your cousin, is it, Harry?" said Mr Weasley.
"Yep," said Harry, "that's Dudley." He exchanged looks, and smirks, with a ginger his own age.
Dudley clutched his bottom and wondered what kind of stories Harry had told his friends about the cousin who tormented him during the summer. Did they laugh, hearing about the time a giant had cursed him with a pig's tail? Would they want to get in on the fun?
"Having a good holiday, Dudley?" Mr Weasley asked.
Dudley whimpered.
The other two boys walked back in with Harry's trunk.
"Ah, right," said Mr Weasley. "Better get cracking then."
He pushed up the sleeves of his robes and took out his wand. "Incendio!" he said, pointing his wand at the hole in the wall behind him.
Flames rose at once in the fireplace, crackling merrily as though they had been burning for hours. Mr Weasley took a small drawstring bag from his pocket, untied it, took a pinch of the powder inside, and threw it onto the flames, which turned emerald green and roared higher than ever.
"Off you go then, Fred," said Mr Weasley.
"Coming," said the boy who must have been Fred. "Oh no—hang on—"
A bag of sweets had spilled out of Fred's pocket and the contents were now rolling in every direction—big, fat toffees in brightly colored wrappers.
Fred scrambled around, cramming them back into his pocket, then gave the Dursleys a cheery wave, stepped forward, and walked right into the fire, saying "the Burrow!" Mum gave a little shuddering gasp. There was a whooshing sound, and Fred vanished.
"Right then, George," said Mr Weasley, "you and the trunk."
Harry helped another Weasley carry the trunk forward into the flames and turn it onto its end so that he could hold it better. Then, with a second whoosh, George had cried "the Burrow!" and vanished too.
"Ron, you next," said Mr Weasley.
"See you," said Ron brightly to the Dursleys. He grinned broadly at Harry, then stepped into the fire, shouted "the Burrow!" and disappeared.
Now Harry and Mr Weasley alone remained.
"Well. . . 'bye then," Harry said. He moved toward the fire, but just as he reached the edge of the hearth, Mr Weasley put out a hand and held him back. He was looking at the Dursleys in amazement.
"Harry said good-bye to you," he said. "Didn't you hear him?"
"It doesn't matter," Harry muttered. "Honestly, I don't care."
Dudley eyed a toffee that had fallen at his foot. It was probably a terrible idea to eat a wizard's food… but when would Dudley get a chance like this again?
He crouched down and reached out a trembling hand, unwrapping a glistening toffee and inhaling it onto his tongue.
Mr Weasley did not remove his hand from Harry's shoulder.
"You aren't going to see your nephew till next summer," he said to dad in indignation. "Surely you're going to say good-bye?"
"Good-bye, then," dad said resentfully.
The toffee was the best one Dudley had ever had. He didn't know if it was because it was made by a wizard, or because he had spent so long without a single sweet, but as the taste of sugar melted on his tongue Dudley felt a moment of pure bliss.
"See you," said Harry, putting one foot forward into the green flames.
But suddenly the bliss turned to fear as Dudley found his tongue expanding, gagging him and lolling over his open lips, farther and farther, until it had become an unwieldy, foot-long appendage through which he couldn't even breathe.
Mum hurled herself onto the ground beside Dudley, seized the end of his swollen tongue, and attempted to wrench it out of his mouth; Dudley yelled and sputtered worse than ever, trying to fight her off. Dad was bellowing and waving his arms around.
I don't want to have my tongue removed, Dudley thought, as he remembered the shining surgical arena. A tail was one thing, but what would he be without a tongue? He tugged away from mum's desperate grasp, heaving on the floor.
Mr Weasley had to shout to make himself heard. "Not to worry, I can sort him out!" he yelled, advancing on Dudley with his wand outstretched, but mum screamed worse than ever and threw herself on top of Dudley.
"No, really!" said Mr Weasley desperately. "It's a simple process it was the toffee—my son Fred —real practical joker—but it's only an Engorgement Charm—at least, I think it is—please, I can correct it—"
"Let him fix it," Dudley tried to say, but it came out of his mouth as gurgles. He was as wordless as Aunt Marge floating on the ceiling.
Mum was sobbing hysterically, tugging Dudley's tongue as though determined to rip it out. Dudley was suffocating under the combined pressure of his mum and his engorged tongue; and dad, who had lost control completely, seized a china figure from on top of the sideboard and threw it very hard at Mr Weasley, who ducked, causing the ornament to shatter in the blasted fireplace.
"Now really!" said Mr Weasley angrily, brandishing his wand. "I'm trying to help!"
Bellowing like a wounded hippo, dad snatched up another ornament.
"Harry, go! Just go!" Mr Weasley shouted, his wand on dad. "I'll sort this out!"
Harry stepped into the fire, looking over his shoulder as he said "the Burrow!"
Dudley's last fleeting glimpse of his cousin was of the black-haired boy standing wreathed in flames that seemed the exact color of his wide, emerald eyes. Mr Weasley blasted a third ornament out of dad's hand with his wand and mum screamed again, still lying on top of Dudley so that Dudley couldn't move. His tongue lolling out like an anchor, he watched Harry spinning around like a top, faster and faster, disappearing in the rush of bright flames.
It took Mr Weasley yanking mum, sobbing, off of Dudley's prone body for the wizard to perform his reversing spell, but the moment he did, Dudley's swollen tongue began to recede. Mum's wails choked off into hiccoughing sobs, and even dad paused with his hand on a china figurine.
"I'm so sorry about all this, Dudley," Mr Weasley said, squatting on the floor as Dudley heaved himself into a sitting position, and he patted Dudley awkwardly on the shoulder.
Mum shrieked, and Mr Weasley drew back his hand, alarmed. Then he gave Dudley a sheepish look.
Turning back to the rubble that now made up the larger portion of the Dursley's living room, Mr Weasley waved his wand. "Reparo!" Bricks flew through the air back in the direction of the fireplace, sticking themselves back together as they did and falling at last into their rightful places, one-by-one, as orderly as a puzzle. At the same time, the china figurines that dad had thrown pulled themselves out of the fireplace and put themselves back together again, depositing themselves gently on the sideboard where they'd been before dad picked them up. The dust that had been covering the floor in a thin layer of gray was sucked back with the force of a vaccum, and became wall again, with only one thin crack in it.
With a frown of concentration, Mr Weasley flicked his wand, and the crack disappeared too. In a moment you could not even tell that the fireplace had ever been dismantled.
Mum looked like she wasn't sure whether to be relieved at the state of the living room or sick about the magic that had fixed it. Dad eyed the china figures warily, as though they might start doing wizardly things any moment.
"I'll leave you to it, then," Mr Weasley said with a brisk nod, and vanished with a loud crack of air before anyone could answer. Mum shrieked and began sobbing again. She grabbed Dudley by the shoulder and smothered kisses into his hair while Dudley squirmed to his feet, panting and swaying. Dad put the last, never-thrown china figure back onto the sideboard with a shaking hand.
"You—you all right then, Dudders?" dad said.
"Yeah," said Dudley. He trudged away, ignoring the grasping hand mum reached out after him.
He stomped up to his room, his heart pounding, and locked the door behind him. On his bedside table was a clean piece of notebook paper that had never been folded. Dudley reached a shaking hand toward it. He started to fold an eight-sided diamond, feeling his pounding heart slow and the cold fear drift from his veins.
By the seventh diamond Dudley realized that he wasn't scared of Mr Weasley.
Dudley had known Harry's friends had it out for him. It was only common sense that they would. But he'd still eaten the toffee Harry's friend had dropped.
And it had been the most amazing toffee of his life.
Dudley paused in the middle of his eighth diamond.
It had been. Even with everything that happened afterward. For a minute, the taste of it had been so sweet he had forgotten to be afraid.
Dudley enjoyed his food. Everyone knew this.
But did Dudley?
All of a sudden, Dudley wasn't sure if he'd ever spent enough time tasting what went in his mouth to tell.