"That fucking bastard!" Hermione scrunched the letter into a ball, dropped it to her desk, grabbed her wand and did the first thing that came to mind. She transfigured it into a fat, black dung beetle, slammed her fist down before it scuttled away, and felt its shell splinter wetly under the impact.
She stood and started to pace behind her desk. She needed Orla. She needed happy thoughts, happy, happy, fucking happy. She brandished her wand, spat out, "Expecto Patronum," and barely restrained herself from sending a blasting curse at the wall when not even the faintest silver mist materialised.
"Laura," she called instead, and when her assistant did not appear immediately, Hermione shouted again, trying her hardest not to scream. She failed on the fourth try. "Laura! For god's sake, get in here!"
Laura edged in around the door, holding out a cup of steaming tea to Hermione as if she were offering it to a wild dog. "Are you all right, Head-" she began.
"Yes, I'm fine. Everything is fine," Hermione interrupted, swiping her hand through the air, red sparks spraying from her wand.
Laura backed away, her back hitting the door fame. Hermione felt what remained of her patience fail. Her assistant was pathetic. Why had she ever employed a Hufflepuff? "Oh for f- for Merlin's sake," she snapped. "I'm not going to curse you."
Laura shook her head, staring at Hermione's wand. Her voice was so tiny when she spoke that Hermione wanted to slap her.
"What? Please, Laura, please speak louder. I'm failing to hear anything you're saying."
Laura cleared her throat and glanced at the door. "It's just, you're, er - bleeding."
Hermione looked down and saw half the letter still clung to the side of her fist. "It's not mine," she said, and managed to channel all of her sudden anger at the girl into a satisfyingly vindictive smile as she held out her hand to take the tea. Laura's gaze was fixed downwards as she handed the cup over and she was halfway out the door before Hermione could call, "Just find me Orla."
Hermione slammed the door shut with a flick of her wand and sat back down behind her desk, not noticing the hot tea sloshing over her fingers as she set the mug down. Laura was incompetent. Utterly incompetent. Weren't Hufflepuffs meant to be hardworking, unafraid of toil? What a false advertisement.
Hermione crashed her head into her hands and lowered herself to the desk. In her immediate field of vision was the brown smear of the transfigured letter so she shut her eyes and continue to fixate on the idiots she employed. The uncaring, money-grabbing, teaching for all the wrong reasons idiots.
But even as she listed the ways in which her staff had failed her, already, by only day three of the new term, the hot, sharp point of rage in her heart receded under the influence of something far more frightening. Something that grew harder and harder to ignore, an awareness of what she was doing. How could she trick herself into forgetting what she had done, project her anger onto fumbling, hapless Laura, when the knowledge sat fat, squalid and so horrifyingly real in her mind.
She had lost the donation from Montgomery. All those thousands of Galleons. And it was not the fault of the press, or the mole, or the WIP. It was all hers.
She had failed.
She, Hermione Granger, had failed at something so badly, the follow-on effects were almost too monstrous to behold.
She stood, her heartbeat frantic in her ears, the air scraping the back of her throat, as if oxygen had suddently leeched from the room. Hermione brought her hands to her face. She realised they were shaking. She dragged them through her hair, picked up her wand, dropped it with a clatter, pulled her hair back off her face so hard it stung, and tried to breath, huge, desperate, juddering breaths in and out.
Failure. She had feared it her whole life, as far as she knew it was still her boggart, but nothing, no vicarious experiences or nightmares could have prepared her for this. It was more than emotion, it was all-encompassing, instinctive, the throbbing tang of adrenaline reaching the tip of each trembling finger.
Hermione lunged for a drawer. When the papers and folders slid around beneath her scrambling hands, she heaved them on to the floor but still found no vials of calming draught knocking around at the bottom. There was nothing in the next drawer, or the next.
Firewhiskey. The last headmistress had left it. Hermione stepped out from behind her desk, catching her toe on the piles of paper. They slid out in a slippery fan before her and she tripped, but caught herself on the handle of the correct cabinet. Ignoring her throbbing knee, she wrenched it open, ducked down and saw – no Firewhiskey.
She spun back around and, spotting Laura's tea, brought it to her lips. It was cold.
The fight left her. Hermione sank into the visitor's seat, holding the full cup of tea steady to stop it from spilling. She noticed what she was doing and laughed, but found she no longer had the inclination to throw it against the wall. The anger had gone. She had failed at something else now. A real fuck-up would have found something to medicate herself with, or destroyed her office a little more deliberately. Now what? What would happen? Would she start failing at everything? Would people be able to tell? That something had gone wrong in her? That she had broken?
And she was distracting herself, again. Hermione breathed in deeply, opened her eyes, gazed around the papers that scattered the floor and heaved herself up. She turned slowly to her desk, lowered her gaze and focused on the reddish brown, bloody mess.
She picked up the end of her wand between tentative finger and thumb, reversed the transfiguration and, with tiny, awkward movements of her hand, as if she was scared of the magic, cast a Reparo. She realised she had been holding her breath for fear of further failure when she felt a bitter sort of relief at the sight of the little flecks of paper and dusk knitting themselves back together. A moment later, the tattered letter lay before her, Montgomery's writing just legible.
She forced herself to read.
Monday, 5 September, 2012
Dear Headmistress Granger:
After reading yesterday's Prophet article, I realised that I had been given a false impression of what you wanted to achieve for your pupils.
What benefit do you believe the proposed subject, 'Cultural Studies,' will have? At best I am sure it will appease some of your critics, at worst will give the newest generation of Muggleborns a taste for what can never be theirs. I noticed that the label, 'pureblood,' was not included in the article, but it is obvious to anyone what 'wizarding traditions' actually means.
By the time these children are of age, they will bear the full brunt of the backlash against this current government's heavy handling of Muggleborn equality and forced quotas. A superficial level of knowledge of pureblood culture gained from study and observation rather than experience will only bring them further derision as they attempt to use it to get ahead. The pure-blooded wizard or witch will never look at one of your pupils and believe them equal to their own child.
I do not think you are naive enough to believe this class will do actual good, so I must believe therefore you are introducing this subject for political reasons. Since I fundamentally disagree with using children in such a way, I will be revoking my pledge to donate to Burbage High.
Yours sincerely,
Brian Montgomery
It had been solely Hermione's decision to release Orla's latest PR effort into yesterday's Prophet. After Montgomery's continued silence after the leak last week, she had thought it would send a strong, powerful message to both him and their enemies, that business was continuing as usual. That they could not be intimidated, that they were a strong, confident institution to invest in, with passion and bright ideas that could not be halted.
But how had he seen it? As an attempt to work her way back into popular public opinion in a paper that derided him the week before. Malfoy's words of advice came back to her in an excellently timed subconscious form of self-punishment. Appeal to his ego. Although, really, what good would it have done to consider that before it had been too late? Hermione would not lie to herself and say she had forgotten what Malfoy said, but she could admit that she never would have heeded his advice. All because of her idiotic determination to cling to the Gryffindor way of doing things. And this was the price of her pathetic, stupid pride.
Hermione dragged herself back behind her desk, swept up the mess of papers with a swish and flick of her wand and gradually brought herself around to confronting the next step: informing the School Governors. She began to draft the letters, her words sounding clumsy and guilt ridden, the quill feeling as heavy and unwieldy as if she were writing her letter of resignation. At least she did not have to admit to the leak of his privacy, and the presence of some unknown mole at the school, as it was not the reason behind Montgomery's decision to withdraw the funds. The Governors would not have to know just how incompetent she truly was. But - her quill dragged to a halt, ink began to pool – they would want to know just what she had been thinking publicising plans for a subject that was reliant on funds that had not been secured, not beyond a verbal agreement.
There was a clatter at the window. Hermione took her time to look up, but on seeing the owl, sat up straight, the quill dropping from slack fingers, ink blotting the desk.
It was Callisto. She swooped into the room, pulling fresh air through the window with two huge beats of her wings. With a guilty glance at the Governors' letters, Hermione reached forward as the owl settled and pulled the parchment from her talons. She stroked out the creases, her fingers and eyes skimming along the beautifully written words, a smile touching the corners of her mouth as she thought about her response.
But when she reached the third paragraph the smile and the idea of replying died as she was brought back into reality. Hermione placed it aside, on top of a small pile of other green-inked letters, and with a heavy heart and hand returned to the matter of the donation.
A short while later there was a knock at the door and Hermione abandoned her work in relief.
It was Orla, shutting the door behind her. "Is everything alright, Hermione?" she asked carefully, but her expression cleared when she saw Hermione was not spitting with fury or trashing her office or whatever Laura had led her to expect. "Laura said it was urgent, she said you…"
"Yes, it was urgent," Hermione said, emphasizing the past tense.
Orla looked affronted. "I'm sorry, I've been having coffee with a journalist friend. She's a massive gossip. You know – researching?"
"Oh, right. Sorry. Have you –"
"Found anything? No. She was a complete waste of time."
"Right." Hermione shut her eyes for a moment, her stomach clenching, feeling jumpy and full of acid. She opened them, Orla was watching her carefully again. She licked her lips, took a tight, tense breath, cast a non-verbal Muffliato Charm under the desk and said, "Montgomery has pulled the donation."
Orla brought a hand to her mouth. "Shit. Shitting Merlin," she said. "My Prophet article. It put him off, didn't It-"
"No," Hermione said quickly, anticipating the violence with which Orla's emotions could swing.
Orla appeared to relax marginally, giving Hermione time to gather her courage. "No," she repeated. "No, it wasn't your article. It was my decision over the syllabus. He didn't care about the last week's leak, but he hated the idea of a class on wizarding culture."
"Bugger," Orla swore. "What a prejudiced bastard."
Hermione gave her a weak smile. "Yeah."
"What… what are we going to do?" Orla asked.
"We'll be fine," Hermione replied automatically. Consistency was key, even if the words no longer held any meaning.
"But- I'm sorry, but how?" Hermione looked up to see Orla glancing behind her, back at the door into the school office, as if she would encounter hordes of angry teachers threatening strike action. The thought was not entirely unrealistic. Their reaction to Hermione's announcement at the Welcome Assembly on Thursday had been awful, and something she should have anticipated. Reorganising the syllabus had been one thing, but to surprise the teachers with a brand new subject in front of pupils had apparently been a step too far.
Upsetting, ugly phrases like over-stretched, under staffed and underpaid had been thrown around her office as she fought off their complaints, cornered behind her desk, unable to tell them that she did not actually want any of them to teach it. Eventually she had actually escaped - she could hardly call herself a Gryffindor - by Flooing from her office to the Apparition Room that day at four o' clock with no other excuse than needing a blond-haired distraction. Though perhaps one could argue seeking out Malfoy had taken a certain kind of bravery.
"There's no way to teach Cultural Studies without that money," Orla went on, and then gasped. "I'll have to release another press release, revoking the last one! The governors – they were so happy, Hermione, what do we do?"
What do I do? The monstrous feeling of failure that had been temporary subdued skirted around the shadows of Hermione's mind, threatening to overwhelm her again. She thought of her pupils, the ones who would benefit from the lesson no matter what backwards, idiotic opinions Montgomery held. And then she thought of Malfoy, and having to explain what she had done, knowing she should have listened to him from the start. The notion was unbearable.
So Hermione said what she would tell everyone from then on. "I intended to introduce Cultural Studies before Montgomery offered us the donation. The class will go ahead." Even if I have to up my use of the Time-turner and teach it myself, she thought with a bone-deep weariness.
Once Orla was gone, Hermione returned her attention back to the green inked letter.
Monday, 5 September
Dear Headmistress Granger,
For the last time, I respectfully suggest that you change your mind. A wizard's broom is an extension of his body, very much like a wand. In a dueling class, you wouldn't presume to take away Scorpius's wand and give him some splintered five inch training wand just because his is superior to someone else's? It is the same principle with his Firebolt.
More to the point, I don't think my ears could withstand another evening of Scorpius's complaints. The weekend was bad enough, thank you for asking. I'm assuming you haven't had the privilege of being on the receiving end of one of Scorp's tantrums, so you won't understand what I mean when I refer to that particular pitch his voice can achieve, but take my word for it: If you cared at all for the welfare of this student's father, you would reconsider.
I'm incredibly curious about the mysterious 'Cultural Studies' class Scorpius blithely told me about this weekend when I questioned him about the free study period on his time table on Thursday afternoons. What is the nature of the class? Is this one of the changes you were working on throughout the summer? I would love to know more. From what he told me, it sounds very interesting, and not at all what I was expecting to be on the syllabus.
I've been thinking a lot about the problem with getting your benefactor, Mr. Montgomery, to trust you again after the Prophet leak, and I believe I have come up with a few ideas. I won't make the same mistake again of forcing those ideas on you again, so let me know if you're interested in hearing them.
Yours,
Draco Malfoy
Hermione loaded her quill with her best dark blue ink and began to write, pushing the matter of of the unfinished Governors' letters to the back of her mind, taking her time to find the correct tone of Disapproving Headmistress, imagining Draco's response to certain words and rejecting them in favour of others.
Monday, 5 September
Dear Mr. Malfoy,
I would never give a student special treatment because I cared for his father's welfare, no matter how true that was. While I am impressed with the confidence that must have gone into that assumption, I most respectfully reject your terrible attempt at manipulating me into nepotism, and politely suggest that you teach your son on how to win the Quidditch trial using fair play, on a school broom. Also, your analogy to wands is illogical, no wand is better than any other, so long as it chose the one who wields it.
I suggest you get your hands on yesterday's Prophet if you want to read about the Cultural Studies class.
Hermione stopped writing and shut her eyes, stroking the feathery tip of the quill down the bridge of her nose. How on earth was she meant to write this part? What did she want to say? So much more than the boundaries of their game dictated.
She wanted to say so much more.
Hermione began again, letting the words flow from her heart.
But then again, that would be rather pointless so don't bother. You can tell Scorpius that the class will give him a superficial knowledge of the things he's grown up taking for granted. Because I'll be teaching it and we all know how I learnt about your world.
I don't know how to turn down your advice this time without coming across as a bitch. I have to, I've lost the donation so it's too late for advice. The thing is, would I have listened to you anyway? You told me that first time we met at Harry's that I had a chip on my shoulder. Well, that chip has cost the school – and you, because I was going to offer the job to you, not that you'll ever know now – thousands of Galleons.
I'm so sorry, Draco.
I feel like I'm losing myself here. It's only the 5th but I already feel as though I've endured a whole year and every day I'm either blagging it, or screwing things up. And the worst thing is, it doesn't matter about me or my feelings – the real casualties are the children. I've failed them already.
I didn't tell you a crucial part of the story of the leaked donation at the party last week. The information in the Prophet came from someone at Burbage High. They were facts that only I heard, from Montgomery's lips, in my own office. I don't know how they heard. I've tried everything legal to protect myself, I've even thought about using Veritaserum on my staff. I don't trust anyone, I don't know what to do. I'm terrified.
The only thing at the moment that's good in my life is you. These letters, these interludes of peace are keeping me going. Please don't stop making me laugh, you play the angry father so well. Please don't ask me about my life, each time I lie to you I feel worse and worse.
I wish you could know all of this and still want to come and see me this afternoon. But I want your respect. I didn't realise that until I wrote that, but it's true. What you're doing - caring for Scorp so well by yourself, what you're doing for your mother, bringing your family back together – it's made me respect you in a way I never thought possible. I'm so happy for the way things are turning out for you. I just wish, wish SO much with all my heart I hadn't been so – no word is strong enough to describe what I am – stubborn, stupid, arrogant? I wish I hadn't lost that money. You could have got away from Zabini and stop risking your safety by brewing Dark potions. I'm so sorry.
Please come and see me this afternoon. I hope you will. But if you do, I want to know why you come by. It can't just be because I'm the Head of your son's school, can it? There is something else here. I think. I just really hope I'm not imagining it.