Chapter 1

Hermione Jean Granger had always known she was different from those around her. Brought up in the suburbs of London by her two dentist parents, John and Linda Granger who, if we're being honest didn't have a lot of time for Hermione due to their busy work hours. Despite not spending a lot of time with her parents when she was younger, Hermione knew she was loved even if her parents couldn't understand the unexplainable events that followed their daughter as she grew up.

Hermione's first burst of accidental magic happened when she was only 4 years old. Her dad had been trying to feed her something that she obviously wasn't fond of. Little Hermione's face turned red as drops of tears fell from her eyes. As the first tear hit the plate the food was suddenly splattered all over the wall behind John. He'd tell hermione years later that he spent a few days sleeping on the sofa as Linda simply hadn't believed him when he tried to explain what had happened.

"Im telling you Hermione, one minute the spinach was on the plate, i didn't even have time to blink before it was all over the wall"

Accidents like this became quite frequent as Hermione grew up. A girl on the playground had been poking fun at Hermione for reading instead of playing and the next thing she knew all the hair on her head had fallen to the floor. A boy a few months later made the mistake of trying to push Hermione off the monkey bars when she decided to give this "Playing" lark a go. He ended up having to go to the hospital with a fractured wrist and a broken leg as the wind had suddenly picked up around Hermione and sent the boy flying a good 20 feet away from her. Despite the fact of the school having no proof that Hermione was responsible for this they expelled her because "Wherever she goes, injuries and pain follow"

John and Linda were livid. Not with Hermione as she had explained exactly what happened and they knew their daughter was not the violent type and there was no plausible way for her to be blamed for this. No, they were angry with the school. Word got around quickly about the quiet bookworm, churches decided she had some kind of demon inside her and wanted to perform an exorcism to "cleanse Hermione's immortal soul" but again and again, her parents refused. Any school in the area refused to take her despite the fact she was academically gifted. At only 10 years old she was performing at the level of a 15 year old, so having no other option John and Linda shut down their dentist practice and homeschooled Hermione themselves. Given the fact they had both graduated with honors this was no difficulty for them, they came into a substantial amount of money from selling the practice so they knew that as a family they would pull through whatever hardships were on the horizon. Little did they know that at the beginning of the summer before Hermione's 12th birthday that everything was going to change.

Hermione was sitting quietly in her room reading yet another book from the library. The librarian Mrs Jenkins had become close to the only friend Hermione had these days. She hadn't been in a proper school for over a year now and kids her own age rarely ever went to the library unless dragged by their parents. She had tried to strike up conversation a couple of times but as soon as her name passed her lips the reaction was always the same. The child's eyes would widen in horror and the parent, if they were close enough to hear, would brush the child behind them as if to protect them and Hermiones shoulders would slump in defeat. It seemed that Mrs Jenkins was the only person besides Hermione's parents who wasn't afraid of her. She would always greet Hermione with a kind smile, ask what she had learned that day and it seemed, to young Hermione at least, that Mrs Jenkins was genuinely interested in the answer.

Snapping out of her thoughts of her failed interactions and Mrs Jenkins, Hermione tried to focus on the latest book that had been recommended to her by the kind librarian, it wasn't normally what she would read, as this book seemed like a fairytale where Hermione preferred cold hard facts but she didn't want to offend her only friend so she decided to give it a go. Her current story was about a witch who didn't have many friends until she mastered her powers and became the greatest witch the world had ever seen. Hermione didn't like this, she thought people should be nice to the witch whether she was good at magic or not, it seemed to her that the people only wanted to be friends with the witch because they were afraid of her. Hermione could relate to the witch despite the fact witches aren't real. Everywhere she went people would press their backs to the wall as she walked by. She had given up a long time ago trying to explain what she could do, it just gave her a headache.

As a present for finishing the school year with all A's, Hermione's parents had gifted her with a snake. The snake looked midnight black but in the light she had flecks of emerald green coating her scales. Hermione was over the moon with her new friend and named her Layla. Despite the fact snakes were meant to be cold blooded and not capable of feeling love it was clear to anyone with eyes that Layla loved Hermione just as fiercely as Hermione loved her. You could often find Hermione and Layla curled up together while she read to her scaly friend. Something Hermione hadn't decided to tell her parents was that her and Layla often had conversations. Her parents had been so understanding of the strange things Hermione could do but she was worried that if her parents found out about this that she would be committed to some kind of mental hospital.

"Someones coming to the door" Layla suddenly hissed looking up from the book her mistress was reading " Probably another church goer coming for my soul" Hermione replied with a roll of her eyes. "No, this person smells like you," Layla said, bobbing her head into Hermiones. Deciding to investigate, Hermione carefully placed her book on her bed and held her arm out for Layla to climb into her cardigan. People were afraid of Layla so it became a habit for Hermione to hide her out of sight. Slowly walking down the stairs Hermione was greeted with the strangest sight, John and Linda were sitting with a shell shocked look on their face in their living room, but that wasn't the strange part. The strange part was the elderly looking woman in what looked like a witches halloween costume. She had her hair pulled up into a very severe bun with oval shaped spectacles sitting daintily on the end of her pointed nose. Despite all of this her eyes looked kind, warm and inviting.

"Are you Hermione Granger?" The woman asked, Hermione could only nod in reply "Ah good, I am professor Minerva Mcgonagall from Hogwarts school of witchcraft and wizardry"

"I TOLD YOU" Layla hissed triumphantly in Hermione's ear. During this conversation Layla had climbed her way up Hermione's arm and was now nestled around her neck, hidden in her bushy curls.

Trying her best to maintain an outwardly cool but respectful facade all Hermione could say was "Oh".

Linda, sensing Hermione fighting a losing battle to remain in control of her emotions got up and gently guided her daughter to sit in between herself and her husband who, by the looks of things, was fighting a similar battle. "So um professor" Linda said, clearing her throat "As i'm sure you can understand, this is alot to take in". The professor smiled, sipping her tea "of course Mrs Granger, I couldn't begin how hard this must be for muggles like yourselves but i'm here to answer any questions you may have"

"What's a muggle?" Hermione asked, finally snapping out of her inner monologue, "Ah my apologies Miss Granger, a muggle is what we magical folk call people like your parents who can't use magic" Mcgonagall replied . "Why aren't I a muggle?" Hermione countered. The professor put down her now empty cup and said "Because you have a gift, with the right training at Hogwarts you will be able to do things like this" She then proceeded to pull out something that looked like a stick, waved it above the cup and before the Grangers very eyes the cup began to float.

Hermione couldn't help the gasp that escaped her throat, Finally! There was an explanation for everything that had happened over the years that she couldn't explain. She hated not knowing the answer to things but now she finally had a way! Her father seemed to be thinking along the same lines as he suddenly jumped up from his seat and proceeded to dance very badly around the room much to the amusement of Hermione and the professor and the horror of Linda "John, what are you doing?!" Linda asked, hiding her head between her hands. "I TOLD YOU THE SPINACH WASN'T MY FAULT LINDA" John whooped not pausing in his dance moves for a second.

Hermione turned to the professor who hadn't taken her eyes off of john and his dancing and said "When I was 4, dad tried to feed me some spinach,I started crying and suddenly the spinach hit the wall behind dad, mum didn't believe him when he said it wasn't his fault."

That's when Minerva lost her composure and burst into laughter, Hermione couldn't help but follow her lead, it was quite funny after all. Between their fits of laughter they managed to hear Linda hiss "Okay John I get it the goddamn spinach wasn't your fault now stop dancing you look like a bloody prat" Which only caused Hermione and Professor Mcgonagall to laugh harder.

Okay that's it for the first chapter everyone !I'm so sorry it's so short. I haven't written fanfiction in over 10 years so please be kind and make sure to let me know what you think because I'd love to hear some feedback on this chapter! I've got plenty of ideas of where this story is going to go!