In Bloom

Hermione Anne Granger, seventeen, witch and generally accomplished person woke up to the feeling it was going to be a very testing day. It was nothing in particular that gave her that impression, rather it was the general attitude of the Yorkshire weather (drizzling), her cat Fluffster (irritable) and her feet (numb) that all added up to give the impression it was going to be just awful. It was also the fact that, after a mere two weeks away from them, she would shortly see Harry and Ron. Usually a pleasure, today it seemed it an utter chore.

After all, Harry had sent her a somewhat half-baked owl on her return chez Granger, declaring that he was being excluded and that he shouldn't have to put up with this. He also said that things had taken an 'unexpected turn' with Dudley Dursley, alluding to something sexual. Hermione, who had seen pictures of Dudley, was quite repulsed.

Harry, Hermione had replied, I'm really sorry about Dudley, but a lot of bullies are repressed so I suppose it's understandable. Anyway, Mr. Weasley is coming to pick you up soon - just hang in there. Your cousin, though!! The best thing to do is probably to talk to him about counselling. Everyone's doing it in America. And you have not been excluded. I have been in France for two weeks. The only people I have talked to are my parents, Aunt Helen, Uncle Rodney and some French people who seemed very insular anyway. I understand that you are worried, and with good reason, but I haven't excluded you from anything except some very nice Brie. Love, Hermione.

Harry didn't reply to this, so Hermione assumed he was too angry to do so. Either that, or Dudley had suffocated him with his hefty layers of muscle and flab. She prayed for Harry every night.

Ron, on the other hand, was quite all right. He had sent Hermione so many owls that she didn't know what to do with them all. Fair enough, there was a war looming large on the horizon, but she wasn't sure there was any need to send such stupid notes as "Saw owl in sky. Think it might mean something?"

There had also been a rather strange undertone in some of the letters that she couldn't quite identify until the one that included the passage ...I really hope you come and that we can work together. There are all kinds of ways of working together, you know, and some of them could be fun....

Hermione had responded that she preferred to work alone and thrown the letter in the wastepaper basket. Ron wasn't her type. He was like her brother, or her cousin (not that in Dudley Dursley's case that seemed to affect anything), not like a boyfriend. She allowed her mind to drift to that half embarrassed kiss they had shared at Christmas over a glass or so of wine, a kiss that was hopeful and sweet, but had left her nervous and regretful the next day. Neither of them had spoken about it again, but determinedly acted as though nothing had ever happened. It made her blush to think of it.

"Hermione!" a voice called from the kitchen. Her mother, of course.

"I'm up, Mum," she shouted, lurching out of bed, trying not to put weight on her numb toes. Fluffster (whose name was not Hermione's doing) gave an indignant meow as he was dislodged, before clambering back to the bed and digging his winsome little claws into her sheets.

"Fluff," she groaned. "You're not a bit grateful to see me back, are you, prince?" She planted a kiss on Fluffster's rumpled fur, considering she wouldn't see him again for nearly a year. He purred contentedly. "At least Crookshanks didn't come this year, did he, darling? He eats all your food, that rude cat. He's a bully isn't he, sweetheart? But you know, I had to have him and not you at school. He's would have been so lonely in that nasty pet shop, wouldn't he? And you don't like the cold, do you? No, it's much nicer here. I still think you're a bit jealous though, you silly cat."

"Hermione!" Her mother's voice was more insistent and shriller.

"Coming! I'm practically dressed!" she shouted downstairs, pulling on the only clothes she hadn't packed for Hogwarts; a man's linen shirt and some dark jeans. She hoped that the clothes would discourage any advances from Ron - they neither suggested she wanted any, nor made it easy for him to get them, what with all the buttons and fabric.

In ten minutes, she was just about ready to go, her cases propped up against the wall, zipped and sealed, her hair pinned back and her jacket on. The weather did not make summer clothing the natural choice unless you wanted to take a very cheap, and very probably acidic shower. She swung down the stairs, skittering into her father, who was swinging his car keys around in his big hands.

"Morning sweetheart," he said and she smiled an acquiesce. "You ready to go?"

"Just going to get some coffee."

"You'll be lucky. Your mother's been drinking it like a fiend for hours."

"I'll make more then," Hermione said in a patronizing sort of voice and hurried to the kitchen. Her mother, clad in a dressing gown and with her hair bunched up looked over the top of her Guardian.

"There you are. You took your time, darling. I've left some coffee for you."

"Oh, thanks." Hermione came across to her mother and put her arms around her impulsively, not because of the coffee.

"I still don't understand why you have to get the train," her mother said. "I mean, couldn't Arthur or Molly Floo you to the Hogwarts, or what have you? Or use one of those little keys that looks like something else?"

"No," Hermione said patiently. "Mum, the Weasleys are really busy at the moment and Hogwarts is warded even more these days. Besides, I want to get the train to Kings Cross. I'll be able to get some reading done on the train. Charlie Weasley, you know the one who works with dragons, he'll pick me up and we'll get to Hogwarts together after I've bought my school things. It's all sorted."

"Still," her mother said, kissing her cheek, "it doesn't seem much of a holiday for you, spending an extra four weeks at school, with just a few teachers and Harry and Ron."

"There'll be about fifty people there," Hermione pointed out. She heated her coffee in the microwave, wishing she had her wand so she could do it instantly and sipped it quietly, inhaling the caffeine-rich vapour. Ah, sweet coffee, you will never desert me! Your love is constant through the storms of life! Together, we stand strong and deliciously tantalising! Hermione devotedly mused on the subject of filter coffee, whilst her mother continued to read the papers.

"Thank God. They're on the way out," her mother said to no one in particular, referring doubtless to the Conservatives.

Hermione shrugged gracefully, understanding, but distracted. "Well, after that ad campaign, you'd hope, wouldn't you? Mum, there's not anything about, you know, strange murders in there, is there? I know it sounds mad, but if the paper reports anyone suddenly disappearing, particularly powerful people, could you send me the clipping?"

"Well." Her mother looked at her with something approaching alarm. "Of course, darling. If you really think we have to?"

Hermione was suddenly back in the Department of Mysteries, fighting for her life. She saw a flash of Harry with Cedric's body, saw Sirius, as she had last seen him, with all his taut, restless elegance and bitterness, a loose canon, perhaps so very close to the edge. She would never see him again. Her voice was distant as she replied, "Yes, Mum, I think we have to."

"Of course, then," her mother said. "But now, I won't see you for so long. Tell me, what are you going to do at Hogwarts?"

Hermione wasn't sure she was qualified to answer that. The absolute truth was that she would have much rather spent the summer at the Burrow, relaxing with Harry and the Weasleys as she always had, enjoying the scene than spent it in Hogwarts, but the Order of the Phoenix had, due to circumstance, moved headquarters and was using Hogwarts over the summer. She, Harry and Ron would be the only minors, as far as she knew, who would be present, creeping around the dreary, deserted school campus. She was looking forward to having the library entirely to herself, without Madame Pince, but not looking forward to having to sit at the staff table each night, nor to the prospect of having no real lessons.

But then, before she had quite finished her coffee, much too quickly, her father was coming down the stairs with her bags and her mother was smothering her with goodbyes and affectionate messages to her friends and protestations about teeth cleanliness and safety, then she was in the car, watching the Muggle world fall by, and then, too soon, at the station, on the platform, waving goodbye to her retreating parents and, shouting that she would owl as soon as she got there, clambering onto the train.

The carriage she was sitting in was seemingly quite deserted if not quiet; there was a Chinese couple on Hermione's left who seemed to be telling each other their life stories in Cantonese, an annoying man who was ringing everyone he'd ever met on his large, cumbersome looking mobile telephone and shouting that he was "ON THE SODDING TRAIN, MATE!" and three miserable teenage girls playing UNO with a small boy. A few solo voyagers sat around, reading books or tapping away on their pagers. In her head, Firestarter was going around and round until she wanted to scream. Cool Britannia, indeed.

Then, about four stops after they had set off, Hermione heard the rustling of bags and clothes behind her, and two new voices joined the raucous melange.

"God, what is this thing Portunus?" one voice said. It was a cold, dripping kind of voice.

"A Muggle train," an other replied in an unsure, if cheerful sounding voice. Hermione blinked. It couldn't be, she thought. Wizards on the 9.23 service to London Kings Cross?

"Well I dislike it intensely," the other voice said. "It's not nearly private enough and it's filled with Muggles, whinging away their lives."

"They do that, though," came the affectionately cheery reply. "Ah well Jan, best settle down for the duration. No sense in complaining about our lot, is there?"

After a while, the voices piped up again. "You're going to read that tiresome book all the way, aren't you? How exacerbating you are."

"It's my book and I like it. If I want to read it all the way to Kings Cross, you can't stop me. I shall read it continually. It's a wonderful book, anyway! So informative!"

"It's about sport. Muggle sport at that."

"Well, it's very interesting. I think it's good to learn about new cultures, you know. Our pupils are going to be Muggles after all."

Pupils! Hermione started suddenly, wondering if she were dreaming or if perhaps she'd mistakenly taken a hallucinatory drug in lieu of a sweetener this morning . Her curiosity piqued, she stood up and moved so she was in the aisle next to the speakers, frowning at them. If they got annoyed, she could always say she was going to the toilet.

They were two men, in their twenties or maybe early thirties, one with ashen hair and a sulking expression, who was clearly the owner of the repellent voice, and the other, a more jovial seeming, rounder man with dimpled cheeks and copperish brown hair, reading a book entitled "Muggle Sport: More Than Just Croquet!' Both of them were dressed in blue shirts and blue jeans, making them look unfortunately like extras from a Levis commercial.

She looked at them for a second, thinking that one of them, the ash-haired, sallow one, did look vaguely familiar somehow, although she couldn't quite place him. She made to move back to her seat, having had a good gawk at them, but it was too late because the dimpled one glanced across at her did a double take. "Granger! Hermione Granger!"

"Erm," she said, rather floored and bitterly regretting that picture in the Prophet of her, Ron and Harry that summer that had lead to so much unwanted recognition (not least because she'd been snapped whilst wearing a very unflattering tennis dress) "Well, yes, as it happens. Yes."

The fair-haired one, who on closer inspection was probably slightly older than the dimpled cheeked one, because he had faint lines on his face glared at her (although perhaps the sound of his own voice had aged him; Hermione could have understood.) "Oh marvellous. We haven't even left Yorkshire and we're being plagued with brats."

"You're talking very loudly, if you don't mind me saying," she said haughtily. "I'm sure the whole train can hear you! I certainly could."

"Shouldn't have been listening then, should you?" light hair said disagreeably but his companion gave him a mock glare of irritation before flashing him a large, joyful smile that was not returned.

"Oh stop joshing her around Janus, she's only young. Sorry, dear. I'm Portunus Froy, and this is my constant companion and friend, Janus Malfoy-Wilkes. We're about to take on the Defence Against the Dark Arts role, you know! Together! Quite unorthodox, of course, but we do try..."

"Malfoy?" she said, startled. "You're related to the Malfoys?"

Janus scowled at her. "Only by distant blood. It's nothing personal."

"Bit of bad feeling there," Portunus interjected thoughtfully. "Say, Miss Granger, come and share that there four table with us. I'm longing for a bit of leg room and if we all put our bags on the spare seat, no one else will bother us. I'm itching to talk to someone new."

Hermione shrugged. "If it's not going to be a problem for Professor Malfoy-Wilkes."

"Gods, I hate teaching already. Would it really matter if it were?" he said through pursed lips. "What Froy wants, Froy gets. Always the same. I am at his beck and call."

Without further commentary, he stood up and shuffled across to the four table, no longer occupied by the talkative Chinese couple. His companion Professor Froy kept his arms around Malfoy-Wilkes's shoulder tightly as they crossed the aisle and sat down, as if they couldn't bear to be separated. Hermione thought it was rather juvenile to not even walk separately, but she felt that perhaps they were nervous outside their comfort zone and should be humoured.

"I see you've already spotted our predicament!" Froy cried as she took her seat, somewhat gingerly, opposite them. "Everyone said you were a clever girl! Stuck together, completely together."

"Stuck?" she said, wondering what she was supposed to have seen in the two of them except perhaps their startling different temperaments. "In what sense?"

"In the sense we can't move apart, you ignorant little chit," Malfoy-Wilkes said. "A potion. It had a rather unpleasant affect. If we aren't touching each other every damn minute of the day, it all but burns our skin off."

"Aches like hell," Froy said dolefully.

"But there must be something you can do," Hermione said as she watched the cheerful sights of Nottingham sail past the window. "I mean, it can't possibly be there isn't a cure."

"That's what we used to think," Froy agreed. "But we've seen so many specialists that we're quite mad with it. Jan doesn't think there's a chance of getting seen to anymore. It can be a real pain, taking baths and the like. Dreadful."

"How did it happen?" Hermione said, horrified at such a laissez-faire attitude to what seemed to her a tremendous problem. A woman dressed in pink shoes high enough to form a doorstop sauntered past them, tottering slightly.

"We wanted to improve our sexual encounters," Wilkes-Malfoy said unflinchingly. "The potion came from a rather unsavoury book. At the time Froy and I were having sexual relations. They were not worth the trouble."

Hermione flinched. "Oh."

"Not much more one can say really," Froy agreed with a twinkling smile. "Now, though, you must tell me: how really did it all happen in the Room of Mystery, or what have you? I read the article, of course, and Dumbledore did tell me a little, but - ah, excuse me," he waved his wand discreetly, "Clandes. Lovely, quiet ward. Well, one always hopes for a little gossip. Or if you want to keep schtum, we could always play cards?"

Hermione agreed to that, finding the relentless cheerfulness of Mr. Froy easy on her mind, and for the next hour, found herself pleasantly engaged in a game of whist with two conjoined men, one of whom was clearly cheating, the other naively saying wasn't his friend having wonderful luck. Life, she decided, was always strange but not necessarily bad.

***

But by the time the train had approached Kings Cross, three hours later, Hermione was thoroughly decided that it must be a fate worse than death for them both to live together, seeming as they did to have nothing in common. Professor Froy was exuberant where Professor Malfoy-Wilkes was austere. If one of them laughed, the other did not understand the joke. If one of them was scathing, the other was the one making the suggestion. Something, she assumed, must have attracted them to each other in the first place, but quite what it had been, she couldn't guess. Even physically they were different; Professor Froy was far plumper and more prone to smiling, and had the appearance of a smooth bouncy ball but Professor Malfoy-Wilkes was all sharp sides and sallow skin. He looked, she thought, a little like a lizard.

Looking out of the window as the train pulled in finally to the frantic station, which was crowded and bustling, Malfoy-Wilkes pulled his thin lips down in distaste. "That," he said without preamble, "is a Weasley."

Hermione followed his gaze. Charlie Weasley was stood there, a trolley in hand, relaxed and half smiling, dressed in a brown T-shirt and slacks, natural in any surrounding, his hair curling up around his temples and with a healthy all over tan that was probably more of an abundance of freckles than anything else. He obviously couldn't see Hermione for all the crowds, but she could definitely make out that it was him. Malfoy-Wilkes must be far sighted, she thought.

"Yes, it's Charlie Weasley," she said. "Second eldest."

"Delightful," Froy said cheerfully. He gave a little wave in Charlie's direction that struck Hermione as being completely pointless.

"Lovely," Malfoy-Wilkes said sardonically. "Precisely what we could do with; A freckled ginger ignoramus. Come then, Froy." He turned to Hermione, meeting her eyes directly for possibly the first time. She thought that they were Draco Malfoy's eyes in his head; slate blue and cold and wondered if that was where she had got the impression of having met him before from. "I expect I'll see you on Thursday, Miss Granger."

"Yes," she said. "It's been - interesting to meet you both, Professors."

Professor Froy gave her a ten million watt beam of a smile and patted her arm. His skin was warm and soft on hers. "Not as nice as it was to meet you, dear! Do you need a hand lugging your cases off this train? Gosh, you know, I bet you can't wait to Apparate can you?! If only we could..."

"Oh! You'd be splinched, of course, if you Apparated when you touched. I see!"

"More than that," Malfoy-Wilkes said scornfully. "We'd be burned to cinders, being separate for more than a minute. It makes the idea quite unthinkable."

"Oh yes," Froy said loosely, "unthinkable! And that dratted bus! Completely 'booked up' as I didn't know what was going on."

Hermione creased her eyebrows, temporarily confused. Malfoy-Wilkes gave her a piercing glare and hissed out an explanation. "The idea of two men sharing a bed is distasteful to the other passengers."

Without further ado, he dragged Professor Froy, who was still babbling to Hermione about it not really being anyone's fault (she didn't think that was really true; it seemed obvious it had to be someone's fault), off the train, and frogmarched him across the platform, until all Hermione could see was their two retreating backs. She wondered where their cases were.

Suddenly, Charlie Weasley leapt onto the train, meeting her at the carriage door, engulfed her in a bear hug, swung her cases for her onto his large trolley and engaged her in spirited conversation about how she was, how he was, and the state of Hogwarts and the Wizarding World generally.

"Charlie," Hermione said once the pleasantries were over and done with. "How's Harry?"

Charlie's happy-go-lucky face was temporarily darkened. "Well, I haven't really seen much of him. Dad only got him on Friday. He's spent a lot of time in the dormitory, to be honest." He lead Hermione through the crowded station. This dissembling did nothing to reassure her about Harry's well-being. Charley gave her a slightly hesitant glance, that didn't suit his open face. "I hope you don't mind if I wander off a bit when we get to Diagon Alley."

"No, not at all," she said politely.

"I have to buy some new dragon handling gloves," Charlie said uneasily, clearly lying. "And see a couple of people. I shouldn't be more than twenty minutes. Don't leave Diagon Alley, whatever you do."

"Charlie," Hermione said sharply. "Have you any idea how many times I've nearly died? I know how to take care of myself."

"Of course you do. But Mum would have a fit if anything happened so I have to warn you at least," he murmured with a Jack-the-lad grin. Then he winked at her. "Course, if you ignore my warnings, so be it. That's your fault."

Hermione smiled and began to regale Charlie with the tale of Froy and Malfoy-Wilkes, who it seemed he knew about ("Weird couple of guys. God knows what made them want to get stretched."). He listened attentively however, until they were safely in the middle of Diagon Alley where Charlie began to twitch a bit. "Well, I get off here. Just stay safe, flower."

Hermione ushered him off lightly. "OK, OK. I'll see you in half an hour or so in the Leaky Cauldron then. Thanks again for picking me up."

"No!" he said abruptly. "No. How about in Flourish and Blott's?"

"All right."

He looked at her with narrowed brows. "You must promise me not to go into that pub alone, Hermione. I'm serious. I know you're almost as old as I am, but," Charlie lowered his voice, looking embarrassed, "but age isn't the only factor in the wizarding world, sometimes."

"It's not like I'm legal to drink, anyway," Hermione said, although she was aware she felt quite annoyed about the insinuation. "It's really fine. Go off and buy your gloves."

So they parted and Hermione moved to Gringotts, to change her money and then proceeded to buy her school supplies and various guilt-trip treats for Crookshanks, who she had left at Hogwarts for the two weeks of her absence. She also bought a book entitled "Grief: The Most Deadly Foe of All" and resolved to paraphrase it for Harry sometime. Crookshanks was a highly enterprising, self-sufficient animal and was hardly likely to suffer from Hermione's absence. If anything, she thought, he probably quite liked having the place to himself.

Milling around outside Madame Malkin's rather aimlessly, Hermione decided, on a sudden womanly impulse, to walk in and look at the robes she would certainly not be able to afford. They were very beautiful dress robes; heavy, creasing silk that embraced her fingers like she had sunk them in cream, rich colours, delicate detailing, made to measure. She sighed and wistfully ran her hand across a lilac robe that looked as though it were made for her.

"Could I help you?" an assistant sauntered over, smelling of lemony fragrance, with an expensive, manufactured elegance that Hermione felt she would never own. As with most shop assistants in boutiques, the woman was bony, blonde and looked as though she thoroughly resented customers like Hermione Granger.

"Oh, no, I'm just browsing." Hermione flushed. "It's so beautiful."

"Try it on, then," the woman said, pulling it off the rack. "Even if you don't buy it today, we could reserve it for you."

"Sure, okay," Hermione said, feeling ill at ease in the environment and guilty that she had no intention of ever buying such a dress.

And wouldn't you just know it, it fitted well, flattered her skin, lightened her eyes, softened her chin and made her look generally so glamorous that she felt a megastar at some society gala. The rest of her looked all wrong of course; too little makeup, her hair too long and bushy, but it didn't matter; she thought she might be in love with the dress and how it made her feel.

"Come out then," the assistant said. Hermione stepped out, hesitantly. embarrassed by her ratty flat shoes but even more embarrassed to take them off in case anyone saw her slightly scabby winter feet, with their rough skin and veins. She did not often have the time or inclination, after all, to take a pedicure.

"Ravishing. Don't you look a star today? It totally brings you out of yourself. Really makes a woman of you," the woman said with a insincere smile that made Hermione feel that perhaps the dress was a mistake. "Fits well, doesn't it? Of course, with the charm woven in, it should do. Why don't you walk into the natural light a little, feel how it goes on your feet?"

If Hermione thought this was a pointless exercise, she didn't say so. Any time more with that dress on would do her. She walked around the shop, aware that people were staring at her and horribly embarrassed. Just as she was about to run back into the changing rooms and very probably kick the bucket out of mortification, she realised, unfortunately, she was not the only Hogwarts student in the shop. Draco Malfoy, Pansy Parkinson and her sister, a mousy looking third year, were watching her with distaste from the corner, where they were leafing through a rack of evening robes. Oh God, Hermione thought, why them of all people.

"Nice dress," Malfoy said with a smirk as he looked up at her. "Shame about the rest of you."

"Draco, don't be unkind," Pansy said with a silvery laugh, patting his arm. "We can't all be as glamorous as you. Granger, you look quite pretty."

Pansy Parkinson gave her a very small, possibly catty smile and touched a long nailed hand to her curled hair. There was an unsettled feeling in Hermione's stomach. Pansy looked different somehow; a little out of her time, with her heavy dark hair and those wide blue eyes, held together with a poise that was not unwitting but practised. Her makeup was careful and elegant; stained red lips and accentuated cheeks. She came from the same breed as the shop assistant; bony snobbery, her head held up high from years of veneration. Hermione could only stare at her with something approaching fascination.

Malfoy looked, on the other hand, rather dull. Hermione didn't see anything in him that merited the fuss he received; his hair was too white and long to be really attractive and his face was forever curled into a sneer that didn't suit him. She supposed his features were even and sharp and there was a certain fashionable symmetry to his face, but looking at him was to her no more interesting than looking at Ron.

"Thanks," Hermione said uncertainly and hurried back to her cubicle, avoiding the eyes of the assistant that she was sure was watching her intently.

"Potter and Weasel not with you?" Malfoy spat at her before she made it safely into the room. If there was something slightly strained about his tone, Hermione couldn't be bothered to identify it.

As she pulled on her shirt and jeans, she heard Malfoy's artful little snigger outside and the silvery titters of the girls. They sounded malevolent and she waited until it was quiet before slipping out of the dressing room and handing the dress back to the woman.

"Not for you then?" the assistant said snidely, as if she had always known that it wouldn't be and possibly wouldn't have wanted to sell it to her anyway.

"No. Not for me," Hermione said, looking wistfully at the fabric for what she assumed to be the last time. "Thanks anyway. I'd buy it if I could."

And, in a few short minutes, she and Charlie were picking up her bags, walking to the car and flying towards Hogwarts and the year ahead. Pansy Parkinson's unfamiliar, strikingly handsome face haunted Hermione for much of the journey. There was something about her.

***