Quick A/N: Ok, I know I've already updated this before, but I found more errors and I'm kinda obsessive, so I had to correct them. :D and everyone keep ur eyes out for a fic im, hopefully, putting out sometime in the next week or so... the one that I was supposed to be working on when I wrote this.. heh heh
pyrolord: sorry, but there isn't gonna be another chapter to this story.. if enough people ask for it, I might do a sequel of some sorts, but this particular fic is gonna stay a one-shot. I'm glad you liked it, though! :)
Everyone else: thank you for all your kind words!! They mean so much to me, really!! And if you haven't reviewed yet, please do!!
Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters of HP, they belong to JK Rowling. I simply own the plot idea and the words that put it together.
Finding Each Other in the Rain
"You don't get it Hermione! You just bloody don't get it!"
It was another day at Hogwarts, another fight between Ron and Hermione. But this time it was different. This time it had made Ron run away when he got too frustrated to keep yelling, and he had run outside into the rain no less. Hermione had, of course, followed him. Now the two of them were standing on the grounds, soaked to the bone, still yelling at each other.
Hermione was livid. "Just what don't I get Ron? Why don't you bloody tell me?!"
Had Ron not been so broken from this particular fight, he would have been surprised she had sworn. But Ron wasn't hearing anything at that particular moment, especially not reason.
"You don't get how every time we fight, I want to bang myself on the head just for saying one stupid thing to you, let alone a whole slew of them! You don't get how whenever you mention seeing some other guy besides me, a little part of my heart crumbles to dust! You don't get how whenever you glare at me I just want to apologize for being myself! You don't get how whenever I see a tear force its way out of your eyes during one of our fights I want to kill myself for hurting you! You don't get how I lo-" Ron stopped his rant abruptly, and let out a noise of disgust.
During Ron's moment of hesitation, because Hermione was still incensed, she let out a vehement "What Ron? What else don't I get? Why don't you tell me, there's plenty of time because I don't have a life, right? Just like you said yourself!"
Ron glared back at her, meeting her anger spark for spark. "I never said that. You're twisting my words."
"THAT IS NOT THE POINT, MR. WEASLEY! FINISH YOUR SENTENCE NOW, OR I'M LEAVING!"
Rain dripping into his eyes, Ron blinked, and the irate look abruptly disappeared out of his eyes and was replaced by something full of anguish that Hermione didn't notice, or simply ignored. His face, however, still held his furious thoughts in abundance.
"All right, Miss Granger, I'll finish my sentence. But you'll wish I never had," Ron whispered menacingly, which was immensely more frightening than when he was yelling.
A flicker of something indecipherable flitted across Hermione's face before she spat out, "Get on with it."
Ron stepped as close to Hermione as he could without actually touching her; his height gave him an incredible advantage, allowing him to look almost straight down at her. The rain poured around and on them, but neither noticed. He whispered the next words so quietly it was as if he had screamed them from the Astronomy Tower.
"You don't get how every time you look at me, be it one of malice or friendship, I want to run to you, and hold you, and never let you go. You don't get how every time you lecture me, I want to do everything you tell me to without question – whether my actions reflect this or not. You don't get how every time you yell at me, I want to cry. You don't get how you are the only person in my life who really makes me happy, and mostly just by being there. You don't get how without you in my life, I wouldn't be able to survive. You don't get how I would give my soul to save you from anything that might cause you harm. You don't get how I've loved you more than my own life since I was thirteen." He paused. Hermione's mouth fell open in utter shock. Ron sighed disgustedly, either for his feelings or they way things were going, and turned away. But when he whispered the last few words, nothing had ever been clearer to one Miss Granger. "You don't get how you are the only thing that has ever truly mattered to me, and that you don't care slowly kills me every day, bit by bit. I'm finished with it all, Hermione. I'm..." Ron's voice broke, "... I'm finished."
Hermione couldn't say a word.
Ron's shoulders slumped; he hadn't expected anything from all this. He had just known he couldn't hold it in any more, couldn't let it eat him alive any more. He slowly began to walk away, to who knows where.
Hermione's hand jumped out to catch his shoulder, and he turned around one last time to look at her. She gasped. Never before had she seen such pain in one person's eyes, not even in Harry's. And she knew it was all because of her. Ron's melancholy, dejected look jarred her to her very core, and she didn't know what to do. As she opened her mouth to speak, not really knowing what she was going to say, Ron gave her one last disgusted look before wrenching himself out of her grasp and walking away from her as fast as his long legs could carry him.
Before Ron even knew it himself, he was running as far as he could from the one person he had ever loved.
As she watched his drenched figure sprint away from her, Hermione, for the first time since she had followed Ron out onto the grounds in the first place, noticed the rain. Noticed how it quickly marred her vision of the red-head fleeing from her presence. Noticed how it mingled so easily with the teardrops on her face. Noticed how it didn't even numb the pain that was rapidly spreading through her body, despite its frigid temperature.
She simply stood there for what felt like an eternity, gazing in the direction Ron had run to, just watching the rain fall. It started falling heavier, pounding against her skin and the muddy ground around her, shaking her from her stunned reverie.
There was no question about it, she had to follow him. Had to. Had to before it was too late.
Wiping the mixture of tears, raindrops, and soaked hair out of her eyes, Hermione peered desperately through the opaque air, trying to see any clue as to where Ron was. Unable to find even the remotest trace of him, Hermione ran frantically in the direction she thought Ron might have gone, her feet squelching in the rapidly liquefying mud, bringing large amounts of it to splash on her already-drenched robes. She paid the dirt rapidly marring her robes no heed; nothing else mattered now. Only finding him.
As she ran, she called out as loud as she could, "Ron! Ron! Where are you? Ron! Ronald Weasley, answer me! Where are you?!"
She searched the grounds high and low, but after what seemed like hours of searching, was unable to find head or tail of him. Her pace slowed, and her shoulders sagged with the realization that she had lost her chance. It was too late.
Just as she turned to walk back to the castle, a peal of thunder broke out, followed by a bolt of lightening that pierced the darkened air.
Just as suddenly, a bolt of recognition flashed through her water-logged brain, and she knew where to find him. She just knew.
Hermione turned in the opposite direction that she had been going, and fled towards the lake.
There was this one spot that Ron had discovered in their sixth year on the lake's shore. You had to weave through the edge of the Forbidden Forest to get to it, though once you reached it, it was certainly worth it. It was just a little bit of grass that faded into a small patch of sand, then flowed into the lake's navy blue waters. But it was surrounded by trees and a wall of rock and earth, which made it almost impossible to see, unless you knew where it was, and were looking specifically for it directly across on the other side of the lake. She knew he would go there sometimes to think, or just be alone. He called it his private cove.
Unaware that her clothes and skin were being ripped by the vicious branches of the Forbidden Forest's foliage, Hermione tore through the trees towards where she knew Ron would be hiding.
She burst, out of breath, into the small clearing, and there was the most glorious sight she was sure she had ever seen, for sitting there, right where she knew he would be, was Ron.
Frankly, had it not been for his vivid red hair, he would have been indistinguishable from any other figure sitting on a boulder in the tremendous downpour threatening to flood the lake.
She stood there for a few minutes, though it seemed like centuries to her, just watching him, noticing how his figure just melted into the rain. Slowly, tentatively, she moved to where he was sitting, knees pulled up to his chin.
The thundering rain masked the sound of her approach, which was fine with Hermione because she didn't really know what she was going to say to him in any case.
Just when she was a foot behind where he sat, Hermione whispered, "Ron."
Said person jumped into the air and whirled around to see none other than the person he least wanted to see. His shoulders drooped, as he muttered despondently, "What are you doing here...."
Hermione could see the pain still clearly reflected in his eyes, and traces of tears and raindrops rushing down his face. Taking a small step towards him, she raised her hand to trace the path of said water droplets on his face, and sighed.
"You don't get how I fight with you to mask feelings I've also had since I was thirteen. You don't get how I never really try to nag you, I just want what's best for you because that's all you deserve – the best. You don't get how I never did go out with Viktor, for you, because you were too busy assuming things that weren't true." Hermione paused, sadly turning her head down to look at the rain-drenched ground beneath their feet and dropping her hand limply to her side. "You don't get how much it breaks my heart that you've felt this way all this time, and I never knew. You don't get how much I love you, too."
Hermione sighed again, biting her lip, and dared to chance a look up at Ron's eyes. She was surprised to see them still filled with tears, but instead of unbearable pain there, she saw relief reflected in his ocean blue eyes.
She had accepted that she was much too late now, tears once again running freely down her face to mingle with the rain, but the unreadable look on Ron's face kept her there a moment longer. Before she could turn away, Ron reached out and crushed her to his chest, burying his face in her wet hair. Hermione gasped, and then comprehending, reciprocated by burying her face in his chest, wrapping her arms around him as if she would never let go.
They simply stood together like that for a very long time, neither moving. Everything between them was understood by all that wasn't said.
They just let the rain wash over and around them, erasing all the pain that had been felt only moments before, and was now replaced with feelings neither of them could ever fully put into words.
Both of them knew that eventually they would have to talk about this to figure out what exactly had happened, but for the moment, all they knew was finding each other in the rain.