Disclaimer: I am not J.K. Rowling. I do not own Harry Potter.
Note: The following short piece is a glimpse of how a different 'trio' might find its roots in an alternate universe in 1991. It's a one-shot originally posted mainly to give those who have me on 'Author Alert' something new to look at.
In other universes, a dozen tiny little things go otherwise, starting with the day that Rubeus Hagrid would deliver Hermione Granger's Hogwarts letter, and running through to Minerva McGonagall's finally tracking Harry down to deliver his; but in this one, that is how the events fall out, and they result in three sortings of especial significance to this universe:
"…Granger, Hermione…"
-"Ravenclaw!"
"…Malfoy, Draco…"
-"Ravenclaw!"
"…Potter, Harry…"
-"Ravenclaw!"
And so this universe advances forward.
Hermione Granger is relieved to be in Ravenclaw. There was one horrible moment where the hat was dithering over putting her in Gryffindor. Gryffindors are probably good souls, if Rubeus Hagrid is anything to judge by, but they're idiots and Hermione really couldn't take seven years of being in close proximity to classmates like that. Hermione may admire Professor Dumbledore, who was in Gryffindor, of course, but she wouldn't be surprised if it had been being sorted into Gryffindor which drove him dotty.
Draco Malfoy isn't sure how he ended up in Ravenclaw. There was a huge punch-up he and Crabbe and Goyle were involved in on the train with three Weasleys, and the next thing Draco knows, is that when he arrives at Hogwarts the Sorting Hat is threatening to send him to Gryffindor, on account of his tendency to 'recklessly charge in'. Draco is a Malfoy; he's supposed to be in Slytherin, and to his eleven year old mind to end up in Gryffindor would be a catastrophe that might as well be the end of his life. In the end Ravenclaw was all that he could talk the hat into sorting him into, though.
He has no idea how Vincent and Gregory have ended up in Slytherin either, when he hasn't done. They were in the fight, too.
Telling his father is going to be tricky. Right now about the only way that he can think of to 'explain' this news is to claim that somehow he had an inkling that Harry Potter was going to end up in Ravenclaw too, and that he insisted that the hat put him there so that he could get close to The-Boy-Who-Lived…
Harry Potter's early encounter with Professor McGonagall convinced him that he didn't want to be in Gryffindor if at all possible – it was great to see her rage at the Dursleys for a few minutes, but other than that the stern-faced tight-lipped woman was no fun at all during the shopping trip to Diagon Alley, and having finally gotten away from the Dursleys Harry had arrived at Hogwarts determined to go into a house with a somewhat friendlier looking teacher than Professor McGonagall in charge, if at all possible. And then the Sorting Hat had told him that he could go into any of the houses, really, and so Harry had asked the hat about the heads of house, and it had directed his attention to the high table, where most of the teachers were sitting.
Professor Sprout and Professor Flitwick had looked the friendliest two, but Harry had heard several remarks on the train about Hufflepuffs being the ones that everyone else laughed at, and Harry was tired of people laughing at him and worse. The hat had seemed to take this as an indication that Harry should be in Gryffindor or Slytherin, of course, and Harry had had to be quite firm, given that their heads of house looked the least fun, that he did not want either of those.
In the end the hat had acquiesced and put him in Ravenclaw.
There was a lot of staring at Harry from his fellow Ravenclaws, that to be honest he found a bit creepy. The only one who actually wanted to talk to him and to be friends instead of firing off a lot of questions was Draco Malfoy – the boy who in the wait for the sorting, along with a red-headed boy, had had to be tidied up by the deputy headmistress after apparently they'd been in a fight on the train. The way that Draco talked was a bit posh, but he wasn't asking a lot of embarrassing questions which either Harry didn't know the answers to or which Harry didn't want to answer.
Draco actually seemed to just want to be Harry's friend, and Harry hadn't had that happen to him before, or at least not for a very long time.
Author Notes: (notes slightly expanded for clarity, 10th February, 2014)
As a reminder, this piece is identified as a one-shot.
I know; I've used the Draco-gets-into-a-fight-on-board-the-train-with-Weasleys before in at least one other piece, and I expect I'll use it again in others. (And Draco does get into a fight with canon Ron on the train, only 'Scabbers' cuts it short.) I do admit to a certain amount of 'Author's convenience' in the Sorting Hat in this universe taking this particular fight as a reason to not put Draco in Slytherin. (Maybe it wants to break up Draco from his 'minions', Crabbe and Goyle, but figures Crabbe or Goyle couldn't cope outside Slytherin, so Draco gets kicked into a different house...)
Harry never actually ran into Draco at close-quarters in this universe before Harry was sorted into the same house as him. (Different timing/schedule for Harry in Diagon Alley with Professor McGonagall having escorted him; Harry ending up in a different compartment on the train from canon and Draco's fight with Ron cutting short Draco's tour of the train before he gets to Harry; and the aftermath of the train fight heading off Draco from 'making contact' with Harry at Hogwarts just before the sorting.)
Draco's being a bit less arrogant than his canon counterpart, when he finally meets Harry in this universe, because Draco's only eleven years old, and he's feeling a bit fish-out-of-water at this point having just being put in Ravenclaw where he wasn't expecting to go (plus he's somewhat distracted by worry over how his father is going to react to his not being in Slytherin, although his concerns are probably a bit exaggerated on this point).
Any extension or further updates of the actual content of this piece seem, as of 27th January, 2015, unlikely at any point in the near future. Too many other ongoing pieces.