It was the day of the Yule ball and fifteen year old Hermione Granger was getting nervous. Nervous? Hell yes! she only had a few hours left to prepare for the big evening. Her friends had spent the afternoon having a huge snowball fight with all the other kids that had stayed for the holidays. With only a few hours to spare before the ball she left the sidelines, from where she had watched her two best friends play in the snow, behind and went back to Gryffindor tower to prepare.

Soaked and wet and cold. Usually Hermione loved walking outside the castle, but this afternoon, she felt ambiguous about it. She was freezing and couldn't wait to get to her dormitory and have a long, steaming hot shower. At the same time, the prospect of spending hours listening to the girls blabbering about makeup, pretty nails, hairdos, dresses... Bleh... Being surrounded by gossiping teenagers was not something she loved. In fact, she hated it; she barely tolerated the non-stop buzzing of their high pitched voices into the dormitory in the late hours of the night, each and every weekend.

There were times where Hermione wondered if she would have been better in Ravenclaw, where her need to be surrounded by books would have been respected and not laughed at. She loved her books, the quietness of the Hogwarts library, the scent of the old books with their leather spine and ( sometimes) musty parchment. She respected them, for the knowledge they could provide, and she had known for a while that knowledge is power. And to be respected in this world, you need power, or money. The fifteen year old might have looked innocent and naïve, and according to certain persons she was, but she knew a lot more than she was expected to. And she knew to be discreet when needed.

Reaching the huge doors leading to the Entrance Hall, a quick and well applied drying spell took care of the mess she would not be leaving on the tiles. True, the prospect of beauty talks was not that interesting, but the mere idea of getting a detention right at the beginning of the Holidays did put things into perspective.

Seven floors and as many set of enchanted stairs to step on, always staying alert and conscious of their moves and patterns, always keeping an eye to where she was putting her feet. After all, getting a foot ( or an ankle) stuck into a tricked step would be humiliating after your first year at Hogwarts. Nobody above firsties got caught if they were cautious. And she was cautious today. She would absolutely not let her mind wander and remember some tidbits of conversation she had heard her roommates talk about during the previous week. All the information was stored into a special place in her head where she would access it if or when the situation needed it, be it for homework, social things or blackmail.

Once on the seventh floor, telling herself she really must go and have her shower, [drying spells were really overrated compared to a hot shower], she hurried her pace. Hermione was shivering, and if someone had asked the Fat Lady her opinion on the bushy haired teenager that afternoon, she would have said that the chattering of her teeth made the password to the tower hard to decipher.

The walk through the common room was quick, as most of the boys were still outside and The younger years had gone home. And girls? Pretty much every Gryffindor girl from fourth years up were already in their dormitories, getting ready for the social event of the year.

Arriving in front of her dorm, lost into her thoughts about the long, hot shower she was going to take, she did not notice the soft moaning and whispers coming from the other side of the wooden door. She opened the door quietly, as she always did. And she gasped, not having anticipated the scene before her eyes.

o-o-o

This story was written for the I never challenge at the Teacher's Lounge. My prompt was : Sure. Hermione is getting ready for the ball in 4th year. So are Lavender and Pavarti. How's that working out for them...?

A big thank you to my beta, Chinaglaze.