2.
There’s a sour taste in her mouth as she walks to the Headmistress’ office. She’s lost in a pool of thought—several different emotions overtaking her almost physically. She trips over her own feet multiple times before making it to the door.
She holds back a cough when she walks in the room. It looks completely the same as it did a year ago. It’s obvious that Minerva has made her best effort to keep everything intact, exactly as it used to be. The angry words she had gathered on her way here slip out of her mind as soon as she enters the office, and when the headmistress turns around in her chair to face her, Hermione is speechless.
“Miss Granger,” she acknowledges. “Have a seat.”
The words snap Hermione out of her trance. She hurries to the desk in the middle of the room, taking a seat and picking at her cuticles, awaiting some kind of explanation. She isn’t even really sure what she wants to hear her say.
“Before you say anything—I want to apologize. I could not have foreseen this to happen. The re-sorting process was… not my plan. I, however, was not entirely opposed to it, as this was not something I had ever expected to happen. Especially not to you.” Minerva says, her frail fingers laced together, chin rested atop them.
Hermione sighs. “But.. there has to be something—there wasn’t a single other student that went from Gryffindor to Slytherin. This is absurd,” she says, her pace speeding up the more she speaks. “I can’t—this isn’t going to work. How am I supposed to—I don’t even—”
“Miss Granger, please slow down.” She says. “I understand. This situation is not what you needed. However there isn’t a solution to it. We can do everything to make the transition comfortable for you, but… you are a part of the Slytherin house.”
Hermione looks dumbfounded, her mouth open. Trying to find the words has never been this difficult for her. “Comfortable? Pardon my language, Headmistress, but how the bloody hell is any of this going to be comfortable? I am going to be miserable! This is unacceptable—”
“Hermione, please.”
She stops.
“If anyone can make this change, it is you. The Sorting Hat must have made its choice carefully,” she goes on, a look of sympathy on her face. “Now, I do not expect that they are going to be overtly welcoming to you. I have arranged a solo dorm for you in and amongst the common room.”
“You mean the dungeon,” Hermione adds in a petty voice.
McGonagall takes off her glasses and rubs the bridge of her nose gently. “Yes,” she admits. “You will not have to share anything with anyone, unless you want to.”
“No.”
“Very well.” She says. “I urge you, Miss Granger, don’t take this negatively. You may find—”
“I apologize, Headmistress, but I don’t know how to do that. I don’t even know what you’re asking of me. I don’t.. I’m just… I’m stuck. You’re asking me to make an already tough situation even more uncomfortable, and it’s justme, having to handle this. No one else. I have no one to deal with this with me. I’m on my own,” she says. “I don’t know how I could not take any of this negatively.”
“I am with you, Miss Granger. You are always more than welcome here,” is all she says, before the door to the office opens and Hermione gives a weak smile, walking out.
The Fat Lady gives her a look as she walks into the Gryffindor common room. She’s tired, and she would rather not deal with the stampede of fellow students who are about to corner her with questions as soon as she walks through the hall into the common room.
And she’s right—the moment her face comes into the light of the fireplace, all heads turn to her and Harry and Ron, and Ginny and Seamus and Neville are all at her side within a second. She pushes past them gently, dropping down into one of the large armchair cushions.
“What did she say? Has everything been sorted out right?”
“You’re back in Gryffindor, right?”
“What the hell did you do to get sorted into Slytherin, Granger?”
The questions circle around her and she blows out a sharp breath. “I don’t know. Nothing has changed. There’s a solo dorm waiting for me in the dungeons.” She says, plainly.
“What?”
“Hermione, you must get McGonagall to do something about this!”
“No way, as if we’re letting you stay with any of them.”
“Excuse me,” Hermione says, standing up. “I have to go grab my things.”
She exits the common room, listening to the hushed voices discussing the matter further after she leaves. She doesn’t know what to think. Is she even safe? Going and staying with all of these Death Eaters? They might as well make a meal out of her. Her mind rambles on as she tosses her belongings into a small trunk.
“Why don’t you use your wand to do that?” A voice asks from behind. Hermione turns around to see Ginny, standing at the entrance of the girls’ dormitory.
“I don’t know.” Is all she says, turning back around to face her bed.
“Does it help you?”
“Does what help me?”
“Doing things by hand. Take your mind off things?”
“Hm. Sometimes.”
Ginny comes and takes a seat on the bed, watching as Hermione zips up small bags and tosses them into her trunk. “What’s going on with you?”
Hermione raises a brow. “I just got sorted into Slytherin?”
“Not that.” She interrupts. “I know there’s something else. We’ve all gone through the same things, yet you’re the only one who hasn’t been able to let loose even once since we got back here. Not since you got sorted merely hours ago. I know there’s something else.” She says.
Hermione drops her hands to her side with a huff. She’s tired of this question. “Nothing, Gin. I’m fin—”
“Don’t give me that, Hermione.” She interrupts. “I know you. Why don’t you talk to me?”
Hermione rests for a moment. “I don’t know, Ginny. I don’t know what’s wrong. I am happy to see you all doing well, but I can’t just forget things—I can’t. My mind is constantly running rampant.”
“I understand that.”
“Do you?”
“I do, Hermione. Of course I do. Do you think I’m really all healed and wound-free? I’ve lost a lot too. Don’t you think I regret not doing more for Fred? Don’t you think I’m consumed by that thought every day of my life?” She asks, grabbing Hermione by the elbow. She begins to hold her breath. “There’s never a moment I am not thinking about him, Hermione.”
Hermione flinches at his name. “I know. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to—”
“We are all handling this differently. It is hard. But there’s no shame in asking for a little bit of help.” She says. “We want to help you. Me. Harry. Ron. We’re all here for you.”
She tries, but all she can offer to her friend is the same weak smile she gave to the Headmistress before leaving her office. “Okay. I’ll try.”
Hermione waits until the Gryffindor common room is cleared before making her exit. She cleaned up all her things and packed them in her trunk—though there wasn’t much she had taken out of her trunk after her arrival. She plans to see her friends later anyway, so she doesn’t wait to say goodnight to any of them before heading out and starting toward the Slytherin common room.
And suddenly she stands in front of the corridor, feeling dumbfounded as she sets her trunk on the stone ground beside her. She stays frozen for a moment. Then she raises a shaky fist and knocks three hard times on the door.
There’s no one there for a minute or two, but eventually the large door pulls open and Theodore Nott stands in front of her, arms crossed. They stare at each other for a second.
“Did you just… knock?” He says, finally.
“I don’t know the password.” She says.
He nods slowly, eyeing her.
“Can I just come in, please?” She says, her tone miserable. She’s given up on holding onto whatever bit of pride she’s got left. It’s late, she’s tired, and she would just like to go to sleep.
“I guess. But get ready. They’re not going to like this.” He says, moving out of the way and motioning for her to come inside.
She’s never actually been inside the Slytherin common room until this moment. She’s given it thought, wondering what it looked like, but the sight is different from what Harry and Ron had described it to look like. But she barely has any time to take in the details, because the moment she walks in, various pairs of sharp, mean, pointed eyes land on her. She stops for a moment. Doesn’t know what to say.
“Hello.” She says randomly. Astoria Greengrass and Pansy Parkinson break out into a laugh. Hermione looks away immediately, trying to avoid anyone else’s gaze. She turns back to Nott, who stands next to her.
Stupid, stupid girl. Why the bloody hell did she try to greet them?
She hesitates for a second, then asks him for directions to the dorms. He gestures to a spiral staircase in the left corner of the common room. “Girls’ hall is on the left.” Is all he says, before walking down by the couches and flopping down onto one of them, kicking his feet up onto Pansy Parkinson’s lap.
She gives them another look before awkwardly making her way past them to walk up the stairs. She tries not to, but she can feel them all staring at her, and she can hear them mocking her as she gets further away. She stops at the top of the stairs when they can’t see her anymore.
“Well, that was fun.” Nott says.
“She looks horrible.” She hears Pansy adds, a giggle in her voice. “Nice to finally see Miss Gryffindor Princess feel a little less than.”
“What do you think of this, Draco?”
Hermione’s breath hitches. She hasn’t heard from—even thought about having to share a house with Malfoy. Her chest hurts when she hears him speak. Her arm itches when she thinks about how she laid on the floor of that manor, screaming in—
“I think… who gives a shit?” He says, and she can hear him swallow what she assumes is some form of alcohol at the end of his sentence.
One sentence from him is enough to make her keep walking. She makes it to the end of the hall and there is an empty room waiting there for her. She walks in to find a large bed and a rather spacious bathroom. She walks over to the bed, dropping down onto it and listening to the mattress squeak beneath her as she tries to make herself comfortable. She notices a set of robes with a silver and green tie folded neatly atop one of her dressers.
As beautiful and commodious as her new room is, Hermione knows she wants nothing more than to stare up at the familiar red ceiling of her four-poster. She drifts off after the tears dry on the side of her face.