When I Realized that I loved Hermione Granger
by, Ron Weasley
By, Spirited Rinoa
Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter or any of its characters. Those rights go to JKR. I'm making no money off this, yadda yadda yadda. You know the drill by now. If you don't, check out one of my other fics to see my standard disclaimers. Well, check them out anyway. It wouldn't hurt ~_^
Gods, I couldn't believe that I'd said that. Even to this day, I cringed every time I thought about it.
"Neville's right, you are a girl…"
Of course she was a girl! I knew that! How could I not know?! But how do you ask one of your best friends to go to Yule Ball with you? It's like…a date. Don't get me wrong; it's not that I didn't want to go with Hermione. I did. A lot. I just didn't know how to go about asking her. Whenever I thought about working up the nerve, I'd get a feeling reminiscent of the time I'd hexed myself second year. I just didn't know how to even begin to ask her.
She had been the belle of the ball, even if she hadn't been aware of it. Malfoy had even been left speechless and unable to come up with an appropriate insult for his favorite Muggle-born. I enjoyed seeing his eyes nearly fall out of his head when he realized who was on Krum's arm. Of course, seeing her on Krum's arm made me want to kick myself. I had asked her too late. Why did it have to be Viktor Krum of all people? Hermione wasn't all that interested in quidditch, and the git couldn't even pronounce her name correctly.
But Hermione had been absolutely beautiful that night. Well, I mean, she usually is, but that night she really seemed to be enjoying herself, rather than obsessing over schoolwork or overworked house elves. That was Hermione for you – she always had to be busy with something, whether it was bettering herself or bettering the lives of magical creatures (though, I still say that she's wasting her time as far as the house elves are concerned). But that night…it was just so different. It was that night, while watching her have such a good time, that I came to the realization that I was in love with Hermione Granger.
So she was with Krum – having a grand old time, and I was sitting around moping because I had asked her at the last minute. I wanted to be the one out there on the floor, dancing with her, the one talking to her over dinner, the one making her smile and laugh. All night, I tried to work up the nerve to ask her to dance, but I just couldn't do it. She seemed to be enjoying herself, just as she was, and she was probably still mad at me for my awful attempt at asking her to the Ball. Not to mention that she was probably irritated that I had more or less called her a liar when she said that she already had a date. So I had to content myself with watching her from a distance.
Of course, I had to stick my foot in my mouth later that night. I'd never seen her so furious about anything. It ended in her storming out of the common room when Harry came in. At the time, I had thought that she had completely missed the point of our fight; but now I realize that she had gotten the point far better than I could have hoped.
And next time there's a dance, I'll ask her first, and not as a last resort.