Disclaimer: JK Rowling invented Hermione, Ron and Viktor Krum. I invented the photo album…
A/N: I was working on this today and I think it is going to be longer than I originally planned. It is a romance, even if it seems to be moving very slowly. I know that it probably gets a bit wordy, but I keep thinking up new situations for Ron and Hermione and I am really enjoying writing them down. Please keep reading, even if it does stretch out to twenty parts! I apologize if there are any Bulgarians out there. I have never been to Sofia, and only made it sound run-down because I felt like it. I have been to Prague, and have lived in Budapest and those are both wonderful cities. The places I describe are real, although whether or not they are magical I cannot say. Unfortunately, I am a Muggle.
PART IV: MUGGLE HOLIDAY PICS
Arthur Weasley did not stay to supper, and, instead, Apparated home shortly after the dentist demonstration. Hermione helped Ron carry his trunk upstairs and gave him a brief tour of the house.
"That's my parent's bedroom in there and this is mine, right here." She said, pointing to a door that had "Hermione's Room" painted on it in flowery writing. At that moment, the door creaked open and a large, ginger cat came slinking out and rubbed up against Ron's leg. "How's it going Crookshanks, ol' friend?" asked Ron, bending down to rub the cat between the ears. Ron did not always approve of Crookshanks, especially since Crookshanks had been very hostile to Ron's pet rat, Scabbers. However, since Scabbers had turned out to be not a rat at all, but a cowardly, evil murderer named Peter Pettigrew, Ron had made an attempt to be nice to Hermione's cat.
"And this is the guest room here." Hermione opened the next door to reveal a simply decorated room. She walked over to the night table and picked up the lamp, "This is the switch to turn on the light – you see, you just push it here." And as she did so, the light came on. Hermione pointed to a door at the side of the room, "The bathroom and toilet are here. To turn the light on, use this switch." Hermione pointed to a switch in the wall by the door. She added, "This bathroom also joins my room, so if you're in here, you can lock that door, but remember to unlock it before you leave, or else I won't be able to get in!"
They went back downstairs, and Hermione led Ron down a book-lined hallway to a medium-sized room. Inside, the walls were lined with things that didn't look quite like books. There was a strange looking box on a table and another cabinet filled with all sorts of gadgets. "This is my parents' recreation room." Hermione explained. "That's a computer" she said, pointing to the box on the desk, "and those are all of the records and CDs." "Ah, yes," said Ron, hoping he didn't sound too stupid and wishing he'd taken Muggle Studies, "CDs." "They play music," she added, seeing the puzzled expression on his face. "Music?" asked Ron eagerly. "I'd really love to hear some Muggle music. I heard some this summer, although I don't know what it was, and it was really cool. Can we listen now?"
Just then, Mrs. Granger called them to dinner and the music would have to wait.
After dinner, Ron and Hermione sat at the kitchen table while Mr. and Mrs. Granger cleared away the dishes. Ron was not surprised to see that Hermione had planned a schedule for every day of his visit.
"…and then on Tuesday I thought we could cook something in the kitchen so that you could learn about stoves and refrigerators and things like that. On Wednesday, we can work on the computer and maybe play some video games, my father has a ton and they can be really educational if you pick the right ones…" ('trust Hermione to find something educational in a game' thought Ron), "and then on Thursday we could maybe go into town and watch a movie…"
Mr. Granger could obviously see the glazed look in Ron's eyes. "Hermione, why don't you go get the pictures from our holiday? I'm sure Ron's a bit tired and can't concentrate on all of that right now. Just look at some pictures."
The holiday! Ron remembered that he was a bit uncomfortable about the holiday. The Grangers had been to Bulgaria, hadn't they? Hermione had been to visit Viktor Krum. Ron wondered jealously if Krum had attempted to kiss her. He'd certainly had opportunity last year at Hogwarts to carry out a plan of attack as outlined by Fred and George. Ron assumed that Bulgarian wizards would probably act the same as English ones. Ron didn't know why, but the thought of Krum kissing Hermione made him want to throw up. Ugh! Why did that image pop into his head? He resolved to observe Hermione closely as she showed him the pictures.
Hermione returned to the kitchen with two large photo albums, a scrapbook, and a small package in her hands. "I almost forgot," she said, handing him the package, "I got you a souvenir." Hermione set the package down on the table and pushed it towards Ron, obviously trying to avoid contact with his hands like earlier. Ron opened the package, which contained a small replica of St. Steven's mummified hand. "Ta, Hermione." Said Ron, smiling at her.
She opened the first album to a page labeled "Prague" and proceeded to show him lots of buildings and monuments, with running commentary on every picture. Ron found the Muggle pictures a bit boring at times, because they didn't move like magic ones. Even Hermione had to admit that she wished she'd used magic developer. "The clock tower would have looked so much more interesting in a magic photo," she mused sadly, "I wish you could have seen it, Ron, every hour little dancers come out and to most people they just look like stone figures, but they were actually little fairies who live there and they were dancing like crazy. I read about it in our astronomy text book and it was created by a wizard who wanted to have a way to record astronomical movements. He needed something large that wouldn't attract the suspicions of Muggles, so he built the clock to look like a normal European clock tower. He put it right on the town hall in the center of Prague, can you believe it?"
Towards the middle of the book, a new section had started, neatly labeled "Budapest and Hungary."
"I was a bit scared in Hungary, everywhere except Budapest." Admitted Hermione. "They have the largest vampire population in the world! Luckily they are mostly in the countryside and we spent almost all of our time in Budapest. The Danube is really beautiful and I discovered something wonderful there." Hermione turned the page to view a picture of a ruined building. "There is an island in the middle of the Danube called "Margaret Island" after the daughter of King Bela IV. Bela's wife was a witch, although he didn't know it, and she convinced him to build a convent on the island. In reality it was a meeting place for witches and wizards in the area. When their daughter turned 11, they sent her there to live, supposedly as a nun and she stayed there the rest of her life. Now, this picture is a Muggle picture and it shows ruins, and all my parents could see were ruins, but its not ruins at all! It's a wizarding community! There were hundreds of witches and wizards mulling through it. I found the official entrance and took my parents inside, because they didn't believe me. There were dozens of shops, but Hungarian is a difficult language, so we didn't speak to many people. We found one witch who spoke English and told us the history. Isn't that marvelous?"
Ron had to admit that it was marvelous, and he was quite jealous. The only holiday that his family had taken him on outside of Cornwall was to Egypt two years earlier. Ron had enjoyed every moment and it had made him yearn for more travel.
Hermione finished the first album and reached for the second. She looked at Ron a little shyly and asked "You're not bored, are you? I'm sorry Harry couldn't come, it'd probably be more fun for you to have another boy around. We can call him on the telephone this week – if you call during the day then you can usually catch him alone. If his aunt picks up, then I just pretend that I'm selling something." It seemed out of character for Hermione to worry about him having a good time and she seemed a bit fidgety. Ron smiled at her and answered, "I'm having a wonderful time. These photos are really interesting – I had no idea that so many magical items were sitting out in plain view of Muggles without their noticing." 'There, Mum,' he thought, 'I know how to be a gentleman, and I wasn't lying, this is quite interesting.'
The second album contained a few more pictures of Hungary and then they came to a page entitled "Bulgaria." Ron felt himself blushing and his stomach started doing somersaults. He really wasn't sure if he wanted to see the section about Bulgaria. He barely heard Hermione as she explained, "We spent a week in Bulgaria. It was nice because we stayed with Viktor Krum and his family and Mum and Dad were quite interested to stay in a wizarding household. Sofia was kind of rough though. It has a wonderful history, dating back 2,000 years, and there were lots of archeological sites but there isn't a large wizarding community there anymore. If we hadn't known somebody in the country, I don't think we would have bothered to go there. The weather was really lovely though, and Sofia, like Budapest, has quite a lot of thermal springs. We went with Viktor's family one day to an outdoor one, but it was really just like a large, warm, swimming pool. My dad's got some back problems and he said that the water seemed to help him."
Ron gazed angrily at the photo in front of him. Hermione was standing in between her parents, wearing what appeared to Ron to be an extremely skimpy bathing suit (although in reality it was quite modest). She looked like one of the girls in the pile of Muggle magazines that Fred and George kept hidden under their beds (they magicked them to look like comic books when viewed by female eyes, to avoid the wrath of Mrs. Weasley). Had Krum seen her in that getup? Maybe it was okay for Muggles, but it certainly was not all right for witches and wizards. Ron opened his mouth to say something and then thought better of it. After all, it wouldn't do to get into an argument with Hermione in her own house. Instead, Ron stood up so quickly that the chair he was sitting in fell backwards. He picked it up hastily and said, "They're really great pictures, Hermione, but I'm a bit tired after all of the stuff that's been going on today. I think I'll go to bed if you don't mind." The clock on the wall read 8 o'clock. Ron walked upstairs very quickly, slammed the door to the guest room and flopped down on the guest bed.
A few moments later, he heard Hermione come into the bathroom from the other side and knock on his door. "Ron?" she asked tentatively. "Ron? Well, I've just laid out some blue towels for you to use. If you need anything, let me know. Goodnight." Ron didn't answer. What was wrong with him? He certainly felt like he was going crazy. As he fell asleep, he heard Fred's voice echoing in his ear "Stay in CONTROL…"
