Marauders - Always - Part One

CXLII: Endearing

"Honestly Ronald, it's S.P.E.W.," she answered. "And no, for your information, I was not recruiting anybody. I was in the library."

"You're the only person who could do homework willingly on a Saturday!" Ron grumbled, "And a holiday, no less! It's Halloween, Hermione! Didn't you get the notice? You ought to be enjoying it, taking a bit of relaxation."

"What do you think it is we're doing right now?" Hermione asked.

Harry spoke up, "Reckon Hagrid will be pleased to see us? I miss seeing him when we're not running from our lives from the Skrewts."

"I missed him, too, but I do hope he hasn't gone and made those rock cakes of his," Ron answered. "I'll bet we're the only ones that actually eat his rock cakes."

"Do you?" Harry asked. "I stopped after I chipped my tooth on one last term. I feel terrible. He goes through all the trouble of making them for us. But they're just so hard..."

"I reckon he makes them with cement and that's why they're so hard," Ron said.

"Sometimes he forgets the baking powder," Hermione intoned. "That's why they're good sometimes and other times not so. The baking powder makes a very big difference in the fluffiness of the cake."

"Yeah well, we ought to get him a sign," Ron said, "So he won't forget it. Big bold letters. OI DON'T FORGET THE BAKING POWDER!"

"I like them very much when he remembers the baking powder," Harry offered. "I don't want him to think we don't appreciate him. That's why I always stick them in my robes pockets when he isn't watching."

"Probably gets distracted by some magical creature or another," Ron laughed.

"It's rather endearing, isn't it?" Hermione asked.

"What? Hard rock cakes?" Ron asked.

Harry said, "I think it is. Very endearing."

Ron continued, "Sort of like Hermione's bushy hair."

"What about my hair?" she demanded.

"I mean most of the girls, they do all this frilly, goofy stuff with their hair yeah? Trying so hard to be pretty and all and they just look like they knotted themselves up and they take absolute ages to do it all, too, and all they do is go about fretting about their looks and how horrible it is when the rain or the wind knocks it about... bloody hell, the way they go on. But you're endearing on account that you don't do all that, you know?" Ron said pragmatically. "You just let it go all over whatever way it wants. Just like Harry's does."

Hermione stopped in her tracks. The two boys kept walking on and Hermione frowned as she grabbed a bit of her hair and looked at it as it flowed over her palm.

Harry was looking at Ron with a raised eyebrow.

"I'm just saying," Ron was still going on, seeing the warning look on Harry's face. "It's refreshing that it doesn't matter what a fright it is, you're good to go just like it is, 'Mione! Endearing."

Hermione dropped the handful of locks in her hand and shook her head, setting her jaw. She didn't answer, but hurried to catch them up, feeling frustrated and annoyed. She thought about the book she'd gotten from the library with that morning, about how she'd stood flushing as Madam Pince had clucked and checked the book out. It was stuck under the pillow on her bed in the dormitory now so that, hopefully, none of the other girls in the room would see it and make fun or, worse, try at doing a makeover like Lavender Brown had so many times tried to talk her into allowing to happen.

Accio Beauty: Potions, Charms, and Tips for Witches Who Wish To Look Their Best.

She'd have to look up a hair charm or potion or something that could save her from it looking a fright, as Ron accused her of. She wondered what was so frightful about it? She didn't think it looked bad... Sure, maybe it was a bit puffy but - wasn't half the beauty products out there about adding volume into hair? So why try to take it out only to put it back in? She couldn't understand. And honestly, who had time to brush it a hundred times a day like Pavarti Patil sat about doing every night before plaiting it for bed?

The boys were talking away about something else - Godric knew what - and Hermione stared at her shoes, scuffed, as she watched and half listened. They were talking about having heard that Viktor Krum was using the pitch for training that day, and speculating who Krum might have got to replace Oliver Kent now that his father had fired the greatest seeker in the world as Ron kept calling him. "Not that Krum isn't absolutely brilliant of course, but he's only perfecting the classic moves Kent came up with ages ago..."

She wondered what had them talking about Krum - startled by the fact that she'd sort of half thought of him being in the library, as though she'd somehow called him to mind. But she saw quickly why they were on about the quidditch star - he was flying his broom stick in laps in the air over the pitch.

"I mean there's no denying he's brilliant," Ron rambled on, "I wish I could fly even half as good as that -- but I'd never, not on that old dung sweeper I've got now --"

They were nearing Hagrid's now and came to the split in the path where the way to the pitch broke off from the way to Hagrid's. Nearing the end of their walk across the grounds, Ron and Harry suddenly broke into a run across the grass. Hermione hugged the box of badges to her chest and sighed as she stared after the boys, walking gingerly so she wouldn't fall down as the path grew steeper.

She wasn't far down the pathway to Hagrid's when heard laughter coming from behind her and she turned back and saw Herbert Fleet and Cedric Diggory just turning toward the pitch, broomsticks flung over their shoulders, wearing matching number jerseys she recognized as being the Chudley Cannons - Ron's team. They were talking excitedly as they went by, and Hermione watched them duck through the door of the locker rooms at the pitch.

She wondered what they were up to and whether they knew Krum was already on the pitch? Maybe that's why they were headed to the pitch, to go and try at flying with the star player. If Harry and Ron weren't so thick, they probably would have gone and done the same thing, she thought. Her eyes turned back to watch them as they came up on Hagrid's pumpkin patch at the end of the path, bent down and winded and laughing at each other.

Gods, she thought. Why did they have to be so thick for?