Chapter 1-Initial Arguments
The boys dormitory door was slammed from up above, and Hermione glanced over in that direction to see Harry stomping up the stairs. Ron and Harry where now officially angry at each other for the first time that she could remember, and she found their argument pretty stupid: Harry getting into the Triwizard Tournament. Ron was angrier at Harry more than the latter, but more than that she was angry at both of them for arguing over such a stupid thing.
Shaking her head, she pulled out her transfiguration textbook, and began to read up on how to turn an owl into a footstool. She found it quite interesting until she could hear shouts coming from a dormitory above. She wasn't normally one to listen in on other people's conversations, but she recognized the voices as Harry and Ron's and set down her textbook, trying intently to figure out what they were saying over the chattering voices from within the common room.
"I would have thought you would at least tell me—your best mate—that you were entering your name into the Goblet of Fire. Don't I have a right to know?" Ron demanded.
"I told you Ron, I didn't put my name in the Goblet of Fire. I'm not that crazy—I don't want eternal glory. I already have enough unwanted attention as it is!" Harry retorted.
"Oh ya, I'm sure you hate every bit of attention you get from the girls staring at you all the time, and the whole wizarding world knowing your name. It must be horrible. I mean—I would do the same thing too if I was in your position and wanted more attention." Ron yelled back.
"You act as if my life is so perfect. I'm not that much of a git as you are trying to make me out to be. Malfoy on the other hand would fit that description, but not me. You're being stupid." Harry yelled back.
"Ya, that's me…Harry Potter's stupid friend. I don't know a thing about you after all these years. You're just too perfect." Ron muttered back, his voice now sounded a little hurt.
Neville's voice could now be heard from the dormitory above. "Hey, guys. We are trying to get some sleep here, so if you two are going to keep yelling would you please take it downstairs?" he asked.
"Don't worry Neville, you won't have to ask us to stop again. Harry and I are no longer speaking to each other." Ron said from above, his voice dying down a bit. Hermione had to listen real hard to hear Harry's final comment.
"Ya, Neville. Ron and I are no longer friends." There was silence from the floor above, and Hermione assumed that the fight was over.
"Stupid boys." She muttered to herself as she pulled her transfiguration book open again, and returned to reading. There was the slamming of a dormitory door again a few minutes later, and soon Harry was in the common room. A few heads turned to stare at him as he walked by.
"Harry." Hermione said as he passed the chair that she was sitting in. He didn't seem to notice her, or didn't want to, because he didn't reply to her call. "Harry." She said again, but he still didn't answer. Jumping out of her chair, she ran over to him just as he was about to leave through the portrait hole. "Harry, you know that it's past our curfew. We can't leave the common room until morning." She told him.
"I don't care, Hermione." He told her without glancing back as he swung his invisibility cloak around his body. Frustrated, Hermione grabbed the edge of his cloak and threw it around her body as well.
"What are you doing?" Harry asked her, turning around in the cloak, causing it to slip off their heads. His face was contorted with rage and pain, as if someone had just cast a cruciatus curse on him, but she could also tell that it was filled with sadness. He didn't like fighting with his best mate.
"I'm going with you." She told him, picking up the invisibility cloak as it dropped to the ground.
"Well, I don't want you to come with me." He sneered at her. "This is Ron's and my fight, and I don't want you to get involved in it as well."
"Well too bad." Hermione told him. "I am as much a part of this fight as you and Ron are. This fight doesn't only affect you and Ron you know."
"Oh, it doesn't does it? You going to side with him too…just like you always do?" He said, snatching the cloak from her hands and walking, picking up where he left off.
"Harry!" she said, running a little to catch up with him. "Are you going to keep on acting like a little child and ignore me? Or are you going to listen to what I have to say?"
"What does it matter?" Harry asked. "I'm just going to end up feeling worse than I already do if I talk about it with somebody." He told her, abruptly stopping in his tracks and turning to face her. "If you want to talk about it with somebody, why don't you go and talk to your crush, Ron. If anyone is oblivious or needs to talk about something, it's you and him."
"You think I care about him a lot?" she asked, her face turning red in the darkness of the corridor. How had Harry known?
"Yes, I do." He told her. "Well, at least more than me."
"Well then, your wrong." She told him. "Very wrong indeed."
"I knew it." Said a faltering voice from behind the pair, "I knew you would side with him, and I knew that you were in love with him!" Hermione and Harry glanced around to see a pale faced Ron standing behind them in the moonlit corridor.
"Ron! What are you doing here?" asked Hermione, her face reddening even more than it already was.
"I think it is me that should be asking you that question, Miss Granger." said a voice that Hermione was not too keen to be hearing at the moment. She turned around to face her current potions master that had caught them after hours, and blushed even more. "Fifty points from Gryffindor each for breaking curfew." smirked Snape, "You will also have detention in my office for the next two months on Saturday evenings, starting at six o'clock."
"But Professor that is hardly—" Hermione began, but she was cut off by Snape before she could even finish.
"I don't care Miss Granger. Your punishment stands as it is. Now, back off to your dormitories." He told them, clearly enjoying the fact that he was able to be the one in charge of their punishment.
The trio sulked back to their common room, not even saying a word to each other and not even daring to steal a glance either. Snape followed closely behind, a smirk still hung on his features.
"Triwizard" said Professor Snape as the came to a halt at the portrait hole. The fat Lady slowly opened one of her eyes and glared at them all.
"What are you all doing out so late? Can't anyone get any decent sleep around here?" she muttered, opening the portrait hole to the Professor's password.
"Sorry, my lady." Said Snape, "I just caught some trouble-makers out after hours, but it has been taken care of. You can go back to sleep." He told her.
"This is what I get for volunteering to be the portrait hole…be woken up in the middle of the night, backtalk from students…" she muttered to herself while Harry, Ron, and Hermione climbed back into their common room, closing the entrance to their dorm once they were all in.
Neither one of them talked once they were back inside. They were all agitated about their punishment, as well about the arguments that occurred earlier. Harry and Ron sat on complete opposite sides of the common room, while Hermione took a seat in the middle. Maybe this was how Harry felt when she and Ron were fighting: stuck in the middle. There has to be a way to fix this stupid argument so that we can all talk to each other again Hermione thought to herself, while her eyes made their way to the fire. It was slowly dying, but it still held onto its purpose. Jumping up and down within the grate, passionately licking the sides as it edged up to its fullest height possible before it was forced back down by gravity, trying as hard as it could to escape from the things that were binding it to its place. It was then, while gazing deeply into the fire that she knew what she had to do to fix their argument. Talking obviously wasn't going to work, which was proved only moments ago, so now she was forced to resort to this. I feel so low she thought, as she stood up, and walked up to her dormitory for the night.