P refectly obvious
The Gryffindors seemed to take it for granted that everyone would understand what was really important and just set about making it happen – always far more loudly than they'd thought they could do it. Ravenclaws discussed endlessly the problem then quietly solved it on a personal level – wailing the entire time that everyone should be so wise. Slytherins didn't bother with problems – they had the idea that they would go away if they ignored them fiercely enough, or at least ignored their proponents right to live.
Hufflepuffs said things. The things everyone knew didn't need saying. And a leader of the Hufflepuffs was expected to take charge on this. The D.A. was more important than O.W.L.s, Ernie said in the Hog's Head, and every other House rolled its collective eyes. But it was worth saying. Because since when could we trust the obvious things to be things people didn't ignore?
Ernie MacMillan was loud and brash and brave and obvious, but in all the right places. And he did wonder: in the heat of the moment when O.W.L.s were approaching, if even members of other Houses didn't have to remind themselves of the simple truth he had set forward like a pearl of wisdom that day in the Hog's Head – perspective was never a problem for Hufflepuffs the way it was for other Houses. And it would be only fitting if what kept them on track was, at least a little bit, the reminder that even that old duffer Hufflepuff prefect knew that the D.A. was more important than whatever rubbish they were concentrating on now.
