I'm Sorry, Gilderoy

Disclaimer: Yeah, yeah, J K Rowling would've put this in the book or on her website or something if she'd written it. Ergo, I'm not J K R. See? It all makes sense, now!

AN: Read, review, no flames, etc.

Gilderoy Lockhart. He's lying there. In that bed. In this hospital. Here. I remember him.

He taught us Defence Against the Dark Arts in second year – if you can call it teaching. I thought he was brilliant.

I read all those books he had written and I thought he was amazing. He had done all those wonderful things, like curing a werewolf of his Lycanthropy!

He was amazing. I also thought he was beautiful.

I can't believe he's here. Here, of all places. Mind you, I should have guessed. He cast a memory charm on himself. Only a true idiot could do something like that. All the same, as Harry and Ron told me this, I didn't realise the truth.

"After all those things he's done," I'd said, "he's defeated by a memory charm. What a shame!"

Harry and Ron had looked at me a bit oddly.

"Hermione," Ron had explained to me patiently, "he didn't do them. He found other people who had done them, got them to tell him his story, and made them forget about it."

"What? He- he can't have… I mean – he just can't!"

Ron's sympathetic look was one of the scariest things I've ever seen. It meant he wasn't winding me up. My hero wasn't a hero at all – he was a fraud.

It wasn't fair!

I'd worshipped him and slept with his autograph under my pillow. And now-

Now he was a coward, a liar, a pathetic git.

What had he done? Where had it gone wrong? Was it my fault?

Ever since I found out the truth about him, I've not stopped thinking about him. Even though I know I love Ron, I'm scared to admit it, because I'm worried that he'll end up as fraudulent as Trelawney. Will he be another Lockhart?

Viktor Krum wasn't, but Viktor and I were onle friends. Ron and I… Ron and I are only friends, too, and I would like to think that we're happy to stay that way, but I don't believe it.

For nights after Ron told me the truth about Lockhart, I could hardly sleep. I had nightmares about Harry metamorphosing into Lord Voldemort and Ron refusing to speak to me. One of those nightmares more or less came true last year.

Lockhart's looking at me blankly. I look back, just as blankly. To think that I was so blind! Just because I'd read about what he'd done. Just because I thought everything in print had to be true. I was so naïve.

I thought he was so wonderful. It didn't occur to me that blond curls didn't mean honesty; that beautiful blue eyes didn't mean courage; that brightly coloured robes didn't mean good spellwork.

I was so stupid.

I love him. Now I hate him. What a fraud.

He's lying there. In that bed. He looks so pitiful and helpless. I can't help feeling sorry for him, even after all that he's done. Even though he obviously hasn't learnt from his mistakes.

I'm not bitter anymore. Just saw. Sorry that anyone should have to live like this. It's such a shame.

I'm sorry Gilderoy.