Chapter 7: It's Not So Easy, Making Friends

When I awoke the next morning, I found that Lily and Sally-Anne were getting dressed, so I hurried to get ready and joined them as they headed down to the Great Hall.

"Isn't it a lovely morning?" I asked, coming up behind them.

"Oh, sure I guess so," Lily shrugged. She pointed out the window. "If you like rainy days."

I felt my face heat up in embarrassment. I hadn't even checked to see what the weather was like. I'd just been trying to make small talk.

"So, it looks like we've got Defence Against the Dark Arts first thing," I said conversationally. "That should be interesting."

"Oh yes, I've been looking forward to that class since we got our schedules yesterday morning," Sally-Anne agreed.

Excited to finally have someone interested in a class, I jumped on this.

"I wonder what we'll start with," I said eagerly. "There's curses and counter-curses, hexes and jinxes, defence against dark creatures…"

"I just can't believe that we're going to have Defence Against the Dark Arts with Harry Potter in the room," Lily said, going starry eyed.

I frowned. What was the big deal? What did it matter if Harry was in this class in particular? "But he's been in all our other classes," I pointed out. "Why would Defence Against the Dark Arts be any different from Herbology?"

Lily and Sally-Anne both craned their heads around to look at me like I had two heads. "Hermione, don't you realize who he is?" Lily asked emphatically.

I shrugged. "Well sure," I nodded. I'd read about Harry. I knew his story just like everyone else.

"So, then you know that he's probably got tons of secret hidden powers," Lily went on. "And if there's a class where he might reveal something like that, Defence Against the Dark Arts is the place."

"Hmm," I hummed. "I don't know. I mean, he was a baby at the time. I don't think he necessarily did anything to stop the curse. I think He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named messed the curse up."

Sally-Anne and Lily both rolled their eyes. "You don't understand anything, do you?" Sally-Anne groaned, making me feel small and insignificant. "He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named was insanely powerful. He'd killed hundreds of people, and tons of witches and wizards had tried to stop him. He didn't just 'mess up'. He was stopped."

I shrugged. If Sally-Anne and Lily were going to insist that a one-year-old somehow had secret powers I wasn't going to argue. And they did make a good point. I'd just entered the wizarding world. Sure, I'd read a few books, but there were still tons I didn't know. I shouldn't be assuming that I had all the knowledge.

"Anyway, what I can't understand is why Harry Potter has been spending all his time hanging around with Ron Weasley," Lily said as we reached the Great Hall and took seats near the front of the room. Harry and Ron were seated about halfway down the table, and Lily looked at Ron with a look of condescension.

"Why?" I couldn't help but ask. "What's wrong with Ron?"

Lily shrugged. "Oh, nothing, I guess. But it's not like that family is anything special. We'd all just figured that he'd align himself with the most prominent wizarding families once he'd arrived. Instead he's hanging out with second-hand Weasley."

I frowned. It was obvious to me that Ron's family had money problems. My first clue had been the scene I'd witnessed at Madam Malkin's, and now Lily's comment confirmed it. But it was no reason to look down on someone. It wasn't Ron's fault his family had less money than others, the same way it wasn't my fault I'd been born into a non-magical family.

"Yeah," Sally-Anne agreed. "But hey, I've got to give Weasley props. Whatever he's doing, he should keep doing it. He's already the second most popular kid in first year, second to Harry of course. He sure does know what he's doing. I might have to take notes."

At this, my mind raced into overdrive at the possibilities. If I wanted to make friends, I needed to raise my social standing. And if Ron had made himself the second most popular first year just by hanging out with Harry, then there was only one thing for it. I needed to become friends with them too.

I tried sitting with Harry and Ron in Defence Against the Dark Arts, but Lily and Sally-Anne claimed the seats before I had a chance, so I ended up sitting with Neville. I tried again in History of Magic, but they took seats in the far back corner, and I just couldn't bring myself to sit so far away from the front. It was hard enough paying attention in the front row when the rest of the class was goofing off or falling asleep.

I told myself that lunch would be a good time to re-introduce myself, but they were sitting with Seamus and Dean and I decided that it would be best to wait until it was just the two of them.

Finally, I got fed up, and just came up and joined them in the hallway as we were walking from the Great Hall up to the Charms classroom on the second floor.

"I don't believe it," Ron was saying. "There's no way muggles actually pay money to watch a bunch of guys run around and kick a ball. Dean's having me on."

"No really Ron," Harry insisted. "Dean's right, it's called football and it's really quite popular."

"I understand your disbelief, Ron," I said, jumping into the conversation without invitation. "It's always baffled me how people can get so excited about sports. It doesn't take brains to run around a field for an hour or two."

Ron turned and gave me a haughty look. "I never said I didn't like sports. I'm a Chudley Cannons fan all the way. I just don't see how this… football… can compare to something like Quidditch."

"Quidditch?" I frowned. The was word unfamiliar to me.

"Merlin, don't you know anything?" Ron cried. "It's only the best wizarding sport ever invented! Here's a thought, you like to read, don't you? Why don't you scram and go read up about Quidditch? Learn something that's actually useful."

It felt like a slap in the face. I immediately stopped walking, letting Harry and Ron get ahead of me while I processed what had just happened.

Ron had been very patronizing, but then again, I had just inserted myself into the conversation. Perhaps I'd thrown him. The real problem was that he'd known about something that I didn't. I'd been blind sighted when he's brought up the topic of 'quidditch'. Ron was right. What I really needed to do was go to the library after class and read up on the subject. Then I'd be ready for my next conversation attempt with the two boys.

Over the course of the rest of the week, I continued to try to make friends with my housemates. Unfortunately, Lavender and Parvati seemed more interested in talking about boys than anything else – a conversation topic I was unable to participate in for longer than a few seconds. Sally-Anne and Lily were alright company, but I could tell that they got quickly annoyed with my presence when I sat with them.

Harry and Ron were still my primary targets, but it was so hard trying to befriend a couple of boys. I didn't share any of their interests and their mannerisms were so foreign to me. One day I saw them punching each other's fists, and I couldn't understand why they would undertake such a violent action when they appeared to be in such a good mood.

I ended up spending a good deal of my time alone in the library, reading and revising. As the level of homework started to pick up, Neville started joining me more and more often. I didn't mind the company, until I realized how easy it was for Neville to drive himself into a state when he didn't know the answer to something. It made me anxious for him, which was an added burden I just didn't need.

On Friday, we had our first potions class with Professor Snape. I'd heard a lot of different things about our potions Professor. Percy had said he was a good teacher, but others had said that he was prejudiced against Gryffindor house, which made me nervous. I was anxious to impress him and made sure that I was extremely prepared when I sat down at one of the desks in the dungeons.

It was immediately obvious that Professor Snape did not like Harry. Almost as soon as he noticed the boy in the class, he started bombarding him with potions-related questions. Eager to make a good impression, my hand shot into the air when the first question was posed. When Harry didn't know the answer, I waved my hand around for good measure, hoping the Professor would call on me and give me a chance to show off my knowledge.

Instead, he posed a second question, again one I knew the answer to. I wondered whether he'd even seen my hand raised and stretched it as high as it could go. It was started to get tired, but I refused to lower it.

When Harry again didn't have an answer, a Professor Snape came up with a third question. It was a trick question, one of my favorites. The Professor's attention was so completely focused on Harry though, and I needed him to see that I knew the answer, so I stood up out of my chair, my hand still raised, as I tried to get his attention.

Finally, Harry suggested that Professor Snape call on me and my heart leapt as I imagined all the points I might win for Gryffindor for being so prepared. Unfortunately, Professor Snape was not interested in having me answer. He ordered me to sit and then proceeded to give the correct answers himself.

I couldn't understand it. Why wouldn't he have let me answer. I knew the answers, and even if I hadn't, wasn't the point of school to have us try? Why would he ask the questions if he was just going to give us the answers himself anyway?

I didn't bother to write down the answers. I'd known them, and in fact, if I'd been called on, I could have gone into even more detail than Professor Snape had in his brief explanations of each of the three questions.

Glancing around the room, I noticed that quite a few people were snickering behind their hands, and I felt bad for Harry. It wasn't his fault he hadn't known the answers. He'd been raised in the muggle world and probably hadn't had time to read ahead like me.

As I sent a scowl in Lavender and Parvati's direction for mocking Harry though, I noticed that they weren't laughing and pointing at him. They were laughing and pointing at me. When they saw that I was watching, Lavender put her hand up in the air and started waving it around, making a face that looked like she was constipated. Parvati dissolved into a fit of giggles, the two only stopping when Professor Snape spun around and gave them a deathly glare.

I felt my face heat up in humiliation as I realized that they were making fun of me. As I looked around at everyone snickering and whispering behind their textbooks, I realized that the whole class was laughing at me, and my face went from faintly pink to red as a tomato. I sunk a little in my chair, wishing I was anywhere but here.

Thankfully, Professor Snape started the actual lesson then, and everybody suddenly became very focused on notetaking, which meant that they weren't looking at me anymore. I swallowed as I tried to calm my nerves. My whole body was shaking, and my pulse was thundering. But I was in class, and I needed to pay attention, so I pushed it all away and focused on what needed to be done.