THE NEXT DOOR
The Slytherin Sort
Chapter Three
Harry stared at a jar full of putrid green liquid nestled on a shelf full of other disgusting oddities. Inside the decomposing liquid a watery, bloated shape took form. He blinked a few times in the lingering silence. It took a moment for him to realize he was standing inside the supply cupboard in Professor Snape's dungeon classroom.
The jolt through time reentered his mind, and he instantly thought of Hermione. He spun on his heel and saw her. She was crumpled in the corner of the storeroom, her mouth hanging open as though she were sleeping under the influence of a heavy narcotic.
He knelt down beside her and shook her shoulders. She did not respond. Harry was on the verge of panicking when Professor Snape's shadow fell across the crowded storeroom. Harry glanced up, unable to find the right words to convey his absolute confusion. And on the one hand, he was afraid the man before him was not actually a Snape from his past. After all, Viktor Krum had been a middle-aged man married to some alternate, perhaps future version of Hermione.
"Leave her, Potter," Snape snarled, eyeing Hermione with disgust.
"But, sir-"
"-Potter, don't make me tell you again," he ordered. "And wash your hands."
Harry stood slowly, not quite comprehending Snape's orders.
"Wash my hands, sir?"
Snape nodded his head curtly. "What has gotten in to you, Potter?" he asked in a low voice that did not carry to the other students in the classroom. "Since when do you dare touch a Mudblood? Much less a know-it-all Gryffindor? Now out! And wash your hands!"
Harry skirted passed Snape and glanced over his shoulder long enough to see the professor reviving Hermione with a spell. Harry rushed over to the sinks and washed his hands, but nothing made sense. Although they had landed in a familiar location, Snape's words were out of sync, and Harry felt extremely uneasy.
Harry dried his hands on his robes and found Ron's face in the crowd of busy students. Cauldrons bubbled and emitted a nasty pungent odor, and Harry crossed the room to sit beside his best mate. Seamus coughed loudly, and Ron turned to look at Harry with an expression of shock.
"Can I help you?" Ron asked in a skeptical voice.
"What do you mean?" Harry asked quickly. He suddenly noticed all the Gryffindors were staring at him with their mouths agape.
"Come to drop something into our potion, Potter?" Dean Thomas said angrily.
"What?" Harry asked, clearly surprised to see his best mates had turned on him. "What are you on about?"
Someone tapped Harry's shoulder, and he looked up into the cold, grey eyes of Draco Malfoy. "What do you think you're doing?" Draco hissed. "Why are you sitting with these…these worthless things?"
"Listen, Malfoy-" Harry began, but he caught a flash of green. He stopped talking and stared at the emblem emblazoned on the front of his school robes. "These are Slytherin robes," he muttered.
"That's right," Ron said and puffed out his chest. "How about sodding off from the Gryffindor table?"
"Slytherin," Harry repeated.
"Careful, Weasley," Draco warned, "we wouldn't want Potter to hex your arms onto your back. Wait…actually that sounds like an excellent idea. What do you say, Potter?"
Ron paled, and Harry continued to stare at the front of his robes. Finally he looked at Ron and asked, "We're not best mates, are we?"
"No," Ron incredulously.
"I'm not in Gryffindor?" Harry continued.
"You chose Slytherin, remember?" Ron said bitterly.
Draco grabbed Harry's arm and dragged him away from Ron's table. Professor Snape emerged from the supply cupboard with a bedraggled Hermione. She rushed over to Harry, and Draco jumped back to avoid being touched by her.
"Harry," she said, "are you okay?"
He shook his head and pointed to the front of his robes. Hermione gasped. "Why are you wearing those?" she asked.
"I've been sorted into Slytherin."
"No," she said and clasped her hands over her mouth while shaking her head. Then, she glanced down to see what house adorned her robes. The scarlet and gold lion stared back at her. "Gryffindor."
"Don't you know better than to touch him, Mudblood?" Draco said viciously.
Hermione ignored him. "What year is this?"
"No idea," Harry answered.
"Do you think we can-" she started.
"Hermione!" Ron called, and when Harry and Hermione looked at him, he was beckoning her over urgently.
She leaned close to Harry and whispered, "Meet me in the library as soon as this class is over." Then, she rushed away to join the Gryffindor side of the room, and Harry reluctantly joined the Slytherins where Malfoy gloated over him in a way Harry could have never imagined.
Hermione sat down between Ron and Neville. She kept a close eye on Harry while Seamus dropped an eye of newt into the boiling cauldron.
"I can't believe he's in Slytherin," Hermione mumbled. "He's not like them."
Ron laughed bitterly under his breath. "He's exactly like them. Power-hungry. Attention-seeking. Disgusting, the whole lot of them."
"Ron," Hermione scolded, "Harry isn't like that at all."
Ron looked at Hermione as though she'd sprouted tree branches on her head, and he passed glances around to Seamus, Dean and Neville. "Since when have you been on a first name basis with the Boy We Wish Had Died?"
Hermione's stomach knotted. "What did you say?" she asked in a strangled voice.
"You heard me," Ron grumbled, "After what he did to Ginny-"
"-Weasley," Snape snarled, "fifty points from Gryffindor for the inability to shut your mouth in class."
Ron whispered such obscenities under his breath it caused Hermione to blush. Then, she said, "We have to get out of here."
"Yeah," Seamus agreed, "I hate Potions."
Hermione nodded her head, but Seamus had misunderstood. Hermione knew she couldn't stand living in a world where Harry was a Slytherin, and their friendship had never existed. As soon as they met up in the library, she would research as much as possible and try to understand what was happening to them before things got any worse.
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