Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. It belongs solely to Ms. J.K. Rowling.
A/N: The second chapter! Thanks for the reviews, by the way – review replies are at the end of the chapter!
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With a Little Interference
Chapter 2: The Planning Stages
Fred and George were at what they liked to refer to as a 'creative standstill'.
Throughout the day they had been discussing ways in which to 'help' (which is what they liked to refer to it as) Ron and Hermione whenever they both had a spare moment. However, spare moments were rarely experienced for the people running Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes, what with the many customers wanting to buy items, and the other customers who stupidly prodded or touched items and then complained about the fact that they had gained a black eye/collection of warts/flourishing moustache – and then there was the sheer amount of paperwork to get through. Who would've thought starting your own business would entail so many pieces of paperwork? Sometimes they were certain the Ministry was just piling it up on them to spite them. Thankfully, they were making enough money to be able to hire a secretary, although neither of them had yet found the time to draft an advert for the Daily Prophet.
Though they had been racking their brains for ways in which to give their younger brother's love life a little nudge, they had come up with nothing of satisfaction. The first plan had been good, but had required copious amounts of armadillo bile – and, besides, they weren't even sure if it would succeed if put into action. Plan B was interesting, but a little too cliché for their tastes; they were the owners of Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes, after all – it wouldn't do to be involved in an overly-clichéd scheme. Plan C had been a work of genius – but when Ron found out about it, and unfortunately this was an inevitable part of the plan, they would probably have to do some serious relocating to escape his wrath. The twins were, therefore, at a loss. When it came to causing havoc in people's love lives, they were wretchedly – and rather embarrassingly, too – inexperienced.
George entered their office-cum-storeroom, looking haggard, and collapsed onto some boxes. "It's a madhouse out there, Fred! Oh, and we're running low on the Daydream Charms. They're becoming rather popular, you know."
Fred made a note of this. "I suppose we could go with the Love Potion, like with Loony and Neville…" he suggested.
"Huh?"
"I was talking about Ron and Hermione. We need to come up with something today. We're seeing them tonight at the Burrow, after all."
"Oh… yeah… but the Love Potion doesn't create nearly enough chaos. I mean, yeah, it was funny when Loony and Neville were all awkward after fervently declaring and… er… demonstrating their love for one another, but that was it. They're actually happy now," George added, as if this was an unexpected occurrence.
There was a knock on the door and a young lady, whom they had hired temporarily to help them manage the store in the run-up to Christmas, poked her head around it. "There's… um… someone who wants see you two," she informed them. Her usual good-natured expression was slightly clouded with worry.
"Who is it, Connie?"
"Um, he won't say… it's a little hard to see his face, he's wearing a dark hood that he refuses to take off, and sunglasses, for some reason – in all this fog too! Must be mad!"
"Ah," said George, grinning. "Bring him in. Oh – hello, Lee!"
"This is not funny!" Lee Jordan, their old Hogwarts friend, hissed from somewhere underneath the black hood and sunglasses he had donned. "You'd better get rid of this bloody make-up right now, so help you! I know you two did this! I'm not stupid – I'd been getting lots of funny looks ever since I left your shop! And what kind of a bloody charm is it? I've tried washing it off and everything, but it won't budge!"
"Sorry, Lee," said Fred, having the decency to at least sound apologetic. "But we wanted to test our new anti-theft measures against someone. Here, just rub some of this on it—"
"But why me? And I didn't steal anything, either!"
"Ah, but by default, these new security measures automatically go into effect if someone leaves the main store without paying for an item, and, technically, you didn't pay for it, Lee."
"That's because you two said it was a gift!" Lee hissed furiously.
"And so it was," George replied. "Only it was… er… something else too."
"I should've known you two weren't just spontaneously generous!"
"And we thought you were smart too, Lee. Love the hood, by the way."
"Don't get me started on that!" Lee cried out suddenly. "Some absolute tit thought I was a Death-Eater and tried to duel me! I had to show him my face in the end – the idiot wouldn't stop laughing. Merlin, I look like a bloody drag queen!"
"A very handsome drag queen," Fred added, winking.
Lee's expression told him that, perhaps, this had not been the most tactful thing to say.
After a few minutes – and a lot more shouting – the make-up had gone and Lee had calmed down sufficiently. Most of Fred and George's friends weren't the type to keep grudges; the ones who did were no longer speaking to them. Lee took off the sunglasses and lowered the hood, and within minutes had cheerfully entered into Fred and George's discussion regarding schemes to help – ahem – Ron.
"Yep, the love potion doesn't do enough harm," Lee agreed. "Hmm… how about trying to make him jealous in some way?"
Fred pulled a face. The idea clearly needed selling.
"It's been proven, time and time again," Lee went on, "that the best way to make someone confess their feelings is through jealousy. Look, it's simple – you slip some Love Potion into Hermione's food or something, but, instead of making her fall for Ron, you make her fall for someone else. I'm sure there are several suitable young beaus at Ministry of Magic who'd be delighted to have such an intelligent, sensible girl pining after them. Anyway, Ron gets mad, confesses his feelings for Hermione, the potion wears off, they live happily ever after. Remember what Ginny said about how jealous Ron was when Krum and Hermione went to the Yule Ball?"
"Ah, an irate, jealous Ron – there is no better entertainment," Fred reflected. "But… a Love Potion? That's so amateur."
"You and George don't seem to have any better ideas," Lee pointed out. "Although, I must say, that one with the hedgehog was a work of genius…"
"But Ron'd kill us."
"Exactly. So go with the Love Potion! It's simple, effective, and, frankly, you two are completely useless with the interfering in love lives thing."
The twins decided to let this comment pass. They decided that, at present, Lee had a right to be a tad abusive towards them. "I suppose we could, Fred," George conceded. "I think we even have some Amortentia left over from the Loony-Neville affair, so it'd be all ready for tonight."
Fred still didn't look too keen on the idea. "Yeah, but Hermione's had one or two boyfriends before, and Ron's never actually been jealous enough to do something about it—"
"—other than grumble every time their names were mentioned."
"Well…" said Lee slowly, "… what if she fell for someone who Ron's always been a tad jealous of? Maybe then something in him'll finally blow and he'll confess his feelings?"
"Someone he's always been a tad jealous of – you don't mean—?"
"I do indeed."
The twins were silent for a few minutes, in which they contemplated the idea. Suddenly, they had an inexplicable desire to grin.
"You know what I think, Fred?" said George loudly. "Along with Hermione falling for someone Ron's always been a little jealous of, I reckon we'll need someone who is in both Ron and Hermione's company fairly often. We can't have Hermione drooling over some chap while Ron's not there, after all."
"No, no, we certainly couldn't!" Fred agreed. "And, in addition to all that, we'll need someone who won't take advantage of Hermione's sudden regard for him. Can you think of anyone who would fit the criteria?" he asked, grinning.
"If I really, really strain my mind, I might be able to think of someone," George replied, an identical grin on his face.
"Oddly enough, me too."
There was silence for a few seconds, in which Fred and George thought about the idea a little more.
"We'll have to use a fairly weak potion – we don't want Hermione's behaviour to be so noticeable that it'll cause suspicion."
"But it'll need to be strong enough for Ron to actually notice the effects."
"Yes. I think we'll use one that lasts for, say, a week…"
"Mmm."
Another brief silence.
"Lee," George began admiringly, "you're a genius."
"Brilliant, Jordan. Never thought you'd be able to succeed where we have failed."
"Yeah. How about a few Canary Creams, on the house, for that?" George offered.
"Wel— no!"
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Ron and Hermione stood warming their hands in front of the fireplace at Godric's Hollow, where Harry and Ron had been living since leaving Hogwarts. Hermione, a frequent guest, had come over an hour or so ago. They would have seen her later in the evening too, as it was a Saturay evening and so Mrs Weasley would be making dinner for the family at the Burrow, but none of them had had much to do. The prospect of going out was currently a not very appealing one, as the weather had reached bitingly cold proportions.
Harry had just left the room to make some tea, leaving Ron and Hermione standing alone in front of the fire. Ron glanced at her. She smiled at him. His insides gave a pleasant sort of shiver.
Go on, do it now, tell her! he told himself. It's perfect. Harry'll be at least five more minutes. And she's just standing there, less than a foot away, waiting for you to say something. The fire's a nice touch too. Romantic, or so they say. The state of semi-darkness helps too; for some reason, not being able to see your lover properly is highly romantic. Besides, if you're going to kiss her, it'll be easier doing it standing here, rather than sitting opposite each other on the sofas—
Oh, Merlin… Kissing Hermione. Part of him couldn't wait to do it – if they ever did, that is – but the other part of him, the part of him that seemed to be surfacing more and more these days, was filled with sheer terror at the thought. Not that Hermione was a scary person – well, no, she was scary: not scary in the sense that she made people want to hide behind a tree when they saw her, but scary in the sense that every time he thought of her in a more-than-friendly way his heartbeat sped up considerably and he turned into an awkward, bumbling wreck. With other girls, when you wanted to start a relationship, it was easy enough. You asked them out and were either rejected or accepted – and that was that. If you were accepted, great, if you were rejected… well, it was a slight blow to your ego, but you'd soon get over it.
But the thought of being rejected by Hermione…
It was enough to make him not want to ask at all. He knew that people said it was better to be rejected than to not take a chance at all, but at the moment he couldn't see why.
Unfortunately, this wasn't his only problem when it came to the matter of wooing his best friend.
He didn't know what to say. The trouble was, he knew how to talk to her as a friend – and it was easy and fun and enjoyable, even the bits when he irritated or annoyed her – but he had no idea about how to talk to her as a prospective girlfriend. Every time he tried to mention something, while trying to find the right words to use, his mind would invariably come to a halt. He sometimes wished she wasn't one of his best friends, and was instead just some girl he knew, because that would have made things a whole lot easier.
The thing was, you couldn't just go over to a best friend one day and ask her out on a date, out of the blue. "Hey, Hermione, what d'you say to throwing away this whole 'being friends' thing and start dating instead?" By asking her out, he would be changing the whole nature of their relationship, and you couldn't do things like that without giving an adequate reason. The result was that he would probably have to – and this was the bit he was really dreading – tell her how he felt.
Ron felt a great deal for her, but he wasn't the type to whom romantic, heartfelt speeches come naturally. It made him cringe when he thought about telling her things like the way he felt when she smiled at him, or the fact that when she argued with him it just made him lo—er, like, her even more. Even something like 'I, er… sort of… like you… a lot…' was a bit too much for him – but that was about as much as he was prepared to say to her right now.
Though he had felt something for Hermione for a few years now, it was only within the last few weeks that he had become more determined to actually do something about it.
Before, things had constantly seemed to get in the way. The year after their sixth at Hogwarts had been far too hectic for them to even think about a possible relationship. And then, the year after that, they had completed their Wizarding education at Hogwarts, which had just re-opened after that horrible year after Dumbledore's death. And that year at Hogwarts had been so perfect and so peaceful that he hadn't wanted to do anything to disrupt it. The year after that… well, as they had spent so much time together and got on so well together as friends, he had begun to believe his feelings for her were purely platonic.
But that little notion soon died when Hermione began to date some oaf from her office. So then, pretending to be perfectly indifferent to Hermione dating someone else, he began going out with a girl from his office. Though these relationships with other people had eventually ended, there was never a period during the next year in which they had both been single, so it had seemed that the prospect of a relationship between Hermione and himself would come to nothing. However, just a month or so ago, they had suddenly found themselves to both be single, and so here they were now, back where they had both started.
Well, they weren't exactly back where they had started. Things between them weren't exactly the same. For instance, he had noticed that for the past few weeks she had been uncommonly nice to him. She smiled at him more often, she was considerably nicer to him, and she had started arguing with him a lot less. Mostly, he enjoyed it, but he was surprised to find that there was a tiny part of him that actually missed the quarrelling and bickering.
Well, are you going to say something now then? he asked himself. Neither of them had spoken since Harry had left. Go for it! he told himself. Right, he thought, this is it…
Unfortunately, silences such as these are always fated to be broken by both people at the same time.
"Hermione—"
"Ron, I—"
"Er – you go on."
"Oh, no! You continue!"
"Well, I… er…" Oh, Merlin, what had he been thinking? He couldn't do it…
He stared feebly at Hermione, who was giving him a puzzled look.
Oh, great, now she probably thinks you're mad. Go on, just say something! Don't just stand there, you useless lump! You know she likes you too! At least, you're almost sure she does. Say something!
"Er…"
Anything but 'er'!
"Um…" he began. Oh, well done, Ron. "For the past few weeks, you – er – we…" Oh, Merlin.
And then – miraculously, thankfully – Hermione had interfered.
Smiling at him – rather shyly – she said, "Ron, it's… er, well, I think I know what you're going to say… and, um, well…"
And then, the whole atmosphere of the room seemed to suddenly change. Suddenly, it was inexplicably romantic. If they had been in a film, this would be the moment where the chorus would have kicked in, singing in heavenly, angelic tones and oh Merlin has she just stepped closer to me?
"Ron…" she said softly, and then stepped even closer to him.
He mentally thanked himself and Harry for not keeping an adequate supply of candles in the house. He could feel his ears turn red.
In the end, he wasn't quite sure if he had leant in to kiss her, or if she had leaned in to kiss him. All he knew was that both their heads had moved forward slowly, and that their lips had met somewhere in the middle.
After that, his whole mind seemed to have gone completely numb.
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"Right," said Fred. "You've got the potion, George?"
"Yep – all it needs is a bit of something from the person whom we want the drinker to fall for. A hair should do."
"Want me to get that?"
"Oh, I'm sure I can manage."
"Fine. How strong is it?"
"Not too strong. And I've watered it down too. It should only last for a few days… a week at most."
"Excellent. And are you sure it's effects won't be too noticeable?"
"If you mean, 'Is she going to go around following him everywhere he goes and grabbing him by the collars and snogging him?' then, yes, I'm sure."
"Brilliant."
"And have you worked out how you're going to get it into her food or drink?"
"Not yet, no, but I'm sure an opportunity will present itself."
"Right. So are we all set then?"
"I think so."
"Good. Off to the Burrow then!"
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The fluff wasn't too fluffy, was it…?
Thanks to my two reviewers, Remus Is Mine (thank you for your compliments and, yes, I suppose things will get slightly disastrous!) and Hakkais-gurl3000 (thanks for reading – I hope you've enjoyed this chapter)