5 am, Christmas Morning (i)
–Hermione is my favorite character in the entire series (though Ron is a close second), this is my version of what happened during Christmas in HBP–
Hermione was up early morning. She looked around her bedroom with it’s tall french windows and a large bookshelf filled to the brim with an assortment of books. The bottom shelf was visible from her bed and she saw that there was Pride and Prejudice leaning on a copy of Romeo and Juliet which was lying on top of (she was quite certain) A Very Hungry Caterpillar. Hogwarts: A History lay comfortingly on her nightstand. She made a mental note to rearrange her bookshelf before turning to the clock which was just approaching 5 am.
She sighed and pulled the covers over her head and tried not to think about what had woken her up at this hour. Ron, Ron-and Lavender to be exact. It was bad enough that they felt the need to grace every public place at Hogwarts by exchanging saliva, they were now invading her dreams, robbing her of sleep when she was hundreds of miles away. She had planned her days with surgical precision to not run into them, she slept before Lavender came up with the curtains drawn around her bed and put a spell to block all potential chatter between her and Parvati. She ate by herself, spending hours in the library at a stretch reading complex tedious books. Occasionally Harry sat with her with a forced air of impartiality, her with one of feigning indifference to Ron’s new relationship status. And yet, despite her best efforts, she did see them all over each other in the common room. And each time was a punch to the gut. Angry tears pricked her eyes-she was so exhausted of the crying, of trying to understand what had gone wrong.
This wasn’t how it was supposed to happen.
She furiously kicked off her blanket and in the process knocked Hogwarts: A History off her night stand. A piece of parchment fell out of it with a very familiar handwriting scrawled over the note. It was from the summer-
Harry may have told you, he’s with Dumbledore (?!) on some kind of mission will be getting here on Saturday. See if you can come in on Thursday, Ginny keeps yapping on and on and I need a buffer
She traced his handwriting going over the ‘love’ so casually thrown in there. He had been waiting in the front yard, she remembered, tall with his bright hair gleaming in the fading sun. His eyes lit up when he saw her, moving forward to hug her, a few seconds outside of just friendly. It was electric. He had to feel it too- the butterflies, the shortness of breath, the excitement and attraction they concealed with well-practiced banter.
“It was all in your head and all you did was make a fool of yourself” she thought to herself harshly, coming out of her reverie. She sniffed and wiped away tears, crumbling the note in her hand.
She had done enough.She had made her intentions quite clear when she had asked him to Slughorn’s party. She had let McLaggen shove his tongue down her throat and grab her bottom because that felt like revenge.
But all any of it made her feel was…
She picked up the fallen book and placed it carefully on her bookshelf. She slammed the door behind her and went downstairs to meet her parents for Christmas morning, but not before she had chucked Ron’s note in the dustbin.
