Antes Da Detenção

Disclaimer: Happy Holidays, and you know the deal about ownership... It doesn't belong to me.

Chapter Two: Antes Da Detenção

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"Oh, bugger!" Hermione exclaimed as she sat against the couch in the Common Room, drawing out her schedule for the eighth time that day.

"Again, Hermione?" Harry whined from above her, sprawled out on the couch, as she insisted that she mumble aloud her timetable.

She rolled her eyes and continued on as if she'd not heard a thing, "Of course, I get a detention the night before all my difficult class..."

"You wanted to take them," Ron butted in from across the coffee table, lounging in an overstuffed chintz, chewing on a liquorice wand as he flipped lazily through Hermione's already extensive Charms notes. She had written brief summaries and important facts of every chapter in Miranda Goshawk's Standard Book of Spells, Grade Seven, and seeing as they had six inches of parchment due on Thursday, Hermione had shoved the folder into Ron's lap earlier that evening.

"I know, I know," she sighed. It was times like these that she truly regretted taking that time-turner contract her third year.

"And you were late," Ron continued. "Brewing a bloody experimental potion," he grumbled, thwacking the side of the chair with his candy. She ignored him.

"Gods, double Arithmancy, Ancient Runes, Defence Against the Dark Arts...and I have to deal with you two..."

"You know you love us, 'Mione!" Harry smiled and patted her playfully on the head. She shook his hand out of her hair, but smiled in silence... only to growl emphatically with the final class of her day:

"Double Potions... Damn me if Snape doesn't give me detention, again. Well, at least I enjoy that class." There was a slight pause in the conversation as Ron and Harry eyed one another. Her sudden 'change of character' had not gone unnoticed since their previous year. Honestly, they couldn't understand it...she had never taken great interest in potions before, at least to their knowledge.

"Hey, no Professor Binns though, eh?" Neville slumped into the armchair nearest the fire, Barbara Bai's Herbs of the Orient: Afghani Arugula to Yerba of Yemen in hand.

"That was today, though... along with Charms and Transfiguration. All with you lot. And then I had Muggle Studies and Astronomy and..."

"Such a terrible thing, we know." Ron rolled his eyes and flipped through the notebook to Hermione's history annotations, his eyes, which had been unfocused, snapping wider on something she had scribbled in the margins. "Are these...? Oh, naturally!"

Knowing immediately what Ron had spotted, Hermione snatched the parchment out of his hands and stuffed it into her pocket.

"Wha...?" Harry frowned.

"How do you do it?" Ron asked, turning his head toward Harry to explain. "She's listenin' to Binns drawl on and on about the Elvin Wars while writing out instructions to a potion! Bloody hell, where do you get all that brainpower?" Ron seemed a little angry, but pulled it off as an exasperated joke.

Just because I don't pay that much attention to you, Hermione thought, looking thoroughly embarrassed.

"Hermione, are you obsessed, or what?" Harry smiled softly.

"It just so happens that I am! Well, obsessed may be pushing the envelope a bit." She paused for a breath. "You both know that I went to Portugal after the war ended."

All three boys nodded.

"I attended a summer program at the wizarding school, Peniche. I... I don't think I want to be an Auror anymore."

Neville looked up from his reading in apparent shock.

Ron chewed his inner cheek.

Harry fumbled with the cuff of his sleeve, trying to hide his disappointment.

"Honestly, we can't spend every waking moment for the rest of our lives together, can we? Harry," she turned and looked up at him, continuing, "you know I'm meant much more for the book-cleaving, knowledge-seeking, hands-on approach to magic. I've never been amazing at Defence Against the Dark Arts."

"What are you saying, Herm?" Ron prodded. She really did talk entirely too much, didn't she?

Hermione looked at him. Thought it was rather obvious, she thought, but all the same, she clarified, "I want to be a Potions mistress."

"That's what you studied in Portugal?" Neville interrupted, sitting up to hear more.

"Yes. That's what I studied in Portugal," she repeated. "With a couple of people from France, Spain and one from Italy. And then there were our Portuguese hosts..."

"This has nothing to do with Snape turning out to be a good guy and all, does it?" Ron butted in with a hint of jealousy in his voice.

Hermione pushed that foolish question away with a wave of her hand. "No, no, no. Not that...really, just... no." And then she realized his motive. "Why would that even matter, Ronald? Merlin, it's Severus Snape! Any man I have an iota of respect for must be some romantic love interest!" She pinched the bridge of her nose before she lost her temper entirely. No wonder I broke up with you, Ronald.

"Whatever you want to do is perfectly fine with me, Hermione," Harry broke the silence and leaned over to look her in the eye over his silly round glasses. Hermione marvelled at the vast difference in emotional capacity of her two best friends.

"Thanks, Harry."

"I heard they teach Herbology down there, too..." Neville began, grasping at a new topic of discussion so Ron would stop moping and Hermione wouldn't have to broach the subject for a little while.

"Yeah, and a variety of Magical Creature research classes...mostly marine, along with astronomy and Portuguese Runes. I really wanted to take that class, but Diniz, my host, didn't take it, and the Headmaster wouldn't allow me to use my Time-Turner," she said wistfully. "Something about 'muitos... formulários'..."

"Wait...Diniz?" Ron interrupted again. "That's a boy, right?" Harry...although he probably was thinking the same thing...threw a pillow at the redhead.

Hermione just chuckled. "Yes, Ron." She took out a fresh parchment and her best quill. "And that reminds me, I need to write him."

"If he was your host, then..." Harry's curiosity finally got the better of him.

"You shared rooms?" Neville giggled, Herbs of the Orient bouncing up and down on his stomach as he did so. "Wicked!"

Three of the four laughed at Neville's word-usage, but Ron was not so quick to laughter. "I suppose you got along quite well, then," he said above the ruckus. Harry couldn't hold back a snort, but Neville shut up quickly.

"Oh, yes!" Hermione's voice became saccharine and animated as she sat up, clasping her hands together. "We spent ev'ry waking moment in each other's company!"

"Did you, now?" Ron sat up in his chair, tossing her notes to the floor and leaning forward.

"Yes, we did. He's quite the intellectual, you know," Hermione said. Harry gave her a look as if to say, 'low blow', but Hermione kept at it in her sugary voice. "And when we weren't with the group, Diniz would take me to the beach and we'd sunbathe while comparing potions notes, and then he'd read me dirty poetry in Portuguese..."

Neville gasped.

"...and sometimes, he'd even pick out my clothing for me!"

Now, this didn't sound right to the boys, but Ron was past logic.

"So, when's the wedding?" Ron said through gritted teeth.

"Oh, don't be silly, Ronald!" Hermione returned to her parchment. "He's gay."

With this Harry and Neville burst into laughter again and did not stop for a good

ten minutes."Nice one, 'Mione," Harry wheezed after a bit. Neville had put a pillow over his face to stifle his own giggles. Ron was...as was to be expected...sulking.

She smiled. "Now, you lot get back to your studies. I've only a quarter-hour, and I want to get this letter done before I sacrifice myself to he-who-doth-not-launder-his-locks."

A/N: My first chapter, the first week it was published, I used a title of song by the Mosquitos (a Portuguese band) for the magic school on the coast of Portugal, and it translates to 'laziness'. A mark of my stupidity...I'm glad it wasn't something like 'slag' or 'pregnant' but it certainly would have been funny, I changed it to a small city on the coast: Peniche. It sounds like it is spelt.

ALSO, for those who can't get enough of our snarky Potions master, he'll be here in the next few chapters, I promise.