What a year. It's 1997, my sixth year at Hogwarts, and I've actually learned something this time around. Over the past few days I've learned about war and the battles we wage in daily life, about victory and why I never seem to achieve it.
There are two main fronts: for one, You-Know-Who is back. For an entire year he went unnoticed by our ever-vigilant Ministry of Morons. Even after it appeared on the front page of the Daily Prophet that He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named had returned, there was no rallying, no call to arms, no one springing to action. No one but a small resistance group, and we're fighting blind. I'll be joining the resistance shortly.
That's if I last that long. This brings me to the second war I waged. You see, while You-Know-Who was recruiting followers, undermining government officials, and assassinating key individuals, the entire female sex went unnoticed when they launched a clandestine assault on my sanity.
Long fucking story. Like many wars and issues of intrigue and diplomacy, it's complicated to the point of being complete bollocks, and I couldn't be expected to handle two wars at once. Chase two rabbits and you will lose them both, as they say. It's even harder chasing birds.
I suppose I should have been worrying about the literal war that threatened everything I know and love. That would have made sense. I thought I had that all figured out, anyway. I planned to hone my dueling skills, join up alongside my brothers and Harry, and follow orders. I wouldn't overthink it, unlike someone I know.
It all comes down to the stone cold fact that I'm a warrior. That's been my ambition since childhood—to be a knight, and to cleave a rend through the Dark forces. One flash to cut evil. At least, that's what I convinced myself before taking on that giant chess piece in the dungeons under the school. I never questioned myself for things like that, so I make a good knight, I reckon. It only ever gets messy when people count on me. That's why I don't appreciate Hermione nagging people all the time, namely Harry. Harry's got enough pressure on his shoulders being the Chosen One. If Ole Boulder-Shoulders doesn't want to take time away from being our bloody messiah to do homework then so be it.
Where was I? Oh, yes, self-sacrifice. It happens. Fight to the death and you will live, but go to war hoping to live and surely you shall die. As you can tell, I've done some reading. Willingly.
What counts is fighting You-Know-Who. Hermione still hasn't sorted out her priorities, that much is plainly obvious. We're in desperate need of schoolhouse unity. We'd all die if our cannons were aimed at each other, you know?
There I go again. I dabble in philosophy, but only as it pertains to cool things like firing cannons. Actually, I think the Cannons deserve to be fired, and they might do a bit better if they started aiming at each other instead of tossing the Quaffle into hordes of enemy brooms—which is surprising to me, considering their fancy for staring at each other's bums.
About Lavender Brown—no, I'd rather take a Fire Crab to my hangers than discuss the mess I got myself into. Suffice it to say I was in dire straits, and that it was nearly the end of me, and that I was fucked. We don't need to be a society of record-keepers anyway, and there's no reason why I should have to detail the reasons behind everything I've done. Hermione knows what's been done, and she's smart so if she contemplated it for a while she'd probably figure out why it was done. I just hope she doesn't know all that's been done.
It's because she went and did Merlin-knows-what with somebody I considered to be a complete git. How's that for diplomacy? She was fraternizing with the enemy. Look, I'm not really a knight, I'm just a quintessentially British bloke who occasionally partakes in revenge. Who did I get revenge on, anyway? That's what I want to know. By the end of it I'll have hurt everyone involved, and none of them did anything wrong except Hermione. Oh, she did all sorts of wrong. Of that, I am certain.
But Lavender... well, I'm trying to feel sorry for her but she's never made it easy. My girlfriend is an idiot. Sure, she laughs at all my jokes and plays along and acts interested when I talk about Quidditch but somewhere down the line I realized she's just easily amused. She'd laugh seeing pudding crawl. And the cutesy rubbish I'm forced to put up with! Calling me Won-Won in public was bad enough, but that gift she got me was over the line. Please note: never buy a man jewelry.
Then again, I'm not a man quite yet. Not legally, not emotionally. Harry is a man. He was fighting evil while I was playing little love games. I guess there was wrong coming from all sides, but Hermione started it. Yes, that's the basis for my entire stance on this issue: she started it. She's the villain.
Looking back on it, I never was too worried about this. People tend to fear the unknown, and this whole thing reminded me of a bushy-haired little girl who once ignored me over a dispute involving a cat and a rat. I was well aware it would blow up in my face. It was a Seamus cocktail waiting to go off. My main concern for a long time now has been damage control.
My campaign to fix things began in the Gryffindor common room. I was searching every nook and cranny for the fold-out chessboard on loan from the library. Gryffindor's chess set was missing. I had my pieces ready to go, and I was planning to march on the Headmaster's office and challenge him to total war. I was confident in my abilities, but I couldn't imagine what a genius like Dumbledore would have in store for me. Probably a boot to the arse and a promise that if I ever wasted his time again he'd have me in one of Filch's thumbscrew contraptions. Supposedly Filch's torture tools have been removed from school grounds, but rumors persist about what he gets off to in his spare time.
The chess challenge was merely a diversion, even though it's something I'd always wanted to do. I planned to strike up a conversation about my plight while I was there. Dumbledore could help. I had questions, and he always had the right answers. It's not like he hadn't personally given me an award for services to the school, so I knew I'd be allowed to bother him. He was giving Harry private lessons. I'd risk sore thumbs for that.
Yes, I did have several older brothers to talk to about this, but owl post had been sluggish with the war on and it took quite a while to correspond with them. Fred and George were particularly infuriating. They seemed to have some mysterious wealth of knowledge of anything to do with girls, but whenever I asked their advice they'd try to rope me into an exchange whereby I lie to Magical Law Enforcement about their whereabouts on certain dates.
I found the chessboard after checking the sofa a fifth time, but then I remembered that it was a piece of rubbish. I hoped Dumbledore might have a real marble board in his office. In fact, he might have been the one that took ours.
Every time Hermione looked my way it solidified my belief that I was going to boil in hell. Somehow I had caught her while she wasn't reading. This was akin to running into a tiger 'round lunchtime. She was able to concentrate all her energy on that death glare, which normally I'd find adorable but now I associate with the stings of a million sharp beaks cutting my skin.
I held up the chessboard and grinned to her, but I'm not sure why. She was mystified and so was I—what was I doing? 'Tee-hee, remember this, Hermione? It's chess. I've played this a lot.'
You can see the sort of state I was in. Sometimes I feel like the Weasley gene pool is more of a buffet table and I was last in line. Bill's the cool one, Charlie's the tough one, Percy's the pratty one, Fred and George are prats too, and I'm a prat. I sense a pattern.
Ginny had been unbearable all year as well. Yes, she's definitely played a role in my suffering. I guess she never forgot about all those times I pushed her into the pond next to the house with the old rusty Muggle 'washer machine' in it.
I checked one last time to make sure I had everything I needed, then exited through the portrait hole and up the stairs. I'd not gone two flights before encountering a pair of Slytherins. Whenever I see the green trim on those robes I know they're up to no good, so I sent them straight to their common room without a second thought. In the very next corridor I found a few younger students, and some of them had biscuits which then became my biscuits. It truly is my duty and a privilege to be a school prefect.
I didn't come round Dumbledore's office very often, and I nearly got lost, but I spotted the stone gargoyle that guarded the door and there I was. I took one look around and the coast was clear, so there was nothing stopping me from proceeding except the lump in my throat. I tried to calm down; I was only stopping by uninvited. He wouldn't mind too much, and I soon realized I've got a reputation for being grossly inconsiderate and rightly so.
"Acid pops," I said to the gargoyle, and the spiral staircase began to rotate.
When I reached the top of the stairs I realized that it was all a horrible idea. There's a war on! War! It was no time to bother our leader and most valuable mind with problems involving teenage girls. What was I thinking?
I waited for the stairs to stop moving and made a hasty exit.
The next day, after classes had finished, Harry asked me where I had run off to the previous night.
"Nothing important," I said. He gave me an infuriating little smirk that told me he thought I was with Lavender, and I didn't set him straight.
I'd been considering a second attempt at challenging Dumbledore all day, but that didn't mean I wanted Harry knowing about it. There were people I could talk to about my love life, and I knew that, but many of them were hacked off at me and others would just tell me to face the music. It was definitely more complicated than anyone realized. I was trying to keep a friend, and Hermione wouldn't even let me open the lines of communication.
"Harry?" I said. "Have you seen Gryffindor's chess set?"
"No, in fact I'm starting to think somebody's nicked it," he responded. "You can't play anyway. Quidditch practice, remember?"
"Yes, captain."
As funny as it sounds, there's just something about flying that brings you down to earth. I emerged from our rigorous Quidditch exercise a happy man, despite my defense of the goalposts being so curiously poor that my teammates took to calling me the Ron-Sequitur.
No, that wouldn't get to me, because my defense of my chess tiles was what would win the day. When the clock struck nine(ish), I would throw the gauntlet.
Nothing would stop me, except perhaps Lavender ambushing me on my way back from the Quidditch pitch. She immediately started a rant about some thing or another and I just kept walking and nodding. Harry and the team were so kind as to speed up, leaving me behind with Lav. Harry can sod off next time he lectures me about being a team player.
"But she's still using that old bag, even though she knows where it's been! Can you believe that?"
"Yes," I said. If only she knew where half of my things had been, courtesy of Fred and George, she probably wouldn't have been holding my arm with a vice-like grip.
She wouldn't keep me held up for long though. I broke a sweat on the field and she could smell it. Sure enough, she relented quickly and inched away from me.
"Meet me in the common room," she said. I simply nodded some more.
I'm more considerate than I let on. I know I was being a total git treating Lavender like that, but I was starting to do it hoping she'd ditch me. Yes, I'll definitely be boiling in hell.
I crossed the covered bridge alone on my way back to the castle with the sun setting beside me, both over the horizon and reflected in the Black Lake below. It was the kind of natural wonder that made for perfect soul-searching conditions. At my absolute peak of thoughtfulness, I observed that one of my shoes was untied.
I accepted that no miracle solution was going to fall into my lap. I couldn't just create a quick fix for this. No, it was going to have to come from Dumbledore. He'd have a quick fix, so I'd ask him over the chess table soon. For the time being I was content to watch the sunset. As beautiful as a clear sky can be, I've come to appreciate life through a filter of fog. Under the right conditions, it can make things glow.
The breeze on the bridge was getting cold, so I started to leave, but something made me freeze entirely. It was Hermione, waiting at the end of the bridge! Fancy that! I started walking towards her, entertaining the possibility that I took a Bludger to the skull out on that Quidditch pitch and that it was all a hallucination. I knew I'd never leave my shoe untied! If it was a lucid dream, I was going to make the best of it.
But it wasn't. I knew by the look on her face that she wasn't Dream Hermione. She was regular, pissed-off Hermione.
"What are you doing out here?" she said. Her voice was shrill but as it's the first thing she had said to me in days I couldn't help but smile.
Never smile or laugh when a woman is trying to be serious, even if the situation is laughable. For months, Hermione and I had been engaged in the social equivalent of trench warfare and her latest tactic was to question my decision to look at sunsets on my way back from Quidditch. Shit, I broke into a full-on chuckle.
She turned around and started stomping away. I cleared my throat and asked, "What d'you mean what am I doing out here?"
"Everyone," she said, spinning back around, "is on high alert, taking every precaution against Death Eater attacks, and here you are wandering around alone outside castle walls! It's dangerous!"
That's all? Obviously I wasn't going to be attacked! Some priority target I am. Typical Hermione.
"You were worried?" I asked. Yeah, that'll shut her up.
"Yes!" she shouted.
...
After a moment, I realized my jaw was hanging so I pretended to cough and regained my composure. I wasn't expecting her to admit it. It was an interesting tactic but I'd do her one better.
"Yeah, don't be... worried. About me. Whatever, go away."
I fucked that up. She groaned in stress and there she went, marching back up to the castle. I followed her, kicking myself the whole way.
When I got back to the common room I found Lavender literally keeping watch at the portrait hole for me. I entered seconds after Hermione and Lav noticed that. As she approached me with narrowed eyes I found myself actually hoping she'd say something about it, bring it all out in the open, but she didn't. Instead, she started talking about something else while I made my way to the boys dormitory.
"Gobstones club is meeting in the Great Hall, d'you want to go down there and watch them?" she asked. I shrugged. "There'll be food," she added seductively.
I was faced with a choice between the mortifying prospect of meeting with Dumbledore or feasting and watching the Gobstones club host their monthly gauntlet, which admittedly I had a few sickles riding on.
I decided to visit the headmaster the next day.
I awoke the next day thinking it was a new day. No better or worse than the previous day, just new. A blank slate. I thought, "I'm in control of my own destiny, and I will face this stupid dilemma... soon. Maybe."
There I was, lying in bed, just me and my iron will. I sat up and pulled my four-poster bed's curtain aside and—bloody hell, it was bright. I got up and stretched until my shoulders cracked, then followed the sunlight to the window. Turned out there wasn't a cloud in the sky. I couldn't spend such a fine day playing chess indoors, could I?
I had slept in. From Gryffindor tower I saw some people walking across the field used for Flying class and towards the Quidditch pitch. I recognized Neville as far away as the Owlery because he tripped up no less than three times going up the stairs. As I surveyed the bustling school which apparently forgets the threat of Dark wizards the moment the sun is shining, I felt my resolve strengthen. I went to go get my chess pieces.
On my way down the stairs, with a roar of my belly, my plans changed. I couldn't wage war on an empty stomach; to the kitchens I went. On my way to the kitchens, which are mercilessly placed in the basement with probably the farthest distance away from Gryffindor tower possible, I considered checking a book out from the library. This book would be read, by me, for both knowledge and reading pleasure. I'd like to establish that I do that from time to time. It's not unheard of.
Thoughts of books soon left my head as my stomach whined again. I knew enough about gamesmanship anyway. I understand the Chinese have built some sort of Sun Zoo that's meant to teach you about fighting strategies but in my view that borders on animal cruelty.
I started tickling the pear. I know what you're thinking, ruddy pervert, but to get to the kitchens you've got to literally tickle a painted pear on the wall. I wasn't in the kitchens two seconds before the House Elves served me food. I reckon history has trained their wee pointy ears to recognize the exact sound of my footsteps.
Mmm, a traditional English breakfast, with breakfast on the side. I was already fueling like a champion. "This is it," I thought. I had my pieces—my soldiers, and it was time for war. I was going to strike fast and conquer everything I see, like that Alexander guy the Muggles think is so great. Up the stairs, through the Transfiguration courtyard, I arrived at the gargoyle that guards the Headmaster's office.
"Acid pops," I said, and the guardian sprung aside.
When I climbed the revolving staircase and arrived at the door, I realized again that it was actually a stupid lark. How could I ask my bloody hero for help with such a silly problem? Granted, I've always wanted to have a match with him, but at such a stressful time... I mean, women do play mind games, and the odds are always in their favor because they're all insane. It's a natural advantage. I headed back down the stairs, towards the gargoyle...
"Who goes there?" someone called behind me.
I hesitated for one bloody second and Dumbledore had already left his office and gone down the stairs. The man is old as the earth but swift as the wind.
"Back again, Mr. Weasley?" he said. Of course he knew I was there the other night.
"How'd you know?" I asked.
"A birdy told me," he said with his hand on the gargoyle beside the entrance. Well, I suppose that was obvious. "Do you need something?"
"A miracle," I said. Too dramatic. "Er—just joking, I need—I mean, I want—er, I was wondering if you'd fancy a chess match?"
He stared at me without moving a muscle, as though my words took a few moments to register. Then he said, "Run out of worthy opponents?"
Yeah, in first year.
"I know it's unusual, I just—well, I don't even know if you play. Sorry, I'll just be going."
I said this but I didn't go, because wasn't sure he heard me. He was lost in thought.
"Perhaps," he said. "Perhaps... but is it ethical?"
He sounded extremely interested in whatever he was going on about. I was too. He's terribly mysterious.
"Ethical?" I asked. "Would you beat me that badly?"
Then his face lit up, only for a moment but I spotted it. "I have an idea, but I've got errands to run at the moment. Meet me in an hour and a half in my office. This time, I ask that you remember to enter. Excuse me," he said with a smile, and he walked past me.
I wasn't sure what to think. Probably because I wasn't sure what had just happened.