Disclaimer: Yup, I am still not Mrs. Rowling, and therefore I still don't own the characters or ideas of Harry Potter. I'm still doing this as a non-profit project, if you want to send someone money don't send it to me. Please don't sue me, I'm poor.

First Night Back

"It was bloody amazing!" Ron was walking around the common room throwing his hands into the air, "Absolutely, bloody, amazing!"

"We know Ron. We saw it too." Harry smiled. He would have been tired of hearing Ron go around and talk about how amazing it was, but he was finally out of his depressed state, and that was exactly what needed to be going on. Who would have thought that the punching Draco Malfoy would make him this happy? If he had known before, he would have done it. He definitely wanted to do it some times.

"Tell us again Ron. You had the best viewpoint of the whole thing." Neville was smiling wide eyed as he listened to Ron.

"Well, actually, Hermione had the best view point, but blimey was that ever amazing. He just reeled back and punched that git right in the face! Absolutely astounding. The noise was even amazing. It was just this sort of thud. Wasn't even a crack, just a thud, but knowing that it was Malfoy that the thud was coming from. Just amazing!" Ron smile and sat down slowly, "Wow. That was just…if I could keep one image in my mind forever, that would be it."

Hermione stared into the fireplace. She wasn't sure how she should be taking all of this. On one hand this new boy had done all that when Draco had been insulting her, but on the other hand, it had been a completely barbaric and uncalled for act. It was unnecessary. It was kind of amazing how he had come to her rescue like that when Draco was being his usual slimy self.

She sighed as she continued to leaf through the book. Apparently it was about the medicinal purposes of the liver of an albino rat, born on a full moon. She was sure that it was all very interesting and would be useful at some point in her life, but she just couldn't get interested in it. There were so many things going on in her mind, it was hard to get interested in anything that was in a book about albino rats. She also knew that no matter how much she read about the liver of this albino rat she probably would never need this knowledge. Sure it would be interesting and maybe even useful, but she doubted that the albino rat liver would be more effective than any of the other medicinal ingredients.

"You okay, Hermione?" Harry asked softly, "You haven't really been reading that book, and that's kind of weird for you."

Hermione shook her head to clear her mind, "Yes, I'm fine Harry. I'm learning about the medicinal purposes of the liver of an albino rat born on-"

Harry cut her off, "Are you sure you are okay?"

"Yes, Harry. I'm fine. Why are you so worried?" Hermione snapped at him.

Harry shrugged as he sat back in the couch, "Because the book you are reading is about offensive spells and has nothing to do with the medicinal purposes of anything."

Hermione blushed furiously as she snapped the book shut and placed it on the table. It was true. She wasn't fine. She was anything but fine. She wanted to tell Harry how she really felt about him, but she wasn't sure how. She wanted to go find this Blake guy and tell him off for beating up Draco, but didn't want to sound unthankful. She wanted to do a whole lot of things and right now she wasn't sure how to do any of it without causing more trouble than she already had.

She sighed and leaned back in her chair, "I'm sorry Harry. I guess I've just had a lot on my mind recently. With everything that happened with you know who, and Sirius and all," Harry winced at the mention of Sirius, "I just…I've had a lot on my mind, and I'm sure you have too. I just…I don't know what to do, you know?"

Harry stared at the ground. He knew more than anyone what she was talking about. He knew what she was talking about even more than she did. He was the one who had lost Sirius. He was the one who had sat silently for the entire summer at that bloody Dursley household. He was the one who would never see his godfather again. How could she know what was on his mind? How could anyone possibly understand how he was feeling? He clenched his fists and took a deep breath. None of this was Hermione's fault. Lashing out at her wasn't going to help anyone, and pushing everyone away wasn't going to help him either. He needed his friends in order to get through this.

Hermione dropped her head as she watched a few tears roll down Harry's cheeks, "I'm sorry. I should have said anything."

Harry took off his glasses and wiped away a few tears, "No. Don't worry, it isn't your fault."

"I just wish I could somehow help you though all of this Harry. I want to help you through all of this." Hermione was almost on the brink of tears.

Harry nodded solemnly, "You are helping me through this Hermione. You and Ron are both helping me through this. I don't know where I would be right now if it weren't for the two of you and Dumbledore. I have to keep going for you and Ron."

Hermione nodded softly. She needed to be strong for Harry. She looked up to him so much, and now he needed her and Ron to help hold him up. The best way to do that was probably by acting like themselves, which was easy enough to do. They would be themselves and Harry wouldn't have to be sad anymore. Maybe he'd realize that he wasn't alone anymore too.

The porthole opened slowly and the boy with he scarlet hair walked into the room, his dark robes swaying softly behind him as he walked. The whole room went silent as he came in. His emerald eyes cast a quick, almost frightened looking glance across the room before he headed up the stairwell to the mail dormitories where he planned to get some sleep.

"Woah…McGonagall must have been tough on him for him to come in and go straight up to bed rather than stay down here and party with us." Ron muttered as he walked over to sit on the couch next to Harry, "So what have you guys been talking about?"

Harry smiled softly, "The medicinal uses of the liver of an albino rat."

"Born during a full moon on a leap year? Yeah I read that one too. Darned mandatory reading…How am I supposed to enjoy my summer vacation if I am stuck inside reading about the medicinal uses of a-" Ron started.

Hermione blinked a few times, "Mandatory reading?"

Ron waved his hand in the air, "Oh, yeah. It wasn't very long. You might have forgotten it with all those huge volumes that you read over the summer."

"I forgot the read it!" Hermione started pulling things out of her bag and piling them onto the table.

Harry looked over at Hermione very concerned, "You didn't do your reading? That definitely isn't like you Hermione. I even managed to find time to do the reading."

Hermione stopped in the middle of piling another book onto the pile on the table, "Wait. This was the really short one on about how when crushed, and mixed thoroughly helped to cure burns?" Harry and Ron both nodded, "Oh that really was small. I sort of panicked for a moment there thinking that I had forgotten to read it. It was really too simple though."

Harry nodded, "Well, that's good Hermione. You might want to look over that again. Snape is probably going to test us on it."

Hermione nodded as she started putting things back into the bag where she had dug all of them out of, "Of course I'll read over it again. I, unlike the two of you, come to classes prepared."

Ron laughed, "And that is why you just panicked about reading that little thing?"

"Quiet Ron, or I won't knit you a scarf!" Hermione snapped. She had definitely developed some keen knitting skills from knitting for those house elves, and a scarf from here would probably last a good long while.

Ron considered this for a moment, "Alright, but only because you asked so nicely. In any case we should probably be getting you bed you know, Hermione. We do have classes tomorrow. Maybe Blake had the right idea in hitting the sack as soon as he got in.

Hermione nodded softly. She had to agree. It was best that she wake up early the next morning so that she could get breakfast and be prepared for class. She had a lot of things to think about anyway, and staying up down here wasn't going to help her to do any of that. She'd have a lot more freedom to think if she was upstairs in her own bed.

"Alright you too, but don't bother the new boy too much. He has classes too, you know. I don't want him to be failing because you two won't let him get to sleep, okay?" She stared at them waiting for their response.

Harry nodded immediately. He had no objections to going straight to sleep and not worrying about anything for the rest of the night. In fact it sounded like a fine idea. He, like Hermione, had an awful lot of things to think about, and sleep hadn't been coming easy to him ever since the loss of Sirius. It was better that he try to get to bed now than sit her and never get to sleep.

Ron sighed softly, "I promise, just as soon as he tells us what he got for punching Malfoy, I'll leave him alone and go straight to sleep."

Hermione glared at him, "You'd better! I won't have it for you to be failing either."

((AN: Wow. That was…well, I don't know what that was. It was more so that you guys don't forget that the real heroes of the story are Harry, Ron, ad Hermione, not my original character. I know I kind of bombarded you with him in the last chapter and this was sort of my way of saying sorry for that. Woo, 4 chapters in 2 days. Go me!))