What If Lavender Had Something to Do With It?

She's not here in person but I had a sudden thought which I decided to turn into a fanfiction. Based on an idea from cool-people-suck! Thank you!

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.

Harry, Ron and Hermione were tired. Everyone else was dancing, but they really couldn't be bothered. Bill and Fleur were at the front of the hall.

"That girl over there - doesn't she look like Lavender?" Harry said suddenly, indicating a teenage girl with Lavender's hair and similar eyes.

"That's my Mum's friend's daughter."

"Oh, good."

Hermione was looking annoyed. Harry knew why.

"Should we - go outside?" he suggested to her. She nodded.

"I'm too hot in here. Come on."

She stood up, without looking at Ron, and marched outside. Ron shrugged at Harry and followed suit.

It was still quite light outside. There were a few benches around, but nobody was on them. They were alone. Ron sat down and yawned.

"I'm so tired! When are we going home?"

Hermione said nothing, wandering around slowly. Harry checked his watch.

"Not for a while yet, I suppose. Why do you want to go, anyway? It'll just mean we're going away tomorrow. I want to have all the fun I possibly can."

"I don't dance," Ron said stubbornly, "I'd rather play quidditch."

"Yeah. That sounds like a really romantic wedding, doesn't it? Ceremony and a nice, mucky game of quidditch in dress robes."

Ron scowled.

"Hermione, where are you going?" he asked. Hermione turned round.

"Nowhere."

"What's up with you?"

Hermione chose to ignore him, turning back to the bush she was examining.

Harry caught Ron's eye. He mouthed one word and Ron understood immediately.

A thought occured to Harry: Hermione still didn't know why Ron had been out with Lavender. She thought he'd actually fancied her!

He snorted.

"Hermione?" Ron said quietly.

"What?"

"Why don't you sit down?"

"I'm fine here."

Harry sat beside Ron.

"Will you sit down now?"

Hermione looked over at them, saw Harry, and sighed. She settled herself beside him, but avoided looking at Ron.

Ron seemed annoyed by this. He cleared his throat.

"Is - erm - is this because of that girl who looked like Lavender?" he said.

Harry shook his head. Ron could be unbelievably silly.

Hermione sighed again, but still didn't say anything. Ron did.

"You know why I went out with her?"

Hermione had to talk sooner or later - she decided on sooner.

"Erm -" she feigned deep thought, "Maybe because you fancied her?"

Ron shook his head. Hermione's eyes became wide.

"You loved her?"

"Eurgh! I mean, no, of course not! I mean that - no - I mean - I only went out with her - I kissed her and all that - erm - well, I did it because -" Ron gulped and blurted out quickly and loudly, "Becauseginnytoldmeyousnoggedkrum."

"Erm - what?"

Ron took another gulp before slowing down, forcibly reminding Harry of the humiliating time he'd asked Cho to the Yule Ball, "B- because Ginny told me you s- snogged Krum."

Harry knew it would be best to leave, but he also knew he's look a bit strange. He stood up and pretended to be fascinated by a bird tweeting at the top of a tree like a twilight wedding bell.

After a long silence, he heard Hermione speak.

"But - why would you care so much about that? Why does that make you want to kiss Lavender?"

"Well - because - because Ginny had a go at me, she said I'd never snogged anyone before."

"There's something else, isn't there?"

Hermione may be intelligent, but you couldn't really give her much credit. It was sort of obvious, after all.

"Yeah. I suppose so."

Harry sank onto the arm of the bench. He knew he should leave them alone, but another, much bigger part of him wanted to stay and listen to what Ron had to say for himself.

"I - I needed to - I mean wanted - t- to show you that I - I couldn't care less. You know, about you and Krum."

Harry had to bite his fist. He was overcome with laughter as he bent down, trying to make it look as if he was tying his shoelace. Ron sounded so pathetic.

He almost fell onto the bench and quickly sat on it to excuse his strange behaviour. He could feel Ron and Hermione looking at him.

"Sorry," he said quickly, not looking at them.

Ron was going to say it any minute now. He tried not to listen, but it was no use. He either needed to leave and not hear it or stay and hear it. He couldn't do anything in-between. And part of him wanted to know what happened ... he didn't want to settle for hearing it afterwards ...

"But ... I ... I, erm - erm - I do. Care. You know - about - about you being - with Krum. Which was sort of why I d-did it. If you err ... you see what - what I m-mean."

Harry couldn't see what was going on, but he could just imagine Hermione's face - her mouth half open, slightly shocked, but also a tiny bit pleased.

"I see what you mean."

Harry had to see it. He turned and stared past them, at the orangey sky, but he could see both of them looking at each other.

"Ron, I - " Hermione shook her head slightly and narrowed her eyes. She suddenly looked very puzzled, "How could you stand kissing her like - like you did, if you didn't even like her?"

Ron blushed - he turned away from Hermione slightly and lowered his voice.

"I - well - whenever I kissed her ... I - sort of imagined she was - err - " he bit his lip, took a deep breath and said what he had to say, "I imagined she was you."

There was a long silence. Harry continued to stare steadily at the sky. He tried not to move, not wanting to spoil the moment. Their moment, it would probably be in a minute or two.

"Me?"

Ron nodded.

"You."

More silence. Harry wanted to yell 'Get on with it!' at them.

He became aware that they were a bit closer to each other than they had been when they sat down. As he watched from the corner of his eye, they seemed to be growing even closer ...

Harry realised what they were actually going to do about two seconds before they did it. Caught by surprise, he stood up. He'd wanted to hear Hermione's reaction - but this was a bit too much.

"Hello! I'm still here!"

Ron and Hermione both jumped - apparently both of them had forgotten this.

"I really don't want to watch you two snog each other. Can't you wait until I'm gone?"

Ron gave a nervous laugh.

"Yeah, sorry."

But Harry smiled.

"Oh, go on, then."

Do you now see what I mean? Please review! And thanks again to cool-people-suck!