Synopsis: This is a short, funny little story of one day in the Hogwarts castle when Harry and Ron are leaving their divination classroom arguing about gnats when Ron makes a startling and upsetting discovery.

A/N: Okay this is what I get for being bored out of my mind the day school gets out for the summer. I just wrote this for fun and it's not written to really make any sense it's just a story I felt like sharing with you all...

Disclaimer: I am not JK Rowling...I do not have the patience to be JK Rowling...That women has to put up with obsessive complusive people like me everyday...

A Boy and His Gnats

"I'm telling you Harry; there are sixty-four gnats in that stupid room. Sixty-four!" exclaimed an exasperated Ron Weasly as the two boys tromped down the spiral staircase leading from their divination classroom. Adjusting his rucksack strap over his shoulder, Harry finished stuffing away his oversized textbook on dream interpretations and turned to his friend.

"Sorry mate, but I'm positive that there are only sixty-three. After all, I counted."

"And what do you think I did; pull a number out of the air?" Ron replied hotly as their other best friend Hermione fell into step with them from her neighboring ancient runes classroom. Picking up on the topic of their conversation, she snorted and said,

"Honestly, divination is a complete waste of a class. I'm so glad that I took ancient runes instead. It's a far better use of my time."

"Yes, Hermione we've heard, we get it, Divination is a bloody pile of crap and Ancient Runes would be a much more valuable waste of time, but that doesn't change the fact that there are sixty-four gnats in Trelawney's room!" Hermione rolled her eyes while fishing out her Ancient Runes textbook and buried her head in the open book in hopes of drowning out the pointless conversation beside her. Ron turned away from her dismayed at her apparent disinterest in figuring out how Harry could make such a horrible mistake as thinking there were only sixty-three gnats in that stupid classroom.

"Alright Harry, let's go through this. Did you count Lansberger?" Hermione looked up from her book to momentarily stare in amazement at how utterly insane of friends she had chosen.

"Of course," replied Harry.

"And the twins Lockhart Jr. and Franny?" Ron interrogated.

"Yes and yes."

"And you of course you couldn't have forgotten Peppermint Humbug III right?"

"Uh…well, about that. The thing is—."

"Ah hah! So there are sixty-four gnats!" Ron smiled triumphantly at his ability to count large numbers of extremely small insects. Harry on the other hand looked a little apprehensive as he said,

"Well, actually, there were sixty-four gnats."

"What the bloody hell are you going on about Harry?" Ron asked distractedly as he picked at a hole in his robes.

"I'm sorry to tell you this Ron but it seems that Peppermint Humbug III, well; he's…he's no longer with us. You see I sort of, well, Isortofswallowedhim," Harry blurted out the second half of his confession and braced himself for Ron's reaction.

"WHAT!" Ron stopped in the middle of the staircase, blocking the way for the rest of the sixth year class who began to complain that they were going to be late for dinner. Ron ignored them and continued to stare in openmouthed horror at Harry who was trying desperately to explain.

"Yes well, you know how her class is. After awhile your eyes kind of glaze over and your mouth just kind of opens up—,"

"You ATE him!"

"—I think he may have been attracted to the smell of the kidney pie I had for lunch—,"

"YOU ATE HIM!"

"—And really he didn't taste like peppermint humbug like we once thought he might. It was more of a tasteless tickle in my—,"

"I can't believe you ate my best friend!"

"I don't remember being replaced by a gnat," muttered Hermione who, after recovering from the shock of Ron's girlish scream, was now busy picking up the textbook she had dropped. Harry looked from her to Ron and replied with exasperated;

"No, me neither."

Ron ignored the two and continued down the stairs remembering all the good times he had shared with Peppermint Humbug III. All the times Peppermint Humbug III had flown around Ron's head as he slept through the lesson on tea leaf readings. And then there were all the times when he was flying about as Ron semiconsciously tried interpreting his dreams. He really didn't think he could ever forgive Harry for this.

Ron continued to ignore his two friends as they entered the Great Hall and he decidedly sat as far away as possible. This wasn't all that successful due to the fact that Ron's scene had caused them to be at least ten minutes late. Ron sat himself between Neville and Seamus and much to his annoyance Harry and Hermione sat directly across from him. These two enjoyed Ron's entertaining fury immensely and spent most of the dinner making comments on the horrible season the Chudley Cannons were having. Ron gnawed at his steak and kidney pie with a strained face as he resolved from telling the two for the hundredth time that he was sure that the Appleby Arrows seeker had been using a targeting instrument the entire season. It surely did not make the Cannons a worse team when others cheated. But when the two realized that their friend had more will power than they had originally thought, they resolved to chucking veggies from their stew at his bent head.

Soon the dinner was replaced with an array of desserts which gave Harry an inspiration. He spotted a large pile of delicious looking toffees from Honeyduke's and grabbing them he cried,

"Hey Ron!" Ron lifted his head and gave a short stony look before his eyes lit up at the sight of the toffees. He greedily snatched them from Harry's hand and much to his friends' displeasure he proceeded to ramble on about the merits of the Cannon's sportsmanship with his mouth stuffed with at least seven of the sticky candies. Finding that Ron had thoroughly recovered from his brief grieving of the gnat and that he was now deeply immersed in an argument with Seamus, Harry turned to Hermione and muttered.

"Well, it's good to know how easy it is to buy his friendship."

Hermione made no reply other than to massage her head at the thought of how many migraines this friendship of theirs caused her.