"I need to get into Hermione's knickers.
I need to get into Hermione's knickers.
I need to get into Hermione's knickers."
I was in a corridor on the seventh floor that nobody ever uses. I wanted to go somewhere I could pace and mutter to myself, so I just went "wherever," and that's where I ended up. Poor, innocent Hermione had no idea what designs I had on her, of course, which was the bulk of the problem. A vision of her tossing her wild hair, of her sparkling eyes and sweet smile appeared in my thoughts, and I smiled, too. Then I cursed myself for being a lowlife bastard.
The only thing noticeable about the whole corridor was a sole portrait of some sort of magic circus with a wizard with a whip herding a bunch of trolls wearing dresses. Other than that, it was empty, not even a disused classroom to be seen.
It must have been my fourth, or perhaps my fifth turn in the corridor when out of the corner of my eye I had a vague feeling I was seeing something in the wall. I turned again, and there it was: an inauspicious looking classroom door. It must have been hidden for some reason, and my pacing must have revealed it somehow.
Surprisingly, it wasn't locked. When I swung open the door and peered in, cautiously, I immediately noticed it was a strangely apt room for the problem I had been worrying over — it was, of course, a library, although a smallish one.
In front of the stacks was a small table just right for putting my clothing on after I took it off, and a comfortable-looking sofa, and lying on that, lavishly and lovingly illustrated, was exactly the book I would need to solve my Hermione problem:
" An Inexperienced Witch's Guide to Resizing Magical Lingerie ."
And next to that, folded neatly, Hermione's brassiere and pants. If there was a chance of getting through this humiliation without her finding out - or, at worst - not hating me forever if she did, it would require spells more delicate than I was used to, after all.
At any rate, after I pulled them on and got dressed again, I vowed to myself I would never, ever, under any provocation or circumstances, make any future wager with a Weasley twin. The penalties were simply too severe.
And that was how I found the Come and Go room.
Apparently, Harry had fallen asleep doing homework in the common room, and his older self had experimented with writing "an essay" in his mental landscape. Sure enough, Harry's body had sleep-written that little anecdote, fortunately on a fresh piece of parchment, which was resting on top of Harry's Potions essay.
Oh, how humorous, you overgrown adolescent, she thought, unconsciously putting her hands on her hips. Still, she needed Harry up and planning their next weekend excursion to the Lovegood home. She gently shook Harry awake and helped him wake up by spelling cold water onto a handkerchief so he could perform the most minimal ablutions before gathering his materials and heading to breakfast.
While eating, she showed him the "essay," and assured him that she had already discussed the Come and Go room with her older self, and it absolutely was NOT how they had discovered the room. Unfortunately for Harry, while he clearly didn't want to offend Hermione, nonetheless he couldn't hold back his laughter at the whole thing. Seeing Harry almost helpless with mirth forced Hermione to smile despite her best intentions. She also warned Harry he must not let his older self do his homework for him, which would be detrimental to his education. Writing up messages and research as he slept would be fine, at need, but no more. And even that was a little disturbing, given Harry had only recently regained control.
Before they finished, Harry said paying for another portrait of Hermione was the least he could do to thank her, and she answered that they could call the first portrait repayment for helping him take his body back, and this one would be repayment for his older self trying to obliviate her memories, so they were even.
"I told your older self I wanted an unlimited budget, but that was for him. Since it's you, we'll work out what we want to do together. And both of us can consult our older selves for both school and our problems this year."
They had decided to leave older Hermione's portrait at the Rook, as it would help when making a second one, and Hermione had had the advantage of consulting her older self for a week, so Harry needed to catch up, anyway. Once the second one was available, Hermione would be able to visit the Lovegoods and catch up with Harry's portrait whenever she wanted. Mr Lovegood would disillusion her current portrait and apparate it to the Hogwarts gates, and she could keep it in her bed with the curtains drawn and silencing spells when people might hear them talking. When she was in classes, older Hermione could study and research at the Rook.
They had talked with Ron Weasley on Friday, offering to buy Ron's pet rat, Scabbers by getting him an owl and a new wand, also throwing in a few Galleons. He jumped at the offer, since he was using a hand-me-down wand that wasn't very effective, and Scabbers was not much of a pet. Mrs Weasley had picked up Ron from Hogwarts on Sunday and met them in Diagon Alley. Hermione told Ron that Scabbers was getting too fat on a diet of scraps from the Great Hall table, and she was going to put him on a healthier diet. From the rat's reaction, it almost looked like he understood her, and if a rat could look put out, he did.
To kill two birds with one stone, they begged Ron to talk to Neville about wands, basically asking him to pass on what Ollivander said about the wand choosing the wizard. When they went to Eeylops Owl Emporium, Ron ignored a tiny hyperactive owl that probably would have been all they could afford, and went for a normal, average bird. That still was an enormous improvement on Errol, of course, and, at a loss for a name, he looked up at the sign and named the owl "Eeylops." Fortunately for him, the shop attendant thought that was good publicity, and threw in a cage and owl treats for free. They discovered that third years often used the floo from the Three Broomsticks to the Glasgow branch of the Emporium to get supplies and have their owl's health examined, since an owl bought in first year was usually due for it.
Molly Weasley looked thankful for Harry and Hermione's intellectual curiosity since they were squaring Ron away better than she'd thought she could, for his first year. Hermione had a hunch that she'd been told about them being mis-sorted Ravenclaws, and that meeting them only confirmed that opinion. The Weasleys seemed pleased when Hermione said she was planning on getting a cat soon, so Scabbers would probably live with the Lovegoods as one of Luna's pets. As they explained to her, if Percy or Ron wanted to look in on Scabbers, they were right next door, and Luna was brilliant with animals of any sort…
Because she and her older self had managed to get all of their work for the next couple of months at least outlined, they had done the same for Harry in the past few days. As for their reputation as miss-sorted Ravenclaws: Older Harry had insisted on Gryffindor, so they could more easily capture Ron's pet, and Hermione decided it wasn't worth bickering over. She could still reach out and make friends with and study with anyone she wished. She took most of older Harry's advice about her behaviour to heart, and it had all made her second week much more enjoyable. In turn, once they'd simply bought Scabbers, both Harrys agreed that the only real advantage left was that Gryffindor needed a Seeker for Quidditch - which Harry wouldn't have time for this year, anyway. Hermione graciously allowed that the request to buy Scabbers might not have worked out as well if they weren't his housemates. And she added that having Harry go into Gryffindor probably made the headmaster happy.
Hermione befriended Susan Bones and Hannah Abbot by offering to study with them, with plans to mention Harry's godfather eventually and ask about his trial. In general, Harry and Hermione socialised without giving up school time, and word got around Hogwarts that they were more or less inseparable. Harry complained that he was seen as being a little eccentric, as he often seemed to space out before answering questions in class. She taught him how to ask his older self questions without apparently losing focus.
Harry and Hermione leaving for the Lovegoods to conduct Potter family business was becoming a routine. If anyone had complained, Hermione would have cited Draco and Pansy doing the same thing (although in truth that had only happened once). Hermione's new portrait was up the stairs next to Pandora's. Her original portrait, and Harry's, were downstairs, and as usual, Mrs Lovegood and Hermione were sharing a picture frame.
She had already explained to them what the pet rat really was, so Mrs Lovegood put a ward on the cage and put it in a warded room that would prevent him changing back to his normal form or escaping. At least, with Luna tending him, he would have a good life until Harry decided the time was right to tell the DMLE about him.
Older Harry had apparently made his peace with his portrait self and was probably eager to get out of younger Harry to be with his Hermione. However, some issues had clearly been smouldering, and while the Lovegoods ate dinner with Harry and Hermione, the three portraits and them had a lively discussion about one of them.
Harry volunteered to pass on what his older self said straight away for a while. He still wanted to explain himself to younger Hermione.
"If the ritual had gone as I wished, but I was merely coming back, let's say, a month, and the net result was you woke up with a month's more memories of the future added on top of the ones you had before I knocked you out, would that be seen as murdering your younger self? Because I can't see it."
She probably looked miffed, though her older self just looked amused.
"No, of course not. But several years change a person fundamentally, Harry. My memory is extremely good, but it's like most people's, not comprehensive. And I am going to lose lots of memories if I have to integrate those several years. Picture yourself going back a century, Harry, and doing that. Would you really think that wasn't more or less erasing my personality and replacing it with an old woman's?"
"Then, when the Obliviation squads go around cleaning up Muggle sightings of magic, are they murdering Muggles? After all, they're not only getting rid of memories, they're implanting false ones, and on top of that, forcing suggestions on them."
"Well, again, no," acknowledged Hermione. "But if you were to take that to an extreme, like Magical Britain did for a while in the early years — you take children from non-magical homes and then you erase their memories of even having a child and implant years of false memories, you're getting awfully dodgy. And awfully close to a kind of murder of the personality, I should think."
At that, older Hermione put her hand in front of her mouth and looked both horrified and ashamed. Hermione had a sinking feeling something she wouldn't like to hear about had gone on. She reminded herself that seventeen- and eighteen-year-old Harry and Hermione had been in the thick of a particularly brutal war, so if they had, indeed, victimised someone in that way, it might have been a life-or-death situation where that was the gentler alternative to outright killing them.
Her older self interrupted, "Well, the entire discussion is moot, and you two should put aside your differences. Neither ritual was what Harry thought it was, and the net result was two sets of souls, not obliviating or restoring memories," she said, with a rather sharp tone.
Portrait Harry agreed with her and added that further philosophical discussions would be enjoyable once they'd covered the business they needed to handle. When they returned to that free-form discussion, with the Lovegoods and the two Hermiones facing Harry and his portrait self, she discovered that she had more in common with older Harry than she'd thought. Time had apparently mellowed her but sharpened him somewhat. She'd become more tolerant and placating, and Harry more uncompromising from their shared experiences. Still, she reflected, portrait Harry had the same personality, yet he mostly showed Harry's tolerant and good-humoured side.
"People said I should go for Ron, or some did," her older self said, looking indignant, "because, they said, unlike Harry, Ron had a sense of humour and could make me laugh. Dreadful advice and absolutely wrong, I found. Ron was influenced by the twins, but Harry had the Marauders, who were much more entertaining."
When they told everyone about the Come and Go room story, they all laughed, and her older self winked at her.
When they returned Sunday evening, they compared notes in the Gryffindor common room. Harry's older self had some urgency about things they needed to get started on. But after Hermione said Harry's parents would have wanted him to focus on school first, older Harry agreed with her. All she had to do, she found, was cite a conversation with older Hermione and older Harry would capitulate every time. It helped, as Hermione had to remind Harry quite often, that in the end, his older self had to answer any questions Harry asked him, truthfully.
She hoped Harry wouldn't ask about her older self's response to the Obliviation issue, but he probably would.