Chapter Two

After Draco left, Hermione quickly applied some more make-up. She hadn't seen Harry, Ron and Ginny for almost two months, and she had changed a lot. Hermione wanted to wait until the feast before seeing them, probably because she wanted a lot of compliments from them.

Hermione brushed her dark brown wavy hair with her fingers. She had grown her hair down to her chest and she had dyed it dark brown, which was a welcome change to browny-blonde. She had discovered the world of make-up, and had transformed herself completely with it. At the beginning of the summer, she was not sure on how to use it, and spent hours finding and perfecting a look that suited her. Hermione didn't want to be covered in make-up; she just used it to enhance her features.

She took off her Muggle clothes and started to change into her Gryffindor robes. A holiday in America over summer had improved Hermione's body greatly. Before she carried a small amount of puppy fat, but this had been burnt off by swimming, surfing and to Hermione's great surprise, yoga.

Hermione was pleased with herself; she had not read over fifteen books in the summer, but three instead. Hermione wanted to drop the goody two-shoes reputation and be more friendly, approachable and fun. Hermione wanted to be fun to be around.

The train suddenly came to a halt. Hermione checked her reflection in the window of the train, fluffed her hair a bit, and joined the throngs of people scrabbling to get off the train.

Draco had his head rested in his hands as Dumbledore talked about last year, this year, new students and changes. He concentrated on not falling asleep, so he reflected on the day's events instead.

'I really treated that third year badly. God, why am I so up myself? It must be father; he always tried to turn me into him. Well, I don't want to be father, I want to be myself. Seventeen years of being suppressed and made to be like my father is too long. I must have missed out on so many things throughout my life because of him. From now on, I won't be influenced by father.'

Draco looked across the hall towards the Gryffindor table. Hermione was laughing and eating with her friends, she was surrounded by people. Dumbledore must have stopped talking and Draco was too involved in his thoughts to notice. She punched Ron on the arm and laughed. It was like Hermione was just turning into a teenage girl. For many years, Hermione had acted like a woman. Now she was finally letting her hair down and was being true to herself.

"I can't believe how much you've changed!" Ginny exclaimed.

"I can't believe how much you've changed!" said Ron. "My sister, the emo. Mother must be so proud!" he finished sarcastically.

"Ha-ha. And anyway, I'm not emo, I'm scene."

"So what brought around this change, Ginny?" Hermione asked. It felt good to catch up with her best friends after two whole months apart.

"Well, mum let me go off in London," Hermione raised an eyebrow; she knew Mrs Weasley wouldn't let Ginny go off in a busy Muggle city alone. Ginny sighed. "Okay, I sneaked off a few times. I said I was going to friend's houses but instead I was going to Muggle shops. London is so great! Anyway, I started going to Camden Market, a few skate shops, and I ordered some clothes over the…" Ginny stopped to think of the name. "…internet, I think it was called. I used a computer in a Muggle library. There was amazing websites with the most incredible clothes you could ever think of! So I ordered them, they came to my Muggle friend, Grace's house, and I paid for them."

Hermione was astonished by Ginny's daring. "How did you get Muggle money? And Grace was fine with you having clothes mailed to her house, was she?"

"I transferred some of Fred and George's money that they gave me for the summer into pounds at Gringotts when I needed to go to Diagon Alley. And Grace was fine with it; I told her my parents wouldn't be okay with it being mailed to my house and she suggested it being sent to hers instead, and she'd mail it on to me."

"You told her you are a witch?" Hermione asked.

"No, luckily the postman delivered it to the village post office, so I had to walk there and sign for it. It cost a lot, but I think it's worth it." Ginny flicked her thick side fringe out of her eyes. Her hair was cropped in a bob to the middle of her neck.

"And then, all summer we were forced to listen to rock music." Harry piped up; rolling his eyes like it was a bad memory.

"I didn't make you listen to it, if you didn't want to then I'd turn it down or switch it off."

"That's not what you said when Bill asked you to turn it down. You told him to fuck off!" Ron reminded her.

"That was because my favourite song was playing."

"Yeah, mum's gramophone took a real beating this summer," Ron muttered darkly. Hermione giggled.

Ginny glared at her brother. "Anyway, I want to hear about you, Hermione. How was your summer?"

And with that, Hermione began telling them about her holiday in America.