Hear No Evil

'If you believe your potion to have the effect desired, you shall drink it now,' Snape intoned, surveying the classroom.

Harry felt slightly nauseous. He wasn't sure his Swiftness potion would have the desired effect at all. His mind had been wandering in all kinds of directions, except his Potions lesson, while he had been working on it. On top of that, Professor Snape had twice come to peer over his shoulder at his cauldron, which had made him so nervous that he could have very well used too much myrtle. Still, Harry knew that if he would not drink the potion, it would mean losing a great number of House Points. Not to mention having to bear Snape's wrath, which in Harry's case was likely to be even worse than most other students normally had to endure. With the possible exception of Neville Longbottom, that is.

Harry carefully weighed his options. Either he drank the potion and hoped it would make him swifter like it was supposed to, or deal with the consequences of admitting he had possibly made a mistake in his brewing of the potion.

'Mr. Potter.' Snape sneered, interrupting Harry's thought process. 'Will you drink your potion or not?'

Glancing around him, Harry saw most students had drank their potion already. Some seemed to be waiting for something to happen, and a few, including Hermione, were looking rather swift and alert indeed. Neville appeared to simply refuse to drink his concoction. He probably feared what would happen if he did.

In an instant, Harry had made his decision. Even if the potion would not work correctly, whatever it would do couldn't be as bad as Snape's reaction to him not drinking it. Stomach tied in knots, Harry lifted the cauldron to his lips and emptied its contents in a few big sips.

Snape stood watching him, taking an almost perverse pleasure in Harry's obvious discomfort. They both waited.

Nothing happened. Harry took a deep breath, thoroughly relieved. Unfortunately, he didn't seem to have got any swifter, but at least he had not turned into a gigantic newt, either. When, after a few more minutes, Harry still looked the same as ever, his professor's face visibly fell.

Snape turned away from the class. Damned Potter, it would have made my day to have seen him covered in green measles.

'What?' blurted Harry, before he could stop himself. Nudging Ron, who was sitting next to him, in the side, he hissed, 'I can't believe he just said that!'

'What?' said Ron. 'Who said what?'

'Snape,' said Harry, under his breath. 'He just said he had hoped to see me get the green measles.'

Ron looked surprised. 'Harry, Snape didn't say anything,' he said. Poor Harry, Snape always on his back. He must be getting paranoid.

'I am not getting paranoid!' said Harry.

The expression on Ron's face shifted from surprise to shock. 'Harry, I- I didn't say that.' But I thought it.

Now it was Harry's turn to look startled. 'Ron. Something strange is going on...'

'I'd say,' Ron thought.

Harry stared at Ron as if he were the most appallingly interesting specimen he had ever seen in his life. 'Ron,' Harry said slowly, 'I just heard your voice. But your mouth didn't move.'

'That's because I didn't say anything,' said Ron. 'He's really sounding off his rocker,' he thought to himself, worriedly. 'Maybe he should see Madam Pomfrey.'

'Well, it just happened again,' said Harry, a cold feeling settling in the pit of his stomach. It seemed his potion had some kind of effect after all.

'Well, what did my voice say when I didn't move my mouth?' asked Ron.

'It said that I'm off my rocker and should see Madam Pomfrey.'

'Now that's a sentiment I could agree with,' Snape's voice came crashing down on them. 'Care to share what you're discussing in my class?'

Harry nearly jumped. 'I'm sorry, Professor,' he said quickly. 'I--'

Thankfully, just then it was the end of class, and Harry got up to hurry to the door, eager to leave Snape's depressing dungeon. 'Cursed boy, just as bad as his father,' Snape's voice followed him out of the classroom.

In the hallway, Ron caught up with him. By now Harry was utterly confused. All around him he could hear a faint murmur, as if people were whispering nearby, but still too far away for him to catch the words. And it wasn't just the regular ruckus of chattering student voices running off to lunch, either. No, it seemed as if there were at least twice as many, if not more, voices filling the air, the whispered murmurs in the background softly echoing some of the spoken words.

'Harry,' said Ron, pulling him aside, out of the throng making its way to the Great Hall. 'What's wrong? You look like you've seen a Chimera.'

Indeed, Harry's face had turned a distinctive shade of ashen. 'Ron,' he stammered, not sure what to say. He had a hunch of what was going on, but he knew it would sound positively crazy to Ron.

Now is he going to tell me or what?

'Yes, I'll tell you,' said Harry. 'I think I can hear people's thoughts.' There. He'd said it.

'Oh,' said Ron, stunned. That means he can hear what I'm thinking right now. But that's crazy, isn't it? Hearing people's thoughts. Maybe I should really take him to the hospital wing.'

'Ron!' said Harry, impatiently. 'I don't need to go to the hospital wing! I'm fine! I'm just- I'm just hearing people's thoughts, is all.'

Now looking possibly even more astonished, Ron merely nodded. 'Well, it seems to be true, then.' That means he can know everything, anything, I think. Oh! That means I must stop thinking about that time I saw Hermione in her knickers in the girls' dormitory. Oh no! I just thought it!'

Harry rolled his eyes and Ron blushed scarlet. 'Please don't tell her,' he said.

Grinning, Harry nodded. 'All right. But this is just too strange. I think- I think I'd like to go to the Tower for a while.'

'You're not having lunch?' Ron asked. Damn, I'm hungry. 'I'll come with you, of course.'

'You can go eat if you want,' said Harry.

'No, it's okay,' Ron replied as they walked off toward Gryffindor Tower. 'Harry,' he suddenly said, after they had walked in silence except for Ron's thoughts, which swirled around at high speed and seemed to be going consistently over all the things he'd rather not have Harry know. It seemed Ron's swiftness potion had worked to some extent. 'I've been thinking, and--'

'Really?' Harry remarked dryly. 'I hadn't noticed.'

'Yeah, well, I was just thinking, this is quite an amazing thing you can do. I mean, you can actually read people's minds, Harry. Think of all the things you can do with that.'

'Maybe,' replied Harry, 'but I find it rather annoying. In the past ten minutes I've already found out more about your love of Brussels sprouts than I'd care to know. Not to mention all the,' now it was Harry's turn to blush, 'all the, eh, interesting thoughts you're having about Hermione.'

'You promised you wouldn't tell,' said Ron, warningly, as the person in question came walking toward them from down the hall.

'Don't worry, I won't,' said Harry. 'But honestly, Ron, on the Quidditch Field?'

Ron shot him a look that could have killed, but Harry had no intention of letting anything on to Hermione, especially not after Ron's thoughts settled into a repeating pattern of, please don't let her find out, please don't let her find out.

'Harry, Ron, I was wondering where you two had gone off to so swiftly,' Hermione laughed, her eyes sparkling, as she brushed a bit of her wild hair out of her face.

'I wish I could brush her hair like that,' Ron thought. It would be romantic. We could go out together and I'd kiss her before she'd go to her dorm and I would do that thing where I'd brush her hair out of her face and I'd look deep into her eyes and then she wouldn't go to her dorm anymore at all that night and instead we'd...

Harry sighed. Did Ron ever think about anything else?

'Aren't you coming to lunch?' asked Hermione. I looked all over the Great Hall, but didn't see them and now they are here, and they are looking kind of mysterious, Ron's blushing and what is Harry grinning so smugly about? They look like they are up to something and not telling me and--

Hermione's Swiftness potion had clearly worked extremely well. 'Herm,' Harry began, but Ron cut in. 'He can read our thoughts!' he said excitedly. 'So don't think anything you don't want him to know.' He looked like he hoped very much Hermione would think certain things she might not want Harry to know. Unfortunately, for now, nothing of the sort happened.

Really? 'Really?' said Hermione. 'That's very interesting. You must've done something wrong with your potion, Harry.' As usual.

'Hey!' Harry exclaimed, indignantly.

'Well, it surely seems to be true,' Hermione said. Why does Harry always have interesting things like this happen to him? No, don't be jealous now, you know he hasn't had it easy.

'Jealous?' he said, incredulously. 'Look, this hearing thoughts is already starting to get very annoying. I want it to stop.'

'We can ask Snape to make an antidote,' Hermione suggested. I wouldn't mind doing some research on it myself, either. Ron could help.

Harry wasn't sure if that last thought counted as something slightly hopeful for Ron or not, but he shot him a quick encouraging glance nonetheless. 'Yeah, I think that would be best,' he said. 'As much as it's interesting to be able to hear people's private thoughts, I'm afraid there are more disadvantages than advantages to it. For one, there are rather a lot of things I'm sure I'd not like to know about.'

The words hadn't left his mouth before Harry spotted the lean figure of Draco Malfoy striding towards them, as always flanked by the much bulkier Crabbe and Goyle. He groaned inwardly. If there was any person in the world whose thoughts he was sure he did not want to know, it was Malfoy. It was bad enough having to hear Malfoy talk; he didn't need to hear his thoughts on top of it.

Having reached the three, Harry expected three trains of thoughts to hit him, but in the end was rather unsurprised to find that both Crabbe and Goyle's minds were silent. Apparently they were even more stupid than they appeared.

Malfoy's thoughts, however, proved more interesting. 'Potter,' Malfoy drawled, trying to look down his nose at Harry but failing because Harry was actually a few inches taller than him. 'I trust you're up for a crushing defeat tomorrow?' he asked, referring to next day's Quidditch match in which Gryffindor was to play against Slytherin. 'I don't think I've ever seen anyone fly a broom as badly as you.' But why does he have to look so bloody good doing it?

Harry very nearly choked. 'What?' he spluttered, his books and cauldron sliding out of his hands and scattering all over the floor. The clattering of the cauldron as it hit the stone echoed on the walls.

'Bloody idiot,' Malfoy cursed. Oh, now he'll have to bend over to pick it all up. Nice. Fuck, I wish I could stop thinking about him this way.

Harry stared at Malfoy, a very strange look upon his face. If it had been possible, his eyes would have bulged, and an odd sound escaped him, coming from somewhere deep in his throat. 'Sorry?' Harry said, blinking rapidly. This wasn't happening. He was not hearing Malfoy think these things about him.

'Well, are you going to pick up your things or not?' snapped Malfoy. Oh please, do it.

Hermione and Ron had witnessed the exchange, and now Ron spoke up, a big grin on his face. 'Harry can hear your thoughts, you know,' he said. 'He had an accident with his potion.'

Malfoy didn't even question this information. In an instant, his face had drained of all color, and he looked positively sick.

'What's the slimy git thinking, Harry?' Ron continued, obviously expecting something very amusing.

Harry, to his own dismay, had become completely flustered. 'He, uh, I- he's thinking how he hates me. And how Slytherin will win the match tomorrow,' Harry stuttered, looking anywhere but at Malfoy.

'Yeah,' Malfoy's voice sounded oddly strangled, as if he was forcing the words out. 'That's what I thought.' Oh no. Oh no, oh no, oh no. He knows. Potter if you can hear this, I hate you. I hate you so much... but you look so hot. No, that's not what I wanted to think. I can't think of this. He'll hear me, he'll know. He already knows. Fuck!

With that, Malfoy abruptly turned around and marched off with Crabbe and Goyle, still literally thoughtless, in tow, leaving Harry stunned, confused, and not a little intrigued.