This is the first chapter to a fic that I've been thinking about for a long while. I hope you like the eventual pairing as much as I do.
Enjoy! Please review :)
The war changed everything for a lot of people. Mostly having to do with how they regarded one another and the unity felt between wizards from all different walks of lives. In the year of rebuilding and learning that occurred after the war nearly obliterated Hogwarts, Headmistress McGonagall made a point encouraging school and not house unity. And it was not only that she was encouraging, it was that she was adamant. On the occasion, which started often and then dwindled quite considerably, she found students hiding out during the bi-weekly, school-wide "activities", she had those students preform rather unsavory punishments, all together, of course, which usually included cleaning, organizing, and Peeves watching over them.
Slytherin walked in arm with Hufflepuff who had a hand in the pocket of Gryffindor who was hand in hand with Ravenclaw. Metaphorically, of course. Though, Hermione was certain that she had seen that exact arrangement parading down the hallway one day.
Hermione had returned to Hogwarts on the option that McGonagall had provided for the student's whose last year had been obscured by the war. Hermione had jumped at the chance, literally, and had excitedly asked Harry and Ron to join her, who looked at her blankly for a moment before breaking down into laughter.
"Hermione!" Ron explained, "it was never as if we actually liked school was it? You were good at it, I copied off of you, and Harry was good at defensive things because everyone was always trying to kill him." Harry laughed, but looked a little haunted, as he had since he came back from the dead in the middle of the forest.
"Well I don't particularly want to go to school without the two of you," she said, taken aback, having never thought of the possibility of people not enjoying school. "What am I going to do?" she asked, picking at a hangnail and focusing specifically on that.
"I don't know," retorted Ron, "read?"
Ever since the kiss, they'd been even more heated towards each other. Harry hoped that they were making up in private, but he knew that both of them were too pig-headed to ask the other how they felt. He would just have to wait for them to bubble over again. Which he hoped he wouldn't have to be present for.
To calm Hermione down, he said, "I'm sure we'll be near the school at the very least, all the reconstruction and that."
This seemed to ease her tensions a little-her hair deflated a bit-and Harry took the opportunity to say, "Yeah, I've talked to Kingsley and a few other Aurors and they need all the help they can get. Apparently entire wings of the school are mostly inaccessible without the use of brooms."
"Actually," Hermione brightened a bit as she came to realize that she might not be alone at the school after all, "you guys would excel at that."
"Excel?" Ron scoffed, "we'll do better than that, we'll own it. Actually, maybe I'll go write a letter to Kingsley right now, see if we can get to work on that."
And Ron stomped out of the room, scooping up a self-inking quill in the process and getting large blobs of ink all over his long nose.
As he left, Hermione turned to Harry and asked, "He does know that to excel is basically to own it."
Harry gave a conceding nod and then said, "You could actually tell him that you like him, you know."
Hermione looked vaguely in the direction that Ron had went and said, "I doubt that would ever work. Not with him. He doesn't...we're not...compatible."
"You're not?" Harry asked, eyebrows raised, "You seemed pretty compatible before."
"No!" Hermione exclaimed, fists banging on the table, "I cared for him for years and he didn't even notice me, sucking at that poor girl's face in front of me! All we ever do is fight, Harry. That's all we ever do!" A cup teetered off the edge and with a flick of Hermione's wand it flew into the sink erratically and shattered there. She burst into tears and crumpled to the floor, "I can't! I can't! I can't do this. I can't be with him if all we're going to do is fight! I need...I need...I need...I don't know what I need, but I don't need him! Harry, I can't...I can't need him."
"I think you're scared."
And Hermione looked Harry in the eye, took a deep breath, and said in a water-logged voice, "Maybe you're right, but maybe I want someone who doesn't make me scared all the time. I'm going to go pack, I'll see you back at Hogwarts, Harry."
She had packed up everything she needed, gone through Diagon Alley, and arrived at the school in less over a day. The sun was setting when she got there, filtering red over the towers in the distance. Just in front of her, there was a line of early-arrived students and teachers, including Neville and Professor Trelawney, the pair of whom seemed to be discussing something rather fervently.
"Hello," Hermione said as she approached them, but neither seemed to hear her.
"I do see that you would have done quite well to follow its advice, child," rasped Trelawney in her croaky voice.
Neville tried to look bored, though small amounts of nervousness crept through.
"Neville, are you here to complete your last year?" asked Hermione.
"Yeah, Professor Sprout said that I should hang around the school for a couple more years if I'm to replace her anytime soon," Neville looked eager, but glanced over to Trelawney in nervousness again. The Divination teacher was staring at a stain on her coat which sort of looked like a pear, if one squinted a bit.
As Trelawney wandered towards the front of the line, Hermione edged closer to Neville, whispering, "What did she say to you? You look so unnerved."
Neville tossed a scrap of paper towards her, saying, "I made the mistake of telling Trelawney that my fortune reminded me of her." Hermione smoothed out the paper and read "Perhaps fate has dire things in store for you, tread lightly this week". Hermione snorted and Neville asked, "So I shouldn't put much faith in it?"
Hermione shook her head kindly, "Fortunes are made in factories, mass produced and randomly selected. They're never accurate, just for laughs. I promise."
Neville visibly relaxed and she gave him a reassuring smile which faded abruptly when she saw who was approaching them from the gate. His blond hair tousled and walking with a slight limp, Draco Malfoy looked mildly amused as usual, but he also looked a tad uncertain, an expression Hermione wasn't sure she had ever seen on his face before. She had heard that he and his mother moved into a slightly less spacious mansion-though it was still extravagant, she was sure-and that the two of them were doing quite well, though having to adjust, living without his father.
Honestly, Hermione wished him well. Having seen how vulnerable he was in the battle, she fell a small pang of pity whenever she saw him now, accompanied by the usual jealousy, annoyance, and mostly indifference. Besides when he outright taunted her, Hermione had never really hated Malfoy, not the way Ron and Harry had.
"Granger," said Malfoy with a nod of his head.
"Malfoy," nodded Hermione back.
"Had a...good summer?" asked Malfoy with a shadow of his old smirk.
"Not particularily, no," she replied with a wane smile. Malfoy just nodded and fiddled with his pockets. Hermione turned to the front of the line and saw that it was her turn to approach the figure at the front of the line. Upon getting closer, she saw it was Professor McGonagall, which made sense as she had been Deputy Headmistress before.
The old professor smiled upon seeing Hermione and swept her up in a hug before pulling back and straightening her robes, "I'd been wondering when I'd be seeing you. I didn't think you could pass up an opportunity for learning."
"I didn't think I could either," smiled Hermione up at McGonagall, "So how is this going to work? Do we just go about as if we're back in school?"
Professor McGonagall shook her head and smiled back at Hermione, "All of you eighth years will sit in on whichever classes you would like, fifth year and up, of course, have full use of the library and with a little prompting can use most of the facilities that the school has to offer, even those primarily for staff use. It will work as more of a university or free-study program. All I expect is for you to complete some form of paper or scroll to hand into me weekly and that you help with the rebuilding effort at least an hour a day during the week, and at least five over the weekend. Assign yourself homework and reading, or don't. Study things that will be useful to you, or don't. It's all up to you, Miss Granger. Or is it Mrs. Weasley now?"
Hermione's excitement, which had been growing the entire conversation, plummeted and she strode away from McGonagall with a curt, "No."
She thought she heard a chuckle behind her, but didn't dare look back.