Becoming Luna
Hermione wants to be invisible. She thinks it would be lovely to be invisible, to fade into the walls or tapestries, to go unseen and unnoticed for days and days. It would be nice if she could stand in someone's path, and just be walked through as if she were Nearly Headless Nick, nothing but vapor or a figment, or whatever it is ghosts are made of.
What are ghosts made of? She knows she's read that somewhere, but can't recall the book or what it said on the subject.
Anyhow, back to the matter at hand. Hermione wants to disappear so she can watch people. Not spy, not peep, but watch. She could never do it openly, she would be too embarrassed. Sometimes, she'll glance surreptitiously over a text book, or look through her lashes, pretending to doze by the fire. But to stare, wide eyed and drinking it in, would be wonderful.
Luna does it, all the time. Those big, surprisingly lucid eyes, just taking every little detail in. Hermione finds her incredibly odd, yet fascinating. How does one become...Luna? How do you shed those insecurities, to be able to blatantly stare? How do you read magazines upside down and talk about things that do not exist as though anyone saw them on the streets everyday? How do you walk around with that looking lost but so completely knowing where you are going at the same time? How? Hermione desperately wants to know these things, because they are what you cannot read in books or learn in a classroom. And so, she starts to ask. Small questions "Is it better to read upside down like that?" "Oh yes." "Why?" "Try it sometime." and sometimes bigger questions "Do you get nervous?" "Sometimes." "About what?" "Well, sometimes I worry over whether my socks match." At this point in the conversation, Hermione looks down at Luna's stocking feet. The socks do not match. "Oh."
The last question she asks is "Are you on drugs or something?" Hermione has grown frustrated with Luna and these answers to her questions that don't really answer the question at all. She would ask how Luna does that, but it would probably lead her in circles.
Luna looks up from her book -- upside down, naturally -- "Drugs? No...no. I don't think so. What kind of drugs?"
"Never mind." Hermione sighs, turning away to open her Potions textbook. She tries to read for several minutes, but her eyes blur and she can't comprehend. Just when she is about to give up and go to bed, and arm reaches around her and turns the book over -- so that it is upside down. Hermione stares at the pale hand, which stays on the book for a moment before drawing away. There is a feathery kiss on Hermione's temple before she feels Luna walk away.
She starts to read.