Chapter Thirteen

Something to Tease Snape About

"Harry! Harry, wake up!"

Harry rolled over to see someone standing over him. He quickly put on his glasses and Hermione came into sharp focus, dripping with water, which amongst other things made her white shirt somewhat transparent; he hastily looked away before she could see he was looking.

"Hermione?" Harry said stupidly. "Have you been swimming?"

"No," Hermione said miserably. "I… I need someone to talk to; can you come down to the common room?"

"Yeah, sure," Harry said, sitting up; the next day was Saturday, so he could sleep in tomorrow anyway. "Want me to wake Ron?"

"Yeah, thanks—I still want to go wake Ginny, and I'll need to change—"

"Hermione?" Ron called, having just woken up on his own. "Why're you all wet?"

"It's a long story," she said pitifully. "Come down to the common room, I'll tell you."

A short while later, Harry, Ron, Hermione and Ginny were sitting by the fire in the common room, Hermione now dry except for her hair as her story came to a close.

"—So then Snape walks in, and yells 'get off my desk!' and I jump down, nearly break my neck sliding in the mess we've made, and the sponge I've been sitting on is clamped between my legs—it's not funny!" she said for the fifteenth time as her three friends laughed. "I was so mortified… I'm just glad he didn't see the whole thing, we must've looked insane as we went skating down the center aisle, and Fred was so… I don't know, mournful-looking with that bucket on his head…" She sighed and trailed off, the others still laughing. "Oh, okay, I suppose that part is funny… but anyway, so then Snape pulls out his wand, and we're both just waiting for us to jinx us, but then he just tells us to get out and he starts towards us, right? Well, he slips in the water, lands on his back, goes scooting across the floor and nearly crashes into the wall! He was glaring at us and we were trying hard not to laugh, but he just roared for us to report straight to Professor McGonagall. Fred and I ran off, almost killed ourselves slipping in that water—we could hear Snape cleaning up with a few spells—and then we went up to McGonagall's office, both of us dripping wet. She shows up in her dressing gown, looking livid, I thought we were expelled for sure… yelled for ages and ages and then she finally gave us our punishment—"

"What did you get, more detention?" Ron asked.

"A week's worth," Hermione said glumly. "And she said that if Fred and I need some sort of lesson in keeping our hands off each other to get our detentions done, she'll keep us in detention until we've learned it, even if it takes all of next term."

"Ouch," Harry said sympathetically.

"Yeah… and then, get this, she dismisses Fred but holds me back, closes the door and starts laughing her head off!"

"No!" Harry, Ron and Ginny gasped.

"McGonagall?" Ginny said.

"Laughing?" Ron said dubiously.

Hermione nodded grimly. "She said she had no idea I'd be taking her advice so dearly to heart," she said. "Apparently she's been keeping tabs, her and a few of the other teachers who've found it amusing… and she asked to hear all about it from me. I told her almost everything, she laughed herself sick, if I hadn't been so embarrassed it would've been great—"

"That's amazing," Ron breathed. "McGonagall, laughing, and encouraging mayhem?"

"We've seen her do similar things before," Harry pointed out.

Hermione nodded. "I get the feeling the teachers find us greatly amusing, all the students you know, like a television show—er, like a very interesting book," she amended at Ron and Ginny's confused expressions. "They don't have as much to gossip about themselves, you know, things wind down when you're in your thirties and forties, I guess, so they talk about us all the time—she said the teachers talk about you guys and me and the Weasley twins in particular, says we always are the funniest. I'm assuming a lot of people are going to be laughing themselves silly in the staff room come tomorrow. McGonagall certainly thought I was a riot… and then she sent me off to bed, and I just wanted to die, I really did…"

"Did she let you out of detention?" Ginny asked hopefully.

"No, of course not, you know what she's like," Hermione said with a sigh. "She did give me five points for Gryffindor, though."

"What? What for?" Harry asked, surprised.

"For giving her something to tease Snape about," Hermione said, sighing pitifully. "She's always looking for a reason—you know how they are, always arguing, apparently they're really good friends, they just compete and bicker a lot—and she thanked me for making it possible for her to make cracks about students doing naughty things on his desk."

"You poor dear," Ginny said, patting her arm.

"I really couldn't believe it," Fred was saying furiously to George and Lee. "I mean, after all that, it turns out she's taking her cue from McGonagall? Professor Stick-up-the-ass? She was just laughing her heart out, at my expense, while Hermione told her everything in this sheepish little voice. I could've killed her, think I would've if I'd been in the same room—"

"To tell you the truth, Fred, I think the whole bucket-on-your-head thing was a tad worse," George said, trying desperately not to laugh. "They're two of a kind, after all, Hermione and McGonagall…"

"Yeah, well, I'm going to get her for this," Fred raged, rubbing his towel over his hair again. "Talk about rude… getting me caught by Snape… the look in his eyes when he saw us, when he walked towards us, Hermione with a sponge between her legs and me with a rag still in my hand, water everywhere…"

"Look on the bright side," Lee said, "you'll never have to clean Snape's room again."

"Stroke of genius, too, telling her you had a crush on her," George added.

Fred blushed, but thankfully George couldn't see his face, obscured as it was by the towel. "Yeah… well… I'm not sure she believed me, though she didn't certainly didn't have any objections when we kissed."

"Like I said when this whole mess started—maybe she does like you," George said. "Remember? Maybe she's trying to get you to like her by turning you on."

"So far all she's done is give me loads of trouble and a bucket on my head," Fred said sourly.

"Well, here's something to cheer you up," George said, "Errol showed up with a letter from Mum while you were in detention, and she says that Bill and Charlie are coming for Christmas, I'm sure they'll have loads of ideas for us—"

"Unless they take Hermione's side," Lee said.

"Ginny's always been Bill's favorite," Fred pointed out, "Bill's almost like a father to her."

"Yeah, well, you know what Bill's like, even if he helps Ginny he'll still help us, more likely than not," George replied. "And Charlie usually tries to avoid taking sides."

"Well, keep me posted over Christmas," Lee said. "I expect Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Ginny will call an unofficial truce while you're at the Burrow, given how scary your mum can be."

"Maybe your mum will let you come over this Christmas, too," Fred said hopefully.

"Nah, I already asked," Lee replied; he asked his mother if he could spend the holidays with Fred and George all the time, but she didn't often let him, as she placed large significance on family at Christmas and Easter. "It's my last year, you know, the last time she can force me to come home for Christmas, I expect I'll have to go home for Easter, too." He sighed dismally; he loved his family, but he had a lot of relatives who all came by for the holidays, and the gatherings had a tendency to go horribly wrong. "Any luck, though, and this time Aunt Lisa will drink enough to pass out before she can get into a row with Mum again.

"Well, good luck," George said. "We'll send you loads of owls… er, though you might want to send yours over first so we can just send you our replies; Errol's still out cold, Hagrid's looking after him…"

"Let us know if you come up with anything, too, ask some of those evil cousins of yours," Fred added, lying down to go to sleep. "I'm going to make her suffer."

As Fred lay awake, trying to sleep, it was not thoughts of revenge that filled his mind, however, but rather questions about when he would get to kiss Hermione again.