Chapter 1: prologue: lightning across an inky sky
Summary:
A prologue, in which they haven't met.
Chapter Text
October 1981
It was late evening. The sound of a band echoed through the streets, mixing with the hoots of a barn owl in a tree opposite the house. Laughter rang out from the neighbour’s house, where a few children traded their sweets with each other and sipped on little cups of orange juice. An old man blew out the candle he’d carefully embedded in a carved pumpkin.
A scream shattered the evening air as a woman fell to the ground, surrounded in a shimmering, glassy, green light. The Dark Lord laughed, a high, cruel sound, and let the shadows envelop him.
The shadowy figure’s cloak made a gentle rustling sound as it dragged over the lifeless limbs of Lily Potter’s body. The Dark Lord moved closer to a small wooden crib, dipping a hand into his robes for a handkerchief. A pattern of serpents, embroidered with the finest silver thread, gleamed in the lantern light.
“Oh Fate, she is a pitiful thing, sending you to defeat me.” said the Dark Lord, carefully polishing his wand with his handkerchief, “Do give her my kindest regards.”
The Dark Lord Voldemort raised a pale hand, letting his finger stroke along the side of the crib. The wood was cold, somehow colder than his hands, which shook slightly with adrenaline. He was excitement, he was victory. The light of dusk settled on the windowsill and the sparrows in the trees watched as he raised his wand, black wood striking against the low haze of the crib-side lamp. The miniscule boy would be not even a footnote in history as he conquered the wizarding world. He was an inevitable force.
“Harry Potter, come to die,” he gloated, leering at the small boy, “Avada Kedavra.”
And then there was a flash of brilliantly green light and a roar not unlike a thunderclap. Pain, ever-lasting, never-ending pain enveloped the room’s two inhabitants and for a moment both were sure that they would die, but when Death halted time and carefully surveyed the moment, it could not have been said that either were gone just yet. Time’s gears began to whir and clank again as Death was swept away into the gathering night. The perpetual light vanished, the immense sound disappeared as if suddenly finding itself in a vacuum, and all that remained of the greatest dark wizard since Grindelwald was an old cloak embroidered with a serpent. It settled slowly on the dusty ground, falling atop a few pieces of plaster that had chipped off the nursery walls. A tiny brown teddy bear fell off its shelf. The children next door turned and ran inside, loudly giggling as they were called into the house for cake. The old man sat on his porch and read a book of poems. The band played on, the sounds of trumpets whistling in the night air. The crib rocked ever so slightly and time remembered that someone in the room still lived, still breathed.
The tiny infant inside the wooden crib brought a chubby hand through his raggedy black hair to the space above his right eyebrow and felt a raised cut that was slowly oozing blood. The pain was slight compared to the immense, overwhelming pain from the menacing green light, but it was pain nonetheless. He didn’t like the pain, he wanted his mama. Why was she on the floor? At any moment, she would jump up and proclaim that this was all a big game of peek-a-boo. Why wasn’t she getting up? He wanted his mama.
And in that same moment, a small girl in London watched in wonder as a tiny lightning bolt etched itself onto her left index finger in deep red ink. No pain came from the symbol’s appearance, nor its continuance on her finger. It was clear on her skin, yet delicate. She felt different, somehow. She stayed awake for a few more seconds, then at the same time as the small boy in the crib halfway across England, succumbed to the embrace of sleep.
— — —
December 1984
It was Christmas Day, a time of goodwill and cheer. Harry could hear laughter outside, and the songs of carollers as they patrolled the neighbourhood, armed with books of Yule songs. Every few moments, a few beams of green and red light shone through the closed shutters on the windows of the Dursley home and made their way towards the cupboard under the stairs, in which a boy sat with his back to the door and tried to catch the lights appearing on the wall opposite him. It wasn’t working. The lights evaded his pudgy hands and danced over his head, making him laugh as they leaped away. It was a good thing there was no one else in the house at that moment. The only time that Harry could laugh freely was when he was all alone.
The Dursleys had departed for a Christmas dinner about an hour and a half ago, after Aunt Petunia had burnt the ham she’d been trying to make all day. She pretended to be a good cook, because she pretended to be a perfect wife from a perfect family, but she usually left all the cooking to her nephew, who sat in the cupboard. Uncle Vernon, a bowling ball with legs and a brown toupee, had laughed and clapped her on the back, exclaiming about his Christmas bonus from the drill company he worked at. He was always very proud of that. Dudley, Harry’s cousin, was entirely motivated by food and in such a manner demanded that if they went out, it had better be to a place with good ice cream sundaes. Of course it would be. Petunia and Vernon Dursley would do anything for their son.
Harry spent a while chasing the lights, but eventually gave up. He sat in his cupboard, pushing toy soldiers along the shelves.
Green lights flashed in the cupboard. The sounds of carollers faded. A man’s voice was telling ‘Lily’ to run, whoever that was. There was a woman’s voice in his head, begging for his life to be spared, sacrificing herself for him. There was the harsh rustle of fabric across the floor. There was a high, haunting scream, the stuff of nightmares. Green lights flashed in his head, colouring the insides of his eyelids a vivid emerald colour.
Harry shook his head and went back to playing with the toy soldiers. They made clicking sounds as they moved, and Harry was reminded of the click of the lock as he was shut in his cupboard. His stomach rumbled and he wrapped his arms around his torso, hunching over as if that would stop the monstrous hunger gnawing at the lining of his stomach. Not for the first time, he wished for something to eat. He’d do anything for a single morsel of food.
The door opened with a click.
Harry’s head shot up so fast that he cracked it against a shelf. Wincing, he held onto the sore part with both hands and tried to stand up, but fell over onto the door. It swung open and Harry went sprawling across the floor, leaving little spots of blood on the cream-coloured carpet. He cringed, knowing that he would be made to clean it up later. But presently, it was no matter to him. His stomach rumbled again and he tottered towards the kitchen.
The fridge was much too tall for him to open and the pantry was child-locked against Dudley, so those food sources were out of the question. There were jars of pickles and jams on the counter, but nothing to put them on. A tray of fresh Christmas cookies sat out on the stovetop, ready to give to Santa, but Harry knew that Aunt Petunia would have counted them before they left, just in case Harry managed to escape his cupboard. Harry looked around for a minute before finding a solution.
On the counter sat Aunt Petunia’s burnt ham from a few hours ago. Harry struggled to climb up on the counter, but he managed it and crawled over to the dish, knees scraping against the stone countertop. It was cold to the touch and grease was pooling on the serving plate, but it was still the most appetising thing Harry had seen for a week. Considering that he’d been locked in his cupboard for a week with only bread and butter, that was true.
The ham was mostly untouched, but there were a few slices cut out. Aunt Petunia might have counted them, but if she hadn’t, then Harry could get away with taking one. He reached out a hand and slowly, carefully took a slice, relishing the weight in his hand. Bringing it to his mouth, he took a bite and savoured the taste for only a moment before cramming another bite into his mouth. As much as he knew he wouldn’t be able to handle eating it all at once, the Dursleys had been gone for almost two hours and even if Dudley had demanded seconds and thirds of ice cream, they wouldn’t stay away forever. Harry’s hand lingered over another slice of ham, but he snatched it back before he got too carried away. If Aunt Petunia noticed, there would be hell to pay.
Harry wriggled down from the counter and contemplated his next move. He could always go back to his cupboard, but the chairs in the parlour looked so inviting. He wasn’t usually allowed to sit on them, but perhaps he could try now?
He toddled over to the parlour and placed an experimental hand on Uncle Vernon’s big armchair, the red one in the corner with an unhealthy amount of crumbs on its seat. Using a knee to help himself up, Harry flopped down on the chair and wriggled around on it a little. It was far more comfortable than the old mattress on the floor of his cupboard. He could just stay there for a moment.
He felt a little dizzy and reached a hand up to touch his head again. It came away dotted with crimson blood. In his rush to eat something, Harry had entirely forgotten about his injury. He swayed a little. Was that a bad sign? Probably.
He woke up a half hour later to a large hand shaking him awake. Opening his eyes with a yawn, he looked up to see Uncle Vernon’s furious face, bulging and red. His eyes were bugging out as if he’d been electrocuted and his top lip was quivering, making his strangely thin moustache vibrate alongside it. His jowls shook with the force he was exerting to try and wake Harry up.
“Boy!” Vernon roared, “Never in my life! I can’t believe- you little- you terrible, horrible! Boy, you are in so much trouble!”
Harry whimpered, hands scrambling against Vernon’s grip on his shoulder. Vernon didn’t appear to care, dragging Harry out of the armchair with a few more gruff yells. He dragged the small boy out of the parlour, not caring about his legs desperately trying to find purchase on the carpet.
“Bleeding on Petunia’s carpet, bleeding on my chair! Eating my good family’s food! You're ungrateful, that’s what it is! Have we not taken good care of you, not since you darkened our doorstep!”
With a crash, Harry was thrown into his cupboard, where he sat staring wide-eyed up at his uncle. Vernon was shaking with rage so much that his toupee had started to slip off of his sweaty head, looking like a dead rat had been dropped onto him.
“You’ll be lucky for bread and butter this time, boy! Never in my life!”
The door slammed shut with a bang and Harry was shut in the cupboard once more. This time, there were no pretty green and red lights to chase.
— — —
April 1987
“Beaver!” cried a small boy, shouldering past her in the hallway.
“Teacher’s pet,” snarled a girl, reaching over and taking her coloured pencils, the nice ones that she’d been given as a present by her mother.
“Cheating,” the principal said, looking down his nose at her, “is not tolerated at this school. There’s no way to get ninety percent on the aptitude test, it’s supposed to be too hard in order to challenge you. You must have seen the answers.”
“A pleasure to have in class, if a bit… overzealous when it comes to answering questions.” remarked a teacher, pushing a folder of Hermione’s test results towards the other side of the desk. Hermione’s father took them and quickly scanned the file while her mother patted Hermione on the shoulder. “Perhaps she should calm down a bit? It isn’t exactly conducive for… friendship, being so intelligent at such a young age.”
That night was particularly hard to get through, as Hermione’s parents consoled her through the evening. They exchanged worried glances as she sobbed into her pillow, not understanding why everyone was so mean to her. She was only seven years old, only a few years into primary school, so there needn’t have been any bullies or problems. But the other students despised her and Hermione couldn’t understand why. It wasn’t as if she was going above and beyond, or being “overzealous” as her teacher called it, she just answered any questions the teacher asked her. She wasn’t cheating on tests, like the principal accused her of doing. She didn’t try to be a teacher’s pet.
All her life, Hermione had found her escape in the books in her local library. The elderly librarians all adored her, answering her multitudes of questions while simultaneously cooing and calling her adorable for needing help to get books down from the highest shelves. Why couldn’t her teachers be like that: both admiring and obliging? Why couldn’t her classmates just ignore her instead of hissing names at her across the courtyard or shouldering past her in the classroom with far more force than was necessary? Both of those questions she wailed into her pillow as her parents patted her back. They looked at each other, tired, and decided to let her rest.
As her parents left her room to let her get some sleep, Hermione rolled over onto her side and wiped her swollen eyes with pudgy hands. She found herself staring at her left index finger, where a thin red lightning bolt had sat engraved into her skin. The existence of the mark was curious, as Hermione couldn’t remember what she’d gotten it from. She’d tried to ask her parents if it was a birthmark, but they’d looked confused and told her that there was nothing on her finger, and she’d never had a birthmark. Even curiouser was the fact that not a single person other than Hermione could see it. Despite asking as many people as she could, no one else believed that the lightning bolt existed. Neither would it come off with extensive washing and scrubbing. As pink and scalded as Hermione’s hands became, the mark was still distinctly etched over the top, not to be covered in any way. It made her calmer to see the mark. It was something permanent in an ever-changing world, something that had been with her as long as she remembered. And now, crying herself to sleep, she had a slight smile on her face as she gazed at the mark.
— — —
March 1988
“Freak,” hissed a large girl, stepping on his foot.
“Stupid,” laughed a boy in his class, taking his pencil and grinding it down until it was blunt.
“Your test scores,” the principal said, avoiding looking at him to instead fix her sight on his aunt and uncle, “are abominable. You have got to put in some more effort.”
“Quiet in class, if a bit more than is normal,” a teacher informed his guardians, “but he’s constantly getting into trouble with your son. I don’t know if there’s some form of bullying, but your nephew always comes back from lunch break out of breath and with bruises. I’m afraid he’s becoming a bit of a troublemaker.”
Uncle Vernon huffed and took Harry's report card, scanning over it with a sneer. Aunt Petunia smiled kindly at the teacher while clenching very tight onto Harry’s shoulder and digging her overly-long manicured nails into the skin of his arm.
That night was particularly hard to get through. Harry’s aunt and uncle threw him outside to paint the fence, locking the house tight as they went to get Dudley ice cream for his meagre report card. Harry sighed as he dipped his paintbrush back into the can of gloopy white paint and let it sit for a moment, contemplating what he'd done to deserve this. Nothing, he concluded. Sure, he was a “troublemaker”, but his bruises were only because of Dudley playing “Harry Hunting” every moment he could find. Why did he have to be picked on? Why didn’t anyone seem to notice that something was wrong?
Harry finished the last slat of the fence with a sigh and made his way over to the shed. Opening the rusty door with an ear-splitting creak, Harry set the paint down and went to wash his paintbrush at the tiny sink.
He stopped. There was something different about the shed.
In the corner was a tiny pile of thick books, stained with something yellow. Harry stared at them. The books were one of Dudley’s presents from a few years ago, though not one that had gotten much constructive use, because Dudley had run over each of them with his bike, cackling like an evil scarecrow. Setting the paintbrush down, he scurried over and dropped to his knees, picking up the book on the top of the pile. Tiny lettering shone like gold in the night.
“The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe,” Harry muttered, eyebrows drawn, “What a curious name for a book.”
And he sat down and flipped to the first page, paintbrush forgotten. That was the beginning of the most magical evening.
By the time Uncle Vernon’s car rolled back into the garage, Harry had already finished the book, gotten back inside by fiddling with the lock on the first-floor bathroom window, and crashed head first into the back of every wardrobe in the house. After a particularly nasty tumble, he climbed back outside and sat on the steps, dreams of an escape to a magical world crushed under the screeching tires of the parking car.
— — —
October 1989
Hermione’s parents always seemed to think that she was a bit too much. It was a common sentiment amongst everyone she talked to — she was too smart, too bossy, too determined. Nevertheless, she always remained the same, despite trying to push down the parts of herself that people didn’t seem to like. Her classmates rolled their eyes when she put her hand up in class, so she stopped doing that. Her teachers sighed when she turned in assignments that were exactly as long as the maximum page counts, so she cut out her extra anecdotes and went with the bare bones. Her neighbours would call her adorable every time she piped up with a fun fact, so she kept quiet until they got uncomfortable. Somehow, everything about her was still wrong anyway.
There were times when she could be herself, though. Halloween was approaching, and every year her parents would drive out to Oxford so that Hermione could go trick-or-treating with her cousin. She’d even gotten a special costume; a Princess Leia dress she’d been eyeing for a few months. On the night, her mother spent an hour meticulously braiding Hermione’s hair into two special buns until she looked exactly like the movies. It was the best costume Hermione had ever worn and she almost didn’t move the entire car ride over to Oxford, determined not to crease the dress.
The streets of suburban Oxford were dotted with groups of kids when they got there. Hermione said a quick hello to her uncle and aunt before going to leap into her cousin Emily’s arms. She was fifteen and the most awesome person Hermione knew — she went to a special science school and did kung fu and ballet on the weekends and had the most luscious blonde hair Hermione had ever seen. Best of all, she seemed to love Hermione like a little sister.
“Hey, pipsqueak.” Emily greeted her with an easy smile.
“I’m ten!” objected Hermione, crossing her arms. Emily laughed and picked her up, shaking her until she squealed.
“Are you sure?”
“Yeah!” Hermione said, an air of finality in her voice. “I turned ten last month!”
“Alright then. Ready to go?”
Soon, Hermione and Emily were trick-or-treating through the streets, carrying plastic pumpkins to put their candy in. People seemed to think Hermione was adorable and cooed after her, which Hermione felt was a bit condescending. Nevertheless, it was refreshing to be able to talk Emily’s ear off and a couple of adults giving out candy smiled down at her when she told them how cool Princess Leia was.
They went through a couple of houses until they reached something unexpected.
“Trick or treat!” Hermione cried. The woman who’d opened the door looked unimpressed.
“Who are you supposed to be?” she asked patronisingly.
Hermione scrunched up her face. “Princess Leia?”
“What’s she from?”
“Have you never heard of Star Wars? It’s a classic science fiction movie, it’s really good! Though the space laser thing is a bit contrived and wouldn’t really work because space is a vacuum-”
“-Oh, such a little know-it-all!” the woman crowed, dropping a piece of candy into her pumpkin. Hermione blanched, choking back the rest of her sentence. “Run along now, sweetie, your sister’s getting bored.”
“Hey!” Emily said, “I’m not bored, Hermione’s very smart.”
“Well, it must be a bit of a bother taking her around! She’s probably talking the ears off anyone who’ll listen.” the woman laughed, looking over at Emily. Emily didn’t respond, only smiling tightly and pulling Hermione down the path and away from the house. Hermione sniffled and Emily looked crushed.
“Am I really bothering you?” Hermione whispered, looking down at her hands. Emily dropped down to one knee in front of her.
“No, Hermione,” Emily said gently, taking her hand, “Never be sorry for being more intelligent than other people. You’re a wonderful little girl, Hermione, and I wish I was as smart as you when I was younger.”
“Really?” Hermione said, feeling all of ten years old. Emily nodded and enveloped her in a hug.
“Now c’mon, pipsqueak, you’ve got candy to eat.”
“But Mum and Dad say no candy after brushing your teeth,” Hermione protested, eyes wide.
Emily laughed, standing up and holding Hermione’s hand, “You can brush them later. Have some fun, Hermione! It’s Halloween!”
— — —
May 1990
Harry knew that he wasn’t loved. It was a simple fact of life for him — the sky was blue, the grass was green, and the Dursleys didn’t love him. Nevertheless, he always tried. The human spirit was indomitable and so was the childish naivety he carried in his heart like some sort of treasure. No matter what he did, the Dursleys would never love him, but there was always a tiny part of him that hoped for it. They were capable of it, obviously, as his aunt and uncle doted on Dudley, but perhaps they just didn’t have enough love left to extend any to him.
It was a cold day for late spring and the flowers out in the garden were shivering in the wind. Inside, Aunt Petunia was preparing for her next luncheon, making red velvet cupcakes and little cucumber sandwiches. Harry had been washing sheets and holding laundry all day
“Can I help you with the decorating?” Harry asked. Petunia sized him up, considering it, then nodded sharply.
“You can do the piping,” she ordered, “And I’ll put on the sugar roses, because god knows you don’t have the competence to do so.”
Harry nodded, not even taking offence because of how often Aunt Petunia said things like that. He was used to his intelligence and skill at anything he expressed interest in being insulted. She passed him a piping bag full of buttercream icing and he squeezed it a couple of times before starting on her first cupcake.
Harry forced himself not to stick his tongue out as he worked the piping bag, knowing that Aunt Petunia thought it was a dirty habit. He focused on the piping and ended up with a nice flower design. It didn’t collapse in on itself and Aunt Petunia looked the tiniest bit impressed.
“That’s good enough,” Petunia said appraisingly, “You’ve got an eye for this, boy.”
“T-thanks, Aunt Petunia!” Harry said, shocked. She’d never complimented him in such a manner before. She tsked and turned back to her decorating. They worked in silence for the next half hour until all forty cupcakes were done, and Harry could almost feel Petunia’s eyes on his back as he washed up. She hadn’t even objected when he licked a bit of icing from his fingers, which was very telling of how good of a mood she was in. Harry was in a good mood as well, sure that he’d impressed her.
The front door swung open with a bang and Dudley’s elephant footsteps came stomping in. Aunt Petunia’s demeanour instantly shifted and she quickly put a cupcake on a plate. Dudley walked into the kitchen and Petunia smiled, enveloping him in a hug before whispering a few loving words in his ear and handing him the cupcake.
Harry bit his lip and willed his face to show no emotion, turning back to the dishes.
Why did Dudley get so much love just for existing? He was a bad person — he pushed younger kids, got rotten grades, yelled at his parents, and was a terror to his teachers. There was supposedly good in everyone, but Dudley sure didn’t act like it. Harry liked to think he was a good person, so why didn’t anyone love him? Why would he never be good enough?
Good things come to people who wait, but Harry had been waiting for an awfully long time.
— — —
July 1991
A still small Hermione was eating breakfast on a picturesque day in July and was awfully excited to get to school that day. They’d just started learning about negative numbers in mathematics and her year six teacher was super nice, so she really wanted to rush to school. If she did well in the test they’d have soon, she'd get to pick a chocolate from the treats box! It was a bit childish, especially for a really mature eleven-year-old like her, but she’d suffer through academic mediocrity for the chocolate. She hurried through her eggs and sausage, accidentally letting her last bite of sausage fall onto her jeans. She dabbed at it with a napkin, hoping that it wouldn’t stain. Strangely, the piece of sausage had disappeared. That was quite strange, probably the weirdest thing for today. Not much happened on normal Wednesdays in suburban London.
“Hermione, dear, could you get the post?” her mother called over the morning paper, “I’m expecting a letter from Barbara.”
“Yes, Mum,” Hermione answered, scraping the last bits of egg from her plate. She ambled into the hall and shuffled the papers around on the rug, gathering the numerous letters into a stack. There were two bills, a couple letters from relatives, Mum’s letter from her knitting circle friend Barbara, and a letter from some place called… Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry? What on god’s green earth was that and who would name a school something so terrible? Hermione pondered the letter for a moment, then decided to go for an expert’s opinion on strange things. After all, dentists did see strange things all the time.
“Mum, I think there’s a prank letter in our mail.” she exclaimed, holding the thick, white envelope up to the light. The warm electric lamp on the entryway table reflected golden light off of an emerald green wax seal, letting Hermione see a fancy crest pressed into it. It had a Latin motto engraved on it, and what appeared to be four animals; a lion, a snake, a badger, and some sort of bird. It was very ornate, but anyone could have procured a fancy stamp and made something like that. It was addressed peculiarly; whoever had written it was evidently close to her, as the envelope even specified that she lived in the ‘second bedroom on the first floor’. Hermione tried to think back about who could have known that, but she’d never really had a friend close enough to invite them over, let alone one who would go through this much work just for a prank. It didn’t matter, perhaps she had told someone, or it was a lucky coincidence.
“Oh, blimey. Give it here, Hermione?” her father called from the kitchen, where he was loading the dishwasher. Richard Granger was very no-nonsense (that was a quality often found in dentists), so of course he’d figure this whole business out.
“Hog-Hogwarts School? Witchcraft and Wizardry? What a load of rubbish. Someone’s trying to pull the wool on you, Hermione.” he said decidedly, “You can give it a read, if you’d like, but after that just toss it. No use paying attention to things like that.”
“Yes Dad, I do think you’re right.” Hermione agreed. She got a knife from the drawer and carefully cut the envelope open. Inside was something she never could have expected. The envelope contained three pieces of creamy, beige paper emblazoned with a colourised version of the crest on the letter, each proudly proclaiming the name whatever hodge-podge school one of the kids at school had concocted for a joke.
HOGWARTS SCHOOL of WITCHCRAFT and WIZARDRY
Headmaster: Albus Dumbledore
(Order of Merlin, First Class, Grand Sorcerer, Chief Warlock
Supreme Mugwump, International Confederation of Wizards)
Dear Ms Granger,
We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Please find enclosed a list of all necessary books and equipment.
Term begins on 1 September. We await your owl by no later than 31 July.
Yours sincerely,
Minerva McGonagall
Deputy Headmistress
“Dad, read this!” Hermione gasped in laughter, “Supreme Mugwump? Order of Merlin? Grand Sorcerer? Well, one thing’s for sure, whoever wrote this has some real creativity. Look, there’s even a little pamphlet about being ‘muggleborn’, it says a teacher will visit us. The subject list is mad! Potions, Transfiguration… Herbology sounds like some sort of pseudoscience!”
Her father grabbed the letter, then guffawed with laughter.
“Oh, Helen, listen to what your daughter’s got to do to reach the school! ‘We await your owl’? Oh, that’s a joke, remember that owl that bit me last year? Those bloody birds are completely savage. This whole thing’s a joke. Keep it, Hermione, that’s good for a laugh.”
Hermione nodded, still giggling. The supply list was confusing but very inventive, with things like dragon-hide gloves and pewter cauldrons. It was a laugh, but the whole thing was totally unbelievable. At least if it was someone playing a prank, at least they had seemingly put some planning into it.
There was a sharp rap at the door and Hermione turned to look at it.
“Hermione, dear, could you answer that?” her mother asked, still gasping with laughter.
Hermione strolled over to the door, chest aching from her laughter. She opened the door and there stood a woman in a very long, grey dress and a blue blazer with large shoulder pads. A row of buttons lined her dress right up to her neck. She appeared to be trying to seem vintage, or perhaps had no knowledge of current fashion, as she seemed to be going to a convention for school mistresses who’d been stuck in supply closets since the eighteenth century. Her hair was pulled up into a tight brown bun, which made her look rather ancient (though Hermione knew it would be impolite to say so). She looked both decidedly uncomfortable and quite hopeful, and Hermione was instantly on guard.
“Can I help you, ma’am?” Hermione asked carefully, lifting an eyebrow. The woman stared for a moment at Hermione’s flared jeans and emerald green knit sweater and muttered something about ‘muggles and their extraordinary fashion sense’.
“Ma’am?” Hermione repeated. The woman seemed to shake herself, then pulled her shoulders back and stared down her cherub nose through dainty spectacles at Hermione. The small girl had the uncomfortable feeling of being heavily and unjustly judged.
“Yes, yes. Apologies, I was lost in my thoughts. Would you happen to be Miss Hermione Granger?” the woman questioned kindly, looking down her nose at the small girl.
“Yes, ma’am.” Hermione dutifully answered, lifting her hand. The woman looked perplexed, then murmured something about ‘muggle greetings’ and gently clasped her hand, shaking it. Hermione cocked her head in confusion. The woman sure was strange, going about and talking gibberish like ‘muggle’. Perhaps it was slang from the octogenarian community? Hermione shook herself. It was rude to say that old-looking people looked old, she knew that.
“Excellent. My name is Charity Burbage, and I am the Professor of Muggle Studies at Hogwarts School for Witchcraft and Wizardry. Do you know what I’m referring to?” the woman questioned. Hermione’s jaw hit the floor. This really was too far for a prank. A funny letter was quite alright and honestly very creative, but this was really going overboard.
At Hermione’s silence, the woman arched an eyebrow, “I trust you received your admittance letter? It should have come by post this morning, if that’s what muggles seem to use.” The last part was muttered in a manner that Hermione found not unlike a parent attempting to act pleased by a child’s rudimentary skills in kindergarten macaroni art.
Hermione gaped, then regained her breath and quickly replied, “Pardon me, ma’am? Not quite sure if I heard you right, you said Hogwarts? That funny thing from the prank letter?”
“I beg your pardon?” the self-proclaimed ‘Professor’ Burbage gasped, “Prank letter? Did you not even read the pamphlet on being muggleborn?”
“Lady, this has been really fun and all, but I think my mum wants me to come and help with breakfast. Thanks a lot!” Hermione said hurriedly, trying to shut the door. The woman put a single patent-leather shoe in the way and raised a bushy brown eyebrow. Hermione winced and tried to close the door again, but the shoe remained firmly lodged in the door frame. The small girl nervously looked up at the old lady who was technically now attempting to break and enter and sucked air between her teeth as if that would calm the jolts of caution racing through her body. She tried once more to close the door, biting her lip. This was certainly one way to get murdered. Of all the silly things! A dangerous escaped convict would have at least started a national manhunt, but a senile Mary Poppins cosplayer was just silly. Hermione internally sighed. This was no way to go.
“Young lady, that is no way to speak to me.” she admonished, looking down at Hermione through her spectacles again, “I’ll explain it all in a moment. May I come in?”
Hermione heard her father get up from the table and decided that she’d rather like some back-up if this woman turned out to be a crazy patient from the nearby clinic. “Dad?” Hermione called down the hallway, “This woman wants to come in, and she’s calling herself a professor at that Hogwarts school place from the letter.”
“What?” her father exclaimed, striding into the hall with great strong footsteps, “Well, don’t let her in! Obviously she’s delusional or something. Maybe she’s been hired as some actor in this prank.”
The woman cleared her throat, looking rather put out at the man’s forthright demands, “Mr. Richard Granger, I presume. My name is Charity Burbage, and I am the Professor of Muggle Studies at Hogwarts School for Witchcraft and Wizardry. I can assure you that this isn’t a joke, no matter how ridiculous it may seem. Now, if I may, I’d like to come in and explain further. If you’d be so amendable as to let me in?”
“Ma’am,” her father declared, “You need to leave this property-”
The woman sighed and murmured something about ‘always needing to prove it for them’. Hermione felt a pang of nervousness jolt through her. ‘Professor Burbage’ pulled a long, wooden stick out of her pocket and flicked it once, muttering something that sounded like gibberish Latin. Hermione looked up at her father, feeling as confused as he looked. Had she gone crazy? She certainly looked it right now.
“Ma’am-” Hermione started.
And that was when the entryway table turned into a tiger. It snarled and roared and the two Grangers stood in terror, shell-shocked by its appearance. With another flick of the woman’s wand, the tiger disappeared. She artfully stepped past Hermione and made her way into the kitchen, where she turned Helen Granger’s Wednesday morning newspaper into a stork. This was the beginning of the screaming.
“My name is Charity Burbage, and I am the Professor of Muggle Studies at Hogwarts School for Witchcraft and Wizardry. Would you like to know more?”
“Yes,” Hermione’s mother said faintly, “Yes, that sounds good.”
— — —
As Hermione Granger sat with a large frothing glass of butterbeer and watched Professor Burbage levitate the Leaky Cauldron’s chairs, she decided that she was quite happy they’d let the professor in. After an hour of astonished questions, the quartet had departed to go and buy Hermione’s school supplies, using something that the professor called ‘the flu’. It had created spiralling green flames in their fireplace and Professor Burbage had pulled them through, intoning some weird place name. They’d arrived in the ‘Leaky Cauldron’, where a friendly barman had pointed the disoriented Grangers into a small back alley. Professor Burbage brought out her wand and tapped a specific pattern onto a dirty brick wall. After doing so, the most brilliantly magical shopping market had been unveiled, with colourful, wonky stores and loud wizards dressed in flowing robes bartering for toad’s eyes and fizzing whizbees. A few children had run past, smoke shooting out of her ears, and Hermione’s mother had collapsed onto a bench in shock. Hermione, on the other hand, was electrified with excitement. She usually wasn’t one for shopping, but this could be an exception.
Navigating the market was easier said than done, with the only way to get through the crowds being carefully placed elbows. They'd entered Gringotts bank, where a goblin (Hermione was still flabbergasted) had taken a hundred solid gold coins from the Hogwarts vaults and handed them to Professor Burbage, who put them into a pouch that certainly shouldn’t have held all of them.
Five different stores, four non-curriculum books, three bags of sweets, two hours of shopping, and a partridge in a pear tree later, everything on Hermione’s supply list was bought, checked, and double-checked. Every school supply was carefully wrapped in paper and put into Hermione’s fancy new school bag. Yes, dragons apparently dig exist and yes, some poor dragon had to die for Hermione’s herbology gloves.
Now, the Granger family was sitting in the Leaky Cauldron and Professor Burbage was dutifully answering the many questions that the Granger family was itching to have answered. The Professor was apparently a half-wizard, half-muggle (a half-blood, she had explained), which explained her knowledge of both worlds (she did seem a little out of touch with current fashion, though). Hermione unwrapped a golden toffee from a packet she’d bought at some sweet shop called Honeydukes and popped it into her mouth. Her mother had given up taking the toffees away, seeing as there didn’t seem to be an ingredient list on the back to show how much sugar was in them. She was still muttering about her baby’s dental health though.
“Sixty thousand wizards?” her father blurted out, shocked, “Bloody hell, no wonder we didn’t know you existed, we’d barely be able to find two wizards to rub together.
“Yes, about sixty thousand,” Professor Burbage confirmed, pointing to a paragraph in Hermione’s new ‘A Muggleborn’s Guide to Magical Living’ book that was lying open on the table, “There are usually nearly three hundred students at Hogwarts, divided into their various houses.”
“Oh, the houses are for that point system thing? The house cup?” her mother questioned over her small glass of Major Stede's Original Swashbuckling Soda. The professor pulled over Hermione’s freshly purchased copy of ‘Hogwarts: A History’ and flipped through to the introduction chapter, where the Hogwarts crest was emblazoned front and centre.
“The four houses are each on the crest. Hufflepuff, the badger, values loyalty and hard work, whilst Gryffindor, the lion, values bravery and chivalry. Then there’s Slytherin, the snake, valuing cunning and resourcefulness, and finally Ravenclaw, the eagle, which values knowledge and curiosity.”
“That’s all very well,” Helen Granger began, “But why isn’t the Ravenclaw symbol a raven?”
“Heaven if I know,” the strict professor sighed, “Would you like another drink? The lavender lemonade is good after a shock.”
— — —
August 1991
“Boy,” Uncle Vernon began, “What are you loitering about for? Finish the weeding or there’s no dinner for a week.”
Harry sighed, letting his hands fall back onto Aunt Petunia’s carefully landscaped and evenly green lawn. He grabbed a pair of old rusty brown tweezers, as the ever-generous Dursleys didn’t seem to think he needed anything newer or fancier to complete his chores. Moving over a few steps, Harry dropped to his knees and bent over, carefully surveying the lawn. He pulled out a single clover and tossed it into the garbage bag. That was weed number two thousand, nine hundred, and forty-one. He picked up the tweezers again. Two thousand, nine hundred, and forty-two. He picked up the tweezers again. Two thousand, nine hundred-
A sensation like crashing head first into a pane of glass enveloped him and Harry felt himself gasping for air. He was floating away from his body. His heartbeat was wild and erratic as he fought the strange feeling. Something, somewhere, was going to happen. That night, in fact. Something, somewhere, was going to happen and it would be beautiful.
And then all at once, he crashed back into his body. Shaking the strange experience off as a symptom of his impending heatstroke, Harry lifted the tweezers. Two thousand, nine hundred, and forty-four.
“Boy, five minutes then you’ll start dinner, and mind you, Petunia has specially requested that you don’t burn the bloody lamb chops this time! Honestly, boy. Have you gotten three thousand weeds yet? It shouldn’t take this long, you slacker! My strong boy Dudley could do it in ten minutes.” Uncle Vernon’s voice rang out from the house as what appeared to be an obese and diseased walrus lumbered out onto the back porch. His uncle sat with a thump into a heavy-duty lawn chair, flicking a lighter on and off whilst smoking a cigar. The breeze directed the smoke into Harry’s face and he coughed, noticing Vernon’s grin.
“Not yet, Uncle, only a few more.” Harry choked out, waving his hand to disperse the smoke. It didn’t work. His eyes watered and he sniffed, accidentally breathing in more smoke.
“Well hurry, boy,” his uncle bellowed, standing and going back inside, still smoking his noxious cigarette, “Or you’re in the cupboard for a week!”
Harry gasped as fresh air prevailed. “Yes, Uncle Vernon.”
— — —
Hermione sat down at her desk, quill in her fingers. She fiddled with it nervously, wincing as the carefully arranged barbs were ruffled slightly. It was late at night, far after her parents had gone to sleep, and she was meant to be asleep as well, but she just couldn’t control herself. She wanted to know, she wanted to experiment with the unfamiliar device, the dainty feather that she was somehow supposed to write with. She needed to. Something compelled her to sit awake in the late hours of twilight and write. She picked up the bottle of smooth, black ink she’d been so excited to buy in Diagon Alley. Carefully, gently, she unscrewed the lid and opened the container, letting the ink sway slightly. It was silky smooth and hypnotic, a void of darkness. Hermione felt a pull towards it and carefully dipped her quill into the ink. She moved the piece of parchment over and carefully lifted the quill, making sure it didn’t drip. Hermione let it hover over the paper for just a moment as she tried to figure out how to use the unwieldy utensil, and in that single second, a drop of ink left the end of the quill and fell so slowly, so beautifully, onto the paper. It splattered a little, the sumptuous midnight ink striking against the creamy parchment. Hermione breathed as a jolt of something utterly magical ran through her body.
Harry Potter gasped awake as a sensation curled through his veins and made his heart lurch, thrumming away through the inside of his ribs. It filled him endlessly, as if a balloon had just been inflated in his chest, and he pulled air into his lungs as he pulled his thoughts together. A strange sensation overcame him and he lurched into an upright position, staring in shock at his right index finger. A strange black mark was seeping into his skin like tattoo ink, sitting perfectly on his fingertip as if it was meant to be there, as if he was destined to have it. He felt strange. He felt inordinately sleepy. He let go of his consciousness and watched it float away like a balloon into a dark sky of tattoo ink as he slipped into dreams.
Hermione shook herself off and dipped her quill into the ink again. Suddenly, she didn’t feel quite as excited about doing so. Her initial purpose was complete. She blinked a few times and put down the quill. It was really quite silly to be doing this late at night, she’d better get to bed. She had no idea why she’d gotten up to write in the first place, except for an overwhelming compulsion to. There was something, somewhere, that needed that drop of ink.
Climbing into bed, she pulled her blankets up as her soulmate shivered in his cupboard in a suburban house in Little Whinging.
Chapter 2: light as a feather, stiff as a board
Summary:
Year the first, in which Ron figures it out pretty much immediately. The others? Not so much.
Ron (with binoculars): kiss kiss kiss kiss
Hermione, 200 metres away, somehow spotting him: Ronald Weasley!
Chapter Text
September, 1991
“Out, boy, get out,” Uncle Vernon growled, practically throwing Harry’s trunk onto the ground, “You’ll stay over Christmas.”
Harry nodded, replying, “Yes, Uncle.”
“Good. Don’t need any more ruddy freaks turning up at my door, no sir.” his uncle muttered under his breath, getting back into his overly large car and slamming the door in his nephew’s face. Harry sighed and grasped the handles of his trunk, heading over to a trolley. Hedwig hooted as her cage was jostled and he murmured an apology, setting his luggage on a trolley and manoeuvring over to the entrance to the middle of the station.
“Packed with muggles, of course, but don’t worry, the platform’s just up ahead.”
Harry took a deep breath and steered his trolley over to the bustling family of redheads.
— — —
Hermione crossed into Platform 9 ¾ with a nervous air and a rattling trunk that was too heavy to pull after herself. She felt a strange pulling as she went through the wall, like her entire body was being twisted and pulled like taffy all the while being syphoned through a straw into the platform. She fell onto the cool bricks with a huff, but quickly pulled herself up and brushed imaginary dirt off her fuzzy blue sweater. The taffy-like sensation faded as her shoes tip-tapped their way towards a bench, pulling her with them. She cleared her head with a shake, then sat down on the bench and quietly observed her surroundings. It was quiet; to be fair, she was over an hour early. Losing herself in a textbook on potions, she read about bezoars and monkshood for ages and ages until she looked up and the station was bustling. A quick glance at the clock afforded the information that the train was due to leave in twenty minutes, so she pulled herself off of the cosy, wooden bench and headed onto the sleek, scarlet steam engine puffing out smoke.
The ‘Hogwarts Express’ was crowded and boisterous inside, as students of every shape and size wrangled the ‘good’ compartments away from the lone first year girl and shoved past each other to greet friends. Hermione huffed for what seemed like the millionth time. Honestly, it was just disgraceful how overexcited everyone was. She looked into the next compartment, and was pleasantly surprised to see that it was empty. Heaving her trunk inside, she left it on the seat and hung out the window for a moment before jumping back inside when someone’s runaway owl tried to land on her head. She sat down on the plush red train seat.
The conductor announced the Express’ departure and Hermione relaxed into her seat.
The door to the compartment slid open and a boy appeared in the doorway. He was rather short and had sandy blonde hair carefully combed to look nice. The effect was negated by his quivering bottom lip and nervous fidgeting.
“Um…” the boy started, “Hi, I’m Neville Longbottom. Could you help me, er- find my toad? None of the prefects would.”
Hermione blinked once, then twice, before remembering that toads were apparently a normal pet in the wizarding world. “Sure, Neville. I'm Hermione Granger, pleased to meet you. Do you know where it could be?”
Neville blinked. “Um- I’m not sure?”
“Well, that’s not a good start,” Hermione said briskly, “but we’ll find it.”
They spent a good forty-five minutes just going up and down the train looking for Neville’s toad, and Hermione met some very interesting people on the way. A group of older Gryffindors convinced her to look at a tarantula they’d gotten in a box, while a Ravenclaw sitting by herself offered her a candy that could make her float a good two inches above the ground. Two first year boys tried to perform magic (which obviously didn’t work), one of them being Harry Potter, who Hermione embarrassingly spent a bit of time fanning over. Eventually, the toad turned up behind a trunk near the back of the train and Hermione went back to her compartment.
Neville left as soon as they got back to Hermione’s compartment, where he nearly fell over himself thanking her. After he left, Hermione sat alone in her compartment just relishing the feeling of being on her way and surrounded by the magical world she’d apparently been part of her entire life. She wasn’t particularly good at feeling when things were magic, yet the Hogwarts Express was absolutely washed in it, seeping into every seat and filling Hermione’s head with butterflies. It was the loveliest thing she’d ever felt, magic. Every time someone mentioned it, a little part of the back of her head would realise that this wasn’t all a particularly long-winded and fantastical dream and that moment of realisation was utterly… she didn’t know what the word for it could be other than kaleidoscopic. Every little titbit that she could pick up about magic made her feel even more incredible. It was even greater when she actually did magic, even though it had all been accidental and she couldn’t cast properly until she got to Hogwarts. All she could think about was the ever-changing pinpricks as sparks danced over her fingertips and filled her up inside in a place she hadn’t known she was empty. It was the same sort of feeling that she got when she touched her beautiful wand, the vine wood glossy and cold. She felt strangely attached to it, which was probably a wizarding thing, just like it was apparently a wizard thing to have strange unerasable marks on one’s finger. Hermione had tried to ask Professor Burbage about the strange markings, but the previously forthcoming professor had just gotten a strangely happy glint in her eye and said she’d find out “in due time”, whatever that meant. Hermione shrugged it off and continued to read one of the textbooks she’d gotten from a bookstore in Diagon Alley.
When the train stopped, she got out and rode a dangerously wobbly boat over an inky blue lake in the middle of the evening (that surely wasn’t safe) until they reached a long flight of stairs up to the mystical, wonderful castle that was Hogwarts. Of course, Hermione had already seen a magical photo of it in Hogwarts: A History, but it was still the most brilliant thing she’d ever witnessed. Warm golden light spilled from the castle’s windows onto great columns and walls of towering grey stone. Hermione trailed a hand over the wall as they entered a large corridor lined with ancient-looking tapestries and paintings that moved and whispered to each other just like the books all described. When Professor McGonagall welcomed them into the Great Hall, Hermione stared at the floating candles on the ceiling and brushed against the Ravenclaw table, wondering if she’d be sitting there in just a moment.
The sorting came and went in flashes until her name was called. She scurried up to the dias and carefully sat on the rickety wooden stool as the professor lowered a very stereotypical wizard’s hat onto her head.
“Hermione Granger,” a raspy voice echoed through her mind, “you are an interesting one, Miss Granger. So suited for each house and so like another that will join me soon.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Hermione questioned, “Are you alive? Ew, get off my head! Wait, are you sentient or just imbued with magic?”
“I see that you have many questions, Miss Granger.” the sorting hat said, gently dissuading her from her line of questioning, “A talent for harvesting knowledge from unlikely sources and a blind trust for that which is written in books will do you well in Ravenclaw-”
“-Hey!” Hermione interrupted, scandalised, “I don’t blindly trust everything in books!-”
“-but your spontaneous decision-making and bravery will aid you in Gryffindor. Loyalty and a definite proclivity for hard work will be rewarded in Hufflepuff, and yet you seem to be the most ambitious of all that’ve sat under me this evening. Slytherin and Ravenclaw are fine choices, Miss Granger…”
Hermione blinked in surprise. “I get to choose?”
The hat chuckled in her mind before replying, “Not often do I let a student have a say in their sorting, but we wouldn’t want you to be here too long, alright, Miss Granger? It would take me a rather long time to sort you by myself. Open your eyes, Miss Granger. We’ve already been here for two and a half minutes. You’ve got to make a choice.”
Hermione opened her eyes (not having known that she’d ever closed them) and looked around the hall. Three hundred eyes stared back at her, the older students blatantly disinterested and the new first years shifting from leg to leg in nervousness. She closed her eyes again and spoke to the hat in her mind.
“Slytherin is right out. I know that wizards are very prejudiced, and I don’t want to be scorned in my own house.”
The hat hummed in thought, “Not Slytherin, egh? A wise choice.”
“I’m quite confused about how I'd ever fit into Hufflepuff, and as much as I’d like Ravenclaw, they seem very detached. I want to make friends. I’ve never had many of them before, no one that I could really call my friend, so I want them. And since I’ve made up my mind, I think you know that I want to be in-”
“Gryffindor!'' crowed the hat loudly. Hermione smiled widely and handed the hat to Professor McGonagall, who smiled back at her. She hurried down to the Gryffindor table, which was boisterously clapping. Her tie changed into red and gold stripes and the inside lining of her school cloak changed to a vibrant red, matching the bedecked tablecloth of the table she promptly sat down at.
Hermione watched in interest as the rest of her new yearmates were sorted into their various houses. The famous Harry Potter, who had been so kind on the train and had been mentioned in so many history books, was sorted into Gryffindor as well, and Hermione felt more nervous than she ever had before when he sat across the table from her.
“Hey, you’re Hermione, right?” Harry asked, smiling at her nervously, “I’m Harry.”
Her breath caught in her throat, “H-hi. Pleasure to meet you.”
“The pleasure’s all mine.”
— — —
October, 1991
“One of a wizard’s most rudimentary skills is levitation - or, the ability to make objects float.”
Harry stared at his feather and let out a breath. He had swished, he had flicked, he had swished again, he had done all the bloody flicking he could, why wasn’t the feather floating?
“Wingardium Leviosa. Wingardium Leviosa.” Seamus Finnegan chanted to himself, waving his wand madly, “It won’t work!”
Harry cracked a grin, but shared Seamus’ despair. There was something holding him back.
“You’re saying it wrong,” Harry heard Hermione snap from behind him. “It’s Win-gar-dium Leviosa.”
“You do it, then, if you’re so clever,” Ron grouched, letting his wand clatter to the desk in frustration.
Hermione rolled up her sleeves, flicked her wand and said, “Wingardium Leviosa!”
Her feather slowly rose and floated about four feet above her desk. Harry felt a burst of something in his chest, the same ever-expanding feeling as when the ink-spot had slowly dripped its way onto his finger only a few months ago and nearly fell off his seat in his hurry to inspect his hands. Dropping his wand, he stared at his fingertips. Ron gave him a weird look, but shrugged it off and started poking his feather with his wand. A tiny, tiny blue feather appeared on his left index finger and he gazed at it in absolute wonder. Perhaps it was a magical thing to have random symbols appear on one’s hands? He couldn’t possibly know.
Harry picked up his wand again and carefully looked at his feather.
“Wingardium Leviosa,” he enunciated carefully, following Hermione’s example. And suddenly, it felt like a weight was lifted from his shoulders. It was so easy! What had been holding him back before? His feather rose gently into the air and waved in a non-existent breeze. Harry sighed. Something just felt right.
— — —
Ron looked up from jabbing at his feather and looked at Harry, who was studying his hands and muttering something about markings. He sent a calculating look at his friend, then at Hermione. His eyes widened momentarily, then a wide grin appeared on his face. Ron prodded at his feather, but stole a glance at Harry, who was deliberately looking everywhere but the Weasley boy. Ron rolled his eyes so hard that he could feel it viscerally.
“Honestly, two of the most oblivious-”
“You’re still doing it wrong,” Hermione interrupted, looking in distaste at Ron’s wand movements.
“Well you’re a bloody know-it-all with no friends but I don’t go around advertising it.” Ron snapped. Instantly he regretted it. The blood drained from Hermione’s face, then rushed back into her cheeks. She brought a hand to her mouth, lowered it, and then stuck it in the air. Ron’s eyes widened. Professor McGonagall stood across the room, helping Seamus with his charm.
“Professor?” Hermione called out. The strict Transfiguration professor spun around on her heel and marched over to Ron’s desk.
“Yes, Miss Granger?”
“May I go to the bathroom, please?” Hermione said quietly, discreetly wiping her eyes.
The professor looked her up and down, then nodded, “Take your bag, the lesson will be done in a few minutes anyways. And make sure to be down at six o’clock for dinner, alright?”
Hermione nodded too, slinging her bag onto her back and shoving the top back onto her ink bottle with a messiness that was terribly unlike her, “Yes, ma’am.”
With that, the girl plodded over to the door with a morose air and pulled it open, disappearing into the corridor.
“Ron!” hissed Harry, “What was that?”
Ron looked at the ground and heard Harry sigh.
“You’d better apologise, mate. She won’t let go of that easily.”
The rest of the day passed slowly, as the rest of the Gryffindor girls spoke only in short, snippy sentences and Ron didn’t even garner a look. Hermione was suspiciously absent from the rest of the classes.
— — —
At nearly six o’clock, Harry, Ron, and Seamus walked down to the Great Hall, chatting excitedly. Halloween was always an occasion to be excited for. At the Dursleys, Harry had never been allowed any sweets, as Dudley would open his great maw and they’d all be gone before Harry was let out of his cupboard. Now, he was looking forward to trying everything. The boys chattered on their way to the hall, easy conversation drifting between them. Off to their left, Harry noticed the first-year Gryffindor girls talking as they walked down to the hall as well.
Harry narrowed his eyes. There was a conspicuous lack of a certain bushy-haired girl in that group. Harry made his excuses and hurried over to the girls, who eyed him suspiciously.
“What is it, Potter? Come to poke more fun at Hermione?” Lavender questioned demandingly. Harry spluttered out a negative, but Parvati picked up the train of thought.
“Well, she’s not here. She’s been crying in the second-floor bathroom all since Transfiguration.”
“Better get your friend there to apologise or she’ll never come out.” another girl piped up, wrinkling her nose at Harry.
“And by the way,” Parvati said, “Fix your tie, it’s awfully crooked.”
“Wouldn’t want you to lose any points, Harry. That would be… terrible.”
“We’d have to make you regret it.” Lavender said, eyes crinkling with a smile that seemed more sinister than kind. Harry nodded quickly, eyes wide, then scrambled back to the boys, who were all standing in various states of shock.
“Merlin’s beard,” Ron said slowly, looking a bit rueful, “Girls are scary. Crying in the bathroom, huh…”
The first-years arrived at the hall, which was decorated for Halloween. Candles of green and brown hung from the ceiling in place of the usual white-coloured ones, and pumpkins dotted the corners of the hall, faces carved into them. There were mounds upon mounds of sweets everywhere, and Harry pocketed a couple peppermint sticks, slipping them into his robes for later. The other boys looked around in wonder, staring at the transformed hall. The ceiling was no longer a mirror of the outside, but instead the grey furrows of storm clouds, broken up occasionally by crackles of lightning and blasts of thunder that echoed through the cavernous hall.
There was now a large crowd forming as the rest of the study body arrived. The noise level was slowly but steadily increasing. Harry looked around, once again noticing that Hermione hadn’t joined them. He’d thought that she’d surely stop crying to get to the feast, but then again, he hadn’t seen her at lunch either. He backed slowly out of the hall, nudging Ron. “I’m going to find Hermione, she’ll like the ceiling.”
“Yeah, mate,” Ron said distractedly, grabbing a few handfuls of toffee and shoving them at Harry, “Give her some sweets, she’ll brighten up. That’s what my dad does whenever my mum’s feeling down. It’s like she’s some sort of werewolf, it’s always around the same time of the month.”
Harry nodded vaguely, exiting the hall. He headed into the corridor and let his walk turn into a stride as he traversed the school’s endless corridors. He turned a corner and climbed a few gently turning staircases, entering the second floor. On his way to the bathroom, he smelt a terrible stench coming from the dungeons, but passed it off as either a failed Potions experiment or the consequences of Snape never washing his greasy hair finally showing themselves. Ducking down another corridor, he found himself in front of the girl’s bathroom.
He opened the door, looking around in fear. The room was practically the same as the boy’s bathrooms, but the tiles weren’t quite as brown and the doors seemed to actually have latches on them, as evidenced by the fact that one of the stalls was tightly shut. The sound of muffled sniffling came from said stall and Harry nervously walked up to it.
“Hermione?” he called, and the sniffling stopped. There was the sound of a nose being blown and then Hermione spoke.
“Harry, this is a girl’s bathroom,” Hermione’s voice echoed from the stall. Harry groaned, “Yes, but it’s Halloween. I brought sweets, if you’d like them.”
There were a few seconds of tense silence, then the door swung open. Hermione stood, holding the door with one hand and rubbing furiously at her eyes with the back of the other. Her tie was loosened and her shoelaces were untied, evidence of her distress - the normal Hermione would never be caught in such improper uniform. Her eyes were red and a little swollen, and Harry felt a pang of pity arch through his heart like lightning. His heart was pounding so hard he could barely breathe, and he reached a hand up into the dip in his throat to feel it thrum. Hermione’s hand snaked up to mirror his, feeling her heartbeat. There was an indescribable tension in the air. Harry reached a hand into his pocket and pulled out the first thing that came to hand.
“Toffee?”
And the tension was broken and Hermione let out a snort of laughter that gave way into amused giggling and everything was alright. Hermione reached up a hand to take the toffee.
There was a heavy thump in the hallway. Hermione’s hand faltered.
Another thump, this time ominously closer.
Harry turned around and slowly walked to the door. He opened it and the same disgusting stench from earlier filled the air. Hermione let out a noise of disgust and Harry echoed it, looking around for the source of such a horrible reek. There was another stomp and a leg was there, appearing from around the corner. It was a leg as wide as a tree trunk, with sickeningly grey flesh. With the leg came a monster, twelve feet tall, its head scraping the ceiling. It was a grotesque humanoid, with a disproportionately chunky and thick torso, fingers as spindly and long as claws, and short legs that lumbered along down the corridor. It had a tiny head, which was swivelling back and forth. Dragging after it, making a slow screech like a dying cat having its claws drawn down a chalkboard, was an immense wooden club. It appeared to be an uprooted tree, its roots carelessly scraping along the stone floor. Harry inhaled sharply, and as the monster’s beady eyes stared into his, Harry felt his mouth move on its own accord. There was a hoarse whisper unlike anything he’d ever spoken before.
“Troll.”
And despite the meagre volume and the croaky voice, Hermione knew exactly what he’d said. She inhaled and Harry followed suit, coughing as the troll’s foul odour filled the air. The footsteps began again then rapidly quickened as the troll lumbered towards the bathroom.
“We need to hide,” Hermione gasped, darting back inside the stall. Harry followed suit, running into the stall with her. There was an almighty roar as the troll swung his club into the door, like the ocean through a conch shell or a plane crashing into a convention for angry lions. It looked around, and upon losing sight of its targets, smashed a row of sinks. Harry heard Hermione stifle a cry and grabbed her hand. The troll spun and stared at the stall, fingers twitching. The club rose into the air, ready to smash the cubicle into splinters, and Harry froze. His breath was steel in the air, grating and scraping through his throat, leaving his mouth as shards that shattered the silence and the troll let out a rasping, creaking, scraping bellow. It took one menacing step, then another, then it was charging, club held in the air. Harry pulled Hermione under his body, their hands still clasped together, and as the stall broke around them with a great swipe of the troll’s club, he squeezed her hand. Hermione squeezed back, her grip crushing, terrified. The troll brought back its club again and in the moment of stillness before the parting of death, before the heavens opened up and let them enter, before their hands would grow cold still grasped together, there was a shaking, nervous, and gloriously beautiful shout.
“Wingardium Leviosa,” screamed Ron, his wand pointed at the troll’s club. The beast turned, its eyes stupid in confusion. Ron’s hand shook as he tilted his wand, letting the club lift above the troll. The tree trunk dropped onto the troll’s head with a bang and it swayed once, twice, before falling, laying on the rubble of the sink it had smashed not a minute before. There was silence.
Ron let out a shuddering breath.
“Ronald Weasley,” Hermione’s voice was more of a whisper than the shout she seemed to be aiming for, “Of all the stupid, reckless, selfless things-”
With four great strides she crossed the room and hugged Ron as tight as could be possible for a pre-teen filled with near-death adrenaline. Ron looked more petrified than when he’d been fighting the troll, and Harry let out a gasping chuckle at the thought. Hermione spun and strode back to him, grabbing his hand.
“Harry…” Hermione began. There was a silence, where she didn’t quite seem to know what to say.
“Toffee?” Harry asked, holding up a wrapped sweet. Hermione laughed and Ron laughed and Harry laughed and then they all sat on the floor in the girl’s bathroom, laughing and talking and sucking on golden toffees and staring at the destruction with a sort of terrified wonder. It wasn’t every day that you nearly died to a giant monster and then ate lollies next to its corpse. They stayed like that until the teachers found them, drowsy as their adrenaline faded and heightened levels of blood sugar became the only thing keeping them awake.
— — —
November, 1991
Aside from the sound of Percy Weasley telling someone off for not being quiet, the common room was quiet. It was nearly curfew, so most of the Gryffindors were already getting ready for bed, clattering and stomping away in the dormitories above the common room. Only a few stressed or dedicated students were still down in the common room working. A few days ago, a circle of NEWT students had proclaimed that they wouldn’t sleep for a week before their Charms mock exam and were making good on their promise with the help of several wards and frequent trips to Madam Pomfrey for pain-relief potions. A pair of third-years sat in the corner whispering numbers to each other and debating whether 8 was the most magically catastrophic number and whether they should just replace it with “second-seven”. Even Harry was awake, determined to wrap up his Potions essay so that he wouldn’t have to do it early in the morning tomorrow. Yet, somehow, no one seemed more stressed than Hermione Granger.
The force that Hermione was exerting onto her parchment at the current moment would have been enough to derail a train. She grasped her quill so tightly that her knuckles were white and the grinding of her teeth was so apparent that Harry would have thought they’d all be gone by now. She’d been unhappily dotting a spare bit of parchment while she worked on her History of Magic assignment, and as time went on, the dots started to turn into holes haphazardly stabbed through the parchment. Harry pressed his lips together and stood abruptly, jolting Hermione out of her frenzied state.
“I’ll be back in a moment,” Harry assured, “just got to get something from my trunk.”
Hermione nodded tersely, “Alright. That’s fine. Do that.”
Her quill bent threateningly in her grip and Harry backed away, eyes wide. “... Okay then.”
He turned and climbed as fast as he could up the stairs to the boys dormitory, nearly tripping over the individual stairs in his rush to get to his room. Shoving open the door and hurrying into his dorm, he ignored Neville’s incredulous stare as he dropped to his knees in front of his trunk and fumbled with the locks. Upon finally unlocking the leather case, he rooted through the mounds of socks and textbooks until he found what he was looking for.
“Ha!” he muttered, holding it up to the light, “Perfect! Now for number two…”
Neville once again watched in confusion as he rushed out of the dorm, tripping on the edge of the door frame and stumbling onto the landing. He ran straight into Fred and George, who raised their eyebrows in synchronised amusement at his stuttering pace. Harry attempted to manoeuvre around them, but they circled him, akin to sharks.
“Harry, Harry, Harry,” Fred began, shaking his head and putting his hand on Harry’s shoulder. George picked up the train of thought.
“In a bit of a rush?”
“Fred, George!” Harry gasped, attempting to catch his breath, “I need your help.”
“Anything for our glorious saviour,” they said together, grinning and sweeping into deep, over-dramatic bows.
Harry waved them off, hurried. “How do I get tea? It’s urgent, please.”
The twins shared confused glances, but seemingly decided to help him. They drew themselves up to their intimidating full heights as if to jump on Harry and make tea from his blood. Harry cringed and shied away a little. The twins drew in a deep breath and Harry braced himself.
“Muttons,” they called out together. The tension disappeared like a deflating balloon and Harry looked up at them in disbelief. “Muttons? That’s the big idea? Have you gone barmy-”
He was startled off of his sentence by a crack as a tiny elf-like creature with huge floppy ears appeared. It wore a crisp tea towel fashioned into some sort of dress, embroidered with the Hogwarts crest in gold. It glanced around, looking at the twins expectantly.
“Hello, Muttons,” Fred said. Harry echoed him, shell-shocked. The twins look amused, but George continued, “Harry here needs some tea.”
“Of course, Master Fred. Master Harry, what tea can Muttons be making for you?”
Harry blinked once, then again, then gathered up his wits and shoved them back into the recess in his head that they’d fallen out of. “English Breakfast, with two dabs of milk and one sugar.”
“Yes, Master Harry.” Muttons said quickly, “Muttons will be getting that for you now.”
There was a pop and Muttons disappeared, only to reappear a second later with a steaming cup of tea on a saucer and hand it over to Harry with a gentle “Careful, Master Harry, it bes hot”. The tiny elf disappeared a final time, leaving Harry on the landing with the twins. The whole encounter couldn’t have taken more than thirty seconds, but Harry felt as confused as he did after leaving an hour long lecture about Astronomy. He looked to the twins for an explanation, noting that they were expectantly looking at him.
“Great creatures, aren’t they, house elves?” Fred said, grinning at Harry. Harry nodded minutely.
George nodded, “I agree, George, or are you Fred?”
“He’s Fred,” Harry murmured. The twins looked briefly surprised before getting back onto their previous disjointed spiel.
“Anyways, Harry,” they said together, “You’d better get back to whatever you were doing, you looked to be in an awful rush.”
Harry shook himself and thanked the twins, proceeding down to the common room much slower than before, owing to the multiple items he was balancing. Walking back over to Hermione, he set the two things in his hands down with a thump. Hermione looked up and gasped before visibly melting. “Oh, Harry, you didn’t have to-”
“Shush, Hermione, have the chocolate.” Harry interrupted, shoving the box of Honeydukes chocolate he’d gotten from Hagrid on Halloween over to Hermione. She conceded, taking a piece of chocolate and popping it into her mouth before taking a sip of the steaming golden tea. Harry handed her a napkin and Hermione gave him an appreciative mumble. Sitting down, Harry pulled Hermione’s essay over to his side of the table, not listening to her chocolate-muffled protests. He glanced over the entries, but found himself coming back to a large space in the parchment that was obviously left for a paragraph on the 1451 goblin rebellion. The spare parchment that she’d been stabbing holes through was a little more ragged now, and there was a large caption of ‘goblin rebellion’ with about a hundred question marks drawn around it. There was a hole stabbed right through between the two words.
“Chapter 5 of the textbook is about the 1451 goblin rebellion, you know?” Harry suggested. Hermione froze, looking like she’d had an epiphany.
“I thought you’d remember,” Harry said, waving a hand in front of the motionless Hermione, “After all, you’ve been trying to get me to study it with you for the past week.”
Hermione smacked her forehead, leaning over and rooting through her bag for the History of Magic textbook. “I’m a total idiot, how could I not remember that?”
Harry reached over and pulled her hand away from her head, smiling. “It’s okay, Hermione, you’re not an idiot. Remember, you’re not yourself when you’re hungry. Have a break, have some Honeydukes.”
Hermione snorted at the references, chewing on a piece of chocolate. “Harry, do you realise the implications of a boy handing a girl chocolate to calm her down, as if girls are rampaging monsters that can only be satisfied with sweets? It’s the 90s, Harry, it’s the modern age. Surely you know better?”
“Um… yeah,” Harry said, ducking his head, “But it worked, didn’t it?”
“You’re so confused, it’s adorable,” she replied, picking up another piece of chocolate and manoeuvring the box to try and find out what flavour it was, “But yes, I guess it worked. I like Earl Grey as well, just a squeeze of lemon. This was one of your very few good ideas.”
“Hey!” Harry protested, affronted. Hermione smiled sweetly and turned back to the chocolates, picking up another one and popping it into her mouth. Harry pulled the chocolates away and ate one, sulking. Hermione wrenched them back with surprising strength and plastered a smile onto her face, chewing on her piece of chocolate and picking up her quill to get back to the essay.
— — —
December, 1991
The Gryffindor common room was quiet. Only a few people sat around the room, ensconced in tiny nooks and crannies around the room and buried in armchairs. The fire was roaring, casting a warm orange glow around the common room, and Harry, Hermione, and Ron sat in the armchairs closest to it, like they usually did. The windows showed the night sky and Harry stared out at it, trying to remember exactly why he had decided to stay up so late.
“Harry?” murmured Hermione, “Don’t stay up too late, we have that test tomorrow.”
“Yeah, ‘Mione, I know,” Harry replied, smiling softly and getting up. Ron muttered something under his breath that Harry couldn’t make out before settling into a lazy grin and getting up as well, groaning about his old, weary bones. Hermione rolled her eyes and pushed Ron towards the staircase up to the boys dormitories.
“C’mon, Harry, bedtime. Gotta listen to Hermione here, right?” he said jokingly. Harry nodded, stealing another glance at Hermione before looking back at his friend and heading over to the stairs. He climbed them, thinking of Hermione as she tucked her hair behind her ear to focus on a particularly difficult question, but soon shaking that thought away in anticipation of the adventure he would have when the lights turned out. The two boys slipped into their dormitory and shuffled to their beds, shrugging off robes and pulling on thick woollen pyjamas. Seamus and Neville were already asleep, with Dean sitting on the edge of his bed to sort out his parchment for the next day. Harry waved goodnight to Dean before climbing into his four-poster bed, drawing the heavy crimson curtains together and fluffing up his pillow.
“Night, Ron,” Harry said quietly, extinguishing his bedside lamp with a quick breath. Ron mumbled something in return, face already pressed into his pillow as the other boy lifted a weary hand to close up his own curtains. Harry settled into the bed, fighting against the cosy embrace of sleep. He couldn’t fall asleep just yet, no matter how inviting the warmth of the dormitory was. Nevertheless, he snuggled down into bed and forced his eyes to remain open until they watered. He couldn’t risk falling asleep — not when his bounty was so close, yet so far. He pulled open a curtain, squinting in anticipation when it squeaked metallically over the rail. Harry stared at the lantern on the wall for what seemed like hours but was actually something like twenty minutes, just taking a second to admire the way the flame danced inside the glass walls.
After waiting an appropriate amount of time, Ron’s snores began to fill the room and Harry got up. He opened the latches of his trunk, fingers fumbling against the cold metal, and pulled out his silvery invisibility cloak. He clasped it onto his shoulders and let the hood fall over his head. Slipping out of the dorm, he made his way down to the common room, where he passed by Hermione packing up her school bag and rubbing her eyes. Harry knew, logically, that he should also be going to bed, but he couldn’t wait another night. He pushed past the sleeping portrait of the Fat Lady and carefully tip-toed through the eerie stone halls and dimly-lit passageways of Hogwarts. Portraits slumbered on the walls and muttered in their sleep, but a few were awake. Harry avoided those ones, unsure if the enchanted paintings could see through his cloak. The hallways were deserted and made scary for that; only the ghosts wandered the halls at this point in the evening.
He was nearly to his destination when an eerie meow echoed through the corridors. Harry prayed that the carpet in this particular passageway was enough to cover the sound of his footsteps and continued walking, albeit a little slower than before. He was in sight of the door he wanted when a ragged and patchy-furred cat slinked around the side of a column and meowed loudly. The sound of heavy breathing and racing footsteps filled the corridor as Filch hurried to where they were. The ever-creepy Mrs. Norris remained in the exact same spot, staring up at Harry with all-knowing eyes.
Creeping into the last passageway, Harry wove around the creepy feline and opened the door to the room with the fantastical mirror. He closed the door very quietly, just in time to avoid being spotted by Filch. Mrs. Norris meowed again and Filch cackled.
“Students out of bed, I hear? Oh, my sweet Mrs. Norris, we’ll find them. Don’t you worry.”
Harry put his back to the door and breathed out heavily, letting himself slide down until his knees hit the floor with an almost imperceptible thud. As the sounds of Filch’s stomping and Mrs. Norris’ light tread moved away, Harry took a deep breath and stood up, walking over to the mirror. He shrugged his cloak off and stood in the same spot as before, examining the stone floor to make sure he was in the right place before looking up.
“What-” Harry started, gazing into the ornate mirror propped against the wall before him. His reflection was different from the last time he’d seen it. Previously, the mirror had just shown him and his parents, but this time Ron and Hermione were standing on either side of him. Ron’s hand was on Harry’s shoulder, while Harry had an arm around Hermione’s waist, pulling her closer. Harry felt the butterflies in his stomach burst out of their cocoons and took flight. He lifted a finger, yet couldn’t find it in himself to touch it, as if afraid that the simple act would cause the image to ripple away into something different, something that wouldn’t make his heart beat a little heavier and his head feel hazy. He stayed there for nearly half an hour, waiting and watching to see if the mirror would once again change, but no. A smiling Lily Potter rubbed Hermione’s shoulder, who looked up at her and beamed. James Potter slung an arm around his wife and grinned at the three children, occasionally reaching out and ruffling Ron’s or Harry’s hair until it stuck up just as much as his. The scene was idyllic, like a perfect family. Harry came to a sudden realisation: he wanted Ron and Hermione to be his family, to be the ones he treasured most. Harry dropped to his knees, putting a hand out and watching as the other inhabitants of the idyllic scene dropped to the ground as well, laughing in a big pile of blankets. He smiled tearily and looked harder at the mirror, determined to tattoo it into his memory. He felt like crying. The mirror had been good before. Now, it was more magical than anything he’d seen so far at Hogwarts. Who cared about Charms and Potions and staying up late to map the stars in Astronomy? Who cared about the feasts and the wide-open grounds touched by winter and the hope in his chest tinged with the bittersweet feeling that perhaps he’d wake up the next day and trudge through Little Whinging with a head full of dreams that had seemed so real until they were gone? Who could care about anything that wasn’t the mirror and what it showed?
Up in the girl’s dormitory, a drowsy Hermione succumbed to much-needed sleep, passing off the strange sensation she suddenly had as some symptom of sleep deprivation. As she closed her eyes and fell asleep, a new mark appeared on her finger in the shape of a shimmering green mirror.
Harry stayed, staring at the mirror for so long that he lost track of time. It was only when brilliant moonlight started to wash through the windows that Harry gently raised himself up off his knees and pulled his invisibility cloak back on. He walked back to Gryffindor Tower in a daze of thoughts, only stopping for a moment to gaze out a window at the clock tower. It shone back at him, proclaiming that the time was near midnight and if he wanted any sort of competence in tomorrow’s classes he’d better hurry up and get to sleep. Harry hurried to obey the clock’s metaphorical advice, tip-toeing through the common room and sneaking up the stairs. Snoring filled the boys dormitory, mainly from Ron and Seamus. Harry wiggled out of his cloak, thankful for the fact that he’d already changed into his pyjamas. He dropped like a stone into his cosy four-poster bed and let his head loll to the side, staring at the curtains. He opened them slightly and looked over at Ron’s bed, where his best friend slept soundly. He smiled.
Dumbledore had been right. There was something dangerous in staring at the mirror too long, seeing something that might never come true. Harry would never get his parents back. He would never have the family he wished for in his cupboard, all blurry silhouettes of welcoming arms blown away by Vernon’s cigar smoke and eyes that never had any particular colour because he’d never even seen a photo of them. He’d never have Lily and James Potter, but he chose Ron and Hermione.
— — —
January, 1992
Harry groaned as he dropped down onto his favourite chair in the common room, slinging his school bag onto its side. He winced as a scrap of parchment rolled away and hit Hermione’s shoe, distracting her from her book. She looked up.
“Harry?” the girl questioned, a frown marring her features, “Have you finished the essay?”
Harry groaned, curling up in the chair and burying his face in a cushion, “Rock, Paper, Scissors and the person who loses has to help the other?”
Hermione arched an eyebrow, but set her quill down on the table. She quickly stopped up her ink bottle, then lifted her hands, rolling her wrists. Harry removed his head from the armchair and lifted his hands as well.
“Paper, Scissors-” Hermione began. Harry lifted up a hand, shaking his head wildly, “What?”
“You’re doing it wrong, Granger, it’s Rock, Paper, Scissors, Shoot!” Harry exclaimed, waving his hands wildly, “Everyone knows that!”
Hermione rolled her eyes, “No, I’m not, Potter, it’s Paper, Scissors, Rock, and that’s final.”
Ron gazed between them with wide eyes and Harry shot him a weird look. He needn’t look so confused, obviously Rock, Paper, Scissors was right. Harry tossed his head, making his hair fly out from behind his ears. He tucked it back behind his ears irritably, letting his hands rest in the correct position for Rock, Paper, Scissors.
“Hold on,” Ron interrupted their game with a confused question, “What are you doing? I’ve never heard of that.”
There was a moment of silence as Harry and Hermione looked at each other, expressions stricken. “What?” they said in tandem, surprised by their friend’s utter lack of knowledge.
Ron ducked his head and rubbed the back of his neck, embarrassed, “I’ve never heard of Paper, Scissors, Rock, whatever that is. Is it some muggle thing?
“What do you do in the wizarding world?” Hermione asked curiously, “For games of chance, I mean.”
Ron blinked, “Oh, whoever’s in the game waves their wands at the same time and say “choose the lucky one” together, and gold sparks come out of the wand of the person who won. It's a pure magic chance. How is waving paper around and throwing rocks at people supposed to decide a winner?”
“Oh, bloody hell,” Harry muttered, grinning, “Never mind, we’ll show you.”
And that was how Gryffindor House was roped into an epic tournament of Paper, Scissors, Rock. Most of the wizard-born children were knocked out of the running immediately, but the muggleborns seemed to be having a right old time. Every second was filled with the sound of shouting, and the Weasley twins gleefully crossed names off of the bracket they’d drawn up on the common room’s chalkboard. The semi-finals were Ron, Harry, and Hermione, along with Dean Thomas, Percy Weasley, Neville Longbottom, and two others that the trio couldn’t name. Hermione squared off against Percy and crowed her victory to the heavens, whooping in a decidedly un-Hermione-like manner as Percy shook her hand and went to sit down with the other prefects. Harry shot an apologetic look at Dean as the former beat the latter with a carefully placed hand of scissors. Ron played one of the other contestants and groaned as he lost, taking a seat on his favourite chair and watching as the final duo of the semi-finals faced off. Harry whooped as Neville won over his partner, and the other boy blushed ruby red, shooting Harry an embarrassed smile.
“There are now only four contestants left,” one of the Weasley twins announced, his voice made unnaturally loud through a spell, “May Harry Potter, Hermione Granger, Neville Longbottom, and Abby Towler please make their way to the arena?”
Harry grinned as he stood inside the ring of chairs that was their “arena”, gazing at the other contestants. Fred winked roguishly at the audience as he drew up the final brackets next to the list of eliminated contestants, which spanned over at least half of Gryffindor house’s participants. Harry faced his opponents, sizing them up.
There was, of course, Hermione, who stood in a strong stance in front of her roommates Lavender, Parvati, and Fay. Her arms were crossed, making her appear severe and determined. She smirked at Harry, who grinned back at her. She uncrossed her arms to dramatically let her hair out of its ponytail, then pulled it up even tighter, making a point to let the hazelnut-coloured curls fall into a beautiful cascade down her back. She brushed the ponytail over her shoulder, still smirking, and Harry drew his attention back to his other opponents, pointedly not looking at Hermione, who was now biting her lip as she looked at him.
The next contestant was Neville Longbottom. He stood next to Seamus and Dean, looking around nervously. He shuffled from foot to foot, alternating between shaking and wringing his hands. Neville jumped up and down on the spot a few times and the two boys next to him whooped, adding to the growing cacophony of cheers and laughter from the surrounding crowd.
The final contestant was a small, mousy girl that Ron informed him was Abby Towler, a third year. She had brown hair pulled into a sensible bun, a smattering of freckles, and pale blue eyes that glimmered with fear as she looked around at her opponents. She bounced nervously on the balls on her feet as the names were drawn up, and looked near fainting when she saw that she’d be playing against Hermione. Harry supposed that his friend had already gotten herself a bit of a reputation. Good. The fear factor was necessary.
Harry strolled over to Neville and grinned. Neville nervously smiled back. “Hey, Harry.”
“Hey, Neville,” Harry replied, lifting his hands.
“Match 62,” George’s voice rang out through the room, “is between Harry Potter and Neville Longbottom. Contestants, take your marks.”
Harry squared up against Neville, who lifted his hands. He was shaking slightly in anticipation but smiling. The two boys lifted their hands up in tandem.
“Paper,” the crowd chanted, “Scissors, Rock!”
Harry cheered as his rock smashed Neville’s scissors. The two boys high-fived, Harry spilling platitudes and Neville assuring Harry that the win was absolutely deserved.
“Match 63!” called Fred, “This match is between the endlessly intrepid Abby Towler and the forever fearsome Hermione Granger. May the match begin.”
“Get on with it, Fred!” a voice called.
Hermione snorted, throwing her head back. There was a smattering of laughter from the crowd before they got back to the matter at hand. Hermione rolled her neck around, then stared at her opponent, a hard glint in her eyes. Abby stared back, wide-eyed at the other girl’s perhaps over-zealous determination. The crowd chanted the first call and there were a few seconds of flying fists before Hermione shouted her victory. The whole match couldn’t have taken more than ten seconds. Harry clapped and cheered, matching appreciatively as Hermione shook her head and let her curls fly everywhere.
“And finally…” whispered George (his voice was still very much louder than normal but the effect was appreciated by the surrounding crowd), “The last match.”
A hush fell across the assembled crowd of Gryffindors. Harry stepped into the ring, meeting Hermione toe-to-toe. They grinned at each other as the crowd began to whoop in delight.
“Hush,” said Fred and the crowds quietened, “Now, the chant.”
“Paper, Scissors, Rock!”
Both competitors showed their hands, revealing the same thing; two fists in the shape of rocks. Hermione murmured the call under her breath and they played again. Harry groaned as both he and Hermione played scissors, and Hermione shot him a mischievous grin.
“Scared?” Hermione whispered, a playful smile flitting across her face before being supplanted by a hard glare. Harry grinned at her as the crowd began chanting. “You wish.”
Harry let his mind wander to strategy as the crowd calmed down enough to allow them to play. Of course, the ever-strategic Hermione would play scissors to counter his paper, but she knew that he’d know that, so she’d play rock. Harry smirked and formed his call.
“Paper,” he whispered, “Scissors, Rock.”
And as they unveiled their hands, the crowd roared and screamed in delight as Harry’s paper took Hermione’s rock. A swarm of Gryffindors surrounded him, lifting them up and chanting his name as Hermione was swallowed up by a dramatically distraught circle of her roommates. Harry grinned at her from his vantage point and she stuck out her tongue, making a decidedly rude motion with her hand before laughing and turning back to her friends. George Weasley sang the results from the other side of the room and Harry heard the rustle of money bags and saw shining coins change hands.
An hour later, when bets had been paid and the crowd of mingling Gryffindors had drifted back to their dormitories for the night, Hermione flopped dramatically onto the seat next to Harry and put her hand up to her head, bemoaning her loss. Harry grinned at her.
“Well, I guess you’ve got to help me with my essay now.”
Hermione rolled her eyes and reached for a quill.
— — —
February, 1992
The snow was finally light enough to walk over. Harry knew that because every Herbology lesson up until today had been started and finished by Professor Sprout letting them practise the fire-making charm that they’d been working on in Charms on the snowy path back up to the castle. For the first time in months, they hadn’t had to do so. This, Harry decided, meant that the grounds were the perfect conditions for a brisk late-winter walk. He had relayed as much to Ron, who wrinkled his nose and looked at the thick snow gathering on the windowsill.
“Prime conditions for walking, you see.” Harry declared, “My aunt always says a good chill works wonders on the psyche. She always made me do the gardening in the snow, and that was when it was the most fun.”
Ron looked a little disturbed by his accidental revelation, but recovered quickly and nodded his support until Harry turned to his trunk. He turned back to his conversation with Neville and Dean.
“Whatever you say, mate,” he muttered, watching Harry walk over to his bed for a brief moment. Then Dean made a joke about Professor Snape’s nose and he roared with laughter, forgetting about his friend’s questionable walking habits and even more questionable home life.
Harry meandered to his trunk, sitting lazily on the floor and fiddling with catches until the trunk popped open. He rooted through the contents of the case, quickly finding his heavy winter boots and a beanie that his cousin had outgrown and tried to throw away. It was about three sizes too big, as expected of hand-me-downs from the near-morbidly obese Dudley, but it was warm and red and covered his ears all the way.
He got up and strolled over to his wardrobe. He threw the doors open and looked through the racks of long, black robes and silky cloaks before eventually stumbling upon his winter cloak, a great beast of black wool and brown fur. The hood would cover his whole face if he needed it to, which was unlikely. The fur was soft, a gentle brown, and spoke of good quality and fine tailoring. It was the thing he had splurged on in Diagon Alley. Hey, it wasn’t as if giving a pre-teen a fortune in coins of precious metal could have ended with any better of a purchase. Despite Harry’s immediate love for the brooms in the shop window of Quality Quidditch Supplies, he’d instead ducked into a boutique at the end of the high street of Diagon and bought himself the finest winter cloak he could find. His love for gardening in the snow came only from the fact that Dudley could never be bothered to actually leave the house and torment him, not the actual gardening. Harry had spent too many days with blue fingernails as he worked icicle-like weeds out of frozen soil. He’d spent too many nights huddling under every piece of clothing he owned to warm up. He’d always wished for something to keep him warm and safe from the snow, and now, he had it.
Harry looked through his wardrobe, a frown across his face. There was a mysterious lack of the three Gryffindor scarves he’d had at the start of the term. He looked through the wardrobe again, but couldn’t find anything. There was not a single fuzzy red and gold scarf in any of the crevices he checked. Harry sighed. It was unlikely that he’d lost them, so perhaps the other boys had borrowed them by accident?
“Ron, have you seen my scarves? I can’t find a single one,” he called across the room. Ron paused his lively conversation, looking over and furrowing his brow in thought.
“No, don’t think so,” he decided eventually, “I was looking for my beanie this morning in my wardrobe and I only saw my one, same place as usual. Sorry, mate.”
The other two boys he was talking to relayed similar sentiments, and Harry knocked Dean off the list as well, seeing as none of the other boys seemed to have any idea where his missing clothing had gone. He thought back a few days, but still couldn’t remember a time when he had his scarves.
Ron caught his attention and brought up his own ideas.
“Hey, mate, why don’t you check with Hermione?” Ron suggested, “She lost her scarf two weeks ago and you lent one to her to show house pride for your next quidditch match, the one on Sunday.”
Harry thought that idea over for a few seconds before thanking his best friend and heading down to the common room, where Hermione sat studying with a group of other Gryffindor students. He walked up to her and tapped her shoulder, making her look up.
“Oh, Harry,” she said, startled, “What is it?”
Harry blinked at her, owlish through his round glasses. “Hermione, have you seen any of my scarves?”
Hermione flushed a very deep shade of mauve and nodded wordlessly. She stood up, closing her book, then muttered a goodbye to her study group and went to stand next to Harry.
“Hermione,” he asked, “Where are my scarves?”
“It’s not my fault you gave me three!” Hermione exclaimed, “What was I supposed to do with them?”
Harry raised an eyebrow, “You could… give them back?”
Hermione somehow flushed deeper than the pink that was already colouring her cheeks, looking down at the floor. She didn’t agree, though.
“Oh.” she said shortly. Harry let out a hum and rocked back and forth on the balls of his feet. Hermione looked at him for a moment, then at her study group, then back at Harry before she made a surprised face and closed her textbook. “Do you want them back now?”
“I mean,” Harry said, “I’m trying to go on a winter walk and I would like to still be warm-blooded by the end, so yes.”
Hermione nodded quickly before scurrying up the staircase to her dormitory. Harry stood for a minute, surveying the room in mild disinterest, before Hermione came back down the stairs, holding his scarves. All three of the red and gold scarves were carefully folded and fluffed around the edges to make sure they wouldn’t flatten down when stacked. Evidently, a lot of care had been taken in storing them away. Hermione blushed in embarrassment and ducked her head as she handed them over. Harry took them from her hands, but hesitated.
“Here, take it.” Harry handed one of the scarves back to Hermione, who beamed and clutched on to it.
“Oh, thanks so much, Harry. I really needed one. I’ll give it back when I find my one,” she said, hugging the scarf close. Harry scratched the back of his neck, feeling his cheeks heat a little.
“Eh, um… yeah. Enjoy?” Harry turned and climbed the stairs to the boys dormitory, leaving a grinning Hermione to clutch her new scarf to her chest for a few moments before rejoining her study group. He looked back down for a moment and wrinkled his nose in confusion as she sat and wrapped the scarf around her neck. It wasn’t even cold inside, and she was right next to the fire. Harry shook his head and entered his dormitory, suddenly feeling like he also needed a scarf. For no reason. None at all.
— — —
March, 1992
Winter was ending. There was no longer heavy snow to form into snowmen, no crisp snowflakes to pluck from the air and let land on one’s tongue. Only light snowfall embellished the peaks of Gryffindor tower, dusting the window sills and sneaking through cracks in the ceiling of the senior student study area in the attic of Gryffindor tower. Percy could be heard bemoaning the slight wetness of melted ice upon the books and Hermione was inclined to sympathise with the sentiment. During the colder months, her books stayed wrapped in sweaters and summer cloaks to make sure they couldn’t be damaged. At this very moment, she was carefully wrapping her textbook in a knee-length skirt that she’d used before Christmas—in this sort of weather, it was far too cold. She gazed affectionately at the last remaining scarf out of the multitude she’d stolen from Harry. Extracting it from her book-stuffed trunk, she let it fall open.
A small book tumbled out and Hermione hugged it to her chest, murmuring apologies for letting it hit the cold part of the floor. Unfortunately, there were only a few rugs in her dorm and Lavender was hogging them, due to something about getting cold feet in the mornings. Hermione hugged her book closer and grabbed the pair of woolly socks she’d come searching for before shutting the lid of her trunk with a click. She flicked the catches closed, wincing at the cold touch of the metal on her fingers. She rubbed her hands together and blew on them, making sure they were nice and warm before sitting back on her heels.
Pulling her socks on, Hermione padded out of the dorm room and closed the door behind her. One of the prefects had assured her that when the doors were left open in winter, all the warm air provided by the fireplace inside would escape and that one unfortunate dormitory of girls in the prefect’s third year had all lost their toes due to frostbite. Hermione, of course, knew that that rumour was all a load of tosh, but appreciated the sentiment.
Smiling at Lavender, who was also descending the staircase, Hermione pulled her cloak around her body and very carefully walked down the stairs. It wouldn’t do to trip simply because of fuzzy socks. She’d go down as the stupidest girl in Gryffindor, even stupider than the girls who’d left their door open and all gotten frostbite. Hermione quietly chuckled to herself at the thought.
Upon entering, she immediately gravitated to her friends. Harry waved, motioning her over to her normal chair and removing the bag he’d had sat there to reserve it. Ron waved as well before focusing back onto the game of chess he was playing with Harry. She smiled kindly at the two boys. Noticing the unusually quiet atmosphere in the common room and not wanting to go back to the usual boisterous Gryffindor noise, she mimed zipping her lips and sat.
She opened her book and grinned at the first page, letting her mind wander to the world of the wonderful detective novel she was reading: The Secret of Shadow Ranch. She’d read it before, of course, and the dog-eared pages showed just how many times. The mystery was still thrilling, though, as Hermione liked to wait about two months between each reading to let herself forget the ending.
With one final check to make sure that the boys weren’t in any great trouble, she turned to the first chapter and began to read.
For the next hour, Hermione lost herself in the adventures of Nancy Drew, brilliant girl detective, and her friends Bess and George at Shadow Ranch. She wondered over the pocket watch and the secret clues, and nearly clapped her hands when the mystery was solved and Nancy found Alice’s father. She stopped herself at the last minute, still not wanting to disturb the silence. Harry and Ron shot her amused glances before going back to their game of chess, where even the pieces had become quieter than normal and regularly shushed each other.
As Ron once again took Harry’s king and his other pieces groaned in (albeit quiet) despair, Harry grimaced at his losing streak. Ron picked up a quill and gently dipped it in a nearby pot of ink, avoiding the hand that Seamus stretched out to stop him. Ron grinned and the other boy rolled his eyes good-naturedly before hissing that he’d better ask for his ink the next time, because it was bloody expensive to get new ink. Ron tapped the excess ink off of the nib of his quill, then brought it over to his piece of parchment and carefully drew another tally mark in his column. Harry huffed and Hermione giggled into her hand, noticing that the score was fifteen games to none. She motioned at Harry and he stuck his tongue out at her.
Harry held up a finger and got up gently before walking over to the boys staircase. Ron, evidently wanting to win some more, pouted, but perked up when Harry mouthed something about bringing food and sat patiently. Hermione pushed his shoulder lightly and went back to her book.
Harry returned a few minutes later, balancing a multitude of plates and saucers on various points of his arms and distracting Hermione from her book when he dropped a fork on her foot. Harry mouthed an apology, but Hermione waved it off, instead focusing on the plates he was carefully unloading onto the table. Hermione’s eyes widened as she saw the spread of snacks that Harry had procured out of seemingly thin air. There were biscuits, scones, and muffins, with butter, jam, and cream as spreads and toppings. Three steaming cups of tea sat in the middle and Hermione picked up the one closest to her. Harry shook his head and handed her a different cup. Hermione took a sip and nodded appreciatively at the perfect ratios of tea and sugar. She shot a surprised glance at Harry, wondering when he’d memorised how she liked her tea.
In all the hustle and bustle of daily life, there was a moment of peace. The trio of friends sat there for another hour or so, finishing their tea and working through the array of baked goods. Hermione licked the jam off of her fingers as Harry lost yet another game of wizard’s chess to the celebrating Ron, who gleefully stole the bottle of ink that Seamus had left unattended for a moment and used it to etch yet another tally mark into his parchment, bringing the score to a grand total of forty-one games to none. Harry groaned as he saw the score, but resolutely shook Ron’s hand before poking out his tongue and disappearing with the empty plates. Hermione helped Ron out of his chair and patted him on the back. He grinned back before heading up the staircase to his dormitory.
Hermione shut her detective novel with a slight crack, wincing at the sound. She looked around to make sure she hadn’t disturbed anyone, but was surprised to see the common room empty. She was grateful for the few hours of silence anyways. Hermione packed up her bag and climbed the stairs to her dormitory. Crossing the room, she opened her trunk with a flick. The locks were warmer now than they had been some hours ago, which was the work of the fire happily burning away in the fireplace across the room. Hermione looked at the clock over the mantle of the fireplace and was pleased to see that it was nine o’clock, around the right time for bed. She pulled on her pyjamas and crawled under the heavy covers of her bed, letting the heat of the fire warm the room.
— — —
April, 1992
Hermione hurried down the staircase to the girl’s dormitories, crossed the Gryffindor common room in three short strides and set a book on Ron’s table with a thump, startling him out of his game of solo wizard’s chess. She stared at him in mild disappointment and moderate disgust as she prodded a finger at the offending piece of literature. “Ronald Weasley, do you care to explain what in god’s name this is?”
Ron moved a piece on his chess board, taking a pawn, then looked up and stared at the book incomprehensibly for a moment, not exactly getting what she was so upset about. “It’s… a book, Hermione. Don’t you have quite a few of them?”
“No, no, Ron, that’s not it.” she said dismissively, nudging it towards him with a thunderous expression. Ron raised an eyebrow and looked harder at the book. It was a faint, mild purple, and didn’t look very insulting to him. He narrowed his eyes a bit, then upon reading the title flushed as brightly red as his hair and dissolved into tiny chuckles.
“What is this, specifically ?” Hermione demanded, not amused in the slightest, “This specific book is very much not the type I have quite a few of. ‘The Witch’s Guide to Finding And Seducing Your Soulmate’?!? What could have possessed you to give me such an insultingly silly book? Have you ever seen me with a romance novel?”
Ron winced, “Hermione-”
“Ronald, I am twelve years old. Do you understand how inappropriate this could be? It’s not funny in the slightest, Ron.” Hermione complained, reaching out a hand and harshly hitting Ron upside the head. He winced.
“Hermione, it’s not supposed to be funny-” Ron tried interrupting her for a moment while nursing his head.
“-Just because I mentioned that Harry had nice eyes last week doesn’t mean I need to… to-” she spluttered, “-to seduce him!” Hermione shrieked, garnering a few confused stares from other students. She flushed a light pink and bit her lip, waving off the concerned look of one of the prefects. Ron grabbed the book back for a second to protect it from her wrath, then reconsidered and pushed it over the table at Hermione.
“Just… just thought it was funny. You should give it a read?” Ron suggested lamely, shoulders sagging. The air was tense as Hermione appeared to consider it. Ron felt a spark of hope splutter awake inside himself. This was Hermione, after all. She never turned down a book, no matter how angry she was.
Hermione turned her nose up into the air. “No, Weasley, I don’t think I will.”
She shoved the book back at him, knocking over his chess game and making the pieces shout in alarm as they fell to the floor. Turning around with a whip of her thick brown braid, she strode back up the stairs and glared at him before continuing up the staircase and out of sight. Ron sighed and pulled the book towards him, wincing at the slight dents in the cover where Hermione had probably viciously attacked it. He tucked it into his bag and planned for next time.
Waiting until Hermione was safely out of the common room, he snuck up to his dormitory and ditched the book. Harry, who was sitting on his bed folding some laundry, gave him a weird look when Ron swore and shoved the book deep into the back of his wardrobe. He would wait and bide his time, but eventually, Harry would be given the beautiful gift of meeting his soulmate. That was, if he actually read the book.
Two weeks later, when the book Ron had shoved into his wardrobe suddenly appeared on Harry’s nightstand, a very well-informed and considerably irate Hermione Granger dragged Harry out into the late spring air and performed her first, last, and only ever book-burning. Standing in the Transfiguration courtyard, Hermione watched as Harry cleared away leaves and bits of sticks until there was a small ring of clean bricks in the middle of the footpath. Hermione dropped the insulting purple book into the circle, not even deigning to put it down gently, and pulled out her wand. She murmured a charm and the book was enveloped in roaring blue flames, instantly blackening the edges and letting the smell of burning paper fill the courtyard. Stoked by repeated uses of the fire-making charm, the book burnt into a pile of ash in a little over a minute. Hermione nudged the pile with her shoe and it scattered slightly before the wind picked up and whisked most of the pile away into the breeze like depressed butterflies. There was only a slight burn mark on the courtyard’s bricks to show that anything had ever happened. Good.
“What an obnoxious git,” Hermione muttered over the remaining flecks of ashes. There was a slight chill in the air, and she huddled closer to Harry as she glared at the ground. It didn’t glare back, not that that would have made her feel better.
“Mm,” Harry said, kicking the ash with the tip of his boot, “Wonder why he did that.”
“Must be his idea of a joke,” Hermione replied.
Staring bleakly out from the window of the Transfiguration tower into the courtyard below, Ron reached into his pocket and pulled out a glimmering silver sickle. Lavender Brown picked it up out of his hand and smirked, tucking it into her robes and feeling around for her money pouch. She dropped Ron’s sickle into the pouch, then pulled out three knuts and offered them up.
“Two sickles that they’re still gonna be in denial by the end of the year,” she said. Ron groaned, sticking his hand back into his robes for a few knuts before reconsidering. The shiny bronze coins Lavender held twinkled enticingly and Ron thought long and hard about the ethics of betting on two pre-teens getting together before sighing and shaking his head.
“No, can’t take that bet, I’ve got to pay Mum back for her copy of that book. I don’t get it,” he huffed, “I’m trying to do them a favour. I know they’re not wizard-raised, but surely at least Hermione knows about soulmates? And finding your soulmate young and growing up with them is supposed to be the greatest gift of all. Honestly, those two just can’t take a hint.”
Ron watches as Hermione and Harry turned and walked through the courtyard back towards the entrance to the tower. Ron grimaced and climbed down from his vantage point on a windowsill, offering a hand to Lavender to help her down as well. They walked down the heavy stone steps of the tower together. Ron was silent. This was a sombre occasion after all. Meeting your soulmate young was a gift, and rejecting them, even unknowingly, hurt Ron in the deepest way. He was a romantic at heart, and seeing their obliviousness hurt him deeply. By Merlin’s left armpit, he’d already started planning their wedding! A beautiful ceremony underneath the autumn trees, leaves falling gently during their vows, every decoration in Chudley Cannons orange… Ron sighed in self-pity. That future was looking further and further away. At this point, it was just up to them — no amount of ridiculously obvious pushing would be able to get them together.
If only they just got their heads out of their arses and actually looked at each other.
— — —
May, 1992
“Oh, wonderful, gorgeous Harry, my favourite person,” Hermione said, a glare on her face, “Do you happen to have any nines?”
Harry shook his head, wearing a smirk several sizes too large for his face. “No, my dearest Hermione, I don’t happen to have any. You could try going fish.”
“Thank you,” Hermione growled, enunciating very carefully to make sure she didn’t yell, “Pleasure doing business with you.”
“Likewise,” Harry replied, still smirking. He shuffled his cards around and Hermione fixed them with a dirty scowl. She had half a mind to snatch them out of his hands. He hadn’t had any nines for the last few times she’d tried, yet she was sure that he’d picked some up.
“Any… kings, oh delightful Hermione?” Harry asked, looking like he hadn’t a care in the world. Hermione ground her teeth, then stopped, because she was a dentist’s daughter through and through and that wasn’t a good way to be frustrated. She decided to use that frustrated energy later, probably by beating Harry over the head with multiple salmon. It wasn’t very practical, but boy, she’d make it hurt.
“Here,” she replied, by way of an answer, slamming the kings of hearts and clubs down on the table. Harry pulled the two remaining kings out of his hand and picked up Hermione’s kings, setting all four cards off to the side in a growing pile of sets. Hermione grimaced, looking over at the final person in their little corner.
Their other friend looked between them with wide eyes, but wisely stayed silent, sensing the ever-mounting tension. After what the Weasley twins had dubbed ‘The Great Paper-Scissors-Rock War of 1993’, he had wisely learned to stay out of Harry and Hermione’s muggle games. Especially when said games always seemed to end up weirdly aggressive. Hermione had to win, though. After she stole all of Harry’s Gryffindor scarves a few months ago, he’d been endlessly teasing her about needing another scarf. She’d been knitting one the whole time, a nice green one, and in a flash of anger at his constant jokes, had bet him her scarf if he beat her at a game of her choice. She’d found an old pack of cards in her trunk, and had therefore challenged him to the age-old game of Go Fish right after Charms. They’d sat in a corner next to the heavy oak doors leading to Professor Flitwick’s classroom and begun to play.
Hermione narrowed her eyes at the raven-haired boy across from her. “Sevens.”
Harry narrowed his eyes right back and made a sharp jab at the pile of cards between them, his face setting into a hard frown. “Go. Fish.”
Hermione rifled around in the fishing pile for a card, then made a face as she picked up a queen. That wasn’t at all what she wanted. All she wanted was a bloody nine! She sighed.
Giving the nines a rest for a moment, she gave Harry both of her fours and then asked for a couple other cards. Surely in a moment he’d pick up a nine. They traded back and forth for a few minutes, with Harry’s mounting pile of sets off to the side taunting Hermione’s meagre stack of cards. She sniffed, a smile approaching her face. He’d had to pick up cards for the past five turns, so surely he’d have picked up a nine. Perhaps even two! Hermione grinned at the thought, waiting for the boy opposite her to finish his turn.
“Hermione,” Harry began. Hermione was filled with a terrible feeling, and she held her cards close to her chest.
“Do you have any nines?” Harry asked, a sly smile on his face. Hermione could have screamed at the heavens, but instead she sat and jerkily pulled the nine of hearts out of her rapidly diminishing deck and handed it to Harry. He gave an angelic smile back.
“Thank you,” he said, very sweetly. He pulled three cards out of his hand and very pointedly put a set of four nines down, the nine of hearts on the very top, taunting her with its absence.
“You bloody crock of-” Hermione snarled, falling over herself trying to grab Harry. He gave a little scream that quickly devolved into a laugh and crawled away, bumping into Ron, who (in a very un-Gryffindor move) grabbed Harry’s shoulders and held him still.
“Get him, ‘Mione!” he cheered. Hermione grinned and picked up her bag, walloping Harry in the chest with it. She’d regret it later, as her quills were no doubt being crushed, but hearing Harry’s screams for mercy was well worth it. She pounced on him like a cat and began to poke him all over his chest. He relentlessly struggled against her, yet it was no use, as Ron still held his arms.
Hermione stopped for a moment to catch her breath and Harry grinned. He laughed for a moment, then managed to gasp out, “You owe me a scarf” before Hermione was back on him again. Ron shrieked when they both fell over on top of him, but began laughing as well. They sat there in the corner on the cold stone floor, tumbling over the grey bricks before Hermione stopped beating Harry savagely and went over to salvage her cards, sweeping them all into a pile.. Harry and Ron caught their breath for a moment, the latter muttering about insane muggles.
“Hey!” Harry moaned, seeing Hermione trying to shove the cards back into their box, “I hadn’t counted all my sets.”
“Why bother?” Hermione replied, “We both know you’ve won, but I certainly don’t want to know by how much.”
Harry dissolved back into laughter and soon they were all tramping back up to Gryffindor Tower, Harry and Ron teasing Hermione for pouting like a petulant little child. She was determined to maim them, but saw the humour and left them in the common room with a promise to never mention the game of Go Fish again.
She rooted through her trunk, half grateful that her dormmates weren’t there to hear her homicidal mutterings and half furious at herself for not being better at the game. For god’s sake, she was a very logical person, and if she couldn’t win a game of Go Fish then what could she win? She put those thoughts to rest as she pulled out her scarf and held it to the light, mourning its loss. It was a very beautiful green colour, sage green or something of the like, made of lovely wool that Hermione’s mother had given her money to buy for Christmas. Hermione pouted, but closed her trunk up and hugged the scarf to her chest. She descended the staircase to the common room slowly, determined to get as much time out of holding the scarf as possible. Unfortunately, all good things must come to an end, and she reached the common room all too soon, where Harry and Ron stood, grins wide and silly. Hermione bit her lip and glared at them, but handed over her scarf to Harry.
“Hey,” Harry said, voice soft as he held the scarf back out towards her, “You can keep it if it’s so important.”
“Nah,” Hermione said, shrugging, “It’ll match your eyes anyways.”
Harry blushed a furious shade of red, but covered it up with a cough and “Well, yeah, but you lost!”
Hermione snorted at the blatant cover-up and Ron laughed and patted him on the back. Hermione smiled as Harry put the scarf on. She was right. It really did match his eyes.
— — —
June, 1992
Harry closed up his trunk. Lifting it onto his bed, he left it sitting there as he crossed the room to look out the window. He felt a deep sense of melancholia, like a cloak had been settled around his shoulders that was just a bit too heavy, yet it was necessary. Bad weather was coming, in the form of another summer at the Dursleys. Harry sighed for what felt like the eighth time that minute—he realised that it probably was.
The end of term feast was over. Dumbledore had bid them all farewell, the teachers had waved them back to their dormitories, the seventh years had holed themselves up in the attic of Gryffindor Tower in a bid to have more time to say goodbye to each other. Everything was finishing, closing up, and shutting down for the summer holidays. Harry just couldn’t let go yet. He’d only had ten months in the most magical place in the world, the escape of his dreams, and yet there was no way he could stay.
Outside of the window, Harry could see Professor McGonagall assembling carriages with a few flicks of her wand whilst Hagrid manoeuvred around the floating pieces, holding a bucket and apparently calling out to something. Harry wondered about what he was doing for just a moment, then went back to staring at the early-morning clouds. He stayed like that for a few minutes, just watching the clouds pass him by.
All too soon, he was in a carriage with Ron, Hermione, Lavender, and Parvati, trundling down the slope towards Hogsmeade. It was a pleasantly quick journey, and soon he was in a compartment, trunk magically appearing above his seat as he strained his neck outside the window, twisting around and vying for a view of the castle one last time before they departed.
Harry watched in muted sadness as the Hogwarts castle fell away outside of the window. It was a home to him—a home more than the Dursley house on Privet Drive had ever been—and he despaired at losing it, even if it was just for a few months. He’d be back, of course, because the Dursleys would absolutely salivate at the chance to have him gone for ten months of the year, but there was a certain melancholy tinge in the air anyways.
The train ride would take ten hours, quickly turning from morning to evening, so Harry busied himself with getting packs of cards and summer assignments out of his trunk, trying not to look at the Forbidden Forest passing by outside the windows. When it did eventually transition into rocky hills covered in moss-green grass, he pulled out a quill and some ink and attempted to focus on a herbology essay on venomous tentacula.
He cheered up a bit when the trolley witch came around. Unlike the first time he’d been on the train, he didn’t buy absolutely everything he saw, but rather stood for a moment and tried to recall which sweet out of cauldron cakes or pumpkin pasties tasted terrible. Admittedly, it had been quite a while since he’d had either. He ended up buying both, plus a host of other sweets and three bowls of thick potato stew for a nice lunch. Ron looked appreciatively at his bowl, hiding a bag of corned beef sandwiches away for later disposal. Harry finished up his business, ferrying his purchases onto the seats. He avoided buying the blood pops, though. Those were truly hazardous.
The trio sipped their soup and talked over the year, with Harry really appreciating the view outside the windows when Ron and Hermione got into an argument about the best seats in the common room. They soon moved on to sweets, though Hermione turned up her nose at them and proclaimed herself a dentist’s daughter through and through. Harry was fine with that. After remembering that cauldron cakes were the terrible tasting ones (Ron gladly took the rest of Harry’s, proclaiming them marvellous), Harry moved on to a fluffy cloud of Doxy Floss, a version of candy floss that floated free of its bag when opened and hovered around. Harry chased after it, laughing when it hovered over Hermione like a pastel-coloured fur hat. She smiled at the situation, but batted it back towards Harry with a murmured “cavities”.
When she looked up a moment later, he was sitting quite happily on his chair, Doxy Floss contained in his hands as it tried to float away. He ate all of it within half a minute, but got a bit on his cheek. Without thinking, Hermione reached over and wiped it off, then wiped her hand on a napkin. She looked back down at her book, then looked up when Harry stopped moving.
Harry was frozen, feeling as though he’d short-circuited like one of Dudley’s broken computers. He was bemused to feel his face heat up and to hear a muffled snicker from Ron before he regained control over his body and muttered some sort of thanks to Hermione. Satiated, she returned to her book. Harry sat there for a moment, reached his hand up to brush over his face, and saw Ron bite his lip to hide a grin. He shot his friend a glare, then picked up his long-forgotten essay and continued to write it. He pointedly ignored Ron’s grin.
Before Harry had even really come to terms with what had happened, London was flashing by outside of the windows and Hermione was shooing them away so that she could get changed into muggle clothes.
“Mate,” Ron murmured, leaning against the door of the compartment and smiling with one half of his mouth, “You’ve got to-”
Harry held up a finger and stared at the ceiling.
“Harry, it’s great to see you and Hermione-”
“Ron, I don’t know why you want me and Hermione to get together, but it’s not going to happen.” Harry interrupted, eyebrows furrowed, “That silly book on soulmates was weird, and we’re only eleven. Give it a rest. Maybe after seventh year?”
Ron sighed, “Yeah, sorry. Don’t know why I was reading into it so much.”
Hermione slid open the door and slipped out, dressed in a fuzzy blue sweater and a pair of jeans. Harry and Ron took their opportunity to enter the compartment. Ron wore a pair of freshly-pressed black business pants, a ratty graphic shirt proclaiming the name of an 80s grunge band that Harry was quite sure he’d never heard of, a pair of blue tennis shoes, and an antique fedora. Overall, he made quite a strange sight. Harry changed into a loose-fitting brown shirt and a pair of Dudley’s oversized grey pants that he cinched at the waist with his uniform belt. Hermione came back in on Ron’s knock and as the train rolled into King’s Cross Station, they lugged their trunks down and out onto the platform.
Ron waved them off quickly, going over to his waiting parents and joining the gaggle of red-heads in the corner of the platform. He yelled a goodbye to them that was quickly swallowed by the hustle and bustle of the station. Hermione hugged Harry goodbye and skipped over to her parents, who looked very confused. She chatted with them for a moment, then waved goodbye to Harry and then to Ron before crossing back over to the muggle side of King’s Cross. Harry waved until she was out of sight, then sighed. He took a deep breath, savouring the scents of chocolate and train smoke before closing his eyes and walked briskly through the barrier. After a moment of walking around, he spotted the Dursleys standing stiffly over near the exit. They looked as if they’d rather be anywhere else. Petunia wrinkled her nose in discomfort at a boy carrying an owl cage, while Dudley stared fearfully at the barrier as if expecting it to turn him into a newt.“"Hurry up, boy, we haven't got all day." Uncle Vernon barked, red in the face and sporting what appeared to be a fuzzy caterpillar on his upper lip. Evidently, he’d been growing out his moustache.
“Yes, Uncle,” Harry replied, looking longingly at the barrier to Platform 9 ¾. With a sigh, he got into the Dursleys’ car and watched Ron’s family cross through the barrier as they pulled away from the curb. It was going to be a long summer.
Chapter 3: an eye for an eye
Summary:
Year the second, in which Hermione spends a lot of time as a rock, Ron spins the soulmate wheel and lands on someone unexpected (unless you read the tags), Harry does flashcards, and the author makes vague references.
Chapter Text
September, 1992
The Gryffindor common room was bustling with happy, laughing students. They chattered about their hopes, expectations, and worries, excited for another year at school, where nothing ever happened that could possibly make them scared or anxious. Every student in the room was in somewhat of a good mood, because the train ride was a time to relax, not a time of stress and anxiety. Harry had been the same as the rest when he’d gotten to Hogwarts, happy to be free of the Dursleys for another ten months and ready to forget all about them until June. That was, until he’d become very anxious, thank you very much. Who or what could possibly be the source of said anxiety?
Hermione Granger pulled a tube of lip gloss out of her pocket and reapplied it to her lips. It was pink and sparkly and unusually feminine for the no-nonsense Hermione, but Harry wasn’t exactly complaining.
She rubbed her lips together a little, distributing the layer of gloss, and Harry felt his heartbeat thump a little harder. Well, not literally, but it felt like it. He breathed a heavy sigh as Hermione bit her lip in thought. She was so heavily engrossed in her copy of ‘101 Essential Transfigurations’ that she hadn’t even noticed Harry’s weighty looks. He felt strong and steady, happy; if it was being around Ron and Hermione that made him feel so… good.
The other students continued to chatter amongst themselves. Harry took a long sip out of a glass of pumpkin juice and swallowed it with a gulp when Hermione bit her lip. The other students noticed nothing. Hermione was buried in her overly large textbook, Ron was sorting Bertie Botts' Every Flavour Beans into a ‘possibly good’ and a ‘possibly bad’ pile, and Harry was staring at Hermione’s lips. They gleamed with sparkly lip gloss, like a thousand suns, or a very shiny mirror, or Professor Snape’s eyes when he towered over some poor unfortunate soul cutting their dried slugs horizontally instead of vertically. Hermione’s lips glimmered.
Harry shook himself. Where had that thought come from? Hermione was his friend. He pushed it far, far away and went back to staring at his friend’s lips, like totally normal friends did. Honestly, it must have just been that he was at a lack of other activities and had decided to just figure out via the colour what flavour Hermione’s lip gloss was. That made total sense.
“Mate-” Ron began, looking up from his sweets over to Harry. A bean sat in his hand, one that Harry knew was vomit flavoured. If Harry hadn’t been so distracted, he would have warned his best friend, but he was a tad bit preoccupied. Ron attempted to get his attention, then he paused, glancing between Hermione and Harry and seemingly coming to a conclusion. One that he apparently liked, as he smiled lopsidedly at his hand and went back to sorting his beans.
“Never mind.”
“Huh?” Harry yanked himself away from his staring to look over at his best friend. “What was that, Ron?”
“Oh, nothing.” said his friend, smirking, “I was just going to compliment Hermione on her lip gloss.”
Harry felt a beast claw its way out of his chest and into his throat, where a whole host of unsavoury words were forming. He swelled like a balloon, pulling a year’s worth of air into his lungs in order to spit out a venomous, “Yeah? Well, so was I.”
He turned to Hermione and gazed hard at her. She was still looking at her textbook, so the effect was lost on her, but Harry continued anyway. He stared right into her distracted eyes, “I like your lip gloss!”
Hermione looked up from her book with a mild expression. “Oh, thank you, Harry, it’s new. I didn’t think anyone had noticed.”
She looked back down again, turning a page and letting her hand rest on her cheek as she was lost back into the endlessly thrilling world of chair-to-desk transfigurations. She rubbed her lips together and lifted her eyebrows ever-so-slightly as if she hadn’t even remembered that she was wearing the lip gloss. Harry nodded to himself, satisfied, completely missing Ron’s gleeful expression. That expression quickly turned into disgust as Ron chewed on the bean he’d just tried to have Harry identify. Spitting the bean out into a bag full of corned beef sandwiches, Ron took a long drink from his glass of pumpkin juice.
‘Mate,” he coughed out between sips of his drink, “Really? You couldn’t have warned me? Just a little bit? ‘Oh, Ron, that one tastes like Merlin’s toe fungus’ is just a bit too far for you?”
Hermione looked up with a frown, “Ronald…”
Harry winced and handed Ron his half-full glance of pumpkin juice to help wash away the remaining flavour of vomit. “Sorry, mate, I was a little distracted.”
Ron hid his grin behind a very fake cough and a very real, very long drink of pumpkin juice. Upon remembering that there were only a few hours until curfew, Harry shook himself away from his staring and scrambled to get out his textbook for Charms and a roll of parchment. As soon as he’d gotten home in June, Uncle Vernon had blustered about magic being in his house (“A disgrace!” Aunt Petunia had cried, “What would the neighbours say?”) and locked his whole trunk away in the cupboard under the stairs, only giving Harry a moment to get his clothes and a bag of treats for Hedwig. His summer homework was woefully underdone, and Harry needed that finished immediately, lest Professor Flitwick lecture the class about having two whole months and not completing their homework. Since classes started tomorrow, he definitely needed to have that done.
“Hermione?” Harry started, meaning to ask a question but getting distracted once again by her lips, “Um… er?”
“Yes?” Hermione said expectantly.
Harry fumbled for a moment. “Oh, um, what’s the wand movement for the locking charm?”
“A clockwise circle over the lock,” Hermione recited, still reading her book.
“Er, thanks.” Harry went back to his essay. He once again ignored Ron’s pointed sips of his pumpkin juice.
— — —
“Here,” Harry said, holding out a small package haphazardly wrapped in blue wrapping paper. Hermione looked confused, but took the gift, inspecting it for a moment before looking up, brows furrowed.
“Harry, what’s this for?-”
“It’s your birthday, right?” Harry said quickly, “I just got you… something small. I thought you’d like it.”
Hermione opened the package gently, sticking the paper under a textbook so that it wouldn’t get blown away before setting the present down next to her on the bench. It was a bottle of ink the colour of charcoal, and Hermione stared at it.
“You got me… ink?”
Harry fell over himself trying to explain. “It’s no-spill ink. You know, because you complained about how you were always getting drops of ink on everything and I thought you might like it- I can get you something else if you want.”
“No, no, it’s a good gift,” Hermione assured, “Thanks for remembering.”
Harry nodded stiffly and turned to see Ron, who handed over a box of Pepper Imps with an easy smile. He wished her a happy birthday before turning back to his game of chess with one of the older students.
Harry watched Ron play as Hermione carefully tested the ink out on a piece of parchment. It really was good ink.
A gust of wind blew through the courtyard and Hermione watched the ink run off the parchment and onto the stone bench she was sitting on. Grateful that it hadn’t gotten onto her robes, Hermione dabbed at the bench with a piece of parchment before giving up. No matter. She packed the ink away and turned to Ron’s game just in time to see him beat the other student. They shook hands and Ron grinned at them before calling out for another competitor.
“Wanna play?” he asked, looking between her and Harry. They both shook their heads.
Harry laughed and replied, “No, mate, you’ve got us all beat.”
Hermione agreed and watched as another student came to play Ron, a tall Ravenclaw girl with a prefect’s badge. The Ravenclaw smirked at Ron and sat jauntily.
“No way you’re beating me, Weasley. Heard your howler in the hall last week! I’m not sure you’re famous for good decisions.”
Hermione narrowed her eyes, but Ron smiled genially and gestured at the chessboard. “I guess we’ll see, Hawkins.”
Hell hath no fury like a ginger scorned.
— — —
October, 1992
The hallway was lit by only a single burning sconce and shadows were drawn in every corner. The flickering flame illuminated a glistening message on the wall. It was written in sickeningly crimson liquid and ran down the walls as if the bricks were melting. Harry gasped, not taking his eyes off the dripping letters. It looked like blood.
THE CHAMBER OF SECRETS HAS BEEN OPENED
ENEMIES OF THE HEIR… BEWARE
“Harry, look!” Hermione gasped, pointing at the nearby sconce. Harry looked around, but couldn’t see anything else out of the ordinary, once again focusing on the message. Ron grabbed his arm and pulled him back, away from the torch. Harry stared at the flame for a moment, then slowly shifted his gaze downwards.
Hanging there, tail wrapped around the sconce, was a stone cat. Harry took a step forward, brushing off Ron’s grip to peer at the statue. The markings, the patchy fur, the unpleasant expression…
He stumbled back, letting a small, unintentional gasp escape.
It was Mrs. Norris, Filch’s cat.
There was a great shuffling of feet and Hermione dragged him back a few steps as student after student began pouring down the stairs. The Halloween feast was over, and the crowd appeared to be made up of Slytherins and Hufflepuffs returning to their dormitories for a long night of sleep.
Gasps rang through the crowd as the assembled students absorbed the sight before them. Every person was whispering, though the combined number of near 150 students meant that Harry, Ron, and Hermione could quite clearly hear the speculation already spreading.
“You’ll be next, mudbloods!” Draco Malfoy’s voice rang out through the crowd and Harry ground his teeth. There was a bout of angry muttering and a rather subdued smattering of laughter from a clump of Slytherin students, though the Hufflepuffs didn’t seem to find it nearly as funny.
Then teachers were arriving and everyone was being ushered away, past the sweeping red letters and down corridors. The footsteps died away, replaced by Filch’s angry screeches as he advanced upon Harry. Dumbledore arrived in a great flurry of movement and soon Harry was swept down another corridor, through an archway, up several flights of stairs, and behind a heavy tapestry of a lady knitting long, red socks. They came to a stop in front of a statue of a gryphon and Dumbledore muttered something about sweets. Harry would have questioned it, but he felt strangely apart from his own body.
He snapped back into focus as the gryphon turned into a set of stairs, which he and Dumbledore climbed. The headmaster made a little joke about being too old for staircases, smiling down at Harry, but his face turned worried when Harry didn’t respond. Dumbledore heaved a sigh, then they were through a door into Dumbledore’s office. It consisted of two large circular rooms, and the headmaster led him past tables covered in whirring silver contraptions, murky jars and kaleidoscopic orbs. He felt himself being pushed down into a plush tartan armchair and Dumbledore sat opposite him behind a heavy wooden desk.
Harry watched himself answer Dumbledore’s questions as if floating outside of his body by a string. There was a haze around him, an air of confusion and terror. His head was full of cotton wool and mothballs and dripping scarlet letters in great, furious brushstrokes against the hallway’s bricks, illuminated by the corridor’s torches. Dumbledore stopped for a moment, and Harry could loosely hear the headmaster asking whether he was alright. Dumbledore offered him a small, brightly-wrapped sweet and Harry took it numbly, not even feeling his own body move.
“I didn’t do it,” he mumbled. Dumbledore’s eyes softened and he patted Harry’s hand kindly.
“Yes, Harry, I do realise that. There are forces at work here that even I myself find daunting, so you must excuse yourself. No one truly believes that you petrified Mrs. Norris, though you might as well take the congratulations to heart.”
Harry huffed a small laugh and Dumbledore brightened before taking Harry’s hand and dropping a few more sweets into it. Harry clung to them, relishing the feeling of the cold, crinkly plastic as it scratched his skin. The numbness was subsiding. He could feel again.
Dumbledore murmured a few kind words, then directed Harry back out the door. Harry returned to Gryffindor Tower in a trance, stumbling through corridors and staircases with a kind of exhaustion that he didn’t even know existed.
That exhaustion immediately disappeared when he entered the Gryffindor common room and saw the mass of students crowded into the room. The common room got rapidly quieter, then whispers started again. Fingers started pointing. Harry winced as a group of first years shrank away from him and started whispering. He crossed to his usual seat, which was suspiciously empty for the amount of people in the room. Then there was a sudden, terrible thought.
They weren’t… afraid of him?
“Hi, Harry,” Hermione said kindly, pulling him down into his normal armchair. Harry sank into the chair, letting it wrap around him in a cloud of worn red fabric — Gryffindor red, as scarlet as blood, as crimson as the letters on the wall-
“Mate,” Ron interrupted his thoughts, looking worried, “Mate, are you okay?”
“I didn’t do it,” Harry mumbled, staring vaguely down at his hands. The feeling of dozens of eyes on him prickled across his skin and he shrank away even more.
“Well of course you didn’t, Harry, don’t be a prat,” replied Hermione, “We know that.”
“I was with you all night. Don’t be an idiot, mate. If anything, I’m the Heir of Slytherin,” Ron said, voice growing stronger, though it did shake a little when he said the last part.
“Then what was it? Everyone seems to think it was me,” Harry said bitterly, glancing at the room. Hermione looked deep in thought, probably running through every book she’d ever read to find some sort of spell that could turn people into stone.
“... Medusa isn’t a wizarding thing, is she?” Hermione asked, an incredulous look on her face.
Ron screwed up his face in thought. “Are you talking about Medusa Hair Cream? My Aunt Tammy uses it to keep her hair in these horribly tight curls that look like she’s been spraying squirty cream on her head.”
Hermione blinked. “That’s certainly… one way of interpreting the myth.”
Harry cracked a small smile and his friends melted in relief. Hermione and Ron looked at each other for a moment, then reached out. Each of them grabbed one of Harry’s hands and Harry smiled as they pulled him into a makeshift hug. The room got a little louder and Harry hid his face in Ron’s shoulder. Ron shot a deadly glare over at a group of muttering fourth years and Hermione made a rather rude gesture to a sixth year who had just loudly suggested that Harry was a new Dark Lord. Harry buried his face a little deeper and the hug got ever-so-slightly tighter.
It dissolved a moment later and they sat back down in their seats. Ron pulled out a bar of chocolate and hit it a few times to make it break up. He laid it down on the table and Harry numbly bit down on a piece. Hermione and Ron were fighting over a piece that had somehow broken into a perfect circle and Harry snorted when they both fell backwards, half a piece clutched in each of their hands. Hermione landed on her chair and looked very happy, while Ron landed smack on the floor and gasped, offended, when Hermione dissolved into laughter.
Harry smiled a little. It was nice to have people in his corner.
— — —
November, 1992
Harry was zooming through the air on his broom, a grin painted across his face as he chased the snitch. Hermione gnawed on her lip as Harry shot down into a steep dive, then sighed as Harry’s hand missed the glittering snitch. There was a flash of wings and it darted away, leaving Harry cruising close to the ground, a disappointed look marring his features. The rain poured down upon the match and Hermione dug herself further into her coat, glad for Harry’s Gryffindor scarf warming her neck.
A bludger streaked past and one of the Weasley twins hit out with his bat. The ball flew past again, heading towards a Slytherin chaser getting ready to receive the quaffle. Strangely, it veered away and started bolting towards Harry, who was hovering above the game waiting for his chance. Hermione was confused. That was not normal bludger behaviour. They generally just went wherever they were directed towards.
The bludger got dangerously close and Harry noticed it, making a sharp swerve before it could hit him. This was, of course, when the bludger should have continued.
It did not continue.
Instead, the bludger made a wide arc, then headed straight for Harry again. Harry was confused, but flew away towards the other side of the pitch. A Weasley twin made his way through the mess of players to hit the bludger again, then again as it swerved yet again towards Harry. The two Gryffindors yelled at each other for a moment, confusion evident on both their faces. The bludger continued towards Harry and was smacked away again, but not for long, as it veered back to Harry again.
“The bludger’s been fixed!” cried Ron, outrage colouring his face. Hermione nodded, slipping her wand out of her pocket and gripping it tightly. When Harry got close enough to the Gryffindor stands, Hermione readied her wand.
“Bombarda!” Hermione murmured. She watched as the faint blue spell streaked through the air, then saw it collide with the bludger. The ball was knocked off course for a moment and Harry looked relieved at the reprieve, but it didn’t last long and the bludger once again chased Harry across the pitch.
The Weasley twins called for a time out, wrestling the bludger, and the teams convened on the ground. The rain pounded harder and any hope of hearing the Gryffindor team’s conversation was gone. Soon, the bludger was released again and Hermione sighed as the team rose back into the air. Honestly, no one in all of Quidditch seemed to have any real self-preservation.
Malfoy zoomed across the field, sneering as Harry was forced to do a strange sort of twirl in midair to avoid the bludger. He called out to Harry something about ballet, but the comment was lost in the wind. Malfoy flew a bit closer then jerked, startled, as the bludger nearly bashed him on its way towards Harry.
“Confringo!” Hermione intoned, a little braver knowing that the sound of the rain was blocking her casting from being heard by the teachers. The fiery spell zoomed through the air but missed the bludger, fizzling out in the pouring rain.
Hermione winced at the failure before calling out another spell, “Bombarda Maxima!”
The spell flew under Angelina Johnson’s legs and narrowly avoided Malfoy (Hermione cursed her failure under her breath), and streaked towards the Slytherin side of the stands. Hermione pretended not to notice when a clump of students wearing green scarves toppled into each other, shrieking.
Suddenly there were screams and Hermione’s eyes shot up to Harry’s form. His arm hung limply at his side and Hermione realised with a gasp that it was broken. The bludger was still careening around him. Malfoy was hovering a few metres away, laughing like a rabid hyena on ketamine or Peeves that one time when he’d just phased through a wall and dropped wads of gooey bubblegum into Professor Dumbledore’s beard. Hermione grit her teeth and readied her wand again, but reeled in shock when Harry started zooming towards Malfoy, good hand outstretched as if to throttle him (Hermione wasn’t entirely opposed to that idea). Harry’s hand twitched.
There was a flash of gold and the stands roared to life as one. Hermione hurried down the stairs, along with half the school, ready to congratulate the team.
Suddenly, the boisterous crowd let out a gasp and Hermione swung around to see Harry falling, broken arm limply stretching out towards his broom. Hermione ran faster than she’d ever done before in her life, her wand ready and outstretched. The crowds sprinted behind her, with several teachers up in their box also reaching for their wands.
Harry fell to the ground with a crack, letting out a short, sharp cry as he landed on his broken arm. The bludger lurched down, gaining speed before driving itself into the ground exactly where Harry was a moment before. Harry rolled, terrified, as the bludger crashed onto the ground near him again.
“Finite!” Hermione cried. The bludger stopped and fell to the ground for a moment before making a lazy circle and heading over to the other side of the court.
Professor Lockhart pushed through, wand at the ready and set upon Harry.
“My dear boy, leave the heroic antics to the rest of us!” He chuckled. Ron curled his lip and Hermione pushed her disgust deep down inside so as to not have it show on her face, because Lockhart was a teacher and that was wrong.
Lockhart grinned widely and brandished his wand a bit, “Let me fix that for you!”
Hermione started. “Um, Professor, shouldn’t he go to the hospital wing?”
“No, no, I’m quite adept at these sorts of charms. Once, while I was in Alaska, I had to unbreak a poor eskimo’s right arm after I saved him from a yeti attack,” Lockhart explained. Ron sent Hermione an incredulous look, which she pretended not to see.
Suddenly, Lockhart had cast a spell.
Harry’s broken arm was now utterly, entirely boneless.
Hermione bit down on her lip until she tasted blood, because she wasn’t going to scream at a teacher. No, she was far more civilised than that. She had the perfect solution all thought out already.
There was a book of curses in the library calling Hermione’s name.
— — —
Hermione stalked through the halls, footsteps light. The day was clear and sunny, so most of the students were outside. Hermione was alone in the corridor.
“Ms. Granger! My brightest student!” Lockhart called. Hermione fixed a smile on her face and spun around to see the ludicrous man striding towards her, azure robes flowing in non-existent breeze and golden hair firmly tacked onto his head like a plastic lego piece or a crappy mass-produced toupee made of bleached chest hair.
Hermione was pleased to see that he was alone. The afternoon air was sweet and cold, like revenge.
“Professor!” Hermione said sweetly, “How are you?”
“Oh, good, good. I was just returning from talking to Professor Dumbledore about Harry’s little accident,” Lockhart said, flashing a charming grin, “No hard feelings, right?”
Hermione nodded, “Oh, no Professor. You were trying your best!”
Lockhart grinned, patting her shoulder with a heavy hand, “Right then, young lady. I’m off to the classroom. Those… lesson plans won’t do themselves.”
Hermione nodded, “Bye, Professor!”
Lockhart strolled away, whistling a jaunty tune that sounded suspiciously like the jingle for his over-priced hair products. Hermione turned and crept into a corner, wand out and aimed at the professor.
“Porcus Meretrix,” she whispered, her wand trained on Lockhart’s back.
Lockhart kept going as if nothing had happened. Hermione grinned, a sharp smile of not pleasure but vengeful delight. The results of the spell wouldn’t show themselves quite yet, or at least, not until tonight. Hopefully he had some Viagra on hand.
— — —
December, 1992
“Hermione, what’s the fifth transfiguration element?” Ron asked, quill scratching into his parchment as he wrote an essay. His parchment was covered in scrawling ink, but only contained about ten sentences worth of writing. That seemed to be a common theme among Ron’s essays. Hermione sighed at the thought then went back to her own activities, accidentally forgetting Ron’s question.
Ron tried again in a moment, waving his quill and accidentally leaving a large splotch of ink on the table. He grimaced as he cleaned it up, carefully dabbing at the ink before questioning Hermione again. “Fifth transfiguration element? Hermione? Hello~?”
Hermione was once again not listening, instead neglecting her own half-written transfiguration essay in order to stare across the table at the boy across from her. The library was quiet as they worked and Harry was focused, leaving a perfect opportunity for staring. Harry tucked another bit of his messy hair behind his ear and Hermione swooned . Well, not literally, but it felt like it. He seemingly hadn’t had a haircut since she’d met him and now his hair was curling gorgeously down and around his ears, making him tuck it back behind his ears every few seconds. Hermione just wanted to reach out and touch it. Beautiful. That’s what it was. It was beautiful, the way it fell in messy curls, his hair the near-exact colour of the ink splotch on the table. Harry did it again and Hermione felt her hand twitch as she resisted the urge to just do it herself. She stared at the oblivious Harry’s hair, not noticing Ron’s annoyed glare.
“Bloody hell,” he muttered, “Not this again.”
Ron got up and started to pack his ink and quill away into his school bag, drawing Harry’s attention away from his textbook. As Ron left, Harry waved him goodbye before going back to his book, tucking the lone strand of hair that had fallen while doing the action back behind his ears. Hermione bit her lip and glared resolutely at her essay, willing herself to pick up her quill and write. Transfiguration formulas… elements? What was it that Ron was asking? She looked up to find her friend, but now noticed his departure. She glanced around before having her attention drawn to Ron, who was walking over to a bookshelf to grab something.
“Hey, Ron?” Hermione called hurriedly, letting her attention wander away from her essay, “Did you have a question?”
“Oh, yeah, what’s the fifth transfiguration element?” Ron asked, turning to look back at her.
“Oh,” Hermione said distractedly, going back to staring at the ever-oblivious Harry, “No one knows.”
Ron looked so utterly disgusted that Hermione just had to laugh. He poked his tongue out at her and stomped away into the shelves in a huff, muttering something about getting a book and oblivious people. Hermione didn’t understand. Who was oblivious? She shook it off and went back to staring at Harry’s gorgeous hair as he tucked it back behind his ear.
— — —
Ron muttered as he stomped off into the rows of bookshelves, very deliberately not looking back. Honestly, those two were the most oblivious people he’d ever met. One of his great-uncles had gotten married without even realising he was dating, and yet Harry and Hermione were still even more oblivious.
“Soulmates!” he muttered, “Bloody hell, they’re soulmates and they can’t even be bothered to notice it!”
First it was Harry gaping at Hermione whenever she reapplied her lip gloss, and now Hermione ogling at Harry’s hair every time he so much as shook his head. Honestly, with all of Hermione’s talk about being so smart, how could she not see?
How could they not see?
How could they not tell they were meant for each other?
They were so unbearably adorable and yet so determined to remain ‘just friends’. Ron couldn’t take it.
He got a metre or so into the shelves and dropped his bag, spinning around on his heel to stare around the corner of the shelves. His bag thumped to the floor and he jolted as Madam Pince’s voice shrieked through the quiet library.
Ron studied his friends through the shelves, deeply focused on the two. Unfortunately, they had not started dramatically declaring their love for each other like he’d hoped they would. That was just too bad. He’d have to… help them along.
Ron slowly crouched down, not taking his eyes off his friends, and rifled through his bag, looking for a note he’d written during Charms. He pulled it out and looked it over, self-satisfied. It was rather pretty, if he said so himself. It had been written in swirling calligraphy with a fancy dictation quill he’d borrowed off some fourth-year in exchange for a couple pepper imps. The paper was crisp and eggshell white, cut off a Honeydukes box and changed to a nicer shade by one of the prefects who’d mastered colour-changing charms. Ron surveyed the note.
KISS THE GIRL
Ron nodded. That ought to do the job.
“Wingardium Leviosa,” he whispered. The note began to float and he poked his wand through the bookshelves towards Harry and Hermione. It hovered towards them and Ron aimed to have it drop down into Harry’s open textbook. He stuck his tongue out in concentration. Nearly there… just about-
“What are you doing?”
Ron spun around so fast he hit himself in the face with his wand, wincing as it whacked his nose. He ignored the distraction for a moment, looking back to see the note falling slowly back and forth. The paper floated down and fell beneath the table, settling right next to Harry’s foot. He didn’t appear to notice.
Ron turned, quiet venom in his voice, “You idiot! Why did you-”
He paused.
A girl stared at him. Her hair was wavy and platinum blonde, curling around her shoulders, and her eyes were luminous and desperately blue. She wore Ravenclaw robes and had the slight build of a first year, like she’d blow away if he got too close. Ron felt as if he’d been dunked in ice looking at her.
She tucked her hair behind her ear and Ron noticed a pair of curiously-shaped earrings.
“Are those-” he coughed, “Um, are those radishes?”
“Where?” the girl said, “I don’t see any. This is a library, not a farm.”
“Er, on your ears?”
“Oh.” the girl said shortly. She reached a hand up and touched her earrings, “I do suppose they are. They help to fend away wrackspurts.”
Ron nodded, feeling extremely awkward, “Um, I’m Ron Weasley.”
The girl made a non-committal. “Yes, I know that.”
“And… you are?” he asked, rubbing the back of his neck with his hand.
“Oh, I’m Luna.”
Ron nodded for the eighth time, beginning to feel a bit like a bobblehead, “Cool. Cool. How are you, Luna?”
“Oh, I’m just marvellous. I’m looking for a Carnivorous Mink, have you seen one? They’re mostly found in Australasia, but I thought I saw one sneaking through the shelves here.”
“Er, no?” Ron said, not having the faintest idea what a wrackspurt was or what a Carnivorous Mink would look like.
Luna sniffed, “Would you like to find one with me?”
Ron shrugged, “Yeah, sure.” The girl was a bit strange, but he felt an odd compulsion to help her find a mink, for some reason.
Luna grabbed Ron’s arm and pulled him along, leaving Ron only a second to grab his bag and tear his gaze away from Harry and Hermione’s quiet studying.
They hurried out of the library, Luna practically dragging Ron’s arm and chattering about the diet of wrackspurts and how Unspeakables were hiding a sentient Venomous Tentacula in Gringotts. Ron nodded along to everything, feeling a cocktail of emotions he couldn’t quite identify.
They strode through corridors, Ron bemused as Luna checked behind every tapestry and exclaimed about the “feisty minks” and their propensity to hide behind large pieces of cloth (this meant they were apparently often found in the tents of camping muggles).
They rounded a corner and Ron found himself near the Ravenclaw tower.
“Luna!” a familiar voice yelled down the hall, “Luna, there you are!”
A braid of brilliantly orange hair came into view and whipped behind a girl running down the hallway. Ron waved awkwardly, dislodging Luna’s hand from his arm.
“Ginny,” he said stiffly.
“Ron,” replied Ginny.
“I’m just-”
“I see you’ve met Luna Lovegood. That’s great. Leave my best friend alone.”
Ron nodded, “Yeah. Um, see you, Luna.”
“Thank you for helping me find the minks, Ronald. It was fun. Now don’t get infested by the wrackspurts.”
Ron put his hand up in an awkward wave, watching Ginny drag a chattering Luna away. As they rounded the corner, Ron felt a tingle on his hand and pulled it quickly towards him. His finger smarted and he watched as the face of a tiny ferret-like creature appeared on the pad of his ring finger, as dark as midnight against his skin.
“Bloody hell,” he exclaimed, a shock grin spreading across his face, “Nice to meet you, Luna Lovegood.”
— — —
January, 1993
A great shattering noise echoed through the hospital wing and Hermione sighed, letting her head fall back against the pillow. Madam Pomfrey pulled open her curtains and tutted when she saw the splinters of broken glass littering the floor, glittering like they were mocking her.
“Really, Ms. Granger? That’s the second glass today,” she hummed, eyebrows drawn as she went to get a dustpan. Hermione murmured an apology and looked at the matron, sort of apathetic. She’d been stuck inside the hospital wing for two weeks and she was utterly bored, the white curtains acting as her prison and the small collection of get well cards on her nightstand her only friends. Well, that wasn’t quite true. Harry and Ron had been by quite a bit and she’d once heard Madam Pomfrey turn away Neville and Fay when she was pretending to be asleep. She didn’t know why she was refusing to see people so much. She was just… a little ashamed. Hermione Granger was supposed to be the one Gryffindor that escaped Snape’s rage by brewing perfect potions and yet she couldn’t brew a Polyjuice potion that was only a few years above her level. She was a failure.
Hermione scowled at her pillow as Madam Pomfrey left, holding a dustpan full of broken glass. To be honest, Hermione had dropped the glass on purpose. She was utterly and completely, devastatingly bored. She hadn’t seen anyone but the matron in two days, Harry and Ron having been busy for a few days with an abundance of homework (mainly from Professor Snape, who apparently smirked at her empty seat every time he assigned something as if imagining the amount of assignments she’d have to make up).
Hermione dug around for a book and groaned quietly as she realised that it was the one textbook she’d been able to get smuggled in once again. She didn’t quite know what she was expecting, because she certainly wouldn’t be able to get a new book. Really, she didn’t know what Madam Pomfrey was thinking either. She’d said something about the effects of small print on feline eyes when Hermione had tried to ask Ron to bring her a book and Hermione had never hated someone with such potency as she did at that moment. A week and a half after that warning, she was still in the hospital wing, her whiskers growing long and her list of homework assignments growing longer. Hermione was eternally and forever stuck in antiseptic hell with only “101 Medicinal Uses of Cooked Dittany Leaves” to keep her company.
There was a faint sound and then the hospital door wings squeaked open. Hermione winced as her feline ears shivered and she cursed the fact that Millicent Bulstrode’s parents hadn’t given her an owl. At least then she could do live-action productions of the Exorcist.
Footsteps echoed through the hospital wing, getting closer and closer to Hermione’s bed. The curtains forming a barrier around it rustled and Hermione lay down just in case she needed to pretend to be asleep.
“Hermione?” a voice sighed, tinged with amusement, “Stop pretending to be asleep, it’s only me.”
Hermione looked up and grinned as she spied Harry’s mop of messy black hair poking through a gap in the sterile white of the hospital curtains. “Hi.”
Harry mirrored her grin and bounded in, seemingly endlessly full of happy energy. Hermione thought back to their schedule and remembered that they didn’t have Potions that day. That figured.
“I brought you the homework,” he said, pulling out a sheaf of parchment, “It’s not too much today, Professor McGonagall was really nice and only gave us three inches on Avifors for revision.”
Hermione frowned, unsure of what spell he was referring to, “Which one was that?”
Harry squinted through his glasses at his partially-finished essay, “Um… the one that makes birds out of small objects?”
“Ah,” Hermione said shortly, internally freaking out. How could she not remember that? They’d learned the bird transfiguration last year and she’d been the first one to master it!
Harry frowned, looking hard at her, then spoke, “No one really remembers the spell, so we’re just doing this to catch up.”
Hermione nodded. “Yes, you said it was revision.”
“Yeah. Just two inches.”
“Hang on,” Hermione interrupted, “You said it was three!”
“Just keeping you on your toes.” Harry grinned as she made a face at him.
“Anyways, I have something for you,” Harry said, reaching into his bag. Hermione softened.
“Harry, you don’t need to bring me things-”
“-Nuh uh. You stop right there. This is something you’re really going to enjoy.”
Harry’s hand emerged from his bag and Hermione gaped at the massive stack of parchment he had in his hand, messily gathered into a pile. They were cut into uneven squares and had his practically trademarked messy handwriting scrawled across both sides of every card. Hermione felt her heart flutter.
“Flashcards?”
Harry grinned and pulled one out of the stack, turning it away so that she wouldn’t be able to see the answers. “What’s the incantation of the bird transfiguration?”
Hermione rolled her eyes, smiling, “Avifors.”
“She shoots! She scores!” Harry cried, nearly losing his grip on the stack of flashcards as he threw his hands into the air. Hermione grinned.
“I didn’t know you watched soccer?” Hermione questioned, eyebrows raised. Harry had never particularly struck her as a sports fan, despite his propensity to fly on a broomstick several hundred metres above the ground.
“Oh, my uncle watches it occasionally and sometimes when I’ve done all my chores, he lets me watch it with him.”
Hermione nodded, ears flopping as she did, and Harry’s gaze instantly snapped to them. Hermione rolled her eyes, but bent her head down so that he could trail a fingertip over the soft fur. He admired them for a moment before his face reddened and he removed his hand, apologising softly.
“No, no, it’s fine,” Hermione rushed to reassure him, “It’s fine. I can barely feel it.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yeah, now get those flashcards out! Transfiguration isn’t going to revise itself!” Hermione said, bouncing up and down a little. Harry grinned and pulled back the stack of cards.
They sat there for twenty minutes just organising the cards into colour-specific piles. Hermione noticed that Harry had apparently found her colour-coded schedule and made the cards have the exact same colours, which was definitely making him her favourite person, and was also sort of adorable. When they were done, Hermione was struck by some sort of idiotic urge and for some reason hugged him. Harry turned as red as a beetroot and mumbled something, but Hermione brushed it off and started to ask about the applications of the snuffbox transfiguration.
It took another hour to revise the entire catalogue of transfiguration cards, because Harry very carefully made sure that Hermione couldn’t read a single one of them, citing Madam Pomfrey’s eternally irritating need to make sure she read small text. Hermione thought that Madam Pomfrey was the most annoying person she’d ever met and decided to make good use of her expansive vocabulary set to proclaim that to the hospital wing’s ceiling.
When the bell for lunch eventually rang, Harry got up slowly and packed the flashcards away, shooting Hermione a glare when she tried to grab them.
“One!”
“Hermione, you’re not allowed to-”
“Three! Just three!” Hermione begged, hands outstretched.
Harry rolled his eyes, “No, Hermione, you can’t have any cards.”
“You’re such a prat,” Hermione said, ashamed to find that she was pouting like some sort of child.
“Bye, Hermione!” said Harry, trying to find a gap in the curtains and failing miserably.
Hermione grinned. “You’ll never get out! You’re stuck in the curtains forever.”
“Ha, ha. You’re hilarious,” Harry replied, still trying in vain to find a suitable gap in the curtains to escape through before Hermione managed to leap out of bed and pry the flashcards from his struggling hands. In the end, he did find a gap in the curtains and disappeared through it, waving through the gap before heading out.
Hermione fell back into the pillow and sighed contently, already planning what she was going to do with the stack of herbology revision flashcards she’d snuck out of Harry’s bag whilst he was distracted.
— — —
February, 1993
“Alright, your homework is six inches on the properties of the venomous tentacula,” Professor Sprout announced, “Class is dismissed.”
Leaving the greenhouse was an endeavour, seeing as the baby devil’s snare they were supposed to be trimming had a tendency to tie shoelaces together. Ron swore when he went down and went bright red when the professor admonished him, but picked himself up and hurried out of the greenhouse.
Harry, Hermione, and Ron walked back to Gryffindor Tower together. They had a little over an hour until dinner, which Hermione declared she was going to use to write the essay for Herbology. Harry and Ron sat down in the common room in the comfy red armchairs they practically owned, what with how much they sat in that particular spot. Harry set down his school bag and rooted through to find a sugar quill that Fred and George had given him, while Ron pulled out his chess board and set it gently atop the table. He brushed it off with all the care in the world, then brought out a dust cloth and cleaned each piece, murmuring little compliments to the little figures. He took extra care dusting off the two knights, remembering his own experience as one of the kind. Chess club on Tuesday had been hard on the pieces, and Ron wanted to make sure that he didn’t lose any respect with the soldiers he commanded.
“Hey.” Ron waved a hand. “Want to play?”
Harry nodded, grinning as he packed away the contents of his school bag and brought the sugar quill up to his mouth. He sucked on it in thought as he watched Ron set up the chessboard.
“I’ll take the white pieces,” volunteered Harry, “Doesn’t matter when I start, you’ll still beat me.”
Ron laughed, but shrugged and tilted his head with a smirk, conceding the point. He turned the board so that the black pieces lay in front of him and the white pieces stood in front of Harry, pouting at him for not picking them to play with. Ron shrugged, pointing at Harry and miming a request. The pawns turned and glared at Harry and Ron winced. It was never good to make your pieces hate you.
Harry murmured an order and one of his pawns moved forward to D4. Ron cracked his knuckles and grinned, brushing a fingertip over the top of one of his knights.
“Knight to F6,” Ron intoned, instantly planning which moves to make next. Harry grimaced and directed one of his bishops through the pawn’s vacated spot on D2 to G5. He looked uncertain. Ron’s grin widened.
“Pawn to C6,” ordered Ron. Harry countered it immediately, moving one of his pawns to E3.
Ron mimed a sigh, “I didn’t want to do this, Harry…”
“How?” Harry cried out, “How do you always beat me?”
“I guess we’ll never know,” Ron replied, “Queen to A5 is checkmate.”
Harry sighed, reaching out a hand to shake Ron’s. Ron held up a finger as he pulled out a piece of parchment and carefully jotted down his new number of games won against Harry: 62.
“Ron,” Harry complained, wiggling his hand dramatically.
“Yeah, yeah,” laughed Ron, clasping Harry’s hand with a firm grip, “Good game. You made three whole moves this time!”
Harry sighed in a deliberately over-the-top way, flopping backwards into his chair and resting a hand against his forehead, “That seems like a lot to me.”
“Let’s see if I can beat you in two moves.”
“Yeah, sure.”
The chance to do so came 20 games later, when Harry played an opening for a Fool’s Mate. Ron zeroed in on it immediately, a smirk breaking across his face as he remembered his promise. Harry moved his pawn to G4 and Ron barked out an order to one of his pawns, ordering it to E6. Harry, nervous at Ron’s loudness, moved his pawn forward to F3 and kept it there.
Ron grinned wider than he ever had before.
“What is it?” Harry asked frantically, “What did I do?”
Ron cackled like a banshee, scaring a huddling group of first years away. He picked up his queen and dragged it ever so slowly diagonally left. Harry’s eyebrows furrowed as he tried to figure out what Ron was doing, looking extremely confused. His queen didn’t even struggle against him, as the carved black piece was also grinning and revelling in Harry’s panicked expression.
“Queen…” Ron said crisply, “To H4.”
Harry melted in relief, obviously thinking that he hadn’t won, “Um…”
“Checkmate,” Ron proclaimed.
“What?” exploded Harry, leaning over and staring at the board with eyes as wide as dinner plates, or blue whales, or the chasms of knowledge between Hermione and everyone else.
Ron laughed until his chest ached, a bright feeling settling in his chest. Harry pouted and reluctantly grabbed what was now called the “Chess Book”. It was a basic spiral-bound muggle notebook that Hermione had bought for Ron as a means to track his chess wins without wasting all of his “good homework parchment” as she’d called it. It came with a little black ballpoint pen that Ron was continuously amazed by and was rapidly filling with neatly-written logs of every chess game Ron had won since Christmas. Each row had the date and his opponent, and occasionally a special anecdote about the game in question. It was written in the most tidy penmanship Harry had ever seen Ron use, as if the carefully-penned rows were the only words Ron thought he should spend any time writing. Ron scribbled down their game and smirked as he noted ‘won in two moves!’ next to the log. They got only five minutes into the next match before Ron won again, and Harry begged off for a second as Ron wrote down his win.
“So,” Ron started, putting down the notebook and happily clicking the pen a number of times, “Have you given any thought to Hermione recently?”
Harry sighed and rolled his eyes. “In what way?” he asked sarcastically, twirling a protesting bishop between his fingers.
“Just… any peculiar feelings?”
“No, Ron,” Harry answered, “No peculiar feelings at all. Stop trying to make me and Hermione happen. It’s not going to happen. Pawn to A4.”
“Knight to H5,” Ron countered distractedly, “I’m just asking.”
“Bishop to F4. Just give it up.”
Ron floundered for a moment, then absentmindedly moved his queen and began again, “Look, Harry, I just-”
“-Checkmate.”
Ron’s brain stopped, restarted, floundered around like a breathless fish for a moment, raced to figure out the chess board, and pulled away from soulmate talk to begin questioning existence, all in the span of about how long it took Ron to say “What in Queen Mab’s saggy left wing is happening-”
“Checkmate,” Harry said, reaching out and taking his king, who looked utterly shell-shocked.
“That’s impossible,” sputtered Ron, “I haven’t lost a chess match since I was eight! I accidentally became a celebrity for it! I beat some guy called Nikolac in a public tournament in London once when we went to the Leaky to meet one of Mum’s cousins and the obliviators had to be called in ‘cause they kept flashing these funny box things at me and calling me a genius! I quite literally do not lose at chess!”
“Looks like you just did,” Harry said, reaching for his bag and pulling out a piece of parchment, “We should get started on that essay Sprout asked for.”
Ron spluttered a little more in indignance, then angrily reached for his bag, muttering about revenge, payback, and the various things people could do with a clipboard, a jar of boysenberry jam, and a kestrel all taped to a very long, very sharp pole.
— — —
March, 1993
“Harry! Harry, wake up!” Hermione groaned, shaking the sleeping boy’s shoulders, “Harry! Get up now!”
“Hermione?” Harry mumbled, squinting through the early morning darkness to see Hermione’s form, wrapped in a fluffy dressing gown, leaning over him. She was bouncing on the balls of her feet, seemingly excited for no reason.
“What… what time is it?”
“Uh… five thirty? Come on, get up! We have to go!”
Harry grumbled into his pillow, but reluctantly got up, pushing off his comforter and sluggishly getting up, rubbing entirely too hard at his eyes. They went blurry for a second and in the moment they took to clear, Hermione had already started to raid his wardrobe, pulling out a threadbare blue sweater from Aunt Petunia and the nice pair of jeans he’d bought at a muggle shop in London during the Weasley shopping trip over the summer holidays. They were soft and a brilliantly dark blue, not as worn around the knees as Dudley’s pair. Harry thought they were the most brilliant thing ever.
“No, no, not that one,” Hermione muttered to herself before pulling out his jumpers from the last two Christmases. She tossed one over to him, then held the other one up, running her hands over the lumpy, crimson wool. She reached out with another hand and flicked her wand towards the fireplace, offhandedly saying an incantation and not even looking as it lit up the fireplace. She was still oddly energetic.
Harry scrunched his eyes up to block out the light, feeling the weight of the morning. “Hermione…” he yawned, “Is that your jumper?”
“No?” she replied, confused, “I don’t have one?”
“But it has an H on it.”
Hermione laughed and held it up, grinning. “So it does. Anyways, get up, get up!”
“What’s the rush?” Harry groused, stretching a little and tilting his head from side to side. He winced as every bone in his body seemed to click at once.
“You promised to help me study for that Potions test, and it’s literally tomorrow!” she moaned, collapsing onto Harry’s bed and crushing his legs. He pushed her off and pulled himself up, grabbing the clothes she’d gotten out for him and crossing to the bathroom to get dressed. Pulling on the jeans and shrugging into the jumper, he stared at himself in the mirror. His haggard reflection stared back, eyes practically bruised purple and skin as thin and translucent as a sheet of paper. Harry splashed some water onto his face and sighed, exhausted, as the residue began to run down his arms and into the crooks of his arms. He shook the water out and rubbed a tired hand across his face, wiping away the water.
When he came out, he was surprised to see Hermione wrapped in his second Christmas jumper, a vision in scarlet wool. Hermione grinned when she saw him.
“Like it?” she said, spinning in a circle.
“Yeah,” murmured Harry, rubbing his face and looking away to hide his blush. She looked good, even in the lumpy and baggy jumper. Her brown hair was frizzy and fell around her face, and her pants had a grass stain on the left knee, but she still looked radiant. Radiant in a friendship way, obviously.
“Anyways,” Hermione said breezily, tucking a lock of hair behind her ear, “Potions! I’m glad you’re up but the test is tomorrow and we’ve got to study!”
“Hermione, the test is tomorrow.”
“Yes. That’s what I said, Harry, do keep up.”
Harry sighed, “Hermione, we have something like eight hours to study. You’ll be fine–”
“–Are you kidding? Professor Snape gave me an Acceptable on the last test and I only got one question wrong,” she interjected, “I’ve got to get it right this time!”
“Just ‘cause he’s a git…” Harry grumbled. Hermione raised an eyebrow but didn’t deny it, instead biting her lip and bouncing a little on the balls of her feet. She looked antsy and anxious to begin, so Harry grabbed his Potions textbook and his stack of flashcards, opening the door for her.
“My lady,” Harry joked, sweeping into an obnoxiously low bow. Hermione scoffed at him, but smiled as she exited his dorm.
It took several hours before Hermione was even remotely satisfied with the amount of studying they were doing, and by the end, Harry’s legs had fused into one big lump of flesh. getting up from his armchair in the common room, he stretched with a groan. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed Hermione was still wearing his jumper.
“Hey, Fred!” he called, catching the attention of the Weasley twins. They looked over at him in sync, then at Hermione, then back at him with a sense of growing realisation.
“Well, well–”
“–Well,” said George, sauntering over to them and leaning against a sofa. Harry grinned and pointed a finger at his jumper, then very slowly and deliberately pulled on Hermione’s arm. She looked confused, but allowed herself to be dragged over to stand next to him.
“Looks like there’s another set of twins in Gryffindor, yeah, Fred?”
“Sure looks like it, George. Looks a lot like it,” Fred replied, slinging an arm over George’s shoulder.
“What- oh.” Hermione looked down at her jumper, then at Harry’s, then rolled her eyes, “Yeah, sure looks like it.”
“Hear me out…” Harry began, “But, Hermione, take off the jumper.”
Hermione pulled the crimson jumper, once again rolling her eyes, and Harry did the same. He then tugged off his own woolly emerald jumper and gave it to her. He tugged her jumper on and ran a finger over the golden H. Hermione took the hint, following his example and pulling on his jumper. She adjusted it a little then turned back to Harry, still unimpressed.
“Now who’s who?” asked Harry triumphantly, pointing at their jumpers. Fred’s mouth dropped open into a parody of surprise as George’s hands flew up to his face. Harry beamed in utter joy, somehow overcome by the ridiculousness of his joke. Hermione exhaled shortly and wore a reluctant if not widening smile across her face, but still lifted her arms and crossed them across her chest.
“Take the crown! You’ve done it, you’ve conducted the greatest prank in the history of Gryffindor!” Fred chuckled.
George chimed in. “If not the history of Hogwarts!”
“If not history itself!” They finished together. Hermione reached out and playfully pushed them back towards their corner of the room, fixing Harry with a look.
“What?” Harry coughed, hammering his chest a few times to get out the last of the laughs. Hermione drew herself up then deflated, seemingly being so amused that she’d been rendered speechless. She looked at the ceiling, then let out a single laugh under her breath, though it did seem sort of sarcastic.
“Well, after that supremely entertaining interruption, I hope you can still remember the nine potions that pickled catnip is used it.”
Harry blanched, but dutifully picked up his textbook and leafed around until he found the index. “Er, one of them’s the Lightning Draught, and… um… Bravery Brew, and… the … wait, isn’t pickled catnip only in twp?”
“Very good,” Hermione said happily, snapping her book shut, “I suppose I can excuse that ludicrous tomfoolery then.”
Harry barked a laugh. “Swallowed a thesaurus, have you, Hermione?”
“I got two for Christmas last year,” she said, turning and heading towards the portrait. Harry grinned and reached for his bag to go after her.
— — —
April, 1993
It was a lovely morning, perfect for Quidditch. Harry left the Great Hall with Ron and Hermione to get his broom and uniform, but seemed distracted. His eyes shifted from portrait to portrait, not quite seeing them.
“Good luck,” Hermione said, trying to catch his attention but failing, “Do well out there.”
“Yeah,” Harry replied distractedly, looking around. He furrowed his brow, then his eyes widened as he let out a shout. Hermione jumped away from him in alarm, seeing Ron do the same. They shared a look while Harry breathed heavily, wildly looking for whatever mystical thing had scared him.
“The voice!” said Harry, looking over his shoulder to stare particularly hard at a portrait of a very fat man drinking from a very small teacup.
Hermione was struck by a very sudden realisation. What could Harry hear that no one else could? What was speaking that only he could hear?
A snake.
“Harry – I think I’ve just understood something! I’ve got to go to the library!”
Hermione ignored Harry and Ron’s confused questions as she raced away, thoughts swirling around as she desperately grabbed at the ones that made sense. Feet pounding against the stone of the corridors as she darted along, she soon reached the library. Time seemed to pass entirely too slowly as she urged her hands to reach for even more books and open them even quicker. Her eyes seemed to never rest on a single page for more than a second as she flew from shelf to shelf, discarding Dastardly Demons of the Deepest Dark for All That Slither in Western Europe and letting her hands flutter past Maniacs and their Main Monsters in favour of Edinburgh's Ugliest Ogres . She kept up a running commentary under her breath as she scrambled around, not quite sure what she was looking for. And then it was there, ugly eyes staring her in the face, a messy sketch of a giant snake in Most Macabre Monstrosities .
“The Basilisk…” Hermione mumbled, overcome by a sudden horror that grew as she read more of the passage. Harry could hear the basilisk because he could understand Parseltongue! Hermione could have kicked herself, but instead she glared at the book, furrowing her eyebrows. This was important information.
Hermione bit her lip and looked around surreptitiously, as if something would leap out at her. Then, she took a deep breath and ripped out the page about the basilisk. She fumbled around for a quill and ink for several long moments, and eventually found a muggle pen buried under a few bits of crumpled parchment in one of her robe pockets. ‘PIPES ’, she wrote, scribbling it on the paper before scrunching it up in her hand and hurrying out of the otherwise silent library.
She fished around in her robes, but she didn’t have anything reflective at all. Hermione continued down the corridor, footsteps loud against the stone as she unwaveringly looked at the floor.
“What are you doing here? Don’t you know the quidditch game is on?” a voice broke through her dazed thoughts and she spun around in fear. A prefect stood there, a tall blonde girl in Ravenclaw robes and shiny Mary Janes.
“I know what the monster is!” Hermione blurted out. The prefect looked shocked.
“What?”
“It’s a basilisk,” Hermione continued hurriedly, “A-a bloody great snake that kills by looking at them. If- if you don’t look at it directly, you get petrified, that’s what happened to the victims! If you have something reflective, you should look around corners with it, then it can’t kill you.”
The prefect fumbled around in her robes and pulled out a mirror. “It’s- it’s a gift from my sister.”
The two girls carefully walked down the corridor, the prefect holding her mirror out. She stuck it out with one hand as they rounded the corner.
There was something at the end of the next hallway.
The eye was large, the size of a football. The iris was a brilliant yellow, streaked with glistening spirals of gold and shining with a glossy, glistening sheen. It almost had an incandescent glow, so beautiful that Hermione found herself transfixed by it. She almost wanted to look at it, but her gaze steadfastly remained on the reflection in the mirror. Something inside her knew that she couldn’t look directly at the eye, but she didn’t know what that thing was. It was as if time was slowing as she stood frozen in the corridor.
Something felt wrong. The eye was still transfixing, but no longer seemed lovely and iridescent, instead instilling a burgeoning terror deep into her very bones. With growing horror, she realised that her fingers had become grey and unmovable, like–
She was turning to stone. The realisation came across Hermione like a cold breeze, filling her with panic. She tried to run, but her feet were stuck to the ground and she found herself falling over, hitting the ground hard but unable to stir. The petrification continued and Hermione soon lost all feeling in every one of her limbs.
As her neck slowly hardened, she heard a great shifting. Trying hard to look to her left, she only caught a glimpse of a giant scaly beast slithering into a hole in the wall before her eyes turned to stone.
— — —
Somewhere out on the quidditch pitch, Harry grasped at the handle of his broom tight with his right hand as his left hand was overwhelmed with a magical sensation leaping through every vein in his body like an uncontrollable wildfire. It disappeared as soon as it came, leaving behind it only a miniscule yellow eye radiating warmth from his pinkie finger. Accustomed as he was to strange (albeit infrequent) situations like this, Harry continued to steer his broom through the air, training his eyes on the snitch.
The exhilaration of flight didn’t last long. Professor McGonagall hurried onto the pitch, face oddly pinched and eyebrows drawn together as she signalled towards Madam Hooch, who called the players towards the ground. She informed them, eyes damp, that the game was cancelled. Wood protested wildly but quietened down when the Professor fixed him with a watery glare and dragged him off to the side for a moment before striding back towards the dispersing huddle of quidditch players.
“Mr. Potter? I…” she paused for a moment, robes rustling as she kneaded her hands nervously, an uncommon habit for the forthright professor, “I think you’d better come with me.”
Ron came tearing on to the pitch then. He skidded to a halt next to Harry and started to say something but soon stopped as he saw McGonagall. “Professor?”
McGonagall took a breath and stepped forward, shoes squelching in the mud and grass of the quidditch pitch. “Both of you must come with me to the hospital wing. Miss Granger has been petrified.”
Harry’s heartbeat pounded in his ears as he took a step backwards. McGonagall opened her mouth and seemed to be looking for the right words, as if there was anything she could say. She closed it after a moment and pressed her lips together into a thin line, beckoning them forward to follow her.
— — —
The air in the hospital wing was sharp and filled with the acrid smell of potions. Sun shone through the windows as if mocking Harry with its cheery light. He stared at the rays numbly, back sore as it pressed into the side of his uncomfortable wooden chair. He had refused a transfigured armchair, preferring to sit there as unmoving as Hermione. She was carved as if a statue, a heartbreakingly gorgeous caricature of Galatea. He was but a lonely shell of Pygmalion, because his goddess wouldn’t turn to flesh and bone, blood still in her veins as she lay in bed. The sheets underneath her were cold.
Harry had been sitting with Hermione for nearly an hour now, just staring at her. She hadn’t moved the whole time he’d been there, obviously, yet it was so strange to see her so still. Hermione was always tapping her quill or gnawing at her lip or shaking her foot and to see not a single twitch was unsettling to say the least. Yet he stayed there anyway, still sitting next to her. Harry reached out a finger to brush over one of her hands, wincing at how cold it was. He kept touching it though, feeling the ice creeping across his skin. Manoeuvring his chair a little closer, he clasped her frozen fist in his own hand. Even if the rest of her body was cold, he would keep this little bit warm.
— — —
May, 1993
The sword went right through the roof of the basilisk’s mouth, a spray of hot, sticky blood gushing out and running down Harry’s arm. He let go of the handle of the sword and watched as the basilisk tipped ever so slightly to the left. He felt a tugging on the top of his left arm and looked down to see that a fang had pierced right through it.
He fell to the ground, somehow unable to move, as the basilisk collapsed onto its side, triggering a boom that deafened Harry for a second. Ginny still didn’t stir. The fang shifted in his arm as he shivered on the cold smooth stone of the chamber’s floor, so he tried to sit up to make himself warmer. It didn’t work. He lay like a ragdoll, tears starting to well up in his eyes. Riddle kept talking, stepping away from Harry to make a few grand gestures around the chamber, but Harry ignored him as he tried to struggle and failed. He looked around desperately, but only saw a few items on the floor around him. There was a book only a few metres away from him.
The diary! He had to get to the diary!
Harry fought to move but it was no use as he collapsed yet again to the ground. As he lay there dying, venom spreading to every corner of his body, tears drying lines of salt down his face, he thought of all he stood to lose. He was struck by the thought that he hadn’t even become a teengar yet. Sure, growing up with the Dursleys had convinced him that he wouldn’t make it to double digits, yet here he was, barely a month or two away from being a teenager. He tried to use the thought to make his limbs move but they remained heavy, heat seeping away into the floor.
Unbidden, the thought of sitting in the train and peacefully drinking soup with Ron and Hermione as first years leaving Hogwarts flashed to mind. A jolt ran through Harry’s stiff body. If the previous thought had been a lightning bolt, this was an entire storm setting fire to every one of his nerves. Ron and Hermione flashed lazy smiles at him in his mind’s eye and all Harry could think of was keeping them smiling, warm and happy. Hermione’s body would be warm and alive, Ron would be hugging his sister and pulling out a chess set or a sugar quill. He had to keep them smiling.
A single note of song broke through his daze, indescribably sweet and pure. Fawkes the phoenix came soaring back down towards him, wings spread like a wildfire. He touched down next to Harry and gazed with what could only be called despair at Harry’s wound. Riddle stole a look at him, still monologuing to unhearing ears.
“It’s okay, Fawkes,” Harry said bittersweetly, lifting up deadened fingers to brush a featherlight touch over one of Fawkes’ feathers. Riddle scoffed and said something about pitiful children, which was really actually true, because he was only twelve. Twelve was a pitiful age to die. Harry watched the phoenix as he bled out onto the floor, venom slithering through his veins and arm beginning to numb. All he could think about was Ron and Hermione. Fawkes leant down and began to cry, and Harry felt mortification creeping onto his face. He didn’t want to be the reason that such a beautiful creature cried.
Fawkes dipped his head like a swan onto Harry’s arm and let a few tears trickle down onto his open wound. Harry muffled a whimper as a bright sensation came over his body. Suddenly, he could move his fingers.
“Phoenix tears…”
Riddle looked surprised and began to cross the room over to Harry, leaving him the perfect opportunity to get to the diary. Harry ignored him as he wriggled, fueled only by the idea of his friends. He reached the diary soon and Riddle looked amused as he held it up. Only when Harry pulled the basilisk fang out of his arm, unleashing a flood of crimson blood mixing with sizzling green venom, did he look scared.
“No!” he cried shortly, beginning to run towards Harry. Harry grinned over at Riddle and lifted the fang above the diary before plunging it down into the book. The basilisk venom immediately started to blister the edges of the hole and Riddle shrieked a long, inhuman scream as he writhed, fingers beginning to dissolve into thin air. Harry watched in pity and satisfaction as he continued to disintegrate, fingers soon gone. The phantom, because that’s really all he was, continued to wail and the sound echoed around the cavernous roof of the chamber.
Harry stood up on shaky legs and crossed over to the basilisk, blood still seeping out of its wound and spreading in a slow puddle across the floor of the chamber. He reached up and cursed the twinges of pain in his left arm as he pulled the sword out of its mouth. The blade was stained with blood now, the same colour as the rubies encrusting its hilt. He let the sword fall to his side and sat on the floor for a moment, just looking up at the giant snake. All of a sudden, the adrenaline he’d been feeling seeped away and he felt an immense tiredness
— — —
Hermione woke up to a bottle at her lips. She choked on whatever liquid was going down her throat and tried to thrash, but found that she couldn’t. Pure panic overtook her as she glanced around desperately for the eye.
“Miss Granger! Miss Granger, calm down, everything is alright.”
Hermione’s eyes focused on Madam Pomfrey and she took a deep breath as the bottle was pulled away from her mouth.
“What-” she croaked. Her throat seemed to close up after only a word as she grasped at it, relieved to feel warm skin where stone had been only seconds before.
“I- I was petrified,” she whispered. Madam Pomfrey nodded, then placed a hand on her shoulder and gave her a kind smile.
“Your research meant that Mr. Potter and Mr. Weasley were able to find and defeat the basilisk, though Madam Pince has informed me that you will be serving detention at some point for vandalising a book.”
Hermione snorted a laugh, overcome by the absurdity. Madam Pomfrey laughed a little too but her smile soon dropped away.
“Miss Granger… you were petrified for three weeks.”
Hermione gasped. “But what about exams? I missed out on so much class!”
Madam Pomfrey gave a sad smile, “I expect that they’ll be cancelled, Miss Granger. Now, are you able to stand up?”
Hermione swung her legs onto the floor and tested her weight on them before standing. She felt steady, and said as much to Madam Pomfrey, who seemed to be satisfied with that answer. Apparently the dinner feast was still going, so she was sent in the direction of the Great Hall.
After traversing several flights of stairs and hyperventilating more than a few times as she turned around corners, Hermione found herself outside the great double doors of the hall. She took a deep breath, pinched her hand to make sure she was alive, and then pushed one of the doors open.
The noise immediately drew attention from the hall, hundreds of heads swivelling to stare at her. Murmuring broke out as more and more people noticed her, but Hermione paid them no attention, instead zeroing in on Harry and Ron sitting halfway down the hall at the Gryffindor table. She started to walk towards them, but an itch of longing grew in her throat and she choked back a happy sob, wiping tears of joy from her eyes as she broke into a run.
Harry and Ron clambered up from the table and stood together as she reached them. Harry stumbled back a few steps as she threw herself into his arms and buried her face in the side of his neck. He seemed surprised, but wrapped his arms around her as well. She saw Malfoy scowl out of the corner of her eye and glared back, gaze hard. He looked away after a moment and Hermione allowed herself to smile triumphantly into Harry’s shoulder. She separated from Harry after a few more seconds, fixing him with a rarely tender smile and turning to Ron.
She didn’t want to hug him. That just didn’t seem like the right thing to do. She looked hard at him for a moment, then bit her lip and offered out a hand. Ron seemed to take no offence, face splitting into a wide grin and grip strong as he shook her hand once, then twice.
“Great to have you back,” he hummed, letting go of her hand and sitting back down at the table. Harry did the same, then scooched over to his right a bit as Ron moved a little further to the left. Hermione sat down between them and smiled down at her plate, revelling in the feeling of rightness and belonging. After such a long time cold and alone, unmoving in the hospital wing, she was surrounded by the warmth of her best friends.
— — —
June, 1993
Dumbledore lifted up a spoon and tapped it against the side of his glass. The hall fell reluctantly silent and Ron was glad for the reprieve. People had been non-stop pestering him about the chamber, and as attention-starved as he knew he was, it was incredibly uncomfortable. His sister and best friend had nearly died, his other best friend turned to stone for nearly a month. This year had been a tragedy of comedic proportions.
Dumbledore sat down and Ron realised that he’d accidentally missed his whole speech. He picked up a sausage as the breakfast dishes appeared and let the grease drip down his fingers. It burned him a little, but he didn’t really care, stuffing it into his mouth in an attempt to not have to talk.
“Ron, tell us again how you helped to rescue your sister?” a random fourth year asked, draping herself over his left arm. Ron bit the inside of his cheek and stole a glance at Harry, who just looked tired. He ate only with his right hand, left hand still a little shaky from the venom. Despite it being a relatively hot summer’s day, he still wore long sleeves. A few nights ago, gasping awake, he had told Ron about the experience of basilisk venom; the burn as it rushed through his veins and the hole it had created in his arm. His pyjama shirt had ridden off his shoulder as he sobbed without tears into Ron’s chest and Ron had seen the scar. Harry didn’t need another scar.
Breakfast soon adjourned and Ron pulled himself away from the fourth year. He caught Lavender’s eye across the table and rolled his eyes when she clasped her fingers together like a supervillain and motioned towards the exit. Standing up, he followed her out of the hall and towards a tapestry, which had a little alcove behind it. They pressed themselves inside and Ron stared at Lavender as she held out a hand.
“Pay up, Ron.”
Ron sighed. “I’ve only got two Knuts on me now.”
“Well, give them over,” Lavender ordered, doing a come-hither motion and looking at him expectantly, “They still haven’t realised it, so you owe me four Knuts.”
“Fine,” Ron said shortly, dropping the few coins he had into her waiting hand. She gave him a sarcastic smile.
“Same time next year?”
Ron rolled his eyes. “Yeah, sure. Not like it’s gonna happen, though. They’re sort of idiots about the whole thing. It’s been a year and they haven’t even noticed?”
“Well, yeah. No one could ever accuse Hermione Granger of being observant,” Lavender deadpanned, letting the coins fall into her robe pocket. Ron snorted and ducked out of the alcove, heading off towards the Gryffindor common room to find Harry and Hermione.
It only took a few minutes to weave through Hogwarts’ corridors until he was standing in front of the Fat Lady’s portrait.
“Cruppy,” he said, and the door swung open. He looked around for a moment, then spotted Harry and Hermione standing in front of the fireplace, pulling on cloaks.
“Going somewhere?”
“Oh, Ron!” Hermione gasped, turning around with a smile, “We were just going to go on a walk outside, but it looks a bit chilly. Do you want your cloak?”
She held out a bundle of fabric and Ron realised with a smile that she and Harry had already gotten the cloak for him. He nodded and pulled it on before they crossed the room as one and headed towards the entrance hall. They talked on their way, meaningless chatter that Ron partook in happily, glad for the semblance of normality. Upon entering the hall, they passed by Professor McGonagall, who was talking to a few sixth years about their non-regulation shoes. They waved goodbye to her and she waved back with a fond smile.
The heavy oak doors pushed open easily enough and the trio headed out into the warm air. Summer had crept over the horizon without anyone really noticing and now it was in full bloom, drying the grass into crackling brown spears and coaxing spring’s flowers into dipping their heads to avoid the heat. Despite that, heavy clouds blocked out the sun in patches, and Ron was suddenly quite happy for his cloak.
The trio walked down the path towards the lake, where a couple other students sat, also enjoying the weather. Padma Patil was there, reading under a tree, and Ernie MacMillan waved at Harry when he saw him, playing some sort of card game on a picnic blanket with a few other Hufflepuffs. Ron let a smile drift across his face as he and his best friends sat down on the edge of the lake. Harry lay down and trailed a hand across the top of the water, and Ron carefully folded his cloak and sat on it to avoid the crunchy grass.
“Crazy year, right?” he joked, looking over at Harry. Harry snorted and went back to playing with the water, whilst Hermione rolled her eyes.
“I still can’t believe we didn’t get to take exams,” she groused, letting herself slump backwards onto the grass, then wincing as it poked her shoulders.
Ron raised an eyebrow. “Really? I’m rather happy about it actually. Good job, Harry, for getting us out of them. Who’s getting kidnapped next year?”
Harry laughed a little but the joke fell flat as Hermione bit her lip and said nothing. Ron felt terrible.
“Hey, um, sorry,” he apologised, patting her awkwardly on the shoulder, “I know it must have been horrible being petrified and-’
“-oh, Ronald, you do make such a fool of yourself,” Hermione said tenderly, launching herself onto his chest and hugging him tight. Ron was surprised to feel a few tears dribbling down his face. He hadn’t thought he was so upset. Water still continued to drip down his cheeks though.
“Wait…” he murmured to himself, holding a hand up. It was soon covered in little droplets of water, “Ah! It’s raining!”
Harry looked up from his play and stared at the sky, looking down a moment later when water started to splash into his eyes. “Oh, it is!”
Hermione brushed the rain from her hair with a shrug, “It can’t get too bad.”
She had apparently jinxed it, because a moment later the sky let out a fearsome rumble and rain started to pour down all over the grounds. It hammered into the dirt and Ron scrambled to pick up his cloak and get it over his head.
“Now you’ve done it, Hermione!” Harry laughed, clambering to his feet and shaking the quickly-multiplying mud off his shoes. Hermione playfully pushed him, but shrieked as he grabbed on to her cloak and pulled her down towards the lake. Ron laughed at them as he climbed the bank, feeling the rain soaking into every piece of cloth on his body.
“You two! This is most certainly undignified, do I need to report you to a professor?” he called out, doing his best Percy impression. Harry grinned up at him and hurried towards him, Hermione at his heels.
It took far longer than it should have to get back to the castle, as Harry and Hermione kept deliberately tripping each other in order to get the other covered in mud. Ron stayed a safe distance away, amused by their antics but certainly not amused by what his mother might say if he got mud inside both of his shoes like Harry had. Hermione laughed as she ran away from him and scaled the slippery stone steps towards the entrance hall. Professor McGonagall was holding the door open for the group of Hufflepuffs who’d also been down near the lake, and she appeared to not be amused in the slightest by the amount of mud, muttering something about Filch having their heads. She cast about a dozen cleaning and drying charms on them, then sent them back to their common room with a stern reprimand about not throwing handfuls of mud at each other's heads like she’d seen Hermione do to Harry. They all made sure to look appropriately chastised until they rounded the corner, breaking out in giggles.
Later, in the common room, swaddled in warm, dry blankets, Ron watched Harry and Hermione start their summer homework with a warm smile. It was nice to have such good friends, people who paid attention to him and didn’t think him lesser or ignore him just because he was ‘yet another Weasley’. They really seemed to care, and that made Ron feel warmer than any blanket could.
Chapter 4: time is but a construct
Summary:
Year the third, in which Ron's hungry for money, Hermione is doing too much, and Harry's just sorta confused and maybe a little sad.
Notes:
This chapter was a pain to write 😭
Not in a bad way, but just because I've sort of come into my stride with this story and am adding extra scenes left and right, which is making the word count go up (yay!) but the time to write a chapter also go up (not yay!). Enjoy anyways.
Chapter Text
September 1993
“One sickle, two sickles… two sickles, three knuts…” Ron murmured to himself, touching his finger to each coin as he counted it out, “That’s enough for… hmm…”
Harry and Hermione said nothing, fully absorbed in the strange and unsettling muggle game ‘Uno’. The cards were simple enough to understand but Ron hadn’t taken up their offer to join, because the way they played the game seemed violent and both of them bloodthirsty. He still hadn’t forgotten the Go Fish incident during first year. They didn’t even seem to notice him slip out of the compartment, which was good, because Harry was gritting his teeth loud enough for it to set Ron’s hair on edge and he didn’t want that sort of attention at the present moment. This ‘Uno’ thing was the newest game and if Ron distracted one of them, they would probably strangle him in his sleep. It wouldn’t last, though: in a week or two, Hermione would logic the whole thing to Merlin and back and start to try and get rich quick by starting betting pools, then Harry would send an owl away to one of his ‘suppliers’ (it sounded more suspicious than it actually was) and Hedwig would fly in with some gift-wrapped box containing the latest and greatest muggle board game from them to try. The whole thing was a familiar and never-ending cycle Ron was now used to.
He got out of the compartment fairly quickly and even managed to close the door without sound. The corridor was hectic even most of the way through the journey, but Ron navigated it well enough, heading down the train towards the special compartment where the trolley lady took up residence after her rounds down the corridors.
As he reached the compartment, he spotted a welcome mane of platinum blonde hair. He came up behind her and tapped on her shoulder.
“Ah, Luna, my favourite blonde!” he quipped, spreading his arms wide. Luna fixed him with a smile and tilted her head, eyes boring into him in a way that made Ron feel both vaguely uncomfortable and incredibly fond.
“I suppose any other blonde is better than Malfoy, right?” she retorted, lifting a hand for him to shake. He did so gladly, thrilled at the rush his heart seemed to undergo as he grasped her hand.
He held up a finger, “Have fun this summer?”
On the tip of his finger, though only he could see it, was some sort of fruit. It was a shimmering purple and looked to be a plum or maybe a passionfruit, and Ron thought back to one of their conversations, when she’d mentioned eating Dirigible plums with her father. It was cute that that was so important to her.
“I suppose you did as well, Ronald?” she said, holding up a finger to mirror him. Ron, of course, couldn’t see the mark she was referring to, but felt a sort of fuzzy feeling in his chest at the thought of Luna receiving it and thinking of him.
“What are you getting?” he diverted the conversation, pointing to the trolley lady’s selection of treats. Luna pouted a little, feeling around in her robe pockets for her money. She pulled out a funny little bag embroidered with some strangely mutated type of goat and dipped her fingers in, pulling out just a few coins.
“I only have two sickles, so maybe only an acid pop,” she replied.
“Well, I have two as well and a cauldron cake is four sickles, so do you want to combine our money and split it?” he suggested, holding out his two silver coins. Luna nodded briskly and dropped her sickles into his hand. Ron grinned over at her and entered the trolley lady’s compartment, quickly buying the treat and asking for a knife. He deftly split the cake in half and handed half of it to Luna, who smiled at him and took it. Ron took a bite and savoured the chocolatey goodness, making sure not to let the green icing drip out. They stood in the corridor together, just two students eating snacks and chatting. Life was good.
When they’d both finished their halves of the cake, they parted ways and Luna went back to her own carriage, where she sat with Ginny. Ron’s sister gave him a strange look when Luna wished him a good term, but said nothing, even as Ron grasped Luna’s hand for a second before he headed down the corridor towards his own compartment.
It was colder now, Ron realised. There was an icy chill over the entirety of the train, a mysterious and unsettling sensation. It wasn’t supposed to be this cold at this time of year, and yet…
“Hey, guys,” Ron greeted easily, “Have fun without me?”
They looked up from their books and Ron was happy to see that they weren’t playing Uno anymore. If they had been, Ron would have just cut his losses and gone to sit with Luna and Ginny for the rest of the ride. It wasn’t worth trying to save his trunk from the compartment, because it might have made noise and that could have distracted one of them from their battle of wits.
“Cold, isn’t it?” Harry said, curling into himself a little more. Hermione nodded and looked over at the window, furrowing her brow as she saw frost creeping up from the corners in star-like patterns.
“I-I don’t think this is normal-”
A cold presence filled the train and Ron fell into a seat, pressing himself into it. He rubbed his hands together, but no warmth seemed to arrive.
“Ron…” Hermione whispered, looking over his shoulder. Ron turned ever-so-slowly and saw the beginning of a hand start to curl around the open door of the compartment. It was the hand of a corpse and the hand of a ghoul, with blackened and sunken skin as if it had been burned to ash and long, jagged black nails like serrated knives. Ron tried to scream or speak or do anything, but words failed him, a lump forming in his throat. All the while, the deathly coldness continued, now not simply strange but also threatening.
Harry shuddered, and at first Ron dismissed it as the same chill overtaking his bones that was settling deeply into Ron’s own, but then he lurched again. Ron turned to him, and in that moment, Harry’s eyes fluttered once before he listed to the side.
“Harry!” Ron tried to cry, but no sound came out. Hermione shot out an arm to stabilise Harry before he could fall off his seat, but both she and Harry ended up on the floor, Harry laying dead-weight over her and unnervingly still. As Ron fought to stand up in an attempt to close the door on the monster, the teacher in the corner of the cabin leaped up, wand shooting out of his sleeve. A misty white cloud came out of his wand and rushed towards the monster, driving it back. It screamed against the glowing mist, but flew back and away from their compartment. The professor watched the door before turning to Harry and furrowing his brow.
“Oh, chocolate,” he said. It sounded like a curse and Ron raised an eyebrow, shoving his hands into his pockets to hide their shaking.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
Harry woke up as he said this, and Ron shakily dropped down next to him, helping him sit up. He seemed dazed and confused and to be honest, Ron felt the same way.
It turned out that the terrible monster was called a dementor, and it was a manifestation of all things terrible and evil within the world. Ron wasn’t sure he understood anything that happened after it disappeared, because he only seemed to come back to himself as they got off the train. His wand sparked against his fingertips as he pulled it out and sent a subtle tripping jinx at Colin Creevey, who had his bloody great muggle camera thing out and shoved right into Harry's face.
Dinner was an exuberant affair, just like every opening feast, even under the shadow of the dementors on the train. Unfortunately, no one seemed more exuberant than Malfoy, who faked fainting every time Ron so much as looked at him. Ron grit his teeth every time, barely having the strength to keep his wand in his sleeve. Malfoy didn't seem to be making fun of Leslie Picking, who'd fainted due to witnessing her aunt's brutal murder at five, or Leonard Hops, or Jasmine Kallis, or any of the dozen people who’d made weak excuses of eating too much on the train and were instead staring at various uninteresting spots around the room, still shaking a little, yet Harry was always special. Ron had once been jealous of him for his fame, yet every time something like this happened, he got a little less envious and a little more sympathetic.
The feast ended with Dumbledore’s closing remarks, which Ron ignored in favour of grasping Harry's hand under the table. If Dumbledore was to be believed (he usually was) and the dementors would be at Hogwarts all year, then Ron needed a get-rich-quick scheme more foolproof than Hermione’s plans of cutting the risk out of Risk, because Harry was going to be needing a lot more chocolate.
— — —
Professor McGonagall made a beckoning gesture and Hermione crossed over to her, wading through the crowds exiting the feast. The professor pulled her into a disused classroom and Hermione raised a questioning eyebrow.
“The time-turner was approved by the headmaster, so you can have it in time for class tomorrow.” She reached into her pocket and pulled out a seemingly innocuous gold chain. On the end was a golden hourglass and Hermione could barely register her own hand reaching out to touch it.
“Is that…?”
“I trust you’ll use it wisely, Ms. Granger,” the professor said sternly, pulling the chain away from Hermione’s hand. Hermione nodded gently, entranced by the shimmer of the golden necklace.
“Yes… yes, of course, ma’am.”
“We are entrusting you with great power. You must use it with utmost discretion, as I warned in our correspondence over the summer.”
“Yes, professor,” Hermione assured, finally looking away from the necklace. Professor McGonagall nodded once, seeming to pull herself together, then held out the necklace. She dropped it into Hermione’s hand soundlessly and Hermione shivered a little as the cold metal pooled in her cupped hands. She lifted it and marvelled at the way the gold shimmered in the low light before dropping it down around her neck and tucking it into her robe. Professor McGonagall nodded and held the door open for her, and Hermione disappeared back into the throng of students, now carrying a very powerful secret.
— — —
Harry climbed the stairs with a lethargy he couldn’t remember ever feeling before. People streamed past him as he walked, bounding along with an energy Harry just couldn’t muster up. His mother’s scream still echoed in his head and Harry clutched at the bridge of his nose in an attempt to block it out. He ducked into an alcove behind a suit of armour and slid down the wall, hugging his knees and watching as other Gryffindors passed him on their way to the common room. The stone was hard against his back and he made a face as a particularly sharp piece of rock stabbed into his back, but stayed in the same place, unwilling to return to the throng of Gryffindors.
A sensation like being burned and doused in ice all at once overcame his right hand and Harry lifted it to see that the pad of his ring finger was glowing in the way that meant another mark was appearing. A few moments passed and the glow faded back into his finger, where a new mark was now imprinted. He brought it closer to his face and saw a golden clock still shimmering through the afterglow, so utterly gorgeous that Harry could almost smile.
For once, though, he couldn’t quite bring himself to care.
— — —
October 1993
The Halloween feast was a jovial occasion as always. Giant candle-filled pumpkins were placed in every corner and orange and black floating candles spun overhead. Professor Snape watched in disgust as his nicest cauldron was filled with candy at the entrance, lip curling every time a first year plucked a piece out. Hermione sat at the Gryffindor table, wearing her nice wizard’s hat and slowly cutting a piece of chicken breast into smaller and smaller pieces. She was nervous, and for good reason too — every year, something terrible happened on Halloween. Her hands twitched ever so slightly as she felt her wand practically burning a hole in her pocket, what with how much it was begging to stay in her hand. She needed to be prepared.
Dumbledore finished his closing remarks and Hermione breathed a sigh of relief, letting her grip loosen on her wand just a little. The Great Hall erupted into chatter as everyone began to get up from their seats and head back to their common rooms. Hermione shuffled over to Harry and Ron, still grasping her wand, but she was happy to see that they looked live and intact. She felt her shoulders release a little and snagged a few mint humbugs from the table. She unwrapped it as she walked and popped it into her mouth, dropping the rest into her knapsack. The bag was also a precautionary measure, containing several vials of a pain-relieving potion she’d brewed in an abandoned classroom a few weekends ago, a booklet of crossword puzzles to do if she was bored, and her copy of the Hobbit, in case she needed to hit someone with the heaviest object she owned.
Everyone seemed to be in a bit of a sugar rush; the Hufflepuffs had begun to sing the school song, a couple Slytherins had taken off their ties, and the Gryffindors were a raucous bunch, swirling around in a feast-fueled haze. Hermione huffed, yet let George Weasley spin her around on one of the landings before they continued up the stairs. As they came up to the portrait, the talking died down to whispers and a weighty silence draped over the Gryffindors like a heavy fabric. Harry pushed through frozen crowds to reach the portrait, Ron at his heels, and Hermione hurried after them, grasping her wand. She felt validation surging through her. She’d known something would happen! Something always happened!
The portrait was in tatters, the canvas hanging in scraps from the edges. It looked as if someone had taken a knife to it, slashing away at it savagely. The crowd was now mulling around, churning like a thick fog. The mood was now as dead as Harry’s parents.
People started to gasp out Dumbledore’s name and in a second he swept through, the crowds parting in scared reverence as he hurried towards the portrait hole. As he inspected it, he said nothing, a stony expression on his face.
"We need to find her," said Dumbledore, looking around as if he’d spot the Fat Lady at a glance, "Professor McGonagall, please go to Mr. Filch at once and tell him to search every painting in the castle for the Fat Lady."
"You'll be lucky!" cackled Peeves, swooping down overhead out of nowhere and looking delighted. People shouted in alarm, as he was known to drop water balloons and thrice-chewed gum on people’s heads, but he wasn’t carrying anything, just doing ecstatic rolls through the air and making the first years flinch away.
Dumbledore suddenly looked every year of his age, sighing with a great weight, yet letting a reluctant smile play across his face. “What do you mean, Peeves?”
"Ashamed, Your Headship, sir,” Peeves crowed, “Doesn't want to be seen. She's a horrible mess. Saw her running through the landscape up on the fourth floor, sir, dodging between the trees. Crying something dreadful, poor thing.”
"Did she say who did it?" said Dumbledore quietly, reaching out a hand to touch the strips of canvas.
"Oh yes, Professor," said Peeves excitedly, "He got very angry when she wouldn't let him in, you see. Nasty temper he's got, that Sirius Black."
There was a great gasp and then every Gryffindor in the corridor simultaneously broke out into shouts. Professor Dumbledore sent Peeves away immediately and set about ordering everyone downstairs and away from the common room. Professor Snape swept off to alert the Slytherins and Professors Sprout and Flitwick followed his lead, hurrying away to go see to their various houses. Professor McGonagall herded the Gryffindors down the stairs, refusing to answer any questions and leading them to the great hall. The tables were cleared to the side and people just started milling around, confused and scared of the mass-murderer apparently free in the school.
Dumbledore arrived a moment later and the doors were sealed. Sleeping bags appeared and the trio scrambled to tug three over to the corner of the hall. Hermione lugged her knapsack behind her and Ron frowned at it, reaching over and pulling it towards him as Hermione fluffed up her sleeping bag. He opened it and dug through, smiling at the crosswords and unwrapping one of her mint humbugs. Harry held out a hand and Ron dropped a candy into her waiting palm before continuing through the bag. Hermione rolled her eyes, but let him continue to rummage through her stuff.
“Well then, what’s the book?” Ron mumbled around the humbug in his mouth, plucking ‘The Hobbit’ out of her bag and squinting at it. Hermione grabbed it and held it protectively against her chest.
“It’s called ‘The Hobbit’, and it’s by a muggle author called J. R. R. Tolkein.”
Harry brightened up as he saw the book, excited. “Oh, I love that sort of thing! I read the Chronicles of Narnia when I was younger, but I’ve never been able to find a copy of that!”
Hermione flushed. “Would you like to read it?”
“Can we read it together?” Ron asked, Harry nodding as soon as he heard the suggestion. And that’s how Hermione found herself reading the first chapter of The Hobbit aloud to her two best friends.
“Chapter one,” Hermione began, “An unexpected party. In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit. Not a nasty, dirty, wet hole, filled with the ends of worms and an oozy smell- yes, Ron?”
Ron had his hand up like in class, looking confused, “Why wouldn’t you want the ends of worms? They’re good in skin-regrowth potions because of their rejuvenating properties. My mum uses them when she goes out with her book club because she wants to look younger than her rival, Barbara. Sorry, I know that must sound stupid.”
“Um…” Hermione seemed to be at a loss for words, so Harry stepped in, considering Ron’s questions. It wasn’t really a stupid thing to ask — Harry and Hermione were so used to being ignorant of the muggle world that they often didn’t know what to do when the script was flipped and Ron asked about muggle things they’d know off the top of their heads.
“Muggles don’t have potions, Ron, remember? So they have no use for the ends of worms. They’re just sort of icky, you know?”
Ron nodded in understanding, so Hermione continued. “-Nor yet a dry, bare, sandy hole with nothing in it to sit down on or to eat: it was a hobbit-hole, and that means comfort. Yes, Ron?”
“What’s a hobbit?” he said, once again looking quite confused, “Is it like a gnome? I hate gnomes.”
“No, it’s like… a very short person with very large feet.”
“So, a goblin?”
Hermione snorted, “No, Muggles don’t have any gnomes and goblins, so they’ve got to come up with something else to use in their books. Just imagine a very short man with very large feet.”
“Ah.” Ron said, nodding. “So, Flitwick. He has size 14 shoes.”
"How do you know Professor Flitwick's shoe size?"
"A magician never reveals his secrets," Ron said wisely.
Harry barked a surprised laugh and then buried his head in his sleeping bag as heads swivelled around to stare at him. Hermione rolled her eyes and kept reading, tiredly answering Ron’s questions every time he asked something. If Sirius Black didn’t kill her then the second-hand embarrassment Ron’s incessant glances at Flitwick every time a hobbit was described surely would.
She finished reading the first chapter only a few seconds before the lights went out, and she wriggled into her sleeping bag happily, whispering good night to her best friends. It was nice to have friends who didn’t make fun of her for reading books “too smart for her”, and even Ron’s interruptions had been kind of nice; it showed that he was interested and actively trying to understand the things she enjoyed. Not many people had done that when she was younger — her parents had mainly just patted her on the head and left her alone, and at worst she’d been ridiculed for being a “teacher’s pet”. Harry and Ron, no matter how much they teased her for studying relentlessly, let her enjoy what she loved and took an interest in what she did. The best friends she’d ever had. Even with the threat of a mass murderer up in the air and the hall choked with the bated breath of five hundred children, they’d still listened to her reading a children’s book. They were good friends, she decided.
— — —
November 1993
Hermione curled even deeper into her chair, shivering a bit. One of the Weasley twins had thrown some magical violet powder into the fireplace and now it wasn’t working, so everyone still hanging around in the common room was draped in thick blankets and scarlet quilts. Golden throw pillows covered the floor, an attempt by a few of the younger students to make sure that they wouldn’t have to touch the cold floor. Hermione sat in her normal armchair, wrapped in a quilt she’d dragged down from her dormitory. Ron lay on the floor next to her, huddled in a ball. He was wrapped in his duvet and seemed to be holding a staring contest with a spiderweb in the corner of the ceiling, a dusty old thing that Hermione was sure any spider would have abandoned long ago.
Hermione turned a page in her astronomy textbook and used a pen to annotate it again. She was trying to memorise every constellation for the practice exam they had the next lesson, and she wanted to have them so deeply ingrained into her eyelids that when she inevitably fell asleep halfway through the exam (due to astronomy being held at midnight on Wednesday nights), she’d be able to remember which one was virgo and which one was orion. Unfortunately, she wasn’t having much luck, and her hand crept up to the chain around her neck as a solution. The thin golden necklace was warm against her skin and thrummed with a power that Hermione knew she couldn’t control nor comprehend, but it was so tempting to use it. She shook herself before reaching up to her face and rubbing her temples, sighing. The time-turner dropped from her fingers to lie undisturbed against her chest.
“Mione? What are you doing?” Ron said, tilting his head to face towards her without ever taking his eyes off the spiderweb.
“Oh…” she started, looking up from her textbook and biting her lip, “Um… nothing? Just studying for that astronomy test.”
“Come on, Hermione! Let go for a minute! As the ever so wise and wisdom-filled wise woman Trelawney always says,” he put on a raspy old lady voice, making his fingers gnarled and hunching his back like a storybook villain, “The stars are full of wise wisdom that the wise may glean their wisdom from, but the wise must know that truly wise wisdom is found through wisdom in the wise one’s world.”
“Does she really say ‘wise’ that much?” asked Hermione, cracking a smile.
“It was almost every third word she said for an entire lesson last week,” Ron confessed, smirking with the corner of his mouth, “I thought she’d just found out what alliteration was, or something like that.”
He was still staring at the spiderweb. Hermione huffed and marked her page, leaning out of her seat to wave a hand in front of Ron’s face. He batted it away and cursed as he closed his eyes for a second.
“Oh, come off it. There isn’t a spider in that web, Ronald, stop staring at it.”
“Hey, you weren’t there when we saw A-Aragog,” Ron retorted. Hermione rolled her eyes and turned to Harry, who’d just darted through the portrait hole and dived into Ron’s pile of blankets. Harry nodded vigorously upon hearing Ron’s complaint.
“It was huge and it tried to eat us! I can barely even think of going into the Forest anymore.”
Ron shuddered. “So big… so hairy… so many legs…”
“Ronald, it’s not that bad,” Hermione retorted, lifting a pillow and throwing it at the redhead’s freckled face. Ron gasped in mock horror and picked up a red throw pillow from the floor, hitting Hermione’s legs with it. She snapped her book shut.
“Is that a challenge?”
Harry groaned and rolled over on the floor. “Please, can we just stay in the blankets? It’s cold,” he moaned, throwing his head back and curling further into the mess of quilts he was wrapped in.
Hermione ignored him, grabbing a few pillows off the floor. This prompted Ron to do the same and they stared at each other in a face-off. Hermione sneezed once into her arm, turning her head for a single second, and Ron struck. Hermione shrieked and hit him back, falling off her chair as she struggled to hit him again with all the grace and finesse of Hagrid in a china shop. Harry sighed and reluctantly grabbed a pillow, reaching out and whacking Ron’s legs out from under him. He crashed to the floor and executed a sloppy barrel roll to evade Hermione’s pillow heading straight down towards his face. Harry laughed and gasped apologies when Ron rolled into a sixth year, who huffed a laugh and murmured to herself about moronic children. Hermione shouted in surprise as Harry and Ron hit her in tandem, then hit them back, giggling. Harry went for another hit, but stopped and made a face as he saw the seams of the pillow he was holding starting to burst.
“Ahem.”
Hermione choked on her giggles and drew herself up, straightening her shoulders and looking wide-eyed at the professor standing in front of their pile of blankets on the floor. “Oh, Professor!”
Professor McGonagall stared down through her glasses at them, a mixture of tiredness and mild disappointment. She looked about as happy as Snape during Lockhart’s Valentine’s Day celebrations last year. She sighed once, then pinched the bridge of her nose.
“Mr. Potter, Mr. Weasley, Ms. Granger…” she began. She stopped and made eye contact with each of them, then closed her eyes and breathed deeply through her nose. “It’s all well and good to have fun at times and treasure your childhood. I will not try to stop you from enjoying yourselves. But please, perhaps that could be done without the imminent destruction of school upholstery?”
“Yes, Professor,” they mumbled as one, putting the pillows down. She looked at them with a sort of reluctant fondness and smiled a little before turning around and going back through the portrait hole.
Hermione turned back towards Harry and Ron, biting her lip to conceal her grin. It wasn’t working and they soon grinned back at her, flopping down onto the floor. Ron started up a game of exploding snap with Harry, still stealing glances every few seconds over at the spiderweb, which funnily enough hadn’t come alive and started to engulf him whole yet. Hermione took a closer look and soon realised that there wasn’t a spider in it at all, though that could have been because it was obviously hiding and biding its time before it could eat Ron. She wouldn’t expect any less from such an evil and dastardly creature.
“Imminent destruction of school upholstery?” she mumbled to herself, settling back into her chair and cursing the fact that she hadn’t brought socks down. Harry heard and shot her a knowing smile, which made her head feel as if someone had taken a blender to it and replaced her brains with sparkles or kittens or something equally frivolous. She blushed and turned the page of her astronomy textbook entirely too forcefully, pressing her lips into a line so that she wouldn’t be tempted to try to say something nonsensical to Harry. He was busy and she had work to do.
— — —
December 1993
Christmas was coming and Harry had to be prepared. The past two years, he’d been so caught up in the adventures of the year that he’d neglected to buy his friends Christmas presents. That stopped now!
He’d sent Hedwig off with a few sickles and she’d returned with what he needed: an owl order catalogue. According to the glossy pages, he could just write down the names and numbers of the things he wanted and send Hedwig to the order place with the right amount of money, and then they’d send him back presents for his friends! It sounded wonderfully easy, but Harry had no idea what to get. He’d gone through the catalogue with a fine-tooth comb, but hadn’t seen anything they might want. He’d ordered anyway, noting down the item numbers of a signed Chudley Cannons poster for Ron and a set of nice muggle pens for when Hermione stayed up too late and couldn’t make herself work a quill to save her life. Still, it hadn’t felt like enough.
Harry walked through the corridors aimlessly, contemplating what he was to do. He’d heard that it was the thought behind a gift that counted, yet that didn’t seem to be pointing him in the right direction. He couldn’t just get Hermione a book, because that’s what everyone got Hermione. He needed to be thoughtful. Maybe some sort of jewellery? Women liked necklaces and stuff, right? Aunt Petunia had been so protective of her jewellery that she had hid it every time Harry cleaned his aunt and uncle’s room, which was a bit redundant, because Harry cleaned the room top to bottom and all she did was hide the jewellery box in her closet underneath a blanket.
He sighed and began to walk down to the hall. They had a special Charms lesson today — helping Professor Flitwick decorate the hall for Christmas. Ron had complained that they were obviously being exploited for free labour and Harry was inclined to agree, but it beat a lecture any day.
The bell sounded with a great clatter and people began to stream out of classrooms out into the corridors. Harry steered around a gaggle of Ravenclaws to meet Ron at the hall, where he’d been playing gobstones in a corner with Seamus. Ron stood up to greet him, grinning, while Seamus lagged behind, packing up the gobstone set. He showed off his new collector’s edition Cosmic Stardust gobstone and Harry exclaimed over it, still not quite grasping the intricacies of the game yet excited anyway.
“I won it off a fifth year in Gobstones club yesterday,” Seamus explained, shoving the ball into his bag, “We’re having a rematch tomorrow so she can avenge her honour.”
“Wicked,” Harry replied, high-fiving him. Ron grinned and dragged him towards his spot further down the table, chattering about the legendary-class gobstone that Seamus was apparently hiding in a pair of socks in his trunk.
Only a few seconds after the bell had wrung, the hall was bustling with people. Professor McGonagall and one of her classes were gathered at the Slytherin table, conjuring piles of decorations, and a few older students sat around at the other tables, reading and chatting. The third years gathered at the back of the hall and Professor Flitwick stood up on the dias to begin to speak, reminding everyone of the incantations and wand movements for the levitation and sticking charms.
“Inharesto, with a slow flick. Everyone repeat after me. Inharesto, with a slow flick.”
Harry echoed the professor under his breath, practising the wrist movement without his wand in his hand. Last time he’d had the wand and tried to practise, he’d stuck his bag to his desk and had to get Professor Flitwick to unstick it while Ron laughed at him. He’d pouted all the way to Transfiguration.
Hermione skidded into the hall and Harry caught a glint of gold as she stuffed a gold chain down her shirt. He sighed and mentally crossed ‘Jewellery’ off of his list of potential Christmas gifts. Evidently, she already had something. Hermione hurried down the length of the hall and smiled tightly at Professor McGonagall, who was commanding her class in conjuring up decorations for the third years to decorate with. The Transfiguration professor smiled back and made a motion that Hermione evidently understood, as her frown smoothed out and she nodded. She stopped near Harry and Ron just as Professor Flitwick dismissed the class and they scattered around the hall.
“Hey,” Hermione murmured, squeezing between Harry and Ron, “What are we doing?”
“Just decorating a bit,” Harry responded, pointing to a page in his notes. Hermione took them and skimmed them over for a minute, then fell into step beside them as the two boys headed over to the other end of the hall, where a large stack of ribbons and baubles sat, ready to be stuck to the walls. Harry pointed his wand at a golden ball and enunciated the levitation charm. Hermione and Ron copied him, lifting baubles into the air, and Harry watched as Hermione performed the sticking charm. The bauble stuck to a ribbon hanging on the wall immediately and hung down, sparkling. Harry raised his bauble towards the ribbon, but flicked so quickly it was practically a jab. The bauble fell towards the floor and Harry stumbled forward a few steps, muscle memory making him reach for the gold streak in the air before the ball smashed to the floor. He grabbed the bauble and sighed, hugging it against his chest and walking back over to his friends.
“Here, let me show you,” Hermione suggested, nudging him, “You do the levitation charm and then I’ll help you with sticking.”
Harry nodded his agreement and grasped his wand tightly, murmuring the spell and watching the bauble rise back into the air again towards the ribbon.
“Okay, so-” Hermione began, reaching forward and grabbing Harry’s wand hand. Harry started, twitching a little. Hermione was holding his hand! Technically, it was only to show him how to do a spell, but nevertheless, something in him fizzed with an effervescent energy he hadn’t realised her touch could bring. Her hand was warm and soft, and Harry was entirely too focused on the way it nestled around his. How was it so soft? Did she moisturise?
“-And that’s everything that I think could help. Just remember, a gentle flick, not a jab. Gosh, your hand’s a little cold. Wait, here,” she paused, reaching for her own wand. She cast a quick warming charm, then smiled brightly, “Right, now you try the sticking charm again.”
Harry wanted to tell her that she needn’t have used a warming charm on him, because the heat radiating from her hand and spreading to his cheeks was making him perfectly warm enough. He didn’t tell her that, though, and concentrated his aim on the ribbon, cursing the subtle shake of his hand. The bauble was somehow still afloat, which was surprising considering the lack of attention he’d been paying to maintaining the levitation charm acting on it. He cast the sticking charm successfully and celebrated with Hermione, feeling heat rush to his already-warm cheeks when she grasped his arm to jump around together. As she walked away to continue decorating, he rubbed the back of his neck and ducked his head, letting the blush slowly drain from his face while he practised the flicking wand movement. Ron gave him an indecipherable look and Harry stared back. He shrugged and Ron turned away, shaking his head. Despite the warming charm having worn off, Harry tugged at his tie a little before following Hermione over to the pile of baubles and selecting another one.
The trio fell into a comfortable silence as they worked, almost in their own bubble. The hubbub around them had quietened now that everyone was settled into their work, and only a modest number of baubles remained to be put up. Time almost didn’t seem to pass and they went without speaking for nearly twenty minutes, somehow so in tune with each other that Hermione needed only to give Ron a quick, weighted look before he wordlessly gave her his cloak, shivering a little but looking satisfied as Hermione curled up and smiled thankfully over at him, looking happier than Hagrid in a dragon sanctuary.
The bell rang and everyone began to pack up, dismissed to prepare for dinner. Hermione returned Ron’s cloak as they walked and Harry had an epiphany. He knew what he was going to get Hermione as a Christmas gift.
As the rest of the Gryffindor boys unpacked their bags and chatted about their days, Harry looked through the owl order catalogue with a single-minded fervour. The cloak had to be perfect. Hermione had lost hers a few weeks ago and had caught a cold around the same time, exacerbated by the winter chill and the snowfall that was beginning to fall heavily over the grounds. One time in Herbology she’d sneezed eight times in five minutes and had to be excused to go and get a Pepper-Up Potion from the nurse. Her favourite colour was either green or purple, so he’d get the cloak detailed with those colours, and her favourite flowers were roses and asters, so he could get those embroidered on it. The only problem was written in fine print underneath the cloak he’d picked out — orders placed to be finished less than a week later would cost a lot more money. He brushed that problem off as quickly as he’d spotted it — he’d pay any amount for Hermione’s perfect gift. What was the point of inheriting a fortune if he couldn’t use it to buy his friends expensive and thoughtful presents? He came across another problem, though. You couldn’t owl-order embroidery. He’d have to go to Diagon Alley.
Everyone began to exit to go to dinner and Harry followed them, grabbing his money bag from his wardrobe before he left. Dinner passed slowly as Harry bounced in his seat, watching Professors Lupin and McGonagall with undisguised intent. They seemed the most likely to help him. After dessert began to clear away, Lupin said his goodbyes and began to head down past the Gryffindor table towards the doors, so Harry stood up, grabbing his bag and hurrying after him. He mouthed goodbye to his friends as he walked a few paces behind the professor. Exiting the hall, Harry called out.
“Professor Lupin! Professor!”
Lupin turned with a confused look on his face. “Harry? Is everything alright?”
“Yes, yes.” Harry hurried to explain, “I just wanted to ask for a favour.”
“Oh.” the professor appeared surprised, rubbing the back of his neck, “Ah, well, what would you like.”
“I’ve got to go to Diagon Alley,” Harry clarified, “For a special present for Hermione, you see. She’s lost her cloak and I wanted to get a new one embroidered with alliums and roses and things, because those are her favourite flowers, but you can’t owl-order embroidery so I've got to actually go to the store, and I was hoping that you could… take me?”
Lupin checked his watch, then shrugged, smiling a bit. “I mean… sure. I’ve got no office hours tonight and it won’t take long, will it?”
“No, sir, I’ve just got to go to the shop and tell them what I want, then they’ll send it along.”
Lupin scratched his neck a bit, looking up at the ceiling, then made a come-hither motion. Harry fell into step beside him and they made their way to Lupin’s office in a friendly sort of silence. They entered the professor’s office just as everyone began to leave the great hall, and Lupin conjured a do-not-disturb sign on his door before heading over to the fireplace. He cast a spell at it and the fire roared, climbing to greater heights.
“You’ve flooed before?” Lupin asked, looking over his shoulder at Harry.
“Yeah,” Harry assured him, “Straight to Diagon Alley, right?”
Lupin nodded, holding out a bag of floo powder. Harry grasped a handful, then threw it into the fire. The flames became a violent emerald colour and Harry stepped in, screwing his eyes up. He was sure he’d never get over his fear of being burned in the floo. “Diagon Alley.”
Then he was off, green fire burning in a pillar around him until he was whisked away. A speck of ash danced alongside him as Harry felt himself pulled in all directions, seeing the burnt bricks of fireplaces and the emerald of floo flames even when he closed his eyes. He repeated his destination in his mind and was thankful to no longer feel himself being tugged off course.
What felt like a full minute but was in actuality probably only a second later, Harry stumbled out into the Leaky Cauldron. Lupin followed behind him a second later and they set off at a brisk pace, passing through the brick doorway and entering the alley quickly. Harry zeroed in on Lady Lockingburn’s Latest Looks and they headed in, a tinny bell announcing their arrival. A shop assistant came hurrying in and Harry waved awkwardly.
It only took a minute to confirm his order and in one shake of a krup’s tale, he and Lupin were back out in Diagon Alley. It was nearly eight-o’clock at night, and the street was clearing fast. The winter air nipped at Harry’s nose and he looked up, seeing the barest hint of snow beginning to fall. He looked back, but Professor Lupin seemed transfixed by the snow.
“Sir?” he stepped a bit closer. A tiny bit of snow was gathering on the professor’s hair, but he stayed in the same place.
“I was good friends with your parents, you know,” Lupin said, staring up at the sky. He didn’t really seem to be talking to Harry but more reminiscing out into the night air. “You’re just like your mother. She had a friend who was a little less fortunate and didn’t really like that being called out, so she never referenced it explicitly, but every holidays, he’d suddenly have a new scarf or a pair of mittens, or the holes in his cloak would be patched up and embroidered over with his favourite designs. We all teased her for it, in good fun, but it was just the sort of thing she did. She was the loveliest of people. A real spitfire, once you got her going, but she could crack the toughest nut and have them smiling in a month flat. She spent almost all of her allowance for a few months on chocolate frogs because she was trading the cards with this Ravenclaw boy. I’d never seen him smile, but then I found them talking and he was grinning like nothing we’d ever seen before. She was just that sort of person. You’re a lot like that, at heart. It’s a good thing you’re doing for Miss Granger.”
“But sir, why didn’t you tell me all this before? About my mum, I mean?” Harry asked, feeling a little betrayed. Lupin had been teaching him for nearly four months now and he hadn’t seen fit to tell Harry how close he’d been to his parents? It sent a stinging sort of pain through Harry and he rubbed at his cheek a bit, which was numb from the cold. He shivered a little, watching Professor Lupin, who wasn’t shivering at all. He seemed frozen. longing painted across his face as he stared out into the vacant Alley. A bit of wind whistled through and Harry dug himself further into his cloak.
“I realise that might come across as a bit unfair to you, Harry,” the professor began, kneading his hands together, “But as much as you deserve to know about them, there is a part of me that still grieves for them. I lived in the same dormitory as your father for seven years, and it sends a little pang of hurt through my heart when I see you going up to Gryffindor Tower. Every time you get a question right in class, your eyes shine just like Lily’s did whenever she laughed. You’re a living reminder of two of my dearest friends, but that’s not something you can change.” Lupin turned to face Harry, face still holding that longing look. “You’re your own person, Harry. I’m sure you get told that you look like your father all the time. I suppose I just wanted to spare myself the pain.”
Harry nodded numbly. He hadn’t considered what Lupin was saying before, but it made a fair bit of sense. He held out a hand, and after a moment’s hesitation, the professor took it.
“Thank you, sir,” he said simply. Lupin nodded, a pained expression flitting across his face for a moment before it settled into acceptance.
“It’s been 12 years,” Lupin murmured sadly, “And I still miss them. But, you know what I think would help?”
“What?”
“Some hot chocolate,” Lupin replied, smiling and squeezing Harry’s hand. Harry let himself be dragged off towards the Leaky Cauldron, smiling to himself.
As Lupin ordered two hot chocolates from the man at the Leaky Cauldron, Harry sat and thought. He’d been in a drought for information before now, but he’d suddenly been handed all of the answers. There were some things people just didn’t think to tell him when they talked about his parents. They spoke in bold strokes — the colour of Lily’s hair, James’ favourite subject, how beautiful the young pair had looked on their wedding day. They seemed like abstract figures, vestiges of good times that Harry would never see. The professor had known them as people — had known all the little things that made them special. Harry couldn’t not take this opportunity.
— — —
January 1994
Winter was always fun in a draughty, old castle. The corners of the ceilings dripped with icy water and the fire huddled in on itself in the glowing embers of the fireplaces, a low bed of flames curling between the logs of wood. The fire was barely even keeping itself alive, not able to warm anything else. Sickness spread through the halls as people coughed and sniffled all throughout the castles. The kitchens were apparently nearly unable to keep up with the demand for hot chocolates and Ron had briefly and disastrously tried to sell hot chocolates as some sort of get-rich-quick scheme. It hadn’t worked, of course, and he’d gotten a very stern look from Professor Sprout for ‘exploiting the illnesses of your peers’. Harry had thought it was brilliant up until he’d gotten sick, mugs piling up as he drank cups of tea and hot chocolate like they were going out of style. Right now, he sat shivering on the couch in the empty common room, looking about as happy as a Sumerian man whose servant had just brought him 1080 pounds of low-quality copper ingots. She’d sat next to him as he struggled tissue by tissue through charms this morning, and now he was resting, hands still wrapped around a mug that had long since gone cold.
Hermione sat down beside him and wordlessly put another blanket on top of him. He burrowed into it even more until only his face was showing, sniffling and rubbing at his nose. Hermione felt a pang of pity for him but pushed it down with amusement - the hero and the saviour of all wizardkind taken down by a simple case of the common cold was at the very least worth one or two jokes. He’d have to deal with it when she inevitably got mad at him a few years down the road and started making jokes about tissues. She wouldn’t start now, though. He looked utterly miserable.
Hermione crossed the room to one of the side tables and picked up a cup of tea, magically heated by some sort of bubble charm one of the prefects had put over the top of it. As she was walking back, the Fat Lady began screeching about closing the portrait properly, so she sighed and went to pull the door closed. She walked back to Harry and dropped down onto the couch, swapping the mug in his hand for a teacup. He was somehow still shivering, despite the extra blankets, and his fingers seemed about as stiff as Professor McGonagall’s upper lip, only capable of curling around a cup.
“It’s honey tea,” she hummed, setting his mug down on a table close by.
“Thanks,” Harry croaked, taking a sip. Hermione internally winced at how despondent he sounded before grabbing the edge of his blanket. She had an idea.
“Budge up,” she ordered, wiggling under the quilt.
“What?”
“You heard me, budge up. I’ve got to stay warm as well, don’t I?” Hermione explained, grabbing another nearby blanket and starting to incorporate herself into the pile. Harry looked delightfully confused but moved over on the couch. Hermione clutched at her bag and ruffled through it, trying to find the book they’d been reading before. It had become a bit of a tradition now amongst the trio that any time they didn’t particularly feel like doing something - Hermione would bring out her old, battered copy of The Hobbit and they’d read it over her shoulders.
Harry coughed a bit and Hermione leaned away, patting his back softly. He grunted a little as he curled up more.
“I feel like shit,” he groaned.
“Harry James Potter!” Hermione laughed, “It sounds like you need another blanket.”
“I’d have enough blankets if you weren’t stealing them as we speak,” he groused, pulling them back towards himself half-heartedly.
“Chapter 12,” Hermione interrupted, shoving an orange quilt over towards him, “Inside Information.”
“Hermione, you don’t need to read to me. I’ll be fine.”
“I want to,” Hermione said resolutely, clearing her throat before beginning to read.
About half an hour later, Hermione had finished two more chapters of the Hobbit, the second one not being read out loud because Harry had fallen asleep around the end of the first chapter. He looked frankly adorable bundled up in multitudes of quilts and Hermione had to stop herself from reaching out and poking his cheek every time he mumbled something in his sleep.
Getting up, she dropped the book onto the couch and hurried up to the dormitory to find some warm socks. It only took a moment, and when she got back, Harry had rolled over and taken back the bit of his quilt she’d been coveting for the last hour. She tugged a bit of blanket over and was just getting comfortable again when she began to get a feeling that something was wrong. She looked at the time and swore under her breath. It was 4:46 in the evening — Arithmancy had started an hour ago and she’d surely get a detention for ‘skipping it’, even accidentally.
“I’ll be back in a moment,” she whispered, slipping out of the blankets and onto the floor in her best impression of a worm. She snuck through the portrait hole, footsteps quiet, then quickly stuffed herself into a broom closet. The time-turner thrummed against her skin as she pulled the long, golden chain out of her shirt. Holding it with a featherlight touch, she turned it once, then felt the sensation she’d never get used to — the feeling of time slowing and distorting around her. It was as if she was trying to push through a beaded curtain, little pinpricks of heat curling over her and giving her goosebumps, a force passing over her and pulling her in every direction. She felt a crackle of fire arch down her spine before everything she’d just felt disappeared and she stood, hands a little shaky. The time-turner showed 3:48 in the afternoon.
She stumbled out of the closet, looking around. The walls of the corridor almost seemed to move and she cursed her shaky vision before turning back to the closet. She felt around for her bag and realised with horror that she’d left it in the common room. She bit her lip with more force than was necessary and revelled in the sting for a moment, letting it ground her. She couldn’t summon her bag, because that was a spell they learned next year, and she couldn’t ask someone to get it for her, because then they’d have to deal with her
“Bollocks!” Hermione swore, putting her head in her hands for a moment. She’d have to sneak into the common room and get the bag herself. Hopefully Past Hermione wasn’t sprightly and observant at the moment. She took a deep breath, bolted out of the storage closet, and skidded to a halt in front of the Fat Lady.
“Spiderweb,” she muttered, hunching down. The portrait swung open and Hermione breathed a silent sigh of relief to see that Past Hermione was getting Harry a cup of tea. As quietly as she could, she dropped down onto all fours and scurried behind a couch, out of view of Past Hermione and Harry. As she poked her head out to scout for openings, Harry blinked blearily at her and she shrunk back even more. Hopefully his fever would keep him from remembering anything, or he’d just be convinced he was seeing double.
“You students are never closing me properly!” the Fat Lady shrieked, waving her oil-painted arms about. Hermione felt herself jump in panic and Past Hermione murmured something Present Hermione would need to wash her mouth out for before going over to the portrait hole and closing it with a thud. Hermione scuttled over to the couch Harry was on and hid underneath it just as Past Hermione sat down on it, handing over a cup of honey tea with equally honeyed words. A fair half minute of conversation later, Past Hermione ruffled about in her bag and Hermione groaned, realising that she’d read for nearly half an hour before she’d realised that it was time for Arithmancy.
She hung her head, letting it rest against the dusty carpet. “Better get comfortable, Hermione, you’re in for a long half hour.”
And a long half hour it was, especially when Past Hermione stumbled over the word ‘creditable’ nearly four times before getting it right. Near the end of Chapter 12, Hermione felt a tickling in her nose and bit down hard on her cheek in an attempt to circumvent the building sneeze. It was inordinately dusty under the couch and Hermione made a strong note to herself to get back here with a feather duster. Her voice had long since past its novelty and now seemed to drone on forever, words blurring together. The sneeze still built in her nose and Hermione focused on Past Hermione’s words.
“-And they all began discussing dragon-slayings historical, dubious, and mythical, and the various sorts of stabs and jabs and undercuts, and the different arts devices and stratagems by which they had been accomplished-”
All of a sudden, Hermione remembered what happened next. At the end of the paragraph Past Hermione was currently reading, Harry broke out into a coughing fit. All Hermione had to do was hold on until then.
“-bold frontal attack. All the while they talked the thrush listened- hey, Harry, that’s a funny word. Thrush. Try saying that five times fast! Thrush, thrush- thrush, thru-th- oh, I can’t do it.”
Hermione groaned lowly. Harry coughed out a very tired laugh and mumbled something that sounded like ‘beetroot’, which was definitely not what was trying to be said. Past Hermione laughed a little, then went back to reading, all while Present Hermione cursed her past self for not reading fast enough. Her sneeze was reaching unbearable heights and she was seriously considering just rolling out from under the couch, shooting off some body-locking hexes, grabbing her bag, and getting the fuck out of that stuffy room.
“-while they talked and the shadows lengthened Bilbo became more and more unhappy and his foreboding grew- oh, Harry, are you alright?”
The coughing had finally begun and Hermione desperately sneezed into her elbow a few times until every semblance of dust had been cleared from her nose. Harry stopped sneezing and Hermione relaxed, suddenly feeling a lot more comfortable. The clock on the wall showed 4:28 — only fifteen or so minutes to go before she could grab her bag and go.
Past Hermione eventually stopped reading and headed out to the broom closet, so Hermione grabbed her chance and picked up the bag, running for it. She didn’t want to think about the time-turner any more, just Harry and Arithmancy- just Arithmancy. That was all she was focusing on. She’d figure out how to get the bag to Past Hermione soon. For now, she just needed to get to class.
She met Parvati outside the classroom and traded notes on the Fibonacci sequence for a few minutes before class started. It was a pretty good class and she finished Arithmancy happy, yet still the bag weighed on her. She ducked into yet another closet, but remembered one of Professor McGonagall’s warnings: not to over-complicate things by going back multiple times to change one event. Unfortunately, she’d time-travelled herself into a corner. She spun the time turner four times before leaving the closet to head to Gryffindor Tower. It had been 5:19. Now, it was 1:15. She’d have three and a half hours to kill before she needed to drop the bag off and skedaddle back to the closet.
Right now, everyone was at lunch, so First Hermione would be there and Second Hermione didn’t exist yet. It sort of hurt Hermione’s head just to think about it, so she ignored the inevitable paradoxes she was creating and raced up to her dormitory. She spent about three minutes waiting safely on her bed before she heard Lavender’s voice.
“For god’s sake!” she swore, throwing herself to the floor. She rolled under the bed just as all the Gryffindor girls, including herself, came back from lunch to get their books for their next classes. She poked her head out and managed to catch a glance of First Hermione chatting to Sally-Anne Perks before she heard what they were talking about.
“-oh, no, I don’t have a class next. I’ve only got Arithmancy this afternoon, so I’ll probably just stay with Harry. He’s been coughing all day. See you guys later,” she heard First Hermione say. She crossed to the door, louder on the last part as she closed the door behind herself.
“Bye!” Sally-Anne shouted, waving from the other side of the room before opening her trunk.
“Wow, that’s so nice of her,” Lavender gushed, shoving a transfiguration textbook into her bag, “They’re so nice to each other.”
“She’s such a good friend,” Fay murmured, a smile evident in her voice. Hermione felt something warm swirl in her chest and smiled, curling up a little more. She hadn’t really thought about herself that way, but it was nice that they were so kind to her even when she wasn’t in the room.
“I wish she talked to us more,” Parvati confessed, wringing her hands. Hermione bit her lip. She hadn’t meant to ignore her dormmates, but she honestly didn’t really know how to deal with friends. It was enough to have two friends (two more than she’d had in primary school) and it was overwhelming to be familiar with anyone. But now, knowing how much they seemed to admire her, she’d have to put in an effort.
The bell rang and there was a great clatter and bustle as all the other girls left the room. Fay Dunbar closed the door behind the group and finally there was silence. Now there were only two hours left until she could toss her bag down next to the couch and book it.
Hermione was just trying to pull herself out from under the mattress when the door opened and Parvati entered. “-Sorry, sorry, I’ve got Arithmancy with Hermione but nothing before that.”
Hermione groaned. If she had a nickel for every time she was stuck hiding under a dusty piece of furniture due to accidentally sticking herself in a time travel paradox, she’d have two nickels, which isn’t a lot but it’s weird that it happened twice.
Parvati sang a slow tune as she crossed to her trunk, feet tapping a little as she danced around in time with the climax of the song. She pulled a ball of yarn from her trunk and flopped down onto the bed, still singing a little.
An hour and a half later, Parvati had finished the blue-and-bronze scarf she was going to give her twin sister Padma for Christmas and had begun on a red-and-blue scarf for her mother. Hermione’s limbs were almost numb and she was almost certain that she’d dozed off halfway through Parvati’s rendition of ABBA’s greatest hits interspersed with her wondering aloud about the state of her parents’ marriage.
After a full two hours, Parvati had gone off to Arithmancy and Hermione was finally alone in the dormitory. There had been a close call when First Hermione went upstairs to grab some socks, but thankfully she hadn’t noticed Present Hermione hiding underneath her bed. It was now 4:43 — four minutes until First Hermione would hurry off to the closet to use the time-turner and Second Hermione would grab the bag. All she needed to do was bring the bag down there and drop it in the same place as it was when Second Hermione grabbed it before heading back to the closet near the Arithmancy classroom. Hermione stretched, hearing her back click. It was time to get moving.
She closed the dormitory door behind her as quietly as someone trying to talk during Professor McGonagall’s class. Thankfully the stairs were clear (due to it being the middle of class time), so Hermione could just stay out of sight.
All of a sudden, First Hermione was tip-toeing out of the common room, hand snaking into her shirt to retrieve the time-turner. A second later, Second Hermione rolled out from underneath the couch, coughing and spluttering, face covered in dust. Hermione wrinkled her nose, trying to remember whether she’d actually wiped the dust off, but came up blank.
“Ugh, that’s so embarrassing,” Hermione groaned. She waited until the portrait door swung closed before she strolled down, dropping her bag in a heap next to the couch. She left the common room unceremoniously before heading back to the closet. It was going to be a long wait until 5:19. Hopefully the mops would make good enough company.
— — —
February 1994
Hermione browsed through the shelf in front of her, discarding The Social Habits of European Nifflers in favour of the third edition of Noisy Nifflers: What We Can Learn From the Communications of Gold-Grabbers . She shoved the book under one arm and reached for another.
There was a popping sound and the book disappeared just as she reached for it. She furrowed her eyebrows, getting up on the bench in front of the bookshelf to look through the hole where the book had been. Then she ducked just in time to avoid a paper airplane heading full speed at her face. She squeaked and dropped, making sure not to get hit. If the airplane was part of some sort of prank by Peeves, she didn’t want to get hit by it, lest it explode or suddenly melt or become made of spiders.
The paper airplane completed a leisurely lap over her head and then slowly dipped down towards the ground before skidding to a halt at Hermione’s feet. Getting off the bench, Hermione knelt down to pick up the airplane, scrunching her eyebrows together. She poked it once and was relieved when it didn’t spontaneously combust. It probably wasn’t Peeves’ work, then. Hermione picked up the airplane between two fingers and squinted at it. There was something written on one of the wings in a handwriting she didn’t recognize.
Bring some water, the plant looks thirsty
Hermione sighed. She knew exactly what the note was talking about. She reached for her bag and slung it over her shoulder, heading off in the direction of the library’s Transfiguration section. It only took a minute or two to find Aisle 4, where she strode over to the potted plant in the corner she’d been keeping alive for a few months, as Madam Pince had evidently forgotten about it. She cast a quick water charm into the pot and almost instantaneously another paper airplane came sailing down next to her. She picked it up, already scanning it for a note.
It’s stuffy in here, I want some air
Hermione looked over at the window, letting her sleeve cover her hand so she could wipe years of accumulated dust off the glass. A stream of sunlight hit her in the face and she blinked quickly to adjust before she wrenched the window open. It made a great grinding sign and Hermione wished for Madam Pince to not have heard it as she dropped her bag and leaned over to stick her head out into the afternoon air. If the librarian found her making loud noises, she might be pushed out the window. That would have been such a terrible end to such a lovely day she’d spent studying the various sounds that nifflers made.
Hermione was so busy worrying that she nearly missed another paper plane flying past. She shot out a hand and grabbed it, swearing slightly under her breath as she teetered a little. If this was a death trap, it might actually be working. The next window shut with a bang and Hermione narrowed her eyes. She knew exactly who the pale hand fumbling with the window latch belonged to.
Warm up by the fire and remember your detective novels (P.S. no burning!)
Hermione grabbed her bag from the ground and headed through the library towards the reading area on the South side. It was a large area filled with comfy chairs and desks, but was often so full with study groups that Hermione didn’t frequent it. Today, the whole space was warm and sunny and many people were taking advantage of the surprising break in the winter chill to stay outside, so the room was practically empty. She wove through the chairs and stubbed her toe on a table, but made it to the fireplace. She looked back down at the note. Obviously she wasn’t supposed to burn the paper crane, but she couldn’t think of what else to do. And what did ‘remember your detective novels’ mean? She pondered it as she stared at the flames. Was she supposed to find another paper airplane inside a Sherlock Holmes book? She didn’t think that the Hogwarts library even stocked those, with them being about a hundred years too recent for the ‘New Arrivals’ section. She thought back to the detective novels she’d been reading recently, then remembered the wizarding children’s book that Ron had loaned her around a month ago — Harry Potter and the Lemon-Juice Letters. She’d originally thought that he was just making fun of Harry having an entire book series centred around him before he could cast a Lumos, but now she was wondering whether she should’ve read into it more.
In the book, one of Harry’s most beloved companions, Clementine O’Cuttle, had been kidnapped. He’d had to decode a series of mysteries in order to get her back — something involving a black cat, a pirate ship, and liberal use of the Summoning Charm? She couldn’t quite remember — and had eventually figured out that the threatening letters he’d been receiving from the kidnapper also contained messages in invisible ink that Clementine had been able to slip in when the kidnapper’s back was turned. Hermione realised what to do now.
“Ah,” Hermione said shortly, stepping closer to the fireplace. She unfolded the paper airplane and pinched a corner, letting the paper dangle over the fire. The paper miraculously didn’t even char at the edges and instead a clear message started to be formed.
There’s something special for you where the sun meets the moon
Hermione shoved the latest paper airplane into her bag and navigated back through the reading area towards the bookshelves. A faint and muffled giggle floated past her and she rolled her eyes, seeing a flash of ginger hair from behind a bookshelf. She walked over to the incredibly dusty astronomy section and found the place where she and her friends had been messing around a few weeks ago. Ron had drawn stars and moons all throughout the dust on one of the shelves and then chased Hermione around with his dust-covered index finger as she tried not to scream. They got thrown out by Madam Pince after Ron had scored a lucky hit on Hermione and left a big streak of grey dust all down the side of her studying robes. Harry had laughed wholeheartedly the whole time, out of dusting range. There on the bookshelf sat a wooden box with a paper airplane on top of it. Hermione reached for it, then groaned to herself.
Happy Valentine’s Day, Hermione
“That’s so tremendously funny. I’m rolling with mirth,” she deadpanned, making a come-hither motion, “You can come out now.”
Harry popped out from behind a shelf. “Surprise!”
Ron waltzed over from beside him, “Open the box, Hermione.”
Hermione did as they said and saw an array of muffins. At her friends’ pleading looks, she lifted one from the box and took a bite. The taste was oddly familiar, she thought. She pondered it while she chewed, her friends still watching her.
“Do you like them?” Harry asked eagerly.
Hermione nodded. “Yeah… they taste just like my mum’s.”
“That’s because we got the recipe!” Ron said excitedly.
“You… what? Why?” stammered Hermione, unable to comprehend what he was saying. This wasn’t… normal friend behaviour, was it? She hadn’t had any before them, so she didn’t exactly have a control group to compare to, but this seemed a bit strange.
“Well, you looked so sad when the muffins at lunch a few weeks ago were “utterly atrocious”,” Harry said, making quotation marks with his fingers, “And then you kept talking about how your mum made awesome muffins and you missed them, so Ron wrote her for the recipe, and then I made them! And you’ve been inside all day, so we wanted to make it fun for you instead of just giving them over.”
Hermione grasped around for something to say, but came up short with only, “I didn't know you could bake.”
“I’ve lots of practice,” he replied, reaching around and grabbing a muffin. Hermione squawked and tried to bat his hand away, chasing him away from the box and only succeeding in giving Ron an opening to steal one for himself.
“And Valentine’s Day?” she asked after taking another bite.
“Well, we needed an occasion,” Ron responded, “As great as we are, we wouldn’t just spring for muffins without an adequate holiday to celebrate.”
Hermione gave him a look and he laughed, moving to the right. She watched him suspiciously as he slowly walked backward away from her. “Ron, where are you going?”
Ron gave her a cheeky smile, looking over her shoulder at Harry. “Grab them and run.”
Harry laughed and darted away, holding the box of muffins under his arm.
“Hey! Get back here!”
— — —
March 1994
Ron had found his get-rich-quick scheme, and this time it was foolproof. Unlike his disastrous attempt to sell hot chocolates (the kitchens provided them for free), this one was going to work and he knew it.
“So glad you could come…” Ron said, spinning around dramatically. Fred and George simultaneously rolled their eyes as Fred closed the door behind them. It created a cloud of dust as it closed that rippled through the disused classroom they were meeting in, making Ron cough a bit, which destroyed the menacing and mysterious atmosphere he was going for.
“Well, well, well, if it isn’t little Ron Weasley…” Fred chortled, leaning up against the wall with his hands in his pockets.
“Do tell us of the… business opportunity you’ve discovered, little Ron…” George continued, leaning up against the same wall. The atmosphere was once again ruined by Fred pushing George a little, making him slide clumsily all the way down the wall.
“Ok,” Ron sighed, “I told you guys to stop calling me that.”
“Sorry, couldn’t help it,” they said together. Fred held his hand out as if offering it to Ron and George high-fived him. Ron eyed them, not amused, and in a moment they calmed down and went back to leaning against the wall.
“So, sharks…” Ron murmured under his breath before raising his voice, “I’d like to start a betting pool on when Harry and Hermione will get together.”
George blanched, while Fred turned away to cough a chuckle into his hand. Ron waited until they pulled themselves together.
“What brought that on?”
Ron clapped his hands together, smiling, “I’m pretty much absolutely sure that they’re soulmates.”
The twins broke out into uproarious laughter and surrounded Ron, clapping at his back. Ron smirked up at them, holding three knuts out in his hand.
“I’ll put three knuts on them holding hands by the end of the year,” he announced, giving his coins over to Fred. George reached out and shook his hand, nodding.
“Does that conclude our business?” George asked grandly
They ducked out of the room like spies on a mission, muttering under their breath to each other about investments and influence and customers they could loop into their new business venture. Ron nodded to himself, satisfied, and left with a jaunty step, heading off to chess club.
The halls were bustling with people and Ron smiled at the early spring sunlight streaming through the windows. The air was cool and crisp as a fresh piece of parchment and Ron revelled in it, a skip in his step as he walked through the corridors.
He arrived at the chess club not long after it started. It was held in a large room used for OWL studies and had a quiet atmosphere as students of all ages focused on their games. He looked at the leaderboard marked up on a chalkboard on the wall and smirked, seeing that he was still on top, as he always was. In his first year, he’d beaten the reigning champion on their third match against each other and had stayed in that spot for the past two and a bit years, still undefeated by even the wisest seventh years.
As he got closer to his usual table, he was surprised to see a small girl swamped by Ravenclaw robes perched like a bird upon his seat. Luna smiled at him, playing chess by herself against the sentient Wizard’s Chess board. That was, if it could be called chess. She was moving the pieces in seemingly random directions and taking pieces on and off every few seconds, spinning a knight in between the fingers of her right hand while placing a queen upside down on top of a rook.
“Luna, do you know how to play chess?” Ron said easily, slipping into the seat opposite her. He could feel eyes on him as the other players turned to look at whoever was challenging their champion. He smiled at her and reset the board, pulling the pieces into place and gently pulling the queen and rook apart. He turned the white pieces towards Luna.
“Not really, but it can’t be that difficult,” she replied, blinking owlishly at him, “Could you teach me?”
Ron nodded, “Of course, I’d love to.”
Luna smiled at him as he adjusted on the chair, gearing up. He coughed once to clear his throat, then put on his lecturing tone. “A form of chess first emerged in seventeenth-century India as a game called chaturanga-”
Half an hour later, Ron had explained the game of chess, all the pieces used in it, and which pieces tasted best melted onto pizza (a childhood experiment Bill had coerced him into giving him chess pieces for). Luna listened attentively the whole time, mindlessly crocheting a very long scarf in shades of orange while she stared into his mouth like it was a scrying bowl. It was a little freaky, but Ron was caught up in his lecture and just rolled with it.
“So, that’s all there is to it. Oh, wait, I haven’t even touched on castling-”
“-Ron?” Luna interrupted, an affectionately bored smile on her face, “I think I know enough now. Shall we play?”
Ron flushed, nodding and sitting down. He didn’t even realise he’d stood up, so enraptured in talking about the game he loved that he’d moved unconsciously. Luna patted his hand and gestured to the board, setting her pieces back in place and whispering to them.
“You can start,” Ron offered, spinning the board around to give Luna the white pieces.
“Knight to H3,” she began. Ron nodded a couple of times, considering her opening.
“Pawn to A5.”
“Pawn to G3.”
“Rook to A6,” Ron countered, looking up at Luna. Her face was scrunched up in concentration and Ron found himself unable to look away. A lock of hair fell down across her face and Ron itched to reach out and tuck it behind her ear.
Luna ordered one of her pieces and Ron mindlessly countered, not really paying attention to the game anymore, focusing only on Luna’s face and the way her eyes reflected the lights of the lanterns hanging on the walls. She and Ron went back and forth a few more times, Ron as if in a daze. Luna looked up at him and smirked, and Ron looked down at the board, trying to get his bearings.
“Checkmate.”
Ron teared his gaze around from Luna’s face to stare gobsmacked at the board. “Er…”
“Checkmate,” Luna said calmly, already getting out her crochet hooks, “At least I think so.”
“No, no, you’re right…” Ron murmured, still staring at the board. His pieces were yelling at him to challenge her again and defend their honour, but he felt only pride swelling in his chest. He didn’t normally lose and when he did, it usually wasn’t with grace. Ron was ashamed to say that his talent had spoiled him a bit in that department, yet he was nothing but happy for his soulmate.
Luna gasped and grabbed at her finger, beaming at him.
“What is it?” Ron panicked, standing up quickly. His chair fell backwards with a bang and he murmured out a few apologies as he grabbed the chair and hauled it up. Luna was still holding her finger, crochet hooks lying abandoned on the table and chess pieces surprisingly quiet.
“I’ve got a new mark,” she said, holding her finger out to Ron. He couldn’t see it, of course, yet he touched Luna’s fingertip gently, feeling a rush of some indescribable joy. It was as if the sun had come out all at once, shining with a warmth he’d never felt before. Every single happy memory he’d ever had was floating through his head, filling him with the most potent feeling of happiness he’d ever felt. Then he pulled his finger away and the feeling slipped from his head all at once. Yet, somehow, a peaceful haze was still there.
“Another game?” he offered.
Luna shook her head. “No, I’d like to lord this one over your head for a few days before I even consider giving you the satisfaction of beating me.”
Ron grinned. “Then race you to the kitchens? The elves are experimenting with how to make butterbeer, and I’d say they’d like some taste-testers.”
“Sounds brilliant,” she replied, shoving her crochet hooks into her bag, “But there won’t be any left for you to test if I get there first.”
“Is that a challenge?”
“Definitely.”
— — —
April 1994
Harry entered the common room bright and early, trying to put some bravado into his stride. The rest of the quidditch team sans Oliver Wood were already there, each of them trying and failing to disguise how nervous they were. Wood strode down a second later, hands not stopping for a moment as he flipped through page after page of notes on strategy. Angelina nursed a cup of coffee and Alicia was stirring something Harry wouldn't question her about into her cup of tea. Katie gave him a nervous smile and went back to stretching, contorting into uncomfortable positions. She twisted into a lengthy pretzel shape and Harry remembered that she’d once confessed she sometimes hoped she’d get stuck in that stretch so she wouldn’t have to play. Harry couldn’t exactly blame her. The Weasley twins were practically jumping off the walls with energy, whispering frantically to each other. They’d been joking about stealing the chasers’ brooms for a few weeks now, but luckily they seemed to have gotten cold feet.
“Right,” Wood began, taking a nervous breath and setting his notes down with a thump, “We’ve got one chance to win the cup, and I know we want to do that, so play hard and fast. Harry, only catch the snitch if we have a fifty point lead, remember?”
“Yes, Oliver,” Harry sighed. Wood had been constantly reminding him for the past few weeks. The lead up to the Quidditch Cup had been exuberant and terrifying in its own right, as every Slytherin in the castle made their support known by sticking out their legs when he walked past. Apparently, one sixth-year had even tried to convince the house elves to poison him, but had accidentally given every Ravenclaw who’d had the onion soup food poisoning by messing up the tables. Harry hadn’t had soup in two weeks for fear of what could happen. On the other hand, Gryffindors cheered when he went past and it was impossible for Harry to get to classes on time due to the large, chattering crowd that followed him around. In all honesty, he’d been more scared for his Firebolt’s safety than he had been for his own, locking it in his trunk and checking every time he opened it to see if the broom was still there. He’d nearly run out of supplies in his broom maintenance kit, what with how much he’d been taking care of it; polishing and buffing the wood every night and inspecting it for nicks and bumps after every ride. He’d slept badly almost every night, but this one took the cake. He tossed and turned all night, stuck in a strangely awful dream where brooms were illegal and he was on the run on his Firebolt. Eventually, he was caught by the ministry and his Firebolt was thrown to the Whomping Willow to be shredded just like his Nimbus. He woke up gasping for air but had soon regained his bearings, and now here he was, zoning out of Wood’s team talk.
“-and of course, Slytherin will try to play dirty. When in doubt, evade. We don’t want anyone getting hurt, and especially no penalties,” Wood finished, fixing the Weasley twins with a look that spoke of absolute hell to pay if they messed up. They gave slightly nervous grins back but were soon cracking jokes again. They went to McGonagall’s classroom for team warm up, avoiding the other Gryffindors. The professor fixed them with a strong look and wished them luck, which Wood returned with a stiff nod. They warmed up for a while, stretching and exercising to get their muscles warm, before the breakfast bell rang. They entered the hall to thunderous applause from the Gryffindor table and more subdued claps from the Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws, who seemed less interested. The Slytherins were silently stoic. They filed out of breakfast before everyone else and hurried down to the Quidditch pitch, changing into their playing robes without much talk. Then the game began and the world became fast-paced blurs as Harry soared into the air.
It was quickly apparent that the game was going to be the dirtiest he’d ever played. Almost instantly, Angelina scored and the Slytherin Captain Marcus Flint went smashing into her. Fred retaliated by throwing his beater’s club at the back of Flint’s head, which earned both teams a penalty. Despite the immediate problems, Gryffindor was soon up by thirty points. Sometime after that, the two Slytherin beaters attempted to squash Harry between them, but he dodged and they crashed into each other instead. They pulled apart, looking woozy, as Harry shot up and away from them, scanning for the snitch. The game and its accumulating penalties faded beneath him as he got higher and higher above the chaos.
There! A flash of gold to his right caught his eye and Harry turned before he could even really comprehend moving. The snitch sparkled enticingly and he put on a burst of speed, hand outstretched. He frowned. The Firebolt was slowing down. He looked around for the cause and half-groaned-half-cursed as he saw Malfoy holding on to the end of his broom. Madam Hooch screeched a penalty, but it didn’t matter. The snitch was gone.
It took another few minutes of rough playing, but eventually Harry spotted the snitch again. He dived and Malfoy copied him, miles ahead. He urged his broom to go faster, angling almost straight down. He was gaining on Malfoy, the Firebolt was working its magic — he was at Malfoy’s ankles — they were neck and neck — his hand grasped around the snitch and the stadium roared. He grinned and held the snitch up, letting it catch the sunlight, a beacon of his victory. Then the team was surrounding him, shouting and laughing and crying, caught in the moment. Harry laughed with wild abandon and hugged them tightly. There was nothing that could stop them now. People were sobbing. A Gryffindor flag was passed over to him and he waved it in the air, feeling the crowd surge in triumph. He beamed and scanned the crowd for Ron and Hermione. There they were, in the crowd cheering like the rest. Harry worked his way over to them and for a moment they just basked in the glow of victory.
— — —
“Hey,” Harry said, slipping out of the party to go stand next to Hermione. He smiled and handed over a cup of some party drink.
She smiled back, taking the cup, “Hey.”
They stood there for a few minutes, just sipping on their drinks and enjoying the atmosphere. It was now well into the night but the party was still going. Ron stood in a group of boys, laughing and comparing famous Quidditch victories. Wood was listless in a corner, Angelina and Katie having covered him in a blanket. A couple sagging tables held a seemingly never-ending feast and self-replenishing pitchers held all manners of drinks. Golden streamers covered the floor and Gryffindor flags seemed to hang from the back of every chair. A radio sat in the corner and even though a few people had said their apologies and headed off to bed, Hermione’s roommates included, many people still danced to the blaring tunes. A second after he finished his drink, Harry was pulled back into the mass of celebrating Gryffindors and flashed Hermione an apologetic grin before dancing around with Percy Weasley, who seemed a little inebriated.
Hermione waved at him and threw her drink back, finishing it in one gulp and setting it down. She navigated through the common room and had just reached the staircase up to the girls dormitory when a hand shot out from the crowd and clasped her own. She turned and saw Harry standing there. He tried to say something but it was lost to the noise of celebration. Something must have shown on her face because he shook his head and just squeezed her hand once. She squeezed back. He let go and waved as George Weasley pulled him back into the throng of students.
Hermione climbed the stairs with a silly grin on her face, hand tingling. She opened the door and stopped short when she saw the rest of her roommates all sitting on Lavender’s bed, talking. She waved awkwardly and they waved back far more enthusiastically.
“I’ll just…” she murmured, ducking into the bathroom. The moment the door was closed, she put her head in her hands. She didn’t know why she was so socially inept around her roommates. They weren’t mean or anything; in fact, they were far more friendly to her than she ever was to them. She thought back to January and overhearing their conversation and flushed pink. They were so kind to each other and to her. She had to at least try to return the favour.
She sighed and opened the door, fixing her gaze on the group of girls on the bed, “Hey, um… can we talk?”
They looked surprised, exchanging looks, but shuffled over so she could clumsily climb onto Lavender’s bed. She cleared her throat, then cleared it again.
“I-I know I haven’t always been the friendliest person,” she began. Fay instantly tried to speak but Parvati fixed her with a look. “And I’d like to- to be better. You’re all always so nice to me and I want to return the favour. I wanna try being friends,” she finished, ducking her head. Her face felt about as hot as the sun and she was sure she looked as red as Malfoy had when Harry had caught the snitch earlier that day.
Lavender cleared her throat, looking at the other girls. They were evidently comfortable enough to understand each other without talking and Hermione felt a pang of something jealous in her heart. For years, she’d been stuck on her two best friends and had scoffed at the thought of frivolous things like her roommates’ hobbies. All this time, she’d been missing out on camaraderie she hadn’t even realised she was hoping for.
Lavender reached out and patted her leg, smiling, “Yeah. I think we’d all like that.”
“Oh! Um, cool! That’s, you know, super cool- and, um. Yeah. I’m gonna,” she blurted out, pointing at the bathroom. Sally-Anne laughed and pushed her jokingly off the bed. Hermione practically sprinted back into the bathroom, hoping her face didn’t betray how embarrassed she was. They were so nice and she was so stiff and ham-fisted when it came to friendship.
She groaned and splashed some water on her face. Two friends was enough work already. What had she gotten herself into?
— — —
May 1994
The summer sun was warm across Harry’s face as he strolled through the school grounds, holding a crimson picnic blanket. Ron walked beside him, lugging a picnic basket full to the brim with snacks and bemoaning his job as designated strong guy. Hermione was out in front of them, already sitting under the tree they’d picked out for their picnic and ruffling through her tote bag. She sighed in delight as the sun shone down on her and Harry ducked his head in an attempt to hide his blush. He didn’t know why he felt so hot. It was probably just the start of heatstroke. He probably should have worn more sunscreen.
Harry unfolded the picnic basket just in time for Ron to fall on top of it. He tossed the picnic basket down with a huff and shuffled over on the blanket so Harry could sit down. Hermione walked over to them and collapsed on the blanket as well, smiling. As she dropped her tote bag next to her, Harry wiggled back and soon they all fit on the blanket. Ron set about unpacking his basket and soon there was a delicious-looking spread of snacks and treats between them; muffins, scones, pudding, and several types of fruit that shouldn’t have been growing at this time of the year. Harry briefly thanked his past self for not eating much at breakfast and took an overly large bite of a muffin. Ron made a face and passed him a napkin.
“Where’d you even get all this food?” questioned Hermione, lathering a scone with an inordinate amount of butter.
“A lady never tells,” Ron replied, a cheeky smile on his face. Harry rolled his eyes and wiggled further into the blanket, relishing the sun. They sat there for a few minutes, just enjoying the morning sun and the incredible food. Hermione finished her second scone and cleared her throat, opening her tote bag. She pulled out a variety of board games and Ron cleared the food away as she set them out. There were a range of brightly-coloured boxes and Harry only recognized about half of them, but that was half the fun.
“Right…” Hermione began, sifting through the pile to pull out one of the games, “Shall we start with Scrabble?”
“Sure,” Harry replied, opening the box and setting it out. The ground was bumpy and so the board was crooked, but they would play it anyway.
Half an hour later, Ron and Hermione were refusing to speak to each other due to a debate that had eventually escalated into shouting as to whether they could use magical incantations as words, due to them not technically existing in the dictionary. Ron had tried Aguamenti and Hermione had retaliated by somehow pulling off Impedimenta. They’d spent a few minutes scouring the rule book for contradictions before Harry pulled out Cluedo and waved it in front of them like keys in front of a baby. That game went a lot more smoothly than Scrabble — no one could be accused of cheating because they were all so bad at it that there wasn’t any doubt. Hermione took Professor Plum and spent her entire time scribbling increasingly confused pieces of information on her paper, while Ron took the other stance and forewent writing down what he’d learned entirely, just guessing random things and then staring at the sky in an attempt to figure out the murder in his head. Harry put his head in hands and worked diligently on his card until he thought he’d worked it out.
“My final accusation is…” Ron said, staring up at the sun in a way that was surely hurting his eyes, “I think that the murderer is Miss Scarlett with the revolver, in the billiards room.”
Harry stared in disbelief down at his paper. That was exactly what he’d written down, but Ron had gotten to it only a turn before him. He watched in bewilderment as Ron reached over the board and picked up the answer cards. He flipped them over and then crowed, throwing them down on the table to show that his accusation had been right. The whole time, Hermione drew larger and larger question marks all over her paper, looking frazzled. Harry stared at his paper as if it had personally wronged him, looking for any sign in the .
“Nice,” he said, in a way that meant he thought it was distinctly not nice. Ron laughed at their expressions and jokingly suggested another round, to which Harry and Hermione fixed him with identically unimpressed looks. Ron chuckled again and pulled out charades. Harry cracked his knuckles. He was tired of losing. This was a game he was going to win.
Two hours later, they’d gone through the entire pack of charades prompts that Hermione had brought and started a new one entirely about animals. His friends had taken twelve whole minutes to guess ‘elephant’ and Harry had gotten so tired that at one point, he’d had just given up and laid down on the ground, to which Hermione gleefully yelled ‘dead person’ and garnered a few strange looks from other people out on the grounds. Ron kept guessing magical animals that Harry had never heard of before and laughing when he was confused, so Harry had responded by guessing ‘mantis shrimp’ to every one of Ron’s prompts until he gave up. It turned out that all three of them were pretty terrible actors — Hermione was almost perfect at guessing but couldn’t act out a worm to save her life, as it was apparently ‘too undignified’. Harry and Ron had both laughed at that and Hermione had thrown a scone at Harry’s head. That had started a brief food fight until Harry had caught a strawberry in his mouth, which led them to start trying to catch food in their own mouths. Surprisingly, Hermione was now the reigning champion after catching seven blueberries in a row.
Eventually, the morning became the afternoon and the sun began to mellow, sending shadows across the grounds. The atmosphere was a lot quieter now — Ron was curled up half-asleep, Hermione packing up whatever food was left. Harry sat on the grass, a pleasant breeze at his back as he stared over the rolling grounds at the lake. The wind caused tiny waves to roll across its surface and a shadow occasionally passed through the water as the giant squid swam lazy circles around the depths.
He yawned and Hermione looked up at him. He waved her off and she smiled a little before busying herself again. He looked away. He’d been feeling an odd sense of melancholy over the past few days. It had been a stressful year overall. With exams coming up and the constant worry of being hunted by a mass murderer trying to kill him, he hadn’t really been able to relax, yet somehow this simple day of carefree fun had loosened something inside of him. For the first time in a while, he felt true joy. There was something light about the air, pushing him to let go and enjoy himself for even the smallest moment, to unravel in the face of a simple thing like a picnic. He was somehow, despite everything weighing him down, happy.
— — —
June 1994
The late afternoon sun shone down across Harry’s face and Hermione had to tear her gaze away from him when Buckbeak huffed and tried to trot away. She settled him carefully and looked back at Harry, who was pulling at a piece of grass and looking bored. They’d been waiting for an hour already, unable to do anything for fear of messing up the timeline, so they just sat. Their past selves, and Professors Lupin and Snape had already gone down into the Whomping Willow and Hermione could almost picture the confrontation taking place under her feet. Hermione leaned against a tree, toying with the end of the rope connected to Buckbeak’s neck and tried not to think of the time-turner hanging around her neck. it tempted her with its very being — she had always been too curious, too determined, too over-committed. The time-turner was irrevocably bad for her yet she always wanted to use it. She reached a hand up and let a finger ghost over the chain.
She dropped her hand with a sigh and set about tying Buckbeak’s rope to a tree. He made a few noises and Hermione hurried to shush him, wary of being heard. A seventh-year Herbology student had been gathering plants in the forest a few minutes ago and had nearly seen them, and Hagrid was still in his hut, grasping a cup of tea and occasionally looking out the windows to scan the skies for his lost hippogriff. They couldn’t be noticed; everything depended on them not getting caught. Sirius’ life depended on them not getting caught. She didn’t understand how they were supposed to save him, as Harry was insistent that the caster of the patronus that rescued them from the dementor swarm had been his father. That was very unlikely, but Hermione had spent the past two years having her worldview turned upside down by magic. She wasn’t well-versed enough in what could and couldn’t happen, so for all she knew, Harry’s father had popped out of the grave to quickly save them from an inevitable death. It sounded believable enough.
Hermione murmured a quick goodbye to Harry and set out into the forest. They’d been taking turns walking around, as it was the only thing giving them something to do. She grasped her wand and set out at a slow place, cautious of the numerous vines and roots that lined even the tamer parts of the ground. She remained alert. Devil’s Snare ran wild in darker parts of the forest and she’d heard enough of Harry and Ron’s adventure into the acromantula den to get anywhere near the overgrown spiders. The sound of centaur hooves echoed in the distance and Hermione reminded herself not to stray too far from the tree line, keeping Harry and Buckbeak in sight.
Clouds rolled over the horizon and Hermione cursed them. Who were they to hide the late sunlight, to cast shadows through the trees? They rumbled in response and Hermione clenched her wand until her knuckles turned white, then forced herself to relax.
She was so tired.
School had been so hard. The time-turner was doing more harm than good, making her stressed and overwhelmed constantly. The bags under her eyes had bags of their own, large enough to carry her textbooks. Her coursework was simply too much and she didn’t know why she’d thought she could handle it. Five electives? She was carrying a false sense of her own efficiency, convinced that just being bright and hard-working would carry her over. While she had dropped divination after the professor’s idiocy had become far too apparent, she was still taking four electives. She’d probably drop Muggle Studies — being muggleborn was enough to get by in the non-magical world. That left her with three classes. She could and would handle three. Even if the course load was large, she wasn’t about to give up her place as top of her year. But perhaps she’d take it easy. She was so tired.
Hermione checked the time, then tucked the time-turner back into her shirt, promising to herself that she’d give it back when the school year finished. She turned and began to walk back over to Harry. They had a few more minutes.
— — —
Harry ran through the grounds as fast as he could, fear pumping through his heart and making every nerve in his body light on fire. The werewolf had left them alone for now, content to howl and bound around the forest, yet Harry stared over at Hermione and ran faster. The time-turner bounced on her chest as she ran and she looked down at it, mouthing the time. They wouldn’t make it. They had to make it.
He skidded to a halt and nearly fell as his momentum tipped him forward. He’d found himself on the edge of the lake. A thin coat of ice lay across the top, which was definitely not normal for summer, even in the evening. The reason became quite apparent shortly, as a cloud of dementors appeared from all directions to bear down towards a ragged-looking man crumpled on the ground on the opposite side of the lake. Harry attempted to call Sirius’ name, but his voice failed him. It was as if all air was sucked from his lungs. Ice crawled through his veins and his heartbeat slowed, a stark difference from the heavy pounding it had been when he was running. He threw himself into a bush to watch and Hermione fell to the ground beside him.
He looked around for whoever had cast the patronus, but there was no one else with him but Hermione.
His past self sprinted down the slope towards the lake, taking stock of the dementors and Sirius’ collapsed body with remarkable speed. He pulled out his wand and Present Harry mirrored him, sticking the tip of it out through the bush.
“Expecto Patronum!” Past Harry yelled. A wisp of white came out of his wand, yet the patronus wasn’t corporal. “Expecto Patronum!”
Harry looked around in a sort of daze. The dementors were evidently having an effect on him, because his head was fuzzy and a haunting scream played on loop in his head.
When the dementors had descended upon him, Hermione, and Sirius, he’d thought of winning the Quidditch cup, yet that somehow hadn’t been enough. He’d thought of long nights staring at his parents’ images in the Mirror of Erised, yet those memories were tainted with bitterness and shame. He couldn’t think of a single thing that could’ve saved them and now Harry watched in silence as dementors descended on his past self. They loomed over Past Hermione and Harry tried to muster up all the protective fury he felt at the sight, yet once again nothing came forth. She crumpled to the ground, Past Harry not looking far away from following her.
“My dad… he’s- he’s not coming,” Harry realised, the thought sombre. Hermione grasped at his hand, eyes welling with tears as she watched Past Harry’s wand splutter out the tiniest bit of white mist before it dispersed again. The dementors fumed around them, sounding for all the world like a swarm of flies around a dead body.
“But… Harry…” Hermione said, eyes fluttering. She looked like she was going to pass out. Even though no dementors were focused on them, their effect was still noticeable in Hermione’s sluggish movements and the cold that was settling bone-deep in Harry’s body.
“He’s not coming,” Harry said, the realisation baffling. Hermione said nothing. Past Harry fell to his knees, hand quivering around his wand as he mumbled the Patronus Charm again and again with a flickering hope.
Harry stood up, fumbling with his wand. He grasped it with a white-knuckled grip and held it straight out in front of him. His voice was scratchy but full as he yelled. “Expecto Patronum!”
He focused whole-heartedly on the last time he’d been truly happy. A few Saturdays ago, he and his two best friends in the whole world had spent a day playing games and eating food together out on the grounds. They’d had a picnic, teasing each other and drinking lemonade and having a lovely time. And somehow that simple day was the happiest Harry had been in as long as he could remember. He brought that memory to the forefront of his mind, almost viscerally feeling the sunshine across his back as he lay on the picnic blanket. He heard Ron’s deep, mellow laugh. He saw Hermione’s beaming smile as she threw her head back and laughed. He felt only warmth coursing through him.
A brilliantly white stag burst from the end of his wand and cantered towards the dementors. Harry let himself bask in the fleeting feeling as his best memory seeped away back into the recesses of his mind.
— — —
Some time later, lying in a hospital bed. Hermione stared at her finger. A symmetrical design lay across it, dark brown and almost like antlers. She knew what the marks symbolised now — her friends and her greatest moments with them. Hermione looked at the marks with fresh eyes. The lightning bolt obviously meant Harry’s scar, but her second mark (a pane of glass? perhaps a mirror?) had no discernable time she could remember. It had obviously been an important moment. She had a fuzzy sort of feeling in her chest as she stared at her hands. Whatever the marks meant, she was glad to have them.
Chapter 5: public service announcement: here be dragons
Summary:
Year the fourth, in which Harry has a breakdown, Hermione has a breakdown, and Ron has a good time being a little terror.
Notes:
WOOT WOOT BITCHES the chapter is POSTED and COMPLETE, both in a TIMELY MANNER, and i am HIGH ON ENDORPHINS BABY
The January portion technically happens mostly on December 31st but ignore that.
Chapter Text
September 1994
Ron doing something over-the-top and slightly stupid for Hermione’s birthday was now practically a yearly tradition, and one that Harry gleefully watched every time it happened. Ron doing something lovely and thoughtful for Hermione’s birthday was also a yearly tradition, and the two clashed often. Case in point - Hermione’s fifteenth birthday. Ron had, of course, gone completely insane over the holidays and cooked up a disastrous plan to surprise her, but sometimes that’s just how life was. He had written a letter to one of his friends who’d moved to Japan and gotten a charm for folding origami into a specific shape then practised the spell for three weeks until he had it down pat. After that, he’d set about turning a large sheaf of origami paper into beautiful paper flowers. He’d then woken up at the crack of dawn and coerced as many school owls as he could find into holding enchanted envelopes he’d gotten from his brother Bill. After he set everything up, the owls were deployed and he returned to his dormitory to try to sleep a few more hours and possibly to pray. Luckily, it all went exactly according to plan.
As Hermione sat down to breakfast, the morning post came in and Ron watched it with eagle-sharp eyes. A horde of owls came down towards Hermione and she raised an eyebrow, looking around as if some other person was eagerly awaiting eight tawny owls carrying gigantic envelopes. One owl swooped down and then the rest followed, dropping the envelopes all around her. An envelope dropped down into her lap and she picked it up just as it exploded, ten white paper roses flying out around her. The rest exploded at the same time and soon what must have been eighty paper roses lay around her. Though there were only a few people in the hall, two or three hollered and clapped and Professor Flitwick clapped a little, exclaiming to the teacher to his left about the delayed explosion and what a nice piece of charm work it was. Hermione, having recovered from the shock, whirled around to see Ron just in time for him to throw her another flower, this one bright green. She took it and then made a face, turning it around to show Harry that it was emblazoned with the words “Happy Birthday” and a rather lopsided drawing of a birthday cake. She turned to Ron and made a come-hither gesture, getting up from the table and grabbing her bag. Ron and Harry followed her, trading looks. They ducked into a classroom and Hermione cleared her throat.
“Ronald Weasley-” Hermione sighed, looking both immensely tired and reluctantly pleased. Harry reached out and plucked a flower from her frizzy mane of hair — she gave him a weary smile and turned back to Ron.
“Hey, before you disown me, just remember that it wasn’t rabbits again,” said Ron, holding his hands up in a gesture of innocence.
“If you’d done the rabbit thing again, you’d find yourself missing several limbs by now,” Hermione said, glaring. Harry snorted. The rabbit thing had scarred Hermione for life and Classroom 3D would never be the same again.
“So… that wasn’t all of it,” Ron began, pulling a gift-wrapped box. Hermione took it with caution, which Harry thought would have been warranted if he didn’t know what was inside. She carefully stripped away the gift wrap and opened the box within before gasping.
“Oh, they’re lovely! Thank you so much!” she gushed, pulling out two books. The box contained special collector’s editions of two of Hermione’s favourite books, Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights, with special cloth dust jackets that Ron had made and decorated himself. Harry had seen them before when they’d been planning out their presents but he still marvelled at the artistry Ron was able to put in when he really cared about something.
“You’re forgiven,” Hermione said, hands still running back and forth over the pages of Jane Eyre.
“For the rabbit thing?” asked Ron hopefully. Hermione shook her head, an ugly light passing through her eyes.
“You are never, ever forgiven for the rabbit thing.”
— — —
Harry’s method of celebrating Hermione’s birthday was significantly different and wholeheartedly tamer. He’d bought the books for Ron to put new covers on, because that was their shared present (Ron had the skills but not the money, whereas Harry could easily buy two collector’s edition hardcovers of some of the most famous novels on the planet but couldn’t sew to save his life). For his own present, he’d skipped Divination and headed into an unused classroom to call for help.
“Um…” he scrounged around for the right name, “Mittens? Muttons?”
The house-elf he’d seen in first year appeared with a pop and he jumped in surprise. “Er, hello, Muttons?”
“How can Muttons be serving Mr. Harry Potter?” the house elf asked, looking curiously at him.
“Ah, yes. Um, house elves make all the food in the castle, right?”
Muttons nodded. “Yes, Mr. Harry Potter, the house elves are working hard in the kitchens to feed the little students.”
“Right, so… where are the kitchens?” asked Harry. Muttons looked confused but offered to show him. Harry gladly accepted and soon they were off, down through the corridors into the dungeons. After a few minutes of walking, they stopped near the Hufflepuff common room.
“Here,” Muttons said, gesturing to a large canvas painting of a fruit bowl, “You’s just need to tickle the pear.”
Harry wrinkled his nose, but lifted a finger and reluctantly scratched at the painted pear. It began to wiggle and let out little giggles, then suddenly turned into a large green door handle. He pulled the door open and stepped inside.
The kitchens were a cavernous hall with high golden ceilings decorated with constellations. The walls were lined with ovens, stoves, and cupboards, and every few metres there were doors leading to things labelled ‘pantry’ and ‘chilled’. The kitchens looked utterly luxurious, and nothing like Harry had expected. At Privet Drive, the kitchen was always spotless yet so brilliantly clean that it seemed soulless. The Hogwarts kitchens felt like a home — the room was giant yet warm and cosy. There were four long tables in the centre of the room, reflecting the tables in the Great Hall above. All throughout the room, hundreds of house elves worked on steaming dishes and great mounds of dough, cleaning up from breakfast and preparing lunch.
The instant he walked in, a few house elves seemed to drop everything to come over to see him. Their high-pitched voices overlapped and Harry could barely make out each of them asking
“I don’t want anything to eat!” Harry exclaimed, bemused, “I just wanted to bake something.”
They quietened down immediately, looking at each other in confusion.
“Mr. Harry Potter wants to… bake something?” one of them said, looking if they were wondering if they’d imagined him saying that. Harry nodded, which began a flurry of chatter as the five or so house elves gathered around tried to figure out why he’d want to bake something and wouldn’t just get them to make it quickly.
“It’s my friend’s birthday, and as much as I love what you can make, it carries a bit more sentiment when I’ve made it myself,” explained Harry. The elves nodded slowly, still a little befuddled. “But I’d like it if someone could help me?”
“Dobby can help!” declared a squeaky voice from behind Harry, “Dobby is here to help the Great Mister Harry Potter!”
Harry felt foreboding creeping down his spine as he turned around. “Dobby?”
“Dobby is here!”
Harry blinked a few times, not quite believing what he was seeing. Dobby stood behind him, eyes wide. He was dressed in a fluffy, white tea towel embroidered with the Hogwarts crest and looked far healthier than when Harry had last seen him.
“Dobby, I… I didn’t know you were here?” he stammered. Dobby didn’t seem to mind.
“The Great Professor Alby Dumbledoris was very kind to Dobby. He said ‘Dobby, you can work at Hogwarts’ and now Dobby works for a galleon a week and the last Saturday of the month off! Mister Harry Potter is baking for his Miss Hermynerm?”
“Er, yes, I’m making biscuits for Hermione,” Harry said, looking around for an escape.
“Dobby will help!” the elf cheered, “Great Harry Potter is coming with Dobby now. Harry Potter is decorating the biscuits?”
Harry confirmed his plans and soon he was in a corner, rolling out biscuit dough as Dobby teleported around him, giving him the ingredients he wanted before he could even ask for them. They were done in no time, as house elf magic could apparently make dough that should have taken hours to chill perfectly in just a few minutes. Soon, the biscuits were cut into shapes and were in the oven baking. Harry snacked on a treacle tart as he waited for them to cook, having a grand time. The house elves were helpful almost to their own detriment, and he needed only to ask for any food he wanted to be underway and delivered in less than a minute. He didn’t envy Ron, who according to the clock was still stuck in Divination being told that the pattern of freckles on his left cheek could predict how many grandchildren he’d have.
Harry finished his tart and checked on the biscuits in the oven. They were perfectly golden and a little brown on the edges, which was exactly what they were meant to be, so he grabbed an oven mitt and pulled them out. He set the tray out on the counter and smiled, breathing in the biscuit smell.
“Alright, Dobby, while that cools, we’ve got to get the icing ready,” he ordered. Dobby nodded and bowls started to appear around him, filled with icing sugar and melted butter and various food dyes. Harry picked up a spoon and carefully began to mix some blue food colouring, then let that sit as he started another colour. Eventually, he had nine different colours of dye mixed up and the biscuits were nearly cool enough to ice. He began to pile the icing into a number of piping bags, holding them tight and then snipping the end off. He picked up a biscuit and set it down on a cutting board, picking up his bag of blue icing. This one would be a book.
Twenty minutes later, he had decorated every biscuit but the last one. He picked it up and frowned at it. It was obviously meant to be a cat, but it had gotten a bit out-of-shape in the oven and now more resembled a horse. Luckily, if he iced it with orange, it would look exactly like Crookshanks. Of course, when he did finish icing it, it looked like a house elf crossed with an acromantula — that was to say, ugly. He grinned and packaged it up anyway. Her reaction when she opened the box and saw it would be well worth the disappointment of bringing something so awful into the world.
— — —
October 1994
Harry stood over Ron’s bed like a serial killer, watching him as he slept. Ron snored loudly and Harry sighed even louder, still deliberating whether to wake up his best friend or let him keep sleeping. They’d been awake hours past curfew last night, because Ron had been bored and started to carve the soap in their bathroom with his straight razor, then Harry had joined in with his penknife and the great soap-carving competition had begun. By the time they’d realised how late it was, all five of the fourth year Gryffindor boys had been working in tense silence, huddled on the bathroom floor with any sharp object they could find in their hands. It sounded a lot more sinister than it actually was, and by the end of the night, Harry had made a beautiful swan out of vanilla-scented soap and Dean had carved a little person that now stood watch over them as they showered from the highest shelf in the bathroom. His name was Little Jeff and every boy in the dormitory would protect him with their lives.
All that to say: everyone except Harry was still sleeping and the entire dormitory smelt of peppermint and tea tree oil. Harry had been meaning to go with Ron to Hogsmeade but it seemed unlikely that anyone in the dorm would wake up before midday. He sighed and turned around, heading over to his bed and toeing into his shoes. Soon he was through the portrait hole and out of the common room towards the Entrance Hall. As he entered the hall, he spotted Hermione and a huddle of the other fourth year Gryffindor girls over by the doors. They appeared to be having great fun, giggling and hitting each other with mittens as they waited for Parvati to put on her boots. Harry bit his lip and turned away. He’d been hoping that he could go with Hermione but it seemed as if she was occupied already.
He manoeuvred around the group, blending in with a gaggle of Ravenclaws leaving the castle. If Hermione was busy then he wouldn’t bother her. But why did he feel so upset?
His shoes crunched over the cold gravel as he walked, shoulders hunched in an attempt to avoid the autumn chill. Hogsmeade appeared on the horizon and he sped up, hearing the low thrum of the bustling town in front of him. Hogsmeade was crowded when he got there and so he ducked into the closest shop he saw.
He looked around and smiled. He was surrounded by books.
Harry walked down the aisle with a quiet sort of reverence that he’d picked up from Hermione, who seemed to live and breathe words and treated every bookstore as if it was the Library of Alexandra. The shop assistant in the corner looked over at him with mild interest but he waved it away and headed towards the dusty section at the end labelled “Muggle Classics”. He’d spent many an hour listening to Hermione exclaim over the books she loved, so he could recognise about half of the titles on the shelf. They’d poured over every book in the Lord of the Rings series together and Hermione had spent most of the last February making her way through all the Jane Austen novels, even convincing him to give Pride and Prejudice a read. He hadn’t exactly enjoyed it, taking an instant disliking to Mr. Darcy, but Hermione still smiled whenever he referenced it, so he’d read it again a couple of times just to see that smile.
He ran his fingertip over the end of one particular book: Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray. It was far and away Hermione’s favourite book, and if she wasn’t working her way through every detective novel she saw, she could often be found curled up in an armchair in the library rereading her dog-eared copy of Vanity Fair. Hermione exhausted herself talking about it regularly and often went through it to find more titbits and quotations to prove her points, almost fanatical in her love for the novel. Harry took the book from the shelf and sighed, both content and a little melancholy.
Ten minutes later, he exited the store with his bag one book heavier. The crowds were still strong, so he headed toward his favourite store — Neil’s Knick-Knacks and Novelties, a curiosity shop down the end of one of Hogsmeade’s quieter streets. He’d found it by accident and it had quickly become one of the places he loved the most in the world. It was full of the oddest things both magical and muggle, courtesy of Mr. Yang (first name unknown; presumably Neil), a middle-aged Chinese man. Mr. Yang didn’t seem to care that Harry was the Boy-Who-Lived and when prompted only dryly asked Harry whether he wanted a discount for being “the famous life boy” when prompted. Harry had flushed deep red when he’d said that, but only partly from embarrassment — it was nice to be around someone that didn’t care about his fame.
The store was empty when he got there, Mr. Yang nowhere to be seen. The atmosphere in the small shop was cosy, bolstered by lanterns hanging from the ceiling and candles that created tiny wisps of smoke that curled themselves into dragons and unicorns. The towering wooden shelves were meticulously clean and filled with all manner of objects. A shelf right next to the door held a towering stack of wizarding board games and a large display case at the end of the aisle held all manners of jewellery. Just like he always did, Harry walked over to the cabinet and looked at one of the bracelets inside.
It was a gorgeous thing — a silver bangle inlaid with blue sapphires and silvery celestite gemstones — and Harry had been thinking of buying it since the second he’d first seen it. Growing up with only hand-me-downs and leftovers had taught him the value of money and he wasn’t exactly one to splurge on useless things (no matter how pretty they were), but this was something else entirely. It was a magical tradition for a girl to own a piece of jewellery with her birthstone on it, and Hermione’s birthday was in September (making her birthstone a sapphire). It all fit together so beautifully.
“Are you actually going to buy it or will you just stare at it like you always do?” Mr. Yang’s voice rang through the shop and Harry whirled around, blushing.
“I’m going to buy it,” Harry declared, looking back at the case. Mr. Yang quirked a thin eyebrow but said nothing, walking over to the cabinet and unlocking it with a tap of his wand. He motioned Harry towards the counter and set the bracelet down as Harry rummaged through his bag.
“Fifteen galleons,” Mr. Yang said, wrapping the bracelet up in crinkly blue paper.
“No dark lord discount?” Harry joked, already counting out the coins. Mr. Yang fixed him with a deadpan stare and Harry laughed, dropping the coins into the shop owner’s hand. He slid the bracelet over the counter towards him and Harry dropped it into his satchel, waving goodbye and heading down the aisle out of the shop.
He left the shop with a spring in his step and a bracelet buried deep in his satchel, wrapped in paper and tied together with hope. Hours later, he was back at the castle, his bag full of things he’d unconsciously bought. He laid it all out on his bed and sighed like a mother at a crying two year old; fond and just a bit irritated. His bed was covered in things Hermione liked. A bar of her favourite chocolate, a quill from an owl like the one she usually used, a pair of mittens the same shade as the pair she wore.
Harry peeked out of the dormitory and saw Hermione down in the common room, still surrounded by those infernal friends. He went back inside and flopped down on the bed. The time evidently wasn’t right. Someday, he’d give Hermione that bracelet.
— — —
November 1994
Hermione sat down and dropped her bag with a thump, instantly leaning forward and dropping her head into her hands. Classes were kicking her arse already — Professor McGonagall had gotten mad about the class’ tired attitudes and assigned them even more homework to get them to “perk up a bit”. Hermione had gritted her teeth and started her essay: twenty inches on the vanishing spell, with extra marks if they could put in a good guess as to where things went after they were vanished. Ten inches later, her hand was cramping and she’d almost written off the whole thing. Her grades were good enough to survive one missed assignment.
She let herself slide forward and rested her head on the table, wood cool against her skin. Her head pounded in a steady rhythm. Suddenly she could feel every fibre in her skirt tearing against her skin and the cold from the table seemed like ice. The sound of Madam Pince stamping books in the corner rose to a roaring crescendo and she grabbed at her ears, groaning under her breath and scrunching her face up. She often got so caught up in her work and forgot to drink water, so headaches plagued her waking hours. They came out of nowhere and seemed to disappear just as fast, hard knots of tension rooted at the base of her skull until she couldn’t focus anymore.
“It is too much sometimes, yes?” said a deep voice.
Hermione dragged her head up and glared mulishly at the person across the table from her, not entirely recognising them, “Who are you?”
“I…” the person sounded perplexed, “You are not recognising me?”
“No?” Hermione replied, eyes focusing enough to see a tall boy in a large red coat with brown fur, “Who are you supposed to be, Father Christmas?”
“I- I am Viktor Krum,” the boy replied. Hermione blinked until her eyes were clear, then fixed them on the boy across from her. He towered over her by at least a foot, heavyset with wide shoulders and a stocky frame. His face was very square and his jaw looked to be carved of fine white marble. He had high cheekbones and a heavy brow framing hazel eyes that were wide with confusion. Hermione could feel a stirring in her heart, but it felt a little unnatural and she pushed it down. He was very handsome, perhaps not as much as Diggory but still undeniably so. She just didn’t care, especially in her current state.
“Sure are,” Hermione said, yawning. She reached for her quill and tried to make herself keep writing the essay for transfiguration, but her hand wouldn’t cooperate. She instead hung her head again, forehead brushing against the wooden table as she hunched over.
“You do not care about me being famous,” Krum asked, sounding more and more confused. Hermione shrugged by way of a response.
“Don’t care about Quidditch,” Hermione mumbled, letting her hair fall down over her shoulder and into her face. A second later, she jumped as a warm hand cleared it away and patted her awkwardly on the shoulder. She jerked up to a sitting position and Krum took a few steps back, looking guilty.
He stammered out an apology, “I am sorry for me being overstepping! I just thought to help you, Miss…”
“Granger,” Hermione said, sighing but letting a smile play across her face, “Hermione Granger. And it’s fine, I guess.”
“You may call me Viktor, Miss. Herm… Herminny?”
“Close enough, Viktor,” Hermione laughed. Viktor laughed as well and she noticed that he was still standing there awkwardly, “You can sit down if you want.”
“I wanted just to make it sure that you were alright,” he said, sliding onto the bench across from her. Hermione smiled more brightly, massaging at her temples and feeling her headache begin to subside. She pushed her essay away and stretched until she could feel her back pop, then leaned forward and stared at Viktor.
“Yeah, I’m… just a bad headache, y’know? And I’ve got an essay to finish.”
“I could help,” offered Viktor, “I may not be knowing the most about English, but I am in final eighth year of Durmstrang and I know much about magic.”
“That would be nice,” Hermione conceded. She shoved her essay over at him and he began to read, scrunching his eyebrows when he got to the bottom and her handwriting became significantly messier. Hermione bit her lip and watched him read, feeling an odd sort of trepidation every time he frowned.
“It is good,” declared Viktor, “You read at the higher year level? This book, this “Advanced Transfigurations for the Enlightened Sorcerer”, this is for the seventh and eighth years at Durmstrang. You are very intelligent, Hermin-onion.”
“Oh, thank you,” Hermione said, blushing. It was one thing to hear that she was smart from people that knew her, but a foreign student who’d only known her for five minutes was another kind of gratification. Viktor smiled at her and stood, holding out a hand.
“There is a book that I think could help, but I am not familiar with Hogwarts library. You could help- no- could you help me find it?”
“Sure,” Hermione said, grabbing his hand and standing up from the bench, “What’s it called?”
“The Turning of the Table,” Viktor said, “I understand it is a play of the words in English. It is by Tabitha Treanchin.”
Hermione grinned in surprise. “Oh! I know exactly where that is! I took it out for some light reading last year and it seems like no one else ever takes it, so it should still be there.”
They set off into the library, already knee-deep in a conversation about switching spells. As they walked, Hermione chattered away and Viktor watched her with an almost fond smile, which was adorable on his hard features. He was so kind, despite only knowing her for ten minutes. He scratched the back of his neck for a moment and Hermione was suddenly overcome with the strongest feeling of longing as he mirrored Harry’s recurring habit. She zoned out a little, wondering where Harry was. He was probably at lunch by now, ogling at the Ravenclaw table where Cho Chang and the Beauxbatons students sat. A pang of some strange jealousy rushed through her chest and her shoulders squared as she bit her lip. She wasn’t jealous — Harry was allowed to like whoever he liked. They were just friends anyways, despite the way that her heart sometimes pounded when he did that adorable sleepy slow blink or ducked his head or tucked his hair behind his ear. They were just friends.
Viktor smiled at her and Hermione pushed her line of thinking so far down that it went through the floor and nestled comfortably somewhere in the dungeons.
“Here it is,” Hermione said, stopping and pulling out a large tome. Viktor smiled again and took the book from her.
“So, have you ever heard of the novel called the Vanishing Cat Theorem? It is pertaining to a subject like this one.” Viktor asked offhandedly. Hermione gasped and clapped her hands.
“Oh! Yes, it’s so fascinating, the way that Graysmith interweaves the inevitability of death with the logistics of the Vanishing Spell and honestly, I was so surprised by the ending, but the foreshadowing of Lady Morrow’s cat being orange was so good, and honestly-”
— — —
December 1994
“Hermy-onion.”
Hermione looked up, surprised, “Oh! Viktor, how are you?”
“I am fine,” Viktor replied, looking a little nervous. He shuffled a bit on the spot and Hermione moved over on her bench, clearing some space on the table in front of her for him to put his bag down. He sat down and sighed heavily, scratching at his head, and Hermione patted his shoulder awkwardly. “I would like to ask you something.”
Hermione blinked. “Yeah, sure, ask away.”
“Hermy-oh-na, I am enjoying the time we have been spending together. Would you go to the Yule Ball with me?”
“Oh! That’s unexpected,” Hermione said. She bit her lip and Viktor seemed to deflate, but she rushed to affirm it, “No, no, I’m not saying it’s unwelcome. I’d love to go to the ball with you, Viktor.”
“You would?” said Viktor, looking surprised. Hermione nodded, smiling. He looked down at the ground and smiled, making a happy motion with his hands and gleefully whispering something in Bulgarian.
“Yes. You’re a good friend, Viktor, and I’m sure we’ll have a great time. What will you be wearing?”
“I will wear the Durmstrang robes. They are red and brown, with fur. Is that alright?”
“Yeah,” Hermione said, smiling. Viktor sat down beside her and they worked in companionable silence — Viktor on an English workbook and Hermione on her Charms homework — as Hermione daydreamed. She hadn’t thought that anyone would ask her to the Yule Ball. When it had been announced, she’d thought Harry would ask her to go with him, but he’d almost refused to talk about it and she’d dropped the matter after a few days. She ignored the little twinge of hurt that curled inside her at Harry’s rejection (if it could even be called that, considering neither of them had asked each other to go) and smiled at Viktor before continuing to do her homework. He beamed back and Hermione internally berated herself for thinking of Harry. Viktor was lovely and brilliant and enough for her.
— — —
‘Twas a week before the Yule Ball and all through the castle, not a person was worrying except for Harry, who was really freaking out, actually. The hallways were quiet except for his frantic muttering as he paced back and forth outside the common room. He’d come up with at least twenty different ways to ask Hermione to the Yule Ball yet none of them had been quite right. Ron’s patented advice for “landing the ladies” had been to “keep it simple”, but Harry had quickly thrown that out the window, as he thought that just awkwardly shouting “Ball” at Hermione and waiting for her to catch on wouldn’t quite have the casanova effect he was hoping for. Not that Ron’s advice was proving very sound — Ron hadn’t asked anyone, nor had he been asked. When Hermione pointed out that she was a girl and that she could be asked to the Ball, he’d chuckled as if nothing could be funnier, like the thought didn’t even cross his mind. That had pissed Hermione off to no end and then all of Ron’s left socks had mysteriously gone missing. Ron had retaliated by changing out Hermione’s favourite ink for soy sauce and Hermione had stolen the few left socks she’d left Ron and replaced them with all of his right socks. After a day of wearing slightly uncomfortable socks, Ron had gotten bitter and now they weren’t speaking. In all honesty, Harry was a little exhausted.
Harry cleared his throat and turned toward the portrait hole again, then turned back around. He spun on his heel and walked to the portrait, but couldn’t even open his mouth. The Fat Lady sighed audibly and dramatically waved a hand, looking terribly bored with him.
“Oh really, do decide whether you want to go in or stay put already. It’s been thirty minutes and I’m tired,” she groaned, rolling her eyes and beginning to fan herself with an enormous grey feather fan. Harry nodded. He really was going to do it. He’d never even considered taking someone to the Ball and in all honesty, it sounded like a bit of a pain, but he and Hermione could go as friends and then the whole chorus of girls that seemed to simultaneously want both his autograph and his hand in marriage would leave him alone. He opened his mouth to say the password.
The door swung open and Harry jumped back, teetering for a second on the edge of the stairs before righting himself and looking to the portrait hole. There stood Parvati Patil, looking shocked.
“Oh, Harry!” she cried, jumping through the portrait hole toward him, “I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you! Are you okay?”
“Er, yes. Thanks, Parvati,” Harry murmured, craning his neck to see if Hermione was in the common room. He was sort of ignoring Parvati now, trying to inch past her, but she seemed determined to stay in front of him.
Parvati nodded, looking at the floor, “Um, so, I had a thing I’ve been meaning to ask you?”
“Um, okay.”
“Would you go to the Ball with me?” she blurted out. Harry blinked in surprise, trying to focus on the conversation. Parvati had asked him a question. He rehearsed his interaction with Hermione in his head.
“Er, yeah?”
“Oh, thank you, Harry!” Parvati said gleefully, beaming, “What will you wear?”
“To what?”
She looked a bit confused. “... To the ball?”
Harry furrowed his eyebrows, “Um, I’ve got some dark green dress robes. Why?”
“Because if we’re going together, we should match, right?” Parvati said, walking away. Harry nodded, feeling like he’d made a terrible mistake. He shook himself. Parvati was a lovely girl who he’d normally love to go out with. But why did he feel so disappointed?
— — —
Ron yawned as he packed up his telescope, still regretting not asking Madam Pomfrey for a sleeplessness potion. Professor Sinistra had warned them that tonight’s Astronomy lesson would end far later than usual, but he hadn’t listened and now he was paying for it. He could barely keep his eyes open and the others had already departed, bright-eyed and chattering. He yawned again, nearly missing a piece on his telescope rolling away as he closed his eyes for a few seconds.
He stumbled out of the astronomy classroom with a tired wave over his shoulder at the professor and a weak grip on the railing. He stared down at the staircase and mentally cursed Hogwarts for being a castle. The stairs were so daunting. Ron had half a mind to just lie down and barrel roll his way down, to hell with the stay in the hospital wing it would inevitably cause, but on the other hand, there was an alternate route he could probably take if he could just get his brain to work. He felt as if he’d stuck himself into a jar of cotton balls — his head was fuzzy and his movements sluggish. He rounded a corner and tried to remember which way to take. He shrugged and veered to the left, hoping that it was the correct route.
Unsurprisingly, it ended up not being the correct route. He walked through the silent corridors with a kind of heavy tiredness hanging over him like a shadow. He was just passing by the entrance to the Ravenclaw tower when he saw Luna Lovegood sitting on the floor.
“Luna?” he questioned, “Why aren’t you in your dorm?”
Luna looked up at him and smiled as if she had just noticed him, “Oh, Ron! Lovely to see you! How have you been?”
“I’ve been great, Luna. Why aren’t you in your dorm?” Ron said tiredly.
“Well, the nargles told me to come outside, but then when I tried to get back in, the door wouldn’t open. Funny how things like that happen,” she said dreamily. Ron glared at the door.
“How do you get in?” he asked. Luna shrugged.
“Usually you solve a riddle, but right now it seems to be spouting nonsense.”
Ron strode up to the door and stared hard at the eagle knocker. “Let me in.”
“It’s beautiful in the morning, yet ugly in the night. It’s fearless to the flowers, but still can pack a fright. It lives inside the darkness, yet shines like something new. If you try to steal it back, it duplicates to two. Can you solve this riddle?”
“What in the world is that supposed to mean?” Ron swore, “Bloody hell, no, I can’t ‘solve this riddle’.”
The door swung open with a click and Ron was left standing open-mouthed, staring into the Ravenclaw common room.
“Huh?”
“Don’t question it,” Luna replied, “The door works in mysterious ways.”
Ron nodded slowly, squinting at the doorknob as if it would garner him some answers. Luna got up from the floor and was heading through the door into the common room when he grabbed her hand. She turned around and stared at him curiously.
“Um, Luna?” Ron began, blushing, “You’re a really good friend and you’re, like, also my soulmate, not that that matters, I mean, it does matter, but not currently, and I was just wondering, I mean, if you wanted to-
“I’d love to go to the ball with you, Ron,” Luna said happily, “I’m wearing dark green. Remember to close your mouth, ‘cause if you leave it open then a Leaping Horgle might jump in and that’s rather unpleasant, what with the fur and everything.”
Ron snapped his mouth shut as the door swung shut behind her. He wasn’t entirely sure what had just happened, but it sounded like he’d gotten a date to the Ball.
“Yes!” he whisper-shouted, excitedly spinning around to head back to his common room, “Yes!”
In that moment, he could have reached the moon. He didn't need to, though. His moon was ten metres away, climbing the stairs to the Ravenclaw dormitories.
— — —
Hermione picked up her dress robes with a smile, running her hand over the smooth blue fabric. She’d bought the robes on a whim at the beginning of the year due to a tiny sentence in her supplies letter reminding students of the importance of formal dress robes for ‘special occasions’, which had never been mentioned before, so she’d asked for an early birthday present and brought her mother into Diagon Alley. They’d gone to a nice clothing store and had a great amount of fun. Now, she laid the dress down on her bed and stared at it in delighted awe. It was a floaty periwinkle silk organza with a satin lining in various colours to create the illusion of flowing water, and it was possibly the most beautiful thing Hermione had ever owned, aside from the cloak Harry had given her for Christmas a year ago. That was hanging up in her wardrobe on the nicest hanger she’d been able to find.
She headed into the bathroom to get ready and Lavender stuck her head in.
“Oh!” she exclaimed, seeing Hermione’s hair, “Hermione, are you not going to style your hair?”
“Why would I need to?” questioned Hermione, furrowing her brow. She turned to the mirror and stared at her hair. It was as bushy as always, brown strands frizzy and long. It reached her mid-back, as she hadn’t cut it in a hot minute, and was not coarse but not exactly soft either. She couldn’t see anything wrong with it, but it wasn’t really nice either. She shrugged and Lavender took that as an invitation to start rooting through the bathroom cupboards, pulling out a variety of brightly-coloured hair products. Hermione gulped.
In a few minutes, Lavender had gotten Hermione to sit on a stool and brush her hair out, and had lined up an array of products. She began to part Hermione’s hair and, unbidden, Hermione felt herself relaxing. This wasn’t so bad — if anything, it was sort of fun. Lavender’s hands were steady and warm, and she hummed as she worked, some wizarding song that crackled out from the old radio in the dormitory. She squeezed a bit of gel from a bottle labelled ‘Sleekeazy’s Hair Potion’ and started to work it through Hermione’s hair; it took only a few minutes before Hermione’s hair was glossy with a sheen she’d never had before. It curled in pretty waves and Hermione reached up a hand to run over it before Lavender could bat it away. Soon, Lavender began to twist and braid and lift her hair, creating some sort of beautiful bun on the back of her head. A few strands swirled around her ears and a section of silky locks tumbled down over one shoulder.
“There it is,” Lavender said, smiling, “That’s why you’d need to.”
Hermione stared at herself in the mirror. She looked, for lack of a better word, beautiful. It was as if she was seeing herself in a new light as some lovely girl smiled back at her from the mirror. Lavender patted her shoulder, gently pushing her off the stool and out of the bathroom. “Now go get dressed, lovergirl, you’ve got a school to impress.”
Hermione grinned, “Thanks, Lavender! It’s… it’s…”
“Gorgeous, I know. That dress isn’t going to wear itself!”
Hermione laughed and ducked out of the room as Lavender rolled her eyes. She was right — tonight, Hermione Granger was going to impress if it was the last thing she did. Who cared that normally she was a plain bookworm? This was her night to shine like they’d never seen before.
— — —
January 1995
The Christmas holidays at Hogwarts were usually quiet and peaceful — Harry could routinely go a full day without having seen more than five people (except at mealtimes) — but this year, the deadline for leaving had come and gone and yet the corridors were crowded as always and the dormitories were pleasantly noisy. New Year’s Eve during the holidays was usually a quiet affair, but this year everyone was rearing up for truly rambunctious celebrations and some good old rule breaking.
The halls were alive with the sound of magic as a group of squealing second years ran down the corridor, waving wands lit up with sparkler charms. Harry smiled fondly after them, remembering his own excitement when Professor Sinistra had taught them the charm as a treat just before the Christmas holidays in his second year. Apparently she was still doing that, to the consternation of Professor Sprout, who was shouting after the group of students to slow down and not to run with lit wands. A sixth year in a corner put down his book and cast a charm that made a little dragon made of light dance through the air and the professor just sighed, turning away and reluctantly calling a reminder of the ‘no magic in the halls’ rule over her shoulder. Harry continued down the hall towards his destination — he and Ron were to meet with Fred and George for some reason they wouldn’t say. He darted down a corridor toward the Great Hall, intending to cross through it to meet Ron near their designated meeting spot, but stopped to see him in the middle of the hall, laughing with Hermione.
He crossed over to them. “Hermione, what are you doing here? I thought you were helping Professor Flitwick chase the Yule Ball fairies out of the candles?”
“Well…” Hermione mumbled, blushing and gesturing at the enormous double doors at the end of the hall, “The first years over there are having a snowball fight and Fay’s offered me two Galleons to help out her little sister Georgina, ‘cause she said she would, but she had a last minute tutoring job and, well, two Galleons is two Galleons.”
Ron nodded wisely and Harry looked around for said first years. He saw them immediately; there was a giant group of nearly seventy tiny boys and girls over near the doors to the hall, pulling on coats and mittens. There was a great deal of chatter happening and Harry leaned toward the crowd to overhear one particularly exuberant boy with mismatched mittens extolling his skill at creating perfectly round snowballs. He did a double take and stopped focusing on the boy, instead looking at the sheer number of students in the group.
“They’re all first years?” Harry asked, marvelling at the huge group, “There certainly weren’t that many when we were sorted; there’s only about forty of us!”
“Baby boom,” Ron said simply, “You should ask how many of them were born in August of 1982.”
Hermione cackled and Harry mulled over the answer for a moment before blushing bright red. “R-really? But how?”
“You see, Harry,” began Hermione, nearly unable to stop laughing, “When a mummy and a daddy love each other very much-”
“-Ugh,” Harry groaned, dropping his head into his hands. He could hear Ron and Hermione high-fiving and dissolving into peals of laughter. He sighed loudly and got up to leave, but Ron pulled him back toward the two, who had finally calmed down.
“You’re a bloody hero, Harry,” Ron congratulated, cackling, “Single-handedly doubling the birth rate of 1982!”
“Oh, come off it, Ron,” Harry said despairingly, “Bye, Hermione.”
Hermione waved goodbye and Ron hurried to catch up to Harry. Not having forgiven the redhead quite yet, he quickly got faster and faster until he was nearly sprinting out of the hall, Ron shouting and cursing behind him. He laughed brightly and ran out of the hall and to the right toward their meeting place. He stopped there and caught his breath while he watched Ron follow at a leisurely jog. Ron, seeing Harry looking at him, rolled his eyes in an exaggerated manner, but Harry laughed.
He turned to the portrait on the wall next to him. It was of a young girl in a blue dress resting in an armchair while her very large dog lay at her feet. She sat in a Victorian-era library with one large window to her left, which kept up with the real world and was currently showing a flurry of snowfall. On the bottom of the frame sat a metal plate, proclaiming her name to be Olivia.
“Hello, Olivia,” Harry said politely. The girl in the portrait blinked lazily a couple of times, stretching before smiling radiantly and waving at Harry.
“Hello, Harry,” she replied, “How are you?”
He shrugged, “As to be expected. You?”
“As to be expected,” she parroted back, “Chester’s feeling a bit under the weather but that’s just because it’s cold out.”
Harry looked down at the painted dog at her feet. Chester didn’t appear to have changed at all over the four years Harry had seen the portrait, and to be honest, the only indication that he wasn’t a particularly chunky rug was that his nose occasionally twitched with a particularly heavy breath. He nodded anyway. “Give him my best wishes for his recovery.”
“That’s very kind of you, Harry, I’ll make sure to do so.”
Ron walked over then, and after saying goodbye to Olivia, they set off at a good pace toward the disused classroom they’d be meeting Fred and George in. They got there ahead of time and a few minutes passed before Fred, George, and two other boys in their year came sauntering in, heads together. Upon seeing them, Fred cleared his throat and began to talk.
“Hello, gentlemen. As you all know, it is New Year’s Eve and that means we’re morally obligated to pull off some shenanigans. After that thing last year with the Devil’s Snare in the teacher’s lounge, we’re going with something a little different. Rest in peace, Professor Snape’s favourite chair, burned but never forgotten–” he saluted with a solemn expression“–and always in our hearts. Anyway, this year, we were going to set off fireworks on the grounds, but the dastardly and conniving Mr. Filch stole them, and that is where you come in, Harold and Ronald. You will help us to execute our miraculous plan, courtesy of Oscar, of which there is no doubt of it working.”
“Is this ‘miraculous plan’ even going to work?” Harry muttered to Ron. He shrugged and turned back to Fred, who was wrapping up his big, exciting speech.
"We are going to pull off the true crime of the day. We are going to steal back our fireworks!” Fred crowed, pumping a fist into the air like something from a teen movie. Harry clapped half-heartedly, but Ron and the twins’ two friends cheered for a few seconds before calming. Harry raised a hand and Fred nodded.
“Crime?”
“Eh, not so much a crime…” George clarified, “Just… some friendly rule breaking. Trust me, everyone’s doing it. Take it away, Oscar.”
Ron muttered something that sounded suspiciously like ‘peer pressure’ and Harry snorted. No one else seemed to hear and soon they were onto the plan, for which Oscar Havelock, one of the twins’ friends, had conjured a large blackboard and was marking out a large upside down T with Filch’s office being represented by a circle in the middle of the bottom line. Each of the three corridors you could use to reach Filch’s office was marked with increasingly squiggly doodles of what Harry supposed were meant to be people but seemed more like cave paintings done by someone who really should have been eaten by a sabre-toothed tiger long ago. Harry didn’t exactly have high hopes for the plan.
“Now, Fred and George, you’re the trouble-making trio,” Havelock said assuredly, to which the twins nodded vigorously, “Everybody will be expecting theatrics from you, so that’s exactly what you’ll be doing. At promptly 7:15, Filch is wrapping up in his office and getting ready for his rounds, so you two will do everything you can to draw him into the east corridor and hopefully into the courtyard at the end. Bernie, you and I will be having a large and expressive argument in the north corridor in order to stop the prefect there from completing his route and patrolling the west corridor. Ron, you’ll be taking care of Mrs. Norris by levitating catnip into her path at one metre intervals as she leaves the office to go begin her patrol with Filch. If you don’t pull it off, she’ll be able to smell Potter going into the office. And Potter, the twins tell me you’ve got some form of invisibility, like disillusionment or something. I don’t really mind, you keep your secrets, but as soon as the distractions are happening and Mrs. Norris is subdued, you get in and out. The fireworks should be in the top drawer of his left filing cabinet. They’re bright orange, you can’t miss them. Everyone good on the plan?”
Harry nodded. He had to begrudgingly admit that despite his earlier reservations, it was a good plan. Extremely complicated, yes, but a plan that accounted for everything. The bell for dinner rang and they dispersed from the room in pairs, Harry and ROn rushing to dinner while the other four hung back — it wouldn’t do to have the whole plan foiled because some professor saw them all coming in as a group and connected the dots.
The New Year’s feast was one of the more spectacular things Harry had seen in his lifetime. Dishes across the tables were piled high with everything Harry could have wanted — steaming whole chickens, racks of tender beef ribs, and chunky slices of lamb made up most of the meats, while platters of salads and greens were scattered around, surrounded by bottles of dressing labelled with every sauce under the sun. Great dishes of roasted potatoes were placed every few metres and were accompanied by boats of thick brown gravy, while gravity-defying towers of dinner rolls were the centrepiece of every table. The house elves had evidently branched away from the confines of traditional British fare, as huge bowls of noodles in decadent broths took their place on the table, as well as thick, orange lentil dahls and piles of roti and naan baked into shapes that shouldn’t have been possibly, like stars and wizard’s hats. Harry enjoyed the feast to the fullest, revelling in the sound of vibrant conversation all around, but couldn’t help but feel a little apprehensive. As soon as the feast concluded and the clock struck 7:00, Harry raced up to his dormitory and grabbed his invisibility cloak before hurrying down to the classroom they’d met in.
The atmosphere there was tense but jovial as the group looked forward to what they were about to do. It was only a minute of waiting before George’s wand started to glow in the telltale sign of Filch entering his office to prepare for his rounds and the twins ducked out, grinning and clutching at their full pockets. Oscar and Bernie were out next and then it was just Harry and Ron in the room together. Harry pulled on his invisibility cloak and then they were off through the corridors. Ron opened a giant bag of catnip as he walked and Harry wrinkled his nose. Ron laughed silently as they neared Filch’s office and Harry ducked into an alcove to wait for his part.
“Wish me luck,” Ron mouthed. Harry nodded and then Ron disappeared behind a tapestry just as Filch’s door opened. The caretaker stepped out, shrugging on his coat, and immediately loud bangs and pops were heard from the courtyard at the end of the east corridor. Filch swore something terrible and fumbled with his keys, barely locking the door before he was hobbling towards the commotion. There was the sound of a small explosion in the courtyard and then the catflap on the bottom swung open and a disgusting ball of patchy hair and rough skin disguised as a cat shambled its way out. Mrs. Norris was on the prowl.
Harry watched as a little ball of catnip shot out from behind Ron’s tapestry and right into Mrs. Norris’ path. The scraggly cat sniffed the air and trotted toward the ball away from the office so Harry began his move. He slipped over to the office door, poking his wand out of his cloak. He cast an Unlocking Charm under his breath and stilled as Mrs. Norris turned toward the hushed sound, but then another ball came flying out from the tapestry and she turned back. Harry thanked his lucky Rons and opened the door, heading inside Filch’s office.
The room was dark but Harry couldn’t risk turning the light on. Instead, he whispered a quiet “Lumos” and headed toward a filing cabinet on the left. He pulled on the top drawer but panicked as the whole cabinet started to tip forward. He heard inside the telltale fizzling of a firework being lit and swore bountifully, pulling the top drawer open and shoved his hands deep into the assorted mess of contraband within. He found the fireworks immediately, seeing as one of them was now fizzling and making a progressively louder higher whining noise. Harry grabbed the fireworks he could and ran.
Harry closed the door behind him with more force than was necessary and practically sprinted down the north corridor past Oscar and Bernie, who were now putting on a duel that very obviously had no heart in it. The sound of an explosion rang out and there was a shout behind him from Filch’s office. He ran a little faster. Hurrying around the corner, he had just gotten out of visible range when he smashed right into someone. He fell flat on his butt and swore as he dropped the fireworks, looking up to see Susan Bones, a Hufflepuff in his year, also on the ground. In front of her across the floor was a pile of wormwood that she’d evidently dropped and Harry struggled to figure out why she had so much of it before the other shoe dropped. Wormwood was a hallucinogen.
Susan Bones was smuggling drugs.
“You saw nothing,” Harry hissed, glaring at her with the best impression of Professor McGonagall’s threatening stare he could do.
Susan glared right back, scrambling around on the ground for the last pieces of the wormwood she’d dropped. “No, you saw nothing.”
“So we both saw nothing.”
“Saw what?” Susan said innocently, looking around. Harry rolled his eyes.
“See you in Herbology next week.”
“The holiday homework’s ten inches on the eight major uses of Shrivelfigs,” replied Susan, “Just in case you forgot.”
“Thanks,” said Harry, smiling, "Don't get too high.”
“No one can stop me,” Susan retorted bravely. Harry nodded and Susan hurried off, arms full of wormwood. The clock tower showed 7:30 and Harry marvelled at just how quickly they’d accomplished their task. A prefect was now yelling at Oscar and Bernie, and shouts were still ringing out from the courtyard the twins were in, but Mrs. Norris was nowhere to be seen and Ron had hightailed it out of there as soon as he’d seen Harry close the door. Laden with fireworks, Harry turned and headed back to Gryffindor Tower.
Four hours later, the merry band of thieves were sitting in the common room as Fred and George put on their winter coats. They said their goodbyes and disappeared out into the corridor, and the rest of the Gryffindors crowded around every window facing south. At fifteen minutes to midnight, one of the second years shouted and pointed out a few moving figures down on the grounds nearby and everyone hurried to watch the twins set out a large number of fireworks good distances apart and attach them to fuses in an incomprehensible mess of string. As soon as midnight struck and the boisterous countdown in the common room had finished, there was the glow of a wand in the dark and the deafening whine of fireworks filled the night air. Almost instantly there was another figure out on the grounds of Professor McGonagall came striding out, holding a tall glass of sherry and looking visibly exasperated. Harry bit his lip in sympathy for the twins but promptly forgot about them, because at that moment the first fireworks went up.
It was a sight to behold. Harry had never really seen the fireworks before, because he was usually left in his cupboard over New Year’s or even banished from the house if the Dursleys were throwing a party, but no one in Little Whinging really did fireworks. They’d been too loud and showy for most of the ‘respectable’ families, and any illegal ones had been set off in the forest nearby but never near enough for Harry to see them. For those reasons, the fireworks the twins had set off seemed all the more spectacular. They went up in great streaks of screaming colour then exploded into moving pictures that could have rivalled the most beautiful painting; a lion shook its mane and roared as a unicorn of pure silver light cantered by to its left. Brilliant lights of every colour whirled through the air like torpedoes doing a ballet, brighter than the sun and more vibrant and radiant than a sunset. It was a dazzling display.
Harry reached over and Ron silently put an arm over his shoulders. Hermione leaned in to his left and they stared out at the sky long after all the fireworks had fizzled out.
— — —
February 1995
Hermione was in Arithmancy class when a small Hufflepuff boy knocked on the door. Professor Vector paused her lecture and called him in, to which he handed her a note and left.
“Ms. Granger? You’re wanted in the headmaster’s office,” said the professor, handing her the note. Hermione bit her lip and began to pack up her notes, shoving them into her bag and slinging it over her shoulder. She left the classroom with a wave over her shoulder and spent the walk through the corridors toward Headmaster’s Dumbledore’s office reading the note over and over for some kind of indication as to what she was wanted for. She couldn’t think of any reason that she’d be wanted there. Hopefully it wasn’t bad news. Her breath caught in her throat as she thought of all the dangerous stunts that Harry pulled every year and she walked a little faster. If he was dead, she’d kill him. But then again, it was only two days before the second task. Maybe they were asking for her to make sure that Harry had figured out his clue?
In only a few moments, she’d reached the entrance to Dumbledore’s office, a large alcove containing an ugly stone gargoyle. Hermione stared blankly up at the statue. The password evaded her grasp like Professor Snape evading teaching regulations. She heard footsteps coming down the corridor to her left and turned to see Ron coming toward her, holding a note. She tilted her head and he did the same, eyes briefly flickering over to the gargoyle before he looked back at her. She held up her note and he mirrored her.
“You got one too,” he observed, “What do you think it’s for?”
“It might be about Harry,” replied Hermione. She glimpsed a flash of panic briefly cross his face before he schooled his expression and shrugged.
“Could be.” he turned to the gargoyle. “Treacle toad.”
The gargoyle groaned but dutifully began to turn on the spot, revealing a spiral staircase made of speckled grey stone. Ron gestured Hermione forward and she nervously climbed the stairs up to the landing, where a large set of oaken double doors stood, intimidating in their grandness. She reached out a hand then took a shaky breath and pushed a door open.
Dumbledore’s office was a large circular room filled with floor-to-ceiling bookshelves and dotted with gilded windows. Portraits filled the entire back wall and many small circular tables were scattered around the room, littered with gilded and bejewelled instruments puffing out smoke and making little dings and whirring noises. At the back of the room, marked by several enormous marble columns, was a raised dais with several steps leading up to it. On the dais behind a vast wooden desk sat Dumbledore, smiling. Professor McGonagall stood to his left, looking worried, with Karkaroff and Madam Maxime standing on the other side of the desk. A tiny blonde girl who looked all of eight stood in front of Maxime and close to McGonagall stood Cho Chang, the seeker for the Ravenclaw Quidditch team. The older girl waved nervously at Hermione and she waved back before looking over at the assembled crowd. Everyone but Professor Dumbledore looked strained and Hermione traded cautious looks with Ron before they both entered the room.
“Ah! Ms. Granger, Mr. Weasley, I’m so glad that you could join us,” the headmaster exclaimed, “Oh, I won’t be able to hear you talk if you stand that far back, do come a bit further forward and forgive an old man his loss of hearing.”
Hermione shuffled closer. McGonagall cleared her throat, turning toward Dumbledore. “Are you sure that Ms. Granger shouldn’t be Mr. Potter’s task?”
“Sorry?” said Hermione, raising an eyebrow, “What’s going on?”
Professor Dumbledore ignored her. Professor McGonagall gave her a smile that was probably meant to be kind but instead seemed more like he was trying and failing to swallow a cough drop and was now stuck with it halfway down his throat but was standing in front of someone he was trying to impress so he was just pretending he was fine while sort of not being able to breath — that was to say, the awkward discomfort of acting fine when you feel a bit off but don’t want to make a big deal of it. Cho fidgeted on the spot. Hermione raised her other eyebrow.
“I apologise for any discomfort this causes,” said Professor Dumbledore calmly. Hermione opened her mouth to question what in God’s name was going on but before she could, Dumbledore snapped his fingers and she felt herself falling over. For a moment, she was back in that corridor outside the library, body turning to stone, the swirling iris of a monster imprinted in her vision. She felt herself panic before there was another snap and she fell into some strange sort of limbo where she was half-awake. She couldn’t speak, couldn’t move, couldn’t breath, not entirely there, but she was grasping on to the little bit of consciousness she had like a lifeline. It was if she was encased in honey, the air thick and immovable, liquid pooling in her lungs. She was vaguely aware of things passing by her at a snail’s pace but she couldn’t reach out and touch them. Her fragile hold on her own mind started to wane then she was floating in a state of terrible uncertainty and blissful oblivion.
Time didn’t seem to be passing, but perhaps it was. She didn’t know where she was or what was happening, but she had the strange sensation of water passing around her and then she was awake. She gasped desperately at the air, water dripping from her lips, yanked from the viscous liquid she’d been floating in far too suddenly. She looked around wildly but dirty green water stretched in every direction and she couldn’t begin to comprehend where she was. She could feel herself begin to sink and started to shake, seeing a blurry blob in the distance. The thunderous roar of a thousand voices filled her ears, and she abruptly became aware of a hand on her arm pulling her through the water. She blinked slowly, overwhelmed. The world seemed tilted on its side and entirely too much. Then comprehension slapped her across the face and she was floating in the Black Lake, Viktor Krum dragging her towards a giant spectator stand rising out of the water and Hermione felt everything fall into place. Her prediction had been right — this was the second task.
Viktor looked over at her and Hermione blanched as he smiled, teeth unnaturally long and pointy. They got to the spectator stand and he pulled her out of the water onto a wooden platform. Hermione gasped and spluttered, unnaturally cold, and clutched the wooden planks of the platform as hard as she could. She felt a nail break and winced.
A moment later, Cedric Diggory’s head breached the surface of the lake and Cho Chang’s with it. They paddled over to the platform and Hermione resonated with the lost, despairing look in the other girl’s eyes. She reached out a hand and Hermione took it, pulling her up and out of the water. They sat there on the platform for at least twenty more minutes, shivering and wrapped in towels as Madam Pomfrey fussed over them. Hermione said nothing, even when Viktor came over to see her. Fleur Delacour stood off to the side weeping and Hermione thought of the little blonde girl in Dumbledore’s office, and then wondered what would happen when the giant clock hit the hour mark and the time was up. What would happen to Ron, who’d been there in the office with her and was Harry’s ‘task’? What would happen to Harry?
The chattering voices in the stands reached a crescendo when the clock struck an hour and Harry had not yet resurfaced with his ‘hostage’, yet Hermione sat and waited. Sitting there on the platform, Fleur sobbing behind her, Cho holding Cedric’s hand to her right, she still waited.
— — —
March 1995
“Mr. Potter, this is unacceptable work,” Professor Sinistra reprimanded, “You’ve mixed up Libra and Aquila again , despite my instruction on how to tell them apart the last time you made this mistake, and in regards to your penmanship, it looks like you spent about ten minutes in total on the whole essay-”
“-But Professor, I’m trying to figure out the third task for the tournament!” Harry interjected, wiggling around on his chair.
“A tournament you should not be in!” the professor exclaimed, looking over her glasses at him, “I do not believe that you put your name in the Goblet, but no matter who or what entered you, you should not be in it. The tournament is made up of only of-age students not just because they are able to complete the tasks with the plentiful amount of knowledge they have over underage students, but also because they can be trusted to take care of their work in a timely manner and have shown an ability in time management and delegation. You, Mr. Potter, are a fourth year. You haven’t even taken your OWLs yet, and by the look of this essay, you’re not even going to get to fifth year. I certainly hope that you’re putting more effort than this into your other classes, because otherwise there’s no way that you’ll pass your exams. Do I make myself clear, Mr. Potter?”
“Yes, Professor,” Harry said sourly, pulling the essay over the desk toward him.
“Seeing as you can’t seem to exercise proper time management by yourself, I suggest asking another student to tutor you,” the professor said, not looking at him anymore as she rearranged some papers on her desk, “That is all.”
Harry nodded and shoved the offending essay into his bag as he tried not to storm out of the room. He failed a little and the professor made an affronted noise as he closed the door a little too hard behind himself. He strode down the hall with heavy footfalls, stewing in his own self-pity. It was true that he’d been neglecting his schoolwork a little as the third task loomed closer, and Astronomy had been one of the first to go. He had, in fact, completed the essay in ten minutes, only remembering that it existed at all a half hour before class and hurriedly writing it down on the first bit of spare parchment he could find.
He walked back to Gryffindor Tower, wrought with worries. Everyone in Gryffindor was either fawning over him because of his recent win at the second task or utterly dismayed at the fact that he was a champion. Even Ron had let jealousy take hold of him, leaving only Harry and Hermione.
Hermione! That was someone he could ask to tutor him. She’d been helping him with every task of the tournament, an invaluable help every time he got despondent and whined about still having to do work despite the stress of being a champion. He felt a pang of guilt about stealing Hermione away from her own schoolwork. She wasn’t the champion and it wasn’t her responsibility to help him, yet she did anyway. She’d never even wavered in her determination to be useful.
Harry murmured the password and the portrait swung open. Hermione looked up from her seat over near the fire and waved, Ron awkwardly waving next to her. Harry pressed his mouth into a thin line and forced himself not to stomp as he walked over, collapsing into the chair and groaning dramatically.
“She wasn’t happy?” Ron asked, leaning back in his chair.
Harry shook his head, pressing his fists against his eyes. “No, she says I should get some other student to help me…”
“Good luck with that,” Ron said sympathetically before going back to his homework. Hermione bit her bottom lip and looked over at the fire.
“Hermione, can you help me with Astronomy?” asked Harry. Hermione gnawed even harder on her lip. “Are you alright, ‘Mione?”
“It’s just… I’m always telling you to do your homework and you roll your eyes and- and I just think you should have listened to me.”
“Oh,” Harry said shortly. He looked at the ground
“I’ll still help you,” Hermione countered, “But you’ve got to start studying more.”
“Alright then, Hermione,” said Harry, cracking a grin. Hermione smiled wryly back at him. He reached for his bag to get out his Astronomy work and soon they were pouring over star charts. Hermione pulled out her flashcards and every half minute, she’d hold one up and Harry would squint at it until the constellation was imprinted on his brain. They studied for a few hours, working past curfew and into their Potions essays as well. Eventually, night fell across the common room and the grounds. The trickle of students leaving the common room slowed and then stopped as everyone but Harry and Hermione left for bed. They remained there, eyes heavy and legs growing numb in their seats, lost in a content bubble of ink and parchment. As eleven o’clock struck and Ron stuck his head out from the dormitory to check on them, only Hermione’s low murmuring voice and the crackling and spitting of the fireplace could be heard.
“Well,” Hermione said, stretching her legs, “We should probably get to bed now.”
Harry jerked awake, not realising his eyes were closed. Constellations danced across his vision and facts about the uses of conch shells in restorative potions spun around his head until he was dizzy. He blinked blearily, rubbing at his eyes, then began to close up his ink as Hermione rolled up her parchment. The air was warm with a companionable silence and Harry basked in the simple pleasure of Hermione’s presence.
Hermione stood up slowly and headed over to the stairs as Harry finished packing up. As he shoved a bottle of ink into his bag, his hand brushed against something cold in the bottom and he grabbed hold of it. Pulling it out, he looked at the celestite bracelet in his hand and contemplated it. This seemed like an opportune time.
"Er… Hermione?" Harry mumbled, shuffling over to the staircase, “This is for you.”
He held out the bracelet and Hermione took it with a delighted gasp, holding it up and watching the lantern light reflect off the inlaid gemstones.
“Oh! Thank you, Harry,” Hermione said sincerely, smiling down at the bracelet as if he’d given her sun, “It’s… it’s so lovely.”
Harry blushed and ducked his head, heading up the stairs. He saw Hermione doing the same thing and waved to her just as she disappeared from view. She waved back and Harry admired the bracelet on her wrist. It looked good on her.
He ambled into the dormitory, realising as he saw the prone forms of his roommates just how late it was. He took a shower as quietly as he could, but as he was leaving the bathroom, Neville woke up and looked at him. Harry waved and Neville smiled lazily before promptly falling back asleep. Harry got into bed quickly and sighed in comfort at the pleasant sensation. Dean rolled onto his side and Ron huffed in his sleep. He closed his eyes and made a noise of contentment as he wiggled further into the bed. It took only a few seconds for him to succumb to the welcome embrace of sleep.
— — —
April 1995
“How dare you,” Ron snarled, glaring at Hermione’s smirking face, “How dare you say that to me.”
“It’s the truth and you know it,” she retorted, folding her arms over her chest.
Harry nodded. “I’m sorry, Ron, it’s true. You’ve got to accept it.”
Ron pouted, all the wind taken out of his sails, “It’s not that noticeable.”
“Mate,” Harry said despairingly, “I’d be able to clock you anywhere. Your hair’s just that recognisable.”
Ron narrowed his eyes before spinning on his heel and leaving the room. He looked over his shoulder and grinned. “Meet me outside the common room in an hour. I’ve got a better place for us.”
He left the room with a smirk across his face, just catching Harry’s resigned look towards Hermione. He whistled as he walked down the hall, suddenly jaunty. He knew just how to retaliate.
The day had started well enough; there was french toast at breakfast, Lorelei Martin’s cat had sat on his lap for a good half hour, and he’d polished his school shoes in record time. It had been a breezy Saturday morning and he’d been prepared to spend it taking a brisk walk around the grounds and visiting all his favourite places. He’d gotten an hour into his walk before he realised something was wrong.
Harry and Hermione had been plotting something the night before, but he hadn’t paid any attention to it. He probably should have. Harry and Hermione apparently decided to start a little competition, because at least one of them seemed to be popping up in every place he went and shouting “found him!”. After a few hours, he’d gotten paranoid and gone to the library, only to be startled when he pulled a book out from a shelf and saw Harry’s grinning face behind it, hissing “found him” before scampering away. When Ron had turned the corner in an attempt to catch him, he’d heard a whizzing sound over his shoulder and turned to see Hermione standing there, smirking like a horror movie villain. True to the cliché, she’d disappeared the moment Ron had taken his eyes off her. He’d escaped onto the grounds, yet had been followed until he cornered both of them in a classroom and confronted them. Apparently, Seamus had made an offhand comment calling Ron’s hair “a beacon in the darkest of times”, and the two had taken that to the extreme. Well, Ron would show them. He’d show them both.
He strolled up the stairs, humming a tune Charlie liked to play on the radio. Eventually, he would lead Harry and Hermione to the southern part of the sixth floor corridor, an abandoned place full of Doxies and Vexies that was accumulating dust, but first he had to gather his supplies.
He murmured the password and ducked into the common room, looking around. He heard laughing from outside and looked out to see a large group of Gryffindors playing some sort of ball game down on the lawn. He squinted and made out the forms of Fred, George, Lee Jordan, and Kenneth Towler chatting amongst themselves.
Showtime.
He climbed the stairs two at a time, passing his own dormitory as he climbed further up towards the sixth year dorm. The door creaked as he nudged it open and he looked around in panic, but true to his observations, no one was inside. He shot a look out the window, making sure that the residents of the dorm he was breaking into were occupied. They were still present and accounted for, so he knelt down in front of Fred’s trunk, looking at the catch. It sparked with magic and Ron grimaced before pulling out his wand.
“Collustrus,” he whispered. The trunk began to glow red in several places and Ron cursed, waving his wand in another spell. “Omittus Caesum. Omittus Caesum.”
The lights began to flicker and dim as Ron carefully disarmed each trap. They would have worked on anyone else, however Ron was nothing if not strategic. He’d sequestered himself in a corner as Fred was buying the book that contained all the enchantments for a magically locked trunk, then had promptly stolen it. Thus, he knew the counterspell to the complicated protective charms over the twins’ trunks. Honestly, what use was a giant snake that leapt out of the trunk and transformed into a net when you had a simple two-word spell that turned it off?
The last of the lights flickered out and Ron opened the trunk with bated breath. He sighed in relief when nothing exploded and set about rummaging in the trunk. He found what he was looking for quickly and shoved it into his pocket before hurriedly closing the trunk and leaving. As he walked down the stairs, Lee Jordan passed him and Ron pleaded with himself not to be suspicious as he tried to walk down the stairs normally. It seemingly worked, and he was out of the common room just in time to meet Harry and Hermione.
He greeted them with a mischievous smile and soon they were on their way up to the sixth floor.
Ron grabbed at the bag in his pocket, spinning around and dangling it out in front of him. Harry and Hermione looked at each other, rightfully confused. Hermione raised an eyebrow.
“Welcome…” Ron announced, opening the bag and grabbing a handful of the Peruvian Instant Darkness Powder inside, “to Hide and Seek.”
He threw the powder and the room was instantly engulfed in an inky blackness, as if night had fallen all of a sudden over the corridor. Ron darted away, wand held up in a Lumos. He heard Harry and Hermione scrambling around behind him and shouting in confusion. Ducking behind a large piece of furniture, he folded himself into a tiny gap and cleared his throat.
“Sonorous,” he whispered, and soon his voice filled the room, “Try to find me now, wankers.”
Hermione groaned through the darkness and it echoed down the hall. “What the hell is this, Ron?”
“You said you could find me anywhere. Well, it’s time to prove it. You have two minutes before the powder dissipates, then you can try to find me. Watch out for the vexies, though,” he laughed, “Quietus.”
He settled into his corner just as a shriek rang out from the other side of the corridor. Looking around the room yielded the hilarious sight of Hermione trying to shake a vexy off her shoe while Harry shot blast after blast of air out of his wand towards it. Both looked blatantly panicked and Ron curled up further in on himself in an attempt to stop laughing.
Vexies were annoying little pests but not particularly dangerous, only able to yowl and spit piles of dust. On the other hand, they wreaked havoc on clothing and Hermione’s robes were now speckled with dust. She let out a yell of frustration and the vexy dissolved under a stream of conjured water.
“Ronald!” she yelled and it echoed around the room. Ron smirked and pulled the hood of his cloak up, masking his distinctive orange hair from view. Now all he resembled was a lump of black cloth stuck in a corner. The final dregs of the powder dissipated and Ron made out Harry and Hermione’s dust-covered forms turning away from him and heading towards the end of the corridor where a large pile of broken furniture lay. Ron grinned. He’d looked there as an option for his hiding spot but had left it alone after spotting a large pile of dust that was most likely infested with vexies.
Harry reached for a chair and a mushroom cloud of dust erupted from the end of the room, Hermione shouted in alarm and Ron grinned, safe in his hiding spot, as she came running past, swearing like a sailor and conjuring streams of water towards the eight vexies chasing after her.
— — —
May 1995
“Just a little closer… come on…” Ron cajoled Harry and Hermione, pulling them over the lawn towards a tree, “Come on! This shouldn’t take all day.”
“Calm down, Ron,” Harry laughed. Ron looked at him innocently and tugged hard on his arm until he stumbled forward. Hermione stabilised him as Ron darted behind the tree. There was a great shuffling and Harry and Hermione exchanged a weary look before Ron’s freckled face popped out from behind the tree, illuminated by the spring sunshine. He was carrying a large, heavy picnic basket stuffed to the brim with food — even from a few metres away, Harry could see and smell a delightful leg of lamb and several small bowls of potatoes. A few napkins broke free from the basket and were swept away into the wind, the trio running after them and laughing. They were unsuccessful in catching the napkins, which had flown on towards the Quidditch pitch, but had soon wandered down into a little clearing near the forbidden forest that was bathed in a pleasantly sunlit warmth.
Spring was in full bloom. Rays of gentle sunlight dappled the ground and fresh flowers dotted the soft grass. The trees of the forbidden forest seemed less foreboding in this light, instead casting a gradient of shadow across the edges of the clearing. The sound of laughter echoed over the grounds as a group of first years took one of their last flying lessons of the year — Madam Hooch was relaxing on the stands with a tall glass of lemonade
It had been a year since they’d last had a picnic together, because every year seemed to be stuffed full of homework and adventures that left them no time to really spend time with each other. He was of two minds about his relationship with Ron and Hermione. Harry often felt as if he was drifting away from his friends due to the troubles that always seemed to find him, and sometimes it seemed that as if the only things they really did with each other were classes, homework, and meals, never the friendly sort of fun that they only got up to occasionally. He tried to make time to hang out with them, scared that if he acted too distant they’d think he didn’t need him and find other people. He did need them — they were his best friends. On the other hand, if he acted too needy with them, they might think he was being a baby and leave him alone.
Once, during his second year of primary school, he’d made a friend who Dudley couldn’t intimidate. Her name was Laura, and she was the bravest person Harry had ever met. She showed up to school every day with skinned knees and finger-shaped bruises, carrying a lunch box full of plain white bread and wearing a necklace made of braided twine. Her father was in the military and her mother a drunkard, but she was stronger than anyone else and not afraid to stand up to Dudley’s playground taunts (to be fair, “Lazy Laura” and “Hairy Harry” were not exactly the hardest insults to fend off). She'd been brilliant at sketching and a crude drawing of an eight year old Harry was tucked in the back sleeve of his photo album. She’d been Harry’s best friend for seven months.
One day, Dudley had pushed him over into a puddle. He’d just sat there, crying, as Laura fended Dudley off. She hadn’t helped him up. Instead, she had gotten mad at Harry for not standing up for himself, calling him a weak, needy baby and telling him to fight his own battles. They hadn’t spoken much after that, and soon she’d moved to Greater Whinging. After Harry went to Hogwarts, he’d nearly forgotten about her, caught up in magic and friends and the wondrous feeling of everyone thinking he was amazing.
He hadn’t seen her in nearly eight years now. Still, the lessons he’d learned from her and the Dursleys stuck to the back of his mind like wet noodles clinging to a wall.
He zoned back into the conversation just in time to hear the end of the story Ron had been telling. Hermione seemed to think it was funny, so Harry smiled in amusement and tried to pretend that he knew what was happening.
“And that’s not even the best part! I turned around and Fred was right there behind me, holding the tray of cookies!”
Hermione threw her head back in a gleeful laugh, her smile more radiant than the sun glancing off the lake. The world seemed to slow in that moment as Harry watched her with a certain fondness he was just becoming able to place. There was something more in the way that his heart stirred when he saw Hermione smile, some irrevocable warmth that coursed through his entire body, making his cheeks redden with heat. In that single second, he came to a realisation.
He didn’t think of Hermione as a sister.
He fancied her.
No, that didn’t work. Somehow that simple phrase didn’t encapsulate the mix of infatuation, heartfelt adoration, and devoted care that was mixing into a brightness in his chest, making his heart pound, making his breath quicken, making every thought he’d ever had go fuzzy as he struggled to wrap his head around the amount of pure feeling that was flooding his senses.
He was utterly in love with Hermione Granger.
And in the second after that, Ron bumped into Harry and the gears of time grinded back to their normal pace. Harry stared at Hermione in utter fascination. He’d never fallen in love with anyone before and he had absolutely no idea what to do about it. Did he tell her right away? Did he wait to observe any indication of her liking him back? He’d never had any sort of experience with loving anyone before, much less a girl he’d spent every day with for years. He knew Hermione like he knew the back of his own hand — why was understanding her now so hard? He then came to the conclusion that he’d never seen a sign of Hermione liking someone before, so he didn’t have anything to work with. Maybe she was just hiding the fact that she fancied someone from Harry? What if… she didn’t trust him enough?
He was struck with a sudden and terrible thought.
What if Hermione thought of him only as a brother, or even worse, only as a secondary friend? She’d been hanging out with her dormmates more and more recently, oftentimes returning to Harry and Ron gushing about the newest developments in their burgeoning friendship — what if she wouldn’t want him anymore? He was so busy being slowly consumed by the horror that that thought brought that he didn’t notice Ron was trying to catch his attention.
“-Harry? Harry? Harry~” Ron sang, waving his hand back and forth in front of Harry’s face. Harry blinked rapidly and mustered a convincing smile.
“I’ll be back in a second,” Harry choked out, still smiling, “Just… need the bathroom.”
He clambered up, feeling a bit unsteady on his feet, and walked out of the clearing. As soon as he was out of view, he dropped to the ground and closed his eyes. The sun seemed to blistering against his skin and the ongoing laughter of the first years out on the Quidditch pitch now seemed intolerably grating. He shuffled behind a tree and looked around the trunk to stare at his friends, biting his lip in apparent anxiety. Hermione and Ron were in the clearing, Ron still talking and Hermione throwing her head back in another joyous laugh. Ron beamed at her and reached down into the grass before his hand resurfaced holding a pretty orange flower. Hermione smiled affectionately and tucked the flower behind her air. It looked beautiful on her, and Ron evidently thought so too, as his hand seemed to linger in the air just a moment too long.
Harry bit his lip with renewed fervour, tasting blood.
How hadn’t he seen it before? Ron obviously liked Hermione. In his stress-addled mind, it all seemed to be adding up. The way that Ron celebrated Hermione’s birthday with over-the-top spectacles was no longer just a quirky display that Ron took fun in preparing, but now seemed to Harry a show of his devotion. The way Ron smirked at Hermione whenever she mentioned detective novels wasn’t a cute way of showing he cared, but rather a signal that he paid meticulous attention to her interests even when he didn’t enjoy them himself. The way he subtly tried to make Harry pay attention to Hermione was not out of some matchmaking ability he saw in himself, but rather a way of trying to deny his feelings by pushing Hermione away.
Harry sighed, back against the tree. The bark was rough against his back but he used the sensation to focus on the present moment. In all honesty, there was nothing he could do but accept it. He could be happy for them. If it came down to it, Harry would give Ron and Hermione a heartfelt congratulations and never say a word.
— — —
June 1995
The hospital wing was as white and sterile as always when Hermione walked in, dragging her bag in one hand and holding in the other one a bouquet of flowers she’d collected outside. The fields of delicate spring flowers were giving way to heartier blossoms that could withstand the heat of the summer months, but Hermione had done her best to find flowers that she’d thought Harry might like. She’d even convinced a sympathetic Professor Sprout to let her into Greenhouse Eight, where the prettiest blooms could be found. Now, she held a bouquet of raging orange coppertips mixed with the more faded and dainty yellow primroses, interspersed with pops of other colours from whatever other flowers she could find. She’d never had much of an eye for flower-arranging but she had tried her best, putting the tall ones in the middle and then shoving the rest down. She’d even sacrificed one of her nicer ribbons to tie the whole thing together and written a cute get-well-soon note inside with a little love heart next to her name.
It was a pretty picture that Hermione wished Harry was awake to see.
His bed lay about halfway down the hospital wing, curtains open so that Hermione could see his face even as she walked slowly down the aisle. He was still a little pale and he hadn’t woken up since Madam Pomfrey had spelled a Dreamless Sleep potion right into his stomach, but he looked a bit better than he had last night.
Hermione banished the thoughts of the third task from her mind. A picture of Cedric Diggory’s waxen face came to mind unbidden and she banished it away, only focusing on Harry. He was bound to be more traumatised than she was; he’d seen Diggory die. What had Hermione done but look at his bloodless corpse for a few minutes? She didn’t get to be upset.
She finally reached Harry’s bed and stood over it for a second, watching Madam Pomfrey disappear into her office. Hermione opened the curtains wide and then strode over to the other side of the room, pulling the blinds open so that the sun would hit Harry’s bed dead on. He needed to be warm when he woke up.
Hermione walked back and sat down on the waiting chair, looking carefully at Harry’s face. Even asleep he looked tired, and Hermione made a noise of discontent as she pushed a lock of hair out of his face.
“It’s certainly been a year, hasn’t it, Harry?” Hermione mused, looking up at the bright fluorescent lights above her until spots danced in her vision. She looked back down and blinked tears out of her eyes. “The tournament really did a number on you, y’know? I’d hoped that you wouldn’t get sucked into another evil scheme but it always seems to happen to you. Why is it always you, Harry? I suppose that’s an easy question to answer in theory, but in reality it just makes no sense. You shouldn’t have to deal with all of this.”
“Sally-Anne’s moving away after the term’s over,” Hermione said thoughtfully, “I don’t know where exactly; I think it’s somewhere in Scandinavia. Her mother’s got a new job and her whole family’s going with her. It’s not important anyway. You’ve never even talked to Sally-Anne. It makes you think, though, doesn’t it? She’s just… leaving. My parents could decide to move at any time and then I could be going to Beauxbatons or Ilvermorny and we’d only talk through letters. I’d miss hearing you talk, though.”
She sighed and adjusted herself in her seat, reached out a hand to gently straighten Harry’s blankets.
Unlike Harry’s realisation the month prior, Hermione realised in a different way. If Harry’s boundless love for Hermione hit him like a freight train made of hope and trepidation, Hermione’s love sidled up beside her and then got aggressive when she ignored it like some sort of middle-aged accountant hitting on a sorority girl at a bar. Her love was only fully realised through the lens of the desperate sadness she felt as Harry slept on. She sighed again, feeling some immeasurable melancholy settle deep in her gut. Unknowingly, she stood up and cupped his face in her hands.
“Harry-”
Her voice failed her for a moment and she closed her eyes for a long second. Then, she leant down and kissed his forehead.
She pulled away instantly and kneaded her hands to stop the tingling sensation that had erupted there. The moment must not have been important enough to either of them, because she checked her hands as she sat back down and there were no new marks adorning her fingertips in intricate images. She sat down and began to talk to him again, disregarding what she’d been feeling.
Even if Harry had been awake and reciprocated the kiss, Hermione still wouldn’t have followed through. He had enough on his plate as it is; he didn’t need the added stress of cultivating a blossoming relationship with someone. He didn’t need some bossy, nagging bookworm telling him how to kiss based on the research she’d conducted and guilting him into doing his homework with her over-controlling urges. As a young child, Hermione had often been told how she acted like some sort of queen ruling over people she was as below her. She’d tried so hard to cull the part of her that wanted to micro-manage everyone, but she’d never explored romance before. There were books on it, she was sure, but she wanted ingredients and temperatures, and “wait for two minutes”, not “you’ll know when the time is right”. She couldn’t be trusted to be so close with a person who seemed to love as strongly as Harry. Every word he said to her was laced with affection, every gift a testament to his thoughtful observations of her character.
She couldn’t ruin him.
And besides, he probably didn’t even like her like that in the first place. He seemed to look at her only as a friend, or if she really stretched her luck, a sister. He and Ron hung out more than he and Hermione did, and they’d only become friends because he and Ron saved her from the troll in their first year. She knew it was cliché — a hero saving the damsel then the two falling for each other — but what if he only went along with it due to some thought of obligation? He’d saved the damsel, now he had to fall in love with her. She didn’t want to pressure him into a romance he didn’t even want because of his heroism-addled sense of duty.
She couldn’t risk the chance.
She couldn’t take all of his attention and devotion, couldn’t ruin him with her exacting rules and measurements, couldn’t hoard his love when he gave it so freely to all that so much as hugged him. He was a hero and she was nothing but some whiny damsel trying to take up space in his story. He didn’t need her there distracting from the main plot, stealing page after page until he stopped paying attention to the impending climax and the villain won.
She just couldn’t do it.
She left the hospital wing silently, twenty minutes before her allowed time was up. She left the flowers there on the table, the scent of primroses almost suffocatingly heavy in the air. The card with them had a large blot of ink that covered where a love heart had been before.
Chapter 6: a promise to the moon
Summary:
Beep, beep, beep! You have reached halfway through the story! Get some water, stretch your legs; the fic will be here when you come back.
But anyways, without further ado:
Year the fifth, in which Hermione passes over an existential crisis by saying "double it and give it to the next person" but (oh no) that happens to be Harry, so congrats, he gets two! Ron is emotional support though :)
Notes:
(See the end of the chapter for notes.)
Chapter Text
September 1995
“Has the message sunk in yet, Mr Potter?” Umbridge said primply, looking up from her paperwork to stare condescendingly down her nose at Harry. Harry said nothing but nodded tersely, defiance in his head but self-preservation halting his tongue. “You may go, then. You must not tell lies, Mr. Potter. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
Harry grabbed his bag and forced himself not to walk any faster than normal as he left the woman’s office and closed the door behind him. He was sure the tension was evident in his shoulders anyway, as he heard Umbridge laugh quietly as he left. It was the most infuriating sound he’d ever heard, partly because it sounded like a bullfrog being put through a meat grinder and partly because of what it meant — Umbridge thought it was just so delightfully funny that Harry had to hold himself back from scurrying away from her like a frightened little first year. It made him grind his teeth to even think about doing so. Harry Potter, the bloody Boy-Who-Lived and the three-time vanquisher of the Dark Lord Voldemort, running from a scary school teacher as if he was in kindergarten. His fame often made him feel like he was disappointing the people around him with how simply adequate he was at most things, and here he was yet again, being a disappointment that couldn’t stand up to a professor. If people knew, they’d lose faith in him and he’d go back to the infamy he’d gained in second year. He couldn’t embarrass himself like that; he’d have to take it.
He walked back to the common room with an angry stomp in his gait. The halls were quieter than usual, but that was probably due to the fact that his detention had run all the way until curfew; a solid three hours of writing with that horrible quill. He reached the portrait and the Fat Lady squawked at his gruffness as he recited the password, but he didn’t really care. The lantern light was low and the fire flickered as he walked towards the chair where Hermione sat, remedies ready and worry clear on her face as the firelight danced across her brow. He sat down hard and sighed, extending his hand toward her with only a few muttered words. She made an angry noise when she saw his hand, but applied the Murtlap Essence anyway. She worked at it for a few minutes, then as soon as the cut was healed enough, rounded on him.
“Harry, this can’t be legal,” Hermione cried in indignation before lowering her voice, “She’s quite literally torturing you and you're just trying to buck up and keep going? Use your head! If you do nothing, it sends a message to all the other students — Harry Potter doesn’t think this is important enough to get worked up about and he’s the bloody chosen one, so they’ve got to keep their heads down and deal with Umbridge as well. Harry, think about the influence you’re having on everybody.”
She sounded a bit hysterical by the end and Harry patted her hand awkwardly, not knowing exactly what she wanted him to do. “So I, what, tell the ministry that’s endorsing Umbridge about all the terrible things she’s doing? They’re approving her decrees anyway, and they already think I’m a liar. What will they do, send a decree saying that the High Inquisitor is allowed to do whatever she bloody well wants to and they don’t care that she’s torturing children? I wouldn’t doubt it. Besides, it doesn’t seem like anyone really cares. People have surely owled their parents about everything going on and nothing’s changed.”
“Harry, we can’t stand up to the might of the ministry, but if they could defend themselves, people would stop speaking out about Umbridge’s poor teaching and she wouldn’t have any reason to punish them,” reasoned Hermione.
Harry sighed. “You’re talking about that club thing again, aren’t you?”
“The defence club, yes. I think it would be helpful.”
“I… I’m not a teacher, Hermione. Being good at defence doesn’t mean I’m good with people I don’t know… or really people I do know either. My patience is too thin and I don’t know how to regulate the behaviour of a group, and people only listen to me because of my title, not because they think I’m some sort of prodigy in defence.”
“I can't deny that, but Harry,” Hermione pleaded, sure of her ideas, “You should use that to your advantage. Do what you can to get them on your side and then show them the real you once they trust you enough to listen.”
“Should have been in Slytherin,” Harry murmured, grinning with only a trace of actual amusement. Hermione waved it off and continued.
“That’s not important, Harry. Do what you can with what you have, where you are.”
“Is that a quote?” Harry asked, looking up through his fringe at Hermione, who rolled her eyes in exasperation.
“Honestly, it’s like talking to a brick wall,” she complained. Harry grinned, “It’s from Theodore Roosevelt, which doesn’t matter in the present moment, because we should be focusing on what’s really important. That little first year over there with the brown hair? Her name is Emily Townsend. She came to me today crying and asked for something to heal cuts because she’s been writing “I must not correct Professor Umbridge” for a week after telling Umbridge that she’d told them to flip to the wrong page. Luckily I had some Murtlap Essence ready to go, because otherwise she could have a worse scar than you. Umbridge isn’t just some mean teacher targeting only you, Harry, she’s going for defenceless little eleven-year-olds and we could help them.”
“Hermione…” Harry said, feeling his cheeks heat in shame. He looked over at the first years and saw Emily Townsend sitting on the opposite side of the room, looking tinier than Harry could have imagined a first year being. She was holding a book upright and that position meant that the backs of her hands were pointing right at Harry. An ugly red line squiggled its way across the back of her left hand and Harry balled his fists when he saw her turn a page and wince. Hermione was right. He imagined a little Hermione sitting there, words she didn’t deserve carved across her skin still undeniably there. What could he have done as a first year to help her? The answers boiled down to “tell a teacher” or “nothing”. Hermione would have gone on writing lines in her own blood and Harry would be able to do nothing but watch. That wasn’t fair.
“We’ve got to-”
“I’ll do it,” Harry said, looking back at Hermione, who was anxiously twisting a strand of hair around her finger.
Hermione looked shocked. “You will?”
“Yeah,” Harry said shortly, looking down at his healing hand and then over at Hermione’s, “We’ve got to do something.”
Hermione’s expression morphed into one of pleasant surprise and she nodded carefully, handing Harry the rest of the Murtlap Essence and letting him apply it carefully, The words had gone from angry and inflamed to little pink lines, but they were imprinted across his skin nonetheless and Harry knew that when he woke up they’d still be there, tiny white words spelling out exactly what he needed to do. It would only be a matter of time before Umbridge targeted Hermione and Ron. He needed to help people.
— — —
October 1995
“Come on, Harry!” Hermione exclaimed, a happy grin on her face, “The bell’s gone.”
Hermione tugged at his hand and Harry got up from his chair with a small smile. His shoulders drooped, heavy with fatigue and unspoken baggage, but he stretched until they felt better. Ron patted his shoulder tenderly and helped Harry to pick up his schoolwork. Harry smiled over at his best friends and packed up his bag silently.
Today was Halloween. All the teachers had been a little gentler with him today, other than Professor Umbridge. It was a kindness, he supposed, but being treated with kid gloves just because his parents were gone got tiring after a while. Despite that, the day still weighed on him. His mind flashed back to the Mirror of Erised and his parents’ visages on the surface, then he thought of Ron and Hermione’s presence there as well. He realised that Hermione had been standing next to him for the past minute, waiting for a response and looking gradually more confused.
“Yeah, I’ll be along in a minute!” Harry responded, putting on a wide smile and losing his train of thought.
Hermione stared hard at him for a second before smiling softer than usual and waving goodbye. “Okay, see you there!”
Harry waved back to her and watched as Ron and Hermione walked out of the common room, talking avidly about something Harry was too distracted to care about. His smile faltered and then dropped entirely when Hermione took Ron’s hand to pull him along, smiling gleefully as he made a surprised noise. His good mood vanished all at once and he bit his lip, heading up to the dormitory to drop his bag off.
The room was quiet when he entered. He crossed over to his bed and tossed the bag down against the wardrobe. For some reason, he just felt immensely lonely.
For a moment, he stood in the empty dormitory. The quiet was almost stifling, but also somehow peaceful. It was never this peaceful in the dormitory; something that was bound to happen when you lived with four other teenage boys. That’s why it was so strange to stand here, with late evening light streaming through the windows and the fireplace cold. He was all alone — everyone was already enjoying themselves at the Halloween feast. He couldn’t go to the feast that night. It would be too painful to see everyone in the know giving his sympathetic looks when he entered late, as if they could ever understand the numb loss that came with knowing that you’d never even hear the sound of your mother’s voice or your father’s laugh. Instead, he’d have to eat some other place. He dismissed the house elves, not wanting to inconvenience them while they worked on the gigantic feast downstairs. That only left one option.
Harry sighed, crossing to his trunk. He opened the lid just a crack and reached into one of the compartments to break into his stash of food there. The Dursleys didn’t feed him enough, that was obvious, so he had to find some other way to make sure he got enough nutrients while he stayed with them. It was hard to get pre-packaged food in a medieval castle where all the food was seemingly made fresh, but he’d managed it by owl-ordering plenty of non-perishable items. He had nearly five dozen muesli bars hidden inside his trunk, as well as a few cans of soup and a bag or two of trail mix. He was avoiding the soup, because when he looked at it he could only see the single cans of cold soup that he’d had to share with Hedwig during the summer holidays before second year. That had been one of the hardest times of his life, and now he was in no rush to drink soup again.
Letting go of the can he’d picked up, Harry pulled a muesli bar out of his trunk and peeled it open with a sigh.
He ate the muesli bar in silence, sitting on the floor to avoid getting crumbs on his bed. It only took a minute to eat and he soon found himself regretting his decision not to attend the feast, but then he thought about breakfast the previous day and his stomach turned. Ron had been cutting up Hermione’s food for her and Hermione had laughed so hard she’d nearly choked on her orange juice. That memory soured the feeling of food to Harry and he climbed onto his bed, feeling strangely lethargic. He hadn’t had much water over the past day, and had skipped lunch. Those two things were probably not good.
Harry laid down on his bed and could only stare at the ceiling, thoughts billowing around his head like hot steam, making his cheeks flush and eyes water. It was like something had broken inside his psyche. For the moment, all he was thinking about was Ron’s face when Hermione smiled at him, tender and gentle and as if nothing mattered more in the world. It was a look Harry hadn’t seen directed towards anyone but him, Hermione, and for some reason, Luna Lovegood. And how could anyone not fall for Hermione?
He sniffled, feeling like such a baby. How could he be putting so much stake into a single look? Despite his objections, he was still over-analysing every interaction he’d ever seen between Ron and Hermione. It was almost a routine nowadays — feeling like shit everytime one of them smiled at each other, running over a list of all the reasons Ron was better for Hermione than Harry was, and then berating himself for overthinking everything and putting himself ahead of his friends’ feelings. They were allowed to do whatever they wanted and Harry couldn’t let himself fuck that up for them.
Footsteps began to echo up the stairs and Harry closed the curtains to his bed just as the door opened. The footsteps paused, then came closer.
One of his red curtains opened silently and Harry saw Neville’s face poke through, surprised and soon white with shock. Neville looked so sorry for him that Harry tried to push himself up to wipe at his face. He probably looked so childish, crying in his bed.
“Hey, hey…” Neville said gently, sitting down on the bed next to Harry. Harry bit his lip to hold in a sob, unable to identify the cocktail of emotions swirling around in his chest. It was building up into a maelstrom, heavy and thick, and Harry could barely keep it back. Neville laid a warm hand on Harry’s shoulder and Harry melted into the contact, letting out an embarrassing squeak and rolling onto his side. Neville didn’t say anything, only looking up at the top of the four-poster bed in silent, bittersweet contemplation.
“It’s hard to lose them, isn’t it?” Neville said thoughtfully. Harry breathed out heavily through his nose and felt a tear slowly make its way down his face. Is that what he thought this was? Harry supposed that could have contributed. All of a sudden, he felt terrible.
What was he doing, lying here and breaking down over Ron and Hermione becoming closer to each other, when this was the day that his parents had died?
How could he forget them?
Harry broke down into actual tears then, not of sadness but of guilt. How could he have forgotten about his parents, on the day that they died? They would have been so upset with him.
“Neville?” Ron’s voice called through the room, “Are you in here?”
“One moment,” Neville replied, kneading at Harry’s shoulder for a moment before he stood up and wove his way through the curtains out of Harry’s line of sight. Harry watched him go with only a numb feeling in his chest.
He lay there for far longer than he should have. The quilt around him grew warm with his body heat but he didn’t move even as it seemed to burn. There was nothing worth moving for.
The passage of time seemed to ebb and flow around him. It was like a stream was washing over him, cleansing him of his worries and leaving only peaceful numbness in their place. At one point he got up — he couldn’t remember what he was trying to do. Nevertheless, he climbed from the bed and crossed to the window. Realising that he didn’t know what he was standing there for, Harry turned to go, but his eye caught on something in the sky.
He stayed in that spot, transfixed and staring out at the moon. It hung in the sky like an eye, staring back. Harry looked at the moon with some emotion he’d never paid much attention to welling in his chest. He’d never thought of the moon as particularly beautiful, but tonight it seemed as if he’d never seen it before. He stared at it like it contained all the answers he needed.
“Oh,” Harry said, voice gravelly. It echoed through the room. “I understand.”
Harry lay back down in bed. He knew what to do now. If Hermione was in love with Ron, he’d let go of his boundless romantic love for her and let them live in peace. If Hermione wanted to have Harry, he would go to the edge of the world to make sure that she did. That was a promise.
— — —
November 1995
The Room of Requirement was packed with people for the latest meeting of the Defence Association. It was a lovely Sunday morning and most of the students would be out on the grounds, but most of the fifth years were still inside. Most were huddled together in distinct house groups around the edges of the room, but Luna and Ginny were talking in the middle of the room and Ron could see Lavender Brown, the eternal social butterfly, flitting between the groups and seemingly knowing everyone’s names. Harry and Hermione sat at a desk in the corner, parchment out in front of them and quills in hand as they talked lowly to each other. Ron grinned at the sight and turned back to his conversation with Dean. They continued talking for a few minutes as Dean tried to explain to him that muggle musician David Bowie and wizarding superstar Ziggy Stardust were apparently the same person, then the room quietened as Harry cleared his throat.
“Right,” Harry said, standing up. People stopped their talking immediately and heads swivelled to look at him, “Good job on Expelliarmus last lesson. Me and Hermione have got a bit of parchment on each of you and we’d like to figure out where you stand skill-wise, so today we’re going to be organising some duels. If everyone could just come forward a bit? Thanks. I’ve got a list of the first couple pairs that I know could work well together, so they’ll go first and then everyone else can pair up and I’ll walk around to observe. Does that sound okay?”
There was a chorus of affirmations and Harry began to read off the list. “Lavender Brown and Hermione Granger, Dean Thomas and Fay Dunbar, Ginny Weasley and Seamus Finnegan-”
“Hold on, why is it just Gryffindors?” Zacharias Smith interrupted, crossing his arms. Harry shot a tired look at Hermione, then turned back to the rude Hufflepuff.
“Smith, I barely remember the colour of your eyes; I don’t know enough about you to put you in a duel,” Harry reasoned, shrugging, “What if you couldn’t cast a Disarming Charm and I paired you with Hermione? It would be hilarious, but you could also get hurt and no one wants that. Now shush.”
He continued to read off the list of names and pairs started to drift away from the group, pulling out their wands. Ron waited for his name to be called and shifted anxiously from foot to foot. He didn’t want to be paired with someone he couldn't predict well: everyone had a pattern, and familiarity let him see it.
“-George Weasley and Padma Patil, and finally Ron Weasley and Luna Lovegood. Everyone else, pair up amongst yourselves and consult with your partner about how comfortable you are with duelling.”
Ron walked towards Luna with a smile that spoke of both his joy and his extreme apprehension. Luna was unpredictable in all senses of the word and it would surely shine through in her duelling. He’d seen her duel once before, when an older girl had stolen her favourite bottlecap necklace. It had been a sight to behold as she wove around spells and used charms in ways Ron had never seen before. She would be an opponent worth duelling.
“Alright, let’s begin. When you’ve got your partner down, finish them off with a Body-Binding Curse or change their robes in some obvious way. Ginny and Seamus, you seem to have gotten acquainted, perhaps you’d like to go first?” Harry offered. The pair traded a grin and walked into the centre of the room, which was now clear of people and sported several large mats on the floor. They bowed to each other, frames wrought with tension and excitement, then began to duel.
Spells flew through the air and several Shield Charms went up as one of Ginny’s spells went careening past Seamus and smashed into the wall behind him. Seamus retaliated with several Blasting Curses, shouting incantation after incantation that Ginny seemed only just able to keep up with. In response, she continued to send high-powered spells at him before dropping to the floor and rolling under one of Seamus’ larger spells in order to cast a spell at his legs that made vines grow up to his knees. He hacked at them in a desperate attempt to get away but Ginny had obviously won, as she sent a spell at him that changed his robes to a bright lime green colour. Laughing, he conceded his defeat and Ginny banished the vines as she helped him up.
“Brilliant, Ginny!” Harry congratulated, “And good job, Seamus, with layering all those Blasting Curses. I think that’s the fastest I’ve ever seen someone cast five in a row. Well done, both of you, good show. Now, who’d like to go next?”
A lot of people looked away, intimidated by the display, but both Hermione and Lavender put their hands up and soon they were in the middle of the room. Hermione started shooting spells immediately, sometimes casting up to two a second, but Lavender wove around them and seemed to know exactly what Hermione was going to do. Lavender was behind an almost constant shield charm while Hermione battered her with a multitude of spells, but as soon as Hermione stopped to catch her breath, Lavender began to barrage her with freezing charms. The temperature in the air lowered considerably and Ron admired Lavender’s resourcefulness — Hermione’s teeth were chattering, which would interrupt her spell-casting enough for Lavender to strike. Hermione seemed to know what she was doing as well, because a ring of fire erupted around her and rushed towards Lavender all at once. The Gryffindor squeaked in alarm and cast another Shield Charm, but the fire was blocking her field of vision and Hermione quickly delivered the final strike, a purple bolt of energy that Harry recognised as a Petrificus Totalus. Sure to his observation, Lavender froze up and fell backwards, legs glued together and arms snapped to her sides. Ron hollered in support and Hermione shot him a grateful smile before reversing the charm and helping Lavender up. They walked off to the side, laughing, and Harry offered his congratulations before sweeping his gaze around the room for the next pair.
“Ron and Luna, you’re up!”
Luna smiled and they walked to the centre as the singed mats on Hermione’s side were replaced. Ron squared up against Luna as Harry called for them to bow, then raised his wand. He cast the first spell, a quick Expelliarmus to scope out Luna’s technique. She dispelled it quickly and then began to cast back. Ron raised a Shield Charm just as the first of her spells slammed into him and he stumbled a few steps back from the sheer force of them. So that’s how she wanted to do it? Ron would raise her one better.
He began to cast spells at her, a Blasting Curse, a Disarming Charm, and a Jelly-Legs Jinx in rapid succession. She dodged all of them, sending a few spells back, then began to really get into it. First, she conjured a swarm of bees that Ron incinerated with a blast of fire, then she turned the ground beneath him to quicksand and he conjured a few annoying birds to swarm her and keep her occupied while he wiggled out of the sand. They continued to duel for a few minutes, using everything they could think of to get the other off guard, until Luna faltered while casting a Shield Charm and a jet of water knocked her clean off her feet. Ron’s eyes widened and he was running over to her before he could even think, helping her up. He smiled at her, convinced he’d won, and she smiled back.
A wand pressed against his sternum and Ron froze. He thought the duel was over! Then he remembered Harry’s instructions and would have hit himself if he was sure that moving wouldn’t provoke Luna. He hadn’t petrified her or changed the colour of her robes, so the duel was still going and he had just given his opponent free reign. He palmed his wand, slowly bringing it up towards her, opening his mouth to cast a spell-
“Petrificus Totalus,” Luna said, smirking. Ron felt himself begin to tip backwards and grabbed Luna’s robes to steady himself but just ended up pulling her down on top of him. They fell to the ground, Luna sprawled across Ron’s chest.
“Aren’t you going a bit fast there, Luna?” Hermione called. Everyone burst into laughter and Ron blushed redder than his Gryffindor tie. Luna only laughed, rolling off him and cancelling the spell to help him up. Ron shot an embarrassed look at Hermione but she only smirked back. Ron folded himself into a corner, still bright red, but watched Luna with an affectionate smile as she walked back over to Ginny. If anything, Luna was going a bit slow. At this point, they’d known that they were soulmates for nearly three years, and they hadn’t even kissed!
As George and Padma began their duel, Luna smiled at him and Ron felt his face somehow heat even more. He wanted to give her the power to choose, because no matter whether or not they were soulmates, she was still only fourteen. He’d let her do everything in her own time. Still, during that present moment, there was nothing in the world he wanted to do more than kiss her.
— — —
December 1995
An icy blue spell bolted through the room and slammed into Cho’s chest, and the room erupted into cheers as her robes turned pink. Harry helped her up and Cho smiled brilliantly, making Harry blush. Someone wolf-whistled off to the side and Ron yelled in indignation, face turning pink. Harry laughed but couldn’t help his smile becoming a little more wooden. What he wouldn’t give for Hermione in Cho’s place, smiling up at him before casting some spell he’d never heard of and winning the duel hands down. Cho was good but not great, only mastering a few lower-level charms and struggling with the Reductor Curse.
The meeting finished shortly after that and everyone went their separate ways in groups of two or three, heading back to their common rooms. Cho stood off to the side with one of her friends and Harry stayed too, collecting up his class materials. Ron and Hermione left together, chatting about something Harry forced himself not to ask about. Instead, he was only looking at the way Ron’s face got close to Hermione’s ear when he whispered to her and the way Hermione exposed the smooth white expanse of her throat when she laughed. Cho flashed a look over at him, something calculating yet heavy in her gaze, and Harry made himself look over at her, to which she smiled slightly. The room cleared in what seemed like a second and then in the barest amount of time Cho was standing next to him, a shy smile on her face. It was in that moment that Harry really took a good look at her.
Cho Chang was undeniably beautiful. It wouldn’t take many to contest that fact. She had a lovely smile and the most beautiful mane of straight black hair that Harry had ever seen, and to be honest, the rest of her wasn’t half bad either. She looked like an angel dropped to Earth, hair whipping behind her as she turned and pulled Harry up from his seat.
He looked up. A sprig of mistletoe was slowly growing down towards them. Cho laughed and it was the most musical sound Harry had heard in a while, echoing through the room as she stepped a little closer.
Harry smiled at her. This was it. This was his first kiss.
It was only a chaste kiss, dry and a little slow, but to Harry it felt like everything. Cho’s hands were soft and radiated warmth where she was holding his arms with a featherlight touch. She tasted like smoke and blueberries and freshly-baked muffins and she was everything Harry had imagined, yet somehow entirely new. She smiled and Harry could feel the strange sensation against his lips. Kissing was weird. Why did it feel so weird? Whenever he’d imagined kissing, it had been some sort of supernova moment in his brain, like a thousand fireworks going off at once. This was surprisingly normal.
Cho broke away, smiling, and Harry smiled back. That was what he was supposed to do, right?
“Wanna get out of here?” Cho said sensually, looking at Harry in the same way Ron looked at a chess set just before he struck the winning move — calculating and a little triumphant. Harry shrugged, smiling.
“Where would we go?” he asked. Cho laughed and he felt a little stupid, but she seemed more delighted than mocking.
“I know just the place.”
They left the Room of Requirement together and Cho took his hand, pulling him down the corridor with a laugh. He laughed as well, a little clumsy on his feet, but followed her towards an approaching tapestry hiding a crevice in the wall.
“Won’t the prefects find us?” he asked anxiously. Cho laughed and shook her head, but Harry couldn’t help but slow down a little as he pondered what he’d just said a bit more. It would be time for the prefect rounds soon, and that meant that Ron and Hermione would be patrolling the corridors. Could he really let them find him and Cho in some dark closet? He thought of Ron whispering into Hermione’s ear and suddenly he felt a little more sour. Hermione was probably snogging Ron in a broom closet anyway — they had all those prefect rounds together and surely they had the space and time. Cho felt him slow down and turned towards him, smile faltering when she saw his blank expression, but he winked scandalously at her and she giggled, hitting his arm and dragging him into an alcove. Harry grinned back at her and happily followed the Ravenclaw girl into the crevice, looking her up and down with eyes that betrayed exactly what he was thinking. Cho smiled, closing the tapestry over them then stepping closer to wrap her arms around his neck.
Actual kissing was something that Harry had imagined often. He was a teenage boy, it was bound to happen, but he really hadn’t thought that it would feel so… wrong. It felt like he was kissing a chicken wing — hot, sticky, and something you didn’t want on your lips for too long. He tried to avoid the sensation but Cho was persistent and so he dealt with it.
Cho pulled back, smiling tenderly at him, and Harry felt like such an arse. Here he was, worrying and getting in his own head, when the girl he’d just snogged senseless was obviously thinking that he was enjoying it more than she was. He should’ve said something! But she looked so vulnerable, hand reaching up to brush Harry’s hair out of his face, and all he could think about was her tear-stained face and shell-shocked eyes, and in all honesty, she deserved this. She needed closure and love and Harry had so much to give. He could be there for her. Hermione and Ron didn’t need his love; they had each other and now Cho had Harry. This is what he would do. This was enough.
Footsteps sounded in the hallway and Cho froze, a teasing smile on her face. Harry shrugged and leaned down to give Cho a chaste kiss on the nose, which she giggled at. The footsteps stopped, then came tauntingly closer towards the tapestry. There were a few knocks at the wall and Harry had a sinking feeling that he knew exactly who’d found them. He tried to flatten down his mussed-up hair, but the tapestry was pulled open and they had to make their exit. Cho went first, graciously ducking through the opening out into the corridor, and Harry followed her, straightening his robes. True to his prediction, Hermione and Ron stood on the other side, looking absolutely flabbergasted.
“Mate…” Ron said, his grin slowly growing. Then his smile faded as Hermione turned and hurried down the corridor, face stony. Harry and Cho stared after her in confusion, but Ron bit his lip and suddenly looked a little guilty.
“Don’t worry, she’s probably just surprised,” Cho said, making sport of the situation, “I would be too, if I found my best friend snogging a girl in a closet.”
“I’d better go talk to her,” Harry said, ducking his head and scratching at the back of his neck. Cho laughed, suddenly grabbing his sleeve and pulling him in for a kiss that made him a little dizzy. Then she pushed him away and Harry grinned at a snickering Ron before she walked away down the corridor, looking very self-satisfied.
“Nice catch, mate.”
“Ron!”
— — —
Hermione said nothing to her dormmates as she stormed in, tears pricking at her eyes as she chewed at her lip nearly hard enough to break the skin. Parvati looked sideways at her in concern but didn’t stop brushing her hair, and Fay only lazily yawned and started to root through her trunk for a ritual item that she lovingly called ‘Crybaby Chocolate’. On the other hand, Lavender instantly got up and guided Hermione over to her bed.
“What’s happened?” Lavender asked apprehensively, shuffling a little closer. She looked both curious and concerned, and Hermione appreciated the attempt at pretending she wouldn’t be talking about this to Parvati tomorrow. For now, Lavender was someone to confide in and it was nice to have that no matter the circumstances.
“Harry,” she said shortly, feeling the life drain out of her. She didn’t know why she suddenly felt so exhausted. Her head was foggy and her hands were tingling and she honestly just wanted everything to stop.
“I thought he liked me,” Hermione confided tonelessly, “I really thought so. But I found him snogging Cho Chang in a broom closet and now I don’t know what to think at all.”
“Oh, you,” said Lavender sadly before lunging forward to hug Hermione tightly. Hermione just sat there, feeling the first tears welling up in her eyes and blinking forcefully at the ceiling in an attempt to stop them from falling. It didn’t work and soon her face was bright pink and blotchy as she cried like a baby onto Lavender’s shoulder, complete with shushing noises and pats on the back. Her wet hair dripped down her back, soaking her robes, and Fay cleared it away as she walked over to throw a bar of chocolate down on Hermione’s bed, the end already unwrapped. Hermione grabbed it with a nod and took a bite.
“I can’t believe I’m crying over a boy,” Hermione said angrily, gnawing at the bar of chocolate.
“Too true,” agreed Lavender, “But… Hermione, have you seen the way he looks at you? Not to be cliché, but it’s like you’ve hung the moon and the stars in the sky. Probable romance aside, you’re his best friend and he wouldn’t want you to feel like this.”
Hermione sniffled but nodded. Lavender smiled and broke a piece from the bar of chocolate, eating it in silence. Hermione thought for a few seconds. She couldn’t stop Harry — Cho was a lovely person and quite attractive, and why shouldn’t Harry kiss her if he wanted? There was just a tiny part of her that desperately wanted to be Cho. She wanted to be the girl with messed-up hair and a cheeky grin who ducked out of closets and winked at Harry like she was telling him a secret. Why couldn’t she? But then again, how could she? Hermione Granger was nothing special. Cho Chang was the most beautiful girl out of all the sixth years, and if Hermione had never seen Fleur Delacour then Cho would probably be the most beautiful girl she’d ever seen; not just beautiful but also wicked smart and so kind. There was something magnetic about the way she smiled and the weightless, graceful way she walked, and Hermione could easily see her beside Harry. Cho was brilliant and Harry deserved someone like that, not someone like Hermione.
Hermione shook her head to clear the inevitable insecurities that would take root from following that line of thought. She didn’t have time for that in her Harry-focused angst-fest. She promptly refocused on the actual subject of her dreariness — Harry and Cho sitting in a tree and never K-I-S-S-I-N-G again if Hermione had anything to say about it.
“I can’t get my hopes up,” Hermione said reasonably, drawing herself up by a few inches and then sagging back down into Lavender’s arms like a doll with its strings cut, “I just can’t let him take over my life. I’m my own person and I don’t need him to like me.”
“Harry can snog Cho Chang all he wants, but you don’t need to care,” Lavender declared, nodding severely as if she’d made the announcement of the century, “If he’s right for you, you’ll be able to tell. And if not? Well, he could be your soulmate, but it doesn’t matter right now. We’re teenagers. You have all the time in the world.”
“Yeah,” Hermione said, looking up at Lavender and smiling sincerely, if not a little tearily, “I… I think I’ll be okay now, Lavender.”
Lavender nodded and smiled genuinely, grabbing the Crybaby Chocolate and throwing it onto Fay’s bed. She got up and pointedly looked at the bathroom, to which Hermione laughed. She really did need a shower, if only to get the tears off her face. She grabbed her pyjamas and headed for the bathroom, entering it before looking back at Lavender, who was now sprawled across Parvati’s bed while she braided her best friend’s hair.
“You’re such a mum friend,” Hermione joked. Lavender squawked in indignation but Hermione caught her smile before she closed the door behind herself and looked over at the mirror. Her face was blotchy and pink, tear tracks all the way down, and Hermione felt a surge of emotion just looking at herself. She was better than this. Harry Potter could kiss whoever he bloody well wanted to and Hermione would not and could not care in the slightest. At least, that was what she hoped.
— — —
January 1996
“Clear your mind,” Snape said silkily, a sharp edge in his voice.
Harry grit his teeth, his annoyance unwavering since he’d entered the room. “I’m trying.”
“Evidently not hard enough, Mr. Potter. Just like your father, never… putting in the work.”
Harry clamped his jaw so hard that he could see stars and focused only on clearing his mind. Not that he knew how to — Snape had been infuriatingly vague so far about what exactly he was supposed to be trying to do. Harry didn’t have high hopes for Occlumency if this was how it was learned. This was his first lesson and Snape had been nothing more than a nuisance who had a distinctly loose definition of the words ‘helpful’ and ‘teaching’. It would honestly be less mind-numbingly annoying to have Snape standing over him while Harry read a book on Occlumency than whatever the Potions professor was currently doing with the subject. Was he even qualified? Who knows. Dumbledore seemed to trust him, but surely teaching the literal Chosen One to guard his mind against the literal Dark Lord could have inspired consulting an outside source, or perhaps some out-of-school tutoring with one of Dumbledore’s many contacts in any number of important magical arts? But no, he was required to be here — sitting in Snape’s office, staring into the man’s soulless and calculating eyes while he was insulted..
“I will begin to penetrate your mind now, Potter. Prepare yourself.”
Harry bit his lip to stop from smirking and worked to make his mind blank. He was as clear as the rain, head as empty of relevant thoughts as Malfoy trying to think up insults that didn’t just amount to “you’re an orphan” or “you have a scar”. There was absolutely nothing he was thinking of and that was how it was going to stay. He closed his eyes and heard Snape take a deep breath, the sound of shifting fabric in his ears as Snape raised his wand.
“Legilimens.”
There was a blinding flash of pain and Harry’s vision went a brilliant white for a few seconds before he heard Snape’s voice in his mind, urging him on while somehow also sounding as bored and frustrated as Hermione trying to make it through a divination class. That train of thought made memories of Ron and Hermione flooded his mind and Harry suppressed them with a grimace, feeling as if an oily hand was raking through his consciousness and disturbing the careful balance inside, leaving only a slimy, tainted trail behind it. Harry wondered idly whether that was normal or just an effect of having any sort of close proximity to Snape, but then realised he’d accidentally been having a thought and almost forced himself to unfocus. Even so, the oily feeling persisted, dragging a memory to the surface.
In his mind’s eye, Ron’s smiling face floated through his vision. Hermione’s face soon entered as well and the scene around them solidified from vague impressions of objects and streaks of faded colour to a lifelike scene of Ron and Hermione sitting in the library and having a friendly argument over the right way to pronounce ‘vase’. Harry could feel Snape’s condescension and thinly-veiled disgust when Ron engulfed Hermione in a hug and she laughed into his shoulder. Harry forced himself to remain calm, even though the memory was now overlaid with a sheen of bitterness that could only come from Ron and Hermione’s inevitable get-together. He pushed that away so hard that he could almost feel the strain he was putting on himself when he attempted to stop Snape from seeing the thoughts. Snape was a colossal wanker as it was — knowledge of Harry’s pitiful teenage love triangle would be throwing the key to his humiliation right into Snape’s gleefully waiting hands.
Harry pressed so hard that he began to viscerally feel Snape’s discomfort, and soon the professor’s spell was receding from his mind like a wave from the shore, leaving a slimy texture all through Harry’s idle thoughts.
Harry resurfaced to the real world with a heavy cough, feeling a pressure in his brain that he was sure would inevitably lead to a bloody nose. He glared at Snape in utter fury. How dare this man dig through his memories like they were nothing and sully his precious moments with Ron and Hermione? Who was he to take what Harry loved and flip through it like a photo album full of people he didn’t know — with lazy disinterest and a spiky undercurrent of sickening satisfaction. Harry was fighting tooth-and-nail to keep the most secret parts of himself private and the professor was pushing that aside like it didn’t even matter. Harry opened his mouth to yell. “You-”
“Legilimins.” Snape said, a dastardly smirk spreading across his face as he saw Harry’s outrage clear into the focused face of a person attempting Occlumency. To his consternation, Harry could only bear to glower dirtily at Snape for one more moment before memories flooded his mind. He shook the spell off a little quicker this time and could feel a tiny thread of something impressed inside his mind before Snape’s distaste once again filled his head.
“That’s enough, Mr. Potter,” Snape drawled, “I don’t want to spend any more time in your presence than I must do. And, if you’re out past curfew, what would I have to do?”
Harry glared and Snape’s eyes hardened.
“Go!” he barked.
“Yes, sir,” Harry ground out, grabbing his bag and striding from the room. He saw Snape’s amused face as he closed the door and grit his teeth until his jaw began to ache dully. Harry made his way back to the Gryffindor common room with a scowl on his face that could make a grown man anxious. He radiated pure frustration — a fifth year passing by eeped and stuck close to the wall when he walked past and a tiny first year Hufflepuff physically recoiled when she rounded the corner and saw him (not that she wouldn’t have anyways — the first year Hufflepuffs had started to sell Harry Potter merchandise early in the year and had gotten a right fright when Hermione interrogated them about royalties and permits — they were now terrified of his face).
When he entered, his face melted into an affectionate smile. The common room was nearly empty, but Hermione and Ron were still in their usual armchairs, apparently waiting for him. Hermione looked half-asleep, eyes drooping with exhaustion while she tried to focus on a book in front of her. Ron stood next to her, holding a plate with the most delicious-looking sandwich Harry had ever seen and waving it in front of Hermione’s nose.
Wary of breaking up the cute moment (despite how it pulled at his heartstrings a little), Harry silently shut the door behind him and leaned against the wall, just watching them.
“-come on. I’ll split it with you! But you’ve got to eat something, Hermione.”
Hermione pouted, rubbing at her eyes. “I’m studying, Ron.”
“But you missed dinner to study! Surely you’ve studied enough by now,” Ron retorted, pulling on her sleeve. Hermione rolled her eyes in exasperation and Harry huffed a sigh, pushing off the wall and crossing over to them.
“Harry!” Ron exclaimed. Hermione did the same a second later and Harry smiled as he sat down in his armchair.
“What’s all this about?” he asked, despite knowing exactly what was happening. It was a recurring pattern; Hermione would be stressed and study for too long, accidentally missing dinner, and then one or both of the boys would coax her into eating. It happened every couple months when there was a big test or assignment coming up, and Harry and Ron already had the perfect strategy worked out. In all honesty, this had happened so many times before that they could convince Hermione to eat her hat and she’d just go along with it.
“Oh, the usual,” Ron replied, “I’ve got this lovely pastrami sandwich here and she won’t try it.”
“What if we all split it?” suggested Harry. Ron made an exaggerated nod and used a cutting charm to split the sandwich into three pieces.
“I mean… I guess that’s okay,” Hermione sighed, putting down her book. Harry and Ron exchanged triumphant looks and started on their thirds of the sandwich, handing the plate over to Hermione. She took a bite then made a surprised expression. “That’s… that’s pretty good!”
“What can I say?” Ron responded, shrugging. Harry laughed, mouth full of sandwich, and Hermione made a displeased face, handing him a napkin. Harry took it with a grin and sat back in his chair, still eating the sandwich. This was life at its finest; four minutes until curfew, three pieces of sandwich, two best friends, and a partridge in a pear tree.
— — —
February 1996
“In accordance with the previously-established rules, you are to be given one afternoon after classes to familiarise yourself with the game, after which you shall hand the game back over to be put in a secure location,” Harry ordered, chin jutted out and eyes hard, “Then we’ll play.”
“That all seems to be in order,” Hermione replied, holding out her hand for Harry to shake. He did so with a stiff nod, which Hermione returned in kind. “See you tomorrow.”
Ron watched them in amusement, sitting back in his chair and bringing up a hand to cover his laughter, and Hermione shot him an unimpressed look. The rules of the monthly board game days were not something to be laughed at — they were a long-running and well-respected tradition that often garnered dozens of spectators from all houses. Last month, Madam Pince had started to kick people out of the library after Monopoly got too heated, and the month before that, Warlock Wars had started a fistfight between two Hufflepuffs that had bet on Hermione winning. It was almost like a club had formed around Harry and Hermione’s board game battles, which had become practically legendary among the younger Gryffindors for being ‘a spectacle of wits and luck’. Hermione suspected that Ron had started a branding campaign and might have been selling commemorative pins.
This month’s game was a wizarding board game called Smoke, which Hermione had never heard of before. It was apparently very popular though, so she could most likely find someone to play it with her in preparation. Harry had already had his afternoon of preparation and had spent half of it in his dorm room with Seamus and Neville, so Hermione supposed that that was a good strategy.
She grabbed the game box from the table and left without looking back. She climbed the stairs up to her dorm and opened the door to see Lavender and Parvati on the floor in the centre of the room. Parvati was doing a wizarding jigsaw puzzle — a moving picture of a dragon that must have been hell to put together — and Lavender was crocheting some sort of bag while she talked avidly to Parvati. Hermione smiled at the sight, used to Lavender and Parvati’s shared proclivity to splay out on the floor and chat for hours. She joined them on the floor and Lavender stopped talking about Celestina Warbeck’s new hair to clap in excitement at the box Hermione had underneath her arm.
“Oh, you’ve got Smoke!” she said in delight. Hermione nodded and Parvati looked up from her puzzle to laugh at the expression on Lavender’s face.
“Wanna play with me?” Hermione asked. Lavender squeaked in enthusiasm and nodded, tossing her crochet project across the room. “What about you, Parvati?”
Parvati shook her head, focused on her puzzle, and Hermione shrugged. “Okay. The offer’s open, though.”
She sat down and pulled the box open, inspecting the contents. Lavender began to root around in her pockets and Hermione watched in growing distaste as she pulled out a pack of divination tarot cards, a sparkly box emblazoned with glittery crescent moons that looked like something a five year old would own. Hermione internally scoffed at the sight, hiding her face behind the game rulebook. While she didn’t know everything, she knew an awful lot — enough to dismiss divination as nonsense. How could that be magic?
Lavender hummed a neutral note, looking at Hermione with a kind of disappointment that said she knew exactly what Hermione was thinking. Hermione blushed a rosy colour.
“I…” Hermione began, looking at the cards. Lavender followed her gaze down to the pack of cards and then made an expression that Hermione couldn’t place, all traces of her previous enthusiasm replaced with tiredness.
“I know you think divination doesn’t matter, but I like it and I’m tired of everyone making fun of me for it. Don’t get all annoyed when I do it,” Lavender said blandly, pulling the tarot cards out of the box and shuffling them idly, “No matter what you think, it’s magic and you can’t define magic to suit your own worldview. It’s magic.”
Hermione pressed her lips together into a thin line, irritation evident in her raising shoulders, “So? It’s just making stuff up!”
Lavender shrugged and began to pat the cards into a singular stack. “You only think that because you don’t like Professor Trelawney-”
“-Well, yes, but-” Hermione attempted to interrupt.
“-If Professor McGonagall taught Divination, you’d think it was gospel,” Lavender finished quietly, setting out her cards in a Celtic cross shape. Hermione opened her mouth to argue again, but Parvati shot her a beseeching look. Instead, she crossed her arms over her chest and reread the rules to their game in sullen, begrudging silence as Lavender looked hard at the cards.
A few minutes of tense silence passed before Lavender cleared her throat, sitting up. “I’m going to win.”
“What?” Hermione snorted, “No, you can’t get that from the cards. This is a logic game!”
“I guess we’ll see,” Lavender retorted, smirking. Hermione cracked her knuckles, putting down the rulebook and reaching for a die.
“You wish, fortune girl, I’m going to win.”
— — —
Soon after Hermione left the room, Ron said his goodbyes and headed towards Tuesday Chess Club to meet Luna. It was her birthday today and he’d spent the past few months on her present, so he was super excited to finally give it to her. Hopefully she’d like it.
He got to the clubroom in record time, jittery from nerves. Luna was next to him as soon as he entered the room, smiling widely and chattering away about the newest conspiracy theory that she and her father had published in the Quibbler. Ron nodded and made the right noises in the right places as she talked, gently pulling her towards their usual table.
“Er… Luna, I have something for you,” Ron said carefully, vibrating on his chair out of anticipation. Luna cocked her head and Ron reached into his bag, carefully pulling out his present, wrapped in sparkly gift paper. Luna took it excitedly and began to open the package by pulling off individual strips to create some sort of pattern that Ron couldn’t understand but could still appreciate. Eventually, the paper split open and Ron’s present was unveiled in all of its mediocre glory.
For the past few months, he’d been learning to knit — helped by his mum and the knitting club that met every Friday on the fourth floor. Now here was the product of all of that meticulous practice — an ugly, lumpy hat made of bright orange and muted blue wool (Luna’s favourite colours) with a pom-pom on top that Ron had made himself.
“Happy Birthday!” Ron cried, smiling hopefully. Luna said nothing, eyes wide with awe and mouth hanging open slightly. Ron stopped, smile falling. “Do- do you- are you okay? Do you not like it?”
“Oh, Ron…” Luna said, tenderly, breaking from her stupor and picking up the hat to rotate it in her hands, “I really love it. It’ll protect me so well against Flyquils! Me and Daddy went out to find them.”
“You think so?” Ron said, ducking his head so that the floor could see his blush. By way of a response, Luna lunged forward and all the breath escaped Ron’s lungs as she hugged him tightly. Her head rested against his chest and Ron could just lean forward enough to rest the side of his cheek on the top of her head, basking in the radiating warmth of Luna’s hands against his bag.
“Love you, Luna,” Ron murmured. Luna mumbled something back into his chest and Ron could only smile tenderly, closing his eyes. It didn’t matter that Professor Flitwick was off to the side mumbling something about reinstating the sex education courses, nor that half the club had broken into whispers, nor that his hair was in his eyes — he wasn’t going to let go of Luna ever again.
A whistle sounded from across the room and Ron spun around to glare daggers at a smirking Leonard Neiman. He made a rude gesture and Professor Flitwick coughed a warning, looking between them with a warning gaze. Neiman looked away, wiggling his eyebrows at Ron, and Ron broke away from Luna’s embrace to sit back down on his chair, blushing hard.
His fingers tingled and Ron looked down at his soulmarks, feeling overwhelming affection. Then he looked up and choked at the sight of Luna wearing the hat, looking like a marshmallow.
“Do you like it?” Luna asked, wiggling like a bobblehead. Ron stammered a compliment and she nodded, satisfied.
“It’s cute,” Ron mumbled, “You’re cute.”
— — —
March 1996
“Over here! Harry, this way!” Ron called, raising his hand in a greeting. Harry smiled and changed course, navigating his way through the busy library towards Ron. He wove through a sea of tables until he reached their usual spot — a heavy oak table near the edge of the study area. It was near a large window and early spring sunlight was bathing the table in a weak glow. Ron’s pale face looked practically ghostly in the light, which Harry commented on as soon as he sat down. Ron chuckled decently in response, good-natured in a way that came only from a decade of ribbing from Fred and George and a few good years from Harry and Hermione, and they slipped into an easy silence as they began on their essays for Herbology. Sometimes it seemed as if all they did with their time was essays, and for the most part that was true, but essays weren’t that bad when working with friends. In all honesty, Harry usually preferred the academic conversations that the trio had while doing homework — leaving Ron and Hermione together without something to focus on often led to a shouting match as one of them inevitably offended the other.
That stopped Harry short. Ron and Hermione fought a lot. In fact, they probably fought far more than was healthy, and certainly in a way that didn’t fit their personalities. While both of them were stubborn, Hermione could see when she was beaten and Ron was good enough at empathising that he could tell when he went too far and could begin to de-escalate. However Hermione and Ron always seemed to bring out the worst in each other whenever they fought.
Harry knew he wasn’t exactly the best at figuring out which person should be dating who, but even he knew that constant fighting was not the recipe for a healthy marriage with two kids.
He looked over at Ron shrewdly, sizing him up. The other boy looked confused, amused, and bemused, looking back at Harry with an expression that Harry couldn’t read. He covered up his behaviour with an honest smile, and Ron squinted a little in puzzlement but smiled back at him.
His strange train of thought was broken off when Cho walked past their table on her way out of the library. She waved at him and he waved back, smile becoming a little more wooden. Cho seemed to pick up on that, freezing for a second before ducking behind a bookcase. Her silhouette shifted, then a minute later she appeared at the library doors, rooting through her bag for something. Harry watched her go and Ron watched him in turn.
“What was that, mate?” Ron asked, concerned. Harry shrugged, the smile dropping off his face as he turned back towards his essay. He didn’t respond and Ron only seemed to grow more uneasy. Then he seemed to have a moment of clarity and his brow furrowed as he looked over at the bookshelf Cho had gone behind then looked back at Harry.
“Harry, is everything alright with Cho?”
Harry shrugged again. “I don’t… I don’t really know, actually. But… it seems like all we do these days is snog in closets and talk about Cedric. I feel like there’s no actual connection between us, you know? It’s nice enough to kiss her, and she’s really pretty and all, but…”
“Your heart’s not in it anymore,” Ron concluded. Harry nodded, head dropping down to rest on the table. Ron’s lips thinned into a line as he nodded, looking the definition of sympathetic.
“I don’t know what to do,” Harry confessed, voice muffled by the table. There was a minute or two of silence as Ron seemed to contemplate what to say in response.
“Well…” Ron said assuredly, “You can’t lead her on.”
Harry raised his head, eyebrows drawn together in thought, “What?”
“Don’t stick with her just because you think you have to. You should be snogging out of love, not a sense of moral obligation. If you stick with it, she could honestly fall head over heels in love with you, and then you’d have a really terrible time breaking up. Honestly, Harry, I think you know that you can’t keep going,” Ron said confidently, reaching over the table to pat Harry’s hand. Harry pondered that advice for a second, then nodded.
“Yeah, I should… I should talk to her,” Harry sighed, getting up. Ron nodded in commiseration then continued with his homework. Harry grabbed his bag and hurried towards the doors.
“Hey!” Harry called, hurrying up towards her. Cho turned around, smiling in a way that didn’t quite reach her eyes. “I’ve got to talk to you.”
Cho seemed to know what was happening already. “You want to break up.”
“I…” Harry said, mouth hanging open like a stunned mullet as Cho stared at him, waiting for him to answer, “Yes. That is what I want to do.”
“There’s someone else, isn’t there?”
“What?”
Cho smiled sadly, gazing at Harry with a clarity that seemed to go straight through him. “It’s Granger, isn’t it?”
“What?” Harry said, getting gradually more scared of the fact that Cho seemed both overcome with emotion and slightly clairvoyant, two things he didn’t know how to deal with. He cursed himself for not being more subtle with his attraction to Hermione. It wasn’t right to be so obvious — even if he liked Hermione more than he’d ever liked anyone else in his life, he was with Cho and she was a human person with feelings. He couldn’t humiliate her with the knowledge that her boyfriend couldn’t even be bothered to pretend to still be attracted to her.
“I see the way you look at her, and…” Cho paused for a moment as if to collect her thoughts, “Honestly, I can’t keep going out with you when I know you fancy her.”
“Cho, I… I wish this could have worked out. It isn’t fair to you for me to be mooning over Hermione like some lovestruck fool,” Harry sighed, ducking his head to avoid looking straight at Cho’s astonishingly knowing eyes. “I’m really sorry.”
“I know. It just couldn’t have worked out,” Cho said, working up speed and gesticulating wildly, “And… I think I was trying to replace Cedric with someone else in my mind, which was really awful of me and I’m sorry to have gotten you into this mess-”
“Hey-”
“-and Harry, really, I wish you all the best. I need some time to myself, but… we’ll still see each other at the DA. We could be friends, right?” Cho finished, eyes just a little watery. Harry bit his lip, looking away before turning to gaze sincerely into Cho’s eyes. It was different now. He didn’t feel the same pang of excited tension when he looked at her, nor did he feel something low rumbling in his throat whenever she smiled. It was as if all of his attraction for Cho was slowly dissipating like a wisp of smoke blowing away in the wind. She was still gorgeous beyond belief, but it was as if Harry just didn’t care now. Nevertheless…
Being friends was enough.
Cho reached out her hand as if pleading and Harry made up his mind.
“Yeah,” Harry assured, taking Cho’s hand, “Friends.”
— — —
April 1996
“Right,” Harry said, getting up from his seat, “Today, we’ll be practising the Patronus Charm a bit more. Good job over the last couple weeks! There’ve been a few near-corporeal patronuses and I hope that today we’ll have some actual corporeal patronuses. Everyone clear?”
There were nods and words of assent from most of the DA before the crowd broke up and scattered around the room, wands out. Hermione grabbed her wand out from her pocket and spent a minute grabbing her notes out from her bag before she headed over to her usual chair. As she sat, Harry strolled over towards her and dropped into the chair beside her.
“You’re going to get it today, Hermione,” Harry assured her, “I’m sure of it. Well, maybe if your notes were legible, it would be easier, but I’m sure anyways.”
“Maybe if you didn’t talk so fast-” Hermione said playfully, faux annoyance seeping into her smile and real insecurity curling in her gut. It wasn’t like her to take so long to learn a spell — even in first year she’d been able to learn complicated spells in just a week or two. While the Patronus Charm was supposedly difficult, she’d learned charms that seemed far harder in theory. Why could it be so hard to cast? Up until now, she’d only been able to conjure a few wisps of white smoke — something that Harry had assured her was perfectly normal but that she really found intensely frustrating. Was the memory not good enough? Was it not enough that she’d found something that might have made her happy?
“Are you thinking of something that truly made you happy?” Harry asked, voice soft. Hermione looked up in surprise, not realising he was still there. She shrugged and he made a face, pulling a chair up next to her and sitting down.
“I… maybe? I think so,” Hermione answered, gnawing at her lip and putting her wand down on a nearby table so that she could fidget with both hands. “I- I really don’t know if it’s happy enough.”
“What are you thinking about?” Hermione looked down at the ground and Harry leaped to course-correct. “I mean, if it’s not too personal.”
“I was bullied a bit at school,” Hermione mumbled, blushing a little out of embarrassment. She didn’t like to admit that to people — the fact that she’d been bullied often somehow made people feel better about bullying her again, as if some little ten year old thinking Hermione talked too much meant that their bullying was founded on common knowledge and therefore okay. Harry got a little closer, straining to hear what she was saying, so she raised her voice to a legible murmur. “I was bullied during primary school; people didn’t like that I was smart or arrogant or bossy, or whatever they were calling me that week. This one time, while I was walking out of school, I was ambushed by some kids in my class and they stole some of my books. They weren’t even special books, just worksheets and textbooks. But I went home and my mum was so mad… she took me to get new books, and then we got my favourite ice cream. I mean… it’s not super happy, but it was really nice to be comforted.”
“Is that memory really happy, though?” Harry asked, idly picking at a loose thread on the hem of one of his sleeves, “I mean… when I was learning the Patronus Charm, I couldn’t really find the right memory. I thought a lot about Quidditch, and then about the Mirror of Erised, but they just… weren’t working. You need something that isn’t bogged down by any sort of negative emotions. It could be the happiness of winning the Quidditch cup, it could be the sort of content feeling that you get on a day when everything is just sort of perfect… but the memory really just should be something that made you honestly and completely happy. Your memory seems sort of bittersweet, as if the happy part is only a temporary cover-up of a larger, more negative emotion. It’s not a big achievement or a perfect day… it’s just… okay for the moment, I guess. That would work in a pinch, but it wouldn’t power a corporeal Patronus.”
Harry finished his speech with a nod and Hermione noticed that half the room seemed to be hanging on to his every word. Hermione rolled the advice over in her mind, taking it into consideration. She supposed she could begrudgingly concede that he was the expert in this situation. Now that she had to rule out the use of the ice cream memory, what could she use instead? What memory would be happy enough that it could power a fully realised and corporeal Patronus charm?
Her mind came up blank and she looked back up at Harry, who was once again still in the same spot, looking for all the world as if he wouldn’t rather be anywhere else. Hermione could appreciate that, as it made her feel like she wasn’t being a bother.
“Harry, what memory are you using? I mean, if it’s not too personal,” Hermione asked, knowingly echoing Harry’s previous sentiment from a few minutes earlier as she attempted to glean information from him. Harry cracked a grin, noticing the repetition, but then blushed a little. He said nothing for a few seconds, mouth opening a little as if he meant to say something but no words would come out. Hermione picked up on that and laughed, then began to tease him. “Is it really that embarrassing? Oh, is it that one time it rained really hard on the way to Herbology and Lavender’s shirt got see-through?”
“No!” Harry cried, scandalised and blushing as if he’d never even considered it in the first place and was now having a straight awakening. Lavender looked over at them, having heard the last bit of their conversation, and winked. Harry squeaked and blushed harder. “Why would you think that?”
“Sorry, sorry,” Hermione said, smiling so hard her jaw hurt. Harry fanned at his pink face like some teenage girl from the forties who’d just seen two consenting adults kiss, then took a deep breath.
“We had a picnic last year and it was so utterly wonderful that I can still evoke the feeling of being completely content whenever needed.”
Hermione blinked. “Really?”
“Yes.” Harry’s jaw was squared, as if he thought Hermione would tease him for that. He was wrong. That was frankly adorable and something that shouldn’t be made fun of, like little kids with their front teeth missing or baby horses trying their darndest to stand up.
“Well, that’s lovely,” Hermione said, putting such force and certainty into her tone that Harry took a surprised step backwards. “Do you think I should use that?”
“If it really made you that happy,” Harry said, shrugging, “You should use something that you hold dear.”
Hermione nodded, standing up and grabbing her wand from the table. She closed her eyes and tried to think hard, then promptly stopped and just focused on her breathing. That didn’t work, so she opened her eyes, stopped breathing, remembered to keep breathing, and then let her happiest memory fill her head.
Gryffindor had just won the Quidditch Cup. Honestly, she didn’t care about the sport at all, but Harry had caught the winning Snitch and so she was still at the after-party. Harry’s warm hand had grasped hers for a second and she could still feel the slight tingling sensation that had caused. She’d then gone upstairs and talked with her friends (friends! it has seemed so inconceivable before), then gone to bed happy. Everything had gone right — she had held Harry’s hand and sparked a warm friendship with her dormmates. It was perfect.
“Expecto Patronum,” Hermione whispered, the feeling of joy swelling in her heart. She breathed deeply, then raised her wand and performed the hand movement as she articulated the incantation. “Expecto Patronum!”
A beam of white light erupted from the end of her wand and she beamed, eyes wide with thrilled awe as the shape began to solidify. It wasn't as large as Harry’s deer — it looked more like a ferret, or perhaps a sea lion. It was small and long, tube-shaped like a rodent but with tiny webbed feet. Hermione felt an overwhelming sense of recognition, mind flashing for a second to the zoo she’d gone to on a school field trip.
Her soul was otter-shaped.
She let out a stunned laugh, watching in pure, childlike amazement as the creature wove around her like it was swimming. She turned to Harry and saw his grin.
“Expecto Patronum!” he cried, and his giant stag Patronus came cantering out from the tip of his wand. It trotted around the otter a few times, seemingly checking it out, then the two animals circled each other. They got higher and higher towards the ceiling until they just flew off into thin air, leaving only faint threads of soupy white fog in the air. Hermione watched them go, feeling her glee settle into something more like calm. Harry smiled at her, content and a little hazy, and Hermione smiled back. She felt light, somehow, more so than she had in a while. It was a feeling she could get used to.
Patronuses were erupting from around the room now, seemingly spurred on by the show in front of them. Ron had conjured a dog, seemingly a beagle or a basset hound, and Luna’s hare was jumping around it in the same sort of display that Harry and Hermione’s patronuses had gotten up to. A fox leaped out of Seamus Finnigan’s wand and Dean Thomas reached out a single finger to brush over the tip of his jellyfish, mouth hanging open. A squirrel was flying laps around a laughing Colin Creevey and a horse galloped around the perimeter of the room as Ginny Weasley spun around and around to watch it.
Hermione sat heavily on her chair, looking out around the room. There was a general aura of joy radiating from every person in the room whether they were casting the Patronus Charm or not — everyone was simply happy. It was a welcome change from the deary and restrictive school outside of the door, where being a child seemed to be outlawed and the gorgeous magic they were performing vilified. Those restrictions would hopefully be gone in a year, when Umbridge was subject to the Defence Teacher Curse and her stain was scrubbed from the walls of the castle. But this? This was something Hermione would have forever. This was something she hadn’t even known she’d needed, but it was wonderful. After all, everyone needed a bit of happiness sometimes.
— — —
May 1996
Ron was just in the middle of a lovely dream where he finally beat Luna at chess when he heard the sound of muffled cries coming from the bed next to him. He rubbed the sleep from his eyes as he sat up, confused. The sound seemed to be coming from Harry’s bed, which was quite strange because every bed had a privacy charm installed that created a silencing effect if turned on. Ron knew that Harry had cried in his bed before (who hadn’t?), but he’d never heard it. Why wouldn’t Harry turn on the silencing charm? Ron dismissed the idea that Harry wanted people to hear him crying — Harry would have been so embarrassed if someone found out he had cried. Then why was the crying audible?
Was Harry… crying in his sleep?
Ron jerked upright at that thought. Harry’s nightmares were common knowledge in the dorm, and everyone knew how to deal with them. They’d been getting worse though, with recent ‘visions’ taking precedence over ‘regular’ nightmares. But he’d be fine, right?
An honest-to-god sob broke through the air and Ron swung his legs over the side of the bed, pulling open his curtains. A quick check of the clock showed that it was the early hours of the morning, but Ron got up anyway, silently cursing himself for being such a good friend.
He crossed to the bed next to his and pulled open the curtain, concerned about what he might find.
Harry was writhing around wildly, tangled in his sheets. He was panting as if he was out of breath, a sheen of sweat across his forehead, and he occasionally mumbled indistinguishable words that Ron couldn’t make out. Ron stood for a moment, frozen, then gently climbed on to the bed. Harry unconsciously rolled towards him and Ron reached out a hand to steady him.
Harry made a sobbing noise and Ron panicked, using both hands to push Harry onto his back in the hopes that that could make him calmer. That only seemed to make Harry more upset though, and he began to flail around as if electrocuted.
“Harry!” Ron said urgently, eyes getting wider and wider as he tried to help, “Harry, wake up! Whatever it is, it’s just a dream.”
One of Harry’s hands hit Ron’s shoulder hard and he bit his lip to stifle a cry of pain, sure that it would only make Harry more distressed.
“Harry, please…” Ron murmured, shaking his friend. Harry groaned and continued to writhe, but his sobbing began to subside. After a minute or so, Harry’s eyes opened, eyelashes clumped together by tears and gaze misted with sorrow.
“Hey, Harry,” Ron started, trying to smile but failing.
Harry looked confused, reaching up to rub at his eyes. “Ron? Ron, you’re here.”
“Yeah,” Ron said gently. Harry sobbed, shoulders shaking as he began to cry in earnest.
“Ron, don’t leave.”
"Yeah, I’m here. I'm with you, okay? Always,” Ron murmured, carding his fingers through Harry’s messy hair in an attempt to calm him down, “I know I haven’t been the most loyal of friends in the past, but at this moment, you can trust that I won’t leave. Does that sound alright with you?"
Harry nodded, eyes watery. Ron waited a few minutes until his tears subsided, then began to probe Harry for answers.
“Do you want to talk?” Ron asked. Harry shook his head, so Ron tried to lighten the mood, assured in knowing that Harry would eventually spill the details later, “Wanna make a pillow fort?”
Harry smiled shakily and Ron grinned. “Well come on then, sit up. I’m going to get some pillows and blankets, while you take the pillowcase off your pillow.”
Ron got up from the bed as Harry started to do as he was told. He crossed over to his bed and grabbed the first few pillows he could see, as well as the quilt that he had down the bottom of his bed, then he crossed to a cupboard over near the far wall. It held all manner of pillows, blankets, and spare sheets, of which Ron grabbed a couple items of each. He took extra care to pick a pillowcase, knowing that Harry’s current one would be soaked in sweat. A few years ago, Harry had said that he didn’t like the fabric of his sheets to be too coarse, so Ron took extra care to pick one that he’d like.
He carried the large number of items back over to Harry’s bed, tottering along as he tried to carry ten different pillows. He’d stuffed a blanket between his legs, so his range of movement was small and he could only take tiny steps at a time. While it was inconvenient and he could definitely make several trips instead of just one, Harry’s face broke into a smile when he saw Ron’s struggle. That made the whole thing worthwhile.
He collapsed onto Harry’s bed with a sigh, internally brightening up at hearing Harry laughing wetly at his antics.
“Put this pillowcase on your pillow while I set this up, okay?” Ron ordered, unfolding the blankets until they were spread out all over Harry’s bed. Harry lay down on them with a contented sigh and Ron smiled at the sight, grabbing some pillows and shoving them at Harry until they surrounded him in every direction. He threw himself down next to his friend, rotating until he could look over at Harry, who was now out of the crying phase and into the introspection bit.
“I want to talk about it,” Harry said, looking as if the words were taking a great deal of effort to say. Ron made a neutral noise, followed by a wiggle of his hand — an attempt not to overwhelm Harry before he got his feelings off his chest.
“Go ahead.”
“It was Voldemort,” Harry admitted simply. Ron forced himself not to flinch, knowing it wouldn’t help the situation. If he showed fear at the name, how would Harry ever trust him with the rest of the details — things that were most likely far worse than just an acknowledgement of the thing that had caused his nightmare. He stayed still, eyes focused on a random freckle on Harry’s cheek, trying to stay strong. He needed to be a grounding presence, otherwise Harry would shove his worries deep down away from sight where they would fester as he tried to find someone he could actually trust. Ron needed to be that person, even just for the simple reason that he liked to be a comforting companion. Despite the fact that it often made his nights a little more sleepless than need be, he liked to help Harry get through his bad dreams, knowing that he could bring Harry relative peace for one night. Call him a hypocrite for complaining to Hermione about not getting enough sleep, but he had been selfish for so long.
As a small child, Ron had known that he was never going to be quite good enough for his family. Every other Weasley had been brilliant in some aspect — Head Boy, Prefect, top of their year, undeniable talents — but Ron had always been the Boy-Who-Wasn’t-A-Girl. He didn’t remember a time when Ginny wasn’t there, being coddled and protected in a way she hated but Ron envied. Once, Ron and Ginny had been doing a race with a few neighbourhood kids. It wasn’t important, nor something that anyone else seemed to remember, but it had been pretty formative for Ron’s character. He’d been coming first, with Ginny in a close second, and he’d been flying on top of the world. Then Ginny had tripped, skinning her knee and crying out, and Ron hadn’t looked back. He’d won the race anyway, but all the other kids had immediately gone to see Ginny and a few faceless adults had scolded Ron for not helping his sister. Despite him being the winner, Ginny had been the centre of attention.
He wasn’t ever going to be good enough, but that was okay.
He was better now. He was a fifth year at Hogwarts, and a Gryffindor Prefect. He was the ‘sidekick’ to Harry Potter, the one in the trio that wasn’t quite as exemplary as the other two, but he knew he was a grounding force. Who else could easily comfort Harry from a nightmare? Who else could convince Hermione to eat after she spent too much time studying? And who else could take those and learn about himself?
Ron knew that he was appreciated by them for just being himself — for doing the little things and being a good friend. He didn’t need to be some incredible student, nor a perfect hero — Harry and Hermione seemed to love him just for him. He didn’t need to be selfish and take everything they had for himself, and he didn’t need to be selfish. He wasn’t destined for fame and glory, and that was okay. All he needed to be was a friend.
“Am I a monster, Ron?” Harry whispered. Ron sat up so fast that he could feel the room spin for a second, turning to look in disbelief at Harry’s prone form. Harry didn’t look back at him, still looking up at the ceiling.
“What?!? No, why would you think that?”
“I'm connected to him, and I see what he’s doing, and I can't stop it, and I…” Harry trailed off, staring at Ron with a beseeching look, "What if he controls me?”
“Listen to me, Harry,” Ron said firmly, leaning forward to take Harry’s face in his hands. “It's not you, Harry, it’s him, and I'll be damned before I let anyone control my best friend, alright? You’re not a monster.”
Harry nodded silently, biting his lip, and Ron surged forward into a hug.
Harry curled up into the blankets and Ron lay down on the bed next to him, getting comfortable. “Do you want me to stay here with you?”
Harry nodded and Ron, true to his word, stayed.
— — —
June 1996
The hospital wing was bright and cheery with summer sunlight when Harry entered. It felt ironic, considering that Harry’s world felt dark. How did the day get to be bright and sunny when everything felt wrong and off-kilter?
Hermione’s bed lay close to the doors. Madam Pomfrey stood over it, arranging the sheets around a sleeping Hermione, and when she saw Harry, she held a finger and shushed him. Harry nodded, discarding his plan of talking to her and just crossing over the room to pull up a chair next to Hermione’s bed. He leant back on the uncomfortable wooden chair and stared at Hermione’s face.
Hermione was usually a healthy tanned colour, but right now she was unnaturally pale as if from shock. Her chest rose and fell far too infrequently and her hair lay in limp brown curls that showed how long it had been since she’d used her special hair oil on it — the one that she got from some fancy wizarding salon that Lavender visited. Harry didn’t want to know how he knew that off the top of his head, but he could grasp deep down that it was because of how much attention he paid to Hermione. That was a scary thought, somehow. Sure, he could name Dean’s favourite soccer team and Susan Bones’ favourite subject, but he didn’t consciously try to memorise those things. In some way, he’d been paying more attention to Hermione than everyone else, intentionally noting down every little thing she expressed interest in and filing it away for future reference, and he knew exactly why.
Hermione meant more to him than anyone else he’d ever cared about, and that was terrifying.
Harry sighed, dropping his head into his hands.
“I… I really wanted to talk to you,” he mumbled, looking through his fingers at Hermione’s unmoving form. “I… you’ve been unconscious for a full day, and Madam Pomfrey said that you would wake up today but I guess it hasn’t happened yet. You’re probably not able to hear me, so that’s… that’s something. I hope you get better soon, and so does everybody else, but it just feels really important to me that you wake up. I don’t know if you know why, and I don’t really want to say it out loud, y’know? It seems strange to admit. You’re really important to me, you know that, right? I mean, you’re important in general, but I really just want you to wake up. I can’t lose you, too, Hermione.”
Harry looked up from his head and looked hard at Hermione’s face.
“I got something out from the Potter family vault for you,” he declared, rooting around in his pocket and pulling out a necklace, “Because I wanted something really special to show you how much I lo-like you. It matches your bracelet.”
He looked at the glittering necklace in his hand. The silver chain shimmered in the warm summer light and the small sapphire pendant refracted the light into a thousand tiny blue lights that spun and danced over the walls of the hospital wing.
He held it out to Hermione as if to give it to her, then realised how futile that was and held it over the bedside table. It clinked against the top of one of the many bottles of Hermione’s potions and he bit his lip, something akin to devastation welling in his chest.
He dropped the necklace back into his pocket. It seemed paltry now, as if all he could do to make up for nearly getting her killed was to give her an old piece of jewellery and then hope to be forgiven. That seemed insensitive. How could he really apologise to her, other than making sure that she never got so much as a papercut for the rest of her life? That was what he really wanted to do, but Hermione would call him overprotective and have a field day psycho-analysing him with a psychology book she’d gotten in third year.
“It’s weird to not be able to talk to you,” Harry surmised, looking up at the ceiling and following the little blue lights across it. He took a deep breath and looked around the entirety of the hospital wing, making sure that no one was around to hear him. The faint melody of a radio song echoed out from Madam Pomfrey’s closed door, so he concluded that she was busy and continued to speak.
“I wanted to tell you about Sirius, just in case no one else already did. He… he’s gone, Hermione, he’s-” Harry’s voice broke up as he sobbed once, tears beginning to well up in his eyes. He clamped a shaking hand over his mouth and breathed hard for a few seconds, rubbing furiously at his eyes, before he gulped away the lump in his throat and removed his hand to keep speaking. “He’s gone. He fell through this giant doorway that everyone keeps calling the veil, and then he was dead. And… I don’t know w-what to do. Ron’s being good about it, of course, but he’s not around a lot. He’s spending a lot of time with Luna, just, like, talking and stuff. He’s been in to see you, of course, and so have your dormmates, but only you and him would be able to actually make me feel better, and he’s not being around enough for it. And you’re still asleep, of course. I miss you, Hermione, and I miss Sirius so, so much.”
Harry leant forward on his chair, putting his arms down on Hermione’s bed and then lying his head on his arms.
“You’re keeping me going, Hermione. It’s not really healthy, I know, you’d spend all day with that psychology book trying to figure out how to help, even though you’re the thing that’s helping. All “PTSD”-this and “Trauma”-that — I can already imagine it. I just… Sirius was protecting me and then he died. Everyone’s heartbroken and it feels like… maybe he should have been the one to live, y’know? I’m just a kid, and he used to be an auror. He could be so helpful to the war, and I’m… I’m just a kid. That’s pretty much all I can say. But you’re keeping me going, Hermione. You’re the one I’m living for.”
— — —
Ron sat next to Luna near the lake, dead grass underneath them and blazing sun above. Luna’s head was on Ron’s shoulder, a comforting weight that Ron focused on to avoid thinking of anything else.
“-I mean… it was scary, but I felt brave,” Luna said, staring out at the sunlight glistening off the lake. Ron looked down at her, squeezing her hand once to let her know that he was still listening, and she looked up at him, smiling with that shaky sort of confidence that Ron was all too familiar with seeing on Harry’s face — the confidence that meant “I should never have been in this situation, but look, I made it through”. It was the feeling Ron had felt when he made the winning sacrifice in the chess game in first year. It was something strange and sad and strong. “I felt like I was part of something, you know?”
“Yeah,” Ron said, staring out at the island in the middle of the lake, “Yeah, I know.”
Luna looked up at him, no longer smiling but instead staring at him in that familiar way that meant she knew exactly what he was thinking. She lifted her head from his shoulder, turning her head to look right at him, and Ron bent his head down to press a soft kiss onto her lips.
Notes:
the chapter after this might be a little late, because i've got exams coming up and i'm, like, failing calculus, so don't hold your breath too long or you'll suffocate, and that would be a really bad way to lose a reader. stay safe, stay healthy, don't suffocate :)
Chapter 7: somehow there's a moment of peace
Summary:
year the sixth, in which Harry looks over at the author (having a breakdown) and decides "this is a competition I can win", so he has several
Notes:
Uh… hi
This chapter was unfortunately quite difficult :(
I detest the Half-Blood Prince on some meta-spiritual level that even I don’t understand, and so writing a whole chapter about it was incredibly unrewarding. I’ve tried to make it as interesting for you as possible, but it might not have worked. This was originally the first kiss chapter, but I love torturing y'all too much, so you're not getting it yet. Forgive me for the quidditch scene possibly not being very accurate to canon because I was super tired when I was writing it and didn’t want to reread the scene haha.
Enjoy anyway! If you saw how long the hiatus was… no you didn’t ;)
Chapter Text
September 1996
“Now, can anyone name what this potion here is?” Professor Slughorn said jovially, gesturing with one chubby finger at a cauldron. The cauldron was filled nearly to the brim with an undulating liquid that kept flitting from pastel colour to pastel colour as Ron watched. He couldn’t place it, but evidently Hermione could; her hand shot up in the air and Professor Slughorn called on her to answer.
“Amortentia, sir,” she said eagerly, the corners of her mouth curling up into a smile. Ron traded a look with Harry, who stared at the cauldron with blatant curiosity.
“And what exactly is Amortentia, Miss Granger?”
“It’s a love potion, Professor,” Hermione answered, “The most powerful love potion ever made, in fact.”
The room went decidedly quieter at that, and half the students seemed to unconsciously step towards the cauldron. Professor Slughorn laughed, ushering the crowd back and nodding to Hermione.
“Correct, ten points to Gryffindor. You recognised it, I suppose, by its distinctive mother-of-pearl sheen?”
“The steam, also; it’s visible, and rising in spirals. It also smells very strongly-” Hermione broke off there, looking embarrassed, though Ron couldn’t imagine why.
Slughorn nodded, “What Miss Granger has just noticed is Amortentia’s most well-known characteristic, and the thing that I’d like to test on all of you now. The scent that the steam of Amortentia gives off is unique to every person who smells it, and is said to smell like what a person finds most attractive. Now, who wants to try smelling it?”
Half a dozen girls stepped forward at that, but Slughorn looked past them to stare at the clump of boys in the corner. “Ah, Mr Potter, come forward. You too, Miss Granger, for such a good explanation. And… I suppose we’ll have Mr Corner and Miss Padma Patil, for such good answers earlier. That’ll be all, the rest of you move back a bit.”
The four students whose names were called stepped towards the cauldron, trading uneasy looks with each other. Hermione was steered forward first, Slughorn prompting her forward until she stood right in front of the potion. She looked uncharacteristically scared.
“I…” Hermione started, looking progressively more confused the longer she stood there, “I smell… fresh grass, and n-new parchment? And… primroses.”
Hermione stepped back suddenly, face white, and melted into the crowd as Padma walked towards the potion. Padma looked just as terrified as Hermione, but her expression eased as she smelled the potion.
“It’s coconut,” Padma said confidently, “Laundry detergent as well, and… oh, grape bubblegum, the kind that you get from the newspaper stand near my house. That’s all.”
Harry was next, and Ron shot him an encouraging thumbs up as he strode forward in the way that showed he was plucking up all his courage.
Harry took a deep breath, then closed his eyes and took another breath. “I smell… wool, and treacle too. And roses, but not the normal kind… I think it’s perfume.”
Hermione squeaked, face going bright red, and Ron got a little bit closer to her. As subtle as he could, he smelled her neck. Then, he rolled his eyes so hard he couldn’t see for a few seconds. Of course Hermione wore rose perfume. Of bloody course she would. If word of this got to the betting pool, the odds would go up by galleons. He could have kissed Slughorn; a love potion that smelled just like the thing you found most attractive was the perfect thing to clue them in. Now it was only a matter of time before they figured it out. Hermione’s scents were a bit harder to figure out, though, he’d have to scour his memory for anything about primroses. Harry didn’t exactly carry them around — maybe she’d given him some, or found out that they were his favourite flower? Anything was possible.
Michael Corner stepped up to the potion and began talking about pinecones, so Harry was able to get away from the class’ prying glances and came back over to them. He looked hard at Hermione, but Ron stepped between them before the atmosphere could possibly get even more loaded. He adopted an easy-going grin and slipped into his role as comic relief.
“You know, I think that cologne that Malfoy’s been wearing since fourth year is floral… maybe both of you are smelling that?” he suggested. Both of them grimaced and he barked a laugh at their matching expressions.
“Oh, the cologne’s so obnoxious,” Hermione said, wrinkling her nose, “I don’t know what he was thinking.”
“It’s like a bloody cloud around him,” Harry complained, grinning. Professor Slughorn dismissed them to go and pack up and Ron watched Hermione stay behind far longer than was strictly necessary in order to take another sniff of the Amortentia. Harry’s eyes were fixed on her as she did so and Ron alternated between long-suffering sighs and rolling his eyes for the last few seconds of class. Harry and Hermione both practically bolted out of the classroom as soon as they were dismissed, and Ron suppressed another sigh only because he wasn’t sure if there was actually any air left in his lungs anymore. Everyone else shuffled out slowly, everyone trying to smell the potion as they went past it, and Ron moved at a snail’s pace to pack his bag before doing the same. Professor Slughorn winked at him, letting him hang there for a second longer than the others, before gently pushing him towards the door.
For a brief moment, the scents of rain, roasted chicken, and dirigible plums trailing after him. He smiled lazily before shaking himself out of the sudden haze in his head. Stumbling out the door a little faster than his feet could take him, he quickly bumped into Harry and Hermione, who were standing just outside the door to wait for him. Not knowing what to do with his shaking hands, Ron shoved them into his pockets and hurried to catch up to his friends.
He split up with Harry and Hermione right before they entered the common room, heading to the library to pick up a book for a Charms assignment he had to do and stopping by the kitchen to pick up some dirigible plums. On his way to the tower, he chanced upon Luna sitting in an open window, dangling her legs out and humming something that was lost in the wind.
“Hey,” Ron greeted simply, sliding onto the windowsill next to her. She didn’t look at him, but dropped her head back onto her shoulder and kept humming. Ron smirked, reaching into his bag to pull out a plum.
“Oh, plums! Ronald, you shouldn’t have,” she teased, reaching out to grab the fruit. Ron lifted it above her head and she pouted before standing and taking it anyway. The heels of her feet dangled off the edge of the windowsill and Ron hovered a hand over the small of her back just in case she’d fall, but she sat down lightly and laid back in the same position as before, head against Ron’s shoulder. They stayed like that for several more minutes, Luna humming songs that might not have ever been written while she ate and Ron snacking on another plum. The wind whistled through the eaves above them and sun danced across the roofs below them, and plum juice dripped down Ron’s fingers until it was all he could smell.
— — —
It was a good day for quidditch. The sun was bathing the grounds in yellow light, but cool autumn wind swept across the grounds, making sure that it wasn’t too hot. Harry and Ginny stood out on the field in their quidditch gear, pouring over a sheet of names together and occasionally making notes, while Ron sat with Hermione on a bench on the side. They watched as all the other players put on their protective gear, helmets and shin-pads strapped on, and Hermione smiled as Ron groaned beside her, letting his helmet-clad head drop heavily onto her shoulder.
“Get off, you oaf,” she laughed, “You’ll miss your trial if you start to sleep.”
“Your shoulder’s just so comfortable, ‘Mione,” Ron retorted, grinning fondly and grinding his head down onto her shoulder even more. She winced good-naturedly, pushing him away.
“Off.” Hermione grabbed her book and hit him lightly on the head, succeeding in making him get off her shoulder.
Ron yawned, turning to look at the group of players on the field. “Besides, I’d win my trial in my sleep anyways. None of the others could get close, ‘cause I’m just too good.”
“Well, I don’t know about that,” Hermione said fairly, “Cormac McLaggen looks to be pretty good. Did you see him warming up?”
Ron’s smile faded a bit. “Yeah. Didn’t miss a shot, did he? It’s fine, he has terrible technique.”
“What?” Hermione asked curiously, “No, he was so good. I can’t see a single thing wrong with it.”
“Yeah, well, you’re not exactly the expert on everything, are you?” Ron replied, though it had a bit of a disgruntled tinge to it, “He’s off-kilter, and he just puts his hand out instead of hitting the ball away. He steers too slow as well.”
“I don’t see that.” Hermione furrowed her brow and looked at McLaggen. The chasers were up in the air now, and he was flying up and down the field a few feet below them, intermittently tossing a quaffle into the air and catching it before it could fall to the ground. “He looks pretty good. Maybe you just can’t admit that he might beat you.”
“He’s not going to beat me and I told you why,” Ron grunted, jaw set and eyebrows lowering.
“How can you know?”
“I told you! His technique is horrible!”
“Well, maybe you’re just seeing things,” Hermione retorted, “He looks fine to me!”
Ron laughed bitterly, reddened face twisting with anger into something ugly. “You don’t understand quidditch enough to say that; you can’t learn technique from a book, it’s learned on the broom, and you haven’t even been on a broom since the mandatory lessons in second year. I think I’d know a bit more about it than you.”
“I think you’re being a big-headed, arrogant prat!” Hermione exclaimed, “Your ego is making you think that you can beat him just because you think you’re better than him.”
Ron sneered and opened his mouth to retort, but a cry rang out from the other end of the field and they both abandoned their heated argument to look at the source. McLaggen was on the ground, holding his swelling ankle and biting his lip to stop from crying out again. His broom flew in lazy circles above him and he waved an arm in the air as if trying to grab it. He’d obviously fallen badly. Hermione started, meaning to go and help him, but sat down as the chasers began to converge on the fallen player.
“Hah!” Ron crowed. Hermione jumped, then rounded on him with a fierce scowl.
“I told you he’d fall!” Ron chortled, smirking at the sight, “I knew he would! He tried to catch it without bending his elbow to absorb some of the impact, and the shock made him pitch off the side of his broom. That’s why you need good technique, I told you!”
Hermione drew in a breath, feeling her eye twitch with the sheer effort she was taking to not start shouting. She stood stiffly, turning to Ron as she gathered up her bags. “Congratulations. Well, I obviously need to do some research on proper quidditch technique, so don’t be worried if you don’t see me around.”
Ron sniggered, grabbing his broom and stepping onto the field. “Yeah, you do that. Can’t stick your head on books forever, though.”
Hermione turned, ignoring the sound of Ron’s fading chuckles behind her, and strode off towards the library. Gritting her teeth to stop herself from shouting in frustration, she glared icily at the quidditch pitch and then stepped inside the castle. She immediately made her way to the closest empty closet, threw up the strongest silencing charm she knew, and let out a long, drawn-out groan of annoyance.
The impertinence! The effrontery! The utter gall that Ron had to act so uppity and all-knowing when he constantly teased her about being too brainy was just so incredibly infuriating. Hermione had thought that they were making headway in being less irritating towards each other — Ron seemed to be making a conscious effort to engage with Hermione’s academic rants and not just dismiss her, while she herself was working on being less bossy and thinking him inferior just for his love of sport. There’d been a wonderful few months during which Harry had broken up a total of two fights, with most de-escalating when whoever was blowing up that time took a few minutes to collect themselves and then apologised and worked to make things better like a responsible near-adult. But this time? Ron just couldn’t accept that he might not be the best at something, and while Hermione knew she wasn’t the designated expert at quidditch, she couldn’t see a single thing wrong with McLaggen’s form. She’d poured over quidditch manuals when she’d first learned of the sport, determined not to make a fool of herself, and she knew full well that she could distinguish good technique from bad. Ron was just being an arrogant prat who couldn’t see that McLaggen was perfectly able to beat him, and that was something he needed to apologise for.
— — —
October 1996
Slughorn had given out his Christmas party invitations and Harry was getting his date sorted now or never. Having learned his lesson from the troubles of the Yule Ball in fourth year and deciding to get the asking out of the way early, Harry had been trying to get Hermione alone all day, but was having no success; she was somehow surrounded by her dormmates or other students. She seemed to have the superhuman ability to sense whenever he was coming and encircle herself in other people until it was utterly hopeless to try and talk to her. She probably wasn’t doing it on purpose, but it was infuriating. Now, they were finally sort of alone; the common room was emptying as students went to bed and Hermione sat with Fay Dunbar in the corner, studying arithmancy.
Harry glanced down at the invitation in his hand, then looked up at Hermione, then quickly ducked his head and stared at the parchment again when she felt his eyes on her and turned to look at him. His hands shook a little as he stood and walked over to her, waiting until she’d finished her sentence to begin speaking.
“Um, Hermione…” he began, wincing at the way his voice cracked, “Can I ask you something? Like, privately.”
“Yeah,” Hermione said, voice raising at the end like she was questioning the request. Harry made a face and Fay stood up abruptly, mouthing something at Harry that he couldn’t quite make out.
“Er, what?”
Fay winked at Hermione, who laughed and pushed her away with a raised eyebrow that Fay apparently read as some sort of instruction. Harry was too busy trying to decode what that eyebrow meant to see the way that Parvati and Lavender on the other side of the room lock eyes with Fay and begin to laugh.
“I… what is going on?” Harry laughed. Hermione shrugged, shuffling over and patting the sofa cushion next to her. Harry sat down hurriedly and fiddled with the invitation in his hand, working up the courage to ask.
“Hermione, will you go to Slughorn’s Christmas party with me?”
Hermione made a soft, low noise, moving her hand to rest on top of Harry’s, and Harry’s heart dropped like a stone. What if he’d been reading the signs all wrong and she didn’t like him at all? What if all he was to her was a best friend, or worse, some sort of brother? What if-
“I’ve already asked Cormac McLaggen to go with me,” Hermione said gently. Harry blanched.
“What?” he exclaimed, mouth falling open into a perfect picture of disbelief. “W-why? Cormac McLaggen? Huh?”
Hermione shrugged, grimacing… “I… it’s… I’m mad at Ron and I thought this would be a good way to… oh, I don’t know, I’ll just avoid him the whole time anyways.”
“He’s so…” Harry made a face and Hermione nodded.
“Yeah.”
“Hmm.”
“Hmm.” Hermione nodded again and Harry took that as his clue to go away.
“Well, I’d better find someone else or Slughorn will make jokes about us both being bachelors the whole time,” said Harry, standing up and offering a sympathetic smile to Hermione, who returned it. His head spun as he left the common room, heading towards the library. Who could he ask to be his date, now that the one person worth asking was taken? He could always invite Parvati, who he’d gone to the Yule Ball with in fourth year, but hopping straight from Hermione to one of Hermione’s dormmates was a bit too crass for Harry to consider. Ginny was also an option, but she was already part of the ‘Slug Club’ and had been glued to Dean Thomas for the better part of three months, so she was probably out. Harry searched his mind for another girl to bring, and finally came up with a suitable option who most likely would appreciate the night out. But now, where to find her?
He combed through the castle, trying to find any spot that his hopeful date could be in, but he came up blank time after time. By the time he found her, the light outside had dulled to the faintly orange shadows of dusk and the torches in the hallway were beginning to light up, signalling the nearing curfew. He approached her and noticed, far too late, the red-headed boy next to her.
“Er, Ron! Hello,” Harry greeted, fumbling his words around until all that came out was “Rollo.”
“Hi, Harry?” Ron said, laughing. Harry made a face and turned towards Luna, who stopped her animated rant about the rising population of the Welsh wandering flillow and cocked her head at him inquisitively.
“Luna, I know it’s a little weird, but… um, would you like to go to Slughorn’s Christmas party with me?” asked Harry, shrugging as if that would communicate the weird mix of feelings behind the question. Both Ron and Luna looked stupefied, turning to stare at each other with wide eyes. “Er, if it’s not too weird? Oh, it’s… nevermind, you can forget I asked, I’ll just-”
“Wait!” Ron called out as Harry turned to go. He was smiling now, a cheeky and mirthful grin that meant he was finding something tremendously funny. Harry didn’t know what was so tremendously funny about his utter humiliation. Ron and Luna shared another look, but now both were shamelessly giggling under their breath.
“Oh, what’s so funny?” Harry snapped irately, crossing his arms over his chest.
“Nothing,” Luna said in a sing-song voice, “It’s just so unexpected that it’s funny. Why, Harry, I’d love to go to a party with you. As friends, though? I don’t think you harbour romantic intentions towards me, right? That would be unexpected. What, kneazle got your tongue?”
Harry stumbled over his words as he shook his head vehemently. “Huh? No, no, I definitely don’t like you at all. I mean, I like you! Just platonically, not romantically at all, because we’re friends and very platonic.”
Ron was now actively biting back laughter, while Luna had a hand clapped over her mouth to make sure that Harry didn’t hear her giggling. Harry took one more look at their grins and rolled his eyes, turning and walking away. He’d buggered that up so terribly that now neither of them would take him seriously for weeks.
“It’s on the twentieth of December!” he called over his shoulder, bravely fleeing down the hallway before they could say anything else.
“I’ll see you there!” Luna shouted, before dissolving back into laughter. Harry rolled his eyes once more and rounded the corner, dropping out of sight.
— — —
November 1996
Ron didn’t know what he was doing. The world was slightly hazy around him in the way that meant that someone (most likely Seamus or Fay) had spiked the butterbeer at the refreshments table with alcohol. People spun around him in fuzzy blurs of colour, clapping him on the back and congratulating him whenever they noticed him. Ron grinned whenever they did so, appreciating being the man of the hour. The quidditch game had taken a lot out of him; every muscle in his legs hurt from being on a broom too long, and his hands still buzzed with the sort of feeling that meant nerve damage from the quaffle coming at him hard. Nevertheless, he smiled and danced and gyrated to the music along with everyone else. The music was almost shaking the floor — or perhaps that was just his shaky legs — and his head spun, thoughts scattering every time the drums reached a crescendo. He idly made his way away from the blasting radio, cup of butterbeer sloshing with every step he took, and found himself in the relatively quiet corner where Harry and Hermione were relaxing.
Ron fumbled with his cup, trying not to spill any of his drink, and almost fell into the wall next to Harry. Harry grinned pityingly and took his drink, sniffing it then shrugging and taking a sip. Ron murmured something about cross-contamination and both of them laughed, or maybe they didn’t, he couldn’t really tell. His heart beat in time with the beat of the Weird Sisters song on the radio.
Hermione rocked forward on the balls of her feet, mouthing something, but Ron couldn’t hear her. He blinked sluggishly as an answer, so she stepped off the wall and put her mouth to his ear. “Enjoying yourself?”
Ron shrugged, swaying a bit on his feet. “I guess? It’s…” he searched for the right words, “... loud.”
Harry made a soft noise of agreement, trading an indecipherable look with Hermione.
“Ron…” Hermione said carefully, looking like she was picking her words very carefully, “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine!” Ron exclaimed heatedly. He didn’t know why he was becoming angry, but his slurred words were gaining volume and people were starting to look at them. “You’re just jealous that I won! You’re never happy when I do something right!”
Hermione’s mouth thinned into a line and her hand inched closer to her pocket, itching to hex him. Ron laughed at the sight. Harry looked between them like a bobblehead at a tennis match, trying to capture every miniscule twitch of Hermione’s fingers on the handle of her wand just in case he needed to start throwing up shield charms.
“If you want to celebrate so much, go do it,” responded Hermione icily, “but don’t expect me to congratulate you. You’ve got your moment in the spotlight, you should be enjoying it, not wasting time over here. Go away, Ron. Go!”
“Fine!” Ron smirked, but his face was twitching with the effort of keeping the smile up. He spun around on his heel, or at least tried to, and stumbled back into the fray, grinning when a few people hooted and began to dance with him. He looked back, sure that Hermione would still be there, but only saw the tip of her cloak whip around the corner of the portrait door, Harry following closely behind. For a moment he considered following after them and apologising, but then he shrugged. She could be upset if she wanted to; she was always upset whenever he didn’t study or do his homework or spend hours in the library for each assignment, so it was almost refreshing for her to be the immature one who couldn’t take it when her friends did well. Ron knew that he was the least impressive out of a lineup of him, Hermione, and Harry, and sure, he got jealous sometimes — who wouldn’t be, when your choice of best friends were a national hero and a once-in-a-generation genius? Ron was prone to fits of jealousy and self-doubt, and that was almost inevitable, but he tried not to show it. When Harry decided to save the damsel in distress and needed a helping hand, Ron was there helping him through the challenges. When Hermione won the latest in a long series of academic rewards, Ron bit his tongue and looked at his own work with renewed determination. He tried so hard to be supportive and not get jealous when Harry’s name was in the papers or when Hermione got her spells on the first try. Why was it that Hermione couldn’t support him in this?
Yes, admittedly, he’d been a little rude. Who wouldn’t have been? Hermione couldn’t accept that she wasn’t the expert at something, and Ron was sure that he’d been as gentle as he could when trying to point out that he was more experienced than her in the field of Quidditch. They had their own lanes and Hermione should have stuck to hers.
That’s what this boiled down to, Ron pondered, possessiveness. Growing up with five older brothers had taught him to guard what was his and use whatever he could to carve out his own niche. He’d started playing chess at two when his brother Percy discarded an older set, and he’d been so good at that that he’d become “Ron, the one who’s good at chess”. That had been his and his alone, and no one could take it from him. He was the strategist who saw what others couldn’t, the passionate and hot-tempered general of his own miniature battlefield. That was the only thing that Ron had for himself. Hermione couldn’t take it away.
But perhaps she wasn’t trying to. She wasn’t the expert, but she was used to being one. Perhaps he shouldn’t have been so harsh, nor celebrated so obnoxiously. He was better than this, and she deserved better than this.
Ron sighed, feeling as if he’d undertaken a great undertaking. He made his way through the crowd to the centre, still wobbly on his feet, but was pulled aside by a hand on his shoulder.
“Ron! Oy, Ron!” cried Fay Dunbar, eyes glazed a bit, “Come see us in the corner, we’ve got firewhiskey!”
“Sure?” Ron shrugged, letting himself get steered over to a corner where a few older students were trading a bottle of suspiciously smoking liquid. He sat down between Lavender Brown and a seventh year he didn’t know, staring around until he grasped what they were doing. They were sitting around a pile of candies and liquor, and seemed to be playing truth or dare. Ron’s hand inched towards the candy while he listened, but he refrained from taking any.
“-dare you to make Levi eat a canary cream.”
One of the girls stood up, grinning at the group, and took a candy wrapped in yellow. Ron was suddenly glad that he hadn’t eaten any. The girl got up and walked over to another seventh year on the far side of the room, talking lowly to him with a smirk on her face. Only a second later, the boy took the candy from her and peeled it open, popping it into his mouth and turning into a canary. The action raised raucous laughter from the rest of the group, which only doubled when the girl sauntered back over to them, turning to wink at the canary.
“How’d you make him do it?” one of the boys cried. The girl smirked.
“Promised him a kiss?”
The group broke out into hoots and laughter, which Ron found himself joining in on. The girl sat down and the game resumed again, a bottle in the middle of the pile spinning until it came to a stop, pointing at Lavender.
“Brown,” the girl from before said saucily, “I dare you to kiss one of the people on either side of you, your choice.”
Lavender’s head whipped back and forth as she contemplated her options: a seventh year boy she didn’t seem to know, and Ron. She zeroed in on Ron and quickly dropped a kiss on his cheek, smirking. The group booed.
“A real kiss!” one of the boys jeered, and the rest quickly agreed.
“I can’t…” Ron murmured quietly. Only Lavender heard, and she looked quietly confused, staring into his eyes with more concern than excitement.
“We’re going to leave,” Lavender declared. There were groans and boos, but they disentangled themselves from the group and Lavender pulled Ron over to the wall, searching his face for something.
“Are you okay?”
“I can’t kiss you,” Ron said quietly, “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t.”
“Oh?” Lavender questioned, before she slowly began to grin. “So it’s true, is it!”
“What?”
“That you and that girl in Ravenclaw that you’ve been hanging around with are a little bit past friends? I thought so!”
Ron laughed, rubbing the back of his neck, “Er, yeah, we’re… we’re soulmates.”
Lavender’s eyes went wide and she stepped back a little, her grin somehow widening even more. “Well, I’m so sorry, I shouldn’t have kissed you at all. My, you’re like a married man already!”
Ron chuckled. “Well, I can’t deny that. Luna’s plenty possessive, and so am I, so let’s forget that this… ever happened. But, we could still get some butterbeer together, as friends?”
“I’d like that, Ron,” Lavender said breezily, grasping his hand tightly and shaking it up and down. Ron grinned back at her, shaking her hand and pulling her over to the refreshments table.
— — —
December 1996
It was the day before Christmas and the Burrow was bustling with activity. Mr Weasley was darting in and out of the living room, busy ferrying presents to their spots underneath the Christmas tree and jovially singing along to some Christmas song on the radio, while Charlie (who had flooed over the day before) was trying to keep doxies out of the tinsel in the hall. Ginny was winding ribbons around the railings on the side of the stairs and the twins were busy rigging every doorway in the house with mistletoe. Mrs Weasley was in the kitchen, barely visible over the giant stacks of pots and pans and trays of potatoes to be roasted and sauces to be cooked. Steam billowed out from the kitchen every few minutes, and Mrs Weasley’s harried assurances weren’t helping to make it seem any less dangerous. She had her wand stuck behind her ear, her hair pulled up into a tangled bun, and a wicked smile on her face that could only be compared to that of a mad scientist in her element. In the midst of all this chaos, Harry and Ron sat in the living room, idly playing a game of chess while finishing stacks of Christmas cards. Harry was using Cutting Charms to make Christmas trees out of green paper and Ron was writing out the contents of the notes; a festive greeting and a thank you for whatever gift they’d get. It was a bit strange to write thank you notes before you even knew what the gift was, which Ron pointed out whenever his hand began to cramp from all the writing.
“It doesn’t even make sense!” Ron had complained, “Why should I have to write Uncle Nelson about the gift he’s sent me if I haven’t even opened it yet!”
Harry agreed, though it was less in part due to the fact that he had to write to people whose gifts he hadn’t opened yet and more due to the fact that everyone who would be sending him a gift was already in the house with them. He’d write them thank you cards anyways, but it was a bit of a waste. He absentmindedly moved one of his rooks and watched out of the corner of his eye as Ron heaved an exaggerated sigh, leaning forward to collapse over the table and fiddle with his king. The Christmas cards crushed beneath his chest squawked, though the sound was muffled.
“Check,” Ron said offhandedly. Harry moved his other rook and went back to cutting out Christmas trees.
“Boys, I told you to trim that hedge!” Mrs Weasley called from the kitchen, head appearing out from behind a box of parsnips, “You’d better get your shoes on already or these parsnips are going in your pillows.”
Ron moved his queen to checkmate Harry’s king, who groaned dejectedly and started to mutter about abdicating. Harry got up and felt every vertebrae in his spine click, then ambled over to the door and grabbed his shoes. Looking up, Ron still hadn’t moved, so Harry grabbed one of Ron’s boots and tossed it at him, succeeding in nailing him on the shin. Ron groaned and shot him a glare, but stood up as well and headed for the door.
The sun shone brightly down on the two as they tramped through the garden towards the hedge. They jumped over gnome holes and veered around the particularly long patches of grass that mokes liked to hide in. Grabbing sunhats and hedge-clippers, they began to trim away at the branches, dodging irate bowtruckles whenever they appeared, and soon a few hours had passed. The sun was beating down on them more than it had been before and sweat dripped from their brows, but the conversation was pleasant enough that it didn’t feel as if too much time had passed. When Ron ducked inside to check the time, it was nearly 3:00 pm and Ron collapsed dramatically onto the step.
“Please,” he gasped, smirking as Harry leveled him with an unimpressed look, “No more, I can’t take it!”
“Fine,” Harry relented. “We’re pretty much done anyways, but you should have a shower or your mum will have your head for stinking up the kitchen.”
“You wound me,” Ron grinned, dropping his clippers on the step next to him. “Will you finish the rest?”
Harry nodded and Ron hurried into the house, footsteps thumping on the stairs. Harry watched him go until he was out of sight, then rocked to his feet and headed over to the shed in the corner of the yard. Heading along its side and making sure no one was looking, he rounded the corner and shimmied behind the shed.
Hedwig was there, sitting on top of a huge pile of brown paper packages, and she gave an indignant hoot when she finally saw him.
“I know! I just didn’t expect it to take this long, I’m sorry!” Harry said defensively. Hedwig hooted again and ruffled her feathers violently. Harry made a face.
“You can survive some heat, you’re behind the shed! It’s shady here.”
Hedwig hooted one more time, then catapulted up into the air and flew off, shooting Harry what could almost be described as a dirty look.
Harry huffed. “Blah blah blah, you’re so rude.”
He gathered the packages in a teetering stack, then tottered off towards the house, making sure that Mrs. Weasley was in the pantry before making a break for the stairs. The sounds of running water and creaking pipes was clearly audible throughout the house, so he hurried past the bathroom door and almost fell into Ron’s bedroom. Dropping the pile of boxes down on his bed, he began to carefully stack them and shove them underneath the bed one by one. Operation Gratefulness was a go.
— — —
He woke up on Christmas morning to the smell of bacon frying and the thump of Mrs Weasley’s footsteps on the stairs as she walked away from their door, having given up on waking Ron up. Harry blinked at the ceiling, bleary-eyed, as Ron rolled over and went back to sleep. Despite feeling the pull of sleep at the edges of his consciousness, he threw the blankets down and tried to manoeuvre his limbs out of bed with as much grace as a unicorn. This didn’t work. He fell to the floor with a thump, limbs as dead as his parents. Ron muttered something and made a rude gesture, which Harry returned with a grin. Hiding from his friend, he rolled closer to his bed and started to pull boxes out. They scraped loudly against the floor.
“Wha-?” Ron mumbled, confused. Harry made an aborted shushing motion that stopped when Ron heaved himself out of bed and stumbled into the bathroom.
“You’re not sneaky,” Ron yawned, closing the door behind him. Harry rolled his eyes and pulled the pile of brown paper packages out from under his bed.
An hour later, everyone else had been dragged out of bed and the living room was packed with half-asleep Weasleys. Harry had found himself a spot on the couch next to Ron, while Fred and George were draped over the coffee table. Ginny was half-asleep, nestled in Bill’s side, and a fire roared in the fireplace, filling the room with a cosy sort of warmth. Harry could almost feel himself dozing off. Mr and Mrs Weasley were huddled in the corner over the pile of presents, sorting them into piles, and several times they looked back at him with confusion as they sorted through the packages he’d brought down. Harry just smiled awkwardly and they turned back each time. Eventually, they’d gotten everyone’s gifts sorted out and Harry was staring at the largest pile of presents he’d ever seen.
He stammered out his thanks and began to open his gifts. Ron had given him a box of expensive owl treats (“made with real pygmy frogs!” the label advertises) and Hermione had sent along a long, thin package that ended up being hawk-feather quills from a tiny Welsh town that breeds albino hawks. He had gotten various other sweets and books from the rest of the Weasleys, Charlie and Bill included, as well as a few of the students from the DA.
He wrapped himself up in his Weasley sweater, which was a deep emerald green and adorned with the image of a snitch, and watched as Ron opened his present.
“Harry…” Ron started, mouth falling open. “I… this is too much.”
The room quietened as the others started to pay attention. Harry grinned and shoved his Christmas card into Ron’s hand, laughing a little at the exaggerated look of shock on Ron’s face.
“Ron, that’s a Cleansweep 14!” Ginny said excitedly, getting up to take a closer look. “It’s the newest model.”
“It’s also 200 galleons!” Ron said heatedly before turning to Harry. “This costs… Harry, I can’t take this.”
“Ron–”
Ron laid his hand on Harry’s, looking at him sincerely. “Harry, I know you have more money than sense, but this is ludicrous!”
“I…” Harry swallowed thickly. “I just… consider it a gift for making the keeper position. I know it’s ludicrously expensive, but… if it makes you happy, I’d pay a thousand galleons for it. Just… consider it.” he finished lamely.
Ron’s face went an interesting shade of red, but eventually he nodded and gave Harry a small, heartfelt smile. This seemed to be the cue that everyone else was waiting for to open their own gifts from Harry. He’d gotten Mr Weasley a subscription to the famous “Muggle Living” journal, Ginny a pair of dark green dress robes that looked lovely against her her, Bill a collection of bone-themed jewellery, and Fleur a selection of expensive French chocolates that she’d mentioned enjoying way back in his fourth year. Mrs Weasley pinched his cheek, looking like she might either cry or hug him (she ended up doing both), and clutched her gift tightly to her chest: a signed copy of the famous chef Madam Maybelle’s newest cookbook.
“Oh, Harry,” she said adoringly, pulling him into a hug, “You didn’t have to, dear.”
“I know, but it occurred to me that I’d gotten Ron Christmas gifts before, but I’d never thanked all of you for being so kind, and welcoming me into your home. I just wanted to…” Harry shrugged, “show how much I appreciate it.”
“Harry, dear, you don’t have to thank us; we’re family, after all,” Mrs Weasley laughed, “Do you think the twins thank me every time I do their laundry?”
“It’s okay, Mrs Weasley. I just hope you like the gifts.” Harry replied, head swimming with the weight of her words.
‘We’re family.’
He had a family.
Ginny grinned at him, holding her new robes up to her body and twirling around, and Harry grinned back. He hugged her tightly as he walked past, making her squeal and laugh in surprise. He sat down next to Ron with a thud, instantly leaning over and tucking his head into his best friend’s (his brother’s) shoulder. Ron relaxed his shoulder down and moved seamlessly into Harry’s space like he’d been anticipating this. Harry smiled and watched his family finish opening their presents.
The glow of happiness that emanated from him for the rest of the holidays could have lit up the world ten times over. He had a family who loved him, and that was the greatest feeling in the world.
— — —
January 1997
“-And of course the new spells weren’t tested on goblin-approved silver” Hermione mumbled, quill scratching away at a piece of parchment covered in barely-legible notes, “And the goblins didn’t… ugh, um… the goblins didn’t approve the new mint so they had to… um…”
She put down her quill with a sigh, ink splashing as she dropped her head into her hands. Letting out a small groan of frustration that was muffled by her hands, she wallowed in her own self-pity for a moment before getting up and heading back off to the history section. There, she found several books on the goblin rebellion of 1039 and was retreating back to her table when a library cart rolled out of nowhere and knocked her over.
The books she was carrying spilled out of her arms with a crash, and she exhaled sharply in irritation, gathering them up and grabbing the cart as support. She looked around for someone to blame for the cart but no one was there.
Sighing, she got to her feet and dropped her books back onto her table, glaring at the cart. It contained a number of books, and Hermione began to inspect them, wondering if she could pinpoint where the cart came from by its contents. The cart was full of books on psychology, a subject Hermione didn’t devote a lot of time to researching, and she picked at the tomes with interest. A bright green book on paranoia caught her eye (and the swivelling eye emblazoned on its cover stared right back), while a crumbling scroll with the name “Nobody May Help Thou Before Thou Helps Thyself” made her laugh out of surprise. Rooting through the pile of books, she found many of interest, but one in particular seemed to catch her eye.
The book was a gentle blue, with neatly-typed words on the front spelling out “Master Manual of Mind Medicine”. Hermione gave it a searching look, then pulled it from the shelf. She immediately regretted it. Underneath the title, a neon bright orange sticker pulsed with an irritating light, and though Hermione muffled it with her hand, it still managed to start screaming out advertisements of what the book could do.
“The master diagnosis to discover your prognosis!” it shrieked through the library, “Simply hold on and let the book figure out how to help! Coping mechanisms have never been easier! Let the master manual find the right medicine for your mind!”
She could see why it was stuffed under all the other books. Nevertheless, Hermione cast a quick silencing charm on the sticker, then picked up the book. She’d be impressed if it could find her a “coping mechanism”.
When Hermione picked it up, the pages began to ruffle and flutter, turning back and forth for at least a minute until it finally settled on a page titled “Meditation”.
“Meditation
A solution to: stress, anxious thoughts, fidgeting, and other nervous ailments.
Simply sit in a comfortable spot, close your eyes, and breathe slowly!”
More instructions were written underneath; tips on breathing and counting and a bunch of tiny other things that Hermione was sure would never solve her constant stress. She hmphed and tried to turn to another page, but suddenly the book seemed to be made of stone.
“Alright then,” she sighed, “I’ll do the meditation later, though? I’m trying to finish my essay.”
The book’s pages fluttered slightly as if pleased and Hermione shot it a look.
— — —
A week later, she flounced into the common room and put the book down in front of Harry.
“Harry,” she said grandly, “I have found a solution.”
He blinked at her. What an idiot — hadn’t he deduced from her proclamation that she had found a solution?
“A solution to what?”
“To your obvious PTSD and trauma,” replied Hermione. He blinked again, then looked at the book, then looked back up at her.
“I don’t have obvious PTSD and trauma.”
“Well, it might not be obvious to you, but it is to me.”
“... Right,” Harry said carefully. He looked down again and Hermione took the opportunity to press the book into his hands.
“It told me to meditate to manage my stress, and it’s only been a week but I already feel better. I didn’t even feel stressed yesterday when I got an Exceeds Expectations on my Herbology essay! It works, Harry,” she said pleadingly, noticing the suspicious way Harry was looking at the book.
“Can’t see where it keeps its brain,” Harry muttered, staring at the book in his hands as it fluttered back and forth.
Hermione shrugged. “Could say the same about half the sentient books at Flourish and Blotts.”
Harry shrugged suspiciously. The pages of the book began to slow down and Hermione watched eagerly as the book seemingly found the perfect diagnosis. It settled on a page, and Harry raised an eyebrow at what he saw there.
“ Self-Expression through Art ,” Harry read, voice coloured with a light amusement, “ A solution to all sorts of mental issues and emotional problems. Just let your creative thoughts fly free! Yeah, I’m… convinced.”
“Just try it!” Hermione pouted, “I’m sure it’ll be fun!”
Sure enough, a few days later, Harry proudly presented her with a messy charcoal drawing of himself, Ron, and Hermione. His ash-stained fingers brushed against hers gently as he handed it to her, and even though the drawing was utterly atrocious (her hair was one large block of colour and Ron had a total of three fist-sized freckles on his face), she savoured the warmth it brought to her heart and vowed to make him practice more.
“Do you like it?” Harry asked, golden sunlight streaming across his face and reflecting off his shining green eyes.
‘You’re gorgeous’ is what she wanted to say, but instead she just smiled up at him and nodded.
— — —
“I’m upping my bet!” Lavender announced to Ron, stepping past him into the entrance of the Potter-Granger betting room and striding towards the large board they’d set up in the middle of the space.
“What- why?” replied Ron in surprise, scrambling back into the room. “Did you see them do something sickeningly adorable again?”
“You saw that Harry has been drawing recently, right?” Lavender asked, feeling around in her pockets for coins. Ron nodded. Harry had been doodling blotchy figures on all of his spare parchment recently, and a few nights ago Ron had found him hunched over a container of black sticks, rubbing them one by one on a piece of muggle paper and muttering about “texture”. Ron had, of course, backed away slowly and spent the night praying that Harry hadn’t either become a runes master overnight or taken up dark rituals, but when the morning came he’d seen the splodgy, strange shape that was apparently meant to represent him and smiled politely.
“And?”
“Well, he gave that horrendous drawing to Hermione and she looked like she was about to marry him,” Lavender said grandly. Ron muffled a laugh into his hand.
“I might put another few sickles on it, then,” Ron said, grinning at Lavender. Lavender lifted her hand for a high-five and Ron carefully returned it, still not entirely used to the muggle gesture despite the amount of times Lavender and Fay did it.
They were leaving the room a few minutes later, chatting quietly about some “cosmic sign of a repaired relationship” that Lavender had seen in divination recently, when Ron turned and walked straight into Hermione. They fumbled with each other for a few seconds, spewing apologies, before Hermione straightened up and turned her gaze cold.
“What were you doing in there?” she asked suspiciously. Ron looked at Lavender pleadingly, not quite knowing
“We were just talking about you,” Lavender said sweetly, linking elbows with Hermione.
Hermione raised her eyebrows, looking furious. “What? Why?!?”
“I was just… asking Lavender for advice,” Ron adlibbed, looking back and forth between the two girls, “I realised that I needed to apologise… for being… rude to you? And I asked Lavender about how I could communicate that with… sensitivity.”
Hermione puffed up like a peacock, “Oh, well… I suppose that’s okay. You’d better apologise well.”
Ron smiled weakly, “Yeah… I… our fight wasn’t totally your fault. Er, could we take this somewhere else?”
“The library,” Hermione conceded. Ron traded another pleading look with Lavender, who only shrugged and mouthed something about cosmic signs. Ron glared at her until she was out of sight, then desperately tried to plan as Hermione pushed him towards the library door. This was going to have to be an apology of epic proportions.
— — —
February 1997
Reminders of Valentine’s Day were plastering every corner of Hogwarts, with cheesy heart confetti littering the floor of the Great Hall and posters for couple’s events pinned all over the notice board in the Gryffindor common room, but Harry was determined to ignore it all. He wasn’t in the mood for romance.
He stepped out of the hall and felt the cold winter air nip at the tip of his nose as he wrapped a worn green scarf around his neck. Gravel crunched beneath his feet as he trode the path towards Hogsmeade. After a few minutes, he veered off to the side and found a bench to wait on. He idly levitated a few pinecones as he waited for his date.
Hermione strolled down the path towards him and her face lit up as she saw him there. Harry waved at her, shuffling over to make some space on the bench, and kept levitating his pinecones into a tower. It was at least thirty pinecones tall now, and Harry was using a large amount of sticking charms to make sure it stayed that way. It was a useless pursuit, as pinecones kept tumbling off, but Hermione snorted when she saw it and that made it worth it. Harry tried to stop himself from thinking that, but she smiled at him and sat on the bench next to him and suddenly his mind was a little too fuzzy to think about anything at all, really.
“You’re so stupid, Potter,” Hermione drawled, but the corners of her mouth were tugging up at the edges.
Harry laughed. “Well, you kept me waiting, Granger. Are we going to that lunch after all?”
“A lady must not be kept waiting, Potter, and you’re not any lady. I, on the other hand, didn’t eat breakfast. Get me a sandwich.”
Harry grinned at her, springing from the bench in order to bend ninety degrees at the waist and extend a hand for Hermione to take. She sniffed dramatically but dissolved into giggles as he yanked her from the bench as hard as he could and she crashed solidly in his chest. They took a few seconds to steady themselves, then set off down the path again. Hermione absentmindedly grabbed his hand to make him walk faster and Harry’s beaming grin could have lit up every lantern in Hogwarts. It took much longer than it should have done to get to Hogsmeade, and when they finally got there, Harry couldn’t feel the cold past the heat in his cheeks.
The town was incredibly crowded, people constantly in and out of every door (and for Honeydukes, every window). Their destination was quickly found by Hermione, who scanned the map and tried to plan out the most efficient route to avoid crowds before every busy Hogsmeade trip.
“Got the pamphlet?” Harry asked. Hermione nodded, flashing a small brochure for some couple’s event in the café they were about to enter — some dainty little teahouse called Norma’s that had advertised a free chocolate cake for any couple that bought two basic cups of tea.
“We’d be a convincing enough couple, right?” Hermione asked innocently. Harry nodded, unable to stop the way the corners of his mouth were twitching into a smile.
“I think we can convince them.”
They entered the café behind another couple and were quickly swamped by the crowds inside. Luckily, the mass of people hid them from sight and no one seemed to notice that they were inside. They joined the long queue up to the front, heads together as they waited, then eventually made their way up to the counter. The front of the store was bedecked in baby blue fabric, with the shopkeeper wearing some flowy navy blue dress that made her look like a blueberry. She stared down her nose at them for a second, then recognition flooded her eyes and she smiled in a way that couldn’t really be construed as nice. Harry’s smile started to drop.
“The Boy-Who-Lived and… is that Hermione Granger!” the shopkeeper chortled loudly, “Well, I never…”
People’s heads started to turn and whispering broke out throughout the store. Hermione moved behind Harry a little more, letting go of his hand, but there were people on every side of them and it didn’t help to quell the hushed voices. Harry frowned in earnest. “Is anything wrong? We’ve just come to have some tea.”
“Nevermind, let’s just… go,” Hermione mumbled, face a brilliant shade of pink. Harry smiled over at her, grabbing her hand and saying a quick goodbye to the surprised shopkeeper before pushing through the mass of people behind them and heading to the door.
“The whole thing’s stupid,” Harry declared as soon as they’d gotten situated in a nearby park under a tree. Hermione said nothing, mouth pressed into a thin line, and Harry mirrored her expression as he tried to figure out what to do. They sat there in silence for a few minutes before Harry grabbed her hand and without a word began to pull her towards a special street. She stammered some expression of confusion behind him, but he ignored her and only shot a grin over his shoulder. She rolled her eyes but began to smile as they wove between people and darted down alleyways, heading towards Harry’s favourite shop in the world.
The sound of a bell rang through the shop as Harry pushed open the door to Neil’s Knick-Knacks and Novelties. Hermione’s eyes widened and an involuntary look of wonder came onto her face as Harry led her down the aisle towards the counter. Mr Yang greeted Hermione with a wave, then shot Harry a look when he noticed the bracelet on her wrist; the one Harry had obsessed over in fourth year. He directed them over to a couch, telling them to “browse the wares at their leisure” (an oddly nice thing that Harry had definitely not been privy to), and they sat down in silence. Hermione’s head was instantly on Harry’s shoulder and he relished the warmth it brought.
After a few minutes, Hermione spoke, “Is it really that out of the question that I could be seen with you?”
“No!” Harry was quick to reply. “They’re just dimwitted gossips and that shopkeeper had no business being so condescending. You’re better than me in every way, Hermione, and it’s their fault that they don’t realise it.”
Hermione laughed wetly, and Harry had the sinking suspicion that she was crying. He refused to look, instead just squeezing her hand and glancing around the store.
“I had wanted to spend this Valentine’s Day alone,” Harry murmured. Hermione made a distressed noise, so he continued, “But I’m glad I didn’t. I was still thinking about Cho; she was my Valentine last year. We went to a dainty little teahouse and held hands and then barely a month later we broke up. And then you said you wanted to go to a dainty little teahouse, and you held my hand, and admittedly we aren’t dating, but I was worried something would happen. I was so determined to spend the day alone, just… wallowing in my own misery or something. I don’t know, it doesn’t matter anymore. I’m glad you’re here, Hermione.”
Hermione smiled into his shoulder, nudging his knee with her own, and he nudged her back. For a second they got into a sort of nudging competition, then it dissolved into Hermione drying her tears while Harry pointed out any interesting item he could see on the shelves. They stayed there a while, and Harry slid a few galleons over to Mr Yang when he brought Hermione some tea and biscuits. Soon, they were watching the crowds outside the window and laughing at everything happening outside. At one point, Ron and Luna stopped outside the shop, so they ducked down behind a shelf and giggled while Luna pointed at some gadget in the front window. Ron grinned at her and Hermione almost cooed at the sight, but they quickly ducked back behind the shelf in stunned silence when Luna kissed Ron’s cheek and dragged him into the store to buy the gadget.
Harry and Hermione sat with their backs to the shelves, trying not to be seen, as Luna bought whatever a “helioscope spectrometer” was and Ron marvelled at the amount of Quidditch memorabilia in one of the cabinets. They traded looks of awe when Ron called Luna “sunshine” and Harry had to physically stop himself from running out the door when Luna started affectionately telling Ron that she would protect him from helioscopes. It was disgustingly sweet, and how long had it been going on? Ron being so openly tender and wholesome with a girl they’d only known for a year was surprising, to put it lightly, but Harry couldn’t help but think that Ron must have known her for a while. He remembered something about Mr Weasley mentioning “the Lovegoods” when talking about their town, which could mean that Ron and Luna were childhood sweethearts — wouldn’t that just be sickeningly saccharine?
As soon as the lovebirds left, Hermione rounded on Harry, who was still sitting there open-mouthed.
“They’re dating?!?” Hermione whisper-yelled. Harry looked up at her, eyes wide in horror.
“How did we not notice?” Harry asked, dropping his head into his hands. His head swirled with questions. Could he have graduated without even knowing that his best mate had been dating Luna Lovegood?
“Oh, Merlin’s beard,” Hermione said despairingly, “We’re totally oblivious.”
Harry nodded, then stopped and thought for a moment. Ron was obviously dating Luna, and had been for some time. Was it such a stretch to think that they’d been dating at the end of fourth year — when Harry had come to the conclusion that Ron obviously fancied Hermione? Was it such a stretch to think that he’d gotten it all wrong? Was it such a stretch to think that he had a chance?
Harry decided it wasn’t a stretch when Ron stopped outside the door to wrap his scarf around Luna’s neck and press a chaste kiss to the top of her head.
— — —
“Come on, Luna,” Ron joked, pulling at her hand as they wove through the Hogsmeade crowd, “You’re gonna miss your surprise!”
Luna grinned back at him, lightly stepping out of the way of a few busy shoppers. Poking her tongue out, she darted off into the crowds towards the Three Broomsticks. Ron rolled his eyes but followed after her, pushing his way through the mass of students to get to Luna.
“No butterbeer!” he called out, “I thought you wanted to see the surprise?”
Luna pouted and “Can we get butterbeer and then do the surprise?”
“Surprise first, butterbeer later,” Ron promised, taking her hand again and leading her away from the pub.
“The nargles are forcing you to deny me my butterbeer,” Luna mumbled, put out by the dismissal.
Ron only snickered, pulling her closer to him and adjusting her bright yellow scarf so that it would cover her better. “You don’t fool me, love; the nargles will be fine for a half hour while the surprise happens.”
“Oh, so it’s an event, not just a gift or something?” Luna asked, brightening up. Ron nodded but said nothing, pulling her into a quiet alleyway and leading her through the filthy side street until they came across a dirty black door set into one of the brick walls.
“Is your surprise organ-harvesting?” Luna asked politely, eyes wide with faux innocence. Ron snorted, still silent, and knocked three times on the door.
It opened very suddenly and Ron found himself engulfed in a hug by a fast-moving lump of gingham fabric.
“Oh, Ron, you’re here!” said the lump, a chubby hand reaching up to pinch at his cheek roughly.
“Hi, Auntie Lucy,” Ron greeted obligingly. “It’s nice to see you again. What’s it been, four years?”
“Oh, you were tiny when I last saw you, Ronnie, practically a baby!” she rounded on Luna with a strangely evil smile. “You’re his soulmate, Luna Lovegood, I presume? Well, that’s just lovely. When Ronald was very little, he would constantly read those sorts of stories; oh, it’s just so perfect that he found you so quickly! Why, every time he writes me he blathers on and on about you.”
“Does he write you often?” Luna asked curiously.
“Oh, yes, Ronnie here writes letters to all of his old, decrepit relatives,” Aunt Lucy laughed jovially, pinching at Ron’s cheek again, “A right sweetheart, you’ve got!”
Ron shot a glare at Luna, who was laughing quietly into her hands.
“Well, Ron, show me those soulmarks! You said you’d kissed the girl.”
Ron smiled, though it came out a little uncomfortable. “Er… no thanks, Auntie.”
“What’s with the gloves?” his aunt asked curiously.
“It’s… er… a Lovegood tradition. I mean, it’s not something I’m used to, but I’d do it for Luna.”
“That’s too sweet of you, Ronnie,” his aunt cooed, “Such a gentleman.”
“Oh, I nearly forgot, didn’t I? Well, here it is,” Aunt Lucy announced, spinning around and grabbing an overflowing picnic basket. “You treat my little Ronald right, Miss Lovegood? He’s too sweet to have his heart broken.”
Auntie Lucy let them go after a few more minutes of reminiscing, telling Ron very seriously to ‘appreciate the tart’ and then ushering them off before her radio program came on. They left the alley and Ron led them towards the park at the end of the street, where several other couples were doing progressively less appropriate activities the further they got from the view of the main street.
“Is your aunt infested by Mairring Cloudknighters?” Luna asked curiously, “They do tend to hang around the heads of people whose heads are too far up in the clouds. The centaurs are covering it up, because they believe that the Cloudknighters are responsible for guarding the moon from invaders. And also, what’s with the tart?”
“I didn’t know that,” Ron said pleasantly, manoeuvring them towards a park bench, “And as for the tart; well, it’s a Weasley family tradition to bake a grapeberry tart when a soulmate pair is found within the family, and… well, I’m not allowed to know the recipe, so I asked Auntie Lucy to make it for us.”
“That’s very sweet of you, Ronald. Too bad I was planning to break your heart,” she teased. Ron rolled his eyes, sitting down and placing the picnic basket between them, rooting around in it until he found plates and serviettes. They ate in comfortable silence for a few minutes; Ron kept turning to look at Luna before finding that she was already looking at him, making them both blush and look away. With the cold winter air nipping at his nose and ears as well, it was a wonder that Ron’s whole face hadn’t turned bright pink. They finished eating and sat there absorbing each other’s company for a few more minutes, then packed away the picnic.
“We’ll leave the tart until last, as is traditional,” Ron declared. “So if you want butterbeer, I’ll have to get it now.”
Luna voiced her desires, so he got up and headed off to the Three Broomsticks, walking backwards so that he could smile at Luna as long as possible before she dropped out of sight. If he thought that Harry and Hermione were sickeningly cute sometimes, he’d hate to see what they thought of him and Luna.
The Three Broomsticks was full to the brim, and so it took Ron far longer than it should have to get to the front and flag down a harried barmaid. He ordered two butterbeers, and when it was time to pay, he looked through his coin purse, counting through the money he had saved up for this date, and luckily he had more than enough. After only a minute of waiting, he thanked the barmaid and carried the glasses out the door and towards the park.
There were loud voices coming from the end of the street and Ron furrowed his brow, speeding up a little while still being mindful of the sloshing glasses of butterbeer he was carrying. He rounded the corner and looked out across the park, zeroing in on Luna’s form, and his blood began to boil. Around her stood three tall Ravenclaws, probably seventh years, and one of them had taken the picnic basket and was levitating it high into the air, laughing as knives and forks tumbled out of it.
“-all by yourself? What an unexpected surprise … and by unexpected I mean completely expected,” one of them said snidely as a plate fell out and shattered on the ground. Luna seems to be shying away from them, flinching every time another piece of silverware clattered onto the ground. They were crowded around her, bodies blocking her off from the rest of the park, and Luna looked so distressed that Ron put the butterbeer down on a nearby windowsill and started to run towards the group of girls.
“You’re so cute,” one of them laughed, “Did you imagine yourself a Valentine? That’s so… sweet.”
“Yeah, I’m really happy for you,” the third girl said sarcastically, a cruel smile on her lips. The other two smiled sweetly as well, and one picked the picnic basket from the air and dropped it on her lap. Ron skidded to a halt at the bench and they turned to him in surprise.
“Weasley,” one of them asked innocently, "Is something wrong?”
Ron didn’t say anything, sitting down next to Luna and pulling her into a hug. She shivered against him, and Ron’s gaze turned icy as she looked at the girls. Luna was perfectly capable of defending herself, but these girls had somehow rendered her speechless and shaking. He got to his feet, nearly vibrating with rage, and they collectively took a step back.
“Leave–” Ron snarled, reaching for his wand, “–before I show you why I survived that battle in the ministry last year.”
“I thought that was all Potter,” one of the girls said testily.
Ron barked a laugh, “Is that what you think? Well, Harry’s plenty powerful, but I’d say I’m definitely more cruel. Wanna find out?”
“Yeah, Weasley,” the bravest girl said, playing with her wand, “Show us what you got.”
Ron was casting before she could react, “Petrificus Totalus, Incarcerous, Incarcerous.”
In less than five seconds, all three girls were on the floor watching Ron stalk towards them. He leaned down in front of the girl who seemed to be the ringleader and began to talk.
“Let me tell you something, Beatrice. I know you. You’re in your seventh year, right? Wanna be a journalist, right? That’s cute. Well, I know you’re relying on your boyfriend’s connections for that, but I don’t think it’s gonna work out. And wouldn’t that be terrible, Beatrice,” Ron leaned in a bit more, watching the older girl’s terrified eyes as he came closer, “Marshall isn’t gonna to use those nice connections on you, Beatrice, not when he knows that you’ve been fooling around with Claude Zhao. What a silly thing to talk about in public, Beatrice, when someone might overhear. You see, I didn’t tell your boyfriend about you two, because it wasn’t my business, but now you’ve made it my business, and Marshall’s gonna find out soon enough. Think about that, Beatrice, and leave my fucking soulmate alone.”
He waved his wand and they were all able to move again. The group of girls scampered away, shooting Ron and Luna deadly looks that were dampened by the fear in their eyes, and Ron shot Luna a small smile before going to get the butterbeer from the windowsill he’d left it on. They ate the grapeberry tart on newly-repaired plates, silent yet comfortable, and as they left the park, Luna kissed Ron on the cheek.
— — —
March 1997
The air was rife with excitement as the Gryffindor and Hufflepuff quidditch teams soared through the air. Hermione hurried up the steps as fast as she could, weaving through the crowds until she reached the top of the bleachers. There, she looked around for a seat. Unfortunately most of them were full, as she’d arrived a bit late to the game. The Gryffindor section was packed with crimson-clad students, all cheering and hollering and generally taking up a lot of space. If Ron was here, he might have saved her a seat, but he was still in hospital after his poisoning, so Hermione might have no one to sit with. She looked around worriedly, momentarily unhappy, but then she spotted Lavender waving at her and Hermione grinned gladly at her, sitting down next to Parvati and beginning to look around for Harry. In a moment she spotted him: he was a hundred feet in the air, idly scanning the pitch for signs of the snitch. Hermione smiled at the sight, winding her Gryffindor scarf tighter around her neck to stave off the light breeze playing against her skin.
She watched for only an hour before the unthinkable yet utterly predictable happened — Harry was injured in the course of playing quidditch. It happened nearly every time he played, yet it never failed to make her breath catch in her throat as she stood and watched him plummet. It was almost laughable how easily her heart dropped down to her stomach whenever he made a daring dive, yet those little insignificant heart palpitations were nothing compared to what happened when he was carried off to the hospital wing, blood and bone in places they absolutely shouldn’t be. Something of that scale happened today as well when Ron’s stand-in pelted a bludger at Harry and knocked him unconscious eighty feet in the air.
Ordinarily Hermione had no way to take out her concern on someone responsible, because usually it was just Harry’s blatant disregard for his own safety and limits to blame. Now?
Now, she had a target: Cormac McLaggen. The repulsive, irritating, infuriatingly smug slug of a boy that had dared to hit Harry with a bludger.
Hermione was not unusually a vengeful person. Yes, she held grudges and kept blackmail and occasionally trapped annoying reporters in jars, but at the heart of her she liked to think that she knew the line for revenge. Therefore, she was not going to hunt down McLaggen and hold him down as she bashed his head in with a beater’s bat until his brains began to make a mess of the carpet. No, instead she would be a little classier with it.
So, as she usually did, Hermione went to the library. She spent a solid five hours in the section on hexes, then badgered Madam Pince about a Sanskrit text on unbreakable curses until she was banned from the library for the next week (she got the book anyway). Then, she was ready.
She cornered him in the common room and when he turned to walk away, she hit him in the back with a bright pink spell. For the next one and a half months, Cormac McLaggen could only speak in rhyming couplets. Or rather, for the next five days Cormac McLaggen only spoke in rhyming couplets and the next month and a bit after that it was beautifully, blissfully quiet.
Then, Hermione went to the hospital wing. It was spring outside, with birds singing and children laughing and all the stereotypically joyful things that happened in spring. Hermione had half a mind to bring a bouquet of flowers, but she thought that would be a bit on the nose. Instead, she brought
“How does this keep happening?” she asked Harry’s unconscious body, “Don't you have any self-preservation? Can’t you see that you’re scaring me?”
Harry did not respond. He just lay there limply, head wrapped up in thick white bandages. Hermione laughed almost hysterically and the sound echoed around the room.
She dropped her head down to her hands, clutching at her head. “Harry, just… wake up. I don’t like it when you’re hurt. I want to pass my NEWTs with you still alive.”
She spent a few minutes just talking to Harry about what a stupid, self-sacrificing idiot he was before heading to the next bed to see the also limp and unresponsive Ron and pointedly reading a book on recognising poisons in front of him before informing him of Harry’s rather large order of bezoars that had flown in via owl post the previous night. Madam Pomfrey ushered her out a few hours later, after she had read her library book on paranoia aloud to the unconscious lump that was Ron and ruminated a bit more about quidditch safety protocols to the limp blob that was Harry.
Hermione made her way back to Gryffindor Tower feeling weary — it wasn’t every day that her two best friends ended up in neighbouring hospital beds. The common room was crowded when she entered, with several people instantly coming up to her and asking about Harry’s imminent death, but she just waved them off. Finally, after several people had tried to ask about what the inside of Harry’s head looked like (“I don’t know! Also, gross, don’t you have better things to do?”), Hermione was able to get to her dormitory, where she flopped down on her bed with an exaggerated groan, making her dormmates look up at her.
“Is Harry alright?” Parvati asked worriedly, “One of the boys in the common room said that his friend’s brother is on the Hufflepuff quidditch team and that he apparently landed right next to a pool of blood?”
Hermione tried and failed to shrug. “He’ll be fine.”
“Well, are… you alright?” Parvati tried again. Hermione wiggled for a second until she could roll over onto her back and look up at Parvati, who looked honestly concerned.
“I’m just so tired of them being idiots,” Hermione groused, throwing an arm over her face to block the infuriatingly bright sunlight that was streaming in through the window. She needed a nap, or perhaps something stronger. Maybe she could get Parvati to hit her with a stunner.
Lavender nodded sympathetically. “Boys.”
“Boys.”
— — —
April 1997
“I’m sorry, Miss Granger,” Professor Slughorn said carefully, “But you know that this sort of work is unacceptable. Not only did you go six inches past the required length on the essay, you also failed to make the potion within the time limit due to restarting…” he breathed in deeply, “ twice , and in an exam you can’t just keep going. Your essay had some excellent points, just make sure to keep everything within the limit.”
Hermione swallowed, doing her best to stop the ringing in her ears. “Yes, Professor.”
The professor gave her a pitying look and slid her roll of parchment back across the table to her. Unfurling it with unsteady hands, she muffled a wounded noise in her fist when she saw the large “D” written in big red ink. She’d never really failed things before — she’d gotten a Poor grade or two on some assignments when she was younger, but never had she gotten something worse than that.
Harry looked over at her in concern, but she couldn’t even muster up a smile to placate him and he looked even more worried. Class was dismissed a minute later and Hermione strode out, unwilling to feel Slughorn’s pitying gaze on her back for even a moment longer. Harry caught up to her quickly and tried to pull her into a nearby classroom, but she tugged her arm out of his grip and back away.
“Leave me alone,” Hermione snarled, tears beading in her eyes. Harry stood steadfastly in front of her, arms open, and after a moment she walked forward and fell into the hug, letting the tears spill over. He murmured platitudes into her hair as she cried and buried her head into his robes.
“Hey, hey, it’s alright,” he hummed, taking no notice of the stares they were getting from passing students, “You’re okay. It’s just a grade, Hermione, you’ll be okay soon. We have that other practical next week and you’ll get an Outstanding on that, yeah?”
Hermione nodded, head still in his robes. He chuckled and pulled her out, wiping tears off her face with a gentle swipe of his thumb, and helped her along until they’d found an appropriately clean alcove to nestle in. The bell rang, signalling that it was time for dinner, and the ensuing barrage of footsteps outside their hiding spot drowned out the sound of Hermione’s sniffles. They waited there in comfortable silence for a few more minutes before Hermione spoke.
“We should go to lunch,” Hermione said softly, voice a little hoarse from her earlier crying.
“Right, I’m knackered,” Harry joked, joints popping loudly as he stretched. “Meet me back here at eight, okay?”
Hermione raised her eyebrows in confusion but nodded. “Yeah… eight. I’ll be there.”
They headed off to dinner after Hermione had cast a few charms to hide the tear tracks on her face, then Hermione went back to her dormitory to wait for eight o’clock. Hermione’s eyebrows were perpetually raised throughout the meal as her questions were rebuffed with cheeky retorts that told her nothing, then Harry had disappeared right after dinner, telling her only that he was “preparing” and reminding her of their meeting time. At ten minutes to eight, she stole upstairs into the sixth year boys dormitory and removed Harry’s invisibility cloak and map from his trunk, then went back downstairs and left the common room quietly. She found her way back to the alcove they were in and knocked at the wall next to it.
“Hermione! So glad you could join us!” Harry said jovially, emerging from the alcove like a figment of her strangest potion-induced dreams. Hermione rolled her eyes and took his hand, allowing him to lead her on a familiar path up to the Room of Requirement. He bowed deeply to her as the door appeared, then grasped the handle firmly and pulled the door open.
The Room had transformed into a potions laboratory; the walls were a comforting cherry oak and the walls clean grey brick, with shelves filled with neatly organised ingredients and large workbenches of golden wood. Shining knives and expensive-looking mortar and pestles were placed on each desk and pristine pewter cauldrons stood at the end of every desk.
“What…?” Hermione said, spinning to look at the room in its entirety.
“We’re going to brew that potion and we’re gonna brew it right!” Harry announced triumphantly, heading over to one of the benches. Hermione smiled and walked with him to the bench.
They brewed the potion carefully over the next hour. Harry wasn’t better than her at potions, but he was far better at slicing and dicing ingredients, so he did that while Hermione watched the cauldron. At one point, her wands were unsteady and he reached over to help her crush some taupuhi root. Her hands became steadier then, somehow comforted by the warmth of his hand on hers.
The potion turned out perfect and Harry crowed triumphantly up until the sip of the potion he’d taken caught up to him and he fell over unconscious. Hermione rolled her eyes. Harry wasn’t dumb and neither was she — he’d obviously had a sip of the Sleeping Draught to make her laugh.
It worked, though. She nudged him to the side and bottled the potion, then woke him up with a stinging jinx and laughed as he glared at her. They wandered back to Gryffindor Tower under the cloak, giggling and whispering to each other, and both fell asleep with smiles on their faces.
— — —
May 1997
“Confringo!”
A sickeningly scarlet-coloured spell flew past Harry and crashed into the mirror next to him, spraying a shower of glass shards over his shoulder. Harry ducked below them, casting some bright blue hex on instinct as he dashed to the other side of the room and hid behind a door. Malfoy snarled another curse and Harry grinned wryly as it shot in a completely incorrect direction and shattered a sink into porcelain chips. He clutched his wand with a white-knuckled grip, willing his hands to stop shaking long enough for him to quickly round the corner and shoot a leg-locker curse at Malfoy.
Three more spells flew at him in quick succession and Harry ducked behind the door again.
He didn’t know what was happening. He’d just followed Malfoy into the bathroom on a mere suspicion, and when Malfoy had drawn his wand, he’d done the same. Now, they were trading exponentially more harmful spells back and forth and it didn’t seem to be slowing down. Malfoy was inching towards the exit, face pale and twisted into an ugly snarl as he cast a bombarda at Harry’s arm. The hair on his arms raised; Instinct made Harry crouch down before the urinal behind him exploded, jets of water spraying out in every direction and making it difficult for Harry to get up. Malfoy saw this and began to cast a volley of body-binding curses, still inching to his left, but Harry slipped into an alcove and began to cast back.
He tried to catch his breath but the curses wouldn’t stop, impacts beating on the stone at his back. He grasped around for some spell that could save him from the barrage, but could only come up with a few short jinxes that would barely stop him. That definitely wouldn't do; they were both aiming for the throat, intent on getting away, but Malfoy’s spells seemed to be hitting a lot harder than Harry’s and he definitely wasn’t looking to simply incapacitate.
Harry darted out from the alcove, wand up, and Malfoy’s lips started to form the syllables of an unforgivable. “Cruci-”
“Sectumsempra!” Harry cried. A blindingly white light shot from the end of his wand and hit Malfoy square in the chest. There was a single second of silence as the curse died on Malfoy’s tongue, then his eyes widened and he staggered backward. Blood spurted from several great slashes that were widening across his torso. Malfoy collapsed onto the floor, water splashing around him, and his wand fell to the side as he clutched at the gouges carved into his chest. Slipping over his feet to get to him, Harry fell onto the floor next to Malfoy, hands shaking uselessly as he tried to recall every healing spell he knew.
“Episkey! Ictusana!” he cried, wand waving and jabbing at every cut he could see, “Oh god, Malfoy, um… Sanguisalva… Piamen Viga!”
Harry choked out healing spells in between calls for help and desperate calls for the paling Malfoy to stay alive, but they seemed to be doing nothing; blood continued to well up from across Malfoy’s chest and Harry could only watch. His hands were covered in blood now as he abandoned the pursuit of spells and began to try to stem the wounds the muggle way — he balled up his jumper and Malfoy’s abandoned cloak and pressed them down onto the other boy, swallowing a sob when Malfoy gasped and tried to push him away with weakly quivering hands.
All of a sudden, Snape was there, pushing Harry away from Malfoy with a harsh bark and kneeling on the grimy floor to begin to cast some lilting ballad of a spell onto his chest, and Harry watched, hands still fisted in bloody fabric, as Malfoy’s wounds began to knit themselves up and disappear.
— — —
Hermione wouldn’t meet his eyes. He’d been sitting on the sofa in the Gryffindor common room for ten minutes, surrounded by Ron, Hermione, and surprisingly Ginny, and Hermione hadn’t looked into his eyes even once after he’d finished telling them what had happened. Ron was a comforting presence at his side, just close enough to lean into if he wanted to but far enough away that he wouldn’t feel squished. Ginny was glaring at the floor, not saying anything, and Hermione was looking everywhere but at Harry, practically vibrating with righteous indignation.
“You need to get rid of that book!” she burst after a few more minutes of silence. “It’s obviously untrustworthy, and now look at what you’ve done!”
“It was self-defence,” Ginny said hotly, making Harry look over at her, “Harry said he was about to use an unforgivable! Yeah, he shouldn’t have used a random spell without testing it first, but what did you want him to do, throw some jinxes and hope that Malfoy’s so busy trying to stop himself from dancing that he forgets he was about to torture Harry?”
Hermione shook her head stubbornly, brow furrowed in anger. “He should have tested it first!”
“Nobody’s disagreeing with you on that, Hermione,” Ron said gently, leaning forwards to talk to her, “But Malfoy was casting an unforgivable and that means it was absolutely self-defence.”
Hermione made a frustrated noise. “You’re getting rid of the book, right?”
“Hermione, drop it!”
“Are you?”
“I’ll get rid of it,” Harry murmured, looking at his hands. He’d washed them so well but the blood was still there and if he hadn’t found that book, maybe his hands would be clean.
Hermione nodded in triumph and Ginny sighed and they left for the Room of Hidden Things. They passed towers of chairs and jewels and books and all manner of knick-knacks and curiosities that Harry was too dazed to pay attention to, simply let Hermione lead him through the jungle of items. A bright yellow book caught his eye and he stared at it until Hermione dragged him round a corner and it was out of sight. In the next aisle, he stared similarly at an ornate tiara and a giant wooden sword. Eventually, they stopped in a large clearing and Hermione held out a hand and took the book from Harry.
“Close your eyes,” she murmured, and he took one last look at the book before obeying. He listened as she walked a circle around him, footsteps loud in his ears. The sound began to fade as she wove her way through the maze of items, and every few seconds he heard her pretending to place the book down so that he wouldn’t be able to pinpoint its location. It was admirable but in vain; he wasn’t planning to go looking for the book again. Anything that held that much capability for violence was better off in the hands of someone less temperamental, less paranoid, and less likely to get into fights with Death Eaters.
After a few minutes, Hermione’s footsteps came to a stop in front of him, and he felt the warmth of a hand held just millimetres from his face radiating against his cheek. She didn’t reach out though, dropping it down and taking his own hand in hers. Harry opened his eyes and was met with the sight of Hermione just standing there, holding his hand, looking tired and frustrated and longing and just endlessly beautiful. He squeezed her hand and she squeezed back and they left the Room of Hidden Things together.
— — —
June 1997
Normally, Harry was a person of the more fiery extreme. He had a heated temper and a burning sense of righteousness and a kind of warmth that made people follow him anywhere. He had warm hands and blistering glares and a scorching-hot attitude. He was heat in every sense of the word, and no one would be able to say otherwise.
Now, all of that was gone. The cold enveloped him like a silken shroud, numbing every sense that he had. It was cold in the cave and it was cold on top of the astronomy tower and it was cold at the funeral and it was cold now in the train compartment as he watched his breath curl into the frosty air. It was not supposed to be this cold in the middle of June, but the sun had all but forsaken them and dark clouds had hung threateningly over the funeral. Harry had glared up at them with the little emotion he could muster (rage, there was only searing rage inside him but it was better to be numb) and they cleared away enough to let the service continue in peace. He sat there on a cold, uncomfortable chair listening to dozens of old men in black robes wax poetic about Dumbledore’s contributions to society, and now he was sitting on a plush velvet seat in a train car watching Hogwarts through a fogged-up window.
The castle that had once looked like home now seemed tainted, the sun behind it hanging in the sky as if on a thread, golden and bright as if to mock his sorrow. Last night had been difficult; he’d woken up shouting for Dumbledore to move, to fight his attackers, to do anything other than stand and let his hope and trust be his downfall. Ron had held him as he sobbed, covering them both in blankets so that Harry couldn’t thrash in his sleep — not that he’d be able to, when the memory of being frozen and immovable in the face of death was so fresh in his mind — and whispering sweet nothings made of sugared air that went in one ear and out the other. Now, Ron sat next to him, one hand hovering over Harry’s as if deliberating whether to touch him. Hermione sat on the other seat, face pale and pinched with concern. She looked at him like she was seeing a ghost, which Harry couldn’t necessarily disagree with. He felt like a ghost; floating above it all, not quite real or really all there. There was something about actually seeing someone die that changed a person irrevocably. Sure, he’d technically seen his parents die, but he hadn’t remembered it until the dementors pulled it to the forefront of his psyche. This felt different.
Dumbledore’s death was playing in his mind in slow motion, turning around and around and never stopping to let him try to breathe. He’d taken a deep breath to try and shout the professor’s name, but now it was caught in his lungs, because it was too late to scream. It was too late for anything at all.
Visions of Dumbledore falling backwards swam across Harry's eyes and he blinked hard to clear them away, not willing to let it overwhelm him. Ron finally made up his mind and placed his hand gently on Harry’s, while Hermione pulled out a book but kept staring over the top of it at Harry’s face.
The train whistle rang out and Harry sank back into his seat as much as he could, watching Hogwarts fall away outside the window. It disappeared in only a few seconds, but it felt like an eternity. He blinked tears back from his eyes, knowing it would do him no good to start crying — if he started, he’d never stop — and hunched in on himself, picking at the threads of his sweater.
The train thrummed underneath him, the sound of the wheels loud and comforting. He waited for a few minutes to let himself relax before beginning to speak.
“I…” he began, then stopped to cough, voice hoarse from disuse, “I won’t be back next year.”
Ron nodded, “Then neither will I.”
He sounded so sure, as if it was a simple decision that he could actually make in a few seconds. Harry blinked at him in surprise. “W-what?”
“I won’t be back next year either,” Ron said simply. Harry gaped.
Hermione looked between them, then sighed, a tiny smile playing across her features, “I mean, I don’t want to miss my NEWTs, but… wherever you’re going, we’re going too.”
“But… you can’t abandon your future just to follow me off on a mission I’ve got no clue how to complete.”
“Well,” Hermione shrugged, “That’s why you’ve got us to help. No sense in you setting off on your own if you’ve got no clue how to complete it then, right? You’re not the brains of this operation, and you never will be, which is why we’re gonna follow you wherever you go, you know? Anywhere.”
“Anywhere?” Harry questioned, not quite daring to believe it.
Ron grinned and squeezed Harry’s hand. “Anywhere and everywhere, mate. You can count on it.”
Chapter 8: oh, runaway child, don't turn back
Summary:
year the seventh, in which the author watched the episode of oprah where she gave everyone in the audience cars, looked out over the array of characters, and decided to apply the same logic to angst and volcano metaphors.
"you get a breakdown!" "you get a period of self-reflection!" "you get a bittersweet moment!" "you get fluff that turns sour!" "you *all* explore your feelings!"
*random lady in the back* "do i get to explore my feelings?"
*the author, eyes glowing with literary power* "NO!"
*a volcano metaphor falls from the sky and crushes her like a looney tunes character.*
Notes:
hi again!
as of this chapter being posted, it has been exactly one year since i started this fic. what a time to be alive, amiright? anyways, i hope to have the last two chapters out at some point before i die; let's hope it doesn't take another year! my muse flutters around like a butterfly and sometimes my arms are just too tired to reach out and catch it.
little section notes:
i think december 1997 is my favourite section so far, so i hope you enjoy that
the tonal whiplash between march and april is severe: from "haha tesco" to literal torture
Chapter Text
September 1997
The locket was in his head. It was twisting his thoughts and his words, making them come out garbled and wrong to his ears, though judging by the looks on Harry and Hermione’s faces, they understood well enough. He was angry at everything and nothing, words spilling out over the floor and splashing at his feet like an ocean riptide. It pulled at him, whispering promises it could never keep into his head.
“-and you have no idea what you’re doing!” he shouted, “You’re supposed to know what you’re doing! Didn’t Dumbledore tell you anything?”
“No, he didn’t,” Harry yelled back, face becoming redder and redder, “But you said anywhere and everywhere and that includes here! I have no idea what I’m doing, Ron, but you’re supposed to deal with that!”
“I thought you’d have a single bloody clue of what to do!”
Harry threw his hands up. “Well, I don’t, alright? I’m just as lost as you are, and if you can’t deal with that you can leave!”
“Maybe I will!” Ron retorted cruelly. No, that… that wasn’t what he meant to say. He’d said anywhere and everywhere, and… he was going to stick with that, wasn’t he?
Wasn’t he?
“Ron, take the locket off,” Hermione said, worry carving lines across her brow, “It’s doing something to you, making you say these things.”
“It’s not doing anything to me,” Ron spat, and she stumbled back a step at the venom in his voice. Ron’s hands itched; he wanted to reach out and make sure she was steady on her feet, but instead he just balled his fists.
“Get out, Ron,” demanded Harry, “Just get out and leave us alone. We don’t need you.”
“Yeah,” Ron laughed sullenly, bitterness laced into his words, “Never needed me to begin with. Good luck, Harry, hope you save the world before you get Hermione killed.”
He threw the locket at Hermione, who caught it and opened her mouth to say something. He suddenly felt like he’d been dunked underwater; he gasped a little, head clearing enough to see what he’d done.
The last thing he saw was Harry’s face, wrought with fury and despair, before he turned around and apparated away.
— — —
Hermione held out a hand and gently, ever so gently, a withered auburn leaf fell out of the sky and into her palm. She let it rest there for a few moments before she let it fall from her hand onto the ground. The locket in her pocket thrummed with a tantalising power, but she refused to put it on, knowing what it would lead to. Harry was in front of her, pacing trenches into the ground and she watched him go back and forth like a tennis match.
“I…” she began, then stopped. Her words were clogged in her throat, thick and immovable, and so she just sat there with her mouth open for a few seconds before closing it and looking away.
“Let’s go inside,” Harry offered, one white-knuckled hand reaching out. She took it and pulled herself to her feet. They walked back to the tent in silence, Hermione’s hand still grasped in Harry’s larger one. As they entered, Hermione turned her head away from Ron’s pile of things, not wanting to see the mug he’d left behind on his table or the way that his sheets were tossed down towards the end of the bed, like he was just out for a stroll and would be coming back to sleep there later. She sat down heavily on her bed, staring out into nothing, and wondered just what had happened.
She’d never have thought that Ron would leave them. Yes, he got in spectacular fights and held long grudges (especially against Hermione), but he’d always come back; even in fourth year when he’d been jealous of Harry becoming a Triwizard champion, he’d still come back when it became clear that Harry needed all the help he could get. That was something Hermione admired about the other boy: even when his own insecurities flared up and he lashed out at his friends, Ron would always come back when times got tough, unable to simply stand by while his friends got hurt. He’d always been able to push his feelings aside and come back when it was clear he was needed. The resentment and insecurity was still there, sure, but he’d just work around it until he could lick his wounds and let go of the past enough to move on.
But now?
Hermione couldn’t understand it. Why would he leave, after everything they’d been through? Why, after he’d said ‘anywhere and everywhere’, would he decide that this was too much, that Harry brazenly charging into danger with only luck and paranoia on his side was suddenly unacceptable?
Actually, she could understand it. She knew exactly what had pulled those festering insecurities to the surface, and it was sitting in her pocket right now. Her own intrusive thoughts were creeping into her head, urging her to run from the danger and storm Hogwarts by herself and sit down to plan the next twenty years of her life out in thirty-minute blocks, and she couldn’t do anything about it.
“Hermione, give me the locket,” Harry said, crouching down in front of her. Hermione shook her head mutely and he furrowed his brow, but then he reached for it and the words stuck in her throat began to spill out unbidden.
“You can’t, Harry, you’re too angry,” she pleaded, “You’ll wear it for twenty minutes and then it’ll make you pick a fight with the first person you see, and who knows what will happen then?”
“You’re not wrong, but…” Harry trailed off, something despairing in his eyes.
“But what?”
He reached out to gently touch her cheek. “You’ve been crying for the past three minutes.”
“Oh,” Hermione said softly. She reached up and took off the locket, feeling the kiss of cold air against her face. She became aware of tear tracks down her face and wiped them away as she set the locket down on the bed next to her.
“Is it safe to-”
“-It’ll be okay,” Hermione promised. “I’ve warded this place to hell and back, and if there’s even the slightest sign of trouble, you can just reach out and put it on. Just… let’s be free for a couple minutes, okay?”
He stood up, and Hermione stood up too. She flicked her wand at the radio and it started up, a crooning male voice beginning to fill the tent. She held out her hand and he took it, and together they began to sway gently to the music. Soon, the song faded out and a more upbeat tune took its place, prompting Hermione to start moving a little bit more enthusiastically (she wasn’t really in the mood for dancing anyways, but already she could feel the mood lifting). Harry smiled and began to dance with her.
A few songs later, Hermione was breathless with giggles and Harry had cracked a real grin when he dipped her low at the end of Sweet Caroline and the mood was so much lighter than it had been before. The tent seemed warmer now, or perhaps it was just that Hermione’s cheeks were flushed from the exertion and the tension between them. Most of the romance novels that Lavender read to Parvati described tension as some strained, awkward atmosphere, complete with sizzling stares and gentle caresses, like the two characters were standing on the edge of a cliff and debating falling over it together. This tension was comfortable, as if they were standing a full hundred feet away from the cliff but could, if they wanted to, run and jump. If they didn’t want to, they could stand here forever and just listen to the waves lap at the rocks below.
As the current song ended, she leaned in, head falling down to lay on his shoulder, and he stiffened under her touch. His smile became a little fixed, and she sighed into his chest.
Hermione knew what was going on here as well. Harry had been distant the whole time they’d left Hogwarts behind, and it wasn’t just because of the tense atmosphere at the Burrow. Hermione knew how her best friend worked — he’d obviously gotten himself worked up over the thought of his death and was pulling back because of it, as if he didn’t realise that being best friends with him for six years had made Hermione more than a little fond of him. Harry was being impersonal because he thought he was going to die in this war, and he thought that being a little less friendly was enough to make sure that she wouldn’t mourn. In some inexplicable way, he was cold, hurting and longing for something he was willingly pushing away from himself.
It was almost laughable except for the fact that it made Hermione want to cry.
Who knew how long the war would take? Who knew when Harry would decide to go out with a heroic bang and leave her to pick up the pieces? They had all the time in the world and no time at all, so Hermione had to do what she could.
She pulled back, taking note of his tumultuous expression, and then hugged him even tighter. She felt him take a shuddering breath and stiffen as if to pull back, but instead of that, he simply melted into her embrace. The radio played in the background and cold autumn wind whistled past the opening in the tent and they stood there for what seemed like forever, just holding each other and wondering what the future would bring.
— — —
October 1997
“Get up.”
“What?”
“Get up, Harry,” Hermione said simply, “We’ve sat around for long enough.”
Harry slowly stood, rubbing the sleep from his eyes and feeling some strange weight in his bones. “I guess so. We have to… we have to keep going.”
And so they kept going, controlling what they could in the only way they could. Hermione pulled some dust-cloths and cleaning liquid from the unimaginably deep expanses of the void within her bag, and they cleaned the tent from top to bottom, barely talking, artfully avoiding Ron’s little bunk area. They stripped the sheets from the bed and Harry tried to remember how to bake muffins (and if it grated on him that the only recipes he could remember was for Dudley’s favourites, it wasn’t the time to mention it) and Hermione sat down and knitted so aggressively that Harry had to tease her, no matter the mood they were in. She threw yarn at him; it was worth it to see her smile.
The little planter box next to Harry’s bed was dying; it had survived three years in a reality-warping tent with no water, but the instant Harry left the lavender inside alone for two weeks it simply had to die. There was a metaphor in there somewhere.
Hermione shoved all of Ron’s things out of their communal bunking space and into the only room they hadn’t filled up, but at least there was one less empty room and one less gaping hole that Ron had previously filled with life and joy and an easy sort of comfort that Harry didn’t think he could ever replace, if Harry never got his best friend back, because Harry didn’t have to look over at Ron’s things every night and think about the fact that Ron had hated him so much that he didn’t even bother to bring his favourite socks when he left—
Harry didn’t want to think about Ron.
Hermione gathered the sheets up in a bag and Harry packed the tent up and they apparated to a random village nearby. Avon-upon-Thames or something along those lines (population proudly four hundred and nine) had a laundromat where Hermione dropped off their sheets and a Saturday market that sold salami and local cheese and an ice cream parlour that had perfectly non-magical flavours of ice cream. It wasn’t anything like Forstescue’s, where Harry had tried salmon and asparagus ice cream and done his homework the summer before third year, but their strawberry was pretty good and so Harry got three scoops and they climbed up to the roof.
The stars were beautiful here.
There had been twenty stars in Surrey. Hermione said there were less than ten in the London suburbs that she’d grown up in. Here in Avon-upon-Thames, at 1:30 in the morning, every light in the village was off and the entire Milky Way was splashed across the sky above them. Hermione whispered constellations under her breath, eyes closed, and Harry fondly remembered the nights they’d spent awake in Astronomy class, when star charts were the only things on their minds and the world hadn’t tried to obscure the stars from their view yet.
They lay there on the roof for what seemed like forever before Hermione spoke.
“I don’t know what to do,” she whispered. Her eyes were open, welling with tears.
“I don’t either.”
Hermione shifted, pulling the sheets from their bag and tossing them over her as a sort of makeshift blanket. “I just feel so… lost.”
“We can be lost together. I sure as hell don’t know what’s happening.”
“What are we even supposed to do?”
“Whatever we can.”
“Are you even listening to me?” Hermione groused, a smile on her lips, and Harry couldn’t help but laugh. She looked over at him, rolling her eyes before she joined in. “Hey– oh, Harry, stop it—”
Finally, like a flower coming to life after a cold winter, like the first rays of sun peeking over the horizon, Hermione laughed, and Harry laughed with her.
— — —
November 1997
Morning dew coated Harry’s shoes as he trudged down an overgrown forest path, stumbling and tripping over every root on the path. Hermione laughed behind him as she gracefully jumped over every obstacle in her path. She seemed to be handling the early morning slog much better than he was. His arms were full of towels that Hermione had dumped upon him, which was possibly contributing to how unsteadily he was walking. Thankfully, the cove they were heading to seemed to be quite close, so his torture wouldn’t last for much longer.
The lake in the Forest of Dean had been frozen solid for a week, so they’d apparated away to a little beach town that Hermione’s grandparents had once brought her to, and walked nearly a mile to a secluded beach near the shore. Now they were somewhere in the middle of nowhere, shivering and stumbling and crushing pale shells beneath their feet. A cold breeze blew down the beach and Harry shot an incredulous look at Hermione, who was drawing closer to the water’s edge.
Hermione darted ahead, smiling genuinely back at him, and he rolled his eyes. “It’s too cold to swim.”
“Nuh uh,” Hermione retorted childishly, poking out her tongue. She rounded the corner and let her towel fall down, exposing the swimsuit that she had underneath (how did she know to pack that? did her bag hold a literal wardrobe?) and a lesser man wouldn’t have been able to stop his blush. However, Harry was a man with a lot of willpower, so instead he busied himself with setting up a towel to sit on and buttering some toast; Hermione had dragged him to this beach far too early in the morning, but he was not going to sacrifice his breakfast. As Ron would say, breakfast was the most important meal of the day.
Harry shook his head to rid himself of thoughts of Ron and turned back to Hermione, who was gingerly wading through the shallows. She looked like a plucked bird with the amount of goosebumps all over her, but she didn’t seem to mind.
“That looks unpleasant,” he remarked, lying back leisurely onto his towel.
Hermione shrugged, dipping her hands into the water. “Not quite.”
She cupped her hands and threw a handful of water towards Harry, who shrieked in the manner of a lady who’d just found out that people liked her rival’s garden party better and rolled onto his side. She laughed at his expression, then turned and waded in deeper. Harry brought his wand out from his sleeve and shot a stinging hex at her back, which made her jump and then glare good-naturedly in his direction. He shrugged and she rolled her eyes, finally deep enough to swim around.
Harry watched her swim for a few minutes, rubbing the sleep from his eyes and willing himself not to nod off right then and there. To distract himself, he grabbed a sketchbook and a grubby stick of charcoal and began to roughly outline the shape of the cove. In about ten more minutes, he’d sketched a beach he was okay with, and now he had to start on the main event.
“‘Mione?” he called out. “Hermione, over here!”
She turned to face him like a sunflower to the dawn, like she was living just to see him, and Harry smiled at the contented grin on her face. “‘Mione, just stand there and look pretty.”
Immediately, she fell into a pose reminiscent of a magazine model, arms up in dramatic shapes and a mysterious smolder on her face. Harry barked a surprised laugh and she fell over, giggling, back into the sea. It swallowed her up and Harry tilted his head in consideration, thinking over the pose. He hadn’t been doing art for very long, so his grasp of anatomy wasn’t the greatest, but he was pretty sure he could draw her well enough. To do Hermione justice would be impossible, but to encapsulate a single moment might be doable. He spelled his sketchpad with a simple protective spell to keep the charcoal from smudging, then began to etch out Hermione’s form in rough strokes.
Twenty minutes later, his fingers were stained with ash, but he was satisfied with what he’d made. Hermione leisurely waded through the shallows towards him and he spun his sketchbook around so that she could see. She smiled and made all the appropriate words of awe, but for some reason Harry didn’t feel satisfied..
“You don’t like it, do you?” he murmured, a thread of upset weaving itself into his words. Hermione frowned.
“Yes, I do,” she reassured him, “And you wouldn’t think that if you weren’t wearing the locket.”
Harry snorted, reaching a hand up to grasp at the locket protectively. There was some twisting, curdling sensation in his gut, like someone was scooping away at his insides and leaving him hollowed out and empty. “I’m fine.”
“Take it off,” Hermione ordered, reaching for his neck. He almost shied away, but something made
“I’m…” he gasped, feeling almost floaty now that the weight of the locket’s machinations had been lifted away, “I’m sorry, Hermione.”
Hermione pursed her lips. “I think we should leave the locket in my bag; it’s doing us more harm than good.”
“But-” Harry tried.
“No buts,” she demanded, “I keep my bag on me all the time, but I won’t have direct contact with it.”
Harry furrowed his brow. It was objectively safer to keep the locket on them — the security risks of needing to run at any moment kept both of them from keeping anything of value in the tent, preferring to hold everything on their persons, but at the end of the day, the locket was hurting them. It didn’t force them into fights, it read their every bitter thought and memory and crafted them into carefully-placed explosions. It wasn’t right to let that keep taking and taking from them, poisoning their words and deadening their smiles and turning their minds inside out and wrong.
“I could keep it in my mokeskin,” Harry offered, and she nodded.
“That’ll work. I…. I’m not losing you too, Harry,” said Hermione determinedly, “That’s not happening.”
— — —
December 1997
For the fifth time in as many minutes, Ron reached for the deluminator in his pocket and pointed it out into the room in front of him. The candle in front of him flickered once, then twice, then the fire seemed to drip off and swirled through the air towards the device, tiny sparks dancing through the air.
Alone, as usual.
Would Harry and Hermione resent him, he wondered, for leaving them all alone? Yes and no, he decided. Harry would forgive him nearly instantly, too swayed by good faith to keep a grudge, but Hermione would be silent and judgmental until they exploded into another fight.
The deluminator warmed in his hand as the flame rushed back towards the candle. It spluttered a little, but soon began to burn in earnest again. Ron sighed and did the whole thing again, watching the flame go back and forth between him and the candle.
He’d fucked up and he knew that, but really, was it so out of the question for him to return? Would they have moved on? Would they need him, or even want him anymore? Would they care? Did Ron really have the room left in his heart to care?
In the past year, three of Ron’s half-blood cousins had disappeared. His brothers were scattered throughout the country, under wards and spells and secrets that Aunt Lucy and Uncle Joseph were killed in a random raid a month ago. After the news came, he didn’t leave his room for a week, just remembering her engulfing hugs and her terrible advice and realising that no one in the Weasley family would ever know the recipe for their traditional grapeberry pie ever again because she died before she could pass it on.
Bill, in quiet, stilted words a few days after the news came in, had told him about growing up during the first war. He’d spoken of the very fears that Ron knew so intimately now, and Ron had gotten a glimpse of the past, sad as it was.
“You have to carry a hundred names in your heart,” Bill said thickly, something amber sloshing around in his glass, “And you can’t do anything about it. You have to sit in your home with whatever loved ones you still have left, and all you have left to do is hope that luck will see you through. But you can’t do anything about it.”
Bill spoke of their uncles, Fabian and Gideon, and the few times that he was able to meet them before they were cut down in a Death Eater raid. He spoke of the ghoul in the attic, once one of their uncles and then reduced to something rife with insanity and agonisingly inhuman by a curse that no one had yet found a cure to. He spoke of orange hair red with blood and the lacerations across his grandfather’s chest that Dad had to staunch until St. Mungos could free up the room to treat him. He spoke of his first sister, still newly swaddled in her mother’s arms, her name barely kissed onto her forehead, and then the devastated silence in the house for years before Mum could bear to have another child, and the way that Percy had breathed new life into their family, broken as it was. Ron, and the twins before him, and Ginny after him — all of them had been balms to the wounds of the war, symbols of new life, and despite the undertones of that thought, Ron was glad to have brought some peace to his family.
Ron thought of his family, and then he thought about Harry and Hermione. Harry, who’d never had a family to care about him until the Weasleys took him in, could never realise the dull hurt of knowing that any of the many people you loved could be killed at any time. Hermione, who’d given up her family to protect them, would never be able to know the bone-deep dread of being targeted just for your name, for a meagre connection to someone who also needed safety and reassurance and feared for you. Ron hadn’t heard from Luna in two months. The others didn’t have anyone left to fear for, but Ron was carrying a hundred names in his heart and wishing that luck would see them through and maybe he wished that Harry and Hermione were the only people he had to care about, but they weren’t, and so he carried those names like lead weights and could only hope that they didn’t drag him down into some inescapable wallow of grief.
The flame stuttered in its movement and seemed to morph, twisting and curling in place as it floated halfway between him and the candle, and Ron stood. He scribbled down a note to Bill and let the flame lead him from the house and down to the beach outside, glowing in the evening air. A wave washed up and over his shoes, soaking his socks and the hems of his trousers. He clenched the deluminator in his hand with a calloused grip. The fire stopped moving, and Ron reached up until his hands were just close enough to feel its heat. It hovered there and Ron knew what he had to do: exactly what every apparition instructor ever would tell you never to do — he apparated without any clear destination in mind and let the flame direct his path.
A raindrop fell through the eye of a needle and he fell through the clouds and the world reassembled itself in a patchwork blur of grey skies, curling smoke, and wind.
He appeared in a copse of trees, stumbling to the ground. He lay there for a second to gather his bearings, then stood and looked around. He appeared to be in the Forest of Dean — the same place he’d fled from. Ron choked a laugh. It was ironic; they’d either come back recently, which would be a funny coincidence, or they’d never left. The idea was oddly funny to him; perhaps all of his worries about them moving on had been wrong both literally and figuratively.
The latter part of that thought sobered him quickly — there was no guarantee that simply being in this forest again would guarantee their acceptance of his return.
The deluminator began steadily heating up in his pocket and Ron nearly burned his hands in his haste to free the flame from where it had enclosed itself while he had apparated. The fire rushed out all at once and condensed into a flickering ball a few feet ahead of him. It shook a little as if beckoning him and then began to move at a steady pace into the trees ahead. Trepidation in his steps, Ron hesitated but followed it nonetheless.
After nearly an hour of walking, Ron was tiring. The flame hadn’t stopped moving the whole time, and seemed to take into minimal consideration the limits of the human body, so multiple times he’d had to find his own way over frozen streams and creeks covered in ice that he wasn’t willing to stand on. Finally, the ball of fire began to slow as he reached a small lake in a thicket of trees. As Ron watched, it began to ascend higher and higher into the sky, then it faded into a single tendril of smoke and dissipated into the wind and Ron was left on the shore without any idea what he was supposed to do.
Something moved beneath the ice and Ron jumped back in fright. Fumbling with his wand, he cast the brightest Lumos he could muster and leaned forward to inspect the thing in the water.
Deep under the ice, writhing and grasping at something around his neck, was Harry. Ron allowed himself a single second to wonder what in Merlin’s good name was happening before he began conjuring fire in a large circular shape on the ice above Harry. When those failed to melt it quickly enough, he began using cutting charms and carving away at the ice. Much to his relief, those worked a lot better, but Harry’s movements were slowing and he started to jerk bodily as freezing water filled his lungs. In a last ditch effort, Ron instinctively flung an arm over his face and sent his strongest blasting curse at the ice. Shards flew up from the ice and Ron threw himself back to avoid them, and when he looked back there was a gaping hole in the ice.
His arms went numb as he reached for Harry and he nearly missed grabbing him, but Ron managed to get Harry out from under the ice.
The next few minutes passed in a blur until Harry opened the locket and set it down on a rock. Instantly, billowing darkness issued from someplace within and twisted into apparitions of Ron’s darkest nightmares; Harry and Hermione taunting him, saying he wasn’t good enough to be their friend, saying they could move on at any moment and questioning him what he thought would happen after that. He didn’t know what seemed worse; the idea of them mocking every little one of his mistakes for years to come, or the possibility that he had mattered so little to their lives that without him they’d just seamlessly slot into the place he’d been before and forget that they ever needed him. Even as he brought the sword down on the locket, he knew he’d be lying awake with that question on his mind for a long, long time.
Later, when he was standing there with Harry, shoes squelching with salt water and hair plastered to his forehead with sweat, he looked down at the locket that tempted all of his ugliest feelings and let those lingering wounds scab over and heal. Tom Riddle read his soul, his mind, his worries and dreams and reservations, but he didn’t truly understand; Ron was a flawed being at his heart, but he did not let his mistakes fester if he was needed. In the same way that a bird could only be said to be made for flight, no matter how hard they were pulled down to the earth, Ron had tried to shape himself into someone who could never actively be a bad friend, no matter how his doubts and insecurities tried to make him so. This idea warred with his own determination to protect his family, but though his family didn’t deserve to be left defenseless, there were other people who could protect them; Harry and Hermione were more his family than perhaps anyone else in the world, and they sure didn’t deserve a bad friend. They deserved someone to protect and nurture them, just as they had been kind and forgiving to him time and time again when his traitorous thoughts turned him jealous and angry. They deserved every part of him, from head to toe to heart, and so his decisions tore at him.
Maybe he hated himself a little for just how he felt, both free and burdened by his decision to leave, but now that hate had been driven away by a deep relief. He had found them. Harry was here in front of him, gasping in air and looking so thin and frightened, but he was alive, and Ron would keep it like that. He offered Harry a hand and his best friend took it, the broken silver locket clutched in his hand, and hope blossomed in Ron’s heart.
— — —
January 1998
Loud disco music pulsed in the air, obnoxious and festive, and Harry grinned as Hermione tried to say something to him that was swallowed up by the noise.
“What?” he asked cheekily, putting a dopey grin on.
“I said, “Let’s get something to eat!”,” she shouted, “Oh, you can hear me perfectly well.”
Harry shrugged, still grinning. “What?”
“Oh, for god’s sake,” Hermione swore, pulling out her wand, “Muffliato!”
Ron laughed and Hermione fixed him with a flat stare, though the corners of her mouth were tugging up. “We should get something to eat.”
“Should we really split up?” Harry questioned, looking around. The fairground they’d stumbled across was bustling with people, and any one of them could have been Death Eaters. Every firework that went up sounded like a spell whistling past, and every time someone bumped into them Hermione nearly jumped out of her skin.
“We can meet near the ferris wheel,” Ron suggested, “At 11:50, maybe? You said the muggles did something special at midnight, and maybe we can watch from there.”
“Alright,” Harry conceded, “I guess I do really want to try those chocolate pizza pretzel things, and Hermione would never go near them.”
Hermione made a face, “I’d bet that there’s nothing else in this fair that even comes close to how disgusting that sounds.”
“I wouldn’t take that bet,” Ron laughed, “I bet that I’ll find the most horrifying thing here.”
A year ago, Hermione would have huffed, rolled her eyes, and taken the bet so seriously that Harry would end up scared by her dedication. Now, she only smiled in a way that really seemed like a grimace and agreed to the bet, disappearing off into the crowd with a tight grip on her moneybag and a tighter grip on the handle of her wand.
“She’s pissed at you,” Harry observed. Ron rubbed at the back of his neck sheepishly.
“Well, she has every right to be.”
“Well… let’s just be normal for an hour or two. We’ve been trying so hard to…” he looked around surreptitiously, “accomplish our goal that we’ve barely had time to relax. Hermione’s got her baking and her knitting and I guess cooking is relaxing for me, but we haven’t really had a breather for a while.”
“I can’t solve this by relaxing,” Ron admitted, “But every time I try to apologise to her she just gets frustrated.”
“She’s not wrong, but she’s not exactly going about this right either,” Harry replied, patting Ron on the shoulder.
“Should we… go get something to eat?”
Harry grinned. “You’ve got to find something absolutely disgusting.”
— — —
An hour later, Harry was pleasantly full of chocolate-dipped pizza pretzels, and he hadn’t seen Ron or Hermione for a little over fifteen minutes. Ron had found plenty of frankly disturbing foods — crickets in peanut butter from some hippie food stall, hot chips covered in cinnamon and peppers from a different vendor — but just as Harry had finished eating he’d spotted something that made him confident he would win and had left Harry alone near the ferris wheel. Hermione too was still out in the crowd looking, and every so often Harry saw her bushy hair peeking out from between stalls, but he hadn’t talked to her yet. Their meeting at 11:50 was rapidly approaching, and Harry couldn’t wait to see what they cooked up (pun intended).
A group of laughing children ran past and when the last of them passed by him, he saw Ron walking out of the crowd towards him. He held a small white paper box in his hand that Harry suspected held his ‘most horrifying food’, and the weird gloves that he seemed to be wearing constantly were stained with ketchup. Hermione also appeared shortly after, flour in her hair and another box clasped in her hands, and Harry waved her over.
“Well, what have you got for me?” he asked jovially, “I sure hope it's disgusting!”
Hermione rolled her eyes but handed over her box, and Harry opened it. Inside sat a steaming piece of chicken topped with whipped cream and a healthy dollop of what looked like strawberry jam. Harry made an appropriately disgusted noise. Ron, never to be outdone, handed over his box, wherein lay a blob of fried something.
“What exactly… is it?” Harry asked, poking at the blob hesitantly.
“It’s deep-fried butter on a stick!” Ron proclaimed proudly, “Some crazy American chap was selling it; said it was his hometown favourite.”
“... Right,” Hermione said, “Well, who wins?”
“Er… both of you?” Harry suggested. Both of them immediately opened their mouths to argue, but just as that happened an announcement blared through the speakers nearby.
“Happy New Year, Bristol!” shouted the announcer, voice squeaking painfully through the speakers, “The fireworks show will commence in only five minutes, so get ready to celebrate!”
Harry grinned and ran to the ferris wheel, where a bored ride operator allowed Ron, Hermione, and him to climb onto a seat and sent them up and up, and just as their seat reached the crest of the wheel, the fireworks whistled into the air and exploded into a thousand brilliant colours. Harry was hit with a wave of nostalgia; three years ago exactly, they had watched the fireworks at Hogwarts together, laughing at Fred and George’s antics, surrounded by life and fun and joy. Now, they were older and more worn down, shaking at the sound of explosions, but there was just as much joy in the air around them, and Harry let it seep into his demeanour.
— — —
They stumbled back to the tent hours later, ears ringing with the hissing of fireworks, breath tinged with alcohol from a bar they’d wandered into, shoes muddy because Hermione had forgotten where they’d put the tent and led them through a field. As soon as they got inside, Ron instantly slumped to the floor and began snoring. Without even looking, Hermione levitated him onto the couch and turned to Harry, smiling sleepily.
Somehow, tension began to bleed into the air; the space between them was thick with unsaid words. She swallowed, and his eyes tracked the movement, and when he stepped forward her hand twitched as she contemplated reaching out. Her gaze was heavy with liquor and unspoken confessions, and he looked back at her in the same way, mirroring her gaze as he searched her face for something. Whatever he found he didn’t like. He took a step back, expression souring into a crushed, sore sort of look. Somehow, underneath that sourness was a hint of relief that made Hermione’s stomach drop. He was pulling back emotionally again, and though Hermione knew why he was doing it, she was still so lost.
“Good night,” Hermione said bitterly, crossing over to her bed.
Harry nodded, something fleetingly devastated on his face, “Good night, Hermione.”
— — —
February 1998
The tent was almost oppressively silent, wrought with a kind of tension that had been all too familiar since Ron had found his way back to them and slotted back into their quiet days. It had been bubbling under the surface for the past few months as Hermione grew more and more frustrated with the easy way that Harry and Ron had seemed to forgive each other, and as Ron grew both more apologetic and more comfortable in their routine. Now, it had come to a head; Ron’s foot tapped insistently on the floor as he watched Harry and Hermione silently argue, and Hermione clicked her knitting needles with a hyperactive, manic sort of energy.
At last, Hermione won her battle of wills and Harry excused himself with a cautious glance, silently allowing her her space. Hermione shot him a grateful look before he disappeared out of the tent, leaving her and Ron alone. Hermione sat down heavily on the couch, head in her hands. Ron stood across the room, all but a stranger to her. It had only been a few months since he’d left and already Hermione felt like their relationship had changed forever, some irreparable little step to the left that may never be righted again. He’d grown while he was gone, she noted absently. Unlike Harry and Hermione, he hadn’t seemed to grow leaner in those months. He now stood as tall as a short tree in the shrub strata; that was to say, around two metres tall. He’d been only a few centimetres taller than her when he left, but he’d shot up while he was gone and now she had to earnestly look up to search his face for answers.
“Hermione…” Ron began, then stopped. He didn’t seem to be able to speak. Hermione shrugged and patted the couch next to her, and he sat down wordlessly.
“I’m sorry, Hermione.”
Hermione said nothing. She stared at her hands as if daring them to start the conversation for her, which they of course couldn’t do, because they were hands, not living people who could handle their emotions normally by talking it out.
Ron tried again, “I- I’m really sorry. Just… say something, Hermione.”
“I don’t want to forgive you, Ron,” Hermione said miserably, “I know you’re my best friend, but… you left. You said you’d always be here and then you left and it was like I was just floating along in no direction at all, just waiting for you to come back. Do you know how that feels, Ron? Harry’s reckless and I’m inconsiderate, and no matter how mad I am at you, I still know that we fit together so intrinsically that it frustrates me. It’s always going to be us three, Ron, and… you left. I don’t feel like that’s an easy thing to forgive.”
“Okay.” replied Ron, “You don’t need to.”
“What?”
“You don’t need to forgive me.”
Hermione looked panicked, “Ron, were you listening to anything I just said?”
“Of course I was, Hermione. I said that you don’t need to forgive me.”
“What does that mean?”
“Well,” Ron sighed, dragging a hand through his hair, “We can work towards forgiveness. It’s obvious that I’ve hurt you terribly. and it’s as much my fault as it is the locket’s. I want to fix this, y’know. Bloody hell, I’ve been sorry since the moment I left and I’ll stay sorry for the rest of my life, but if just an apology won’t cut it, then I’ll prove to you that you can trust me again.”
“Oh,” Hermione said softly, “That’s very… mature of you. Thanks.”
They said nothing for a few minutes as Hermione contemplated what to do. On one hand; she was utterly furious at Ron. They’d thrown months of time down the drain and all he had to show for it was an apology and a promise to do better; all he had to do was say sorry and Harry would sigh and smile and forgive him? It made no difference to her whether he was under the influence of the locket or not; he still meant the things he said, no matter how twisted and mean they were.
On the other hand, the locket had pulled things from him that he’d never had said before. His anger had been so searingly hot, in a way that Hermione had never pulled from him before; Ron was a master at forgiving but he was terrible at forgetting, and all of those memorable moments of pain and fear and frustration had erupted from him like a volcano’s fire and burned Harry and Hermione to the ground. He towered above them with a fury they couldn’t understand, and all they could do was watch and await the pain that rained down upon them like burning ashes.
It was an easy decision, but one that Hermione didn’t want to make. There was a warmth in Ron’s words and the kinder part of her heart responded to it in kind, allowing her to fall into his side and curl up like a little kid.
“We’re just kids, Ron,” Hermione murmured, “We’re… we’re just kids. Can’t we just be kids?”
“I know. But… we’ll get through this, and then we can be kids just like everyone else. They can’t ask us to give up any more of ourselves when we’ve already given so much,” Ron replied, staring off into space.
“I… that’s all I want. It’s all I hope for.”
“It’ll happen, Hermione. It has to.”
— — —
March 1998
“Are you sure you’ll be okay on your own?” Hermione asked, brow drawn in concern. “What if you get attacked?”
“I’ll be okay,” Ron reassured her, forcing a grin onto his face, “Besides, you should spend some time with Harry.”
The pendulum had swung and Hermione had gone from frosty and closed off to a mother hen that rivalled even Ron in nature in a matter of weeks. It had been nice for the first few days as Ron soaked up the love and attention he’d locked himself away from when he left, until he’d noticed that all the “Harry and Hermione” activities — like cooking meals and drawing together — had now become “Trio” activities, but the tension that smouldered away between them had not changed and he was stuck an uncomfortable third wheel every time they contemplated snogging right then and there in front of him.
“I…” Hermione made a face, “If you’re sure…”
Ron nodded frantically. “I’m really sure! You guys need some bonding time, right? Go bond! Yay, bonding is fun!”
Harry gave him a weird look, as did Hermione, but thankfully neither of them pressed. As much as Ron loved being around his friends, he was wildly uncomfortable with the dramatic tension between them, and they needed time alone together to truly appreciate each other (and therefore realise their love and maybe get on with the whole soulmates thing).
“Okay… well, we’ll be going now,” Harry replied, and off they went together. He heard the sharp cracks of disapparition and sighed, relaxing back onto the couch. He had letters to write, quests to ponder, and biscuits to eat.
— — —
Harry stumbled as he finished apparating, face scrunched against the familiar sensation of one’s organs being liquefied and then squeezed through a tube. Hermione, somehow ever so graceful whenever she apparated, landed lightly beside him and shot him an amused look. That very feeling had nearly cost her her apparition exam.
“This is why you should have gotten an apparition license,” she laughed, “If only the ministry hadn’t fallen, you would have been apparating as beautifully as I do.”
“Don’t get a big head,” Harry grumbled, and Hermione laughed again.
They’d appeared in a dingy back alley between two shops; one was dirty brown and had a sign that proudly proclaimed ‘20% off all bikini waxes’, despite it barely being spring, and the other was a corner shop plastered with bright green ads for the ‘all-new gut-tingling, brain-fizzing vodka snapshot!’. In short, it looked exactly like the cheap shops on the outskirts of every shopping district.
“Come on, then,” Hermione said playfully, tugging at his arm. Harry rolled his eyes but allowed her to pull him out of the alley and onto the street. Their destination was just across the way; a large movie theatre, red paint and gold lights and the smell of buttered popcorn awaiting them.
“Alright, what are we watching?” Hermione asked, patting her pockets for her moneybag. “I couldn’t find what was on.”
“Not a horror movie,” Harry said firmly, and Hermione agreed quickly. “Something… family-friendly?”
They eventually decided on some recent animated movie and funneled into the showing room with some twenty chattering children. It was great fun, and Hermione found herself enjoying the film, however distracted she was; at one point, Harry had leaned his head on her shoulder and she hadn’t been able to focus on the singing candlesticks at all.
The sky outside was dark when they left the theatre. The streetlamps cast a warm light across Harry’s face and Hermione smiled almost absently as she noticed the way he seemed to glow. Though bittersweet, the smile came to her lips easier now; years fell off their faces underneath the gentle gold of the street. They walked in silence for a few minutes, aimless, simply enjoying each other’s company.
Hermione snuck a glance at Harry, hoping it wasn’t strange to do so. Happily, he didn’t notice her, still staring at the lights of the shopping district around them. He simply breathed, cold breath making puffy clouds in the air, and Hermione nearly swooned.
Why was it that every little thing about Harry sent her into a daze, and he didn’t even seem to notice her in turn? Was he oblivious, deliberately ignoring her, or just plain stupid?
— — —
Harry was utterly stupid, and that was that. He and Hermione had walked for nearly ten minutes, and had finally settled down in a random park, shivering in the night air, hands gravitating towards each other, and Hermione had looked just so incredible bathed in the gleaming light of the streetlamps that he’d considered kissing her right then and there, but he’d messed it all up the second he’d seen something strange in the distance and broken the delightful tension into shards.
Harry looked at the Tesco, then back at Hermione, “If Tesco exists… Hermione, why are we… struggling in the woods?”
“Harry…” Hermione said slowly, “Where do you think I’ve been getting your toast bread from?”
“Er… aren’t you baking it?” Harry asked, confused. The tent had been full of bread for about a month, and he’d attributed it to Hermione’s newfound hobby; baking, because there wasn’t anything else to do.
“No?!? I know I tried to make sourdough a bit over the past few weeks, but it looks like a brick and is about as edible as one too.”
“...Then where’s the bread from?”
“Tesco, Harry!”
“Is that where you’ve been going?”
“Yes!” Hermione cried, looking utterly lost, “What else did you think ‘I’m going to get food’ meant?”
“I thought you were foraging?”
“Foraging perfectly rectangular loaves of bread?!”
“Well, if you’re not foraging then why are we having so many mushrooms in every meal?” Harry said heatedly. Hermione looked like she was seeing Harry for the first time.
“Because I like them and they’re cheap at Tesco! I’m not foraging in the woods every day for perfectly round portobellos.”
“How are you even paying for this?”
Hermione paused and shifted her gaze to the ground, looking guilty. “Well, I pay when I can, but… the invisibility cloak and a little bit of the Confundus is useful too.”
“Hermione, you’re stealing from them?!?”
“They’re Tesco!” Hermione defended, “They’ll live!”
Harry gaped. Hermione stealing was about as likely as a pureblood willingly freeing their house-elf; nigh impossible to see, and if you so much as suggested it, you’d be met with shocked and incredulous derision.
“I can’t believe this. Hermione Granger, breaking the law?”
“Shut up, you prat,” Hermione retorted, “We needed more food than I could get legally, and this was the way to do it. You’re the one who eats a metric ton of food at every meal, how else was I supposed to keep up? I’m grateful that you’re good at cooking, but really, all I make is sandwiches and last time I did that you ate seven of them before I’d finished my third!”
“I’m a growing boy!”
“You’re seventeen!”
“Still growing!”
— — —
April 1998
When Hermione was four years old, she had to get a polio vaccine. She read the pamphlet in the reception area, trying to understand every big word and fancy acronym, and got about halfway through it before her name was called and her mother took her hand to lead her into the doctor’s office. She lifted Hermione on a cushioned bench, and the doctor smiled and called her ‘Miss Granger’ and Hermione nearly forgot about the needle until the doctor pulled it out and started talking about the unicorns outside the window. Hermione was not a stupid child, so she didn’t look out the window. The doctor pulled a lollipop from the drawer and asked Hermione whether she liked sugar, and Hermione replied that she didn’t want her teeth to fall out. The doctor sighed and asked her mother to hold her and rolled up the sleeve of Hermione’s nice blue shirt. The needle came ever closer and Hermione tried to wriggle away, but her mother’s arms were too strong to escape and Hermione could only watch as it punctured through her skin.
Hermione at four years old had not had much experience with pain, but when the needle sunk into her arm, she thought she knew it all. For a moment, it was all-consuming and she slumped there, wriggling forgotten, little genius brain trying to comprehend something she’d never experienced before. The pamphlet had said it wouldn’t hurt; the pamphlet had said that children were easily distracted and wouldn’t mind the pinch. How, she asked herself, did it burn and sting and hurt so utterly anyway?
Was it because she couldn’t get away?
The needle withdrew from her arm and a throbbing ache settled in. The doctor smiled and called her brave. She still got a lollipop and a bright red plaster and a little badge with Pingu on it that said ‘I’m Brave!’, even though she’d never felt more weak.
There were no lollipops here, but six years in Gryffindor had given her a lot more experience with bravery.
Bellatrix Lestrange stalked towards her, wand in one hand and a sheathed knife in the other, and Hermione reminded herself that just because she couldn't get away didn’t mean that she had to focus on it.
“Crucio!”
Pain unlike anything she’d ever felt filled her entire body. It was a burning flame, it was an aching sore, it was a hundred thousand needles bearing down on every pore in her body. It was a lot harder to not focus on it. She could hear screams, long and high and interspersed by quiet sobs, and it took her a few seconds to realise that it was her making those noises, keening and crying out for some unknown force to save her from this pain.
The marble ceiling above her glittered with inlaid gold, and Hermione willed her sobs to stop as she looked at the tasteful artwork, trying to detach herself from reality.
Breathe in, breathe out.
Directly above her head lay a sparkling blue gemstone the size of her fist. How much would it have cost the Malfoys to buy a jewel of that size? Was it ethically sourced? Were they really that tacky?
Breathe in, breathe out.
The chandelier in the centre of the ceiling was practically dripping diamonds; they dangled in dainty strings and reflected the warm light from the numerous candles around the room and attached to the chandelier itself. How did that get cleaned? Wouldn’t wax drip down all over the diamonds? Was it magic? Was this really an efficient use of their candle supply?
Breathe in, breathe out.
“Look at me when I’m talking to you, mudblood,” Lestrange snarled near her ear, all hot breath and greasy hair and a sickeningly wide smile. Hermione bit her lip to suppress a sob. The Death Eater straddled her to keep her from moving and wrenched her arm out, gently rolling up Hermione’s sleeve in some mockery of care. The steely sound of a knife drawn from its sheath echoed through the manor’s hall.
A sharp pain erupted on Hermione’s bicep as Lestrange started to sing.
“Little birdie in the wind,” she murmured, hoarse and off-key, “Mama wants you home again. Fly, my birdie, in the breeze, going wherever you please–”
The pain in her arm worsened as Lestrange jerked to one side and dug the knife in harder, and Hermione couldn’t help it anymore; she screamed.
“Oh, little mudblood, you made it worse,” laughed Lestrange, “Now I have to start all over again. Little birdie in the wind, mama wants you back again–”
Hermione knew a lot of things. She knew why the sky was blue and the grass was green, and how to cast magical spells, and she knew why people hated what they couldn’t understand. Unfortunately, that knowledge didn’t seem to lend itself to comprehension, because somehow she couldn’t wrap her head around this at all. What vengeful god in the heavens above had she offended so to be lying on a cold marble floor, nerves tingling with aftershocks of curses, just letting herself be cut into pieces by a madwoman? What had she done to deserve this? Who could possibly deserve this?
Lestrange kept singing, grinding the end of her knife into the end of the ‘M’ now carved into her arm.
Breathe in, breathe out.
The song echoed in her head long after they’d escaped the manor.
— — —
Bill shut the door behind him with a click, horror and concern in his eyes as he looked at the two people inside his guest room, and while Harry usually would’ve reacted poorly to such blatant pity, he only nodded in sympathy and let Bill go. He wouldn’t know what to say anyway.
Hermione lay perpendicular to him on the guest bed, head in Harry’s lap and arms wrapped around her torso as she sobbed herself into a fitful sleep. Occasionally, she mumbled about birds and Harry was reminded of the strange new mark that had appeared on his thumb while he was in the dungeon in Malfoy Manor, listening to Hermione scream. It was a bird of some kind, blue and white, and he couldn’t look at it without feeling some immense distress that didn’t seem to be his own.
Harry watched as Hermione fell asleep, head on his lap, and mourned what he’d lost in only a day. Hermione’s arm was red and still oozing blood from the word that Lestrange had carved into it, Ron and Luna were still holed up in the living room, refusing to let each other go, and he was here, alternating between carding his hands through Hermione’s hair and staring out the window at the newly-conjured gravestone on the hill.
He knew the war might take everything from him, but he hadn’t thought it would take this. It was the small wounds that seemed to ache the most; losing Ron or Hermione or perhaps Luna would have sent him into a spiral of carnage for weeks, if not months, and he wouldn’t be able to stop destroying and desecrating and demanding the death of whoever had killed them until he himself was either dead or broken into bits. Dobby’s death was different. It was like losing Moody or Dumbledore or Sirius, in that he wished he had understood them better before they gave their very lives away for him. That sort of death wasn’t a shot through the heart, but rather a dull sort of wound that would last and last because the sort of closure it required couldn’t be bought through blood. Dobby was going to be something he regretted for a very long time.
— — —
“I was worried,” Ron said, “But I didn’t do anything. I just… I can’t believe myself. There are Death Eaters all through Hogwarts and you didn’t write me for months and I still didn’t do anything!”
“You did what you could,” replied Luna, head buried in Ron’s shoulder. “A heliotrope blew in through the bars of the window and it whispered to me that you’d save me when it was time, so I was okay, because I trusted you, and you did what you could.”
Ron avoided shrugging, as it would dislodge her. “No, I didn’t, and… and you shouldn’t just forgive me for that!”
Luna brought his hand to her lips and gently kissed it.
“You did what you could. That’s all I needed.”
— — —
May 1998
A single blue curse trailed through the night sky, soaring past the moon and blotting out stars with its trail, and began to arc slowly down towards the glistening blue shield that lay over Hogwarts. Ron watched it with bated breath, and as the shimmering dome above him began to fracture and shatter into tiny pieces that dissolved before they could reach the ground, he could only sigh and grab his wand.
Instantly, long-range spells came sailing into the courtyard from the Death Eater horde on the hill outside the castle, and parts of the castle began to crumble and burn. Like Mount Vesuvius above him, the towering hill outside the castle walls was erupting with fire, and like a volcano’s pyroclastic surges, Death Eaters began to converge on the castle. And just like those in Pompeii, all Ron could do was wait, pray, and hope that whatever god they’d offended enough for this fiery death would not forsake them now as they faced their incoming doom.
Luna stood beside him, stance firm, knuckles white, and Ron could only take her trembling hand in his own.
The air around them slowly started to cool as dementors floated towards them, forming a mass of ragged cloaks and cracking skin that chilled Ron to his bones. He lifted his arm and tried to conjure the happiest memory he could. One came to mind readily: the first time that Luna had been allowed to go to Hogsmeade. A year older, he’d had a year to smuggle candy and trinkets back to the castle for her, but then she’d finally been able to go and they’d huddled together in a crowded sweet shop, mouths full of candy floss, and drank orange juice that Ron’s mum had sent along while the autumn wind nipped at their ears and danced with their scarves. Ron sighed, remembering how happy he’d been when he first saw her coming down the courtyard steps towards him.
“Expecto Patronum!” he cried, and a dozen voices chanted with him. His basset hound patronus charged headfirst into a cluster of dementors and they swirled away howling, only to run right into Luna’s sparkling hare. A squirrel jumped past, corralling two dementors towards the main body of them, and a jellyfish took the other side. Other patroni that Ron didn’t recognise began to help his own and Ron marvelled at the display; half the students around him hadn’t been in the DA, but nevertheless they had adapted and found a way to protect themselves. Neville had evidently taught them well.
Death Eaters had finally made it onto the bridge and now began to charge towards the group, and Ron looked around for someone to help. There was no one else — giants had broken through into the courtyard behind them and screams rang out as teachers tried valiantly to wrestle their tree-trunk clubs away from the attackers. It was up to them to defend from this threat.
“Dumbledore’s Army!” Ron yelled. He took a quick look around, surveying who had the strongest patronus and who he knew from the DA. Ginny was a strong duelist, whereas Dean was possibly the best shielder in the school. He would, of course, leave the dementors up to Luna. Four others he marked down in his head as good duelists, and he directed them to the front, watching as the doubt in their eyes was overcome by the trust that they had for him and hoping that that trust was well-founded.
He grabbed Ginny and she joined the duelists just as the Death Eaters reached halfway across the bridge.
“Dean!” he yelled, “Get a shield up! Anyone else who’s best at shielding, protect the duelists!”
Seven patroni faded and seven shields stuttered to life in front of the duelists, who began to cast spells out towards the incoming attackers.
“The rest of you, Patronus Charm! Luna, keep them away from the duelists and the shielders!” Luna nodded at him and renewed her Patronus; the dementors were not being driven back anymore, but were at least held back by the ten or so Patroni they had left. Ron nodded back and headed towards the front, wand at the ready, and cast a Blasting Charm past their shields into a section of the bridge about ten metres in front of the line of Death Eaters. One of them didn’t stop in time and fell through the newly-made hole, tumbling down with the debris. The Death Eaters began to veer to the left and Ron called a command, watching as his fellow schoolchildren adjusted their strategy in kind.
“They’re going to try to attack from the left, because it’s easier to get into the courtyard from there, so make sure to pick off the ones over there. Stand strong, everyone. Dumbledore’s Army!”
The call was returned by twenty odd voices, young and old alike, and Ron set his mouth into a determined line and kept casting.
Ginny danced around gaps in their shields and cast curses Ron didn’t know she knew. Dean stood strong, one arm clasped around Seamus, and kept his shimmering shield up as Death Eaters hammered at it with spells and fists alike. Dennis and Colin Creevey stood back to back, Dennis shielding two duelists while Colin protected the group from falling debris from the rapid destruction of the courtyard behind them. Padma Patil and Luna drove the dementors back with a hare and a rabbit that twirled around the mass of darkness together, and Ron held the line against an army.
— — —
Snape’s blood was still drying on the laces of her sneakers. Tears she’d wiped off of Lavender’s face were still wet on the tips of her fingers. Voldemort’s declaration was still echoing in her head. All she could see was blood and all she could hear was the wet gurgling of a second year girl choking on blood, and the tiny whispered “thank you” as Hermione had cradled her to death, blood soaking into her jeans, and the world was stained reddish-brown with blood. The Great Hall was filled with bodies upon bodies, ranging from wizened Order fighters to small children caught in the crossfire. Professor Vector lay dead in front of her, and Hermione remembered their last conversation; some banal talk about Arithmancy homework.
Ron was sobbing on the floor, arms thrown around Fred’s body, and Luna’s arms were in turn wrapped around Ron. Hermione watched the Weasley family with tears in her eyes, but could only offer them the peace of uninterrupted grief without inserting herself into their mourning.
Harry still hadn’t come back from Dumbledore’s office; he’d stumbled off, face white and trembling hands grasped around the vial of Snape’s tears, and Hermione hadn’t been able to get the feeling of wrong ness away since he’d gone. It was as if a piece of ice was dropping slowly closer towards the back of her neck; she could feel the cold encroaching upon her, but she couldn’t predict when it would finally touch.
She left the Weasleys and hurried down the hall towards the staircases, and for just a second, the wind of a person moving past her settled on her skin. When she spun around, no one was there. She reached the staircase; the stairs had stopped moving, so it took her far longer than usual to reach Dumbledore’s office. The door was open — the guardian had been knocked from its pedestal and lay off to the side, moaning and groaning about chips in its stone. Hermione took the stairs in twos, determined to find Harry and make sure that he wouldn’t do something stupid like sacrifice himself.
A spike of pain caused Hermione to drop her wand. Ducking into a corner, she grabbed her wand from the floor and lifted her palms up.
Across each palm lay a single black dot.
There was a singular moment when time seemed to stop entirely and the Earth stuttered on its axis. No words could describe the absolute and all-consuming anguish arching through every vein in her body, as if fire was running in her blood and ice was stoppering the beating of her heart. There was grief woven in the stars in the sky and agony falling in comets and meteors and the sharp, cold rain that fell from the very heavens above her could not have compared to the frigid daggers of horror that pierced her through her core. She let out a wordless scream of agony and torment and misery and the morning sun rose steadily on the horizon and the world slowly began to turn again.
Hermione stared at her palms, clear and unblemished. She didn’t know why she was crying.
She wiped cooling tears from her face, hands still shaking, and then watched in fragile awe as a tiny drawing of a train appeared on her pinkie finger.
— — —
Harry sat in the grass next to Hagrid’s hut, hand in Hermione’s own, and ate sandwiches and shortbread as Hogwarts pieced itself back together in front of their eyes. Bricks knitted together, directed by McGonagall’s wand, and Harry watched Hermione watch the professor work, smiling a little wider every time she exclaimed over the magical handiwork. He lifted a shortbread to her mouth, accidentally smushing it against her cheek when she didn’t notice him and kept staring at the castle.
“Harry!” she laughed, and he grinned back at her, dipping a finger into the treacle of his tart and lifting it to her face. She shrieked, trying to run away, but couldn’t stop laughing and so was subjected to Harry putting treacle on her nose.
Ron rolled his eyes at the sight and continued divvying up the food between them. He set some sandwiches to the side, carefully opening them to remove the cucumber, and Harry raised an eyebrow.
“Luna doesn’t like the cucumbers,” Ron explained, gesturing over at the girl in question, who was sitting a few metres away from the group drawing some sort of horrific shadow creature in a notebook while picking apart a piece of bread.
“Old married couple, you are,” joked Ginny, detangling her limbs from the picnic blanket to lean over and steal the cucumber from Luna’s plate. In doing so, she fell over Neville, who cursed good-naturedly and pushed her back. Harry turned back to Hermione, who was wiping treacle off her nose, and leaned against her. Almost unconsciously, he found himself moving his head towards hers.
Hermione inhaled sharply and Harry pulled back, disappointment stinging at the corners of his eyes.
“Harry, we need to talk,” Hermione said softly, “Come with me.”
Harry pulled himself up gracelessly and followed her, murmuring an excuse to Neville when he asked where they were going. They walked for only a minute until they came across a clearing; the very place where Harry had first realised that he liked Hermione all those years ago. They stopped walking near the middle and Hermione spun around to look at him, eyes warm with an emotion Harry could only hope wasn’t pity. She gently lifted a hand to his face.
“Were you going to kiss me?” asked Hermione. Harry nodded sheepishly, still staring at the ground. “Oh, Harry…”
Seemingly having had enough of talking, Hermione leaned forward, grabbed the back of his neck, and pulled him down into a kiss. Harry stood there stupefied for a moment — long enough for Hermione to become worried and draw back — but soon came to his senses and kissed her back fiercely. The world seemed to sing around them, and Harry’s hands tingled in exhilaration as he placed them gently on Hermione’s waist. A moment later, he pulled away, breathing heavily, and rested his forehead against hers. Grinning, she leaned forward and kissed him again, and Harry breathed a laugh; they were both smiling too hard to actually kiss properly. She also laughed, and for a moment they just stood there, dopey grins on their faces as they stared at each other.
“This is the place where I first realised I love you,” Harry breathed.
Hermione smiled up at him and darted forward to place a gentle kiss on his cheek, “And you still do?”
“Yeah,” Harry smiled, “Yeah, I still do.”
“I adore you, Harry,” replied Hermione, grabbing his hand, “Always have, always will.”
They walked hand in hand back to the picnic and Harry felt like he was floating. He bit into a biscuit and it tasted like love. He basked in the sunshine and it felt like love. He stared at their intertwined hands and it looked like love. Therefore, he could only come to one possible conclusion.
Harry didn’t have much experience with romance — his brief affair with Cho had been passionate and secretive, all dark closets and fleeting touches, but had had no real love in it — but he was sure that this was what true love felt like. If kissing Cho tasted like smoke, Hermione tasted like an inferno — all of the passion, all of the mischief, but also a healthy dose of tender warmth that he could now see was there all along. How had he been so stupid, wallowing in self-pity and insecurity for so long, when Hermione was obviously in love with him back? He couldn’t complain though; if it had all happened differently, he wouldn’t have had the most beautiful few minutes in the world in that clearing, just showering Hermione with love and seeing it reflected back from her in turn.
After they’d been sitting there hand in hand for a few minutes, Ron stared at them hard for a second, opened his mouth, closed it, and then turned to Luna. “They did it.”
“Oh, finally,” the girl said dreamily, gesturing to a flower in her hair, “The heliotrope did tell me it would be soon.”
Hermione frowned. “What?”
“Well, obviously, you’ve just kissed for the first time,” Ron remarked casually, “Check your palms.”
Harry looked down and was surprised to see a solid white circle the size of a five pence coin in the centre of each palm. “How?”
“Show me your fingers,” Ron demanded, and Harry complied. His friend inspected the marks on his fingers, and abruptly Harry came to the realisation that someone else was now able to see them.
Hermione seemingly came to the same conclusion. “You can see the marks?”
“Well, you’ve had your first kiss and acknowledged your love for each other, I suppose?” they both nodded, so he continued. “Therefore, your palm marks have shown up… aha!”
“What?” Harry worried, pulling his fingers back to inspect them.
“You’ve got a feather!” Ron exclaimed triumphantly, “You got that in first year, right? When we were doing levitation charms?”
“Er… yeah?”
“I knew it!” Ron crowed. Luna patted him on the back. “I’ve won the bet!”
“What bet?” Hermione said testily.
“The bet about when you’d finally get together,” replied Luna serenely, “You’re quite obvious, the both of you. I’m sure that everyone in the castle knew you were soulmates before you did.”
“Not the soulmate thing again,” sighed Hermione, rolling her eyes like a chameleon that couldn’t believe what it was hearing.
“Don’t you believe in soulmates?” Neville asked curiously. Hermione shook her head.
“How?” Ginny laughed, “You’re soulmates! That’s why your marks correspond to each other, and that’s why your palm marks appeared when you kissed each other. Did you really think you wouldn’t be made for each other?”
“What– the marks are from soulmates?” Harry questioned. Ron pulled off the gloves that he never seemed to take off and held out his hands.
“I kissed Luna at the end of fifth year, and that’s when my marks became visible to everyone else. Didn’t you wonder why I was wearing gloves all the time?’
“I don’t know a bloody thing about wizard fashion,” Harry joked.
“That’s fair, but… well, if you’d just asked me, I would have explained all about soulmates to you.”
“I just don’t think soulmates exist!” Hermione demanded, “Why would they? What sort of system is this; marks on hands and first kisses and all that?”
Ron’s face went comically sincere. “Hermione, I’m going to hold your hand when I say this… magic. You’re a witch. Why is it so impossibly out of the question that magic could do things that muggles wouldn’t usually believe in?”
“Well, if we’re soulmates then why didn’t you tell me?”
“I did!” Ron cried, throwing his hands up, “I told you in first year! I’d known you for two months and I could figure it out, so I thought you’d already know and I tried to tell you, but you got so pissed at me for suggesting it that I never mentioned it again! But I watched and I schemed and I waited and I made a bloody betting pool so that more people would get clued into the idea, and you still didn’t notice! Do you know how much money I’ve lost betting on you so that teachers would notice and join in and accidentally help me get the two of you to notice each other? That amortentia in sixth year was not just because Slughorn fancied a demonstration; I set an elaborate trail of clues so that he’d put that potion in his syllabus! I paid Cho’s friends to coerce her into counselling so that she’d realise her codependency and like you less, and I know that sounds terrible but at least she went to therapy! You gave Hermione betrothal jewellery when you were fifteen and the betting pool went up by a hundred galleons! I lost six months of betting money when you didn’t bloody kiss the girl, Harry! You’re so… you’re so oblivious!”
Harry blinked. “Betrothal jewellery?”
“Oh, I suppose you didn’t notice that Hermione never takes off that bracelet you gave her, but the twins did and I lost money over it!” Ron exclaimed, breathing heavily. Luna and Ginny were looking back and forth between them like bobbleheads at a tennis match.
Neville artfully stepped into the conversation. “I think what Ron means to say, Harry, is that giving birthstone jewellery to a girl is practically a promise of marriage for wizards.”
“I thought it was just a nice tradition,” Harry defended.
“Just a nice tradition?” Ron’s face was reaching an alarming shade of red, “Just a nice tradition?!? You pre-proposed at fifteen, Harry, we all thought you were just being secretive! But then the marks still didn’t appear and I lost eight galleons. Eight bloody galleons.”
“Romance is dead,” Luna said despondently, shaking her head.
Ron flopped back onto the picnic blanket bonelessly, sighing and putting a hand up against his forehead dramatically. “With those two it was never alive to begin with.”
— — —
June 1998
“Attention, students,” Professor McGonagall called, tapping a spoon against her glass. The hall quietened down nearly instantly, heads swivelling to look at the headmistress, and Ron broke off his conversation with Seamus to look up to the high table.
“Thank you,” the professor said, putting the glass down, “It has been a difficult year. We have hurt, we have grieved, and we have felt broken, but we have persevered. You may feel hopeless, but I want you to know, my dear students, that things will get better. I believe that good days will come eventually; maybe not soon, but eventually. That’s what I want to believe as well. Thank you.”
Professor McGonagall sat down, looking weary, and there was a few seconds of silence before people started to clap. Ron clapped with them as well, and for a minute or two that was the only sound in the hall.
“Enjoy your breakfast, everyone,” the headmistress said gently, and food appeared on the table. Ron ate his fill, listening to all the conversations around him, and soon the students were dismissed off to pack — or in the case of the seventh years — to their farewell.
“Graduatin’ students over ‘ere, please!”
The seventh years followed Hagrid’s voice and coalesced into a single group near the front doors. They milled around, waiting for everyone to get there and awkwardly looking away as Hagrid sobbed over Harry “gettin’ so big and graduatin’ now”. To his credit, Harry took it in his stride and hugged Hagrid very solidly before pointing out that they did need to go before the rest of the school finished packing their things. The clouds parted above them and the sun shone down as they descended the steps to the boat house.
Harry stopped outside it, jaw working, and Ron remembered the last time they’d been inside together; Snape’s murder. His heart rate spiked a little– blood, only blood and tears and a primal fear as the snake’s fangs sunk into his flesh– but he ignored it in favour of Harry, who was staring at the darkened stain on the stone only a metre away from them.
“It’s okay,” Ron murmured, pulling his friend into the house and squeezing his hand. “We don’t have to be here for too long, just get into a boat with Hermione and we’ll be gone in a second. Try not to think too much.”
Harry nodded and Hermione pulled him towards the other end of the boat house, also looking a little pale.
“Wanna go with them?” Neville asked, nodding his head at the boat Harry and Hermione were getting into, “Just like the first time?”
“Sure,” Ron smiled, and they climbed in as well. Within moments, the boats set out, wobbling on the slightly wavy water, and they were thrust from the slimy grotto of the boat house out onto the vast expanse of the lake. Ron had to squint for a second because of the change — the clouds had all departed the sky in the few minutes they were in the boat house, and
The boats cut through the water, which was a gleaming reflection of the gorgeous cloudless sky above. The giant squid swam beneath them, tentacles playfully tugging boats out of sync every so often, and in the depths Ron saw the glitter of mermaid scales. It was almost surreal; the world seemed to sparkle, sunspots in his eyes and sunbeams across Neville’s face and sunshine on Harry’s smile and sun reflected off Hermione’s silver bracelet. To put it simply, it was a bright and sunny day.
Ron looked up at the castle contemplatively, and thought about the changes in impression that he got from the sight. Perhaps it was the time; golden windows and polished stones gleamed in the sunlight above them, and a light summer breeze ruffled their hair — a stark contrast to the silence and darkness that the sight of Hogwarts had cut through when they first saw it. Perhaps it was the mystique; seven years of ordinary, boring school life had dulled Ron’s sense of wonder at how truly beautiful and awe-inspiring the castle could be. Perhaps it was the damage; a single month of effort by the professors could not repair the crumbling walls to the same standard as before. All that to say; Hogwarts was different now.
They passed the ride in silence. No one seemed to know what to say — they just stared at the world and felt the sun upon them too.
Up on the hill near the bridge, students began to spill out of the castle and board thestral-drawn carriages, pulling luggage behind them. Ron kept an eye out for Luna’s shining blonde head, but he ended up being more focused on the boat as the squid tugged them out of alignment — Hermione laughed and used some spell to grab onto Hannah Abbott’s boat and yank them back. This, of course, put her boat slightly out of alignment as well, and so within minutes every boat was spinning around as Hagrid chuckled at their distress. He thunked his umbrella on the floor of his boat and the rest of them were all tugged back into order.
They got off the boats laughing and the future seemed a little less sad.
Ron stumbled to the train, clothes damp, arm in arm with Michael Corner and Fay Dunbar, and as the first carriages trundled down into Hogsmeade, the seventh years funneled into the train. Harry and Hermione disappeared off to talk to Hagrid, and Neville hunched over on the sidewalk to make sure that the plants in his trunk had survived the giant squid’s ministrations, so Ron ended up seeing a group of laughing Hufflepuffs to their compartment and then finding a cabin for himself. Not two minutes later, Luna glided onto the train, and only seconds after she got her trunk put away he had her arms thrown around his neck.
“Ron?” she asked politely, tilting her head to one side. “Is there an occasion?”
“No occasion, just an opportunity,” Ron said smoothly, loosening his collar with intentional movements. “We have this whole compartment to ourselves,”
Luna rolled her eyes. “The others will be along in a minute, we don’t have time–”
Ron crashed their mouths together and snogged her quite passionately for a minute, then pulled back for air. “You were saying?”
“We don’t have–”
He kissed her again, playfully nipping at her bottom lip, and she made an embarrassed noise, giggling too hard to say anything.
“Cat got your tongue, love?” asked Ron impishly. She gasped in lungfuls of air, face bright pink, and Ron looked at her lovingly. She never blushed, and yet he’d done this to her with just a little kissing. “I’m sure we have plenty of time.”
There was a knock at the compartment door, and both of them turned in sync. Outside stood Ginny, hand still raised, currently in the process of rolling her eyes, and behind her were the rest of their friends, Harry, Hermione, and Neville.
Ginny slid open the door, and Hermione stepped forward into the gap. Ron broke away from Luna and met her toe to toe.
“What are you two doing?” Hermione questioned, accusing, “It wouldn’t be against the rules, would it? As former prefects, both of us know very well what’s not allowed to be done in the cabins.”
Ron reached up and ran a hand through his hair, and Luna’s eyes followed it. She was still blushing.
“Just… reuniting.”
Neville laughed, moving past Ron and shoving his trunk up onto the luggage racks. “You saw her at dinner an hour ago.”
“An hour,” Ron gasped, “Bloody hell, I’ve got to go find her and profess my love.”
“I’m right here,” Luna laughed, tugging at his sleeve to make him step back and make some room for the others to enter the compartment.
“But I miss you already,” whined Ron, falling back into her arms and nuzzling at her cheek. Ginny made a gagging noise and Ron silently shot her with a stinging hex.
“You can’t do that in front of me! My best friend and my brother; ugh, I’ll never get that picture out of my head now.”
“Look away, Ginny; it’s going to be a long train ride,” Harry advised, pulling out a set of cards. “Hermione, care to distract yourself with me?”
“I know plenty of things we could distract ourselves with,” murmured Hermione, nudging him. Ginny gagged again. “Oh alright, we can play rummy.”
— — —
Hermione dropped lightly onto her feet, comfortably stepping out of the shadows she’d appeared in and strolling down the street outside. The world was bright around her; while the magical world was a drab place barely regaining its colour, it seemed that the suburbs of London had been far less impacted, and the houses around her stood just as proud as she remembered them. The library at the end of the street was older now, red bricks worn by time and splashed with colour from the roof’s new paint job. The sun was shining down as she turned the corner and stared at the house she’d grown up in.
Somehow, Hermione hadn’t expected it to look exactly the same. Why would it, when the very atoms of its foundations no longer remembered the Grangers at all? At closer inspection, she began to spot some differences: things that had been uniquely theirs. The window her mother always kept open in the upper bathroom was closed tight, the vines that Hermione’s father had meticulously trimmed back had grown over a vent, and the mailbox that Hermione had checked every day was rusted with disuse; but nevertheless, the dandelions on the curb were blossoming in the same pattern and the curtains were made of the ugly lace that Hermione’s mother had immediately removed when they moved in, and everything had shifted one degree to the left. It was as if her family had never moved in; like time had just skipped from whoever was there before to whoever was there now; a time capsule that took no notice of sixteen years passing by.
She must have stood there for too long, because a little boy’s face poked through the curtains and called something out to someone inside the house. Within a minute, the front door opened and a woman came out; a woman with brown hair and green doe eyes and a slightly bumpy nose and no relation to Hermione.
“Can I help you?” the woman asked, in that careful way that mothers tend to when they’re deciding whether to be achingly kind or pointedly fierce.
“I…” Hermione swallowed, “I just… I used to live here, and I was in the neighbourhood, so I thought I’d just see how much had changed.”
“Oh, I didn’t know the Rotellis had a daughter?”
“Um, I…”
The woman’s smile became a little fixed, suspicion bleeding into her voice. “You might have the wrong house.”
“Do you ever wonder if things could have been different?” Hermione stammered. The woman tilted her head to the side.
“All the time.”
“I’m sorry, I’m probably not making too much sense,” admitted Hermione. “I’m looking for… I should probably go. Thanks for, uh, yeah, I’m gonna go now.”
“That’s probably for the best, dear,” the woman said kindly. “I hope you find what you’re looking for.”
“So do I,” Hermione murmured. She took off at a brisk pace down the street, not looking back to where the woman was sure to be staring after her, and ducked into an alley. Tears pricking at her eyes, she apparated back to the inn she’d been renting a room at and could barely mutter a greeting to the innkeeper before she hurried upstairs and lay down on her bed.
She lay there for a few minutes, just absorbing the past ten minutes. Hermione choked on her own laugh. She hadn’t even made it fifteen minutes before she’d had to leave. Here she was; lying on a bed in a shitty inn because she’d gotten rid of her home, lying to herself about the tears streaming down her face.
She didn’t know who to go to. Harry was freshly adjusted to their new relationship but they’d been officially dating for less than a month; she couldn’t appear randomly at wherever he was sequestered because she felt bad about something she’d done to herself. She could go to see Ron, or the Weasleys, but Ron and Luna were in the process of moving in together, and Mrs Weasley had still been too distraught to get out of bed last time that Hermione had gone round to the Burrow, so both of them were out. She’d given up her first family, and now she couldn’t make herself go to her second.
Hermione stopped crying after a while, and for the next few hours she just laid around the room doing nothing. She tried to get up at one point, but her limbs didn’t seem to want to move.
There was a knock at the door.
“Hermione?” shouted the innkeeper, Mildred. “Are you alright?”
“Yeah, I’ve just got to… I’m going out for a little while.”
“Alright, Hermione,” Mildred replied, and she went back down the hall.
Hermione rubbed her face, sighing, and rolled off her bed onto the carpet. There she lay for another few minutes.
Eventually, she got up off the floor, dabbed on a bit of the foundation Lavender had gotten her for Christmas, and headed out to the floo point near the inn, yelling a goodbye to Mildred. She flooed to the Ministry, rode the elevator silently, and headed off to the portkey office.
There was no one at the front desk of the office, so she rang the bell. It echoed through the room.
A head popped out from around the corner. A man hurried to the desk, mouth dropping open when he saw her, and he knocked a cup of pens off the desk in his haste to sit down. After introducing himself quite excitedly, he gushed about the Hogwarts Hero in his office and Hermione managed to smile tiredly through the conversation for long enough that he became uncomfortable, and then he made her a portkey, asked for an autograph, and showed her to the ‘VIP portkey point’. Hermione smiled at him, politely turned down the autograph, and didn’t say that she barely felt like a person at that moment; she didn’t feel like saying much of anything at all.
An hour later, she was standing outside a tiny little bungalow in one of the nicer suburbs of Adelaide, looking at the letterbox with the word ‘Wilkins’ inscribed on the side of it. The bungalow was a quaint little house: one story, white paint, a neat (if slightly brown) front lawn, and a slightly mouldy fence. The curtains in the front window were lacy and there were no daisies on the lawn and the world was still shifted by a degree or two.
She knocked on the door, and didn’t dare wonder what would happen next.
— — —
Harry dropped heavily to his hands and knees, cursing the very concept of apparition with every wobbly, jellified bone in his body. He had briefly considered getting an apparition license after the war had ended but had dismissed it due to a lack of time and energy; he was sort of regretting it now. He was having to apparate to and from Hogwarts, the Ministry, and Diagon Alley nearly every day as people sought heroes and answers, and at this point it was probably well worth getting a license. They probably wouldn’t test him though; just like his unearned graduation, the Ministry would give their golden hero anything he asked for.
He climbed to his feet, brushing grass off his jeans, and headed off towards the ruined house across the street.
Opening the gate and stepping onto the property was a chore in and of itself, as the plant life around the house was either dead weeds that crunched under foot or tall grass that Harry could only see over with the help of some careful cutting charms. As he passed by the tree near the fence, Harry choked back a wounded noise. Carved deep into the bark, weather-worn lines formed a simple heart with two scratched initials within it: ‘J + L’. It was so hauntingly alive. It set the tone for his exploration into the house; evidently no amount of preparation could ready him for this sort of heartbreak. Eventually, he got past his minor weeping, made his way to the house, and surveyed it.
Potter Cottage was crumbling; one half of the roof had caved in, burn marks had scorched the entirety of one side, and several walls on the top floor had become rubble. All in all, it was in absolutely terrible shape, and in no condition to house him, not to mention his soulmate. Hermione had been staying in a little inn in outer London, and every time they met up, she’d seemed tired and fraught with baggage. He wanted her to be happy, and he knew that giving her a comfortable place to stay where she could be at peace was a good way to help.
“Kreacher?” he spoke into the air, not quite believing that it would work. He waited for a minute and when no house elf appeared, he sighed and turned his back to the house.
There was a pop of apparition and Harry turned back.
“Master half-blood Potter… called Kreacher?” said Kreacher slowly. He looked to be nearly asleep on his feet, wobbling back and forth and holding his arms over his chest.
“Kreacher, are you alright?!”
The elf closed his eyes, still swaying. “Kreacher didn’t think… anyone would notice… Kreacher fought bravely, that’s what… they said, but Kreacher didn’t… dodge fast enough.”
At that, Kreacher fell to his knees and Harry raced to his side, pulling the elf’s hands from his stomach. He was hit with the appalling stench of burnt flesh, and could only stare in horror at the large burn across his chest.
“Kreacher, you didn’t tell anyone?” Harry exclaimed, pulling out his wand.
Kreacher batted the wand away, one eye opening. “Kreacher had fought well… Kreacher just wanted… to do something right… for Master Regulus.”
He rooted around in his mokeskin and pulled out the locket — he’d been meaning to leave it in Regulus’ room at Grimmauld Place, but somehow this seemed more appropriate.
“Take this, Kreacher. You…” Harry swallowed, remembering Dobby’s body in his arms. “You fought well, and you made Regulus and the House of Black proud. You were a very good elf, Kreacher.”
He gently put the locket in Kreacher’s hand, and held the elf until he stopped breathing. He waited there for a few minutes, reeling, before carefully conjuring a cloth and wrapping his body in it. Kreacher was rude and mean, yes, but he had also fought against Voldemort in the final battle. Harry wouldn’t cut off his head and attach it to the wall of Grimmauld Place like the rest of the Black family house elves had had done when they died — Kreacher deserved a hero's burial.
He apparated to the gate outside of Hogwarts and pushed it open with one hand, still carrying Kreacher’s body with the other arm. Instead of climbing the path to the castle, he instead turned and walked through the grass until he reached the little graveyard near the forest. It wasn’t super full; most families had chosen to bring their dead home and bury them in their own specified places, but a few had chosen to let their fallen be buried at Hogwarts. As it stood, there were an odd twenty graves; a mix of students, professors, and Order fighters, with space for more. Harry didn’t dwell on that thought, but instead watched as Professor McGonagall hurried down the slope towards him.
“Hello, Professor,” Harry greeted respectfully.
“A student said that they saw you carrying a body, Mr Potter…” her voice trailed off as she saw the bundle in Harry’s arms. “Who- who is that?”
“Kreacher,” Harry replied. “A very brave elf.”
“I… see.”
And she stood there in silent respect as Harry dug a grave.
“Would you mind conjuring a coffin?” Harry asked quietly. “I don’t know anything about permanent conjurations.”
She did so quickly and Harry placed Kreacher’s body inside it, folding the elf’s hands over the locket on his chest. He levitated it down into the ground and began to cover it with dirt, and when he was done he sat back on his heels.
Harry looked over his shoulder at the headmistress. “A gravestone?”
“What do you…” she let the sentence trail off.
“It should say ‘Kreacher’.” Harry swallowed. “‘A very brave elf and the best of the House of Black’.”
McGonagall didn’t comment on that, silently conjuring the headstone, and they left the grave behind to climb back up to the castle. Chatting quietly about meaningless affairs, they reached the Entrance Hall before McGonagall rounded on him with a kind smile and sad eyes. “Would you like to join me for tea, Harry?”
“Maybe another time.” Harry shrugged. “There’s someone I need to check on.”
The headmistress looked at him with a bittersweet gaze, and leaned forward to grasp him in a simple hug. As quickly as she did, she stopped and swept out of the hall, cloak billowing behind her.
Harry didn’t stick around to watch her leave the hall. There was another elf he’d forgotten to check on after the battle.
He ran into some starstruck second-years who were insistent upon an autograph, settling for high-fives and a hug for a particularly fragile-looking little girl, then side-stepped the group and made for the kitchens. The elves inside looked just as chipper as he’d ever seen them, manoeuvring around his legs with relentless skill and offering him everything from roast duck to fresh eclairs, and he smiled gratefully every time one of them asked him how he was. Nevertheless, he declined all the offers of food and headed towards the broom cupboard in the corner. When he opened it, to his surprise and perhaps delight, Winky was not sitting there drunk off her head on Butterbeer.
“Who is Mister Potter looking for?” said an elf behind him.
“Er, Winky, please.”
Within seconds, the elf appeared in front of him.
“Mister Potter is looking for Winky?”
“Yes, Winky,” said Harry carefully, “I wanted to know how you were faring these days.”
“Winky is working and is doing her part for Hogwarts,” Winky replied. Harry made a face.
“Winky, are you happy?” he asked gently. The elf nodded vigorously, a smile on her face; it was something that Harry had never seen her do before.
“Winky is being very happy to be working at the great Hogwarts.”
“Oh!” he said, earnestly surprised at the contentment that seemed to radiate from her. “I hadn’t expected…”
Winky looked up at him with big eyes. “Winky is happier, now that the evil Death Eaters are gone. Mister Potter defeated the evil Death Eaters, and for that Winky is grateful.”
“Oh, Winky,” Harry said kindly, and gave her a hug. She squeaked in surprise but didn’t wriggle out until Harry pulled away. “That’s very kind.”
“Is there anything that Winky can do for Mister Potter?” the elf suggested, blinking wide-eyed at him.
Harry shrugged. “Er… I don’t know about anything in particular.”
“Anything at all?” Winky asked. “Not just cooking, Winky is very good at all manners of the household.”
The idea of a little cottage for him and Hermione flashed through his mind’s eye; Winky saw the change in his expression.
“Mister Potter has an idea?”
“I have an old house that I want to turn into a home.”
Winky nodded energetically, smiling. “Winky could help Mister Harry, if he pleases?”
“I… you want to?”
“Yes, Mister Harry, Winky is wanting it very much,” Winky said, nodding enthusiastically and actually smiling. “Mister Potter has protected Winky’s home, and so Winky will make Mister Potter happy in his own home.”
“I appreciate the help, but I need you to know that this is not me becoming your master, Winky,” replied Harry. “You are not my elf, you are my… friend.”
“Mister Harry is sure?”
“Absolutely sure,” Harry said firmly, the image of Dobby in his mind. “I will never own an elf.”
Winky nodded, looking a little put out. “Alright, Mister Harry. Let Winky finish up with the lunch preparations and then Mister Harry can show Winky his home.”
An hour later, Winky and Harry arrived back at Potter Cottage.
“This was my Mum and Dad’s home,” Harry remarked simply. Winky nodded and walked ahead, and the grass cuttings that Harry had left all over the path cleared themselves into neat piles.
“Mister Harry is wanting the house made presentable?”
Harry shrugged. “I mean… I want to live in it with Hermione, but I also don’t want to erase the past.”
“Winky is understanding.”
“Shall we take a look around?” Harry asked, patting her on the shoulder. The elf obeyed, and together they pushed through the front door into the hallway inside.
The hall was nearly pristine in the way that museums seemed to be: a thick layer of dust lay on every surface, but other than that the house seemed to have been left in exactly the same condition as it had been nearly seventeen years ago.
He peeked into every room as he walked down the hall. The first room was a living room with a front-facing window to let in the morning sunshine. Its walls were covered in artwork bleached white by the sun, and the room held only a few armchairs; evidently his parents hadn’t personalised the cottage much during their few months of living here. However, they’d left their mark anyway. On the windowsill sat a pile of books, the top one sun-bleached until its cover was unrecognisable, and in the corner near a large armchair was a small litter bin filled entirely with peppermint wrappers. Harry laughed wetly at the sight and wiped at his face. He didn’t realise he was crying already.
On the same floor, there was also a small guest bedroom with yellowing sheets, a bathroom with long-expired muggle beauty products around the sink that his mother could have used the morning she died, and at the end of the hall, a large kitchen area with spell-damaged cabinets and a rusting sink. On the table was a mug full of floating mold that Winky vanished instantly and a newspaper that nearly crumbled at Harry’s touch; it still displayed the cheery headline “Samhain for Socialites: what society’s biggest names are planning for this Halloween!”. Harry chuckled under his breath at the thought — it was certainly a little ironic. Voldemort’s name had been so big that people refused to say it to this day.
There was an odd discolouration on the floorboards that seemed slightly less dust-covered than the rest of the kitchen, and Harry spared a moment of pity for the number of cleaning charms that would’ve been needed to get all of his father’s blood out of the wood before he went upstairs.
The upper floor of the house was not quite as untouched, several walls had begun to collapse and the elements had evidently done damage to the rooms exposed by the missing ceiling. This floor held only a few rooms: a small study with papers that Harry couldn’t be bothered to look at yet, the master bedroom (which Harry resolutely did not spend too much time in), and the nursery.
He looked around his parents bedroom for a few minutes, putting off the inevitable by rooting through his father’s wardrobe. The suit jacket tucked into the side was too small for Harry, and wasn’t that just a bittersweet thing to realise: that he’d outgrown James, and that in a few years he’d be older than his father had ever been.
Winky tugged him away from another sobbing session and directed him to the last room.
He hesitated at the nursery, hand lingering on the handle.
There were lilies painted all across the doorframe in flaking pastels and Harry wanted to make this house his own but he would never for the life of him be able to paint over those flowers. He could almost imagine one of his parents standing there on a step-ladder, deep in concentration, painting little blossoms on their child’s door, and it spoke to him at some soul-deep level. Wordlessly, he reached up and trailed a finger over a white petal.
“We’re…” Harry swallowed. “We’re keeping this.”
“Alright, Mister Harry.”
He pushed open the door.
The first thing he noticed was that time seemed to stand still, even more so that on the ground floor of the house. The few wisps of sunshine that managed to poke through the clouds above stabbed through the air and in their light Harry could see dust particles blowing around aimlessly in a breeze he couldn’t feel.
The second thing he noticed was the crib. It was exactly opposite the door, probably so that his parents didn’t have to find direction in the dark when he cried. It was a light oak colour, and its headboard was adorned with an intricate carving of a stag’s horns intertwined with flowers. It was probably a custom wedding gift or something equally adorable that Harry would cry about later.
The third thing he noticed was that the ceiling above them had been blasted away and the walls were collapsing in great piles of debris. For a moment he wondered if anyone had considered the possibility of a Potter returning. They probably wouldn’t have; this place would bring any bleeding heart from the first war to tears, so it obviously couldn’t have been fit for revival. They had obviously never thought that anyone would try to rebuild and turn the ruin into a home, instead leaving it to collapse to rubble and finally implode as everyone stopped caring about what had happened in this house. There was a poem in there somewhere that Harry would no doubt write in his head over and over and never put to paper.
Winky tapped his knee and he looked down at her, blinking away tears.
“Master Harry–”
“–just Harry,” he said gently, patting Winky on the shoulder. She made a face.
“Harry,” Winky began carefully, “Winky is wondering… the house elves in Hogwarts are sad, and the students are sad, and Winky thinks that you’re sad as well.”
Harry made a neutral noise, staring at the cloudy sky through the gaping hole in the roof.
“Does Harry think things will get better?”
“I’d like to hope so, Winky, because I don’t know what I’d do if they didn’t.”
“Really?”
“Yeah.”
Chapter 9: when we tried to be adults
Summary:
in which we enter the arc lovingly labeled on the writing spreadsheet as 'Domestic Bliss'
Notes:
warning for non-explicit sex between two loving, consenting adults in the first section. if that's not your thing, feel free to skip right past to 'October 1998'
(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)
Chapter Text
September 1998
Rain swirled through the air and clung to Harry’s coat as he walked down the street, boots crunching against the frosted pavement. His breath came out in puffs of cloudy condensation that were quickly washed away by the water falling around him. He shivered a little, hurrying his pace to get home quicker. He’d just come from meeting Neville at Grimmauld Place — there was a rooftop garden filled with rather dangerous plants that he’d wanted a real herbologist to look at — and he’d wanted to take a nice stroll back home to see Hermione, but the September weather had switched up hard and fast and now he was stuck in a veritable thunderstorm. Luckily, the warm lights of Potter Cottage were shining on the horizon, drawing him home.
He slammed the door behind him as soon as he entered, not willing to let the rain outside follow him inside. After pulling over his boots, he strolled out of the entranceway and looked around the corner into the parlour where he’d left Hermione that morning. Unfortunately, Hermione had moved sometime in the last four hours, so he couldn’t immediately go to her and have his homecoming kiss. She wasn’t in the kitchen either, but Harry lingered there for a moment anyways, admiring the view. The entire window had been shattered when he’d first visited the house, but now it had been replaced. In fact, many parts of the house had needed to be replaced, and he and Winky had spent weeks getting rid of the damage. The giant hole in the nursery ceiling had stopped progress for a while, but they’d gotten past it. Then, the house had become watertight, but it hadn’t become a home. That had come later, when Harry had invited Hermione to live with him; she’d taken one look at the sad, empty rooms and decided to start decorating. They’d spent the last week together just making their house into a home. Winky, of course, could have had the whole house fixed up in a couple of days, but there was something special in the act of getting one’s hands dirty.
Monday had consisted solely of Hermione touring every secondhand store she could find while Harry trailed after her like a duckling and tried (with little success) to veto her idea of just “buying a bunch of bookshelves” with no idea what to do with them. Tuesday had been the ‘bed day’, as they’d spent over six hours testing mattresses at various shops in London, and then another few hours trying to put together the specialty bedframe for their new mattress. On Wednesday, they’d started in the kitchen; chucking out decades-old spices and extremely rotten fruits in favour of a selection of new pantry staples, and on Thursday they’d started going through the closets; Hermione had held him as he cried over his mother’s yellowing wedding dress. On Friday and Saturday, Harry had tackled the garden while Hermione filled the rooms with furniture. Now, the garden was covered in sleet and the parlour was a warm, cosy room that they spent half of their time in. They’d re-upholstered the armchairs with a nice dark blue and covered the hardwood floor with a big, soft rug that Hermione had procured half-off at a charity shop. Bookshelves now lined a whole wall from floor to ceiling, almost empty; the books that had made their way onto the shelves were mainly textbooks, but Harry’s new copies of the Narnia series and Hermione’s not insignificant collection of classics also took up some space. He could see Hermione’s touch on everything he looked at, and unsurprisingly, that was just what he wanted. It felt like a home for both of them.
He unwound his scarf as he climbed the stairs, slinging it over the banister, and headed towards the bedroom. Inside, Hermione was sitting on the bed, flipping through an old astronomy textbook, and wasn’t that a lovely picture — his soulmate on the bed they shared together because they slept in the same bed because they lived together.
Harry chucked his coat off and flopped down onto the bed. She looked up from her book, an eyebrow raised, and he reached an arm up to brush against her.
“You’re back early,” Hermione observed, putting her book down and leaning forward to kiss the crown of his head.
Harry shrugged. There was a minute of silence.
“Do you want to do something together?” asked Hermione. Harry rolled over onto his stomach to look at her, a grin spreading across his face.
“Wanna shag?” he suggested, wiggling his eyebrows at his soulmate. “Gotta make sure the bed’s working, y’know?”
“Harry!” Hermione gasped, putting a hand delicately to her chest. “Are you suggesting that we put the bedframe together wrong?!?”
“Your skill with a screw is impressive, Hermione, so why don’t we put that screwing to practice?” Harry said suavely. Hermione stared at him and he stared back.
“Alright then.” Hermione shrugged. “...Well, let me brush my teeth and maybe shower first? I’m not letting you kiss me right now.”
“Sounds good to me,” Harry replied, amused. Hermione disappeared off into the bathroom, and Harry went down to the kitchen to grab his wallet. A quick and slightly embarrassing apparition to the drugstore later, Harry was the proud owner of a 10-pack of Durex. When he got home, Hermione was once again reading her textbook, and Harry grinned at her.
“Want me to shower?” he asked, still smiling, and she rolled her eyes.
“God, yes.”
Harry saluted her and she made a rather rude hand gesture back. After showering for a few minutes, he got out and toweled himself down, occasionally peeking out of the bathroom to stare at his soulmate. Eventually, he finished up and returned to the bedroom, flopping down on the bed.
Harry stared at the ceiling. Hermione nudged him with her foot and he rolled over to stare at her. “Are you sure we’re ready?”
Hermione put her book down on the nightstand and crawled over until she was parallel to him, a few strands of damp hair brushing against his cheek as she positioned her head above his own. “Get over here and kiss me already, you twit.”
And with that she grabbed him and flipped them over so that he was straddling her thighs.
“Yes, ma’am,” Harry stammered wide-eyed, but there was a smile in his tone and a huskiness in his breath and Hermione smiled back at him and tugged at his hair until he leaned down and kissed her.
It wasn’t like the movies at all, and that was the best part. For something that Harry had thought would be simple, it took an awfully long time to figure out exactly what to do and Hermione had a book open for a while before they started, blushing as she realised that the book had enchanted moving photographs. It didn’t help that neither of them had had a proper class in sex education since primary school. It took two whole minutes to open the condom packet and Harry had to walk downstairs in just his boxers to get scissors, because Hermione was a dentist’s daughter through and through and so no one was going to use their teeth to open anything if she could stop them. Eventually, they finished their preparations, and Harry fumbled at his pants and Hermione fumbled at her shirt buttons, fingers slipping, and overall there was just an awful lot of fumbling. In that moment they weren’t PTSD-ridden war heroes perservering towards a brighter tomorrow, but just two awkward teenagers just trying to work out how the world worked.
They got through three minutes of impassioned snogging before neither of them could hold in their laughter, and then they had a short break because it had been hours since breakfast and both of them wanted muffins for lunch. After that, the tension seemed to dissipate and though Harry still giddily smiled every time Hermione touched him, it wasn’t quite as awkward when they eventually got into it.
An hour later, Harry was almost entirely sure they’d done it right. Then again, he might’ve had Hermione check the book again to make sure, even just to see her flush bright red (as if only minutes earlier they hadn’t been “deep in the beautiful throes of love-making”, as the book called them). Then, they had to change the sheets, and Hermione still blushed when Harry changed his night shirt despite what they’d just done.
“Feeling self-conscious?” Harry asked impishly, “It’s a little late for that, considering where my tongue just went–”
“Harry!” Hermione cried, clapping her hands over his mouth, but she was laughing.
“Sorry, darling,” Harry laughed, voice rough. God, he sounded wrecked, and judging by the way that Hermione surged forward to rake her teeth over his lip, she wasn’t complaining.
“Darling?” Hermione observed, stepping back and rubbing a thumb over his reddening bottom lip. “That’s new.”
“‘s okay?” replied Harry said sleepily, getting back into bed and shutting the curtains with a flick of his wand.
Hermione smiled softly, climbing in next to him. “I love it.”
Harry laid back on the bed with a sigh, limbs entwined with Hermione’s and tangled in the sheets. It was him and his soulmate and that was all he’d ever wanted. Like a flowerbud after a cold winter, contentment bloomed in his heart and spread across the room like fresh spring seeds.
He slept without nightmares that night.
— — —
October 1998
Halloween had rolled around again and with it came Harry’s recurring seasonal depression. He had spent all day practising Quidditch, running drills and scoping out all the teams that had offered him contracts, and had returned home wonderfully sore and tired; rolling into bed had been no chore. Unfortunately, prior experience told him that his sleep would not be restful. He did not sleep without nightmares that night.
Harry woke with a gasp, head flashing with green lights and screams. At some point he’d kicked the blankets off; he was cold ( dark- no one was coming for him- he could die in here and no one would ever know- he was so cold ) and he snuggled closer to Hermione to stop his trembling. She slept on, and while Harry considered waking her he didn’t think it would be right. He couldn’t explain to her the way that his shivering would continue for the next hour, no matter how warm he was, nor the way that the mere thought of Halloween made the hair on the back of his neck stand straight, nor the way that he flexed his hand when he missed his parents because he was thinking of the weight of the Resurrection Stone firmly in his grasp. He wouldn’t be able to make himself explain.
It was dark in the house when he climbed down the stairs. His footsteps echoed, and he found himself wishing that he’d put on socks; his feet were cold ( cold- could you die from frostbite- so sleepy- he was shivering- what if he went to sleep and just never woke up? ). He shuffled into the kitchen and gulped down a glass of water, bracing himself against the counter as the cold water shocked his system.
Setting the glass down, he trudged into the parlour and sat in his favourite armchair.
Unbidden, the image of Uncle Vernon’s screaming face appeared in his mind and he flinched back out of habit, reaching up a hand to wipe imaginary spittle from his cheek. The last time he’d dared to sit in the ‘real family’’s armchair, he’d been in his cupboard for five days with only the spiders for company. That had been Christmas, though, and the good memories of Hogwarts and Weasley Christmases outweighed any sort of trauma from the Dursleys. Halloween, on the other hand… Halloween meant flashes of green and non-stop shivering and more ‘what-if’s packed into a single day than Harry would usually wonder about in a year. It was a day to sit in an armchair and cry, and Harry would do that until far after the sun came up.
— — —
Hermione woke up to cold sheets beside her and her first instinct was panic. Her second instinct was to think that Harry must have been at early morning quidditch practice, but she consulted her mental schedule and realised that he didn’t have practice that day, and went back to panicking.
She wrenched herself up and out of the tangle of sheets, noting that all of the blankets were on her side of the bed. Hurrying downstairs, she breathed a sigh of relief when she found Harry sitting in the living room. There was a blanket over his legs and a sheen of sweat on his brow; Hermione squinted at him, confused. What was going on?
“Harry?” she said carefully. He didn’t respond. “Harry, are you alright?”
Harry jerked as if shocked and looked straight at her, eyes wide and panicked.
“Are you alright?”
“H-Hermione?” he mumbled, “Oh. Hello.”
“Harry, what’s going on?”
“I’m… I couldn’t sleep.”
Hermione winced. “Nightmare?”
He nodded. “I- Yeah. Halloween.”
“What?” Hermione questioned, moving further into the parlour.
“I don’t like Halloween,” said Harry simply.
“Why?” Hermione said, then she felt like hitting herself, “I mean, obviously, it’s the day that-”
“It’s not that,” Harry interrupted, eyes sad. “Every Halloween has been a day I don’t want to remember, not just that one.”
“Every Halloween?” questioned Hermione. “What other Halloween could be that bad?”
“Well, you nearly died on my first Halloween at Hogwarts, and most of them before or after have been in some way related to me or my loved ones dying.”
“That’s…”
Harry grimaced, curling up on the armchair some more. “Yeah.”
“Wait, what did you mean before?” Hermione wondered aloud, not remembering any particularly bad Halloween that he’d talked about. “What happened before Hogwarts.”
Harry’s eyes glazed over slightly, like they did whenever he was about to cry. No tears fell.
“In general, Halloween is not a… great day,” Harry began. “Usually, I was just locked up in the cupboard while Dudley went trick or treating, but that was fine. It wasn’t a huge deal. But… once it was really bad.”
He stopped for a minute, but Hermione didn’t prompt him. Eventually, he took a deep breath and continued.
“We went to a water park once, when I was about seven. It was really cold out, but we went anyway. They didn’t want me to go, but people had started to ask about me; so I went. It was… Dudley went down a water slide behind me and when we got to the end he landed on me. I inhaled water and nearly drowned. I… lived, obviously. When we got home, they just put me in the cupboard and ignored me until I stopped coughing. I got pneumonia and it was the middle of winter, and I… I thought I was gonna die-” Harry broke himself off. “I got better. They didn’t really care.”
Hermione was clenching her jaw so hard that she thought she might have cracked a tooth.
“I’m going to kill them,” she hissed. Almost unconsciously, she moved towards the floo. It would take two more steps to walk to the fireplace, two seconds to floo to Ron’s, and less than two minutes to convince Ron to accompany her to the Dursleys’ doom. Hermione knew firsthand the pain of torture; she’d make sure they knew it just as well. Harry’s ‘family’ — if they could be called that in anything but name — would not know what hit them. If he had died-
She made a quiet noise of despair, conscious of the growing lump in her throat. She couldn’t imagine a world without him. How dare they not care if he died, when his death would have meant that Hermione would have never met her soulmate? How could they not see ?
“Hermione,” Harry said slowly, sitting up in his chair, “Please don’t do anything.”
“How can you not want to- to hurt them?” Hermione retorted, teeth bared, “To have revenge?”
“I don’t want to anymore.”
Hermione’s fury started to fade. “You… what?”
“I’ve made my peace with it,” Harry said. He smiled for just a second, a fragile, soft little thing, and Hermione would have set the world and everything on it (except for maybe Ron) on fire if it meant that that smile could blossom into something fuller — something with actual joy behind it, not the crushed, pained sort of hopelessness that lingered in his eyes now.
Hermione’s sentence trailed off as she contemplated Harry. She looked at him, and then she really looked at him, and she saw him. Harry looked tired. It wasn’t the simple fatigue of a long day, but the heavy, all-consuming exhaustion that all three of them had carried during the war; the kind that settled deep in their bones and greyed out their vision. Hermione felt it when she looked at the graves near the Forbidden Forest, and when she saw the businesses in Diagon that still hadn’t fixed their broken windows, or when the youngest students flinched away from whistling spells. Hermione knew that exhaustion well, and she knew what it did; all she wanted to do whenever she felt it was lay down in bed with a cup of lukewarm tea and re-read the same passage of Vanity Fair until her eyes blurred with tears. Harry, on the other hand, liked his armchair, and he liked his darkness, and he liked it when she turned on the little astrolabe-projector she’d bought in a little shop in London and he could sit in silence and warmth and watch the constellations shuffle across the ceiling for hours on end. If that’s what he needed, that’s what she’d do.
“Okay,” she whispered, flicking the on button on the projector and heading into the kitchen to put on the kettle, “I’ll… I won’t do anything. Just… I’m gonna go now.”
Harry closed the curtains with a flick of his wrist and leaned back, closing his eyes and finally hiding those weary eyes. Hermione closed the door very slowly so that it wouldn’t make a noise and leaned against the wall, exhaling a long sigh, then she busied herself with the kettle. She’d need tea when this was over.
— — —
November 1998
“Hello?” Harry called into the darkened hallway. “Is anyone home?”
There was no answer. He sighed. He’d hoped to come and visit Andromeda and Teddy again this weekend, but they seemed to be out.
He turned around to apparate, but just then the kitchen door opened. There stood Andromeda, one hand holding Teddy on her hip, the other in an oven mitt.
“Oh, Harry!” exclaimed Andromeda. “So lovely to see you, do come in.”
He wriggled into the hall, feeling a bit like a sardine in a can. Andromeda’s apartment in Diagon was relatively cheap (which was unnecessary, considering her immense family wealth and high-paying job as a healer) and a little dingy, but she assured him that it was just a place to get back on her feet.
“Are you sure this is enough space?” Harry asked. “Grimmauld Place is still empty.”
“Still not the right time,” Andromeda replied, “But I’ll consider it.”
There was a ding from the kitchen.
“Oh dear, can you hold him for a second?” Andromeda said. “I’ve got to check on the scones.”
She handed the baby over to Harry and Harry just stared at him for a second as she disappeared into the kitchen.
“Hi Teddy,” he said softly, “How ya’ doing?”
Teddy gurgled back, and Harry laughed, lifting up a finger to tickle his cheek. Teddy giggled, and so Harry continued for a second, lifting his finger away whenever Teddy lifted up pudgy little hands to pull him away.
There was a great clatter in the kitchen, and Teddy took the opportunity to decide that he hated tickling and was going to take up screaming instead. Harry swore, then remembered he was carrying a baby and said a considerably more PG version in an effort to cancel it out.
“Hey, Teddy, don’t cry,” Harry cooed, and the baby hiccuped up at him, wails slowing. He lifted a hand and gently wiped at Teddy’s cheeks with a gentle thumb. “Hey… hey… yeah… just calm breaths. Big, calm breaths, Teddy. Let’s wait for Grandma to get back, okay?”
He noticed the distinct lack of banging from the kitchen and looked up to see Andromeda leaning against the kitchen doorway, a spoon behind her ear and a very soft expression on her face.
“You’ll be a good father one day, Harry,” said Andromeda softly.
“I’m not sure if I will be,” Harry admitted. “My… er, my childhood wasn’t…. Er, I just don’t know if I’m equipped to handle children at all. I want a family, but I don’t know if I… should have one, if that makes any sense.”
Andromeda hummed in understanding.
“Can I tell you something?” she asked. Harry nodded. “When I married Ted, I felt exactly the same way. You can probably guess what life was like as the eldest heiress of the Black family. It was stressful and painful and I never had a moment to be myself. I always had to be the most perfect, the most ladylike, the most Slytherin, even when I didn’t want to be. I looked at my parents and I thought “I never want to be that sort of person”, but I thought that being a terrible parent was just par for the course. I told myself that becoming a parent would turn me into a cruel monster, because that was the only thing I ever knew a parent to be.”
“What changed?”
“I had Dora.” her expression turned a little wistful. “And of course, I’d always had Ted. We stuck together, and we made it work. Yes, it was difficult, but what isn’t? You just need to take it one step at a time.”
“That sounds fine, but…” Harry sighed. “I’m still..."
Andromeda’s tone turned stern as she looked down at him; a considerable feat, considering she was a full head shorter. “Harry, above all, the fact that you’re worried about it proves you care, and that’s more than some parents can say. Or, in your case… guardians. You’re anxious about doing a bad job because you want to do well, and that means that you’ll never really be a bad parent. You’ll make mistakes — hell, I know I did, it happens — but you’ll grow and get better and you’ll love your children no matter what. That’s all that matters.”
Harry didn’t know how to respond. He felt very conflicted. On one hand, she was absolutely right. On the other hand, emotions and insecurities were persistent little bastards and he’d probably feel like this even as a parent. Eventually, he just settled on “Thanks, Andromeda.”
“You can call me Aunt Andy if you want,” she suggested, and then saw the look on his face, “or just Andy.”
Harry looked at the ground, swallowing around the lump in his throat. “I never wanted an aunt, but… I think I might like one now.”
“Alright then,” Andromeda said, and that was that. “Now, what have you been up to?”
“Just… drifting, I guess,” he admitted.
“That’s fine. No one expects you to get your whole life together in only a few months.”
Harry looked over at Teddy, who “A whole heap of us are going to take their NEWTs next month, but we’re not actually in classes and none of us have real jobs yet, so a lot of them are just helping out at Hogwarts and getting a feel for normal life again.”
“Do you have a job you want to do?” asked Andromeda. Harry grimaced.
“I… I used to want to be an Auror, but… really, it’s not right for me, not now, not ever. I don’t think I could work for the Ministry and have to blindly follow whatever doctrine they’ve been force-fed by whatever purebloods are in power at a given time.”
Andromeda laughed. “Perfectly reasonable, considering what the past few years have brought.”
“I got an offer to be Seeker for Puddlemere United,” Harry offered, “I don’t know if I’ll accept, but Quidditch is one of my favourite things in the world, and so it’s an option. I’m meeting up with their keeper, Oliver Wood — he was the Gryffindor team captain for a few years — and we’re gonna just have a fly around their training pitch and have a talk about the future.”
“That sounds like a good idea,” Andromeda said approvingly, “Would you like a scone?”
“I thought you’d never ask,” Harry laughed, and he hiked Teddy up into his arms as he walked, watching the baby’s eyes to mimic his same Killing Curse-green — no, not that. Teddy’s eyes were now the colour of the eyes of Lily Evans.
— — —
December 1998
The ministry foyer was a hive of activity; like bees, hundreds of workers hurried through the hall. Hermione stood in the middle of it, huddled with a group of her friends — Harry, Ron, Neville, Parvati, along with a few others — trying not to remember the last time she was here. Then, the foyer had been so quiet; nothing but the tapping of polished shoes on the ground and the rustle of fabric as she walked in another woman’s body. Now, the earth had had the audacity to keep turning and so it was somehow already December, and the ministry was absolutely bustling.
They’d been assigned a worker to escort them — a young man who blathered on about change and new horizons like he was reading from a brochure — but Hermione had tuned him out after a few minutes. He’d kept trying to talk to Harry, who’d gotten progressively more uncomfortable until Ron had snapped and told him that they needed to focus. They weren’t here for the tour, he’d reprimanded, they were here to take their NEWTs.
Hermione leaned against Harry’s shoulder, working through her breathing exercises. She was a war hero. She could handle exams. They were, in fact, far easier than war, and she’d had a lot more practice at surviving them. The last three days had also been exams — History of Magic, Transfiguration, Potions, Herbology, Arithmancy, Astronomy — and now she just had to complete today’s two; Ancient Runes and Charms. She’d been studying for months, and she would not fail now.
The foyer began to empty out as the morning rush slowed, and eventually it was just the small group of ex-students waiting near the entrances, watching as the occasional person hurried past. They waited for seventeen minutes (Hermione counted) before a worker came to escort them to the testing halls.
One by one, they were called into the testing hall, and Hermione had a sudden wave of nostalgia. There they were, seven years from their sorting, still lined up in the same order. She watched Hannah Abbott’s blonde braid disappear round the corner as she was called, and remembered that same girl half as tall and half as brave walking up to the sorting hat. Hermione had been so terrified to walk up the steps to the stool and let the hat there decide her future, and now she was terrified for the next step in her journey; the thought was sort of funny, in a peculiar way. She had nothing to be afraid of. She’d survived so long, and she’d survive this.
“Hermione Granger!” called a voice, and Hermione started forward. She’d zoned out for so long that she’d missed Susan, Seamus, and Lavender’s names being called, and now it was her turn.
She took a breath and walked to the door.
She had nothing to be afraid of. She was Hermione Granger, and she had faced down things far worse than exams. She could do this.
She opened the door and stepped inside.
— — —
Harry closed the door behind him, straightening his tie with one hand, and grinned as he saw Hermione sitting on their bed waiting for him, already ready. She looked radiant, wearing a simple set of dark green dress robes over a light green dress and her hair done up in that way that Harry couldn’t resist.
“Looking great!” Harry grinned, leaning down to steal a kiss.
“Hey, don’t smudge my lipstick!” she laughed against his lips. “-And I could say the same about you.”
Harry glanced down at his outfit and shrugged; it was just his second-best set of black dress robes and a dark green tie to match Hermione.
“Such a flatterer, darling,” said Harry fondly. He grabbed his wand from his bedside table and waved it over his hair, drying it off, then tucked it into his pocket.
“All ready to go?” Hermione asked him. He nodded, gesturing out the door, and they walked down to the living room. Hermione tossed some floo powder into the fire, calling out “Hogwarts” in that clear voice that Harry could listen to forever, and together they stepped in and were swept away by the fire.
They stepped out of the fireplace in the Entrance Hall, which was currently filled with trees covered in fake snow. It took several minutes just to navigate through, and the hems of their fancy robes were wet with melted snow when they’d found their way to the entrance of the Great Hall. Laughing, Harry cast a warming charm, and Hermione leaned closer and kissed him lightly on the cheek in thanks.
The huge double doors opened for them and, as always, Harry marvelled at the sight of the Great Hall during Christmastime.
The room had been completely transformed. Instead of the normal four house tables, there were now a number of smaller tables — all adorned with festive wreaths and ribbons — and a number of Christmas trees stood between them. Pinecones and white candles floated in the air, and far above the starry ceiling was displaying the entire Milky Way. Fake snow was falling from the ceiling still, but now it was dissipating a metre or two before it could reach their heads. The room emanated a warmth and security that Harry only ever felt during Christmas at Hogwarts (and during late-night cuddles with Hermione); a kind of unmatched cosiness that only came from everyone in the room being content and peaceful.
Most of the students had gone home on the Express a few days ago, and so there were only thirty or so students left. Two large tables had been pushed together to fit everyone left in the castle, and the teachers had moved down from the head table to sit there as well. Surprisingly, the room was nearly as loud as it was normally; everyone was chattering and laughing away. It was refreshing, Harry thought, to see so much cheer. Even with the war won, people were still busy rebuilding their previous lives, and so the usual festivals and holidays that could have promised unconditional joy had fallen to the wayside in favour of weary persistence. Here there was actual joy on people’s faces; Harry hadn’t realised that he’d been missing the sight.
Hermione sat down at a table and immediately struck up a conversation with Professor McGonagall. Harry dutifully slotted into place on her right side and began talking to the starstruck first year next to him, who informed him that he was “super cool”; he took that compliment very seriously and tried not to let Hermione’s affectionate nudges distract him from hearing about the boy’s new owl. They chatted all throughout dinner and dessert until the first year dismissed off to bed with the rest of the younger students. As the plates disappeared, Harry turned instead to Professor Flitwick, who was sitting across the table from him.
“Enjoying the Hogwarts Christmas as usual, Mister Potter?” Professor Flitwick asked.
“Oh, it’s not the same as usual this year,” Harry said pleasantly, stealing an adoring look at Hermione, “There’s just something about spending Christmas as a couple that makes it feel different.”
“Just don’t go dragging Miss Granger into any broom closets,” Flitwick responded, “We’ve got quite enough of that from the students already; we don’t need another couple in the cupboards.”
Harry didn’t quite know what to say to that, so he just spluttered a little.
Hermione paused her conversation and leant over, voice dropped down to a conspiratorial whisper. “He’s not the one who’ll be doing the dragging, Sir.”
Harry sputtered a bit more. Hermione pinched his cheek, ate a bit of pie, and turned back to her discussion with the Headmistress.
“I… er… how are the first years settling in, Professor?” Harry changed the subject, flushing red; Flitwick laughed at the question but indulged him, and soon they were deep in conversation about the newest students. So deep in conversation, in fact, that Harry didn’t notice Hermione’s wobbling until she’d wobbled so hard she fell into him.
“Hey, Hermione, are you alright?” Harry asked worriedly, “Oh- Hermione, are you drunk?”
“No…” Hermione furrowed her brow. “Well, just a little.”
Harry raised an eyebrow at Professor McGonagall, who quickly moved her and Hermione’s cups out of reach.
“I do apologise, Miss Granger, Mister Potter,” said the headmistress, trying to act as if her cheeks weren’t bright red from the alcohol, “We were debating how to transfigure drinks and ended up transfiguring a fair bit more gillywater than necessary.”
Harry waved off her apologies, laughing. “Oh, it’s alright, Professor. Hermione needed to let loose anyways; I doubt she’s been this… relaxed since, well…”
‘Before the war’ went unsaid. The thought sobered him up a bit, and McGonagall must have seen the change in his expression, because she immediately got up from the table and gestured to the door, somehow managing to remain regal despite her flushed features and slightly blurry movements.
“Time to return home, Mister Potter?”
“Yes, we should probably turn in,” Harry replied, pulling Hermione to her feet. His soulmate blinked up at him, eyes wide and lips parted, and Harry felt a tight stirring that meant he’d probably had a little too much alcohol as well.
Professor McGonagall escorted them to the floo — she had enchanted the Entrance Hall into its winter wonderland state and therefore knew its layout well enough to get them through the trees — and helped Harry get ready to floo. As they stood there, Harry rooting through his pockets for floo powder and McGonagall handling Hermione, the professor looked at Harry so intensely that Harry began to get concerned.
“Headmistress, are you… alright?”
The professor looked at him for just a second more, then smiled. “How would you like to teach at Hogwarts, Mister Potter?”
Harry blinked. “Are you saying this because you’re a little drunk or because you honestly think I’d be a good teacher?”
“The latter,” McGonagall said, “I think you’d be a very good teacher.”
Harry stared at her, trying to figure out whether the professor was actually serious or just really good at hiding how drunk she was. He decided to let seven years of experience win and take into consideration what Professor McGonagall said, even if he didn’t agree.
“I mean, I only finished our NEWTs last week,” Harry said helplessly, “I don’t know if I could take up teaching so soon. It’s an option, but… it’s not the right time to return.”
McGonagall smiled understandingly. “I believe you, Mister Potter. You’re still young; you should be out exploring your future and the rest of the world. Don’t feel pressured to stay and take on more responsibilities; our world has expected enough from you.”
“I…” Harry responded, before finally sighing. “Thank you, Professor. That means a lot. But… I would like to be around here while Hermione and I get our lives back on track. Maybe I could just… help out? I don’t want an official position right now, just something to fill my time between quidditch practices and make me feel like I’m helping.”
They flooed back home just after midnight. Harry brought them up to the bedroom, helping Hermione up every step, and began to get ready for bed. Normally, they each did so rather quickly (to have more time for snuggling), but tonight involved cajoling a surprisingly tipsy Hermione into brushing her teeth and changing into her nightclothes.
Harry tried to grasp at the hem of Hermione’s pretty green dress and she threw herself down onto the bed.
“Stop it,” she pouted, laying there like a very cute ragdoll. “I have a boyfriend!”
“You sure do,” Harry murmured, brushing a gentle hand down the side of her face.
“You’re grinning like an idiot.”
“I sure am,” Harry said adoringly, “But I’m an idiot who has to get to bed and so you need to take that dress off.”
Hermione lay there for another minute before reluctantly taking off her dress and putting on her nightclothes. Harry didn’t look, instead opting to get into bed and pull the sheets down to make room for his soulmate. After a little while, Hermione lay down next to him and he switched off the light. Fifteen minutes later, Harry had almost fallen asleep when he heard Hermione jolt upright.
“Harry?” Hermione gasped, and he felt her snuggle closer to him. “When did you get here?”
He struggled not to laugh as she wiggled close, pulling the blankets off the foot of the bed. They’d fix it in the morning.
“I love you, Harry,” Hermione murmured, face smooshed into the pillow.
Harry smiled, rolling his eyes. “Yeah, I love you too.”
— — —
January 1999
Ron didn’t even get a second’s warning before Harry’s head appeared in his fireplace and scared him half to death. He jolted back, screeching in alarm, and the marshmallow he’d been toasting over the fire went flying and hit the opposite wall with a wet splat; Luna held out a plate and the marshmallow fell perfectly onto it.
Harry watched with a raised eyebrow. Ron raised his eyebrows right back. Their eyebrows battled it out for nearly twenty seconds before Luna threw another marshmallow at them; Ron stabbed it onto the stick and began to toast it over Harry’s eyebrows so that he wouldn’t have to see them.
“Ron,” Harry began, and Ron moved the marshmallow to be over his mouth, “How would you like to be part of the first ever Hogwarts ‘Morale Day’?”
“You know I have a doorbell for a reason?” Ron said airily, “And you have such a lovely Patronus…. and you could always rent an owl…”
Harry rolled his eyes. “Yes, yes, I’m sorry, I should have rung ahead, sorry.”
“What’s a Morale Day?”
“Does Hermione not want to go?”
“You know that job interview she’s been talking about for weeks?” Harry complained, and Ron nodded along. “Guess what was mysteriously rescheduled to be on this exact Saturday?”
“Oh, Harry, am I always to be your second choice?” Ron teased, but a tiny little flicker of jealousy sparked to life inside his chest.
“Never, Ron,” Harry said firmly, though a smile was still playing across his features, and the little spark withered and died, “I would have asked you anyway; the invitation didn’t have a limit for how many people I could bring. It’s you, me, and Hermione for the long road, mate, always us three. Even so, you’re far better with kids than Hermione is; you’d have been my first choice even if she could go.”
“Alright then, you flatterer,” laughed Ron, feeling very warm and fuzzy at the validation. “This Saturday?”
“Yeah,” Harry smiled, “See you then.”
Harry disappeared and Ron pulled his marshmallow out of the fire; it was also feeling warm and gooey.
— — —
He and Harry arrived at the castle just after noon on Saturday. Headmistress McGonagall was waiting on the front step for them.
“Mister Potter, Mister Weasley,” she greeted, “Thank you for coming.”
“Our pleasure, Professor,” Ron said jovially, “What’s on the schedule for this… Morale Day?”
“Well, there has already been a game of football, and a gobstones tournament is currently underway. We had thought about providing some sort of duelling space, but given… interhouse safety concerns, we thought best to skip that. Next up is Quidditch, which I hope you could help with; Madam Hooch retired after last year and we haven’t gotten around to finding a new instructor yet, so the lower years don’t have much in the way of flying experience, and the house league hasn’t been reinstated.”
“We’d be happy to help,” Harry answered earnestly, and together the three of them started their walk down to the Quidditch pitch. On the way, they made idle conversation.
“Have you thought of establishing a league that isn’t reliant on the house teams?” asked Ron offhandedly.
“How so?” Professor McGonagall responded, surprised.
“Well, currently only 28 or so people actually get to play in the house league, and there aren’t any other opportunities for others to play in front of the school. It might make people feel more comfortable if they were able to play with their friends, and it would stop house tensions from escalating due to quidditch team loyalty. You could make some sort of bracket; maybe a casual league and something more professional to rival the house league-?” Ron cut himself off, realising he’d been blathering, but Harry smiled encouragingly at him anyway.
“That’s a fantastic idea, Ron!” Harry exclaimed, “God knows Gryffindor could be nastier than anyone around match time; anything to psych the other team out, or take revenge!”
The headmistress looked at him appraisingly. “I agree, Mister Weasley, I’ll have to take it into consideration. I appreciate the thought you’ve put into calming house tensions.”
Ron flushed pink, and Harry snickered into his hand, so Ron elbowed him hard enough to trip him into a patch of mud. Harry cleaned his robes, scowling good-naturedly, and Professor McGonagall sniffed in a quite dignified manner before opening the gate onto the Quidditch pitch.
The sound of chattering stopped as two hundred children seemed to all turn and stare at once. Harry blanched. Ron physically took a step back.
“Professor, you didn’t say there would be this many children!” he hissed out of the corner of his mouth. Professor McGonagall smiled.
“Oh, you’re quite popular, you two. I think there’s been quite a turn-out already, but there might be some stragglers still to arrive.”
“More children?” Harry muttered, face pale, “More children!? We can’t be that popular!”
“Oh, I daresay that the students have been waiting for this for weeks,” the professor said breezily, pushing them forward onto the pitch. The mass of children seemed to take a collective breath of anticipation.
“Weeks? I only agreed on Monday!”
Professor McGonagall laughed. “I knew you wouldn’t say no, Mister Potter.”
And with that, she stepped back and the gate swung closed behind them.
Ron took a deep breath and turned to face the horde. They all seemed to blink at once.
“Is this some sort of hive-mind situation?” Harry murmured. Ron shrugged and stepped forward.
“Who’s ready to fly?” he yelled. The resounding cheer was deafening.
Harry blinked. “Well… alright. We can do this.”
And so they got to work. Ron walked around separating by skill level — some of the muggleborn first years had never even seen a broom before, what with Madam Hooch’s departure and the lack of house quidditch games — while Harry shuffled the year levels into teams. The children did what they said quite happily, starstruck by the presence of two famous war heroes; even some of the upper years were following them around like ducklings. Harry seemed to have gotten a dozen hanger-ons chattering away around him, and Ron even found himself being talked at by a number of younger Gryffindors. Eventually, they got everyone sorted out into teams, but there was a problem.
“They’re excluding the Slytherins,” Harry murmured, gesturing at one side of the field. It was true; while Harry had sorted the teams randomly, people were swapping left and right, and now most of the Slytherins were standing in a clump away from the rest of the students.
“You should talk to them,” Ron suggested. Harry gave him a look, but actually did walk over to the main pack of students. They looked up at him approaching.
“Why are you changing your teams around?” he asked calmly. There was some shuffling on the spot.
“We… er…” one of the boys said quietly. “It’s better like this.”
“Like what?” Harry prompted.
There was a bit more shuffling before someone worked up the courage to say what everyone else was apparently feeling. “Without the Slytherins!”
“And why is it better without the Slytherins.”
A girl blinked up at him, one hand at the side of her mouth as if telling him a secret. “They’re evil?”
Ron watched in amusement as Harry heaved a sigh and put his lecturing voice on. “They’re not evil just because they're dressed in green. They’re ambitious and cunning, but they are just as capable of heroism as everyone else. Think of Peter Pettigrew, who fought for Voldemort, and Severus Snape, who sacrificed himself so that I could have the chance to defeat Voldemort.” Harry sighed and bent down to look at the younger students. “Look at the first years that you’re ostracising for their house; what are they going to think of you if we’re caught in another battle? Are they going to stay behind and selflessly sacrifice their safety for people who think of them as irredeemable from the second they get sorted, or are they going to remember the way that they’ve been excluded and mocked and sneered at and decide to save themselves instead?”
“Didn’t they all fight for You-Know-Who?” one girl asked, eyes wide.
Harry shrugged. “All? No. Some certainly did — that’s why we have the ongoing trials and raids; so that the people who did fight for him are caught — but not all. Don’t treat them as if they’ve all already been found guilty; give them the benefit of the doubt. I don’t doubt that some of the Slytherins are still sympathetic to the Dark Lord, but don’t assume that they are just because of their house. You’re still children, and so are they. Don’t forget that.”
There was a chorus of affirmations and a lot of nodding. Ron sighed; he just hoped Harry had gotten through to one person. He hated the thought of defending Slytherins when they were the house most predisposed to becoming Death Eaters, but he couldn’t deny that continued ostracisation would have worse and worse effects the longer it went on. That was how the hatred for Slytherins had started in the first place; the remnants of Grindelwald-era distrust that had started decades of exclusion and suspicion. He didn’t want another war in forty years, and so he agreed with Harry, no matter how it rubbed him the wrong way.
“What a rousing speech,” Ron laughed gruffly. Harry stepped back from the group and shot a quick stinging curse at his arm. “Now, back in your teams from before — don’t bother to switch them, we’ll know if you do — and then we can get on to flying!”
There were more cheers; Ron laughed at the enthusiasm and started to hand out brooms.
Harry watched him, tired from his impassioned speech and relieved that Ron had taken over directing the children. “You’re so good with children, Ron. I don’t know how you do it.”
“It’s what I get to make up for not sharing your talent at motivational speaking,” teased Ron back, and he grinned at Harry before beginning to teach the younger children how to pick up their brooms.
— — —
February 1999
Hermione hummed under her breath as she whisked a tablespoon of cocoa into her saucepan of warm milk. The kitchen was quiet and dark around her, Harry still being asleep upstairs. She’d woken up earlier than usual from a nightmare, but she had given herself a moment to calm down and then decided that staying in bed wouldn’t do her any favours, and that she’d rather make hot chocolate.
The sound of snow swirling outside the window was a comforting white noise against the silence in the kitchen. She sat at the kitchen table with an old Nancy Drew novel she’d read a hundred times until the room was lit up orange by dawn and Harry was stumbling down the stairs to look for her.
“You’re up early,” Harry yawned. He rubbed his eyes as he crossed to the stove, peering in and perking up when he saw the contents of the saucepan. “Oh, you made cocoa?”
He helped himself to a mug of it as Hermione finished up the chapter of her book, and then they sat around the table and did nothing for a few minutes. It was very peaceful.
Hermione looked out of the window and had an idea. “Do you want to go out?”
Harry blinked. “Yeah, sure. If you want to.”
So they trekked back up to the bedroom to change clothes. Harry grabbed his old green scarf from the wardrobe and Hermione was hit with the memory of knitting that scarf a few winters before Hogwarts, and giving it to Harry, and how well it had matched his eyes when he had worn it for the first time. Now, it was so faded that it didn’t match his eyes anymore, threadbare in places, with several trailing threads. She hadn’t even realised he kept it.
It wasn’t snowing anymore when they left the house, but it was cold nonetheless. They took a long, meandering walk around the neighbourhood, stepping on frozen puddles to see if they’d crack and using subtle spells to make sure that the path wasn’t too slippery. Because of all the heavy snow, it took them nearly an hour to complete Hermione’s usual twenty-minute walk. They grabbed scones from the bakery in the shops and ate them as they walked back. It was very peaceful; Hermione could feel the last vestiges of tension from last night’s nightmare slowly leaving her.
They reached the end of their street and suddenly, Harry was digging something out of his pocket, shrugging off his gloves in order to better root around in his jacket.
“You’re going to get frostbite,” Hermione warned. Harry laughed brightly and shoved his gloves into one pocket. One fell out onto the ground, and as Hermione leaned down to pick it up, she heard the sound of a camera shutter. She straightened up, brushing the snow off the glove, and the camera went off again.
She looked up to see Harry holding a camera up to his face. His eyes weren’t visible behind the camera, but she could see his mouth stretched into a wide grin.
“Where’d you get a camera?”
“Just picked up one of those disposable ones at the pharmacy and sent it in to Diagon to get it enchanted,” Harry said, “Doesn’t matter.”
He snapped another photo of Hermione, snow on her lashes and cheeks pink with cold.
“Oh, put that away,” Hermione scolded. She turned around, and suddenly Harry’s cold hands were on the back of her neck; she squeaked loudly, glaring at him as he laughed at her discomfort.
“You’re too cold!” she groused, “I told you to keep your gloves on!”
“I guess I’ll just have to warm up like this,” Harry replied. Hermione rolled her eyes, but endured the shivers for another few seconds before shoving Harry away and shoving his gloves at him. He put them on dutifully, slipping the camera into his pocket.
“Are you just going to keep taking photos?” Hermione asked, “I’m not even doing anything.”
“Doesn’t matter,” Harry grinned, “I just want to have memories of you forever.”
“Pensieves exist for a reason,” Hermione grumbled, but she wasn’t really too mad. It was cute, in a weird Harry-ish way.
True to Harry’s proclamation, it became an ongoing theme in her life. Harry’s photo-taking obsession continued for another few weeks, and she couldn’t be sure that he wouldn’t whip out the camera at any moment of the day (or night). She was enjoying a piece of lemon cake at a café near their house and then suddenly Harry was there, one hand wiping a crumb off of her cheek and the other on the camera. She was curled up in her armchair at home, rereading Vanity Fair for the millionth time, and he was leaning against the doorway with a fresh new photo in his hands. She was getting ready for work — she had become the youngest Undersecretary in the entirety of the Ministry, working right under the Head of Magical Law Enforcement; her work was so good that Kingsley had implied that she might be promoted to Junior Undersecretary to the Minister — and Harry was there, documenting the occasion. At one point, she was taking an afternoon nap and she thought she heard him taking a picture of her, but she couldn’t be sure.
Now, Harry had calmed down considerably and was limiting himself to only a few photos per day. After finding his giant stack of photos in the back of the pantry, she’d encouraged him to find a photo album, and he’d just finished putting all the photos into it. There were actual hundreds — Hermione struggled to recall more than fifty times she’d actually seen him taking a photo.
He slotted the last photo into place, sighing in satisfaction. “All done now, Hermione. I promise not to take anymore if you don’t want me to.”
“You should label that,” Hermione observed.
“Can you do it? You have better handwriting than me.”
Hermione laughed. “Oh, so now you finally admit it!”
Harry rolled his eyes. “Yes, Hermione, your handwriting is better than mine. Go on, bask.”
Hermione held out her hand for the album, and carefully labeled it ‘February 1999’. As she was sticking the pen behind her ear, the camera shutter clicked again. She looked up to see Harry holding his newest photo, grinning goofily.
“What’s happened to that promise of yours?”
“You’re just so pretty,” Harry said dreamily, smiling down at the photo.
Hermione rolled her eyes. “Not really.”
“Don’t ever say that, Hermione. You’re beautiful, and I’m not just saying it because you’re my soulmate; I’m saying it because you’re objectively pretty.”
Hermione blushed, feeling some tiny weight that she hadn’t even realised lift off her shoulders. She’d never been a very pretty girl, not to herself or to anyone around her, and she’d learned to live with that; some girls were beautiful and some were not, and she could live with being the latter. She knew that Harry thought she was pretty, but everyone knew that soulmates were supposed to be attracted to each other; it didn’t reassure her general insecurity. Hearing Harry directly assuage them, however biased as he was, put some of that hidden fear to rest.
Harry kissed her cheek as he stood up, grabbing the album from the table and slotting the newest photo into the front. He crossed the room and put the album on the bookshelf; it slotted into place as if there’d always been a space for it, right between her well-worn copy of Vanity Fair and Harry’s dog-eared photo album of his parents.
— — —
March 1999
“-and the Arrows have completed their entrance lap, so it’s time to welcome in our opposing team! Now flying in, we have…. Griffiths!”
The navy blue-clad chaser at the front of the line was shooting forward as soon as her name was called, and the crowd cheered as she flew onto the field.
“Chuang!”
The next up in the line zoomed onto the pitch, and Harry took a deep breath. The sound of cheering was tremendously loud, but still not as loud as the pounding of his heartbeat in his ears.
“Atkins!”
Wood shifted around his place in line, turning around to see Harry and then quickly raising an eyebrow at his teammate’s state. He squeezed Harry’s shoulder in a silent check-in.
“MacCoughlan!”
Harry smiled back nervously. He’d played games before, but none of them would be quite so important as this one. Winning the House Cup was important, but as silly as it seemed, if he screwed this game up terribly, the goodwill that he’d built from being the Slayer of Voldemort could dissipate pretty quickly. The British public was fickle, and a simple humiliation during a National League Quidditch game could make or break his reputation. He’d graduated to ‘Mythical Figure’ in the eyes of some, and though he didn’t want that, it was far better to be ‘Mythical Figure and Star Seeker’ than it was to be ‘That One Seeker Who Fell Off His Broom Because Of Nerves And Lost Puddlemere Their First Game In Seven Seasons And Also Killed The Dark Lord That One Time’. He couldn’t screw this up.
“Najjar!”
The last of their teammates flew out onto the field, and Harry could feel his heartbeat going a mile a minute. He took one deep breath in.
“Wood!”
Oliver smiled at him, turned away, and shot onto the field.
“and, in his first ever professional game,” the announcer yelled over the sound of the crowd, voice cracking with excitement, “the new Puddlemere United seeker Harry Potter!”
If the crowd had been loud before, it was nothing compared to now. The whole stadium seemed to swell with noise, almost riotous as every person in the venue tried to get a glimpse at him. Harry exhaled in one long sigh of anticipation, slung a leg over his broom, and began to fly.
It was a long, hard game. The Arrows had been training just as hard as Puddlemere, and their two new chasers were almost inhuman in their uncanny ability to always be where the other was passing towards. MacCoughland and Najjar succeeded in keeping most of the bludgers away from Harry, but he still caught one in the shin, which now throbbed in time with the crowd’s chants. Luckily, the other team’s Keeper got nailed in the chest with a bludger at one point, and in the fifteen minutes before he was allowed back onto the field Puddlemere scored eight times.
They went almost two hours underneath the sun, sweaty and panting in the heat, before Harry was able to lock onto the Snitch. He followed it for nearly five minutes, getting ever closer to catching it. He reached the edge of the stadium, nearly cornering the snitch as it fluttered around trying to escape, and reached out a hand for it.
Suddenly, there was a deafening impact against his side, sending him careening into the wall beside him. He gasped as all the wind was knocked out of him. Luckily, the part of the wall he’d collided with was mostly made up of a fabric banner; he shuddered to think of what might have happened if he’d crashed into one of the more solid parts of the stadium.
The whistle blew and his team descended around him, concern on all of their faces as Harry struggled to push himself back up onto his broom.
“I’m fine,” Harry gasped, “Just winded. What’s the score?”
“350 – 490,” said MacCoughlan somberly, patting him on the shoulder. “We’ll need a miracle, Potter.”
He stared at the scoreboard. The situation was bleak; unless he managed to catch the snitch before the Arrows scored again, they’d have a 150 point lead on Puddlemere and he’d have to wait to catch it until his team scored another point, leaving the Arrows seeker open to catching it.
“I’ll try,” Harry promised, and they all flew to their positions.
Just as he’d feared, the starting whistle blew and the Arrows instantly got into formation, shooting towards Wood with a single-minded ferocity. As he tried to defend all three hoops, Wood smacked into one of the poles and during his brief moment of distraction, the Arrows scored through the middle hoop. He hadn’t even gotten the chance to pull off his miracle. Feeling the weary disappointment of knowing his team would lose in his bones, Harry abandoned the search for the snitch in order to go and make sure that Oliver was okay. The keeper had one eye on the game and the other on his broom, which was looking a little roughed up after his collision with the pole.
“Harry, get back out into the game!” his previous captain scolded, and Harry instinctively straightened his back. “I’m okay.”
“Are you sure?” Harry asked worriedly.
“I’m alright,” reassured Wood, and so Harry slowly flew up and over, watching as the Puddlemere chasers struggled to grapple the quaffle away from the already triumphant Arrows team.
Lucas shot across the field, having spotted the snitch, and Harry trailed after him somberly, knowing the futility of trying to catch up.
“Lucas goes for the snitch; has Potter given up? The scoreboard would say so! Looks like the victory will go to– hang on, Griffiths scores!”
The Arrows team had all stopped to watch their seeker go for the snitch, and as they did so, the Puddlemere chaser Wilda Griffiths had managed to sneak a point past the Arrows’ keeper. Harry was shooting towards the snitch before he even realised it, diving as fast as he could. Lucas didn’t look up at him, too focused on his own flying, and so Harry used the opportunity to fly right over his head, distracting him for just enough time to pull ahead.
“Potter! Lucas! Now it’s Potter! It’s Lucas!” the announcer screamed. Harry urged his broom faster. It seemed to be vibrating beneath his fingers, or maybe it was him that was vibrating with the effort. He could almost viscerally feel the adrenaline rushing through every vein in his body. He was clenching his teeth hard enough to feel it in his jaw; Hermione would scold him if she saw.
The snitch grew closer and closer as he caught up to the other seeker, hand shaking as he reached out, and finally, as the roar of the crowd crescendoed around him, his fingers closed on the cold metal of the golden snitch.
“Harry Potter catches the snitch and Puddlemere United wins!” the announcer screamed over the cheers of the crowd, “Puddlemere wins! What an incredible finish! 510 points to 500 points.”
Harry almost blacked out as he dismounted on the ground and all the adrenaline left him in an instant. He nearly fell over, but one hand grasped his broom to hold him up as the other raised the snitch into the air. His robes were soaked with sweat and half the bones in his body felt broken (at least one probably was) and he was grinning like a madman. His team tumbled off their brooms, laughing and cheering with the crowd, and Harry let out a shuddery little exhale, too out of breath to even laugh.
“Bloody good flying out there, Harry!” Oliver shouted jovially, sprinting over to pull him into a hug. “I knew you were the right choice!”
The rest of the team followed behind, equally joyful, and they surrounded Harry, all shouting and jumping and grinning wildly. Harry set aside the fact that he was a grown man — after-game team celebrations were no place for dignity and restraint — and jumped with them, grinning and laughing. This was it, he decided; this was the thing he lived for and dreamed of and wanted more than anything; sweet, hard-earned victory. He couldn’t believe he’d ever thought about going into a different career when Quidditch was so obviously the path for him. Ever since he’d first picked up a broom it had been like some unshakeable bond had attracted him back to flying over and over, and he’d been such an idiot to even think about giving it up. All he needed in his life was his soulmate and his broom; the only two things that could still bring him childlike wonder in a world full of magic. That was all he needed to be happy.
— — —
April 1999
Hermione picked her way through the graveyard, tripping over the hem of her robes as she tried to avoid standing on any of the graves. There weren't many; a little under two dozen in three neat rows. Faintly, the memory floated by of her first (and only other) time visiting this place; it had been barely a fortnight after the battle, and she’d still been basking in the afterglow of finding out that Harry was her soulmate. The earth had looked freshly dug then, piled up in front of the headstones like they’d dug more than they could fit back in; grass was creeping over the sides of the mounds by now, and the summer flowers that littered the slopes around them had slowly begun to spread into the graveyard.
She stopped in front of a silvery headstone.
Lavender Brown
1980 - 1998
Underneath the dates, some kind of esoteric symbol was engraved; probably a divination thing. It was so remarkably reminiscent of Lavender that Hermione had to scoff quietly under her breath, one side of her face twitching into a small smile; her bed curtains in their dormitory had had sigils embroidered into them by patient hands and the books in her wardrobe had always been freshly bound in ‘free range twine’ that she’d chanted over. It was just like her to forgo an epitaph for this.
“Hermione,” said a soft voice, “I didn’t expect to see you here.”
Hermione spun, hand going to her wand as it always did these days, but she relaxed when she saw simple blue robes and gold jewellery that had often been left on the floor of their dormitory. Parvati stood there, staring past Hermione at the grave, and Hermione’s breath hitched as she saw her friend in her entirety for the first time since the battle.
Her face was mangled: half of her cheek was burned into a mess of melted skin, a mockery of the golden tan she’d spent so long cultivating, and the pink of new skin was barely visible beneath the scars. One of her eyes was slightly more closed than the other, as if the skin above her eye had melted like candle wax and closed it for her, but they shone with a confidence that Hermione had barely seen on Parvati before. Her skin stretched grotesquely as she smiled, and Hermione’s eyes were unwittingly drawn to the burn. Parvati’s smile faltered, gaze flickering over the expression that Hermione was sure she was making and then hardening.
“Don’t pity me, Granger,” Parvati said scathingly, and it tore through Hermione like shrapnel, “I don’t want your pity.”
“I didn’t mean–”
“–Why are you here?” asked Parvati.
“I came to see how you are,” Hermione replied, rubbing at the back of her neck. Parvati scoffed and turned away, but Hermione grabbed her hand. “Not- I just wanted to make sure you were okay! I saw that you were… injured.”
“Injured?” Parvati laughed, wrenching her hand away, “I’m some ugly freak of nature now. I’ve never been ugly in my life. Forgive me if I don’t want your pity, I’ve got quite enough of it already.”
“Fine,” snapped Hermione, losing her patience, “I do pity you; just a little. Every time I see someone hurt in the battle I can only think about how I could have saved them, and that applies to you as well, Parvati. I’m sorry that you’re an ‘ugly freak of nature’, but that’s not why I came to see you. I stayed away for a while but by now people have started to heal, and I wanted to make sure you were– well, not okay, but maybe a tiny bit better after Lavender…” she couldn’t finish her sentence. She gestured listlessly at the grave and Parvati averted her eyes.
They sat in silence for a few minutes, both breathing heavily as they calmed down, and Parvati half-sat half-fell to the ground next to the grave. The grass crunched beneath Hermione’s shoes as she shifted her weight from foot to foot.
“Do you miss her?” Hermione asked, breaking the silence. Instantly, her cheeks pinked; what an obvious question.
Parvati looked hard at her for a moment before laughing softly, eyes downcast. “Every moment for the rest of my life. You?”
“I… yes. I think I do.”
“She was… my everything for seven years.” Parvati said softly, trailing a finger across the dirt. “We weren’t soulmates or anything, just really good friends; that shouldn’t matter. If there ever was a soulmate for me, it was Lavender. We just… understood each other, y’know?”
Hermione swallowed, feeling a lump developing in her throat. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t apologise; you didn’t kill her.”
“I know.”
They sat in silence for a minute before Hermione cleared her throat. “It’s been nearly a year now.”
“I’m gonna stop mourning on the anniversary. Start fresh, you know? She wouldn’t want me to mope around forever.”
Hermione nodded, settling down cross-legged in the grass. “I’m… that’s a good idea, Parvati.”
“I’m happier to have loved her and lost her forever than to never have met her at all, because at least I have memories. God, we had so many plans,” Parvati laughed wetly, sitting down on her heels and brushing her shoulder against Hermione. “I always thought we’d have all the time in the world. She said that she adored the idea of a soulmate but that she’d give them up to grow old with me; I guess this is what happens when you say things like that.”
“She would have left her soulmate for you!?” Hermione gasped. She couldn’t even imagine something like that; the pure contentment that she felt whenever she so much as looked at Harry was too much for her to consider it.
“I know that seems hard to imagine, what with your situation, Hermione,” Parvati laughed, voice amused but with an undertone of bitterness, “But yes. We… it wasn’t romantic, but we loved each other and given time it could have developed into something more. I thought… I thought we might have had that time.”
“At least you got the time you got.”
“Yeah,” shrugged Parvati, scratching at the skin of her burnt cheek, “I’m glad.”
“What are we going to do now?” Hermione asked, leaning back and staring at the sky.
Parvati shrugged again. “Just… live, I suppose. It’s like I haven’t been able to breathe for the past year and now I’m breathing pure oxygen. It’s… overwhelming.”
“You know what oxygen is?” questioned Hermione.
Parvati laughed; a high, tinkling sound that Hermione had loved and hated over the years. “Fay explained it to me at one point. I didn’t quite understand, but then again, I don’t understand much of anything nowadays.”
“Do you want me to explain it?” Hermione asked. It felt like an olive branch of sorts, and Parvati’s smile let her know that she was accepting it. She didn’t smile back — it would have come out watery and fake — but she didn't feel quite so alone.
They sat together in the grass, there in the graveyard where their friends lay buried, dirt in their shoes and pollen in their hems and they talked. They sat there for hours, just talking about what they had wanted to do when they were baby-faced and full of unadulterated hope. Hermione tried to explain the periodic table to Parvati; Parvati tried to explain the appeal of a beauty consulting service to Hermione; Hermione taught Parvati about the biology of scar tissue; Parvati taught Hermione how to tell the future with seven-sided dice next to Lavender’s grave. The sun set in what seemed both an instant and an eternity as they chatted about meaningless and profound things like their hopes and dreams and fears and regrets. By the time Parvati stood up and offered her hand, Hermione had wet cheeks and a lump in her throat but she was warm.
— — —
May 1999
It was time, Harry decided, for the kid gloves to come off. This was getting serious.
“Ron, do you have any sevens?” he asked politely.
Ron physically leapt forward and tried to attack Harry; while he was doing so, Hermione summoned all the fives out of his hand and put down another set of four. The homemade muffins on the table next to him went flying, but Hermione luckily managed to catch them all in a levitation spell before they could end up in the fireplace.
“You smarmy little bastard,” growled Ron. “You knew I was collecting them.”
Hermione interrupted them with a sharp cough. “Hand them over, Ron. Any sevens, Harry?”
As soon as Harry had the sevens in his grasp, they were unjustly taken from him. Hermione laid down the last of her cards with a flourish.
“I believe I win again,” Hermione announced, adding another tally
“So that’s… eight rounds of Hermione, two for me, and… none for you, Ron,” Harry said, sarcasm dripping from every word, “Oh no, whatever shall you do?”
“I’m going to drown you,” Ron snarled.
Hermione quirked an eyebrow. “Harry, is this what it feels like to win a game against Ron?”
“I’d call this comeuppance for the chess notebook, Hermione,” Harry responded, and Ron groaned loudly.
“I don’t like this game anymore,” he pouted, “It’s not as fun when Hermione can trounce all of us so thoroughly.”
“All of us?” Harry asked innocently, “I do recall the scores being 8 to 2 to 0, not 8 to 0 to 0. Seems like it was only thorough for one person.”
“So, the Quidditch league is going well!” Ron said loudly, “Bloody good play at that last game, Harry! Epic catch!”
Harry rolled his eyes but indulged the topic change. “Yeah, I’m really loving the team. It’s my dream job, y’know?”
“I thought you wanted to be an auror?” Ron joked. “You’d be amazing at it, what with your impulsiveness and inability to take orders.”
Harry grinned back, shoving a muffin at Ron to stop him from talking. “No, Quidditch has always had my heart.”
“I thought I had your heart!” Hermione retorted. Harry attempted to rectify his mistake with a kiss but she pushed him off, laughing.
“Fine then; it’s my second-favourite thing in the world. Though…” Harry made a face, “Hermione has stuffed me full of stats about the length of Quidditch careers; all good things must come to an end, so I’ll have to find something to do when I’m unable to move my knees anymore.”
“You could always teach,” Ron suggested, nibbling at his muffin. “You did say that McGonagall offered.”
“I’m no teacher,” Harry laughed, before his expression turned a little wistful. “But… maybe in ten years.”
“She gave me the offer as well,” Ron said quietly. “I accepted.”
Harry and Hermione turned to him with equal expressions of shock. “What? When? Why didn’t you tell us?”
“Er… January,” Ron admitted. “She liked the way I was teaching during Morale Day, so I’m going to be the Quidditch coach and the Head of Gryffindor. Gonna… gonna make a difference, y’know?”
“Wow, that’s… that’s amazing, Ron!” exclaimed Hermione. “I’m so proud of you; a Hogwarts professor!”
“Technically not a professor,” Ron murmured, smiling. Hermione launched herself at him and hugged him fiercely.
“When do you start?” Harry asked.
“Er… next year, probably? I’m taking a teaching course right now, which is easier now that me and Luna have moved to Hogsmeade.”
“How’re the renovations going?”
Ron made a face. “Oh, you know how it is. I loved Aunt Lucy but she had the worst taste in carpets, and she put them over a beautiful hardwood floor! I truly don’t understand. It’ll take a few more weeks to tear up all the carpeting–” he took a look around the room and sighed– “God, look at us. All grown up; renovations and jobs and shit.”
“Doesn’t feel like it sometimes,” replied Harry. “But at least…”
The rest of the words went unsaid.
“Wanna play another game?” Hermione offered.
“Nah, I’ve gotta get home and get changed for… tonight,” Ron said lowly. Harry suppressed a sigh and waved Ron goodbye with only a weary smile. Ten minutes, Hermione was downstairs and he was alone in his room getting ready.
It was the day of the memorial service for everyone killed in the Battle and he was just tired. He didn’t want to go and be surrounded by hundreds of people who would either cry over his sacrifice or blame him for not doing enough to save their loved ones. He’d have to go regardless; it was necessary to keep up appearances.
Hermione came in and got ready silently, slipping into the same simple black robes as Harry. As they left the house, Harry turned off all the lights behind them and, on a whim, picked up his camera from the shelf. Together, they then apparated to the bottom of Hogwarts’ steep drive. At the gates, a few black-clad students were handing out candles and directing people over to the graveyard.
Harry dutifully took a candle and walked over. Hermione hurried away to talk to Parvati, who was putting her candle on Lavender’s grave, and so Harry was left alone. Up and down the rows of graves he walked, feeling every name impact against him like a stone thrown at his chest. Eventually, he found one he regretted above all.
“You always thought I was such a hero, Colin,” Harry whispered to the cold stone. It didn’t reply. “But I didn’t do it ‘cause I was ready, or because I wanted to do it. I did it because no one else could. I don’t think that makes me a hero, just a survivor. But I’m glad that you believed in Harry Potter up until the end. I think it really made a difference. I think you made a difference.”
With that being said, he lit his candle and put it on the ground in front of Colin’s grave. After a second’s thought, he pulled his camera from his pocket and set it on the grave as well. Then, he turned and followed the trickle of people walking up the slope towards the castle.
A few minutes later, after all the candles had been laid, the last stragglers arrived in the main courtyard. Just like when he’d dueled Voldemort, everyone was pressed to the walls in one huge circle, but unlike then, he was not going to be in the middle. He was just Harry now, not Harry Potter, and no one could force him to be in the spotlight.
Professor McGonagall stepped slightly out from the circle and silently lifted her wand to the sky. She closed her eyes, expression fraught with despair, and then sighed and looked at the sky. Her wand issued a brilliant white light that shot straight up over the castle.
Slowly, other people began to step forward and cast their own spells. Harry watched as every professor began to cast, and as more and more of his friends stepped up to join them. Hermione stepped forward, sending an unreadable look back at him that Harry hoped wasn’t annoyance, and joined in. There were Ron and Luna on the other side of the courtyard, holding hands as they cast their spells, and Ginny and Dean and Seamus and Parvati and dozens of other people Harry couldn’t name but knew from years of seeing them in the halls.
In a corner of the courtyard, Draco Malfoy was casting his own spell; just a tiny fraction of the overall shield, but it was there and that meant something.
Harry took a deep breath and stepped into the throng, lifting his wand up to the sky and sending the strongest pulse of raw magic he could up into the sky above Hogwarts. It crystallised in the air, joining with a thousand other crystalline structures to form a huge dome. Finally, the last person had sent their spell up into the air and in an almost choreographed manner, everyone stopped casting and looked up at the shield they’d created. It spread across the entirety of the sky, just like it had during the battle.
Harry looked away for a second, just in time to see one of the graves near the treeline issue a brilliant shower of sparks. Electronics and magic didn’t mix, obviously, no matter how well they were enchanted, and this amount of pure magic in such a short amount of time would have fried anything electrical.
He looked away and stared up at the sky again. He didn’t know what he was supposed to feel, but it probably wasn’t empty apathy. It was as if his guilt and regret had been muted down to nothing, just a little whisper in the back of his head instead of the roar that they usually manifested as.
How was he supposed to know when it was time to move on? How could he possibly know what to do when those horrible feelings that he hadn’t been able to get rid of just silently slipped away? What happened next when the guilt that was weighing him down was gone and he became light enough to fly away… should he stay on the ground?
He looked at the grave. Colin was sixteen years old when he died, infinitely more naive and foolish than Harry had been at that age, but he’d been just as brave. He couldn’t dishonour Colin’s memory and his own sacrifice by searching for guilt to lay upon his own shoulders; he had to keep living and breathing and moving on. He was going to keep going.
— — —
June 1999
Hermione woke with a gasp, head swimming with the splashing of blood and jaw aching from the force she’d been clenching it with. She wrenched her arms out from beneath the blankets, dislodging the blankets piled over Harry, and sat up onto her elbows. The room was dark, silent except for her ragged breaths. In the corners of her visions, shadows danced and swam in coiling patterns like snakes.
Harry was still asleep beside her; at least she hadn’t woken him up. He breathed deeply as he slept, and she tried to slow down her breathing to match his, which might have been a little creepy but did earnestly help to calm her down. She followed his breathing for a few minutes, but her eyes didn’t feel any heavier, so she swung her legs out of the bed. The floor was cold underneath her feet, and she focused on the sensation. That, combined with her controlled breathing, helped to slow her racing thoughts.
She was worn absolutely ragged, she realised. Her year of ‘relaxation and recuperation’ hadn’t been quite as relaxing as she’d wanted; not when the entire government needed to be restructured and half of Hogwarts was still crumbling ruins and most of Wizarding Britain had barely gotten back on their feet. By trying to simultaneously put her future back on track and survive moment to moment, she’d burned herself out and gotten absolutely nowhere. The fact that she’d also been trying to find a place to live and a job in a government that needed heavy systemic reforms to even continue existing hadn’t helped; luckily, she now had a home to go back to.
She laid back down with a heavy exhale, and turned to look at Harry, who was still sleeping peacefully. Reaching past the blankets, she stretched out and grasped his arm, squeezing it once, then twice. Her soulmate was real and alive and in this moment that was all that mattered.
Harry stirred, a low rumble in his throat as he yawned a greeting. “‘Mione? It’s… still dark.”
“Yes, I know, sweetheart, go back to sleep.” sighed Hermione.
Harry’s eyes fluttered open for a second, fixing upon her with affectionate intensity, before closing again. “Sweetheart? That’s new.”
“Do you like it?”
“I love everything you do, Hermione.” Harry murmured, inching a hand across the blanket between them so that he could caress her face with a few fingertips.
Hermione breathed a laugh. “That’s so cheesy.”
“Mm… you love it,” Harry replied, blinking lazily.
“I do.”
She placed a kiss on his shoulder — the nearest part she could reach — and then hauled herself up a bit so that she could nuzzle into his cheek. Harry turned his head and for a minute they lay there, foreheads pressed together as they breathed. Harry’s breath evened out as he fell back asleep and Hermione pulled herself back, dropping a quick kiss on his cheek. For a moment, she just stared at him fondly.
Hermione loved him, and every time she thought of him, she loved him a little more, and for all of her genius she would never be able to think up enough words to describe the way that felt. She could have spent every moment of her life with a pen to paper, scribbling out every musing and metaphor that crossed her mind in messy lines and diagrams and yet it would never be enough to encompass them.
There were not many wizard poets — in a world where wonder was at their very fingertips, what use were words that could never define them? — but the poems they wrote were remarkably similar to those of the great muggle minds. Soulmates were a frequent topic in both muggle and wizarding poetry and somehow neither realm had entirely figured them out — not for a lack of trying; no amount of human curiosity had managed to decode magic’s mysterious methodology for matchmaking. Men older and wiser than Hermione had tried to put their thoughts into writing, talking about things like the flow of rivers and the orbits of moons and the ever-present companionship of a shadow, and time after time Hermione had devoured their words in search of something that could help her explain her feelings, but no. No timeless masterpiece could compare to what she felt for Harry. He was more than a river and a moon; he was better than a shadow because a shadow was bound to its maker by the laws of light, but Harry could leave at any moment but wouldn’t.
Hermione was not a poet, but the thoughts in her head could make her one, and for Harry she’d give it a try.
Her eyes had known him for seven years, but her hands, head, and heart had been intertwined with his since she was born. She’d hoped for someone so perfect for her before she had even known what romance was, and she’d waited for him for an eternity and a day and now here they were: two shellshocked, messy teenagers who’d barely dipped their toes into life. Fate was the kindest thing, sending Harry to her, and Fate was the great simplifier, showing her how to love him.
To put it to words: she wanted the breath in his lungs and the curve in his lips. She needed his hand in hers and his head on her shoulder and his heartbeat resonating against her chest. He didn’t confine himself to clichés; he wasn’t her sun or her moon or the world that surrounded her, he was her very being; some intrinsic piece of her that could never be pulled from her soul.
She saw him in the puffy white clouds that made shapes only they told to each other, and the warm rainbows that danced on the surfaces of puddles on the pavement, and the dandelion seeds that floated from their hands and were carried up to the heavens and beyond by the gentlest of spring breezes. Harry was birdsong in the mornings and noctilucence in the evenings and the rain on her windowsill and a thousand other things that fluttered around in her head like butterflies that she couldn’t catch.
He was past, present, and future; a dance and a song; heaven, hades, and everything in between. A poem longer than the span of the life of the universe could not have encompassed what she felt, so luckily there was a word just for that:
Soulmate.
And the best part?
She knew that she meant the same to him.
Hermione couldn’t write a poem more perfect.
Notes:
a little self-promotion: on this day, august 17th, year of our lord 2025, I published two other fics - feel free to give those a read as well!
Might not update for a hot minute; once again, as they do every year, exams are rolling around. I'm an infrequent and inconsistent poster in general, especially during exam seasons, but thankfully this is the last chapter.
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