"So, Harry, how's your first day going so far?" asked Hermione, the brunette general manager who had trained him.

"Just swimmingly," Harry said scathingly. "I already managed to piss off a customer and Minerva."

Minerva McGonagall, an older woman, was the owner of Pleasant Cup cafe.

Hermione waved her hand dismissively. "Minerva knows how hard you've been working. She'll be fine. And what are you going to do about pissed off customers? You can't please everybody."

"I spilled coffee on him."

"Wait, you what?"

Harry sighed.

Hermione's hand flew up over her mouth as her eyes crinkled in amusement. "You can't be serious."

"Deadly."

"Oh, you poor thing," she cooed. "More like, poor him. Bloke was just trying to go about his day and you spilled coffee on him."

"It's not like I meant to," Harry said, collecting the coffee pots and heading to the dish room, hoping Hermione would catch the hint and terminate the conversation. She did no such thing.

"What did you say to him?"

"I said what any normal person would've said, I said I was sorry."

Harry couldn't help but reflect back on the fury in the stranger's eyes as he'd spilled the scalding liquid down his front, how those grey eyes almost seemed to sparkle silver in the light. They had captivated him.

"'Sorry' doesn't unstain his shirt, you know."

"He took it fairly well, all things considering. He could've gotten a lot madder. I even offered him something on the house for the trouble."

"Hermione," came Ron's voice, another coworker of Harry's, "remember we've got that meeting to- Oh."

Ron stopped at the sight of Harry, and Harry cocked a curious eyebrow.

"Meeting?"

Ron flushed. "Erm . . ."

Hermione pinched her lips. "We aren't allowed to talk about it . . . I'm sorry, Harry."

"Talk about what?" Harry pressed. He knew it was none of his business, and he had a feeling that he'd be wiser to stay out of it. But something tugged at his gut, telling him that he needed to know and be a part of whatever this was.

Ron and Hermione exchanged an uncomfortable glance.

"It's top secret, we could get arrested just talking about it-"

"We aren't in a place to tell you, is what he's saying," said Hermione grimly.

Harry sighed. "Okay. I understand."

"Thank you."

"Ron? Hermione? Are we still on for the discussion of Half of a Yellow Sun today?" came a dreamy voice that belonged to a blonde named Luna, Harry and Ron's other coworker.

Hermione sighed deeply.

Ron face planted.

Harry's eyes widened. Half of a Yellow Sun sounded like . . . a book . He couldn't remember the last time someone had mentioned a book in front of him. Just talking about them was strictly forbidden, and could result in arrest.

Luna startled at the sight of Harry, and she almost dropped everything on her tray.

"Oh. I didn't realize you had company."

Hermione glared daggers at her.

"I was just telling Harry how good of a job he did today, other than the coffee incident," she said through her teeth.

"Oh, the coffee incident," said Luna wistfully, a mischievous smile on her face. "I saw that."

Harry felt humiliated. First he was being shunned, now Luna was grinning at his expense. But he couldn't focus on that for long. Luna had mentioned a book . What was going on?

He looked at Luna, gaze pleading. Luna shook her head at him sadly.

"I should've kept my mouth shut, shouldn't I?"

"I know you don't have a reason to trust me," Harry began carefully, gaze flicking from Ron to Hermione to Luna, "but whatever it is you're talking about, your secret's safe with me. What incentive do I have to rat you out? Besides, it sounds pretty dangerous, to be honest, so I probably shouldn't get involved at all."

He hoped that by feigning disinterest they would lax their barriers around the subject.

Hermione and Ron exchanged another skeptical glance. Luna took a step closer to him.

"He seems serious," she said quietly.

"Are you mad?" Ron exclaimed. "Absolutely not. Sorry, mate, but this isn't something that's meant for an outsider's ears."

"You should've been more careful talking about it, then," said Harry, knowing that wasn't going to get him any closer to finding out the secret but not caring at the moment.

Ron glowered.

"You've only been working here a week, and how was I supposed to know you'd be in the dish room? Speaking of which, can we take this conversation somewhere else? It reeks."

Hermione sighed. "We aren't taking this conversation anywhere, because it's over. Harry, I'm really sorry. Luna, you'll do well to remember not to mention any titles aloud. Ever."

"I think we should give him a chance," said Luna. "He's one of us now, and he already knows it has something to do with books."

Hermione gasped at Luna using the B-word so openly, even though it was only the four of them in the shop.

It wasn't hard for Harry to figure out; he wasn't a moron. Clearly Luna was alluding to some sort of secret club of sorts, where they met and discussed books. Like a book club. He used to go to book clubs when he was younger because he'd loved reading so much.

"Listen," said Harry, taking pity on Ron and Hermione for attempting to hold together the house of cards that was already wobbling. "I know you're talking about a book club. I'm not stupid."

"Shh!" Hermione hissed, brown eyes widening.

"There's no one else here," he reminded her gently, but he understood the apprehension. Riddle had drilled it into them to never mention books aloud. Many had even learned to fear the word itself. But Harry didn't see the point in fearing a word; it was just a word. He thought that by fearing the word, he would come to fear Riddle more.

"As it is, it's a private book club," said Ron. "And we're currently not accepting members."

"Don't be ridiculous," said Luna. "He already knows, we may as well show him instead of leaving him out to dry."

Harry looked at her gratefully, a small smile spreading across his face.

Hermione fiddled with her brown, curly bun. "Harry could have connections to the government."

"I don't have any connections to the government."

"Like we're supposed to just believe that?" exclaimed Ron.

"If Harry supported the government, he'd be working for the government," said Luna. "The Peace Preservers promise luxury salaries and paid leave, while the rest of us are left to brawl over the remainder of jobs that don't pay nearly enough, often having to work multiple at a time. Why would Harry be working here if he supported the government?"

Ron gave Harry a once-over, as though he were looking for something.

"Not everyone who supports the government has a government position."

"But most of them do, because it's common sense," insisted Luna.

"Listen," said Harry, needing this argument to end. "Whether you guys end up deciding to show me your club or not is entirely up to you. I won't force you to do anything you want to do, and it clearly makes the both of you uncomfortable so I won't bring it up again."

Hermione straightened her posture. "Thank you, Harry."

Ron nodded. "As you shouldn't."

Suddenly, Hermione's cell phone rang. She dug into the pocket of her jeans to pull it out.

"Hello?"

It's Seamus , she mouthed to Ron.

"You can't hold the meeting anymore? Why?"

Harry heard faint echoes of a voice that sounded frantic.

"Hold on, hold on, slow down. What happened? Walk me through it."

Hermione listened, face morphing from cool and collected into panicked and afraid.

"What is it?" Ron asked. Hermione shook her head at him.

"She what?"

More silence. Harry and Luna exchanged a nervous glance.

All the color from Hermione's face drained. "Oh, no . . ."

Harry wasn't sure what was being said, but he thought he could faintly make out the words "lethal injection." His blood ran cold.

"Seamus, I'm so sorry. That's awful. I'm really, really sorry. How did they find out?"

Hermione fiddled with the hem of her dress shirt.

"No, I'm just glad you're okay, that you weren't home when it happened."

Pause.

"Did she hide a lot of them?"

Pause.

"Oh, Jesus Christ . . ."

Hermione sighed.

"I know she couldn't help it, I know she was always a . . . bookworm." She shuddered when she spoke the word.

"What's going on?" asked Luna quietly. "Hermione, is everything alright?"

Hermione shook her head frantically.

"Seamus, I . . . I'm so sorry. Really, I am."

Pause.

"No, please don't worry about the meeting. We'll find somewhere else to hold it- No, yes. We will."

Pause, and then,

"Okay. I'll call you later, alright? Please stay safe for me. And give your family my condolences."

Hermione snapped her phone shut with shaky hands, white as a sheet.

"Well?" Ron pressed.

"T-That was Seamus. His . . . his sister's being . . . killed. For storing books."

Luna and Ron gasped. Harry stood there with his mouth gaped open. He, like everybody else, knew that riots broke out everywhere and some people's books had escaped the raids of the Peace Preservers, but every time he heard a story of someone getting caught it filled him with the same kind of ice cold dread it did the first time.

"We need to find somewhere else to direct the meeting," she said quietly. "Somebody else needs to open up their home to the risk of a book being discovered."

It just occurred to Harry how long the increments between meetings must have been, if books were so scarce there was probably only one copy of Half of a Yellow Sun left on the entire continent. Each member would have to read the book before gathering for a meeting.

Ron dipped his head, remaining silent. Luna pursed her lips.

"Any takers?" Hermione asked.

No one spoke up. Slowly, all heads turned toward Harry, who wore a smile on his face.

"You could hold it at mine, if you want."

Gobsmacked, Hermione's mouth dropped open in shock.

"Just like that. Just like that, you're willing to put your life on the line for a club you aren't even a part of?"

Harry shrugged. "I live in a pretty secluded area. It's not right in the middle of everything. Additionally, I live in a house, not an apartment, so there'd be more than enough space for everybody."

"You live in a house? And you're working at a place like this?" asked Ron.

Harry flushed. He had inherited his parents' fortune when they'd died, but he still wanted to integrate himself into the community and not be a total and complete recluse. But it wasn't like he was about to tell Ron all that.

"Need the extra cash to pay off my mortgage," he lied easily.

Ron nodded, seeming to accept the lie.

"That still doesn't solve our issue, because we're obviously not doing it at Harry's," he said.

"What other choice do we have?" asked Luna softly. "Dean certainly wouldn't allow it, not with the way Ginny works for the Peace Preservers."

Hermione looked at Harry and gave a deep, long sigh. "Fine."

"Hermione!"

Harry grinned widely.

"Brilliant!" he exclaimed. "Hermione, I'll text you my address, and then you can forward it to all the other members of your club. If you don't want me to be a part of the discussion since I didn't read the book, I'll kindly see myself out of the room and leave you guys to it."

"No," she said quickly, "that's alright. It's your home, Harry. You can stay with us."

Harry smiled again.

"What time does the meeting start? I'll just need to do a bit of cleaning, and then you guys are welcome over."

"Normally nine," said Hermione. "But we can push it to ten, to allow you enough time. Unless that's too late?"

"No. It's perfect."

"Alright. It's settled, then. We're going to Harry's house."

Harry had just finished dusting the living room when the doorbell rang. Incidentally, the first people to arrive were Hermione and Ron. Harry politely refrained from asking if they'd come together, because it was obvious that they had. He wasn't sure what the nature of their relationship was, but throughout the day he'd caught Ron looking at her when he thought nobody was noticing.

"Come on in," he greeted warmly, stepping aside from the door.

"Hi, Harry," Hermione smiled. All he got in greeting from Ron was a curt nod. He'd take it.

"May I take your coats?" he asked.

"You don't need to be so formal, Harry," said Hermione, shrugging out of her jumper and handing it to Harry all the same. "But thank you."

Ron gave him his jacket as well, and Harry hung both garments up on the coat rack. The weather was brisk, with a slight breeze and mildly tolerable temperatures. It was too cold to be outside without a jacket, but not so cold you needed your winter coat.

"May I offer you something to drink?" Harry asked as he led his guests to the kitchen. "A glass of wine or something?"

"A water would be wonderful, thank you," said Hermione. Harry briefly wondered if she was actually thirsty or just appreciating his efforts to entertain.

As Harry filled her cup with ice, the doorbell rang again. He set down the cup and went to answer it.

Luna and Neville stood outside his door.

"Neville?" Harry asked in surprise. He honestly hadn't pegged the other man for a reader.

"It's good to see you, Harry," he greeted with a smile. He wrapped an arm around Luna; they were together? How many people in the cafe had relationships/things with each other?

"Come on in. Ron and Hermione are already here."

"Did they come together?" Luna asked as she shrugged her jacket off.

"Yeah, why?"

She smirked. "I dunno. Just thought they might."

Neville looked at Harry as he removed his jacket. "I dunno what she's on about. They've always been really close. They worked together for years before she got promoted to general manager."

How could he not see it? Harry saw it, and he'd only been working there a week. Today had been his first day out on the floor without Hermione or Minerva breathing down his neck.

The last guests to arrive were a redhead woman and an African man who introduced himself as Dean. The woman was named Ginny, and Harry noticed her handshake lingered for an unnecessary amount of time. He also took note of the way her eyes sparkled when she looked at him. He sincerely hoped she'd somehow figure out he was into men on her own without having to have an awkward conversation.

The group migrated from the kitchen to the living room, where Hermione stood at the front of the room with the copy of Half of a Yellow Sun tucked under her arm with a piece of paper in her other.

"Attention, everyone," she called, causing the chatter to slowly subside.

"I'd like to thank you all for coming in spite of the abrupt change in plan, and I'd also like to thank Harry for opening his home to all of us tonight."

Harry smiled at her. He could understand her initial apprehension to key him in on what was going on, so he decided he'd be grateful for the way things were going and take what he could get.

"Unfortunately, Seamus can't make it tonight. His sister has been captured by the Peace Preservers and is facing lethal injection, scheduled next week."

Quiet gasps rippled throughout the room.

"It's important that we keep this organization exactly what it was meant to be- a secret." As she said this, she looked directly at Harry, who faltered under her piercing gaze. He had no desire to expose their organization. He just didn't know how to get them to believe him.

"And it's even more important that we don't let this turn into some sort of rebellious riot. This is, and nothing more or nothing less, than a book club. Where we come together and talk about books that you guys have preserved. And then we hide them when we are finished with them, never to see them again."

Harry wondered how they found books to begin with. It couldn't have been easy. He wondered if there were some sort of black market. He was sure there was. How else would they get their hands on them?

"So without any further ado, I'd like to begin our discussion of Half of a Yellow Sun. I'm going to start with one of my discussion questions, and then as usual you guys can debate and respond to each other's responses. If anyone else has any discussion questions they'd like to ask, please let me know and we can allow time for them. Otherwise, my first discussion question is: How was Ugwu's identity shifted throughout the text? Did war portray a significant role in this shift, or did he already have inherently violent tendencies before war corrupted him further? There are several instances in the text that point to him having violent tendencies before the war, such as his desire to teargas Nnesinachi and rape her, which is cryptic foreshadowing of his later actual raping of the bartender, the ultimate destruction of Ugwu's identity. What do you guys think? Let's discuss."

Harry stood in awe of Hermione's complicated question. He'd been a reader, sure, but he'd never analyzed or contemplated literature so deeply. He was beginning to understand why Ron so badly wanted to preserve this group from him. It was fragile as a flower, delicate as glass, blissfully beautiful and heartbreakingly rare.

A hand went up.

"Yes, Ginny?"

"I agree with your opinion that he was violent before the war, Hermione. The text also points to an additional moment, several, actually, where he expresses genuine excitement for being a soldier. Granted, this excitement is mixed with fear, but is alarmingly present all the same. Ugwu wasn't programmed to be violent; it was in his nature."

Two more hands went up. Stunned, Harry let his mouth fall open. Was this what college English classes would have been like? What he was witnessing right now was golden. He wouldn't ever dare fuck it up.

"Yes, Luna, and then Neville."

"I see your point, Hermione, but I actually think that Ugwu was only excited to be a soldier because he wanted to make his patriotic master proud. He looked up to Odenigbo almost as a fatherly figure, and the master-servant dynamic between them slowly shifted to a father-son as the violence of the war worsened. Ugwu was terrified of war just as much as anybody else, and he wasn't raised properly so he didn't know how to treat women with respect. All he knew how to do was follow his animal instincts, no matter how violent they may have seemed."

"Interesting point, Luna. I very much agree that Ugwu wasn't raised right, and that largely contributed to his mistreatment of the female figures in his life. I also remember him putting Olanna up on a pedestal quite a bit in the novel. In fact, he even wanted to see his own sister's breasts so he could compare them to Nnesinachi's. However, that does not excuse his actions to any degree, and the fact that he wanted to act that way suggests that to at least some extent, he was violent by nature. Neville?"

"I was going to say that while I agree his identity may have been corrupted before the war, war definitely exacerbated those effects. It fundamentally changed who he was, hence the rape scene. I wholeheartedly believe that if he had not become a soldier, he wouldn't have gone through with the rape. I believe that his fantasy with Nnesinachi was just a fantasy; I don't think at the time he fantasized about it, he was emotionally capable of executing it."

"Hmm . . . That's a very interesting interpretation, Neville."

Harry watched in awe as the men and women continued to passionately discuss the book. Soon enough he found himself actually wanting to read Half of a Yellow Sun, even though its contents had already been spoiled for him. Then he immediately shook his head at himself for having such treacherous thoughts. He had a good thing going for him now- he didn't need a book to fuck it up.

"What about the chronology of the novel?" Hermione asked, bringing him back to earth. "What did you make of the way Adichie skipped ahead in Part Two and went back in time for Part Three?"

This led to an outbreak of discussion, and Harry swallowed it all up like an eager college freshman attending his very first lecture. He was utterly fascinated by this group. He had to admit it- he wanted in.

"Hermione?" he asked as everybody was gathering their things.

"Erm, I was wondering if I could . . . If I could . . ."

"Join the club?" she asked. "I'm really sorry, Harry, but we can't afford to expand. It's too dangerous."

"No!" Harry exclaimed. "All I was wondering was if I could borrow that book?"

It was out. There was no taking it back. Harry Potter wanted to read a book, and he had admitted it.

Hermione's eyes widened. "Okay . . . But it's your responsibility to dispose of it once you're done."

Harry smiled. "Deal."

Hermione slipped him the book. "Never, and I mean never , tell anybody you have it. Be sure to hide it away when company comes over. Don't bring it up, no matter how fascinating you may find it. You can't even talk to us about it; it's too dangerous."

Harry nodded. "Alright. I won't."

He said goodbye to his guests, who all thanked him for the company. On Ginny's way out, her gaze lingered on him and she gave him a soft, sultry smile. Harry wondered if Dean, the man she'd come with, was her boyfriend. Not because he was jealous; but because if it turned out Ginny was interested in him, Dean deserved to know about it. But what did it matter, anyway? This was a one-time thing. The likelihood of ever seeing Ginny or Dean again was slim to none. It wasn't his business. He didn't need to get involved.

Then he remembered- they were dating. Ginny worked for the Peace Preservers, which was why they hadn't been able to hold the meeting at their place.

With that thought, once he said goodbye to his last guest he fixed himself dinner and read and read and read. He couldn't stop thinking about that man he'd spilled coffee on today. Draco . Aside from the fact that he was criminally attractive, there was something in his guarded demeanor that made Harry want to shake him and ask him if he was alright.

Harry had wanted to get more integrated with the community, after all, and today had been the most eventful day he'd had in years. He wondered if he'd ever see Draco and those gorgeous grey eyes again.