Author's Notes: This chapter was very difficult to write. I rewrote it about four times before I got anywhere close to being happy with it. I'm beginning to veer a little from the book into a world where one can only interpret and guess. The first draft had Hermione and Ron falling over each other like fanfiction clichés. The second draft just had Hermione kissing Ron on the hand. The third draft just had Hermione talking, and well, you'll see what's in this.

If you would like another take on the infirmary scene, go to vellagirl's fic entitled Hermione's Visit. I thought that was also a very plausible take on what happened, and it's very different from mine.

Responses to my readers come after the chapter.

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In the Infirmary +

by Jen Ann Bradley

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Ron was dreaming that he was in Potions class trying to answer a question that Snape had posed, but whenever he tried to speak all he could say was, "Lavender stole my tie." He implored his friends to help him, but Harry had turned into a duck, and Hermione wouldn't meet his eye. "Lavender stole my tie," he begged.

"Honestly, Ron," she said.

"Lavender stole my tie!"

He sat bolt up in his bed, gasping for breath. To his surprise, he discovered Hermione sitting at his bedside, wearing a pensive expression. For some strange reason she was dressed in formalwear, but Ron decided it was best not to mention it. He smiled at her.

"Hermione?" he whispered.

She stared back, sweetly and reached for his hand. However, just as she was about to take it, Ron croaked, "Lavender stole my tie."

Ron gasped and awoke, only this time for real. He felt disoriented and sick to his stomach. His head throbbed so hard that he groaned.

"He's awake!" cried someone who wasn't Hermione.

A red-headed boy, who looked exactly like his brother, leaned over him, peering into his bleary eyes. "Welcome back, Ron," said Fred with a grin. "We were wondering when you'd decide to wake up."

George appeared next, saying, "You had us all very worried. It was a lucky thing Harry was there to save you."

Though he felt weak, Ron managed to sit up a bit and look around at the familiar trappings of the infirmary. Fred, George and Ginny were grouped around him, the latter of whom seemed sullen and upset.

"You're lucky I was here," she said by way of a greeting. "Fred was planning to Polyjuice himself into Romilda Vane and tell you that you'd gotten married when you woke up."

Ron blushed. "Harry mentioned that, eh?"

"He kind of had to in order to explain why you were at Slughorn's office drinking poison," said George. Fred, who was probably still mourning the lost opportunity for a good prank, let out a sigh.

"Poison!" exclaimed Ron. "Blimey, is that why I'm here?" Then he realized that his brothers hadn't been back to Hogwarts since the previous year. "Is that why you're here?"

Ginny sniffed. "You gave us quite a scare. Mum and Dad were here earlier, but they had to leave on Order business. And Hermione was here too—"

Ron remembered his dream and hoped he hadn't mumbled anything about Lavender and ties in his sleep. Otherwise, the news that Hermione had come to see him did wonders in curing his headache. "She cared enough to stop in, then?" he asked, poking around for information as casually as possible.

Ginny seemed thoughtful when she nodded. "Hermione's been by more than we have, actually. She was really upset. I think…well, you should say something nice to her when she drops by next."

"I've been nice to her since the beginning of term!" cried Ron, reflexively. "She's the one who's been ignoring me!"

"Yes, well, you should try extra hard —" said Ginny, ignoring his outburst. She stared at him matter-of-factly, daring him to argue. Ron pictured all the instances when he'd tried to initiate contact with Hermione only to be rebuffed, and thought about listing them all for Ginny. However, Ron knew that she would refuse to take his part no matter what, and so it would be wiser to save his breath. He folded his arms over his chest with a frown.

"So what's this about poison?" he asked, changing the subject.

Ginny related the story that Harry had told her while the twins chuckled at the parts about Romilda Vane.

"I remember that part," said Ron, sharply. "I'd rather not go through it again, if you don't mind."

"And then Harry stuffed a bezoar down your mouth," finished Ginny a few minutes later. "He told me that he got the idea from his Potions book."

"That Prince was brilliant," marveled Ron. "Saved me life."

Ginny just looked confused.

A few more minutes passed by before Madam Pomfrey appeared in the doorway, holding a few herbs that she must have gathered from Professor Sprout's greenhouse. She spied Ron sitting up in bed and rushed over.

"He's awake, Madam Pomfrey," said Ginny.

"That much is apparent, Miss Weasley," she said, setting down her supplies and coming over to feel Ron's forehead. "Still feverish," she said. "He needs food and rest. Everyone out!"

"But I've been sleeping for days," Ron protested.

"And you'll be sleeping for the rest of this one, once you've eaten. Out! Everyone out!"

Ron ate a pitiful dinner of porridge and broth, but Madam Pomfrey was right. He fell asleep easily after eating and didn't wake up again until morning.

When next he awoke, he was given another bowl of porridge, but his broth was upgraded to sausage. Ron ate them both greedily as his stomach had finally recognized the hunger that had been mounting all week while he lay unconscious. He was stuffing the last bit of sausage into his mouth and was chewing when Madam Pomfrey appeared at his bed. Ron instinctively clutched his half-empty bowl of porridge, afraid she was here to snatch his food away before he had finished it. But Madam Pomfrey did no such thing. Instead she smiled, saying, "You have a visitor, Mr. Weasley," and she stepped aside to reveal Hermione Granger.

Ron swallowed his food with a loud gulp.

This was the first time he and Hermione had been alone together in months. He wished it had not taken a near-death experience to bring them together again, but he was pleased to see her nonetheless. However, she looked so nervous and pale that Ron wondered whether she had better not submit to Madam Pomfrey's care as well. She shuffled from one foot to another in a very un-Hermione-like way, and she was fidgeting with something behind her back.

"Hi," he said, breaking the silence. "I er…woke up,"

Hermione seemed relieved that he had spoken, managing a small smile. Why was she smiling? he wondered, hoping she was not smiling because he had just said the stupidest thing on the planet. He felt a little more confident when he saw that she was blushing. Then, suddenly, Hermione brought her arms out from around her back to reveal three scrolls of parchment clutched in her hands. Ron almost yelped for joy when he realized what they were.

"I brought you a birthday present," she said. "I couldn't buy anything nicer because the Hogsmeade trip was cancelled, but I wrote your essays for Charms and Transfiguration. I even charmed them so it would look like your handwriting. Oh, and I outlined the essay for DADA, but Snape would know if I wrote the whole thing, so —"

She set them gently on his bed and drew back again, like she was afraid he'd snap off her head if she stayed close. Then she looked around until she found a chair next to his bed.

"Can I sit?" she asked.

Ron smiled. "Please," he replied, quietly, motioning to the chair.

Hermione scooted the chair so she was facing him and sat down, leaning over his bed. Ron observed the dark circles under her eyes and the way she was struggling to speak, and knew it was a time to be silent. Patiently, he waited for her to say whatever it was she had to say, sensing that it was something of enormous importance to her. This was confirmed when, after a moment or so had passed, Ron saw a solitary tear drip down her cheek. She was crying, and even more unbelievable was that she was crying for him!

"Hermione," he gasped, instinctively reaching out to touch her hand that rested on his bed. When he realized what he was doing, he drew back again, but as Hermione continued to cry, Ron felt he must try to make her stop. Isn't that what people usually did while watching a person cry? He had no experience with crying girls. Ginny seldom cried, and Hermione always ran away whenever she was about to do it so no one would look at her. For Heaven's sake, she was still going at it. If he hadn't known Hermione better, Ron might have thought she was upset that he had lived. And yet, he found her distress strangely moving. Ron reached out for her hand once again, but before he could reach it, she withdrew her hand quickly in order to wipe her eyes as they watered past the point of control.

"Oh Ron," she broke into an uncontrollable sob. A flurry of speech followed. "I'm sorry! I was so stupid to treat you the way I did. To think that you might have —" she reached into her robes and brought out her wand in order to conjure a handkerchief, which she used to dab furiously at her eyes.

Ron took her by the wrist and lowered her hands away from her face. Hermione gazed up at him, vulnerable and distraught, but she allowed him to watch her cry.

"I was so angry over nothing at all," she continued. "And if you had…if you had gone, thinking I hated you…I never would have forgiven myself."

"I never thought you hated me, Hermione," Ron said. However, this statement caused Hermione to burst into a fresh bout of tears, which Ron watched with horror bordering on elation.

"I never knew you cared so much," he exclaimed, almost to himself. He had known Hermione to be furious with him before; Ron could expect her fury. But he had never expected such a display of concern for him. This was something he had only seen her do for Harry.

Hermione didn't appear to notice what he had said, for she seemed too busy attempting to rein in her emotion. She fidgeted with the handkerchief again, breaking the moment. With a little sniff, she dabbed at her nose. "I shouldn't have stopped speaking to you just because of Lavender," said Hermione, under her breath. She seemed to be dragging the words out of her mouth by sheer force of will. "I had no right —"

"I don't care about Lavender," Ron blurted out all of the sudden. He had wanted to say something to make Hermione stop crying, but it was only by sheer luck that he had stumbled upon the one thing he could say that was exactly right.

It worked like a charm. Hermione's eyes widened in shock, but Ron could see that her tears had stopped. However, Ron was not finished, not when finally he had both the opportunity to speak and the impetus to do it. "Lavender's not like you," he blustered on, wanting to get it all out before he lost his nerve. "I mean…she's not you. I mean…" But when Ron saw that he was dangerously close to an admission of love, he became too flustered to go on. He couldn't get the words out of his mouth, for fear of sounding silly and rendering this inexplicable, powerful feeling into something laughable. He wouldn't do it, so Ron could only hope that he had gotten his point across.

He knew that he had when he saw Hermione's lips curve upwards into the beginning of a brilliant smile. Yet, just as the smile had started, it stopped. Hermione sniffed and whispered, "It's okay, Ron, you don't need to say that just to make me happy."

"No, I…" he spluttered, just about to protest when the door to the infirmary swung open and his parents waltzed in.

Ron swore under his breath. Hermione blushed redder than a ruby and wiped at her eyes in order to remove all traces of tears before she was spotted. Suddenly, she took the scrolls that she had brought and hid them under the bed. She seemed to be preparing to leave.

"Where are you going?" he asked, practically begging.

"I don't want them to see me crying," she said. "They'll think something horrible happened."

Ron grimaced. But something wonderful happened, he wanted to say. However, before Ron could convince her to stay, his father approached.

"How are you feeling today, Ron?" he asked, completely oblivious to the scene he had interrupted. "Ah, Hermione! You two catching up?"

"I was just about to leave," she managed, through her choked voice. She stood from the chair, offering it to Ron's mother, and straightened her robes.

"Do you have to go?" asked Ron, miserably.

Hermione looked up, flashing him a smile through a fresh sheen of tears. "I'll come back," she reassured him.

"Nonsense," said his mother, "You can stay if you like. You're practically family anyway." Ron turned red at the words, 'practically family.'

But Hermione, who was about to cry any moment (for joy, Ron hoped), refused and hurried off. Ron watched her go, wishing with all his heart that he could chase after her. Who knows what might happen if he did? But he couldn't go anywhere for another week, so he could only wait until she returned.

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By the time his parents left, it was afternoon and Ron was so exhausted that he immediately turned on his side to go to sleep. As he buried his aching head into the pillow, he comforted himself with the thought that when he woke up, Hermione or Harry or Ginny might have come for a visit.

Drifting closer and closer to sleep with each passing second, Ron had journeyed half way towards the world of dreams when all of the sudden he heard a distinct feminine patter creeping up toward him. Instantly, consciousness catapulted itself back onto him.

Thinking that perhaps Hermione had returned, Ron grinned under the sheets he held tucked over his head. He decided that he would let her think he was asleep for a while in order to see what she would do. This time, he hoped for a heartfelt confession of love and undying devotion.

What he got instead was…

"Guess who, Won-Won!"

It was all he could do to stifle a groan of utter agony. Lavender had found him.

He clenched his eyes shut, held his breath and waited for the nightmare to pass. He felt little hands groping at his shoulder. "Oh, you poor dear. You're still unconscious. Well, that's all right, I suppose. Now I can tell you all the things that I'm too afraid to tell you when you're awake!"

Oh goody, he thought. He couldn't imagine Lavender being afraid to say anything. She had always seemed to him to be without shame.

"Oh Ron, I was so worried when I'd heard you'd been poisoned."

Her statement, lacking the customary "Won-Won" generated enough pity inside him that Ron considered opening his eyes at this point. Unfortunately, Lavender was not done talking.

"I can't believe no one told me you were here. I had to find out from Cormac McLaggen of all people. I don't know how he found out. He's probably been waiting for something like this to happen so he could play Keeper. Maybe he was the one who put the poison in your meade!"

At this most unpleasant news, Ron began to cough and had to disguise the sound with a snore. Lavender bumbled on without appearing to have noticed.

"I was afraid that Hermione Granger would come begging for you to take her back again," she said. "Parvati told me she was really upset when she'd heard about you, but then I saw her crying in the hall this morning, and I knew that you must have said no. And I forgive you for being so mean to me in the common room, because I know you were just under a love potion…"

Hermione had still been crying in the hall? His heart beat faster at the thought. Ron managed to drown Lavender out for a little while, scowling at the way she talked about Hermione. He supposed it was his fault for encouraging her, but he felt that she ought to have taken his censure of Hermione with a grain of salt. For five and a half years, he and Hermione and Harry had seen each other through everything from exams to near death experiences. She ought to have expected them to make up sooner or later. Now that they had, Ron thought Lavender ought to be more gracious about it.

Meanwhile, Lavender had begun to talk about their future, which nearly gave Ron a heart attack as she explained to them the details of their wedding. "I always thought we could get married in Dover on the tops of the cliffs where it's sooo pretty," she said. "It's much prettier there than where my parents got married in Manchester. Oh, and then we could have lots and lots of babies, all with red hair as nice as yours. And we can name the first one Thomas and the second one Judith or maybe Sybill after Professor Trewlawney because I like her very much…"

As it turned out, Lavender wanted pink dress robes for the bridesmaids, and she was planning to write her own vows, which meant Ron was required to do the same. Their second son was to be Ronald Jr., but under no circumstances was Ron to name any of their children after his father.

"Arthur is such an old fashioned name, don't you think? Of course you do."

And they were going to buy a house on the coast of France after they graduated from Hogwarts. Only Ron decided that they would be buying a house bordering a river in Hell before he'd marry Lavender. Fortunately, when Lavender began talking about their grandchildren, Madam Pomfrey rescued him. Ron wondered if she had seen the twitching of his eyes behind his eyelids or whether she too was sick of hearing Lavender's voice. At any rate, the good woman threw Lavender out on the pretense that visiting hours were over, even though Ron knew that visiting hours were not over for another hour at least.

After Lavender was gone, Madam Pomfrey came by and tapped him on the shoulder. "All right, Mr. Weasley, I think you need another dose of medicine after that."

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Harry and Ginny were frequent visitors to the infirmary over the next week, but Hermione did not appear again for two days. Ron wondered at her absence, thinking perhaps he should not have said what he had said about not caring about Lavender. He wasn't certain why that would make Hermione angry, but he supposed it was possible that he had offended her.

However, when she did reappear, Ron understood the reason for her neglect immediately. This time as she entered she was carrying four scrolls.

"How many essays were we assigned?" he exclaimed when she set them on his bed.

"Oh, these are due next month," she said with a smile, giving no indication that composing four essays for someone else had caused her any trouble whatsoever.

"But I'll be out of the infirmary by then," he said, examining the scrolls lying at the foot of his bed. He knew that he could not refuse Hermione since she had exerted so much effort, but he didn't like it that she thought he would appreciate her more as a study aid than as a friend. Ron would have preferred a visit to his homework.

"You don't have to bribe me into liking you again," he explained. "I never stopped."

Hermione frowned, which made Ron wonder what he had said wrong this time. Perhaps he should have just thanked her. But then Hermione sat down in the chair next to him and started chatting about class and the latest gossip as if the last visit and the entire term before it had never happened. Ron was both relieved and disappointed to have things go back to normal. It was good to have Hermione speaking to him again, but he had spent the past few days realizing that didn't want things to be exactly the same as they had always been. He had thought that Hermione wanted the same thing. Hadn't she understood the point of his whole, stuttering declaration during their last conversation? When she started in on Herbology, Ron realized she had definitely not understood. He felt an unspeakable gloom wash over him. Ron didn't know how she could fall back into their old routine so easily. For him, it was especially difficult to think of Hermione as only his friend.

Ron found himself incapable of really listening to what she was saying. All he could do was stare at her. As Hermione was telling him about Susan Bones' latest mishap during Apparition lessons, Ron could not stop himself from wondering what it would be like to kiss her. The prospect of kissing Hermione no longer seemed as frightening as it had a few months previous when he hadn't known where to put his hands or lips. Would her lips be mushy like Lavender's or would they be just right? His eyes wandered to her mouth, where they remained as he delved deeper and deeper into a fantasy where he swooped down and snogged her until they both passed out from lack of air. He could do it. Just lean forward.

From her seat across from him, Hermione suddenly noticed what was happening and shut up. "Ron?" she asked.

Ron blushed a little, but didn't try to disguise what he had been thinking. It was too late to hide it anyway; he was certain that Hermione had figured it out. However, though she was flustered by his suggestive gaze, Hermione continued with her discourse on Susan Bones. Ron did notice that she seemed more hesitant in her speech.

"Twycross told us she could have splinched herself —"

"Hermione?" he stopped her. "I meant what I said before. You know, about Lavender…"

But sure enough, if you speak of the devil, he will appear.

"Where's my Won-Won!" boomed Lavender's voice from the door.

Ron's eyes bugged out in terror. He hurled himself back onto the pillow and pulled the covers over his head. "Quick, tell her I've been asleep the whole time!"

"B…But," stammered Hermione, but Ron cut her off with a pretend snore.

"Oh Ron," she sighed, exasperated. But she dutifully informed Lavender that he had been sleeping all morning and that he still required a great deal of rest.

"Madam Pomfrey wants us to keep especially quiet around Ron," added Hermione. "He still gets migraines very easily."

"I know how to take care of Ron, thank you," snapped Lavender.

"Oh. I'll leave him in good hands, then," said Hermione, refusing to be anything but civil. Even so, Ron thought he could hear resentment hidden within her voice. He listened to her retreating footsteps and prepared himself for thirty minutes of torture.

To his surprise, Lavender did not say much at all other than, "I hope you get better soon, Won-Won. I miss you." Only she whined too much as she said, "miss you," so she sounded like a Screaming Mandrake, which in turn destroyed all semblance of sincerity.

Nevertheless, Ron felt instantly terrible for ignoring her and for making Hermione lie to her, and most of all for making Hermione lie. However, the guilt was not enough to compel Ron to open his eyes. He sensed that underneath her pretensions at worry, Lavender was masking her characteristic self-centeredness whereby she cared for Ron only because she didn't want to go without her trophy boyfriend for another weekend.

When she departed ten minutes later, Ron was not sorry to have her go. His only regret was that Hermione did not come back to finish their conversation. She had probably predicted that Lavender would be with him forever and had wanted to disappear accordingly.

In fact, Ron did not see Hermione again until Saturday evening when she came with Ginny to visit Harry, who had cracked his skull during the earlier Quidditch match.

Both girls entered with a quick hello before moving on to examine Harry.

"He's still unconscious," said Ron, glumly, as he waited for Hermione to stop peeking at Harry's bandages. Ron did not like being ignored.

Hermione looked at him with one eyebrow raised. "Are you sure he's not pretending?"

Ron scowled, even though he knew she was teasing him.

"Don't worry, Ron," said Ginny walking away from Harry's bed toward Ron's. "We didn't forget you."

"In fact," said Hermione, fiddling with something in the pockets of her robes and then pulling the 'something' out with a flourish, "We brought you something."

Ron was pleased to see that it was too small to be homework. Instead, as Hermione came closer, he saw that it was a photograph of a disgustingly corpulent youth, wearing Gryffindor Quidditch robes. The subject of the picture also sported abnormally long toenails that curled out from his feet like bed springs.

"What's this?" he asked, taking it.

Ginny giggled. "That's Cormac McLaggen after the match today. The entire team cornered him in the common room later on, and then Hermione and I got Colin Creevey to take this picture." She pointed to McLaggen's toenails. "Harry taught me that one."

Hermione let out a snort. Ron figured she knew exactly where Harry had gotten that toenail hex.

"So, uh, will you be staying for dinner?"

Ginny shook her head. "I have to go meet Dean," she said without any real enthusiasm.

Hermione pointed to Ginny for some reason. She offered him an apologetic look. "I said that I'd go with her."

"Oh," he replied.

Ginny laughed at his disappointment. "I'm sure Harry will come to in an hour or so, and then he can keep you company. Make sure you show him the picture when he does." Then she paused as her jollity faded. "Harry's been acting a bit strange lately, don't you think? He barely arrived in time for the match."

Hermione sighed. "I bet I know why. He was probably chasing Malfoy again."

Ginny nodded. "He did say something about Malfoy —" Then she shrugged. Ron didn't venture any new information. He wasn't sure how much Harry would want Ginny to hear.

"Oh well. I'm hungry," Ginny said at last, and with a wave good-bye she headed out.

Before following Ginny to the door, Hermione leaned over Ron to whisper in his ear, "Tell Harry not to teach Ginny any more hexes out of that book."

"Okay," said Ron, too distracted by the feeling of her breath puffing against his ear to do anything but agree. However, after she had gone and Ron processed what Hermione had said, suffice it to say he had no intention of telling Harry any such thing.

An hour later, Harry did indeed wake up, and did indeed confess to having followed Malfoy. Ron felt irritated, especially when Harry mentioned that he'd have rather missed the Quidditch match in order to follow him. Harry's obsessions were getting ridiculous.

"Don't be stupid, " Ron said. "You couldn't have missed a Quidditch match just to follow Malfoy, you're the Captain!"

"I want to know what he's up to. And don't tell me it's all in my head, not after what I overheard between him and Snape —"

At this, Ron sat up straighter. "I never said it was all in your head," he said, anxious to defend himself. Ron knew that Harry's instincts were generally close to being correct, but his greatest failing was that he carried his suspicions too far. If he would only be patient, he would discover that all would reveal itself in time. Probably near the end of the term if the pattern continued itself. In the meanwhile, missing Quidditch for Malfoy was inexcusable. Quidditch was one of the only untouched things remaining in the Wizarding World. Everything else: Diagon Alley, Hogsmeade and Hogwarts itself were suffering from wartime tension.

When their conversation lapsed into silence, Ron briefly thought of conveying Hermione's message, but in the end he turned over on his side and went to sleep.

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To a few of my readers:

Er My Nee, Carly-M & DaggerLy: I really liked that scene from the book too, where Ron mumbles Hermione's name. But the more I thought about it as I was writing this, the more I realized that Ron wouldn't think he said, "Er My Nee." It's his POV, so he would hear "Hermione" very clearly in his dream instead of "Er My Nee." Also, if I followed the timeline from the book, I'd have to write a lot of Ron's dreams because he doesn't wake up immediately after saying it. It seemed too frustrating to bother, especially when it's done so perfectly in the book.

Just DaggerLy: Well, the part that shocked me was when Ron said, "I love you, Hermione." I started thinking, "Oh my God, what!" But then it turned out just to be a casual comment.

Love That Elf: I don't mind long reviews. I don't mind criticism either as long as it's tactful and intelligent. So if you (or anybody else) ever see a typo or a continuity problem etc. etc., please tell me.

Animeobsessed: No, I'm not planning to go beyond Book 6. I'm really not a very fast writer when I'm trying to deal with my own plots, and I don't think I have a good theory about what's going to happen next. I'm sure someone will tackle it soon, though. J

Satu Simpson: Originally, this was going to be a two chapter work where I had Ron's thoughts in one half and Hermione's in the other, but this is taking too long. So, no, I don't think I'll write Hermione's version of events. I can't get into her head as well as I can Ron's anyway. I think I understand her, though. She seems to me to know that Ron likes her, but she's too inexperienced to know how to get him to admit it. Krum approached her on his own, without any urging from her, and she expects Ron to do that too. She is furious when he doesn't, and probably feels very insulted that he misled her by agreeing to go to the party with her. Hermione, as we know, does not like to be wrong. But after the poison, I feel like Hermione realized that she really liked/loved Ron, and would rather put up with Lavender in order to be with him than not be with him at all.