Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or any of the characters, places, etc. found in the Harry Potter books. These belong to J.K. Rowling and various others, such as Scholastic and Bloomsbury. In addition, the title of this story comes from a quote by William Blake: "Thy friendship oft has made my heart to ache: do be my enemy--for friendship's sake." I thought that it was appropriate.
Author's note: I wrote the beginning of this story on a very old computer over the course of a year or two. I decided that it would be worth more where other people could read it and criticize it. Also, I am American, and although I succeeded in using some of the most well known British English (e.g. Mum instead of Mom), any British readers will find it very obvious that I don't really know British English. Finally, let me apologize ahead of time for my terrible Hagrid dialect—I hope I've gotten his character right, if not his manner of speaking. Read, review and enjoy.
Do Be My Enemy for Friendship's Sake
ByMerlinsBeard
Chapter 1: Loneliness and Sympathy
We had been best friends for what seemed like forever. When I was eleven, trying to find an empty seat on the Hogwarts Express, feeling completely out of place, it was Percy who brought me into the same compartment as his brothers, Charlie and Bill. The Sixth and Seventh Years treated us like royalty, asking us what house we wanted to be in and telling us everything that we needed to know in order to survive our first week as First Years.
When Percy and I were both sorted into Gryffindor, it was official: we would be best friends. We got each other through the terrors of being in a strange place with even stranger people and creatures. Granted, it was mainly me who needed help getting through it. Percy's family was made up of wizards. I was a Muggle-born child who had only learned that magic existed when my letter came from Hogwarts.
I was still unsure of what had happened. Percy started dating Penelope. I knew that much. But what had happened to our friendship? I couldn't simply accept an answer that seemed too un-Weasley-like. Percy Weasley would not just ditch me.
I sat alone in the common room watching everyone go about his or her own business. The Sixth Years were huddled around the fireplace, like always. I often wondered if they were all vampires because the fire never seemed to overheat them as it did the rest of us. The Fifth Years were nowhere to be seen, no doubt planning some attack on the Slytherin common room under the leadership of Fred and George. The Fourth Years were doing homework. Potter and Company were doing the same. The First and Second Years had gone to bed already.
And the Seventh Years? My year? Wood's fan club? Who cared? Certainly not me. Nor Percy, although Percy was nowhere to be found, I reminded myself.
It wasn't supposed to be like this, I thought. You're not supposed to be alone during your Seventh Year. This was supposed to be the best year of my life. Not the worst.
And so that night was the same as every other night had been for the past few months—the first few months of school that year. I walked up to the dormitory, so I could be alone without the company of everyone else.
About an hour later, the rest of the Gryffindor Seventh Year girls walked into our dormitory. I looked up from the textbook I was reading and smiled at them, and they all returned the favor. I didn't hate them, after all. I just couldn't like them, and the same was supposed to be true for the four of them.
"Laura, what are you doing up here?" Cedar Treeman asked sweetly. Her real name was Cynthia, but the play off her last name fit her better. She was strong and the tallest girl in our year, but she managed to keep some sort of femininity.
"Don't, Cedar," Joan Creevey said quietly. She was soft spoken and considerate in an annoying, meddlesome way. I often wondered why she wasn't in Hufflepuff.
They all knew why I was in there, all alone. All of the Sixth and Seventh Years did, no matter what house they were in.
"I was only trying to be polite," Cedar mumbled, heading towards her wardrobe to get her pajamas.
"I know," I said, returning my gaze to the pages of my book.
"Laura?" Joan asked. "Would you like to go to Hogsmeade with us tomorrow?"
"What?" said the rest of us in the room.
"We can all hang out together. The four of us were only going to sit around The Three Broomsticks anyway. It can be the five of us instead," Joan said, smiling.
There was a slight pause. "Yeah. We want you to come," Tara Spencer said, walking over and sitting on the edge of my bed. "Just the five of us."
Tara was beautiful and, while she knew it, she tended to ignore it, more for her own sake than for anyone else.
I didn't respond immediately to the invitation. Perhaps I was being set up, I thought. But I doubted it. And I was lonely. "All right. Tomorrow, then," I said after several seconds.
The girls smiled and nodded.
Tomorrow became today, and the next thing I knew, I was walking to Hogsmeade with the four other Seventh Year Gryffindor girls. The road to Hogsmeade is where students had the most privacy. There are no paintings or ghosts around, and one can easily see if any other students or teachers are within listening distance. After we were away from the dementors, the real conversation started.
"I think I'm going to break up with Cedric," Rose Brown said. Rose was arguably the most stereotypically Gryffindor of any of us…and arguably the most Slytherin, as well.
"What?" the other three girls asked in unison.
"Are you crazy? He's gorgeous, a Quidditch player and a Hufflepuff," Tara said.
"Exactly. He's a Hufflepuff. They're so…dull. And he's only sixteen. I need some excitement."
"Like who?" I asked.
"Flint," Rose said, smiling broadly.
"The Slytherin?" Cedar asked in her typically straightforward way. "Ew."
"He's good looking," Rose said.
"So is Cedric," Tara said.
"But Marcus Flint is so…."
"Controversial?" I guessed.
"Exactly! Exciting. We'd be the talk of the school," Rose said.
"Why not date Professor Lupin? He's good looking and controversial," Cedar said.
The rest of us laughed.
"On second thought, leave him alone. He's mine," Cedar said.
"You can have Lupin if I can have Snape," Rose said, unable not to make a face.
"And I get Flitwick," Tara added.
"Dumbledore!" Joan said, cracking up with the rest of us.
They all turned to me.
"Well?" Rose asked.
"Well, what? You all obviously claimed my first choices," I said, smiling.
"Oh, come on."
"Just keep away from Hagrid and we'll get along fine."
We all laughed and joked about the professors for a few more minutes before we'd exhausted the material and started feeling bad for making fun of people we genuinely liked, or at least respected.
"So, you think I shouldn't break up with Cedric?" Rose asked to bring the conversation back to the subject at hand.
"No, it sounds like you should," Cedar said.
There was silence for a few minutes, and I started feeling the awkwardness of being around these girls outside of Hogwarts. Cedar must have felt it, too, because she quickly tried to keep the conversation going.
"So, we've fixed Rose's romantic dilemma. Who's next? Laura?"
I jumped a little and mentally laughed at myself for thinking that the silence had been awkward. I'd been hearing about their lives for years. After they figured out that I wasn't going to spread their secrets around Hogwarts, they began talking openly in the dormitory. However, it made things easier on all sides to pretend as if I wasn't there. My problems never came up.
"Sorry. No dilemmas to speak of," I said, trying to be nonchalant.
"Come now. There must be something worth talking about," Rose prodded, never one to give up on good gossip.
"Not really," I said, trying to think of a new subject.
"Not really? Come on. I've never heard of you dating anyone in the seven years you've been here. After all of the times you've had to listen to our problems, surely there's a 'not really' that we can help you with now," Rose insisted.
"I don't really want to talk about it," I said, blushing.
"Ahh… what did he do to you?" she asked.
"Rose, leave her alone," Tara said.
"He didn't do anything to me."
"Well, surely it wasn't your fault. It's always the boy's fault," Rose said, ignoring Joan's glare.
"He died," I said quickly.
What else could follow an admission like that other than an uncomfortable silence?
"The summer after our third year," I said, just to break the tension, thinking that maybe the length of time involved would make them less uneasy.
"Dan?" Tara asked. She immediately looked sorry for prying.
"Yes," I said.
"How?" Rose asked.
Cedar hit her lightly on the arm. "We all know how," she whispered.
"Not how he died," Rose whispered back. "How she was dating a Seventh Year when we were only going to be Fourth Years."
"She can hear you," Joan said almost angrily.
"I was spending the month with Percy at the Burrow," I said.
"You don't have to prove your story, Laura," Joan said, casting another dirty look at Rose.
"I wasn't saying she was lying. We all know she was there when it happened. I only meant that there's a large age difference—"
"And no one guessed or knew because of the age gap," I said.
"You don't have to say anything," Joan said. "We believe you."
"What's not to believe?"
"That you were dating the Quidditch Captain who was three years older than you," Rose challenged, quick to meet anger with anger. It's not a trait I should condemn too quickly.
"I shouldn't have come," I said, feeling tears come into my eyes and turning to head back to the castle.
"Don't go," Joan said.
"Yeah, we want to hear about it," Cedar said.
Perhaps loneliness makes you stupid, or maybe anger does. A combination of both certainly must. I never would have told them without both. Not because I didn't trust them—I'd heard enough about each of them to keep them silent. Not because I didn't know them well—I'd lived with them for over six years. I simply could not have opened up without first being provoked.
"My parents had always wanted to travel, but I was born before they could really get the chance. So they decided to take a month and see Europe."
"Laura, you don't have to tell us—" Joan started.
"Then you'll think I was lying, and the lie will be one more thing you pity me for," I snapped.
She looked a little hurt but joined the others in listening.
"So, I spent the month with the Weasleys. Mrs. Weasley didn't mind having another person to look after. I spent most of my time with Percy, but Percy has always been a workaholic, and I started getting bored. I started spending more time with the other Weasley children, especially Ginny. We spent a lot of time watching the others play Quidditch at their pitch behind the house. They all love the sport, including Percy, though he's never been good at flying.
"I went back to the pitch to find Ginny one day while only Dan was practicing. He didn't have as much talent as his older brothers, or even Fred and George, but he was excellent at strategy. He never thought he was a good enough player to be a chaser for our team. He thought that his brothers had gotten him on the team, not his talent. He practiced all of the time."
"I never knew that," Cedar said.
"Only the Weasleys did, I think. Anyway, he noticed me watching him and said that if I was going to stay, I might as well help him practice. He told me to fly around and throw golf balls for him to catch. I—"
"Golf balls?" Cedar asked.
"Muggle sport. They're about the size of a snitch," Tara, a half-blood, explained.
"Oh, sorry," Cedar said.
"It's OK. Well, it only took about a minute for Dan to discover that there was a good reason that I always stayed on the ground with Ginny while they practiced. We had to spend a few hours every afternoon for a week teaching me how to fly before I could help him practice at all. But I liked talking to him more than I liked Quidditch, and after a while, we talked more than we practiced."
"It sounds romantic," Joan said, smiling.
I laughed. "Not at all. We fought all of the time. Eventually we figured out what topics to avoid." I wasn't angry anymore, but I was caught up in the story, so I continued. "I knew that I liked him, but I just thought of it as a school girl crush on a boy who was older than me. Then one day, I walked out to meet him, Ginny, or whoever was out there. I saw him flying around slowly, which he usually did when he was working on a new play. No one ever interrupted this, so I stood there watching him. After a few minutes, he noticed me standing on the edge of the pitch and flew over. He got off his broom, leaned over and kissed me.
"I pulled away. I hadn't been expecting it, and he'd scared me."
"Was it your first kiss?" Rose asked.
"Yes. I was only going to be at the Burrow for about another week, and in that time, Dan only kissed me a couple more times. The age difference bothered us both a little, and we thought it would bother everyone else more. So…why tell anyone, we figured. And…you can't tell anyone. If one more person knows, then the whole school knows, and there are five Weasleys who don't need to be reminded of what happened. OK?"
All four of them promised quickly, and at that point, I could only trust them.
"So the Weasleys don't know?" Tara asked after a minute.
"There was never a good time to tell them. They don't talk about him. Ever. At least not while I'm around. Anyway, it doesn't really matter anymore."
We walked the rest of the way to The Three Broomsticks in silence. Four of us claimed a table near the back while Cedar ordered five butterbeers at the counter. She rejoined us a few minutes later. Madame Rosmerta followed her, carefully balancing a tray with our drinks. She placed the bottles in the center of the table before walking away quickly to serve everyone else in the overcrowded pub.
The five of us began to drink without talking.
"You know," Joan said after a few minutes, "there's no reason why you can't hang out with us at Hogwarts. You don't have to seclude yourself just because—"
"Thanks, but no thanks," I said, coldly. Upon seeing her expression, I added, "It's never been you four. You know that. You understand."
"No, I don't," Joan said, but she didn't try to push the issue.
Slowly, the conversation returned to more mundane, comfortable topics, and after about an hour and a few butterbeers each, we were laughing and having a good time.
"You're messing with us," Rose said.
"No. I was looking out a window with Dave, and a big cat and dog went into the Whomping Willow. I have no idea how they did it. All I know is that one second the willow was whomping, and the next second, it was frozen and two animals were walking into the tree," Cedar said.
"You've been obsessed with that old tree forever. When Potter and Percy's little brother hit it with that car, you cried," Tara said.
"I didn't," Cedar protested.
"Did too," the rest of us said, laughing.
"So I was worried about it. Poor thing. Had a sling and everything," Cedar said, suddenly very somber.
We all laughed even harder.
"So there you are. We've been looking for you four."
I stopped laughing immediately. The other girls, looking over my head and still smiling, gradually grew silent as well.
"I thought we were all going to check out Zonko's," Wood said.
"Change of plans," Cedar said.
I stood up and brushed some nonexistent dirt off my cloak. "I have some homework to finish up back at the castle. I'll see you…." I said, smiling at the girls and ignoring the boys beside me.
"Where's Percy?"
"Oliver, shut up," Rose said.
"We'll walk back with you, Laura," Tara said, standing as well.
"We were heading back to the castle, too," Adam Still, Tara's boyfriend, said. He had never truly caught on to the fact that not everyone got along and most people liked him for that.
"No, I still need to buy… something at… I don't know, I have to buy something," Mark Jordan, Joan's boyfriend, said, trying to ease some tension.
"Now, Mark. What kind of men would we be if we didn't walk the girls back to the castle?"
"Men?" I muttered.
Wood just smiled sweetly, making me even angrier. "Unless, of course, you were waiting for Percy and Penelope," he said to me.
"Let's just go if we're going to, OK?" Joan asked, standing and giving Wood one of her looks.
He stepped back and motioned for the girls to walk in front of him. I walked out of the bar before they could catch up and ducked inside of Honeydukes. After about five minutes, I made my way back into the street.
"Hey, Laura!"
I turned towards the voice. It was Percy. He jogged up to me.
"Hi," I said, smiling broadly. I talked to Percy in between classes and at some meals, but it had been a while since I'd been around him outside of or after school.
"Hey, listen, have you seen Penelope? I lost her in Flourish and Blotts," he said, looking in both directions down the street.
I sighed. "No, I haven't."
"Oh. OK. Well, maybe she went to The Three Broomsticks, then. See you," he said, walking off.
I drew my cloak around me and started back towards the castle. About halfway there, I heard someone call my name again.
I turned to see Professor Hagrid and smiled to greet him.
"'ello, Laura. 'ow are ya?"
"I'm fine," I lied.
"Really? Ya seemed like ya were mopin'."
I turned on my fake smile that I'd been using more and more often. "I'm just taking my time getting back to the castle. How're you?"
"Oh, well…I've been better."
I nodded. "So have I."
"Want t' talk about it?"
"There's nothing to talk about, really."
It was his turn to nod. "Ya know, sometimes ya just 'ave to play with th' cards yer dealt."
"What?"
"Me. I weren't meant to be a professor."
"Nonsense. You love it. I can tell."
"Yes, but the students aren't enjoyin' themselves."
I didn't answer at first. "Look. I know Malfoy's incident shook you up. Maybe you started off too big with the younger students, right? They should start with… less dangerous creatures, but that's no reason not to work with more interesting creatures with your older students, right?"
His smile brightened. "Yer right, I suppose."
"I think so."
"I think yer right. I'm gonna go back and work on somethin'," he said, walking faster, which, for Hagrid, was pretty fast. "Thanks!"
"You're welcome," I said, although I doubt he heard me.
Once I reached the gates, I ate a piece of chocolate and hurried through the gates and towards the castle. When I got back to the common room, the rest of the Seventh Years were already there, in their normal place near the center of the room. Joan stood up when she saw me and intercepted me before I could reach the door to the stairway leading to the dormitory.
"I'm sorry," she said.
I tried to say something but she cut me off.
"Not for Wood. I should have said that I was sorry about Daniel."
I shook my head. "I shouldn't have told you in the first place. I usually don't just… ramble like that."
"You should have told someone sooner."
"Tell who?" I asked quickly.
"Any one of us would have gladly listened," she said. "We don't dislike you."
"I know," I said, a tad bit defensively.
"And you don't dislike us."
"No."
"Then why not come over with me—"
"I don't dislike you, but—"
"Oliver? Why not just let it go? It's ancient history," she said.
"Not to us."
"But it's stupid."
I shook my head. "I'm not the only one you'd have to convince. It's complicated. You know that. Everyone knows that."
"But why isolate yourself?" she asked.
"I have homework, Joan. I appreciate the thought, but I don't want anyone's pity except my own. I'll see you later," I said, dodging past her and hurrying upstairs.
Do Be My Enemy for Friendship's Sake by ByMerlinsBeard
Chapter Notes: Laura, discontent with how her seventh year is going but unwilling to do anything to change it, is suddenly invited to join her roommates on an outing to Hogsmeade. The chapter introduces the Seventh Year Gryffindors, including Percy Weasley and Oliver Wood.
Chapter Endnotes: Author's note: Yes, this chapter is vague. The next chapter explains why Laura and Oliver don't get along.
I do my best to make dialogue sound believable. It was more difficult in this chapter because I was trying to introduce the three main conflicts in the story. The conflicts become more connected later. The first conflict is between Oliver and Percy, who had a fight during their second year. The second is between Oliver and Laura because Laura took Percy's side in the fight five years ago. The third is an internal conflict that Laura has concerning the death of Daniel Weasley.
What did Percy and Oliver fight about that Joan thinks is so stupid? What happened to Daniel Weasley? And what is the scariest thing in the Forbidden Forest: an unknown creature or Laura's "enemy"? Some answers coming up… in Chapter 2.