32 Harry's Gift
Hermione looked at the trunk in her bed and read the note attached to it before tears prickled down her face.
It was the only gift she had received throughout the day.
None of her other classmates knew that today was her birthday or even bothered to care and even tough her parents cared a great deal about her, they couldn't send a gift to her here in Hogwarts because no muggle Post would ever reach here and they had no magical owl with which they could send their gift.
The only gift she received was given to her by Harry and she hadn't talked to him in the last two weeks.
No, it was not that she had not talked with him but more like she hadn't even seen him in the school till now.
She searched for him in all the abandoned rooms in which they studied together but found that those rooms were just that now. Abandoned. Just like she was.
She still remembered clearly how Harry had asked her if she would leave the school with him if she did and she remembered how she had hesitated and then said that she wasn't sure that parents would allow it even though she knew that it was just en excuse and nothing more.
After all, the school was becoming better these days for her.
All the bullies now left her alone.
All the teachers now paid more attention to her and even Professor Snape seemed in a better mood these days as he hardly took any points from them without reason.
And all her roommates treated her better now. Even though most of the time they only wanted to know about Harry.
All in all, her life was turning out to be pretty good here in Hogwarts which was why she had made that excuse when he asked if she would transfer with him if he left the school.
She only later realized the weight behind those words.
He had wanted to know how deep their friendship was.
If she was willing to sacrifice something for him.
He had wanted to know what their friendship meant to her.
And then she had gone ahead and gave that excuse about her parents but in the end, that's just what it was. A flimsy excuse.
As soon as she had given that excuse, his expression had turned to stone before slowly crumbling away as his eyes became wet and at that moment, she knew that she had made a horrible mistake.
He had not come to meet her in the abandoned room to teach her about charms that evening.
She had tried to find him after that and hadn't stopped her search till the curfew but found no signs of him anywhere in the castle.
The same thing happened the next day. And the next. And she soon figured out why none of the teachers were able to ever find him no matter how much they tried.
And why he was given the cheesy nickname of the 'Phantom' even though none of the students dared to call that name to his face.
She had felt utterly alone the first few days without his constant presence. Without his constant hugs.
And that feeling only got worse along with time and by now she had even forgotten how many times she had cried over the last few days.
Her roommates had asked her why she was crying and when she confided in them about the status of her friendship with Harry, their attitudes had turned a full 180 degree with concern to scorn and contempt.
Unlike how it was at the start of the term, none of the boys bullied her or called her names as all the teachers had now become quite strict about this and gave quite harsh punishments to anyone who was caught in the act of bullying but that didn't mean that she was treated any better by her housemates who had now actively begun to shun her.
Harry had once threatened Ron in front of the whole class when he had called her a know-it-all and the red haired boy had almost pissed his pants in fright.
The Gryffindors hadn't taken kindly to the fact that one of their own had been threatened by someone from outside the house even though they had conveniently forgotten that she belonged to Gryffindor as well and Ron bullied her all the time before Harry set him up straight.
No all the housemates had actively alienated her at her time of need and she felt utterly horrible.
At this point, if Harry even suggested to change the school, she would have jumped at the chance to do so.
But that chance had come and gone a long time ago.
She had failed to see that the only reason why her housemates and classmates were treating her better was because of Harry's constant presence.
She on the other hand, had conveniently forgotten that he had no interest in Herbology or History of Magic and the only reason he attended those classes was so that he could sit with her and protect her from others.
She had conveniently forgotten how much she was bullied before he came into her life and rescued her.
She had taken his precious friendship for granted and now she was getting everything that she deserved.
She read the instructions given behind the note and carefully opened the trunk before stepping inside it.
Her own trunk was nothing special and only held two times the actual space that a normal trunk of that size would hold. And there were only a few charms on that so that she would find it easier to carry.
Her parents had bought that trunk for her so that she would able to carry the extra books that she bought in Florish & Botts.
Of course she had known that there were trunks that had such such large spaces inside them that a whole house could fit inside of it. In fact, her parents had seemed downright fascinated by those trunks and had shown the desire to buy them but those trunks were terribly expensive and despite the fact that both her parents were Dentists and had a lot of money to spare, they decided that those trunks were a 'luxury' and didn't bought them in the end.
And now Harry had gifted one such trunk to her even though she had not seen him for two whole weeks even though the actual time seemed so much more to her.
She held the urge to sob and entered the first room on a ladder.
It was a small bedroom with a cozy looking bed and a wardrobe that was filled with dresses of her size.
She could only guess how much Harry must have spent on these things and held a sob. Thoughts related to him made her feel like crying all over again.
She closed the dresser and moved to the second room which was a large study room which was also filled with various tools and trinkets that she knew from her Charms and Transfiguration classes along with a cauldron and a large amount of supplies of Potion ingredients for her to practice with.
She remembered Harry telling her that he was quite rich but she had never truly asked him how much. Now she had a little idea about that but at this point she didn't even care about frivolous things such a money.
She just wanted her friend back.
Oh, if she could only go back in time and remind herself to not take his friendship for granted.
She sobbed once again and moved to the last room with held two large selves and was a library for all intents and purposes.
She browsed the books and saw that they were divided under various subjects such as Transfiguration, Charms, Arithmency, Potions, Alchemy, Ancients Runes, etc.
She didn't knew anything Alchemy but knew that books related to that subject were horribly expensive. And there were more than a dozen of such books in the shelf.
But that was not the end of it either.
She read the last instruction on the small note and went to the third row of the second shelf before pulling the 8th red colored book in it and was startled as the whole shelf suddenly moved to the side like how she'd read in some of the detective novels.
She giggled at that thought and realized that only Harry would do something so dramatic like this and sobbed as she was once again reminded of their broken friendship.
She entered the hidden room and was floored at the sight that greeted her.
A library almost as large as half of the Hogwarts library was in front of her and she gaped openly at that sight for a long moment before her gaze hungrily went to the books upon the various shelves.
She did not even had to go through the first bookshelf completely before she realized what this was.
All the books kept in the Restricted section of the Library were present in front of her plus a few more books that even their library didn't have.
How had Harry gotten hold of these books? Had he bought them. They all seemed so new. And she suddenly realized why this whole library was hidden. She could not show these books to anyone else. There was a reason why these books were kept in the restricted section.
She was so lost in this new world that she almost missed the note that was kept in the first table.
Knowing that it must be something from Harry, she immediately left those books in their places and jumped at the note before picking up and reading it's contents.
~~A gift for someone who values Education over Friendship~~
If anyone else had written the note, she would have taken it to be sarcastic or mocking. But coming from Harry, the note seemed to be filled with sadness.
And was that an indent made from a water drop at the corner of the note?
She traced over that indent and realized that no. Harry had been crying when he wrote this note and she suddenly felt like the worst person in the world.
The world might see him as their The Boy-Who-Lived. The Vanquisher of The Dark Lord. The Savior of Magical Britain. A Mysterious Boy. A Phantom. But she and only she knew about his abused childhood. About why he never made any friends or why he held such hostility toward most adults.
And now she had hurt him even more with her actions.
She sobbed as she clutched that note tightly to her chest before her sobbing turned into crying and before long, she was openly wailing in the empty library.
She did not need this gift.
She needed her friend back.
