03 Harry Reflects

Seated in the Common Room, Harry ignored everyone while he ruminated on the information provided by Professor Flitwick that evening. He wondered how much of the information was real – the truth.

'Professor Flitwick took a chance telling me all that. Unless it was at orders of Dumbledore or some goblin in Gringotts. Prisoners do what their jailers tell 'em to do. And magic could make those different papers look like…'

Suddenly, Harry closed his eyes and wished fervently, 'Please let it be true! Please let it be true so I can get away from these people!'

As the night grew closer to 11:00 PM, Hermione Granger pretended she didn't see the look on the face of the young wizard and approached with two parchments in her hand.

"Harry, when you left for Professors Flitwick's detention, I went into your book bag and got your transfiguration report and the paper due for charms. I corrected both with red ink so you can find my changes. If you start now, you can get copies made in your handwriting before too late. They're both due tomorrow."

It took a second for Harry to respond but then he said, "Hermoine, remind me; did I ask you to scribble red ink all over my work, so it had to be copied over again?"

"No, but I always correct your English, spelling and sentence composition."

"So why not just give me your transfiguration report? Or your charms paper? That would be much faster than making me write the reports only to have to copy over your total re-write."

Holding up his palm to forestall Hermione's protests, Harry continued, "Don't say it's not right because you hand over a draft of every paper to Ron. And if you haven't noticed, he just puts his name on the papers and turns them in as his work."

"Really Harry? You're going to complain about the only friend you have left trying to help you get a better grade?" asked Hermione, ignoring the comments about Ron.

Shaking his head to dismiss her argument, Potter said, "Hermione, I'm surprised you didn't figure it out before the end of first year."

"Figure out what?" she asked. Blinking for a moment, she said, "Of course I figured everything out…but what in particular are you talking about?"

"Ron knew before he came to Hogwarts but kept his mouth shut like he does with his inside information," complained Harry.

"What are you going on about Harry? Has the Triwizard Tournament driven you mad?"

The young wizard explained, "It doesn't matter what your grades are during the year. If you get Outstanding or Trolls on the papers we write, or the tests the teachers make us take. Well, I suppose if you get Trolls, they make you do remedial work and more detentions but I'm always going to get detention from Snape, so I don't even try in his class anymore."

"Harry, that's not correct."

"It is," Harry insisted. "The only thing that matters are the scores you get on the end of year tests to pass to the next year. And then the scores on the OWLs at the end of fifth year determine what classes you can take in sixth year to prepare for the NEWTs at the end of our seventh year. Yeah?"

He continued, "NEWTs are the only tests that matter to the ministry and employers – or that's another lie they tell us."

Unhappy to hear this argument from yet another student at Hogwarts, Hermione protested, "But we have to do our best! The teachers pick the perfects, and the head boy and head girl based on their grades and classroom participation."

"Hermione, what do the prefects do?" asked the young wizard. This question prompted the witch to list the many tasks that the prefects completed for their house, the school, and the professors.

Harry summarized the list saying, "So, they're like free help to police the students, keep order in the tower so Professor McGonagall doesn't have to run up the stairs to the sixth floor every ten minutes when George and Fred blow up another cauldron."

"No, it's great honour to be made a prefect!" insisted the young witch. "That is how you can be selected to be head girl."

"Did you know my mum was never a prefect – hard for mudbloods to be picked to be a prefect. Then suddenly, she was picked to be head girl in her seventh year with my father as the head boy – and he'd never been a prefect. I think my dad and his buddy Sirius Black set the record for most points deducted by prefects of any student before or since."

"You're wrong! I'm going to be picked to be prefect and then head girl in my seventh year! Just you wait and see."

"That's a great ambition, Hermione. I hope it comes true for you, and I know you'll work hard to make it happen. And I'll help you out; don't correct any more of my papers and stay out of my book bag. Starting tonight, something will bite you if you stick your hand in there."

"What do you mean?" she asked, drawing back and clasping her hands together, trying to protect them.

"Ron's been talking about getting another rat," said Harry making up an off-the-cuff story. "A real one this time and he'll stick in my book bag to aggravate me. All my papers and books will smell like rat pee. Ugh, McGonagall won't make you prefect in our fifth year if your hands smell like rat pee."

"HARRY POTTER! You're vulgar! Just like every other fifteen-year-old boy!"

"Hermione, I'm only fourteen. You're the one who is fifteen and acting so very mature."

Incensed, Hermione lifted her hand to smack the face of the Boy-Who-Lived. But a loud voice called out, "Miss Granger! That's five points and detention!"

Hermione turned around, her face pale with her mouth hanging open. But the 'prefect' was Fred Weasley imitating his older brother Percy from the previous year when he was head boy. Angry and embarrassed, Hermione grabbed her books and headed up the stairs to the girls' dormitory.

'Thanks, Weasley," Harry said. "I wasn't sure how I was going to get out of that one."

Checking that no one important or named Ronald Weasley was listening, Fred replied, "I owe you, Potter. And Dad will whale on Ron when he learns how he's been acting."

"Why is everyone mad at me?" asked Harry. "I didn't enter the tournament! The grownups are making me participate."

"I was disappointed when you figured out how to get around the age restriction. Other older kids probably feel the same way and think you get everything handed to you on a silver platter," explained the Weasley twin, ignoring Harry's claim.

Shaking his head, Harry decided to forget making any headway with the students in his dorm – or any student in the entire school. He decided, 'The other outcasts are relieved that I'm taking the spotlight off them. Of course, they won't help me out either.'

'I'll keep my eyes open and my wand ready to throw any hex or jinx thrown my way. The prefects can't give me detention and the professors have to check the magical signature on a hex to assign detention – that's Hogwarts rule.'

Resolute to a terrible year, Harry headed for bed. That night while the other fourth year boys slept, Harry moved all of the important items in his trunk into the bottomless book bag he carried, cast a booby-trap spell on his trunk, and left the dorm.

Under his cloak of invisibility, Harry studied the ward that Professor Dumbledore had cast over the doorway into the girl's bathroom earlier in the week to keep 'him' out of the Chamber of Secrets. Shrugging, Harry made his way to the dungeons where the primary entrance to the chamber lay near Slytherin's secret office. Harry had no desire to explore that room but decided to consider using it as a trap for particularly loathsome Slytherins in his year.

He tapped the snake-shaped sconce and hissed, {Slytherin Guile and Stealth.}

The stone wall faded away like the entrance to Diagon Alley in the Leady Cauldron, and Harry stepped through. The stone immediately fell back into place and Harry Potter disappeared from Hogwarts.

~~~~*HP*~~~~