A/N: Yeah! Let's hear it for cool foreign teachers! That should be fun I love Ms Hammond. And Ron is at it again. Man he just has a knack for loosing his temper, tisk tisk. Well there is more where that came from. (hee hee foreshadowing) And all around the situation just gets more complicated. Poor Harry (tee hee more foreshadowing!)

Chapter 3

A Second Hand Emotion

The days passed. Classes (and detentions) came and went, the weather got colder and the leaves began to fall. It was two days until the Halloween Feast and Harry, Ron, Seamus and Hermione were sitting on the rug in front of the fire in the Gryffindor common room, doing more talking than homework. Seamus was spilling to them about this girl he had met in Astrology, and about how wonderful she was but how the situation was complicated.

"Just ask her out for goodness sake, so we can stop hearing you complain about the complicatedness of the situation," Hermione groaned as she flipped aimlessly through her Potions textbook.

But Seamus, being a boy, and having bad experiences with girls in the past, was unsure of how to approach the situation without scaring her away or hurting her feelings.

"Look," said Ron. " The more you think about it, the more complicated it will become. Then you won't know what to do, because your brain will be so messed up that you can't think straight. But you can't get her off your mind, because she's so wonderful and amazing and you love her, but hate her too. And you won't be able to sleep at night if you don't tell her you love her, and it will consume your entire being!" Ron, who had been passing the room and speaking so loud the whole common room could hear, realized what he was doing turned an amazing shade of crimson, and stopped abruptly. He slumped back down on an armchair trying to avoid suspicious glances.

"Where did that come from?" Harry asked wide-eyed.

"I dunno," Ron replied sheepishly. " Guess I just have strong views on...uh...this sort of stuff."

Hermione didn't say anything. Everyone finished his or her homework in silence, lost in thought.

October 31 arrived much to everyone's delight. Classes seemed to lag by at the slowest possible rate known to human existence. The sixth year's classes seemed even longer. They took notes in Transfiguration, had a pop quiz in Potions, and spent all of Astronomy charting planets. The only fun class of the day was Defense Against the Dark Arts, even if they took notes. They were going in depth into vampires, defense against them and remedies and such and Professor Hammond was telling them the most hilarious stories about her school days back in Australia and the experiences she had while she was working as an assistant to a local Auror in New Zealand. Harry was convinced, (and Ron and Hermione agreed) that this was going to be one of their best years at Hogwarts. Classes finally ended and everyone rushed to their rooms to get ready for the feast. Harry and Ron were almost ready to go, when Hermione poked her head in their door catching all the boys by surprise.

"Ah! What are you doing in here?" Dean screamed ducking for cover as he was lacking a shirt.

"Oh dry up Dean," Hermione groaned. "I have seen a guy with no shirt before. It's called a swimming pool. Anyway can someone help me with this necklace? I can't get the clasp done up."

"Why couldn't you get a girl to help you instead of coming all the way up here?" Harry asked.

"They were all in the bathroom doing their make up, and, well I don't really know the girls in the other rooms very well." Hermione confessed.

"That's a lame excuse," Seamus commented. " I mean come on, it's a necklace. You don't have to have an intimate relationship with someone to get them to do up your necklace."

"What about Ginny?" Harry asked. "You know her. She could've done it."

"Oh...I didn't think of that." Hermione said.

"That's still a lame excuse," commented Dean

"Someone just come and help me for goodness sake!" Hermione exclaimed impatiently.

"I will," said Ron walking over to her.

The other boys stopped what they were doing and watched curiously. Ron took Hermione's hair in his hand and brushed it gently in front of her shoulder. Then her took the gold chain the snapped it together turning the charm so it was even on her neck. Then he let her hair fall back placing his hands on her shoulders turning her around to face him.

"Thanks," she said trembling because she was closer to Ron's face than she had ever been in her life.

"No problem." Ron replied smiling then moving past her back over to his trunk.

Everyone was very still for a second and Hermione didn't move a muscle until Harry broke the silence.

"So.... we...uh...better finish getting ready then Hermione...uh...bye." Harry half mumbled.

"What? ...Oh right...see you downstairs." She replied coming back into reality and heading out the door.

"WHAT WAS THAT?" the boys asked pouncing on Ron the moment Hermione had shut the door.

"I dunno...it was nothing...Ow...Get off me!" Ron yelled pushing them away.

"Nothing! Nothing! Dude, that was not nothing!" Dean exclaimed. "You were totally hitting on her."

"It's nothing ok? Just leave it." Ron protested annoyed.

Harry just stood off to the side and looked worriedly at Ron. If Ron really liked Hermione, which Harry suspected he did, Harry could lose his two best friends. What would he do then? They would get together and even though Harry knew they wouldn't desert him, he knew that they would be together with each other more, as any healthy couple would and they would unintentionally leave him out. It certainly gave Harry something to think about and he knew he would have to confront Ron about it sooner or later.

Nevertheless everyone finally made it down to the Great Hall for the feast. As usual it was absolutely delicious. Ron and Hermione didn't say anything to each other the whole meal but it was the most obvious thing to see that they kept looking at each other, trying not to let the other one see. Harry was becoming continuously worried and made up his mind that he was going to talk to Ron about it tonight.

At the same moment Harry decided to confront Ron about Hermione, Ron himself was coming to his own realization. He hadn't seen Ginny in at least two days, which was very unusual because where ever Hermione went Ginny usually went to. They were such good friends. But where had she been? Ron had a sneaking hunch and it didn't sit well with him. Not well at all. He stood up and looked around. Ginny wasn't there. He looked frantically across the hall. A certain someone wasn't at his table either. Harry and Hermione noticed something was wrong.

"Ron?" Hermione asked tentatively. " What's wrong? What are you doing?"

"Uh...nothing," Ron replied. "Listen I have to take off. I'll meet up with you guys later."

Harry and Hermione, being smarter than Ron gave them credit for, followed without hesitation. Ron ran out into the entrance hall. It was deserted. Where could they be? They certainly couldn't be in any common room. That wasn't allowed. Ron rushed outside into the garden. He raced through the small hedge maze that had me conjured for the event. Harry and Hermione found it hard to keep up because he kept darting all over the place. Then Ron spotted them. Draco Malfoy, the archenemy of the entire Weasly family, and his sister were sitting, too close together in Ron's opinion, on a rock at the end of one of the passages. He raced toward them, Harry and Hermione hot on his trail. Ginny and Draco saw Ron sprinting toward then and jumped up immediately. Ron was just about to grab Draco by the collar and throw him on the ground when Ginny jumped between them.

"RON, STOP!" she shouted.

"WHY?" Ron shouted back. "GIVE ME ONE GOOD REASON WHY I SHOULDN'T MURDER HIM HERE WHERE HE STANDS?"

"Because...because...because he's told me things Ron, things about him. He's not the devil everyone makes him out to be," she replied calming down.

"Oh really?" Ron asked still outraged.

Draco took a step toward Ron his fists clenched but Ginny held her ground.

"He's not," she continued. "Look...I can't tell you anything because that's up to Draco."

"Psht! As if I would want to hear what that oaf has to say," Ron mumbled under his breath.

Again Draco tried to get past Ginny to pummel Ron with no success however.

"You should want to," Ginny said. "Everyone deserves to be listened to. Well...I guess there's not much to do now when everyone's so riled up. I...I should go and let you guys work it out if you want. But without fighting please."

Ginny stepped gingerly out from between the two fuming boys and started making her way to the exit of the garden.

"I'll come with you!" Draco called after her. "We're defiantly not working anything out tonight and probably not ever." He shot a menacing glare and the three friends and he pushed past them to catch up to Ginny.

"Oh no you don't!" Ron yelled starting to run after them before Harry jumped on him pinning him to the ground.

"Let them go," Harry said struggling to keep Ron pinned until he finally gave up and relaxed. "You're not going to get anywhere besides McGonagall's office if you go after him. They were only talking! Maybe nothing happened."

"Oh stuff was happening, all right," Ron said standing up. "I know from the way he was looking at her. It's the same way I..." he stopped mid sentence. "Never mind," he said brushing past his friends. "Let's just get back to the castle. We probably missed the rest of the feast thanks to that git."

Harry passed Hermione and she gave him a "What do I do? Talk to him please!" look that made Harry chilled to the bone. This whole situation was way to complex for him to comprehend. He was definitely going to have to talk to Ron...tomorrow. Or maybe he would do it the next day.