Remus sucked the last of his chocolate bar from his tumb and forefinger as he held the book he was currently absorbed with in his opposite hand. His eyes flowed over the words as he was thrown into a world very much unlike his own. The lead was an outcast because of an incident when he was young that resulted in a physical deformation and new social status. That was something he could relate to.
He vaguely registered that the door to the library at Grimmauld had opened. Looking over after a moment when he heard some rather annoying rustling had him dropping his favored book to the ground, his knees quickly following. Hermione had apparently not realized the room was occupied and had run in, collapsing to the floor in front of the couch she was aiming for and struggling with a bag of her favorite comfort food : butterscotch hard candies.
He carefully picked up the obviously distressed young woman and sat down on the couch with her held safely in his arms. She still struggled with the candy wrapper on one of them, but eventually got it open, popping it into her mouth between sobs. For some reason not unlike him and chocolate, she found comfort when extremely upset by sucking on a sugary treat from her childhood.
Remus ran his hands over her bushy hair while whispering words that were supposed to be comforting to her. Unfortunately, it only seemed to be making it worse, so he settled for asking, "Hermione, what's wrong?"
Her next cry came out as more of a squeak molded with a squeal, and she buried her face into Remus' surprisingly toned chest. He nuzzled her hair with his nose, " 'Mione, I can't help until you tell me."
When she still cried, Remus sighed while his left hand rubbed gentle circles into her back, "Do you want me to owl Harry and Ginny? I'm sure they could bring little James with them. How about Ron? Where's he? He could help you as well."
She pulled her head away from his warm body and gazed up at him with glistening eyes, "Oh, Remus! Ron broke off our engagement today. He told me-"
Before she could finished, her cries took her over again. Involuntary anger ran through the older man's body and he held her tighter, "What did he tell you, love?"
"H-he said that even though he t-t-thought we could make it work, he should have k-known that after five years of dating and still not being sure on being together, we should have called it off long ago. I..." she coughed a sob away. "I tried to protest, but when I did he got angry and told me there were many other women who wanted to date the second man of the Golden Trio. There were other women he could be much more compatible with than a bossy, know-it-all like me."
"You're not a bossy know-it-all," Remus said, wiping her tears away.
She gave a harsh laugh, "Yes I am. Somethings never change, eh?"
More anger ran through his body at the thought of her, one of his favorite people on the planet, degrading herself to less than nothing, "No, love. You're plenty smart, but you use it much more capably now with age and I seem to remember many a night spent in this very library where we had some very nice heated debates over topics I could have never had with anyone else. You're not bossy, but like things done your way. You're also compassionate, loving, helpful, beautiful, and extremely passionate. None of those are bad qualities."
Her eyes filled with tears again, but this time he was sure they were tears of relief. She wrapped her arms around his neck and rested her face on his shoulder to cry on. He was perfectly content letting her do so.
He wasn't sure how long she cried for, but the next time she looked up at him, it was with a completely different gaze than the one she had walking in, "What...what will Harry and Ginny think of me now? I'm sure Ron has gotten to them by now."
Remus wiped the remaining tears off of her face and stared into her bright chocolate eyes, "I seem to recall that it was always Ron and yourself fighting, not you and Harry. With that and the fact that it was you who never turned your back on him and Ron has multiple times, no matter how good the reasoning, I think Harry would have enough sense to make a judgement based on fact rather than because of his current relation to the ginger in question. I also remember Ginny is your best friend and knows for certain that her brother is a prat. My point is you'll be fine. No one is going to hate you because of what Ron decided to do."
"But his family-"
"Will know it was him and not you that called it off. They can't possibly hate you for something you had no say in."
Hermione stared at him for a moment, seeming to be searching for something, right before she pecked him on the lips and pulled back enough to see his reaction.
To say he was shocked would be an embarassing understatement. His blue eyes widened before softening with a growing smile across his face.
She smiled back and settled into cuddling against his chest. He glanced at his book on the floor and then at the girl in his arms.
Oh, yes. This was much better.
Please review and let me know what you think of my first HP one-shot. May be extended into a story if I ever feel like it.