Professor,

I like you.

By this, I don't mean that I simply think you're a good teacher and I enjoy your class. That is true, but there is more than that. I like you in the sense that I want to get to know you while cuddling on a couch eating marshmallows and running my fingers through your hair. And I would be sure not to get any sticky substances in the wrong place.

There is a certain amount of lust involved. I freely admit that I find you to be very attractive. I also admit that I've spent more than one class staring at your lips, wondering…well, I'm sure you can imagine the sort of things I wondered about. You usually asked me if I wanted to go to the hospital wing on days like that.

Despite this lust, I also want to know you. The real you, the really true you. I want to know what makes you tick. Your likes, dislikes. Your habits and quirks. The little things that make a person who she is at any given moment. The endearing, and not so much, qualities that can make or break a relationship.

I suppose that brings me to the crux of it. A relationship. While I admit that I like you, I am also not entirely sure that I'd like a relationship. I am not entirely sure that I want you to like me back. After all, I am still a child in the eyes of many, no matter what I've done. Fighting a war doesn't make you any less physically young, and so I wonder…should I want you to like me or would that mean there would be something inherently wrong with you to like me, a "child?"

In addition, I don't even know if you'd be open to the idea. After all, you may be straight. For all I know, you could be married with children. Or maybe you are as queer as I, but maybe you have a partner with whom you're entirely in love? And I find it doubtful that you've thought of me as anything but your student. I read books and hand in too much homework - what is there that could endear me to you?

Though I don't know very much about you - in fact, I know next to nothing - I do still like you. For though I don't know where you grew up and what was the name of your very first pet, I do know other things. I know that when you're angry or upset, your lips become a thin line and your brow wrinkles in just that way. I know that when you're happy, you smile…but it doesn't always reach your eyes. You don't give a smile like Mr. Lockhart - yours is small, private. I know that you like ginger newts with you tea, and when you drink your tea you do so like a proper lady - pinky sticking out. I know that you would do anything to protect those you care for, or those you're responsible for. I know that you chew on the end of your quill when you're concentrating and run it across your lips when you think that no one is looking.

I also know that I could never have said any of this to your face, for the moment I uttered the words, "I like you," you would have sent me packing, probably declaring that I'm much too young to know what I'm talking about and that I should go find Ron Weasley and let him apologize for his latest blunder. You would have been firm and not given it a "what if?" By taking the time to write this letter, to put into words much of how I feel and what I'm thinking, I hope that you are better equipped to make a decision as to how to deal with this…with me.

And so I leave my heart in your hands, Professor McGonagall. I do not presume to say that I love you, nor do I presume to think I will never get over you. I do hope that you don't feel pressured either way and can act on how you truly feel.

Sincerely,

Hermione Granger

Minerva read the letter for what must have surely been the hundredth time. Then she heaved a great sigh, put her head in her hands, and thought.