Confused By: Clean_Fics
Disclaimer: I don't Harry Potter or its characters. That honor belongs to a certain J.K. Rowling. Nor do I make any monetary profit out of this, although I hope to make emotional profit seeing people enjoy my work.
Author's note to revised version: After I posted up this chapter I received a lot of constructive criticism from a number of readers, and I'd like to thank all who did. Because of this, I've re-done this chapter a bit. The story itself hasn't changed, just the layout of it.
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Harry was confused. Well what else is new? He thought. It seemed that for the past 23 years of his life he had always been confused about one thing or another. He sank deeper into his chair, sipping his tea slowly- he had had too much experience scalding his tongue- and thought back to see if there had ever been a time he hadn't experienced that feeling he was currently experiencing.
When he was a kid, of course, it had been how his parents had died. He'd never really thought the car crash was very viable, because why would he have remembered green light? It would've been red light; either from the car in front of them or from the traffic signal. He'd had no other choice but to believe the car story though, so he remained confused about that.
Then, on his eleventh birthday, Hagrid had solved that mystery but brought along many more with him. Now Harry was confused, amongst all the other confusing things wizardry brought with it, about why him? Why had Voldemort tried to kill him? He remained confused about this almost until his 16th birthday. Well, a month or so before, anyway. Even now he cringed as he remembered how he had shouted at the kind old man who had helped him all his life and how he had broken many of his things, especially now that he knew what they were. He was sure Dumbledore had simply 'Reparo'd' them as soon as he had left, but he still felt bad.
Over the next year was the confusion of Voldemort's past, which dove-tailed into what could house his horcroxes. Once that confusion cleared he thought he'd be ok, but then he was confused as to why people still hated him, at least on the Wireless and newspapers, while in person they hero-worshiped him as much as ever. That in itself was confusing enough without any other complications.
This had confused him for around five years until he had decided that it wasn't worth his trouble being confused about. Now something else was confusing him, and he was afraid it may well have been the most confusing thing he had ever been confused about. Hermione. He sat back and sighed, placing his now empty teacup on the saucer in front of him. What had gotten into her recently? After school the three of them had stayed together, converting the house at 12 Grimmauld place into a somewhat decent place to live. Harry had gone on to become an Auror, as he had wanted to, Ron was now a reserve Keeper for the Cannons, and wasn't doing half bad either. He had actually been in the running for highest save percentage last year. Even though he hadn't won, they had still seen it as a tremendous improvement over his touch-and-go performance at school. But Hermione.
Hermione had started off great, just as everyone had expected. After Voldemort had been destroyed she had immediately applied to St. Mungos Graduate School for Magical Medicine, hoping to devote her life to helping the sick and making discoveries. She had progressed nicely and was into her third year when suddenly she had begun to change. She seemed to lose interest in her work, became a lot less social with everyone, and would come home and head straight to her room after grabbing something from the fridge (one of a number of muggle appliances they had decided to keep in their home, much to Ron's delight).
A few months later she had dropped out of school after speaking with one of the counselors. No one knew what had been said behind the closed doors, but whatever it was, the school had given her a "contemplative leave of absence" with a clause that she could return whenever she wished provided she could commit herself once more to her duties.
Harry picked up the letter next to his cup, the latest source of confusion. He re-read it for what must've been the sixth or seventh time, as if trying to find a deeper meaning in its contents. He read:
Dear Harry and Ron,
First off, I'd like to apologize for the way I've been behaving lately. I know I've been anti-social, moody, grumpy, and just plain unbearable. I also know you guys are disappointed at me for my situation at school. Well, I hope to fix that all. I'm going away for a few weeks to collect myself, and I hope when I get back, things can be back to normal. Please don't try to track me; I really need this time to myself. All my love,
Hermione.
Harry shook his head, put the letter in his pocket and was rinsing out the cup when he heard the screen door slam open. He was hopeful for a second until he heard Ron's voice,
"Guys! I'm home!" Harry went downstairs to meet him.
"Hey mate. What's going on?"
Sensing Harry's somber mood, he groaned.
"What is it Harry? Blimey, not you too?"
Harry smiled sadly, shook his head, took the letter out of his pocket, and handed it to Ron.
Ron read it slowly, read it again, then read it a third time and shook his head, handing it back to Harry.
"Well, I guess it was a matter of time. She had been acting, you know, kinda weird lately. It was bound to come to this."
"What are we gonna do about it?"
"Do? Nothing, just like she said. Just wait and hope for the best."
But Harry had started pacing rapidly, and Ron knew what that meant. He had seen that look before.
"Look, mate, there's nothing we can-" but Harry cut him off.
"We can't just sit here doing nothing. In the state she's in- whatever that is- she won't be able to protect herself. If she even took her wand, and I won't be surprised if she forgot."
"Granted, but whatever's going on with her, she needs to face it alone. All we'll do is get in her way and defeat her purpose."
Harry sighed. 'Frustration would be another mood to add to confused', he thought.
"But why? What happened? She was fine and then she just-" he threw up his hands. "The least we can do is try to find her, just in case. To keep an eye on her, not to interfere." he said, sensing what Ron was opening his mouth to say.
Ron sighed in resignation. "Fine." he said. "But she can't know."
"Agreed." Harry said, putting out his hand. Ron shook it, a hint of their old playfulness back in effect. "But first" Harry looked up expectantly.
"Let's eat."
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Hope you guys liked this start-up chapter. I hate to leave you with only one chapter, so I hope to upload the second very soon. I t's already written, as is the third, but I have to look them over again. In general, just to warn you, my thing with updating is very touch-and-go. Some times it may take me a while, while sometimes I may update multiple times in one day. It all depends on my work load. Hopefully I'll find my first story interesting enough to work on it often, but any support from you guys would be greatly appreciated. If you just want to give a quick comment (I know Portkey's against that) just throw me an e-mail at cleanfics@gmail.com (it'll automatically be forwarded to my regular address, so a quick reply is almost certain) and I'll count that as a review. Thanks!
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