Fireworks exploded above them, beautiful even in the bright sunlight. Loud music played in the background. Colourful stalls lined the sides of the road; the clamour at each as people attempted to win the prizes offered only adding to the din. Balloons and confetti floated around, laughter was frequently heard and the air of festivity was apparent.

Emma hurried through the crowds, oblivious to all of this. She could see nothing more than masses of limbs and confusion. A carnival was a terrifying place for a seven year old to get lost in. She stopped, trying to find the bright candy stall that her mother had pointed out to her earlier. Emma had thought it looked like the gingerbread house from Hansel and Gretel. She was supposed to go there if she ever got lost. The sidewalks were getting crowded as trumpets blared, signalling that the float procession was about to begin. Emma called out for her mother, panicking. She squeezed between two men, turned around and ran straight into a redheaded boy.

"Ouch! Watch where you're going," he exclaimed as they both fell. He got up and dusted himself off quickly but Emma just remained where she was. She couldn't find the shop. She couldn't find her Mum. How would she get home?

"Are you alright?"

Emma looked up, startled, at the boy's voice. He was staring at her warily. "Are you okay?" he asked again.

Two fat tears leaked out Emma's eyes in response.

"Hey don't cry," the boy said. He held out a hand. "Come on, get up."

She shook her head, sniffing as the tears fell in earnest.

He grabbed her hand and helped her up anyway. "It's okay, don't cry. My name's Ron. What's yours?"

"Emma," she whispered, still sniffing.

He looked a little uncertain about what to do. He turned around and his face brightened. "Bill! Hey Bill!"

A taller redhead walked over and regarded them both. "What did you do?" he asked Ron, one eyebrow raised.

Ron scowled. "I didn't do anything. She bumped into me and started crying. Her name's Emma."

Bill bent and picked up Emma easily. "Hello Emma. Don't cry, kid. Tell me what's wrong. I can help you."

"I can't find my Mum," Emma mumbled.

"It's okay, we'll find her. You're safe now. Did she tell you to meet her somewhere if you got lost?" There was something soothing about the way he talked to her. Emma decided she could trust him.

"The candy shop," she said. "The one that looks like the gingerbread house."

Bill nodded. "Point it out to me when you see it, okay? She's probably waiting for you there. Let's go find her," he said, walking down the street, still carrying her.

Emma looked behind Bill and saw Ron following them quickly. He was rummaging in his pockets. He pulled out a lollipop and held it up to her with a big smile. "Here. My sister says candy makes her happy. Maybe it'll make you feel better too." Emma took the candy from him, smiling slightly. He grinned back at her.

She never threw away the wrapper. It was as red as his hair.

"Don't get too far ahead Emma!" She and her mother were walking through the woods near the town. It had been Emma's idea to have a picnic lunch to make up for her fright the last week in the carnival.

"I won't," she called back, running amongst the trees. She caught sight of a flash of red up ahead. She slowed down warily. The Black Circle was only a little way away in that direction. It was a hole in the woods – a huge expanse of charred, blackened soil where no trees or grass ever grew. The popular myth was that witches once lived there and in a fit of rage, had burned that part of the forest to the ground. The land was still said to be cursed. Not only had no foliage ever grown back, many people approaching it had often found themselves elsewhere without remembering how they had gotten there or had rushed off for appointments that had already been met or were scheduled for another time. It was an area the townspeople usually avoided.

Emma didn't like witches. The only ones she'd read about were wicked. And she'd read a lot of stories. She saw the flash of red again as she moved closer carefully. She couldn't hear her Mum behind her anymore. She was nearly there when a hand fell on her shoulder. She screamed loudly and turned around, lashing out at her attacker.

"Hey, calm down. It's only me. Remember? Ron from the carnival?"

Emma stopped flailing and stared at Ron. "You scared me!"

He looked sheepish. "Sorry about that. What are you doing here? You aren't lost again, are you?"

Emma glared at him. "I'm not lost! Besides, I know how to find my way back home from here. I've left a trail just like Hansel and Gretel." This was a lie of course, but she was determined not to look foolish in front of this boy again.

He looked confused. "Who?"

"Don't you read? Hansel and Gretel!"

He shook his head. "I –er – don't read much."

She gave him a withering look. "What are you doing here anyway?"

"We – my family – er – we came to go camping?" He sounded uncertain about the word. "We thought it would be fun."

"Oh. Are you staying here for a few days then?"

"Er we'll be here every weekend," Ron replied. "Listen, how about you join us next weekend and we'll have some fun here? You've got to be about my sister Ginny's age. She's eight and she's always complaining about not having another girl around." He rolled his eyes.

"I'm seven," Emma replied. She bit her lip. "I'll have to ask my Mum."

"Well I hope she says yes," Ron shrugged.

Emma hoped so too. There was something interesting about this boy. She'd like the chance to be friends with him.

Eight-year-old Emma had never been happier to have summer vacation. The Weasleys would be arriving soon.

Ron would be arriving soon.

She had never met a more interesting boy. Sure he was gross and picked his nose and shoved her into the dirt like all other boys but he was ready to talk to her about magic. None of her school friends found fairy tales and stories about elves and goblins fun but Ginny and Ron had. In fact, they told her more stories. Some were different from the kind she'd read, but that didn't matter. She'd finally found someone she could talk to.

She liked Ron. He had visited a few times during the year too. He would go on walks in the woods with her, trying to find fairies and unicorns. The best part was that he seemed to believe in them as much as she did.

She wished he stayed in Chudley. Then they could have really had some fun.

"I'll be going away to school this year," Ron said. They lay side by side in her backyard, their mothers discussing recipes in the kitchen. She'd always found Ron's mother a little odd what with the old-fashioned long dresses she wore and the way she couldn't figure out how to use the microwave or even the telephone. Ron was strange that way too. Sometimes he didn't seem to know what she was talking about even if it was something as common as a sweet or one of her favourite stories.

"To the school where all your brothers go?" she asked. "You won't be visiting until next summer then?"

He nodded. "I'll be at school all year." In her opinion, he didn't look unhappy enough about not seeing her again for a long time.

"Oh." Emma wondered why she was feeling so disappointed. It wasn't like she saw him very often anyway. "Will you write to me?" she asked suddenly.

"Er – I'll try," he said. "Can't promise anything though."

At least he'd been honest about not writing, Emma mused. She was being silly of course. Ron Weasley hadn't sent her a single letter in seven months. Why should she expect him to send a card or even remember her birthday?

Her eyes fell on one of the story books beside her bed. She had tried to get Ron to read Snow White but he'd just laughed and shied away from the pink cover.

She remembered the first time she'd met him. She'd practically been a damsel in distress. And he'd found her.

Did that make him her prince?

He looked worried the next summer.

"What's the matter?" Emma asked, pausing in her contemplation of whether fairies were more powerful than goblins. "Is everything okay?"

He stopped shredding the grass he'd been pulling up. "Yeah. Everything's fine."

She moved to sit in front of him. "I do know you, you know. I can see something's wrong. Why didn't you bring Ginny?"

"She isn't feeling very well," he said shortly.

She bit her lip. "Are you worried about her?"

"Look it's none of your business."

She was silent for a moment. "You'll find a way to make her okay."

He looked up at her. "What makes you so sure?"

"You found a way to help me when I got lost the first time we met, remember? You're good at that – helping people."

"You're the only one who thinks that, Emma. Most people think I can't do much." He looked surly.

"That's what my friend Lilian thinks about princes in fairy tales," Emma said. "She thinks all they do is go around kissing princesses and the story is really about the princess or the villain. But she's wrong. Without the prince, no one has a happy ending. So you're like the prince. The story can't end without you, even if what you do is a small part of it."

Ron smiled and ruffled her hair. "Thanks Emma." He sighed. "I won't be seeing you for the rest of the summer. We're visiting Bill in Egypt. You remember him?"

Emma nodded slowly, trying not to let her disappointment show. She spent the evening drawing herself and trying different princess clothes on the sketch – it was one of her favourite hobbies. It wasn't long before she was doodling, though, as her mind wandered to Ron again and what he might be doing.

She was startled to find she'd drawn a prince beside her picture. A prince who looked suspiciously like Ron Weasley.

He didn't show up at all the next summer.

She almost got into trouble for embellishing the corner of all her holiday homework with the picture of a boy with red hair.

She was getting better at art now. Her mother wondered why all her red pencils kept getting used up.

Then finally, one day, she woke up to find a letter on her bedside table. It was from Ron. She jumped up, feeling fully awake. She didn't care where it came from or who had put it there. She simply ripped open the envelope. He had mostly rambled on and on. She wasn't even sure what he was trying to say. She might only be twelve but she could tell he was feeling lonely.

She wrote a long reply and put it in an envelope, not knowing how to post it. It was gone the next morning. She spent the whole day hunting for it below her window but couldn't find it.

A lollipop sat on her desk the following morning, the wrapper as red as Ron's hair.

Was it normal to have feelings for a boy whom she barely knew and only saw once a year? Emma walked through the woods, pondering how she felt about Ron. She didn't quite love him, but she knew it wasn't a simple crush anymore either.

He had turned up only once that summer. He was fifteen now, Emma realised. Maybe he was growing out of princes and magic and fairy tales. Was he growing out of his childhood friend too then? He had barely talked to her when she'd seen him. He had been roaming the woods near The Black Circle. He'd looked tense but refused to talk about what was bothering him. He'd just seemed to need to get away from things for a while. So she'd prattled on about her beloved magical creatures and spells and stories. She didn't think he'd listened to her much though.

She looked up, shaking herself out of her musings. She was close to the Black Circle now. She'd been coming out here more and more the past few days, partly because she was hoping Ron would show up again and partly to see her favourite piece of nature.

Two tall trees grew close to each other – so close that their roots were tangled to the point where you couldn't tell which set belonged to which tree. They bent away from each other because of the lack of space as they grew taller, but the roots were still entangled.

They reminded her of Ron and herself. She was hoping that though they might be growing apart as they grew older, their roots were twisted together enough for them to be together someday.

"Emma!"

Emma gave a little scream and nearly fell off the mossy rock she was perched on. She dropped her sketch book only to have it picked up by a long hand. She looked up to find Ron Weasley smiling slightly as he held out her book. "I seem to keep startling you, don't I?" he said.

"What are you doing here? I thought you weren't going to turn up this summer either," she said, taking the book back.

He looked towards the Black Circle. "I was just… I missed this place and the good times I had here." He waved at the woods behind him. There were new scars on his arms that Emma was too polite to ask about. Besides her mind was preoccupied with a more pressing question.

Was it normal that her heart should be thudding in her chest even though the shock of seeing him had worn off?

"You're saying it like you're never going to come back here," she joked. He met her eyes and her breath caught in her throat. "You… you really aren't going to come back here, are you?" she whispered.

"I don't know, Emma. I hope I can, someday. I'm going to miss all the fun I had here." He hesitated for a moment. "Look, can you promise me something? Don't go out at night, especially not when there's a lot of fog, okay? Don't wander around in the woods alone like this. It isn't safe."

Emma nodded. "Okay." She didn't know what it was but something was obviously bothering him and she just wanted to reassure him that she would be safe. She looked at him for a moment. What if this was the last time she was going to see him?

She suddenly moved forward and kissed him lightly. Before he even had a chance to respond, she drew back and took off through the woods. She thought she heard him call out her name but she didn't look back. He was going to leave her, she knew it. Even if he came back, she knew he wasn't going to fall in love with her. He had said he'd miss the place. He hadn't said he'd miss her.

She knew for sure now. He wasn't her prince. He had never wanted to be.

The next time she saw him, she was eighteen. She was volunteering at the sweet shop in the Carnival and the minute she saw his red hair – so distinct in the crowd – her heart leapt into her throat. She tried to duck behind the counter but he spotted her.

"Emma?" he asked, grinning. "Hey! It's been so long since I've seen you."

You were the one who left, Emma thought. She forced a smile onto her face. It had been three years, for heaven's sake. She had even dated other guys. Why on earth should Ron Weasley still make her blush?

"Hello," she said. "Yeah, almost been three years now." He did seem a lot more relaxed than the last time she'd seen him.

"You're volunteering here now." He grinned at her. "Did you do the decorations? This stall looks more like a gingerbread house now than it ever did before."

She smiled back, a little more naturally this time. "Yeah, I did most of the drawing and painting."

He nodded. "I remember you were always good at that stuff. You loved those fairy tales and magic stories too, didn't you?"

"I don't believe in magic anymore. I guess I grew out of it," she said.

"Well that's a shame. I'd wanted to introduce you to someone who loves reading as much as you. She's got a thing for magic too." His eyes twinkled with amusement at some hidden joke. He reached out a long arm – Emma was suddenly struck by how tall and confident he'd become – and pulled a bushy haired woman to him. "This is Hermione. Hermione, this is Emma. We were friends when I was younger."

Emma stared at the woman, almost forgetting to shake her hand. She barely heard the woman's greeting and only nodded in return. She was his girlfriend; there was no doubt about that. The way he looked at her was just too obvious. She managed to smile politely and excused herself quickly. She needed to get away from them. She needed to clear her head.

She hurried through the crowds on the sidewalks. She had stopped believing in fairy tales long ago but she had never thrown away those drawings where Ron featured as the prince. Some small part of her had always hoped she'd have a happy ever after with him. But now, the story had ended. The prince had found his princess.

But she wasn't the princess. Hermione was.

Trumpets blared, announcing the arrival of the floats. She barely saw where she was going; she was just pushing her way through the crowds, feeling almost as lost as she had on that fateful day when she'd met Ron for the first time. She squeezed between two men and –

"Ouch! Watch where you're going!"

She fell to the ground and cried out as someone heavy sat down hard on her legs. "Sorry, sorry," a voice said and the weight on her legs disappeared. "Sorry, I should have been looking where I was going too," the voice said.

She looked up and her stomach did an odd leap as she looked into the eyes of a brown-haired stranger. He was smiling apologetically and holding out his hand. "Sorry about that," he repeated.

She took his hand, feeling goosebumps rise up her arms. "No," she stammered. "It's my fault, I was a bit distracted."

He was still holding her hand. He let it go when her eyes moved to it. He scratched his neck awkwardly. "I gave you a bit of a shock though. Er – how about we go get some chocolate? I hear it's good for the nerves." He held out his hand. "My name's Philip."

"Emma," she said, shaking his hand. "I volunteer at the sweet stall just down the road. Why don't you come down there and I'll take you up on that offer?"

He smiled at her. "That would be lovely." He touched her shoulder lightly. "Lead the way."

Emma smiled to herself. She spotted Ron again in the crowd, but somehow, that leaden feeling in her stomach was gone. She sneaked a glance at the man walking beside her. There was something interesting about Philip. She didn't know what but she knew she wanted to get to know him better.

And maybe her story wasn't over yet. Maybe… maybe she got to choose when to close the book.

Please do review and let me know what you thought :)

This was for the finals of the Quidditch League Fanfiction Competition. It's been an amazing time writing for this competition and I wish it wasn't ending already. The prompts used were: Growing apart doesn't change the fact that for a long time we grew side by side; our roots will always be tangled. - Ally Condie, There is no real ending. It's just the place where you stop the story. - Frank Herbert and Happy ever after.

I'm not sure how this story turned out. I like it, but I'm a bit afraid Ron might be OOC. My logic - being a canonhead and wanting badly not to make this AU - is that the Weasleys have to have had some amount of Muggle interaction. Ron was ignorant of most Muggle things but he did know a bit about them. It seemed plausible to me that he might have had Muggle friends when he was younger. He couldn't have been isolated from the normal world. He meets Emma at Chudley during the annual carnival at that town and continues to meet her almost every summer after that. I can't think his parents would have a problem with him meeting a Muggle friend so few times through the years. She's two years younger than him and, well, life at Hogwarts happens for Ron. But what starts off as a crush for her, turns into something more until she realises that he isn't meant for her and there are other people out there who can be her prince. She's a girl who never stops believing in fairy tales. A bit of the drama and stereotypes are there on purpose. She's a teenager, she does silly things like doodling his name and his face all over her books.

The Black Circle is where the Chudley Cannons Quidditch pitch is. It's got the same kind of charms as the World Cup stadium which understandably, scares the Muggles.

I hope the ending was not too abrupt. In my mind, Emma had already given up on Ron. But sometimes your old crush just turns up after years and you have that weak moment where your gut feels like it's being pulled out of your body. But then you find someone else and you remember that it's okay, you don't care about him that way anymore.

I hope you thought it was good enough :) Please do leave me a review!