Switched!

Harry was laughing with Hermione and Ron just as their compartment door slid open.

"Hi Harry." Harry spun around in his seat, still laughing, until he saw the pretty face of Cho Chang.

"Cho… I thought…"

Cho sighed. "I know… but… I think I can forgive you if you don't want to talk about it… I'm sorry I just get very… emotional…" she trailed off, still not looking directly at Harry.

Hermione grabbed Ron's arm, seeing that the pair needed to talk. "I… I think that we have some prefect duties, right? Ron?"

Cho said, "Actually I just wanted to say hi, and see if Harry was all right… it's okay, you don't have to leave. And Harry? I really only did want to say hi… I don't know if I'm ready yet… just so you know."

Ron hadn't moved anyway, so Hermione sat back down and looked at Harry, who was staring in mild interest outside the

window.

"Harry…? Cho's trying to talk to you…"

Harry looked around before looking into Cho's eyes. "What? Oh yeah, I'm fine. And uh… that's ok… I don't know if I am either. Well, I've got to…um… use the loo if you'll excuse me…" Harry spoke in fluent lies.

Cho nodded, seeing that Harry wanted her to leave, exited the car. After she left, Harry sat back down again, just to see Ron and Hermione staring at him.

"Harry? I thought you liked Cho… Don't you want to talk to her?"

"Well… I do, I suppose, but I dunno it's kind of different since Sirius… went through… well, … died." He broke off, but then started again, "I mean, I really like her still, I suppose… I just needed a little more time last year."

It was the first time that Harry had said anything, so Hermione and Ron stared at him longer in sympathy.

"Well… Harry how could you get her to like you? If you really want that I could… pose as your… girlfriend for a while…" Hermione offered.

Harry brightened up at this. "Really? I'd appreciate that…Thanks Herms you're the best."

Ron during this entire time hadn't said a word. He had only turned his head to look at Hermione while she made her offer.

Harry and Hermione suddenly became aware of this and turned towards him.

"…Ron? Are you okay?"

Ron shook his head and said, "uh… yeah, I guess."

"Okay… you were sort of scaring us there." Ron gave a feeble laugh and became silent once more. Harry and Hermione had no idea what to do, so there was an awkward silence in the train car. The lady with the food trolley saved the day with her usual, "Anything off the trolley, dears?"

It had been a month of school and Harry had loved every minute of it. So far not much had happened, which was odd. No strange teachers, no new students, except for the first years… pretty much nothing. The only new teacher was obviously their new DADA professor, who was named Professor Luyetia. She was a bit like McGonagall—a fair but strict teacher. But other than the arrival of their new professor, things were pretty normal at Hogwarts.

Things were very different in Harry's social life, however. Hermione had been posing as his girlfriend for two weeks and so far her plan had worked. Cho had been talking to Harry much more often and seemed to like him. But there was still something odd between them, as if nothing could change what had happened on last year's date. Harry and Hermione were having a good time together, cooking up schemes to make Cho even more jealous and basically just having fun being friends. What they didn't know was that they had been making Ron jealous too…

flashback to a week ago…

"Cho? Could I talk to you?" Cho spun around, and opened her mouth in surprise at seeing Ron the "Tornado-hater" standing behind her.

"Erm… I suppose. What about? Where are Harry and Hermione?"

"That's the thing. They're eating outside together… I know that they're trying to make you like Harry again, but they've been kind of… leaving me out. Wanna spy?" A sliver of Ron's usual grin spread across his face.

Cho smiled as well. "So that's what they're doing? Well I guess it's working… kind of." She looked at Ron again, cocking her head to one side as she stared at his tall figure. "I don't know… maybe they'll have to do a little more than that to make me fall completely like I did last year again." She grinned mischievously, glad that she had figured out what Ronald Weasley was really like.

end flashback

Hermione stared at Harry as he sat next to her, having their usual little outdoor lunch. He was munching on a sandwich, but suddenly feeling her eyes on him turned to her. He swallowed. "Yes?"

"Oh, nothing. It's just… I think…" She couldn't bring herself to tell Harry that she thought he was wonderful, nice, a little of a bad boy… and… sigh extremely cute. Not to mention that she thought she might be starting to like him. Then she started for no apparent reason. I think I like him? You're just helping him… he's just a friend… she told herself.

Harry shrugged, being more interested in his food than Hermione at the minute. Then he stopped, turned around and watched Hermione pick delicately at her food. She looked up just as he had, and asked, "Is there something you want to tell me?"

"uh… Er… no." Harry couldn't believe it. Why had he never noticed Hermione's beauty and brains and… and… how feminine she was before? Wait… he shook his head. He was supposed to like Cho. He shook his head again and went back to his lunch.

Meanwhile, a very similar thing was happening with Ron and Cho. Ever since that first day they had been 'spying' on Harry and Hermione. Ron looked over at Cho and discovered that he could finally see what Harry had always seen… and Cho looked over at Ron (at a different time, of course) and discovered that she hadn't really thought about Ron as more than Harry's friend before. Believe it or not, the two pairs of friends were falling for each other… and old love dies hard.

It really was surprising how similar the two pairs had gone about. After a few more weeks boy asked girl out, girl accepted, girl and boy went out together and… didn't live happily ever after…

Unfortunately Ron felt after a few dates with Cho that although she knew about quidditch and was definitely smart, he missed his old friends… a lot. Harry and Hermione still sometimes felt that they were still pretending and were just caught up in the game. Cho… somehow all of a sudden felt that 'why did I ever fall for Harry or Ron? They're a year younger than I…" Both pairs of couples broke up, and although Harry and Hermione were still friends… nothing was really the same. Life went on… breakfast, classes, break, classes, lunch, classes… free time, dinner, free time, bed time…. Life went on as it should.

Moral? Life goes on in confusion.

A/N: Wow! Don't ask me where the moral came from… it just sounded right right there. Lol. That was a bad ending I agree but I wanted to finish this chapter and it was like almost ten on a school nite and I was tired… Well anyway I hope you like (and liked) my other chapters better! Read and review!!!!! (not that anyone does… sniff sniff) lol haha o well it's fun to write this stuff anyway

and I think I mite have read a story like this a while ago, but I don't really remember… so please tell me if I offended you, and I'm sorry in advance!