A/N: You can all thank the guy who broke my heart for this chapter. Usually, all my best writing comes out of me when I’m fucking miserable, so here goes. Adios!

-CatJetRat

Chapter 2

Memories

Pansy’s POV

The warm comfort of my bed was just too appealing, I decided, cracking one eyelid open. Still dark out. Good. I had plenty of time to—

I shot straight up in bed, having just caught sight of my clock. 9:45. Fifteen minutes before my meeting with Dumbledore. What the….

I got out of bed and threw my curtains back. Clouds covered the sky and I cursed. I had forgotten that it was always cloudy in England. No time to shower. I yanked on my clothes as I ran out the door.

“Shit, shit, shit!!” I cursed, and grabbed my backpack, running out the door.

I arrived at Oxford one minute before my interview was scheduled to start. I frantically looked around. “Where’s Professor Dumbledore’s office?” I asked a passerby. She looked rather taken aback.

“Third floor,” she said. I thanked her and ran up to the third floor, and came to a halt in front of a door that said “Professor Dumbledore” on it.

I knocked. “Enter,” came a voice from within. I opened the door and walked in to…I’m not quite sure how one might describe the sight that greeted me. The first thing I noticed was a large red parrot sitting on a perch. With no cage. Then the rest of the room came to me. A stack of what looked like dusty framed awards sat in the corner. The walls were covered with newspaper clippings, though I didn’t focus in on one. There were tables filled with little silver trinkets which had no discernable purpose, and finally, a white bearded old man in what appeared to be bright purple pajamas.

“Ah, Ms. Parkinson,” he said cheerfully. “Sit, sit.” He motioned to a large chintz chair in front of his desk. Struck dumb, I obliged, my eyes flickering over the objects on his desk. There was an old black and white photo of a young blond man, who couldn’t have been more than eighteen when the picture was taken. There was a large jar of saltwater taffy as well. Dumbledore saw where my gaze had gone, and he smiled.

“Taffy?” he offered, holding out the jar. I eagerly took a piece, smiling back at him, and wait—were his eyes actually twinkling?

“So, Ms. Parkinson. You are here to receive your schedule, correct?”

I nodded. “Yes sir,” I said, then added quickly, “And thank you so much for accepting me into your school. It means so much to me.”

“Of course, of course,” Dumbledore said, smiling, as he pulled a sheet of paper out of his file cabinet. He turned around and handed it to me, and his eyes focused on something around my neck. “That’s an unusual necklace,” he commented mildly. “Where did you get it?”

My fingers protectively wrapped around my heart-shaped necklace. “It was given to me,” I stammered. Shit! I had completely forgotten to take it off. I used to wear it every day, but when Hannah and I had gotten together, and I had told her the story of the necklace, she had been okay with it at first, but as each week passed that we were together, she grew more and more resentful about it, until at last we had a huge blowout over it, and she told me that I could either keep her or keep the necklace. I never wore it in her presence again, though I always kept it on at my house and when I went to sleep.

“What’s inside of it?” he asked curiously.

“Wax,” I said quickly.

He laughed a little. “Perhaps today is just the day of odd necklaces. I had a young lady come in earlier with a necklace made out of bottle caps, and another one with what looked like a laminated, blood-stained razor.” Dumbledore sighed. “I will never understand the fashions of today.”

I raised my eyebrows at him, but made no comment.

“Anyway, your classes begin tomorrow. Have fun!” With that, Dumbledore shooed me out the door. I felt a tad startled. I’d thought there would be more to the conversation, but whatever.

Now that I had caught my breath I was able to take in just how hungry I was. And how in need of a shower. I wrinkled my nose as I caught a whiff of my dirty clothes, and pulled my hoodie top over my head, rushing out of the building, colliding with a girl walking past the door. Her books fell out of her hands.

“Sorry,” I said, and leaned down to help pick them up.

“It’s okay,” she said softly, her curly brown hair covering her face. I hesitated for a moment, and for some strange reason felt a strange urge to look into her eyes. But…I was tired, and cranky. Now was not the best time to be trying to make friends. And England was a small country. I’d probably see her again. Dismissing the desire, I handed some of her books to her and turned around, heading for my car, food, and a shower.

Hermione’s POV

I strolled around the campus at Oxford, looking down at the schedule Professor Dumbledore had given me when we’d had our meeting at 9:00. A strange man, but he seemed nice enough. And I’d already made a friend! A girl named Luna, who, while equally as strange as Dumbledore, was very nice. She had been going in for her meeting right as I left mine. Maybe we could trade notes. I wondered what her major was.

As I walked past the entrance to the main building a girl rushed out of the door and collided with me, knocking my books out of my hands.

“Sorry,” she mumbled, and rushed to help me.

“It’s okay,” I said, slightly annoyed. She shoved some of my books into my hands and ran off before I could get a good look at her face. I frowned and watched her go, my hands tingling slightly where she had touched them. Odd. But she had a hoodie on, so I had no way of figuring out who she was. Whatever.

I looked around at the beautiful campus and breathed in the fresh English air. I know it sounds silly to say that the air tastes different in England than it does in Texas, but it really does. I walked twice around the building before I finally found a spot that suited me, and I settled down in front of a tree and started reading Voltaire.

“Heavy reading,” a voice said teasingly. I looked up. A pretty redheaded girl was eyeing the book in my hand, a small smile teasing the corners of her mouth as she clutched her own books in her arms.

I allowed my eyes to travel lazily up and down her frame. She was voluptuous and beautiful, with soft curves all around her body and a face that looked like it couldn’t frown. She was wearing a flowery, almost hippie type dress, and her head was cocked to the side. My gaze flickered from her well-defined breasts to the uneven hem of her flowing skirt, which was hiked up almost provocatively close to her nether regions. I allowed a grin to break across my face as I imagined running my hands up her skirt and gripping her tightly.

“Depends upon your perspective,” I said idly.

“What’s your perspective?” she smirked.

“That in the end, humans only truly exist to do three things. Eat, sleep, and fuck,” I said, raising my eyebrows at her.

She raised one in turn. “Oh really?”

“Really,” I said with a shrug. “We didn’t evolve with the goal of being philosophical in our genes. We evolved so that the best and strongest could survive and reproduce. Our intellectual side? Pure gravy. The truth is that very few, if any humans at all will be able to even begin to comprehend the secrets of the universe, let alone discover them.”

Her eyebrow was still raised, but she smiled. “Interesting. I’m Ginny Weasley. An exchange student from NYU.”

At this, my heart nearly stopped. This…this was Ginny? I remembered Ginny. I went to high school with her. She had been Ron’s obnoxious sister. But the last time I’d seen her, she’d been a pimply faced fourteen year old who clung to Pansy Parkinson like a leech. A very, very, annoying leech. I had barely had any interaction with her. She would taunt me to follow Pansy’s lead, but that was it. She was ugly and annoying and therefore not worth my attention. Yet the girl standing in front of me was…stunning. There was no other word for it. She seemed sweet and sincere, and obviously had no recollection of me whatsoever. I probably wouldn’t either, except she had hung around Pansy a lot and was therefore in my periphery vision ninety percent of the time. So I remembered her. Barely.

“I’m Hermione…Lopez,” I said hesitantly, deciding to use my mother’s last name. Not so much because I was worried it would be awkward if she knew who I was, but because I was afraid she would tell her brother, and while I didn’t mind Harry knowing where I was, because he wouldn’t tell anyone, if Ron knew where I was, he was sure to blab his big mouth and it might get back to Pansy, and that just could not happen. I had put her through so much grief. It was best that she forget about me and live her life. The last thing I wanted was to hurt her again.

“Well, it’s nice to meet you, Hermione Lopez,” Ginny said, taking it upon herself to settle in the grass beside me. “You don’t sound English, either. Where are you from?”

“Austin, Texas,” I said. It wasn’t really a lie. After all, that was where I had just come from.

Ginny smiled. “I’ve always wanted to go to Texas. Open fields, horseback riding, churches to taunt on every corner….”

I snickered. “As appealing as that does sound, it wasn’t really like that in Austin. Austin’s the liberal oasis of Texas. It’s awesome there.”

“Huh,” Ginny said. “Well, it certainly sounds nice.”

I smiled slightly. “Yes. It’s a wonderful city.”

She cocked her head to the side. “I’ve heard it’s like the San Francisco of Texas.” Her brown eyes focused in on mine, and there was a question in her gaze.

My smile didn’t falter, though my heart rate sped up. She was cute, sure, and I would probably be very interested, normally. But…it was Ginny. Pansy’s friend Ginny. Something about it just felt…wrong. Dirty.

I opened my mouth and shut it. Why should it feel dirty? I hadn’t seen Pansy in years, and probably would never see her again. Ginny seemed grown up, and was pretty besides. Nothing should feel weird about this. Nothing at all.

“I found it to be so,” I said, meeting her gaze. She grinned.

“Cool.”

A/N: So I was guilt tripped into posting this, because a certain reviewer who shall remain nameless posted and posted and posted, filling up my inbox and making me feel guilty as hell. So here you go. It’s short, but I’ll keep writing, and I swear I’ll finish this story if it kills me. Adios!

-CatJetRat