Diclaimer: I do not own any HP stories, characters, plots, blah, blah, blah. Why would you even think I could afford to?

A/N: This is my first venture into the HP fan fiction world, so please, no flamers, okay? I love all you who review!!!!
"Blasted Potions essay," Ronald Weasley muttered, kicking a bookcase in the library. He glanced at the large grandfather clock and found that he had stayed in the library for almost a full three hours working on a parchment about moonstone. It was almost midnight.

"Hermione would have a fit if she knew I wasn't in bed," he grinned, pushing back a strand of brilliant red hair from his forehead. He gathered up his ink, quill, and parchment and stuffed them unceremoniously into his weathered sack.

His lanky legs carried him wearily up the many flights of moving staircases and he was more than once reprimanded for the noises he made by awoken, grumpy paintings. "Sorry," he muttered, staring at the cold, stone floor.

Finally, Ron had reached his destination, the painting of the fat lady, and was faced with the difficult task of waking her from her snoring. "Honeysuckle," he said loudly. The woman didn't move. "Honeysuckle!" he said even more loudly, with a hint of annoyance this time. Again, the lady didn't flinch. "Honeysuckle!" he shouted menacingly.

The fat lady awoke, "How rude," she sniffed, looking on him with disgust. "Password?"

"Honeysuckle!" Ron yelled, becoming red in the face. All he wanted to do was sleep.

"Humph," the woman sniffed airily, and swung open to reveal the door that lay behind her.

Ron bit back an insult and quickly entered the common room, throwing a nasty glance behind him. He turned to walk towards the boys' dormitories, but stopped. There was something different about the common room that night. There wasn't a large, hearty fire in the fireplace this evening. "Hermione must've put all the elves out of work," he mumbled with a shrug. Ron started to make his way to his bed once more.

"I heard that, Ron," a voice rang out quietly from across the room.

He spun around much too quickly and his bag fell to the floor with a dull thud and the contents came rushing out onto the rug. "Drat," he muttered under his breath, watching his ink bottle's lid come undone and the black liquid seep into the dark red rug. Ron snapped his head back up, searching the room for the body of the disruptive voice. "Who's there?" he called into the blackness.

There was a slight pause, "It's just me, Ron," the voice said again.

"Hermione? What are you doing up at midnight? You don't have prefect duties tonight," Ron said, taken aback. His eyes rested upon a lone figure sitting on the large, cushiony window seat right under the sill of the large, bay window. Moonbeams were streaking through the glass and resting on her face and her famous, bushy brown hair. Hermione looked almost...magical.

"She is," Ron murmured absently. He took a few steps in her direction.

"What was that?" Hermione asked, swiping something off her face. It looked like a tear in the moonlight.

"What's wrong?" Ron asked bluntly, joining her on the window seat, sitting opposite her. He mirrored her actions by putting his back against the wall and drawing his bony knees up to his chest.

He watched as she seemed to shake her head and sniffle. Hermione ran a hand through her unruly mane and said, "Nothing, nothing's wrong."

"There's obviously something wrong, Hermione." Ron titled his head intently, watching a tear drop off of her chin, staining her robes.

"Do you ever think that you weren't meant to be who you are? Like your body doesn't belong with your mind or like you feel so out of place it's alienating," Hermione sighed, staring out the window and onto the unlit grounds of Hogwarts below them with sad eyes.

"Sometimes," Ron answered with a shrug, keeping a tight watch on her face. She looked beautiful with the moon illuminating the gold in her hair and her pale cheeks. "Why?"

"Do you ever wonder what it would feel like to be somebody else?" was her reply.

"Yes," Ron said curiously. "Who do you want to be so badly its making you cry?"

"That's not exactly it," Hermione sighed, tracing something with her finger on the glass. "I don't want to be me anymore."

"Then who do you fancy to be?" he asked, sitting closer to her, but her eyes never reached his face.

A small, knowing smile spread across her face. "Someday I would like to become the moon."

"The moon?" Ron asked with a puzzled glance. He let his gaze wander to the window and saw the full moon Hermione was tracing her tiny, delicate finger. "Why?"

"Because people regard the moon with being beautiful and graceful," she said loftily, "and not some busy-body bookworm."

He said nothing.

"No one says anything horrid about the moon. The moon is pure," she sighed again.

Again, there was a pause, "But why would you chose to be such a thing that's so distant?" Ron asked his brow furrowing.

"Being distant has its rewards," Hermione answered with same secretive smile. "Imagine, seeing a man steal a mango off a cart in India or a girl fall off her bike in Wales. Or a man shooting another man somewhere else. There would be nothing you could do about it, but you would be safe and it wouldn't have been your fault."

Ron's attention turned back to his troubled friend's face. Surely this wasn't the Hermione he knew. She would want to be there, protesting or something. Hermione wouldn't sit back and let something she didn't like happen.

"You would have no worries about family or school, either," she added as an afterthought.

His sat closer to Hermione as he moved to look out the window, his shoulder touching her kneecaps that had been drawn up to herself tightly.

"But wouldn't it be terrible not to have a family?" he asked, astounded at her thoughts.

Hermione shook her head softly and shifted to she sat with her back to the room, her legs drawn into an Indian-style sitting position so she could sit shoulder to shoulder with him. "No. Without a family there would be no pressure to become the best."

"Is that so?" Ron asked with a small, unbelieving grin. He put an arm around her small shoulder, holding Hermione close to him.

"Yes." Hermione sounded definite, like her old self. "Being the moon would be lovely."

"Perhaps the moon thinks your lovely as well," Ron answered, looking down on her halo of hair.

"What?"

"It shines so brightly on your face tonight, the moon must think you're some kind of special," Ron said. Those were the exact words of comfort his mother used to tell him before tucking him at night when he was younger.

"The moon shines brightly for everyone, Ron. Everyone is special, especially you," Hermione told him, moving closer.

Ron smiled and put his other arm around her, encasing Hermione in a hug. "Then I should want to be the Earth," he told her, watching the moon shine. His heart was racing.

"Why?"

"So I could watch you day after day, seeing you radiate beauty." Ron grinned to himself, "And you could see me everyday, and see all the people who love you so." And as another thought, he added, "Even though they already do."

"I think I would very much like that," she whispered. Taking her eyes from the window, she tipped her head back and laid a soft, airy kiss on Ron's mouth, much to his surprise. "Thank you."

"No problem," he whispered back. And with that, Ron kissed the small girl in his arms once more.

Now the Potions essay was the last thing from his mind.

A/N: Now you've read my story - REVIEW WITH NICE COMMENTS!! I wrote the premise of this story at like, two o'clock this morning in the dark wearing my fav. Harry Potter t-shirt! It has Daniel Radcliffe on it!
Okay, bye!
portmanroxsmysoxs