The High Road by Anesidora Nichole

Seriously, why did Snape even have to talk to him? It's not like mum was there to make them talk to each other but Snape was still harassing Harry at every given opportunity. So, Harry hadn't been hanging on his every word. It didn't matter what the rules were because Harry knew he would be accused of breaking them even if he didn't. He found his way to his room and could tell immediately that this would take some getting used to. Harry was an only child; not only did he have no siblings, but he didn't have any family his age that he was used to sharing with. Well, apparently he did have a Muggle cousin but he'd never met him so didn't tend to count him. He was used to having his own room, not to mention bathroom since Snape refused to share one with Harry until he learned to pick up his soiled towels and not leave hair in the drain, and plenty of time to himself. It would be strange to have to share this small space with three other boys.

Harry had been roomed with Blaise Zabini - who he had seen a handful of times because Mrs. Zabini sometimes came to get potions from Snape - and Theodore Nott who he had never met before. Both boys seemed pretty decent, though Zabini wasn't particularly sociable. Of course, then there was Malfoy, who was the fourth occupant of the room. Somehow Harry wasn't surprised; the two boys had been being thrown together since they were very young. Lucius Malfoy was friends with his stepfather and Draco came to stay with them sometimes when his parents had business that didn't involve him.

Harry didn't like Lucius because he had once heard him call his mother a Mudblood when talking to Snape. Neither of the men had known he was there though he had been about to give himself away to leap out and yell at the man for using that nasty word about his mum. He was saved from the spanking that he probably would have gotten right then and there, though, because Snape had told Lucius in no uncertain terms to get out of his house and not come back until he could show Lily the respect she was due. It was one of the few times that he remembered admiring Snape and feeling like they were on the same side.

Draco shared his father's sentiments about muggleborns but for some reason seemed to get along very well with Lily. She was really nice to him, which was weird in Harry's mind, and would happily listen to him talk about his favorite Quiddich teams and weekend plans and sometimes even sent him home with freshly baked biscuits. The really weird part was that Malfoy was nice right back at her. Malfoy wasn't nice to anyone, even his friends. It made Harry feel a twinge of jealousy sometimes because Malfoy had his own family. Two parents, in fact, the last time that Harry had checked.

One day he'd confronted his mum about it after Malfoy had left to go home, "Why are you so nice to him?"

"Who? Draco?" Harry nodded in the affirmative and Lily raised an eyebrow, "Is there a reason I shouldn't be nice to him?"

"Well . . ." Harry hesitated; he wasn't sure that he should tell her because he didn't want to hurt her feelings. Finally, he decided to just blurt it out, "His dad doesn't like you, you know."

To his surprise, Lily had laughed, "I might have heard something about that, yes. That's not Draco's fault, though. Look, Harry, I just don't think Draco has that great of a home life. Maybe we should both try to be nice to him."

"Mum," he said seriously, "He has a Quiddich pitch in his backyard. I think he's okay."

Her lips twitched at her son's conviction that someone who had their own Quiddich pitch could not possibly have any problems and she tried to explain, "Harry, having physical possessions doesn't really make people that happy in the long run. He doesn't get to see his parents very much. Lucius has a lot of business ventures that keep him busy and Narcissa . . . well, she has a lot of other interests that keep her occupied."

Harry realized that he had been staring at Malfoy who was now looking back at him with an irritated look on his face. Feeling his face turning red, he wondered how long he'd been staring while lost in thought. Malfoy said, "What are you looking at, Potter?"

"Nothing," Harry muttered. Though the other three boys had opted to leave their trunks for the morning, Malfoy was carefully unpacking his own. That was one good thing about having the blonde as a roommate, Harry supposed, he was very neat. Compulsively so. He'd been to his room in Malfoy Manor once where the books were all in alphabetical order and the clothes were organized by color. Snape thought maybe Harry could learn a thing or two from Malfoy and Harry thought that maybe Malfoy should see someone about that.

Harry went down to the shared bathroom to relieve himself and brush his teeth before bed and then changed into some of his more comfortable pajamas. He was more tired than he thought he would be and laid there in the relative silence of the bedroom punctuated only occasionally by Zabini turning a page in the book he was reading by way of an illumination charm. Harry was vaguely impressed. He knew the names of some spells, of course, but had never actually tried one yet. Closing the curtain on his bed for some privacy, he was left with his thoughts.

He knew his mum wouldn't mind him being in Slytherin and Remus probably wouldn't care one way or the other since he was all about tolerance and understanding. What about Sirius, though? His godfather had made it clear that he didn't care for the Slytherin house and a lot of his stories from school involved playing tricks on its members. Would Sirius be mad? Would he think Harry was not so like James after all? No, Harry decided. Sirius was not only his godfather but his friend and he wouldn't care about Harry's sorting.

Not for the first time, he wondered why his mum couldn't just have married Sirius. That would have made more sense, wouldn't it have? Sirius was James' best friend and he actually liked Harry. Why wouldn't she have turned to him for comfort rather than . . . Snape? They could have been quite a happy family, in Harry's opinion, and he fell asleep thinking about how much different his life would have been if his mum had married his godfather.

SSHPSSHPSSHPSSHPSSHP

The next morning, something hit Harry in the side and he opened his eyes and sat up. Someone had thrown a book at him, luckily one of their thinner ones. He groped on the bedside table for his glasses and put them on to find Malfoy glaring at him. Presumably he had been the one who threw the book.

"What the hell, Malfoy?"

"You snore," he said with obvious disgust. He was already dressed in his school uniform with hair that was slightly damp.

"I do not," Harry shot back.

"You do," Zabini chimed in seriously from where he was putting on his shoes.

"I'm afraid so," Nott added apologetically.

Harry looked at the three boys and said, "Okay, well, sorry. I'll put a silencing charm up after I learn one, I guess. Did you really wake me up to tell me I snore?"

"No." Malfoy said. "I woke you because if you don't start getting ready now, you're going to have to choose between breakfast and getting to class on time."

Harry grabbed his wristwatch from the bedside table which informed him it was seven fifteen which gave him forty-five minutes to shower, dress, eat, and find the Transfiguration classroom. He supposed it was nice of Malfoy to wake him up but couldn't help but note it wasn't with much time to spare when the blonde had clearly been up for a while.

He made quick work of his shower even though he would have liked to stand under the strong, warm water current for longer. Harry got dressed in his robes and combed his hair even though he couldn't really tell a difference before and after. By time he got to the Great Hall, the table was already thinning out with people leaving as he was arriving. He sat down and bolted down some eggs and toast and orange juice. Luckily, he didn't get too lost on his way to Transfiguration and arrived just as Professor McGonagall was getting ready to close the door.

"Ah, Mr. Potter. Just on time. Barely." She ushered him in and he sat down at one of the desks next to Nott.

They were turning a matchstick into a needle. Harry liked Transfiguration but found it very challenging and only managed to get his to turn a steely grey. Professor McGonagall assured him that it was a good start when she made her rounds to see the progress the students had made. Next he had charms where they had to try to levitate a feather which Harry did manage albeit only a few inches off the table. The bushy-haired girl, whose name was apparently Hermione Granger, managed to levitate hers clear to the ceiling.

There was a break after this during which Weasley approached him and asked him if he wanted to play Exploding Snape with him and Neville. Harry was pleased that apparently the boy - who had spent Charms going between staring at Harry and ignoring him, obviously torn - apparently didn't hate him for being sorted into Slytherin. After that he went to Defense Against the Dark Arts which sounded more exciting than it actually would. Or maybe it still would have been interesting if Harry hadn't developed a splitting headache soon after class begun.

He had planned to go to the Infirmary after class but his headache seemed to fade a bit once he got out into the hallways. Harry's last class of the day was potions which he was not looking forward to because he knew Snape was going to pick on him. He opted for a seat toward the back and tried to look busy looking for something in his bag. Snape barely glanced at him, though.

Snape gave a spiel - something about brewing glory and putting a stopper to death - and then they were to try to brew their first potion. Harry followed the instructions closely but when he finished the color was slightly off. He frowned down at the potion which stayed stubbornly the wrong color. Snape had already begun to make his rounds of the classroom and Harry decided there was nothing to be done about it now.

He felt Snape stop behind him and couldn't help himself from snapping, "I know it's wrong."

"It's . . . not bad. Do you know what you did wrong?" Harry glanced at Snape like he'd grown a second head.

"Uh, I think I might have stirred it too much." He said. Then, he admitted, "I lost count because I got distracted."

Snape nodded and looked for a moment like he might put a hand on Harry's shoulder which he thankfully seemed to think better of it because had he actually done so, Harry would have been convinced something was wrong. They had not spoken this civilly in a long time. Instead, Snape said, "Five points to Slytherin, then. For knowing what you did wrong."

Harry was glad to get out of the extremely weird potions class and felt a sort of freedom realizing he had the rest of the day to himself. He decided to take a walk out on the grounds to burn off some energy. About halfway through his walk, Harry happened upon Hermione Granger who was sitting alone under a tree reading a book. He felt kind of sorry for her because he knew that a lot of the Slytherins had been giving her a hard time. See, the problem was that she had been excelling in every single class and to most of the purebloods; it was unacceptable for a muggleborn to be outdoing them in nearly every subject. She went against nearly everything that they believed in.

He walked over to her and she glanced up a bit fearfully. Hermione relaxed when she saw it was only him but not completely. Harry asked, "Can I sit?"

She looked as though she thought it was a trick and he wondered if his mum had ever been picked on when she was in school for being a muggleborn. He doubted it and imagined that the Marauders probably wouldn't have allowed that to happen. He assured her, "I won't bother you. I just thought you might want some company."

"Okay." She smiled at him and moved her bag so that he could sit down next to her.

"You got your bag back."

"I had to pay a third year Slytherin for it. Thankfully I had some galleons in the bottom of my trunk."

"Oh. Sorry." A beat of silence, "What are you studying?"

"Oh!" She seemed pleased someone was taking an interest. "It's a treatise on the use of flobberworm in common household potions."

" . . . Cool." More silence but it didn't seem to bother Hermione who just looked relieved that someone was talking to her. Harry decided not to let it bother him, either. Who needed to be talking all the time? He pulled out his Transfiguration homework and they worked on their separate projects in companionable silence.

An owl swooped down and dropped a letter on Harry's book before swooping back into the sky. Harry recognized the brown barn owl as his mum's and happily opened the letter.

Dear Harry,

I hope everything is going great on your first day of Hogwarts. I miss you something awful and Crisp hasn't left your bed since you left for school. I hope you're being nice to everyone and behaving yourself.

I'm writing to let you know I'm going to make a trip to Hogsmede this weekend (Surprise!) and want to meet you and Severus for lunch. I want to hear all about Hogwarts and your first week. Let Severus know and he can bring you down with him, okay? Meet me at the Three Broomsticks at 2:00.

Sorry for the short note. I ran home to write it; I'm on lunch break right now. I'm working almost every night but at least it’s keeping me busy so I don't miss you two so much!

Love,

Lily.

He smirked at the mention of Crisp who was their old, finicky cat who usually didn't want anything to do with him. He was glad that she was coming to visit but leave it to her to invite Snape along. Actually, the man had been unusually tolerable today, so maybe it wouldn't be that bad. Then again, maybe Snape would be doubly awful tomorrow. Maybe he would say Harry couldn't even come with him as punishment for some transgression he would no doubt commit.

Then he got an idea; he just wouldn't tell Snape. He could floo to see her anytime he wanted, anyway. How hard could it be to get to Hogsmede? He could practically see it from the castle. He crumpled up the letter and stuffed it in his bag. With a smile, he tipped his head back to let to weakening fall sun hit his face.

Life was good.