It's funny how when upsetting things happen, all you remember are the words that were said and a minor detail, like the clicking of a mechanical pencil that was happening in the background, or the narrowed eyes of the person you thought was your friend.
Hermione felt so angry that she could hardly read, and when her emotions threatened to consume her, she made lists. Today's was:
Things People Say Instead of Apologizing, by Hermione Jean Granger
1. Oh, you know how I am.
2. Let it go!
3. What's the big deal?
4. If you didn't...then I wouldn't have...
5. I only...because you...
The girl gritted her teeth as the last statement played in her head. It played and played, each time giving emphasis to a different word in the sentence.
If she wasn't curled up in the library, she would probably scream. All she wanted to do was expel his face, his voice, that sentence, that friendship, from her memory, so she could lose herself in Beartown by Frederik Bakman. The knowledge that she had a free half hour in the middle of the day to just read this book was what got her through the first four hours of the morning.
She stopped breathing when the loud, heavy door to the library opened and she saw who trudged in. Squeezing further into her hiding spot, she thought No no no no no no no no no no no. Her head was pressed up against the wall, behind the plant, and her eyes drilled a hole into the ceiling, while she reasoned desperately, if I can't see him, then he can't see me.
"If you can't see the camera, the camera can't see you!" Uncle Donald would say at family reunions. She nodded, and even though she was a remarkably logical girl, she assured herself of this. Even when she heard the footsteps of those moccasins that he wore (that were actually slippers, she didn't know how he wore them outside) approaching her.
"Hermione," Harry whispered. Hermione groaned when she realized her hair was too big for her to properly hide behind the plant. "What are you doing in here?"
"Reading," Hermione replied in a small voice, shifting ever so slightly away from him.
"Why haven't you been at lunch? Ron said that you guys got into some kind of fight?"
"I don't want to talk about it." Hermione tried to keep her voice down and glancing over at Mr. Ressendorf, who was trying to appear very invested in his game of Solitaire but actually heavily eavesdropping. He didn't know why Hermione was avoiding going to her lunch, but he wondered if it had anything to do with Harry Potter and his obnoxious ginger friend that always played games on the computers instead of doing projects.
"High score!" Harry exclaimed, his hands flying into the air, as he beat the computer soccer game. Ron groaned.
"You always win everything," he whined.
"We need to talk about this! Hermione, we need you!"
"Need me?" Hermione snorted. "For what?" Mr. Ressendorf wasn't sure, but it sounded like she already knew the answer to that question.
Harry sighed, running a hand through his messy black hair, reminding the librarian of James Potter, who he had gone to school with. "Geometry is kicking our butts and we both just failed a Bio test-"
"Oh, so you need me to help you with your work?" Hermione broke in, angrily pushing herself up toward him. Any other person's voice would be rising with the heat of emotion, but Hermione would never dare to increase the volume of her voice while in the library. Anyway, the way she hissed made her sound even angrier. "You don't need because, I don't know, I'm your friend? You genuinely enjoy spending time with me? You care about me? It's my fault that you failed that test, as Ron so kindly told me?"
"Hermione, of course we care about you!" Uh oh. Not only did Harry interrupt her, but he began to raise his voice at her. The librarian tutted and shook his head.
"Well, that's news to me! You guys are all busy with your football parties and getting drunk on the weekends and acting like IDIOTS and you expect ME to pick up your slack?" Hermione took a deep breath, threading her fingers through her hair, trying to calm down. "I'm not your mom. I'm not your tutor. I thought I was your friend. If you really want my help, you're gonna have to PAY me because I am SICK of you guys only wanting to hang out with me when you NEED something from me!"
Mr. Ressendorf was so disgusted with how Harry and Ron had been treating Hermione that he decided he needed to end this. "Mr. Potter, I believe you have somewhere you need to be," he hinted, trying not to act like he cared too much. Harry opened his mouth in indignation, but thought the better of it and stomped out of the room. "Some friend you are!" Harry yelled before he opened the door, and the librarian jumped when an apple soared through the air, hitting Harry in the back. "ARGH!" He slammed the door behind him. Mr. Ressendorf picked up the apple, tossed it in the trash can, and turned back to his game, but started when he heard a sniffle.
Dang it, thought the man who had only really about his cat. He pulled himself up out of his old blue chair, grabbed the purple box of tissues, and decided he probably needed to say something comforting. "Coming from one nerd to another," he spoke gently to the girl hiding behind her mane of light brown hair, "you're going to want some friends who like you for you, and not what you can do for them."
Hermione nodded tearfully and mopped her face off. "But how do you find those?"
Mr. Ressendorf shrugged. "I know it sounds cliche, but you just need to be yourself." He heard a slight push on the door entering the library as Hermione blew her nose, and he saw the Bulgarian foreign exchange student peeking through the window. A small shake of the head told the boy what he needed to know, and he didn't enter the room. But then Mr. Ressendorf thought about how the girl may have already found herself a friend who liked her for her, whether she realized it or not.
"Get up, now. I need someone to read the new John Green book for me and tell me what level of heartbreak to expect, so I can prepare my sister." Hermione chuckled and followed him to the desk, not noticing the foreign exchange student still watching from the door concernedly. Mr. Ressendorf sighed, and while Hermione read the back of the book, invited the boy in with a wave of his hand.
An avid reader the boy was not, but today he had been wondering if checking out and reading his own books would impress Hermione, or make her feel more comfortable. "You have soccer books?" Viktor asked Mr. Ressendorf. Hermione jumped when she heard another voice as she was already sucked into the story and not heard him come in.
"Hi Viktor," she greeted warmly, then promptly buried her face in the book when she realized how frightful her post-crying face must look. Her cheeks and eyes always stayed red for the rest of the day, and her brown, bloodshot eyes looked terrible.
"Hi Hurrmione," Viktor began, "Are you..." Mr. Ressendorf looked warningly at him, attempting with his eyes to say that this was not the time to ask "Are you okay", not when she had just managed to calm herself down. "...how. How are you. Sorry, I am learning English. Are you how. How are you. Oops." He gave a tiny grin, and the librarian thought him lucky that he was so charming, awkward, and foreign, so he could get away with that strange sentence.
Smacking a hand to his face, Mr. Ressendorf walked beckoned the boy with him to the soccer books. "I'm fine, thanks. How are you?"
"I am good. I am happy to see you," the boy replied boldly. Hermione looked a little taken aback, but Mr. Ressendorf met her eyes and raised his eyebrows meaningfully. The girl was smart, she had to pick up on something, and she had to respond if she wanted herself a friend.
"It's nice to see you again, too," she replied sweetly, and went back to her corner. Viktor's dark eyes followed her, and his long legs began to do the same.
"Hey. Soccer books," Mr. Ressendorf reminded him, and Viktor wheeled around.
"Yes. Sorry."
"I don't know what kind of books you're looking for, but we have a book called How Soccer Saves the World, this book on the history of soccer tactics, a biography on Lionel Messi, and another one about Pele."
"Um...all the books," Viktor responded distractedly, his eyes wandering back to Hermione, who was in her nest with her back against the plant, her hair tangled in it, and surely she would be left with leaves in her hair.
Now, Mr. Ressendorf wanted this thing to work out. Hermione deserved it, Viktor seemed like a nice if not a little bit of a lanky Golden Retriever kind of kid, but the boy couldn't just stare at her. "Take this one, I think she'll be the most impressed with it," he muttered, giving him the book How Soccer Saves the World. "Bonus points if you mention an interesting fact or story. She's not sporty, but she loves to learn."
Viktor grinned at him. "Dank you, sir."
"And don't forget to actually read the book, don't just pretend," Mr. Ressendorf pointed out to him, which was met with a quick nod. Viktor slowly approached Hermione (sitting a little closer to her today! The boy was not wasting time) and Mr. Ressendorf noticed them, on two separate occasions, glance up at each other, smile, and return to their books.
He sighed and leaned back in his chair. Caring about people was exhausting. Thank goodness Tina, his cat, was so low maintenance.
As the minutes ticked by, the librarian remembered that Viktor was not in Hermione's lunch, recalling the week before when he had been sent to the library by McGonnagall during a test. The boy was skipping out on class to spend time with her, and the most intimidating teacher in the school's class at that. It was too late in the semester to switch into most classes, but perhaps Minerva could be persuaded to allow him to independently study in the library.
Oh, no. Now he was caught between being his library job and this side gig matchmaking. And he was fooling himself into thinking that Minerva McGonagall, human tornado, would be persuaded into allowing one of her students skip her class to learn on his own for no actual reason. Mr. Ressendorf groaned at himself, and tried to focus on Solitaire and maybe think of a different option.
The bell rang, startling all three inhabitants of the room. "Bye Hurrrmione!" Viktor called quickly, knowing that she left so fast that he might not get a chance.
"Bye Viktor!" She replied, waving.
Viktor picked up her forgotten pillows, afghan, and teddy bear, and put them in the conference room closet. He smiled gratefully at Mr. Ressendorf, who a minute earlier had been struck with an amazing idea after looking at the school's lunch schedule. The other classes that ended before Hermione's lunch were complicated things like Trig, AP Lit, and Physical Science...all except for one, that he was sure Viktor would be able to transfer into. "Hey, Viktor," he asked innocently, "how do you feel about singing?"