Chapter 23

Hermione was fuming. After saying goodbye to Oliver and her friends; her goodbye to Oliver being rather short and curt; she led her parents out of Diagon Alley without a word. In fact, they were in the car and halfway home before she said anything at all.

"I just don't see what the big deal is," her mother said, with a laugh, and Hermione glared at her from the back seat. "He was rather charming."

"Don't see what the big dealis?" Hermione seethed. "We arefriends! Nothing more! Yet you act like you're younger than me, crushing on someone when you'retwicehis age at least! Andyou!" She rounded on her father. "You were no better! Grilling him, asking him about his intentions with me. Do you know howembarrassingit was!?"

"It wasn't like it was entirely our fault," her father said, trying not to laugh. "He's the one who kissed your mother's hand."

"Yes," Hermione said sharply. "And I will deal with him about that later, but mom wasflirtingwith him!"

"Oh, I was not!" Her mother said laughing again.

"Oh, yeah?" Hermione asked. "Oh, Oliver," she mimicked in a high-pitched voice. "You thought I was Hermione'ssister? You are too kind. And what are your plans after school?"

Her parents chuckled in the front seat.

"Oh, I am going to apply to be a professional Quidditch player," Hermione mimicked in a deeper voice. "And what does that pay?" she asked, her voice lower than before. "Seriously!?" she asked, going back to her normal tone, though it was still high with anxiety. "Youknowthere are some things that we can't tell you! There willalwaysbe some things you cannot know about! It's against the laws of this new world for anyone without magic to know about it! You know stuff like that was why I got the extra books last year. I told you what I could about those rules that I learned fromMagical Misdemeanours and the Modern Law, andLaws of Conduct When Dealing With Muggles. There were other things I found inAncient Law, A Legal Compendium 198, Law and Literature, and theLegislative Guide to Proper Use of Magicthat I couldn't tell you! He could get into trouble, yet you both kept prodding him, and you also acted like you were trying to set us up to getmarried! If you hadn't noticed, I'm onlytwelve!"

Her parents sighed in the front seat.

"You're right, sweetheart," her father said as he continued to drive down the road.

"We're sorry," her mother added. "We shouldn't have pushed. It's just... we want to be a part of this new world you're in."

"Iknow," Hermione said sadly. "And I wish I could share more of it with you, but... Ican't."

September 1st came quickly and Hermione found herself looking for Ron and Harry on the platform. She had seen the twins come through, along with Percy, then Mr and Mrs Weasley followed with Ginny, who would be starting this year. There was no sign of Ron or Harry though, when the Conductor and Ticket Wizards called for all aboard as the clock chimed the eleventh hour.

Shaking her head as she wondered what happened, if perhaps she'd missed them, and they were already on the train, she boarded quickly, knowing that if they weren't on the train, they weren't going to be... the gateway sealed at eleven o'clock.

Making her way down the aisle, she checked the compartments and found Ginny sitting with a blonde girl with a dreamy look on her face, and a blond boy with a Muggle camera around his neck who was talking excitedly to both, not noticing that neither girl was paying attention. Further up the aisle in another compartment, she found the twins, Lee and Oliver.

"Have you seen Ron and Harry?" she asked when she opened the door.

"Naw," George said.

"Haven't seen them since we got on the platform," Fred answered.

"Is everything alright?" Lee asked.

"I don't know," Hermione said and bit her lip. "I didn't see them get on the train, but I was hoping that I just might have missed them."

"Well, you're welcome to sit with us," Oliver said. "As always."

"Yeah," George said.

"Ginny's stuck with that Colin kid..." Fred said.

George laughed when Hermione looked at him in confusion.

"Blond boy," he said.

"Yeah," Lee said. "Don't think you want to be back there..."

Fred and George laughed. "Yeah, he's worse than you were last year..."

"Hey!" Hermione said indignantly and smacked them each in the arm. "That's mean!"

"Ouch!" the twins replied, rubbing their arms. "It's the truth! He's not shut up since he got on the train. The blonde girl's off in her own world, ignoring him, but man, you should have seen Ginny. She looked like she wanted to strangle him with his camera."

Oliver chuckled and shook his head, and Hermione joined in after a moment, unable to get the image of Ginny stringing up the blond boy she'd seen in the compartment by his camera strap out of her head.

"I'll be back," Hermione promised. "I'm going to check the rest of our car for Ron and Harry. If I find them and don't come back, you know what happened."

She was just turning around when the engineer pulled on the whistle in three short bursts and a longer pull, repeating the sequence several times, though the train didn't slow.

"Woah!" Lee said from behind her, and she turned to see him looking out the window and the twins and Oliver following suit.

"What is it?" Hermione asked.

"Oh, noway!" Lee continued.

"Um," George said, looking back at her.

"I think we've found Ron and Harry," Fred said, turning to her as well.

"WHAT!" Hermione shouted, rushing into the compartment and peering out the window.

There was a gasp from the four, and they could hear shouts in other compartments, too, as they looked out the window and saw the blue Ford Anglia do a barrel roll in the air as the train sped along. Cries went up again as it tilted on its side, one of the doors opened and Harry, discernible by his hair, fell from the car and was hanging onto the door for dear life before Ron, presumably, was able to grab him and right the car as it continued to fly along next to the train.

"I'm going tokill them!" Hermione said, fuming as she watched the car rise above the train and out of sight, heading up into the cloud cover, she could only guess.

"You won't be the only one," George said, sitting back with a grin.

"Yeah," Fred added. "How much do you want to bet they get a Howler from mum tomorrow?"

"I'll bet 10 Galleons," Lee said.

"5 Galleons," Oliver added.

The twins held out their hands and collected the money from Oliver and Lee. They held out their hand to Hermione, but she just crossed her arms and dropped down on the seat by Oliver.

"Alright then," George said.

"If you'll excuse us," Fred continued as they stood.

"Where are you going?" Hermione asked.

"To take bets," the twins said together, and headed out of the compartment.