Love Complications (Part 4)
By Firenze
A/N: This is the follow-up series to "Enchanted." And if you've read the other parts, you would've known that. So if you haven't yet, I suggest you read these six things: that trilogy and the first three of this series, so everything makes sense.
In this particular part, an intense love triangle is building between Harry, Hermione, Ron, and a slug. Just kidding, it's only the first 3. Hermione must decide whom she can really trust, and debates over the possibility that one of her best friends has put her under a love potion.
Disclaimer: Everything recognizable from any of the Harry Potter books clearly is property of the amazing J.K. Rowling, and I have nothing to do with it, except I'm an author writing this story for my own enjoyment, and for the readers, too, I guess. If you honestly thought these characters and things are of my making, or that I actually am J.K. Rowling, I'd advise you to visit a doctor and find out if you're a real human.
* * *
"The Triangle Forms"
Harry trudged back from Quidditch practice. Every single bone in his body was aching, all his muscles were sore, and to top it off, he was soaking wet, because it had started to rain halfway through practice.
The only thing that kept him going all the way to Gryffindor Tower was the thought of Hermione. He was caught up with every part of her, her shining eyes, which twinkled when she was happy, her velvety hair that bounced up and down when she ran, her flushed cheeks, which used to redden even more when she was around him, her soft, sweet-tasting lips…
A person running very fast bumped into him, and knocked his senses back in. By the look of their bushy, brown hair, and the way his spirits were instantly raised, it had to be Hermione.
"Hermione!" he cried out in glee, speeding up to catch up to her, despite the fact that he was ready to collapse. "Boy, are you a sight for sore eyes—"
When he reached her, turned her around, put his hands on her shoulders, and looked at her face, the expression he saw looking at him was one of fear. Her eyes were wide, her mouth open in shock. Suddenly, she appeared puzzled, thinking something over. Then suspiciously, her eyes narrowed quickly, she wrenched herself from his grasp, and dashed away.
"Hermione!" he called after her. "What's the matter? What's going on?" He was now too tired to run after her again. Soon, she was so far ahead, that all he heard was the faint patter of her feet on the ground.
He heard footsteps behind him also. Ron jogged up by his side. "How was practice?"
"Exhausting," Harry said. "But it wasn't as bad as the greeting I got from Hermione." He explained to Ron exactly what had happened.
For a fleeting second, Harry could have sworn Ron had a look of contempt and smugness on his face, but when he blinked, Ron was looking perplexed. "Really? She was acting kind of weird at the library, too, now that I think about it."
"Who knows?" Harry said, sighing, and dragging his feet forward, leaving a trail of water behind. "I'll never be able to understand girls."
"Ditto," Ron replied.
* * *
Hermione leaned back against the headboard on her four-poster, hugging her pillow tightly. She had been trying to lose her thoughts in a nice book, but it just wasn't working too well. No matter how hard she tried to avoid it, Ron's weird behavior and the possible truth of his words mystified her.
She was just so confused. What if Harry really had put a potion on her? No, he'd never do that. I loved him all on my own.
What if Ron had put some in her butterbeer? Now that was a definite possibility, and that really scared her. She loved Harry, and she knew it. But if the potion was real and it took over, her life would be a complete mess. Why did Ron have to be so spiteful of her and Harry's relationship, which otherwise would have been perfect?
"Is something getting to you?" Parvati asked Hermione, while reading an issue of Teen Witch magazine.
"Not really," she lied, feeling nauseous at her dilemma. Who could she really trust? She would normally have been able to answer that instantly, but when it was between her two best friends in the world, one of whom was her boyfriend, it was impossible to decide.
"Never mind her," Lavender said breezily, re-taping her poster of Celestina Warbuck, which she had autographed at the Valentine's Ball, up on the wall. "It has something to do with Harry and Ron, and that'll keep her like this for days at the least."
For once, Lavender was actually right, but she was probably better at understanding people's emotions than schoolwork. "I just need to think," Hermione replied quietly, burying her face in her pillow.
Suddenly, Lavender whipped out a pack of cards from her trunk, and Hermione had always figured her to be too much of a girly-girl to play Exploding Snap, so she was a bit surprised. But instead, it was a deck of tarot cards.
"I'll give you a reading," she volunteered to Hermione. "Maybe it can clear up what's going on in your life, and what's to be expected to happen next."
"I suppose so," she replied, because at least it was something, Divination or not. She crawled out of her bed, and sat on Lavender's, where she was arranging the cards.
"Now, flip them over," she instructed, opening up the book.
If tarot cards had a bit of truth to them, this reading just might have had it. According to the book, Hermione's situation was that many complications in love would be heading her way in the very near future. A love triangle was building, and Hermione and two other boys would soon be entangled in it. She'd have to make a quick decision on who she could really trust, and try to find a way to fix everything in her life with her friends.
Hermione sighed. "Everything is pointing to the fact that I am in a deep mess."
"Don't worry," Parvati said comfortingly. "You've never believed in Divination, so why start now? I'm sure things will look better in the morning."
Hermione nodded, and settled into her bed, her thoughts now just more jumbled and confusing than they had been before Lavender tried to solve her problem.
* * *
The next morning wasn't looking up for anyone. Anyone but Ron, that is. Ever since he awoke, he was walking with a sort of spring in his step, and for some reason, he was really interested with getting to breakfast.
"Whoa, calm down," Dean said, as Ron practically threw his robes on.
"Gotta dash!" he yelled, and zoomed away.
Harry had overslept, and once he got up, the room was deserted. He took a quick shower, changed, and he was combing his hair in front of the mirror when he remembered what had happened last night, and his heart dropped.
Hermione had run away from him. He could practically see her expression of mistrust and wariness that she had worn in the mirror. What had he done to make her suspicious?
He wasn't sure, but he gave up on trying to fix his hair, and ran to the Great Hall to try and find out what was going on. Hopefully, if it wasn't too much too wish for, she'd speak to him this time.
* * *
Hermione slowly raised her spoonful of porridge to her mouth. This morning, she was sitting with Parvati and Lavender, because she couldn't bear to face Ron or Harry, even though he wasn't even there yet. She still couldn't decide who was the right one to believe and trust, and the dream she had had last night only did to further confound her.
It was the end of January. Hermione skipped down to the Great Hall for breakfast in delight. She sat down between Ron and Harry, in her normal seat. Both of them said hello and smiled cheerfully at her. Her heart skipped a beat when she saw Ron grinning widely.
She reached across the table for the plate of eggs, and at that time, out of the corner of her eye, she distinctly saw Harry empty something into her goblet. "What was that?" she asked him, but he shrugged innocently.
"What do you mean?" he asked naively, and Ron growled.
The scene flashed to the whole time during the Entrancement Enchantment phase, and she remembered how entirely out of control her feelings had been, and she was convinced that she truly wasn't using her own actions. It just couldn't be.
~
But then she saw it from Harry's point of view. She had always like Harry, ever since their first year, and it only intensified more up until their fifth year when she really noticed it. And hormones raging; she had been desperate to get so much as a glance from him.
The idea of an enchantment sounded perfect to her, and she grabbed at it. The whole time, she realized how jealous Ron had been acting, even though he had hit it off with Padma, not counting the whole Super Energy Elixir thing.
It flashed to how much more jealous he appeared when Harry and Hermione started going out with each other. Maybe he had gotten desperate, and it was a love potion he had poured in her butterbeer.
In the end, she decided to trust Harry, because after all, he was her boyfriend, and had always been the person she could trust the most in her life. But then he let her down. The next week, she was walking by an empty classroom, and she saw Harry making out with Cho. She heard their conversation, also.
"…Yeah, it was fun with Hermione. We had some good times, and she was an okay kisser, but I got tired of her. She was like a leech after a while. Maybe that potion wasn't such a good idea," Harry panted, and then started to kiss Cho's neck.
"I can be so much better than her for you," Cho replied, and they were kissing passionately again.
Hermione's head was swirled, and she dragged her spoon around in circles in her bowl of porridge. Harry probably was using her, cheating on her with Cho. And Ron's possible love potion had had no effect as of yet, and that was if her vision had even been real. With that, her mind was now totally made up.
Harry ran into the Great Hall as fast as he could, nearly tripping on the hem of his robes. "Hermione!" he cried out, instantly spotting her, even out of her regular seat. "We have to talk!"
"There's nothing to talk about," she said angrily, walking away, abandoning her porridge. She wasn't much in the mood for breakfast anyhow, and she definitely wasn't going to talk to her so-called "boyfriend".
Harry stared after her, and ran his hand through his tangled hair. What had he done to make her hate him so much?
Ron, who was smiling widely, unaware of the globs of porridge on his chin and cheeks, waved at Harry and motioned him to come over and sit down.
He grinned back and walked to the empty chair. When worst came to worst, he could always trust his best friend Ron to stand by his side. Right?
* * *
Ron was alone in the common room, brushing up on chess tactics. He needed to think of new ways to beat Harry and let Hermione win without her knowing he had.
Just then, Hermione burst through the portrait hole, looking slightly crazed. "Ron!" she said merrily and darted to him. She proceeded to sit next to him on the armchair he was on and kiss him hard on the lips. "I'm so sorry I didn't realize the truth sooner…" she breathed.
He closed his eyes, and a huge grin spread across his face, as he wrapped his arms around her waist, and kissed her more intensively. They kissed for the longest time, abandoning all fears. It seemed like they would never see each other again.
"What's going on?" asked a fearful voice.
The tangled two broke their kiss to turn and see who was speaking. Luckily, it was only Neville, but maybe that wasn't such a lucky thing at all.
"Hermione?" he asked in disbelief. "You ran away from the library to kiss him?" The loathing was pretty clearly heard when he referred to Ron. "He's your boyfriend's best friend."
"Harry doesn't have to find out," Hermione whispered.
"I don't have to find out what?" someone asked, entering the common room.
Neville raised a slightly trembling hand and pointed at Hermione and Ron sitting very close together on one armchair. Eyes following Neville's finger, the person who had run into the room's heart stopped. None of them would ever forget the surprise, confusion, fury, wretchedness, and mostly the hurt and suffering all blended together on Harry's face.
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I won't keep you hanging for long! More soon (meaning tomorrow), if you give me enough reviews (they have to be somewhat good though, because flames may slow me down).