Disclaimer: I'm not JK Rowling. I don't own Harry Potter. In fact, I don't really own anything.
Email: angeldlsm00@hotmail.com
HEY JEALOUSY
Kiara
Try as hard as he might, Harry Potter just couldn't concentrate on the Transfiguration essay that Professor McGonagall was forcing him to do. It wasn't like the essay was required and the only other seventh year Gryffindor that would do it would be Hermione Granger. Unfortunately, Harry had been falling behind this year and McGonagall said he needed to do the essay if he wanted to have a prayer for passing. Honestly, the thought of failing wasn't enough motivation for him to get the essay done. The real motivation came from the thought of failing and being left behind by the very distraction keeping him from finishing the essay.
They were seated on the couch again, snuggling back into the plushy cushions and using each other for warmth, despite the fire raging in the hearth just across from their chosen spot. Sometimes he felt like he should stop watching them so much but Harry could control his attention span just about as much as Ron could control his temper. Ron. Shouldn't have opened that door, Harry, he thought, cynically. Attempting to force his attention back to his essay, Harry looked down to his parchment and tried to ignore the fact he had several large blotches of ink spotted across his words. He also tried to ignore the soft giggles coming from behind the scarlet back of the couch.
His hands were shaking as he found his eyes trailing up again to land on them. Hermione had tilted her head up and was saying something so soft it was indistinguishable to Ron. A soft smile had come across her lips and Harry grimaced when Ron brushed a piece of hair that had fallen into her eyes away. Harry wasn't sure whether it was his envy or his curiosity that made him want to know what they were talking about. He supposed that maybe it was both. Forming the grin that made half of Hogwarts melt into a pile of goop, Ron leaned forward to brush his lips across Hermione's. Harry's shaking elbow promptly rammed into his inkwell, spilling black ink all across his homework.
"Damn," muttered Harry, trying to get everything together. That was the third time this week he had lost it like that when he saw them kiss. The first time had been bad, Harry shredding his Potions homework, which later had to be pried from his fingers (he hadn't noticed he still held the pieces). The second time, Harry had been leaning back in his chair and, when their lips met, Harry's chair went reeling backward. Now he had mutilated his chance at pulling up his Transfiguration grade. He really needed to get it together.
"Do you need some help, Harry?" said Hermione, and Harry looked up to see her sitting across from him.
"I'm fine," he muttered.
"You could tell us if there was something wrong, you know," said Ron, who had now sat down beside Harry. "We are your friends."
"There's nothing wrong. I'm just frustrated with this essay and I can't think straight, okay?"
"We're worried about you, Harry."
Trust Hermione to get straight to the point. Every time Harry seemed to be going off on the deep end, Hermione always was the one who came right out and said what needed to be said. Ron always had a tendency to dance around the subject until he backed out of whatever he originally wanted to say. Harry usually preferred Hermione's methods but today he wanted no more than to be left alone to brood. It wasn't like he could tell them what had really caused the scene anyway.
"You don't need to be worried about me," snapped Harry, a little more bitterly than he had intended. "I'm having problems in class right now and all I want to do is pull my grade up. Trying to do so is stressing me out a bit. That's - all."
"Oh," said Ron, biting his lip. Harry waited, knowing it would come. "We thought it might have something to do with -" Pausing as Ron always did, he exchanged an uncertain glance with Hermione. Her eyes were set, urging him on. "You-Know-Who," he breathed out at last.
"It has nothing to do with Voldemort," said Harry, noticing the way his two best friends flinched. He tried to suppress a smile. "I'm going up to the dormitory to be alone."
"Are you sure, Harry?" said Hermione, quickly, before he had a chance to escape. "We are your friends. It isn't . . . about us, is it?"
Hermione had been asking the same question ever since she and Ron first got together and every time Harry told them that it wasn't. With each opportunity to answer the question over again, Harry felt a sense of guilt tugging at him, demanding that he tell them the truth, but he couldn't. She had just said it herself, after all. They were his best friends and it would be a really rotten thing of him to do to tell them he couldn't stand to see her with him.
"It's never about you, Hermione. I don't care if you're together. I've told you that before," said Harry, trying to sound sick of answering the question. It wasn't that hard of a reach, even if he did tire of it for different reasons than he wanted them to believe. "I'm going up to the dorm. I'm sorry I disturbed you."
Gathering his books, Harry gave one last look to them before turning and heading up to the dormitory. He climbed the stairs and kicked open the door, glad to see that none of the other seventh years were up here yet. It was rather early, anyway, judging by the sun still set low in the sky. Shoving his books in his trunk, Harry dropped back to his bed, drew the heavy curtains closed, and shut his eyes.
Harry was sick of being asked if there was something wrong with him. He didn't understand why people even asked anymore. Of course there was something wrong with him. There's always something wrong when your name is Harry Potter, the golden Boy-Who-Lived. Unfortunately, Harry was dealing with a lot more than Snape's hatred of him or Voldemort wanting him dead. Now he had to deal with them and he hated every minute he spent in their combined company.
Nine months ago, Harry wouldn't have thought twice about his two best friends in a relationship together. In fact, he probably would have genuinely supported it without it having to kill him slowly. However, those were the days when he still had Cho, before he learned to listen to his heart, and when he still saw some light at the end of his tunnel.
Halfway through his fifth year at Hogwarts, Cho Chang, his long-time crush, finally gave him more than a passing moment of her time. Ever since Cedric Diggory's death in his fourth year, Harry thought Cho would despise him, seeing as how she was close to Cedric in more ways than one. However, she had been looking for solace and Harry, who was still feeling vulnerable about the whole situation, had been the one she went to for comfort. The relationship (if you could even call it that) had been a strange, twisted one of reliability brought together by the most unfortunate of circumstances and it wouldn't be a stretch to say it was doomed from the moment it began. They used each other over and over again until Cho decided just before her graduation that she couldn't be a part of it anymore. The thrill of being with the Boy-Who-Lived had worn out and she no longer had a use for Harry in her life.
Tainted, Harry had gone home for the summer and, after a row with Dudley, he had been shoved back into his cupboard for a good two weeks. Thinking all that time with nothing else to do wasn't proving well for Harry's mental health. Alone in his cupboard with no other distractions, he was forced to see just how wrong his relationship with Cho had been and just how long he was suppressing what he knew in his heart since early in his fifth year. Harry was bisexual and in love with his best friend. They could never know.
Something inside Harry had always known, he supposed, that he was in love with Ron. There was always an attraction for the very first day on the train, though that spark had led to the greatest friendship he had ever known. The first inclination had come during the second task of the Triwizard Tournament, but he had just been through a period with Ron where they hadn't spoke for months. Harry tried to accredit the fear that seized his heart when hearing it was Ron they had taken to that. He just got his best friend back; he didn't want to lose him again.
Having never had any real friends before, sometimes Harry thought he made a bigger deal out of his closeness with Ron than it really was. Still, he couldn't help but believe that he got lucky when it was Ron who first walked onto his train compartment. There wasn't a better option for best friend in all of Hogwarts.
The cupboard under the stairs had to be the worst place for Harry to discover such a momentous revelation. With Cho out of the way and Harry painfully aware of his love for Ron, he had nothing left to do but psychoanalyze his every action toward Ron since the Tournament, wondering if he had underlying motives even he wasn't aware of. He hated it sometimes. He hated feeling the intense jealousy, knowing that Ron would never love him the same way. He hated feeling like such a whiner. More than anything, he hated watching Ron give his love to someone else, especially someone they were both especially close to, and he hated having to support it at every bloody turn.
Fortunately, thought Harry, there's only a few months left. Only a few months until I'm dead and the world will have no more Harry Potter.
The storm of emotions had left Harry at this conclusion. Voldemort wanted him dead anyway and if he were to save the entire wizarding world a second time, he was facing a lifetime watching Ron in love with someone else. Harry didn't think he could take a lifetime watching Ron hold someone else. Perhaps he was being selfish, but Harry couldn't bring himself to fight. Voldemort was bound to strike soon and Harry thought he just might let him. Harry had killed his parents, he had killed Cedric, and now Harry thought it was only right that he die, too. No one would miss him, anyway. Ron and Hermione had each other.
"Harry?"
His eyelids slowly drifted open upon hearing Ron's voice through the curtains. He debated pulling them back in preference of pretending to be asleep. Knowing Ron would check on him and seeing what he would do finding Harry asleep was almost enough to drive him to do it. Changing his mind at the last moment, however, Harry brushed back his curtains and looked around to find Ron hanging at the corner of his bed, eyeing the partition carefully.
"What do you want, Ron?"
Harry had to suppress shivers when Ron's eyes landed on him, scrutinizing him from head to toe.
"Harry, are you okay?"
"I already told you that I was fine. Why do you have to keep getting on my arse? I wish you and Hermione would leave me alone."
"We're only trying to help, Harry."
"I don't need your help," Harry sneered, climbing out of bed and walking over the window. It was getting dark now, the sun setting below the horizon. Sitting by the window, Harry pulled his knees up to his chest and sighed.
"What were you doing up here?" asked Ron, trying to change the subject.
"Nothing."
"Do you want to come back down to the common room? Seamus was talking about playing a game of Exploding Snap."
"I don't think so."
"Wizards chess?" asked Ron, trying to sound cheerful.
"No, thank you."
"Hermione could help you with your Transfiguration essay. I think she already did hers."
"I'll do it by myself. I don't need Hermione's help."
"Don't be mad at me," said Ron after a long period of silence.
That had been the last thing Harry expected. Harry supposed he did sound like he was upset with him but he hadn't intended for Ron to take it that way.
"I'm not mad at you," said Harry, smiling.
"You mean that?" said Ron, disappearing from view.
"Of course I mean that. You're my best friend. I told you before; I'm stressed out. I'm not mad at you. I'm just snappy. Sorry."
"Good," said Ron, sounding mischievous. Before Harry could turn around, however, and locate him, he was whacked across the head with something that suspiciously felt like a pillow. The impact caused Harry's head to fly forward, barely smacking against his knees. When Harry turned around, Ron was grinning at him, his red hair mussed up, and he clutched a large pillow in his hands.
"Prepare to die, Weasley," said Harry, smirking. Chucking the pillow at him, Ron ran from the dormitory, his feet pounding against the stairs as he went. Tossing the pillow aside, Harry raced after him. Years of running from Dudley and his gang hadn't gone wasted, Harry catching up to Ron as they neared the common room. The stretch between them was closing as Harry made his way into the common room, his hair worse than usual and his face pink from the exertion.
"Save me, Hermione," Ron's voice came from behind the chair Hermione was seated in. She rolled her eyes and gave a polite wave to Harry.
The grin that had spread across Harry's face fell, the memory of why he had been brooding in the boys' dormitory in the first place crashing into him with unrelenting force. Ron was now peeking over the top of the table, his face so pink that his freckles were blending in. His hair was sticking out at various angles from what must have been a dive behind her chair. Forcing a smile, Harry sat down next to Hermione.
"Truce?" said Ron, his chin resting on the table.
"Truce," said Harry. "For now."
Laughing, Ron took the chair across from Harry. "So what do you want to do?"
"Wizards chess. This time I just might win."
"Right," said Ron, snorting his disbelief as he stood up to retrieve his chessboard. Harry sighed as he watched him leave the room, completely unaware of Hermione's eyes settled on him.
This is the first part of a Trilogy. For the second and third parts, click on my pen name at the top of the page and it will take you to a list of my stories. The second part is called Sweet Honesty and the third part, Now and Forever.