Disclaimer: I still lack ownership of the characters of Harry Potter, and all of the ideas portrayed in the book. I make no profit off of this, or any other chapter in this story. I am doing it purely out of boredom and the joy of writing. I'm poor. Please don't sue me.

I'm Thinking Party

Hermione, Ron, and Harry were all sitting in cushiony armchairs in the Gryffindor common room, looking over their notes from the various classes that they had. The first weak had been relatively simple. It was basically a refresher in everything that they had forgotten over the summer. The defense against the dark arts was the only class where they had actually gone into why it was important to study. Of course potions was the only class that they had actually gotten homework in so far.

Hermione was studying only for the other two to have the benefit of her being around as a resource to study from. She was actually reading a copy of the daily prophet while the other two worked away at reading and periodically came up with questions that were more difficult to uncover in the text. That was how she had been able to continue to contribute to the team. She had always shared her notes, explained things, and answered questions to make sure that the other two had at least some chance at passing. She sometimes found herself wondering how they ever would have gotten as far as they did if it hadn't been for her notes and quick wit. Someone in the group had to keep their wits about them and study when the other two couldn't.

She had found an interesting article about a joke shop in Hogsmeade that was making a whole lot of money and hadn't been there before. That was obviously Fred and George. It was good to know that they were making a living off of what it was that they loved. Few people managed to do that with their lives. Hermione smiled softly. Maybe she could end up being a teacher at Hogwarts or something, and she could make a living off of being as smart as she was.

"No way are you guys still studying…you people are going to waste away all of your time studying for stuff that we probably won't even cover…" Blake sighed as he watched them from the doorway that he was leaning on. It led up to the male dormitories, "You should all be at Ravenclaw…that is where the bookworms are supposed to be…heh…Ravens and bookworms…that's pretty good…."

Hermione looked up from her paper and raised an eyebrow at Blake didn't seem to have any interest in studying. Perhaps she had been wrong about him when she had thought that he was here to be a student. Maybe he was just here because he had no choice, or because he thought that it would be a good place to party. He was wrong of course, but it wasn't like she had any power to do anything about it.

Harry was continually reading over the same sentence, over and over again. He felt stupid about asking Hermione to help him every time that he had the smallest of problems. He wanted to be able to prove that he could do all of this one his own, without anyone's help. He was the boy who lived, but that didn't matter all that much if he couldn't do some simple homework on his own. Besides, being the boy who lived wasn't so great when everyone around him seemed to die catastrophic and painful deaths. He had to prove that he could survive on his own, and then maybe everyone else would stop gravitating to him in hopes of being able to help him.

Hermione looked back to her newspaper, "These two need to take advantage of every chance that they get to study. They always seem to fall behind by the end of the year, and that is why I am here to make sure that they do study and so that they can ask me any questions that they have."

Blake ran his hand through his scarlet hair, living the bangs that were over his eyes out of his face for a moment, "Guys…I'll save you some time. I don't think we have to study for, care for magical creatures. I don't really think that we have to study for charms, but I can understand the need for practice. In potions we've already had some homework, which is basically studying, and for Divination, as long as we remember that there is a bad sign over Harry and he is going to die a quick and painful death I think we'll do fine."

Ron nodded to Blake. He had been about to say that exact speech just before Hermione had decided to make sure that he knew she would be making sure he studied. He liked arguing with Hermione, but he liked hanging around with her and being able to stick close to her more. Any time that he was just with Hermione and Harry was time that he cherished. It was time that he was spending with his friends, and even when he was studying something like Potions, it was time well spent.

"What about Herbology and History of Magic?" Hermione spoke, still reading through her paper.

Blake waved his hand in front of him, "Herbology is simple, and History of Magic…well, that class is something I'm going to fail anyway. Binns will put your right to sleep, so it isn't like I'm going to be able to write any of the tests. Besides, I don't think he likes me."

Hermione turned the page in her newspaper before she spoke again, "How can he not like you? We haven't even done anything in that class yet. You haven't even said anything."

Blake smiled softly as he wandered over to the chairs where they were sitting and leaned on the back of the one that Hermione was sitting in, reading over her head, "I'm violent, unrefined, and fell asleep in his class before he started talking. I don't think he likes me very much."

"I'm not sure that I blame him. You are brutish, and you are violent, and you are unrefined." Hermione snapped as she closed her copy of the daily prophet and put it down on the table in front of her, "If you put half the energy that you put in being a brutish ogre into learning you would be able to be the one sitting here answering questions instead of me."

Blake chuckled softly, "Wow. You're still angry about that whole thing at the feast? I thought you'd be thanking me for making that guy shut up. Well, I guess they can't all be winners, now can they?" He pushed up off of the chair and looked at Harry and Ron, "Hey, you guys know what? I think I really like the idea of having a party to celebrate me not having to run cleanup duty with Filch anymore."

Ron and Harry both looked up at the same moment. Not only had a party been mentioned, but it was in celebration of the very quick end of Blake's punishment. Anything that had to do with Draco Malfoy being punched in the face was an occasion to celebrate. This was a chance to get to know Blake better if nothing else came out of it. Ron closed his book with a snap and started standing up.

"You sit back down, Ronald Weasley." Hermione snapped as she stood up and pointed at the redheaded boy, "I forbid either of you from having anything to do with this party. We aren't going to encourage him to hit people." She glared at him, "Even if the school is going to let him get away with it."

Blake sighed and shrugged as he turned to walk out of the common room, into the main hall, "Suit yourselves. I'm gonna go get myself a nice big Saturday breakfast. You all know where you can find me if you decide to change your mind."

The comment about the large lunch reminded Harry that he hadn't eaten much for breakfast and hadn't eaten anything since. He sighed as he looked back down to the book. He still hadn't made any progress in the book, and now most likely wasn't going to anymore. The only things running through his mind now were thoughts of food, and now that Blake had announced where he was going, food wasn't going to happen for him. Hermione would read it as him trying to go off and support Blake, or secretly sign up for his party. He was going to be stuck here to wonder about food and pretend to study until she felt that she could let them leave.

Ron sighed as he sat down. Hermione was being bossy just like his first impression of him back on that first train ride had been. He let the text drop onto the desk with a loud thud and slowly flipped the book open to a random page. Hermione glared at him. He stared at her and turned the page slowly to the next one, without ever have looked down at the book. She was against him having any sort of fun and he had no idea why.

Hermione snorted as she flopped back into her cushiony armchair, "I won't have either of you associating with him. Even if he is from our house, as far as I'm concerned he is just as bad as Malfoy. At least Malfoy has never been physically violent."

Ron snorted, "Hermione, you are being a complete hypocrite! You have hit Malfoy before, and now when someone else does it you get all angry with them?"

"That was completely different!" Hermione snapped at him.

Ron glared at her, "How is that?"

Hermione crossed her arms over her chest, "I didn't go parading around about how I had managed to do it and then get off with just a slap on the wrists for it. He is going to have this party, and when everyone shows up it is going to encourage him to do something like that again. Next time it will cost us a nice deal of points. Is that what you want?"

Ron growled softly as he looked down at his book. He wanted to come up with something witty to say, but Hermione was right. He didn't want to lose the cup just to see Draco get punched again. As much as he wanted to preserve the memory of Draco getting punched in the face, it didn't even compare to the memory of winning the house cup. There was no way to get both, another vision of that punch and win the cup. It was whichever he would have liked more and that meant the house cup.

Harry slowly got up, closing his book, "I'm not getting anything done here, and I've got to get to one of the defense against the dark arts training meetings in about twenty minutes. I'm going to go grab a quick lunch and head over to that." He looked at Hermione's angry expression, "I promise I'll finish this studying while Blake's party is going on. You will be able to watch me do it if you want, Hermione."

Harry left through the porthole, which left Hermione and Ron alone in the room. Hermione glared angrily at Ron as he continued to silently flip pages, not paying much attention to anything that was on any of them. It was obvious that he wasn't studying and was just sitting there. Why did she even bother trying to help these 'friends' of hers to pass? It wasn't like either of them cared about their schooling or the lives that they would be going into after they graduated.

"There goes Harry to have some fun with Cho and everyone else in that little club that he's started." Hermione glared at the porthole now instead of at Ron, "I suppose you are just killing yourself laughing inside about how Harry just ditched me for some time with Cho."

Ron glared at the pages of the text book, "Shut up Hermione." He looked up at her as she blinked in complete shock, "Marietta quit, Cho quit, Michael quit because Cho quit, Ginny quit because Michael quit, you quit, I barely show up to those anymore. Harry sits there and trains the few people who quit because they had only joined to take down Umbridge. If you were still a member you would know that he is there wondering how many people are going to show up every time he goes there." She stared, shocked at him, "We don't have fun anymore, Hermione, and I'm tired of you being jealous over nothing. Some of us actually have reasons to be jealous!"

Hermione stared at him for a long, long moment. He was right, she was being jealous over nothing. Harry wasn't hanging around with any girls other than Luna Lovegood, and everyone with the exception of Luna knew how he felt about that. He was just sitting there being lonely, probably beating himself up about not being able to save Sirius. That was likely what Harry was doing. He blamed himself completely for the death of Sirius and was going to end the DA immediately when it had happened, but now he was going back all the time to a place where he was teaching skills that he felt he should have been able to save his godfather with. He was punishing himself.

Hermione got up. Ron got up immediately after her and glared at her, "No. You are sitting right back down. I'm not going to let you rush off to Harry. You are going to sit down because right now he is doing what he thinks he needs to do. He is offering a service to the students of Hogwarts, and if you go and see him right now I guarantee that he is going to tell you tom come right back here." He was pointing his finger at the chair that Hermione had gotten up from, "Sit. I'm not going to listen to you cry because I let you go see him."

Hermione sat down and sighed loudly. Ron picked up his book and tossed it to her side of the table, "What are you doing?"

Ron looked at her, "You're going to help me study so that I can get this done, and then I'm going to take you to that stupid party that Blake is going to throw so you loosen up!"

☼

The party that night wasn't really much. It was just a bunch of them all in the common room drinking butterbeer. It was just like any other day in the common room, only with more butterbeer, and more jokes going around. Hermione didn't see much of the point in any of this. She could have gone in any seen this any day. Instead she was sitting here being forced to be part of it.

"This wasn't so bad, now was it, Hermione?" Ron smiled softly, as he looked at Hermione. He took another swig of his butterbeer and sat down beside her, "I mean it isn't really like we're saying, 'hey, that was a great hit back there, do you think if I punched Malfoy that I'd get a party' or anything, now are we?"

Hermione sighed. She felt terrible for being at this party. It was against everything that she believed in. People weren't supposed to be violent for no apparent reason and then be proclaimed heroes for it. She could have taken care of Draco all by herself, but instead Blake had stepped in and took the matter into his own hands. Now he was being hailed as a hero for not knowing enough to keep out of everyone else's business.

Blake leaned over the back of the chair that Hermione was sitting in and looked down at her, "Wow, I thought you were the big naysayer about my party. Who would have figured that someone would be able to get you to join in the festivities?" He pushed himself off of the back of the chair and waved his hand in the air, "Hey, everyone. This party even has the approval of Hermione!"

Hermione closed her eyes and sank down into the chair. More than anything right now she wanted to be invisible. She was now the center of attention, all because of Blake, who had now wandered off to go talk to someone else, "…inconsiderate bastard…"

Ron laughed a little, "What's wrong Hermione? Don't like being in the spotlight?"

Hermione let her head rest in her hands. She could have been doing a million other things right now that didn't involve being here. She could have been sleeping, or studying, or any number of other things that would be far enough away that she wouldn't even care that there was a party going on. She could have been out finding Harry, and that would have been a great evening for her. Instead she was at a stupid party, being made into the absolute center of attention, by some barbarian who she had probably not said much more than a few sentences to.

"Hermione? I thought you were the one who told us specifically not to be here." It was Harry. She could tell from the voice. She had listened to that voice so closely that she knew exactly what it sounded like.

This was not her night. Now she was pictured as even more of a hypocrite than she was before. She couldn't help but wonder if this had been part of Ron's plan all along. Just to humiliate her and make Harry hate her or something. It didn't make much sense, since he had been staying out of her way when it had come to Harry so far, it was just something that she couldn't help but think. Maybe he had some secret reason that she hadn't thought of to not want her to be with Harry.

"Are you okay Hermione? You look a little sick. Do you need to see Madam Pomfry?" Harry's voice seemed concerned. Hermione didn't know if he looked concerned. She was too busy wondering if she could grow claws so she could gouge her eyes out.

She spoke softly, "I'm fine Harry. I think I just need to get a little sleep." She then calmly got up, turned, and walked to the door to the girls dorm, walking up the spiral staircase and vanishing to her dorm.

Neville hand wandered over to where Ron was sitting and Harry was standing, "Wow…What do you think was the matter with her?"

Harry shrugged as he looked at the door to the girl's dorm. He knew that he couldn't follow her up there to see if she was alright. He had absolutely no idea what was wrong with her. She was just so confusing to him sometimes. They were at a party, and parties were supposed to be fun. Hermione had looked like she was having the least fun in her entire life before she had left.

Ron yawned, "She was probably tired. I have to say, I'm a little tired too, aren't you guys?"

Harry, and Neville blinked as they looked down at Ron. He slowly go up and wandered over to the boy's dormitory door, opened the door and wandered up the spiral staircase. Both Harry and Neville shrugged, just as confused about Ron as they had been about Hermione and went back to partying and cracking jokes with the first years.

((AN: Wow! That was long, and wow, Ron almost admitted his feelings for Hermione…that's like a double wow!))