Neville, Dean, Seamus, and Ron were surprised on their first morning of class with a wide-awake Harry Potter rushing them to make it down to breakfast on time. Harry was normally up first after being forced awake to cook for the Dursleys his entire life, but he was always finishing up homework or doing something else, and absolutely never wanted to go to breakfast. "Ergh! Harry…you know, Jamie would let me sleep a little longer and be late to breakfast," Ron grumbled. He was usually the one trying to get food before class. It was just so early though.
Harry paused in pulling Neville out from under his covers at the code word. He thought for a minute and then seemed to decide that he was showing an acceptable level of strangeness. "Ron…you know you're going to grumble all day and be irritable if you don't get your breakfast," Harry warned. "Hermione always says that it's important to eat in the mornings."
"I didn't think you ever listened to her though," Ron muttered as he stumbled out of his bed and towards the bathrooms.
"Who's Jamie?" Dean asked while he seemed to be having a hard time tying his tie, still being half asleep.
Now that Neville was out of his bed, Harry turned to grabbing all his belonging impatiently. "He's just a new friend of ours. We're basically pen pals since he doesn't go here," Harry explained before tying Dean's tie for him to hurry things along faster. "I'm really starting to see why we miss breakfast so many mornings," he muttered when Dean smiled at him thankfully.
"You never cared before," Seamus grabbed his bag and huffed out of the dorm and down the stairs, making sure with his attitude that Harry knew he was still angry and didn't believe his story that Voldemort had returned for a second.
"Well, I'm on a new health kick," Harry explained to an apologetic looking Dean with a shrug at Seamus's actions. It hurt him, but he had much bigger problems than a prat of a roommate. He hadn't realized his habits were so bad before all this until his dormmates thought it was strange for him to make reasonably healthy decisions. Jamie needed taking care of since he couldn't take care of himself though. "I plan to eat three healthy meals a day and get a reasonable amount of sleep every night."
More than a few Gryffindors, and even some faculty members, were impressed and a little surprised when the entire fifth-year boys dorm made it down to breakfast on time and fully dressed for the first time ever. Hermione was even more impressed when Harry put eggs, fruit, and some oatmeal on his plate and seemed determined to eat it all. "Wow, Harry," she smiled as all the other fifth-year boys sleepily grabbed bacon and toast. "Have you actually been listening to my health talks all these years?"
Harry grinned at her as he speared a strawberry. "I always listen, Hermione. I don't always care though."
She threw a bit of egg at him and laughed. "Well, at least you won't be hungry for a fun day of Transfiguration, DADA, and Double Potions." All the fifth-year boys groaned dramatically and turned back to their breakfast.
Transfiguration, as usual for a first day, was just McGonagall going over the syllabus for the term and explaining what they would be covering in their OWL year. Harry didn't even have to use magic, so he breathed a sigh of relief at the reprieve. He was also happy that during classes, no one was especially excited or happy. It was much easier to pretend he was a normal human when he wasn't hungry. Hermione and Ron both had to stop him from playing with his locket a few times since there was a beam of light from the window that just touched his desk, and he could get the locket to shine in the light. Overall, there weren't any major slips though, and he went to his first Defense Against the Dark Arts class hopeful that the day would continue smoothly. Yeah…right…
It only took ten minutes before Harry decided that he hated Umbridge even more than Voldemort. Yes, Voldemort was a murdering psychopath, but at least the man was honest about it. Umbridge was going to get them all killed while smiling in their faces and telling them it was for their own good. As the toad-woman went through her asinine spiel about how nothing was wrong and they didn't need to learn to protect themselves, all of Harry's classmates kept glancing at him to see when he'd finally blow up and yell at her. Whether they believed him or not, they all knew his temper and that he was reaching his breaking point.
Keep your head down…don't draw attention to yourself. Harry kept repeating to himself over and over again. The last thing he needed was a ministry official paying him any attention, specifically this one that looked extremely angry and confused when she saw him walk into the classroom like she hadn't expected him to have been there. If Voldemort had killed him over the summer, it would have been in all the papers though. And supposedly she didn't even believe Voldemort was back, so why would she think he wouldn't have made it back to school?
Harry was confused and angry and frustrated that he couldn't just release his aura and scare the living daylights out of the evil woman. He made it almost all the way through class, and even Hermione had kept her mouth shut in her confusion that Harry hadn't risen to the woman's bait. Only a few more minutes to go…
"Mr. Potter," Umbridge turned her beady eyes directly on Harry who stifled a groan. "I'm glad to see the summer has changed your attitude for the better and brought you to see reason. Lying and saying He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named has returned was very naughty of you, causing fear when none was founded."
Yeah…there was only so much one dementor can take, and this was it. "Professor Umbridge," Harry smiled at her just as sweetly and fake as she was smiling at the class. "Of course, Voldemort has returned," he said as if addressing a small child. "Cedric Diggory didn't just drop dead of a stroke at 17 now, did he? I can give you a very good description of Voldemort if you want to write up the report for the ministry…He's now about six foot with red eyes, no nose, no hair, very snake-like in appearance, still loves the torture and killing curses though he did try the Imperius on me as well. Also, the Death Eaters who were in the cemetery with him were Malfoy, McNair, Avery…"
"You will be quiet this instant!" Umbridge yelled out before calming herself and plastering the fake smile on her face once more. "I see you are still the liar we all know you to be. Detention, Mr. Potter. Let's see if we get a lesson in honesty to sink into your addled brain."
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