Disclaimer: I still don't own any of it.
A/N: Ok, so the reason why this last chapter is longer than the rest is because I didn't want to get you all furiously angry and then stop the chapter right there. The beginning of this chapter will probably shock you all, but PLEASE keep reading. I promise it will all be ok. I felt like I needed to say this because my little sister insisted that readers would absolutely quit reading when she heard about my plans for this story. Yes, this has been planned from the very outset, but really, I'm begging you, please stick it through to the end. Thanks and happy reading!
Chapter 21: Happily Ever After?
Hermione woke up with a start. She looked about the room, a little bewildered about her surroundings. The moonlight coming through the open window lit up one of the walls that was plastered with posters of the Weird Sisters and cute Quidditch players. Hermione's mouth went a little dry. She knew this room. She looked over to see a shock of red hair peeking out from the covers of the other bed. Ginny kicked her legs a bit and flipped over onto her side.
"Nooo," Hermione moaned as she kicked off her covers and looked down at herself. She no longer had her twenty-four year old self's body. For that matter, George's warm sturdy body was not curled up next to her, as he had been when she drifted off to sleep. She put a hand to her hair, which had been smooth and straight moments before. Instead, it was frizzy and extra bushy from being slept on. "A dream? A bloody dream?" Hermione said out loud.
Gasping for air, she ran out of Ginny's room and down the hall to the bathroom. Splashing cold water on her face, she tried to calm the rising panic. It had all been a dream, she told herself over and over. She did not, however, have any idea what was going on. Had Ron proposed to her? Was Voldemort dead? Nothing seemed real anymore. Finally regaining control of her ragged breathing she turned quickly to leave the bathroom and ran into something quite solid…and shirtless. She looked up in surprise and saw a very sleepy George looking down at her with an equally surprised expression on his face. She didn't have to look for his scar to know it was George. She'd been looking into those blue eyes for the last six months, well in the dream at least.
"Are you alright Hermione? It looks like you've seen a ghost. The ghoul from the attic didn't wake you up did he?" George asked tenderly. Hermione shook her head and bit her lip out of confusion and frustration with the situation.
"I just sort of, had a dream. That's all," she said nervously.
"A nightmare?" He asked. She tried to repress a smile at the sound of concern in his voice. After all, she reasoned with herself, this was not the same George that she had been slowly falling in love with over the last few months. He had just been a dream.
"Well, sort of," she responded. The dream itself had been wonderful, but waking up from it was pretty nightmarish. "What about you? What are you doing up?"
"I had a dream too, actually," George said smiling.
"George?" Hermione asked as she sat down on the toilet seat, toying with one of her unruly curls.
"Yeah?" He perched on the edge of the bathtub, so close to her that their knees were almost touching.
"Am I engaged to Ron?" She mumbled in a voice barely above a whisper.
"What? What would make you say that?" He grabbed her hand and she looked up at him hopefully, "You're not wearing a ring are you?"
"Oh, yeah," Hermione said, blushing.
"Is that what your nightmare was about? Getting married to Ron?" He asked with a laugh.
"No, well yes, but no," Hermione stuttered. "Are we still dating? Ron and I?"
"Still dating? If you ever were dating, that's news to me. And probably news to his girlfriend, Hannah, as well." Hermione breathed a sigh of relief.
"What about Voldemort? Is he dead yet?" Hermione asked nervously, trying to piece together where in time she really was.
"Hermione you were there when Harry killed him. You fought against the Death Eaters. We were all there, don't you remember that?" George looked at her, obviously concerned by her odd behavior.
"Yes, well no, but I mean," she said, not making any sense. How could she explain to George that she had just been living a very real dream in which Ron had proposed to her after Voldemort was killed? Suddenly a look of comprehension came over George's face.
"Come here," he said gently, pulling her off the toilet and on to the ledge next to him. He wrapped his arm around her, pulling her in close to his very bare chest. Her heart fluttered crazily and she tried to think clearly. "The events of the last year, especially what happened a month and a half ago when Voldemort died, have been hard on everyone. You're not the only one with horrible memories, or the only one suffering nightmares of that night. You should know that better than anyone, what with the way Ginny thrashes about screaming in her sleep. You're not alone in your fear of him. But the point is, Voldemort is dead. You don't ever have to be afraid of him again. He can't hurt you now, I promise."
"Is that what you were dreaming about? Voldemort?" She asked him.
"No, I was dreaming about something a little…happier," he said smiling, the Weasley blush started to creep into his cheeks. He tucked a piece of her wild brown hair behind her ear, and she thought of something. She turned towards him and ran her finger down the jaw line below his ear. He looked at her surprised as the blush deepened.
"How did you get this scar?" She asked, looking deep into his blue eyes.
"When I was six Charlie beat me up for 'accidentally' taking his broom for a joyride and crashing it into the garage," George said with a sad smile.
"Oh," Hermione said, disappointed that it had nothing to do with dungbombs, Percy, or broken windows. Something suddenly dawned on her. If her dream hadn't been real then "Charlie! He's alive!"
"What? No, Hermione. He died, in the Final Battle. You were at his funeral. Don't you remember any of this?" George asked, shaking his head.
"I-I think I do. It's just this dream I was having. Everything was different. Everyone was different," she said with a sigh. She looked up into his eyes again, wishing that the dream had been real. He had been so wonderful in the dream, so grown up, so mature. But in real life he was just Ron's older brother, the prankster who dropped out of Hogwarts to start a joke shop, though it didn't seem so horrible as it once had.
"Tell me about it," George said, lost in thought about his own dream, apparently.
"It just seemed so…real," they both said in unison. They looked at each other with surprise and started to laugh. George looked down at Hermione, who was still sitting very close to him, shaking with laughter. This was not how she had been in his dream. She'd been more sophisticated, more prim and proper. But he liked this better, this tiny pajama-clad, bushy haired girl with dancing eyes. Before he knew what he was doing, he tilted her chin upwards and kissed her gently on the lips. She did not recoil in disgust and her eyes did not even pop open in surprise. Instead, they just fluttered shut as she leaned in to kiss him back.
A few moments later, they drifted apart. It was not the sort of kiss that you spring back from wondering what in the world you were doing kissing your little brother's best friend. No, George thought, it was not like that at all. Instead, it was strangely reminiscent of the kisses he'd been sharing with her for the past couple months in a very realistic dream he'd just been having. And exactly how his dream self knew the way her tongue traced the top of his bottom row of teeth when she kissed, he was not exactly sure. But that was precisely what she'd been doing just a second before. In his middle of the night logic he chalked it up to her being the daughter of two dentists so she must be curious about teeth and of course his dream self would have known…and suddenly he very much lost that train of thought because she was kissing him again and her tongue was doing that thing with his teeth and the pink painted toes of her right foot were brushing up against his ankle and it made him tickle from the top of his head to the bottom of his feet.
"Merlin, I've missed your kisses," George murmured as she moved her mouth to kiss along his jaw line. Her body went stiff and cold and she looked up at him with bewilderment.
"What?" she asked, drawing away from him. She started to shake and he wanted to bring her in close and keep her warm, but he was afraid of the peculiar expression on her face. Shit, he thought to himself. How was he supposed to explain this?
"Um," George gulped. Nothing clever was springing to mind. He was just lost.
"George," she said with a strange expression on her face. She was scooting further away from him and he just couldn't let her get away and forget this happened, he had to see. So he grabbed her hand and pulled her close.
"Hermione, I know this is going to sound insane but I just woke up from this amazing dream where you and I…we were together. I'm sorry, I know that's weird and completely inappropriate but sitting here kissing you feels so right because in this dream I'd been kissing you for months and you see just tonight, I mean, the night in the dream, right before I woke up, I'd, well I sorta proposed to you. I know that sounds so weird, please don't think I'm some sort of freak," George babbled nonsensically. Hermione's eyes were so round and afraid that he knew he'd made some sort of mistake. He never should have told her.
"Holy shit," she mumbled, right before launching herself into his arms and smothering him with kisses. He pulled away after a moment, laughing.
"And what do you think you're doing young lady?" George asked, glad that Hermione had not completely freaked out and ran away.
"George, I think we need to talk," she said with a smile. "Come on, I'll make some tea, I think it's going to be a long night." George smiled up at her as she took his hand and pulled him up from the bathtub ledge.
They settled onto the couch in the living room, steaming cups of tea in hand, and took turns telling each other bits and pieces of their very odd, and very similar dream. Of course, some bits were different, Hermione noted, somewhat sadly, but the essence was the same, not to mention the outcome: them being engaged. Both being slightly embarrassed by parts of the dream, the talk quickly moved to their own lives. Hermione told George about her life before Hogwarts and George told Hermione childhood stories about the mischief six little red headed boys can create. He also told her all about their booming business and she admitted how nervous she was to start her new job in London. At some point in the night George had put down his teacup and started tracing shapes on the thin skin of her inner wrist and by the time the sun was coming up she had settled into crook of his arm with her head leaning on his (still bare) chest.
"Hermione, love?" George said, shaking her slightly. He realized, too late, what had slipped out, but she didn't respond oddly so he just let it go, it had become habit really.
"Mmm?" She asked, stirring slightly. They'd stopped talking and were just dozing in each other's arms but George heard footsteps upstairs and figured they'd better get into their own rooms, or at least out to the breakfast table where they could feign innocence, before his mother came down.
"Do you want to head upstairs to bed before Mum comes down?" He asked her, running his fingers up and down her bare shoulders. She shook her head sleepily.
"I don't want to leave you," she mumbled, nuzzling her head into his shoulder and yawning.
"Alright…would you like to go to the kitchen then and have some tea and breakfast?" He asked.
"Yes, please." She said, though she made no move to get up. He laughed at her limp form and rustled around until he was in position to scoop her up and carry her to the kitchen. She seemed to awaken at the rush of being picked up and giggled as he plopped her into a kitchen chair.
"Thanks," she whispered, suddenly awake and suddenly shy.
"Hey Mione? Before the others come down, I was just wondering…um…do you want to go out tonight? Like on a date? Like our first real date?" George asked, too bashful to meet her eye.
"Yes yes yes," Hermione exclaimed, throwing her arms around his neck and kissing him. It was their first kiss since coming out of the stupor of their dream and it felt more real than any of the other kisses they'd shared in all the "months" of dating in their dreams. They pulled apart just in time to separate and inconspicuously start making some breakfast by the time Molly walked in. She was stunned, obviously, to find one of the twins, who so often just spent the night at the little flat above their shop, in the kitchen with Hermione so early in the morning, but it was sort of sweet and her mind began to float to all sorts of romantic possibilities. Though she intended to leave them alone as soon as humanly possible to foster their romantic relationship, little by little the rest of the family trickled down and they were forced to limit themselves to shy smiles and the occasionally brush of one foot against the other (though one time George missed and got Ron's by accident which made for a whole round of blushing and awkward questioning glances).
After breakfast was finished and everyone dispersed to shower (the girls), play Quidditch (the boys), clean the attic (Mrs. Weasley), and tend to the shop (Fred and George—but not without a small goodbye kiss on the cheek and a promise to pick Hermione up at 6), Hermione collapsed onto the cot in Ginny's bed with a sigh.
"What are you being all girly about?" Ginny asked with a knowing smile.
"Gin, I know this is going to sound totally weird, but I'm going on a date tonight…with George," Hermione said with a tentative smile.
"And why would that sound totally weird?" Ginny asked. Hermione looked at her in shock.
"Because…because…well I don't know. It's just weird. Aren't you supposed to say something about how this was never the brother you expected me to end up?" Hermione asked, bewildered as to Ginny's nonchalance.
"Well, I never expected anything serious to ever actually happen with you and Ron. And it's not that I expected this between you and George, but it's not that unusual. You're the type of girl George needs. And Merlin knows George would be a good influence on you." Ginny said playfully.
"Hey! What's that supposed to mean?" Hermione asked indignantly, chucking a pillow across the room at Ginny's head. She only giggled in response as she focused on braiding her hair in the mirror. Hermione sighed, swooning against her pillow. "Gin, I know this sounds bizarre and I can't get into all the details but I just have this feeling that things are really going to work between us." Ginny turned to look at her friend with a smile and couldn't help but rush across the room and give her a hug. She just loved when other people fell in love. "Do you want to go shopping with me this afternoon?" Hermione asked, an idea popping suddenly into her head.
"Have you ever known me to pass up a shopping trip?" Ginny said with a delicious grin, despite having a mound of schoolwork to complete before school started up in September again.
An hour later the two young girls tumbled out of a floo in Diagon Alley. Ginny started off in the vicinity of Madame Malkin's, but Hermione grabbed her arm and pulled her in an unfamiliar direction.
"Where are we going? I thought you'd just want to pick up some dress robes or something," Ginny asked, slightly bewildered.
"Actually, I'm going into Muggle London. I need some Muggle clothes." Hermione replied, quite calmly as she weaved her way through a trash-strewn alley and appeared on a street crowded with Muggles.
"Muggle clothes? Why? Does my dear old brother have a thing for girls in Muggle clothes?" Ginny asked with a slightly wicked grin.
"I really have no idea. All I know is that I'm looking for a very specific outfit," Hermione replied absentmindedly as she peered into store windows looking for the right type of clothing.
"A very specific outfit?" Ginny asked skeptically.
"Erm, yes…I saw it in…a magazine!" Hermione said, feeling quite triumphant for coming up with a logical explanation, as well as finding a store that seemed to carry just what she was looking for. The mannequins in the window were wearing flowery skirts and capris with matching cardigans and shells in a variety of pastel colors.
"Um, are you sure this it?" Ginny asked, surveying all the pink and lavender with a critical eye. It was not exactly Hermione's typical style.
"Yes," Hermione said, making a beeline for a display of yellow and green skirts, retrieving a handful, and heading to the dressing room. Ten minutes later, Hermione reappeared in a yellow, green, and white striped skirt with a yellow cardigan.
"What do you think?" Hermione asked, swirling around to let the skirt billow out.
"Well," Ginny began, trying to think of something nice to say, though she was unaccustomed to Muggle fashion trends, "you look a little like a daisy." She hoped that was a compliment. The smile on Hermione's face told her it was.
"Perfect." Hermione said and quickly changed into her other clothes to pay for her purchases.
After Hermione got all the essentials for her first date with George, she and Ginny wandered over to the Leaky Cauldron for drinks.
While they drank their butterbeers they discussed Ginny's upcoming last year at Hogwarts and Hermione's upcoming job at the Daily Prophet in London. In her mind, Hermione was secretly wondering about Grace. She had really liked dream-Grace and wished she really existed, but knew better than to hope she really did. The conversation turned to Ginny's indecision about what to do after Hogwarts. She was sticking with a pretty basic curriculum for her last year unlike many students who specialized according to their after-graduation plans.
"I guess I just like so many things, but none of them really seem fit for a job, you know?" Ginny asked as she took a sip of butterbeer. Hermione nodded her understanding.
"Somehow I can see you as a healer," she said, with a sly smile. Ginny looked up in surprise.
"Really?"
"Oh yeah, you've always been so kind and caring and cheerful, not to mention cleaning up your brothers' injuries with your mum. You're a natural," Hermione explained. Ginny began to nod as the idea sunk in.
"Hey, you're sorta right. Maybe I should go into healing!" Ginny exclaimed. Hermione wondered if, after her healing training, she would get engaged to Harry, but kept quiet at the moment, not really knowing how prophetic her dream had been. "Maybe we ought to get home, we've only got an hour and a half before the big date," Ginny said with a giggle. Hermione blushed but gathered her bags and they floo'd back to the Burrow. When they arrived, Mrs. Weasley caught their attention as they ran up the stairs to Ginny's room.
"Oh Hermione, someone stopped by for you."
"Really? Who?" Hermione asked, wondering who it could have been.
"Some girl about your age. She said she was starting at the Daily Prophet next month as well and wanted to stop by and meet you. I just can't remember her name. I know I wrote it down on some little bit of parchment. It should be around here somewhere," Molly said as she rifled through a stack of paper.
"Grace?" Hermione asked in wonder.
"Yes! How ever did you know?" Molly asked in wonder.
"Just a lucky guess," Hermione said with a shrug. Ginny gave her a peculiar glance.
"Well, she said she would owl you sometime soon," Molly responded.
"Wonderful," Hermione said as she and Ginny headed up the steps.
After taking a shower and putting on her new daisy outfit, Ginny did her hair up in a small ponytail just like Hermione asked.
"There, you look great, spin around one more time," Ginny requested. Hermione complied, giggling the whole time. "Oh wait, I know just what you need." Ginny ran to her chest of drawers and, after a good 5 minutes of rifling through old clothes, pulled out a yellow ribbon to tie in Hermione's hair. "Ok, I think you're ready. And just in time, it's 6:00 now, do you want me to run down and see if he's here." Hermione nodded her head, suddenly very nervous, while Ginny ran downstairs. A moment later she reappeared in the door to her room. "He's here and he looks adorable. Except he's got…well, you'll see. I just hope you don't change your mind about him." Hermione looked worried but headed out the door and down the steps. At the bottom of the steps, George was standing, looking charming but nervous as hell. When he saw her coming down the steps his eyes lit up and she knew that she'd been right about the outfit, she had been wearing this outfit in his dream too.
"Here, these are for you," George said, pulling a bouquet of broccoli from behind his back. Hermione's smile widened, just when she thought she'd never smiled so brightly in her life. She accepted the broccoli and his arm and headed out the front door with him.
"So where exactly are we going?" She asked him.
"Well at first I wanted to go to the place we went on our first dream date. You know that little sports bar where we watched the Quidditch match?" Hermione's face was blank and she gave a little shake of her head.
"I'm sorry, mine was different…" Hermione said, feeling a little disappointed. Her outfit was not necessarily suited for a sports bar…
"Well that's alright, because I changed my mind anyways. I heard about this little place, it's in London, but I've arranged a portkey. It's called the Raspberry Tearoom. Have you ever heard of it?" Hermione gave him her most winning smile.
"Yeah, I've heard of it," she replied. And with that, Hermione and George walked arm and arm down the walkway of the Burrow and into their future.
A/N: Wow, it's over. Over over over. How weird. Well, I hope some of you stuck it out till the end. Thank you so much all of you for your support and encouragement, especially during those times where I went weeks and months without updating. You have all been such darlings and I adore you all. I am starting a new story about the James and Lily (and some others) though it's set in Harry's time (he's sort of experiencing their lives, you see). It is called "Lily's Pensieve" and I'm posting the first chapter right after posting this one. I encourage you all to check it out. Thanks!