Don't Panic Chapter 1, a harry potter fanfic

Don't panic.

Disclaimer. Harry Potter and related characters are the creation of J.K Rowling This is a work of fan fiction.

A.N. Rated M. Also every time you come across a new section expect a time jump.

Hermione stood watching. She would ask how she got herself into this but the path she had taken was still vivid in her memory. It was all seemed perfectly rational until she stood here in a school uniform with a rising sense of panic.

The numbers on the cash machine display were large and if it hadn't been followed by the letters OD would have been pleasing. As it was she turned sadly to Chloe. "Looks like an early night for me."

"You need to let your hair down girl. Of making books there is no end, and much study wearies the body. Come on it's my treat."

Hermione was struggling with student life. The studying was not a problem but the paying for lodgings, food and other necessities of life left very little for her to socialise. Some students worked and while she put in some hours at a coffee shop it didn't seem to help her situation. Others depended on hand outs from parents. That really wasn't going to happen with her. To say her relationship with her parents was frosty would be an understatement. Something about wiping their memories and sending them across the world made rebuilding trust difficult.

"Don't panic." Chloe placed an arm on her too tense arm. "Try a puff of this." Chloe offered a tightly rolled cigarette that Hermione knew wasn't tobacco.

"I've never before."

"This will be a night for lots of firsts then. You're too stiff, this will help you relax. You'll never make it halfway at the moment."

Hermione watched her own slightly shaky hand take the offered joint and breathe in the smoke.

They were on their second drink. Hermione didn't normally drink cocktails, she stuck to bottles of cider but Chloe was buying and it seemed rude not to. As the second drink went to her head, it had been a long time to the cheese and onion sandwich at lunchtime, she found herself laughing louder than normal.

Chloe opened her purse and looked in. Hermione's eyes widened at the crumpled and creased twenties and fifties in there. "Want another."

"How can you afford all this?" Hermione pointed vaguely at the purse and the glasses on the table.

"That my dear is a three drink revelation." Chloe headed off to the bar leaving Hermione alone with the empty glasses.

Getting a degree had seemed like such a good idea at the time. She hadn't realised how little time it would leave for Harry and Ron. Ron, things had gone badly wrong there.

Chloe returned two brightly coloured glasses. Hermione took a sip. They tasted of fruit but the kick told her that there was a lot of vodka in there.

Chloe gave her a long and serious stare. "I like you Hermione but you're a bit judgemental. So if I tell you how I make my money and you react badly you'll be making your own way home. Which seeing how unsteady you are and you have no money for a taxi will be difficult."

Hermione gathered herself. How hard could this be? She after all was a witch who had ridden an invisible Skelton horse. She had broken into a bank and escaped on a dragon. What could Chloe tell her that would shock her?

"I'm a lap dancer."

Hermione choked on her drink. The alcohol burnt as it forced its way out of her nose."

The other dancer left the stage and it was time to wait. She was up next but this gave the other girls time to serve drinks to offer private dances, that apparently was where the money was but she had to do her time on the stage first. Prove that she was could do this, prove it to the whole room and herself.

She was drunk, she knew she was drunk, the room was swirling and her best friend had just said she was a lap dancer. She was hoping her spluttering was being put down to shock and not judgmentalism.

"I haven't told many people but I get that a lot." Chloe smiled weakly.

"I want to ask you so much but I need to get home, please don't leave me here." Even to herself she sounded pitiful. She couldn't understand how an intelligent girl like Chloe could demean herself like this, selling herself for other people's pleasure. She more immediately couldn't remember how her knees were meant to work as Chloe pulled her to her feet and helped her to the door.

A hand on her back gently pushed her out. "You're on."

The music started, the muzzled trumpet wailed like a siren announcing her presence before settling down into its sultry theme.

Chloe held back her hair as she threw up over someone's garden wall. She also found her keys for her and helped her to bed. She awoke alone in her bed dressed in just her underwear. She blushed that meant Chloe had probably had to undress her. Her eyes hurt and her head hammered. She crawled out of bed and to her chest of draws in the bottom draw under clothes she never wore was her beaded bag. Hidden in that was the potion she was looking for. Once she had drunk her hangover cure, a gift from the George because one thing everyone knows about students was they drank too much.

She found her phone in the pocket of last night's jeans. She had a text from Chloe. "Can I come round?"

A quick reply and she headed for the shower. She was feeling almost human when there was a knock on her bedroom door.

She let Chloe in and watched her sit cautiously on her bed.

"So, now you can string a sentence together I'm sure you have something to say."

Hermione caught herself in the process of folded her arms. The word honestly was banished from her vocabulary these days. "Chloe, we're friends or just starting to be and I know for a fact you are an intelligent woman. I can't find the right words that don't sound judgmental in my own head. Explain it to me please."

Chloe smiled at her. "That's pretty good. Technically I'm classified as a sex worker. I undress for men and I get paid for it. Lap dancing is all about power not sex. I have the power. I have something they want, they have to pay for it. Convince me they're worth it. I can walk away at any point leaving them gasping and desperate. So they see me topless if they are good if they behave. I don't degrade myself for men, they do for me. They come begging for my favours. If they are lucky they get a reward."

"So you don't do more that dance?"

"I dance and I undress." Chloe held Hermione's stare. "Just once, okay. In the last month I've had two, one night stands once back to his place, one in an alley way behind the nightclub. In six months of being a dancer I've had sex with one client and I initiated it not him. If I'd met him in a club I'd have done him for nothing." She shrugged "As I say it's all about my power. I'm a lot more reckless in my personal life than professional."

"I hear what you're saying and I know you but you hear lots of things."

"Some are true I'm sure. Sex trafficking, girls threatened, supporting drug habits, manipulated by men. I'm not stupid enough to deny it just it's not the reason I'm there. Hermione you're not some innocent who's unaware of the world and men. I know about you and that ginger lad."

Ron. Things had been going badly for a while. He didn't understand her wanting to go to muggle school as he called it. His Auror training was a lot of stress, they were pulling in different directions. She had decided to start having sex with him to help their connection, to keep a closer bond. It wasn't what she had hoped for. He was finished before she had started. Not just the first time but every time. She had told him to slow down to pay attention to her. He had called her a nag. She suggested counselling maybe. He had told her she wanted to learn everything from a book. She was barmy. She agreed she was barmy to ever think it was worth spending time with someone with the emotional depth of a teaspoon.

"I suppose." She admitted. "If he'd been paying for it he might have valued it."

"Come with me tonight. I'm dancing. I have a turn on stage then an hour on the floor."

"No, absolutely not."

Somehow Chloe persuaded her and so she stayed backstage, mesmerised, watching the dancers. Ordinary girls until they stepped up on stage then they became goddesses. Holding power. She absolutely did not want to strip. She was never going to do a lap dance. She wanted that power. She noticed some of the girls talking about her and laughing in the background but she ignored them.

She mentioned it to Chloe as they took a cab home. "Oh they were just starting a book for when you first get up on stage. Seven days is the average but I think you'll be closer to fourteen"

"Never will be more likely."

"That's what I said. Anyway I'm famished were do want to eat?"

"You know I can't afford to eat out."

Chloe unzipped her jeans and pulled out a fifty from the edge of her panties. "I let him put it there because he wanted to touch me so much. I refused when he had a twenty. I let him when he produced the fifty. I knew you'd be hungry and I've have to pay for us both. I think he cum in his pants when he touched me, he was that desperate. So where do you want to eat?"

Hermione knew when someone was being provocative so ignored the comments and answered the question. "I'd could murder a curry."

"So how does it feel profiteering from my immoral wages?"

"It's a false question, designed to make me feel guilty. I didn't make you go up there. I'm not making you pay for me. You saying you only took the money to buy me food is just designed to make me feel guilty. The next thing you will be saying is wouldn't it be more honest to earn it myself. Why are you pushing me to do this?"

"I forgot how smart you are sober. You are the second person I've told about this. Amy shouted at me and gave me a long feminist rant. I was expecting the same form you but I wanted someone I could talk to about it. The thing is I saw you at the club. On one level you want this. I can see it in your eyes, there is something about it you want. It's not the money and I know it's not the sex. What is it?"

"The power. I saw the girls back stage. I saw you. Then you change once you go out there. You become goddesses and the men your worshippers. I've been put down all my life. Bushy haired, buck teethed, know it all bookworm. That's some of the nicer things I've head said about me. I want that power

She walked out to the edge of the stage. Slow and carefully matching the tempo of the music. The cheers and the whistles were for her. A quick turn back and the flimsy material that mimicked a school skirt lifted, flashing thigh all the way up to panties that got her another cheer. She was back in the centre of the stage. A snare roll and the tempo changed she matched it walked from one edge of the semi-circular stage to another, exaggerated steps causing her skirt to move, showing more leg than she dreamed off. The crowd loved every step and movement.

Chloe had a word for her and the next night she found herself serving drinks. Although it wasn't that easy. It turned out there are a lot more rules for serving drinks here than in the coffee shop. She was talked through it by the manager. She had to take drinks. Which were three times dearer than a normal club. She had to tell the customer the prices before the drinks were poured and no one was allowed to run up a tab. Also since the tables were set back and slightly private she had to keep an eye out on the girls dancing if the customers were not respecting the rules it was her job to call the club security. As well as taking drinks she also had the vouchers for dances. A customer had to pay to get into the club and would get two vouchers with their entrance. It was one voucher for a dance or two vouchers if they wanted a specific girl. The dancers only had to strip to their underwear although most would go topless for the right tip.

She was again fascinated by the dancers. Back stage and in the private areas they were just like her, normal women. Students, mums, some were married, most weren't. On the floor they became something else. Hermione knew magic and power. She had seen the reactions of those who feared Bellatrix but these girls got even more respect. The customers brought them offerings and hoped they would be worthy of their favour. She hadn't been there an hour before she started picking music in her head and started to construct her routine.

"You think you're going to take me but you'll never take me alive." Her shirt hit the floor as the line was sung. She turned and walked back proud and confident. They thought she was there for them. They were there for her. They would never take her. She was feeding off their energy. She was vaguely aware she was ahead of the routine Chloe had helped her work out but she was loving being loved.

After her shift serving drinks was over they headed back to Chloe's flat. No study bedroom with shared facilities for Chloe, she had a studio flat with its own separate entrance.

"Sit. " Chloe pointed as she put on music. "The first thing is to find a stage routine. Something the speaks to everyone in the room but also makes them think it's just for them.

Hermione watched entranced as Chloe stripped down to her underwear.

She then changed her style of dancing and moved directly in front of Hermione. "Now the stage is okay but the tips you make in lap dancing are where the money is"

Hermione gave herself a good talking to As Chloe danced. Reminding herself she was straight.

"How much would you pay for my bra? How much for my tits to come out and play?"

With a move that broke the mood Chloe dropped her purse on Hermione's knee. She offered a twenty and couldn't hide her disappointment when Chloe refused. It wasn't her money but Hermione would of gladly given the fifty out of her own if she had it. She placed the fifty pound note under the strap of Chloe's panties. Chloe took of her bra and dropped it laughing on Hermione.

"So that's it. You'd have to start paying me with your money if you want these to come off." She snapped the strap on her panties. "Also I'd be a little suspicious if you did. You are straight aren't you."

"I shared a dorm room in private school with a group of girls for six years and I've never had a lesbian thought in my life. Until you started stripping for me anyway. How do you do that?"

"Time for you to find out." Chloe pulled her to her feet. "I'll only give money if I'm into it. If I give you money you can keep it."

Hermione undressed to the music, mimicking Chloe's movements. "Stop. Don't be me. Find yourself. You are seeking my approval you need to be secure in yourself and demand my attention. At the moment if you don't get undressed I'm not bothered, I have to be heartbroken."

Hermione's skirt fell to her ankles and she took one foot out of it. The other flipped it up letting her catch it. She held in front of her when she turned back to the crowd. She waited for the groan of disappointment before she dropped. She put a hand to her chin and mouthed the word "opps."

She spent a lot of time at Chloe's flat in the next week. Chloe wanted her comfortable in her own skin. So she spent most of her time there in her underwear. She wasn't certain if it was better or worse when Chloe joined her in that state. She would practice her dancing at least once a night. At some point she had gone from I'm never going to do this to, I will be the best.

When Chloe finally gave her the money, slipping it into the top of her panties and Hermione removed her bra, slowly and teasingly, hinting at first then showing of her breasts with no shame, she felt a triumph matched only when she had duelled death eaters. I have won. She screamed inside her head.

The two women shared a hug to celebrate. Hermione was suddenly conscious she was only in her panties and Chloe was only wearing one item more.

They broke the hug both mutually embarrassed.

"You're not even slightly gay right?" Chloe asked her.

"Hey you're the own who's insisted I spend my evenings here half naked."

"True, but well I've have had at least one gay fling so I've been enjoying the view."

Hermione looked her up and down. "Sorry I only feel like that when you're dancing. "

She left the stage to shouts and applause. She hadn't picked up any tips but Chloe had warned her that stage dancers rarely got any. Chloe was waiting for her and pulled her into a hug. Which Hermione returned.

"Get a room, girls." Natasha the next dancer up told them.

Hermione wasn't certain why, but something about being told no, being mocked in a moment of triumph always made her act rashly. "Fuck you Tash."

Instead of breaking of her hug from Chloe she pulled her into a kiss. Chloe flinched before responding before they both broke off the kiss to give the finger to Tash who was making gagging noises.

" So you're ready, have you thought about a stage name. Hermione Granger is a bit recognisable."

Hermione grinned an uncharacteristic grin. " I was thinking about Trixie Lestrange. Would it be too much?"

Chloe gave her a long look. "I think that's about right. Just one thing that isn't the name of someone you know is it?"

"I've never met anyone called Trixie in my life." Hermione assured her.

They club manager was not surprised when Hermione asked if she could have a spot on the stage and move from waitress to dancer.

"This will either go horrendously well or be a car crash. There's no point asking you to audition, I've met girls like you before, the audience makes or breaks you. You'll either freeze or be fantastic." She turned to Chloe who had come with her. "If she messes up you will have to take her place on the stage."

Chloe nodded her acceptance.

"Right, Chloe's next on Tuesday. I can fit you in then, second dance and then if you're ok with that another later. I'll also pencil you in for two stage dances Thursday. If you survive that then next week you can go on the floor and do private dances. If you make it that far I'll tell you about the back rooms."

As soon as they had finished talking Hermione dragged Chloe off so she could explain.

"Right, the back rooms." She swept her hands through her hair. "First off, I've never done a back room dance, so they are entirely optional. A customer can request a back room dance, costs them four tokens, there is an assumption if you do one you will totally strip. Some girls go further and masturbate too. Still absolutely no contact between customer and girl although if the guy decides to touch himself that is usually ignored. I just don't. I know I strip for men but I have limits. Although the girls who do can make at least two hundred a dance with tips."

Hermione stood in the wings watching Chloe dance. There was no two ways about it the girl turned her on. She enjoyed watching the other girls dance. They mesmerised her with their dances but Chloe had a special effect. She worried a little because she had to follow her and while she knew she could dance now and loved the crowd's reaction to her she wasn't certain she could one up Chloe's routine.

Chloe headed back stage and pulled Hermione into a hug. Hermione hesitated catching Chloe's eye the girl was accepting and Hermione pulled her in for a kiss. Chloe responded and Hermione stopped holding back. When she got a tap on the shoulder she headed out for her turn on the stage ready to knock the crowd dead.

They headed back to Chloe's flat after they had both done their turns. Hermione flushed with excitement that she had done it. Danced for the crowd got the response she wanted. She had felt the power she had over them just by removing the odd item of clothing. Chloe was strangely quiet.

She let them both in and sat Hermione down while getting them both drinks.

"Hermione, you've told me you're straight. I've told you I've had a lesbian relationship before. I'm not going to push but you get to make a choice." Chloe stood up quickly and took off her shirt and skirt. "I'm going to bed now, either join me or let yourself out. Whatever happens I want us to still be friends. If you let yourself out the kissing stops. If you join me, then we see were things go."

Hermione looked down at the bottle in her hand.

"I'm not gay. I really don't fancy girls. I do fancy you." She stood hesitantly. Toying with the bottom of her t-shirt. "I'm going to join you, if that's ok? I'm just worried that I'll want you to stop halfway or after tonight I'll never do this again and hurt you."

"Never let future fears stop you from present fun."

Hermione dropped her clothing next to Chloe's and joined her in bed.

She lay sweaty and satiated coiled around Chloe. "So that's what an orgasm is."

"You've never had an orgasm before?"

"Well on my own in the shower, never when someone else was in control."

"That my dear was just the start. Next lesson multiple ones."

Hermione couldn't wait.

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A.N.

Hermione the lap dancer is a cliché but there you go.

The song I had in mind for Hermione's dance is anachronistic so isn't directly mentioned. For the curious it is Don't Panic by the excellent Molotov Jukebox, yes that is Tonks singing.