In Perpetuum

Chapter 40

Chapter 40: Ante tempestate placidium

The rest of the summer continued without much mishap. In fact, much of Hermione’s sixth year passed without any major problems.

Hermione avoided Sirius completely, and she particularly avoided James. They had progressed to speaking terms, but they hardly were what you might call chummy. Mostly they spoke to each other because they had to.

Her sixth year was so uneventful, and normal that Hermione often thought that this is what it must have been like for other students, who did not have to worry about horcruxs, or defeating the darkest wizard of all time. For the first time, Hermione was living in the present whilst Voldemort and his henchmen appeared to be laying low for awhile.

Sybil Trelawney had replaced the old Divination teacher. Hermione had panicked slightly when she saw the much younger Professor Trelawney at the staff table, at the start of term. It was only after a few words from Dumbledore that Hermione knew that he had only offered the job out of kindness and courtesy than anything else.

All was, so far, going to plan. They just had to extend that plan to include the final destruction of Lord Voldemort.

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On the first day of September in 1977, Hermione caught the Hogwarts Express for the second to last time as she began her final year at Hogwarts school of Witchcraft and Wizardry.

Only to Hermione’s slight surprise, James was made Head Boy. She had already known that it was going to happen, but it had come as a slight shock to Hermione that it was seventh year, and James had not yet been expelled for his behaviour and creative use of Zonko’s products over that time.

Lily Evans had, of course, been made Head Girl. Hermione hoped that this somewhat academic bond between her and James would be the thing that would finally nudge them together properly. Hermione was quite sick of the cat and mouse game that had been going on over the past year, and she would have been delighted to lock them in a broom cupboard together so that they could sort out their differences.

Hermione turned her attention to the conversation that was now being held between her fellow Gryffindor seventh years, in their compartment on the Hogwarts Express.

“Well, Remus,” said Estrella, “gave me the most wonderful necklace. It is made of opals and moonstones, and it is charmed to appear as though it is glittering.”

“What was the occasion?” questioned Alice through a mouthful of chocolate frog.

“No occasion,” Estrella replied with a shrug of her shoulders, “Remus is just thoughtful like that.”

“That’s nice. All that Frank gave me on a whim was a Remembrall.”

Hermione hastily covered her giggles. It was funny that Neville so greatly resembled his mother. She wished that she had been able to tell him all these things about his parents that he had never known. She wanted to tell him that his parents really were as brave as his grandmother was saying. But that was not all that they were. They were smart and funny. Alice’s smile could light up a whole room even when she had burnt through her sixth cauldron in potions.

She wanted to tell Neville that his Dad had been very quiet as a boy, but he had a quick wit that would even have the most annoying Slytherin’s amused for hours.

Having grown up with Neville’s parents, Hermione was sure that they would have been very proud of their son and what he had achieved. If she had anything to do about it, she would be adamant that they would be able to find out for themselves what a wonderful son that they had.