This is a missing moment from Deathly Hallows.
So this is how it happened: I was reading DH when a particular statement jumped out at me, equally puzzling and wonderful. Page 485:
"I need you two as well!" he called to Ron and Hermione, who had been sulking, half concealed, in the doorway of the sitting room.
They both moved into the light, looking oddly relieved.
Has anyone else wondered what exactly was going on to cause Ron and Hermione to look oddly relieved?
Ron POV.
Please, please, please, please review!
Disclaimer: Do I look like a genius to you? (
Harry swept from the room, and Ron felt Hermione begin to stir beneath his arm—she was going to join him. He got up with her, and then suddenly paused.
"Ron, what is it?"
He stared very intently and carefully into Hermione's eyes, and then gently pulled her with him into the shadowed doorway of the sitting room. He turned to face her, grasping her wrists where his hands had slid down her arms, trying to decide what to do or say next. Hermione gave him a curious, questioning look, but it was only because he knew her so well that Ron could easily see the under-lying worry.
"How do you feel?" He murmured.
"Ron—it's all right, we should go…"
"Hermione."
She sighed, and Ron did not care that she had been asked this question a dozen times in the last half an hour—he needed to hear that she was okay. He tried to imagine what it had felt like to be trapped; the Malfoy drawing room acting like some dark demented cage, and Bellatrix's wand pointing at her…the curse hitting endlessly… He couldn't bear to imagine it…
"Ron," she said quietly, and she moved her hand sort of tiredly to place on his shoulder. Ron felt the fabric of his jacket warm beneath her touch. "It was terrible, but it is over, okay?"
"I'm so…I'm so sorry—we were trying to help, Hermione, we were—Harry got Dobby to come using the mirror, and I was feeling for a door—" He broke off under her gaze, his mouth finally quieting, which previously had seemed to be blabbering on of its own accord.
"I know. I heard you," she whispered. She moved a bit closer to him, her face now completely hidden from the light. "You, calling me. I couldn't answer, I wanted to answer." Her eyes were wet again. Ron placed his hands on her face, and her tears beaded on his fingers. He knew that, like him, Hermione was thinking about the intimacy of the movement, and it was true that he could not remember a time when he had touched her this way…
"I'm sorry I left. I'm sorry a million times, Hermione." She draped her hands over his wrists, wrapping her fingers around his arms.
"I know."
"I wish I could take it back, I never should have been such an insufferable pra—"
"You came back," she said quietly, looking into his eyes, and Ron's face began to warm for the first time. "I knew you would."
Ron continued to stare at her, unabashed, and he knew that he should probably feel embarrassed, but it was impossible to feel an emotion so normal. He felt as if he was caught up in some separate span of time, and when him and Hermione left they would not be where they had been…everything would not be exactly as it had been before… And Ron could feel something inexplicable passing between them, and he knew that something impossible was about to happen—and that he, Ron, was about to do it…
"I need you two as well!" Harry's voice called, penetrating their bubble, and Ron and Hermione immediately dropped their arms and stepped simultaneously into view, and Ron could not help feeling like he would have liked to equally hex Harry and hug him at that single moment.