Chapter 6: First Day
When I woke up the next morning, there was only one other girl still in the dormitory. She introduced herself as Lavender Brown. She told me that two of the other girls in our dorm, Sally-Anne Perks and Lily Moon, had woken up very early and left right away.
I asked about the last girl, since there were five girls sleeping in our dorm, and Lavender told me she was just in the bathroom. I began to gather my things and I got ready for the day. When the last girl, Parvati Patil, emerged from the bathroom, she said hi, and then she and Lavender left for breakfast, leaving me alone in the dorm. I vaguely wondered if maybe it had been a mistake not to participate in the conversation the previous night. Had I already alienated my roommates so far that they wouldn't want to be friends?
I decided it didn't matter. Based on their conversations, they weren't really the kinds of people I would get along with. Lisa Turpin and I had gotten on pretty well on the train, so I decided that she would be my first attempt at a proper friend.
Once I was ready and had piled all my books into my bag, I headed down to the Great Hall. I still hadn't received my timetable, and I wasn't sure what books I would need today, so I decided to bring everything. My bag was quite heavy.
When I got to the Great Hall, I sat down next to Neville, who was looking rather lonely. All the other first year Gryffindor boys were talking together a little way down the table, but for some reason Neville had been excluded. I realized that Neville also would be a good candidate for a friend, because he and I had that in common – being shunned by our classmates.
"Are you excited to be starting classes?" I asked him. I certainly was.
Neville, on the other hand, did not appear to be looking forward to classes. "No, not at all," he replied. "I'm going to be rubbish, I'm sure of it."
I tried to cheer Neville up by telling him he would do great, but I don't think I did a very good job. I found myself a little discouraged. If Neville didn't enjoy school, then maybe he wasn't a great choice for a friend. We wouldn't have too much to talk about with school out of the picture.
Once breakfast was over, Professor McGonagall came around and handed out our timetables. I glanced at it quickly to see where I would be going and saw, to my delight, that my first class was History of Magic. Since I didn't yet know my way around the castle, I found a prefect and asked her where the classroom was. She gave me some directions, and after thanking her, I led Neville out of the Great Hall to go to class.
History of Magic turned out to be quite fascinating. I had already read the whole textbook, but Professor Binns provided details that weren't actually in the book. I made sure to copy down very thorough notes since I was sure I wouldn't remember everything by the end of the year when I would have to write an exam. I noticed that I was the only one taking notes, and I sighed to myself. I suppose if the entire rest of the class wanted to fail that was their own choice.
The other really exciting thing about History of Magic was that Professor Binns was a ghost. He didn't mention how old he was, but it was clear that he had been dead for quite a long time, which meant that some of the history he was teaching, he would have lived through! I was very much looking forward to getting a first-hand account of some of the events that I'd read about in my textbook. It was quite a smart move, on the Headmaster's part, employing a ghost for this particular subject, I thought.
After History of Magic, we had Herbology, which was in the greenhouses. I followed my classmates in the hopes that they knew where they were going, since I didn't see a prefect anywhere around. Neville actually enjoyed Herbology, and I actually saw him smile, something I hadn't seen yet all day.
After Herbology, it was time for lunch, so we all returned to the Great Hall. I decided that it was time to see about making some real friends, so I scoped out the Ravenclaw table until I spotted Lisa Turpin sitting amongst some of our Ravenclaw classmates and went over to join them.
"Hi Lisa," I said merrily, taking a seat across the table from her. I didn't know the names of the rest of the girls yet, so I avoided that little awkwardness by smiling at them each in turn. "How's your first day been? So far, I've had History of Magic and Herbology, and I have to say they were both simply fascinating."
"Uh, Hermione, what are you doing?" Lisa frowned, glancing around, as if to make sure nobody was watching.
"What do you mean?" I asked. "I just thought I'd come over for a chat, eat some lunch." I grabbed a sandwich from a platter in the middle of the table and put it on my plate.
"Hermione, you can't sit here," Lisa said in a hushed voice.
"Why not?" I asked, looking around to the other first years. They were all nodding their heads along with Lisa and I felt like I'd swallowed a brick.
"You're in Gryffindor," Lisa explained. "You need to eat at the Gryffindor table. You can't eat over here at Ravenclaw."
"What's the big deal?" I frowned. "I'm sure lots of people eat with their friends at other house's tables."
"Hermione," Lisa said gently. "Look, yesterday was fun, on the train and all, but now that we've been sorted, things are going to have to be different. I'm in Ravenclaw and you're in Gryffindor. So, I need to be friends with the Ravenclaws, and you need to be friends with the Gryffindors."
"But all my roommates want to talk about is boys and nail polish," I protested. "You actually have an interest in school."
Lisa shrugged. "I'm sorry Hermione, I don't know what to tell you. Maybe you should have told the hat you wanted to be in Ravenclaw."
"I don't think that's really how the hat works," I muttered.
"Either way," Lisa said. "You've got to go."
Reluctantly, I rose from the table and walked away. A multitude of emotions were running through me. I was feeling embarrassed, for the way that the Ravenclaws had rejected me. I was feeling lonely, because the only like-minded people at this school had made it clear that I couldn't be friends with them. And I was feeling uncomfortable, because I could feel the eyes of the Ravenclaws on me as I walked away, and I knew that they were gossiping about me.
I glanced over at the Gryffindor table, trying to decide where to sit, but ultimately decided just to go to the library and study instead. This lunch period had been stressful enough. I just needed to wind down by going over my notes from my first two classes again.
After lunch was Transfiguration. Professor McGonagall taught Transfiguration and it was the first class where we got to try casting actual spells. We were supposed to be turning a match into a needle. I hadn't practiced this at home, but about halfway through the class I was successful, and Professor McGonagall showed the whole class. Nobody else had been able to do the transfiguration so I smiled smugly, glad to be back in my element, which was doing well in school. At least one thing hadn't changed.
After Transfiguration was Charms. After my success in transfiguration, my confidence was back up, and I decided to try my hand at making friends again. I took a seat with Lavender and Parvati, thinking that maybe I could befriend them by showing them how much I already knew about Charms.
"Hey girls," I greeted them, interrupting whatever conversation they'd been having.
"Oh," Parvati said, looking up at me. "Hi Hermione. Are you going to join us?"
"Yeah, I thought I might," I nodded.
"We were just talking about Seamus," Lavender said with a giggle. "Don't you think he has the most adorable little ears?"
"Oh," I said, feeling completely out of my element. "Sure, I guess so." I didn't really have an opinion, but it was clear that I was supposed to agree. "So, are you excited about our first Charms class? What charm do you think we'll start with? Personally, I'm hoping either for the levitation charm, or the unlocking charm. Those are my best two so far. I can do the wand-lighting charm as well, but my light isn't as strong as I'd like it to be. Of course, that may all change once Professor Flitwick teaches the lesson. Maybe I've been doing it wrong this whole time."
"Yeah," Lavender said. "Right. So anyway, Parvati…"
I sagged my shoulders as Lavender turned her back to me and continued her conversation with the other girl. Clearly, I needed to work on my conversation skills. I suspected that my problem was the way I had a habit of rambling when I was nervous. I needed to stop talking about myself so much and learn to ask more questions.
In the end, Charms class was a bit of a letdown. We didn't cast any actual spells; Professor Flitwick simply began to explain the various theories we would be covering that year.
When classes were over for the day, I decided that I'd had enough of trying and failing to make friends. I was exhausted, and all I wanted to do was relax. So, I headed to the library yet again, and started to go over my notes from the second half of the day.
When I'd finished revising, I decided to get up and explore the shelves. Since it was only our first day, the Professors had decided not to give us any homework. It had been a little disappointing at first, but it did give me time to explore, so I didn't mind too much.
I spent almost two hours just walking through the library, learning the organizational system, where the different sections were located, and randomly pulling books off of shelves to get a feel for all the different topics that were available to me to read.
By the time dinner rolled around, I'd selected two volumes to borrow and brought them up to the front desk, where the librarian was shuffling through some paperwork.
"Excuse me?" I said to get her attention. "I'd like to check out these books."
"First year?" the librarian snapped, grabbing the books away from me and flipping to the back, where the slip for keeping track of loans was kept. "I have very strict rules about borrowing books," she said. "No eating near my books. No writing in my books. No taking my books into the bathroom, even if they're just inside your bag. Never carry ink in the same bag as my books. Never fold over the corner of a page to keep your place – if you need a bookmark, I can provide you with one."
"Oh, don't worry about that," I assured the librarian. "I have about twenty bookmarks back in my trunk. I'll take very good care of these."
"See that you do, Miss…?"
"Hermione Granger," I gave her my name for the loan cards, and she scribbled it down, adding a stamp with the current date.
"You have two weeks before these are due back," the librarian declared. "If they've been marred in any way, you'll find your book borrowing privileges revoked faster than you can say 'library'."
"Understood," I said seriously. Though her warnings were wasted on me – I would never bring a library book back in less than pristine condition – I respected her need to ensure I took proper care of the books. I appreciated her rigorous and severe attitude in that regard.