Harry was fairly certain that he had mastered the use of the Engorgement and Shrinking Charm. As he waited in an empty compartment in the Hogwarts Express he performed the two charms over and over again on a playing card. He was thinking about how he could incorporate magic into his tricks when the door opened.
"Woah! Are you doing magic?"
Harry looked up to see a very small - smaller than he was at that age - mousy-haired boy that had a large camera hanging around his neck.
"Yeah." Harry nodded
"Can I have a picture of you doing magic? I'm Colin Creevey. Do we need to have cards or is that just for the older students?" The small boy reminded him distinctly of Hermione when he first met her in the train and he found himself wishing someone else could enter the compartment to take his attention away.
"No pictures. And you don't need cards, that's just me. I'm Harry." Harry said curtly.
"Oh." he said, crestfallen. "Well do you think you can teach me a little bit of magic? I never knew all the odd stuff I could do was magic til I got the letter from Hogwarts. My dad's a milkman, he couldn't believe it either. So I'm gonna take loads of pictures to send home to him. I heard that Hogwarts is a castle!"
Harry stared at the boy for several moments and processed what he had just said. "No, I will not teach you magic, the professors will do just fine."
"Oh," Colin looked crestfallen again, like someone had just kicked something he loved, "I was just hoping - " The compartment door opened and Harry breathed a sigh of relief.
"Would you like to buy a Quibbler?" asked a small blond girl.
"Sure. Come in." Harry commanded, glad for someone to turn Colin's attention to. ""I'm Harry, this is Colin Creevey." He jerked his chin towards Colin.
"I'm Luna Lovegood, it's a pleasure to meet you." She sat down next to Harry, who had gone back to thinking about incorporating magic into his sleight of hand tricks.
"What's a Quibbler?" Colin asked.
"It's a tabloid, this month's edition is all about the Blibbering Humdinger." Luna replied.
"What's a Blibbering Humdinger?"
Luna launched into a long explanation about the creature and the further she went on, the more Harry was sure that it didn't exist. Colin, on the other hand, was absolutely enraptured which only encouraged Luna to keep talking enthusiastically. Harry was just glad they were talking to each other and not him. He put away his cards, having given up on using magic and sleight of hand at the moment and started reading one of Lockhart's books.
He was just getting to the part where Lockhart was confronting a werewolf when he heard the compartment door open again. He glanced up to see Luna walk away with a smile on her face.
"Wow! Can you believe it? All these creatures existing - and I never knew! Right under my nose the whole time!" he exclaimed.
"Yup. Amazing. Where'd she go?" Harry asked worriedly.
"She said she was going to sell more copies down the train. Did you know about all this?" Colin gestured to a copy of the Quibbler. "I mean… Wow! I just can't believe - "
"Okay stop." Harry held out his hand. "Stop saying that, it's getting annoying." If Colin looked crestfallen before, he looked like he was going to burst into tears at that remark.
Harry sighed. "Listen, Colin. I know… you're excited about the magical world… and all that. But you have to stop with this attitude."
"Th- this attitude?" Colin blinked tears out of his eyes.
"Yes, I'm not trying to be mean when I say this," Harry placated, "but you're acting… loud, excited, you talk too much, you treat everything with so much glamour, like someone who's ahhh, what's the word." Harry snapped his fingers. "You know when someone meets a celebrity they idolize and they can't think straight?"
Colin asked, "Like Neville Longbottom?"
Harry almost laughed, "You think Neville's a celebrity? I mean, he is… But you can't treat him like that, like you're - starstruck! That's the word!" Harry exclaimed. "Listen Colin… Don't let magic dazzle you. Don't get me wrong, it's amazing and I wouldn't give it up for the world but… the people are still just people. If you keep up this attitude people are gonna make fun of you - like Luna."
"People make fun of Luna?" Colin asked, with a look of horror.
"No, but they will. Trust me." Harry said. "I don't think any of those creatures exist and I'm sure most people will agree with me. Now, if you go around talking about make-believe creatures what do you think will happen?"
"People... will make fun of me?" Colin asked timidly.
Harry nodded, finally he was getting it, "Yes, if you don't want to be made fun of then… do what I do. Try to stay quiet and remember to always stick up for yourself. If you ever let someone bully you and you don't do anything about it, then they'll keep bullying you. Try to laugh it off as a joke, make fun of them back, ignore them, but whatever you do, you can't let them think they've won."
Colin nodded his little head up and down and Harry sat back, satisfied that his lesson had gone through the boy's head. He opened his book again to find out how Lockhart would conclude his latest adventure. He finished by the time the trolley came by and he bought a few extra treats to show Colin, who instantly perked up when he bought him a Chocolate Frog.
"Are they really frogs?" he wondered.
Harry frowned, "Colin, that's the kind of question you can't ask. They make you seem dumb, like you don't know anything. Instead of asking 'are they really frogs' ask… 'how are they made'?"
"What's the difference?" Colin asked.
"The difference is…" Harry took a moment to hink. "If you ask it like the way you said, it means that you think it's a real frog and if you're wrong you look stupid. If you ask it my way, then it just sounds like you're interested in how they're made. Get it? You can't ask a question that… can make you wrong."
Colin just looked back with a face of confusion and Harry took a deep breath, "I mean - Just try not to ask yes or no questions. Instead, try to start your questions with why or how and remember not to ask questions a lot. Don't ask at all if you can help it." Harry leaned back to chew on his pastry and let Colin absorb the information. When Luna came by later to a much more subdued Colin and Harry tried to impart the same knowledge with her but she insisted that Blibbering Humdingers were real and after a while Harry gave up.
Harry was surprised to see her go to Ravenclaw instead of Gryffindor like Colin did, with her stubbornness he was sure Luna would be a Gryffindor. Harry sat next to the Bloody Baron again whom he nodded to as a way of greeting and ate as much as he could for the first night back at Hogwarts.
Neville had never hated anybody but he was quite sure that Lockhart was the first person he hated. He was lucky he went to Diagon Alley with his mother who scared Lockhart off when he tried to drag Neville for a picture. For once he was glad that she could be so scary when she wanted. Now, at Hogwarts the morning after the feast, he was sure that none of the other professors liked him very much either.
Just after Herbology class - his favorite - Lockhart had grabbed him and dragged him up to his classroom, his turquoise robes flowing behind him. Neville straightened his own robes and sat down at the very back. The rest of the class came clattering in, and Ron and Hermione sat on either side of Neville. When the whole class was seated, Lockhart cleared his throat loudly and silence fell. He reached forward, picked up a copy of Travels with Trolls, and held it up to show his own, winking portrait at the front.
"Me," he said, pointing at it and winking as well. "Gilderoy Lockhart, Order of Merlin, Third Class, Honorary Member of the Dark Force Defense League, and five-time winner of Witch Weekly's Most-Charming-Smile award - but I don't talk about that. I didn't get rid of the Bandon Banshee by smiling at her!"
He waited for them to laugh; a few people smiled weakly.
"I see you've all bought a complete set of my books - well done. I thought we'd start today with a little quiz. Nothing to worry about - just to check how well you've read them, how much you've taken in -" he said, handing out test papers. The quiz turned out to have nothing to do with actual spells or magic and was simply about Lockhart himself. Harry answered the questions he could and left the few he couldn't blank. Harry had resigned himself to another year with an incompetent defense against the dark arts teacher when he revealed a cage of Cornish pixies.
A few students let out snorts of laughter, but Lockhart waggled his finger, "Don't be so sure! Devilish tricky little blighters they can be!" The pixies didn't look dangerous. They were only about eight inches high, electric blue, with pointed faces, and shrill done. The moment the cover had been removed, they had started jabbering and rocketing around, rattling the bars and making bizarre faces at the people nearest them. "Right, then," Lockhart said loudly. "Let's see what you make of them!" And he opened the cage.
The pixies shot in every direction like bullets. Several shot straight through the window, showering the back row with broken glass. Harry stood up, scooping his things into his bag and slinging it over his shoulder. The pixies started to wreck the classroom, grabbing ink bottles, shredding books and papers, tearing pictures from walls, up-ending the wastepaper basket, and throwing books and bags out the window.
Harry slapped a few away when they tried to grab at him or his bag, trying to think of a spell that would take care of these annoyances. He snatched another pixie out of the air and scowled down at it. It mimicked his scowl and chomped down on his fingers.
"Ow!" Harry yelled. The tiny creature giggled in his hand and Harry scowled.
"Right, let's see how you like this - " he smacked away another one that was attempting to grab at his hair. He threw the pixie as hard as he could out the open window. It quickly disappeared out of his sight and he grinned, repeating the process with the next one he grabbed.
"Come on now — round them up, round them up, they're only pixies," Lockhart shouted. He rolled up his sleeves, brandished his wand, and bellowed, "Peskipiksi Pesternomi!" It had absolutely no effect; one of the pixies seized his wand and threw it out of the window, too. Lockhart gulped and dived under his own desk, joining most of the students. The bell rang and there was a mad rush for the exit and Harry made sure to be among the first few out of the classroom.