"Hey 'Mione?"

Silence.

"'Mione?"

"What Ronald?"

"Can I ask you something?"

"No. Read."

Silence.

"'Mione, I really want to ask you something."

Hermione slammed the book she was reading shut.

"What?"

Ron cleared his throat and closed the book he had been pretending to read. "I was just curious. I mean, we all thought life would sort of go back to normal, or whatever it may be, after You-Know- I mean Voldemort died. Obviously for us it hasn't, but what did you plan on doing when we didn't have 'saving the world' duties?"

"I planned on returning to Hogwarts, finishing my seventh year I suppose. Maybe teach, or a job at the ministry. I'm not quite sure, I hadn't really thought about it. Why?" Hermione threw Ron an inquisitive expression. Ron looked down at his book and turned a slight shade of pink. Luckily the room was dimly lit by only a lamp in the corner, so she was unable to see the almost humorous humiliation that was painted across the red head's face.

"I said I was just curious."

"Well what did you plan on doing?" Ron couldn't tell if Hermione was annoyed by his question, or legitimately interested. He knew what he had wanted to do. What he had planned and desired to do was to express his true feelings for Hermione. He hadn't forgotten what they thought was going to be their final moment together. He had been dying to repeat the motions since then, but he wasn't sure if it would be appreciated. They had gone from bickering first years to jealous ball attendees to what they were today. Ron had loved her, in his strange way, even when they were whiny first years that couldn't stand to be in each others presence.

"Are you just trying to waste time so you don't have to read?"

"No, of course not!"

"Than what?"

His head grew hot as he searched for an answer. All he could think of was kissing her. His mind should have been on finding the clue, or the fate of his sister trapped in the clutches of Voldemort's son, but his mind, body, and heart were all focused upon the individual beside him. Ron felt a small spark of courage grow inside him. The pinkness left his face. He done it before, why couldn't he do it again?

"What did I plan on doing? To be honest, this," Ron lightly grabbed Hermione's chin and kissed her. For a moment she shuddered, and he feared that he had made a terrible mistake. But luckily, he was wrong. Hermione pushed the books between them onto the floor without breaking the kiss, and pulled herself closer to Ron.

He knew he'd made the right decision.

Hermione was tightly in his arms returning every kiss he gave her. Perfection. Now he knew why she strove for it constantly. The perfection of her gave him such an adrenaline rush and made him desire it in every aspect of his life. And he wanted her to be by his side the whole way.

He tore away from her. She looked at him longingly, as if she knew.

"Hermione, you have to know. You're the most brilliant woman I've ever met. I lo-"

"I FIGURED IT OUT!"

Bloody fucking bastard I'm going to murder you after we rejoice in your discovery. Ron thought to himself as he jumped away from Hermione.

Harry realized after his exclamation that he completely ruined the moment for his two friends.

"Um, do you want, me to- um- I can come back later, if- err…"

"No, don't be silly! What did you find?" Hermione attempted to flatten out her hair, which could truly never be tamed.

Harry shook his head of his poor timing and sat down between his friends on the couch. "After a million different patterns, I found the right one. I was right about it being similar to the pattern used at Diagon Alley, except it include every brick in the mantle. Anyways! After I had done so, the brick moved to reveal a small shelf where there was another memory in a vial." Harry pulled the vial from his pocket and handed it to Hermione. A huge grin spread across her face.

"What about you two? Any luck?" Harry paused, and realized what he had said, "Well, obviously someone got a little lucky, but I'm talking about the portr-"

"HARRY JAMES POTTER!" Hermione smacked her friend on the arm, a little hard for comfort. Her face was hot with mortification as Harry and Ron both laughed.

"Dammit, Hermione. It was merely a joke. And besides, it was bound to happen anyways," Harry smiled. It felt like old times, back when they were in the cozy common room of Gryffindor, procrastinating on one of Snape's unbearable essays.

"Does it look like we found out how to get the clue form the portrait?" Hermione sneered at Harry.

"Well, the best idea that I've come up with is lighting the bloody thing on fire," Ron said as he threw his feet up on a rather large pile of book in front of him. Hermione sprang to her feet.

"Ronald, you're a genius!"

"I know?"

Hermione ran over to Ron, kissed him hard on the lips, and ran to the portrait with wand in hand.

"Let's hope your stupid idea works," Harry said as the two arose to join Hermione. When they arrived, they saw the disappointed face of Hermione as blue flames began to die on the portrait. But her expression didn't last long.

"I need you two to stand back. I need you both with wands at the ready. I'm going to use the Fiendfyre spell that can destroy any dark magic. It will save us the trouble of dealing with the portrait again, and I think it will get us the final piece of evidence." Hermione pulled her hair up into a ponytail, for safety reasons. Harry and Ron stood behind her, ready to put out the flames before they got out of control. Hermione closed her eyes as she focused. She could control the flames attack upon the subject but it would take an amazing amount of concentration. Her eyes fluttered open and her wand flew into the air as she declared, "Fiendfyre!"

Flames burst from the tip of Hermione's wand and molested the portrait. The silencing charm that Hermione had placed upon it earlier was almost insignificant, because the flames did the screaming for Mrs. Black. Their timing had to be perfect, or the flames would lose control. When the painting and frame had been devoured by the fire, jets of water burst from the three wands to deplete the last of the flames. It was not a moment too soon, because the head of a serpent had appeared in the flames, ready to finish off the rest of the house.

When the final ember had been extinguished the three moved toward the damaged wall before them. The place where the portrait hung upon the wall was now an enormous opening.

"Lumos!" Hermione said as she held her wand into the gaping hole. The illumination from her wand revealed no vial, but a book of some sorts. Hermione picked it up and blew the dust off of it.

"What is it?" Ron asked. Hermione flipped through the pages. It was empty.

"Great, all of that work for an empty book," Hermione was about to throw it on the floor when Harry grabbed it form her.

"Wait! I've seen something like this before," he ran back into the drawing room, grabbed a quill and some ink from a desk against the wall. He sat upon the couch and was quickly joined by Ron and Hermione. Harry opened to the first empty page and dipped the quill into the ink pot. He then began to write on the page, "Hello, my name is Harry Potter."

Nothing. Harry let out as sigh. "I thought it was just like- wait. Hold on," Harry stopped. A few of the letters disappeared into the pages, some rearranged and new letters arose.

"Hello, Harry. I've been dying to meet you."

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Alright, I know, it has some super corny bits. But it's late and I haven't written in forever so I wanted to throw a quick one in there. Review! Please. I know I've got grammar issues and whatnot, so please don't remind me. It's the last thing I'm worried about with these. If they really bother anyone that much, just tell me and I'll start focusing more on it.