Hermione Granger and the Year Hidden from Hogwarts

Chapter One

Why was it so much easier to talk to the dead than it was conversing with her peers at school?

"T-T-T-Theresa."

Her voice came out in the multi-layered way of departed souls, sounding like three speakers superimposed atop of each other but with an echoing lag. It made it that much more difficult to decipher the breathy words. "Theresa? That's good. What's your last name, Theresa?"

"Theresa."

Hermione resisted the urge to pinch the bridge of her nose, a habit she'd picked up from her mom anytime Dad recited one of his Dad jokes. "Yes, but your last name, Theresa. Mine's Granger. Hermione Granger. What is your last name?"

"I don't want the bad man to hurt me anymore."

Hackles rose up and down Hermione's arms. "The bad man?"

The little girl nodded, her eyes bugged but her expression solemn. "With the knife."

Hermione blinked. Even though the coldest part of these experiences happened at actual manifestation when they seemingly needed a burst of energy to break through whatever veil hid them from the living, her body broke out in goosebumps. "A k-knife?"

"Yes. It's really sharp. H-He cut me with it, right here." The girl pointed to her tummy.

Hermione's eyes filled with tears. She'd expected a car accident, not a... "Oh, that's just awful! You poor thing! I'll help you. I promise!"

Theresa's form shimmered, flickering in and out in the face of Hermione's vehemence.

"No! Don't! Please don't disappear. I won't be able to help find you. You want me to find you, don't you?"

The little girl trembled in place, her bottom lip pushing out as her eyelids shivered. If she were alive, Hermione imagined she'd be crying by now. As it was, she would never shed a tear again.

Even at the tender age of six, Hermione knew it was time for a new tact. She climbed out of bed, slotted her feet into her perfectly placed slippers, and beckoned the ghost to follow her to her desk. "Come here, Theresa. Would you like to watch while I draw a picture?"

Art wasn't one of her top subjects at school, but she put in more effort into that than PE, utilizing her practice with crayons to improve her penmanship.

"Okay," Theresa whispered in that layered, multi-voice output of the dead.

"I'm not very good," Hermione admitted, squinting at the wobbly triangle floating over a squiggly banana shape. "It's supposed to be a boat. You know, like a sailboat. My parents took me one time to the event in Teddington Lock where they... What's wrong, Theresa?"

"I like to draw."

"Oh," Hermione wanted to offer her a new sheet of paper, but unless she was a lot stronger than all the other apparitions that'd visited throughout the years, she wouldn't be able to interact with the crayons. "What would you draw? Maybe I can try to draw it for you."

Theresa glanced at her, not seeming to find it strange that Hermione hadn't shared in that way that some ghosts were wont to do, especially ones living in denial. "Oh, I think I would draw," she bit her lip, narrowing her eyes in concentration. "I think I would draw a bird."

Hermione swapped the blue for a black and sketched out a pigeon which ended up looking more like a demented bat trying to tango. She tried not to sigh at her limitations. If she'd been born with the gift of drawing, her life might've been so much easier. Ghosts often came to her incoherent, unable to give even the straightest of answer. If she'd been able to show her parents concrete proof, a visual to go along with, "The man with the bloodied hole in his head that dissolved from my room," then her life might've been a lot easier.