It Could Have Gone That Way; A Harmione Fanfiction

Chapter 25: Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban

Dear Harry,

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

I hope this letter gets to you this year, along with the presents of course. I can't believe I'm going another year without seeing you on your birthday!

Hedwig's been brilliantly quiet, so my mum and dad haven't suspected anything at all, which is very good. That sort of explains one of my gifts, I suppose. If you followed the envelope's instructions, you'd have opened this before the presents. I have left a little note inside of each parcel explaining why I got you them, as I didn't want to spoil them all for you.

I know we've not had much of the holidays yet, but I already really miss you. Fingers crossed the rest of the Summer goes quickly!

Enjoy your birthday!

Love,
Hermione
xxx

P.S. Open the presents from biggest to smallest.

P.P.S. Mind the largest present - it's fragile.

***********

Harry read the letter for what must have been the millionth time since his birthday four weeks before then. He could remember clearly opening the presents she had gotten him:

Following Hermione's instructions, he had opened the largest parcel first. Under the paper, he had found a baby blue coloured box. Carefully opening it, Harry found a delicious round chocolate cake with scarlet icing all over it. On the top, the words -

Happy Birthday, Harry!
~ Love Hermione

- had been carefully piped in banana flavoured yellowy-gold icing, along with a yellow orb which Harry took to be a smiley face and a white blob he assumed was meant to be Hedwig. The note inside of the box had confirmed only one of his assumptions,'I'm so sorry the pictures are bad, I've never iced anything before! The yellow one is meant to be a Golden Snitch and the white thing at the bottom was Hedwig, but they didn't turn out too great. I made the cake the other day, when my parents were at work. I'm not sure what they'd say if they knew. It's actually quite fun, breaking the rules."

Harry had chuckled at her whilst opening the next present. He found a brand new pair of leather Seeker's gloves with a note that read,'I noticed that your pair were getting quite small, so I thought you could do with some new ones. They're supposed to be better at conserving heat, but I'm not sure how good they'll be.'

The next present was a brush about the size of Harry's hand. For a moment, Harry was rather confused. Why on earth would he need a hair brush? Maybe Hermione was trying to tell him something...

But then Harry had read the note,'It's not for you, it's for Hedwig. May you enjoy her grooming as much as she does.' This time, Harry laughed at himself for being so thick.

The penultimate gift was rectangular in shape and reasonably solid. Harry guessed it was a book. He was correct. Harry did not, however, guess that it was a chess book. Upon seeing it's name and author, Harry had laughed so loudly that Vernon had yelled at him from downstairs. The book was titled: A Beginners Guide to Chess by Anne Ight. Ingenious, Harry had thought to himself, Completely mad. The note Hermione had left with it said,'I apologise for the pun, but I had a look through it and it seemed rather helpful. I hope that it enables you to beat Ron at least once.'