Intermission: Hermione's Timeline

Early-to-mid 1980s
Hermione Granger has strange events happen to her, which she's not old enough to understand. Her toys float around and when she's upset, she can break things without touching them. When she's alone, she can make a doll move around as if it were alive. Her parents decide it's a poltergeist, though they're unsure if such things are ghosts or a manifestation of ESP.

July 1986
Hermione hears her teachers agreeing to have her skip a grade, but also admitting she's plain, clumsy, shy, and friendless, and people can't stand her know-it-all personality. She creates an earthquake in her house, brings her dolls to life and enchants her teapot to fill itself from the family pot downstairs.

July 1988
Hermione, already aware she has special powers, perhaps due to a poltergeist, reads about the magicians in Steinbeck's King Arthur book, and identifies with their "pitiable" condition.

Saturday, September 1 1990
Hermione visits The Old Curiosity Shop for the first time and is shocked and impressed enough she works it into her next history term paper.

Monday and Tuesday, September 17-18 1990
Hermione seeks to solicit Happy Birthdays but only gets four.

Tuesday, September 18 1990
Hermione re-visits the Curio Shop and is gifted seven books, apparently from the future, and written about her! She and her dolls give the books a once-over.

Wednesday, September 19 1990
Hermione's 11th birthday. She and her family take the day off and go shopping in Diagon Alley. Later, they stop by the Curio Shop, which is shuttered and dusty as if closed for years. Hermione sits on a box that turns out to be another gift from the Curio Shop, containing three additional living dolls. When they arrive home, the Grangers encounter Deputy Headmistress McGonagall of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.

Thursday, September 20 1990
Hermione accumulates belated Happy Birthdays, eventually getting more than she'd hoped to. Since her dolls are draining her magic by reading her books, she faints in class after playing football during playtime break and is banned from participating until she gets a doctor's approval slip.

Friday, September 21 1990
Hermione has the dolls continue taking notes, and skims a few chapters herself. She begins preparing lists of questions and a tentative to-do list.

Saturday - Friday, September 22-28 1990
Hermione's stamina recovers and she is able to attend school while the dolls take notes. She resolves to save Pandora Lovegood, Sirius Black, and Harry Potter - in that order of urgency. She sends Harry an anonymous letter that liberally quotes Rubeus Hagrid from the first book. The Grangers find Ottery St Catchpole, and Hermione makes progress with the Curio Shop dolls. All her dolls together write a letter to the Lovegoods, which Hermione mails. Harry Potter receives his anonymous letter and is confused. Nonetheless, he tries magic with a toy wand abandoned by Dudley and manages to conjure hundreds of rabbits, unknown to him, while trying to pull a rabbit out of a top hat.

Saturday, September 29, 1990
Hermione has her first Quidditch practice. Her uncle has quickly repurposed part of his rope line area, since it's somewhat off-season.

Friday, October 5 1990
Harry is invited to the Grangers for tea with Hermione. Harry watches Hermione's recently made Quidditch video and meets the dolls, whom he finds terrifying. Hermione gives him a linked journal so they can message each other.

Tuesday, October 9 1990
The Grangers confront the Dursleys, and successfully intimidate them. Harry is moved out of the cupboard under the stairs up into Dudley's 2nd bedroom. Hermione gifts the three Curio Shop dolls to Harry, since they've apparently bonded with him, despite his fear of them. They travel to the Curio Shop, where the shop girl sells them Sirius Black's communication mirror. Hermione tries calling Moony, who refuses to answer. They encounter what they believe to be Albus Dumbledore, but turns out to be his brother, Aberforth, who promises not to say anything about either of them to the headmaster. Selene gifts Hermione yet again - this time with a necklace that prevents Legilimency. Aberforth Confounds Harry's memories so that if Dumbledore reads his mind, he won't know about the Curio Shop or their meeting with Aberforth. Aberforth tells them about Albus Dumbledore's lifelong history of villainy, but warns that there are far worse wizards out there, and not all of them are obvious. Harry and the Grangers meet the Lovegoods. Pandora and Xenophilius simulate the One Ring from the Lord of the Rings as a prank on Hermione. Hermione agrees to do research for the Lovegoods in exchange for their aid. Harry finds out Hermione already has a crush on him, and tentatively agrees to be her boyfriend, as long as no kissing is involved. The Lovegoods say she can't even mention their great-great-great-great aunt, Selene, as the time paradoxes would endanger everyone, especially the Lovegood family.

Wednesday-Friday, October 10-12 1990
Hermione finishes reading the first book, skims the second book, makes more lists, and practices Quidditch in a reduced way in her back garden. She also practices her switching spell, at first with mixed results. She follows the Dumbledore and Ron Weasley threads through all seven books to a degree, and reconfirms that they are both sinister and false. She also reconfirms that, by requiring her to research for them, the Lovegoods are also teaching her, in a way that respects her dignity.

Saturday, October 13, 1990
Harry and Hermione conference via their journals. She tells him that if he contacts Neville, and he tells anyone, that it would be very dangerous for Harry. Since they already agreed on that, Harry asks her why she's reiterating a known fact. She says, so Harry can honestly say he was told that. Harry says that shows girls are devious. Hermione receives a letter from Luna saying her mother is back doing dangerous things, and relating that her goal is undoing Lucius Malfoy's murder of Selene in the distant past, the Lovegood family tragedy.

Sunday, October 14, 1990
Harry and Hermione successfully, wandlessly, switch Peter "Scabbers" Pettigrew with a shop rat (mutilated for the cause). They also succeed in getting Neville a new wand. They send Pettigrew and a note proclaiming Sirius Black's innocence to DMLE head Amelia Bones. They also send a warning letter about Dumbledore and the Philosopher's Stone to Nicholas Flamel. Upon receipt of Pettigrew and the note, Amelia Bones gets Sirius Black out of Azkaban and confines him to house arrest at 12 Grimmauld Place.

Tuesday, October 16, 1990
Discovering that the most menacing enemy they have in the wizarding world, Lucius Malfoy, is already casing the Curio Shop (preparing for his trip to the past to attack Selene), Hermione's father gets a license to buy a self-loading hunting rifle. He immediately sets up a shooting area in the basement. Both Grangers practice shooting every night going forward.

Wednesday, October 17, 1990
Aberforth Dumbledore, Amelia Bones, and a black dog appear at the flat of two witches, Amandine Malabul and Pamela DuCharme, and they are invited to a meeting of people who are working together to protect Hermione Granger from a great danger she's stirred up against herself and her friend, Harry Potter. The Grangers and Harry return to the Curio Shop, where they meet up with Aberforth Dumbledore again. They go out for coffee and food, and Aberforth explains how Dumbledore cast the Fidelius Charm for Godric's Hollow and yet told the truth when he said he didn't know who the Secret Keeper was. He also explains why neither Albus Dumbledore nor himself openly confront enemies like Lucius Malfoy, and why he put up with Albus' abuse. They all travel to a secret magical tea shop at the Ancient Priors in Crawley. There, they meet up with the Lovegoods - and, to Hermione's shocked surprise, not only Sirius Black, in the flesh, not only Amelia Bones, but her two favourite teachers, Ms Malabul and Ms DuCharme - they're witches! [Details of the conference and what they discussed and decided will be filled in in the next few chapters]. Afterwards, everyone stays overnight at the Grangers' house, and Harry sleeps in Hermione's room, which makes her very happy.