Disclaimer: I own nothing, it all belongs to J.K.R. and I am not getting a dime from writing this.
Hey guys! Yes, I am back, and I am bringing a brand new and edited version of Bohemian Vanity. While it will have the same basic idea as the old BV, it has been changed up quite a bit. My goal is to have the whole story written by the end of November as part of NaNoWriMo, but I will also be working on my own original things but I promise that updates will be more frequent than they have been in the past. Well, I hope you enjoy and please, tell me what you think!
Slowly, Hermione regained consciousness. The dark spots in her vision began to fade and she saw that she was exactly where she had been, only now she was on the floor staring up at the ceiling. But something was decidedly different. Perhaps it was the fact that she had just been knocked unconscious by a flash of light that appeared out of thin air, but the room felt different, changed somehow. She tried to lift her head, but her neck refused and so Hermione contented herself to staring at the ceiling for a bit longer.
That's when she noticed, the suspicious stain by the window was gone, along with the chip in the wood paneling. Though she had only been inhabiting the room for hardly two months she was sure that the stain and the chip had been there before she blacked out. And upon closer inspection, she swore that the ceiling looked polished, clean, new almost.
Forgetting completely the resistance of her neck, Hermione lifted herself off of the floor and looked around. All the furniture was where it aught to be, but panic began to settle in her heart when she realized that none of her stuff was there. Her trunk, her books, everything was gone and someone else's books, someone else's trunk, someone else's stuff!
Stupidly, she pinched herself hard on the arm to make sure that this wasn't a dream, that she wasn't imagining this.
Well, this was no dream.
And she would have a bruise there later.
Only the sound of approaching footsteps kept her from hyperventilating and without knowing why, Hermione scurried under the bed to hide from the intruder, or possible occupant. She held her breath as the door opened and someone that Hermione hoped to be a girl, walked inside. The girl in question was mumbling under her breath, something about a James and a Donna. She sounded upset and Hermione was more than relieved when she groaned and left the room once more.
Apparently, crawling out from under the bed was much harder than crawling under it and it took a full five minutes for her to wiggle her way out. She stood for the first time since being knocked out, and looked around the room.
She had been right earlier, this wasn't her room. Well, it was the room that she had been living in for the past two months, but nothing in the room was hers. Her brain fought to find a solution to the problem in which she currently found herself in, but nothing came to her except an ever increasing fear that the rooms occupant would come back and catch Hermione standing in the middle of the room.
So, she put her decision making skills to work and formulated a plan. Obviously, she was still in Howgarts judging by Gryffindor robe crumpled on top of the bed, so the best course of action would be to see the Headmaster, whoever he might be.
But where was his office? Was it still behind the stone gargoyle? And how was she supposed to get into the office without the password? And what would she say when she did get into the office? That she blacked out and woke up in what she thinks is a different time?
Hermione mentally shushed herself, and reminded herself that she simply needed to take things one step at a time, and step one was to take off her robe and get out of the room before anyone noticed her and the gleaming Head Girl badge proudly presented on her robes.
And so, draping her robes over her arm, she walked up to the door and took hold of the handle. Fear coursed through her veins as it slowly turned and the door began to open. It was absurd, she thought, to be scared of going out into the common room, especially when there was likely to be only one other person in there at most.
The Head Girl and Head Boy were given separate dormitories away from all of the other houses. It was seen not only as a reward for all the hard work the two particular students had done in past years, but also as a way to encourage students of other houses to come and ask for help and advice when necessary. The Head Boy and Head Girl rooms were connected by a Common Room that looked almost exactly like the one in Gryffindor Tower, except slightly smaller.
As far as she remembered, it was a very short distance between the Head Girls door and the door out of the common room. Just a few paces, she though, and she would be in the clear, at least for the most part.
With one last breath, Hermione slipped though the door and with her head hung down, walked as fast as she could to the door. Unfortunately, one single couch stood in the way between her and her freedom. A couch laden with teenage boys that she was sure she had never seen before.
She avoided eye contact and ran the last few feet to the door and began sprinting down the hallway, robes in hand, past the throngs of students until she came to the one place that she could rely on no matter what the date.
The library.
She didn't dare go inside, not wanting to put herself in a situation where she might end up speaking to someone. Instead, Hermione stood by the door and caught her breath. Only once had she ever been up to the Headmasters office, but she still remembered where it was, just two floors up and to the right would take her exactly where she needed to be.
But then she remembered that she didn't actually have a way to get into his office without the password.
Just take one step at a time, she told herself. What she needed to do right now was get to the Headmasters office and once she was there, she would figure out a way in. After all, she was the brightest witch of her age.
Again, she pushed that thought to the back of her mind and calmly began heading towards her destination. She kept her eyes and her head down so that she avoided all eye contact and she did her best to navigate the familiar halls. Thanks to her long strides and her fast walking, Hermione made it to the stone gargoyle in record time.
But now came the hard part of her task, actually getting into the office. From what she could remember, Dumbledore had been headmaster for decades before she had ever gotten there and she hoped and prayed that he would still be now. So, with that in mind, she began trying a variety of passwords that he could have used, all revolving around sweets of course.
"Berty Botts Beans."
No luck.
"Pumpkin Pasties."
No luck.
"Licorice whips?"
Still no luck.
"Acid pops!"
Nope.
"Oh come on!"
The gargoyle frowned at her.
"Sugar quills."
Try again.
"Jelly slugs!"
No again.
She was finding it hard to think of more sweets. After all, candy had never quite been her thing, that had always been Harry and Ron's area of expertise. For ten minutes, or what seemed to be ten minutes, she stood there thinking and tapping her foot when suddenly, she thought of something else.
"Chocolate frogs!"
This time, the gargoyle began to move and shift and Hermione almost cried out in joy. The second there was enough room for her to squeeze through, she raced up the stairs and began pounding on the door as though she was trying to break it down. In fact, she was pounding so hard that she hardly heard the voice on the other side calling for her to come in.
The sound of a familiar, though less strained, voice sent waves of warmth through her bones as she pushed open the heavy door. She smiled when caught sight of those ever twinkling eyes of her headmaster and she let out the breath that she wasn't sure she was holding.
"Professor Dumbledore, you have no idea how wonderful it is to see you," she said as she strolled up to the desk and sat herself down in the chair.
The headmaster looked at her for a long moment, studying her face, looking confused. "Do I know you?" he asked after a few minutes.
The question surprised her, a fact that made her feel silly. How could she just walk in and expect him to know who she is? After all, she was quite obviously in the past, though she didn't know how far in the past she was, so how on earth would Dumbledore have any idea who she was?
Obviously he didn't.
She considered her words carefully, opening and closing her mouth enough times to look like a fish out of water, before she decided on what to say. "Sorry sir, I forgot that you don't exactly know who I am. Well, for starters, my name is Hermione Granger and I am, or at least I will be, a seventh year student at this school."
Dumbledore looked confused, but nodded for her to continue on and so she did. "I know that this is going to sound insane, but not twenty minutes ago I was sitting in my room when I was hit by a cruse. I'm not sure what curse it was, exactly and I don't know where it came from or who cast it but it hit my time turner. The next thing I knew my time turner was going crazy and everything was spinning. I took it off and threw it away as quickly as I could but the moment I did, something hit me in the head and I blacked out. Next thing I know I was waking up in a time completely different than my own."
A long, uncomfortable silence followed. Her knees began to shake and she looked nervously around the room, never settling on one particular thing. Too scared to look at the expression on Dumbledore's face, Hermione tried her best to think of different ways she could convince him when he inevitably called her insane and suggest that she should be sent to the special ward in St. Mungos.
"I'd be willing to put my memories into a pensive for you to watch, Sir." She spoke into the stony silence.
"Very well then,"He replied with a nod of his head. He took the wand that laid on his desk and with a whispered word and some gentle wand movements, the pensive sat on the desk, not a foot in front of her face. Hermione grabbed her own robes that she had laid across her lap and searched for her wand. A delighted smile crossed her face when she found it, and she quickly placed the tip near her temple and extracted a memory of the incident and also a harmless memory of the future, just in case he needed some extra convincing. These she placed into the pensive and waited patiently for him to look.
Soon, the Headmaster stuck his head into the pensive and Hermione waited, twiddling her thumbs and once more looking around at her surroundings. The pictures on the wall were the same, and rightly so, and nothing seems to have changed significantly, though she had to admit that everything had a newer look to it. But then again, that is what happened when you went back in time, things that were old became new and things that were new became non-existent.
I wonder what year it is, she thought to herself, and decided that once he came back up, she would ask.
She searched the walls for a clock but found none, not that she expected to. The future Dumbledore didn't have a clock on his walls so why should this one? They are, after all, the same person.
An eternity seemed to go by and she seriously considered pulling him out of the pensive, when he finally came up for air, wearing a look that she had never seen on him before.
Compete and utter shock.
He stared at her, mouth mimicking a shored fish. She sat there, her hands folded in her lap, and waited for him to say something.
"I can say that this is a scenario I never expected to deal with as a Headmaster. I trust that you wish to get back to your own time as soon as possible?"
Hermione nodded vigorously, and asked, "If I may, sir, what is the date."
"September 4th, 1976."
Her eyes shot open. Twenty years! She had gone back twenty years!While she had expected the number to be extravagant, she would have never expected to go back twenty years.
Then her mind began to work. What exactly happened in 1976? Was there anything going on? Was Voldemort in power? What in Merlin's name was going on?
"The way I see it, you have one of two options." He cut into the silence, interrupting her thoughts, "You could stay here or you could look for a way to get back to your own time. Obviously, using the time tuner is no longer an option because it is no longer in your possession. I must confess, I haven't looked into time traveling with any depth and so the task of finding a way back will be up to you, that is, if you wish to go back."
"Of course I wish to go back," she snapped back at him, "honestly! How could you think that I would get pushed back here by no choice of my own and be content staying here? I can't stay! Harry needs be back at home, Ron needs me, they won't graduate without me! And I certainly can't stay here. I know things about you and about this school and I can't afford to accidentally slip up and tell you something that you shouldn't know!" Then she continued, a bit more calmly, "No, no, I have to get out of here as quickly as possible."
He nodded. "Very well then, I will get you set up with a schedule and supplies, now, which house were you in before."
"Gryffindor, Sir, I was head girl."
"Well then, in the Head Girls quarters you will remain, as I am sure Miss Evans would not mind sharing." Then with the sparkle back in his eye he continued, "And I am sure that she will appreciate having another female around to help her manage Mr. Potter."
Hermione's blood ran cold.
Evans.
Potter.
Unless that hit to the head caused serious brain damage, she swore that Dumbledore was talking about Harry's parents. She had to make sure. "You mean, Lily Evans and James Potter? I am going to be living with Lily Evans and James Potter?"
"And taking classes with them yes. Why? Do you know them?"
She laughed awkwardly. "I know of them, Sir."
He looked at her for a long moment and said, "Well then, I could put you somewhere else if you would like, though it seems as though the only free bed is in the Slytherin dorms."
"No!" she shouted the moment the suggestion escaped his lips. "I'm muggleborn sir, I would never willfully live in Slytherin, besides, I believe I know people there too."
"I think you will find, Miss Granger, that there are a number of people around here that you know, so unless you wish to stay somewhere other than Hogwarts then you must deal with that fact."
"Yes sir, I understand. It's just that, well, I have a few personal grudges against most of the Slytherin house and, well, I don't know if I could stand a week without hexing them."
For the next two hours, they discussed the details of her stay including the classes that she would be taking, where she would stay, what year she would be in, and so forth. He even asked a house elf to fetch the schoolbooks that Hermione would need, along with some other essentials, all at the expense of Dumbledore, of course, and Hermione assured him that the moment she was back in her own time she would pay him back.
They even worked out a plausible back story for her, though she resisted getting a new name. She insisted that there would be no person alive when she got back that would remember her name.
After all, she thought, James, Lily, Peter, and Sirius will all be dead by the time I get back. I'm going to be living with ghosts.
So, once they were all finished setting things up, and the house elf had assured them that her things were already settled into her room, Dumbledore floo called Lily and asked her to come straight away.
Hermione braced herself as the red hair came out of the flames and for the first time, she came face to face with the mother her best friend would never know.