Harry gloomily trudged out of the Transfiguration classroom.
It was a week before the end of term, and Professor McGonagall had just demanded that he have a date for the upcoming Yule Ball (that she'd just now thought it relevant enough to tell them about), something he had absolutely no interest in doing. In having a romantic partner period, and certainly not in trying to find and ask said date to go with him in less than two weeks. In fact, he was pretty sure he would rather face another dragon than try to find a date for a dance he was already bound to embarrass himself at, since with the dragon he at least already knew how to defeat it, but he was completely clueless on how to ask a girl to go to the Ball with him or on how to dance, neither having been social skills his relatives thought worth teaching him.
So not paying attention to where he was going as he walked out of the classroom, he ran straight into someone who was standing in the hallway just outside the door.
Looking up, he realized it was Hermione, waiting for him. And an idea suddenly dawned on him.
"Hermione, I assume from all your reading that you're aware that the champions have to bring a partner to the Yule Ball?" he asked carefully.
"I think I read something about the champions opening the dance, which would require a partner, yeah. Why?" replied Hermione, as they walked towards the Great Hall together for lunch.
Harry was silent for a few seconds, building up his courage, before asking in rush, "Wouldyouliketogowithme?"
"Pardon?" asked Hermione, stopping and turning to face Harry. "Could you repeat that just a tad bit slower?"
"Would you like to go with me? To the Yule Ball," repeated Harry slightly slower this time, though still faster and quieter than his normal voice, before rushing on embarrassedly, "But I'll understand completely if you don't want to."
"What? No, I'll go with you. Of course I'll go with you. I just can't believe you'd ask me," replied Hermione, clearly taken aback that he'd asked her.
"You sure?" asked Harry, surprised himself that she'd agreed so quickly. "I mean, I'd understand if you wanted to go with someone else instead of me."
"No, no, I want to go with you," said Hermione hurriedly before Harry could try to talk himself out of it like he'd already started doing, and rescind the offer. "I just didn't expect you to want to go with me of all people — I mean, you could have pick of any girl in the castle, so I'm just surprised you'd pick me."
There was an awkward pause for several seconds as they both just stood there looking at each other, Harry too embarrassed to say that out of any girl in the castle she is exactly the one he'd pick now that the idea had finally dawned on him, and Hermione not knowing anything else to say.
"So, uh, I guess we'll talk about when and where to meet up when it gets closer to time?" said Harry awkwardly after several seconds, unsure of what exactly to say, but knowing he needed to say something or they'd both just keep standing there in ever increasingly awkward silence forever.
"Yeah. Yeah," replied Hermione, just as awkwardly.
"So...lunch?" asked Harry, trying to break the awkwardness that had settled over them and return them to their normal, comfortable selves.
"Yes, lunch," replied Hermione gratefully, the relief audible in her voice, and so they quickly resumed their walk towards the Great Hall, neither of them saying anything more until after they'd sat down at the Gryffindor table in the Great Hall.
Crowded as usual at lunchtime, the only seats together Harry and Hermione could find when they arrived were across from Ronald Weasley.
Ever since the first task, when Harry's popularity had predictably soared after his not only survival, but first place finish, Ron had been oscillating back and forth between actively loathing Harry for all the attention he was receiving and for still refusing to tell him how he'd entered his name into the tournament, and trying to talk to Harry like they were best of pals in an attempt to use some of Harry's popularity to his own advantage. And as acquiring a girl to go to the Yule Ball with him was best served by riding in the wake of Harry's fame, that was the side he chose now.
"Got any idea who you're going to try?" he asked as soon as Harry sat down.
"Huh?" asked Harry in confusion, having no clue what the redhead was talking about. How could you 'try' a person, and try them for what?
"The Yule Ball — do you know who you're going to try for for the Yule Ball?" repeated Ron impatiently.
"You mean what girl am I going to ask to do me the honor of attending the Yule Ball with me?" asked Harry.
"Yeah," replied Ron. When Harry didn't answer in half a second, the redhead continued on, "Listen — you're not going to have any trouble. You're a champion. You've just beaten a Hungarian Horntail. I bet they'll be queuing up to go with you."
"Oh, Merlin — I didn't even think of that! I sure hope not," groaned Harry, causing Hermione to reach under the table and squeeze his leg lightly in support and sympathy.
Ron, on the other hand, completely ignored Harry's groan and began monologuing about the kind of girl he'd prefer going with, which really was just a list of physical requirements any such girl he would consider asking would have to meet. As he then moved on to complaining about how impossible it was going to be to ask a girl to the ball, and idly wondered if he could just lasso one, Harry glanced over at Hermione with a smirk, having just the slightest inkling as to why it might be so impossible for Ron to ask a girl to the Ball. Hermione smirked back, clearly thinking the same.
~HP~
As it turned out, Ron's prediction and Harry's fear that girls would be lining up to ask him to the Yule Ball turned out to be true.
The very next day, some curly-haired third year Hufflepuff girl Harry barely recognized and certainly hadn't ever talked to before asked him to go with her. It was right before Harry and the rest of the fourth year Gryffindors had History of Magic class, so after he'd politely told the girl that he already had someone he was going with, Ron, Dean, and Seamus, who'd been standing near enough to see the girl ask him and then walk away disappointed, but not close enough to actually hear what Harry had said to her, acted like one might expect Draco Malfoy or some other Slytherin to act, and taunted and ridiculed Harry about her throughout class. But Harry resolutely ignored them, knowing he would be the one with the last laugh come Christmas night when he walked into the Yule Ball with Hermione Granger on his arm.
Girls continued to ask him out over the next several days, including some too young to attend even with an older student, until eventually Harry had told enough of them that he already had a date for the Yule Ball that word spread throughout the female population of Hogwarts that Harry was already taken, and they finally stopped trying to ask him. But for the several days until that finally happened, he had to put up with his fellow Gryffindor males' continued taunts and laughs every time they saw him turn another girl down, making him wonder how any of them were going to get dates of their own for the Ball — he certainly wouldn't have gone out with any of them after that if he'd been a girl.
Fortunately, however, this was about the worst he had to deal with leading up to the Yule Ball and in the last week of classes. Despite her eagerness to interview Hagrid about the skrewts, Rita still hadn't published any article about them in the Daily Prophet, so in the last Care of Magical Creatures class of the term, Harry asked him about it.
"She didn' seem very int'rested in magical creatures, ter tell yeh the truth," answered Hagrid. "She jus' wanted me ter talk about you, Harry, since she knew yeh were in me class. Well, I told her we'd been friends since I went ter fetch yeh from the Dursleys. 'Never had to tell him off in four years?' she said. 'Never played you up in lessons, has he?' I told her no, an she didn' seem happy at all. Yeh'd think she wanted me to say yeh were horrible, Harry."
"She probably did," replied Hermione. "Now that Harry's well-liked by the castle again after he did so well in the first task, she needs trouble to be able to sell. Some breaking story that contradicts what most people think at the moment to make them have to buy a new issue — a manufactured crisis only she has the story on."
"Then she should've interviewed Snape," said Harry sardonically. "He'd give her the goods on me any day. 'Potter has been crossing lines ever since he arrived here —' I believe were his exact words after my name had come out of the Goblet."
Before Harry could really get started on a rant about Snape, or Hagrid could try yet again to defend the abusive 'teacher' like he did every time Snape's name came up, Hermione quickly but politely asked, "Are you planning on attending the Yule Ball Christmas Evening, Hagrid?"
"Though' I might look in on it, yeah," replied Hagrid gruffly. "Should be a good do, I reckon. You'll be openin the dancin', won yeh, Harry? Who're you takin'?"
"Sadly, I do have to," answered Harry, ignoring the second half of the question. "I'm really not looking forward to embarrassing myself even further by not being able to dance."
Fortunately Hagrid ran with this, possibly thinking Harry hadn't answered him because he didn't have anyone yet and was embarrassed to admit it, instead of having someone and simply not wanting to tell people until they all found out the evening of. But either way, instead of pressing Harry on who he was taking, he just replied, "Ah, I'm sure yer not all tha' bad at dancin'."
But Hermione, instead of breezing over Harry's worries that he would embarrass himself with a trite 'encouragement', had gasped to herself. Knowing Harry perhaps even better than he knew himself sometimes, she knew that if Harry said he wan't able to dance, he wasn't trying to be modest — he really didn't know how to dance. A wave of guilt swept over her for not having realized it earlier and having just assumed he already knew how to dance like she did, as it became obviously clear in her mind that he wouldn't know how to dance given his upbringing. She immediately made a mental note to ask him later if he would allow her to teach him how to dance so he would know before the Yule Ball, and not have to embarrass himself in front of the entire school, who would no doubt hold it over his head for the rest of his time at Hogwarts or until the next thing they could hold over his head came along, like they did every time something happened involving him.
~HP~
So that evening, as they finished up their day's homework in the library, Hermione casually said, "When you told Hagrid this morning that you're not able to dance, was that by any chance because you've never had anyone to teach you how to dance?"
Harry looked up from where he was adding the finishing touches on why the position of Io around Saturn meant his fourth death that month was going to be at the teeth of a rabid pack of rats, and replied, "Yeah. Not exactly something the Dursleys thought absolutely necessary to teach me — although that wasn't just me, I don't think Dudley knows how to dance, either. And sorry for not mentioning it to you earlier, and will likely embarrass you too Christmas night — I'll understand completely if you want to dump me and go with someone else who does know how to dance."
"No, silly!" exclaimed Hermione. "I was just making sure before I asked if you would be willing to let me teach you. And I'm sorry for just assuming you already knew how to dance just because my parents did teach me as a little girl. I wasn't even thinking that you didn't grow up in a loving household like I was blessed to."
"Oh," said Harry in more than slight surprise. "You want to teach me? You sure that won't be even worse than just suffering through one embarrassing song with me and then not having to dance any more?"
"Harry! Of course not!" laughed Hermione. "I would be honored to teach you how to dance, and as far as just 'suffering' through one song goes, I fully intend on dancing to a lot more than just one song. And I promise you, once you know how to dance and are no longer afraid of embarrassing yourself, you'll want to dance more than just one song as well."
"I don't know about that, but I'd be more than happy for you to try to teach me how to dance," replied Harry. "Just don't get your hopes or expectations up too high for my dancing ability. I'll probably still suck even with you being the one teaching me."
"Oh, I know you'll do just fine," said Hermione encouragingly, before asking, "If you're nearly done with your homework, want to go start practicing now? I'm sure we can find an empty classroom nearby to use."
For the next hour until they had to head back to the common room before anyone caught them out of bounds after hours, Hermione practiced dancing with Harry. She started out teaching him the steps to the simplest dance she knew just to make sure he'd have something presentable at the Ball a week and a half later, but Harry picked it up quickly to his own great surprise, and by the end they had made solid progress on more advanced dances. Hermione credited it to his dueling skill, as that also required quick, careful footwork — Harry insisted it was entirely due to Hermione's proficiency at teaching. But whatever it was, most likely a combination of both, Harry had made much more progress than either of them had honestly expected for his first lesson, and they readily agreed to continue practicing for an hour or so every night until the Yule Ball, so the two of them would be the best dance pair on the floor, blowing everyone's minds.