Hello, this is Smartie. I have put in a vague Skybreaker reference. I will give you a gift certificate to the Golden Phoenix if you can find it.

It was one of those days at the Ministry, when all that you wanted to do was go home and relax. Hermione Granger wanted exactly that. She clocked out of her high-paying job in the Department of Magical Cooperation and headed toward the elevators. She stepped in, following several other people and was squashed until everyone was out in the lobby. There she waited in a long line in front of the Ministry fireplaces until it was her turn to floo. Normally, she would have just Apparated, but she didn't have even enough energy left for that.

She reappeared in the hearth in the cozy apartment that she and her boyfriend Ron shared in London. She glanced around, looking for him, but saw no one but her cat, Crookshanks. That was when she saw the invitation. She would not have noticed it if it was not for the decorative scarlet and gold ribbon wrapped around the small scroll. She hurried over to the ornate oak coffee table that the note was on.

"What does he want,?" Hermione muttered quietly, wanting nothing more than a long bath and a good night's sleep. She pulled off the decorative Gryffindor ribbons, read the invitation silently, and set it back down on the table, scoffing slightly. The note read:

Miss Hermione Jane Granger,

You are invited to dinner with me,

Ronald Bilius Weasley, tonight at the

Golden Phoenix in Diagon Alley at 7:00.

Hope to see you there.

"So much for my early night," she murmured as she went to her bedroom to get ready.

Ron was late. Hermione was used to it, but since he invited her, she thought that he should have been there first. After ten minutes of careful consideration, she had chosen a tasteful red dress that showed off her small figure. She added a gold bracelet with rubies that Ron had given her for their first anniversary for effect.

She drummed her fingers on the secluded table that the host led her to, bored. It was getting late and she was about to fall asleep at the table.

"If he doesn't get here within the next ten minutes, I'm leaving his sorry ass here to wait all night," she grumbled, gritting her teeth.

Luckily for him, though, Ron arrived within the next two minutes. He looked dashing as always in a suit and tie, with his windswept hair.

"Sorry, I'm late, Mione," Ron panted. "Practice ran late."

" It's fine," Hermione told him. He had his dream job, working as the keeper on the Chudley Cannons, and she could never stay mad at him when he talked about it.

A waiter with a ridiculous mustache and strangely familiar red eyes approached the table. "Would you like to order,?" he asked them with a ridiculous and obviously fake French accent.

"Yes, I would like the arctic char, please," Hermione told him pleasantly. "What would you like, Ron?"

Ron was looking intently at their waiter, who was looking, in turn, more and more nervous.

"You're not French," Ron informed the anxious waiter.

"Of course I am. I have this outrageous accent," the man told him.

"Come on. Anyone could do that accent," Ron, to prove his point, did a perfect imitation of what the waiter had just said. "See?"

"I didn't know that you could do a French accent."

"I can."

"I know."

"Back to you," Ron turned back to the waiter.

"What would you like to eat, sir?" The waiter was starting to sweat with all the tension at the table.

"I would like you to admit that you're not French."

"But I have a funny mustache."

"So do those guys with the big hats."

"The Mexicans with the sombreros?"

"Yeah, those guys."

"I love those guys."

"Me too. But the point is you are not French and you know it."

"Of course I'm one of them. I grew up in Paris."

Hermione, who had recovered from the shock that Ron could do a French accent accurately, piped up and said, "Ron, stop harassing the waiter and order your food before I get annoyed and leave."

"Mione, I'll stop aggravating him if he just admits that he is not French."

The waiter, who had progressively become more nervous, pulled off the waiter suit and revealed himself in a flowing, black robe.

"Of course, I'm not, you daft fool! I am Lor-." He stopped as Ron Stupefied him.

Another waiter came to see what the commotion was about.

"Right then," Ron told him, seriously. "I'll have the smoked duck."

"Why did you deprive me of my sleep anyway,?" Hermione asked Ron after he had knocked out Lord Moldy Shorts.

"What,?" Hermione thought that Ron's confused face made him look adorable, with his face scrunched up, wondering what in the bloody hell that she was talking about.

"I was about to collapse this afternoon at work. I needed to go home and sleep, but instead I am here at this restaurant, with you. Why, Ron?"

"I think that why not is the better question, Mione," he answered with a goofy smile.

"This is not a time for you to be stupid. Why, Ronald?"

They paused their argument, when a new waiter came by, pouring red wine into their crystal glasses.

"Bloody hell, Mione, it's because I love you. That's why we are in this restaurant, wanting to eat this ridiculously expensive dinner, which better come soon or I am going to have a fit, because it will use up nearly the salary that I got for that last game against Bulgaria."

"You mean the game where you threw the quaffle at Viktor's head, when he look up in the stands where I was sitting?"

Ron mumbled something incoherently about "ruddy pumpkinhead", "bludgers" and "unfortunate accident" that did not sound pleasant at all to Hermione.

"Ron, answer the question," Hermione shot him a glare to show him that she meant business.

"Yeah, that game. The manger of the team gave me a bonus. Something about Viktor being a right foul git, who deserved everything that came to him."

"He did not say that,!" Hermione looked thoroughly scandalized.

"Yeah, he did. Said he heard about Vicky Stunning people during the third task of the Triwizard Tournament," Ron answered her, with a slightly smug look that Hermione, although she would never admit it, thought looked very cute on him.

"But he was under the control of the Imperius curse. Did you mention that? And for the last time, his name is Viktor, not Vicky or Victoria or some other clever nickname you came up with for him."

"Must have slipped my mind, Mione. He is a grouchy git, though, that Vicky. I never would have thought of Victoria. Thanks, Mione."

"Ron, I'm serious."

Voldy woke up from his Ron-induced unconscious state. "I shall kill you al-!"

Ron once again Stupefied the villain, cause he's good like that.

"No, you're not. Remember, Sirius died, left all his crap to Harry, which Dung stole, and Harry was PMSing for two months?"

"PMSing, Ron?"

"It's a new phrase. It means 'Partly Mentally Sick.' I invented it. Don't judge me."

"I would never do that, Ronnikins," Hermione told him seriously, suppressing an amused grin.

"Why do people keep calling me that?"

"Because it's fun, Won-Won."

"Please don't start that again."

"Oh, do you only want your Lav-Lav to call you that,?" Hermione asked with the same amused grin.

"Lav-Lav?"

"I heard it from Harry. Ask him."

"I don't even want to know, actually," Ron told her, very seriously. "It will probably lead to a story that I don't want to hear."

"It probably will. Harry has mental problems, even if he is the Boy-Who-Lived-And-Was-Chosen-to-Kill-Voldemort or whatever he told the Daily Prophet to call him this week," Hermione agreed.

"That's good, Mione."

"Thank you, Ronald."

"Anyway, why I brought you here was because I thought that you could use a nice night out. And well, because of this."

Ron reached his hand in his jacket pocket and pulled out a small jewelry box. Hermione gasped as Ron got down on one knee.

"Hermione, I know that we have had problems in the past and most of them have been caused by me, but I want to spend the rest of my life with you. So, Hermione Jane Granger, will you marry me?"

"Does Harry have problems,?" Hermione answered with a smile.

"Yes,?" Ron looked thoroughly confused, after giving what he thought was the perfect proposal.

"That's my answer."

"Harry has problems?"

"No,!" Ron looked crestfallen. "My answer is yes."

Ron perked up visibly, "YES!!!!!!!!"

The next time Voldy woke, he was lying in the restaurant, alone. "What did I miss?"