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Sometimes Hermione feels that she has been looking after people her whole life. She does not really mind. Her parents, her cousin, Harry and Ron - the latter two she thinks, are a lifelong responsibility.
Her mother always looked upon her with a bemused fondness when she took charge. You know dear, we did somehow manage before you came along. Hermione thinks about that; but how, oh they would have been so inefficient! To her, they dawdle at the simplest of tasks – taking far too long to decide anything. She wonders where she got this from, this efficiency, this determination of this is my path and I will follow it until she sees her parents work. When they work, it is as if taking on their role as dentists changes them, they have always appeared more certain, more definite in their actions then. Watching them as such, she can see herself clearly.
The rest of the time however, well, it makes her exasperated.
She hurries them along, makes their decisions for them and pushes them. It is food for thought that they do not find it irritating or tiresome. In herself she realises that being pushed as she pushes them would infuriate her but they understand that this is how she is, that she means it for the best and they, oddly enough, enjoy it a little. This is love, she thinks.
When she is eight years old, her aunt’s family move nearby. Introduced to her cousin, a fair-haired, shy little thing who cannot match her in intelligence but has more sweetness that Hermione had expected, she sees in her someone else to look after. Hermione might not have had friends- she has books, she does not need much else -but she was not bullied either (not after a series of discreet campaigns against such offenders). She realises that appearing friendly with Sarah will significantly reduce Sarah’s chances of forming new friends- children are cruel she tells herself when she is six, never forget that. She pushes Sarah towards some of the nicer girls and when required, carefully concocts retribution against those who tend towards teasing her. Hermione can handle harsh words better than most; she can give back better than she receives in that aspect. Sarah cannot, Sarah who takes too much to heart and is a nicer person than Hermione could ever be.
When she is eleven years old, her world is changed. She receives her Hogwarts letter. She feels as if things slot into place at this. It all fits, it is all clear, the loose ends of wondering why she sometimes manages to do things that should rationally, logically, not be able to happen, are all tidied up. She harbours hope of perhaps finding others like herself, of being accepted not just tolerated.
When she first sees the boys on the train, she cannot help herself from telling the redhead he looks messy. She is intrigued at meeting The Boy Who Lived, whom the books she has already read, mention with admiration. There is disappointment though; he looks normal, nervous but at least nicer to her than Ron. [This has not changed and nor is it likely to, Harry is and always will be the more considerate of the two.]
In that first week, she overhears Ron’s comments of her to Harry and she finds herself crying. She has never hoped so badly before that she would make friends. To realise that this school, amazing and awe-inspiring as it is, will be the same as those she has attended before, it hurts. She is surprised at how much.
But when things are sorted, trolls are clubbed and embarrassingly, she is rescued, harsh words are forgiven and she is joyous at having these two boys as her friends. Irrationally possessive as it may seem, she sees them as hers. She spends her time picking them apart, their expressions, movements, moods. Aside from her parents, they are the first people whom she has considered so closely, analysed so deeply. She accepts that she will not have close female friends here. She is yet to find one, witch or muggle, whose priorities do not stray so far opposite hers. But she has these boys, they are hers and she will keep them. She writes them timetables, makes them study, keeps an eye on them and comforts them when they need it; she argues with them, bosses them around, and becomes so angry and frustrated at them. Is this she thinks, what it must feel like to have children? This fierce pride in them, an inability to stop worrying and this overwhelming love that swamps her whole, she cannot stop feeling any of this.
Seven years after they become hers and she theirs, she is still looking after them. The stakes are higher now, it is not exams to pass, potions to brew that they worry about, but their very lives. She is scared-- nauseated with worry and fear. She cannot imagine her life without them, they need each other, are a part of each other. She suffers pangs of guilt that she did not consider, not once, leaving them for her parents. Harry and Ron need her more. She has done the best that she, or anyone, could do for her parents. They are safe, they will be safe. But Harry and Ron, they are at the centre of this with her. They only have each other.
When Ron leaves, she thinks she understands now why they hanged deserters. How dare he, how dare he leave them now. Harry needs him; she needs him, more than she will admit to herself, more than she can. Harry only has her now; she cannot and will not fail him. She recalls her textbooks to stop thinking of Ron, subject by subject she pores through in her mind what she remembers seeking vainly for what will be helpful.
When Ron shamefacedly returns, she gives in to her anger; it has been seething under her skin since he left. Some things strike deeply and betrayal is one of them. This will not heal quickly, for all he says and does to compensate for it. Harry understands - but he is also a more forgiving friend than she has ever been. For the next week she wakes up in the middle of the night and checks to make sure he is there.
She realises amidst fighting for her life in the final battle, that until then, she has still not forgiven him. While she has known from the start that there was a high chance that they would die, it is the heart-stopping fear that comes from seeing curses flung about, it is then that she realises she doesn’t care; she doesn’t care that he left because he came back, he will always come back. None of them can stay away from each other, however much they might wish it. She loves them both so fiercely it hurts her; it is for them that she fights with all her spirit.
Afterwards, they drift a little- more than a little broken and uncertain of this freedom, this absence of fear, but they are together, they face it as one, as they have before and as they always will.
This is not a promise she thinks, this is a fact.