Disclaimer:
Right-o. I do not own Harry Potter or any of its indica. They belong to J.K. Rowling (the magic goddess). Parts of it also belongs to Warner Brothers (I am their movie slave). I am not being paid to write anything (wouldn't that be nice). So please don't sue me (cause you'll be on the bottom of the list of people to pay).
Title: The Battles That Win Wars
Chapter 1: Battle of the Bed
July 12th
Meals at Privet Drive were becoming more and more tolerable as the month wore on. Harry was no longer required to cook or clean. He was also given portions of food that at least rivaled his Aunt Petunia's now.
Harry found that the presence of his two best friends, Ronald Weasley and Hermione Granger, forced the Dursleys to be nearly civil towards him.
It astonished Harry how absolutely hypocritical his relatives could actually be. His Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia treated Hermione as if she were their guest and as if it had been their idea to allow her to stay for four weeks of the summer; despite the obvious fact that they detested all things magic and Hermione was perhaps the most brilliant witch of her time. It did, however, please Harry to learn that his aunt and uncle felt a great deal of disdain in welcoming Ron as they did welcoming a huge muddy dog that had rolled in its own messes.
Of the three wizards, now residing (temporarily) at Privet Drive, Harry found himself sitting somewhere between detested and stomached. Hermione, being the most polite, impressive and muggle savvy of them all, sat pretty as the Dursleys favorite by far. And Ron, being loud, rude, sometimes crude, and eagerly impulsive, occupied the spot that had once only been reserved for Harry. Harry himself, found that his relatives frowned at him more when they had just been exposed to great doses of Hermione, but often engaged him in small talk, if only to discourage Ron's presence at all cost.
Both Ron and Hermione seemed to take in a small bit of pride at their accomplishments in the Dursley household. Hermione took in the Dursleys minute approval as if it were the highest grade anyone could receive on any assignment. Ron, on the other hand, believed the Dursleys lack of enthusiasm for him to be something worthy of a plaque in the Trophy Room at Hogwarts.
Harry was not at all shockedto see that Dudley hardly ever remained in the house most days. Even when it was pouring torrents of rain, Dudley would drag his wide body out to the garage, hop on his bike and take off to spend the day with his own friends. Harry had a glad suspicion that his tubby cousin was still not quite past any of his previous encounters with wizards. Dudley seemed to accept that Ron was a wizard easy enough, but it had taken quite a while for it to sink in that "the pretty chit with the flyaway hair and soft brown eyes" could hex his nether parts into the center of the Atlantic. Once he realized that Hermione's simple and innocent demeanor was a façade put on to placate his parents and that she carried a wand too, he found himself wanting to visit Piers more and more often and for longer periods of time.
The Dursleys had been surprisingly compliant to Ron and Hermione staying a few weeks with them. Perhaps it was because they remembered Dumbledore's demeaning scoldings from the previous summer or more likely it was because Ron had marched up to Uncle Vernon when he arrived (very late) to pick up Harry and had said, 'Right. Hermione and I are staying at your place with Harry until my brother's wedding. If that displeases you than be assured that we are all of age and are fully prepared to use magic to convince you otherwise'. In any case, Uncle Vernon had driven Harry, Ron, Hermione, three school trunks, one agitated cat, one annoyed and one spastic owl back to Number Four. Upon entering the house, he promptly announced to his wife and son that Harry and his friends would be staying with them for a few weeks'. To which both Aunt Petunia and Dudley had replied with wide eyed obedience. It had all gone over so smoothly that both Harry and Hermione questioned Ron intensely about whether or not he had actually used magic on the Dursleys. But none of them had seen a spell cast and it was more likely that the suddenness and forcefulness of Ron's decree had shocked the Dursleys into passivity.
Among the shocks from the Dursleys that summer, were their somewhat lenient attitudes towards the mess of owls that arrived weekly. They never mumbled when Molly and Hagrid owled messages every Monday. They didn't titter when Remus sent barn owls and the Granger's replied to their daughter's messages on Tuesdays. And they didn't faint when stoic Hogwarts messengers arrived from McGonagall and sometimes Slughorn on Fridays. Though, Uncle Vernon always turned that unattractive purplish red color that Harry loved some much at the flutter of wings. Aunt Petunia always became suddenly busy when there sounded a whispered 'hoot' near the front door. And Dudley always scurried out of sight whenever claws would rap on the windows.
To save the Dursleys some grief, the majority of the Weasley family included messages all at once in Molly's parcels, Remus attached several messages of events that had already taken place when he wrote, and Hermione had the Daily Prophet delivered nightly to Harry's tiny little bedroom. Only sometimes, theses little courtesies were ruined if Luna Lovegood or Neville Longbottom sent a correspondence.
The only offense that Harry could really notice was that the Dursleys stuffed all three of them into Harry's bedroom. Harry had chivalrously given Hermione the lone bed in the room, to which she protested against nightly before bed. This of course caused Ron to roll his eyes and mutter savagely under his breath on more than one occasion and especially when he was full from dinner and exhausted from Hermione's daily research fests that she had recruited both boys to help her with.
Tonight was such a night.
It was nearing midnight. It was hot and absolutely no air was entering from the gaping window. Dinner had been uneventful. No one had said a word through out the meal. They were all too busy waiting for the rotating fan to move their way and surely uttering a sound would cause you to miss the miniscule breeze that didn't seem to last more than a second. After dinner Hermione had emptied her school trunk once again of textbooks and 'recreational' reading and demanded that Harry and Ron scour every page for references to either 'horcruxes', 'Rowena Ravenclaw', 'Godric Gryffindor', and 'R.A.B'.
And once again they had found nothing. Now they were all of three of them full, hot, irritated, and tired. Harry snatched the spare pillows and sheets from the bed and split them between himself and Ron.
Ron disregarded the idea of using the sheets to soften the hardwood floor and instead rolled up into a ball and shoved it into the pillowcase to make a bigger, lumpier pillow. He pushed himself right under the window, hoping that whatever breeze might flow in would hit him right away on his bare torso.
The trio of friends had long gotten over such modesty as partial male nudity earlier in the boiling heat of the summer. Ron and Harry were stripped down to their boxers (and sometimes socks if they were feeling modest at all). Hermione was not quite so daring as to strip down to her own underwear, but opted instead for thin shirts and shorts. It wouldn't matter, Harry soon discovered, if Hermione wore a potato sack, it would still cause Ron unease as they settled down for bed. Because Ron was 'uncomfortable' having Hermione walk in after he and Harry were settled on the floor, Hermione got settled under her sheets before the boys walked in.
Harry spread out his sheet and walked over to the doorway. He shut the door, turned off the light, and dragged himself down to his makeshift bed.
"Three more days," Harry sighed tiredly. "Three more days until I'm gone from here forever". He pushed his glasses up his face and into his hair. Then he wiped the sweat from his forehead and replaced his glasses on his nose.
A reassuring grunt came from Ron near the window.
Silence drifted into the room when a slight breeze wafted in. Harry could feel the air tickle his chest faintly before being replaced by thick, sticky air.
Near his head, Hermione repositioned herself on the bed, causing the old metal springs to squeak. Silence took over again. Seconds passed and Hermione let out an agitated sigh. She turned on the bed again. Silence.
Harry closed his eyes and breathed deep, hoping that Hermione would find a comfortable spot soon and fall asleep. Across the room he could hear Ron grinding his teeth whenever Hermione moved in the slightest.
She huffed. Then she flipped herself over, the springs squeaking in protest.
"Hermione," Ron hissed trough clenched teeth. Hermione stopped moving.
Harry let out a contented breath, relaxing his muscles and preparing to rest. Ron stopped grinding his teeth and started to breathe easier, too. Minutes passed in wonderful silence then the metal springs creaked again.
Ron bolted up. And Harry opened his eyes, tensing himself for the argument he knew was coming.
"Hermione," Ron whispered furiously, "would you stop moving around!"
Harry heard the bed groan as Hermione pushed herself up into a sitting position.
"It's silly that I'm the one up here in the bed," Hermione reasoned. Harry rolled his eyes. 'And so it begins,' he thought.
"It's just a courtesy, Hermione. Leave it and get some sleep," Ron told her. He pushed his haphazard pillow up towards the wall and made to lie back down. Hermione's disbelieving snort stopped him.
"It is not a courtesy. It's because I'm a girl," Hermione protested.
"Come off it, Hermione."
"No. I'm not sleeping up here, while you two are down on the floor." Harry could hear Hermione pull the sheets off of her and swing her legs around to the side of the bed. Before she could put her feet on the ground, Harry felt Ron jump to his feet and slide over towards him, quickly. In a flash, Ron pulled up Hermione's sheets and pushed her legs back under them. Then he immediately started stuffing the ends of the sheet under the mattress to stop Hermione from escaping again.
"Ron!"
"If you've got 'girl' parts, you sleep in the bed."
This was the part that Harry loved. He could just imagine Ron's face beginning to flame red as he gestured toward Hermione's –'girl' parts.
"That's completely barbaric Ron," Hermione objected. She struggled to free herself from the tangle of blankets.
"Doesn't matter," Ron told her matter-of-factly, "It's a Wizarding Law; look it up." The red head crawled back to his bed and lay down.
"It most certainly is not!"
"Sure it is. It's unwritten. Very old. Any one can tell you." Ron gave an exaggerated yawn before snoring loudly and refusing to answer any more of Hermione's pleas or comments.
"Hermione, we can discuss it tomorrow, yeah. Right now, it's too late and we're all tired," Harry put forward. He grinned to himself when he heard Hermione grumbling to herself about sexism and vowing revenge.
When Harry was positive that the even breathing reverberating around the room meant that his friends were asleep, he laughed himself to sleep. 'It was funny,' he thought, 'within the year they were more than likely going to face the most terrifying and dangerous wizard alive and they still felt uncomfortable discussing the fact that one third of their trio was so obviously not male'.
Author's Note:
I made this first chapter funny, because I think it's important to balance humor and drama. I can't just let people go into a story where everything is going wrong and everyone's taking a ride on the angst bicycle. So within the next chater or two expect some serious faces and reminiscing.
It is my plan to make this as canon as possible. That means, that everything that happened in Books 1-6 has occurred in my little fanficcy world.
This also means that if you read something that is not 'canon': TELL ME. Send me a message, write it in a review, let me know in some way shape or form. BUT be polite about it. No name calling or negative, demeaning remarks.
I love Reviews. So write me a review. Tell me what you liked, what you didn't, suggestions, comments, write what you look forward to, write what you absolutely don't want to read in this fic. I can't write it, if I don't know about it. OR I can't not write it, if you don't tell me anything.
You can even send a review that just says, 'hi'!
Well, I'm not putting this story on a deadline. I'm working on another fic along with this one. So they'll be updated as inspiration hits.
LOTS AND LOTS OF LOVE!
CHEERS, DAHRRRLIHNG!
TNGOH