Chapter 1: What is this feeling?
Author's notes:
1. The Sorting Hat does not sort the students into houses...there are no houses...only separate parts of the school for girls and boys. What the sorting hat does is sort them into their dorms with students in their same year. It also does not tell them whom they are rooming with...just what room they'll be in.
2. The dorms are done in odd ways. If parents are willing to pay more, then their children are guaranteed to be one of the last people to be placed with a room mate, and there for, will be given a room to themselves if the need to share the room does not arise. The less money a family pays, the more likely it is that they will be sharing a room.
3. The Wizard (or the Wiz) is the name for our favorite villain, dear dear voldie, who, in this story, is the Minister of Magic. (Sorry, but it was either that or Dumbledore, and you'll be glad it wasn't him soon).
4. The students still have to wear uniforms, but just as it is at most schools with uniforms (including mine) it's not viewed as stylish (mainly by the popular girls) to where your skirt at the length that it's meant (and required) to be worn. It's always rolled until it's extremely short and then the girls who think they have to look perfect all the time (a.k.a the popular ones) buy their shirts (mainly oxfords) like three sizes to small so that they fit really tight and they think they look cool. In these girls' minds, apparently, it's uncool to wear clothes that actually fit.
Hermione Granger could feel their eyes on her as she made her way to the sorting hat. She could hear their whisperings and mumblings as they got a better look at her. She watched as all their eyes widen and their fingers cross as they hoped they would not get her in their dorm. She looked over at Vanessa, her younger sister, who smiled nervously back at her, adjusting her weight on the crutches. Everyone seemed to be perfectly comfortable with Nessa, who had always been the beauty, and the baby, of the family.
The hat was placed on her head and she waited, hoping that it would place her with someone who would not care about her blood line or the curse placed on her and Nessa. The hat seemed to be taking its jolly good time deciding on where to place her. Finally, its raspy voice rang out through the hall. "West Tower...Dorm 703." From somewhere in the hall she heard a groan arise, followed by several mocking laughs.
Great, she thought. I can already see just how well I'll be fitting in here.
Hermione made her way to one of the emptier tables and took a seat. She smiled at the other students close by, but they gave her looks of disgust and moved further away from her. Deciding that she might as well just settle in and get used to it now, she pulled a text from her shoulder bag, and steeled herself for the lonely year ahead of her. Looking down at the Advanced Charms book, he eyes wandered to her hands...her horrible green hands...and sighed.
She had transferred to Hogwarts in her last year at school from France, hoping for safe haven and acceptance. Back home, the French Ministry of Magic had been corrupted by people who hated Muggles, and who wanted to rid France of all Halfblood witches and wizards. They set out first to differentiate these witches and wizards from the rest of the crowd by casting a spell on all of them, giving them characteristics or handicaps that would give them away. It seemed the more of a threat they imposed on the ministry, the worse the spell affected them. Each person had something different...some were given physical handicaps; one of such was her sister, Nessa, now had one leg that was paralyzed from the hip down. Nessa had been just barely passing her classes. Others were given physical abnormalities, such as herself and her now hideous green skin. Hermione, of course, had been the best of all her classes, and because of her strong gift of magic, stuck fear in the heart of the ministry. Her uncanny she did, nothing could reverse the effects of the spell. For now she was stuck the way she was, hoping that England would be better.
Finally, after what seemed like years, the sorting ceremony and opening feast were over and the students began to make their way to their dorms. After seeing that Nessa was alright in her dorm and that her roommate would be able to take care of her if need be, Hermione began to search out her own room. Somewhat secluded at the end of a winding hallway and at the top of what seemed to be a mile long stairway, she found it. Taking a deep breath, she slowly pushed the door open, looked around, and groaned.
Half the room was PINK and GLITTERY! The walls were a sickening bubble-gum pink and were lined with images of famous quidditch players and other male wizarding world celebrities. A large vanity at one corner was so loaded down with make-up and such that it looked as though it would collapse. Hermione definitely did not fit in to this scheme. Her bed stood out as a thorn among roses (or was it a rose among thorns?) with its plain dark blue coverings. In truth, nothing of hers belonged, especially the book cases that were actually filled with... dare it be...BOOKS! Hermione sank down into her desk chair, trying to let the newness (and pinkness) of the dorm room sink in when the door swung open a bubbly, blond, blue eyed girl came skipping in only to come to a skidding halt at the sight of her. If Hermione had thought that the room was bad, seeing the girl that she would be sharing it with practically knocked her silly.
"Oh great," her roommate said in a high, shrill voice. "It's you." The blond gave Hermione the once over before sitting down on her bed, which was pink and frilly, of course. When she spoke again, her voice completely gave away the detestation she felt towards Hermione, not to mention the look of disgust on her face. "I should have known that even Daddy's money couldn't leave me to a room of my own forever. The name's Luna Lovegood. My friends call me Luna...but you can call me 'Miss Lovegood.'" Luna settled back against the headboard and pulled one of the many flowered throw pillows to her before turned her attention back to her roommate. "Now, we're going to have some rules since we seem to be stuck together. I need my beauty sleep, so there will be no lights after 10 pm on weeknights. My stuff is not to be touched. And most importantly, when we are out of this room, you will NOT talk to me. Preferably, you won't talk to me in here either. Understood?"
"Real happy to be stuck in the room with you, too...Miss Lovegood," Hermione said, her voice absolutely dripping with malice. She flung herself on the bed, pulled the curtains shut around her, and set to write a letter to her father about her predicament. Somehow, she had a feeling that Miss Lovegood was doing the same.
Dearest Darlingest Mummsie and Popsicle,
There's been some confusion over room under the Wiz, but of course I'll rise above it, for I know that's how you'd want me to respond. Yes, there's been some confusion for you see my room mate is unusually and exceedingly peculiar and all together quite impossible to describe...
Your Loveliest Luna
My Dear Father,
There's been some confusion over room under the Wiz, but of course I'll care for Nessa, for I know that's how you'd want me to respond. Yes, there's been some confusion for you see my room mate is BLOND!...
Yours,
Hermione
What is this feeling, so sudden and new?
I felt the moment I laid eyes on you
My pulse is rushing
My head is reeling
My face is flushing
What is this feeling?
Fervid as a flame
Does it have a name?
YES...
When Hermione awoke on the first day of classes, in took her a while to figure out where she was. She sat up, drew open the curtains, and cringed. Luna was walking around with some strange colored crap on her face and curlers (which looked like snakes) in her hair. And people thought she looked bad! If only they could see this girl in the mornings, looking at her would be like a breath of fresh air. Seriously, if Luna was getting any beauty sleep at all, it certainly wasn't enough to even make a super model beautiful. Groaning to her self, Hermione pulled herself out of the bed and set to the task of making it, straightening out the covers and arranging the pillows.
Luna looked over at her like she was mad. "You do know that we have house elves to do that, right?"
"Of course I know that," Hermione retorted. "I just don't agree with the house elves having to do things that are very easy for me to do myself. I bet you that they aren't even getting paid! Can you believe that! Doing all the work in this huge place and never getting anything in return! The poor things are being exploited! It's absurd!"
"Um...Whatever."
Hermione walked away to her trunk in a huff. She pulled out her uniform, which consisted of a plaid skirt and a white oxford shirt, and went into the bathroom to change. When she came out, Luna was wearing the same thing...well in principle, anyway. Her skirt was so short that it hardly covered anything and her shirt, barely buttoned up over a bright pink, lace trimmed tank, looked like it belonged to one of the first year students. Hermione pulled her hair back into a braid, pulled on a pair of loafers, grabbed her books, and turned to leave.
"You're going out like THAT!" Luna exclaimed in disbelief. "Surely you're going to take at least some pride in yourself! Even though you have some, well, issues, I'm sure you could do something to make it a little better." She turned to look at herself in the mirror and smiled, making a final check on her curly hair and sparkly makeup.
"I think that I look fine." Hermione said and walked out the door.
As she entered the great hall, Hermione started to seek out Nessa. She spotted her at the far end of one of the tables and started to make her way over to her sister when she noticed that Nessa seemed to have already made some friends. Not wanting to ruin her sister's chance at happiness, she grabbed a piece of toast from one of the serving platters and made her way to the library to get a head start in her classes. Unnoticed to her, two pairs of eyes followed her. The first were blue and they held a look of disgust and contempt in them; the second, a brilliant emerald green, which seemed to shine with admiration for the green skinned girl.
That night, when Luna came up from the west tower's common room, she found Hermione sitting on her bed, wrapped up in a blanket, surrounded by books, writing an essay that had been assigned that morning and was not due until next month. It was also only supposed to be two parchments long, and Hermione was almost finished with her fifth roll. Is this all this girl ever does? Luna thought. She knew every answer in class, and she skipped the meals to go study in the library. Merlin, she's bloody crazy! Let's just hope her sister's better than she is.
Hermione finally caught up with Nessa a few days later. Her sister was absolutely full of questions about Luna and couldn't stop telling Hermione how lucky she was to be rooming with the most popular girl in school. Apparently Luna had taken to "mentoring" Nessa in the art of "popularity." No matter how much Hermione tried to convince Nessa of how annoying and superficial Luna was, the younger girl wouldn't hear of it. She truly believed that Luna was a wonderful person.
Loathing
Unadulterated Loathing
For your face, your voice, your clothing
Lets just say
I loath it all
Every little trait how ever small
Makes my very flesh begin to crawl
With simple utter loathing
There's a strange exhilaration
In such total detestation
It's so pure, so strong
Though I do admit it came of fast
Still I do believe it came of fast
And I will be loathing, loathing you
My whole life long
"How can you stand her?"
"Is she as digesting as she seems?"
"Does she really glow in the dark?"
Luna sat in the middle of a large crowd at one of the lunch tables, being bombarded with questions about Hermione. "It is rather hard to stand being around her, I mean, how on earth can a person be that strange? She will go on and on for like an hour about how the poor house elves are being exploited, or something like that! I swear, she only has on outfit to wear other than her uniform, and I hardly think it ever gets washed...either that, or she just has like 10 of the same dress...if that's what you call that hideous thing she wears. And as for her glowing in the dark, I really don't know. She's always still up when I go to bed, reading with the covers over her head and her wand in the bed with her for light. If I wake up in the middle of the night, I try not to look her way...that way, if she does glow, at least I won't be haunted with nightmares about it!"
Ron, who had had a major crush on Luna since the beginning of 1st year put his arm around her shoulders, saying "You're just to good, Miss Luna. You're a martyr and a role model to us all. Trust me when I say that you're definitely not alone...we all share this hatred for her."
"Yes," Luna said, brushing his arm off her. "Well, we all have our trials in life. This must be mine."
Somewhere in the crowd, a messy raven haired young man shook his head and rolled his emerald eyes. She surely can't be that bad, he thought to himself. I'm sure she's quite sweet if someone would bother to try and get to know her.
STUDENTS:
Poor Dear Luna
You are just too good
How do you stand it?
I don't think I could
She's a terror, she's a tarter
We don't mean to show a biased
But dear Luna you're a martyr
LUNA:
Well, these things are sent to try us
STUDENTS:
Poor dear Luna
Forced to reside
With someone so digustified
We just want to tell you
We're all on you side
We share you're loathing
Hermione had never felt more disheartened in her life. She felt as if she had run away from France for nothing. Things were exactly the same here. People still looked at her like she was last weeks trash, and she was still treated as if she were invisible. The only thing that kept her from leaving was Nessa, who seemed to be fitting in and making friends just fine. The girl was off her crutches now, and in a wheel chair that Madame Pomfrey had supplied, saying that it would be easier for her to get around the school that way. Unfortunately there was no was of helping hide the green skin. They still hadn't found a way to cure her leg or Hermione's abnormality.
Hermione found an empty seat at one of the lunch tables and took a seat. As always, everyone in her vicinity scooted as far away as possible. She sighed and took a sandwich off of one of the serving trays. Pouring over a copy of Hogwarts, A History while she ate, as to avoid having to make eye contact with the hateful students, she was surprised to see a pile of school books land in front of her, and to hear someone sitting down across the table from her. She looked up in shock to see a raven haired, green eyed young man that she had seen being sorted in to the seventh year dorms during the ceremony. He grabbed a sandwich off the tray and smiled at her; a lopsided grin.
"Hello there. Harry, Harry Potter." He said, extending his hand. She slowly reached to shake it and then quickly withdrew it again, leery that he was just another person, come to find something about her to make fun of. "You're Hermione Granger, aren't you?" he asked and took a large bite of his sandwich. Hermione slowly nodded. "You transferred here from Beauxbatons, didn't you?"
Her eyes widened a little. "Yes, how did you know?"
"I heard about the crap that's going on there with the halfblood witches and wizards. Everyone was talking about it in Durmstrang...that's the latest school I was kicked out of." He laughed. "I think I remember you from my time at school in France. You weren't green then, but you always seemed to have your hand in the air and your nose in a book. It seems that nothing else has changed."
Hermione smiled, suddenly remembering who he was. "Oh...you're the one who got kicked out after 3rd year. What exactly did you do, anyway?"
"Well, let's see." He said, laughing. "Pretty much, you name it, I did it! Do you remember Fleur Delacour?"
"You mean the girl who nearly drowned on the third floor?"
"Yep, that's her. I was experimenting with this new spell I had found. I conjured up an invisible swamp right on the spot. Undetectable to the human eye."
"Oh yeah. You always knew when a first year accidentally ended up there. They'd find their way into the Great Hall dripping wet. Madame Maxine has yet to figure out how to get rid of it."
"Then my legacy still lives on."
"Wait," Hermione said, eying him closely. "Were you the one who got those two idiots stuck in the rafters?
"That'd be me. I believe that their names were Crabbe and Goyle, or something like that. They were up there for how long before they were found?"
"All summer long, I think."
"I have yet to figure out how they lasted up there so long"
"I'm pretty sure that one of the only charms they ever learned what how to conjure up cupcakes. They must have lived on those."
"No wonder they were so fat the next time I saw them. They looked like a couple of beached whales."
"No kidding! All I know is that I can still remember walking into the Great Hall the next school year, hearing their pitiful round of "'Row Row Row Your Boat' echoing through the rafters."
By know, they were laughing so hard that they were both nearly in tears. They were also getting some pretty strange looks from the other students.
"Did you go to Durmstrang after that, or what?"
"No. I went to Salem's school for a couple years, got kicked out, and then went there for a year. My godfather planned on me coming here eventually. I guess, since he didn't really want to come back to England yet, he decided to wait until I got kicked out of all the other schools...just as I had with all the elementary schools I attended growing up!"
"Well, let's just hope that you make it to graduation here, seeing as you've run out of places to go!"
"Yeah, really!" I was right, he thought to himself, pushing his hair out of his face. She's really sweet. I could come to really like her. She's definitely better than the rest of the girls here...and better that what Luna makes her out to be.
Neither of them noticed that a certain blonde was eyeing them, and definitely did NOT look happy.
"HERMIONE GRANGER!" Hermione could hear the shrill screech from the top of the tower, as Luna stormed up the stairs. "HOW DARE YOU FLIRT TO HIM! HE'S MINE, DO YOU UNDERSTAND! EVERYONE KNOWS IT! YOU BETTER NOT MESS THIS UP! YOU DON'T WANT TO KNOW WHAT DADDY WILL DO TO YOU IF HE FINDS OUT YOU'RE GETTING IN MY WAY!"
"Whatever, Miss Lovegood," Hermione said sarcastically. "Anyways, we were just talking. Apparently he and I went to school in france together for a few years. And don't worry, I wouldn't dream of messing with yours and Daddy's plans!"
She turned, missing Luna's performance of mouthing every word she had said.
What is this feeling so sudden and new?
I felt the moment I laid eyes on you
My pulse is rushing
My head is reeling
What is this feeling?
Does it have a name?
Yes
Loathing
There's a strange exhilaration
In such total detestation
It's so pure, so strong
Though I do admit it came of fast
Still I do believe it came of fast
And I will be loathing
For forever
Loathing
Truly, deeply
Loathing you
My whole life long
Oh yes, she thought to her self. This is the beginning of a WONDERFUL friendship.