Chapter 7: A Jump to the Left
Remus insisted they wait in the Great Hall for Harry to return. He assumed the boy would not know the way to class and would need help getting there. But as the tables emptied, Harry still had not come back and they were all in serious danger of being late on the first day of classes.
"Come on," Hermione said. "He probably… uh… found someone and asked for directions… or something." Without waiting for anyone to follow, she collected her bag and hurried into the entrance hall. Remus ran to catch up.
They walked together to Transfiguration, Hermione asking him about classes and teachers as much out of interest as to distract him from asking any questions of his own.
When they entered the classroom, Harry was already there. He was sitting in what had always been his usual seat. Ron was not there to sit beside him this time, and Hermione could see the sadness in his posture and eyes as he looked at the vacant spot where his friend ought to be.
"I'll help him out," Sirius grinned and dropped into Ron's seat, startling Harry with his proximity and friendliness.
"You can sit next to me if you want," Remus offered. "I'm pretty good at this subject, and I can help you out if you need it." She held her tongue as she sat down next him. Dumbledore hadn't said anything about disguising their skills, nor had he questioned their level of abilities outside asking if they had managed to pass their OWLs in each subject. She assumed it was safe for her to continue on as if she were back in her own time.
Professor McGonagall quizzed her students in far greater detail that she generally did on the first day of class. Hermione wondered if it was because they had reached NEWT level or because McGonagall was interested to see the two new students' abilities and understanding of her subject. Whatever the reason for the in-depth review, Hermione's hand was first to rise with every question, her answers always textbook perfect. McGonagall's face betrayed none of her astonishment; James and Sirius, however, turned in their chairs to stare open-mouthed and impressed at the girl.
"What?" Hermione whispered when she heard Remus chuckle quietly.
"It looks like they won't be pestering me for help on their homework this year," he smiled.
"Oi! Harry James Granger," Sirius whispered when the professor had turned her back. "Would she help us write our essays if we asked really nicely?"
"Or flirted shamelessly?" James suggested.
Harry shook his head, "No."
Sirius and James bit back curses. The perfect student dropped into their laps and she wouldn't help. Cruel fate!
"But," Harry interrupted their overly melodramatic thoughts, "if you ask her to check your essays, she'll fix the mistakes for you."
"Brilliant!" Sirius shouted and hugged his new best friend.
"Gerroff!" Harry cried and tried very hard to keep the goofy grin off his face.
"Mr Black, whenever you've finished assaulting the new student, would you kindly tell me how to interpret this diagram?" Professor McGonagall asked. Harry swore he saw a hint of a smile and a glimmer in her eye.
"Of course," Sirius smiled as he pulled out of the hug, leaving one arm wrapped around Harry's shoulder. "That is a diagram of The Time Warp. See, it's just a jump to the left—"
"Yes, thank you Mr Black," McGonagall cut off the boy's words. "Mr Granger?"
Harry swallowed his laughter and looked from the tight-lipped teacher to the diagram she had drawn on the board. "Uh… that's the… um… I… I don't know what that is, Professor." Harry hung his head as James snorted and Sirius patted him on the back consolingly.
"Of course you don't, Mr Granger. I haven't explained it to you yet," McGonagall said and began to dissect the meaning of each of the diagram's quadrants. Harry took notes furiously, certain she would be quizzing him again before the end of class.
oOo
True to his word, Harry handed over his textbooks as soon as they had finished with lunch.
Hermione felt extremely awkward in the boys' dorm. She used to visit Harry and Ron there all the time. Dean and Seamus and Neville never complained; she had been hanging around with Harry and Ron since first year and to all the Gryffindor boys of her year she was a boy in all but plumbing. But Sirius's wolf whistle as she followed Harry into the sixth years' bedroom confirmed what she had already known – this was not at all the same.
"I like a girl with daring," Sirius declared and circled her appraisingly. "Not afraid to push boundaries, Hermione Granger? You got a middle name?"
"Yes, I do," she replied and did her level best to ignore him.
"Leave her alone," Remus threw a pillow at him.
"She's a girl in the boys' dorm," Sirius said as if it excused any behavioural flaws he might be exhibiting. "I think I'm allowed to treat her as something special."
"Tildy's up here all the time begging for help on her essays, so you can give it a rest," he countered.
Sirius opened his mouth to reply, but Harry slammed his trunk shut loudly enough to distract him. He struggled to stand under the weight of the books in his arms. "Here, I'll get some new ones later."
"Are you sure, Harry?" she asked, taking the pile of books as if they weighed nothing. Compared to what she usually hauled around, the stack was rather light. "I don't want you to fall behind because you didn't have your books."
He shook his head and fought the derisive laugh. "How long have we known each other? Do you really think I'll read those yet?"
She scowled at his flippant approach to schoolwork. "If you put a bit more effort in, you might have made prefect last year instead of Ron." She paused, realising what she had said. "I still don't know why he made prefect. His grades were rubbish."
Harry shrugged, "Dum—Uh, the Headmaster never said why Ron got it, only why I didn't."
She glanced over to where the other boys were sitting, pretending not to listen to their conversation even though that was clearly what they were doing. Sirius, by contrast, was leaning against the post of Harry's bed, making absolutely no effort to pretend he was doing anything but eavesdropping.
"Write to Flourish and Blotts this minute," she commanded Harry, eager to have their conversation done with so she could leave.
"He can borrow anything he likes from us," Sirius said. "Not like we'll be using our books straight away."
"Thanks," Harry mumbled.
"Oh, it's not generosity," the boy grinned wickedly. "It's a favour. And favours require repayment… I let you borrow something, so I get to borrow something in return." As he said this, his eyes raked over Hermione slowly, his face taking on a decidedly wolfish quality.
"Borrow something like my sister?" Harry rolled his eyes and pushed the girl toward the door before Sirius said something that would set her off. She had done very well at controlling her tongue so far, but he wasn't sure how much more of Sirius's innuendo she could take before indignation overrode her desire to keep a low profile.
"Come back and see us again," Sirius called, a world of meaning hidden in his words.
"You—" Hermione began, turning around to shout at him even as Harry pushed her through the doorway.
"I'll write for new books and send an owl off before dinner," Harry interrupted her.
Nodding her acceptance and glaring at Sirius, she spun around and marched from their room. She could hear Sirius's voice, loud and confident, from the stairs as he declared, "I like her. She's got spunk!"
Shaking her head and simultaneously fighting a smile and a scowl, she went down to the common room with Harry's books in her arms. There were far too many eager faces looking her way, curiosity evident in their eyes and questions perched on their tongues. She did not want to say anything without Harry there; their stories had to be kept the same and she was afraid that she would say something that might contradict what he was telling the other sixth year boys.
Without giving anyone time to say so much as 'hello', she turned and ran up the stairs to the girls' dorms.
It was the first time she had set foot in the dormitory since June of 1996, some two months past and twenty years forward. The beds were the same, thick mattresses covered in school linens and surrounded by heavy scarlet curtains that kept the light out in the early hours and body heat in on the cold nights. She had not expected that to have changed at all, but there were some slight differences.
There were only three beds in her day – Lavender's, Parvati's and her own – but here there were five. The room was large enough to accommodate them all, but they seemed so much more crammed in than in Hermione's time. She knew which bed was hers by the lack of any decoration around it. There really wasn't much around it in her time, either; she would spell-o-tape revision schedules to her wall and notes on things that she wanted to look up when she got the chance. Lavender and Parvati always shook their heads in dismay when they saw her doing that, but it was what she enjoyed. Their walls had been covered in moving posters of sports stars, actors and musicians.
The posters she was looking at now were of musicians, too, but they were unmoving. Muggle musicians, she realised. She also recognised them as men she had only heard about in the past tense, handsome young men in tight jeans or leather trousers showing off their pale, lean chests and stomachs. In her time the men on the posters would be tan and muscled and wearing pants so loose they showed off skin as if by accident. Not these men, they showed everything on purpose and with pride.
So engrossed was she in the thoughts of being alive and young in the same time when her mother was swooning over these same young men that she didn't hear the voices on the stairs or see the movement of the door opening. The girls barrelled into their dorm, their laughter stopped dead when they saw the girl staring intently at a poster, looking sad and lost.
One girl cleared her throat, bringing Hermione's attention away from the wall. "Bowie fan?"
"What?" Hermione asked, too distracted to form a polite response.
"David Bowie," the girl walked up and petted the poster lovingly. "I adore him. He's brilliant."
"Wants to have his illegitimate children, she does," one of the other girls chimed in.
Hermione smiled at the blush that covered the girl's cheeks. "Tildy Moorehead," the girl introduced herself and held a hand out, realising a bit too late that Hermione's arms were still full of books. She smiled at her own foolishness and took half the heavy textbooks from her, dropping them onto the empty bed that Hermione had known was hers. "Please no jokes about my last name, I get enough of them from the boys."
"Hermione," she offered in reply.
"Nice to meet you," Tildy smiled a wide and toothy grin that made it look as if she had slipped someone's false teeth into her mouth.
"We have over here…" the girl pulled Hermione across the room, "Mary Macdonald. She will try to force a makeover on you with every new issue of Witch Weekly. Silvia Dunn, do not start her on Quidditch," Tildy warned. "Your ears will drop off and you'll die of starvation before she'll stop talking about how fantastically wonderful the Puddlemere Canons or whoever are." Silvia made to protest, but Tildy kept talking and the other girl didn't get the chance. "And our resident prefect, Lily Evans. Practically perfect in every way except for Transfiguration, where she is, if possible, worse than me."
"Thank you," Lily replied sarcastically. "I'm getting better."
"You'd get better quicker if you accepted Potter's help," Tildy winked.
"Never going to happen," the girl said flatly, her tone leaving no room for argument.
Tildy leaned in close to Hermione and began to explain in a conspiratorial stage whisper, "Potter's the one with the glasses. A little on the short side but more than makes up for it in good looks. Charming and super brilliant—"
"And he knows it," Lily interrupted. "Conceited prat thinks he runs the school." Hermione just smiled. The flush in the Lily's cheeks spoke far more loudly than she did on the matter of James Potter.
"Moving on!" Tildy said, transitioning their conversation with the subtlety of a Bat Bogey Hex. "What are you into? I love music, and David Bowie. Silvia's crazy for Quidditch. Mary's going to rule the fashion world as soon as she graduates. And Lily is going to marry Potter and have a dozen of his children. So… what do you do?"
All eyes, even the pair of indignant green eyes that would rather be glaring at Tildy, turned to her, and Hermione wasn't sure what to say. "Um… I like to read."
"Ooh! Study buddy!" Tildy declared and wrapped Hermione in a possessive hug. "I call dibs!"
"No fair!" Silvia whined. "You were closest. Re-do."
"I don't hear you whinging like that when Gryffindor Seeker nabs the Snitch because he's closer when it's spotted," the girl countered. "Same rules apply. I win fair and square."
"Don't I get a say in this?" Hermione wondered, slightly put off by her sudden popularity yet feeling an incredible warmth in her chest at being around girls who actually wanted to talk to her. Lavender and Parvati were dismissive of her since first year, only Ginny and Luna ever sought her company.
"Sticking with the Quidditch analogy," Tildy said. "A Snitch doesn't have any say in who catches it."
Hermione gave a deep and theatrical sigh, "Fine."
"Yay! This is going to work out so much better. I used to annoy the boys, but now I have a study buddy in my room," Tildy squealed and hugged her tighter. "Are you taking Arithmancy?"
"Yes," Hermione managed to squeak out.
"Enough bone crushing, Future Mrs Bowie," Evans declared and pried the girl off Hermione. "It's her first day. She doesn't need you scaring her off." She flapped her hands at the hyperactive girl, forcing her to back up and give Hermione a reasonable amount of personal space. "You okay? Frightened? Overwhelmed?"
"A bit," Hermione replied, a smile on her face despite how flustered she really did feel.
"Okay," Lily said in a purposefully calm tone. "If you need anything, don't hesitate to ask. It's what I'm here for." She smiled and let Hermione retreat to her bed and books.
Eyeing the familiar covers and titles, Hermione realised there were some missing.
"Actually," she said quietly. "Does anyone have an Arithmancy book I can borrow? Harry's not taking that class and I lost my books on the way here."
"Of course!" Tildy said brightly, eager to please her new study buddy. She bounced across the room and handed over her textbook. With her wild hair, seemingly endless energy and exuberant mannerisms, she reminded Hermione so much of Tonks it made her want to cry.
"What's the matter?" asked Tildy.
"You just remind me of someone we left behind," she replied, her throat so tight the words barely made it out. No one knew how to respond, so no one did. It was just as well since Hermione did not want to say anything that might give the identity of her lost friend away. Tonks would be three years old in 1976, and it was entirely possible that they might have met the excitable little Metamorphmagus in Diagon Alley or at King's Cross. She wasn't entirely sure how close the Tonks family was with Sirius.
"We'd better hurry if we want to be on time," Tildy said in a voice so subdued that Hermione hadn't realised it was her speaking. Hermione nodded and followed her from the dorm, leaving the others to consider the girl's sudden turn towards despondency.