Sorry for the crappy title, but my imagination is worn out!
Hermione Granger, now eighteen years of age, had returned to Hogwarts, determined to gain her N.E.W.T's even though she had recently been dubbed by the Ministry, the Order of the Phoenix, and The Daily Prophet as the most intelligent witch of her generation, and had been told by numerous ghosts and portraits that she was the most gifted witch of her age they had seen since Minerva McGonagall had been a student. Qualifications were important, she mused, as she made her way back to her room that she shared with Ginny Weasley. But more than that, she was stalling for time, having no idea what she wanted to do now that she didn't have to help save the world, capture dark wizards and find time to study. Truth was, since the end of the war, Hogwarts was the only place she felt comfortable. She knew that she couldn't rely on it forever, but for the moment, it was her own little sanctuary, something that she knew others who had been involved in the war were still trying to find. With attending lessons not being compulsory for her, she spent a lot of the time in the library or in Professor McGonagall's private study, reading, researching and writing theories for charms, healing, and transfiguration.
It was during a particularly rainy day in November, researching the link between depression and dark magic, that the thought came to her. Though life had moved on, there was still an element missing from it, as if someone had put the jigsaw together wrong, but couldn't find the mistake. Re-reading the paragraph she was on, she realised now what it was. No one laughed anymore. Not the polite laugh, or the obligatory laugh, but actual, tear-streaming, muscle-straining laugh laugh. People were afraid, she thought, because laughter and enjoyment meant that you had moved on, which meant that you had forgotten. Irrational, she knew, but the truth often was. They – Hogwarts, the staff and students; the Ministry; hell, the whole Wizarding community – needed something to break the ice that had settled over it. She flicked absentmindedly through the magical book, and through the pages of her muggle collection of books on psychological illnesses, until suddenly she stopped and frantically flicked back a few pages.
There. She thought, a grin spreading from ear to ear as she took in the title of the picture (Calendar Girls, overcoming grief and tragedy, extending laughter, love and hope throughout the world.)
That's it.
Armed with her books, parchment and internet connection that she had miraculously been able to tenuously set up in Hogwarts, she got to planning.
Madam Hooch, Madam Pomfrey, Professor Trelawney, Ginny and Molly Weasley, Professor McGonagall and Professor Sprout all stood in the hallway of the third floor corridor, awaiting the arrival of one Hermione Granger, who had owl-ed them all at some absurd time of night, requesting that they all meet in this random place as soon as dinner was finished in the Great Hall the next evening. Molly Weasley had apparated outside the Hogwarts wards and had Minerva McGonagall meet her at the entrance gates, unsure how she would explain to the new headmaster of her reason for visiting, when she herself had no clue. Just as they were about to send Ginny looking for her, Hermione came hurtling round the corner, nearly colliding with all of them.
"Sorry sorry sorry," she panted. "Research." She began to pace past a particular place in the corridor, and as the members of staff shared concerned glances, and Molly was on the verge of insisting that Hermione return to The Burrow, a huge wooden door appeared in the middle of the wall.
"Well I never." Molly gasped.
Ginny suppressed a giggle as Professor Trelawney gingerly reached out with trembling fingers, only to jerk them back, as if a vortex of hell had just opened up in front of her.
"Come on in then." Hermione said brightly, opening the door and leading the way into a room that looked as if it had been waiting for them the whole time. Just the right amount of comfortable seating, enough tea, biscuits and cold drinks, and one suspiciously amber looking bottle that Professor Trelawney immediately noticed, and with a surprisingly steady hand this time, Ginny thought, picked up and stashed in her robes.
"Welcome to the Room of Requirement, for those of you that have not been here before." Hermione began as they all settled down.
"Now, I've been thinking recently-"
"What's new?" Ginny asked, her voice torn between admiration and exasperation. "I think I can even hear your brain whizzing when you sleep!"
The occupants of the room chuckled, before looking again at Hermione.
"Yes, well...I had an idea last night, about a fundraiser. For St. Mungo's, I thought, seeing as we all know too well the extraordinary work that they do, and I don't think any of us can say that we don't know of one person who has passed through there in recent years."
She quieted for a moment as all thoughts turned to the war that had recently blown their lives apart.
"Well anyway, it occurred to me that it should be something...different. Something quirky. Something that people can talk about; no, more than that, something that people can laugh about, and not be scared to laugh about."
Ginny piped up quietly.
"No one laughs anymore. People hardly smile. It's like, if you do, you might break this bubble that we think we're living in, and either the darkness will come back, or everything will return to normal, and nobody could deal with either of those things."
Molly patted Ginny on the shoulder and drew her towards her. Ginny rested her head on her mother's knee from her position on the floor.
"She's right." Madam Poppy Pomfrey chimed in, sighing. "And even the Minister himself can't order people to laugh."
"Exactly." Hermione interjected, before the conversation got too maudlin. "Which is why we need...something to break the bubble gently. Show that it's ok. Laughing doesn't mean forgetting. But remembering doesn't mean that you have to be sad all the time. So...I believe that all of you gathered here now are the ones that can help me to accomplish this."
"How?" Professor Minerva McGonagall asked, genuinely intrigued. Since Hermione had come back to Hogwarts, she had been treated more as a student teacher than a student, even offering extra help to students as a classroom assistant, but as intelligent as she was, Minerva could see no plausible way that they could cheer up the entire Wizarding world.
Hermione took a deep breath.
"Calendar Girls." She said, then kicked herself when she drew a sea of blank looks. "A naked calendar shoot. Us. In time for Christmas." She kicked herself again at her lack of elocution. A host of raised, furrowed and unmoving eyebrows met her stare.
"Well?"
Madam Pomfrey, taking pity on the girl, leant forward a little in her chair.
"I think we're going to need a little more to go on, Hermione dear." She said with a smile that Hermione couldn't help feel was patronising.
"There was this group of muggle women who decided to do a naked calendar because one of their friends had cancer. It became inspirational; not only did they raise thousands – millions by now, probably, because it became a best-selling film and play – but it cheered people up; it spread a message of friendship, of love. And laughter. They got naked; people got hope."
She gave them a few moments to digest, willing herself to stand still and not shuffle nervously. She saw Molly nodding her head, slowly at first, then more vigorously.
"Yes," she said firmly. "Yes. It's wonderful, Hermione. I'm in."
Ginny looked at her mother, shocked. Granted, the reasoning behind the idea was excellent but...did her mother really have to be involved?
"Mum!" she exclaimed. "But, it's naked!" she hissed, her eyes darting to the other occupants of the room, who were watching the interplay with mirth slowly building in their faces.
"Yes dear." Molly replied nonchalantly. "I must say, the idea is quite thrilling. I daresay I'm quite looking forward to it."
"But...but that easy to say now, when you've got your knickers on!"
If possible, Ginny's face grew redder, now clashing excellently with her hair, as the thought of seeing her mother...everyone else seeing her mother...naked...flitted unwillingly through her mind. The rest of the room guffawed, with the exception of Professor Trelawney, who merely looked rather bemused. Hermione interrupted before the famous Weasley temper took hold.
"Yes, Ginny, you will be naked, but people won't be able to see all of you. For instance," her brain whizzed as she thought of plausible situations. "Your mum could be photographed in the kitchen with buns hiding her...you know..."
"Buns?" offered Madam Rolanda Hooch, smiling at Hermione's blush.
"Yes, exactly. And you could be on a broom with...oh I don't know..."
"A couple of bludgers?" suggested Molly, the two women clearly enjoying themselves now.
"Count me in, too." Hooch said firmly. "Now, we need to think of scenarios that everyone else can fit into..."
"Now hold on!" Minerva McGonagall, uncharacteristically silent so far, spoke up. "The rest of us haven't actually agreed to anything..."
"Well I think that it's an admirable idea. I can't think of anything else that could be quite so...attention grabbing." Pomona Sprout piped up, causing Minerva to pin her with a steady glare.
"I'm in, too." She met Minerva's glare with a steady, challenging one of her own.
"Well if everyone else is," Sybil Trelawney chimed in. "The tea leaves do not inform me of any harm that could come from it."
"That'll be the firewhiskey you mixed in with it." Minerva mumbled, causing Ginny to giggle.
"Great!" Hermione beamed. "And Ginny, you go without saying, being my creative director and all. So that just leaves you, Professor."
Minerva McGonagall blanched as seven pairs of eyes were directed at her.
"Well, I mean, the idea and your enthusiasm is admirable, really, but...what I mean is...isn't there someone...younger?" she finished lamely. Hermione took a moment to marvel at the usually stoic and brave Gryffindor stumbling over her embarrassment.
"Oh, come on, Minerva!" Rolanda Hooch said, exasperated. "Live a little! It's for a good cause, and besides...it's not like no one's ever seen you naked, is it?"
Minerva McGonagall, for the first time that Hermione could remember, blushed. Actually blushed. She seemed unable to form a response, so Molly Weasley interjected.
"Well of course not. I mean, Dumbledore..."
Minerva had apparently gathered enough about herself to get her blush under control and fix Rolanda Hooch with a particularly deathly 'Professor' stare.
"Albus himself did not see me naked until the spring of '56." She said quickly, and almost immediately covered her mouth with her hand. In a very Muggle, very Scottish manner, her brain came up with only one response. Shit.
"What happened in the spring of '56?" Molly Weasley asked, intrigued. Although a select few knew that the Transfiguration Professor and the Headmaster had enjoyed a...dalliance...no one knew the exact details.
Minerva sighed, and completely uncharacteristically, blushed again.
"There was a newt in the shower bucket at his holiday residence. A very...slippery newt. The resulting escapades were quite...inventive."
At the startled gasps that went through the room, Minerva slyly met a few pairs of eyes.
"We were all young once, Miss Weasley. And Hermione...do close your mouth, before I am forced to demonstrate said ingenuity when you catch flies." She sat back in her seat, her green eyes sparkling as Hermione turned crimson. Molly was the first to break through the roars of laughter, her intrigue shining through her eyes.
"So you and him...you..."
"Yes, Molly. Albus and I had sex that time. And many times after. Though I am glad to say that that was the first and only time that an animal became used as a form of foreplay."
Ginny Weasley almost turned green and covered her ears with her hands.
"I may be nearly of age, but there are some things that I should NOT be subjected to...LALALALALA...thank God lessons are nearly over...LALALALALA...finished yet?" she yelled out, gingerly opening one eye to see the occupants of the room holding back laughter at her expression.
"Quite." Minerva stated
"So come on, Minerva. This will be a laugh. As long as it doesn't end up like the summer of '69, huh?" Rolanda Hooch tried to keep a straight face as she met the furious embarrassment in Minerva's eyes.
"What the heck happened in '69?" Molly asked, almost falling out of her chair she leaned that close to McGonagall. Hermione looked to the Professor, all at once horrified, mystified and intrigued. After seven years of knowing the woman, she knew that she had only ever seen the teacher persona, yet somehow she had always found it impossible to imagine her as anything else, with anyone else. Absurdly, she found herself feeling slightly jealous of the headmaster, and slightly dreading what was coming next.
With a resigned sigh, Minerva again blushed to her roots.
"I found that whilst Albus was...inventive...he lacked certain...assets that witches can put to very good use-"
"Especially taking into account the year number." Rolanda added with a wink
Molly gasped.
"So you..." she looked wildly from Minerva, who looked as though she wanted to transfigure a black hole in the floor, to Rolanda Hooch, who was wiping tears from her face, to Sybil Trelawney, who's eyes were flicking madly to look first over, then through her glasses, to Hermione, who looked, strangely enough, slightly devastated. "You shagged..."
"LALALALALALALALALALA!" Ginny sat on the floor; eyes clamped shut, hands firmly over her ears, rocking her little body to block out the rest of her mother's sentence, which, thankfully enough for many parties remained unfinished.
"Oh, for goodness sake!" Hermione tutted, and hit Ginny none too gently on the side of the head. "So you'll do it?" she asked Minerva, her eyes sparkling intently.
Minerva again sighed resignedly.
"It's no big deal, Professor. We've all got the same bits, just in different sizes."
"Oh, apparently she already knows that." Molly interjected, as she sat back and crossed her arms and legs, unable to keep the twinkle from her eyes, and chuckling lightly at Ginny's loudly groaned 'Muuuum!'
With a death look aimed at Molly this time, Minerva straightened her back resolutely.
"Very well then, Hermione. If we are to be getting naked together, I suggest you call me Minerva."
A squeal of excited 'yay's' went up through the gathering, and Rolanda Hooch patted her on the back, before adding, in an exaggerated whisper.
"Didn't you say that to someone back in '71?"
Well, do you like it, do you like it?
Also, funnily enough, I just read up on the original Calendar Girls after writing this, and found that one woman "who only came to the meetings if there was a good speaker" got enlisted. Kinda reminded me of Trelawney! Sorry...it is quite late!