Hermione couldn't sleep. She couldn't stop thinking about her encounter with the troll, the fact she had lied to a teacher, and her new friends. She felt horrible about how she had acted and couldn't believe Harry and Ron still helped her after that. She still hadn't forgotten, though, that she had been crying in the bathroom because of Ron.
With so much to think about, she realized sleep would be impossible and grabbed a book from the stack near her bed. She headed down to the common room to read. She thought she would be able to think better.
It was the middle of the night, and she didn't expect anyone to be up, but there was someone sitting in a chair near the fire. She was annoyed she would not be alone, and was ready to tell them to go away, or just go back upstairs, but then saw it was Ron. He seemed to be thinking about something, but looked up when he heard her footsteps.
"Oh! Uh, Hermione…what're you doing up?" Ron said shyly.
Hermione felt a bit awkward. She felt as if she was interrupting something, and she also didn't know if she was ready to talk to him. But things had changed. She could do this. "Well, I couldn't sleep. I guess you could call the day interesting, to say the least." She let out a half-laugh, and was happy to see Ron laughing at the understatement, too.
"Yeah, I couldn't sleep either. And Neville's snoring doesn't help." Hermione laughed.
They sat in silence for a few moments until Ron spoke again. "Hermione, I was, uh, thinking about something," Ron said. Hermione was leaning on the chair across from his, and he stood up to talk to her.
"I wanted to say sorry."
Hermione was shocked. Was he really apologizing?
"I've been pretty awful to you, especially today, saying you had no friends and all. You could've really gotten hurt, and that's not what I wanted. And I was wrong, anyway, because Harry and I are your friends now, right?" Ron talked slowly, only glancing at Hermione to gauge her reaction as he shuffled his feet around on the floor.
Hermione didn't know what to say, so she rushed at Ron and gave him a hug instead. He didn't really know what to do, but gingerly hugged her back. "Thank you, Ron. Thank you for saving me and thank you for apologizing. Though I should apologize, too. I was a big know-it-all and shouldn't have tried to embarrass you in class."
"Um..it's okay," Ron said uncomfortably. Suddenly, Hermione realized she was still hugging him. She quickly let go and stepped back, blushing. His face was tinged pink, as well, and he started to rub the back of his head.
Hermione tried to recover. "Well, I guess I'd better, uh, get to bed. It's late and we have classes tomorrow." She started to back up towards the girls' staircase.
"Yeah, I'm heading up, too," Ron said quickly.
They were both halfway up the stairs when Hermione turned around and said "Ron?"
He turned back. "Yeah?"
"Thank you. Really."
Ron grinned sheepishly. "You're welcome."
Hermione nodded and turned around. She called back, "Good night, Ron."
Ron turned around smiling. "Good night, Hermione."