Thought I'd be nice and update quickly. I like this chapter, let me know if you agree! Well thought I'd spotted a continuity mistake on Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire but I was wrong, ah well never mind!

'Harry Potter, Harry Potter, HARRY POTTER!'

'Come on Harry, for Goddness sake!'

lol sorry, couldn't resist! As I said, let me know what you think :)

Sarah XxXxX ;)


Chapter 22

'So what do you want to know then?'

Hermione and Cairo were in the back garden, sat opposite each other on the picnic bench, drinks in hand.

'Ok then, rumour one: Harry Potter locked you in the girl's bathroom with a troll. True or false?'

Hermione laughed, this was going to be interesting.

'True.'

'You have got to be kidding!'

'Afraid not, him and Ron saw the troll wandering in there so thought it would be a good idea to lock it in, which in all fairness was a great idea, lock it in somewhere where there was no one for it to harm. Slight problem though; I was in there and had been for most of the afternoon, so it had me to play with!'

'How in Merlin's name did you get out?'

'Ah, well you see, when they heard me scream they realised I was there, so they came running in and tried to distract it from me, then Ron levitated it's club above it's head and made it fall on it's skull so it got knocked out.'

'Wow, you were pretty lucky it didn't hurt any of you.'

'Yeah we were.'

She looked down at the bench she was sat on. Cairo took a drink from his glass; Hermione looked up and did the same.

'Right then, next up…when you, Harry and Ron went to get the Philosophers stone you drank a slow working poison so Harry could carry on and finish the job at hand leaving you slowly dying but with enough strength to go and get help.'

'Please tell me that wasn't something a lot of people believed!'

'So not true then.'

'No, I'm afraid that's false. We did go after the Philosophers stone and I did drink a potion but it wasn't a slow working poison, what did people take me for? I might have been twelve and naïve but I wasn't stupid!'

Cairo laughed.

'So what did happen then?'

'Well, Ron had just played us across the chessboard, Merlin knows how he did it, he was amazing, but he'd had to sacrifice himself so we could finish and get through. Anyway Harry and I finished the game and went through to the next room. We had to figure out a logic puzzle to find the potion, which would take you through the black flames at the door. A couple of them were harmless, I think three were poison, one let you through the flames to the next challenge and one sent you back through the flames at the door you had just come through. I worked out which two those were, but there wasn't enough to send us both forward. So Harry took that one, and I took the one that sent you back to help Ron and get a message to Dumbledore.'

'Merlin! I think the truth's stranger than the rumour!'

'Well they say fact is stranger than fiction,' she swirled the remaining half of her drink around, washing the bubbles off the sides, 'what's next?' she raised the glass to her mouth and drank.

'Well, there was the one that said McGonagal found you and Viktor Krum in a compromising situation in the Broom cupboard outside the Great Hall,' he said very fast.

Hermione tried to gasp at the information, but instead inhaled her Butterbeer and started to choke. She turned away from the table and leant over coughing trying to rid her lungs of the liquid. Cairo clapped her on the back trying to help. After a minute she sat back up, her eyes watering and red in the face.

'What?' she managed to ask through her coughs. 'Who the hell,' she coughed again, 'told you that?'

'Well I can't reveal my sources now can I?'

'When it's something like that you bloody well can! Who was it?' She was trying to wipe away the tears that had made an untimely entry to the world, without smudging her eyeliner or mascara.

'Nope, 'fraid not, I have a feeling you would damage them and I would feel awful if that happened. I take it from your reaction it's not true!'

'Err no! The thought of being caught in a broom cupboard by McGonagal is terrifying enough, never mind in a 'compromising situation'!'

Cairo laughed.

'Yeah, I suppose it would be,' he looked at Hermione still wiping her face of her tears. There was one under her cheekbone she had missed. 'Here,' he added quietly, 'you missed one,' He reached forward and wiped it off her cheek with his thumb, 'got it,' he said quietly.

'Thanks,' Hermione replied, aware that the space between them had been reduced slightly. She picked up her glass and swilled it again, 'I'll try this again.'

Cairo smiled and she took a drink from her glass. As she raised her head towards the sky she saw it was a beautifully clear night and she could see the stars high above her. She tilted her head to the left and picked out Orion from the network of stars. She smiled, remembering something Ron had said to her and Harry.

'What are you smiling at?' Cairo asked when he noticed the look on her face.

'Nothing really,' she replied, not taking her gaze off the constellation, 'just something Ron said about him, Harry and I.'

'What did he say?'

'Well, can you see Orion?' she asked him pointing to the stars above her.

'Yep,' he replied.

'Well he once said that the three of us were like the three stars of Orion's belt: Quite good separately, better as a three together, but part of something so formidable that we might never understand it fully. It's strange really; I think that's when I realised properly how I felt about him.'

Cairo didn't say anything for a minute; he looked at the bench in front of him pondering his dilemma. He looked back at the stars.

'My favourite's Cassiopeia, it's really simple and it's the shape of a W which is the first letter of my middle name. Let me just find it. Hang on, which way's north?'

'I have no idea, oh, no wait,' she took her wand out of her robes, 'point me,' she said. The wand spun round on her hand and pointed towards the house. 'That way,' her arm snapped out towards the building.

Cairo stood on the bench, looked at Orion and then north.

'There it is look,' he pointed at the constellation, 'do you see it?'

'I do, I see what you mean, it's definitely a W,' Cairo jumped off the bench and sat down hard on it. The two glasses wobbled.

'Careful,' Hermione said, 'so what's your middle name?'

'Wayne,' Cairo replied, 'it was my mum's brother's name, he died before I was born, apparently, when I was born, I had the same hair he had when he was born, so I was named after him, in a sense.'

'Was he a wizard?'

'No, my mum was muggle born like you, he was fifteen when he died, got hit by a car, my mum was seventeen and at Hogwarts. I think it hit her really hard.'

'I can't even imagine what that must have been like.'

'She regretted not telling her how much he meant to her, I suppose it's not really cool is it? Telling your teenage brother how much you love him and think of him. People don't say things they should though, do they? They keep things inside so they don't lose face, or because they think they'll make things awkward if they do.'

Hermione didn't reply, the burning sensation she got in her stomach when she thought about the times she should have told Ron how she felt about him, but didn't, crept through her. Aided by the alcohol she had drunk that night, it felt ten times worse.

'Do you think people should just tell others how they feel, regardless of what might happen?' asked Cairo.

'Yes,' replied Hermione without any hesitation: that was something she wasn't going to disagree with. A sudden longing for Ron swept through her. She wanted to hold him, she wanted him to hold her and tell her he'd be with her forever, she wanted to feel his fingers run through her hair and feel his lips on hers. She sighed deeply and closed her eyes. She heard Cairo's voice from a long way off, deeply immersed in her own thoughts.

'I've wondered whether or not to tell you this Hermione.'

'I…I've always felt embarrassed saying stuff like this…but at the minute there's nothing more important than me telling you how I feel,' she heard Ron saying to her, his blue eyes staring into hers.

'I really like you Hermione and I want you to know that I think what I'm feeling is growing into something more.'

'I've fallen in love with you Hermione Granger and I can't see there being anything that's gonna change that,' she smiled as he said it to her, finally hearing the words she had been longing him to say to her for weeks. He leant forwards towards her and kissed her, she tingled remembering how it felt to kiss him. She leaned into the kiss and then opened her eyes. Two piercing eyes were looking back at her, but there was something wrong, they weren't blue, they were brown.

Her memories fade instantly as the realisation where she is, who she was with and who she was kissing hits her. She pulled back from Cairo sharply and gasped realising what had just happened. She jumped up from the bench.

'Shit! No, that wasn't…shit!'

'Hermione what's wrong?' Cairo asked standing up and walking towards her. Hermione walked backwards away from him.

'What's wrong? Do you even have to ask that question? SHIT!'

'Hermion-'

'Don't Cairo, I have to leave, I…I have to go.'

'Hermione wait!'

His pleas were in vain; she turned on the spot and disapparated no more than a metre in front of him.

'Bollocks!' he shouted to the night sky. He walked back to the bench and landed hard on it, the force this time knocking over his glass, 'well done Cai, that's one friendship you've seen the last of.' He picked up the fallen glass and threw it onto the pavement, smashing it into hundreds of pieces. He sat alone outside for the next ten minutes, wondering what he should do. When he returned to the house there were only a few people left, mainly couples taking up the sofa and chairs kissing and gazing longingly into each other's eyes, including Harry and Ginny. They were two people he did not want to talk to.

The host of the party slipped quickly upstairs unnoticed by anyone and retired to bed, although it was a long time before he fell asleep.