I try and be organised and not leave things till the last minute, but when I do, everything else out of my control (goes wrong) you can imagine (those) weren't the words I've been using all day! Anyway, three days till I finish my degree...and then I'm seeing Take That on Monday night...Oh yes! Absolutely marvelous
Back to the story and less of my ramblings, sorry it was a while...for me anyway - queen of fast updates - it's here at last. Think it's starting to wind up now to the end, and we'll all see whether Ron will wake up or not! ;)
Cheers, Step ;)..ooo please R&R!
Chapter 32
There was a loud ringing in her head but Hermione didn't know where it was coming from or what it was. She slowly opened her eyes and realised that the phone was ringing in the lounge, all the way downstairs. She dragged herself out of bed and stumbled towards her door as she tried to wake up. As she reached the bottom of the stairs it clicked onto their answer phone message, well, Hermione's answer phone message, Harry had refused to have anything to do with the recording of it so it had been down to her.
"Hello, we're sorry but we can't come to the phone right now, but if you leave a message then we'll get back to you."
It was a very brief message and she had purposely left their names out of it. She didn't know why, but if someone was hoping to get confirmation that the famous Harry Potter, and not quite so famous Hermione Granger lived at the house they were ringing, they were going to be disappointed.
'Hermione it's your mum, I was just wondering if you were coming round to see us today, your Aunty Christine and Uncle Tony are coming round and they wanted to see you. If you could give us a ring when you get this, we haven't heard-'
'I'm here mum,' Hermione said, having finally reached the phone and picked it up, 'sorry, I was asleep.'
'Oh I'm sorry dear, I thought you'd be awake.'
'Mum, it's barely nine o'clock and it's Sunday!'
'Yes well, never mind. How much of my message did you hear?'
Hermione slumped down on the sofa, resisting the urge to lie down, she had a feeling she would want to close her eyes, and this would greatly increase the chance of her falling asleep whilst talking to her mum, which wouldn't go down well at all.
'Erm…all of it I think. Aunty Christine is coming round and you wanted to know if I was doing the same.'
'Yes I think that was all of it.'
'Is Rachel coming too?' Hermione asked with a grimace on her face. Rachel was Hermione's cousin and was the world's biggest show off. What made things worse was she was as intelligent as Hermione – well no, she wasn't, but Rachel thought she was, and seemed to think that they were in competition for the highest grades and the best social life.
'Yes she is, she thought she'd come round to see us all before she went back to university.'
'Oh Merlin above! I'm going to have to endure all her stories about how wonderful her first year of uni was aren't I?' Hermione groaned. Her mum laughed quietly,
'Yes I'm afraid you might have to, and you'll have to stop praying to Merlin when they're here too!'
'Oh, I'm so going to forget! What am I going to say when they ask me about uni, hang on, we did tell them that's where I went didn't we.'
'Erm yes…yes we did…'
Hermione sensed her mum was keeping something back from her, 'Mum what aren't you telling me?'
'Well…I might have gone a bit over the top when I was telling Christine about your university life.'
Hermione heard someone moving behind her, she twisted round and saw Harry walk to the sofa, holding the enchanted coin with raised eyebrows as he did so. Momentarily forgetting she was on the phone to her mum she stood up and moved in front of Harry.
'Harry what is it?' she asked him. She had the strangest feeling inside of her, how could she be worrying about what her cousin thought of her after everything that had happened last night, and everything she had yet to tell her parents, if she was going to at all.
'Malfoy's sent us another message. It's nothing major, just thought you should know. Carry on talking.'
'Hermione what's wrong?' she heard her mum ask in her ear.
'Nothing's wrong mum, can I call you back in about ten minutes, I just have to sort something out.'
'Are you sure nothing's wrong Hermione?'
'Yes mum I'm sure, I'll phone you back soon.'
'Ok then, love you.'
'Love you too mum.'
She hung up the phone and dropped it on the sofa.
'I said you could carry on taking, it really isn't anything major,' Harry said trying to stifle a yawn.
'I don't care, what does it say?'
'It says, "Can't meet in Hgsmd" – I'm presuming he means Hogsmeade – "Aurors around, may have been spotted.'
'Oh he would get spotted now wouldn't he. Did he say anything else?' Hermione asked.
'No. You can't really get much more around the edge of a coin, H.'
'Ok, well do we need to send one back?'
'Saying what? We haven't decided how we're going to do things yet so it would be pointless until we have.'
'Yeah I suppose, are we doing that later on?'
'Well that's what we said last night before you…'
'Hid away in the attic.'
'That's the one.'
'Ok, and there was me worrying about seeing my cousin this afternoon!'
'You're cousin…Rachel?'
'Yeah that's the one. Want to come?'
'From what you've told me about her, no thanks.'
'I don't blame you!'
Hermione sat back down on the sofa, moving the phone before she sat on it and gazed at nothing in particular.
'Harry, do you think I should tell my parents what's going on with Ron?'
'Oh er…I dunno Hermione.'
'I suppose it would be hypocritical if I do, I asked Ginny not to tell Molly or Arthur.'
'It's different though isn't it. I mean your parents aren't exactly going to bump into Rufus Scrimgeour any time soon are they?'
'Well no, but still. Anyway on a totally different point, they'd probably worry if I told them, and I probably wouldn't get chance to tell them today seeing as though I have to make up lots of very interesting stories about my imaginary life at university to keep my cousin happy.'
'They still don't know you're a witch then?'
'Goodness no! But then again I would love to see the smile on Rachel's face if I got to tell her. That is something she wouldn't be able to tell me she had done first, or better, or with better grades.'
Harry chuckled.
'She can't have got better grades than you Hermione, I know you didn't exactly study the same subjects these last few years but surely they're comparable. Just tell her you got top grades in everything you took. It's the truth at least.'
'Well not quite.'
'You're going to be annoyed about that one little 'E' for the rest of your life aren't you?'
'Would you think I was strange if I said yes?'
'If it was anyone else then yes, I probably would but because it's you…no!'
'I'm not exactly sure how to take that Harry.'
Harry gave her a cheeky grin, but then turned round when he heard movement behind them. Ginny came into the lounge with a huge glass of water and sat down next to Harry on the sofa.
'Water Gin?' he asked, putting his arm around her and kissing her forehead. 'Where's your usual coffee?'
'I need to be able to drink something fast. I don't think I realised how much Hagrid actually gave me to drink last night and I'm gasping!'
'Headache?' Hermione asked.
'No no, nothing like that just gasping for some water.'
She turned and sat cross-legged on the three seater facing Harry and Hermione. 'So, I believe we were going to talk about what to do next, this morning weren't we?'
'Yes we were,' Hermione replied.
'Well, I realised something when I woke up. Us trainee Healers have got to go into St. Mungo's tomorrow and decide which of the wards we would like to be on for the first of our many two week placements.'
'Already?' Hermione asked, 'you've only been training since the end of July!'
'I know, they don't actually take place until the new year but we look at one ward every week and that takes a while and then we have to have 'deciding time' so they start them now. Anyway my point was, around eleven o'clock there's going to be groups of people walking around the wards, which means any Healers who are on duty might be a bit more distracted than they usually would be. So, it might be an ideal opportunity to get Malfoy in there, with the help of your invisibility cloak of course.'
She fell silent, Harry and Hermione looked at her and then at each other.
'That could work,' Harry said.
'It's quite short notice though,' Hermione said, trying desperately hard not to think that all her prayers could be answered at precisely eleven o'clock tomorrow, give or take a few minutes.
'Well I doubt Malfoy's got many pressing engagements and remember how he was with the last meeting, he brought it forward to the next night.'
'That's true,' Harry agreed, 'well, we won't know anything until we change the coin. Where did I leave it?'
'And you wondered why Hermione wanted to be the only one who touched it!' Ginny said, exasperated at the thought that Harry had mislaid it.
'All right, all right, keep your hair on! I put it on the coffee table. Look it's there.' He reached over and picked the coin off the low table. He handed it to Hermione silently.
'Are we meeting him somewhere first?' she asked.
'Do you mean do I want him to be able to search him so he doesn't have his wand?'
'Well, yeah I do.'
'Well he's got to have a wand at some point so there doesn't seem much point. Plus…as much as I hate to say it, it might help us, if we showed him we trusted him…a little. It goes against everything my head's telling me to do but never mind.'
'I suppose!' Hermione mumbled.
'Oh! I almost forgot, I thought of something else. Do we have all three wand cores? I mean between the three of us, we've only got two 'cause mine and yours are the same aren't they Hermione.'
'Yes they are, that's typical. Do you think Malfoy's will be unicorn hair?'
'I dunno, you'll have to ask him on the coin?' Harry said.
'If it isn't…could we use…Ron's wand. His is unicorn hair.'
'Erm, yeah I suppose we could,' Ginny replied, 'I'd have to get it from home and hope mum doesn't notice it's disappeared.'
'Is she likely to?'
'Probably not, she doesn't go into his room as much anymore, just every few days to make sure it's still as clean as she'd like it to be. I could always put one of Fred and George's fake wands in its place, even if she moves it she's not going to wave it around so it won't change…hopefully.'
'Right well at least we know we've got all three cores, regardless of what Malfoy's is,' Hermione said, a small amount of relief showing on her face. 'That's one less thing to worry about, we don't have to ask him that then, one less thing to try and fit on the edge of a coin!'
'But we still have to get him there unseen, which means you'll have to meet him somewhere to give him the cloak,' Ginny reminded them.
'Ok ok, here's a plan. I'll meet him in Knockturn Alley and give him the cloak, then we apparate straight to St. Mungo's so I don't have to go back into Diagon Alley and face any awkward questions.'
'Harry you can't go down there!' Hermione exclaimed.
'Why not? It's not exactly busy down there anymore is it?'
'Yeah but still,' Ginny said in protest, 'I'm not too keen on the idea either. How about…'
'How about what?' Hermione asked calmly.
'How about you bring him here first?'
