With their new wands, Ron and Neville made leaps and bounds in Transfiguration and Charms.
Ron's performance in Transfiguration, in particular, earned repeated praise from Professor McGonagall. Along the way, she also praised Harry for caring about his classmates and being observant and good at spotting problems.
Over the next two months, Ron experienced an unprecedented joy in learning. For once, Neville was also doing well in all his subjects.
Then something awkward happened...
Harry became one of those who lagged behind in their little group.
It was not for any other reason. In fact, Harry's performance in class had always been quite good. But he did, after all, have one subject he essentially had to teach himself-potions class.
As the lessons grew more difficult, Harry found studying on his own increasingly hard, even with Padma's patient guidance. Although Padma was a top student, she was ultimately only a top student and could not replace a teacher.
Having this weak subject put Harry under considerably more academic pressure. It even reached the point where... sometimes Ron and Neville would offer Harry a little help with his studies.
That had never happened at all in the preceding months.
As for this, Harry felt... it was actually pretty great. His friends could all help him. Wasn't that a lovely thing?
As a result, Harry grew closer and closer to Ron and Neville, to the point that their friendship had quietly begun to surpass his friendship with Hermione, whom he had also known from the start and shared many experiences with.
This was not to say that anything had gone wrong with their friendship with Hermione. The main issue was that Hermione's same old habit had resurfaced.
The half-term after Christmas was about as long as the one before it, lasting just over