A/N: This story is a slight AU. It takes place in the 7th year, after HBP, but Draco and Snape haven't disappeared anywhere and Dumbledore isn't gone.

She Loves You

Chapter 1: The Confrontation

The fireplace in the Gryffindor common room burned brightly and warmly for the three remaining students who dwelled in its cosy chairs. These three students were up doing their homework, and from the insistence of one, they were also making review sheets – four months before their actual exams.

"I still don't understand why you're making us do this now, Hermione!" Ron exclaimed, exasperated. "What's the point if we're going to forget in a week anyway?" Seeing the warning signals go off, Harry wisely cast a Hearing-Loss charm on himself to block out most of the noise, so everything they said would come out as a dull whisper.

"It's good study practise!" Hermione explained in her bossy tone. "Some people could use the practise. I will not mention names."

"Well thank you for not making it obvious, Miss Know-It-All!" Ron groaned. Sometimes her bossy attitude simply got on his nerves. She was fine when they were talking about something non-school related… or when they weren't breaking rules… or when it didn't have to do with the well being of elves or rats…

'Who am I kidding, we barely get along!' Ron thought bitterly. Hermione glared at him from her spot next to Harry, but she held her tongue. That is, until Ron closed his heavy History of Magic textbook and pulled the table with the chessboard closer.

"What are you doing?" she snapped.

"Taking a break," Ron replied irritably. "What's it look like?"

"Honestly Ron, you can't afford to fall behind in your studies!"

"Are you kidding me?" Ron laughed indignantly. "With your help, I'm leagues ahead of the rest of our classes!"

"And yet that doesn't stop you from having poor marks…" Hermione muttered under her breath, only it wasn't as quiet as she had hoped and Ron glared daggers at her.

"What was that last part?" he demanded. "'Cause if you've got something you'd like to say, then say it." Hermione chewed on her bottom lip, as if deciding whether it was wise to repeat herself. Making up her mind, she chose to attack the bull head-on.

"Yes, I have something I'd like to say!" she began. "You're always complaining about the extra work I give you and you put it off and put it off until it's way passed the deadline! Then you need me to proofread your work and fix all your errors; I may as well do all your work to begin with! And then you complain about the marks you get in our classes. If you would have just taken my advice, you wouldn't be in that situation every year, moping about just barely passing and stressing out before exams, EVERY TIME! I'm sick of it!"

Ron went red around his cheeks and ears. He thought it was understood among their trio that his marks were not to be mentioned, either seriously or in jest. He was very sensitive about it and would prefer that no one make it worse. But here she was, bringing them up and using it against him.

"Oh, and I suppose if we had it your way, we'd be working every waking minute on schoolwork, chuck dinner and Quidditch, chuck everything else but work, work, work! You're like a slave driver, I swear to Merlin!" In his fury, Ron knocked his History of Magic book from his lap, spilling his notes everywhere and making Hermione jump a little.

"Don't get shirty with me!" Hermione retorted at his outburst.

"Shirty! Believe me, if I was getting shirty, you'd know it! Just leave my marks alone, Hermione! I mean it!"

"Well how else do you expect to improve if no one pushes you?" asked Hermione. Ron gaped at her. She was starting to sound like his mother.

"I don't need pushing, thank you very much! I'm doing just fine!"

"I suppose fine for you is a bunch of 'A's."

"Well excuse me for not fretting because I didn't get all 'O's! If anything, you stress more than I do before exam time, and especially after!"

"Because I care about my future! I want as many options open as possible! Do you even know what it is you want to do? Or is all you're thinking about is getting out of Hogwarts as soon as possible? Because there are faster ways, you know, and you have a wonderful knack of finding them, getting detentions and potential expulsions!"

"First of all, what I want to do after Hogwarts is none of your business! Second, don't act like Miss Perfect, 'cause you've gotten into just as much trouble as I have, if not more! You just have a way of weaselling your way out of it because you're such a teacher's pet!"

"I am not a teacher's pet! Well what about Harry?" Harry jumped at the sound of his name. He looked at Ron and Hermione on either side of him and thought it would be safer if he simply slinked away to a nearby chair, further away from the feuding friends. "He gets fine marks, if not excellent, and he's not a teacher's pets. Plus, he gets in as much trouble as you do, but he keeps up in his studies!" Ron couldn't believe that she was actually comparing him to Harry. She may as well have said 'Why can't you be more like Harry for once?'

"Everything is about studying to you, isn't it?" he yelled, throwing his hands in the air. "It's a wonder you ever find time for anything besides study! It's a miracle when you get out and enjoy the fresh air, socialize, noticed people around you! Amazing you ever got a date for the Yule Ball!" Hermione's mouth dropped at that unexpected last comment. Where did that come from?

"Amazing…? Did it ever occur to you that someone might've been interested in me? Someone who didn't use me as a last resort?" Ron blushed at that. He remembered how he had noticed too late that he could've asked her to the dance. He still kept playing out different 'what if' scenarios in his head.

"That's not what I meant, but if you want to go down that path, then lets!" The floodgates had been opened. He felt words rushing out of his mouth, words that he didn't quite mean but felt the need to say anyway. "To be honest, yes, I was surprised you showed up with a date, Viktor Krum of all people! But then again, we never did establish if he was using you or not."

"Using me! He wasn't!" Hermione shouted, highly offended that Ron would assume that a guy would ask her out not because he was generally interested but because he needed her for information. "He never even mentioned Harry! He was a complete gentleman! You're just being ridiculous because you asked me too late!" She winced, not meaning to let that slip. It was quite an assumption and the last thing she wanted was to sound full of herself.

"Maybe I was hoping something better would come along!" Ron blurted out, feeling both hurt and angry. Hermione gasped. "Besides, what kind of a gentleman kisses on the first date?" Hermione suddenly looked mortified.

"Who told you that?"

"What does it matter? What matters is that you let him take advantage of you!" Hermione was suddenly confused. He was going way off topic. He wasn't making any sense.

"And what about you and Lavender?" Hermione brought up, thinking that if Ron was going to berate her love life, she may as well take a stab at his.

"Laven… Lava… uh…" Ron was caught off guard and he fumbled through his words. "I never took advantage of her!" Hermione gritted her teeth. Why couldn't he just admit that he was using Lavender to make her jealous?

"Oh god, forget it! You don't even know why you were dating her, do you? She was just some fun on the side, wasn't she? You slimy git!"

"And I suppose you weren't for Krum? Well there's no way he wanted to take you to the ball for your looks back then!"

"My looks?" She felt a sharp stinging pain in her chest. He thought she was ugly? It was like her heart was being ripped apart. She lost all control after this point. "Look who's talking, you gangly, overgrown ape! You wouldn't be able to cover your face with a paper bag even if you wanted to!"

"Overgrown ape? You're the one who had buckteeth three years ago! And you still haven't managed to control your animalistic hair! I swear, there must be a rat nest in there somewhere!" Hermione started to see red. If he was trying to get her to back down or cry, it wasn't going to work.

"You can't even find clothes that fit you 'cause you're always having growth spurts! You look ridiculous with your ankles showing when you sit and you roll up your sleeves to cover up how short they are!" Ron's ears turned a deeper shade of pink. "Can't spare a bit of change to buy new clothes? Just because you're family's poor doesn't mean you can't transfigure your own clothes, but I guess you're such a piss-poor wizard, you can't even manage that bit of magic!" A dark look took over Ron's features, making Hermione instantly regret opening her big mouth. But she had to say something in retaliation to the comment about her looks. Right…?

"Don't you dare bring up my family or our financial situation…" he growled. This was a very tender nerve to be striking. He was never as fortunate as many others, coming from such a large family, but in their trio, no one ever tried to upstage Ron on purpose. They were modest about their achievements and Harry never went around flaunting his family fortune. Hermione knew that, at least Ron thought she did, but here she was, making him feel terrible and lividly enraged all at once. "Besides, you're one to talk, being brought up by barbaric Muggles! I'm amazed that you managed to adjust to being a witch so quickly, but I guess you were born a know-it-all and it never goes away, does it?" Hermione returned an equally dark glare at the mention of her Muggle parents.

"Just because I'm a better witch than you are a wizard doesn't mean you should get upset! After all, not everyone can be good at things they're expected to be. Hell, I bet Malfoy's a better wizard than you are!" Ron kicked over the table with the chessboard, causing a loud clattering noise to resound throughout the quiet common room. Harry jumped and stared at the furious Ron Weasley. Hermione held her breath, knowing she might've crossed the line. Her eyes were wide with fear and regret.

"You comparing me to Draco now? Is that it!" Ron demanded, standing his six-foot-frame to its full height, making Hermione squirm slightly in her chair. "If he's such an amazing wizard, why don't you go running off to him then!"

"That's not what I –" she began.

"No, I think your meaning was perfectly clear, Hermione! I'm not the greatest wizard in the world! It doesn't mean that Mudbloods like you have to rub it in all the time!" The room went deathly silent. Even with the Hearing-Loss charm active, Harry ears still picked up that key word… Mudblood… The one word that Ron had wordlessly vowed never to use and defended Hermione when she had been called that back in their second year when he had been willing to hex Draco Malfoy and risk detention and expulsion.

Hermione's eyes brimmed with unshed tears. Had he really just said that? Did he just call her that word, the very same word Malfoy and his cronies used whenever they really wanted to get under her skin? She couldn't believe it. She wanted to pretend that it never happened. But it did. The words kept ringing out in her ears.

Mudblood.

Mudblood.

MUDBLOOD!

"Burn in hell, you bloody, filthy bastard!" Hermione screamed. She let out a loud, choked sob that bordered on a desperate cry and she ran up the spiral staircase leading to the girl's dorm, not bothering to pick up her things. She just had to escape, to run, to not turn back and let Ron see the tears streaming down her face. She had to be somewhere he wasn't.

Silence rang out for many minutes. Ron just stood there, staring after where Hermione had fled and disappeared. He had worked himself into a good mad, but now all that was left was a hollow empty feeling of remorse. How could he be so careless? He was angry that she brought up family's money issue. He was furious that she compared him to Malfoy of all people. But now, he was just… empty. And yet… he couldn't bring himself to go after her, to say he was sorry. A part of him wasn't. He was mad, nothing could change that, but Mudblood was definitely NOT the word he meant to choose. Swot-nutter, maybe, but not Mudblood.

He sighed, not quite sure what to do with himself and the situation he managed to get himself into. This was not a row that he and Hermione could just 'bounce back' from. He wasn't even sure if they'd ever be friends again…

Harry snorted with disgust.

"Now you've done it, you smeg-head!"

A/N: 'Swot-nutter' is a word combination I invented. 'Swot' means study or cram. 'Nutter' is someone who is crazy. So 'swot-nutter' means 'study-crazy'. Let me know what you think of the story so far. Are the characters a little too OOC? I know the chapter was a little short, but it was only supposed to cover the big fight. Reviews are greatly appreciated.