Ron had been right when he said thing between the three of them would never be the same again. However, unlike Ron had expected that change in their relationship was a change for the better. All three of them had felt so inherently miserable when the balance between the three of them had been disrupted along with appearance of Parvati Patil that the relief they felt at sorting it all out was profound- to make up for the mistakes they had made in the past, the friends were warmer and more honest with each other than they had ever been. None of them ever said voice it but they all three knew a change had come over them. Hermione came closest to putting their newly realised affection with each other not words, though- "I don't think it would be a good idea for us to fight again. We're too hard to keep away from each other." Harry and Ron agreed whole-heartedly.
Harry also took the time to apologise to Hermione from the very bottom of his heart- he and Ron had both treated her appallingly over the last couple of months and they were both abjectly remorseful about it. Hermione waved it away however.
"Oh please, Harry- if anyone should be apologising, it's me. If I hadn't-" and here she paused and blushed a little, "If I hadn't objected so much to Parvati going out with Ron in the first place then you both probably would have believed me."
"You were jealous?" Harry filled in for her.
Hermione's face darkened a shade. "Yes, I suppose I was. But," she added quickly, "It's not because I fancy him or anything, if that's what you're thinking. I've never really liked Parvati, and of course I would be jealous if you started dating someone as rotten as her as well. She didn't deserve Ron. Or you."
"Hah," was all Harry said, and the broad grin on his face broadened as Hermione mumbled an excuse and beat a hasty exit away from the conversation.
As for Parvati herself, she was in disgrace. Somehow, the story leaked out. Parvati Patil was a liar. Parvati Patil was a slut. Parvati Patil broke Ron Weasley's heart by trying to sleep with Harry Potter. Parvati tried to force herself on Harry- it was all out there, even more ludicrous and sensational on the lips of every Hogwarts student in the school. Hermione had initially suspected Harry of letting the Hogwarts rumour mill churn out this particular piece of gossip- it would have been a nice revenge for him after all- but he swore it wasn't. Hermione believed him, as some of Parvati's disgrace initially reflected onto Harry- someone twisted the story around to make it seem as though Harry had been the one trying to force himself upon Parvati- and for a few weeks Harry had boys of all ages stoping him in the corridors to find out if Parvati Patil was as good a kisser as everyone said.
Eventually, though, Hermione discovered who the real culprit was. It happened one day close to the end of term when Hermione had retreated to the library to get some work done on her own. It was too hard to get anything done with the boys around lately, although she did feel awfully lonely once she was in there. She wasn't, however, alone for long.
"It was me."
Hermione looked up from her book to see Lavender Brown standing over her, an extremely morose expression on her face. Hermione raised her eyebrows. "I'm sorry?"
"Me. I told everyone about what Parvati did."
Hermione blinked a couple of times. "All right."
Lavender sat down. "Parvati told me what happened- most of it wasn't true of course. She made it seem as though she hadn't done anything wrong. Then I overheard Ron telling bits and pieces of it to Ginny and I sort of pieced it together myself."
Hermione was by now, completely baffled. "Lavender- this is possibly our first conversation in five years. Why are you telling me this?"
Lavender shrugged. "I just wanted to let you know that I don't like what Parvati did to Ron and Harry. Especially not to Ron."
"Why?"
Lavender picked at her fingernails. "It was nasty and sneaky of her. She's so two-faced, Parvati. She's always showing off and trying to suck up to the seventh year girls. She only keeps me around to remind herself that she's better than me."
Hermione had always privately thought this, but didn't say so. Instead she repeated, "Why are you telling me this?"
Lavender looked bemused. "I'm not sure. I suppose I just wanted you to know that whatever you might think- I'm not like Parvati. I have a conscience."
"And why do you think you have to validate yourself to me?" Hermione said. "We barely acknowledge each other's existence."
"Well, now's as good a time as any to start."
She was, Hermione realised with astonishment, being surprisingly mature and objective about the whole thing- two qualities she generally respected in a person. She grinned at Lavender- and Lavender grinned back. The mild animosity that had always existed between the two suddenly felt miles away. That's how it remained from then on.
But of course, the animosity between Hermione and Parvati was too much to ignore. Hermione couldn't deny that the disdain she'd once held for Parvati had evolved into hatred, and it was pretty clear that Parvati felt the same way about her. Hermione wouldn't out it past Parvati to curse her while she was asleep, the way things were going, and so she took to waiting until she was sure Parvati was asleep before going to bed herself. Things had to come to a head between them, and on the day that Lavender approached Hermione in the library, there also appeared a rather vulgar message on the message board outside Gryffindor homeroom. Furious, Parvati rounded on Hermione the moment she stepped back into the homeroom after dinner.
"What's your problem you stupid bitch?" she snapped, accosting Hermione as soon as she stepped through the portrait hole.
"I don't have one. What's yours?" Hermione replied frostily, as she stalked past Parvati and made to walk up to the girls dorms. Parvati grabbed Hermione's arm; her long, varnished fingernails could be felt through Hermione's robes and she winced.
"Take your hands off me," she said, struggling to control her temper. The obvious display of anger had caught the eye of a few Gryffindors- the words "cat fight" were audible above the murmurs that ran around the common room. Hermione felt her face grow hot as everyone turned to stare at her. She knew people had been expecting a catfight between Parvati and herself for some time, and she was not about to indulge the gossip-mongers of Gryffindor. Taking a deep breath, she forced herself to calm down. "Look," she said, "Maybe we should go somewhere else and talk about this?"
"Why? So you can hex me without everybody watching?" Parvati said spitefully.
"No, that's not it at all, I just-"
"Just admit it! You spread those rumours about me! And you wrote that message on the board!"
"What message?' Hermione snapped, not having noticed the graffiti on her way in. "Please let go of my arm."
Parvati finally released her grip., but continued to shout furiously at her. "You're such a cow, Hermione Granger! You think you know everything, and just because your friends like you more than they've ever liked you, you spread all those rumours about me! That's so pathetic."
Hermione couldn't help it. "Pathetic? What's pathetic?" she snapped. "How about trying to secure the attentions of a boy by dating his best friend? How about behaving like you own Hogwarts when in fact half of the people here only know your name because of what you did to Ron and Harry! How about breaking someone's heart just because an old, confused lady like Professor Trelawney told you to?" Parvati looked surprised- obviously she hadn't known that Hermione knew about professor Trelawney's prediction. Hermione managed to get a few more words in. "Pathetic is believing that girls are only as good as the boys their dating- I believe that's the credo you live by, right? Well let me just tell you, despite the fact that you just dated one of the most loyal, brave and talented boys in Gryffindor does not make anywhere near as valuable or as good as he is! The fact that you tried to break his heart makes you a complete and utter low-life. One day you're going to leave Hogwarts and then you're going to realise that nobody cares if you're dating a Quidditch player or even Harry Potter- that's just it. Nobody cares. The fact that you base your life around such a trivial, petty, useless conquest- well. That's pathetic."
Somebody started applauding- later on, Hermione strongly suspected it to be Lavender Brown- and then the whole homeroom joined in. Parvati looked for a split second like she was about to burst into tears as the homeroom cheered Hermione's quiet but furious tirade. Parvati turned back to Hermione and with a strangled, angry cry, started towards her- Hermione was sure, for one second, that Parvati was going to slap her. But Ron- who, Hermione later found out, had watched the whole thing- grabbed hold of Parvati's arm firmly.
"God, you just don't know when you're beaten, do you?" he shouted at her, over the applause. "Deal with it Parvati, she got the better of you. Not surprising, really- you're not even in the same league as her- in any respect!"
Parvati wrenched her arm free with a shout of fury, delivered a resounding slap to Ron's cheek, and before Hermione could even react, dashed out of the common room. Fred and George Weasley hissed at her as she left.
Hermione lay awake for a very long time that night, and not just because she was too afraid to fall asleep lest Parvati Patil did something to her in the middle of the night. She was thinking about what Ron had said. You're not even in the same league as her in any respect.
Ron had stood up for Hermione almost as many times as he'd argued with her, but never before had something he'd said made her feel so inexpressibly fuzzy.
And in the back of all of that, Ron worked, possibly harder than he ever had in his life. Hermione and Harry helped of course, as did the twins, and Sirius, when Ron sent letters to him, asking him for help. Everyone wanted Ron to pass, but none more so than Hermione. They stayed up late into the night together, long after everyone else had gone to bed, sometimes after the sun had risen. On more than one occasion did Harry wander down to the common room in the morning to find them both asleep on the same open book, still clutching quills in their hands. They still argued, of course- to Harry's mind, their arguments now were far more heated than they had been before the events of the past two months- all that had changed was that they now both found it so much easier to apologize to each other and be friends again. In fact, the arguments made them so miserable that they found themselves making it up much quicker than usual as well. In the midst of a period of a few hours, in which Hermione and Ron weren't speaking, Ron was to be found agitatedly asking Harry, "Is this all worth it? All this work Hermione and I are doing- it's just making us both cranky and mean to each other. Is it really all worth it?"
It was. By the end of the term, Ron was even getting a C-plus in Potions, and on the final Charms assignment of the term he got the highest mark in the class. Professor McGonagall had been spotted giving him a smile and Snape's loathing increased as Ron's marks did. But that wasn't the best part.
The best part was Hermione. Staying up late, working together almost every hour of the day, Ron found talking to her so much easier, so much better, that suddenly she wasn't just Hermione she was Hermione and everything else as well. Reflecting on their years of friendship, Ron found that he hadn't, as he had previously thought, only put up with her because Harry did, but that the deep affection he'd had for her had always been there. For Hermione's part she had never felt more at ease with Ron as she did. They talked about things they used to less, and talked about everything else more, and both started to appreciate the other's more beautiful qualities than they had done ever before.
On the last day of term Ron got a note from Professor Dumbledore in the morning's post, that read:
Dear Mr Weasley,
Your efforts do you proud. I must congratulate you on your magnificent academic performance and improvement in the last month. Do not forget that in continuing to work hard you will reap even greater rewards in the future, and I have no doubt in my mind that this will be the case. Unfortunately I will not be able to attend your brother's wedding and have had to decline his kind invitation (along with my heartiest congratulations to him) so do have a very Merry Christmas and remain safe throughout this holiday period.
Sincerely,
Professor Dumbledore
"Don't listen to him Ron, " said Fred, as he read over Ron's shoulder (and chewed toast rather noisily in his ear). "You've worked your arse off. Take a break."
Ron folded up the letter and stuck it in his pocket, feeling more content with himself than he had done for ages. "No," he said, "I don't think I will." He and Hermione shared a grin.
"I'm very proud of you," she whispered, and squeezed his arm.
