Ch. 3

Snape was raging in his office, the entirety of his fifth year potions class had destroyed one of the most simple potions for a fifth year student to create. There was a hesitant knocking on his office door, he wondered who it could be. Who would be foolish enough to disturb him at this time? The door creaked open and the probably the last person in the world he wanted to see stuck her head around the corner.

"Professor," Hermoine cautiously, "I was wondering if you would like to meet the new student?"

Snape stared at her. She would have been, most definitely, the person who heard most about his temper at the moment.

"Is it essential, Ms. Granger, that you interrupt my lunch to introduce me to our new student?"

"You are the last teacher that she needs to meet, and I thought that it would be a better idea to introduce to her now, instead of during a class." Hermione mumbled.

"You thought?" questioned Snape, "Right now it seems that thinking was the last thing on your mind."

Rebecca out in the hall was listening to all of the conversation and couldn't help thinking that Snape may have been the most sarcastic jerk ever. She didn't need to meet him, and now with hindsight she was pretty sure now that she didn't want to meet him.

"You might as well bring her in, seeing as how you have already managed to take up most of my time with your frivolous chatter." Snape sneered from his office.

Hermione turned toward Rebecca and motioned for her to go into the office. Rebecca walked in, noticing that Hermione chose to stay in the doorway.

"And you would be?" Snape asked.

"Rebecca Johnson." Rebecca retorted. She cringed realizing how challenging that had sounded.

"And pray tell, what is your reason for transferring to Hogwarts at this most inconvenient point of the year?"

"I was told that I ought to come here, because I showed promise in areas concerning magic." Rebecca lied. "I was able to do things that weren't possible, without magic."

Snape looked at her, seeing through the obviously lie. "Oh and what were you doing that showed promise?"

"I didn't burn." Rebecca prayed that he wouldn't ask her any more questions concerning anything about her past. That was a subject that she wanted to go into.

"Hmm, well you will be staring with first years, yes?" Snape asked.

"Yes."

"I would like you to come in after dinner for the next week, you will need to be caught up with the rest of the class. I will not have you doing any of the potions that the rest of class may be doing until you are caught up on the basics."

Rebecca nodded and turned around to leave.

"Oh, and Ms. Johnson, this is not an easy class, you will need concentration and dedication, there will be silly wand waving here."

Rebecca turned back around expecting more.

"You may go now Ms. Johnson. I will see you tomorrow after dinner."

Rebecca walked back out into the hallway with Hermione and shut the classroom door quietly behind her.

"Is it just me, or does he make you want to punch your hand through a wall or something?" Rebecca asked Hermione

Hermione laughed, "I'm not really the person to ask, although he is a rather sardonic prat, I can stand him, just a little bit, however if you want to get into a 'Snape is a satanic wanker, talk to Ron."

Rebecca nodded, "So, you can stand him, why? He treated you ghastly there. And he has this whole, 'Evil is my middle name' quality about him."

"Well, yeah he is really unpleasant, but I don't really know, I guess its just, I don't think he'd be here if he wasn't to be trusted."

Hermione looked away from Rebecca and began walking down the hallway, she was a little wary about telling Rebecca all of Snape's past, or at least what she knew of it to justify why she trusted Snape. Rebecca watched as Hermione began to walk away from her, and shrugged, untouchable subject number one had just been put on the table, and Rebecca couldn't figure out why.

"In my experience, girls don't talk about something that their friends don't like...... if they really liked the something. That was it, Hermione must have a crush on Snape." Rebecca reasoned, "Ew, tall, dark and very, very scary."

Having made up her mind on the situation, Rebecca ran after Hermione down the hallway.

Hermione was practically out of the dungeons by the time Rebecca caught up with her. She grabbed her shoulder trying to get her to stop. Hermione kept walking until Rebecca grabbed her arm and pulled hard, making Hermione fall on top of her. Rebecca cracked up, and Hermione looked at her for a few seconds and began laughing too. They both began to stand up, and Rebecca noticed her sweatshirt was torn.

"Aw, damn, stupid sweatshirt got torn!" Rebecca was trying to see how bad it was, and realized the tear went all the down the seam of the sweatshirt.

"Hey, Hermione do you think we could go get me something else to wear? I'm not going to walk around the rest of the day with a torn sweatshirt on."

Hermione grinned, "Yeah, this is actually a good excuse to show you around the Gryfindor tower. And we can try and figure out which room you are in."

Rebecca smiled sarcastically, "Yay, more fun."

Hermione showed Rebecca to where the Gryfindor tower was, the door seemed to be behind a giant portrait of a fat opera singer.

"What's the password, ladies?" The lady said.

Rebecca shuddered slightly, she still couldn't get over the portraits that moved, it seemed unnatural to her.

"Manticore." Hermione stated.

"That's it!" The fat lady sung out.

The painting swung open and Hermione and Rebecca climbed through into the common room. Rebecca was stunned, the entire place was red, and gold. There was message board over on the side with layers, and layers of papers all fluttering slightly. There was a enormous fireplace right in the middle of the wall and at least twenty armchairs in different places around the room.

"This is the Gryfindor tower" said Hermione, "This is the common room, where most people are after dinner most nights, some people go to the library, on weekends some people will lie around in here. And through that door, is the girls dormitory."

Hermione pointed at a plain wooden door.

"Now lets go and try to find your trunk and stuff in there."

It took them about twenty minutes to find the room Rebecca was in, Hermione noted with some surprise that her stuff had been moved in here too. Hagrid had probably done that after he found out that Hermione was Rebecca's tour guide of sorts, and would be one of the only people Rebecca knew.

"Hermione, do you think I ought to change into a robe?" Rebecca inquired.

Hermione nodded, "You might as well get used to wearing them now."

Rebecca grabbed one out of her trunk and put it on. She looked at herself in the mirror and laughed.

"I look like a vicar, or a judge!" She put on a mock serious face, "Order in the court!"

Rebecca burst out laughing again. Hermione noticed that Rebecca still would stand out from everyone else, she had put on one of the school outfits, but had only tied her tie around her neck in knot, she had pulled her socks up, but you could barely see them under her knee high boots, and her shirt was not tucked in to her skirt. She looked a lot scruffier than all the kids at Hogwarts.

"Rebecca, maybe we should go to the library now?" Hermione interrupted Rebecca's appraisal of her self in the mirror, "You still haven't seen most of the school, and we only have an hour before dinner."

Rebecca nodded, curtseyed at herself in the mirror and followed Hermione out of the dormitory.

The library was huge compared to any of the ones Rebecca had been in before. There were hundreds, if not thousands, of rows of books. A old looking woman with horn rimmed circle glasses sat behind a desk at one end of the library. As they walked in, she gave them an accusatory look and wouldn't take her eyes off them. Hermione showed Rebecca where the sections were and what a few of her favorite books. Rebecca got really bored, and fast, libraries were not her thing. Hermione noticed her boredom, and realized it was time for dinner.

Hermione and Rebecca were one of the first people into the great hall other than a stately old man with a huge beard sitting at the professor's table. Hermione grabbed Rebecca's arm and began dragging her up the aisles between tables toward the old man.

"Rebecca, that's the headmaster, Professor Dumbledoor!"

Rebecca looked at him, closer up he didn't look that old, his eyes look childish and he was smiling.

"Hi, Headmaster." Hermione said.

"Hello Hermione." Dumbledoor said, "Is this our new student, Rebecca Johnson?"

Hermione nodded.

"Hi." Rebecca said.

"How are you enjoying Hogwarts so far Ms. Johnson?" Professor Dumbledoor asked

"Its all confusing, I never thought that I would be going to a place where they'd be teaching such stereotypical classes for witches and wizards, like potions, or charms. It makes sense, but it's all different for me, and this place is huge."

Dumbledoor smiled, "Confusing is usually the case with our students from muggle households."

A few people were slowly filtering into the hall, so Dumbledoor politely excused them back to their table where they sat and waited for Hermione's friends to arrive. When they did Dean Thomas was with them this time and Rebecca was introduced to him. Neville was in a much better mood after herbology, and Ron and Harry were still talking about quidditch.

"So what did you think of Dumbledoor?" Hermione asked Rebecca.

Rebecca looked up at the headmaster who was in a deep conversation with Professor McGonagall.

"I think he's a lot smarter than he puts on, and I felt like he was laughing at me slightly when he smiled. He's rather mysterious, I think that there is a lot more to him than the smiling headmaster façade."

Hermione nodded, "There is, he's one of the most powerful wizards in the world, maybe even the most powerful."

Rebecca looked at Hermione and smiled slightly and began to eat her food.

Rebecca's Thoughts at dinner

Most powerful wizard in the world? Amazing, if I were most powerful, I wouldn't be here, in this madcap school, wasting my time being headmaster. Well mistress if it were me, I'm female. This is all way too much, all these wizarding terms. I wonder if Hermione really does have a crush on Professor Snape, nah he doesn't seem her type, more like cute little red head boys like the one she is staring at right now. Ron's so not my type, too.... Freckly? Nah, not for me, but neither is Harry, brood much? I mean come on, he's talking to his friends and he still has a 'my puppy was run over, my house repossessed, my car towed, and I was fired all in one day' look on his face. But that Seamus guy, nice looking guy there. I wonder if he's single....

Hermione's Thoughts at dinner

Rebecca's nice, she always has her mind else ware though. I don't think I could ask her anything that she didn't already say was ok, she seems like she could really get mad at people. Is quidditch all Ron and Harry talk about? Sometimes I just want to walk up to them and shake them and say, 'THERE IS MORE TO LIFE THAN QUIDDITCH!!' like me, I'm here too. I let them copy my homework, my notes, I go to Harry's quidditch games and lose constantly to Ron at wizard's chess. But they don't notice. Well sometimes they do, like when Ron smiles when I make a good move during chess, or when Ron says, "I love you 'Mione" When I let him copy my homework, or when its cold out and Ron lets me borrow his scarf or mittens because I look cold , or when Ron.....

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