Disclaimer: The Characters and situations of Harry Potter depicted in this story are the legal property of J.K. Rowling, Bloomsbury, and AOL Time Warner, and have been used without permission. No copyright infringement is intended. No profit is being made off this story and it is being used for entertainment purposes only.
Author's Notes: I just cannot seem to help myself with these things. Another Missing Scene, Ron and Hermione mostly with a vague hint towards Ginny/Harry. Spoilers abound, takes place directly after the Ron/Lavender break up. Read, Review, and Enjoy!
That was it. She knew it now. There was no denying it any longer-- not that she ever really could in the first place. Hermione Granger, sixth year student of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry was many things: Smart, a talented witch, an excellent reader, and according to Viktor Krum, a pretty good kisser (although she really still isn't sure whether that one pathetic kiss really counted) but a liar she was not.
Especially not when the person she was lying to was herself.
So she did it. Screw the consequences, she had said. Bullocks to everything her mother had ever said about wearing her heart on her sleeve, about her father always telling her not show all her cards. She had ignored everything her head-- something that had never, ever let her down before-- was telling her to do and said to bloody hell with it.
Hermione Granger had broken the one cardinal rule of friendship. The one rule that was suppose to be followed about all else, suppose to be cherished and held above all others.
Hermione Granger had gone and fallen in love with her best friend.
And it had hurt.
It had hurt bad.
And the thing that had hurt-- was still hurting-- the most was that her for all the books she read and all the cleverness she had inside of her, it had all failed her. Let her down. Everything she had clung to as a child and now as an adult, all the worthless fairy tails she thought she would have when she finally let herself love Ronald Weasley never came. Had no intention of coming.
She had fallen in love with him hook line and sinker and there was nothing she could do stop it. There was no prevention, no road blocks down this gravely and dangerous path that said 'do not venture here, disaster lies ahead' and now, despite her best tries, there was nothing she could do to get rid of it.
The fact that life was not fair was something she had come to terms with a very long time ago, but sometimes these days it just seemed like nothing was fair. It wasn't fair that she had fallen in love with her best friend and he didn't love her back. It wasn't fair that Ginny, who had pined away for Harry for years, was finally going to get what she had always wanted.
It was not fair that Ron was allowed to go out and snog Lavender bloody Brown and she was suppose to waste away waiting for him to notice her.
To wait for him to feel just a fraction of what she was feeling. Because Hermione knew, she could feel it in her bones, that if Ron felt just an inch of what she felt for him than he would know. He would know that it was a waste to look anywhere else because she was here. She would always be there, and no one could ever love him like she did.
There were days when she just wanted to pull Ron by the robes, kiss him senseless and scream at him that nobody would ever feel the same way about him as her. Some days she just wanted to know whether all he saw in Lavender were her looks or if there was more. Hermione wanted to know why he could never be around them both. Why some days her and Ron were perfectly fine and then minutes later they weren't.
Why, when Lavender had been furious to see them coming out of the dormitories and she was yelling insults at her like there was no tomorrow, Ron had told her to go away. Told her to leave.
What did Lavender have that she doesn't?
Hermione had been pondering that question for weeks. Months actually, over and over in her head as if finding the answer was somehow intertwined with saving her own life, but to no avail. Obviously it did not matter. It did not matter that she had been to bat for Ron Weasley just as many times as Harry. Never mind the fact that she was one of the only people who ever stood by him no matter what.
Never mind the fact that she was the one that loved him, and had been in love with him long before he became Ron Weasley: Quidditch star.
She had thought she could live with it-- the Lavender part, that is-- she had thought she could stand by and wait for him like all those great women do for the men they love in all those muggle movies. Hermione had thought, rather wrongly, that waiting was half the feat. Waiting meant when you got to your preferred destination the outcome would be that much sweeter, that much better.
It turns out she had been wrong. So terribly wrong. Waiting equaled misery and misery equaled insanity, and now all Hermione had become was a miserable girl who had nothing but her books and cleverness. Nothing but her two other best friends who were rapidly falling in love with each other which, in turn, was slowly but surely driving her insane.
She was miserable and defeated and Ron didn't even care. Not even the slightest. And as much as it hurt her, as much as it was going to kill her, Hermione knew that somewhere along the way she was going to have to stop caring too. Because she just could not do it anymore.
For the first time, in such a long time, her heart and her head were almost in agreement. Her heart was tired of aching the way it had been for the last four months and her head was tired of thinking and thinking and doing nothing but thinking about why her heart was aching the way it was.
And it was not even the minor type of ache. It was the full-blown, heart wrenching, pulls you in and doesn't let you go type of ache. And she couldn't stand it anymore. She just couldn't. It hurt too much.
Something had to give, and while she was deathly afraid of what that might be, it was time for her to let go and let what was going to happen, happen.
There would be no more waiting. There would be no more crying on Ginny's shoulder about how she loved a boy who did not love her back. There would be no more misery and no more heart ache. She was determined. More so, in fact, than she had ever been before.
Hermione loved Ron, and while she was also very afraid that her love for him was not going anywhere in the near future, she also knew it was time for her to move on and not let her life be consumed with it anymore.
For the first time in Hermione Granger's life she was going to do what she knew in her heart and in her head to be right and forget about all her books and cleverness and trust her instincts. Trust in the fact that if the timing were right-- if it were ever going to be right-- she would know. That she would feel it and things would just slowly and gradually begin to click into place.
With a heavy and dreadful sigh, Hermione pulled a book from the shelf in front of her, scanned the index, and upon finding it held nothing of her interest pushed it back on the shelf hastily. The library was cold and drafty, almost empty, and she would much rather be sitting in her warm chair by the fire in the common room instead of here, but the feel of being unwanted hindered any movements she would have made to go back.
Hermione had been spending so much time here in fact, that she was almost sure Madam Pince was beginning to wonder if she belonged anywhere else.
Pulling out another book, she scanned it as well, and once again shoved it back on to the shelf before moving on to the next one. The routine was tedious, but she had nothing better to do, and her dire need to prove to Harry that his Advanced Potion Making book was a little more than an ordinary book was starting to become an obsession.
So Hermione did what she almost always found herself doing this time of night. She stood in the middle of the oldest, dustiest, dirtiest section of the Hogwarts Library. Continued going through all the books there were on past teachers and students and old copies of newspapers. Did this all in hopes of finding out just who the bloody half blood prince was, but in all actuality did it to pass the time.
"There you are, I've been looking all over for you."
The intruding voice was warm and familiar, and held such an amount of worry in it that she had not heard it weeks. Despite her genuine surprise, she did not turn to look at him, nor did she acknowledge him in the least.
"What do you want, Ron?" was all she said, voice bored as she pulled at another book and began scanning the index.
"I've been looking for you," he repeated.
She raised a quick eyebrow in his direction, "So you said."
"Come on, 'mione," his voice was on the verge of a whine and she could not help the tinge of something that sparked deep within her belly. "I don't want to argue with you anymore."
Hermione didn't feel much like arguing with him either, didn't feel much like doing anything. The fact that they were fighting wasn't even the biggest problem they had, the problem was when they weren't arguing they weren't even talking to each other. And as much as it pained her to admit it, she missed him. Not even because of her recently admitted feelings of love. Not because she was jealous.
She just missed her best friend.
Hermione loved Harry with all her heart, but he wasn't Ron. He was different, so different, and had this whole world of things going on that she would never understand, couldn't even begin to understand.
So she just stood there, harshly pulling book after book, scanning the indexes then putting them back where they belonged. Waited for him to say something, if he were going to say something, because she just simply refused to make the first move.
Ron sighed, deep and resigned as he took a step closer to her. "I broke up with Lavender."
Despite her greatest efforts, nothing she did could prevent the slight racing of her heart at his words. Her face remained cool and emotionless, but her insides were doing back flips.
"Terrific," she replied, emotionless and she grabbed another book.
"She was crying and it was real awful, and she was saying all these mean things," Hermione had a pretty good idea what exactly she was saying and who exactly she was saying it about, but refused to comment as she watched out of the corner of her eye as Ron ran a hand over his eyes, "And finally she just asked me. Outright asked me, and I wasn't sure what I was suppose to say."
Hermione placed the book in her hands and grabbed another. Redid the same routine she had been doing for weeks and waited for Ron to continue.
"Aren't you going to ask me what she wanted to know?" Ron asked, moving another step closer.
"I actually don't care all that much, Ron," she replied stiffly, not even bothering to look up as she scanned the index of yet another book.
"She asked me," Ron began, reaching out for the book in Hermione's hands and taking it away from her. "If I loved her," he said softly, placing the book back where it belonged and successfully moving in-between Hermione and the shelves of books. "And I said 'no'," he continued, crossing his arms over his chest. "And that's when things got really ugly."
The small 'humph' sound was her only acknowledgement as she turned her back to him and started on another shelf. She could get over him, she could make it so her feelings for him were not consuming her life and every waking thought she had. She could do these things and do them well.
That, however, did not mean she couldn't give him the same treatment he had been giving her since before Christmas.
The cold shoulder must be a miraculous thing-- especially when you're on the receiving end of it, she thought snidely as she angrily grabbed a book and started flipping through it's age worn pages.
"Will you stop looking at those damn books?"
"Will you stop acting like an insufferable prat?"
Ron groaned and Hermione stood her ground.
"You," she threw the book back on the shelf, "have been ignoring me for weeks. Talking to me when you feel like it. And now suddenly you and Lavender have called it off and you want to be best friends again?" she pointed an angry finger at him, "I don't think so."
"I haven't been ignoring you," Ron nearly shouted, "you--" he pointed an angry finger back at her, "have been ignoring me."
"You're writing a fascinating version of history, my friend."
"Well ask around, Hermione, you'll hear a fascinating version of it."
Hermione, well past the point of anger and moving straight into full blown pissed off, was just about to stomp her foot childishly and scream to whatever power that be there was and ask, just why, just why in the world did she have to fall in love with the unimaginable git standing in front of her.
"You know what I'll hear, Ron? I hear that ever since you went out with that tart you call a girlfriend--"
"Don't call her a tart--"
"Oh," she shouted, hands on her hips and fury on her features, "Oh, that is rich. What is it you called Viktor Krum for all those months--"
"Don't bring that bloody bastard into this."
This time she actually did stomp her foot, and let out a long, frustrated groan in the process. Crossed her arms over her chest and glared the meanest, coldest, most hateful glare she could manage. "I thought you said you didn't want to argue."
Hermione expected him to yell back. She expected him to get angry, and frustrated. She half expected him to storm off in a self righteous fit, but what he ended up doing, what he said, surprised her more than anything else in her entire life.
"I came here to apologize. I came here to say I'm sorry," Ron glared right back at her, "is that good enough for you?"
Hermione sniffed the air, trying to make herself look uninterested, but on the inside her stomach was doing that mushy gushy thing it had not done in months. She really, really hated the fact that it was because of the guy standing across from her.
"I was hacked off about you snogging Krum, and I went out with Lavender to get back at you, alright? It was a low, bastard thing to do, and I'm sorry."
Hermione raised a weak eyebrow. Tried not to make herself look to interested.
"Ginny told you to say that, didn't she?"
Ron crossed his arms over his chest and shuffled his feet, "She just told me to say I was sorry," he managed a futile attempt at a smile, "The rest was all me."
Neither said anything for a long moment, just continued to stare at their own feet, the carpet, the books-- anywhere but each other. Hermione could not help the swell of happiness that swarmed through her at the words, the way every bone and muscle in her body was itching to run over to him and jump into his arms and plead for them to never fight again.
But she was stronger than she thought, and she squelched that urge, and only smiled in response.
"Well, that was a half decent attempt at an apology."
Ron smirked that unforgettable smirk of his, "Humor me, it's one of my first."
Almost as soon as the words left his mouth the smirk that played on his lips turned into a full fledged, Weasley grin. And just like that, with that one single gesture, everything was suddenly okay. Suddenly better. Nothing was forgotten and nothing was ever going to fix what had been done, but it was better than it had been. The situation was more livable and even more likable, and besides, Ron was grinning at her. Giving her that grin that made girls' knees weak and hearts flutter, and honestly, how could something be wrong when Ron was smiling at her like she was the only thing in the world.
So Hermione did the first thing she thought of: she looked away and finally let a smile grace her own lips. Softly, of course, and more to herself than for him.
"So," Ron coughed, breaking the silence that had somehow began to ring in their ears, "What exactly are you doing here?"
Both his cheeks and ears were pink and she, despite herself and everything she had thought she was going to do before he had the audacity to strut in here, found it absolutely adorable.
"I'm looking for anything I can to tie to the 'half blood Prince',"
Ron rolled his eyes playfully, "Not that again."
"Yes, that again," she smiled softly, turning back to a book and flipping towards the index. "The only problem," she began as if the fight that they had both participated in five minutes ago had not happened, "is I don't know what I'm looking for."
Ron grabbed a book too and mimicked her actions even though it was very clear he had no idea what he was looking for either.
"I'm sure it will come to you when you see it."
Hermione supposed that this was how friendships were suppose to work. One person would muck things up, and then the other person would do something even worse to muck things up even more, and at the end of the day (or four long months) it didn't matter. Hermione figures, after all is said and done, she really was just waiting for an apology.
She may love Ron Weasley, but she was first and foremost his best friend before she ever even noticed he was a boy.
"You, um," Ron reached up and touched the side of her nose, "You had a little bit of dust right there," he said, touching his nose with his left hand in the same exact spot he had touched her own.
Her cheeks flushed furiously, and she immediately put the book she was holding away and ran her hands over her face in effort to rid herself of whatever remainders there were on her due to the dust and dirt from all the books she had gone through. She was horribly embarrassed, but as soon as she looked back at him and found him staring at her in the most endearing way, all that slipped away.
Ron opened his mouth as if he were about to say something, but at the last minute he obviously thought better about it shut it abruptly. Instead he grinned halfheartedly.
"I think Ginny is about to ditch Dean," he sounded a little to excited about this prospect, "what do you say we go back to the common room and watch the show? I, for one, do not want to miss it."
She was hightly interested in what he was going to say, but decided to not comment on it. "We should probably try to wait up for Harry too. See if he succeeded in getting Slughorn's memory. "
Ron nodded in agreement, yet he only appeared to be half listening, "that too."
As the two made their way past Madam Pince and out of the library, Hermione realized, for the first time, that the ache in her heart and in her head did not seem that noticeable anymore. Did not hurt as much as it used to. Didn't really hurt at all. Nothing was perfect between them-- things would probably never be perfect-- but things were okay. They were really okay for the first time in months and it felt good to think about that instead of all the reasons she was angry with him. All the things she wanted to shout at him.
It was better than thinking about all the things she was going to have to do to get over him.
And as they finally exited the library and turned towards Gryffindor tower, Ron's calloused hand slid into her own and she realized why things felt so different.
Why things felt so incredibly right for the fist time in a very, very long time.
It was because, amazingly, things had finally begun to click.
And that, Hermione found, made all the difference.
End.