My Once and Future Self

"Ah, Ms. Granger, excellent," Dumbledore said with a smile as Hermione entered the room.

Mrs. Potter gestured with a smile for her to take a seat, and, as kind as she was, it did little to make Hermione feel any less nervous. She was suddenly very aware of the oversized t-shirt she was wearing, and the fact that her bushy hair was now home to a great deal of feathers.

"I have explained the unique nature of your situation to the Potters. You are welcome to stay here for the remainder of the holidays."

Hermione smiled politely. "Thank you for your hospitality."

Mr. Potter inclined his head and smiled kindly.

"The school will supply you with a starting fund with which you may purchase you school things," Dumbledore continued.

"Thank you," she said again.

"I understand you were talking with the boys earlier," Dumbledore said, his eyes twinkling behind his glasses and surveying Hermione in what seemed to be amusement before lingering on the feathers stuck in her hair.

She nodded, not bothering to wonder how he knew that.

"Ah. And, if I may ask, what have you told them?"

"Erm... my name," she said, cringing slightly. "It was pretty stupid but I can't exactly take it back now."

He nodded, his expression giving away nothing.

"Oh, and I told them I came from Beauxbatons, and that my parents sent me there to learn French even though we live in England."

He nodded again.

"It was the only thing I could think of to say," she said apologetically.

"Have you told them anything else?"

She racked her brain replaying the conversation in her mind before shaking her head. "No."

Dumbledore smiled widely, "Excellent. Your Beauxbatons story will do nicely. As for your name, as you said, there is nothing to be done about it."

He stood up and smiled at Mr. and Mrs. Potter before bidding Hermione a cheery "good day" and strolling merrily out of the room.

...

After a long and exhausting shopping trip to Diagon Alley where she found that Dumbledore had, as promised, provided her with a fund with which she was able to buy her school supplies, as well as a few good sets of clothes (she was secretly glad she wouldn't be wearing James' boxers anymore) the last thing Hermione wanted to do was move. Unfortunately, Mrs. Potter seemed to have other ideas.

"Dinner!"

Hermione groaned, then pulled on one of her new jumpers and trudged downstairs.

She ran into James in the hallway (fortunately not literally this time), who was now accompanied by three boys. Sirius and Remus she knew, but the third boy was blond, blue eyed and slightly chubby, the combination of which resulted in an almost charming boyish appearance that Hermione would have found almost appealing if she wasn't aware of who this most likely was.

"Hermione, this is Peter."

Peter held out his hand (which she noted still had all five fingers) and said, "It's nice to meet you. Sirius said you made quite an impression on James." He smiled teasingly.

James snorted. "Still have the bump and everything..."

She blushed.

"The food's getting cold, if you're not down here in one minute I'm feeding it to the house-elves!" came the shout from downstairs.

"We should go," said Hermione, ignoring Peter's outstretched hand, something which did not go unnoticed by the four Marauders.

"Did I say something wrong?" Peter asked curiously after she disappeared from sight.

"She's a girl, mate, there's really no knowing. It's too bad she went shopping though, I thought she looked smashing in Prongs' boxers," Sirius said before clapping Peter on the back and heading down to dinner.

Remus laughed, while James looked sheepish.

"You made her wear your boxers, Prongs? Well no wonder she won't have anything to do with me since you introduced us," Peter said with a snort before heading after Sirius. "C'mon I'm starving, and your mum always makes such good food."

Remus chuckled and followed obligingly as James fell into step with Peter.

...

Hermione couldn't help starting at Peter over dinner. Staring at all of them really. The differences were astounding.

If someone had told her that the small, blue-eyed boy, who was offhandedly joking with his friends in a manner that spoke of casual closeness, would one day betray his friends, she would have laughed.

But it was true, she reminded herself, recalling the man who had begged for mercy in the Shrieking Shack in her third year.

It was hard to even think of them as the same person. And Sirius was amazing. She remembered the Azkaban escapee as being rather drawn and haunted, but he showed none of that now. He was happy, carefree and cheerful. His smile lit up his entire face in a way she had never seen before.

It was hard to believe he'd be dead. Or that James would be dead. Betrayed by the friend they now playfully teased. Or that Remus would be left all alone.

She looked down at her barely touched dinner and tried desperately not to cry.

"Excuse me," she murmured then rushed upstairs to her room, well aware that all eyes were watching her exit.

"Is she alright?" Peter asked in concern after she had left.

James frowned then gave him a look that said clearly that they'd be discussing it later in private.

Nodding, Peter returned to his meal.

...

"So what's the big deal with Hermione?" asked Peter when they'd finally retreated to James' room.

"Dunno," said James. "But everything about her has been strange. First, she appears out of nowhere and bowls me over -"

"And then you spontaneously propose to her -" added Sirius.

James glared. "I was distraught!"

Sirius jumped back theatrically.

"That sounds like you're channelling Myrtle, Prongs."

"It's a little creepy," added Remus seriously.

"Very," put in Peter.

"Secondly," continued James, as if no such "Myrtle channelling" had occurred, "she's all injured for no apparent reason."

"She was injured?" interjected Peter. "You didn't mention that before!"

Remus snorted. "That's because Sirius was too busy regaling us with the tale of James' proposal."

"That will go down in history, it will," Sirius said with a wistful smile. "Most tragically unromantic and sudden marriage proposal in the history of Hogwarts."

James glowered. "Yes, yes. It was unromantic, spontaneous, and I'll never live it down. Quit beating a dead horse. And yes, she was injured. Cutting curse or something."

Peter frowned. "But who...?"

"Dunno... there was no one around. Anyway, thirdly, she talks with Dumbledore and all of a sudden, she's transferring to Hogwarts. I mean have you ever even heard of a transfer student before?"

"It's rare but it does happen," said Remus. "In cases where the family moves, or deems the previous school unsuitable."

Sirius rolled his eyes. "Look out everyone, Professor Moony is on the loose."

"Fourthly," James said. "She doesn't sound French."

"She's not French though," Remus cut in. "She said she lives in England."

"Yes," James said impatiently. "But if she speaks French all year you'd think it would have some effect on her speech. That she'd use French phrases occasionally or have some kind of an accent."

Remus rolled his eyes. "How do you know she doesn't? You haven't spent much time with her."

"Are you saying it's not strange?"

"No, I agree, the circumstances around her arrival, and your parents' quick acceptance of her is certainly odd, but I wouldn't go analyzing her speech patterns yet."

"And what was with that episode at dinner?" Sirius said.

Remus waved it off. "She's probably homesick or something."

"I'd agree, except that she was staring at us all through dinner," said Peter. "Quite frankly, it creeped me out."

James and Sirius nodded as Remus frowned.

"It's certainly odd," Sirius finally said.

"And odd is our specialty," said James with a grin.

"I thought pranks and rule breaking were our specialty," remarked Peter casually. "I do hope you haven't changed it without me."

"Odd things, pranks and rule-breaking are all Marauder specialties," Sirius said with an emphatic nod. "We're multi-talented."

Remus snorted.

"I propose we get to the bottom of this," James said. "Specialty or not."

"More gallivanting and adventures?" Remus asked politely.

"Late night crusades?" added Peter.

"Awkward moments wandering around the castle late at night, dodging prefects -"

"That's gotten harder now that Dumbledore gave goody boy Moony a nice shiny badge," teased Sirius.

"It could be dangerous," said Peter seriously.

"And Marauders laugh in the face of danger!" Sirius said, jumping up onto James' bed and waving around an imaginary sword, skewering the pillows.

"Hey!" shouted James, jumping up to defend his honourable pillows (of which there were quite a few, remnants of the defeated pillow fortress).

Despite James' honourable pillow saving intentions, the whole thing became a giant wrestling match, which swept up Peter and Remus as James and Sirius tumbled off the bed, scattering pillows in all directions.

Sirius sat up, with as much dignity as one who has just been defeated in an impromptu wrestling match could muster, and said, "So, are you in?"

Peter nodded, brushing his mussed up hair out of his face. "Of course."

"Excellent!" James said, though it came out rather muffled as his face was buried in a mound of pillows. "And you, Remus?"

"Of course I'm in; someone has to keep you all out of trouble."

Sirius gave an indignant shout and lobbed a pillow at Remus' head, but missed him by quite a bit and hit Peter in the face instead.

Peter, upset that he was unfairly beaten by a flying cushion, grabbed another pillow and threw it back at Sirius. However, due to a rather unfortunate miscalculation in his aim, the pillow hit James instead, who in turn lobbed pillows at everyone. And thus started the largest pillow fight ever recorded.

...