Chapter 7: Starting a fight and making everything right…
Hermione was early, she always was, it was her trademark. In the same way that Cedric was always a couple of minutes late. She sat at the table, feeling angry, today had not been her day. Her boss had shouted at her because she had paused to have a conversation with a patient. She couldn't see what she had done wrong, she had no other patients to see to and that patient had wanted someone to talk to. But apparently that had been wrong, her boss had found her during her lunch break and had loudly informed her of that in the middle of the hospital canteen. To top it all she had worn a stupid sun dress today but, because it was a typical English summer the first drops of rain were beginning to hit the window.
Needless to say, Hermione wasn't in the best of moods, it wasn't helped when she saw Valerie in a restaurant down the street.
When Cedric turned up, he was feeling fairly irritable too. He had the worst migraine he had ever had and he had been waylaid after practise by a woman who insisted that she needed 37 signed photos. Normally his mood always improved when he saw Hermione, but at present she was unknowinglybeing eyed by no less than 4 men in the same restaurant. She did look lovely in a pale pink sun dress and sandals but Cedric could feel himself slipping further into his black mood.
"You're late" she said, shortly, she didn't mean to take out her mood on him and instantly opened her mouth to apologise but he cut across her.
"Well, I'm sure you at least enjoyed yourself, flirting with everything in trousers"
"Excuse me?!"
"You heard me"
"I don't flirt. AT ALL."
"Oh really?"
"Yes really, for a start I don't know how to. And anyway you're a filthy hypocrite; you're always flirting with those stupid airheads who follow you around as though you're some sort of God."
"Well, at least they live life once in a while"
"And what is that supposed to mean, exactly?"
"It means that they take their noses out of a book every once in a while"
"What is wrong with you? When I knew you before you always used to be so nice and now you are constantly moody. I haven't done anything wrong and you're being so horrible"
"You haven't done anything wrong; you're the one who flirts with every man you know"
"Stop being so overly dramatic. They're just friends"
"Yeah, right"
Their heads had been close together, they were whispering fiercely. To a bystander it would have looked as though they were just talking about something very private. But, if you looked very closely you could see that Cedric was clenching his jaw and Hermione was shaking with indignation. An apprehensive waitress made her way over to the table
"Are you ready to order?" She squeaked
"No" said Hermione "I've changed my mind. We're finished." Cedric had the sense that she was talking about more than just the meal and suddenly felt awful.
She stood up to leave blinking hastily and said in his ear "Valerie, the girl that Mark cheated on me with just walked past, but I don't think Icare about making him jealous anymore because I've just realised that all men are justthe same."
And she was gone.
He immediately felt incredibly cruel and left to make it up to her, except he didn't know where to find her. The rain fell in torrents and he hunched his shoulders as he stepped out into the street. He hoped to God that she hadn't gone to Grimmauld Place or the Burrow, he remembered the speech he had been given by the Weasley's and Harry if her hurt Hermione. Most of them had involved sharp kitchen implements being inserted into his body in some rather unorthodox ways. Actually George hadused aparticularly creative threat, involving being force fedcrates ofskiving snackboxes before being finished of with a hot poker.
He apparated straight to her house, the door was locked but heused the 'alohomora' charm and it opened quite easily. He made a mental note to ask her whether her house had any protective charms on it at all. But now was not the time.
"Hermione?" He called, but there was no answer. Her jacket laid on the floor of the kitchen, as though it had been thrown off in a great hurry and her sandals were lead in the middle of the hallway floor. That wasn't right. Hermione was never untidy, even when she was miserable she tidied things up. What if something had happened to her?
His stomach fell intohis shoesbut then he heard therain. That wasn't right either because he had closed the front door, unless her roof was leaking he shouldn't beable to hear the rain that clearly. He made his way to the back door and what he saw in the garden made him feel so guilt-ridden that he almost felt physically sick.
From a tree at the far end hung a wooden swing, she was sat on this, her shoulders shaking with hersobs. The rain had soaked her through and the dress and her hair were dripping steadily.
He ran to her.
"Hermione, I'm so sorry"
"No, I'm sorry" She hiccoughed "I was so horrid to you and … and" but she couldn't finish the sentence. He hugged her tightly as she wept. Eventually she stopped crying and chuckled slightly
"What?" asked Cedric
"I've just realised, we've had our first fight"
Cedric had to join in her laughter, though he couldn't understand just why she found that quite so funny.
A faint peeping noise came from overhead and a letter fell into Hermione's lap.
She opened it, read it quickly and gasped.
"We have to go" she said "Padma's in labour"
Cedric had been enjoying the hugging "Do we have to go just yet?"
"Well, yes" called Hermione, running back towards the house "I'm her midwife"
In what seemed like no time at all Cedric was sat in Ron Weasley's living room with Ron and Harry and Ginny. All 4 of them looked a little anxious; they had been there for nearlyages.
The door swung open quietly and Hermione entered the room, carrying a small bundle of blankets a baby girl was wrapped in them, fast asleep, a tiny pink fist gripping one of Hermione's fingers. Hermione looked beautiful and, in the few seconds before the baby was handed to Ron, Cedric thought that she may have been one of the few people who was born to be a mother.