Disclaimer: You know the drill - I’m not J.K. Rowling, I don’t own Harry Potter, etc. Do you have to keep rubbing it in?!
Harry dropped his toothbrush in exasperation, and looked up from the patch of floor he was scrubbing. For what seemed like the thousandth time, he cursed the uneven stones of the dungeon for being so hard to scrub. Whilst he dipped his toothbrush into the soap and decided to take a break from the floor and start on the walls, he noticed that Ron was being unusually quiet.
“Ron?” Ron, totally oblivious, just kept scrubbing at the desk. “Ron! If you scrub at that desk anymore, there won’t be any desk left to scrub! And seeing as that’s Snape’s desk, that’ll be another week of detention!” Ron blinked, as if awaking from a dream.
“What? Did you say something Harry? Are we done yet?” Harry sighed.
“No, Ron. What’s up with you? Something wrong?”
“Apart from the fact that we have detention with Snape, in which we have to scrub the whole of these ruddy dungeons clean, using only a toothbrush? I still don’t get why we have to use our own toothbrush…Anyway, apart from all that?” Ron said, looking slightly irked.
“Yeah!” Harry agreed enthusiastically. “Apart from that, and that we have to hand in the essay that we didn’t do today, by tomorrow’s lesson.” At this point, Ron stopped scrubbing the desk, and started banging his head against it instead. “Is anything else wrong?”
“Yeah.” Ron admitted, rubbing his head. Harry waited expectantly, rubbing at a suspicious looking dark mark on the wall he was currently scrubbing.
“Well? Aren’t you gonna tell me what it is?” Harry prompted, after Ron didn’t answer. Luckily for Ron, he was saved replying from the echoing footsteps approaching down the corridor, that could only belong to Snape. Both boys hurriedly got back to their toothbrushes.
“Well?” Snape sneered, as he surveyed the room. “Do you call this clean?” Ron, still in a daze, opened his mouth to answer, but Snape continued before giving him the opportunity. “It seems we have different standards. But if your essays are not up to my standard, you’ll be doing this all again, until you present me with an essay that is up to my standard, is that understood?” Both boys nodded an answer, then fled before he saw the dent in his desk.
Later that evening in the common room, Harry kicked back in his chair after throwing his quill down on the table ceremoniously.
“Well, that’s me done!” Harry exclaimed happily. Ron glared at him in the lamplight.
“Well I’m not! I’ve still got another 2 inches! Do you think Hermione will let me see hers tomorrow morning?” Ron asked, looking up hopefully, but he was brought back to reality by Harry’s cynical look. “All right, can I borrow your essay then?” Harry handed over his essay before starting his interrogation again.
“So what were you so pre-occupied with earlier?” he asked, examining Ron‘s expression closely.
“Oh, nothing,” Ron answered absently, turning over Harry’s sheet of parchment.
“Oh really? ‘Cause I heard Hermione say…” Harry grinned impishly as he watched Ron’s reaction with amusement, moving nearer to the fire.
“What? What did Hermione say? Was it about me? Was it good? Not that I care…obviously. I don’t care what Hermione thinks, why should I? Who said anything about Hermione anyway?” Ron said, trying to regain his composure, which was slightly spoiled by the fact that he had stabbed himself with the leg of the table he had upset at the mention of Hermione’s name. He continued to stare at Harry as he tried to set everything back up, forcing him to answer.
“Oh, nothing!” Harry admitted innocently. “It’s just that it seemed to me that you were thinking of something other than scrubbing the dungeons. Or someone…”
“I wasn’t thinking about Hermione! I was thinking about…something other than Hermione! I do not like Hermione! In fact, you brought her up Harry, you know, you’re always bringing up Hermione, do you have a thing for her or something?” Ron jabbered at rapid speed, suddenly becoming increasingly absorbed in his shoes.
Harry sighed in exasperation. Was it really possible for someone to be even stupider than Goyle looked? Obviously.
“No Ron, I don’t fancy Hermione! But I think I know someone who does…”
“What?” Ron yelped in a strangled voice. Harry shook his head, picked up his essay and started up the stairs to the boys dormitories, with Ron tailing him closely behind.
“Who? Come on Harry, you can tell me! Does she like him? Is it Dean? It’s Neville, isn‘t it? Oh, Merlin, it’s not Malfoy is it? Are they going out? What has she said? What has he said? Is he going to ask her out? Is it Smith? What about …”
“Morning!” Hermione greeted the boys brightly. Through their bleary eyes, both Harry and Ron glared at her.
During Potions, Harry noticed that people were behaving rather oddly. He presumed that this was either because they had all accidentally swallowed their Potion, which, naturally, wasn’t brewed correctly, or they had all read the first edition of 'Dear Dumby’, which had come out the night before.
Harry was able to come to these conclusions because he could actually hear himself think. The reason for that was, for once, Ron and Hermione weren’t arguing. She seemed to be saying something, and Ron was nodding his head in agreement. Harry was in shock, but luckily for him it didn’t last for long as Hermione proceeded to hit Ron over the head, but instead of retorting, Ron laughed. Harry didn’t have time to dwell on this, or the notice Hermione laugh back, or even see them get detention for “laughing and general merriment” (Hermione really did hit Ron then), as he saw Snape’s shadow looming ominously over him. He dared to look up, and saw that Snape’s hand was held out in front of him. Harry reluctantly handed over his essay, and gulped as he saw Snape smile. That couldn’t be a good sign.
At lunch, Harry noticed more odd happenings. Lavender Brown seemed to be having trouble picking up her fork, and had an even harder time trying to spear a sprout with it. Harry wondered why she didn’t just use her right hand, but then he saw why, as she reached out for her glass. She was wearing a particularly unique glove, that Harry thought might belong to Luna Lovegood. She also seemed to be murmuring, something about evil pestles being the weapon of choice for taking over the world.
Harry wisely decided to ignore this (though he made a mental note not to mention it to Voldemort), and turned back towards his two best friends, but it seemed that the truce was over.
“I can’t believe you!” Hermione cried, glaring ferociously at Ron.
“What? I don’t get it…” Ron replied uselessly, looking extremely bewildered.
“That’s just it! You never get it!” Hermione yelled in frustration, getting up abruptly as she stormed out of the Great Hall.
“Well?” Harry asked, raising his eyebrows.
“Well what?” Ron stabbed his fork viciously onto his plate. “I didn’t do anything wrong…I don’t think.”
“What exactly did you say?” Harry asked, rolling his eyes.
“Nothing!” Ron replied defensively. “I just asked her if she maybe, sorta wanted to hang out with me after dinner…” Harry smiled as he noticed that Ron’s ears were going gradually redder with every word. “…to help me with my Herbology homework.” Harry’s smile disappeared as he fell forward and started banging his head repeatedly on the table. Although, Harry thought in hindsight, it might have worked better if he’d cleared his plate first.
“Why? Why?” Harry cried as he wiped the mashed potato from his forehead.
“Well…” Here Harry noticed that at least Ron looked somewhat sheepish. “I got scared that she’d think it was, well, you know,”
“A date?” Harry interrupted, grinning as he saw Ron’s ears turn a whole new shade of crimson. “Isn’t that what you wanted anyway?”
“Mumph,” Ron muttered incoherently. “Yeah, and that she’d say no, so then I just added on that it would be homework, so it would be, less awkward.”
“Yeah, nice plan Ron.“ Harry said, his voice dripping with sarcasm. Ron merely grunted again and concentrated on devouring his food. “’Cause now it won’t be awkward at all, will it?”
“I dunno Harry, these pea‘s are hard to spear, but I wouldn‘t call them awkward…” Ron broke off to see Harry banging his head on the table once more.
Dear Dumby by Oppungo
Chapter Notes: We find out what the effects of the first edition of Dear Dumby are and why ‘new toothbrushes’ are on Harry and Ron’s Christmas Lists.