Chapter 7: The Final First Day
The sight of the Hogwarts Express moving into Hogsmeade station both calmed Hermione and set her on edge. This was the last time that she would go to an opening feast as a student, and yet she knew absolutely no one in attendance.
She was standing at the kitchen window after collecting her bags from upstairs, the contents of which had grown much larger since her shopping trips. Aberforth stood behind her grumbling at the sheer volume of students that flooded into his village. Hermione sighed and attached some name tags to her luggage that would send them up to the castle to be sorted with everyone else's.
With everything sorted she turned towards her surrogate carer and smiled at his pinched expression. Although he pretended to be grumpy and annoyed all the time it was clear that he would miss her, even though she had agreed to visit every Saturday to help at the pub. They embraced firmly before breaking apart while he fixed her brand new robes and then she left to get a carriage with the rest of the students.
At first no one seemed to notice her as she was quickly swallowed by the throng of students fighting for a carriage. Luckily for her, she was quite small and therefore inconspicuous but that quickly changed after a harsh shout of her name.
"Oi Dumbledore!" Not used to being called by her new surname, Hermione looked around in confusion before laying her eyes upon three friendly faces. Remus and Sirius's heads towered over the crowds and she smiled as she also took in the watery eyes of their smaller friend before he tripped over someone's suitcase.
Both friends openly laughed at the boy in what Hermione uncomfortably thought was quite unkind before helping him to his feet and arriving at Hermione's side. The smaller boy grimaced in an abashed way as his face reddened with embarrassment.
"I thought I was glad to see her, but Wormy is so excited that he can't even walk in a straight line. What are you gonna do next, wet yourself?" Hermione frowned at the cruel way that Sirius bullied his friend and Remus did nothing to stop. How can these boys be the same men that Harry looked up to all those years in the future?
She leveled her stare at the teenager, "Well it may be difficult for you to understand, but some people need some more interesting company, so who can blame Peter for jumping at the chance to spend time with anyone other than you?"
Sirius was used to women finding their group's playful teasing of Peter funny and endearing, so to hear this girl biting back shocked the boy into silence. Hermione used this to her advantage to turn to the smaller boy, linking arms and walking off to find a carriage. She didn't miss the thankful smile he shot at her in return.
"Hey Remus, where's James?" She called back to him, "From what I gathered from the last time I met you, you guys seemed to be joined at the hip." Remus chuckled at the dumbfounded look on Sirius's face before following the pair into a carriage. He was quietly glad that there was finally someone who could hold off against Sirius's charms and didn't mind putting him in his place.
"James is stuck doing some Head Boy duties, but he said that he would meet us at the feast. He didn't want to miss your sorting."
Sirius seemed to have gotten over the blow to his ego and joined them, scoffing in condescension, "Head Boy duties? As if! More like he wanted to suck up to Evans and simultaneously scare off any other boys that get too close to her. Did you see the look that Matthews shot her way on the train, I thought Prongs was going to rip him apart."
Before the boys could recount their experience on the train, she thought it prudent that she pretend that she knew nothing about their lives. "Evans?" She began, "James has got a girlfriend? Anyone else got someone to tell me about?"
"Not yet sweeth…" Before Sirius could continue flirting, Peter interrupted, "Ha, he wishes! Prongs has been obsessed with Lily for years, but she doesn't really like him that much. That doesn't stop him trying though!"
"Yes the poor sod is in love and can't seem to give up, no matter how little response he gets in return. That is, the Marauders, we don't know when to quit." Sirius cut in, a teasing glint in his eye, directed at Hermione.
"The Marauders? Is that what you four are, a kind of club? Is that where the nicknames come from?" She grinned innocent curiosity.
Remus cut in, "Not really, it's just we all share a dorm and are always lumped together whenever anything goes wrong so James and Sirius came up with a name for the group and all of us eventually."
Sirius leapt up in indignation, "Blasphemy! We are a brotherhood, my good friend! How dare you besmirch our good name!"
Hermione giggled as Remus quipped back, "Don't lie, I'm sure McGonagall would argue that nothing we do could use the word good to describe. In fact…" Hermione smiled as the three boys continued to squabble back and forth and instead decided to look out of the window at the steadily approaching castle.
If that conversation had been anything to go by she knew that this was going to be a long year. If lying was that exhausting, how could she survive a whole lifetime in this era, never telling anyone the truth?
At last, they reached the front door, so she separated from the boys to find McGonagall and the rest of the first years. She had to wait for a couple of minutes while they disembarked from the boats and then a couple more in the room to the side of the Great Hall. When she was 11 she assumed that the wait was so that the rest of the students could take their places, but she now knew they had already sat down, and instead the wait was to increase the tension. Dumbledore was a crafty bastard after all.
They were eventually allowed into the Hall and she found herself the object of a thousand inquisitive stares. She decided not to meet any and instead glared resolutely ahead, looking directly into Dumbledore's smiling face. What a prat she must look towering over these midgets! He knew exactly what he was doing when he refused to let her be sorted separately.
Mercifully, McGonagall decided to call her up to be sorted before the first years, after quickly introducing her and her situation. Unfortunately, it was impossible to ignore the stares and whispers when her name was called because it seemed that a 7th year transfer student was big gossip, especially when connected to their famed headmaster. This time the hat was not so big that it covered her eyes so she was forced to look across the room at everyone watching her.
"Hmmm. Very curious indeed. You seem to have already sat here before, yet I do not remember you." Hermione fought to keep her face impassive as the hat continued. "Well that's beside the point, what matters now is where to place you."
Sidetracked, Hermione's eyes wandered to the Gryffindor table where she found the four Marauders. Noticing her glance, they all waved quietly but enthusiastically, she couldn't help but smile in return. "Ah. A clue then. You care for people deeply, especially your friends?" They're not my friends. She impulsively thought in reply. Not yet.
Somehow that hat started to chuckle, "Maybe not Hufflepuff then, you are loyal and true yet still very practical. Maybe a Ravenclaw?" Hermione pondered that for a second, remembering that that was the other house she was originally almost put into. She could be very happy there, maybe a change of scenery would do her good.
No. Shaking herself mentally, she banished that idea. I'm here to do a job, I can't do that job up in Ravenclaw tower with no allies. "Allies are a fickle thing," the hat eavesdropped, "In Gryffindor you would have plenty of friends, but would you have the means to carry out this task you seem so set on?"
Hermione considered this but was once more reminded of the crushing loneliness that she'd been experiencing lately. You can't help anyone if you are hurting yourself. She closed her eyes and decided. Gryffindor. For some reason this made the hat laugh again.
"I of course must take your decision into account, but your willingness to be sly and thoughts of self preservation are so Slytherin it's comical." Come on! She huffed, rolling her eyes when the hat seemed to pause for dramatic effect. If you don't get on with it I'm going to set you on fire, this time around I know a lot more spells!
"No need to get grumpy," the hat moaned petulantly, "I can see that you would bravely set up your life again in any house so I guess I'll have to put you in…
GRYFFINDOR!"
The shout came so unexpected Hermione jumped a foot into the air and almost fell off the stool. Before McGonagall could take the hat off of her head and give it to the next person, she ripped it off and shoved it towards her. Thankful that she no longer had the patronising voice parroting into her ear she walked towards her familiar table and sat down next to the Marauders.
They immediately huddled to clap her on the back or give one armed hugs and she felt immensely glad to be back in a place she felt at home. This was slightly muddied by the fact her new so-called 'friends' were now imitating how she had almost fallen from her seat not 5 minutes ago.
When the large group of first years had finally been sorted she turned to chastise them as she would with Harry and Ron but soon realised that they may not appreciate it seeing as they didn't know her as well. She let it drop on instead pretended to be amazed at the copious amounts of food that suddenly appeared in front of her.
"What took the hat so long with you then?" Remus inquired, and when he only got a confused frown in response he clarified. "It spent about 10 minutes shifting through your brain. Not that it wasn't entertaining at all, watching your facial expressions."
Oh. Maybe she would have to improve at that aspect of lying about your identity. She blushed nonetheless and garbled out some rubbish about how she was older and so there was more to sort through and analyse. " Not that the old flea bitten rag was very polite." She muttered at the end.
"Ha!" James laughed and draped his hand around her shoulder in a brotherly gesture, "Our Hermione here is exhibiting her brave tendencies already. Gonna fight an old hat for us love? I'm glad we've got you defending the honour of us Griffindors."
Hermione surreptitiously flicked her fork and suddenly James had mashed potato all over his face. Whilst he was trying to paw root vegetables out of his eyes, Hermione couldn't help noticing a bunch of girls looking at her oddly, regarding the arm around her shoulders with contempt. They looked about her age and she didn't plan on sharing a dorm with a bunch of girls who didn't like her again, so she quickly removed his arm.
James didn't notice this however because he was too busy fighting off small pellets of mash that Sirius had charmed to hit him repeatedly in the face. Spectators continued laughing at his increasingly red face until he remembered that he was, in fact, a wizard.
When everyone had lost interest and James had finished wiping his face he turned to Hermione, joking "Thanks for that Mione, now I won't be able to get potato out of my ears for days!" He fortunately missed the way that her face fell at the weird use of her old nickname when he turned to Sirius to give a similar comment.
The rest of the feast passed rather quickly although she did not miss that the majority of the student body turned to her at one point or another, presumably talking to their friends about the new transfer student. It also didn't help that she had somehow managed to make friends incredibly quickly with a group of boys that she strongly suspected were the most popular and rowdy group in the school.
When dinner ended and they finally made their way up to bed Hermione trailed behind them to make it seem like she didn't know where she was going. As they walked, Peter talked to her about the portraits they passed and funny moments that had happened on certain staircases and in alcoves. Sirius and Remus seemed to be talking amongst themselves and James would eventually call out certain students to make it look like he deserved the badge that glinted on his chest.
Hermione sighed at the comfort of the room surrounding them as soon as they made it to the common room, smiling at the small aspects that had barely changed. Unfortunately, her back was turned when a screech quietened the room, causing her to jump out of her skin yet again.
"JAMES POTTER! WHERE THE HELL HAVE YOU BEEN? WHEN YOU BECAME HEAD BOY I ASSUMED YOU HAD GROWN UP BUT HERE YOU ARE… um. Why is there potato in your hair?"
Up next is Chapter 8: Wicked Witch of the Past