Hermione's Choice (SHIP)

[blpurdom]

No: HPFGUIDX 37719

--- In HPforGrownups at y..., Penny Linsenmayer <pennylin at s...> wrote:
> As best I recall, Ron only oogles Fleur specifically (and, like 
> Harry, the veela in general at the Quidditch World Cup, although 
> in the case of the QWC, Hermione pulls *Harry* down to his chair & 
> seems exasperated with *him* & not *Ron*).  

No, she's pretty exasperated with both of them.  Seems she's 
starting to see what it'll be like to be best friends with two 
teenage boys once the hormones have kicked in.  In Chapter 8, "The 
Quidditch World Cup" we get the following:

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Ron, meanwhile, was absentmindedly shredding the shamrocks on his 
hat.  Mr. Weasley, smiling slightly [and seeming unaffected by the 
Veela, perhaps not being as hormonal as Ron and Harry], leaned over 
to Ron and tugged the hat out of his hands.

"You'll be wanting that," he said, "once Ireland have had their say."

"Huh?" said Ron, staring openmouthed at the veela, who had now lined 
up along one side of the field.

Hermione made a loud tutting noise.  She reached up and pulled Harry 
back into his seat.  "*Honestly!*" she said.
---------------------------------------------------------------------

I believe Hermione's tutting and "Honestly!" is meant for both 
boys.  There's no indication that these things were only aimed at 
Harry, only that he was the one who needed to be pulled back at that 
point.

> As for Fleur though, Hermione despises Fleur from the very second 
> she sees her, and this is *way* before Ron has *any* reaction to 
> Fleur.  If you re-read the scene where the Beauxbatons students 
> arrive at Hogwarts, you'll see what I mean.  Hermione takes an 
> instantaneous dislike to her that is completely & totally 
> unrelated to Ron's subsequent reaction to Fleur in the dining 
> hall.  So, I think Hermione just dislikes Fleur in a general sense 
> in any case and her friend Ron's reaction to Fleur just puts the 
> icing on the cake so to speak.  

I don't know why you think this.  When the students first arrive, it 
says simply, "They were shivering, which was unsurprising, given 
that their robes seemed to be made of fine silk, and none of them 
were wearing cloaks.  A few had wrapped scarves and shawls around 
their heads."  There's absolutely nothing about Hermione spotting 
Fleur and taking an instant dislike to her, nor Ron noticing her 
either.  (Nor Harry, for that matter, who probably just thinks that 
they should have planned better and brought cloaks for a visit to 
Scotland.)

In fact, the thing I found funny upon looking back at this, is that 
Ron notices Krum before anyone else, and is dreadfully excited about 
this.  Hermione's response is, "For heaven's sake, Ron, he's only a 
Quidditch player," to which Ron responds, "*Only a Quidditch 
player*?" as though she's spouting heresy.  She also immediately 
gets annoyed with some girls squabbling over a lipstick they might 
get Krum to use to sign an autograph.  [Funny, I never noticed that 
mention of makeup before...gah.  Another issue.]  In some ways she 
seems more irked about this than about Fleur.  Any Ron/Viktor 
shippers out there? Perhaps HE really wanted to go to the ball with 
VK? <eg>

Perhaps when you say Hermione took an instant dislike to Fleur, you 
are thinking about this passage:

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One of the Beauxbatons girls still clutching a muffler around her 
head gave what was unmistakably a derisive laugh. [in response to 
Dumbledore]

"No one's making you stay!" Hermione whispered, bristling at her.
--------------------------------------------------------------------

This is a reaction to the girl's lack of respect to Dumbledore, 
nothing more.  And it isn't "from the very second she sees her."

The next mention of Fleur is on the next page:
--------------------------------------------------------------------
At that moment, a voice said, "Excuse me, are you wanting ze 
bouillabaisse?"

It was the girl from Beauxbatons who had laughed during Dumbledore's 
speech.  She had finally removed her muffler.  A long sheet of 
silver-blonde hair fell almost to her waist.  She had large, deep 
blue eyes, and very white, even teeth. [I believe the mention of the 
teeth is important because of Hermione's deciding to let Pomfrey fix 
her teeth later.  Also, there is no mention of Hermione bristling 
when the girl asks for the food.  If we're to think she'd taken a 
clear permanent dislike to her, this might be included here.]

Ron went purple.  He stared up at her, opened his mouth to reply, 
but nothing came out except a faint gurgling noise.

"Yeah, have it," said Harry, pushing the dish toward the girl. [He 
is evidently unaffected by her.]

"You 'ave finished wiz it?"

"Yeah," Ron said breathlessly.  "Yeah, it was excellent." [When 
Hermione offers him bouillabaise earlier, he says, 'Bless you,' as 
though she'd sneezed, and then doesn't try any.]

The girl picked up the dish and carried it carefully off to the 
Ravenclaw table.  Ron was still goggling at the girl as though he 
had never seen one before.  Harry started to laugh.  The sound 
seemed to jog Ron back to his senses.

"She's a *veela*!" he said hoarsely to Harry.

"Of course she isn't!" said Hermione tartly.  "I don't see anyone 
else gaping at her like an idiot!"
--------------------------------------------------------------------

Now, Hermione's reaction here seems to be clearly an annoyance with 
Ron because of his reaction to Fleur (mostly, I think, because his 
reaction is so over-the-top).  She's not in fact reacting badly to 
Fleur, but Ron's behavior.  (And it certainly isn't in response to 
Harry's response to the girl, which seems pretty neutral.)  This is 
followed soon after by Ron's proclamation that "They don't make them 
like that at Hogwarts!" (which I would take as a personal insult if 
I were Hermione) and Harry saying, "They make them okay at 
Hogwarts," while looking at Cho.  (NOT looking at Hermione--or 
Ginny, for that matter.)  

Hermione's reaction: "When you've both put your eyes back in," said 
Hermione briskly, "you'll be able to see who's just arrived."  She's 
clearly miffed with BOTH hormonally crazy boys here, as at the QWC.  
First Ron basically insults every girl at the school, which includes 
her, then Harry defends the honor of Hogwarts, but not by holding up 
Hermione as an example.  You'd think she could expect her two best 
friends to show a little more loyalty, right?  Hermione probably 
thought so, and is not too pleased to learn how easily they can be 
distracted.  This whole experience has got to be a blow to her ego, 
IMO.

> As for Cho, we're not sure really whether Ron or Hermione would 
> know that Harry was crushing on Cho.  We know Harry reacts to 
> seeing Cho at the QWC campsite & Ron seems to notice this .... but 
> he might just think Harry thought she was pretty (didn't know it 
> was a bit more than that in other words).  Hermione isn't even 
> present when Harry tells Ron & Ginny that *Cho* turned him down.  
> Ginny says they were both turned down by girls & so Hermione knows 
> that much ... but who knows if she's guessed it was Cho or not?  
> In any case, since Cho was clearly linked up with Cedric post-Ball 
> (and possibly pre-Ball), Hermione might not have guessed there was 
> any reason for jealousy.  :--)  She also might not be conscious of 
> her own feelings for either boy for that matter.  
 
No, but as noted above, she has to tell Harry to put his eyes back 
in his head when he's staring at the Ravenclaw table, and I don't 
think she thought he was staring at Fleur.  Hermione's pretty sharp; 
she's probably seen where his eyes have been going.

When Ginny informs her that both Harry and Ron have been turned down 
by girls they'd asked to the ball, Hermione doesn't know for certain 
that the girls are Cho and Fleur, but her reaction to Ron is the 
fiery one:

"All the good-looking ones taken, Ron?" said Hermione loftily 
[perhaps including herself here, since she is in fact 
taken], "Eloise Midgen starting to look quite pretty now, is she?  
Well, I'm sure you'll find someone *somewhere* who'll have you."

OUCH!  Somehow, though, she doesn't feel the need to needle Harry, 
and she WAS just nagging him previously about working on the egg, so 
it's not like she's walking on eggshells around him or anything.

> In that vein, I'd be very interested to hear more about 
> Barb's "Krum as doppelganger for Harry theory".  

I had this in a post some months ago.  I can go search the archives.

--Barb