Author: Kiara
Prologue
Characters: Hermione/Draco
Rating: R (just because I don't know exactly whats going to be in here yet.)
Disclaimer: I don't own the song or the Harry Potter characters, places and situations. Harry Potter belongs to J. K. Rowling, Bloomsbury Publishing Plc, Scholastic Books, and Warner Brothers.
Author Policy: Can be found at http://www.writersu.s5.com/law/moreharrypotter.html
A/N: I'm not sure where this is heading...I have the first part of the fic mapped out in my head, but the end of it I am not sure about. Don't worry, Hate's Sweet Seduction is being worked on!!
I used to wonder why the saying "Learning is a never ending experience" is so popular. I'm sure that we have all heard it at some point or another. Teachers seem to love pulling that one out to try and motivate their students, and well meaning relatives like to use it too. They say it with such bright enthusiasm. Maybe they are hoping to make whoever they are speaking to realize how wonderful learning is, to light a spark of excitement in the eyes of a bored student. After they say it, they look at you with expectation, as if they believe that all of a sudden their classroom of bored, sleepy students will morph into one full of willing, eager learners.
Of course, I've always been different from everyone else. Give me some credit, my intelligence is not always centered around facts. Even as a child I felt that there was something that held me apart from the others. I remember walking with my mother in the park, and badgering her with questions about everything I saw around me. She would laugh indulgently, but never once did she leave one of my questions unanswered. She didn't know everything, of course, but she would never just say "I don't know," and leave it at that. She would tell me that she would see if she could find something for me, and sure enough, in a day or two, she would call me over to her and I would learn something new. Sometimes she merely told me bits of information, other times she would lovingly guide me through a book she had brought home from the library, or hold me on her lap as we sat together, enthralled in a video she had found.
Other kids noticed that I was different. Don't ask me how, I think that when we're children we just have a natural radar that tells us when something is different or unusual. Unfortunately, this same radar leads us to believe that being different is a bad thing. At first I tried to fit in, tried to be like the happy groups of little girls that I saw all around me. But when you're young, you don't know what exactly makes you different...you just are. And try as I might, I just couldn't change who I was.
You do get used to it after awhile, you know. The stares don't always feel like x-rays, examining and exposing all your secrets to the world, and eventually the whispered comments don't turn themselves into horrible stories being told about you, in the depths of your own imagination. Being alone becomes a commonplace thing, and its hard to imagine what its like to be with other people, or what it would be like to have someone other than family to rely on.
Its the pain that gets you in the end, though. You can try to bury it deep within the depths of your heart and soul, but it'll eat through to the surface and show its ugly head. Too much pain can twist and mutate the best among all of us.
I know that I'm lucky. Somehow the gods looked down and decided to bless me with two people who liked me for who I was. The day that Harry and Ron saved me in the girls bathroom was the beginning of a new future for me.
But the happiness of the present or of the future does not eliminate the pain of the past. It smooths over the scars, and allows old wounds to close up, but deep beneath the surface the memory remains. And it recognizes pain in others...in some ways I think thats what drew Harry and I together. We needed each other in ways that neither of us understood then, or even understand today.
That same remembered pain pulled me towards another person, but it took a long time before either of us listened to what our hearts were telling us, or even allowed the blindfolds of hate to be removed.
You can never truly understand what I mean, unless you experience it for yourself. But let me tell you about it anyways. It turns out that learning really is a never ending experience. And remember - some things you just can't learn about in books.