Love, Hermione

Part 1

"But what now? What am I supposed to do with all of these feelings?"
- Jenny Han, To All The Boys I've Loved Before

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Hermione sneezed into her sleeve for the nth time that day and blew her nose into a piece of tissue. The chill was creeping into the December air and she had caught the flu a week before. It was so bad initially that she was ushered home by her boss and told to rest and not come back to work until she was all better. Well, the flu was gone, but now she was left with a cold. Still, Minister Shacklebolt insisted that she stay home and she was simply bored out of her mind.

Hermione was not a homebody at the very least. Her work at the Ministry of Magic as the head of the Department of Mysteries kept her very busy and she spent most of her days, and even nights, in the office. Minister Shacklebolt thought that this was the perfect time for her to get some much needed rest that she wasn't even authorized to work from home. He had instructed that she be left undisturbed unless it was absolutely urgent. Hermione couldn't tell if this was his way of trying to get rid of her or if he was truly concerned.

But Hermione was bored and her work was much needed to save her from misery. So she had instructed her assistant, Evelin, to covertly come by her home later in the day to bring some papers and research to go over. She had received floo messages from her colleagues all throughout the week and she knew just how busy her department was. The Aurors had unearthed scrolls written in ancient Chinese writing during a coven raid in Wales. Why Welsh witches would have those scrolls were a mystery and the aptly named Department of Mysteries was tasked to translate and investigate the scrolls.

It was only 10 o'clock in the morning and Hermione was left feeling the need to do something productive. In the past few days she had been going through the different rooms of her house cleaning and rearranging furniture. She had already done the kitchen (twice), living room, master bedroom, and spare bedroom. The only thing left was her office. Grabbing a glass of water and a box of tissue, Hermione walked down the hall from the kitchen and up the stairs towards her office.

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Hermione's office was very much Hermione. Tall bookshelves lined the walls with the thick tomes sorted alphabetically by author. Sections were divided by little trinkets and picture frames with many of them containing Hermione and her two best friends. In front of a large bay window was her enormous desk with quills and inkwells and parchment neatly arranged on top. A larger picture frame was placed on one corner next to a small bowl of her favourite sweet.

On one corner of the room, however, was a large cupboard which contained all of her whats-its. It was that cupboard in her house where she would put everything that didn't really have a proper place. Like a shrunken head, for instance. She was given it as a present from a coworker who holidayed in Mexico. It also talked; and Hermione had to cast a very strong and permanent Silencio on the head otherwise it would keep yapping away inside the cupboard. Yes - today was the day she would sort out that mess.

Hermione Accio'd a dustbin next to the cupboard and promptly chucked the shrunken head into it. Next to go was a pair of broken glasses - Harry's, she assumed, since she didn't even wear glasses - and the "Extendable Ears mach 3", a new version of the Extendable Ears the twins had given her to try two years ago. One by one Hermione went through the drawers of the cupboard methodically and got rid of items she had no need for.

When she opened the bottom drawer, Hermione found a large round box which her parents had given her for her eleventh birthday. She had expected to find a present inside but it was empty. Her parents told her that the box was to be filled with all the things she loved and wanted to keep, especially since she was about to embark on her new adventure at Hogwarts. She had treasured it ever since and added little mementos inside the box over the years.