I'm so good at this updating thing now. Probably cause my Beta will kick my ass if I don't move along. Jasmine (BlueFlowerAlways), you're awesome!
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JK Rowling owns everything, including my soul.
Chapter 8
Hermione sat, dumbfounded. She stared with her mouth agape, looking directly into Ginny's bright brown eyes. She searched for something that would tell her what was going on inside her friend's mind. Was she angry? Confused? Happy? Worried? What was it? Hermione gave up, knowing that Ginny would be blocking her emotions until she heard the answer.
"Wh-what?" was all that Hermione could manage to gasp out.
"Are you and Dobby, er, together? Like, as a couple?" Ginny responded carefully and patiently.
Hermione didn't know what to say. Should she tell the truth? Ginny was her best friend, after all, and she couldn't imagine her being cross with her, or never speaking to her again. But it was a complicated thing. She and Dobby weren't really a couple…but they were. They shared the same adoring feelings for one another, but they didn't behave like a regular couple. They snuck around to talk with each other, and they were most certainly not intimate. She didn't think of Dobby in that way. After a minute of rapid thoughts, Hermione settled on the truth.
"Yes," she stated plainly, "but it's sort of confusing."
"How do you mean?" Ginny's face remained unreadable.
"Well, we expressed feelings for each other, but we're not a couple in the sense of…intimacy, if you catch my drift."
Ginny's face spread into a huge, wide smile. She jumped off the desk and ran over to Hermione and embraced her to the point of squeezing all the air out of Hermione's lungs. She pulled away, still smiling.
"Oh, Hermione, that's the most adorable thing I've ever heard! I've always thought Dobby was the cutest house-elf."
Hermione was so relieved.
"I'm so glad you don't disapprove! I've been terribly frightened of what might happen if word were to get around. I'd be scorned and shunned by the entire school, I suppose, and Dobby would most certainly be freed and shunned as well. I couldn't think of how awful I'd feel if that were to happen," Hermione let out.
"Oh, I promise I won't say a word! You know I wouldn't!" exclaimed Ginny, as if doing so was a crime.
"I know you won't. But I have to ask…how on earth did you know? I thought we were pretty quiet about it."
"I'm more perceptive than the rest of this lot. I saw you guys spending more time together, laughing more, and when he brought you breakfast, that did it for me. Then I thought back to the day of the protest, when you came back grinning like an idiot, and when you wouldn't tell us where you'd been. I knew."
"And you aren't…grossed out, or angry?" This had been Hermione's biggest fear.
"Not at all! You know I'm not like that. I think it's wonderful."
"Oh, Ginny, I'm so glad! But…of course, since I'm completely mental, I've started to have some second thoughts, so to speak," Hermione confessed.
"Uh oh. Spill," demanded Ginny in a manner that clearly expressed her genuine concern and interest as a friend.
"I don't like sneaking around, at all. I guess a part of me is ashamed- no, that's not the word. Maybe I'm just too much of a coward to face everyone if they found out. And I know this sounds selfish, but I want the closeness of a regular couple. Like…like I had with Ron, you know? And what you have with Harry. But then I feel terrible about it. To top it all off, recently I've begun to have…thoughts, I guess you could call them, about…well, about Ron. Feelings, is perhaps the better word." She let everything that had been troubling her completely go, as she confided in Ginny, her best friend besides Ron and Harry.
"Whoa, whoa. Let's take this one at a time. First of all, no one likes sneaking around. You can't be yourself, you feel like you're hiding the person you're with, which you normally are, and it's especially difficult for you because that is, essentially, what you have to do. Hide Dobby. With your situation, because of the special circumstances, it's natural for you to be nervous or worried or scared to go against the grain if and/or when this, whatever you'd like to call it, goes public."
Hermione nodded, and waited for Ginny to continue.
"Again, it's normal for you to want a certain closeness because that's what everyone wants, especially with a significant other. You're going to have to decide how important that is to you in a relationship, and then go from there."
"I go back and forth with it though. First I don't care, then I want more, then I don't need it, and then I want it again! I don't know what I want." Hermione was frustrated with herself.
"It's understandable. You're going to have to think about it some more, and possibly talk to Dobby about it."
Hermione cringed, and Ginny responded.
"I know, that won't be a very comfortable conversation, but it might have to happen. As for your possible feelings for Ron, I really don't know what to tell you. All I can say is that you might want to observe your feelings for him, and observe the way you act around him, the way you feel around him. I know for a fact that he still has feelings for you, but don't let that alter your decision."
Hermione felt infinitely better.
"Oh, Ginny, I don't know what I'd do without you! This talk has really helped."
Hermione got up and hugged Ginny. The two girls had never bonded quite like this before.
The pair of girls walked out of the classroom and parted ways, as Ginny needed to meet up with Harry in the library and Hermione had Professor Binns' essay on goblin wars to write. The entire walk back to Gryffindor tower found Hermione thinking a lot about things. About Dobby, about Ron, about her feelings, and about what she really wanted. She had always been so sure of what she desired, being extremely driven in her academic career. But Hermione never really stopped to think about her personal life. There had never been much for her to think about in that respect, and it was extremely frustrating and troubling to have it be such a burden on her now.
"Toffee éclairs," said Hermione to the Fat Lady, and she climbed through the portrait hole to the common room.
It was about ten o'clock and the common room was pretty packed. Everyone was hanging around, talking, laughing, smiling. It was the weekend, after all. Hermione felt incredibly out of place and, noting that the common room wouldn't be a good place to start her essay, headed up to the dormitory to work.
It was not empty, as she would have liked, but Hermione felt that two girls was better than god knows how many riley Gryffindors. She sat down on her plush, four-poster bed and brought her bag up with her. Pulling out a piece of parchment and her ink and quill, she started to write about the goblin wars.
It wasn't quiet for long, as Hermione realized the two girls to be Lavender and Parvati, the two most gossipy, loud, girls in all of Gryffindor House. Just wonderful.
Hermione tried to focus on her essay but couldn't help overhearing their conversation.
"So, what was snogging Ron like?" asked Parvati curiously.
"Oh, he was absolutely incredible. The way his hands would work up and down my body, and his lips, oh don't even get me started…" Lavender replied shamelessly.
Hermione grit her teeth in an attempt to stay silent. Ignore them, ignore them…
"He would do the cutest little thing with his tongue…" Lavender continued.
Urg the Unclean led the goblin rebellions during the 18th century…
"I've sort of always had a thing for redheads, especially down, well, you know where…"
Hermione exploded.
"Can you two just shut up?! And you, Lavender, are perhaps the most horrible person I have ever had the displeasure of meeting!"
Lavender had a smug look on her face.
"I think, Hermione, that you are just jealous that you were never able to get that close to Ron. Your sub par physical appearance turned him off, and now you're angry with me. It's understandable. I'm sure he never touched you besides holding your hand. I'm almost positive it was completely unbearable for him to kiss you. I honestly don't know why he dated you at all, to be perfectly honest."
Tears were spilling over Hermione's brown eyes, streaming down her cheeks, some falling on her bed, and some snaking their way into her mouth. The salty taste was bitter, because they held a pain beyond what she had ever experienced, and because somewhere in her deep subconscious, Hermione had felt this way. She knew that Ron had touched her other than just the hand holding, but as a result of her low self-esteem, she felt that Ron might have found her not very attractive.
"You evil bitch!" Hermione managed to yell as some of the other girls came into the dormitory. She ran out and down the steps to the now deserted common room and sunk into one of the chairs by the fire place.
She knew that she shouldn't let Lavender Brown get to her, but it was too difficult. The words were quite possibly too true. And Lavender was every guy's perfect dream girl. Ditzy, curvy, and all-too-willing. But that's what the guys wanted. Hermione was a flat-chested, bushy-haired bookworm that all too often got on Ron's nerves with her mentions of S.P.E.W. and her critical nature. She couldn't help it, it's just who she was. And she never meant it to be mean or naggy. When you spend any amount of time with a person, especially a significant other, you get annoyed by the little things.
But you also learn to love the little things. Ron's caveman-like chewing, his snoring that could wake the dead, the gentle touches when they were alone, the way he could let his guard down and say the sweetest things with such subtlety…
Hermione pulled her knees to her chest and continued to cry. She cried for the good times, she cried for the bad times. She cried for her confusion and for her loss of Ron. She didn't know what she wanted, but she knew she missed the tender caress of his hands, and the way he loved her so much. She needed it.
The portrait was being opened and closed, as evidenced by the sound Hermione heard from inside the common room. She tried to wipe the tears away from her eyes but anyone stopping at the chairs would notice it right away. She buried her face in her knees, hoping that whoever it was would go straight to bed. But, of course, luck was never on her side. The person walked right up to her and sat down next to her on the couch.
"Hermione, what's wrong? Are you okay?" It was Ron.
She didn't look up and tried to stabilize her voice.
"Yeah, I'm fine. I'm going up in a couple minutes, you don't have to wait up for me."
"I know when there's something wrong. Look at me, please. You're worrying me."
Ron cupped her chin and brought it away from her knees. He gasped at the toll that the crying had taken on her face, and instantly knew she was not alright.
"Please," he pleaded.
Hermione didn't know what to say. How could she tell Ron that she was having second thoughts about being a couple with a house elf, and that she was simultaneously having feelings for him, and really upset and jealous by what Lavender had said in the dormitory.
"It's silly, really. I don't want to bother you."
"Hermione, you know you can talk to me about anything. I care about you."
His words tugged at Hermione's heart. It was such a comfort to know that he could still care for her after all they had been through.
"I'm just…really confused lately, about a lot of things. And earlier Lavender was saying some awful things that just really got under my skin…"
"Lavender? Don't worry about her, she's an airhead."
"Normally I wouldn't, but…" Hermione trailed off. How could she say it?
"What is it?"
"She was saying things about…well, about you."
Ron's face looked puzzled.
"Like what kind of things?"
"About things she did with you."
"You mean…sexually?"
Hermione cringed at the thought.
"Yes."
"Don't believe anything she tells you. We didn't get as far as she'd have liked."
Something blazed up in Hermione's chest.
"It doesn't matter, Ron! She was going into grotesque detail, and it made me sick to my stomach to hear another girl talk about you that way! It shouldn't matter because we're not together anymore, but I felt terrible and all I wanted to do was rip her throat out! And then she was saying things like you never really loved me and you hated to touch me. She said you would never touch me like you touched her."
She felt ashamed. Angry. Upset. She had just spilled something so very personal and confusing to the guy she was confused about. And it was Ron, of all people. Hermione hung her head down again, too embarrassed to look in his eyes.
"How dare she," Ron snarled, "How dare she even think about talking to you like that."
Hermione lifted her head. "Huh?"
"Listen to me, Hermione. I loved every minute I spent with you. It didn't matter if we fought, I loved you with every fiber of my being. I still do. I don't even think that I didn't want to touch you, because I did. Lavender is disgusting, every guy's sloppy seconds. And I'm not just saying that. Believe me when I say I was not truly happy with her."
She stared in his eyes, unable to coherently speak. Ron continued.
"But with you, Hermione, it was like pure bliss. It was beyond anything I could have ever imagined. You would say the cutest and wittiest things that would catch me off guard. You never ceased to amaze me. Still don't. Hermione, you are more beautiful than anyone in this school, and I mean it. I can't describe it, but it brings a light to my life, as cliché as that sounds. I love you still, and I'm not sure I can ever stop."
Hermione couldn't believe her ears. Everything Lavender had said had been a lie. He loved her, and only her, wanted to touch her more than he wanted anything or anyone else. The thought made her heart swell, and all she wanted to do was melt into Ron's arms and never leave.
She turned to Ron and stared intently in his eyes. She tried to portray all her emotions, whatever they might be at the time, to Ron, hoping he would somehow understand. How that would be possible when she didn't even understand, she didn't know. But it seemed…right.
Ron cupped Hermione's cheeks in his hands and returned the intense gaze.
"I love you more than I could ever tell you; more than I could ever show you. I can't quite describe it. But you make me so happy, Hermione."
Hermione felt her heart beat faster as the words came out of his mouth.
His mouth…
"Ron," Hermione breathed, "I think I love you, too."
And with that Hermione leaned into Ron's face and pressed her lips against his. The feeling of his mouth working against her was so enticingly familiar. She kissed him more forcefully this time, never wanting the moment to end as she wove her hands through his red hair. Hermione traced her tongue along Ron's bottom lip. He groaned in anticipation, which gave her full access to snake her tongue into his mouth. They battled for dominance, until Ron finally gave in to Hermione's persistence. He ran his hands up and down her sides, massaging her curves along the way. Hermione fisted Ron's robes into her hands as she pressed her body flush against his, intensifying the kiss and closing the space between them. There was a noise that sounded like a high pitched sob. It definitely didn't come from Ron, and Hermione broke away from the kiss and turned to her right. Someone was watching them, and that someone was…crying.
"Dobby?"
Big big big big thanks to the Harry Potter Lexicon. When my memory fails me (which it often does) I consult the lexicon for references I want to include. Thank you!
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If you're a fan of Twilight, check out my story, "A Friendly Deception," which should have an update soon.
I'm currently writing a one-shot crossover sorta crack Harry Potter/Twilight fic. It should be up in about a week, so look out for it!
