Sitting in the back of her parent's car, Hermione watched the city speed by. At first she'd watched her parents in the front seats, but the tension made her even more nervous about school.
Every once in a while, her parents would glance back at her, quickly, before gripping something tightly.
The steering wheel.
The armrest.
The other's hand.
Hermione closed her eyes and clutched a book to her chest. Hogwarts: A History had been one of her comforts for the past few weeks. While her parents had been talking in whispers and quick glances to each other, Hermione had been reading her school books and anything else she'd picked up in that store.
Knowing how disappointing it was that she wouldn't be going to a respectable school and becoming a dentist or lawyer or any real job, she'd become determined to at least be the best at this new school.
Thinking back, she thought about how she felt when the professor had visited her house to tell her that she was actually a witch.
The day had started normally enough, waking up around eight in the morning on a Saturday. Her parents liked her to keep an early morning schedule so that the change between the summer and school schedule wouldn't be too bad.
Brushing her teeth, her hair and dressing in a pair of jeans and t-shirt. Her parents only allowed these types of clothes in the summer and only on the weekends. They had always told her that professionals dress up, even at home.
Next, she made her bed and went downstairs for breakfast. Her parents liked to be punctual, so breakfast on the weekends were always at eight-thirty.
The conversation that day had been just like any other. They talked about teeth, what their neighbors had planned and asked Hermione how her applications were going.
For the past few months, Hermione had been filling out applications for several boarding schools. Between the applications and essays, she'd kept very busy this year.
After breakfast, she settled down to her new summer hobby, if you could call it that, and looked at more leaflets for boarding schools.
She looked at one; a school that claimed their students were better prepared for medical school, and read the classes offered.
By nine-thirty, the mail arrived. Her mother came into the kitchen and sat down in the seat next to her and looked through the mail.
"Hermione, you have mail from two of the schools you applied to!"
Hermione snatched the two letters from her mother, more forcefully than she'd intended, but she was worried. What if they told her that she wasn't good enough? What if she'd messed up her essays?
"Open it sweetie! You'll be fine. They're both probably going to tell you that you're accepted." She chuckled, mostly to herself, watching her only child. "In fact, your problem will probably be deciding which school you want to go to, since they'll all probably accept you."
She smiled encouragingly at Hermione, and nodded towards the letters.
Hands shaking, Hermione slowly opened the first letter and read the letter quickly. She breathed a sigh of relief and handed the first to her mom as she started to read the second.
She leaned back in her chair, a grin on her face. She was so excited she'd been accepted at both.
Then the doorbell rang.
Her mother ignored the door, still reading the second letter. Hermione looked over the first again and laughed. Her mother gripped her shoulder in a proud sort of way.
Suddenly, her father leaned in.
"There's someone here to see Hermione. She says she's here to talk about a school she's been accepted at." Mother and daughter looked at each other, confused. Was there something special about this one that someone had to tell her in person?
"Maybe you've gotten the highest scores and they want to congratulate you!" Her mother tried to whisper, but her voice still carried and Hermione worried that the woman in the living room could hear her. Hermione shrugged and followed her father to meet the woman.
Sitting stiffly on the couch, she stood the moment they walked into the room.
"Hello, Dr. Granger, Dr. Granger," she shook the hands of both of her parents in turn, to acknowledge each of them. "Miss Hermione Granger. I am Professor Minerva McGonagall."
Hermione hesitantly shook her hand. "Please, have a seat Professor." Hermione waved her hand down towards the couch, which Professor McGonagall took.
"I'll prepare some tea." Hermione's mother left the room for a few minutes as Hermione and her father watched the older woman sitting across from them.
"What school are you from?"
"We should wait for your wife to come back before we continue to discuss this further. I'm afraid that explaining it twice will take a lot of effort and time that neither of us has to waste."
Her father leaned back. He seemed impressed by her secrecy, thinking that this must be something highly unusual and important. He smiled at Hermione and squeezed her knee encouragingly.
Hermione felt slightly sick. She was worried even if her parents weren't.
She didn't have much time to think about it though as her mother walked back in with a tray of tea cups and a steaming pot of tea.
"Well, here you are." She handed out tea to everyone and sipped hers excitedly. Hermione continued to feel nervous and only sipped her tea to be doing something while she waited.
"Well, I'm sure you are all very curious as to why I'm here. I'll get straight to it. I am a teacher at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. I am here to inform you that your daughter has been selected to attend our school because she is a witch in need of training."
The three Grangers looked at her as though she'd grown a second head. Then, what she'd said sank in and her father leaned forward angrily.
"Now see here, Professor, we do not appreciate your calling our daughter a witch." He spat out the sentence with as much civility as he could muster, though the message was very clearly hostile.
"I do not intend to insult her, Dr. Granger. I am merely telling you what she is. Let me demonstrate what I mean." Pulling out a thin wooden stick, she tapped her teacup. The teacup promptly grew legs and dashed across the table before Professor McGonagall tapped it again, returning it to its inanimate state. "I am also a witch. As I mentioned before, I am a teacher at Hogwarts."
The three stared at her even more. Without realizing it, Hermione leaned forward slightly.
"Do you mean that…that those strange things that sometimes happen-that's magic?"
"Yes Miss Granger. I am happy to see you catch on so quickly. Yes, those things were magic. At Hogwarts, you will learn to harness your power and gain control of it so that it doesn't get away from you." She pulled out a letter and handed it to Hermione. "This letter will contain your acceptance letter, your school supplies list and your ticket to the Hogwarts Express that will take you to the school. If you would like help navigating Diagon Alley, where you will purchase your school supplies, I will gladly help you. If not, there are directions for both getting to Diagon Alley and how to get on the school train."
Her father seemed to recover himself. "No. We'll be perfectly fine. But we need to talk about this."
"I understand." Standing up, she looked down at them. "Please remember that without training, she may cause serious harm to others if her magic gets out of hand and our Ministry will have to take action. I do hope to see you at school Miss Granger." Without further discussion, she walked down the hall and let herself out.
"What was that?" Her mother finally spoke, sounding shell-shocked. "Magic? She can't be serious." She looked cautiously at the tea cup that had walked across the table as though expecting it to do the same again.
"Even if it's real, I don't think Hermione should go. What kind of future would she have?"
"Can I go?"
Her parents looked at her, startled.
"Go? What do you mean? You don't really want to be a-a witch, do you?"
"I don't know mum, but shouldn't I get control of it? What if I do something that gets me in trouble with the Ministry?"
"Yes, but magic? That's not real!"
"Can I please go?" Hermione rarely asked for anything, but this seemed like an opportunity to try something different. Her parents had raised her to be prepared to be the best at some type of high paying career. This seemed like something that could be all hers. Something her parents couldn't dictate. The prospect was too enticing to ignore.
They never discussed it again. Not even as she bought her school supplies and extra books so she could learn more about this other world she'd never even dreamed of. Her parents looked afraid the entire time, so she got her things quickly, but when she was home, she read all of her books and memorized them as best she could.
Even if she didn't do what they wanted, she would still try to make them proud of her for being the best.
"Are you sure this is what you want?"
Startled, Hermione jumped a little at her mom's voice.
"What do you mean?"
"Well, sweetie, don't you want to go to one of the other schools that you applied to? You were accepted at all of them." Her mother's voice was concerned, but with a touch of hesitation. The same type of voice she'd been using since Professor McGonagall had visited. The voice told her that her mom was still hoping Hermione would change her mind or that the whole thing had been an unpleasant dream.
"We'd hate to see all your good marks go to waste at this new…school." Her father, she noticed, gripped the steering wheel tighter when he referenced Hogwarts. He relaxed it, trying to sound cheerful, but it was something he'd failed to do for a while.
He was getting better at lying about it though.
They'd finally said what they'd wanted to say for weeks since they'd let the topic drop that day. She looked down at her book.
"Mum, Dad, we're almost there. I already agreed to go."
"But we don't want you to ruin what you can do with your life! You're only eleven. All this…magic, seems like a grand idea now, but when you get older, you'll find that you want to do something else. A regular school might seem boring now, but you'll go somewhere and appreciate it." Her mom finally looked back at her, sympathy and determination painting her face, making a strange expression, one that was fighting with itself, wanting to show the sympathy and to hide the determination.
"Mum, can I decide at the end of the year? Since I didn't give any word to the other schools, I'll go to school for a year and decide what I want to do when I have an idea of what I want."
Her mom bit her lip and turned to look ahead.
"Fine."
The rest of the trip was silent.