Disclaimer: The works of JKR are in no way mine, nor do I have any illusions that they are. I am exceedingly grateful that she allows us to play in her universe.
Author's Note: All my thanks to everyone who reviewed!
Detention
September, 1996
'Severus,' Lucius nodded to him in greeting before matching his strides, leading him down the dank, rotting corridors of the Riddle House. 'Our lord has been wondering where you were.'
'Dumbledore knew I was in Diagon Alley.'
'As one of us? Have you been compromised?' The grey eyes stopped him, some worry for his own skin almost masking the gloating pleasure visible in his eyes. Snape knew Lucius would take exquisite delight in executing him- the blonde man's hand was already reaching for his wand.
'No. He didn't know I came with you. Many of the professors were there, he assumed that I had come to the defence. I had to make my excuses to him before I could leave without arousing suspicion.'
'Are you sure he suspects nothing?'
'He thinks I am his spy. Do not be too disappointed if you don't get to use that on me, Lucius,' Snape hissed. 'Our lord would hardly be pleased if you killed me- and some gratitude is in order. I helped get you out of Azkaban.'
Lucius laughed coldly. 'Indeed. That is a debt I am sure I will owe you many times over. Well, you have come just in time.' A deadly smirk played about the older man's mouth, now for a different victim. 'We have captured the famous Harry Potter. Our lord is allowing us a little…sport.'
'Again?' Snape's heartbeat soared and he instantly cursed his body's unchecked betrayal. Harry Potter. Again. The boy had to run out of luck sometime, and Voldemort only had to hit him once. The Boy-Who-Lived only had to die one time.
'We get to have fun until Halloween.' In spite of their animosity, Lucius did not conceal his shiver from his compatriot. The old feast of Samhain. The night where the veil between those who inhabited the land of the living and the world of the dead was thinnest. Their master had an exceptionally dark purpose to risk holding the boy for more than five weeks to the proper date.
'Hopefully without Potter this will be over and we will stand victorious,' Lucius was continuing, keeping his own morbid wonderings at bay with the supple sound of his smooth voice. 'Dumbledore is too weak to carry on without him.'
'Indeed. I suppose you had better pray for that to be true, given the nature of Draco's...assignment.' Snape picked up speed, sneering in the face of Lucius' sudden expression of white rage. The dark wizard's voice was hard, almost gleefully so when he asked, 'And where is our dear Mr. Potter?'
Lucius laughed scornfully, returning Snape's dig viciously. 'Never got to have the satisfaction of killing the father, so you must forever brutalize the son. I suppose some of us must make do with an unarmed boy half our ages to settle our scores. Too bad you're not allowed to do real damage. We've been limited to a few bruises, a cracked rib or two. Come. He is down the hall.'
**********
March,
1996
Hermione approached their Potions lesson with more than a little nervousness, her heart beating more wildly than it had ever pounded before, and that included Krum kissing her by the lake. If only her body didn't remember those fingers, not smooth like a child's but callused from work, promising capability...
Unbelievable she mocked herself pitilessly. The hand-waving, Gryffindor Know-It-All has a doubled heart rate and all the collected poise of an eleven-year-old with her first crush. And all because of a teacher. I may have preferred Gilderoy Lockhart. But in spite of her efforts at deep breathing and distracting herself by mentally reciting a completely unrelated piece of knowledge (both tips garnered from vaguely listening to two squealing roommates pore over Witch Teen), her stomach continued to knot and unknot, vanish and reappear too heavily.
'Hermione? Are you all right?' Ron's hand was on her arm, and Harry put a hand on her back.
'Hey? You okay?' Harry echoed Ron.
'Of course,' she snapped, fighting the urge to throw both of them off, their easy touch suddenly stifling. She grimaced as both recoiled, startled by the sharpness of her tone. 'Sorry. I just…these detentions must be getting to me more than I thought,' she replied, mustering a smile that she knew failed to touch her eyes.
'Well, you only have tonight and tomorrow,' Ron said encouragingly, letting his hand travel down to hers and squeeze.
'I know,' she responded. The room was unlocked, and as usual there was no sign of Professor Snape. He enjoyed his expected but somehow always unanticipated, sweeping entrances. He seemed to think they set the right tone. She set up her ingredients, Ron, Harry and Neville unpacking all around her.
'Harry,' Hermione muttered under her breath, 'You stand closest to Neville. I'll give you instructions and you can pass them onto him.' She would be buggered if she allowed this passing flirtation with her over-reactive hormones to give Snape the upper hand.
'Sure. Okay,' Harry readily agreed.
Snape slammed the door open, black robes billowing as he strode into the room in his accustomed intimidating manner. Dean and Seamus rolled their eyes at one another.
'Today, we will be making an Immunity Draught, something useful against most flus and minor viruses. If it is made properly.' His eyes swept the room. 'If it is not,' his gaze settled predictably on Neville Longbottom and a smirk touched his lips, 'then it can make you very sick indeed.'
'Instructions,' his wand flicked and the obligatory writing appeared on the blackboard, 'are on the board, ingredients are in the cabinet. You have an hour and a half.'
'That looks complicated,' Ron blanched, scanning the more than thirty steps of the potion.
'I guess we'd better start,' Harry muttered resentfully, eyeing the board as if it were a particularly large, furry spider. He scooted slightly closer to the dark-haired boy in front of them. 'Neville- I'm gonna help you today.' Neville, for all that his confidence had slowly blossomed during DA sessions before Umbridge had cracked down on them, cast a glance of pure panic back at Hermione, who was working a desk behind him. Snape apparently remained one of his worst nightmares.
'It's okay- Hermione's going to tell me how,' Harry told him, flashing him a grin when he was sure Snape's back was turned.
Neville returned the smile, although not quite as whole-heartedly. 'Thanks, Harry. No offense, but I think the only thing you do better in this class than me is not melt your cauldron so often.'
'Hear, hear,' Hermione whispered, and smiled impishly into Harry's look of half-feigned outrage.
There were three liquids listed that Hermione did not have in her own potions kit. She joined the throng at the cabinet, reaching for the last bottles- only to have a pale hand snake in and take them from just under her fingers.
'Thanks, Granger,' Draco Malfoy smirked. Hermione resisted the strong urge to slap him and instead turned to speak to Snape.
'Professor, there is no more Mandrake solution, adulterated bubotuber pus or coreopsis extract.'
Snape stiffened slightly at the sound of her voice as if it were directly connected to his spine, the movement so subtle that he doubted Albus Dumbledore would have noticed. He had been consciously trying to ignore the girl today, and he found himself unable to, which both deeply irritated and puzzled him.
His contact with the bright Muggle-born witch had proven slightly greater than the amount of time he spent with most of her peers - due solely to the fact that she had decided to befriend his green-eyed, Quidditch-obsessed, unofficial ward. It seemed that there were inherent dangers in being emotionally close to Harry Potter, which hardly surprised him. When the dark wizard's need to watch after the boy had included either the wild-maned witch or the flame-headed youngest son of the Weasley Clan, he had neither balked nor resented the necessity, but accepted it as part of the job he had adopted many years ago.
But in the past five years, he had never spared either of them a thought not directly related to Potter. He rarely spent much time thinking about any of his students beyond the broad parameters of their safety and their performance in his dungeon. That he had entered his classroom today to find himself...aware...of the young woman's presence - not angered or pleased by it, but simply knowing that she was in the room - shook him. Twenty-four hours ago, no such unwelcome weight had impinged on him as the whole school sat eating dinner, or even while she had served her detention.
Now it had settled, a definite, strangely comfortable feeling floating in his solar plexus, bizarrely lending him a feeling of completion, as if he had been missing a piece of himself and had now found it again.
She was waiting for ingredients. 'I believe you know where to find these items, Miss Granger?' his voice was deliberately frosted, colder than usual in response to his illogical, irrational thought process. He snatched the keys from his desk and extended them to her.
She strode over, took the key with a swift, 'Thank you, Professor,' and started for the door.
'We need some too!' Parvati and Lavender chimed together.
'Anyone else?' Hermione asked. Neville raised his hand shakily. Hermione gave him her most reassuring smile before turning and walking three doors down.
At least he's put them back in order, Hermione thought as she scanned the long shelves for ingredients. Of course, this is Snape I'm thinking about and if his storerooms are ever out of order I'll start keeping a House-elf...
As she carefully gathered the required materials, Hermione found herself ridiculously disappointed at her professor's lack of reaction to her today. She had been...preternaturally aware of his existence today, as if her subconscious had already thoroughly ingrained him into her waking mind. But not one movement had indicated any memory of the strangeness of that moment on this cold floor, and his tone had been, if anything, more forbidding than she usually warranted.
Earth to Granger. Common sense, check in please. She didn't resist the urge to roll her eyes at herself. She was having a fit of teenage pique because Ron had not yet managed to find his tongue and ask her out again after that disastrous fight over the Yule Ball more than a year ago. That was all. And who safer to fixate on than a professor? A man she didn't know, and who would never, in a thousand-thousand lifetimes, ever consider her to be more than the stereotype he had created when she was eleven.
She gathered the last of the vials and her emotions and went back to class.
**********
'What's wrong, mate?' Harry asked Ron. They were sitting at their usual table in the common room, listening to the fire snap as they tried to get a head start on studying for their O.W.L.'s and write Transfiguration essays worthy of at least an "Acceptable" for Professor McGonagall.
Ron had given up all pretence of working and was now staring moodily into the flames, his two-sentence essay lying on the table next to him.
'I can't stop thinking about Hermione,' he confessed, not looking at Harry. Harry knew how deeply this occupied Ron- his friend wasn't even blushing or trying to avoid Harry's eye. He was just looking at the orange tails whipping upwards into the chimney and drumming the table.
'You've liked her since second year,' Harry said softly. It was only ten, but the common room was mostly empty save for a few seventh years testing each other on N.E.W.T.'s material at the other end. 'Why don't you just do something about it?'
'Not brave enough. Remember our fight about Viktor Krum?'
Harry rolled his eyes. 'Yes. But she was never really into him. Well…sort of,' he amended at the disbelieving look on Ron's face. 'She definitely had a crush on you last year though, and I think during third year too.' Harry felt awkward talking about Hermione this way- she was…Hermione. As dearly cherished and firmly asexual as a sister. But Ginny had told him about Ron's on-again, off-again moping and its cause ages ago, when he'd first arrived at Grimmauld Place that past summer, and he felt it was time his best friend did something about it.
'Ask her for…' he cast around mentally, searching for a situation that wouldn't be too strange for best friends, 'ask her for a date in Hogsmeade the next time you go.'
'Would you come with Cho?' Ron asked eagerly. Harry found something very interesting to hunt for in his Transfiguration book as he replied:
'Er…no. I don't think so. She...that's been a total disaster, to be honest. Besides, after her friend sold us out with the DA last weekend…' Harry stumbled to a halt, unwilling to tell his best friend that in the past few weeks, Ron's youngest sibling, and not the dark-haired girl of his first crush, had been the girl running through his dreams, the long red-and-gold tresses that he couldn't believe he'd never noticed before falling in silken waterfalls over her Quidditch-fit body... He jerked that line of thinking to a halt before his blush could give him away. His mind had been following the same pattern as Ron's for days now, with an additional problem: would his best friend and dormmate go spare if Harry started dating his one and only sister?
'Oh. Right. Yeah – it's kind of Marietta's fault that Umbridge is Head now, isn't it?' Ron was mulling this over, deciding he didn't blame Harry for not wanting to go out with Cho again. 'D'you think that would work? Me taking her to Hogsmeade, I mean,' the Keeper asked seriously.
'Yeah, I think so. It's not too strange, and if I'm right, and she likes you too, she'll be thrilled. You just have to do it- Hermione'll never say anything. You know girls - they like to feel like they're being pursued,' Harry encouraged.
Ron took a deep breath. 'Well, Hogsmeade is in a couple weeks. I'll… I'll ask her tomorrow.'
'Good,' Harry said, with an enormous feeling of relief that at least Ron's emotional state was now settled. 'If you've made up you're mind, can we look up that thing on how Switching Spells are related to Animagi?'
**********
My last detention. My last detention, Hermione chanted to herself on Wednesday night as she made her way down to the dungeons. What's wrong with Ron? she wondered in between her mantra. He had been jumpy all day, and Harry had kept giving him pointed nudges when he thought she wasn't looking. Come to think of it, both boys had refused to look her in the eye. Her scrutiny of this new puzzle was interrupted by her arrival at the dungeon door.
She knocked.
'Come in,' Snape commanded. When she entered, he was already standing, pocketing his wand.
'We are going to my potions lab this evening, Miss Granger. I expect you to take notes again.'
'Yes sir,' she answered, carefully controlling her excitement. He gestured for her to precede him down the corridor.
She stationed herself at the small desk in the room as he checked each potion again. Fully intending to banish his strange reaction to her proximity, her professor had planned this as a deliberate torture - bring her to a place practically begging the questions she never seemed about to still and then ordering her to remain utterly silent.
But as she settled at the desk, resignation seething from the faint slump of her shoulders, he felt a pulse of desire, a pure need for knowledge that seemed to come from within them both, and instead of silence as he inhaled the different fumes, he spoke to her in a quiet, measured voice that he knew she had never heard him use in class.
'The cauldron nearest the door is an improved Wolfsbane Potion, containing moonstone,' he told her. 'Oddly enough, adding moonstone to that particular potion makes the full moon's effects less potent. I am searching for a balance- one that will keep the werewolf from becoming a wolf at all at that critical time.'
'This second one, the light red, is a blood-thickening solution to help with major injuries. It helps blood clot faster- so in the middle of a battle you will lose less of it. The third, which is this marbled black and white, is…' and on it went. All the way around the room. Hermione wasn't sure if she was supposed to write it all down, but she did anyway. If he didn't want the information, she would surely keep it.
'Bring me…the head of a fire salamander and a pinch of arsenic,' he commanded when he was stationed around his cauldrons in the middle of the room again. She jumped to get them, bringing them carefully. Instead of returning to her desk, she risked a peek at the potion and a question.
'Is this to create an immunity to curses?' she asked, peering into Variant Four's cauldron and getting a face-full of steam.
'No. This is to be administered after a curse. The final product will not only wipe the effects of the curse from the drinker's body, it will restore them to full health and the ability to continue fighting.'
'Why add the fire salamander's head to the potion?'
'They're creatures of extraordinary endurance, and of course, they have to use magic to spit fire and endure the flames. Their native magic, is, fortunately, completely incompatible with all forms of Dark Magic. They will flush out the toxin in the victim's body and their strength is transferred to the drinker.' They moved to Variant Two. Snape poked at it with his wand and glowered. 'Bring me more crushed garnet. Flakes this time, not powder.'
'Might it not work better if it were both amethyst and garnet?' Hermione asked before she thought. Snape frowned into the dark blue liquid for a moment and then nodded.
'That might be exactly the balance necessary,' he murmured. He thrust out his hand, clearly expecting her to hand him his tools. She did so, remaining within easy reach of his arm as she gazed into the cauldron, her compulsion to learn having long outweighed her self-preservation instinct.
'Go back and write this down, Miss Granger,' he snapped as he trickled the flakes of stone into the cauldron, watching them glitter purple and red-orange in the candlelight. 'There is some merit to the scientific methods I employ, much as you and your classmates ignore my suggestions to that effect.'
Sighing, Hermione retired to her desk, where she recorded his rapidly spoken words.
'Perhaps a touch of jade?' Snape wondered, prodding the surface, which was now a rich purple. The potion seethed at him. 'No, I think not.'
'Ivory? For purity?' Hermione offered from where she was seated. She could not believe her mouth. It seemed to have run away with her. The urge to solve the mystery was greater than any fear of Snape.
'Miss Granger,' he hissed silkily, cursing himself for six kinds of a fool to have ever started explaining any of his work to the nosy creature. 'You forget yourself. No student has even been in here before. You are the first. You are also likely to be the last. Just as I do not allow students to help with my grading, it is unthinkable to allow you to assist with my private brewing. You will kindly be silent. Given the other ingredients, ivory may well cause the entire concoction to explode, which you should know if you've been reading the text about the purposes of crystals and gemstones. Use some of the deductive reasoning your Head of House keeps insisting you possess.'
Grinding her teeth together - an attempt to be helpful hardly warranted a diatribe in her opinion, the young woman muttered, 'Yes, professor,' and bent her head back to her work.
Neither paid attention to the time.
**********
'Where is Hermione?' Ron asked as the clock ticked towards twelve-thirty.
'I dunno. Detentions aren't allowed to go on after midnight,' Harry replied. 'And the dungeons aren't that far away.'
'You think she's okay? Maybe we should go check,' Ron said, rising.
'No,' Harry said, eager to avoid the Potions master at all costs following the revelations of the Pensieve that had earned him the end of his Occlumency lessons. Guilt still squirmed unpleasantly in his gut if he thought for too long on what he had seen. 'Relax, Ron. You know Hermione. Even Snape can't deter her. She probably thought of some dire question to ask him right as detention ended.'
**********
Snape cursed under his breath. Variant Two was the most promising of all, and still something was wrong with it…ivory might explode the cauldron. But it also might create the perfect balance. How did Granger know?
She's smart. Possibly brilliant. That has been undeniable since her first year. And her talent with Potions would be the envy of many masters.
He strode to another room to get it. Hermione watched him go, started to rise and go after him. Perhaps he wanted to leave? She glanced at the clock. It was one-thirty in the morning. She stifled a groan. She had class tomorrow, and her Astronomy essay was only half finished.
But she did not leave, even though now she was within her rights to.
Snape billowed back in, holding a small, round, white rod. Ivory, she recognized, and ducked her head with a smile so that he wouldn't see.
But to her surprise, he came over and grabbed her arm, pulling her with him towards the door without a word of explanation.
'Professor!'
'Be still, Miss Granger!' he snapped as he continued pulling her out of the room. 'Adding the ivory is dangerous, as I told you.' He muttered a spell, and glimmering shields sprang up over all the cauldrons except the one he was working on.
'It is entirely possible that the ivory will destroy it. But the recipe is preserved, and the magical properties of ivory may well perfect the draught. I can only test it.'
He lifted the ivory with his wand and sent it sailing towards the surface of the unshielded cauldron. It hovered over the purple briefly before sliding in with a gentle sucking sound.
When nothing happened, Hermione started forward. Snape tightened his grip on her arm. 'If you get blown up, Miss Granger, I don't want to have to file the death report. Stay here.'
Snape's hand remained around her arm as he counted to ten, then to twenty. The potion let out a low hiss and a sparkling, silver vapor rose from the mixture. The cauldron continued its placid bubbling.
'Now,' he said, releasing her. They crossed the stone floor together, each equally eager to see the results-
-they were six feet from the cauldron when it ignited. Iron shards rocketed out in every direction, and the hot liquid spurted wildly, coating walls and floor and dousing the fire instantly.
Snape felt the magic charge in the air right before it detonated. 'Get down!' he roared. He threw himself at Hermione, her impatience had carried her a few steps in front of him, and carried her to the floor, rolling frantically to get them both behind the only protection in the room: the desk.
The ceiling shook with the echoes of the explosion as they lay there, their breathing quieting as the sounds of potion hitting stone gradually faded from a downpour to a murmur and then halted.
'It burns,' she whispered, remembering just in time not to touch her neck where a fiery pain stung.
'Oddly enough, boiling liquids do have the tendency to do that, Miss Granger,' he replied dryly, wiping it away with his sleeve. 'I would have thought that working in close quarters with Longbottom for so many years would have already taught you that lesson.'
She bit her tongue to restrain her sarcastic reply. Even tucked into his too-warm robe, bodies pressed together in their haste to escape, he would probably take points. 'You have some here, in your hair,' she said instead, carefully reaching to rub the lump from his scalp before it could sear the skin.
'I am not a two-year-old washing his scalp, Miss Granger. Kindly remove your hands from my person.' He flinched instinctively from her touch when she insistently removed the liquid anyway. 'It is safe to stand,' he announced, only to find that he first had to disentangle himself. His robes were tangled up with Hermione's legs- in his dash to get to safety it hadn't mattered how intertwined they had become.
Hermione held her breath, not looking at him. In the dive and roll, he had ended up cradling her in his arms. She was inches away from him. Her existence abruptly seemed limited to the pulsing in his veins, to the pressure of his fingers wrapped around her arm. She could feel the beat of his heart racing through the long arm encircling her back, and his breathing whispered across her forehead, making the tiny curls there flutter. She could feel her own pulse hammering in her chest, and she didn't think it was entirely due to the panic or the exploding cauldron.
This is revolting, she told herself firmly. She rolled away from him, out of his embrace, allowing him to stand up unimpeded. Misdirected hormones. The only thing to do was ignore them.
Snape was glaring at her. 'And that, Miss Granger,' he snarled, wiping himself off, discovering holes in his robes where the potion had burned through, 'is why we do not add ingredients wantonly to new potions.'
'Yes, sir.'
Snape prodded the large puddle that had extinguished the fire underneath the now-shattered cauldron.
And he yells at Neville for melting cauldrons? Hermione thought spitefully. If they had been closer to the cauldron, they would have been killed. Shards of the former receptacle were imbedded in the stone walls around them. Any one of them could have taken off her head.
A low hiss escaped his mouth, and in spite of everything, he began to laugh. It was an ironic sound with a peculiar ring, a laugh both happy and disbelieving.
'What is it?'
'It works,' he replied, laughter stopping as he recalled the presence of another in the room. 'The indicator spell says the potion has been perfected for my purpose. This is the right recipe.'
'But it explodes the cauldron.'
'That just means you have to give it a room to itself while you're brewing it. Such explosions can be channeled as long as we are forewarned.' The potion was a success, and even a cauldron now scattered throughout the chamber and Hermione's peculiar presence did not dampen Snape's elation.
If he were always like that, I think I could admire him, Hermione thought, quite against her will.
He waved his wand and all the potion conglomerated off the walls into a smaller vat. Much of the potion had been destroyed in the blast itself, but Hermione estimated he had perhaps a quarter of the original amount left to test.
'Testing on human subjects can begin tomorrow,' Snape murmured. 'Miss Granger, help me bottle it all, and then one vial will go to Madam Pomfrey, one to the Headmaster-' he stopped, a frown flitting across his face, 'one to Grimmauld Place, where the Headmaster will find it,' he amended, 'and the rest will be stored here until there is further need for them.'
She followed him to yet another room, and gasped.
This room was enormous. The high, vaulted ceiling was painted with scenes of potions masters of the past, and shelves stretched to the ceiling, most of them containing potions.
'Did you invent all of these?' she whispered in awe.
'No. Most of the shelves have a vial of each potion invented by every master to teach at Hogwarts. It is an archive of sorts. Here are mine.' Somehow, Hermione was not surprised to see three full shelves with his name scrolled on them. Cruel and heartless Snape might be, but brainless or lazy- no. He placed one vial of the new potion carefully on the shelf, labeling it with its number and then a question mark.
'It is a work in progress. In practical tests, we don't yet know how it will fare,' he explained to her raised eyebrow. 'Therefore, it is only a tentative success. Put the rest of the bottles on the ground with these others.' Vials and beakers for other potions that were being tested littered the floor next to them. Hermione carefully arranged hers in neat rows along the wall.
'Professor?' she said as they turned to go.
'Yes?'
Hermione hesitated. It was an awkward thing to say at best…the simplest way would be the least uncomfortable. No dramatic words or beating around the bush. And in spite of the fact that he had been particularly snappish, he had taken her suggestion as well. 'Thank you for saving my life.'
She expected a sneer, some snarled reference to her clumsiness or stupidity, and, indeed, these scathing possibilties crossed his mind, but when he opened his mouth, he simply inclined his head and replied, 'You're welcome.'
After she left, Snape allowed himself to cover his thin face with both hands, covering his eyes as if that would remove the memory her body had burned into him. So close, their limbs tangled together...a sense of oneness had pervaded him, unity singing in the joining to two separate halves...
Instead of dispersing the unsettling feeling he'd been having for the past forty-eight hours about his most intelligent student, he had just worsened it.
He dropped his hands in self-digust and made a mental note to research compulsion curses and potions. One did not simply change one's mind about or abruptly notice a child in the space of two days. This was entirely unnatural, and as a Potions master and Dark Arts practitioner, he knew better.
**********
'Hermione!" Ron rose worriedly, taking in his friend's flushed face and the circles under her eyes.
The object of his concern nearly groaned aloud. Ron. It was not at all what she had been expecting to find when she got back from the potions classroom. It was, after all, two in the morning.
'I couldn't sleep- and I knew you weren't back yet…how did that…' here followed several words Hermione knew he didn't dare say at home, 'keep you another two hours?'
Hermione opened her mouth to explain, then stopped. It was…private. She didn't want to tell anyone. No one else had ever been in the lab, Snape had said, and she didn't want to tell Ron or Harry especially. They would probably insist on using the invisibility cloak to "discover" what he was doing. Regardless of his actions, both remained highly suspicious of him and seemed completely unwilling to change their stances.
'He didn't,' she managed to lie in credible time. 'I went to the library to do some work on McGonagall's essay.' Hopefully, Ron would not remember that the library closed at midnight.
She needn't have worried. Ron stared at her incredulously, then smiled slowly. 'You're unbelievable, Hermione. Totally unbelievable.'
Hermione settled down to actually finish her Astronomy essay, tired enough to ignore Ron's sudden fidgeting.
'Erm…Hermione?' he asked a minute later, hoping his voice sounded deep and mature instead of high-pitched and nervous.
'Ummm?' she replied non-committally.
'Are you going to Hogsmeade in a couple weeks?'
'Probably,' she murmured, reaching into her bag for another book.
'Well, I would like, I mean, if it's okay with you, I thought it would be great…' he trailed off. There was enough anxiety in his voice that Hermione lifted her head and smiled at him.
'What is it?' she asked quietly.
'I…er…would you, would you like to go to Hogsmeade with me?'
Hermione struggled to keep her jaw shut. It was the last thing she had expected to hear tonight. 'Like…on a date?'
'Yeah. Yeah. Like on a date,' he replied steadily, his voice suddenly much smoother.
Hermione swallowed, surprised by the sudden appearance of strong hesitation, an almost physical force urging her to say no. If anyone had asked two weeks ago if this was what she wanted, she would have answered yes without any qualifications. Absolutely. She had liked Ron for nearly three years. Surely it hadn't evaporated?
No, she told herself firmly. It's just taken longer than I thought it would, so I put it away, out of sight…I went out with Victor and this new-WRONG- thing about Snape...
'Of course,' she said with a huge smile comprised of relief and giddy happiness.
'Great!' A little awkwardly, Ron leaned forward and kissed her cheek. 'Well, see you tomorrow, Hermione.'
She just nodded, trying furiously to quell the little voice in the back of her head that was promising her that it was already too late. She had passed some indefinable turning point.
She shoved that voice behind a mental door and locked it. A crush on a professor was for bookworms without boyfriends. She was now, most emphatically, a bookworm with a boyfriend and she stubbornly determined that she wouldn't allow the saturnine wizard and his long fingers to ruin this.
