Disclaimer: Yeah, not mine.
I'm an Only Child
As Hermione listened to the representative explain the strange things that had happened around her all her life, a wonderful horrible idea began to form in her advanced brain. She was special. Special where others were decidedly not. She had known it, now they all knew it.
Hermione practically bounced out the door as they headed for the mythical wonderful sounding magical alley. The alley where she would secure the supplies for her education as a witch.
The alley that held books, books that would surely make her dreams come true.
Hermione looked wistfully down the dark alleyway the man had warned them of. Knockturn Alley. Her mother was clasping her hand too tightly, wary of the spectacle surrounding them, overwhelmed. There was no way she could explore the shops today.
She was certain she could find the answer down there.
Hermione scoured the shelves of the vast library at Hogwarts, the answer must be here! Plucking her selections off the shelf, she ignored the suspicious look on Madam Pince's face.
In her sixth year she found it.
By denying the problems existence, she had already begun the cure.
As her parents picked her up at Kings Cross, Hermione held her tongue. Excited at the implication, but knowing better, she waited, making chitchat on the way home as she stroked Crookshanks.
The house was quiet and this was the moment of truth. Placing Crookshanks on her bed, Hermione moved to the door of the room adjoining hers. Taking a breath, she pushed the door open slowly, heart in her throat.
All was as it should be. As it always should have been.
The plaques, ribbons and certificates on the walls all bore Hermione's name. Not those of one coming behind, desperate to out do her, outshine her achievements, steal the glory that was rightfully hers. Much too often succeeding.
This was now her office area.
Where once there was a bed, now there was a table, filled with potions equipment.
A desk with the computer, formerly in her bedroom where a dresser used to be. Funny she hadn't noticed.
Bookcases upon bookcases filled with magical texts.
She spun around the room, her room, in her house with her parents, happier than she could ever remember, giggling softly.
Crookshanks hissed as he moved into the room, sensing the change, not realizing what she had done. Hermione smiled, for the first time in this room - now her room, since the idea had occurred so many years ago, picked him up, soothing his ruffled fur. She had won.
After all the years of pretending, wishing and dreaming.
Her sister was gone.
Now she really was an only child.
Finis
Hermione's sister:
Will we get to know the Grangers? Is Hermione an only child?
JK Rowling replies - I always planned that Hermione would have a younger sister but she's never made an appearance and somehow it feels like it might be too late now.
Does Hermione have any brothers or sisters?
No, she doesn't. When I first made up Hermione I gave her a younger sister, but she was very hard to work in. The younger sister was not supposed to go to Hogwarts. She was supposed to remain a Muggle. It was a sideline that didn't work very well and it did not have a big place in the story. I have deliberately kept Hermione's family in the background. You see so much of Ron's family so I thought that I would keep Hermione's family, by contrast, quite ordinary. They are dentists, as you know. They are a bit bemused by their odd daughter but quite proud of her all the same.