Sleeping
Beauty Chapter 7
"One
problem solved"
by
Foxfeather
See part
one for details
Remus Lupin
sat at the teacher's table, completely lost in thought. He watched Hermione and
her friends. Harry and Ginny seemed to have solved their problems. Hermione sat
down and looked at him, catching him off-guard. He quickly looked down at his
plate and for the umpteenth time cursed himself for being attracted to the
girl.
Next to him
Professor Sinistra chattered about the lunar eclipse they would experience next
month. Absentmindedly he told her that he had never seen a lunar eclipse in
human form so he couldn't quite share her excitement, but she waved it off and
continued talking.
Lupin
hmm-ed and nodded from time to time to her words but his thoughts drifted back
to the last few hours.
After the
kiss he had told Hermione that he wasn't sure if his affection was love or only
longing for company, and he had believed it then. He had watched her talking to
Harry down at the lake, had watched her sitting on that rock and staring up at
his window. And he had felt something pulling him to her, but he had resisted.
He had
buried himself up in his work, correcting papers, preparing his next lessons,
but he had been finished with it sooner than he really wanted. He had gone down
to the library to search for the spell that had hit Hermione and found her
sitting there, lost to the world, a beam of sunlight making her hair shine like
spun bronze. He had stood frozen to the spot for what must have been minutes.
Watching her turn the pages, burying her hands in her hair, shuffling her feet,
sighing deeply and moving on to the next book. She hadn't noticed him standing
there and he had been glad for it. When he had heard somebody enter the library
he had grabbed the next book, signed the borrower's list and left the room.
Only back at his office he had noticed the title of the book: 'Romeo and
Juliet' by William Shakespeare. Of all the books at the school's library he had
had to grab the story of an unhappy love. Just perfect!
He had
liked Shakespeare's works since he had found a battered copy of 'Much ado about
nothing' on a park bench in his youth, so he had tried to read 'Romeo and
Juliet', but he hadn't made it beyond the third page. The picture of Hermione
sitting in the library had materialized over the page, blurring the words in
the process. After having read the same sentence for the eleventh time, he had
closed the book and tried to find out what he felt.
"Remus?", a
voice interrupted his stream of thoughts.
"Hmm?"
"Did you mean
what you just said?"
"Pardon?"
"You just
consented to marry Severus and live on the ground of the lake with him!"
"Oh."
Pause.
"What did I
do?!"
Professor
Sinistra grinned. "I
take it that you haven't listened to one word I said, right?"
Lupin
blushed. "I'm sorry. I was… elsewhere."
"Problems?"
"Something
like that."
"Want to
talk about it?"
"No. But
thank you. I have to solve it myself. Again, I'm sorry I didn't listen to what
you said. I'm sure it was very interesting."
Professor
Sinistra patted his arm. "Nothing to be sorry about. It was only me mooning
about the beauty of the full moon. Not quite the right topic for a werewolf,
isn't it?"
Lupin
smiled and shook his head. "Not quite. I am a bit biased against Earth's
satellite, you know?"
She grinned
at him. "I'll leave you alone with your thoughts, then."
Lupin
nodded and tired to focus on his dinner.
"Hermione,
can we please talk?" Ron had grabbed her sleeve and pulled her aside after
dinner.
"Yeah,
sure. What do you want to talk about?"
"You. Harry
and Ginny. And yesterday evening."
Hermione
tried to keep calm. "What do you want to know?"
Ron looked
around and then pulled her into the next empty room. He seated Hermione on a
chair and took seat in the one opposite her's. "Well, I heard Ginny had been
hexed. And I have a suspicion about who is responsible. And I have the
suspicion that you have been affected by the hex, too. I watched you and your
actions were, well, strange. So?"
"So what?
And what do you mean, you have a suspicion about the culprit?"
Ron shot
her a glance and moved around on his chair.
"Okay. When
Harry and Ginny came down into the Hall, hand in hand, I heard Fred and George
talking. They said that the potion had worked as expected. They knew of Ginny's
crush on Harry and they had said they would try to help her, but she refused
their offer. Yesterday evening after the pillow fight they came back with
sweets, remember? I noticed something strange, then. I tried to grab one bottle
of butterbeer from them, but they pulled it back and handed it to Ginny. First
I thought they made it taste ugly or something, but Ginny drank and nothing
happened. Then I noticed them switch her bottle with yours. I thought of it as
a prank, you know the twins, but again, nothing happened. Only when you and Ginny
acted so strangely this morning I suspected something had happened. When Ginny
and Harry finally told me what had happened yesterday I put two and two
together."
Hermione's
thoughts raced. Ron was only one step away from the truth about her and Remus.
She had to
take the first step now.
"That
explains some things. I'm sorry I didn't talk to you. I was so confused.
Yesterday evening I tried to kiss Professor Lupin. He got very angry and we had
a big fight about it. Especially since he thought it all being a bad joke or a
bet that could cost him his job. I was so shocked and so angry that he would
think I would be thoughtless enough to do that to him and so baffled about that
sudden urge to kiss him that I couldn't get myself thinking straight today. Now
everything is clear. Thank God! I thought that maybe I was in love with him!
Me! Professor Lupin! Ugh, he's so… old!"
Hermione
didn't feel well saying that, but she could think of no other way to distract
Ron from finding out the truth. She watched his reaction closely.
Ron stared
at her. "You kissed…? I should curse those… those… jerks! He got angry? He
could have hurt you! I mean, he's a werewolf after all!"
"He would
never hurt me!", Hermione burst out. Quickly she added. "I mean, he would be
thrown out at once! And besides, I don't think that would be in his nature."
"Okay, but
one day after the full moon? He's wolfish enough to… I don't know…"
"Bite me?",
Hermione laughed.
"Er…" Ron
apparently tried to imagine the ill-looking Professor trying to bite an enraged
Hermione and burst out laughing.
"I have one
question left", Hermione said. "Why did the twins try to hex me, too?"
Ron blushed
and mumbled something unintelligible.
"Pardon?"
"Theythoughtyou'dcometome."
"Huh? What
do you mean?"
"Um,
Hermione, look, I… it's that… Ilikeyou."
"Ron, could
you please talk loud enough for me to understand you?"
"I – like –
you. And they know it. I think they wanted to help me." The colour of Ron's
face competed with the colour of his hair and was close to winning.
Hermione
was speechless.
"Oh, Ron! I
had no idea!" Hermione's mind was blank. What now? She didn't want to hurt Ron,
but she didn't like him the way he liked her. She loved Remus. What should she
say?
"I know you
don't like me like that." Ron shuffled his feet and looked down to the floor.
"I never wanted you to find out. Not until I was sure that you liked me, too."
His voice was a whisper.
Hermione
acted on impulse, stood up, walked over to him and hugged him.
"Ron,
you'll ever be my best friend. I know that that's not enough, but… I can't be
what I'm not. That would only hurt you. I'm so sorry!"
Ron hugged
her back, then let go of her to look at her. "You're not mad at me?"
"Mad? Gods,
no! Why should I? On the contrary, I'm honoured that you think so highly of me.
We… we'll stay friends, won't we?"
"I'd be
glad, Hermione. I'll worship you from afar, my lady!" Ron quipped.
Glad that
he took it this composed Hermione searched her pockets and came up with a clean
lace handkerchief and handed it to him. "Then take this scarf as a token, my
knight!"
Ron took it
and with a deep bow stuffed it into his shirt. "I'll keep it near my heard,
dearest lady Hermione!"
Both
laughed and Hermione kissed him on the cheek. "Thank you, Ron."
They left
the room. "Come with me back to the common room?"
Sorry, Ron,
but I think I have to talk to Professor Lupin about this. I don't want him to
be mad at me for the rest of the term."
Ron
squeezed her hand and left.
Tbc…