Thin Skin

Marietta stood in the passageway of the Hogwarts Express, knocking on the door to the toilet in which Cho had locked herself. She could hear her crying and hoped Cho planned to stop before they arrived in London. While Cho was Marietta's best friend and had shown her amazing loyalty over the past three months, Marietta found Cho's nearly constant tears to be tedious. It had been one thing when Cho had cried over Cedric. That had been understandable, expected even, and Marietta had had many arguments with some other Ravenclaw girls who had dared to criticize her best friend. However, now she was crying over Harry Potter. It is one thing to be devastated at the death of a loved one, quite another to be so gutted because some boy doesn't want to date you.

"Cho, I should be the one in there crying. How many boys do you think want to kiss me these days?"

Unfortunately, the only affect this sentence had was to cause Cho to cry even harder. Marietta leaned against the door and cursed herself for ever hearing the name Harry Potter.

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Growing up, Marietta had harbored a bit of a crush on Harry Potter. Who hadn't? He was The Boy Who Lived and was responsible for the end of the war with You Know Who. She had only been two years old when the war ended, but she knew it had been terrible. Every so often, Marietta would see her mother crying when she thought Marietta was playing outside with her friends. Occasionally, after a dinner party with other wizards, the air would grow somber and all the children would be ushered into another room to play. Then of course, there was the look of fear in every wizard's eyes when someone said the words You Know Who. But every witch and wizard Marietta had ever met spoke of Harry Potter with admiration and toasted his name. Most children who grew up in wizarding families dreamt of being Harry Potter. Perhaps it was only natural that young Marietta developed a small amount of hero worship for this boy whom she had never met.

Marietta's parents were both from very old wizarding families and had expected their only daughter to attend Hogwarts. They had always pushed her academically and had made it clear to her that failure would not be tolerated. Marietta had been ecstatic when she had been sorted into Ravenclaw because she knew how proud her parents would be; they had both been in Ravenclaw and had expressed their opinion that it was the best of all the Hogwarts houses. Marietta spent most of her first year at Hogwarts in the library and she saw her hard work pay off. She found the classes to be challenging, but not too difficult, and her marks reflected the time and care with which she prepared for class. She noticed her professors began to look at her with a mixture of pleasure and amazement when she would answer their most difficult questions. Then one day, as she passed by the staff room, she overheard Professors Flitwick and McGonnagal talking about her.

"...Wonderful with Charms. She's so far ahead of herself," Professor Flitwick was saying.

"Yes, it is impressive," Professor McGonagall said, "Quite talented in Transfiguration as well. Of course, the whole Edgecombe family has always excelled in their studies. But Severus has said she is exceptional in Potions as well, which is surprising. He usually only praises Slytherin students. Now if only the other students worked the way she does..."

Marietta walked away as their conversation moved on to the sad state of most Hogwarts' students study habits. She walked back to the Ravenclaw common room and thought she was the happiest girl ever at Hogwarts.

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"I never did tell anyone about that," Marietta thought to herself as she stood listening to her friend crying behind a locked door, "probably just as well." She remembered how warm she used to feel when she thought of that conversation between two of her favorite professors, how she had been so pleased to hear that Professor Snape had said nice things about her, for she had been positive he hated her, and how she had imagined she would one day wear the blue and bronze badge of the Prefect on her robes. She felt depressed and ashamed when she remembered it now.

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Marietta had planned to spend the summer between her first and second years studying, which she did, although not nearly as much as she had initially hoped.

About two weeks into her summer holidays, Marietta accompanied her mother to Diagon Alley and bumped into one of her fellow Ravenclaw classmates, Cho Chang, who was there with her mother. Marietta had always liked Cho, with whom she had shared a dormitory room, but had been a bit awed by her beauty. Marietta knew that Cho must be smart, she was in Ravenclaw after all, but feared that she might be stuck up because she was so gorgeous. Also, Cho seemed quite popular, having made friends with many people in the different houses. Furthermore, Cho was rumored to be very good at Quidditch and some people suggested she would become the Ravenclaw team's Seeker when the spot opened up. It seemed impossible to Marietta that someone so accomplished would want to be her friend, but she soon found that she and Cho shared similar goals academically and a similar interest in boys. The girls spent the day together and made plans to meet again the following week.

By the beginning of their second year, Marietta Edgecombe and Cho Chang were inseparable.

Everyone was excited by the news that Harry Potter would be starting at Hogwarts that year. No one knew anything about him, but Roger Davies, a Ravenclaw boy who was a year ahead of Marietta and Cho, swore he saw a boy with a lightning shaped scar on his forehead with Hagrid, the school groundskeeper, in Diagon Alley. Of course, he said it had been on the same day that someone had attempted to break in to Gringotts bank, so it was difficult for Marietta to believe him.

The entire school sat in anticipation in the Great Hall as they waited for the first years to enter and be Sorted. Everyone wanted to catch a glimpse of the famous boy who had saved all their lives when he was a mere baby.

"He's so skinny," Cho whispered to Marietta when the boy who was Harry Potter entered the hall.

Marietta agreed that he was in fact skinnier than she had expected, and shorter. The scar on his forehead wasn't nearly as impressive as she had imagined it would be. Just an ugly lighting bolt, not terribly different from the tattoos she saw on some of the Muggles she encountered on the Underground. Marietta realized that she had never really thought of Harry Potter as a real boy, she had thought of him as a powerful wizard who was more confident and intelligent and socially graceful than herself. She looked at the boy with the messy hair and glasses and saw that he was nervous.

"I thought he would be different," Marietta whispered to Cho, who nodded her agreement.

While Harry sat with the Sorting Hat on his head, the rest of the school watched and each person hoped he would be sorted into their house. The Sorting Hat shouted the word "Gryffindor" and screams erupted from the next table while the rest of the houses attempted to hide their disappointment.

"Well, at least he didn't end up in Slytherin," Marietta mumbled to herself.

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SLYTHERIN! Marietta did not want to run into any students from that house, especially not standing alone in the train passageway. While most of the students at Hogwarts had been very nice to Marietta, the Slytherins as a group had taken to calling her by the name now written in pustules across her face. SNEAK. It seemed unfair to Marietta, as they were the students who had helped Umbridge the most during her year at Hogwarts, but then, the Slytherins always seemed the most prone to schadenfreude. Perhaps it had something to do with all their ambition.

Marietta knocked on the toilet door again and shouted, "Cho Chang, open this door right now! This is getting ridiculous. You can't stay locked in there forever. If you don't unlock this door right this moment I am going back to our compartment and I am throwing all your things out the window. You will spend you entire summer vacation trudging through the Lake District looking for your underwear."

Marietta heard the click of the latch being pulled back. Cho didn't open the door. Marietta opened it and entered the toilet, silently giving thanks that this was the Hogwarts Express on which Cho was having her crisis. Unlike Muggle trains, the toilets on The Hogwarts Express were large and comfortable, with many compartments and a fainting couch, not unlike the women's restrooms in posh hotels. Cho was sitting on the couch with her head buried in her hands. Marietta locked the door behind her and sat next to Cho.

"I'm sorry I said all that," Marietta told Cho.

"I know. S'okay I'm sorry for being such a baby."

"Stop apologizing to me. You're not being a baby. It's my fault you and Harry broke up anyway," Marietta bit her lip as she said this. Cho had never blamed Marietta for what had happened, but Marietta was fearful that deep down, Cho did resent her for the events that had taken place.

"It isn't. I don't know why I am crying. I think it was just seeing him with HER," Cho said, her eyes filling with tears again, "why couldn't she just have remained ugly? Why does he have to like her so much?"

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Second year was harder than the first, but Marietta had spent her summer studying and thought that she was performing at the same level of excellence as she had during the previous year. Furthermore, her marks were the same as before, so she couldn't understand why they now looked at her with the same look of detachment which they gave her classmates. Professor Snape began to criticize her for taking too much time preparing her potions, Professor Sinistra gently suggested she allow the other students to answer questions, and Professor McGonnagell told Marietta to stop asking for extra classwork as she needed to concentrate on what had been assigned. Only Professor Flitwick twinkled when he saw her, and Marietta had to admit to herself that he twinkled at the sight of any Ravenclaw, as he was their head of house. Marietta couldn't understand what had happened to cause the sudden change in her professors' behavior towards her. Then one day, she was in the library, studying, and overheard Madame Pince and Madame Pomfrey talking.

"Albus says she is the most talented student we've had in years and Minerva said she doesn't think she has ever taught a more brilliant student," Madame Pomfrey whispered.

Marietta ducked down so that she could not be seen.

"She has so much talent, and from a Muggle family," Madame Pince whispered in reply.

" Well, that is no surprise," Madame Pomfrey said, "Our most talented wizards tend to be from Muggle families. My friend who works at St. Mungo's tells me it has something to do with the spontaneous eruption of magic occurring in a vacuum. Personally, I think it has more to do with new blood. Those old, pureblood wizarding families suffer from some of the same difficulties of inbreeding as the royal families of Europe."

"It isn't only blood," Madame Pince observed, "That girl is in here studying all the time. I don't think I have ever met a more gifted and hardworking witch than Hermione Granger."

Marietta felt as if she had been punched in the stomach. She waited for the two women to move away (Madame Pomfrey said something about having to get back to the infirmary and Madame Pince had to discipline some Slytherin boys who were attempting to sneak into the Restricted Section,) then gathered her books and rushed back to her dormitory. She knew that she couldn't tell anyone what she had overheard, or why it had hurt her as it did. She told herself that it was her own fault, that nothing good comes from eavesdropping, but then she had to admit that as painful as it was, at least her question was answered. She had wondered what had caused her professors to lose interest in her. At least she knew that it wasn't because of anything she had done. She had just been replaced as the star student in their eyes. And there wasn't anything she could do about it.

Marietta would stare at Hermione Granger during meals, sitting at the Gryffindor table and tortured herself with questions: If Hermione was so smart, why wasn't she placed in Ravenclaw? If Hermione was so hardworking, why wasn't she placed in Hufflepuff? Why does Hermione get to be so loved by all the professors and by Harry Potter? What is so special about her? Marietta would repeatedly ask herself these questions, and soon, she grew to despise the sight of the bushy brown hair and buck teeth of Hermione Granger, which meant she hated seeing Harry Potter as well, since the two seemed to be inseparable. "I don't even know what he sees in her," she would say to her friends, "I mean, she looks like a squirrel!" All the girls would laugh, because Hermione Granger was definitely not popular, and Marietta would take some comfort in this.

Gradually, Marietta came to terms with her reduced status in her professors' eyes. She saw that she still was at the top of her class and came to accept that it wasn't entirely Hermione's fault that her status had been diminished. Marietta had friends and was becoming interested in boys and she admitted that she was not putting the same level of effort into her studies as she had during her first year.

Marietta's dislike of Hermione faded with time as the events of life at Hogwarts made Marietta view the Muggle girl in a new light. Marietta was happy to see Slytherin lose the House Cup at the end of second year and grudgingly accepted Hermione's part in ending the "Snakehouse Streak." During her third year, the entire school was terrified that the beast of Slytherin would kill all the Muggleborns at Hogwarts. Hermione had been petrified while studying in the library, along with the Ravenclaw prefect Penelope Clearwater. Even though Marietta disliked Hermione, she would never have wanted any real harm to come to her. Then, the summer between third and fourth year, Sirius Black escaped from Azkaban. Marietta had been terrified the entire year, as much from the Dementors on the school grounds as by the threat of the vicious killer and supporter of Voldemort. She saw Hermione's fear and realized Hermione had far more to fear than Marietta. After all, Hermione was Harry Potter's best friend and Sirius Black had helped kill his parents.

Marietta had thought her hatred for Hermione ended during her fourth year. She was able to smile at her when they met in the library, which was often as they both were there all the time. Marietta even started to consider Hermione as a sort of friend, albeit one to whom she never actually spoke. Marietta just assumed that Hermione had the same sorts of hopes and fears that she herself had, and tried to imagine how hard it must have been to grow up as a witch in the Muggle world. By her fifth year, Marietta considered approaching Hermione, but the events of the Tri-Wizard Tournament distracted her and then something happened which made Marietta's dislike of Hermione return with full force.