Living with the Dursleys had tempered Harry against any notions of self doubt to a degree, ironically because of how often the family would try to put him down, rather than despite it. After all, if there were any people in the world that he would trust to recognize signs of intelligence, it definitely wouldn't be the Dursleys.

But none of that meant that he was blind to his faults, either. Harry didn't think of himself as a dumb boy, especially after having the unfortunate fate of knowing far too many truly dumb people to ever want to associate himself with that sort. That wasn't to say that he thought of himself as being particularly smart either, but it wasn't like he particularly wanted to be. That was Hermione's thing, and the thought of trying to compete with her for the title was an exhausting one.

As much as he liked having her around, he was immensely grateful for the fact that she was a girl, and that she slept in an entirely different dorm room from him and Ron. While Ron seemed to have the ability to tune out and ignore Hermione whenever she was going on a long rant about homework or something, Harry hadn't had the luxury of practising that skill with the Dursleys when they would lock him up in his room if he tuned out at the wrong moment, leaving his only true sanctuary against Hermione in the washrooms and in the dorm rooms, though that had been proven somewhat wrong when she invaded the boy's dorms to wake them up on Christmas morning, showing off that nothing was truly fair in the world.

Harry couldn't help but feel a little mean for thinking these things about Hermione, especially when she was one of his best and only friends, but she could be a little much.

When Hermione made her little mistake with the Polyjuice potion that left her confined to the Hospital Wing for weeks, Harry did feel bad for her, but he couldn't help but feel a little guilty with he recognised the small part of him that was a little bit grateful that he could get to spend the most of the Christmas break without any mention of homework. Homework! On Christmas break!

Still, the guilt that he had for even feeling that way ironically made him want to spend more time with Hermione in the Hospital Wing than he might've spent otherwise. Though he didn't have many particularly fond memories of the Hospital Wing, having visited it too many times himself, at the very least, Madam Pomfrey was kind enough to let Harry and Ron bring in a couple of seats from the Gryffindor common room. While she threatened them with a lifetime of detention when Ron so much as suggested that they could bring in a deck of exploding snap, perhaps due to the Christmas spirit, or simply because Hermione was the only student in the Hospital Wing, she was still much more lenient than she might've been otherwise.

Though Pomfrey did kick the two boys out often to tend to Hermione, for the most part the three friends made the Hospital Wing their home for the rest of the Christmas break, and surprisingly, Hermione barely even mentioned schoolwork during that entire time, but also surprisingly, Harry might've preferred that to what they talked about instead.

At the very least, when Hermione obsessed over schoolwork, Harry had Ron as an ally in suffering, but sometimes, when Hermione and Ron got into their heated discussions over their favourite subject as they often did, he wanted nothing more than to jab his quill into his ears to save him from having to listen to the same arguments over and over.

"I'm telling you, there's something off about him," Ron said, slamming his fist into his palm, and accidentally crumpling up the cards in his hand, apparently not even noticing that he had effectively ruined their game of exploding snap. Thankfully, they had borrowed Neville's non-exploding version of the game, to appease Madam Pomfrey, but Harry winced as he made a mental note to apologise to the boy and buy him a new set.

"Ronald," Hermione said, in the familiar tone of voice that she used whenever Flintstone, even if her voice itself was still affected by her botch transformation. "Will you lay off him already? He's done literally nothing wrong to you. I really don't understand what you've got against him."

"Nothing wrong?!" Ron asked, flinging Neville's cards away, sending a few of them flying underneath the neighbouring beds, where they would be forgotten forever.

Though Harry hadn't yet mastered the art of tuning out, it was a lot easier to do when he had heard Ron rant enough times to know what was coming even before he said it. "Hermione, he-" Almost got Harry killed. Is chummy with Snape. Practically lives in the Forbidden Forest. Even the newest argument that even Malfoy was afraid of Flintstone when they interrogated him as Crabbe and Goyle was old by now, despite only having happened less than a week before.

"Ron," Hermione said, with an eye roll that looked a little unnerving with her cat-like eyes. "Flintstone-"

Was saving me, he just made a mistake. Is a good student, it's not a crime to be friendly with his Head of House. Is allowed to be there. And finally, Malfoy's probably still spooked by the accident from the duelling club.

Though Harry had his head buried in the throw pillow that he had brought from the Gryfindor common room in case something like this would happen, he could still imagine Ron's glower clear as day.

"Of course, I forgot that you were Fredericton's girlfri-"

Ron's voice cut off as a fuzzy paw was slapped over his mouth.

"Don't even suggest that," Hermione hissed, her voice tinted with a tinge of fear as she looked around, no doubt scanning the room for any hint of the terrifying blonde witch that was Flynn's friend.

Even though they all knew that she was home for the holidays, and therefore not in Hogwarts, Harry couldn't blame Hermione for wanting to make sure. He suspected that the only reason why Ron wasn't accusing her of being the Heir of Slytherin, rather than Flintstone, was because he was scared enough of her to risk not saying her name out loud.

To support his theory, Ron's face immediately went pale as he seemed to realise what he had said, and seemed content to pretend like it had never happened, the only evidence of his slip-up being the few stray hairs that he brushed off his tongue when Hermione took her paw away.

"Harry found something that might change your mind."

Harry waited for Ron's smug tone to fade when Hermione inevitably broke down Ron's argument with words and logic as she always did, and it took him a long moment for him to realise that he was being dragged into the conversation, somehow.

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"What?" he asked. "Me?"

"Yes, you," Ron said. "Go on. Why don't you tell Hermione what you found and then we'll see who's wrong about Fredericton?"

Harry blinked a few times at Ron, watching as Ron's smug smile faded slowly.

"Well?" Hermione said, with her arms crossed. "I'm waiting."

Harry glanced back and forth between Ron and Hermione, blinking a few times in confusion before he realised that they wouldn't stop staring at him until he said something.

"I have no idea what you're talking about," Harry admitted.

Ron's mouth dropped open in an expression of abject betrayal.

"Don't tell me you're taking her side," Ron said.

"I'm not taking anyone's side," Harry said, stopping Hermione mid-approving nod.

"Then why don't you tell her?" Ron asked.

"Because there's no amount of evidence that could convict an innocent man," Hermione said.

"Huh?" Ron asked.

"Harry's not telling me anything, because there's nothing to say," Hermione explained, with another unnerving eye roll.

"That's not entirely true," Harry said, though he immediately regretted his instinct to defend Ron when both of his friends turned to stare at him. "I'm sure Ron's right when he said I had something to say. I just might've forgotten it."

Hermione didn't look impressed, and neither did Ron for that matter, but at the very least he seemed grateful for the weak attempt at defending his honour.

"I'm talking about the book, Harry. The diary?"

Suddenly, Harry remembered what Ron was talking about. Though they didn't need much of an excuse to visit Hermione in the first place, they had wanted to tell her about what Tom had shown him the previous night. Though their original plan was to mention it casually over a game of snap, since Harry knew she might be upset at him for dabbling with a "clearly cursed" object despite her warnings, he had all but forgotten about it when Ron started yet another argument about Flintstone.

When Harry started to tell Hermione the same thing he had told Ron, Hermione listened to the end, with a hard frown frozen on her face, though she didn't try to interrupt him until he was finished.

It was only when he finished his story, that Hermione spoke, her displeasure clear in both her growly voice and the way that the fur on the back of her neck stood up angrily.

"Firstly, before anything else, haven't I told you that you should throw that thing away, or at least give it to Dumbledore? It's clearly a cursed object," Hermione said, predictably.

"Tom seems like a good person," Harry said, with a shrug. "I don't think he would be the type to put a curse on his diary."

"Yeah, and making cursed objects is illegal," Ron chimed in. "He's basically a worse version of Percy, and Percy throws a fit whenever he catches me skipping out on brushing my teeth. I can't imagine a bloke like him doing anything like cursing a harmless looking book. That's more of a Fred and George thing."

"You skip out on brushing your teeth?" Hermione asked.

"That's besides the point," Ron said. "The point is that the book isn't cursed. Trust me when I say people like them don't do anything that's 'against the rules.'"

"I'm not saying that Tom has to be the one to curse it," Hermione said. "Another person could've cursed it."

It was a familiar enough argument for Harry to know that they would never come to an agreement. "Cursed or not, I was in Tom's memories," Harry said. "I don't think what I saw was a lie."

Hermione gave Harry a pointed stare, but seemed to accept his silent proposal to keep the conversation going.

"So you think he's telling the truth? That Hagrid was the one to open the Chamber of Secrets the last time?" Hermione asked.

Harry frowned at the same time that Ron's smug smirk fell off his face, as he seemed to realise that even if Hermione accepted the idea, it wasn't necessarily a good thing.

"I'm not sure," Harry admitted. "Hagrid's a great person, one of the best people I know, really."

"But he did raise a dragon last year," Ron said, repeating the same solemn thought process they had gone through in their discussion earlier in the morning, when Harry had told him. "We're sure he would never hurt someone on purpose, but what if he was raising some sort of monster that got loose by accident?"

"But why would Hagrid be the Heir of Slytherin? How?" Hermione asked.

"Well, he might not be," Harry said. "Just because people think it's Slytherin's monster that's running around the school, petrifying people, doesn't mean it has to be. It could just be any old monster, really."

"And Binns did say that the Chamber was just a myth, right?" Ron added. "Even though Slytherin's monster was loose once already, it's not like they ever found the thing, right? It doesn't have to be Slytherin's Heir that's running around the school, just someone who's pretending to be."

Hermione blinked a few times in surprise. "That's surprisingly insightful of you two," she said.

Harry frowned, wondering if she meant that as an insult or not, but Ron didn't seem to notice either way as he nodded seriously.

"I'm pretty good at noticing things if I'm serious about it," he said solemnly. "And right now, all the clues are lining up."

It was at this point that Harry lost track of what Ron was saying, but after a short moment, Hermione's eyes narrowed as the short-lived admiration in them faded away to suspicion.

"And you think that someone is Flintstone," she stated, more than asked.

"Of course, it's Fredericton!" Ron shouted, pounding his fist into his palm angrily. "Think about it! Everything lines up! Even if Hagrid has nothing to do with the so-called Slytherin's monster this time around, I bet he's still friends with a ton of monsters lurking in the Forbidden Forest. And who's the only student who goes into the Forbidden Forest with him, Hermione?! Who?!"

Harry sighed and buried his face into his pillow once more, not caring which one of his friends was right and which was wrong, as predictably, Hermione shouted back, telling Ron to stop being so stupid. In either case, he hoped that they would come to some sort of an agreement soon, or he would be tempted to try and suffocate himself with his pillow instead of just screaming silently into it.