Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter
Mrs. Weasley was fine with the idea of the four friends going camping, provided that they did stay close to the house, as Hermione had suggested earlier. They had all gone to bed early that night, wanting to get some rest before their day full of preparations.
The next morning, Ron awoke early. He rolled over and grumbled when he saw that the clock said 6:30. "Too early..." he mumbled. He rolled over and tried to sleep, but his efforts were fruitless. Finally he just decided to get up and get some breakfast.
When he walked into the kitchen, he discovered that he was not the only one who awoke early. "Morning Hermione. What are you doing up? This is early, even for you."
"I was meaning to ask you the same thing, except that last part. Early for you is before noon," she smiled. "But to answer your question, I was too excited about today to sleep any longer. I love getting ready for things like this, and I'm so excited to camp again."
Ron poured some milk into his cereal. "Yeah, I guess it's the same here. I'm not awake because I didn't try to fall back asleep, though."
"I guessed that, from the messier-than-usual hairstyle you seem to be sporting this morning." Ron ran his fingers through his hair, trying to flatten his red locks. "So, what do you think we should do with all this time to kill before Harry and Ginny wake up?"
"Maybe we should have another flying lesson." Hermione eyed him nervously. "Oh, come on. You did just fine yesterday. You're still here today, aren't you? And all in one piece, how 'bout that."
"Well, fine," gave in Hermione.
"I had an idea for what should be your next step," said Ron, all excited about his plan. "I figure that you aren't ready to go on a broom on your own," Hermione nodded, agreeing wholeheartedly with him, "and I thought that maybe we should tie the ends of two brooms together. We'll take your broom, and tie the back end to my broom, then do the same with the front ends, so it's a sort of double broom, and we'll sit side-by-side. You'll do all the directing and what not, and I'll just be on the broom next to you, ready in case you get nervous or in a bind."
"Ron, that's brilliant!" exclaimed Hermione. Ron's face turned a bright crimson color. "Are you sure that my directions will be heeded by both brooms, though? What if my commands aren't strong enough for me and my broom, and you and your broom?"
"We'll just have to worry about that if it comes to that, I guess," replied Ron. Ron and Hermione walked out into the yard. Ron was in a daze. She thinks my idea is brilliant! Ron was always so impressed with himself after Hermione complimented him like that. It felt great to be thought of as brilliant by the most brilliant witch of his year, and by his brilliant friend.
They each carried a broom, and Ron carried two lengths of rope. He tied the brooms together in the manner that he had described to Hermione, and they mounted the brooms with much shifting around so Hermione's right and Ron's left leg both fit in between the brooms.
"On three, you ready? One…two…three!" Hermione kicked off the ground, and she and Ron went soaring into the sky. The plan was working perfectly. The two brooms took Hermione's suggestions with ease, and Ron's added weight seemed to have no affect. Perhaps because Ron was watching Hermione's movements, and directing his broom in accordance with how she directed hers. They flew higher and higher, until they were as high as the treetops. Hermione was a lot more comfortable than she was yesterday, but she still stuck with gradual turns and slow speeds. Ron couldn't think. His leg was so close to Hermione's, and at the places where they touched his skin was red hot.
What if she notices? He wondered. What if she can tell that I'm this nervous around her? But when he looked at Hermione, he didn't see any hint that she detected his nervousness. She finally did not look that nervous herself. Her eyes were wide and bright at the exhilaration of being up in the air, and she was concentrating so hard on what she was doing, she did not have the capacity to notice how Ron was feeling.
After about an hour they landed and dismounted, Ron regretting the loss of nearness to Hermione. When they got into the house, Harry and Ginny were in the kitchen, just finishing up their breakfast. They four got ready and then headed to the Muggle grocery store to pick out food for their camping trip.
"Now, Ron, I'm warning you now, DO NOT GO OVERBOARD! There will be a lot of food in here, and I'm sure you have the capacity to eat it all, but we don't have the money to buy it for you," said Hermione cautiously.
"Seriously, Hermione, what do you take me for? I can control myself, and I don't eat that much." Harry and Ginny burst out laughing.
"Ron, you're doing better on that first one, although you still can't completely control yourself, but you don't eat that much? That's the biggest lie I've ever heard!" By this time Ginny was laughing so hard that she had tears in her eyes, and Harry could barely get the words out of his mouth. Ron looked to Hermione and saw that she was trying not to laugh behind her hand, but he could see the laugh in her eyes. Even though he knew that the laughing was at his expense, he felt it was worth it to see the laughing in those chocolate brown eyes. Ron thought about what he had said, and started laughing at himself. He knew that he ate more than the other three combined. There was no saying otherwise.
Once the four had some semblance of control over their laughter, they had arrived at the grocery store. Harry and Hermione walked easily through the automatic door, but Ron and Ginny stood outside looking nervous.
"Don't sorry about it. There's a sensor underneath the mat, and when you step on it, the door opens. It stays open until you get off of the mat on the other side of the door," explained Hermione. At this, Ginny walked through tentatively, but Ron stayed outside, not daring to enter until after Ginny had cleared the doorway on the other side, and the door had closed again. He was not going to be seen getting trapped in a Muggle trick door.
Ron forgot all about the door once he looked up at the store. He could not believe the amount of food that was in front of him! Ginny's eyes went wide, then she composed herself and looked like she had been to a grocery store a hundred times before.
"Ron, if you stand there like that, the workers are going to have to come and mop up the drool that you're leaking onto the floor," said Hermione. "You need to act like this is normal for you. These are all Muggles, and this is an average Muggle thing to do. If you goggle like that, they're going to know that something's amiss," added Hermione in a low voice. With that Hermione got a grocery cart and led the group into the store.
They walked through the store, going up and down all of the aisles to make sure that there was nothing that they wanted that they missed. They got to the checkout, and Hermione and Harry started to load the items onto the moving conveyer belt. Ron and Ginny just stared. Ginny tried to hide her amazement, while Ron's mouth was yet again to the floor. "Ron, you can't do that! I'll explain later," hissed Hermione discreetly. They check out and then left the store, each laden with two full grocery bags.
On the walk back, Ron asked about the check-out lane. "What is that thing that you put the groceries on?" he asked.
"That's a conveyor belt. They hit a button underneath the counter, and it moves the groceries nearer to them. It saves a lot of time and energy. Some have sensors, and know to move when there is something placed on them," explained Hermione.
Ron was awed by what Muggles and figured out how to do without magic. Maybe he was a little like his father.
Hermione, Harry, Ron, and Ginny got back to the house and put the groceries on the table. "You're going to eat all of that?" asked Mrs. Weasley. "How long are you going to be gone?"
"We don't know. But we have Ron with us, remember? This food might just last us a day," laughed Hermione. Ron stuck his tongue out at her. After putting the food away, the four started getting their gear together.
Ron and Harry were up in Ron's room, packing. Ron got out his trunk, while Harry got out a large duffle bag. "Ron, what are you doing?" asked Harry.
"I'm packing," replied Ron, like Harry was crazy.
"You don't take trunks camping. They're too big and clunky," replied Harry.
"What else am I supposed to use?" asked Ron ask he put some shirts into his trunk.
"Here, have one of these," said Harry as he tossed Ron another duffle bag. "These are much better for camping. They aren't hard, so when you're not using them, you can fold them up, and they're lighter, too."
"Thanks, Mate," said Ron. "Have you gone camping before?"
"Only once, and it wasn't very fun that time. Dudley and his scout troop went for a weekend once, and I was dragged along. Uncle Vernon did not like the idea of leaving me alone with Aunt Petunia," replied Harry. Ron looked worried.
"Oh, don't worry. The others had loads of fun. It wasn't fun for me because they didn't let me do anything. I'm so excited to be going with my friends and doing everything!" Ron looked relieved. He didn't think that Harry would let him do something that he knew was not fun, but he had still been worried when Harry told Ron how he felt about his first camping experience.
"Just think of it, no adults, just the four of us," said Harry. "Isn't it going to be great?"
"Yeah," agreed Ron. He didn't want to say what he was really thinking. No obligations, no annoyances, just me and Harry and Ginny, and especially Hermione. He was excited and nervous at the prospect of being away with Hermione.
"You done packing yet, Ron?" asked Harry. "If you are, then let's go down and check and see how the girls are doing. You know how long they take with stuff like this." With that the two boys carried their duffle bags to the living room, and then went back upstairs to look in on the girls.
Harry knocked on the door. "Is it safe to come in?" he asked.
"Yes," he heard Ginny call from within. Harry opened the door and saw the girls standing there, their bags in their hands, all packed.
"Wow, we thought that you two would be hardly done!" exclaimed Ron.
"We're going camping, not on a fancy trip," replied Hermione. "You don't need to take as much stuff. It's not like there will be a chance to go to a fancy restaurant or something, you're in the woods!"
The girls carried their bags and placed them with the boys' bags. "Now we need tents," said Hermione. "Do you have any here?"
"Just the one from the Quidditch World Cup, but that's not usable," replied Ginny.
"Why not?" asked Hermione.
"Well, Fred and George decided that they would live in it on week over the holiday break, and when they were done with it, it was completely trashed," explained Ginny.
"What are we going to do then?" asked Harry.
"Never fear…we're here!" The four turned around and saw Fred and George at the top of the steps, carrying two tents.
"Where did you get those?" asked Ginny.
"We made them," said George proudly.
"No, we're not using any tents made by you two," said Ron.
"Don't worry little brother, they are perfectly safe and trap-free. The only thing we did was make them invisible to bears," said Fred.
"Bears?" asked Ron.
"Yes, don't you know that there are bears in dem dere woods?" asked George.
"Yeah, right. There aren't bears near here, they are too many people," said Hermione matter-of-factly.
"All the more sweets to attract the bears," said George. "I would suggest taking these. Besides, what else do you have to use?"
"He's right," said Harry. "We'll take them," he said to Fred and George. The twins looked at each other with mischievous smiles on their faces.
"Have fun," sang Fred and he and George went back up the stairs, leaving the tents near the top. Harry grabbed the tents and put them by their duffle bags. Ron let out a loud yawn.
"Wow, today must have been more tiring than I thought," he said. Harry and Ginny nodded in agreement, and they headed up the stairs. Ron noticed that Hermione hadn't followed, and went back down to see why.
When he got there, he saw Hermione half-sitting and half-lying down on the couch. She was fast asleep. Ron got a pillow, put it on one end of the couch and carefully placed Hermione's head on it. Then he pulled her legs straight out so she was lying down. Then he got a blanket off of a nearby chair and covered her with it, tucking the edges in so none of the cool night air could get in. He hesitated a second, then kissed her on the forehead. "Goodnight Hermione," he whispered, then he headed upstairs.
A/N: I'm sorry that this story is slow going, but I like to put details in. I promise, they'll leave for the camping trip next chapter!