Chapter 7: A More Equal Friendship
Hogwarts was abuzz with the news: today was the day when the Durmstrang and Beauxbatons parties would arrive, and the Triwizard Tournament would finally get under way. Everyone was talking about the foreign witches and wizards, and waiting with baited to breath to see what they would be like.
The only people who couldn't seem to share in the enthusiasm where Harry and Ron.
Harry had watched Ron stomp around all day in a foul mood, going red whenever he saw Hermione and find hasty and ill thought out reasons to be somewhere else. He could see it hurting Hermione and yet, at the same time, he could understand perfectly why Ron was doing it. He himself, when he looked into Hermione's face, could see his own guilt reflected there and he hadn't even gotten his trousers off.
It wasn't the prank per se- compared to some of the things Harry knew that his father and Sirius had done to Snape it was rather mild- or the embarrassment of being caught out like that, Harry thought. The transformation had been physically very accurate, nobody could have guessed that it wasn't the real Hermione. No, what was getting to Harry and Ron was what it said about the way that they thought about Hermione. Anyone should have been able to tell that Hermione would never behave like that, and yet they had both gone along with it, because, why? Because they wanted her to act like that? Was that all Hermione, their supposed friend, was to them? Did they just keep her around for, for fanservice or something?
Is that any worse than keeping her around for her brains? A small and treacherous voice in his head asked.
'I don't do that.' Harry thought angrily.
I think you'll find you do. You've never treated her the same as Ron, she's never been your best friend in the same way. Why do you think she's always doing things for you?
'Because she's a friend!'
Because she knows that unlike Ron she has to earn your friendship, her place in your little circle. So she does your homework for you, she does your thinking for you, and she helps you out through one crisis after another.
'Ron helped out too. And I did the really dangerous bits.'
Compare what she does for you with what you do for her and then tell me that you don't use Hermione. The snide voice in his head, which sounded a lot like Professor Snape at his sneering best, said acidly.
Harry felt sick.
Naruto paced the corridors wondering at how excited everyone was getting in this place about the people from the other schools turning up to compete in the tournament. Nobody could wait to meet them. The whole thing kinda put him in mind of the Chunin Exams, with all the ninja from the different villages coming to compete against the Leaf Village's finest. Hopefully these foreign wizards wouldn't be led by a murderous psycho with an urge to commit murder in order to prove his own existence. That might just be more than he could cope with.
He wondered where Sasuke was, the guy hadn't been around much lately and nobody seemed to know where he went. He just kept on getting weirder.
He passed by the bathroom on the third floor, and stopped in his tracks when he heard someone inside there sobbing. Naruto took a couple of steps backward and after hesitating for a moment, it was a girl's bathroom after all, he pressed one eye to the crack in the door and peered inside.
Hermione was in there, sitting in the middle of the bathroom floor with her bushy hair all awry, crying into her own arms.
"Hey," Naruto pushed the door open, "what's up, Hermione?"
Hermione looked up, and just as quickly looked away again when she saw who it was, "Oh it's you. It's nothing, leave me alone."
"Don't be like that," Naruto shut the door behind him as he came in, "listen, you don't have to like me being here, you don't even have to like me; and I may only be a hyperactive knucklehead ninja, but that doesn't mean I might not be able to help you out if you tell what's wrong." he wasn't sure why he was doing this, unless it was because he felt guilty for what he'd done to Harry and Ron earlier. Sakura had given him hell for it and the punches she landed on him couldn't hurt worse than her utter disdain could.
"It's Ron," Hermione said, confirming Naruto's fear, "and Harry. They're both acting like idiots." she sniffed, "Or perhaps I'm the one whose been the idiot."
"What do you mean, an idiot? I've heard people talking about you, you're like a genius or something. You could give Shikamaru a run for his money, and he's smarter than any of us." Naruto said.
"Books," Hermione said, "cleverness. It doesn't help you understand people does it?"
"Uh, I guess not."
"I've tried so hard to fit in with them, I've tried so hard to make them see; and still neither of them really understands. Oh, what's the point?"
"You can't say that Hermione," Naruto knelt down beside her, "don't ever say that, ever. You can't turn your back on your friends, you can't give up on them completely, its only your friends that make life worth living."
"But when they make you feel like this," Hermione said, "when they can hurt you this way, isn't it better to just go it alone?"
Naruto thought of Sasuke, trying to walk his road alone and finding nothing but pain, anguish and defeat along the way, "Sometimes, when you care about someone, they can hurt you. But that isn't anything compared to the feeling of emptiness when there is no one around who cares about you. Trust me, for once I know what I'm talking about."
Hermione wiped away tears from her eyes, "How?"
Naruto's voice dropped a little in volume, "I used to be alone. When I was growing up, I didn't have anybody. No parents, no friends, nobody would talk to me, nobody would hang around with me; I'd do anything to get there attention but, all it really did was make them hate me all the more. You don't have any idea what its like to live every day in that kind of dark emptiness, in a pit where nobody can reach you, or even wants to. I hated every day, I just wanted it to end, I didn't want to go on any more.
But now, there are others. People who share my life with me. People who make it worthwhile to keep on living. First it was just a few: Sasuke, and Sakura, and Kakashi sensei, and Iruka sensei; but now, now I have lots of friends and it's great to wake up every morning and know that they're all there for me. How can you not want that? How can anybody decide to turn their back on that?"
Naruto was wrong, Hermione thought, she did know what it was like to have no one. She did understand what solitude was. That was why she had sought refuge in books in the first place, which had the effect of making her even more withdrawn and lonely. She had at least had her parents, but she still knew what it felt like to be completely alone.
But she had needed reminding of it, and reminding of the fact that when she had come here Harry and Ron had been the first to accept her, after their fashion, to rescue her from the darkness. And if they weren't perfect well, at least they had tried, and that was something.
"You know," she said, "you can be quite insightful sometimes."
Naruto chuckled, "Uh, sure, whatever. So, do you want to come and watch these foreign wizards arriving?"
"Yes," Hermione accepted his helping hand up, "and along the way, I'll try and think of what I should say to the both of them."
"Ron?" Harry caught up with Ron making his way towards the entrance to Hogwarts, where the rest of the school had either gone or was going to watch Beauxbatons and Durmstrang arrive. Ron, however, didn't stop when Harry called his name.
"Ron, wait." Harry was jogging to catch up with him, "Ron, stop ignoring me."
Ron resolutely didn't look or say anything.
Harry sighed, and decided he was just going to have to say it, "Ron, do you think we take advantage of Hermione?"
Ron turned like a whiplash, "For the last time Harry nothing happened! And we agreed we weren't going to talk about this."
"I didn't mean like that you git," Harry said, "I meant, take advantage of her in a different way."
"Oh." Ron said, "What do you mean?"
"I mean we don't really do a lot for her compared to what she does for us." Harry said.
"Yeah, but that's cause she's clever than we are." Ron said, "How are we supposed to help her with her homework."
"I know that but, there must be something we could do." Harry said, "I mean, erm, we could, um," he held up his hands in despair, "Look at us! If this doesn't we prove what rubbish friends we are I don't know what does."
"Harry? Ron?"
Harry turned around to see Hermione standing at the other end of the corridor, with Naruto hovering just beyond her shoulder. Hermione looked quite nervous, and Naruto was giving quiet encouragement from behind.
"She's with him now?" Ron demanded, aghast, "How can she prefer him to us? I mean, at least Sasuke looked cool but him."
"Maybe he gives a bit instead of just taking." Harry murmured.
Hermione started to walk forward, down the corridor towards them both, not the sexy slink that Naruto had used while pretending to be Hermione, but rather the prim but elegant step that they were used to from her. Harry found that, as if he was looking at it anew in the light of his fresh resolve, he found it quite graceful.
Hermione stopped in front of him, and took a deep breath in, "Harry-"
"No, wait," Harry said, "there's something I have to say first." he reached out and took her hands in his own, "Hermione, I've been a git to you recently, and I'm sorry for that, but what I really want to say sorry for is the way that I've been a git to you ever since we first met. You do…so much for me, and I don't do anything for you in return. And that's going to change. I'll, um, I'll help out with SPEW, properly help out I mean, and we'll even stop calling it spew as well, and anything else you need, or want or; I suppose what I'm trying to say is that I'm going to try and be there for you the way you've been there for me."
Harry staggered backwards as Hermione flung her arms around him, burying his face in a tangle of bushy hair.
"Oh, Harry," Hermione said, "that's all that you ever had to say."
Naruto smiled as he watched them from the far end of the corridor. Looked like everything was back on track, and he'd kind of made up for what he'd done earlier.
"That was a nice thing you did for the two of them," a soft, ethereal voice said from beside him, and Naruto saw that a witch about his age, slightly pale with silvery blonde hair, was standing next to him, "it's good to see that they're back." she reached out and grabbed at Naruto's hair.
"Hey!" Naruto sprang back, "What was that for?"
"You have wrackspurts in your hair." the girl said calmly.
Naruto immediately started to run his fingers through his air, "Really? What do they look like? What do they do?"
"They're too small to see," the witch said, "and because no one's ever caught on, nobody really knows what they can do. Nothing beneficial though I should think."
Naruto gave his hair another quick muss, "Shino'll be able to catch one, he knows all about bugs and stuff like that. Thanks for letting me know, um,"
"Luna Lovegood." Luna said, "And you're the Nine Tailed Fox."
Naruto stopped in mid step, "How did you know that?"
"It isn't hard to see." Luna said, "He's there inside you, trying to get out. More people would notice except that they don't really want to. You should be careful, there are things out there worse than Crumple Horned Snorkacks."
"Uh, sure, thanks." Naruto got out of there as quickly as he could, but he remembered to ask Shino about the Wrackspurts, after all he didn't want to get ill or something.
Author's Note: I did intend for Beauxbatons and Durmstrang to arrive this chapter, but it didn't really fit in with the relationship stuff, but rest assured they will arrive next chapter absolutely certainly.
