Harry Potter is an Arsehole
***Hermione***
Hermione Granger is proud to say that she is perfectly weird, thank you very much.
She is weird because she attends Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. She is weird because her joint-best friend, Harry Potter, is destined to destroy the evil Lord Voldemort. She is weird because she, Harry and her other friend Ron Weasley have fled Hogwarts to track down Horcruxes – pieces of Voldemort’s soul.
But what is weirdest of all about this morning is that Ron isn’t here.
Because last night Ron shouted at Harry, that they still hadn’t found any Horcruxes, and that they were wasting their time while Voldemort seized power. Last night Ron stormed out of their tent, and disappeared into the woods. And now, for the first time in months, Hermione has woken up without Ron.
She’s lying under her bedsheets, running through last night in her mind again and again. Every time she hears the rage in Ron’s voice as he vanishes into the darkness of the forest, she wants to scream at him. Every time she sees the disgust in Harry’s scowling eyes, she wants to run away from him into the night, too. In hindsight, there are a thousand things that Hermione should have done. She should have told them of how important their friendship was to each other, and have assured them that if they could get through all the pain and challenges they’d already overcome together, they could make it through this too. They were Harry, Ron and Hermione. They could do anything, as long as they were together. Maybe she even should have cast a body-bind curse on them, and paralysed them until the morning when they could think things through logically.
But at the time, she hadn’t done any of those things. She’d only sobbed and begged them to stop, because every time she watched one of them shove or strike each other, it had felt like they were shoving or striking her too. She’d done nothing.
She’s not going to do nothing today.
Hermione opens her eyes. The canvas above her bunk glows white in the dawn light. The tent is unearthly silent without Ron’s snoring; his bunk is so neatly made that he can’t have been anywhere near it. She kicks away the sheets, and sits up. Her skin feels rough and musty. She’s still wearing her jeans, hoodie and scarf from last night. She runs her tongue over her sticky teeth, and almost laughs. Her parents would not be impressed that she hadn’t brushed them.
Her parents.
She takes a deep breath. She can’t think afford to think about the family she’s given up, not now when her other family is breaking apart. She has to sort out this mess. Now.
Hermione clambers out of her bunk and stumbles towards the kitchen, where Harry is rolling his wand across his palm, staring at it. She clears her throat, and he jumps, hastily shoving the wand in his pocket, and scurries around, tipping some grilled Porcini mushrooms onto two tin plates.
The third lies next to the sink, unwashed.
Hermione opens her mouth to speak, then stops. Harry is glaring at Ron’s empty bunk, his face as hard as stone, his eyes as emotionless as asteroids. The candlelight casts flickering shadows across his marble face, and they migrate across it like dark clouds, gathering before a storm. His hair is almost silver in the early morning light, and when he furrows his brow it’s not difficult to imagine him as a bitter old man. She drags a chair across the floor, and sits down. Her hand is shaking. She grips onto the table to steady it. It’s ridiculous that she’s nervous about talking to Harry. Harry is her best friend. She’d do anything for Harry. She clears her throat again. ‘So…’
Harry ignores her. He slams the plates down so hard the whole table vibrates.
She stabs a wad of mushrooms with the fork, and lifts them towards her mouth. Then she puts the fork down, counts to three, and takes a deep breath. ‘I watched him walk far into the woods last night. So we should start by combing the nearby area. And then afterwards we need to draw up a list of all the places he could have’ - She pauses, to take another deep breath - ‘apparated to. The Burrow’s an obvious one. Also Bill and Fleur’s. And we absolutely have to check-’
‘Hermione.’ Harry’s voice rumbles like thunder.
Hermione blinks, and looks up.
‘We’re not going to go wandering in the wilderness. And we’re not going to check up on every name on the Weasley family tree.’
Hermione’s face brightens up. ‘Did you put a tracking charm on him, then?’
‘No.’ Harry gets up and snatches Hermione’s plate, even though she’s barely touched the mushrooms.
She frowns. ‘What, then? I can look in The Standard Book of Spells, but I doubt there’ll be anything I don’t already-’
‘Hermione.’ Harry slams the plates onto the counter. Hermione flinches. ‘We’re not going out looking for Ron. We’re not using any spells to find Ron. We’re not using an army of house elves, or a magical tracking carnation, or some enchanted earmuffs to find Ron.’
‘I never suggested using-’
‘We’re not going to find Ron.’
Hermione stares at him, studying the lightning scar on his forehead, and the determination in his hardened eyes. ‘What do you mean?’
‘He made his choice.’ Harry turns to face the cupboards. ‘You heard him, last night. He said he didn’t want to help me find the Horcruxes. And so he’s not going to help me find the Horcruxes.’
She laughs. ‘And you’re perfectly alright with this. You’re just going to let him get away?’
‘Yes!’
Tears sting Hermione’s eyes. She blinks them away. ‘He never meant what he said. Not really. It was the Horcrux, messing with his-’
‘Stop- stop defending him!’ Harry roars. ‘It’s all you ever do, and I’ve had enough of it, Hermione. He said what he said. I never should have let him run away with me. He’s never been able to cope with the idea of me, has he?’
Hermione flicks tears off her cheeks. ‘What do you mean? He’s our friend, isn’t he?’
‘Exactly!’ Harry kicks the table. The mugs shudder. ‘He’s Harry Potter’s Friend. And he’s never been able to cope with just being Harry Potter’s Friend, has he? Let’s face it, Hermione, I’m the hero, you’re the heroine, and he’s some idiot sidekick who provides comic relief once every few years. Ron wants to be the hero. Ron wants to be the star. Ron wants every wizard and every witch in every corner of the globe to know his name. He doesn’t – under – stand!’ Harry slides to the floor, buries his face in his hands, and sobs. ‘I’d give anything to be like him, Hermione. I’d give anything to be as average, and as ordinary, and as irrelevant as him.’ Tears are streaking through his fingers, and down his knuckles.
Hermione knows that she should pity him. She should apologise to him. She should leap across the kitchen, wrap her arm around his shoulder, and tell him that everything’s going to be alright. That’s what Hermione does, whenever Harry feels despondent. But, as Hermione watches Harry complain about what a burden his destiny is, after he’s let Ron slip through his fingers, and rejected her help to find him, she doesn’t want to do any of those things. ‘You’re a fool,’ Hermione whispers. And she turns towards the door.
Harry runs after her. ‘Where are you going? You’re not leaving me.’
‘Of course not,’ Hermione strides across the kitchen, ‘I’m just… temporarily departing. I won’t be long. We watched Ron walk off into the woods. I know more or less where he’s going.’ She unzips the door of the tent. The forest is alive with the whistling of birds and the rustling of leaves.
He grabs her sleeve. ‘Don’t go. I need you.’
She studies his face – the messy hair, the green eyes, the round glasses, the lightning scar. How many times has he asked her for help? How many times has she saved him? But this is the way to save him, even if he doesn’t understand it yet. She shakes his hand off. ‘You need both of us. And I need both of you.’ She steps out of the tent, pictures Bill Weasley at his house, squeezes her eyes tight, and prepares to disapparate.
Nothing happens.
She tries again. Nothing.
She opens her eyes, and gasps.
Her vision is dissolving into a whirl of green and gold, as if somebody had drawn a picture of the forest, and was dissolving it in ethanol. Her limbs tingle with numbness, as if she was disapparating. This sensation is unlike any magic she’s experienced before. She’s not doing anything – someone, or something, is control of her.
She looks behind her, but the tent is also a spinning blur. ‘Harry,’ she screams, ‘Harry!’
‘Hermione!’ His voice cuts through the swirl of colours. ‘Hermione, you’re disappearing – I can’t see you! What’s happen-’
And then she falls. And she screams, but she can’t hear her own scream, because she’s falling, although she’s not even sure where or how she’s falling, but she feels like she’s falling because her heart is racing and it feels as if she left her stomach behind in the tent. And now images are flashing in front of her, of a glittering island of female warriors – Amazons? – and then of something flying – a bird? A plane? Something else – and then of cackling clowns, and of bats, and then she lands.