Butterbeer Ramblings
Author: nacey
Email: tosh@opera.iinet.net.au
Category: Romance
Rating: PG
Spoilers: PS, CoS, PoA, GoF
Summary: It's Quidditch Saturday, and Harry, Ron and Hermione are receiving a visit from Fred, George, Angelina and Alicia, all graduated and bearing alcohol gifts. Much fun and baring of souls ensues.
DISCLAIMER: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.
Author notes: I know, butterbeer isn't alcoholic, but I imagined what if would be like if they made full-strength butterbeer for adults, which is the pretense of this fic. It's not a very good one I know, but stick with it, it's worth it. I'd like to take this opportunity to welcome Mistiec into the HP fold. Well, she's not really fully into it, yet, but she's written a fic and that's in enough for me, so I'm welcoming her. Thanks girl for beta-ing this baby. Let's break out the pumpkin juice.
~~*~~
They finally crept out of the back door and out onto the vast lawn that lead to the Quidditch pitch through a small clump of trees.
"Where are the others?" breathed Hermione.
"Wait…" Harry fell silent, frowning in thought, trying to make out the sounds in the distance. There was an unmistakeable chattering coming over the breeze from the lake. "The lake, by the sounds of things. We can go to the Quidditch stands if you like."
Hermione didn't say anything, and he assumed she agreed with him. Her hand grabbed his as they drew close to the Gryffindor stand.
"Come on, Harry!" she hissed.
"I thought I was the one spiriting you away?"
"Well we're out here now," she said, "May as well have some fun."
It was a balmy late spring evening, and the stars twinkled like pure polished silver in the deep blue satin Scottish night. The grass was kissed by light dew, of which Hermione took utterly no notice as she threw herself down onto it and lay back, gazing at the sky. She grinned at Harry who gazed back down at her, watching her a moment. The half-moonlight traced her young lightly freckled-flecked features in the darkness, and for a fleeting second he understood why Ron was so fixated upon her. Hermione wasn't just the pretty little impish thing she used to be at eleven. She had grown since they'd first seen her, her body maturing, rounding, her sweet little face lengthening to more graceful proportions. Always the same were her lovely brown eyes that had always warmed his heart without fail. Right at this moment her long brown hair pooled about her head in curled silky tendrils, the bushy mess thinning some as she'd progressed through puberty. She was still in her uniform, her socks were just under her knees and her school skirt had ridden up a little, exposing some leg and looking rather saucy to Harry. If it hadn't been for that, she may have looked like a wild looking wood nymph. He shook his head, attempting to clear his mind of such thoughts. It was bad enough having Ron behaving barmy over the girl, lest he start it too.
"Do sit down, Harry," Hermione said. "Or are you going to stare at me all night?"
Forward as ever. He smiled, flopping down onto the ground next to her. He plucked a bottle of butterbeer from the few next to him and offered it to Hermione. "Care to whet your whistle?"
She chuckled, sitting up and taking the bottle from Harry rather demurely.
"So tell me," he asked. "What's the difference in getting sloshed out here and getting sloshed in Gryffindor Tower?"
"Well, this is a little more discreet, isn't it?" she replied, twisting off the cap of her beer bottle. "The common room is a little too near 'the lion's den', so to speak, for me to really relax and enjoy myself."
Harry nodded, opening his own butterbeer and holding it up to Hermione. "To best friends."
Hermione smiled softly and clinked her bottle to his. She really did look like a pixie sometimes. "To the very best of friends."
They both took a swig of their drinks, and promptly sat up and nearly hacked and coughed them back up again.
"Bugger ME that's nasty!" exclaimed Hermione. Harry broke up into laughter, and Hermione giggled with him. She took another good pull on the bottle, draining it considerably. She licked her lips, grunting with approval. "I could get to like this stuff…"
Harry sniggered, tipping back his own bottle and taking a mouthful. He felt himself wince as the sharp wheaty taste sunk through the buttery sweet flavouring. The hops collided with it all to create an odd sensory explosion in his mouth. It was strangely more-ish.
"Hurry up Potter!" Hermione said, leaning back on an arm roguishly. "We've got more bottles to get through."
"Wouldn't that be strangely poetic?" Harry said. "Getting drunk under the non-existent table by Hermione Granger…"
Hermione sniggered. "How will the Boy Who Lived ever live *that* down?" She frowned. "No, you'll be all right, nobody's going to know about this."
"Not even Ron?"
She glared at him. "Especially not Ronald Weasley, thank you very much!"
Harry watched her drink a moment, her obvious wariness of Ron keen in his mind. "Can I ask you a rather embarrassing question?"
She looked at him flatly before tipping her head back to sip her drink. "Yes. What kind of answer you get, however, depends on how quickly this beer works on me."
Harry smiled at that only faintly. His sad look returned, and his stomach lurched. "You still like Ron, don't you?"
Hermione gasped. "Oh of course I do! I adore him! Dear me!" She tutted and peered into her bottle of butterbeer.
Harry looked confused now. "Then what's with all the animosity?"
She tittered. "There's *always* been animosity! Fighting is what Ron and I do. Bicker, bicker, bicker. Since day bloody one!" Her face went blank then. "I was kind of hoping we'd grow out of it."
"Same here," Harry said.
"Doesn't help that all he ever seems to be doing lately is pulling the piss out of the way I am."
Suddenly, her earlier rant in the hallway made utter sense. The bookishness and the dedication to her studies wasn't some phase, or some fear of life around her. She really did enjoy it, and it was important to her, and day in and day out, Ron trod all over that with his teasing remarks. Maybe if he knew that…
"You know people think you're both in love with each other…"
Harry wasn't quite sure why he had said that. It was just the sort of thing he shouldn't have said in the given situation, but it slipped out nonetheless. His worries of Hermione's revelation that people thought she and Ron were a potential item turned out to be unfounded. Hermione just spat out her beer in a dark snort.
"Oh yes! Aren't we the pair?" she growled. "Such fire! Such intensity! 'Oh you wouldn't react if he didn't do something for you!'" she twittered, impersonating someone (possibly Lavender). "Yes, the perfect bloody couple."
"I take it people have suggested it to you before."
Hermione leant towards him, wavering in his personal space, her face barely an inch from his so that her now alcohol soaked breath puffed against his lips. "People think Ron and I will end up together, no matter much I protest." She glowered. "Frankly, I find that really depressing." She sat back and finished off her first bottle, throwing it over her shoulder carelessly after a quick, clean swig. She then held out her hand to Harry. "Barman, fix me up another, please!"
Harry chuckled and handed her another bottle of butterbeer. He watched her a moment. Was it a case of utter denial? It had to be. She must have been in love with Ron, she showed all the signs. The fighting, the glowers of jealousy when he flirted with any of the girls (usually Lavender, for she elicited the most girlish giggles from Ron's cheeky advances), the raging emotions… well, that's how it worked in the movies and popular literature. He looked to Hermione, who was still gazing into her bottle forlornly. Life, he realised, rarely worked out like it did in the movies. Hermione was obviously miserable about it all.
"Do you-" he began, but stopped, a blush rising in his cheeks. He should ask her that, but he wanted to know. He very badly wanted to know. "Do you… you know…"
"No."
He sighed with frustration. "You don't fancy Ron at all, do you?" He meant for it to come out less loaded and not so much an askance for a negative response. He did a lot of thinking and convinced himself that it was insatiable curiosity that drove the question (it was, of a sort).
Hermione gave a thoughtful moan, tipping her head this way and that and finally touching her forehead to Harry's shoulder awkwardly. The action made his heart jump and warm.
"He's awfully cute," she said. "Oh I *do* adore him. In fact… I couldn't imagine being without him." Despite logic usually being Harry's friend, something soured in his heart, a terrible twist of discomfort, and it was all emotion. Logic had abandoned him, and he was now feeling inexplicably awful. At least until Hermione added: "But I couldn't live without you either!" She threw her arms about him, snuggling to his shoulder. "Can't I just keep you both?"
Harry choked on his beer. "Oh dear – uhm… I don't think Ron-"
"Oh bugger Ron!" she growled. "Bugger, bugger, bugger him!" She took a violent swig of her beer.
Harry smiled faintly at that, meeting Hermione's slightly glazed eyes, leaning towards her a little as she propped her head on his shoulder. "I do believe you're drunk."
"Splendid observation, Mr. Potter," she said, blinking more often than she needed to. "What's your next trick?"
"Trying to figure you out," Harry said into his beer bottle before sipping from it. Hermione sighed at that, draping herself over Harry again and settling her head into the nape of his neck. She giggled and sighed.
"Hmmm."
"What?"
"You smell nice," she said, inadvertently nuzzling him. She stuffed her face into the nape of his neck and took great long sniffs. "Mmm! What is that?"
"Some cologne Sirius gave me for my sixteenth birthday," Harry said, feeling that delightful blush burn his cheeks again. (It was the first time he could ever remember welcoming it).
"It's gorgeous!" she sighed, face still pressed against his neck.
"Apparently my Dad used to wear it," he said, that blush in his cheeks burning furiously from Hermione's grabbing him clumsily and talking into his neck.
"I bet he was awfully popular!" she exclaimed. She frowned, pulling her face away and looking to Harry. "Was that disrespectful?"
Harry shook his head with an amused smile. Hermione smiled back at him and draped herself over his wide-shouldered frame again. She was so funny, and against him like this, she was so little. Gosh, he adored her. Sitting there, half-drunk, snuggling, he felt as if there were no girl alive that he had as much fun with as Hermione. A strange thing occurred to him at that moment, and that was that he had never really paid attention to how they'd grown, and he was rather surprised to discover, up close and snuggled like this, that Hermione had changed. No, it was more than changing. It was blossoming. She'd become so different to him, and different in ways he liked. It was the kind of different he'd noticed in other girls, but never in Hermione. He… he had never *let* himself. It was the light low-key lip-gloss she'd come to wear on her lips, the extra care she took in her hair (that wasn't over the top or obsessive like Lavender and Parvati), the way her legs had stopped being knobbly-kneed and were now elegant and pleasingly curved. It was far more than that, far more than appearances. She was such a deep and complicated young woman that he didn't dare sum it up in his head what had become clear to him that evening. The fact remained - he never really looked to Hermione as an option before… it just didn't *occur* to him. He sat there, utterly dumfounded, trying to scrabble together the reason why… why hadn't he seen her? Dear me, he thought. I'm an idiot. A blind, dull-headed idiot. Ron's not stupid. He's just seeing what everyone else has been too stupid to notice – me included! He suddenly felt like he'd missed a bus he could have caught if he hadn't been so distracted by the magazines at the local newsagency mere steps away from the bus stop. And it was probably far too late to do anything about it, considering that she was in the grips of Ron-Love denial.
He took a deep swig of his beer then, but he wasn't too keen on getting smashed with Hermione as drunk as she was. He was getting down, and being down and getting drunk was never a good idea. Hermione, on the other hand, seemed determined for him to join her in insobriety.
"Have more beer, Harry," she mumbled into his shoulder. "I refuse to be the only drunk one."
Harry eyed her and took another sip, and she chuckled, grabbing whatever parts of his body were in her hands (which happened to be his right pectoral and his flat oft-admired Quidditch stomach) and squeezed.
"That's a boy- Ohhh…" Her eyes became even more glazed.
"What?"
"Never mind," she said, getting suddenly shy and ducking her head away. She seemed to forget about the hands that were currently latched onto his torso.
He frowned in confusion. "'Mione?"
"Hmm?"
"Why are we buggering Ron?"
Hermione looked at him. "Huh?!"
"You said… you said 'Bugger Ron' before…"
"Ugh!" She rolled her eyes. "Forget about Ron! I don't want to talk about Ron anymore." She lifted a brow at him. "You seem to be awfully interested in talking about him. Do YOU fancy him?"
Harry didn't flinch at that. "You're avoiding my question."
She sighed. "I'm not letting it bother me anymore."
"Not letting what bother you?"
"Never mind," she groaned, waving a hand and sipping her beer again.
Poor Harry couldn't help but mind. He minded a whole lot. He worried about Hermione. She was endlessly dear to him and the last thing he wanted was for her to be unhappy in any way. The very idea of her being less that thrilled with her life was rather abhorrent to him. What was worse that the source of her upset was his very best friend… who he didn't really feel like thinking about right now either. Come on, Harry, he thought. Let's be reasonable… It's obvious it'll happen. Hermione will get over whatever it is she needs to get over to accept Ron's – rather confused – advances, and you just joined the game too late. Nothing to be done for it, just accept it.
He looked to her, and his heart sighed – a frightening falling feeling that was similar to being knocked off his broom-stick in the middle of a Quidditch match. She was gazing up at the sky, leaning on his shoulder, looking utterly content. Her pointed top lip twitched as she swallowed, and as she blinked, her long lashes just made her dark brown eyes look utterly breathtaking.
Harry looked back to his drink. That's it, he thought. I am going mad.
"You went quiet," she complained.
He looked to her. "Sorry. What do you want to talk about?"
She blinked, and then a bright smile slid onto her face as she tilted her head. "You."
"Me?"
She nodded. "Yes."
Harry blew out a sigh. "Guess that makes a change."
"I don't mean who wants to kill you, or what weird thing you saw the other day," she said, sounding remarkably sober for a moment. "I mean… what do you want to do once you leave Hogwarts?"
Harry licked his top lip. "Hmm. I really have no idea."
"None at all?"
He tilted his head. "Well… everyone thinks I should play Quidditch. But I've seen those international teams – I just don't compare. I couldn't stand up to them."
"So Quidditch is out," she nodded, probably keen to get him out of a sport that had him risking his life far more often than she preferred. "Have you ever thought about Moody's advice?"
Harry looked to her from the corners of his eyes. "Being an Auror?" He let out a snort and gazed ahead, sipping his drink. "Facing dark wizards and Death Eaters day in, day out?" He shook his head. "They couldn't pay me enough."
Harry had seen his fair share of action in the short years he'd been at Hogwarts, and the weariness of his struggle to survive was clear in his sharp green eyes.
Hermione pursed her lips. "What about being a teacher?"
Harry turned his head, looking to her. It was like someone had dropped something heavy onto his chest. "A what?"
"A teacher," she said, "You know, maybe one day you could teach here?" She smiled then, a little waveringly from the drink. "I think you'd be a good teacher."
Amazingly, Harry thought so too. He just had never considered teaching before. Harry felt awfully stupid right at that moment. He'd been so wrapped up in things – Quidditch, getting good marks, his own bottom – that he'd not stopped to take a breather and a fair look at things. He looked to Hermione again, a warm smile on his face.
"I might just think about that," he said. "Thank you."
Hermione smiled back at him, still leaning on his shoulder. "It's all right."
The next comment just fell out of his mouth, and his whole body seized in a blinding heat as he said it.
"You're very pretty, you know."
Her smile stilled, her eyes caught in his, gleaming brown peering into green. "You really think so?"
He nodded, very slowly, the dizziness from the beer augmenting the whirling his mind was doing. Hermione's arms tightened around him, and her eyes narrowed in a remarkable smile.
"You really are a wonder, Harry," she said, her smile fading, but warm affection still burning in her eyes. "Sometimes I think I know what to expect from you but you… you always go and surprise me."
He chuckled, very softly. "I'm only matched by your unpredictability."
Hermione chuckled back at him. "Someone's got to keep you on your toes."
"You do," he breathed, his smile fading. He felt lost, wallowing in a warm endless sea of bliss, and his only anchor was the girl beside him. His soul clutched onto that, never shifting. "All the time."
"Hmmm…" Hermione stretched her arms languidly, and then without hesitation, draped them around Harry's neck, leaning her chin on his shoulder. "Whatever will you do without me?"
It was a valid question. It was mere months before his time at Hogwarts was spent, and then the seven years of endless joy that was his time at Hogwarts would be over. He honestly didn't want to be anywhere else, and he didn't want to be with anyone else other than his closest friends, and right now, the girl he was sharing his beer with. He sighed. What *would* he do without her? He frowned then, a genuinely sad twist taking his features as he thought about it. He sighed, pain keen in his voice.
"I'd-" He choked. "I'd rather not think about it."
Hermione's expression cleared, from amused to one of revelation. "Me either…"
Harry vaguely felt Hermione's fingers dip into the shaggy black locks at the back of his head, near his neck, but it felt a world away as he gazed at Hermione's lovely face. Something in her eyes perceptibly shifted, and his whole world with it. At its herald he found himself leaning forward, space slipping away between him and Hermione, so fast and so slow. He tilted his head, his heart tremoring, tightening, jumping and seemingly trying to climb its way out of his throat. Hermione tilted her head the other way, her hands sinking into his hair and pulling him towards her.
And he felt it. Oh dear God, he thought. Oh Hermione… how could I have missed you for so long? Her lips were so soft, so utterly soft! It was the most perfect, the most delicate little thing he'd ever felt in his life - a pursing of lips, a slow, gentle touch that felt like he had been lurched through a portkey. All he could do was sigh, and hold her. God, he wanted to hold her for always!
As they parted, his eyes opened, and he looked to Hermione. The same dizzy drunken glow was on her features, but he knew it wasn't the beer. She clutched his shoulders, smiling lazily.
"Mmm, Harry!"
Harry blushed, looking down and feeling rather sheepish all of a sudden. That's when he felt the lips on his cheek, peppering kisses there. His eyes fell shut and he sighed, his body slowly burning up under the attention. He was worried for a moment he'd have to reign in her behaviour (as loathed as he'd be to do it), but thankfully she leant back to regard him again. She tilted her head and sighed.
"I'm very glad we did that."
Harry licked his lips and nodded. "So am I."
"Want to do it again?" She looked positively wicked.
Harry blushed again. "Uhm – what about Ron?"
Hermione blinked and chuckled. "What?"
"Well – you know-"
She chuckled again. "If he wanted to snog me, he should have been gentlemanly enough to take me for a walk, make me feel better and get me very nicely drunk," she said, poking his shoulder for emphasis. "He didn't."
Harry frowned. "Is that the only reason you kissed me?"
She sighed, the amusement in her eyes shifting to a knowing warmth that Harry found humbling and awfully comforting. "Sometimes I think you're all I need, Harry. When I'm with you like this – I – I fear nothing. And I'm not ashamed of myself." She smiled, as if a weight had been lifted from her shoulders. "I'm proud. I'm proud of myself when I'm with you."
A dip of seriousness twitched in Harry's brow. "I wouldn't want you to be anything but, Hermione."
She gave a happy sigh through a bright smile, pulling him to her and kissing him again. Harry felt the world suddenly jar and spin again, in an altogether pleasant way. He decided that all was right with the world when he was doing this. It wasn't a deep or particularly complicated kiss, not the sort of thing Harry would see in the Quidditch stands after a match. It was different, he thought. Utterly special, perfectly eloquent. But he wouldn't mind a bit of the heavy Quidditch stuff a bit afterwards, he added to himself, and judging from Hermione's opening mouth, neither would she. However it was all cut painfully short by the rowdy hoots and hollers of half of what used to be the Gryffindor Quidditch team who had somehow managed to stay quiet for long enough to actually sneak up on the pair.
Hermione sighed as Harry pulled away and blushed, squirming as though he were looking for a place to hide. She folded her arms and lifted a brow at a cackling George and Fred.
"Are you quite finished?"
"Nowhere NEAR!" cried George as Fred wrapped an arm around Harry and ruffled his hair vigorously. Angelina Johnson and Alicia Spinnet were in similar states of inebriation, chortling and giving Hermione rather shaky sets of thumbs up. This broke her annoyance and a smile teased the corner of her mouth.
"'Arry, 'Arry, our boy 'Arry!" crowed Fred, shaking him so proudly that Harry nearly lost his glasses. "Di'n think ya haddid in ya, you dirty li'l bas'sad!"
"Mm, I would say he does," said Hermione. This heralded another rousing chorus of rowdy noise-making, and Harry leant to her.
"Don' encourage 'em," he begged, wobbling a bit.
Hermione just smirked.
"Now," announced George, "We're gon' go back to Gryff-eh-naw towah, n' you're comin' with us."
Harry blinked, disappointment plunging through him. He stared at George. "What?"
George wagged a finger and tried to look firm, but it just seemed like he was doing an absurd impersonation of Percy. "Now I'm not afraid to say it, Harry… Harry?"
"Yes?"
Harry hadn't moved. George just obviously felt the need to repeat himself.
"Good boy Harry. Harry – I love ya, mate. You're like the l'il brother I never 'ad." He slapped Harry roughly on the shoulder and Harry was tipsy enough that it unbalanced him and he nearly fell over.
Hermione gave an exasperated sigh, steadying him and glaring at George. "You mean other than that tall hunkering lout that answers to the name of Ron?"
George sighed, covering his face with his hand. "Smart-arse." He looked to Harry. "You're like the OTHER little brother we never 'ad, and as a rule of thumb, I don't let me younger sibili-ings… sib… " He stopped for a moment to think, then looked back to Harry. "Where was I?"
"As a rule of thumb…"
"Right! As a rule of thumb, I don't let me younger sib- fuck it – I don't let 'em have more fun with a girl than I've 'ad!" He nodded and slapped Harry on the back. "Le'ss go!"
Perhaps it was for the best, as Harry didn't know how long he could go on kissing Hermione like that without getting carried away in some way or another. She looked up at him with a sleepy smile, and he attempted to get to his feet. This involved a bit of staggering, and Fred and George trying to steady him, which was a bit of a joke since they were as steady as a game of jenga. The girls laughed at this, and Hermione shook her head.
"It's times like this one needs that… that charmy thing that makes one all better. That charm…"
Harry frowned at her. "Mion', I don't think you could get your tongue around the bloody spell to cast it in the first place."
"Why not?" piped up Alicia, a proud and indulgent smile on her young face. "She seemed to manage to get her tongue around yours!"
Fred, George and Angelina all crowed at once, holding their bottles in the air and falling into helpless laughter. Hermione just narrowed her eyes at Alicia with a mildly amused smile. Harry stepped over (carefully) to Hermione, and offered her a hand.
"Come on," he said. "We better get inside before we hurt ourselves."
They all staggered inside, all jeering and teasing Harry and Hermione along the way, for no other reason than Fred and George and the girls had gotten bored of jeering and teasing each other. Harry couldn't help but think they were going inside because there were more people to poke fun at in the tower. They finally, and miraculously, made it to Gryffindor Tower without getting caught. How this happened, no one knew. Hermione nearly fudged the silencing charm, which could have caused a myriad of problems. They had tried to cover themselves with the invisibility cloak, but none of them had seen that their feet were all sticking out from the bottom of the thing. It was an eerie procession of staggering disembodied feet. One wouldn't have blamed Filch if he'd seen them, and just turned around and went right back to his office for a nip of fire-whisky. It was the sort of thing one just didn't want to deal with at that time of the morning.
Author: nacey
Email: tosh@opera.iinet.net.au
Category: Romance
Rating: PG
Spoilers: PS, CoS, PoA, GoF
Summary: It's Quidditch Saturday, and Harry, Ron and Hermione are receiving a visit from Fred, George, Angelina and Alicia, all graduated and bearing alcohol gifts. Much fun and baring of souls ensues.
DISCLAIMER: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.
Author notes: I know, butterbeer isn't alcoholic, but I imagined what if would be like if they made full-strength butterbeer for adults, which is the pretense of this fic. It's not a very good one I know, but stick with it, it's worth it. I'd like to take this opportunity to welcome Mistiec into the HP fold. Well, she's not really fully into it, yet, but she's written a fic and that's in enough for me, so I'm welcoming her. Thanks girl for beta-ing this baby. Let's break out the pumpkin juice.
~~*~~
They finally crept out of the back door and out onto the vast lawn that lead to the Quidditch pitch through a small clump of trees.
"Where are the others?" breathed Hermione.
"Wait…" Harry fell silent, frowning in thought, trying to make out the sounds in the distance. There was an unmistakeable chattering coming over the breeze from the lake. "The lake, by the sounds of things. We can go to the Quidditch stands if you like."
Hermione didn't say anything, and he assumed she agreed with him. Her hand grabbed his as they drew close to the Gryffindor stand.
"Come on, Harry!" she hissed.
"I thought I was the one spiriting you away?"
"Well we're out here now," she said, "May as well have some fun."
It was a balmy late spring evening, and the stars twinkled like pure polished silver in the deep blue satin Scottish night. The grass was kissed by light dew, of which Hermione took utterly no notice as she threw herself down onto it and lay back, gazing at the sky. She grinned at Harry who gazed back down at her, watching her a moment. The half-moonlight traced her young lightly freckled-flecked features in the darkness, and for a fleeting second he understood why Ron was so fixated upon her. Hermione wasn't just the pretty little impish thing she used to be at eleven. She had grown since they'd first seen her, her body maturing, rounding, her sweet little face lengthening to more graceful proportions. Always the same were her lovely brown eyes that had always warmed his heart without fail. Right at this moment her long brown hair pooled about her head in curled silky tendrils, the bushy mess thinning some as she'd progressed through puberty. She was still in her uniform, her socks were just under her knees and her school skirt had ridden up a little, exposing some leg and looking rather saucy to Harry. If it hadn't been for that, she may have looked like a wild looking wood nymph. He shook his head, attempting to clear his mind of such thoughts. It was bad enough having Ron behaving barmy over the girl, lest he start it too.
"Do sit down, Harry," Hermione said. "Or are you going to stare at me all night?"
Forward as ever. He smiled, flopping down onto the ground next to her. He plucked a bottle of butterbeer from the few next to him and offered it to Hermione. "Care to whet your whistle?"
She chuckled, sitting up and taking the bottle from Harry rather demurely.
"So tell me," he asked. "What's the difference in getting sloshed out here and getting sloshed in Gryffindor Tower?"
"Well, this is a little more discreet, isn't it?" she replied, twisting off the cap of her beer bottle. "The common room is a little too near 'the lion's den', so to speak, for me to really relax and enjoy myself."
Harry nodded, opening his own butterbeer and holding it up to Hermione. "To best friends."
Hermione smiled softly and clinked her bottle to his. She really did look like a pixie sometimes. "To the very best of friends."
They both took a swig of their drinks, and promptly sat up and nearly hacked and coughed them back up again.
"Bugger ME that's nasty!" exclaimed Hermione. Harry broke up into laughter, and Hermione giggled with him. She took another good pull on the bottle, draining it considerably. She licked her lips, grunting with approval. "I could get to like this stuff…"
Harry sniggered, tipping back his own bottle and taking a mouthful. He felt himself wince as the sharp wheaty taste sunk through the buttery sweet flavouring. The hops collided with it all to create an odd sensory explosion in his mouth. It was strangely more-ish.
"Hurry up Potter!" Hermione said, leaning back on an arm roguishly. "We've got more bottles to get through."
"Wouldn't that be strangely poetic?" Harry said. "Getting drunk under the non-existent table by Hermione Granger…"
Hermione sniggered. "How will the Boy Who Lived ever live *that* down?" She frowned. "No, you'll be all right, nobody's going to know about this."
"Not even Ron?"
She glared at him. "Especially not Ronald Weasley, thank you very much!"
Harry watched her drink a moment, her obvious wariness of Ron keen in his mind. "Can I ask you a rather embarrassing question?"
She looked at him flatly before tipping her head back to sip her drink. "Yes. What kind of answer you get, however, depends on how quickly this beer works on me."
Harry smiled at that only faintly. His sad look returned, and his stomach lurched. "You still like Ron, don't you?"
Hermione gasped. "Oh of course I do! I adore him! Dear me!" She tutted and peered into her bottle of butterbeer.
Harry looked confused now. "Then what's with all the animosity?"
She tittered. "There's *always* been animosity! Fighting is what Ron and I do. Bicker, bicker, bicker. Since day bloody one!" Her face went blank then. "I was kind of hoping we'd grow out of it."
"Same here," Harry said.
"Doesn't help that all he ever seems to be doing lately is pulling the piss out of the way I am."
Suddenly, her earlier rant in the hallway made utter sense. The bookishness and the dedication to her studies wasn't some phase, or some fear of life around her. She really did enjoy it, and it was important to her, and day in and day out, Ron trod all over that with his teasing remarks. Maybe if he knew that…
"You know people think you're both in love with each other…"
Harry wasn't quite sure why he had said that. It was just the sort of thing he shouldn't have said in the given situation, but it slipped out nonetheless. His worries of Hermione's revelation that people thought she and Ron were a potential item turned out to be unfounded. Hermione just spat out her beer in a dark snort.
"Oh yes! Aren't we the pair?" she growled. "Such fire! Such intensity! 'Oh you wouldn't react if he didn't do something for you!'" she twittered, impersonating someone (possibly Lavender). "Yes, the perfect bloody couple."
"I take it people have suggested it to you before."
Hermione leant towards him, wavering in his personal space, her face barely an inch from his so that her now alcohol soaked breath puffed against his lips. "People think Ron and I will end up together, no matter much I protest." She glowered. "Frankly, I find that really depressing." She sat back and finished off her first bottle, throwing it over her shoulder carelessly after a quick, clean swig. She then held out her hand to Harry. "Barman, fix me up another, please!"
Harry chuckled and handed her another bottle of butterbeer. He watched her a moment. Was it a case of utter denial? It had to be. She must have been in love with Ron, she showed all the signs. The fighting, the glowers of jealousy when he flirted with any of the girls (usually Lavender, for she elicited the most girlish giggles from Ron's cheeky advances), the raging emotions… well, that's how it worked in the movies and popular literature. He looked to Hermione, who was still gazing into her bottle forlornly. Life, he realised, rarely worked out like it did in the movies. Hermione was obviously miserable about it all.
"Do you-" he began, but stopped, a blush rising in his cheeks. He should ask her that, but he wanted to know. He very badly wanted to know. "Do you… you know…"
"No."
He sighed with frustration. "You don't fancy Ron at all, do you?" He meant for it to come out less loaded and not so much an askance for a negative response. He did a lot of thinking and convinced himself that it was insatiable curiosity that drove the question (it was, of a sort).
Hermione gave a thoughtful moan, tipping her head this way and that and finally touching her forehead to Harry's shoulder awkwardly. The action made his heart jump and warm.
"He's awfully cute," she said. "Oh I *do* adore him. In fact… I couldn't imagine being without him." Despite logic usually being Harry's friend, something soured in his heart, a terrible twist of discomfort, and it was all emotion. Logic had abandoned him, and he was now feeling inexplicably awful. At least until Hermione added: "But I couldn't live without you either!" She threw her arms about him, snuggling to his shoulder. "Can't I just keep you both?"
Harry choked on his beer. "Oh dear – uhm… I don't think Ron-"
"Oh bugger Ron!" she growled. "Bugger, bugger, bugger him!" She took a violent swig of her beer.
Harry smiled faintly at that, meeting Hermione's slightly glazed eyes, leaning towards her a little as she propped her head on his shoulder. "I do believe you're drunk."
"Splendid observation, Mr. Potter," she said, blinking more often than she needed to. "What's your next trick?"
"Trying to figure you out," Harry said into his beer bottle before sipping from it. Hermione sighed at that, draping herself over Harry again and settling her head into the nape of his neck. She giggled and sighed.
"Hmmm."
"What?"
"You smell nice," she said, inadvertently nuzzling him. She stuffed her face into the nape of his neck and took great long sniffs. "Mmm! What is that?"
"Some cologne Sirius gave me for my sixteenth birthday," Harry said, feeling that delightful blush burn his cheeks again. (It was the first time he could ever remember welcoming it).
"It's gorgeous!" she sighed, face still pressed against his neck.
"Apparently my Dad used to wear it," he said, that blush in his cheeks burning furiously from Hermione's grabbing him clumsily and talking into his neck.
"I bet he was awfully popular!" she exclaimed. She frowned, pulling her face away and looking to Harry. "Was that disrespectful?"
Harry shook his head with an amused smile. Hermione smiled back at him and draped herself over his wide-shouldered frame again. She was so funny, and against him like this, she was so little. Gosh, he adored her. Sitting there, half-drunk, snuggling, he felt as if there were no girl alive that he had as much fun with as Hermione. A strange thing occurred to him at that moment, and that was that he had never really paid attention to how they'd grown, and he was rather surprised to discover, up close and snuggled like this, that Hermione had changed. No, it was more than changing. It was blossoming. She'd become so different to him, and different in ways he liked. It was the kind of different he'd noticed in other girls, but never in Hermione. He… he had never *let* himself. It was the light low-key lip-gloss she'd come to wear on her lips, the extra care she took in her hair (that wasn't over the top or obsessive like Lavender and Parvati), the way her legs had stopped being knobbly-kneed and were now elegant and pleasingly curved. It was far more than that, far more than appearances. She was such a deep and complicated young woman that he didn't dare sum it up in his head what had become clear to him that evening. The fact remained - he never really looked to Hermione as an option before… it just didn't *occur* to him. He sat there, utterly dumfounded, trying to scrabble together the reason why… why hadn't he seen her? Dear me, he thought. I'm an idiot. A blind, dull-headed idiot. Ron's not stupid. He's just seeing what everyone else has been too stupid to notice – me included! He suddenly felt like he'd missed a bus he could have caught if he hadn't been so distracted by the magazines at the local newsagency mere steps away from the bus stop. And it was probably far too late to do anything about it, considering that she was in the grips of Ron-Love denial.
He took a deep swig of his beer then, but he wasn't too keen on getting smashed with Hermione as drunk as she was. He was getting down, and being down and getting drunk was never a good idea. Hermione, on the other hand, seemed determined for him to join her in insobriety.
"Have more beer, Harry," she mumbled into his shoulder. "I refuse to be the only drunk one."
Harry eyed her and took another sip, and she chuckled, grabbing whatever parts of his body were in her hands (which happened to be his right pectoral and his flat oft-admired Quidditch stomach) and squeezed.
"That's a boy- Ohhh…" Her eyes became even more glazed.
"What?"
"Never mind," she said, getting suddenly shy and ducking her head away. She seemed to forget about the hands that were currently latched onto his torso.
He frowned in confusion. "'Mione?"
"Hmm?"
"Why are we buggering Ron?"
Hermione looked at him. "Huh?!"
"You said… you said 'Bugger Ron' before…"
"Ugh!" She rolled her eyes. "Forget about Ron! I don't want to talk about Ron anymore." She lifted a brow at him. "You seem to be awfully interested in talking about him. Do YOU fancy him?"
Harry didn't flinch at that. "You're avoiding my question."
She sighed. "I'm not letting it bother me anymore."
"Not letting what bother you?"
"Never mind," she groaned, waving a hand and sipping her beer again.
Poor Harry couldn't help but mind. He minded a whole lot. He worried about Hermione. She was endlessly dear to him and the last thing he wanted was for her to be unhappy in any way. The very idea of her being less that thrilled with her life was rather abhorrent to him. What was worse that the source of her upset was his very best friend… who he didn't really feel like thinking about right now either. Come on, Harry, he thought. Let's be reasonable… It's obvious it'll happen. Hermione will get over whatever it is she needs to get over to accept Ron's – rather confused – advances, and you just joined the game too late. Nothing to be done for it, just accept it.
He looked to her, and his heart sighed – a frightening falling feeling that was similar to being knocked off his broom-stick in the middle of a Quidditch match. She was gazing up at the sky, leaning on his shoulder, looking utterly content. Her pointed top lip twitched as she swallowed, and as she blinked, her long lashes just made her dark brown eyes look utterly breathtaking.
Harry looked back to his drink. That's it, he thought. I am going mad.
"You went quiet," she complained.
He looked to her. "Sorry. What do you want to talk about?"
She blinked, and then a bright smile slid onto her face as she tilted her head. "You."
"Me?"
She nodded. "Yes."
Harry blew out a sigh. "Guess that makes a change."
"I don't mean who wants to kill you, or what weird thing you saw the other day," she said, sounding remarkably sober for a moment. "I mean… what do you want to do once you leave Hogwarts?"
Harry licked his top lip. "Hmm. I really have no idea."
"None at all?"
He tilted his head. "Well… everyone thinks I should play Quidditch. But I've seen those international teams – I just don't compare. I couldn't stand up to them."
"So Quidditch is out," she nodded, probably keen to get him out of a sport that had him risking his life far more often than she preferred. "Have you ever thought about Moody's advice?"
Harry looked to her from the corners of his eyes. "Being an Auror?" He let out a snort and gazed ahead, sipping his drink. "Facing dark wizards and Death Eaters day in, day out?" He shook his head. "They couldn't pay me enough."
Harry had seen his fair share of action in the short years he'd been at Hogwarts, and the weariness of his struggle to survive was clear in his sharp green eyes.
Hermione pursed her lips. "What about being a teacher?"
Harry turned his head, looking to her. It was like someone had dropped something heavy onto his chest. "A what?"
"A teacher," she said, "You know, maybe one day you could teach here?" She smiled then, a little waveringly from the drink. "I think you'd be a good teacher."
Amazingly, Harry thought so too. He just had never considered teaching before. Harry felt awfully stupid right at that moment. He'd been so wrapped up in things – Quidditch, getting good marks, his own bottom – that he'd not stopped to take a breather and a fair look at things. He looked to Hermione again, a warm smile on his face.
"I might just think about that," he said. "Thank you."
Hermione smiled back at him, still leaning on his shoulder. "It's all right."
The next comment just fell out of his mouth, and his whole body seized in a blinding heat as he said it.
"You're very pretty, you know."
Her smile stilled, her eyes caught in his, gleaming brown peering into green. "You really think so?"
He nodded, very slowly, the dizziness from the beer augmenting the whirling his mind was doing. Hermione's arms tightened around him, and her eyes narrowed in a remarkable smile.
"You really are a wonder, Harry," she said, her smile fading, but warm affection still burning in her eyes. "Sometimes I think I know what to expect from you but you… you always go and surprise me."
He chuckled, very softly. "I'm only matched by your unpredictability."
Hermione chuckled back at him. "Someone's got to keep you on your toes."
"You do," he breathed, his smile fading. He felt lost, wallowing in a warm endless sea of bliss, and his only anchor was the girl beside him. His soul clutched onto that, never shifting. "All the time."
"Hmmm…" Hermione stretched her arms languidly, and then without hesitation, draped them around Harry's neck, leaning her chin on his shoulder. "Whatever will you do without me?"
It was a valid question. It was mere months before his time at Hogwarts was spent, and then the seven years of endless joy that was his time at Hogwarts would be over. He honestly didn't want to be anywhere else, and he didn't want to be with anyone else other than his closest friends, and right now, the girl he was sharing his beer with. He sighed. What *would* he do without her? He frowned then, a genuinely sad twist taking his features as he thought about it. He sighed, pain keen in his voice.
"I'd-" He choked. "I'd rather not think about it."
Hermione's expression cleared, from amused to one of revelation. "Me either…"
Harry vaguely felt Hermione's fingers dip into the shaggy black locks at the back of his head, near his neck, but it felt a world away as he gazed at Hermione's lovely face. Something in her eyes perceptibly shifted, and his whole world with it. At its herald he found himself leaning forward, space slipping away between him and Hermione, so fast and so slow. He tilted his head, his heart tremoring, tightening, jumping and seemingly trying to climb its way out of his throat. Hermione tilted her head the other way, her hands sinking into his hair and pulling him towards her.
And he felt it. Oh dear God, he thought. Oh Hermione… how could I have missed you for so long? Her lips were so soft, so utterly soft! It was the most perfect, the most delicate little thing he'd ever felt in his life - a pursing of lips, a slow, gentle touch that felt like he had been lurched through a portkey. All he could do was sigh, and hold her. God, he wanted to hold her for always!
As they parted, his eyes opened, and he looked to Hermione. The same dizzy drunken glow was on her features, but he knew it wasn't the beer. She clutched his shoulders, smiling lazily.
"Mmm, Harry!"
Harry blushed, looking down and feeling rather sheepish all of a sudden. That's when he felt the lips on his cheek, peppering kisses there. His eyes fell shut and he sighed, his body slowly burning up under the attention. He was worried for a moment he'd have to reign in her behaviour (as loathed as he'd be to do it), but thankfully she leant back to regard him again. She tilted her head and sighed.
"I'm very glad we did that."
Harry licked his lips and nodded. "So am I."
"Want to do it again?" She looked positively wicked.
Harry blushed again. "Uhm – what about Ron?"
Hermione blinked and chuckled. "What?"
"Well – you know-"
She chuckled again. "If he wanted to snog me, he should have been gentlemanly enough to take me for a walk, make me feel better and get me very nicely drunk," she said, poking his shoulder for emphasis. "He didn't."
Harry frowned. "Is that the only reason you kissed me?"
She sighed, the amusement in her eyes shifting to a knowing warmth that Harry found humbling and awfully comforting. "Sometimes I think you're all I need, Harry. When I'm with you like this – I – I fear nothing. And I'm not ashamed of myself." She smiled, as if a weight had been lifted from her shoulders. "I'm proud. I'm proud of myself when I'm with you."
A dip of seriousness twitched in Harry's brow. "I wouldn't want you to be anything but, Hermione."
She gave a happy sigh through a bright smile, pulling him to her and kissing him again. Harry felt the world suddenly jar and spin again, in an altogether pleasant way. He decided that all was right with the world when he was doing this. It wasn't a deep or particularly complicated kiss, not the sort of thing Harry would see in the Quidditch stands after a match. It was different, he thought. Utterly special, perfectly eloquent. But he wouldn't mind a bit of the heavy Quidditch stuff a bit afterwards, he added to himself, and judging from Hermione's opening mouth, neither would she. However it was all cut painfully short by the rowdy hoots and hollers of half of what used to be the Gryffindor Quidditch team who had somehow managed to stay quiet for long enough to actually sneak up on the pair.
Hermione sighed as Harry pulled away and blushed, squirming as though he were looking for a place to hide. She folded her arms and lifted a brow at a cackling George and Fred.
"Are you quite finished?"
"Nowhere NEAR!" cried George as Fred wrapped an arm around Harry and ruffled his hair vigorously. Angelina Johnson and Alicia Spinnet were in similar states of inebriation, chortling and giving Hermione rather shaky sets of thumbs up. This broke her annoyance and a smile teased the corner of her mouth.
"'Arry, 'Arry, our boy 'Arry!" crowed Fred, shaking him so proudly that Harry nearly lost his glasses. "Di'n think ya haddid in ya, you dirty li'l bas'sad!"
"Mm, I would say he does," said Hermione. This heralded another rousing chorus of rowdy noise-making, and Harry leant to her.
"Don' encourage 'em," he begged, wobbling a bit.
Hermione just smirked.
"Now," announced George, "We're gon' go back to Gryff-eh-naw towah, n' you're comin' with us."
Harry blinked, disappointment plunging through him. He stared at George. "What?"
George wagged a finger and tried to look firm, but it just seemed like he was doing an absurd impersonation of Percy. "Now I'm not afraid to say it, Harry… Harry?"
"Yes?"
Harry hadn't moved. George just obviously felt the need to repeat himself.
"Good boy Harry. Harry – I love ya, mate. You're like the l'il brother I never 'ad." He slapped Harry roughly on the shoulder and Harry was tipsy enough that it unbalanced him and he nearly fell over.
Hermione gave an exasperated sigh, steadying him and glaring at George. "You mean other than that tall hunkering lout that answers to the name of Ron?"
George sighed, covering his face with his hand. "Smart-arse." He looked to Harry. "You're like the OTHER little brother we never 'ad, and as a rule of thumb, I don't let me younger sibili-ings… sib… " He stopped for a moment to think, then looked back to Harry. "Where was I?"
"As a rule of thumb…"
"Right! As a rule of thumb, I don't let me younger sib- fuck it – I don't let 'em have more fun with a girl than I've 'ad!" He nodded and slapped Harry on the back. "Le'ss go!"
Perhaps it was for the best, as Harry didn't know how long he could go on kissing Hermione like that without getting carried away in some way or another. She looked up at him with a sleepy smile, and he attempted to get to his feet. This involved a bit of staggering, and Fred and George trying to steady him, which was a bit of a joke since they were as steady as a game of jenga. The girls laughed at this, and Hermione shook her head.
"It's times like this one needs that… that charmy thing that makes one all better. That charm…"
Harry frowned at her. "Mion', I don't think you could get your tongue around the bloody spell to cast it in the first place."
"Why not?" piped up Alicia, a proud and indulgent smile on her young face. "She seemed to manage to get her tongue around yours!"
Fred, George and Angelina all crowed at once, holding their bottles in the air and falling into helpless laughter. Hermione just narrowed her eyes at Alicia with a mildly amused smile. Harry stepped over (carefully) to Hermione, and offered her a hand.
"Come on," he said. "We better get inside before we hurt ourselves."
They all staggered inside, all jeering and teasing Harry and Hermione along the way, for no other reason than Fred and George and the girls had gotten bored of jeering and teasing each other. Harry couldn't help but think they were going inside because there were more people to poke fun at in the tower. They finally, and miraculously, made it to Gryffindor Tower without getting caught. How this happened, no one knew. Hermione nearly fudged the silencing charm, which could have caused a myriad of problems. They had tried to cover themselves with the invisibility cloak, but none of them had seen that their feet were all sticking out from the bottom of the thing. It was an eerie procession of staggering disembodied feet. One wouldn't have blamed Filch if he'd seen them, and just turned around and went right back to his office for a nip of fire-whisky. It was the sort of thing one just didn't want to deal with at that time of the morning.