Hermione had figured her problems were over when she got home. How very wrong she was.
Everything had gone perfect. Hermione's speech had gone wonderful. ( apart from the fact that she momentarily forgot all the words and had imagined herself in her underwear for a second). She kissed Ron at the train station and promised to write him every chance she could. ( She did, too. Sometimes she had to load her owl, Athena, with three of four letters, just as she was returning) Harry had been frightening her through the entire trip home with gruesome stories of stalking and abductions, but was nice when they reached the station.
Hermione was reading a book in her room when she heard a tapping noise on her window. She ran to it, thinking it was Athena with Ron's letter. An unfamiliar barn owl swooped in, holding a silver envelope and a black rose.
Hermione screamed. Instinctively, she threw them out the window. Hermione sighed and turned back to her book.
She gave a strangled yell. The envelope and rose, that she had thrown out the window, lie on the page she was reading.
Hermione snapped the book shut on the parcel and threw it thing out the window. She laid on her bed -- where the rose and note were already waiting.
She ran, shrieking, down the stairs. She was alone, her parents had gone to a dentist's convention in London. Hermione picked up the phone and dialed the Dursley's number.
"Hello?" said a gruff male voice.
Hermione quickly caught her breath. "H-hullo? Is Harry there?"
"Who are you?" said the voice, suspiciously.
"I'm - I'm Hermione Granger. I need to speak to Harry."
"You wouldn't happen to be from that school, would you?" The man, who Hermione figured was Harry's uncle, Vernon, was alarmed.
"this is urgent!" She cried.
"Answer the question, girl,"
"yes but -- " there was a click as he hung up on her. Hermione redialed the number. "Please!"
"LEAVE MY FAMILY ALONE!" He shouted. Hermione dropped the phone.
"Please!" she shouted. "This is very serious and I can't reach anyone else! I need help -"
"DAMN RIGHT YOU DO!"
Another voice appeared in the background. "Who is it, Vernon?" she asked.
"Some nut for Harry."
Hermione recognized Harry's voice. "It's for me?"
"NO"
"You just said it was! Who is it?"
"How should I know?"
"It's Hermione!" she cried. "Tell him it's Hermione."
"Shut it." Mr. Dursley snapped.
Harry groaned. "Is it a boy or a girl?"
"It's Hermione!!" she repeated. "please, sir, just say that it's Hermione and that I got another rose."
"It's some girl about a rose," Mr. Dursley muttered.
There was a chink of breaking glass and a woman in the background screamed.
" CLEAN IT UP!!! ALL OF IT!! DINNER, ALL OVER MY NICE CLEAN FLOOR..."
"Reparo" Harry said. Hermione frowned, he wasn't really supposed to do magic around muggles. She supposed it was acceptable at home. He performed another spell to clean up the mess.
"DAMN IT, BOY, WHAT HAVE WE TOLD YOU ABOUT THE USE OF YOUR ........ ABNORMALITY .... IN THIS HOUSE?"
"I cleaned it up, didn't I?"
Hermione glanced at a patch of moon light on the counter, where the rose and note were laying, innocently.
Hermione gasped. "Please, sir!" She exclaimed. "I need to speak to harry! The rose..... It's here....following me...... "Hermione's breathing had become deep and uneven."... Going to get me......... Going to die......."
"I think you're friend is having a nervous break down, Harry" Said Mr. Dursley. There was a sound that indicated Harry wrestling the phone out of Vernon's hands.
"Hermione? What's wrong?"
"The rose........" she repeated. "it's here......following me.......going to get me.......going to die..."
"Hermione! Calm down!" Harry sounded almost as frantic as she did. "Begin at the beginning."
"I was reading.... An owl came...... delivered the rose and a note.....threw it out the window.....it came back..."
Harry gasped.
"....Threw it out the window again, as well as the book...... laid down on my bed.......It was already there.....ran downstairs...... called you. I -- just saw it again -- lying on the counter......in a patch of moon light,"
"Hermione? Do you have a garbage disposal?"
"Yes,"
"Put it in the garbage disposal and turn it on. The other times you got rid of it, but you didn't destroy it."
"That makes sense, I guess." She stuffed the rose and the note into the sink and flipped the switch. With a sickening gurgle, the note and rose were gone. "It's done." She said.
The lights in Hermione's kitchen were off. The only light was the pale glow of the moon. Hermione walked to the bathroom and locked the door. She felt safer there, it was the only room without windows.
"harry, how does he know where I live?"
"I -- don't know...."
Hermione flipped on the light and nearly fainted. A shriek echoed through her neighborhood that Hermione recognized as her own.
"Hermione? HERMIONE? Are you all right? Hermione?"
"The rose..... It's here."
Harry's eyes widened. He knew what she had to do. "Hermione." He said, "You've got to open that letter."
"I don't want to, Harry." She whimpered, frightened. "It scares me to death. What does he want? Why won't he just go away!"
"Open it, Hermione."
"All right," she moaned. She tore it open. A letter fell out.
I have to touch you. You drive me mad. I'm coming for you. I know where you are, I know what you're doing. You're on the phone, talking to Harry Potter, in the bathroom. I can see everything you do...........
Hermione shrieked. She read the letter to Harry, who didn't speak for a moment.
"Hermione." He said, shakily. "Don't come out of the bathroom. Don't go anywhere or do anything. I'll have to fly to your house. It's not that far."
"What if he gets here before you do? Apparently, he's a wizard, if he took potions and was able to look through a seventh story window."
"You know the spell to make sure the Alohomora charm doesn't work, right?"
"Oh, yeah. Why didn't I think of that?"
"Maybe because your trapped in a bathroom by some mad stalker?"
"but he could apparate!"
"Well,..... we'll just have to hope he doesn't."
Luckily, harry didn't live very far from Hermione. It was only about an hour's drive and a half an hour's flight. Harry got there just as Hermione was on the verge of a nervous break down.
"Hermione?" Harry called.
"GO AWAY!!!" She screamed. "I WON'T LET YOU IN!"
"It's me, Harry!"
Hermione unlocked the door. She threw her arms around Harry and hugged him.
"Oh, Harry! I thought you'd never get here!"
'I thought I'd never get here." Harry said. "A firebolt seems a lot slower when a friend is in danger." He helped her to the kitchen, she couldn't stand very well much less walk. "The first thing we have to do is get you out of here without him knowing. I guess you'll have to stay at the Dursley's' for now. I can't think of any other place to put you, even if we send a letter to Ron now, he won't get it until tomorrow."
"Yeah... How are we going to get to the Dursley's house?"
"Fly."
"Fly?" Hermione began to look rather sick. "I'd rather keep my feet on the ground, if you don't mind."
"And be caught by your stalker?" Harry asked.
Hermione's got a torn look on her face. "I guess I'll fly," she mumbled.
The flight was extremely uncomfortable, Harry and Hermione both would have agreed. Hermione didn't like heights, and Harry didn't like people moaning in his ear while he was flying. The worst part, was how Hermione felt as if she were being watched. Every now and then, her head would snap back, searching for a face, or at least a pair of eyes, watching her........ She kept thinking she had seen a person on a broomstick under them, above them, everywhere......despite the invisibility cloak.
After what seemed like hours, they finally landed in the Dursley's back garden. harry threw off the invisibility cloak and went to find Hermione, who had gone running the moment they landed. He found her being violently sick.
"I HATE heights." She said as she cleaned her mess up.
"Well, lets get you inside." Harry led Hermione to the back door of the house and let himself and Hermione in.
"Who's your friend, Harry?" said a titanically fat boy with blonde hair and three or four chins.
"Go away, Dudley."
"Not until you tell me who your friend is."
"Her name's Hermione. Now go away before I blast you to bits." He held out his wand, threateningly.
For a moment, he looked deathly afraid. He smiled stupidly. "You can't. You'll be thrown in that prison of yours -"
"Petrificus Totalus!" Dudley's obese body snapped together as if my remote control. Hermione recognized the spell as the full body bind.
"HARRY!" Shouted the gruff voice from Hermione's telephone conversation. "I HEARD THAT! UNDO IT NOW!"
"Harry, don't you think we've got enough trouble to deal with without you getting your mind beat out of you?" Hermione said, her eyebrows raised.
"Yeah, I guess you're right." He performed the counter curse as a large, mustached man clomped into the room.
"Who's this?" he barked.
"I'm the one you talked to on the phone, remember?" she said, politely.
"The one with the rose........ right." He said, as if she were completely mad. he backed away a bit.
"C'mon" Harry muttered to Hermione. "we don't want to stay around him too long. Plus, we have to write Ron."
"Yeah. Oh, I wish he were here........"
When they got to Harry's room, he pulled out a long bit of parchment. "Do you want to write it?"
"I don't think I could..." she said, infatuated with the collection of nearly untouched books.
"all right. Now, how should I begin."
" 'Dear Ron,' would be nice." Hermione said.
Harry laughed sarcastically. "Funny."
Dear Ron,
I got a phone call from Hermione earlier this evening. She had gotten another rose. She called me because I was the only one she knew with a phone. Any way, the rose and note followed her, even after she threw it out the window and chopped it up. I made her read the note and it said that he needed to touch her and he was coming for her and that he could see everything she was doing. I have her here with me now. She's safe at the moment, so don't worry. Get here as fast as you can!
- Harry
PS Hermione says that she loves you.
"That works." He said to himself as he finished to note. Harry took Hedwig out of her cage and tied the letter to her foot.
Hermione watched as she flew away. "I hope Hedwig's quick. I need to see Ron. I really miss him. "
"I know. He'll get the letter soon and you can have him then."
Everything had gone perfect. Hermione's speech had gone wonderful. ( apart from the fact that she momentarily forgot all the words and had imagined herself in her underwear for a second). She kissed Ron at the train station and promised to write him every chance she could. ( She did, too. Sometimes she had to load her owl, Athena, with three of four letters, just as she was returning) Harry had been frightening her through the entire trip home with gruesome stories of stalking and abductions, but was nice when they reached the station.
Hermione was reading a book in her room when she heard a tapping noise on her window. She ran to it, thinking it was Athena with Ron's letter. An unfamiliar barn owl swooped in, holding a silver envelope and a black rose.
Hermione screamed. Instinctively, she threw them out the window. Hermione sighed and turned back to her book.
She gave a strangled yell. The envelope and rose, that she had thrown out the window, lie on the page she was reading.
Hermione snapped the book shut on the parcel and threw it thing out the window. She laid on her bed -- where the rose and note were already waiting.
She ran, shrieking, down the stairs. She was alone, her parents had gone to a dentist's convention in London. Hermione picked up the phone and dialed the Dursley's number.
"Hello?" said a gruff male voice.
Hermione quickly caught her breath. "H-hullo? Is Harry there?"
"Who are you?" said the voice, suspiciously.
"I'm - I'm Hermione Granger. I need to speak to Harry."
"You wouldn't happen to be from that school, would you?" The man, who Hermione figured was Harry's uncle, Vernon, was alarmed.
"this is urgent!" She cried.
"Answer the question, girl,"
"yes but -- " there was a click as he hung up on her. Hermione redialed the number. "Please!"
"LEAVE MY FAMILY ALONE!" He shouted. Hermione dropped the phone.
"Please!" she shouted. "This is very serious and I can't reach anyone else! I need help -"
"DAMN RIGHT YOU DO!"
Another voice appeared in the background. "Who is it, Vernon?" she asked.
"Some nut for Harry."
Hermione recognized Harry's voice. "It's for me?"
"NO"
"You just said it was! Who is it?"
"How should I know?"
"It's Hermione!" she cried. "Tell him it's Hermione."
"Shut it." Mr. Dursley snapped.
Harry groaned. "Is it a boy or a girl?"
"It's Hermione!!" she repeated. "please, sir, just say that it's Hermione and that I got another rose."
"It's some girl about a rose," Mr. Dursley muttered.
There was a chink of breaking glass and a woman in the background screamed.
" CLEAN IT UP!!! ALL OF IT!! DINNER, ALL OVER MY NICE CLEAN FLOOR..."
"Reparo" Harry said. Hermione frowned, he wasn't really supposed to do magic around muggles. She supposed it was acceptable at home. He performed another spell to clean up the mess.
"DAMN IT, BOY, WHAT HAVE WE TOLD YOU ABOUT THE USE OF YOUR ........ ABNORMALITY .... IN THIS HOUSE?"
"I cleaned it up, didn't I?"
Hermione glanced at a patch of moon light on the counter, where the rose and note were laying, innocently.
Hermione gasped. "Please, sir!" She exclaimed. "I need to speak to harry! The rose..... It's here....following me...... "Hermione's breathing had become deep and uneven."... Going to get me......... Going to die......."
"I think you're friend is having a nervous break down, Harry" Said Mr. Dursley. There was a sound that indicated Harry wrestling the phone out of Vernon's hands.
"Hermione? What's wrong?"
"The rose........" she repeated. "it's here......following me.......going to get me.......going to die..."
"Hermione! Calm down!" Harry sounded almost as frantic as she did. "Begin at the beginning."
"I was reading.... An owl came...... delivered the rose and a note.....threw it out the window.....it came back..."
Harry gasped.
"....Threw it out the window again, as well as the book...... laid down on my bed.......It was already there.....ran downstairs...... called you. I -- just saw it again -- lying on the counter......in a patch of moon light,"
"Hermione? Do you have a garbage disposal?"
"Yes,"
"Put it in the garbage disposal and turn it on. The other times you got rid of it, but you didn't destroy it."
"That makes sense, I guess." She stuffed the rose and the note into the sink and flipped the switch. With a sickening gurgle, the note and rose were gone. "It's done." She said.
The lights in Hermione's kitchen were off. The only light was the pale glow of the moon. Hermione walked to the bathroom and locked the door. She felt safer there, it was the only room without windows.
"harry, how does he know where I live?"
"I -- don't know...."
Hermione flipped on the light and nearly fainted. A shriek echoed through her neighborhood that Hermione recognized as her own.
"Hermione? HERMIONE? Are you all right? Hermione?"
"The rose..... It's here."
Harry's eyes widened. He knew what she had to do. "Hermione." He said, "You've got to open that letter."
"I don't want to, Harry." She whimpered, frightened. "It scares me to death. What does he want? Why won't he just go away!"
"Open it, Hermione."
"All right," she moaned. She tore it open. A letter fell out.
I have to touch you. You drive me mad. I'm coming for you. I know where you are, I know what you're doing. You're on the phone, talking to Harry Potter, in the bathroom. I can see everything you do...........
Hermione shrieked. She read the letter to Harry, who didn't speak for a moment.
"Hermione." He said, shakily. "Don't come out of the bathroom. Don't go anywhere or do anything. I'll have to fly to your house. It's not that far."
"What if he gets here before you do? Apparently, he's a wizard, if he took potions and was able to look through a seventh story window."
"You know the spell to make sure the Alohomora charm doesn't work, right?"
"Oh, yeah. Why didn't I think of that?"
"Maybe because your trapped in a bathroom by some mad stalker?"
"but he could apparate!"
"Well,..... we'll just have to hope he doesn't."
Luckily, harry didn't live very far from Hermione. It was only about an hour's drive and a half an hour's flight. Harry got there just as Hermione was on the verge of a nervous break down.
"Hermione?" Harry called.
"GO AWAY!!!" She screamed. "I WON'T LET YOU IN!"
"It's me, Harry!"
Hermione unlocked the door. She threw her arms around Harry and hugged him.
"Oh, Harry! I thought you'd never get here!"
'I thought I'd never get here." Harry said. "A firebolt seems a lot slower when a friend is in danger." He helped her to the kitchen, she couldn't stand very well much less walk. "The first thing we have to do is get you out of here without him knowing. I guess you'll have to stay at the Dursley's' for now. I can't think of any other place to put you, even if we send a letter to Ron now, he won't get it until tomorrow."
"Yeah... How are we going to get to the Dursley's house?"
"Fly."
"Fly?" Hermione began to look rather sick. "I'd rather keep my feet on the ground, if you don't mind."
"And be caught by your stalker?" Harry asked.
Hermione's got a torn look on her face. "I guess I'll fly," she mumbled.
The flight was extremely uncomfortable, Harry and Hermione both would have agreed. Hermione didn't like heights, and Harry didn't like people moaning in his ear while he was flying. The worst part, was how Hermione felt as if she were being watched. Every now and then, her head would snap back, searching for a face, or at least a pair of eyes, watching her........ She kept thinking she had seen a person on a broomstick under them, above them, everywhere......despite the invisibility cloak.
After what seemed like hours, they finally landed in the Dursley's back garden. harry threw off the invisibility cloak and went to find Hermione, who had gone running the moment they landed. He found her being violently sick.
"I HATE heights." She said as she cleaned her mess up.
"Well, lets get you inside." Harry led Hermione to the back door of the house and let himself and Hermione in.
"Who's your friend, Harry?" said a titanically fat boy with blonde hair and three or four chins.
"Go away, Dudley."
"Not until you tell me who your friend is."
"Her name's Hermione. Now go away before I blast you to bits." He held out his wand, threateningly.
For a moment, he looked deathly afraid. He smiled stupidly. "You can't. You'll be thrown in that prison of yours -"
"Petrificus Totalus!" Dudley's obese body snapped together as if my remote control. Hermione recognized the spell as the full body bind.
"HARRY!" Shouted the gruff voice from Hermione's telephone conversation. "I HEARD THAT! UNDO IT NOW!"
"Harry, don't you think we've got enough trouble to deal with without you getting your mind beat out of you?" Hermione said, her eyebrows raised.
"Yeah, I guess you're right." He performed the counter curse as a large, mustached man clomped into the room.
"Who's this?" he barked.
"I'm the one you talked to on the phone, remember?" she said, politely.
"The one with the rose........ right." He said, as if she were completely mad. he backed away a bit.
"C'mon" Harry muttered to Hermione. "we don't want to stay around him too long. Plus, we have to write Ron."
"Yeah. Oh, I wish he were here........"
When they got to Harry's room, he pulled out a long bit of parchment. "Do you want to write it?"
"I don't think I could..." she said, infatuated with the collection of nearly untouched books.
"all right. Now, how should I begin."
" 'Dear Ron,' would be nice." Hermione said.
Harry laughed sarcastically. "Funny."
Dear Ron,
I got a phone call from Hermione earlier this evening. She had gotten another rose. She called me because I was the only one she knew with a phone. Any way, the rose and note followed her, even after she threw it out the window and chopped it up. I made her read the note and it said that he needed to touch her and he was coming for her and that he could see everything she was doing. I have her here with me now. She's safe at the moment, so don't worry. Get here as fast as you can!
- Harry
PS Hermione says that she loves you.
"That works." He said to himself as he finished to note. Harry took Hedwig out of her cage and tied the letter to her foot.
Hermione watched as she flew away. "I hope Hedwig's quick. I need to see Ron. I really miss him. "
"I know. He'll get the letter soon and you can have him then."