Somewhere inside all of us is the power to change the world – Roald Dahl
Chapter 8
"This is stupid as hell," Regulus Black drawled as he lounged back in his chair, his dark hair falling into his face.
Hermione looks up from her desk, where she was trying to figure out the drawing that was carved into the wood and sighed. It had only been fifteen minutes and this was the third comment he had made. She was finding the sound of his voice very grating.
"So take it up with Professor Slughorn," she told him as he glared at her.
"Oh, wow what a clever suggestion. I never could have thought of that on my own." His grey eyes were glacial as they stared into her own. "What a clever Ravenclaw you are."
Hermione just shook her head at him. "Of course it's not as though you have any clever ideas of your own to suggest." At his look of annoyance, she added: "I don't think cleverness is a Black family trait actually."
"What is that supposed to mean?" Now he was looking angry. "If you're comparing me to my soft-headed brother then you can just piss off!"
Hermione's eyebrows rose. She had definitely hit a nerve, judging from his words. It always seemed with him that talking about Sirius was an extremely bad topic. "Am I sensing a bit of hostility between the two of you?"
"That bastard is no proper brother of mine," he told her. "He has disgraced the family name of Black and shamed our parents." He shook his head. "Sirius has no proper pride for his family history, his blood status, or even his place as a member of wizarding society."
Hermione stared. "How do you figure that last one? It's not like he snapped his wand in half and went to join the muggle world. "
"He might as well have," Regulus told her. He was no longer lounging in his chair but sitting erect as he faced her. "He loves muggle things. Motorbikes and tools and pictures of muggle girls... He used to hang them all over the walls of his room, muggle girl pictures, non-moving, all over the walls of his bedroom in our house!" He said this as though it were the height of scandal.
Hermione wasn't sure whether to laugh or not. It seemed very like Sirius to hang pictures of motorbikes and girls on his walls. She wouldn't have put it past him to hang naked girl photos on his walls if it irritated his parents. Then a thought hit her and she couldn't resist.
"Are you going to tell me you never took a look at any of those pictures?" she asked. "Not even the smallest of looks after he left?"
He looked the same way Percy Weasley looked after Fred and George found out he had a girlfriend: Scandalized, upset, and judging by his flushed face: more than a little bit guilty.
"I have better things to do than look at muggle girls," he replied haughtily, his face still slightly red. "But Sirius always did everything he wasn't supposed to and look at where that's gotten him?"
Hermione shrugged. "Well I don't know him very well but he looks happy enough to me."
It was impossible not to see the hurt look that briefly crossed his face before he assumed the same haughty glare. "It is not worth it to throw away years of tradition and a family that only wants the best for you. Nothing matters to him though but getting into trouble with that James Potter." It was also impossible not to catch the bitter way he said James Potter's name.
"Well I think that they are seem pretty jolly to me," Hermione said. She wished she had her books with her. There was still homework to get through, and here she was wasting her time with a very surly fifth year Slytherin.
"You would think that they were jolly though," Regulus said. "You and that Lupin seem pretty cozy together these days."
"Mmmm." Hermione had gone back to inspecting the desk.
Regulus's grey eyes narrowed as he glared at the bushy-haired Ravenclaw. "I bet you two get real cozy in the evenings after everyone's gone to bed. You both are a little too straight-laced to not have something steamy going on." He smirked at her. "Tell me, does Lupin have it in him to make you scream? Or do you make him scream?"
Hermione looked up. "If that's jealously, Regulus, then it doesn't look good on you."
"Jealous of a peaky-looking halfblood?" He laughed. "Believe what you want Perkins, but the thought of you and your little hairy boyfriend shagging doesn't do it for me."
Hermione froze. 'How the hell did he know?' He was still talking, making more nasty remarks about her and Remus Lupin, but she failed to hear any of them. 'Snape,' she thought, 'Snape must have told him. How many others did he tell?'
"Are you listening to me Perkins?" Regulus said. "No, probably fantasizing about that boyfriend of yours."
"Sure," Hermione said. "It beats thinking about you and this detention." She sighed. Whatever Snape had told him, it was best not to rise to the bait. "And I have homework to do." She added miserably.
"You and me both," Regulus said. "But you choose to attack me, so here we are."
It was Hermione's turn to glare. "If my memory serves me correctly you're the one who sent me to the hospital wing, not the other way around." She drummed her fingers on the desk. "I could be doing anything: homework, catching up on sleep, re-reading Hogwarts, a History."
"Kissing your boyfriend," Regulus added. He was smirking slightly.
"Right, as I said, it beats being here with you." She glared at him. "Why do you have to make a show of fighting with everyone, Black? You and I here, this could have been avoided."
"If you hadn't of attacked Evan then it would have been avoided," he told her. "But it's not surprising that you did what you did. When you spend time with my brother and his friends, some of their bullying ways are bound to rub off on you."
"I'm not a bully. It was Evan Rosier who was bullying another student, but you will insist that I'm the bully. I don't regret attacking Rosier."
His eyes were looking determinedly in the other direction now. "No I suppose you don't. He attacked first, so it's okay, I didn't attack first,but it's still all, I'm just a Slytherin. That's free game for you and your mates."
"I did attack you first," Hermione said. She turned to face him, but he was still looking away from her. "And I'm sorry for that. I shouldn't have let things get to that point." He continued to face the wall, his posture rigid. "I don't know all that is wrong between you and your brother and I know that he is far from perfect. I just don't like to see students hexed because of petty reasons and that goes for him and Rosier both."
At first there was no response, then, he answered quietly: "I haven't hexed anyone."
"No," she agreed. "I've never seen you hex anyone. You agree with Rosier doing it and that's still pretty bad. I'm not saying that your brother and his friends still aren't wrong," Hermione added, for he had opened his mouth to argue. "They are, but so is Evan Rosier."
They sat in silence for several minutes before Hermione felt the need to break the silence. "Do you know anything about motorcycles, Regulus Black?"
He shot her a venomous look. "No I do not, and I hardly care to hear about them. My brother always had the most rubbish taste."
"I don't much care for them either," Hermione told him. "I'm not interested in recreational sports. I know that you like Quidditch, but I much prefer to read. Every since I was a little girl I liked to read. My grandmother, who is a muggle, she got me into reading." Regulus Black made a derisive noise at this which she pretended not to hear. "She used to read to me all sorts of muggle stories, like Cinderella and Beauty and the Beast. We made our way through the Chronicles of Narnia together as well." She smiled in sadness at the thought of Rose Granger, who had been dead for years.
"Sounds fascinating," he said sarcastically but she could tell he was curious. He did cross her as something of as reader.
Hermione smiled. "Of course most witches and wizards in these stories were quite bad, but Cinderella's godmother is a good magic user. She helps Cinderella out in the end."
"Like muggles would know the first thing about how real magic works," Regulus sneered contemptuously.
"Well they get as much wrong as they get right," she told him. "Of course muggles are also very interested in science fiction. My father always liked to read Jules Verne, he's a French writer from the last century and he wrote about people going to the moon and tunneling deep into the earth and things like that."
Regulus scoffed. "As though muggles could do anything like that."
"Well they did make it to the moon," Hermione said brightly. "Witches and wizards still have yet to do that."
"There is no way in hell muggles actually made it to the moon," he told her, "If wizards haven't done it, then I don't see how a bunch of ignorant muggles could have."
"We have books in the library about their achievements," she told him. "As extra reading for those taking muggle studies." Unable to resist the temptation, she added: "If reading about muggles isn't so very beneath your great dignity that is, you might want to look into them."
"Like hell I will."
Hermione fixed him her most determined stare. "That's because you're afraid of challenging any viewpoints of yours that you're currently fixated on. I dare you to try and do some research of your own on muggles. They might surprise you."
He said nothing to this. The two sat in silence for several minutes before the door was opened and tiny Professor Flitwick came in.
"It's ten o'clock," he said cheerfully, "and you've both made it through fine. I hope you've each gotten the chance to talk to each other and make peace."
Regulus Black grimaced. Flitwick frowned at him. "Now then, give it a chance and you might find that you have more in common than you think. Each of you is a fine student, after all. No…" he took a look at each grim face in turn and then shook his head: "well at any rate, it's getting late. Off to bed with the pair of you."
"Goodnight Professor," Hermione said as she took her wand back and headed out, an idea brewing in her mind.
"So how was detention last night?" Remus asked her as they sat in the grounds. "Sirius's brother not giving you a hard time?"
Hermione shook her head as she stared over at the lake. It was a chilly day and the students outdoors were wrapped tightly in cloaks and scarves. She leaned back against an old tree trunk as she watched a pair of first years skipping rocks.
"Remus?"
"Yes." He looked at her.
"Why didn't you…" she paused, then started again, "why did Sirius and James attack Bertram Aubrey?" She had meant to say, 'why didn't you stop them,' but had decided against it. It was too late though, as he had obviously figured that out.
"I don't know, because they could I guess." He too stared at the students at the lake. "I know I'm a prefect," he muttered, "and that I should stop them, but it's hard to check them when we are all together. They are so funny sometimes, and such good friends and fun to hang around, that I guess I just get carried away with them when they pull their little stunts."
Hermione took his hand. "I imagine you must have fun. You always seem so bright when you're with them." 'So much less lonely too,' she thought, 'what I don't know about being horribly lonely.' Remus smiled at her as they sat there holding hands and watching the remaining leaves blow in the air and the squid rise to the surface and splash the shrieking first years.
"Are you going to the next Hogsmeade weekend Rose?" He sounded very hopeful.
"If I can," she told him, "It all depends on how good Regulus Black and I are. If we play nicely over the next two weeks, then yes I can go." Hermione smiled at him. "And I would be delighted if we could catch up on any other places you left off last time."
Remus gave her a grin that seemed almost wolfish. "I would be delighted to escort you anywhere, Miss Perkins."
"Just to Hogsmeade, nowhere further," she told him smiling. She then checked her watch. "The sun is starting to set. We should go in soon. I still have to get to the library before dinner."
Hermione made her way through the shelves carefully, her brown eyes scanning the dusty contents for anything that looked interesting or informative. She would start small, especially since her efforts might be horribly rejected. Ducking around two seventh years leaning against a row of books, she found the perfect place to seek from.
"He'll look," she said quietly to herself as she inspected the cover, "even if it gets thrown back at me, his curiosity will be roused and he'll come back to look." Ignoring the frown a third year Hufflepuff sitting nearby was giving her for talking; she pulled the book and went in search of another.
Nine o'clock at night found her arriving punctually to Flitwick's detention. After cheerfully handing him her wand, she smiled and patted the books. "These are for Regulus," she told him as he looked at them questioningly. "I think he'll like them if he gives them a try." With that she headed in and settled in the same battered desk as the night before, this time in a far better mood.
It was another five minutes before he arrived. After handing in his wand, Regulus took a seat across from her, his eyes averted.
"Hello Regulus Black," she said cheerfully. He ignored her. "It's nice out today, don't you think?" Still no answer. "I think that today is a nicer day than yesterday."
Still not receiving any answer, she smiled more brightly than ever before turning to her books. "How boring you are. At least I brought something to do." She opened the smaller of the two and directed her eyes away from him. She was aware of exactly when he turned to regard her; knew that he was doing so every few minutes when he thought she wouldn't notice, but she said nothing. Turning a page every so often, she pretended to be deeply absorbed in her book.
"You're not supposed to be reading in here."
So he finally talked. She didn't answer him though. Hermione knew what she was doing.
"You're going to get us into trouble."
Hermione turned a page.
"Is that a book on muggles? Are you trying to peak my curiosity?"
Hermione continued to ignore him. His eyes were narrow as they watched her. "Stupid muggle books, I could care less about them." He turned in a huff in his seat, his back to her as he glared at the wall. 'He really hates that wall,' Hermione thought in amusement. 'He gives it the meanest looks.'
He continued to glare as he turned back to focus on her. "What the hell are you reading?" He leaned over in his seat to inspect the books. "Perkins!"
Hermione looked around in surprise. "Do you need something, Black?"
"You're not supposed to be reading in here," he told her, "but since you are, you might as well tell me what you're reading."
"Oh, it's nothing you would like. You don't like muggle literature, after all."
He gave her a nasty look. "So it is something muggle after all. Figures." he scowled. "What the hell is it though?"
"Why do you care?" she asked him. "You wouldn't read any of it. It's beneath you to read a little muggle literature." She then smirked at him. "I bet you wouldn't understand the work anyway.
"Piss off Perkins. I can understand anything written by a muggle."
"Then open your mind and read."
"If I do, will you stop talking to me about them?" he asked her. "We have nearly two weeks of detention and you're driving me mad."
"Well," Hermione pretended to consider. "Deal."
As Flitwick started to unlock the door, Hermione stepped over to his desk and placed down in front of Regulus a copy of 100 Innovations for the Magicless home and an old battered copy of H.G Wells' The Invisible Man. "And I want five rolls of parchment to be handed in on Friday," she told him cheerfully.
He looked at the books and then back at her with a mixture of confusion and annoyance. "You set me up."
"Maybe I did," she conceded. "But if you don't make an effort than I'm going to assume you can't even manage the literature." Her eyes were alit with amusement. "Go ahead Black and step up and prove me wrong."
She knew she had him and he knew it too, judging from the scowl on his face, and the anger burning in his eyes, but his pride was on the line and that was enough.
