A/N: Me again, trying to inject some "life" into this mundane fanfic of miniscule proportions. Nothing interesting here, move along.
Harry Potter and The Order of the Phoenix
Part two
Harry went back to Hogwarts with not much fuss. It had been a Friday afternoon when Hagrid had brought him back to Hogwarts, and now, after a weekend of mostly joyful reunions, it was as dreary a Monday morning as you could get. Dumbledore had thoughtfully procured a set of fifth year school books, and he had potions first thing Monday morning. Every Monday morning, according to his timetable, in fact. He had managed to get into every class with either Ron or Hermione or sometimes both of them. "Duh!" he said to himself, "That's because we're in the same house!" Harry shook his head. In Australia, it was much different. Everyone went to different classes, no matter what homegroup you were in.
Harry liked it a lot better at Hogwarts than in Australia. Here, he shared a room with his friends, not an overgrown pot plant and several shoe boxes. But the house he had lived in in Melbourne wasn't all that bad. It had a quaint little attic room, and although the garden was rather wild, it had a nice, wizarding feel about it, even though the people he was staying with were Muggles. Apparently there were millions of wizarding schools in Victoria, most of them being in the rich eastern suburbs. Hell, there were about five of them in the radius of about 2 miles, near the McDonalds where he used to work. It was ridiculous, Harry thought, and each of them had around 2000 students each. There was Trinity Grammar, an all boys' school, Xavier, another all boys' school, MLC, an all girls' school, Ruyton, another of the same, although quite a bit smaller, and Carey, the only co-ed one. And around 15 minutes by tram down the road, there was another one, an all boys' school called Scotch. It was hard to believe they were wizards and witches, all dressed up in Muggle clothing, but he felt the sparkle of magic around them.
Harry trudged into Potions,
and dropped his books on the table where Ron and Hermione were sitting. They
were sitting really close, and were looking at each other as though they wished
that nothing was between them, no clothes, and no air. Harry cleared his throat,
and they both guiltily looked up.
"Hi, Harry!" Hermione said.
"Er, yeah, hi." Ron added, his cheeks burning. Harry greeted both
of them, and then sat down. Just then, Snape swept in, looking a lot kinder
than he had during the past four years.
"Now class." Snape looked at them indulgently, "Today we will be concocting a potion of your choice. You will have to bring your suggestions to me, and I will either approve or disapprove of them. You have five minutes to make your choice. By the end of those five minutes, I expect I shall have approved a potion of some sort to every group of two or three." He sat back in his high backed chair, and waited. Almost immediately a hubbub broke out.
Harry sensed something was wrong the moment Snape had walked in the room. This Snape was too nice. Way too nice. He looked way too nice too. Something about him was different-nicer, not as menacing. The Snape he knew would have been berating Harry about his absence for the past three months. And on his appearance-long hair and shabby robes. But then again, maybe not. After all, Snape was the one who wanted to get him expelled. It didn't happen, but perhaps ignoring Harry was the best way Snape could get over it. So Harry stopped worrying over Snape's intentions and whether they were good, and got on with choosing a potion.
Eventually, Hermione, Harry and Ron decided they would make a hair dye that was ingested and guaranteed whoever took it bright purple hair. For some completely unknown reason, Snape agreed, and they started on it straight away. Then it hit him. Snape's hair wasn't dripping with grease as it usually was, it wasn't long either. This Snape had had his hair cut. But the hooked nose was the same-just like always. There was no doubt that this person was Snape. But was he really?
About halfway through the lesson, Snape stood up and called for silence. His eyes gleamed. "The time has come for me to take you on a journey to a place far, far away, yet so close."