Turn back time - Hermione Granger in the Marauders era

Chapter 9 - The spell

"I don't understand. He just broke up with you? Why?" Mary questioned as Lily, Marlene, herself and Hermione sat on the latter's bed.

"Yes," Hermione lied.

"That's ridiculous. What's wrong with him? Did he even give you a reason?"

"Just that he... wasn't ready for a relationship yet. He's been too busy thinking about... his mum - apparently," Hermione could almost feel her tongue blacken.

Lily tutted and rolled over to her own bed, the two others following suit.

"I'm sorry," Mary sighed.

Hermione nodded as her friends repeated Mary.

"It's alright. I don't even feel that... sad."

Hermione couldn't see her friends expressions in the darkness, but she could almost sense their confusion.

"It's no big deal. We were going out for, what, a week?"

"Yeah, but he is your first boyfriend."

"He hardly even counts!"

"If you're sure..."

"Yeah,"

"Ok then. Well I'm going to go to sleep, I'm shattered." Lily said and her friends mumbled agreements.

"Night," Hermione whispered as she turned to face the wall.

She was lying to her friends, and not for the first time since the beginning of the school year. But one thing was true that she said. She didnt feel that upset. It was as if she hadn't quite accepted it yet; she had no heart ache, nor 'broken' soul or whatever. Yet her thoughts were on her ex-boyfriend. She was more frustrated than upset that he had broken up with her. It was annoying how he constantly insisted that he was a monster. And he was judging himself. All the things she said to him flooded her mind, and she suddenly thought of a thousand more things she could have said. Most importantly, how much he really did count to her.

The next day, she was able to cunningly avoid Remus and his group of friends surprisingly subtly. The lessons droned on, and Hermione waited for them to finish tiresomely. It seemed a boring day for a boring girl. Out of her many boring lessons, only Defence Against the Dark Arts had been abnormally interesting. They learnt a number of spells, including a few protective ones. Suddenly, the conversation drifted to the dark forces at work outside Hogwarts safe walls. You know who - Voldemort. The chatter of the class screeched to a halt at the mention of his safe-name. Their teacher (Professor Morgenway) then lead the conversation into the dangers and the threat he posed. Of course, Hermione, as well as the rest of the class, knew about this already, but it became somehow more real when a teacher was talking about it as the Slytherins exchanged knowing glances. Yet from what Professor Morgenway was saying, You-Know-Who was becoming a lot more powerful than Hermione had realised and anticipated. After Professor Morgenway's small speech, Hermione was immediately influenced to study harder and to learn more spells and to train herself how to defend herself. The idea seemed almost exciting to Hermione, so she decided to start straight away.

Immediately after her last lesson, Hermione headed down to the library. She greeted the ancient librarian with a smile (unreturned) and quickly began to scan across the bookshelf.

"Miss Granger?"

Oh Merlin. Hermione thought, recognising the voice immediately.

"Yes, Guilderoy?" She replied tediously.

"Looking for a certain book? I would recommend C
Alex Murray's A book of Defense Spells. Or maybe even Lily McLaughlin's How to succeed in Potions. Of course, you'll probably have read those already. Am I wrong?"