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Hermione sighed. It was past two in the morning. She'd spent the evening reading and napping in her dorm and only came down to the common room to finish her new book without waking the other girls. She didn't know why Ginny and Neville were on the floor. "Why are you on the floor?"
"We belong here," Ginny said solemnly.
"We were going to do. . .something." Neville scrunched up his face like he did for his rememberall.
"But someone got more Exploding Snap cards in and we haven't played in forever. And THEN, we snuck out to the kitchens," Ginny recounted. She was blearily examining the ceiling like it held some enchanted puzzle that could resolve itself.
"And I put my bags away. . ." Neville was still trying to follow his thought. Ginny was immune.
"This is better. You should've dumped your books for us, Hermione."
"Why, so I could watch you snort fireworks every minute?" Wizard games baffled Hermione, but none more than Exploding Snap, where victory was delayed by cards randomly exploding in their holder's face.
"Who doesn't like Exploding Snap?" Neville threw his arms up at her. He was so groggy he'd forgotten to care what he was forgetting.
"I thought you two could appreciate reading."
"We can't," Ginny informed her.
"You go to the library with me."
"I read what I need and send the books back to their graves where they belong," Ginny stumbled.
"What graves, exactly?"
"Their wooden. . .coffins. All lined up in rows through the library. . ."
Hermione checked Ginny's head with her foot and picked an armchair facing away from them while Ginny and Neville giggled at her.
"I don't go to the library to read," Neville announced in some exhausted stupor.
"You read books with me all the time," Hermione told him in disbelief, already lured into staring over her shoulder at them.
"No, I look at herbology books with pictures. I look at diagrams. It's completely different than reading."
Hermione narrowed her eyes and flounced forward. Ginny continued her role as a bad influence.
"Ginny, today I looked at a picture of a frog with huge hidden fangs, and had stripes in seven different colors. Seven."
"That'sssick, Neville."
"And I saw a fungus in-"
"Could I eat that frog? We missed dinner," Ginny asked in loopy delight.
"What? We just went to the kitchen. And anything that colorful will poison you."
"Flowers."
Neville actually paused, giving Hermione hope. It didn't pay off. "Flowers are colorful so bees eat them. You're not a bee."
"I could be. I could be. . .bee. . ." She laughed until she snorted.
"That wasn't even funny. Go to bed," Hermione ordered.
"No, we were going to do something," Neville insisted.
Ginny had other plans. "Why do you like reading, Hermione?" she drawled.
"I'm not playing along. Go to bed, you have class tomorrow."
"I hate reading," Neville piped up. "The English language is bad."
"Do you know any other languages? Did the plants teach you, Nev?" Ginny regaled him.
"When I see, new words in English I NEVER know how to pronounce them! When I see a new word in Spanish at least I can say it."
"Did you find some plant book in Spanish and pick it up like 'I'm going to learn so much from this book I can't read-'"
"Yes and I did learn. When a diagram has words they're all in places so you know what they're there for, like the title is the species name and the labels point to-"
Ginny snorted from laughing again. Hermione gave up reading and turned to watch in concern.
"So I learned the names of all these plants and some Spanish words for stanum and pistil because they weren't in English and I can pronounce them! Why's English so weird?"
"English contains words from languages of several different roots."
Ginny and Neville stared at her, sleepily attempting to process. The chance to explain something went from distracting to over-powering.
"English has influences from Germanic and multiple romance languages. Like Spanish," Hermione clarified.
"Even I know what romance languages are, you know," Neville said, hurt.
Ginny rolled on her belly and regarded Hermione imperiously. "How do you confund someone in Spanish, Hermione? Why are spells not in Spanish?"
"There are."
They stared. Ginny continued. "Why don't we know any? Do they only use Spanish spells in Spain?"
"Spanish spells are used in multiple continents. Every wizarding culture has spells in languages common to their region for ease of use."
Ginny glared as if Hermione was responsible for millennia of lingual developments. "There's nothing easy to use about spells in Latin. Why not English? I don't wanna learn bloody Latin to make booger bats."
"Latin is extremely easy to use for making spells. Better than most languages, since it's very old and no longer in common use," Hermione told them, resistance gone. "Fewer conflicting cultural influences on usage limit the variation in effects. A hodge podge language like English is very unreliable for spell making, especially for very basic spells that don't require intent and are shaped by the nature of the language itself-"
"So English is bad," Neville summarized.
"Useless," Ginny agreed. "You just made a super case for Spanish, Hermione. Closer to Latin."
"Our textbooks are written in English," Hermione said scathingly. "You need to know it to read. Communicate. And as I just explained-"
"Reading English is bad?" Ginny cut in.
"It's the real problem," Neville echoed. "We should get rid of all the textbooks written in English."
"So all the required ones, then," Hermione offered shortly. If not for past experience Hermione might have kept arguing. In her fourth year, she'd noticed how shy Ginny and Neville both were. She'd made the mistake of assuming they were also well behaved. Inviting them to the library at the same time was officially off the table these days. Once friends, they enabled each other to become loons.
"BAN textbooks unless they tell you how to say every word they use exactly. At least have an index for pronounciation. I don't want to read a whole fucking book to find one-"
"You just fucking swore," Ginny guffawed.
"I did."
"I didn't know you knew swears. All these years I've been trying to teach you, I had no idea you were listening."
Neville almost looked annoyed, but then he just gave Ginny some sort of pleading look. She ruffled his hair. "Aw."
"That tickles-"
"Your hair is really soft."
"Thanks."
Hermione rolled her eyes. "Have you two been confunded?"
Ginny rolled back over. She looked at Hermione upside down and stuck out her tongue before enunciating dramatically. "Curmudgeon. Stuffy higher-than-thou-est of the high."
"Bookworm." Hermione levelled Neville with disappointment and he looked guilty. "Worms are nice, it's not so bad to be one."
Ginny interrupted whatever that was before Hermione could decide if she was offended. "I feel nice. Nicer than I've felt in ever."
"Because you finally broke up with Dean?" asked Neville.
"Yes. No. I feel tired. So tired I, like. . .stopped caring what people think about me. Who cares what Ron or Dean or Romilda think? I'm fun."
"You're awesome, Ginny."
Hermione snapped her book shut and decided to lead by example. "I'm so very glad you found each other. Now go to bed."