You're a protagonist Harry
Chapter 07 – The people you meet
…
"Wow!"
"Prek!"
Honestly, it was so childish. He was a teenager for crying out loud, he wasn't supposed to be impressed by anything. But come on, how was he not supposed to be impressed by THAT! It was like learning about magic had magically transformed him back into an eleven-year-old.
"The Hogwarts express," so big, so shiny, so red.
It was like a sleek steel dragon sitting on rails, patiently puffing out rings of smoke.
"Wow!" If this kept up, he'd have to start holding his jaw up, or get used to the taste of dirt.
"Prek?"
"Huh? Oh, yeah, yeah, let's go."
He'd come extra early that morning to make his train, partly out of eagerness, but also, this was when his guide for the day could get him there. Doris Crockford was a Leaky Cauldron regular and had been pleased as punch when the 'boy who lived' (yet another odd conjunction of words that seemed to mean more than it appeared) had asked for her help.
And help he needed, because he didn't have to ask to know what sort of reaction he'd get from anyone at the train station inquiring about a Platform 9 ¾. If he hadn't known magic was a thing, he would have assumed someone was having him on.
Even knowing magic was a thing it had taken all his grit, determination, and a poke from Doris, to make the run at what appeared a very solid wall.
It wasn't, thank heavens, and there was no one standing right on the other side as he came through, thank the author, for not using such a tired old cliché when he easily could have and you know he really wanted to.
Don't worry though, they're coming, just you wait.
As one of the first to arrive he had his pick of the compartments. All appeared essentially the same, so he stowed his things and flopped down in one near the back. The seats felt like real leather and with only his newest friend for company he had plenty of room to spread out.
"Points for quality," he thought aloud, "not quite luxury, but still pretty nice," or so he fancied.
He'd only been on the trains a handful of times when he was younger and Petunia couldn't find a sitter. While it had been fun getting out of the house, the memories overall were hardly pleasant; the best among them could only be called neutral.
"Well, that was then, and this is now," and now was looking considerably better than then.
Fully fed, the griffinette settled in for a nap, and with nothing better to do, Harry pulled out the book on Contemporary Wizards of Note he'd picked up the day before, when the clerk had hinted none too subtly that he was in it.
Three paragraphs had answered so many questions while simultaneously asking a dozen or so more. It was a balancing act of intrigue and frustration, and as he paged through the book he tottered precariously.
Advantageous then that he was not long to his solitude. The sound of people soon filtered through his open window as his fellow students began to arrive.
Setting his book aside, he sat and listened to the various exchanges, trying to imagine the face that went with each voice. Feeling a bit shy, and also not wanting to look rude, he refrained from sticking his head out the window and staring like an ugly tourist.
No one out there knew him yet, and he didn't want their first experience being of some fool hanging out a window gawking. First impressions were important, and he aimed to make a good one this time; no punching people… unless they really, really deserved it.
That aside.
By quirk or cliché, Harry remained alone in his compartment as the train filled. It looked to be about time to go and Harry was thinking of opening his book again when a great ruckus broke out on the platform.
"Sounds like someone's running late."
A powerful matronly voice shouted over several rambunctious clouds of noise. Such a calamity, Harry felt, warranted at least as discreet peek.
Sneak, sneak, sneaking to the window, he peered out onto the platform into a sea of red; ginger to be specific. Four gangly looking boys of various heights were saying goodbye to a matronly woman, doubtless the source of the matronly voice, and a small girl of the same flavor.
The tallest boy was very formal about the whole thing while the pair below him, who looked disturbingly similar to one another, were whispering something to the little girl. The fourth was just trying to hurry everyone along.
Harry snickered as he flopped back into his seat, "They look like a fun bunch."
"Prek!" came the protest at his careless flopping.
"Sorry."
The group of gingers were still carrying on when the train's whistle sounded their departure and the four boys clambered aboard. Harry peeked from the window again as they pulled out of the station, overcome by a sudden excitement and the need to see it.
"Here we go. We're really doing it."
The butterflies wrestled in his gut as the train picked up speed. It was really happening. He was really going. It was really happening.
He'd had some trouble believing it; the week had been long and filled with tiny bouts of what might have been panic attacks. Every time he came back from Diagon Alley, the feeling would hit him, the fear, like if he looked away or closed his eyes, it would all disappear, a fantasy, nothing but his imagination.
It was almost more than he could handle, the idea it was all al lie and any moment he'd be dragged back to the Dursley's, their constant smug dismissals and seemingly endless string of unpaid back-breaking labor.
But he was better now. It was happening, now. The train gained speed and ate up the distance, faster and faster. It wasn't his imagination, it was real, and it was happening, now.
"Still almost can't believe it," he grinned to himself. "Suppose I'll just have to get used to it."
Something he wouldn't mind getting used to, like having a pet, or an honest to god comforter on his bed. Boy had that been nice.
The train was just finding its stride, and everyone seemed to have set in for the ride when there was a knock at the door. An embarrassed ginger head poked in.
"Sorry," the head apologized, "everywhere else was full."
Harry grinned then chuckled at the embarrassed ginger, "Probly wanna try getting here before the train starts pulling out," he quipped. "Come on then, have a seat mate."
The gangly ginger flashed a grateful smile and slid into the compartment.
"I told'em we needed to get going. They think it's funny but it's not their first year."
"Is it always like that?"
"Every time we go anywhere," the ginger lamented. "You saw that out there?"
Harry nodded.
"That was a good day. Like herding cats mum says. Worse when Bill and Charlie first went to Hogwarts she says. Don't really remember too well myself."
"Which ones were Bill and Charlie?"
"Oh, none of those," he said. "Charlie graduated last year and Bill the year before. Percy's the oldest at school now; Head boy this year and hasn't stopped polishing the badge since he got it. Prat."
Harry chuckled and kept listening.
"Then there's Fred and George, they're the twins. Even mum can't tell them apart most days. They love that. If anything explodes it was probably them."
"Great."
"Then there's Ginny, she's the youngest."
"The girl that was with your mum."
He nodded, "Yeah, she'll be coming to Hogwarts next year. And that just leaves me. I'm Ron."
"Harry," said Harry, taking the offered hand. "And this is Billy," he gestured at the lazily attentive beast next to him, "cuz she eats like a Billy goat."
"Wicked," Ron chuckled. "Oh, this is Scabbers." Digging into his raggedy coat, he produced a fat brown rat, "He used to belong to Percy. Bit useless."
"Does he do any tricks?"
Ron shook his head, "Nah, just eats."
"Well, if you can only be good at one thing it might as well be something important."
Ron smiled at Harry's attempt in finding the silver lining. "Thought I lost him a couple times this summer. We went to Egypt to visit Bill; he works as a curse breaker for Gringotts…"
And so it went for an hour or better. Harry sat and listened while Ron regaled him of Bill in Egypt, then Charlie in Romania, the curse breaker and the dragon handler, and when he'd run out of things to say about them, he talked about his dad, who worked for the ministry, and his mum, who was a mum, and nothing else, so far as he knew.
He was just getting to the brothers that would be at Hogwarts with them when there came another knock at the door.
"Anything off the trolly dears?" the kindly old woman asked. "Pumpkin pasties, every flavor beans, chocolate frogs."
"Nah thanks, I'm good," said Ron, holding up a wrapped package of something unidentifiable.
Now, Harry was no fool, he knew you could not buy friends. However, as he looked over the contents of the trolly, he pondered, no one ever said you couldn't buy stuff and give it to people to make friends.
"How much for one of everything… for three."
He could see his pet looking at him expectantly and didn't want to find out what she might do if he didn't feed her again.
This proved wise.
"Cor, lookit her go!"
He was, "I know the guy said she could eat anything," but good grief.
"I used to like Bertie Bott's when I was younger," said Ron, commenting on the griffinette's current subject. "Guess I grew out of it, mostly."
"Mostly," Harry noted, meant only eating half the box and giving the rest to the rat. "They can't really mean every flavor."
"No, no, they do," said Ron. "Fred says he got a bogie flavored one once."
"I think Fred was having you on," Harry chuckled.
So did Ron, "Probably."
Their 'sampling' of wizarding treats was interrupted by a sudden crash from the hall.
"WHOA!"
"OWCH!"
"LOOK OUT!"
Three voices sounded the collision, but when they opened the door to see what had happened, there were only two people there.
"That third voice sounded familiar," Harry mused, observing, and not recognizing either of the people still sitting on the floor, both of whom were girls. "Are you two alright?"
The first to answer wore a pair of severe spectacles, framing her eyes much the same way her hair framed her face, by being so unavoidable you couldn't help but look at what was in the center. The hair was a great bushy mess, the sort of mess good combs had died trying to tame. Her attitude was at least slightly less off putting.
"I've been better," she said mildly. "What hit me?"
"A runaway wolf girl," said the other, a blonde who, despite rubbing her head gingerly, did not seem to flinch but in fact had her eyes open as wide as they would go.
Ron recognized this one, "Luna?"
"Hullo Ronald," said 'Luna' without even looking at the person she was speaking to.
"What are you doing here?" said the boy who would not be ignored. "You weren't supposed to start at Hogwarts till next year."
"That's a matter of opinion," she said without much inflection. "My birthday only just missed the cutoff date. I had daddy send a couple owls and here I am."
"Here you are, sitting on the floor," Harry pointed out. "Would you like a hand?"
The big-eyed girl looked at the offered hand, "Don't you need it?" she said. "I shouldn't think I'd want a hand you were just going to throw away. No, a secondhand hand just would not do in my opinion."
With her big-eyed expression unchanged, he wasn't sure if she was having him on or if she was completely serious. "Would you like some help getting up?"
"Oh! That would be lovely, thank you."
Helping the, peculiar, blonde to her feet, he turned and found Ron had done the same for the bushy-haired girl. "So, uh, introductions I think."
"I'm Hermione," said the bushy-haired girl immediately, "Hermione Granger."
"Um, Ron Weasley," said Ron, inching away from the over eager girl with the glasses.
"I'm Harry," said Harry, "And you're Luna apparently," he finished, turning to the blonde.
"No," she said, "I'm Luna Lovegood."
Harry blinked; he was not at all prepared for this conversation. But, if that's how she wanted to be, two could play that game.
"And do you?"
She tilted her head quizzically, "Do I what?"
"Love, good?"
He ignored the stifled exclamation of scandal behind him in lieu of seeing what his subject would say. The response was not all he hoped for.
"I think I'll need to get back to you on that," she said apparently unflustered, though he did notice, as she turned away, the slightest pink in her pale cheeks.
That just left, Hermione.
"Have either of you seen a toad. A boy named Neville lost one?"
Both boys shook their heads, drawing a sigh and a determined look from their new acquaintance who marched off to continue the search.
"Well, she's very… uh…"
"Driven?" Harry offered, sliding the door closed behind them.
"Yeah. Yeah that's the word," said Ron, lying so poorly Harry almost thought he might be telling the truth. "Honestly, I was not expecting 'her'."
"You mean Luna who might not Lovegood?" Harry smirked.
"Yeah," said Ron, not sharing his mirth. "She used to play with my sister when we were young. Didn't think I'd see her. Hope she doesn't get sorted into the same house as me?"
"Why's that?" Harry wondered, seeing nothing that might repel one from the girl.
"She's… weird."
Harry gave the ginger a sardonic look, "You're going to have to be more specific than that. People back where I grew up used to call me weird."
"What for?"
"Because it was easier than learning the truth, I guess." How was he supposed to know why people did what people did?
The subject didn't seem all that important to either of them and it ended with a, "Still hope she's in a different house. But what about you Harry? What house do you think you'll be in. I'm almost guaranteed to be in Gryffindor. My whole family's been in Gryffindor for generations."
"Uh, what're my options?"
This question brought a smile to the ginger's face, "Well, you got Gryffindor, then there's Ravenclaw, Hufflepuff, and Slytherin," the last one drew a grimace. "You don't want to get in there. As for how you find out… well, I'm not actually sure. Everyone I've asked just gives me this look like it's supposed to be some big surprise and they don't want to spoil it. Though George claimed we'd have to wrestle a troll."
"Pretty sure he was having you on," said Harry.
"You think so?"
Given the alternative, "I hope so."