Just a little help

Chapter 1 – No thanks! Or maybe on second thought...

She was really irritated by now. How many times hadn't she fallen by now? Way too many in her opinion. She guessed she wouldn't ever be any good at this. Even with this thought she got up again, she wasn't one to give up on something easy.

She got up and slid about 20 feet down before *THUMP*

She gave an angry sight.

"Need some help?"

"Absolutely not. I'm quite capable of riding a snowboard without any help!" she told the guy having just stopped right in front of her just a moment ago. He wore a green jacket and a pair of black skiing pants.

She got up once again and continued downhill.

However, she didn't get far before she fell once again. This time it was humiliating, the guy, who had just offered her help was still watching her from where she had left him 30 feet away from where she lay now.

"Still don't want any help?"

"On second thought, I guess I'm not as good at this as I thought I would be. I guess I... could do with some help." It took a lot out of her to ask about help from some unknown person.

She looked up at the guy, and noted that he had a smug grin on his face, or at least in the part she could see. His eyes were covered by a pair of black skiing glasses and his hair covered by a helmet.

"I'm Hermione by the way."

"Ron."

&%&%&%

"I'm knackered!" Ron said after about three hours of snowboarding with Hermione. "C'mon, let's take a break."

Instead of going downhill, they took of their snowboards and Ron led Hermione to a small stone cabin, which served as a cafe. They left their snowboards outside, leaned against one of the walls.

They entered and Hermione sat down at a table and Ron came up to her a minute later, with a cup of hot chocolate in each hand. He handed one to Hermione and put his own down on the table as he sat down and started to unfasten his boots.

"I hate them," he explained; "Their a bit small."

Hermione answered with a nod, even thought here's were just the right size.

"Ron, please let me pay for the hot chocolates. It's the least I could do for all the help you've given me."

"I'm not going to let you do any such thing as pay. I was the one suggesting we take a break and go here, so I'm paying. And that's final."

Hermione wasn't usually one to give up easily, but she didn't feel like arguing with Ron after he had helped her out for so long.

Ron took of his black glasses to reveal a pair of sapphire blue eyes.

"Okay then Ron, if that's what you want."

Ron gave a satisfied smile. "Good."

Hermione followed his example and took of her own skiing glasses and two pools of chocolate were revealed. She also took of her helmet, even though she knew her usually frizzy hair would be even worse than it used to be.

"So Ron, why have you graced France with your presence?"

"Oh, it's supposed to be 'bonding with siblings' vacation, but when we got here all of us wandered off to do our own thing. My sister and her boyfriend aka my best friend is one example. They always run of to be somewhere alone. However, today we all agreed to go skiing together, but I lost the rest of the bunch after 10 minutes, and while I searched for them, I found you. You then? You sound just as British as me, if I may say so."

"I came here from Bulgaria, I was over there, visiting a friend of mine there, and then I came here to meet up with some school friends of mine and spend some time round here. I used to go to school not far from here, and before that I used to go here on vacation with my parents."

"So you went to school here, that's interesting." Ron had managed to empty his hot chocolate as they spoke.

"Say Hermione, if some random bloke, who just used half his day teaching you how to snowboard properly, asked you out for dinner, what would the young gal's answer be?"

"Well, that depends... Is this hypothetical guy of yours cute?" She gave him a teasingly smile.

"He's cute and bloody handsome I tell you," Ron gave her a small wink.

"I guess I could think about it, if he promised to stop swear that is," she said, even though Ron didn't know if she was teasing him or if she was serious now.

"Looks like Ickleronniekins got himself a girlfriend," someone said in a singsong voice.

"Bugger of Fred!" Ron turned around to find all of his siblings and Harry, minus Bill who had stayed home with his wife Fleur, standing not far away from his and Hermione's table.

"Ron, why didn't you tell me you are a Weasley?"

Ron blushed while Charlie said;

"That's our cue to leave."

With the help of Harry, Charlie managed to usher all of the Weasley's outside.

"Uhm, sorry I guess, but h... how have you heard of us before?" 'Oh Merlin, she has to be a...'

"I'm a witch," she whispered, almost like she was afraid there were a muggle family with Weasley's too.

"Wait a minute! You're Hermione Granger! Viktor Krum's girlfriend!" "I'm certainly not his girlfriend, we're just friends!"

"Oh, so he doesn't want anything else from you then a shag then."

*SMACK*

Hermione had hit him with full force.

Ron held his hand over the red handprint that was now on his left cheek.

After some time in silence he pressed out; "I guess I deserved that..."

Hermione gave a nod.

"I'm sorry Hermione... I just... I hate that git, okay? He stole my date to the Yule ball my fourth year at Hogwarts. I even didn't really like her, but I asked her first! And she said yes, but two days later she told me she couldn't go with me, because Krum had asked her and she said yes to him too, and she much rather go with a international quidditch star. And... I just simply hate that git!"

Hermione gave him a small kiss on the red handprint. "I'm really sorry about your date Ron, but who knows; maybe you wouldn't be here for me to have dinner with if you had a date to the Yule ball."

"So, you still want to have dinner?" Ron looked really surprised and happy too.

Hermione bit her lower lip and gave a nod.

"How 'bout tomorrow night?"

"Yeah, that sounds nice." She gave him what he right then decided was the most beautiful smile in the whole world.

"I could come pick you up at, say seven?" "That would be great. I'm staying at this B&B my friend's running. I'll just write down the address for you."

She picked up a pen from the pocket in her jacket and wrote down her address on a napkin. "Here you go."

She handed it to Ron and he put it in his pocket to keep it safe.

"Hey Ron! We have to go now to catch our bus." It was Percy who called at him from the door.

"Well, I've got to go now, but I'll see you tomorrow then." He gave her a peek on the cheek and left her blushing.

"Bye Ron."

A/N: Oh Merlin, that turned out to be a really long chapter... More than twice of what I usually write... But it's nice to be back. Just been so much happening in my life, but I'll try and do my best to get back to writing. R&R people!