The Food Fight

The next morning when Harry woke up he didn't remember at first why he had butterflies in his stomach. Then he remembered that he was going to Hermione's house today, that he was going to spend the whole rest of the summer with her, that from now until the end of the school year he got to see her every day. Harry was very excited.

He was so excited, in fact that he did a happy bouncy dance, which was a very un-Harry-like thing to do, seeing that he usually kept his emotions under control. This time however, he decided to let himself have his fun little moment since Ron was still asleep. Or so he thought.

Just as he was in the middle of doing a hokey-pokey sort of spin, he heard snickering behind him. Blushing furiously red, he turned around to face Ron, who looked as though he was about to explode from laughter and had tears running down his cheeks.

Between gasps of air, Ron managed to say, "What. in the worl. world. was. th-that?" Harry sighed, joyful happy-dance moment ruined. He quickly decided that now was NOT the right time to tell Ron about his new crush.

Harry then remembered that he would be expected down at breakfast in about thirty minutes and that Hermione would be there and that his hair probably looked really bad and that he was still wearing his pajamas and that. He ran to take a fast shower.

When he got out, Ron was busy slapping hair gel onto his head. Harry stole it from him and squeezed some onto his head. He hurriedly began smoothing his hair down with it while searching through his drawers to find something to wear.

Ron was staring at him again. "Man, Harry, what's up with you lately? Ever since we ran into Hermione and Lav yesterday, you've been. hey, waitaminit. Harry, you don't.you can't. Hermione?"

Harry nodded meekly. He had hoped that Ron wouldn't be mad about this, or make a big deal, but it looked like Ron would.

Suddenly Ron grinned. "I knew it! I knew it! I knew you two were going to get together eventually!" Now Ron was the one doing the happy dance.

"I'm gonna tell her! I'm gonna tell her you like her! Hahahahahahahahahahaha!" Ron laughed wildly and then bolted to the door. Harry lunged after him but missed, skidding out the door of their room before catching himself and then promptly running straight into Hermione at the top of the stairs. She fell back onto the landing while Harry thudded down half the steps before stopping painfully midway down the stairs.

Hermione suddenly appeared above him. "Harry? Are you alright?"

He looked up at her concerned face. "Yeah," he said as she helped him up. "Sorry 'bout that. Are you okay?"

"I'm fine. Why were you chasing Ron?" They walked down the remainder of the stairs together and made their way across the crowded pub to the table where everyone else was already seated.

"Oh, he was going to tell. someone something I didn't really want him to. But he's not going to tell, now is he?" Harry raised his eyebrows at Ron across the table and glared.

"Alright, alright, fine," Ron grumbled. "I won't tell."

Now Hermione looked curious. "What is it? You can tell me, I promise I won't tell."

Harry fidgeted. "Well, I can't really tell you because, um. well, because you're the person I didn't want Ron to tell in the first place. Um, yeah."

Hermione gave him a strange look. "Okay."

Harry smiled at her. "I'll tell you later, I promise."

"She smiled back. "How much later?"

"I dunno, you'll just have to wait and find out, won't you?"

Hermione squealed. "Harry Potter!" she threw a scrambled egg at him.

"Cool!" Fred yelled. "Food fight!"

After that, Harry was too busy flinging oatmeal and dodging flying toast to talk to Hermione at all. As the fight subsided a few minutes later when Mrs. Weasley intervened, Harry realized that he had egg in his hair, jam on his shirt, and a particularly large gob of pudding drying on his cheek.

So much for looking good in front of Hermione he thought. Just then, he felt a wet smack on the back of his neck. When he reached back to see what it was, he made contact with skin. He spun around and saw Hermione behind him, giggling and holding a plate of buttered biscuits.

He chased her up the stairs and down the hall until he finally caught up with her and tackled her. Sitting up, he noticed that she too was covered in the remains of their breakfast fun. Even so, she looked quite pretty.

"Harry?" she waved her hand in front of his face. "Are you awake? What are you staring at?"

"Huh? Oh, nothing, just. just. just a really pretty girl, that's all." he stammered. She beamed and leaned up like she was going to kiss him. She put her arm around his neck and. and. and dropped a crumbling biscuit down his shirt. He yelled and pulled his shirt out so the biscuit fell out onto the floor. And then he grabbed Hermione and kissed her, right there in the hall of the Leaky Cauldron.