Nearly ten years have passed since the Dursleys woke up to find their niece on the front step, but Privet Drive has hardly changed at all. The sun rises on the same tidy front gardens and lights up the brass number four on the Dursleys' front door; it creeps into their living room, which is almost exactly the same as it was on the night when Mr. Dursley saw that fateful news report about the owls. Only the photographs on the mantelpiece really show how much time has passed. Ten years ago, there were lots of pictures of what looked like a large pink beach ball wearing different-colored bonnets—but Dudley Dursley is no longer a baby, and now the photographs show a large blond boy riding his first bicycle, on a carousel at the fair, playing a computer game with his father, being hugged and kissed by his mother. The room holds no sign at all that a girl lives in the house, too.

Yet Sarah Potter is still there, asleep at the moment, but not for long. Her Aunt Petunia's awake and it's her shrill voice that makes the first noise of the day, knocking on the door of her little cupboard under the stairs.

"Up up up you get! It's morning!"