Dovetail: to join or fit together compactly or harmoniously.
November 15, 1991
Hermione Granger was almost always in the first straggling wave of students to arrive in the Great Hall before the breakfast food had even appeared. Most were born in on a tide of lost sleep, looking anxious or upset, and the rest simply had no one to wait for. All in all, it was not a very cheerful crowd. They all sat carefully apart, quiet, many staring sullenly at their plates with bloodshot eyes, or else buried themselves in homework.
She did not particularly mind being a part of this group. It was better than forcing herself into other people's conversations, or worse, being shut out of them. By her third month of school, these solitary, early breakfasts seemed peaceful.
Ron Weasley, on the other hand, would have slept through breakfast if he'd had it his way. But since coming to school, he hadn't had it his way. Not that he'd had it much his way at home, either, as a matter of fact, but he'd thought at Hogwarts he might be left alone some.
"Ron, hurry up!" Harry complained, pounding on the bathroom door as he passed it.
Ron spat a glob of toothpaste into the sink and called back for him to hold his hippogriffs. The prat was probably already dressed and ready to go. Seven-bloody-thirty in the morning for Merlin's sake, and Harry's throwing pillows at his head.
But if Ron was perfectly honest, he didn't actually mind it as much as he made out. After all, when was the last time someone wanted his company badly enough to drag him out of bed? Especially at seven-bloody-thirty when classes didn't start until nine. He contemplated how much having his company so valued weighed against an hour more of sleep as he opened the door.
Harry Potter was no stranger to sleepless nights. He observed the pale, red-eyed loners huddled over their oatmeal and marveled briefly that he wasn't among them. Not anymore. Not here at Hogwarts. Here there were people willing to get up at the crack of dawn just to have breakfast with him.
Hermione nearly jumped out of her skin when Harry and Ron swung themselves onto the bench on either side of her, their conversation wrapping around her like a blanket.
"I'm telling you, he's probably already got, like, six lethal poisons on his body somewhere," Ron said, reaching across Hermione for the stack of toast.
Harry shook his head. "Yeah, but what's a poison gonna do if he's jinxed on the floor?"
"What are you talking about?" Hermione asked, smacking Harry's hand as he tried to snag a piece of bacon off her plate.
"Just half?" he begged, looking forlornly at the empty platter in front of them.
She rolled her eyes, but tossed a piece onto his plate. The grin he gave her was ridiculous.
"If Snape or McGonogall would do the other one in first," Ron answered, snatching his own strip of bacon before she could stop him. She smacked his arm.
"McGonogall, hands down," Hermione declared and Harry smirked.
"If they ever dueled, but I'd peg Snape as a killer before McGonogall," Ron insisted.
Keen blue eyes watched this natural ebb and flow from the staff table. In the past two weeks, something had sprung up between those three, like clear, sweet water from solid rock. It was barely a babble now as it tripped its way through the mountainside. But by the time it reached the ocean, it would be a roaring, frothing current sweeping away anything in its path. That perfectly tuned hum between them would crescendo into a ringing harmony.
Because when things fell together just right, the ordinary had a tendency to become the incredible.
A/N: I dunno about this one. Dunno if it came together as I wanted it to. But anyway, Katrina Roxanne asked for some young trio stuff and I haven't written them in ages so here you are! I missed them and I hope you all enjoyed it. :) Oh, and sorry if there are any tense issues in this. I've been writing some more 21 Years Earlier and find it rather difficult to switch between past and present tenses.