A/N: My first R/Hr. I know, I've been shipping them forever and I've
never done anything on them. Shameful! Slap me. This was written in
about five minutes and I got the idea from the whole 'we believe in
trees' thing. Yay for mottos. We need one for GnH!
Warning: Shameless fluff. Ooer.
Disclaimer: The babes are not mine; they belong to JK Rowling. As we've all said countless times.
Always
Hermione likes apple trees. At her home in the countryside, she has loads of them, all scattered around, and when she goes for holidays she climbs them—always with a book—and stays up there for hours. It is her secret place; her world of fantasy.
She invites Ron there one summer; Harry must of course come later. Ron looks awed at all the trees; and seems twelve under seventeen, as he stands tangled in the branches of the tallest one. "I can't see," he moans, trying to claw his way through. "Hermione!" Hermione throws her head back and laughs, like a girl, oh that's new. She's sitting on a rather high branch, and she picks up an apple and drops it on Ron's head. It clashes with his hair color for a second.
"Hermione, where are
you?" She can hear him hoisting himself up on a branch. She shifts
higher, so that her head pokes out of the top of the tree.
"Hermione!"
"I'm up here,"
she calls. She will let him have a rest from the game. "Can you see
me?"
"Always," Ron calls, and Hermione is so very glad he can't see her blush. She will make sure to hit him with another apple when he gets to the top.
When he finds her branch Hermione makes to toss an apple at him—not to him, at him—but Ron smiles crookedly and kisses her hand. "I found you."
"Always," Hermione answers, breathless.
They sit there for awhile, and Ron asks how long the apple trees have been there. Hermione is still thinking about always—always he can see her, and always he can find her—and says, "Always," and says again, "always," and says it again as she laughs like a girl. "They've always been here."
