The door opened.
In walked her mother… and a boy?
Hermione’s eyes narrowed.
“This is Harry, dear,” Emma Granger said warmly.
“Harry, this is my daughter, Hermione.”
“Isn’t he a little young to be tutoring maths?” Hermione asked, skeptical.
The boy offered a small, confident smile.
“Harry’s maths skills are well beyond A-level,” her mother replied with a grin.
“I think the two of you will find you have quite a lot in common.”
Hermione’s gaze flicked back to the black-haired boy.
She had always considered herself something of a prodigy—the kind you occasionally saw on the news—but this boy actually sounded like one.
“Well, I’ll leave you two to it,” Mrs. Granger said.
“If you need anything, Harry, don’t hesitate to ask.”
The door clicked shut, leaving Hermione alone with the mysterious boy.
“Are you really that good?” she asked, still doubtful anyone their age could be at university level.
“I am.”
“Fine then.” She snatched her maths textbook from the desk, flipped to the very end, and thrust it toward him, jabbing a finger at one particularly nasty equation.
“Solve that.”
The boy took the book, glanced at the problem, then set it down.
He rummaged in his bag and pulled out a textbook of his own.
Flipping to the back, he handed it to her and pointed at a different equation.
“This one’s for you, Miss Granger.”
Hermione looked down.
A sea of unfamiliar symbols stared back at her.
She had no idea where to begin.
After twenty seconds of staring at the indecipherable mess, a hot blush of inadequacy crept up her neck.
She looked up.
The boy was holding out a notebook.
She took it.
There, in neat handwriting, was the complete solution to her equation, complete with every step of working. The source of this chapter is g.com.
The boy met her eyes and smiled.
“That’s not fair!” she protested.
“You’re obviously at a much higher level than me!”
“And now you know that, Miss Granger. I am not your peer. I am your teacher.”
She fought to keep the blush from spreading across her entire face.
“So,” he continued, “are you ready to put in some real work? Or am I wasting my time?”
“No! I—I mean, yes. I’ll work hard.”
“Excellent.”
For the next two hours, she battled arithmetic, wrestled geometry, and pinned algebra to the ground.
It was intense, but her new teacher made it genuinely enjoyable.
This was so much better than the snail’s pace her school teachers insisted on.
The feedback was immediate and tight—she could feel herself improving.
“Well, this has been a productive session,” Harry said, packing his books away.
“Yes,” she agreed quickly.
“When’s our next one?”
“Your mum suggested twice a week. How does Saturday morning sound?”
“Great!” she exclaimed, then immediately realized she sounded far too eager.
Harry smiled.
“Miss Granger, have you ever read Alice in Wonderland?”
“Yes,” she replied, caught off guard by the sudden change in topic.
“Did you know Lewis Carroll was a mathematician?”
“No.” She was genuinely surprised that the author of such an absurd tale had been a man of logic and rules.
“Your homework is to re-read Alice in Wonderland and look for the mathematical and logical principles he wove into the story.”
A catlike grin threatened to split her face.
Now this was her kind of homework.
“Okay.”
≤○≥
Hermione sat on her bed with her arms wrapped around her knees, watching the clock tick relentlessly toward nine o’clock.
She hadn’t found any mathematics in Alice in Wonderland.
She had tried—oh, how she had tried.
But Alice’s adventures seemed to mock logic itself.
Nothing was consistent.
Not even the way things changed.
She hated failing assignments, and she felt she had failed spectacularly.
Harry was the first person her age who could actually keep up with her.
Now he was going to think she was stupid.
Being smart was the only thing she had.
She wasn’t athletic, or pretty, or popular.
The clock struck nine.
Her execution had arrived.
The door opened.
“Good morning, Miss Granger.” Harry stepped inside.
The door clicked shut behind him with finality.
“Are you ready for today’s journey through the looking glass?”
“Ah… well, Harry…”
Her teacher dragged a chair beside the bed and sat down, studying her intently.
“What was the single most un-mathematical thing you found in the book?”
“The single… un-mathematical?”
“The single most absurd occurrence—something that completely defies mathematics and logic.”
Hermione was confused.
She was relieved Harry didn’t seem disappointed, but she couldn’t see how this related to their studies.
Still, she thought about the question.
“I suppose it would be the Mad Hatter’s tea party,” she said, gaining a bit more confidence, “when time stopped at six o’clock but everything else kept moving.”
“Ah, yes. That was a good one. I haven’t figured that one out yet. Someone may have, but if they have, they’re not sharing.”
She blinked.
Figured it out?
Were they playing some kind of metaphor game?
“Can you give me another?”
She thought for a moment.
“When the animals throw pebbles at Alice and they turn into cakes.”