"What the hell are you doing?" Ron screamed.
"Well Ron, it looks like they're making out," Ginny said.
"Get off my girlfriend!" Ron shouted rather loudly.
Fred turned to face him. "Excuse me? Don't you mean my girlfriend?"
A hushed silence went over the entire room. Ron glared at Fred. Fred looked at Ron with a bemused look on his face.
"Your girlfriend?" Ginny shrieked. "Oh that's amazing!" Ginny leapt up from the table to hug Hermione. "Come with me, we've got some things to catch up on." Ginny linked her arm through Hermione's and the two walked out of the Great Hall. Ginny stopped by an abandoned classroom, a good deal out of the way of the main traffic in the castle. "I knew something was going on between you two. I could just tell. So, tell me. Why Fred and not George? Why Fred and not someone else? When did this start? How did it start? Come on, fill me in. I want the whole story."
"I can only answer one question at a time, Ginny."
"Alright then, why Fred and not George?"
"Why Fred? I don't know why Fred. Fred has just always seemed more fun then George. Fred's hair has a cute way of settling after Quidditch, and George's is always messed up. Fred seems more intelligent, brave, attractive, nice..."
"Ok, excuse me while I go throw up." Ginny said.
"You carry on about Harry like this, and you still haven't even told anyone else that you're dating. You can't point the finger of blame at me."
"Speaking of telling people that you're dating, that was a monstrous kiss for two people that haven't been dating long." Ginny said with a mischievous look in her eye.
"Who ever said that?"
"No one, I just assumed."
"Do you know what happens when you assume?" Hermione asked, quoting one of her favorite muggle sayings.
Ginny laughed and said, "Hermione I know. That is the stupidest saying ever, if I do say so myself. But come one, tell me more details."
Hermione filled Ginny in on all of the specifics. By the time she was done, dinner was over, so the girls headed to the kitchens to get some food.
She got the same treatment from Parvati and Lavendar. Hermione told them only the bare facts so they hopefully wouldn't have much to gossip about. Over the next few days, Ron wouldn't talk to Hermione. He would glare daggers at Fred and he was giving Hermione the silent treatment. It looked as though trying to become friends with him was going to be more difficult then she had hoped.
Harry and Ginny, on the other hand, were taking the news rather well. Ginny was still badgering Hermione for information. In Harry's eyes, the less information he knew, the better. Harry was fully supportive of the relationship, and said he was trying to talk to Ron. But both of them knew that once Ron got angry, it would be more than a few days before he would listen to reason.
She had good reasons for leaving Ron. Yes, she had felt something while she was with Ron, but it wasn't love. Dread was more like it. She dreaded every minute that she was alone with Ron. She was scared of letting him touch her. The thought of touching him disturbed her. 'Maybe your problem is you overthink everything,' she said to herself.
A week after the incident in the Great Hall, Fred left Hermione another note on her bed.
"Hermione,
Meet me at midnight at the same place as before."
'Well he isn't one for many words,' Hermione thought to herself. But she kept wondering how he could get into her room when no one was there. It was a conundrum. She kept this note to herself, and pretended to go to sleep that night. At 11:45, Parvati and Lavendar were sound asleep. Hermione quietly dressed and snuck up to the Astronomy Tower. She knew the prefects on patrol that night wouldn't be patrolling the Astronomy Tower. If she was to remain a perfect student, she was going to have to speak to Fred about sneaking somewhere less dangerous. She was still trying to think of other places to go when she arrived at the Astronomy Tower at exactly midnight.
When Fred arrived a few minutes later, she started to tell him to pick a better spot to go to.
"Sh," Fred said, silencing her with a kiss. "No one's going to come up here tonight." All of her inhibitions left herself as he deepened the kiss between them. She wrapped her arms around his neck. He started running his hands soothingly along her back.
After about twenty minutes of kissing, Fred broke the kiss and started to trail light, butterfly kisses down her neck. She moaned when his lips met her collarbone. He brought his mouth back to meet hers and started running his hands over her chest through her shirt. After an hour, Fred broke the kiss and told her goodnight.
"Goodnight," she said breathlessly.
She smiled to herself as she walked back to her room.
