Hermione's Redheaded Friend

Hermione's Redheaded Friend

I don't know you any more. You are right beside me, sitting in the same class, but you are not there. Your eyes are glazed over as you follow the professor's movement around the room. He is giving us simple instructions but your ears do not hear. I watch your hand as it move across the faded, old parchment making haphazard letters that barely form words.

You look the same on the outside; with your fiery red hair falling just below your shoulders, your face splattered delicately with freckles over your nose and high-chiseled cheekbones, and you are fairly short for our age group but you make it up in the character you possess.

But your honeyed brown eyes, which hide behind wire-framed glasses, give you away. They use to reflect who you are. You built a wall around them to keep everyone from reading your thoughts and feelings. You are insincere with this behavior you adapted from an unknown source. You know that I have penetrated through your barrier made of lies but do you know that Harry sees through you too?

We see what you really feel.

Sometimes I wonder how you can keep so many secrets to yourself, but you have someone in which you share everything with. You don't say who he is, but I know he isn't who everyone says he is. Your honey colored brown eyes gives that much away. They tell me all your secrets and your lies but there is such a great amount that they all jumble together which is worse than not knowing at all.

You're like a jigsaw puzzle without a lid to see the picture and as I'm trying to complete it you take it apart. You don't talk to me the way you use to when the boys aren't around. You are never around, have skipped a class and didn't have an explanation, and you don't look me in the eye anymore. I knew everything when you look me in the eye: what you are feeling, what you are thinking, and whether or not you like the way the conversation is going.

No longer do your steely honey brown eyes dance with joy, nor do they water with pain, anguish, grief, or loss. It seems you lost the ability to feel anything at all, even the smallest amount of pain. This is painful for me to see you in such a bitter state of well-being.

I know better, but not you.

They have a desire, a craving so great that it has taken over your life. It is your life, the thing you think of during class, the reason why you lose concentration, the reason you aren't ever around, the reason why I hate you.

You are an addict to the sinful pleasure.

You have received a beautiful gift and possess one of your own and if I were you I wouldn't waste it the way you are. The headmaster has allowed you to move ahead. For such a rarely talented girl like your self this is a great chance to prove yourself. You are taking this opportunity for granted.

Classes no longer matter to you. I saw you fail to answer a question even Neville knew in Transfiguration. You accepted a detention for absolutely no reason in Potions. You homework is lacking in length and is messy. The drive you had for Qudditch was extinguished months ago.

You were an excellent chaser. You had the right build and cunning, the way you swerved around the opposing team, as if they were motionless poles, took pure determination, your aim was always on the mark, when apposed to the Slytherin team, you'd use all you incisive tactics to get passed them and the referees eye. The three of you would perform as one, never did you have to aim to pass the quaffle; your minds were all linked together.

The passion you had died long ago. Your aim is off and your passes are weak. You loose concentration and drop the ball. Nobody cares as long as we win the game, but we do.

Harry and I care.

Harry told me that you no longer change in front of anyone after practice and games. To everyone else it was no big deal, but I know why.

But I don't know you.

You save yourself for one special person. I have heard of him many times but never of whom he is. You use to be a carefree flirt, now you look down at your feet when a boy says hello. Your lover is manipulating you; he is making you an addict of the game, a game that you play in secret.

At the beginning of this year, you traded your skirt for boys' slacks and your short flirty hair for long wavy hair that reflects your new personality. You love the game, I know you do; but does he love you? Do you love him? Or is that exactly it, a game for the addicts of the brutally painful pleasure.

The bell rings waking you from your thoughts. We walk down to the Great Hall together and seconds later we are joined by Harry and Ron. Instantly, your eyes are on your food, which is being mixed together by your fork. You are not in the light, comfortable conversation we are having.

You're cheating at your own game, yet you seem to be proud of this. You have a devious smile that makes your eyes gleam. I know nothing of your plans tonight, nor do I want to know.

When you scarf down three plates of dessert, you dash out of the Great Hall with a little wave of your hand. Minutes later a group of Hufflepuffs leave the Hall as well.

I no longer know the shy girl behind the glasses. Though for a while you were loud and outrageous, but at least you were you. She was kidnapped and replaced with you. She was the night.

Filthy, little girl what have you done to my best friend?

You are alone in the library when I walk in. That suspicious little smile is still in your eyes as I join your weak attempt to do your homework. Amazingly, you talk happily, for the first time since last year, I finally hear about your day. It seems that I was wrong about you; it was all silly rumors about adult things.

What do you take me as? I see past the mock enthusiasm and see impatience. I am delaying you, and I get an evil satisfaction from this.

Who is he? Your eyes never answer this. You don't stare at anyone during class or mealtimes, so why do you want to be with him so much if you don't want people to know who he is?

It is obvious that your lover is a Slytherin, otherwise the whole school would know about you two. The whole school is blind, though. Rumors went around but they were never true about you. Harry is not your boyfriend and it cannot be Ron (for obvious reasons and...), Ron is mine. You made them lies yourself, that or your Slytherin lover.

You make me feel sick. My best friend never lied to my face or kept things from me. She was always honest, a very true friend, but only a friend. You do, you tell me lies and sneak around my back. She always told me everything; you are an evil, mysterious addict who tells me nothing. I wish you would tell me who your partner is, even if you tell me nothing else.

Is that all he is to you, a game partner, or a lover, or another person to add to your growing list.

I don't know you anymore but I do.

You grab some books and leave at eight-thirty. I saw your face just before you left me. You are going to meet your lover in secret. You seem oblivious that some day people will find out about you and him as you rush out of the library

This is not your first, maybe with him but you are not new to this game controlled by lust. Have you always been with him or is it what I fear: many boys in this year alone? I know I ask for a bit too much but you don't answer anyway so what is the point?

I know the answer from your eyes, but is he your first?

You are driven from my mind as I dump my stuff off in our dormitory. I have a rendezvous with Ron in a half an hour.

Our meeting place is on a secret corridor on the sixth floor. It is hidden by portrait depicting a one-roomed corridor. You merely walk though it and you are in a corridor filled with secret rooms. We have managed to find the way into one room so we use the room as a place to secretly talk, complain, and, as any teenaged couple would, to snog.

It sometimes seems that this particular area is unknown to many of the students and staff. Too many a time had it seemed like we were about to be caught when a sound echoed from outside the hidden corridor. Each time the danger moved past and we were safe. We reckon it was just Peeves the poltergeist causing trouble for Filch.

Ah, the sweet time has come and I make my way down staircases and corridors. As I approach the henceforth-mentioned corridor, I hear a low moaning noise. I quicken my pace, the sound growing louder making me wonder if Mrs. Norris actually knows about the corridor. There's a possibility that it doesn't work on animals. I walk through the portrait and walk down the corridor. My heart races as I pull out my wand to open the door. Once, twice, click. The door opens a small crack. I hesitantly open it further, walk in, and freeze dead in my tracks.

The unused classroom already has a fire roaring away emitting an intoxicating smell. Candles are scattered about on desks, windowsills, the floor, and some are floating in the air. In the middle is a makeshift bed made of extra blankets, sheets and a few pillows, which you are on. To sets of school robes litter the floor surrounding you. Not only are you nude but barely covered with the stolen sheets, but also another body atop of you protects you from unwillingly seeing eyes: Draco Malfoy.

You don't notice me watching definitely against my own will as he covers your mouth with his hand. You screw up you eyes when Malfoy's body begins to push against yours forcefully. I can hear your muffled cries of pain. The sadistic look on Malfoy's face makes me sick with guilt. Because of being frozen to the floor I am unable to stop your torture.

Is it pain?

At first it looks like he's rapping you, right before me, everybody, and god. I feel pathetic when I lose my voice and ability to move when he moves the hand that constricts your mouth. You pull his face down to yours and brutally kiss him. Your perfectly manicured nails dig into his back.

It becomes obvious that you've been with Malfoy before when he covers your mouth yet again when you begin to scream. Your body arches upward, heels digging deep into the blankets that push the both of you off the makeshift bed. There are about five different sets of misshapen half-moon scares on Malfoy's back that reflect the candlelight.

I haven't blinked since I first walked in because my wide, horror-struck eyes begin to water. I'd like to keep them shut but they snap back open just as the top lid made contact with the lower one. My legs are like led, my arms hang at my sides forgotten, my jaw dropped a little, and my eyes are wide. In my head I'm calling out to you, but in reality I make no noise.

Malfoy's face disappears behind yours and a small smile comes across your face. Words are whispered into his ear that I don't hear. He smiles or smirks or sneers or something ridiculing evil. A person in the hall cuts whatever you have planned short and suddenly my mind is back on track.

Ron, it's RON!!

Time stops as he stares down at you. Your bodies are plastered together with sweat and rhythmically your tongues explore the mouths they hold.

Ron's voice returns as well as his anger. Malfoy jumps off of you in alarm with a repulsive squelching noise. Your face drains of color as you scramble for cover. Ron continues to shout as Malfoy stands up with a sheet wrapped around his waist. He shouts, Ron turns a marvelous shade of red, and after finding a sheet to conceal yourself with you join the fight. I cannot make sense of the words being shouted, but my brain and mouth are working correctly again. I do the first thing that makes any sense. I shout at the top of my lungs to make everyone shut up.

You look at me with a look of shock, as if you just recognized that I was there. Malfoy has a small self-satisfied smile on his pointed face that he is failing to suppress. When I look at Ron for mental support he is goggling at you and your companion and probably your stupidity. I tell Ron that the room is clearly yours and that we should leave. But he becomes the overly protective brother again and is ready to take on Malfoy bare handed. I try very calmly to explain to him that this room is yours and that we ought to leave. He still doesn't listen to reason pushing me to drastic measures.

This is not normal to me. Teen couples should argue about silly things, not have sex in empty classrooms. What is normal though? I read somewhere that more teenaged couples are having sex than those who aren't, but is this normal? I hope not, I really do.

Frustrated, I take my wand out and point it at Ron's chest. I direct him out of the room and down the corridor. I know he'll be mad at me when this is all done and over with but that won't compare to how much trouble you'll be in. Therefore I am not concerned with Ron at the moment; all I want is to get away from you and to get the image of you and Malfoy's bodies out of my mind.

Safely in my bed dorm I refuse to go to sleep. Each and every time I close my eyes you and Malfoy are laying there on the floor again. These and many other images keep me up late, late enough to hear you creep in from the sixth floor corridor. Your breathing slows down and I know you are truly asleep. My eyes are pleading to allow them to rest but my inner eye, my minds eye, my eye that sees you and Malfoy won't take heed. Against my and my inner eye's wishes, I doze off.

I want nothing more than to have last night to be a horrible dream; no the whole year to be a nightmare in which I'm about to wake up from at home were summer holidays is about to end. Then to get aboard the train with you, Harry, and Ron as we always were. You, with your red ringlets hanging loosely passed your shoulders, an honest cheerful smile and skirt. Ron, and his witty jokes, vivid red hair, and thick-headed-ness. Harry, with his green eyes so bright, and messy jet-black hair. And me, with my big brain, and knowledge of the library. All of us the same, never changing.

I guess I want too much.

When I wake up the third time, the sun is already up but I am not worried about that, it is Saturday. What I am worried about is... you. I get dresses and rush out of the tower without looking at your four-poster.

It was a quarter till ten when I arrived in the common room pushing Ron with my wand. I stayed up till you arrived at one with a hope that you would have came back minutes after I did.

I expected too much.

I quickly make my way down the marble staircase but slow down when I see Malfoy come up from the dungeons. Ahead of me is a tall girl with corn silk blonde hair that shimmers with each step she takes, which I suddenly notice is a lot like his. I watch as Malfoy greets the girl with a kiss on the lips. He spots me when he pulls away and yells up at me.

I'd like to smack him again, then you for being so stupid. Malfoy's dating Pansy Parkinson, a silvery long blonde haired girl and having you on the side. How blind can one person get? Obviously, you need thinker mental glasses.

You will be crying on my shoulder when you find out, I know you will. Then you'll pretend not to care and finally you'll get over him. You don't let things get you down long.

Every day is a chance to change your self. You are a chameleon, your appearance changes but your attitude is the same. The drive, passion, determination never left, it was just put to a different use.

The blonde girl looks up at me after Malfoy shouts at me for being a peeping tom. She greatly resembles him. She has the same pointed nose and thin lips, the same high-rise cheekbones, the same cold gray eyes that are always narrowed when looking at me or Harry or Ron or you. However, she does not sneer, she screws up her eyes instead.

With a series of small pops, the straight, long, blonde hair becomes flaming red curls, the cheeks lower, freckles spring up all over, and the girl shrinks several inches. There you are, staring up at me with your dark brown eyes smirking evilly. More 'pops', and the girl Malfoy is back, just as tall as the boy Malfoy. With a small sadistic smile, Malfoy mouths 'It's just like cheating' and takes you under his arm and leads you to the Great Hall.

The second level of your game has begun: dating publicly. I'm surprised with the way you agreed to bring it to the school's attention; to just walk in with Malfoy is rather daring. Then again being a risk taker is what makes you, you. It's your, his, our last year of Hogwarts so we all might as well make a lasting impression, even if no one recognizes you.

I know you, you won't ever be the same, and I know too much. I hate you.

~Fin~