Numb

fopalup

Rating: PG13
Genres: Angst, Drama
Relationships: Harry & Hermione
Book: Harry & Hermione, Books 1 - 5
Published: 24/12/2003
Last Updated: 13/04/2005
Status: in_progress

After Harry arrives home, he can't seem to put the previous years problems behind him, until...

Chapters

1. untitled

2. Bemused

3. Hermione

4. A Story?

1. untitled

AN- Ok folks this is my first attempt at a fanfic in a long time, and my very first involving Harry Potter. I am trying to build a neat story, and this is gonna be a kinda background piece, with multiple parts, so I hope you enjoy. Usual disclaimer here about not owning anything Harry Potter and hopefully JKR will forgive me for playing with her toys.

Numb.

That was the only thing he could feel these days. A bone-chilling numbness that seemed to penetrate everywhere and everything he touched. Harry Potter just couldn't get himself to care anymore. Sirius was dead.

That thought was the one that just wouldn't let go of him so far this summer. Every time he seemed to turn around the thought would return. How this could be with Harry staying at the Dursleys' home on Privet Drive was a bit of a mystery to him and yet it wasn't. Nothing in the Muggle-dominated home had anything to do with Harry and yet it was this house that Harry had always wanted to escape from. In his early days living in the cupboard under the stairs, he would imagine a place where his uncle wouldn't belittle him, where his aunt wouldn't constantly complain about him and his continued existence in their lives, and where his cousin, Dudley would not be around to torment him, either by attempting to beat him up or make his life hell by making up something Harry had done wrong and tattling to Aunt Petunia.

Later when Harry found out about Hogwarts he couldn't believe or frankly understand his good fortune. It just wasn't something that happened to him, Harry Potter. Then came all the new revelations of who he was, how important he was to the world he was about to enter. Harry had felt numb then too. But anything was better than the life he had lived before Hagrid had entered his life so spectacularly. Unfortunately Harry had to return to his Muggle relatives each summer. Each year he realized he had to return to the ridicule, the complete and total lack of any positive feelings directed at himself.

It was all of that, that Sirius had promised to remove him from.

Sirius was dead.

And so when Harry found himself at Privet Drive yet again at the end of his horrible fifth year, numb was all he could feel. The Dursleys' had been sufficiently intimidated by Mad-Eye Moody and co. and Harry had not been seriously bothered by them this year. However a lack of open hostility had been all that had been granted to him and despite the politely-phrased requests (usually given through gnashing teeth) about doing some chores, he still spent most of his time alone in his room, outside of meals around the meal table.

Harry had felt something on the train back and on the platform, gratitude for all the people that were willing to support him, back him up when he needed it. The drive back however had merely reinforced the despair that had building within him over time. No one talked to him. No one even looked at him. Harry was a non-person, which was nothing really new, but the new treatment had the feeling of ‘ If You Ignore It, It Will Go Away’. For the following 3 days it had been like that. Harry had been left to himself, in his own personal Purgatory. He felt a bit like a ghost, one that was best ignored for the sake of all involved.

It was at this point that Moody appeared at the front door, with his bowler hat over his magical eye. Apparently he came to check up on Harry, to drop off a couple of letters that had been sent by his friends Ron and Hermione, and to have a few words with the Dursley’s. Harry never found out what was specifically discussed, he really couldn’t care either, but the following day his Aunt Petunia had approached his door, and after Harry had granted her admittance, asked (ASKED!) for his help for something in the backyard. Harry really didn’t care about doing it, but he didn’t really care about refusing either, he merely responded with “Whatever”, and went outside to start weeding the garden. He wasn’t really sure if this is what his Aunt had in mind for him to be doing, but she hadn’t complained and it had given Harry something to look at besides his bare ceiling and walls.

The following three weeks had been much the same. Sitting alone in his room, merely staring at his surroundings, with the occasional request from Aunt Petunia (such as doing the dishes or whatnot), Hedwig returning from wherever she went to, and visits from members of the order, though mostly it was Arabella Figg who came by. Those conversations were fairly brief, and most visitors tried to cheer him up. Kingsley Shakelbolt had been by, as had Tonks (sporting a lime green hair color), and even Mundungus Fletcher (though he was STILL going on about buying some cauldrons). Mrs. Figg was starting to look more and more worried, but Harry just couldn’t bring himself to come out of whatever funk he was in. They brought him mail too, since owl post was too traceable, mail which he had yet to read. Even those first letters hadn’t been looked at. Harry just couldn’t bring himself to read them and there was quite a pile building up. He guessed that they weren’t all from Ron or Hermione, judging from the writing on the envelopes. One of these days he was going to have to read of those. He knew that his friends were worried, but the one person who Harry wanted to hear from wouldn’t be heard from again.

Sirius was dead.

Sighing, Harry decided he needed to open a window and take a shower. He hadn’t taken one in over three days and he and his room were starting to stink.

*******

The afternoon sun shone through Harry’s open window as he lay on his bed, totally apathetic to the world. ‘Is this what I have to look forward to’ Harry thought to himself as he pondered his life, ‘having people disappear from my life all the time because of some… some lunatics weird obsession with me?’ Harry felt he had already lost too much, his parents and now Sirius. He also felt bad for those who were just around him, people like Ginny back in second year, used as a lure to get to him, or Cedric in fourth year, killed for just being in his general vicinity. The whispered ‘Kill the spare’ floated through Harry’s mind at that moment, sending a shudder down his back.

He thought about the other people in his life, Dumbledore, the teachers at Hogwarts, members of the Order of the Phoenix, his fellow students in the DA, including Cho… he even gave Snape and Malfoy a brief thought. Ron and the Weasleys’. Hermione and her parents. Would any of them live through this… confrontation that would eventually lead up to Harry and Voldermort in a one-on-one face-off?

Sirius was dead.

Sirius hadn’t survived. How many more were going to have to go through what he did, losing people left and right, until everyone finally gave up and left it up to Harry and his snake-like adversary to just go at it? Sometimes Harry just felt like walking out the front door, walk down to Diagon Alley and calling out to Voldermort to come and get him then and there. He just wanted it over with one way or another. Realistically though, he knew that he was the only hope that the wizarding world had, and that if he didn’t defeat Voldermort, the rest of the wizarding world, and in conjunction, the rest of the world would pay for his failure. ‘No, no pressure at all!’

Suddenly Harry felt angry. Very angry. Without stopping to think about it hi stood up and started to pace the small room. An emotion was building in him, and that was something he had not dealt with in a couple of weeks. Emotion; pure raw feeling. Anger. Rage.

Harry rapidly sat back down, his breathing coming rapid as the rage and pain built up in him. He grabbed onto something, he didn’t know what, couldn’t see through the feeling he was going through, until they became so intense that he had to close his eyes and scream out loud, letting all the emotion go into a primal cry that ripped through the air.

‘That felt good!’ Harry thought in disbelief.

Harry kept his eyes closed, breathing in his nose and out his mouth, actually feeling some measure of peace for the first time in quite a while. It was fairly short-lived, however, as he felt something flutter against his right cheek. Opening his eyes, Harry discovered white feathers everywhere, floating in the breeze caused by the open window. Looking around, he quickly discovered the source. The source was in his hands. Or at least what was left of the source. ‘Looks like I’ll need to get another pillow,’ he thought to himself stupidly, watching all the feathers float in the air in a dance that had him mesmerized by the sheer lightness of it all. The wind had picked up, apparently, and kept everything in the air for quite a while. In a way, it reminded Harry of a game of Quidditch, and the freedom felt when he was on his broomstick, his trusty Firebolt…

Sirius was dead.

With a half growl, Harry got up and closed the window, watching as the breeze was cut off and the feathers started falling towards the ground. There was some symmetry there towards his own life that he really didn’t want to think about. Not waiting, he started cleaning up the mess of feathers and placing them all on his bed, thinking to himself that maybe he could stuff them back inside his pillow case and try his hand at sewing it back up. Harry did have some experience sewing, mostly holes in his clothes after he had ‘inherited’ them from Dudley, so he wasn’t really worried about that. An odd thought did come to mind, however, ‘I didn’t think my pillow was stuffed with feathers…’

Suddenly a knock on the door broke Harry out of his half stupor. With a sigh Harry got himself up from his bed and went over to the door, opening it and expecting his Aunt Petunia to ask him what all the noise was about, or possibly about another chore that she needed done. Truth be known, he wouldn’t have minded something to do at that particular time. However it wasn’t her at all. In fact Harry really couldn’t have been more surprised if Voldermort himself hadn’t arrived to invite Harry to afternoon tea.

His best friend, Hermione Granger, had arrived at his bedroom door.

“Harry!” she cried as she enveloped him in a hug.

All Harry could do as she did that was stand there stunned. Speechless. Numb.

2. Bemused

Authors note- Thanks to all for your kind responses. I am posting this on both fanfiction.net and portkey.org but I had a harder time putting it up on portkey until recently. Anyways I’m looking at improving my writing skills so if anyone has any critiquing they would like to do please don’t hesitate. Even flames are welcome. I’ve had a lot of practice with rejection. ;)

Numb 2

Harry couldn’t move. Shock wasn’t a strong enough word. Here he was standing inside his room minding his own business when suddenly Hermione comes into his life from out of nowhere, giving him one of the biggest, if not THE biggest hugs he had ever received in his life. She was also mumbling something into his shoulder, but Harry could only make out about every fifth word or so, words like ‘sorry’ and ‘staying’ and ‘letters’ and ‘blame’, but one that stood out above the rest was ‘death’. Eventually she wound down and just continued hugging him as if everything depended on the one simple fact that if she was hugging him, nothing could happen. Harry started to enjoy the hug, but too many things were going around in his head.

“Hermione,” Harry questioned, finally coming out of his catatonic state (still not a strong enough word, in Harry’s opinion) “what’s going on? Why are you here? Did something happen to you?”

She looked up at him, backing out of the hug now, but her hands grasping his forearms, and surprise clearly showing on her face. “Did something happen to me? That’s the question I should be asking you,” she sounded slightly irritated at the moment, for reasons Harry couldn’t figure. She continued, “All I know is there is a sudden reading of magic in the area, wandless no less, and a huge scream that I immediately recognized as you. It could be heard for blocks, Harry.” She looked at him sternly then. “Oh Harry, please don’t tell me you have been fooling around with wandless magic to get back at your relatives.”

“Uh, um……. what?” Harry asked, getting more and more confused by the second. ‘What is she doing here?’

“Harry!” Uh oh. When Hermione last used that tone of voice, it was to lecture about needing to study for OWLs, and wouldn’t accept any argument to the contrary. “You know that it isn’t allowed to play around with muggles like that! I’m not even sure what the Ministry is going to do about this. Well, this is a fine pickle. I come over here, thinking you were in some kind of trouble and here I find you…” at this point she actually looked around the room from the threshold they hadn’t moved from yet, “…….collecting …….feathers?” she finished quietly and confusedly.

Harry sighed, and back-stepped into the room, pulling away from Hermione and the death-grip she had on his forearms. “Why don’t you come in, Hermione?” he invited, going back to his bed and sitting down. She came in looking around, obviously trying to decide what to do. She looked from Harry, to the pile of feathers, to the small desk and chair, up to the ceiling and around the bare walls and out the window and slowly came back to Harry.

After regarding him, no, studying him for a few moments, she sat down on the hard chair he had for his desk. She looked like she had several questions for him, but was holding herself back for some reason, perhaps just to give him time to adjust to the fact that she was actually here, in his room. Harry felt the shock of her arrival slowly leaving his system as they sat in their respective seats for a few more seconds, that stretched into minutes that seemed like hours to Harry, so her apparent plan seemed to be working. He was, however, feeling rather confused at the moment. ‘Hermione is here. Why is she here? How did she get here? Why was it that she was here and not someone else? Where is the Order? Why aren’t they here? Do they know she is here? Is she suddenly part of the Order? Why?!?’

Hermione seemed to jump suddenly, as if surprised and a bit scared. It reminded him of her reactions to him last year when he was in a mood. She swallowed and said “Why what, Harry?”

Oh. He must have spoken that last part out loud. Unfortunately now that the question was out in the open, Harry found he really didn’t care for a real answer. “Never mind, Hermione, it’s not important.” All the answers he received lately had just led to pain.

They sat there for a few more silent minutes studying each other. Harry still had trouble believing she was here, perhaps it was a dream but he didn’t care about that at the moment. She seemed like the first real human contact that he had had since leaving Hogwarts. Even then he had not been really receptive to communicating with people, had hardly spoken to anyone except when asked a direct question. But having her beside him now made him realize how much he craved… something. He couldn’t pinpoint what it was but whatever it was he craved it like almost nothing else in life. Maybe it was companionship, or someone who understands what he’s been through, or trust. None of these thoughts felt completely right to Harry but they came close. The Order, in sending their people, just wasn’t the same as seeing someone whom you had come to rely on for the last 5 years of your life.

“I’m sorry,” Harry said suddenly.

Hermione seemed to blink suddenly, shaking her head as if waking up. “Whatever for, Harry?”

“For yelling at you just now. I didn’t mean to have that come out. For this past year. I’ve been a great prat this past year.” Words were suddenly coming out of him like a fountain of water. He couldn’t seem to keep it all in. “I don’t like yelling at you, and I’m sorry I did, I know you were just looking out for me. I’m sorry that you are here now, worrying about my sanity. I’m sorry that I make you worry so much. I’m sorry that you have so much in your life to worry about.” Harry could no longer keep eye contact. He had to look anywhere but into her face. “I’m sorry that you and your parents are in danger……. in danger because of me.”

“Harry…….”

“I’m sorry that you got hurt…….” Harry’s breath hitched, “ that you got hurt so badly because you followed me where I shouldn’t have gone, where you warned me not to go. You just lay there on the ground like you were dead, and I couldn’t think. You’ve always been there for me. All last year you tried to tell me to do what was right…” Harry trailed off as an unpleasant memory surfaced suddenly, ‘There is no good and evil, there is only power, and those too weak to seek it….…’ A feeling of horror passed over him. ‘Which one am I?’

Those thoughts hit too close to home, too near the mark for him to ignore. All these emotions, one on top of the other all day, became too much for him.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t know, I’m so sorry…….” he kept whispering these words over and over, never noticing that he had curled up into himself, never noticing that she had climbed onto the bed with him, hugging him to herself and rocking him until, exhausted, he fell into a deep sleep

3. Hermione

A/N – This has been one of the most difficult pieces I have written to date! Hermione’s point of view was a challenge in that she is very logical in her thinking, and quite the genius, but I feel she is going through some changes in attitude and perspective. Harry was a whole lot easier for me to write! It doesn’t help that she is female while I am most definitely not! Ah, well…

Special Thanks to anneu53714, for pointing out my mistake. I can’t believe I missed that! Stupid, stupid…

And to the people at Fanfiction.net, FINALLY a new chapter!

Enjoy all!

‘Well, that was certainly different,’ the nearly 16 year old girl thought to herself.

Hermione Granger was seated with her back against a wall in a bedroom; not her bedroom, and not just any bedroom, but the bedroom of her best friend, Harry Potter. How she had ended up in this position was anyone’s guess, she wasn’t sure how and she had been part of the entire process! At the moment she was hugging Harry to her while on his bed, his back to her front, leaning against the wall, slowly stroking Harry’s black hair in an effort to calm him. She was also sitting on a pile of feathers, but she wasn’t thinking about that right now.

They had been like this for about half an hour now; Harry seemed to be calm, seemed to be sleeping in fact. It wasn’t really something she could verify at the moment. She couldn’t actually see his face, but the steadiness and depth of his breathing assured her that he was a whole lot calmer than before. She had been surprised by that outpouring of emotion that had been released by Harry. Generally in Hermione’s experience in all things Harry Potter (‘Five years running, thank you!’), he was a reserved person, very seldom letting people see what he was really feeling. Though this past year seemed to be something of a different Harry. He had certainly expressed his emotions over recent events more often than he ever had in the past years that she had known him, his reaction to the DA just an example of his abnormal behavior – abnormal for him anyway.

She could understand why, in all honesty. The Dursleys had never been kind to Harry, from his description, and as she looked around the room she could readily believe the few tales that Harry had told about life on Privet Drive. Spartan was the word that came to mind. For furniture, there was just the single bed they were on (little more than a cot in her opinion), a desk and chair, a dresser and armoire, nothing special about any of it and none of it personalized in any way. On the walls were only a corkboard and a red-and-gold Gryffindor flag. That flag was possibly the only thing that made the room seem like it had a person living in it at all.

Harry was a non-person here, persecuted and prejudiced against because of his wizarding ancestry, treated as a third class person even before he knew he was a wizard. It was somewhat surprising to her just how normal he seemed, or at least how much like a teenager he was. Living in this kind of environment, a person should probably retreat into themselves, becoming very meek and non-confrontational. But Harry’s personality just would not allow that, he knew almost instinctively what was right and wrong and always tried to protect the weak, and stood up for himself too. It’s no wonder really that he was placed into Gryffindor, with bravery like that, despite all his worries about Slytherin from second year. All this despite his upbringing. ‘Grr, those Dursleys’!’ she thought to herself. One would think he would have turned into the raving lunatic the Daily Prophet had been calling him all last year.

Last year… Hermione still cringed whenever she thought of it. It was certainly one of the worst thus far in her 15 years that she could remember. Beginning with the end of the Tri-wizard Tournament, and the re-emergence of Lord Voldemort (not You-Know-Who!), right up to now, it had been one of constant stress and worry for her, and one of the main sources of her worry was resting peacefully in her arms right now. It really should have brought some sense of embarrassment to her, holding him like this, but it brought a sense of relief to her instead. He actually seemed relaxed, which was something that was few and far between these days, something rarely seen since the Tri-wizard Tournament in fact. He certainly had reasons to be tense, with Cedric and Voldemort, the Order, and then Umb… That Woman, as she was starting to be referred to as; the DA and Occlumency, and even OWL’s, had all been a huge pressure on Harry, and the final problems with the Prophecy that had been destroyed, and Sirius’ death, and the Battle of the Ministry, well the list just seemed to be getting longer and longer, with problems piling up on him. ‘Maybe it was a smart decision for Dumbledore to appoint Ron as a prefect instead of Harry…’ Hermione considered that for a moment, then put it aside for the more immediate matters that kept her attention.

Harry had, for lack of a better term, developed an attitude, one that she didn’t particularly like seeing in him, even if she did understand why. He was angry and confused, and didn’t really know who or how to channel his emotions, never having much practice in it previously, so he had the unfortunate habit of releasing them on Ron or, especially, her. It stood to reason, really. Ron didn’t really ‘rock the boat’ with Harry after the entire debacle with the First Task in the Tri-wizard Tournament. She, however, was an instigator, someone who got things done. She had to be, hanging around Ron and Harry for the past years at Hogwarts, otherwise absolutely no homework would have ever been finished. Since Hermione met them till now, she had been the voice of reason in the group of friends, but ‘reason’ was not exactly welcomed by ‘emotion’, when it could not answer the basic question of Why. That was the purpose for Harry’s frustration, the Why of all the happenings from the past could or would never be answered. He had even asked as much earlier, though she was pretty sure he hadn’t meant to. She had started to despair for him, especially following his impetuousness in going to the Ministry, thinking that nothing was getting through to him.

Then came his breakdown just minutes ago…

She had never felt more vindicated than when she had heard Harry apologize to her like that. It had made her feel invigorated and energized; it made her feel free. She pondered that thought for a moment. It wasn’t that she had been proven right (well, maybe a little bit of that was in there…) but more that she had been right in doing what she did; she had done right! Here, holding Harry, comforting him, Hermione felt the best that she had probably felt in a long time, just living in the moment.

Oh oh…

Well maybe not

How is she going to get to the bathroom like this?!?

4. A Story?

AN - Hi again. I'm finally continuing this fic again. This has been a long time coming, and for that I apologize. Anyway some comments would be appreciated.

Numb 3

Consciousness came slowly to Harry, and he really wasn't sure what was going on, nor did he care. He did know that he had a headache and that he felt rather stiff, but he actually felt better that he ever had that entire summer. His sleep had actually been restful. That was probably a first, Harry thought as he kept his eyes closed. He was warm and comfortable laying on his bed. Warmth spread all over him. The stroking of the hair was really nice too… .. hold on!

Harry's eyes snapped open as his mind started to register other information. A smell that was not his own was nearby, something fruity. He was laying on something that seemed too soft to be his bed. Someone's arm was around his chest while their other hand was playing with his hair. Groggily Harry sat up, not feeling any resistance to his movement. Once up Harry was able to turn around to see “Hermione?”

“Hi Harry.”

Slowly he was fighting off the sleep. “Hermione, what…”

“Could you possibly hold on to that thought,” she asked as she disentangled herself from him. The look of distress on her face was easy to see. “There's something I have to do first.” And with that she got up, almost sprinted to his door, opened it, and went down the hall, where he heard another door close shut.

Dudley's head slowly turned around the corner of the door, looking into Harry's room, a look of confusion on his portly face, then turned to look in the direction that he had seen that girl go. Now there was a face he had been happier NOT seeing much of this summer. His cousin's diet had not been going well and it looked like he weighed at least another 20 pounds since last year. Harry personally thought Dudley was in a contest with Uncle Vernon as to who could weigh more, Dudley's version of teenage rebellion, since his parents didn't notice his more delinquent acts anyway.

Harry realized that he wouldn't be able to get off without Dudley opening his big gob and saying the exact thing Harry didn't want to hear. Unless… Pulling out his wand, Harry started tapping it in the palm of his free hand slowly, almost threateningly, one would say. Not that Harry would stoop so low as to threaten Dudley. Heavens, no!

Opening his mouth to comment, still looking in the direction that Hermione went, Dudley was cut off by Harry saying quietly: “Say. Nothing.” Harry scowled at Dudley, who looked back in the direction of his cousin and scowled back, until he saw the wand in Harry's hand. Apparently Dudley decided he had gotten all the enjoyment he could out of this and went his own way down the stairs. Probably going out to torment some primary school kid, Harry thought to himself.

Harry decided to just sit there and wait for Hermione to come back. That is until he saw all the feathers laying about. `Oh yeah,' he thought, picking one up between thumb and forefinger, `I forgot about these.' Of course there was the mystery about where they all came from. Harry's brain, still sluggish from sleep, started up trying to figure out where the feathers all came from, and recalled…

“Harry, are you feel…”

“WAH!” Harry stumbled, or more accurately fell off his bed, pointing his wand at the noise, directly… at Hermione's nose. She was now staring cross-eyed at the object that was even now shaking a bit. Harry took a deep breath and lowered his wand, trying to calm down from being startled by Hermione's entrance back into his room. After taking a couple of more breaths to steady himself and clutching at his chest to make sure that his heart hadn't leapt out of his ribcage, he looked up to see the slightly startled look on Hermione's face. `At least she could look like I'm not about to turn into a raving lunatic in front of her.'

“Hermione, what are you doing here?” Harry asked getting himself back under control, trying to make it seem like nothing had happened.

At this point Hermione seemed to change from looking startled to looking embarrassed, or uncomfortable, to Harry's eye. “Well, that is a rather long story actually. This may not be the best time…” She obviously didn't want to talk about it.

Harry interrupted at this point. “Why, do you have to leave?”

“No, but…” she quieted then, and by her expression was not sure where to take the conversation. Her obvious reluctance made Harry very curious. Whenever Hermione didn't want to talk about something, it was usually very interesting. In Harry's experience it was usually when she was doing something she wasn't supposed to. An inward smile grew.

“Well, then I want to hear a story, a long one since that's the way you put it. We are in my room and I want to hear the `What-Hermione-is-doing-in Harry's-room' story.” Harry had said this in a rather teasing tone, which surprised himself more than Hermione, he was sure. But for some reason, Harry's whimsy had taken over since he had woken up and was leading him where it will. He waved her to the bed to sit down as he closed his door and then he sat in his desk chair.

Hermione smirked at the turn of phrase Harry had used while she sat down. “Wouldn't that be quite the scandalous heading for the Daily Prophet?” Laughter was clear in her voice.

But Harry wouldn't be that easily deterred. “You're stalling. Come on. Tell.”

Defeated she sighed and began, “… All right then. Well, I suppose it started about a week after I arrived home for the holidays. Whenever I get home from Hogwarts, I start on my homework, you know, get it out of the way so I am able to have the rest of the time to myself to do whatever I want, or look up anything that interests me. Sometimes I get great ideas by just elaborating on the homework projects…”

Getting impatient, Harry interrupted again, folding his arms, “You're still stalling.”

“No I'm not,” she huffed. “I told you it was a long story. If you don't like the way that I'm telling it, then I suggest that you tell it yourself.”

“Huh? I don't even know the story, how could I tell it? That doesn't make sense!”

“Then I think you should just calm down and let me tell it . Don't you?” she said with that smirk on her face she always wore when she knew the right answer.

Harry realized that he really couldn't argue that point, pouted slightly, and slouched back in his chair.

“Thank you. Well, this year we didn't have any homework because of the OWLs' and so I had rather a lot of time on my hands. Also, because of the Ministry of Magic now admitting to Vol-Voldemorts return, special dispensation was given to students to practice magic outside of school…”

“WHAT?!?”

“Oh, sit back down, Harry. You would know about that if you had ever bothered to read, or even open any of your mail. If I may continue,” she said with a raised eyebrow. Harry suddenly realized he was standing above Hermione, looking down at her.

Sitting back down, Harry waved a hand at her to continue, looking slightly sheepish. Hermione continued, looking miffed, “Now, there had been a lot of restrictions placed on the use of magic by a student, one of the main ones being the consent and supervision of a fully trained and qualified wizard or witch. Now this certainly led to problems for me, because my parents are neither fully trained nor qualified in the uses, applications, and safety precautions of magic. So I decided to write to Professors Dumbledore and McGonagall to see if there was any way that I would be able to practice, perhaps in the presence of a tutor. My parents also sent their own letters to the professors along the same lines.” Hermione frowned slightly at this point, a worried look in her eyes. “Last year really scared them, Harry. I think if I hadn't found someone who was willing to become my tutor, my parents would have decided to move to somewhere they would have considered safe. I heard them talking about it one night. They thought that I had gone to sleep, and truthfully I had been, but had to get up to… well it's not important why I was up, just that I was. This was just last week and they were talking about what their options were, about whether or not I might be safe if they withdrew me from Hogwarts, and moving far away from all the troubles that seem to be developing here. They were suggesting places like New Zealand, or somewhere in America. Now understand that my parents are never impulsive. They are people that make up a list to go shopping for groceries and never deviate from the list, or at least I've never seen them do so. So the fact that they were doing this on the spur of the moment really surprised me. Actually now that I think about it, it really is rather out of character… hmmm.” Her brow furrowed at this, as it usually did whenever she discovered a problem that needed unraveling.

After a few seconds though Hermione's face cleared from that thought. “Anyway, they eventually figured that I wouldn't go along with any plan of theirs to take me away from… well, everything! The next day we had a bit of a chat, they had decided to see what I would like to do. So I told them in no uncertain terms that my life is here, that I was needed here. Now how did we get off on that topic? We were supposed to be talking about how I ended up here, weren't we? Anyways… what are you smiling at?”

Harry tried to stop the light smirk that had formed on his face. “Nothing, absolutely nothing.” Nope, it was still there. Damn, she isn't going to like this… Uh, oh. Harry looked at Hermione's face, she was wearing what he and Ron had dubbed her `McGonnagal Glare'

“Fine then, Harry. Fair is fair. I won't tell you anymore until you tell me what that look was for!” And with that she sat sideways on the bed and started staring out the window.

Uh oh! Harry thought to himself. Now I've done it. She's right brassed off for some reason. What did I do this time?!?

Trying to think up a response to Hermione's apparent ire, Harry opened his mouth to say something, he didn't know what, but was then interrupted by Hermione as she sat up straighter, still staring at the window, a slightly apprehensive look on her face. “Harry.”

“Er, yeah, Hermione?”

“There is an owl sitting on your windowsill.”

Harry turned quickly to the window, seeing a rather angry looking, brown barn owl staring straight at him. As soon as he thought it, a new line of thinking began running through his brain.

The Ministry.

Oh look. There's that numb feeling again.

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