Disclaimer: I don't own the characters or places of Harry Potter and am not making money off of this.

Author's Note: Happy Valentine's Day! You know what's sad? We didn't do this in school! I thought we were, but…. Sniff. I'm fine now. Sort of.

Yes, I know that Harry isn't really in character; he is a little immodest here.

Oh right. I'm not really sure when they have Charms, but in this fic, they have it now.

BUT ONTO THE HERMIONE/RON GOODNESS!

Sorry… one last note. This shall be the second-to-last chapter of H/R.

Hermione was flustered. She didn't like Harry! She didn't! She liked red hair… especially on tall, lanky, freckly boys. In other words, she liked Ron. But Ron thought she liked Harry.

So Hermione had to engage in the deadliest of sports, the one that breaks both the mind and the soul.

Flirting.

Hermione had hoped she would never have to win back a boy through this dangerous way, but there was a war going on. The Order of the Phoenix took risks every day. Why couldn't she?

True, these were not the same settings, but Hermione had heard Lavender and Parvati tell many a tale of girls breaking sobbing and going mad from the exhaustion of flirting. Of course, they did like to exaggerate.

"R-" Hermione started, but then saw a picture of Rowena Ravenclaw. "Rowena!"

"What do you want?" Ron said with a note of disdain in his voice. He had heard Hermione and turned around.

Hermione jabbed her finger at a classroom and tried to smile seductively. It felt horribly fake, like she was wearing a mask. She tried looking up at him- he was much taller than her- and tilting her head a little bit, but he looked at her rather oddly.

"I thought you had Arithmancy!" he said confusedly.

Hermione kept on walking, but looked back at him for just a second. When their eyes met, she quickly tore them apart. She shook her head, figuring that if she wasn't facing Ron, the charm wouldn't think that she was communicating with him.

Ron followed her, still looking perplexed.

"But we're going the long way!" he protested as they both climbed the stairs that were to Hermione's right.

She glared; longer was better. There was more time to refine her flirting skills.

What else can I do? Hermione thought desperately. She had read a few magazines for girls during the summers and before she had gone to Hogwarts and they had had tips for flirting. Smile big, one had said. Move your hips a little when you walk, another one had said. She decided to do the latter.

Her hips starting moving with each step, but was it the right way? Did it look stupid? Did she look stupid?

She started walking faster, so Ron would catch up with her. It worked.

"So are you going to tell Harry?" said Ron abruptly.

Hermione felt a pained look evolve on her face. She hoped Ron would take it as though she didn't like to talk about Harry.

"Right. So you want me to tell him?" Ron fake-whispered.

A glare replaced the pained look.

"Did you fancy anyone else?" A thoughtful look came over his face. "Does Vicky know?"
Ron spat out the name of the "enemy". It was still an extremely touchy subject between Hermione and Ron.

Keeping the tradition, Hermione's glare deepened. She could almost feel her hair getting bushier with anger. Why did he have to bring it up? Why?

Hermione stalked away, foregoing the hips entirely. If Ron was going to be such and idiot, she just wouldn't even try to flirt.

Instead of sitting by Harry and Ron like she usually did, Hermione made the choice to sit by Lavender and Parvait, who, by some luck, had the same Charms class as she did. When Hermione had finished and the other two didn't feel like working anymore, they discussed what had happened.

"So then he brought up Viktor Krum?" Parvati said in a hushed voice, awed.

"Yes, he did," Hermione whispered. She had been over this at least five times.

"And he still thinks that you like Harry?" Lavender whispered forgetting to be mute to Hermione.

"Yes. He does," said Hermione through clenched teeth.

"Well, what are you going to do?" Lavender inquired with feigned wonder.

"You are the ones supposed to be helping me," Hermione said, loosing her patience.

"There's not really much we can do!" Parvati consoled Hermione. "But you could just ignore Harry…"

"Yes, but I'm already doing that!" Hermione nearly yelled. Professor Flitwick looked over at them disapprovingly. Hermione felt ashamed; teachers never yelled at her!

"I guess you'll just have to figure it out on your own…" Lavender said airily.

Hermione shot a harsh look at Lavender. Parvati rolled her eyes. She thought the whole fight between Lavender and Parvati was rather stupid. Lavender had been dumped plenty of times and all of those boys were with somebody else! She hadn't made a big deal of it until Ron and Hermione.

"For homework, write an essay-no less than three rolls of parchment- about…" Hermione studiously copied down every word that Flitwick said into a homework planner. It was silent, unlike Harry and Ron's.

Stupid Ron.

Stupid Harry.

Hermione went down the Common Room for her free period. She had one between Charms and Ancient Runes. She studied furiously and cursed Ron at the same time. She could multi-task very well.

But then Ron and Harry came down; their class had been let out early. Hermione sighed heavily. This would be fun.

The boys took their usual seats- right by Hermione. She could eavesdrop on their conversation perfectly while doing her homework!

"But seriously mate," Ron was saying fervently to Harry. "She said…"

Oh great. Ron was talking about her supposed crush on Harry.

Harry's eyes grew wide. "No way!" he said and looked around.

"Yeah. Well, she didn't actually say it but-"

"Of course not, her heart is still pink, isn't it?" Harry said sarcastically.

"she just blushed when I said your name," Ron finished loudly. Apparantely, blushing meant something very deep to him. Harry was a little skeptical. Good for him.

"But, Hermione wouldn't just admit it," he reasoned.

"Keep your voice down!" Ron warned.

"She didn't admit it. She blushed!" Ron said crazily, as if turning red was the worst thing you could do in the world.

"But-" Harry said, then stopped himself. He didn't know girls any better than Ron did. Well, he had kissed a crying girl before… But look at how that turned out!

Hermione got up suddenly to go to Ancient Runes. Honestly, Harry and Ron pretending to know what girls thought! Ron didn't even know what his thoughts meant!

She snorted to herself while carrying her extremely heavy textbooks. Every single one of them- and she needed four for Ancient Runes- was at least eight hundred pages! However, it did make a good way to build muscle.

And at least Ancient Runes was a class without stupid Ron in it.

Stupid. Stupid. Stupid, Ron.

He could have carried the books without any problem, But he would have gloated about it. Or was it her that would have gloated about carrying them?

She wasn't sure.