Wow...you bring Malfoy into things and people get excited! lol Thanks for the reviews peeps, marvelous! Keep them coming. I'll put the next one up pretty much straight away 'cause they follow on and I'm really nice like thathe he :D
Cheers, Step XxXxX ;)
Chapter 25
Hermione reappeared in the landing just outside her bedroom, having remembered that her bedroom floor was presently showered in shards of glass. She looked at her floor, wondering whether or not the bulb was reparable with magic, the glass being in hundreds of pieces in various shoes and wedged in cracks in the hardwood floor, and the filament and fitting still six feet in the air, attached to the ceiling.
She was wary of mixing magic with electricity but the light was off and it wasn't as if she needed to fix any of the electrical parts, unless, she thought, the filament counts as electrical. She decided to give it a go, she knew they didn't have any spare bulbs in the house.
'Carefully Hermione,' she said aloud cautiously.
She waved her wand and concentrated, shutting her eyes as she did so and then opened them, raising her gaze to the ceiling. The bulb had reformed in the shade and looked to be perfectly in tact.
'Well the only way to know is to switch the light on!' she said, again talking to herself. She stepped one pace forward so she was further in the room and flicked the switch on the wall, in a much more controlled manner than she had the last time she tried.
The light flickered above her and came on as if nothing had happened. Hermione sighed, thankful her room hadn't been showered in sparks and glass for a second time.
She walked into her room and heard footsteps up the stairs. She sighed deeply knowing it was time to answer questions she didn't particularly want to. There was always the chance that Harry didn't have a clue about what had actually happened. He and Ginny might just think she went somewhere else, to someone else's house, Colin's maybe, he was a good friend. But then again, she thought, you would have told them where you were going. You are not one for disappearing acts Hermione.
She heard the footsteps move across the landing and knew that she would soon be discovered.
'HERMIONE!' Ginny shouted, 'where the hell have you been?'
Hermione turned towards her friend, and noticed the mix of emotions fighting for centre stage on her face. Mild anger won, even though she tried to hide it.
'I err…well I-'
'GINNY! Who are you talk-. Is Hermione there?' Harry called up the stairs.
'Yes Harry, I'm here,' replied Hermione, calmly but loudly.
Harry thundered up the stairs, ran into Hermione's room and practically shoulder barged Ginny out of the way to envelop Hermione in a huge hug.
He pulled away from her and looked into her eyes.
'Promise me you won't do that again, we've been scared shitless not having a clue where you were. Another couple of hours and I'd've had the whole Auror office searching for you.'
'I'm sorry Harry, and I'm sorry Ginny, I didn't mean to worry you both. I just needed some space. I need to tell you a few things…I don't know where to start really.
'How about you tell us why Cairo thought he could kiss you first, that seems like a good idea,' Ginny demanded.
Hermione is slightly taken aback by her comment but then realised it had been foolish to think her and Harry wouldn't know what had happened. It was a party after all, anyone could have seen them.
'Well, yes…I suppose I could start there, erm, well…we err…'
Ginny sighed irritably, Harry turned around and looked at her silently asking Ginny to give Hermione a break.
Hermione shivered, the rain that had caught her before she took shelter making its presence known.
'Erm well…'
'Hermione why don't you get into something warmer and I'll make you a hot drink. Then we can talk downstairs. How's that sound?'
Hermione smiled, glad of Harry's kindness.
'Yeah, that would be good Harry, thanks. I'll be down in a minute.'
Harry turned and walked out of the room taking Ginny by the hand as he did so. He closed the door behind them and Hermione heard him whisper loudly to Ginny as they walked across the landing and down the stairs.
Hermione undressed and changed into her pyjamas. She rooted in her wardrobe for her towelling robe, took it outrmioHermione and pulled it on. She didn't know why but for some reason it gave her a huge amount of comfort. She pulled her slippers on and took her wand off her bed. Her hair was still damp so she performed a drying charm on it. She made her way downstairs and walked into the kitchen.
Ginny was leant against the fridge in the corner of the room and Harry was sat at the table, his hands wrapped around his favourite mug. Hermione spotted a full mug in the place opposite Harry and walked across to the seat and sat down. He had made her hot chocolate, with marshmallows floating and melting on the top. Hermione smiled.
'Thanks Harry.'
'That's ok.'
She blew on the drink cooling it and took a sip, feeling it run down her throat and into her stomach. Instantly she felt a little better and a little stronger to tell her tale.
'Ginny, aren't you going to sit down?' Hermione asked cautiously.
'No, I'm fine here,' she replied, abruptly.
'Oh ok.' Hermione took another sip of her drink, again gaining a little strength from it.
'Right…well…I don't know where to start really. I'll get the most obvious issue out the way, 'cause there's a more pressing one to deal with after that. It's probably easier if you tell me what you were told, or figured out from people.'
Harry went to answer, but Ginny beat him to it.
'You disappeared from the party and we spent quite a while looking for you at the house, Natalia told me she had seen you and Cairo having words and said she guessed you apparated 'cause you were there one minute and then not the next, so Harry came back here and found your light bulb in bits and your dress robes strewn across the bathroom floor. When he arrived back at the house we got the truth out of Cairo.'
She stopped for air, but Hermione cut in.
'What did he say to you?' she was stung by Ginny's tone and she already knew the answer to the question she had just asked, but the more Ginny said, the more Hermione would learn about just how upset and angry Ginny was. Like her blue-eyed brother, Ginny was not one to easily hide her hurt or upset.
'He said he'd kissed you, and then you did your disappearing act!' she spat.
Hermione sighed and looked up at Harry. He was staring resolutely into his mug, avoiding the confrontation.
'Ok, well that's true, he did.'
'Why did he thinks he could kiss you?' Ginny demanded.
'I…I don't know really. We were talking-'
'About what?' Ginny interrupted.
'Ginny! Let her speak! And calm down, come here and sit down.' Harry said calmly but firmly. Ginny glared at him and ignored his request for her to sit down.
'Hermione, just tell us what happened from the beginning. We promise we won't interrupt.'
Hermione smiled slightly at Harry.
'Well, we went outside for a chat. It was hot inside and the music was loud so we couldn't hear ourselves think. I'd promised to tell him whether the rumours about you, Ron and I from school were true or not. We'd been talking at work and he said something about breaking the rules, and I said I'd tell him what he did was wrong but with what we got up to I'd be a hypocrite if I did. So he asked me a few things and we got talking about other stuff, which led onto the constellations. I told him about what Ron had said about Orion's belt. Do you remember?' she asked Harry.
He smiled, 'Yeah I remember. Not bad on our own, pretty damn good together, but part of something so huge we'll never fully understand it.'
'Yeah that's the one. Well, after that I told him that's when I realised how I felt about Ron. Cairo went quiet, but then he started talking about how Cassiopeia was his favourite constellation because it was shaped like W, and that was the first letter of his middle name, which was given to him in memory of his mum's brother who died when he was fifteen.
'He started talking about how it had hit her hard because she thought he was great but she never told him how much she admired and loved him. He asked me if I thought people should tell other people how they felt about them. Well I was hardly gonna say no, was I? Not after everything that's happened. So I told him yes, simple as that. As soon as I started thinking about Ron, I couldn't stop. I imagined holding him, and talking to him like we did the night before the final battle.
'I was replaying the whole thing in my head, the words he said to me and the way he kissed me afterwards. I could hear Cairo talking but I wasn't listening, bit rude really considering, but I just couldn't stop thinking about Ron. Anyway, the next thing I knew I realised Cairo was kissing me. As soon as I realised it was him and not Ron I freaked out a bit and left. That's what happened and I swear it's the truth.'
She sighed and waited for a response form either Ginny or Harry.
'He just kissed you! What did he say before hand?' Ginny demanded.
'I don't know really, I think he was saying that he liked me a lot but he thought what he was feeling was turning into something more,' she ended the sentence in a mumble, feeling embarrassed at saying the words.
'I told you didn't I? I knew he liked you!'
'So what if he does! I didn't do anything to encourage this Ginny, surely you know I wouldn't do that?'
Ginny glared at Hermione, hurting for her brother, determined to defend him and fight the battles he couldn't.
'Ginny, you know how I feel about Ron. I'm in love with him for God's sake! Just because Cairo apparently has a crush on me doesn't change anything!' her voice was raised but she calmed down a little before continuing, 'I thought you knew me better than that,' she said, a trace of bitterness in her voice.
Ginny looked up at Hermione, she knew she was telling the truth, she could see the hurt she was feeling about Ron every time she visited him and found him in exactly the same position she left him in.
'I know,' she said in a whisper, 'I know you love him, I just…'
'Need to defend him like any sister would,' Hermione said, finishing her sentence for her, 'I understand that Ginny, but you know me, if I had realised he felt that way, I would never have let things pan out the way they did, or at the very least I would have kept my eyes open whilst I was daydreaming!'
Ginny smiled, most hostility forgotten. She walked over to the table and sat down in the empty seat.
'Ok, I'm sorry I jumped to conclusions.'
'That's ok, I understand how things must have seemed.'
Hermione took a drink from her mug and chewed on the marshmallow that had yet to melt.
'So where did you disappear to Hermione? That really had us worried. I only just missed you at St. Mungo's.'
'That was you?'
'What was me?'
'The shadow that made me panic and leave!'
'Oh, yeah I suppose it was.'
'How did you get out?' Ginny asked, 'There's anti-apparation wards on the hospital at night.'
'Yeah I know. I was just so determined to get through to see Ron, I just barged my way through them. I was pretty upset, you saw the light bulb in my room.'
'Shattered all over the floor. Yeah we saw it.'
'Yes well, it's not something I'm proud of. I generally don't like making things explode, but apparently the extra energy makes breaking through anti-apparation wards much easier.'
'So where did you end up then?' Harry asked.
'Hogsmeade, I just needed to get away, but I met someone who we haven't seen in a long time.'
'Who the hell was in Hogsmeade at two in the morning?' Harry asked.
'Malfoy,' she replied, 'that's who.'
