Chapter 2- Battles and Hair Talk
Hermione suddenly appeared in front of a very tall and very shabby house. To anyone looking, it would have seemed as though a woman had just come out of nowhere. Of course, she had just come out of nowhere. She looked a little breathless and turned to stare up at the house.
The house was at least four stories high, with so many additions and sticking out corners, it would not have still been standing if it were an ordinary house. However, it was not an ordinary house. It was the home of one of Hermione's two best friends, Ron Weasley. She smiled up at the house and was walking up to the door when it jumped open. Before Hermione could say anything, she was picked up and swung around. She was hugged tightly to a very muscular chest that could only mean one person.
"RON!" Hermione shouted, finding it very hard to breath, seeing as she was crushed against him. She laughed and allowed herself to be swung around a few more times before insisting to be let down. Her feet touched the ground softly and she stepped back to look at her friend.
He looked good, there was no denying it. Years of living with five older brothers had taught Ron the importance of being strong. He was easily the tallest Weasley brother. In the time following his graduation from Hogwarts, Ron had grown to a towering 194 centimeters (6'4" thought Hermione, to keep with the American Muggle terms). One would have thought that Ron would look strange, gangly and tall. But he had bulked up. His hair was still the bright red, making him an obvious Weasley. He had grown it out his hair; it was now touching his collar. It gave him the-
"Like my oh-so-casual-I-forgot-to-get-a-hair-cut hair?" Ron questioned in a loud voice, looking impressed with himself. "Mum's been killing me to get it cut. I dunno though… I reckon it makes me look-"
Ron was cut off from his speech by a bone-crushing hug from Hermione. "Shut up, Ron. I don't care about your hair," she raised her head to see his face. Predictably, it was bright red. "Don't worry though, I think it looks grand," Hermione added to mollify him. He nodded once and smiled.
"I know. Let's go inside, Harry hasn't come yet. I think that he is going to be late. Well, he must be. It's already seven minutes after nine. Bloody Hell! I can't believe it! Was Hermione Granger actually late to anything? I think I'm going to faint!" Ron laughed and pulled down on Hermione's arm as he fell to the ground in a pretend swoon. "What is the world coming to?"
Hermione looked down at him, crumpled in a laughing heap on the path into the house. She couldn't help it; she fell onto the ground and laughed too. After a minute, the two friends quieted down and turned their heads to look at each other. As if there was some unseen agreement between the two of them, they attacked at the exact same moment. It was their tickling battle.
Ron had the advantage of being quite a bit larger than Hermione. He quickly used his bigger body as a weapon and crushed her. He ran one of his hand over her side and let the other grab her knee. Gasping for breath, Hermione wiggled out of his arms and rolled on top of him, straddling him, and pinned his arms above his head. He squirmed for a few moments, and then gave up. He looked up at Hermione, who was giving him a very evil smirk.
"Gottcha," she whispered, still breathless from the battle.
Ron lay still for a moment and caught his breath. Then, with unexpected agility, he pulled his arms from her grasp and rolled back on top of Hermione. They were both screaming with laughter and had tears streaming down their faces. Ron was in the middle of a very intense attack on Hermione's stomach when the sound of a throat clearing made it to his ears.
He looked up and saw a very entertained, black haired man staring at the two of them. The man spoke, "Bloody hell, Ron. If you wanted this time to make out with Hermione, you should have told me to come a later, Mate." Harry Potter had arrived and Hermione and Ron did the first thing that came to their minds. They pulled Harry onto the ground with them and soon another tickle-war was going.
* * * * *
Hermione stood in the kitchen and took a deep breath. She closed her eyes for a moment then opened them. She looked around and saw everything the same as the first time she had visited the Burrow, back in her fourth year. It was a fairly small room, but very cozy. There was a fireplace off to the side with many pots and jars sitting on it. Each of the jade-colored jars was labeled with bright blue words like "Floo Powder". There were also stacks of books sitting on the mantle. Hermione looked around for her favorite, Charm Your Own Cheese. She giggled as she saw the old cookbook with the funny name.
The focus point of the kitchen was the scrubbed wooden table. It was very long. It does have to feed all those Weasleys… They need a long table! thought Hermione. She sat down next to Harry at the end of the table. Ron stayed standing and began to rummage through the cupboards.
"I swear we had some good stuff in here…" Ron was mumbling. He went over to the other side of the kitchen and looked in those cupboards. "All we have is… What is this?" He held up a box with an utterly perplexed look on his face. "Says 'flow-ur'… Never heard of it…Dunno where Mum keeps all the food…Sorry guys, I usually don't cook breakfast…" Apologetically, Ron bent back down and stuck his head into the cupboard. "Dammit…Mum's trying to starve us all, I swear…Hiding all the-"
But what Mrs. Weasley was hiding Hermione never found out because Ron's voice was cut off by another one, a female voice. "Ron, if Mum wanted to kill you all she would have to do is take away your broom. You'd go crazy without it." Hermione turned around and saw a very pretty red-haired young woman standing with her hands on her hips.
"Gin!" Hermione shouted as she launched herself her best girlfriend. She gave Ginny a huge hug and then pulled back. "Hell, Ginny! You look amazing! What is so different?"
"Well, I finally cut my hair… now it's a lot shorter than the last time you saw me. Like it?" Ginny replied, tossing her shoulder-length hair back. The sun caught the red and made her look very pretty indeed.
"What is it with you Weasleys and your hair?" Hermione asked with a laugh. She was greeted with blank stares; clearly they had no idea what she was talking about. "When I got here, the first thing that Ron said to me was 'Do you like my hair?'" Hermione tried to imitate Ron's low voice but ended up sounding ridiculous. "And now you mention it too! I guess Harry's the only sane one around here!"
"Harry?" Ginny asked, looking around. When her eyes finally landed on Harry, she squealed, threw Hermione to the side, and jumped onto Harry's lap. Harry looked a little surprised, but laughed with everyone else. Ginny only buried her head in Harry's chest.
"Gin, I just saw you two days ago. Do you really miss me that much?" Harry teased. Harry and Ginny had been dating since Harry's seventh year at Hogwarts. He confided in Hermione that he had always thought Ginny was cute and when he realized that he was going to leave Hogwarts, he knew he had to have her. Hermione was aware that it was harder for them now. Ginny had graduated last summer and was working in Diagon Alley while living at home to save money. Harry was playing Quidditch for the Chudley Cannons and had to live far away from Ginny. Once Harry had passed his Apparitions test he popped by, even if only for a moment, at least every other day. Their relationship had only grown stronger because of the hardships and Hermione knew that they were meant to be together. Ginny planned on moving to be near Harry when she had enough money, even though Harry had offered for her to stay at his house.
"Shut up, you great lump. I've missed you," Ginny pulled back for a moment and held Harry at arms length. "Hey, did you do something with your hair?"
Hermione looked up and burst into laughter, "See, I told you. You are OBSESSED with hair. This can not be natural! I think we need to take you to see a doctor. You and your brother," she shot a look at Ron, who grinned.
"Don't be mad at Gin and I just because we have great hair and you do-"
"Ronald Weasley, if you want to live to see your first child, hell, if you want to have a child, I strongly suggest that you SHUT UP!" Hermione shouted, trying to drown out the end of Ron's comment. Everyone in the kitchen looked at her and blinked in silent shock. She hadn't realized how loud her voice was. "Ummm, thank you."
"Hey Harry, remember that one day back in first year how I told you that Hermione was a little bonkers… I think she has finally cracked." Ron "whispered" loud enough for everyone to hear.
Hermione did crack. She threw herself onto Ron and started to hit him, albeit a little too hard to be just playful. She was in the middle of strangling him with her bare hands when another voice met her ears.
"Well Hermione, I am glad that finally someone else came to their senses about our little brother Ron."
The twins had arrived, with, of course, their sense of humor. Wow thought Hermione, looking at the two boys with a smirk At least two people in the Weasley clan don't care about their hair…Both boy's hair was sticking straight up, out, left, right, forward, back, and every direction that hair could, and even ways it couldn't, stick. The two twins looked at each other with a very evil grin. Hermione, who knew to be quite worried when she saw those smiles, jumped up and did the smartest thing she could think of.
"Gin, I've forgotten, where's the loo?"
* * * * *
By the time Hermione got back from the bathroom, and from avoiding the trouble that Fred and George were bound to cause, everything had settled down. No loud bangs had been heard and Hermione was quite disappointed that the fun that the two twins used to cause without hesitation had obviously not taken place.
Mrs. Weasley had clearly come to the kitchen because everyone was quiet eating. Molly stood with her back to Hermione, humming while she washed the dishes the wizard way, a flick of the wrist. Hermione didn't recognize the song, but that was no surprise. She went up to Mrs. Weasley and offered her thanks for letting her stay at the Burrow for the next two days. Mrs. Weasley, as suspected, seemed overjoyed to have a full house and offered to let Hermione stay whenever she wanted. Hermione smiled and sat down at the table in between Ron and Ginny.
Ron and Harry were discussing Quidditch. No surprise here thought Hermione with a smile. It was lovely to see her best friends together again. Ever since Harry had been recruited by the Cannons, Hermione suspected that Ron might be jealous. Fortunately, she was wrong. Ron had seemed to embrace the fact that Harry was playing for his favorite team. Harry had convinced the team to change their motto back the original one. Somehow, Harry thought that "We shall conquer" looked better on orange and black banners than "Let's all just keep our fingers crossed and hope for the best." Harry was trying to bring the team back to their former glory; so far they were sixth in the league. There was still room for improvement, but it was a lot better than ninth, their position since 1892.
"I don't care, Harry. I am not doing it."
"But Ron, you had posters of all the team up in your bedroom before!"
"Well, yeah! But hell, Harry! None of the other players are my best mate since I was eleven. There is no way that I am going to buy a Harry Potter poster."
Harry looked at his friend and grinned evilly. "If you do, maybe I'll get Amy to sign a poster for you."
Ron turned purple. He managed to get out, "Well, you, you, you know, maybe I could, you know, buy, maybe, just a, um, little, VERY little, um, little picture of you." Everyone in the Weasley home knew that Amy Reddings was the object of Ron's affection. Even though he had been to countless Cannon's games with Harry, he still admired her from afar. Somehow his mouth always went dry and his throat closed up when he was within fifty meters of the pretty blonde beater.
Hermione turned to Ginny and was quickly immersed in a very interesting conversation about Ginny's and Hermione's life after Hogwarts. Hermione mentioned her break from work and was just about to ask if she could borrow some Muggle clothes to wear to the reunion, there was a tap on the window. Hermione jumped up and let a rather large barn owl into the room. She untied the note on the owl's leg, thanked the owl, and sent it back out the window, where it flew very fast and disappeared into the horizon. The letter, addressed to "Hogwarts Alumni", was very light. Hermione opened the letter, as no one else besides Ginny had really noticed the owl. She read the letter and gasped. It dropped into a dish of butter on the table and Ginny asked, "What's the matter, Mione?"
"Bloody Hell."
* * * * *
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Author's Note:
Yeah! I absolutely loved writing chapter 2. It's my favorite chapter. I find all the personalities intriguing. Cool, huh? My favorite part of the chapter was when Hermione threatened Ron with, well, let's just say that he wouldn't be having children. I thought it was funny…
Just a note, the reunion will cover everyone from Marcus Flint's year, down to Ginny Weasley's year. This would mean that everyone in the second Harry Potter book will be at the reunion. Ginny just graduated a little less than a year ago.
So, did you guys like that cliffhanger here?!?! I'm sorry to do this to you, but I am posting chapter 3 at the same time, so in all reality, it doesn't really matter. I just wanted to leave you guys hanging, at least until you click to read the next chapter. :)
Again, please review! I would love to get your input about anything that you want to happen, anything you like, heck, even anything you didn't like! Just please let me know that someone else out there is reading this! I love you guys a lot!
-MOLLY
