Disclaimer: They aren't mine. They belong to the divine goddess JKR, they
just like to play in my garden sometimes.
She silently moved her lips, rounding the pink fullness of her mouth over the vowel heavy numbers. "Two hundred and eighty eight, two hundred and eighty nine," she muttered soundlessly.
Harry looked back at her for a second, brows quirked in askance. "Shh," she slid a finger over her lips in the universally understood sign for 'be quiet'.
"Two hundred." she trailed off as she lost count. She made a face at the back of Harry's head, sticking out her tongue and childishly blowing him a raspberry.
Malfoy leant over to her, "put your tongue back in your mouth, Granger. My boyfriend only has eyes for mine! Besides." he trailed off glancing meaningfully at Crabbe who was salivating at the view of her tongue- fat lump probably thought it looked like a slice of bacon or something, she thought resentfully- ".Crabbe might be getting ideas." He dropped a lid in a wink that she supposed he considered sexy and sat back in his seat again.
After class, Harry walked up to her. "What on earth were you counting that was so important that you ignored the last review session of Charms before the N.E.W.Ts?"
"Nothing," she stammered, flushing fuchsia. "I have to go." She turned around, intending to stride off down the hall before he could ask any more embarrassing questions.
But she was stopped short when she crashed into his back. Thank heavens that it was his back, and not. well, not his front.
"Do you have eyes?" he began, as he turned around slowly. He registered it was she that had run into him and awareness flashed in his eyes. "I errr." was as far as he got as she turned tail and ran off, like a small, scared animal.
Ron flushed, the tips of his ears and back of his neck matching his ginger hair, ran a hand through aforementioned hair and blew his breath upwards towards his fringe in frustration.
"Is she ever going to speak to me again," he asked his other best friend, plaintively.
"I doubt it," Malfoy- that insufferable prat- drawled, slinging an arm casually around Harry's shoulders. "You made a right arse of yourself, you know," he remarked conversationally.
"I-wasn't-bloody-asking-you," Ron snarled, through gritted teeth.
"Sheesh, don't bite my head off, Weasel. For all I know, you might have rabies."
"Yeah, well, if I took all of everything you knew and gathered it up, I wouldn't be able to fill. to fill a thimble!" Ron retorted. He was spoiling for a fight, and Malfoy, almost former nemesis would do.
"Oy," said Harry, hitting him squarely in the middle of his forehead. "We all know that Malfoy isn't the genesis of your crappy mood. Maybe you should go track down the cute, little catalyst, who by the way was counting your freckles," he suggested hopeful as always of alone time with Draco.
"How can I?" Ron muttered resentfully. "She hasn't spoken to me in a week."
"You can speak to her," Draco threw in, rather 'helpful' as always.
Ron opened his mouth, hesitating, but before he had a chance to retort, Harry had set his hands on his shoulders, turned him around, and shoved him down the hall, in the general direction of the Prefect dorms.
He walked a bit, muttering under his breath some colourful expletives that would have made the 'cute, little catalyst' blush, had she been with in hearing distance and on speaking terms with him.
He glanced around furtively- Sirius Black standing over him with a knife in third year had impressed upon him the importance of password security- before whispering, "Occlumency," to the old fashioned gentleman residing in the portrait.
"Hey there, old chap! Haven't seen you in a while. Is it any wonder? Your ladybird has looked very peeved," the man got up and smirked at him from the foreground. "What did you do to displease the little bird?"
"I.errr. nothing," he stammered out, after realizing in one moment of cognition that he had no idea what Hermione had been on about.
"Suuure, it's nothing," the portrait said smarmily. "Nothing's the reason she's been running in here every day at about 3:15, eyes all red and nose running halfway down her blouse."
At that precise moment, Hermione emerged from behind him. "Occlumency," she said crisply to the portrait. "Good day, Lord Ruthven. And I would thank you to keep your insignificant observations about the state of my person to yourself. Ta."
"Wait a mo', Herm. At least listen to what I have to say." he trailed off, putting his hand on her arm gently.
"What, Ronald?" she asked, prying his fingers from her limb as though they were part of an extremely disgusting creature, that she would not lower herself to touch under normal circumstances.
Unfortunately at that moment, he felt his body responding to her imperious voice and her 'lady-of-the-manor-bestowing-an-honour-on-the-stableboy-by- allowing-him-to-touch-her-arm' act.
Even more unfortunately, she pressed her back into the wall, sliding down it slowly to sit down, giving him a view of more than a little of her creamy legs.
He wildly thought of the most unsexy things he could at that moment; 'Potions- oh God, Hermione's long, tapered fingers.-, pumpkin pie- she tasted that way after being kissed so.-, the giant squid- and how her blouse had looked after they had splashed in the.- McGonnagall; no way to twist that into a perverted image.
Thoughts of McGonagall slowed his reaction, but did nothing to cure it. 'McGonagall and Snape getting it on.' His face twisted in disgust, but he found himself growing as he though of the act itself. 'Leaving stuff on his desk in Transfigurations! Yes that was it; McGonagall and Snape shagging wildly on his Transfiguration desk and leaving better unnamed fluids!'
His nose twisted; he could almost feel himself shrivelling. He had probably gone a little too far with that last image.
"What, Ronald? If you don't have anything important to say to me, I'm going to start my Charms essay," Hermione said, in a loud sort of voice.
He realized with horror that he needed her to be quiet if he wanted to apologize without dragging the circus around in his pants- or at least the big tent portion of it.
"Yes my dear Mr. Weasley; it's impolite to keep a young lady waiting, especially such a beautiful young lady," Lord Ruthven shot a wink at Hermione.
He managed to squelch a feeling of jealousy at the painting's familiarity with Hermione to begin his speech.
"Hermione; please just listen to me for five minutes, so I can get it all out at once and not, and not have you confusing me with all of your words and distracting me with your voice and your eyes and." his voice trailed off lamely.
"What do you mean, I 'confuse you'?" she demanded, putting a hand over her mouth and looking at him almost apologetically after realizing that she had interrupted him.
'Well shit; there were images associated with those lips and.Turn off brain!' he roared at the symphony inside his head.
He took a deep breath, realizing only then that he had no rehearsed speech and that he had not considered what he was going to say to her. He figured that she couldn't fault him for a flawed performance, if there hadn't been any rehearsal, and so began to tell her so.
"I haven't practiced this yet, I haven't even thought beyond you talking to me again," he blurted. "Because, because." he trailed off. 'Drat it all! It would have been so much better had he rehearsed the speech.'
"Mr. Weasley; in my day, eloquence was prized by the ladies. For your sake, I hope things have changed quite a bit," the painting drawled at him, and he had to once again squelch the urge to rip the old, mouldy piece of crap to shreds.
"Because all I've been doing lately is worrying about what I'll do if you never speak to me again, and how it's going to feel after I talk to you and you walk away from me again, and I realized that I'm going to feel like crap. I never meant for that thing to happen," he gestured wildly at his stomach region.
"And I think you should maybe." he trailed off, gnawing on his bottom lip. "Take it as a compliment; because it's definitely a compliment in boy speak."
"And I really." he chewed on his nails for a second, "and I really didn't mean to do that, but they- I mean," he faltered at the expression on her face, "you looked really nice."
"Okay, Hermione," he took a deep breath. "We all know that I have foot in mouth disease, and judging from Fred and George, it's not something that's going to clear up in the near future, so please, please, please don't get mad at me. Again. Mad at me again."
"Mr. Weasley; I don't think that foot in mouth disease will clear up in this lifetime, nor will those misfortunate spots you seem to have gained, all over your head," the lord said snidely.
"Shut up, you mouldy piece of scum," was shot out the corner of his mouth, before he realized that he was off topic. "And I realize that this relationship might be moving a little faster than you'd like it to; I can compromise on that, you just let me know and I'll. I'll never touch you again."
He slumped back against the wall, and slid down it to join her on the ground, visibly exhausted by his animated apology.
"Is it really?" Hermione asked him, looking up at him through her eyelashes, coyly.
"Is what really what?" he asked back, wiping the beaded sweat off of his forehead with the back of his hand.
"Is it really a compliment in 'boy speak'?" she made cute little quotations around 'boy speak', with her long 'fingers that really would look much better.'
"Errr.yeah," he muttered into his knee, where he was fixedly staring at the navy material of the uniform.
"Does 'errr. yeah' mean yes in today's jargon?" the portrait mused, tapping a finger on his chin.
"Well, I have to say; I think 'you'" she made those little quotations around 'you'. "I think 'you' just paid me a really nice compliment." She smirked a bit when he glanced up at her and back down at himself as her words' meaning caught up to him.
He drew his knees up to his body, pressing them tightly into his torso, resuming his staring competition with his knee.
He didn't notice when she scooted over to him and pressed her leg against his side. He did, however, notice when she slid those long fingers over his chest, leaving invisible scorch trails on his skin, tilting his head in her direction by manoeuvring his chin.
"Thank 'you'," she quotationed her fingers lightly on his jawbone. "That's the nicest compliment anyone has ever given me."
"Good," he managed to sneak in, right before their lips met. "I would hate for someone else to be giving compliments of that calibre to you."
//
"So how many have I got?" he managed to ask, some time later, when they were sprawled out in front of the common room fire.
"How many what have you got?" she asked, and adorable confused expression finding its way onto her face.
"How many freckles?" he asked, conversationally.
She blushed and mumbled something through the fingers she used to cover her face up with.
"What was that?" he asked.
"I said, you have more than two hundred and eighty seven on the back of your neck alone!" she shot at him.
"Oh," he said, starting to unbutton his shirt, nonplussed.
"What are you doing?" she asked him; they had just finished putting their shirts back on.
"Letting you count the rest of course!" he grinned at her cheekily. "We would hate for Hermione Granger not to know the answer to everything. Who knows when someone might ask you how many freckles a Weasley has."
And they started to count them, together.
//
.fin.
She silently moved her lips, rounding the pink fullness of her mouth over the vowel heavy numbers. "Two hundred and eighty eight, two hundred and eighty nine," she muttered soundlessly.
Harry looked back at her for a second, brows quirked in askance. "Shh," she slid a finger over her lips in the universally understood sign for 'be quiet'.
"Two hundred." she trailed off as she lost count. She made a face at the back of Harry's head, sticking out her tongue and childishly blowing him a raspberry.
Malfoy leant over to her, "put your tongue back in your mouth, Granger. My boyfriend only has eyes for mine! Besides." he trailed off glancing meaningfully at Crabbe who was salivating at the view of her tongue- fat lump probably thought it looked like a slice of bacon or something, she thought resentfully- ".Crabbe might be getting ideas." He dropped a lid in a wink that she supposed he considered sexy and sat back in his seat again.
After class, Harry walked up to her. "What on earth were you counting that was so important that you ignored the last review session of Charms before the N.E.W.Ts?"
"Nothing," she stammered, flushing fuchsia. "I have to go." She turned around, intending to stride off down the hall before he could ask any more embarrassing questions.
But she was stopped short when she crashed into his back. Thank heavens that it was his back, and not. well, not his front.
"Do you have eyes?" he began, as he turned around slowly. He registered it was she that had run into him and awareness flashed in his eyes. "I errr." was as far as he got as she turned tail and ran off, like a small, scared animal.
Ron flushed, the tips of his ears and back of his neck matching his ginger hair, ran a hand through aforementioned hair and blew his breath upwards towards his fringe in frustration.
"Is she ever going to speak to me again," he asked his other best friend, plaintively.
"I doubt it," Malfoy- that insufferable prat- drawled, slinging an arm casually around Harry's shoulders. "You made a right arse of yourself, you know," he remarked conversationally.
"I-wasn't-bloody-asking-you," Ron snarled, through gritted teeth.
"Sheesh, don't bite my head off, Weasel. For all I know, you might have rabies."
"Yeah, well, if I took all of everything you knew and gathered it up, I wouldn't be able to fill. to fill a thimble!" Ron retorted. He was spoiling for a fight, and Malfoy, almost former nemesis would do.
"Oy," said Harry, hitting him squarely in the middle of his forehead. "We all know that Malfoy isn't the genesis of your crappy mood. Maybe you should go track down the cute, little catalyst, who by the way was counting your freckles," he suggested hopeful as always of alone time with Draco.
"How can I?" Ron muttered resentfully. "She hasn't spoken to me in a week."
"You can speak to her," Draco threw in, rather 'helpful' as always.
Ron opened his mouth, hesitating, but before he had a chance to retort, Harry had set his hands on his shoulders, turned him around, and shoved him down the hall, in the general direction of the Prefect dorms.
He walked a bit, muttering under his breath some colourful expletives that would have made the 'cute, little catalyst' blush, had she been with in hearing distance and on speaking terms with him.
He glanced around furtively- Sirius Black standing over him with a knife in third year had impressed upon him the importance of password security- before whispering, "Occlumency," to the old fashioned gentleman residing in the portrait.
"Hey there, old chap! Haven't seen you in a while. Is it any wonder? Your ladybird has looked very peeved," the man got up and smirked at him from the foreground. "What did you do to displease the little bird?"
"I.errr. nothing," he stammered out, after realizing in one moment of cognition that he had no idea what Hermione had been on about.
"Suuure, it's nothing," the portrait said smarmily. "Nothing's the reason she's been running in here every day at about 3:15, eyes all red and nose running halfway down her blouse."
At that precise moment, Hermione emerged from behind him. "Occlumency," she said crisply to the portrait. "Good day, Lord Ruthven. And I would thank you to keep your insignificant observations about the state of my person to yourself. Ta."
"Wait a mo', Herm. At least listen to what I have to say." he trailed off, putting his hand on her arm gently.
"What, Ronald?" she asked, prying his fingers from her limb as though they were part of an extremely disgusting creature, that she would not lower herself to touch under normal circumstances.
Unfortunately at that moment, he felt his body responding to her imperious voice and her 'lady-of-the-manor-bestowing-an-honour-on-the-stableboy-by- allowing-him-to-touch-her-arm' act.
Even more unfortunately, she pressed her back into the wall, sliding down it slowly to sit down, giving him a view of more than a little of her creamy legs.
He wildly thought of the most unsexy things he could at that moment; 'Potions- oh God, Hermione's long, tapered fingers.-, pumpkin pie- she tasted that way after being kissed so.-, the giant squid- and how her blouse had looked after they had splashed in the.- McGonnagall; no way to twist that into a perverted image.
Thoughts of McGonagall slowed his reaction, but did nothing to cure it. 'McGonagall and Snape getting it on.' His face twisted in disgust, but he found himself growing as he though of the act itself. 'Leaving stuff on his desk in Transfigurations! Yes that was it; McGonagall and Snape shagging wildly on his Transfiguration desk and leaving better unnamed fluids!'
His nose twisted; he could almost feel himself shrivelling. He had probably gone a little too far with that last image.
"What, Ronald? If you don't have anything important to say to me, I'm going to start my Charms essay," Hermione said, in a loud sort of voice.
He realized with horror that he needed her to be quiet if he wanted to apologize without dragging the circus around in his pants- or at least the big tent portion of it.
"Yes my dear Mr. Weasley; it's impolite to keep a young lady waiting, especially such a beautiful young lady," Lord Ruthven shot a wink at Hermione.
He managed to squelch a feeling of jealousy at the painting's familiarity with Hermione to begin his speech.
"Hermione; please just listen to me for five minutes, so I can get it all out at once and not, and not have you confusing me with all of your words and distracting me with your voice and your eyes and." his voice trailed off lamely.
"What do you mean, I 'confuse you'?" she demanded, putting a hand over her mouth and looking at him almost apologetically after realizing that she had interrupted him.
'Well shit; there were images associated with those lips and.Turn off brain!' he roared at the symphony inside his head.
He took a deep breath, realizing only then that he had no rehearsed speech and that he had not considered what he was going to say to her. He figured that she couldn't fault him for a flawed performance, if there hadn't been any rehearsal, and so began to tell her so.
"I haven't practiced this yet, I haven't even thought beyond you talking to me again," he blurted. "Because, because." he trailed off. 'Drat it all! It would have been so much better had he rehearsed the speech.'
"Mr. Weasley; in my day, eloquence was prized by the ladies. For your sake, I hope things have changed quite a bit," the painting drawled at him, and he had to once again squelch the urge to rip the old, mouldy piece of crap to shreds.
"Because all I've been doing lately is worrying about what I'll do if you never speak to me again, and how it's going to feel after I talk to you and you walk away from me again, and I realized that I'm going to feel like crap. I never meant for that thing to happen," he gestured wildly at his stomach region.
"And I think you should maybe." he trailed off, gnawing on his bottom lip. "Take it as a compliment; because it's definitely a compliment in boy speak."
"And I really." he chewed on his nails for a second, "and I really didn't mean to do that, but they- I mean," he faltered at the expression on her face, "you looked really nice."
"Okay, Hermione," he took a deep breath. "We all know that I have foot in mouth disease, and judging from Fred and George, it's not something that's going to clear up in the near future, so please, please, please don't get mad at me. Again. Mad at me again."
"Mr. Weasley; I don't think that foot in mouth disease will clear up in this lifetime, nor will those misfortunate spots you seem to have gained, all over your head," the lord said snidely.
"Shut up, you mouldy piece of scum," was shot out the corner of his mouth, before he realized that he was off topic. "And I realize that this relationship might be moving a little faster than you'd like it to; I can compromise on that, you just let me know and I'll. I'll never touch you again."
He slumped back against the wall, and slid down it to join her on the ground, visibly exhausted by his animated apology.
"Is it really?" Hermione asked him, looking up at him through her eyelashes, coyly.
"Is what really what?" he asked back, wiping the beaded sweat off of his forehead with the back of his hand.
"Is it really a compliment in 'boy speak'?" she made cute little quotations around 'boy speak', with her long 'fingers that really would look much better.'
"Errr.yeah," he muttered into his knee, where he was fixedly staring at the navy material of the uniform.
"Does 'errr. yeah' mean yes in today's jargon?" the portrait mused, tapping a finger on his chin.
"Well, I have to say; I think 'you'" she made those little quotations around 'you'. "I think 'you' just paid me a really nice compliment." She smirked a bit when he glanced up at her and back down at himself as her words' meaning caught up to him.
He drew his knees up to his body, pressing them tightly into his torso, resuming his staring competition with his knee.
He didn't notice when she scooted over to him and pressed her leg against his side. He did, however, notice when she slid those long fingers over his chest, leaving invisible scorch trails on his skin, tilting his head in her direction by manoeuvring his chin.
"Thank 'you'," she quotationed her fingers lightly on his jawbone. "That's the nicest compliment anyone has ever given me."
"Good," he managed to sneak in, right before their lips met. "I would hate for someone else to be giving compliments of that calibre to you."
//
"So how many have I got?" he managed to ask, some time later, when they were sprawled out in front of the common room fire.
"How many what have you got?" she asked, and adorable confused expression finding its way onto her face.
"How many freckles?" he asked, conversationally.
She blushed and mumbled something through the fingers she used to cover her face up with.
"What was that?" he asked.
"I said, you have more than two hundred and eighty seven on the back of your neck alone!" she shot at him.
"Oh," he said, starting to unbutton his shirt, nonplussed.
"What are you doing?" she asked him; they had just finished putting their shirts back on.
"Letting you count the rest of course!" he grinned at her cheekily. "We would hate for Hermione Granger not to know the answer to everything. Who knows when someone might ask you how many freckles a Weasley has."
And they started to count them, together.
//
.fin.