Okay, it's been eons, and I apologize. I barely had the internet, and then, when I did, I didn't have the slightest clue what to write. I hope this story is worth it!
With thanks to don't own this! Enjoy!
-The Author
A new letter arrived in the mail late in the summer. It was made of parchment, same as the original, with the same address, (Second Bedroom Upstairs, Lincolnton, Wessex), but the writing was different. Her parents watched as she opened it. They all bent down over the paper, but only Hermione could read it. Her parents were looking at it upside-down, after all.
"Oh!" she said.
Her parents jumped.
"Since I was born into a Muggle family, I get a guide to the Wizarding world!"
"Who?" Mom asked.
"Another student, just starting out at Hogwarts, too!" Hermione said. "It says that they hope that we will be great friends. He comes from an old Wizarding family."
"What's his name?" Dad asked.
Hermione read: "Neville Longbottom."
Her parents frowned.
"That's a good name," Mom said.
"Yes," Dad said. "Very, ah, fitting."
/end
A few letters were sent back and forth ("Haven't they heard of a telephone?" Mom sighed), and it was all arranged: Hermione was going to meet her first schoolmate! They were all going to have lunch at a restaurant in a town right in between Lincolnton and their town!
What was Hermione going to wear? She searched through her whole room for something that looked witchy. There was the black dress she had worn to Great-Uncle Jack's funeral. Too formal. The black slacks and a black t-shirt? Ugh. Black was not her color.
She went downstairs to ask her mother.
"Mom, what's my color?"
Mom didn't even look up from her cup of coffee. "Red or green."
Color! Hermione dashed upstairs. She opened up Hogwarts: A History. Colors were important at Hogwarts.
After the four separate founders selected each their own students, they chose to mark and honor the students by giving them each robes of their favorite colour. Gryffindor chose for his students scarlet robes; Hufflepuff, yellow; Ravenclaw, blue; and Slytherin, green.
"Red or green." She flipped through to the back, to the brief biographies of the four founders. She would go with the color of whoever sounded the neatest. Red was the color of Gryffindor. Godric Gryffindor wanted students who were brave. Hermione didn't feel too brave. She was all shaken up over just meeting another wizard! Perhaps she ought to go with Slytherin's green?
Slytherin believed students should only be selected from "pure" students, whose whole family was Magick, as far back as anyone could tell. No half-bloods, and no muggle-borns. That sounded like racism! And it certainly excluded her!
She came downstairs to show her mother. She wore her red t-shirt and blue jeans. It was a nice t-shirt, and she had ironed it. She picked up her red hat from the front hallway, put it on, and paraded before the breakfast table.
"Very nice," her mother said. "Just one thing." She went to the hall closet, and picked up Hermione's blue hat. She exchanged the two hats, so she was wearing a blue hat and a red shirt. "I lied. Green isn't your color at all." Then she kissed her on the cheek. "You look lovely, darling."
"My hat was red."
"Matching accessories are out. Eat your breakfast."
Hermione sighed and ate her breakfast. Lunch was going to be so much more exciting!