Sorry, Cinderella's Out Today

Sorry, Cinderella's Out Today

Forget about the guys who never call.

Forget about the ones who set you up to fall.

Princes leave you at the ball. -David Levithan, The Realm of Possibility, 2004

Once upon a time...is such a cliché. Ginny, Parvati, Lavender...all of my girlfriends have started their autobiographies with those four little words. I hate cliches; they're just overused, too cheap for my taste. Every fair maiden from here to THE END can use that line.

I, Hermione Granger, am so sick of being told I have caramel curls, cinnamon highlights, strawberry lips, vanilla skin and pools of chocolate for eyes. Next I'll have Jell-O hips because I am the Walking-Sundae-Condiments-Princess. Gag me with a wand. Authors think its sweet to have various male counterparts tell me they can see my soul in my eyes, or that they were attracted to me for my fabulous eyes of toffee. I don't want to date a guy, ever, who is attracted to me for my high-calorie eyes. Can I please get a man who likes books or at least my mind, not my cherry?

And then there are the princes themselves. You've got candidate numero uno, Ron Weasley who was dumb enough to attempt wooing me with glass slippers. I refused to wear such impractical footwear, they were further sent away to be melted into something useful such as a magnifying glass for Lindsey Lohan and her highly amusing stint on Saturday Night Live.

I am not suddenly going to sprout plastic body parts. I'm not an hourglass or a pear. I don't have grace, I'm the klutziest girl in the kingdom and the first male that volunteers to carry my books around, least I drop them, will be transported to an Author who will appreciate their crappy pick-up lines.

Harry tried to win me over with his money and his fame, his accomplishments and expensive gifts I didn't want. What am I going to do with thirty yards of Italy's finest silk besides make curtains (which I did)? I think Harry would have preferred bed sheets, but he wasn't getting any.

The third moron, Charming was his name, seemed to be in the wrong fairytale. He wanted to marry me for my mystery. What makes me mysterious? Is it my proximity for sharing all my knowledge in extremely annoying loads with the class? Charming was on about fairy godmothers and pumpkins, and these lost glass slippers that seemed to have disappeared from his book. I had to hunt down Ron, berate him for trying to move objects from fictitious place to fictitious place, summon the magnifying glass, return it to its normal form, and send Charm away. I hit Ron firmly on the head afterward and pointed him in the general direction of Luna Lovegood.

I've tried to play the part of Draco Malfoy's lover, but I just couldn't do it. Something about self-loving gits that just doesn't work for me. Add to that the indignity that I was just the third side of the triangle for a Draco/Pansy fic. They deserve each other, something about have the same great-great-great-great-great Aunt sixteen times removed.

My problem, you see, is that I am the contemporary fairytale. I get the extra props and princes from other successful fairytales. The Authors who need to make romance shapes pull me in for a bit of plot intrigue, just to see how much ridiculous shit they can make me do. I get Harry after Cho, Ron after Lavender, Draco after Ginny, Pansy, Hannah, and half the female population of fandom. I'm like the recycling plant; next people will be throwing their empty butterbeer bottle on my head.

There is nothing remotely attractive about the tall, dark, and mysterious. For one thing I'm so short the tall really don't satisfy, and if its dark how can I see to read his copyright disclaimers? Without copyright disclaimers I could end up snogging Ken or Spike or maybe a random anime character whose name I can't pronounce. I must know what crossover I'm tangling with!

I would be only too happy to oblige the general public with a list of cliches that don't work for Hermione Granger...

I'm just your modern princess, your Muggleborn girl who was about two summers from braces, jeans worn in all the wrong places, too-big robes with potions stains, and socks that don't match because in the morning I'm too preoccupied with the text for university. Please note at no time in the morning am I obsessed with coffee, caffeine, or getting a quick shag before breakfast with Ginny's boyfriend who is secretly engaged to Susan Bones.

The next idiot who gallops into my fairytale best not be wearing tights and chain mail, cooing to me my eyes are like oceans to swim for all of eternity in, and talking at great length about how he has quested for the perfect wedding gift for me. Monty Python is not romantic, nor are coconuts. Amusing yes, but I get no butterflies from them.

And then he came along, the prince of spades, carrying a half-eaten box of chocolates, and roses he plucked out of the royal garden on the way. He hasn't made one comment about the freaking Astronomy Tower or the 'Going Away Dance' that Hogwarts has never had before. Blaise is different, his eyes aren't sapphire blues, but I'm not sure what color they really are because his hair is hanging over them. He is not a quiet, secretive artist who draws nude pictures of me. Yes, he's a Slytherin, but I didn't even know if he was a guy or not until JKR told all of fandom he was a male. I'm slightly relieved not to be in another sordid femmeslash fic where I announce my love for another woman in the Myrtle's bathroom while pulling myself back together on the toilet tank.

I wasn't attracted to Blaise for his animosity or because I had to help him on a homework assignment for potions. There were no love spells or unorthodox situations cooked up by authors. There was no geometry, just a guy in violation of school dress code. The thing that got to me was the shirt he had under his robes, the one that wasn't tucked in, the black shirt that had large white block letter reading... AND THEY LIVED HAPPILY EVER AFTER.