Chapter five – Goodbye is never forever

'Why are you dragging us upstairs?' Ron mumbled at Ginny, who had his arm in a vice like grip. Trying to escape her digging nails, she just grabbed on harder. When they all got to the top of the landing, Ginny shoved Ron into his bedroom, and pushed the other two in. Once she entered she closed the door, and turned around with her hands on her hips.

'When exactly were you planning on telling Ron and me?' Ginny said looking at Hermione and then Harry who had sat down on Harry's bed.

'Tell us what?' Ron asked confused, 'What did I miss?'

'Yes, do tell us Hermione, what did we miss?' Ginny said sarcastically.

'Calm down, Ginny. We were planning on telling both of you after dinner. But you obviously saw straight through us.' Said Harry slightly defensively. He turned to Ron, and said 'Look mate just now, literally' looking at Ginny and then back, 'Hermione and me have decided to start going out. We hope you're going to accept it.' They all looked at Ron, to be honest Hermione had been the most worried about Ron's reaction, he tended to react without thinking, and had a very hot tempered.

However Ron simply, shrugged his shoulders. 'About time, I say, everyone in our year has been predicting when it would happen, Lavender said that with her divination skills she was planning on narrowing it down to a date. Actually I'm kinda pleased it means that I get my 10 galleons from Neville.'

'What you had a bet on about our relationship?' Hermione said, unsure what to feel.

'Oh no, I wasn't the only one; half the school was doing it. I think Dumbledore might have even taken part in it. You do realise that you're going to have to announce it to the school. Otherwise people will miss out on their cash.'

The only one who hadn't spoken was Ginny, but she was still standing by the door and unreadable expression on her face. Hermione had noticed and slowly stood up, Harry looked while she stood up, because his body missed the presence of hers against his.

'Come on Ginny,' she said and slowly turned Ginny out of the room, and they walked to her room. 'Ginny I'm really sorry you worked it out, I didn't want you to find out like you did, I wanted to tell you.'

'Its okay, I suppose. It's obvious that he fancies you, it all of his face, and yours.' She took a deep breath. Inside Ginny felt rotten. She felt like her friends had punched her in the stomach, her throat felt dry, she just wanted to sit down and think for a bit. This wasn't what was supposed to happen. Her body was shaking, trying to hold the tears in, hold her posture. She fell onto her bed, and brought her knees up. She couldn't blame Hermione. Ginny had always put her friends before herself, and this was exactly the same, Hermione deserved him, and he deserved her. It was as simple as that.

Hermione saw the pain in her friend's eyes, and the way she held herself. Hermione hated the way she had made Ginny feel. She walked over the pile of clothes and sat on the edge, next to her quiet friend.

'I'm sorry Ginny. If there –' Hermione began, feeling the need to explain, or try to console her friend.

'It's okay, Hermione, I'm not angry; you two deserve to be together. I kind of guessed downstairs, but I suppose that I wanted to be wrong, when you two admitted it, I was in shock. I'm sorry, I don't want you to think that I'm jealous, or anything, and I am really pleased about it, it's just going to take a while to get use to. You understand?'

'Yes, I understand, and thanks for accepting it, it really means a lot to me.'

Ginny looked at her friend, and could see the happiness that shined in her eyes. She lifted her arms and wrapped them around Hermione.

The two friends hugged each other for several minutes, both finding strength and solace from the hug. When they broke apart, they both had tears sitting in the corners of their eyes.

They laughed and wiped them away for each other. Ginny sobered slightly, and looked at Hermione, 'Friends?' she said, Hermione glanced at her and smiled,

'Always.'

Ginny stood up and took Hermione's hand, 'come on, dinner should be ready now, I'm starving, doing all that water sport has really emptied my stomach.'

When they walked into the kitchen Molly had began serving the food, and round the table sat, Mr Weasley, Mr and Mrs Granger, Harry and Ron.

Hermione sat down next to Harry and Ginny sat next to her. 'Everything okay?' Harry said lightly looking Hermione with concern.

'Yeah it is now.' She said while she squeezed his leg to try to emphasise her point.

'NO, really how does that work?' came from the position at the end of the table, where a very animated Mr. Weasley sat staring at Mr. Granger. Mr. Granger seemed slightly shocked from the mature man's outcome, but swallowed it and began on explaining about pocketknives.

Mr. Weasley's mouth was slightly agar, as the muggle explain how a small instrument could perform up to 50 jobs. He held in a squeal when the man produced one out of his coat jacket,

'They're really useful, look this is a bottle opener, this bit is a knife, and there's some scissors here…' Mr Granger said while pulling all the pieces out, by the time he finished there were gadgets spread out, originating from the red handle.

'Molly, have you seen this?' Arthur said while holding it in his hand looking at in awe.

'It's lovely Arthur.' She said when glancing at it. She handed out the plates, and then used magic to move the food onto the table. 'Help yourself, everyone' she said.

Mr. Weasley handed the contraption back to David, and tucked into some potatoes, while staring at him while folding it all back up again. He shock his head in disbelief, 'its amazing how such a small thing can hold loads of uses.'

'This isn't the only one you can get, this is a relatively basic one, some have hundreds of uses, depends what you want it to specialise in.'

'I am going to have to get one, they're amazing.' David smiled, and tucked into a piece of chicken.

Suddenly there were two pop and two males appeared in the kitchen. They both wore red hair, a famous trait of the Weasley family.

'Fred, George. You've decided to visit; it's lovely to see you. Come, sit. You can tell us all about how the business.' Molly said while getting up to hug her boys. She fetched two plates and placed them in a free space. The two men sat down and tucked into an assortment of food.

Ron and Harry glanced at each other, amazed that they had arrived just when the food had begun to flow. Obviously they were trying to spend as little time as possible, so they could reduce the chance of the topic children coming up.

As Molly settled down to carry on eating, the twins started to talk about the business.

'Well business is blooming, we've just staring to expand, and we've got a lab to test all our inventions in. The place is becoming too small to hold everything; we've decided to move to Hogsmeade as well. Business is going really good. It just proves what we always believed.' Fred said, while scooping some of mash potato onto his chicken and stuffing it into his mouth.

'What did you believe in that you proved?' Ron said through a mouthful of peas.

'Ron, shut your mouth while you're eating.' Molly said, shaking her head lightly wondering where she had gone wrong with her youngest son.

'Well Ronniekins, it just happens to prove how much people like pranks and mischief, our sales have continuously increased throughout the time we've been open.' Ron glared at his brother at the use of his childhood nickname

'And now that it's the holiday, we should be expecting even more business.' George said to finish his brother's speech.

'Well it looks like you've settled down in your career –' Molly began, but saw the look her husband gave her. She quietened down feeling disappointed to bring up the topic of children and settling down in other areas of their lives.

Everyone focused on their eating and looked down to avoid the awkward atmosphere that had seemed to have suddenly fallen around the wooden table.

When everyone had finished his or her meal, Mr. Granger licked his lips.

'That was a lovely meal, Molly.' He said while his wife nodded in agreement. He looked out the window, to see the sun lying on the horizon. 'But I'm afraid we're going to have to call it a night, we have a fair journey to go and we don't want to be out all night.'

'It was lovely to see you Molly, we'll come and visit again, and thank you very much for letting Hermione stay here for the rest of the summer. She was desperate to see her friends again.' Emma laughed trying to keep the tears at bay. Her husband noticed and wrapped his arm around her petite shoulders.

'Thank you again for dinner,' and when he turned to Arthur he said, 'I'll bring some other unusual things by, next time we come and visit, if you like?'

'Would you? That would brilliant, I can't wait. We can come up and see you, it'll only take several seconds, it would save you the journey.' Arthur said, already planning on visiting David.

The two males shook hands, and the women embraced in a hug. When they pulled away, Hermione followed her parents out the front door.

Her father unlocked the door, and turned to see his only daughter cuddling his wife. Emma kissed Hermione on her check, and smooths her brown hair behind her ears. She'd given up holding the tears back, as they rolled down her checks.

'I'm going to miss you sweetie, please write to us regularly when your at Hogwarts I want to know everything that's going on, you hear me?'

Hermione nodded, feeling her heart break slightly. This was the hardest part of being a witch, the long time away from her parents. Her eyes changed from looking at her mother to her father. He walked up to the two women and hugged them both.

Slowly after several minutes they broke apart and Hermione stood back slightly as her parents settled in for the long journey back home. As David put the car into first gear, he looked into the rear view mirror and struggled to hold back a sob, as he saw her standing out on the dirt ground. Tears streamed down her face at the thought of not seeing her parents for at least 5 months. To be honest Hermione was crying her grief, at the thought of losing them. She knew it was a very pessimistic thought, but with the rise of death eater activity, and the war heavily on them, she knew that her parents were very near the top of the list that Voldemort wanted dead. They were muggles, and parents of Harry Potter's girlfriend.

She felt a strong arm wrap around her shoulders and any resistance she had had disappeared, as she almost fell into Harry's body. She turned around and cried into his chest. Harry stood there as he held her close while stroking her hair, trying to sooth her.

'I can't lose them.' She whispered into Harry's shirt, 'I can't.' Harry closed his eyes as he looked up,.

'You won't. You'll never lose them.' He said, holding her close as they swayed well after the sun had set.