Magic Is Real
Hermione is just seven when she first experiences magic.
She later comes to learn that this is perfectly ordinary for people like her, but in that moment, she's different. And she's not sure it's in a good way.
It takes her by surprise.
She's sad, that's all. She doesn't know what she did to offend the other girls—but that's all she ever seems to do nowadays. She's too loud, too bossy, too different. They don't want to play with her on the playground anymore—they don't like the way she tells them what to do.
But she means no harm, she thinks to herself sadly. She just wants to be a part of it, and whenever she doesn't take charge, they just exclude her. She's tired of tentatively asking for permission to join in with them, pretending she's not disheartened when they all share exasperated eye rolls and unsubtly snigger behind their hands when they think she can't hear.
Or maybe they know she can hear. Maybe they just don't care.
So she sits atop the climbing frame with a heavy heart, and Hermione can't help but watch them roleplay as fairies, or princesses, or whatever it is they want to be that day. And she can't help but envy them. There is such beauty in pretending to be something you're not, something that can set you free, no matter how briefly.
But for Hermione, it's the same every day. They tease her, they mock her, and she tries to laugh along with them but it's never the same. Sometimes it's her hair, sometimes it's her teeth, and sometimes it's for the innocent notion of reading a book—which she can never quite understand. She reads to escape—to be transported to worlds far from her own, and live the lives of people with far more exciting stories to tell than herself. She can go anywhere; she can be anything. Is that any different to the other girls with their playgrounds games?
Not really. So why do they mock her?
And suddenly, Hermione is angry. She resents the girls—for excluding her, for teasing her, for persistently making her feel worthless and never giving her a reason why—and though it's petty, she wishes that, just once, they might feel as embarrassed and worthless as they make her feel.
The sprinkler explodes.
Water bursts from the ground, furious jets spraying far further than the boundaries of the vegetable patch, a flurry of droplets raining down upon the girls Hermione has been watching. They start shrieking—one of them's even crying—as one of the teacher's rushes outside, confused and alarmed by the sprinkler's sentient behaviour.
Hermione absentmindedly swings her legs over the edge of the climbing frame, watching the chaos unfurl with curiosity and amusement. The girls are completely drenched, and everybody else is laughing as they screw up their faces in disgust, shrieking their heads off in a tantrum to end all tantrums.
It's only when Hermione laughs, a small little chuckle just to herself, when the jets falter and the water is gone. There's no anger anymore, and just a small but blissful feeling of satisfaction.
She cocks her head.
But it's not possible; it's not real.
She assumes it's just a coincidence.
When she receives her Hogwarts letter, at eleven years old, Hermione assumes it's a joke. She assumes, somehow, that the girls in her class—the girls who have always taunted her and seen her as an outcast—have discovered her address and gone to new, creative heights to make her feel different.
And not in a good way.
But she falters. Something within her screams that it's real, that it's entirely possible. She's a witch, she's magical, she's different—and maybe, just maybe, in a good way.
She can't deny that she's noticed it. She's noticed how little things just kind of happen around her—things out of the ordinary, especially when her emotions are heightened—whether positive or negative. She's grown self-conscious of deeming everything a coincidence.
And all too soon, she finds herself in a shop, clinging tightly to what she's only read about in fairytales, and she knows it's real. She can feel it.
She can feel the magic as it courses through her body, her fingertips tingling with energy at the touch of the wand. Her wand.
And the ageing man with the kind eyes is smiling at her with a deep and overwhelming pride. "That's the one," he says excitedly. "That's the wand for you, Miss Granger."
Hermione is ecstatic, incapable of expressing the giddy thrill of delight that grips her stomach.
"Can you feel it?"
Hermione nods, still somewhat breathless, never wanting to put it down.
"The wand chooses the wizard, Miss Granger." He smiles again. "Or, in this case, the witch."
A witch. Because she knows now, that that is what she is. And for a girl who's never been chosen before—who's always been excluded and turned away—Hermione finally feels at home. With the wand in her hand and the magic in the air, she feels like her. She feels real.
Magic presents itself to Hermione in vast and creative ways over the years.
She feels it during her first sighting of the castle, looming before her amidst the lake and, even though she's never set foot in it before, welcoming her home.
She feels it during her first successful spell, praised and extolled by her teacher and looked at with (mostly) adoration from her peers—something she has never once experienced before. And similarly, her first potion.
She feels it during her first corporeal Patronus Charm, which also fills her with warmth, and happiness, and power—three things she has been so unused to feeling in her childhood.
But Hermione feels it most strongly in the moments she doesn't expect. In the moments one wouldn't particularly assume, given that she's a witch, are strictly magical. At least, not in the obvious way.
She feels it when she's with Harry and Ron—when they fight trolls and Death Eaters, when they're running from werewolves and riding Thestrals. But it's never the adventure, never the task itself, it's the unity. It's that connection, that feeling of something deeper—she has never been so close to two other people in her whole life. She has never felt so appreciated.
And she feels it, perhaps, most strongly, when she's with him. When the battle is raging and their emotions are tense, and neither of them know what's really going to happen over the next few hours. Hermione feels it in the way he looks at her, soft and yet deep, eyes screaming of an adoration—a longing—that she's never seen before.
And when they kiss, she's reminded of the first time she ever held her wand. She can feel it coursing through her body, her fingertips tingling with energy at the touch of, not her wand this time, but him—his skin beneath her fingertips, red hair gently tickling her face. And she feels, in that moment, all the things she's ever wanted to feel. She's feels real, she feels wanted, and she feels home.
And oh, yes, Hermione knows magic is real.
Originally written for the Quidditch League Fanfiction Competition Season 4—Round 5
Team: Holyhead Harpies
Position: Captain
Task: Story must revolve around the word 'Magic' (Canon mystery box)
The Valentine-Making Station Challenge (by TheNextFolchart):
Stickers
Tulips – Write about a couple's first kiss
Ribbons
Bronze – Write about Hermione
Red – Write about a Gryffindor
Cinema Competition II (by TheNextFolchart):
Mean Girls – Write about trying to fit in somewhere. Alternatively, write about the Death Eater initiation. / "I just wanted to say that you're all winners. And I couldn't be happier the school year is ending."