Chapter Eleven - Harry and Hermione

I was currently getting ready to go to school. Today was Friday, so I was preparing my female uniform, why did I decide to be a girl for my plan to make Hermione an unpretentious girl with a big ambition, well simple, I had no other choice mentally.

Despite being a bastard, I hate constant bullying like bullies, I find it so pathetic and low it makes me sick to my stomach. If I have a problem with someone, I'd rather just settle things once and for all instead of continually picking on and harassing someone, bullies look like stupid dogs playing with the same bone without getting tired of it. But I prefer to just break the bone and be done with it.

But what has that got to do with choosing to be a girl, well simple, it's bad enough that I bully a girl, but to bully her as a boy, would be even worse. There is nothing more disgusting than gender abuse, and I'm talking about both cases, both as M/F or F/M, because, although it seems ridiculous in this society, I have seen cases of a woman mistreating a man, and it's not pretty.

Anyway, it's been 5 months since I signed up and I've been annoying Hermione a little bit at a time. Sometimes I push her with my shoulder, sometimes I take her books or throw them at her, I tease her in class or just laugh at her hair.

Nonsense that a girl who thinks she's cool would do to the less popular one, and although it was harmless this bullying, I knew that Hermione was hurting and sad inside, something even I knew since I had experienced it before and I'm over it.

I also noticed that other girls who noticed this took an impulse to physically tease her, when before it was just verbal taunts or just ignoring her, but apparently I influenced them to do that to her.

But today was different.

- "Oops, sorry little Granger, I didn't see you hahaha" - I was waiting for her in the library and when she came out I appeared in front of her and pushed her hard leaving her on the floor.

I saw her pout and her eyes filled with tears, she grabbed the book she went to get and quickly left sobbing, I sighed internally and continued with a smile and so I started to physically harass her on Tuesdays and Thursdays, nothing really bad, well depending on the perspective, but I know I wasn't that hard on her. I noticed that she was already going into a depressed and submissive mode. Every time I approached her, she seemed to expect anything and everything and it happened.

Like today when I grabbed her in the bathroom, pulled her hair and we went into one of the toilets.

She started crying and just choked back the sobs.

I pulled her hair tightly and pulled her close to me and whispered - "You're pathetic, little Granger, and that's why I'll keep bullying you until you decide to defend yourself, but I know you never will and that will make it more fun for me" - I grabbed her arm and pulled up the sleeve of her uniform to quickly bite her arm while with my other hand, I covered her mouth to stifle a cry of pain - "A little present for you to remember me by, and it will also remind you that I'll always be there for you. Oh and one more little thing... if you tell anyone about this, you'll regret it."

As I left the bathroom, I heard her start to cry again.

- 'Come on, Hermione, hang in there a bit longer, soon you'll get to know me and I'll teach you how to defend yourself against this bully.' - But for now I'll leave her alone for a while, she's still too young and if I keep pushing her I'll push her too far.

.

When I started to deal with Harry, I knew that he didn't need a bully, he already had his jerk of a cousin whose name I don't remember and his two idiot friends whose names I don't remember either.

So I became his silent shadow who was there when he needed me, but always stayed away from him. It was then that I felt that the boy who lived began to watch me from afar whenever I protected him from his bullies and we were taken to the headmaster's office for beating them, but of course, I always did it in such a way that it didn't look as if I was protecting him, but just made an excuse and beat them.

When we were in management, the walrus and Harry's horse of uncles would exclaim with hatred that I should be expelled for giving their little whale a completely black eye, but Narcissa and I had the board in our pockets after donating a "small" amount making them completely ours, so the board always accused these acts as a small disagreement and nothing more, after all, the school couldn't afford to lose the generous cheque/bribe they received from us.

Slowly, I began to approach Harry, at first it was just a light hello and then some small talk. Nothing noteworthy, but I noticed the change when we did group work, and I would join him on purpose.

It wasn't long before the end of the year which is at the end of June and I watched as Harry looked like he was going to get his last little freshman year beating.

I listened as they started calling Harry a freak for believing in magic and all sorts of taunts, it was then that I felt Harry's anger seem to explode and I decided to intervene before Harry became the school weirdo.

- "Magic exists, asshole" - I approached the group as I rolled up my sleeves, and pulled out a deck of poker cards.

The few people standing around watching Harry being harassed without doing anything were surprised by my act of presence, after all, I was acting like a typical emo who didn't talk to anyone and kept to himself.

- "Get out of here, Black," - Exclaimed one of the bullies, - "Besides, why would you defend this freak?"

- "Why, well it's pretty funny you should ask since... who you're bullying, happens to be my cousin."

When I said that, Harry's cousin exclaimed surprised - "What?!"

As Harry's eyes and mouth widened in great surprise unable to attach a word.

- "But back to the magic..." - I gathered the deck, flipped it over showing all 54 cards, and then flipped it over to only dwell on a single one. - "Magic is very real.... like for example"

I then hid the card and made 10 cards appear in each hand and then threw them at the three bullies one at a time making their clothes start to fall off then Harry's cousin was shown to be wearing adult female underwear, something I had transfigured beforehand without him noticing.

- "Well... I don't judge, so if you wear your mother's underwear it's none of my business."

Laughter exploded into fits of laughter as the three underwear-clad bullies ran off, more so the girls who spotted Harry's cousin in grown-up women's underwear.

- "Kids... are you alright, Harry" - I walked up to him and shook his hand, he looked at me and nodded without saying anything to me as he took my hand - "When I found out I had a relative here, I wasn't sure, but I could confirm that it's true Harry, and yes, you and I are cousins, a bit distant, but we are cousins at the end of the day..." - I was saying and then he hugged me tightly.

- 'I wasn't expecting this reaction, maybe doubts or tears, but I think he really wanted another relative, I think this will make it easier for me.'

.

Pov Hermione

This first year she was going to start a new school life after leaving kindergarten. She had no friends there, so she had thought this would be different, well, she hoped it would be as she had very high expectations.

In kindergarten, she had a hard time making friends, since she was stuck with the books and couldn't make any.

But now for primary school, she hoped it would be different. Her parents gave her an early birthday present and took her to have her eyes operated on because of her poor eyesight her father also fixed her two front teeth for which she was always teased in kindergarten. She now looked different from before and hoped that she would not be teased by others. But apparently, her expectations were too high.

She realized that even without her ugly glasses and without her teeth, other girls found different flaws in her which separated her from the group. So sadly she knew she had to go back to her precious books which were always there to tell her all sorts of stories, but then, she arrived.

- "My name is Tanya Von Degurechaff, I hope we get along, tehehehe" - When I looked into her eyes and she looked at me, I felt a horrible feeling in my stomach, even her laughter sounded unpleasant.

She only attended on Tuesdays and Thursdays for reasons nobody knew and she never answered when asked, but those Tuesdays and Thursdays started to be her two worst days. Her parents would ask her why her eyes were sometimes red from crying or why her performance seemed to be too low, but she always told them she was fine.

She didn't know if her parents believed her or not, but she always kept her crying to her pillow and was thankful for the days when this Tanya girl was not in attendance.

When it was almost the end of the school year, she was thankful that she wouldn't see Tanya again for more than two months, but when she ambushed her in the bathroom and left that painful bite, she felt she didn't want to endure the torture of that horrible girl anymore.

She wanted to do something against her, even when she told her she would stop if she tried to stop her, she knew she couldn't do anything to her, she was too scared of her and held back for being such a coward.

Surprisingly, after what she did to her in the bathroom, Tanya started to ignore her and just smiled at her from afar, which made her Tuesdays and Thursdays more bearable but still left her constantly on guard waiting for her to come back and harass her.

At recess, she was pushed by the group of girls who were also bullying her, it couldn't get any worse, but she almost hit herself at the thought of it when she saw Tanya walking straight at them. If it was bad enough these bullies, with Tanya would be worse, she could even feel her tears spilling down her cheeks already.

- "Hey! Leave the little Granger alone," - Tanya exclaimed, leaving everyone speechless, even herself, was she defending her?

- "Hahaha, good joke, Tanya. Come and teach Hermione a lesson" - The blonde of the group told her and turned her gaze to me, but before she could do anything, I saw how Tanya kicked the blonde bully's legs knocking her to the ground on her side and started crying while holding her foot.

- "If anyone is going to bully little Granger, it's going to be me. She's my nerd, get your own" - When she said that, Tanya pushed them both away and the three of them quickly walked away, although one went limping from the blow she received - "Tks, I pity you, little Granger, you're pathetic, you can't even defend yourself from those useless good-for-nothings. You better get ready for next year, we'll have a lot more fun together, and remember, I won't stop until you get your fangs out, little Granger!"

When Tanya left after saying goodbye in reverse, she didn't know what to think, it was all so strange.

Her bully defended her from the other bullies and almost made her laugh, but the last thing she said about seeing her next year made her feel bad again. She couldn't defend herself, how could she defend herself against Tanya who made three bullies cry and she couldn't defend herself against any of them?

When I left school with my mother, I was talking to her about what to do for my holidays, until I bumped into a boy who knocked me to the ground.

- "I'm so sorry, but I'm in a hurry!" - He exclaimed and kept running quickly without stopping.

I was about to get up and saw a light brown stick with cute designs on it, I assumed he dropped it and was going to tell him that, but he had already disappeared from my sight before I could give him back his stick.

- "Looks like he was in a hurry, at least he was polite enough to say sorry" - My mother said as she saw the boy quickly leave - "I guess when you see him you can give him that back".

- "Yes, if I see him again, I'll be sure to give it to him" - I said and she nodded.

When we got home and it was bedtime, I picked up this little stick as I looked at the design, I felt something on it like I felt very comfortable with it.

- "Maybe a magic wand?" - I said to myself with amusement - "Why not, abracadabra, make yourself the light..." The wand began to cast a glow and I covered my mouth to cover my scream as I released the wand - "I did magic..."

.

Pov Harry

When Azrael Black introduced himself to the class, everyone seemed to understand his words and moved away from him, but even so, it didn't affect my school days one bit, my cousin and his friends were making my life miserable.

It was then that I began to notice how little by little my cousin began to divert his bullying and had awkward accidents like falling, making a bit of a fool of himself and his friends had the same awkwardness.

When I started to get a good look, something I was very good at since I always kept to myself and kept my distance from everything because of my cousin who made it his business to make everyone else treat me like a freak, I noticed that every time something happened to my cousin, far away, but close enough, was Azrael Black who had a smile on his face.

I began to suspect that he was the one causing the accidents because he was always at the exact right time, but how did he do it if he was far away, that had always left him curious as to how, and so I began to stalk the new boy, who always seemed to disappear every time I let him out of my sight for even a second.

Still, I didn't give up, I wanted to find out the secret of how Azrael Black always caused some things that seemed to happen whenever he was around. It was then that one moment he appeared in front of me when I was stalking him and I froze in his presence, he just smiled at me, walked past me, and patted me on the shoulder.

Then I felt that he had always known that I was watching him, but I couldn't be sure, he didn't call me out or hit me for doing that, so maybe I imagined it that way. For that reason, I decided to stop following him, I didn't want the one person who never did anything to me or made fun of me or anything like that to decide to make me a target.

But then he started waving at me, which left me speechless and unable to respond in time, which made me feel worse because now that he was waving at me, I was rude enough to simply not respond, it couldn't get any worse, which, luckily for me, was a surprise.

One day, my uncles came to school to have a meeting with the principal because according to my cousin, Azrael Black in gym class when they were playing baseball.... well, he couldn't say that his cousin wasn't wrong about what happened, but he wasn't sure if it was on purpose or not.

- "And pitcher Black throws a 156km/h pitch" - He said with a smile as he threw the ball.

His cousin didn't even react when the ball hit him right between his legs, I could have sworn I saw blood on my cousin's trousers. And from that day on, Black came up to me and we both started talking, well, he talked, I could barely say anything to him because of my nerves. I had never had a friend before and it seemed like I had just made one, or so I hoped I had.

In the end, though, I ended up getting something much more than a friend. When he said he was my family, I felt like my mind was blocked for a moment. I had a cousin who had been protecting me, a relative who had been looking for me, so when he said we were cousins again, I just hugged him.

I hoped so, I wanted to get away from them, I didn't want to starve anymore, I didn't want to be the servant of my uncles. I had seen a lot of families before and I knew that no one normally would treat a child the way they treated me, so I hoped that if my newfound cousin could get me away from those horrible people, I would be grateful forever.

.

I still can't take Harry. As much as I liked the fact that he gave me easy access to him, I had the problem that I still had to make my presence known to the Minister and openly declare that Harry Potter is a Black on his paternal grandmother's side, Dorea Black.

The problem was Dumbledore, as he was his magical guardian, he had some power over Harry, but if that happened, then I would have to use Sirius's letter, as being Harry's godfather, Dumbledore couldn't do anything, not to mention that releasing Sirius would be another cash cow for me, after all, he is family.

'I still have a lot of things to do. I need to rearrange my schedule and hope nothing weird happens.'