Chapter 3 0.o

The next day Ron rose with the sun and went downstairs for breakfast. He sat down across from a tired looking Tonks who had bags under her eyes and looked very much under the weather.

"Whatcha doing up so early?" The woman asked looking across the long table at him. Today she had shoulder length lime green hair which stuck out every which way. It was obvious that she hadn't slept that night.

"Um… nothing?" Ron tried and failed to act like he got up at 5:30 every morning. Changing the topic, he said quickly "What's with you anyways? You look like Lupin after a full moon!"

Tonks checked her reflection in the back of her spoon, snorted in disgust and wrinkled up her nose. Instantly, her bags disappeared and her hair smoothed, straightened and began to turn a rich brown-y red color.

"Better?" She asked him. "Now will you tell me about this girl… Hermione? (she pronounced it Her-MEE-own )

"It's Hermione!" Ron said indignantly (he pronounced it correctly XD) "And there's nothing to tell…"

"Really?" she smirked at him. That's not what I heard.

"No really!" The boy implored "Me and Hermione have always been friends, never anything more than that."

Tonks took a sip of coffee, and opened her mouth to speak, but just at that moment Mr. Weasly ran into the room.

"Do I look like a muggle?"

Ron tipped his head to the side, like he had seen people do in the movies, and tried not to laugh. Actually, for Mr. Weasly standards, it wasn't too bad. He was wearing a royal purple jacket over a dark, forest green T-shirt, dark, tan colored dress pants, and to top it all off, a shiny black top hat. Tonks looked over at Ron, her eyes daring him to say something embarrassing.

"Uh …you look …erm … good?" Ron phrased this as a question, not a statement.

Mr. Weasly didn't seem to catch on.

"W-what time is it?" Tonks question was stifled by a yawn.

Ron looked at the muggle watch Harry had gotten him for his last birthday. "7:45" He announced, a little surprised at how much time had gone by.

Tonks jumped out of her chair and rubbed her face hard with her hands. "Oh m-my gosh, I gotta go down to the-" She stopped after a glare from Mr. Weasly, and glanced at Ron "I mean, I … have to … go … now…" With that, she disappeared with a loud crack. Ron was surprised that people could apparate in the house they were it. He would have thought that it would make I easy for an enemy to find them, but with Dumbledore as their secret keeper, who knew what would happen if an enemy tried to materialize into headquarters? But as Ron was pondering this, there came two identical cracks came from behind him. He jumped a little bit, fell off his chair, and landing hard on his butt. Glaring at his older brothers, he picked himself up and with as much dignity as he could muster, and strode out of the room. He heard laughter in the kitchen, but did his best to ignore it as he marched up to his room to change.

0.o

Ron glanced at the window of a red sports car, trying to catch a glimpse of his reflection in it without being totally obvious about what he was doing. What he saw of himself was an odd, distorted image of a tall red haired boy with gangly arms and legs and a long nose. He looked down at his digital watch and saw that it was 5:15. It wasn't like Hermione to be late. He looked around him. How did muggles do it? He could never live without magic, that was for sure. They had coped pretty well, though.

Tonks, as though reading his thoughts, said quietly "Yeah, pretty weird, isn't it?"

Ron turned to the lady who he had come to be friends with and smiled at her "Nice hair."

Tonks ran her fingers through her, now short bright pink hair. "You really like it?"

Ron nodded. "It's very becoming."

Tonks smiled "Thanks, Weasly" and they fell back into silence.