Chapter Eleven
Ron came downstairs the next morning fully expecting to find his mother ready to fuss over him much as she had the night before. At least all of her mothering had resulted in his right eye no longer being swollen shut, but he still had one hell of a black eye. He had barely recognized himself when he looked in the mirror and saw the massively bruised face staring back at him. He had protested Hermione's attempts to heal him because he hadn't felt like he deserved it. Compared to the two people he had killed and the other two that lay unconscious at St. Mungo's, he had gotten off easy.
He had stayed the night at Lupin's, glad that he had left some clothes behind so he could change out of his bloody trousers and shirt.
He didn't see his mother anywhere. In fact, he couldn't find anyone until he stepped into the dining room and found Hermione in there. It came as no surprise to see five open books spread out in front of her.
"How do you feel?" She asked looking him over.
"Not much better than I look probably," he answered, sliding into a chair at the opposite end of the table. "Where is everybody?"
"Ginny's upstairs and Remus went out to get a few things."
He grabbed one of the books on the table and took a look at the cover. "The Best Defense is Self-Defense?" He gave her a curious look.
"Remus has some books in the study," she started. "I thought I'd look through them."
"You sure didn't waste any time," he noted. "It's okay. I heard what Tonks said last night. It doesn't look too good for me does it?"
"They still have to conduct the investigation," she said, choosing not to answer his question.
"I'm sure it's all over the Prophet," he said to her. "They wouldn't pass up the chance to exploit the Minister's son as some kind of murderer." Hermione didn't have to say anything because Ron could already tell from her expression the wizarding newspaper had already decided his guilt. "So what are they saying about me?"
"It's all just speculation. They don't have any of the facts," was her chosen response. She had thrown out the morning paper as soon as it arrived, not wanting Ron to see the headline that read Minister's Son Turns Boyhood Grudge into Murder, nor for him to read the four page article that went on to confirm his guilt.
A thought suddenly occurred to Ron. "Shouldn't you be at work?"
She looked down at the book in front of her. "I took the day off."
His jaw dropped. "You what?"
"I thought I would help you with a defense."
"I thought you just said they still needed to conduct an investigation?"
"It's doesn't hurt to look into it."
There was no one other than Hermione who could throw him for a loop like this. Even after how bad things were between them, she was putting him first. "You have to go to work," he told her.
"I can't. I already called in using the floo."
"Hermione, just the fact that you would consider taking a day off means more to me then you'll ever know, but this is my mess. You can't stop going to work because I screwed up."
"It's just today," she assured him. "Tomorrow's Saturday, which gives us three days to look into what happened. Remus knows someone who used to practice magical law. He thinks he can help or at least get us some books we can use."
"I think you're getting your hopes up," Ron said, the sound of defeat heavy in his voice.
If Hermione didn't know better he sounded ready to throw in the towel and pronounce himself guilty. Hermione Granger wasn't a quitter and she wasn't going to let him give up either. "Ron, I know you feel responsible, but it wasn't your fault." She didn't want to consider the possibility of him being tried and convicted. She had to believe it would never go that far. "Tell me exactly what happened," she said.
He ran a hand through his sleep-tousled hair. "I already told you."
"Tell me again."
He sighed. "I was walking down the street where O'Connors is. I didn't see anyone and then Malfoy just appeared."
"You mean he was hiding and then he showed himself?"
"No, I would have seen him. It was like one second no one was there and then I heard his voice and he was there."
"Malfoy Apparated?" She said, her tone doubtful. "Ron, Malfoy can't Apparate. You and Harry both said he failed the Apparation test." Malfoy had failed his Apparating test, while both Ron and Harry had passed on the first try. She remembered it clearly because the two of them had laughed about it for days. For some reason Malfoy had been able to remain on active duty even though he was still unable to Apparate – at least not legally.
"Maybe he took the test again."
"You would know if he had. Anyone in the Auror program is required to list if they can Apparate. If they don't they can be removed from the program and face charges.
"I'm just telling you what I saw," he snapped. "Look, I'm sorry. You're only trying to help." He dropped his hand on the table, and swore under his breath as pain shot up his arm.
"You should let me heal that."
"It's fine," he insisted. "But you should see the guy who did it to me." The immediate frown that formed on her face told him she didn't find that amusing at all. "Sorry, that was a little post-concussion humour."
Still frowning, she picked up the book in front of her and began to read. She had known it wouldn't be easy to help him, not just because of what happened, but because a lot of tension still hung between them.
"Where should I start looking?" He asked, startling her from her thoughts.
She tried not to look surprised at his sudden willingness to help himself, let alone do research from a giant, musty book. "You can start with that one," she said, pointing to the one he had picked up earlier.
He didn't protest or complain at the size of it. He opened it up and flipped through until he reached the contents page.
Together, they researched in silence.
When Harry returned home in the evening at the end of what was one of his most uneventful shifts since the Dementors attack on Azkaban, he was expecting to see Ron there, but not find Ron and Hermione in the living room together with their heads each buried in a book.
"What's with all the books?" He asked them.
"Hermione thinks we'll find some way to get me out of the mess I'm in," Ron answered.
"It's worth a look," said Hermione. "There's not much else we can do. The Law Enforcement squad has the whole street blocked off where it happened, we can't even go down there."
Ron let out a frustrated sigh. "We've been at this all day. If we haven't found anything useful yet, I don't think we're going to."
"Where'd you get all the books?" Harry asked, hoping to stop a fight from starting. He dropped onto the couch and picked one of them up.
"From Remus mostly. The rest I checked out from the wizarding library."
Harry nodded, resisting the urge to put the book down. Ron needed his help and if Hermione thought they might find something useful in them it was worth it. Helping Ron was more important then letting his current feelings for Lupin get in the way of it.
"You don't have to do this," Ron was saying to him, knowing he had to be exhausted.
"It's okay, I don't mind," he responded.
"Ginny wanted to help too," Hermione started in an uncertain voice. "She said she would come by when she finished with her homework." She looked uneasily at Harry, remembering how upset he had been the last time Ginny had showed up unannounced.
Harry gave a sort of shrug but that was the extent of his response.
They didn't talk much after that, immersing themselves in the mountain of legal books sitting on the coffee table.
Two hours later Harry was beginning to agree with Ron's sentiments that this was a waste of time. Half the stuff he came across he didn't even understand.
Ron slammed the book he had been reading onto the coffee table. "This is a waste of time."
"We haven't even gone through half – "
"Hermione, we're not going to find anything in here. It's pointless," Ron said irritated and stood up.
"Where are you going?" She asked him.
"Anywhere. I can't look at this stuff anymore."
He walked out of there so fast he almost knocked Ginny over who just appeared in the doorway.
"Is he okay?" She said, hearing the front door slam.
"He just needs to clear his head," Harry said to her.
"Maybe we have been at this too long," said Hermione standing up. "I'm going to go back to Remus's to see if he's heard from Tonks. Maybe she was able to find out something useful."
She cleared out almost as quickly as Ron had.
"I guess the research didn't turn up anything, did it?"
"No," Harry said, his voice low.
She turned then as if to leave, and he said, "you're leaving?"
His question surprised her. "I thought you wanted me to stay away from you. That is what you said, right?"
He flinched at the coldness of her tone. "I was trying to do the right thing, Ginny."
"Does 'the right thing' involve showing up in my room in the middle of the night, asking me to let you stay?
"I shouldn't have gone to you," he said, remembering that night clearly even though he had been feverish and unable to think straight. "I was delirious and didn't even know what I was doing."
Ginny remembered that night too, comforting him until he had fallen asleep, then waking up in the morning and finding him gone. "You just left."
"It was a mistake, Ginny. I shouldn't have gone to you. That's why I thought it would be best if I was gone when you woke up."
"Because I'm incapable of controlling myself when you're around, is that it? You think I didn't turn you away because you were affecting me?"
"I don't know," he admitted, staring down at his hands. "There's a lot about my abilities that I don't understand. Even Snape doesn't understand what I can do half the time. I still don't know if what's happened with us is a result of these abilities."
"I guess I don't know either," she admitted. "I've had this infatuation with you since the day I met you. It was like no one could affect me the way you did – not Michael, not Dean, not anyone. That's not normal is it?"
Harry didn't answer.
"But I mean, I feel fine around you," she said, boldly taking his hand and lacing it through one of hers.
"We shouldn't," he said and pulled his hand from hers.
"There's no way to tell for sure if what I feel is real or if you're just doing this, is there?"
Harry swallowed and shook his head. When she didn't back away from him, he looked confused. "Doesn't that bother you?"
"It did, for a while," she admitted.
"What about now?"
"Maybe it doesn't matter anymore."
"Gin, of course it matters," he said, getting angry. "What's wrong with you? How the hell can you even think this is okay?"
"I never said I was okay with it – and maybe it is all a bit scary, but whatever this is, Harry, I feel better when I'm around you."
He squeezed his eyes shut. This was all wrong. She needed to stay away from him. "What are we doing, Gin?" He asked in a pained voice. Was she purposely hoping he would cave? Did she want him to give in?
"You tell me, Harry."
He tried looking anywhere but at her, but he couldn't. All those months of Occlumency had taught him absolutely nothing about self-control.
"Hermione's probably wondering why I'm taking so long," she said when he didn't speak. "It's probably for the best if I don't come back. I don't want to make this worse." She turned to leave.
Ignoring what his conscious was screaming at him, he said, in a low and unsteady voice, "stay."
She turned back around, and seeing the turmoil of emotions on his face was going to ask if that was really what he wanted. But then he probably didn't know what he wanted any more than she did. So Ginny ended up doing the only thing she could – she stayed with him.