A Place to Belong
Hermione Granger had never been what one would call a "normal girl." As a child she had skipped pre-school and Kindergarten because she was already on the level of a second grader.
At first, her teachers found it adorable the way she answered every question correctly and glowed over her ability to make many friends. The other children would follow her around and beg her to do another trick and to tell another story to go with it. They called her "magical" and the teachers always thought it was so cute the way she was quite bossy around her peers.
She was much smaller than the older students but they treated her like royalty in the beginning and each would fight over who got to stand in line beside her or who sat by her at reading time.
"Don't fight," she said scolding them in a much too mature way, "You can sit by me tomorrow and you the next."
"Watch this, now." She would say and she would lead the children over to a corner of the play ground and they would all participate in some secret game of theirs. Several times the curious teacher would wonder over to inspect them but they would turn from her, making shushing noises with fingers over their lips.
At first, it was just an accident when the boy laughed at Hermione for tripping over the second step of the stairs and his pants fell down and he blamed it on her. She didn't even touch him!
It was another accident when Jenny Ray chose the new girl for her best friend and she got her taffy stuck so tight in her hair and so close to the scalp that she had to have all of it cut off. Oh, poor Jenny didn't attend school for a week and everyone knew why. She really wasn't so cute and pretty without her long blonde hair. She once told Hermione that she had her nanny brush it exactly 50 strokes a night. The boys all called her "skinhead Jenny" and her mother had been at the school for hours yelling at the teacher. She threw Hermione a rather nasty look on her way out that made Hermione burst into a frightful fit of tears.
Hermione had been sent home with a mark on her school report that day and her parent's had frowned but Hermione cried and told them that she didn't do it. She said she had thought about it and it had just happened. They soothed her and exchanged glances above her head as she buried her head in her father's stomach.
She didn't really want it to happen!!
More of the little things started to happen when she was practically excited or upset and it was now that people began to notice.
When Jamison Williams spilled glue all over her perfect Popsicle house and glue suddenly began pouring from his nose and ears, the teacher called for a conference with the Granger's and the students' began to edge away from her with wary looks.
None of them really found Hermione interesting anymore and the neighborhood kids were forbidden to play with her.
Her parent's took her to a doctor who informed them that perhaps she was suffering from stress even though she seemed perfectly fine to him and referred them to a therapist.
The final straw had been on a Tuesday, in third grade, during their coloring activity. Hermione had been trying very hard all day to behave. She didn't even get angry when that tall boy tripped her. In fact, her eyes had watered, her small lower lip pouted and quivered and the teacher put the mean boy in time-out.
But when the teacher walked by all the other students' paper's and smiled at their work, but told her that she was coloring the wrong way she just couldn't help but get a little annoyed. She was younger than everyone else after all, how was she supposed to know that there was a certain way to hold a crayon.
Before she could count to ten, her box of crayons just seemed to float up into the air and hurl themselves at the unsuspecting teacher.
Her parent's had signed her out of the school that very day and when none of therapist sessions or doctor appointments proved to find possible idea of the problem, they hired a private tutor and told her it was because she was just too smart for normal schooling.
But she was smart, you see. And Hermione knew that there was something very wrong with her that wasn't normal at all. She had thought it was funny and amazing how she could make the little characters in her fairy-tale books move and dance. She thought it was amazing the way she could make her dollies dress themselves and make a book come to her without even picking it up, just like that movie Matilda!
But not everyone did. She saw her parents talking worriedly after they would put her to sleep and she would sneak downstairs for another cookie.
The weird lady with the big leather chair would talk quietly with her parents and no one wanted to play with her anymore. Soon the Granger's stopped sending her to that lady and settled on all home tutoring, horse-riding lessons, painting, piano lessons, and dance lessons to keep her occupied. She never knew it when she was younger, but she was quite the rich little girl.
So, Hermione put her eight-year-old brain to work and tried to put a stop to all the weird things she was doing. She stopped playing with her dollies, gathered books by hand, and read only novel length books without the pictures. Fairy-tales never came true anyway.
Her parent's noticed and they were momentarily relieved at this until they realized how unhappy their daughter had become.
"Why don't you go outside and play with the other children, pumpkin?" Mr. Granger asked his ten-year-old daughter as he stood in the doorway to her room, watching her read a rather thick book.
"I'd prefer to read." She said simply in her small voice and turned a page.
"But, darling, the other children are having a wonderful time." He protested. And it was true. They were darting in and out of the sprinklers, the water leaving small drops on their crisp, tan skin warmed by the brilliant sun.
"They don't play with me!" She said annoyingly and snapped her book closed. She stomped over to her window and looked out longingly towards the ground.
"I asked to play but they think I'm weird." She muttered with a pout. Oh, how she wanted to fit in.
Her father crossed the room and took her into his arms. What else could he do?
"Come, we'll have our own fun." He said lifting her onto his back. "Mummy told us not to sneak a snack, but she never said we couldn't bake anything."
Hermione giggled against his shoulder.
"You and baking don't mix, Daddy."
"Ah, well, I can try. Practice makes perfect."
Imagine how confused, relieved, and happy the Granger's were when they got the letter from Hogwart's and the visit from the strange man, Dumbledore.
Their daughter had smiled and was keeping herself busy by dragging them on numerous trips to the magical place of Diagon Alley, to stock up on all her school supplies and anything of importance that caught her interest.
Hermione was ecstatic about being a witch. Nothing was wrong with her after-all!! She was special!
She was going to do it right this time! She would learn everything she could and be the best she could be. Hopefully she would find a few friends along the way.
Friends...
It would be nice... Surely they wouldn't be hard to acquire now.
After all, she was a witch, she had powers like everyone else, and she would fit in!! More people just like her!! The thought was amazing. She was on clouds for the rest of the summer.
She gave a hearty but eager goodbye to her parent's and was on her way.
However, she found that making friends may not be as easy as she thought. She was excited to show off that she knew as much about the Wizarding world as everyone else.
She met Harry Potter, the boy she had read about, and his friend and they disregarded her with a mere crude glance. But they weren't the only ones. She clung socially to the Longbottom boy, but he clung to her as well. They were quite a pathetic pair.
Her first day and she was already feeling as alone as she did at home.
But...she went on, drinking up her classes and making friends with all the girls in her dorm.
She soon learnt that maybe all it took was a little time...
She would never be normal, but she was fine with that, she thought, as she headed off to class with Harry Potter and their friend Ronald Weasley.
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Mr. Granger smiled at his daughter before him. She grasped the Weasley's hand as she spoke to her mother from across the couch, leaving him to smirk at the young red-headed boy's obvious discomfort in conversing with her father.
His little girl had grown up and the process had certainly been a confusing, but happy time nonetheless. She had found her place in the world and he wondered if she ever thought about it like he did.
She leaned over to kiss her fiancé on the cheek and he burned bright red and looked nervously at her father.
Mr. Granger leaned forward.
"Now, let's chat about your feelings towards my pumpkin and how you plan to support her, shall we?"
The Weasley gulped.
fin
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A/N: Ah, the smell of success is fresh. This, like many of my ideas, came as a whim. Just wanted to delve deeper into the life of Hermione Granger before and after. Hope you enjoyed!!