Chapter 9: St. Valentine and His Repercussions

Author's Note: Yes! Another chapter! And I get fluffy. Again. But don't you dare think it's over! OH, no, the angst I have left! So, stay tuned! Nothing ends happily this quickly. Thank you to all my reviewers, I really appreciate it!

Disclaimer: I don't own any of these lovely, lovely, people. Mmm...*cackles evilly* but if I did....*lapses into daydream of about three or four hours*



'Cause you're
Everywhere to me
And when I close my eyes
It's you I see
You're everything I know
That makes me believe
I'm not alone

And when I touch your hand
It's then I understand
The beauty that's within
It's now that we begin
You always light my way
I hope there never comes a day
No matter where I go
I always feel you so

-Michelle Branch, "Everywhere"



The next few hours had certainly been interesting.

To start out with, Harry had re-entered the room with a rather huge smirk on his face. Sitting himself down rather ceremoniously on the nearest chair, he was perched there ridiculously for a moment, mocking his own pose. Then he burst out laughing and nearly fell off it.

When he was finished, he looked at them both with one arched eyebrow.

"About bloody time!"

Ron and Hermione blushed furiously.

Then he burst out laughing again, and through his gales of laughter, walked over to them and patted them both on the back.

"You see," he continued almost conversationally, "I've known for quite a long time. Two years or so, in fact. The only question in my mind was when on earth you would finally get around to it."

Ron's mouth formed a little "o".

Harry looked as if he was about to start laughing again. "Anyway, I thought I should tell you, Ron."

Hermione answered for him. "What?"

"Snape hasn't done anything. Nothing at all. No marks off from Gryffindor, nothing."

Ron was completely flabbergasted. "But why -"

Harry shrugged. "I don't know. But it's true. So either he's waiting to ambush you right when it hurts, or he's not going to do anything."

Rubbing his forehead, Ron replied drily, "Knowing Snape, the last one's every so much more likely."


                                                                              ***


Harry had left again. Ron and Hermione sat together in awkward silence.

Hermione spoke abruptly. "I was really angry at you after the Krum incident. And Viktor was really sweet. So I forgot about you for a bit. And I was fine." She shifted in her chair, and swept her hair back from her face.

"But then this year, it was like I couldn't just shove that anger between us again. You were - it was like - well for a while I tried to ignore it. It actually worked for quite a bit. Except for after Hallowe'en." Looking down, she continued as if she was steeling herself to finish it. "You know what happened Hallowe'en. And after that it all just - but I just need to know one thing. Do you - were you - is it just me?"

Ron smiled softly. "Hermione, you are the smartest witch in this school." Somehow, he was filled with gentleness at the sight of the most confident person he knew looking up at him with a fearfully hopeful face that needed to be reassured. "Do you really think that I would do all that and not feel something for you?"

Smiling, she replied, "No."

Ron grinned. "Good, then. It'd be too weird if you got something wrong."


                                                                                ***


And so, over the next few weeks, Ron and Hermione began to understand just what it was like to be "boyfriend and girlfriend." Not, of course, that they publicly declared it in the manner of Pansy Parkinson and some various Slytherin boys necking beside the girls' washroom.

It was really just their closest friends that knew. Besides Harry, they hadn't really meant for anyone else to find out, but with inexplicable quickness Ginny brought it up smoothly one day, slipping it sleekly into the normal flow of conversation ("I know you and Hermione are on a date in Hogsmeade tomorrow, but Mum says that you need to -"). Dean and Seamus beamed in an amused fashion every meal, to Ron's confusion, until their mock kissing faces brought the reality home. This elicited from Hermione a "Just childish, really," accompanied by an unwilling giggle. And soon an owl from Fred and George arrived with the inevitable teasing.

So the events around Ron weren't really received with any great attention. So, the fact that Snape had to be rushed to the sick room after being attacked by a renegade baby Skrewt from fourth year caused only a few hours of mirth instead of the usual weeks. And when Parvati and Lavender discovered rats in their wigs one fine morning, Ron didn't really harbor too much satisfaction in his heart. The arrival of a transfer student from Durmstrang went by practically unnoticed.

For Ron, it was so amazingly wonderful that Hermione saw him as more than a friend he could hardly even think of anything else in spare moments. Actually, not really anytime.

Their meetings were sweet and reverently romantic, or there were those when they joked around almost like when they had been only friends, except for the kiss thrown in that neither of them could avoid, nor wanted to resist.

Of course, they were still the same people they had been before. They still squabbled, they still fought about almost everything. Once, Hermione asked him why this time had been different.

"You used to just argue with me, didn't you? Why didn't you do that this time when you liked me?"

Ron thought for a minute. "Because it didn't work last time?"

Hermione rolled her eyes pretentiously. "So, not because you learned anything, or became a better person, or something similar?"

Considering, Ron smirked. "Depends on your point of view."

"Right."

"But, of course, now that all that nice stuff is over and done with, what say we go back to that mean fake animosity?" Ron laughed and let Hermione swat him.


                                                                         ***


Harry was chewing his scrambled eggs and toast thoughtfully. "I'm so glad you two finally got it over with. I mean, first I had to put up with that constant 'I hate her/him' in fourth year, and then this year, you two were just way too nice to each other. Oh yes," he said, spearing a sausage, "it was simply unnatural. Walking around being polite. Honestly, it was maybe the weirdest thing ever."

Ron grimaced. "Thanks, Harry. Civility is a crime between us or something?"

Nodding reflectively, Harry replied, "Actually, it might be."

Hermione spoke out from over her Transfigurations book, "Well you won't have that problem much longer. Ron refuses to study for his OWLS-"

"Because it's March."

"-and won't see the fact that although, yes, it is March, this is extremely important. You can't be too prepared -"

"You're trying your best, Hermione."

"-and he simply must stop procrastinating. And no personal connection is going to stop me reminding him."

Harry patted Hermione's arm. "He's well aware of that, Hermione."


                                                                             ***


Valentine's Day, as usual, was the havoc that a magical school seemed to create. Although without the serenades that second year had had, it certainly did very well. Ron doubted that Muggles could even come near to what his world managed to do. Most of the teachers remained unmoved by the romantic holiday (a mere arch of Professor McGonagall's eyebrows was enough to answer Parvati's question).

Long standing couples celebrated mushily, and many others formed upon the unexpected arrival of a gift. Hermione watched the scenarios form in the halls with a bemused expression on her face.

"To some of these people, you'd think the world depended on them getting something. I don't understand it at all."

Ron patted her arm. "Well, you see, that's why I've chosen you. No need to remember anything."

Lifting her chin high in an attempt to agree, Hermione asked diffidently, "Did you get me anything, Ron?"

"Not, of course, that you care or anything."

"Oh be quiet. Did you?"

Smirking, Ron replied, "As a matter of fact, I did."

"Where? Where? When do I get it?"

Ron laughed outright. "Not excited, are we?"

"Oh shut up. I've never gotten a Valentine's Day present. And if you hadn't have told me, I wouldn't be excited. Normally I don't care."

"If you must know, it's not really anything big."

Hermione's eyes shone with anticipation. "Give it to me after supper, okay?"

Ron was thinking, I just hope she likes it.


                                                                                ***


He had obviously not had enough money to buy something fancy, like Harry's pendant for Cho. But he figured he had to do something - anything. It had taken him a few days.

He sat Hermione down in the thankfully empty Gryffindor common room. She had been eager all the rest of the day after he told her.

"Right, Hermione."

And he said those three words, and waved his wand.

It was their usual heart spell. As it appeared, and Hermione read the first familiar lines, her eyes lost their glow. "Ron -"

"Just wait."

Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:
O, no! it is an ever-fixed mark,
That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.
Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come;
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
If this be error and upon me proved,
I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

"You just recycled the.." Hermione's mouth fell open. Because it wasn't over. And he hadn't just recycled the spell.

Hermione, I love you.

Before he even knew it, she was in his arms, holding him tightly. "I love you too, Ron," she whispered in his ear, before she kissed him quite soundly.

And Ron felt nothing but passionate exhilaration.

Not bad for a Valentine's Day.