"Hey, Hermione? I've got a question."

Hermione Granger looked up at the sound of Ron Weasley's voice, her brain still half-stuck in the book propped open on her lap. He felt his ears go red. It had been some time now since Ron had broken up with Lavender – the time had moved so blissfully quickly that he wasn't sure just how many days, but it had been enough – and he found that he still couldn't look Hermione in the eye without wanting to sink straight down into whatever patch of floor he was occupying at the moment.

He'd muttered Hermione's name while he'd in the hospital wing – what had come over him? (Besides the poison, of course.) Quite miraculous, really, that Lavender hadn't strangled him on the spot…

"Yes?" Hermione had raised one eyebrow, Ron realized, waiting for him to get on with whatever his question was. He cleared his throat, momentarily distracted by what he thought was pinkness in her own cheeks. It could have been the sun, he supposed; it was setting through the windows of the common room, staining the squashy chairs and sofas with fiery light.

Ron made a conscious effort to keep his voice down; Harry had gone to bed early, but he was in a foul mood, owing to the fact that he'd received a detention from Snape earlier that day that would remove him from the next day's Quidditch match. The evening spent between the four of them – Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Ginny, who'd taken to spending more time with the trio after her break-up with Dean – had been more than a little awkward.

"Right," he said at last. "Well. This is a bit of an odd thing to bring up. I… erm…" A combination of eagerness and annoyance flitted across his friend's face as she waited patiently for him to spit out the words. "It's about Harry," he said in a rush.

Hermione's face fell just a few millimeters. "About Harry?"

Ron had not seen her change in expression. He was now chewing hard on his bottom lip, the essay he was supposed to be working on all but forgotten across his knees. "Yeah. Has he been acting a bit strangely, d'you think?"

She blinked at him. "He's just gotten detention for using one of the Half-Blood Prince's spells on Malfoy," she said coolly, bending her head back over her book. "Not to mention he sleeps with the bloody book – and he's been skulking about the castle tracking Malfoy for the entire year." Hermione paused to carefully note something from her book onto a scrap of parchment, and then added, "So, would you consider that strange, Ronald?"

"So you've noticed it too!" Ron burst out.

Hermione stared at him. "Yes? Haven't we talked about this before?"

It was Ron's turn to look crestfallen. Had she missed his point? Was he going to have to spell it out for her? She was still looking at him as though she thought he was a bit thick. "No," he muttered. "I – it's something different…"

"Ron, please spit it out," she said impatiently.

"DoyouthinkHarrymightbegay?"

He spit out the words so fast a little bit of actual saliva flew from his lips; Ron surreptitiously wiped his sleeve over his mouth. Hermione's mouth dropped earthward so fast it was actually impressive that she didn't crack her jaw in the process.

"Do I – do I what?" she said faintly.

"You know…" Ron's ears had far surpassed red now; he reckoned they'd sizzled to tiny black crisps on either side of his head, so much did they burn at that moment. "Do you think maybe he fancies Malfoy a bit?" Oh God, it sounded so stupid; Hermione would think he was absolutely stark-raving mad for even thinking it.

"Look," he said in a rush, before she could get a word out. "Doesn't it make sense? He's been obsessed with Malfoy for ages. He's been following him around all year, obsessed with what he does, and you know as well as I do that he can't actually be a Death Eater. What if it's something he got out of the Prince's book?"

"You can't learn to be gay from a book," said Hermione, but her voice was still whispery. Her eyes had focused on a point on the tapestried wall behind Ron. "Doesn't he fancy your sister?"

"Ginny?" Ron gave a tremendous snort he hadn't intended; it wasn't a very attractive noise, and he was well aware of it. "Come off it, Hermione. His fancying Malfoy is about ten times more likely –"

Hermione cut him off with the flapping of hands. Her book was forgotten on her lap as well by now, and this time Ron definitely didn't mistake the tingeing of color in her face. "Don't say it like that," she begged. "I just – no, he can't – but if –" She cast her eyes helplessly at Ron, who merely shrugged, equally at a loss.

"Okay," she said, in the voice of one forcing oneself to keep calm. "If… if he is gay… we've got to let him know we're behind him in this, don't we?" Ron's mouth twisted, and he fought against the urge to crack a joke and take her words literally. "Oh, grow up!" she snapped, seeing through it at once. "We have to be his friends in this, Ron. He needs to know that we won't treat him any differently if he happens to prefer boys to girls."

Ron had a sudden, awful thought. "Hermione… do you think he's ever fancied me?" he said, somewhat horrified.

She didn't dignify this with a response; she was now tapping her chin with her fingers, forehead creased in worry. "And if he's felt he's had to hide it all this time… I can see why, he's so scrutinized by the wizarding world these days…" Hermione looked up suddenly, mouth set into a firm and decisive line. "Let's give it a few days. And if by that point, nothing's changed, we can ask him about it. Be sporting to him about it, won't you? All right?"

Ron nodded; he was still half-lost in the notion that he might have been the object of his best friend's affections in a much more serious way than he'd ever intended. "All right," he murmured, and neither he nor Hermione brought it up for the remainder of the evening.

As it happened, such a conversation was thankfully avoided; the very next night, after Gryffindor won the Quidditch match against Hufflepuff in Harry's absence, Ginny rushed at Harry and kissed him full on the mouth, a gesture which he wholeheartedly returned. He looked to Ron for his approval, arms clasped around Ginny's waist.

Ron felt as though he looked thunderstruck; great waves of relief were pouring through him from the moment his sister kissed his best friend. He was grateful to have avoided such an awkward conversation, and relieved beyond belief that he'd never been an object of Harry's affections. His acceptance of his best friend's heterosexuality was a blessing he was willing to bestow on him, and so, with a small nod – if you must – he let it go.

As soon as Harry and Ginny had left through the portrait hole, Hermione gave Ron a weary look. "Gay?" she murmured, but Ron merely shook his head. Those were waters he never felt like treading ever again.

A/N: This was just a quick story I wrote while conversing with a writing friend and poking fun at Harry's obsession with Malfoy, Snape, and the Half-Blood Prince in the sixth book and movie. I definitely don't think he's actually gay - but this scene was too fun to write for me to give the idea up! I hope you enjoyed it, and thank you for reading!