Chapter 8: Better Off Alone

I spent the rest of my day with my head down, trying not to draw attention to myself. Thankfully, we had Friday afternoons off, so I found myself a quiet spot in the library and kept out of everyone's way. My hope was that if I waited long enough, everyone would forget, or someone else would do something more embarrassing, and the heat would be off me.

I waited until the vey last minute before curfew to head back to Gryffindor Tower. I wasn't insane and had no intention of being caught in the corridors after hours, but I also wanted to postpone my return to the dormitory as long as possible.

As I climbed the stairs, I convinced myself that I had nothing to worry about. Nobody was going to be making fun of me now. It had happened, and it was over. I'd moved on, and so had everyone else, I was sure.

I pushed open the door to my dormitory to find Lavender, Parvati, Sally-Anne, and Lily all huddled on Lavender's bed. They were clearly giggling about something, so I went over and asked what was going on, hoping to be allowed to join in.

"Ooh Professor Snape, pick me, pick me!" Lavender cried, shooting her hand up into the air and waving it around like an American with a foam finger at a baseball game.

I felt my spirits plummet.

"I know the answer. Please call on me. If you don't call on me, I'll die," Parvati added, much to the glee of the other girls.

"I know all the answers, because I spend all my time reading textbooks in the library, and have no life" Lily jumped in.

"That's not fair!" I exclaimed. "I do so have a life. And friends." It was a feeble argument, but I couldn't just stand there letting them disparage me.

"What, you mean Longbottom?" Lavender challenged me, getting up from her bed so that she was facing me. "Sure, if you can call that a friendship. Looks to me more like you just do your homework next to each other. Do you do anything besides homework, like ever?"

"Sure I do," I defended myself, taking a step back. Lavender was starting to crowd me and I could feel myself starting to shake.

"I mean besides read for fun, you little bookworm," Lavender said, advancing on me.

Suddenly, in my mind, her face morphed into that of Nancy Hummel and I was right back on the playground of my old primary school.

"What's that you've got there?" Nancy demanded, grabbing my book out of my hands. It was the autobiography of an accomplished female scientist that my parents had gotten me for Christmas.

"Just a book," I replied, reaching to grab the book back. But Nancy held it up high, and because she was just that much taller than me, I couldn't reach it.

"Come on, give it back!" I cried, jumping in an effort to wrench the book from her hands.

"What do you think, girls?" Nancy asked, looking to her friends, who surrounded us. "Should I give the bookworm back her book?"

Her friends started laughing and shaking their heads, and Nancy laughed along with them. Then she tossed the book into a nearby puddle.

"Go and get it," she said to me, pointing at the now ruined book.

Humiliated, I went and picked the book up out of the puddle, holding it out so that the water could run off the pages.

"I bet she's going to take it home and blow-dry out the pages," Nancy laughed as she and her friends turned away from me. "What a nerd."

"Don't call me a bookworm!" I cried, tears springing to my eyes. I spun around and crossed the landing to our shared bathroom, shutting and locking the door behind me.

For all my efforts, for all my attempts at making friends, I'd failed. I was right back where I'd been when I was in the muggle world. Whether it was Nancy Hummel or Lavender Brown, someone was always going to mock and make fun of me. Maybe there was something about me that repelled other kids.

Professors seemed to like me well enough. Not Professor Snape, but Professor McGonagall and Professor Flitwick had already taken quite a liking to me. And Madam Pince had taken to smiling at me whenever I entered the library.

I sank to the floor and pulled my knees up to my chin, wrapping my arms around my legs. Why did girls have to be so mean? Lavender and Parvati, Sally-Anne and Lily… why couldn't just one of them have been nice to me, tried to include me, stuck up for me back there? Neville wasn't like that. In fact, none of the boys here had made fun of me like the girls had. Maybe that was the answer. Maybe what I needed were guy friends. Maybe I just wasn't the type of girl that bonded well with girls.

Gathering myself up off the floor, I switched on the shower and began to get ready for bed, hoping that by the time I was finished in the bathroom, the other girls would have gone to sleep. I'd face them in the morning, once I'd had a chance to sleep away all my emotions. And when I did, it would be with my head held high.

Over the course of the next week, I really tried to make friends with some of the Gryffindor boys. Unfortunately, all any of them seemed to want to talk about was flying and Quidditch, a topic I couldn't relate to in the slightest. We started flying lessons that week, and I'd hoped that maybe I'd find that it wasn't as bad as I'd expected, but after Neville injured himself and had to go to the hospital wing, I knew that flying was never going to be my thing.

The night after that first flying lesson, I overheard some Slytherin boys challenge Harry and Ron to an after-hours wizard's duel. I was appalled that they would suggest something like that, and even more appalled that Harry and Ron agreed. I tried to intervene, but Harry and Ron wouldn't listen to me.

I was extremely annoyed with them both, and even more so when I got stuck tagging along on their foolish mission after getting locked out of the common room. By the time we'd returned, having just barely escaped from the three-headed-dog, I was furious. If this was what friendship with Harry and Ron was going to look like, I didn't want any part of it. I would sooner spend my days in the library with Neville than risking expulsion.

So, the next day, instead of trying to sit with Harry and Ron, or even with Seamus and Dean, I sat alone at the end of the table in the Great Hall and composed a letter to my parents, realizing that it had been far too long and that I owed them a letter.

Dear Mum and Dad,

How are you? I'm quite enjoying Hogwarts. I made a couple of friends on the train, Neville and Lisa, though Lisa is not in my house, so I don't really talk to her anymore.

I decided not to mention the fact that she'd outright told me we couldn't be friends because of our different houses. Mum and Dad didn't need all the details about my complete failure in the friendship department.

My classes are quite fun. I'm very good at Transfiguration and Charms, and I'm the only one who pays attention during History of Magic. I do enjoy brewing Potions, but the teacher, Professor Snape, doesn't seem to like me very much. Professor McGonagall does though, you remember her? She was the one who came to visit us in the summer. She gave me five points because I knew what a Switching Spell was.

The librarian, Madam Pince, is also very nice. I come to the library almost every day so she sees me often and she recognizes me now and smiles when I arrive. I'm studying hard, as always, so don't worry about that. I hope to hear from you soon.

Love,

Hermione

I left out anything about my dormmates, or Harry and Ron and the incident the previous night. Mum and Dad would only worry if I told them any of that, and there was nothing for them to be worried about. So instead, I focused my letter on my classes and left it at that.

When I was finished writing my letter, I left the Great Hall and headed for the owlery to borrow one of the school owls, since I didn't have one of my own. As I watched the owl fly away with my letter, I hoped my parents had had enough time to come to terms with everything and that they would be as excited as I was that I was attending Hogwarts.

At the end of that second week, Professor McGonagall came to find me in the library.

"Good afternoon, Hermione," she greeted me. I looked up from my potions essay, surprised to see the Transfiguration teacher so far from the Transfiguration classroom.

"Good afternoon, Professor McGonagall," I returned the greeting. "Can I help you with something?"

"I thought we might go back to my office and have a little chat," Professor McGonagall said. "Talk about how you're settling in."

"Sure, I guess so," I agreed readily. My potions essay could wait, it wasn't due until next week.

Professor McGonagall's office wasn't far from the library. When we arrived, she took a seat behind her desk and gestured to the chairs in front of it, indicating that I should sit down. She offered me some tea, which I accepted, figuring it was polite.

"So, Hermione, how are things going?" she asked, taking a sip of her tea.

"Things are good," I said. "I simply adore Transfiguration of course." I earned a smile with this statement. "And History of Magic is truly fascinating. I'm quite good at Charms as well."

"Professor Flitwick is very impressed with you," Professor McGonagall stated.

I beamed with pride at this statement.

"You are certainly excelling in all your classes," Professor McGonagall commended me. "It is always a concern that there could be an adjustment period for our muggle-born students during the first month, but you've adapted quite quickly."

"I'm vey adaptable," I agreed.

"I have noticed that you don't spend a great deal of time with your classmates," Professor McGonagall said then. "You sit apart from the others at meals, you spend your free time studying in the library. I'm worried that you aren't socializing enough."

"I socialize," I frowned, not liking the direction our conversation was taking. "Neville studies with me sometimes, and I don't always eat alone."

"It's true that you and Mr. Longbottom spend some time together, but you don't appear to do much more than homework," Professor McGonagall noted. "Your other classmates are all starting to form solid friendships, and I would hate for you to be left out of that because you waited too long to integrate yourself."

Too late, I thought to myself bitterly.

"Professor McGonagall," I said, choosing my words carefully. "I appreciate your concern, but I'm just happier on my own. If you don't mind, I do have a potions essay to write, so if we're done here…?"

I stood, to indicate that I was through with the conversation, and Professor McGonagall sighed.

"My door is always open, Hermione," she said as I made my way to the door. "If there's ever anything you want to talk about, you can come to me."

I nodded and slipped out into the corridor. I couldn't believe that Professor McGonagall had ambushed me like that. How was it any of her business what I did with my free time? So long as I was doing well in classes, she had no right to interfere in my life.

Reluctantly, I decided that for my own good, and for the sake of keeping Professor McGonagall off my back, I would endeavor to at least make it look like I had friends. I would sit near my classmates at mealtimes, try to spend some of my time in the common room instead of always being in the library, and hopefully that would do the trick.