Chapter 14
Biting her swollen, grinning bottom lip, Hermione shuffled out of the bed, making an exaggerated effort to remain covered by Ron's sheet, twisting it out of the bed as she went, one last corner tickling Ron's overly sensitive skin as it trailed over his stomach, leaving him fully exposed on the bed to watch her.
But he was knocked from his trance as he heard his mother's voice downstairs. Eyes widening, he scooted to the edge of his bed and began scanning the nearby floor for his boxers. Finally locating them, he stretched one long arm halfway under the bed, leaning left to snatch them. When he straightened up, lifting a flexed foot to begin dressing, he found Hermione watching him, holding her knickers in a clenched fist.
Blushing, he lifted his arse and slipped his boxers the rest of the way on, running a hand through his hair as he stood awkwardly in front of her.
She cleared her throat daintily and turned her back on him. He was on the point of searching for the rest of his clothing when the sheet, formerly wrapped tightly under Hermione's arms, dropped with a shuffle to the rug.
He swallowed, taking in the newness of a full view of the back of Hermione's nude body, head to toe. He actually took a step back, just to see her better, as her arms twisted her bra, straightening it to put it on...
So okay, he'd never seen a completely naked girl in person. But he'd seen a fair few naked female arses in magazines, yes. And he'd be lying if he said any one of them had even come close to preparing him for seeing Hermione's. It was SO smooth and creamy and puffy in exactly the right way... curvy and, as he'd discovered earlier, a perfect fit for his palms.
Oblivious to Ron's worship, Hermione tossed her hair and slipped her bra straps over each shoulder, reaching back to fasten it, shoulder blade rolling beneath still-flushed skin. And then... she bent to pick up her shirt. A sort of sideways lean, twisting as her small fingers closed around the material.
Ron's knees buckled automatically, and he sat back down on his bed, mouth hanging slightly open, slouching, and now in direct eyeline with Hermione's perfectly proportioned arse.
She slipped her arms into her shirt and, as she began working on the buttons, the back hem brushed down along the heaviest part of the outward curve of her arse. She turned back around to face Ron, blushing as her fingers worked on the next button, a vertical strip of slightly sweaty chest skin still revealed as she worked to cover herself. His eyes darted down to the curls peeking out from beneath the front hem of her shirt just as she looked at him, pausing to be shocked at his position back on the bed, eyes glazed with renewed lust.
"Hello?" she teased, tilting her head to the side. He dragged his heavily lidded eyes up to hers, and a grin spread in slow motion from cheek to cheek.
"You have the best arse in the entire world. Did you know?"
Hermione blushed scarlet all over again.
"No, I don't!" she argued.
"Ohh, you do."
Harry's voice rang out from a level or so below... Ron cringed.
"Right. Let's not let Harry find out how great your arse is," and he lifted an eyebrow at her, grinning again, lopsidedly, as he resumed his search for the rest of his clothing, listening to the delightful sounds of a still shocked Hermione, giggling lightly at his praise and follow up joke. So, his standard order of events.
He found a stray t-shirt instead of working through the effort of buttoning however the hell many buttons his former article had contained. However many it was, it was a number his post-shag brain would have quite an awful lot of trouble counting to, at any rate.
And by the time he'd pulled it on, Hermione was tugging her jeans over the curve of her hips. He watched her over his shoulder, hair falling into his eyes. When she caught his gaze, she gave him a shy smile, toeing his own jeans in his direction as she lifted a solitary eyebrow. He smiled and bent to pick them up, hopping as he shimmied into them, brushing his fringe back from his forehead as he studied his general appearance, glancing down to wiggle his toes.
"Ready as I'll ever be, I suppose," he shrugged, and Hermione nodded once, raising her wand to undo the spells. And not a second had passed once she had, when a loud series of pounding footfalls began to ascend.
Hermione opened the door, acting far too casual, just as Ginny leapt onto the landing outside of Ron's room.
"Oh, you ARE up here," she panted, catching her breath. "Dinner'll be late. Mum's started cooking but sent me around the house with the message. We got some chocolate cakes for dessert. They smell incredible..."
Hermione adopted an expression of extremely over zealous interest and Ron bit the inside of his cheek to keep from laughing.
"Right. That's all," Ginny said, backing up a step. But at the last moment, just as she was turning to go, she winked very suggestively in Ron's direction, and he bit much harder into his cheek than he had been before, probably cutting through the inside of his mouth with his teeth. He mentally swore as Ginny disappeared with a parade of descending thumps.
Hermione blew out a nervous breath and glanced back at Ron, narrowing her eyes.
"You've got to do this exactly how I say, because this is really a very stupid idea..."
He nodded, opening his mouth extra wide and shifting his jaw around, attempting to undo the damage he'd inflicted upon himself a moment ago. Hermione watched in a slightly mesmerized way before lifting her eyebrows until they had ascended very close to her hairline.
He stuck his tongue out at her before closing his mouth and smirking. She swallowed visibly and her lips parted. Thrown off by her sudden expression of... desire?... he blinked at her.
"Nevermind," she breathed, cheeks flushed lightly, "just follow me downstairs, only go on down past the loo when I go in. Go outside-" she lifted her fingers to air quote "-for a walk-" she lowered her hands "-and apparate into the loo once you've walked far enough that no one can see you from the house."
His smirk intensified.
"Got it?"
"Yes."
She nodded, brushed past him onto the landing, and took a breath.
"Right," and she began trekking down the stairs, Ron following close behind her.
He watched as her messy hair swayed against her back, stomach bubbling with butterflies. It was a different kind of nervousness now, one that could be classified as far more giddy and happy than terrified, quite the opposite of hours ago, when everything had begun with that row he had started.
He grinned at her back as they reached the second floor, and she turned towards the half-open loo door. She looked back and up at him, and he nodded confirmation of the completion of The Plan, phase one. She smiled softly, lightly biting her lip, and she disappeared inside, closing and locking the door behind her with a click.
Clearing his throat and trying not to grin too obviously, he continued the rest of the way down the stairs... only to run directly into Harry.
"Oi!" Harry steadied himself and straightened his askew glasses. "Where've you been?"
"In my room, where else?" Ron shrugged.
"Mmm," Harry said, widening his eyes in some attempt at what Ron could only guess was a suggestive gesture.
"Sod off," Ron laughed. "I'm going for a walk," and he took several long strides past Harry to open the front door.
"Ah, I'll join you," Harry said, quickly catching up.
Ron froze, hand still clutching the door knob.
"Sure, uh, sure you wouldn't like to spend some time with Ginny?" Ron tried, wondering where the hell his brain had melted off to...
Harry stared at Ron for several seconds before laughing and shaking his head.
"That's a trick question," Harry said, and he brushed past Ron to shuffle out onto the porch. Not sure what to do from here, Ron exited the house and shut the door behind him, knowing for sure only that staying inside the house to work this out would not be a good idea... He could hear his mother from the kitchen, instructing his father on the proper potato peeling spellwork.
"Okay, Ron," Harry said, stepping down off the porch and eyeing Ron suspiciously, "what the hell is up?"
Ron took Harry's arm and led him away from the house, out into the yard and cutting left towards tree cover.
"You've gotta go back inside," Ron said, "and let everybody who asks know that I'm out for a walk and will be back for dinner."
"Why?" Harry looked on the fence between concern and playful teasing, awaiting Ron's next move to jump down to the proper side of that fence...
"Oh hell, Harry, okay," Ron sighed, letting go of Harry as they finally crossed into the deep trees, out of sight of the house. He ran a hand through his hair and shifted his weight from foot to foot. "I'm meeting Hermione and-"
"Ah. Got it," Harry cut in, full on smirking now. "Say no more. Go do... whatever you're going to do... I'll cover."
Ron let out a heavy breath and laughed.
"Thanks, mate..."
Harry shook his head.
"Look," Ron added, "just don't tell Hermione you had any idea what was...uh, really going on because...yeah."
He shrugged and scratched the back of his head, hair sticking up in the process.
"No problem," Harry chuckled. "Right, going. See you at dinner," and he turned to go back up to the house.
Ron blew out another breath, butterflies kicking up again, full force, and he shook his limbs, grinning.
"Here goes," he whispered roughly, and he turned, disapparating on the spot.