Part Four
25 December, 1994
He hadn't seen her in hours. In fact, it was growing rather suspicious, the longer the day stretched on. He was just beginning to wonder if she'd really been hurt, by not being asked to the ruddy ball. And honestly, he was starting to wish he'd just stayed up in the dormitory as well. Maybe he could have let Hermione almost win a few games of wizard's chess in the common room, while everybody else was off being ridiculous...
But, instead, he was on his way down to the transformed Great Hall, where he was bound to make an utter fool of himself. It was either that, or Fred and George would make sure something made a fool of him.
Once he'd finally made his way to the entryway with Harry, face to face with the Patils, he did a series of things automatically, because his brain seemed to shut down. And then, suddenly, he was in the midst of the Ball with Padma, who looked... a bit put out. Everything was too fancy, too sparkly and clean... and he didn't fit in here.
He wasn't sure if he wished he did fit in because he wanted to be invisible, to blend in with the crowd and not stand out to be ridiculed, or if it was because he wanted-
And then he saw her.
Hermione.
And he hardly recognized her.
And she looked... very happy.
And she wasn't alone at all.
And he was suddenly quite sick.
The night passed in a thick, hazy blur of an upset stomach and stabs of... something he wasn't sure he could name. And anger, oddly sudden and real, and he didn't want to feel this way about her. He wanted to go back to how things were, actually. To before he was sitting here, depressed and upset. Back to when they'd been best friends and they'd had a lifetime of days yet to come. Because he'd never thought about it, really. He'd never considered that things could change.
But they were changing... weren't they?
And so, when she finally addressed him, he couldn't stop himself. He rowed with her, and stomped up to his dormitory, leaving her to sigh frustratedly at his retreating back. And to cry. He was sure he'd seen her tears. But he'd ignored it, because he was the one who'd been having it rough tonight... wasn't he? He didn't owe her anything...
She'd actually been... happy. Now he really wanted to disappear...
Hours later, he couldn't sleep. He stared, hardly blinking, up at the ceiling above his bed.
It was bollocks. He was supposed to...
Well. He was supposed to what?
What was he entitled to that he felt he'd been cheated out of getting... or cheated out of keeping? And it was then, in the dark, with sickening memories of Hermione's arms around Viktor Krum, that he understood.
He'd thought... He'd really thought...
No. That wasn't quite it. He hadn't thought, had he. Because he hadn't bothered to really consider the truth. He'd assumed. All this time.
He'd assumed that she was just Hermione. He'd assumed that she was always going to be... what she was to him. That things would never change. But things were always changing, weren't they. And he'd been left so far behind...
He wished so many things that he couldn't put into words. He wished he'd seen some kind of a sign, earlier, when he'd still had a chance to catch up. What did she want, exactly, that he wasn't?
He breathed out a bitter laugh.
Everything. That's what. Viktor Krum was all of the things that Ron wasn't. All of them.
And that was so very many things... surely.
He considered his gift, the one he'd wrapped for her, to give to her tonight when he thought he'd be returning to Gryffindor Tower to find her, as usual, revising in the Common Room. Perhaps she wouldn't be too gutted at not getting an invitation. Perhaps she'd think the Ball was just as ridiculous as he did. And he'd give her the gift he'd planned, and she'd thank him and smile, and it would make the slog through the night worth it.
But now, she was probably dreaming pleasantly, sickeningly, of Krum... and here Ron was, unable to sleep because of one stupid night. One moment, really, to change too many things.
He scooted to the edge of his bed and reached a lanky arm underneath it, retrieving a relatively well-wrapped package. He turned it over in his hands and sighed. And he wondered... did she see how different the world looked now?
He closed his eyes, breathed in deeply, and shook his head. Without another thought, he climbed out of bed and shuffled across the dormitory, opening the door with the tiniest creak and slipping through. He made his way down the stairs, but just as he came around the second to last curve, he was certain he heard a sharp intake of breath, followed by a quick scuffle. Frozen, he listened, wondering who could be up at this hour. But silence lingered, and he turned the last curve down, entering the dark Common Room at last.
Her eyes shone wide in the moonlight, and he gasped, fumbling for his wand.
"Ron? !"
"Bloody hell, Hermione!" he whispered harshly, as her outline became more prominent, where she was standing just a few feet away from him. "You nearly gave me a stroke!"
"Well," she said, crossing her arms heavily over her chest, "I could say the same to you! What did you think you were doing, lurking on the steps for so long?"
"I heard a noise, coming from down here," he explained, "and obviously you were the source of it."
"What do you want?" she bit back, tightening her jaw.
"Didn't think I'd run into you, did I! So... don't reckon I want anything from you," he said, frustratedly. She closed her eyes and puffed out a short breath.
"Ron, why are you down here at this hour?" she demanded.
"Don't see how that's any of your business," he mumbled.
"Oh, fine!" she shouted shrilly, untangling her arms from across her chest in order to toss them up into the air. "Go on, then. Have at it... whatever it is. I'm going to b-"
But her eyebrows furrowed and she stopped speaking abruptly, staring at something near Ron's left elbow.
Oh, right. Her gift. Which he was still holding under his arm.
"What's that?" she sniffed.
"Uh, yeah," he muttered, removing it from under his arm. "It's your Christmas gift," and though he was trying to keep up his tone of annoyance, he was actually failing quite thoroughly.
"What? !" and she looked up into his eyes, moonlight glowing in her own dark, round pupils.
"I was just going to chuck it down here somewhere, and not say who it was from, so you'd find it in the morning," he shrugged. "Stupid plan. I dunno, it's got to be nearly 3 o'clock in the morning..."
But his excuses didn't actually excuse the thought that went behind what he'd come down to do. And Hermione didn't seem to take note of any of them at all. In fact, she was looking rather flushed and impressed and caught completely off guard.
"Why not just give it to me properly?" she asked him, and something about the innocence and cluelessness of her tone of voice set him on edge again.
"Oh, I don't know," he started, sarcastically. "You think maybe I didn't particularly fancy seeing you, at the moment?"
"I hate you sometimes," she whispered, almost inaudibly. But his heart sank as she looked away.
"Oh, go on," he said, trying to dismiss it, because he really did not want to row again. Not right now. He was still too cross with her, and he knew, from experience, that he'd say all sorts of things he didn't mean if he rowed with her just then.
Okay, so maybe he'd learned one thing, tonight...
"You're here now so, might as well..." and he handed her the package.
She looked oddly skeptical at first, as if he was actually trying to trick her or make fun of her.
"I've had it for a while, Hermione," he said, dully. "It's not like I rush ordered something horrid just because you fought with me."
Her eyes shot up to his again, and she glared at him.
"I fought with you?" she hissed.
He winced, terrified of getting into this right now. He really would do almost anything to get out of here, immediately, and not have to do this...
"Look," he said instead, against his better judgment, "I'm not going to say I'm sorry right now, okay? Because I'm not sorry... yet."
She looked ready to murder him on the spot, but then he did something terribly bizarre... he gave her a small, hesitant smile, lopsided and hopeful. And he watched the anger literally melt away from her face.
That... was bloody brilliant.
"Fine," she huffed, "but then I don't forgive you for any of it and we're still in the middle of a row, aren't we. And I'm not going to apologize, so don't you dare think it's coming."
He grinned wider still and watched the corners of her mouth twitch up before she cleared her throat, blushing. And she began to meticulously, carefully, rip open the colourful paper he'd used to wrap her gift.
When, at last, she'd uncovered her gift, she blinked down at it, and she really did smile.
"This is brilliant..." she said softly.
Feeling far more flustered than he ever had before, in the dark, in the middle of the empty Common Room at 3am, he shuffled his feet and set about rambling... exactly what he did best, when nervous...
"It's... like a Quick Quotes Quill, but better, because it doesn't just make up bollocks as you're dictating. It actually takes down the words you say."
She turned her smile up in his direction.
"Thought it'd be useful because you've got these, uh..." he scratched at the back of his neck, "blisters, on your fingers, from all that damn writing you do."
"I do?" she asked, voice floating through the air so lightly between them, and she looked down at her own hand, studying the blisters he had nearly memorized.
Was it odd that he'd noticed, really? They studied together nearly every night. She revised half of his homework for him, blimey...
"Yeah," and he cleared his throat. "Look, you can go back to being hacked off with me now. But we should... get to bed, yeah?"
Her cheeks flushed a slightly deeper shade of red... or could he really tell for sure, in the darkness?
"Solid plan," she said. "Thank you."
"Any time," and he turned around, before she could speak again, to head back upstairs. But she froze him with her next words, aimed up the staircase at him.
"You really should think about what I said, you know, at the Ball, when we were rowing..." He could almost feel her shyness, edging up the steps towards his back. "Because... if any of what I instructed... or said about you... or what I said I thought... isn't true or right... then you should probably tell me."
Her words rang as clear as his morning alarm clock, and the night seemed to close in on what she'd really meant. He would never have been able to put it into his own words, or bet on his own suspicions, but he didn't need to ask, to hear her explain it. Not yet. Not now.
Not with memories of Krum still fresh and painful. And real. That was the part that confused him, that muddled him down in his own self-doubt.
But he somehow managed to successfully complete the functions required to turn his neck left, to look halfway over his shoulder...
"Goodnight, Hermione," he said, and this time, she didn't call him back again.