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Chapter Two: New Arrangements and Midnight Chats
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The feel of Ginny beneath him made Harry's head spin. It occurred to him briefly that he was, yet again, kissing a crying girl. Only this was much, much better than when he had kissed Cho.

He had never felt this way for anyone before Ginny, Cho included. She had the ability to make him lose his bearings, and yet make him feel so happy that he didn't care if he ever thought clearly again. She was even worth jeopardizing his relationship with Ron.

If Ron walked in right now, Harry was sure that his friendship with the youngest Weasley son would be collectively over.

Ginny moaned from underneath him and all thoughts of Ron were lost. Harry ran his tongue across her lips, seeking entrance. She parted her lips and massaged his tongue with her own. Her hands made their way to his hair, raking her fingernails against his skull, pulling him closer.

What was he thinking about?

Oh, right. Ron.

Harry pulled away and shook his head, panting heavily. Ginny sat up and cleared her throat, looking at him with a curious expression on her face.

'Sorry,' said Harry. 'I didn't – you were – I just ...'

'Harry,' Ginny said coaxingly, 'it's okay. I'm not angry with you.' Harry glanced up at her suspiciously.

'You're not?'

She shook her head. 'No. It was kind of nice,' she added thoughtfully.

'Yeah, but we – we broke up. We aren't supposed to ... you know,' he stammered.

'Tons of wizards aren't supposed to be killed by You-Know-Who. Dumbledore wasn't supposed to die. Snape wasn't supposed to be a double-agent, betraying Hogwarts, not to mention the Order. Hogwarts isn't supposed to close down. Ron isn't supposed to snog Lavender when he's clearly into Hermione,' Ginny said slowly. 'Lots of things that aren't supposed to happen, still happen.' She smiled coyly. 'I don't have to be your "girlfriend" if you don't think I'll be safe, Harry, but I'm still going to snog you senseless whenever the mood strikes me, whether I'm supposed to or not.'

Harry gaped at her in shock. Did he hear her correctly? Did Ginny actually say what he thought she said?

Wanting to make sure he was absolutely clear on this sudden change of events he asked, 'You mean we're still going to, er, do stuff, even though we aren't exactly together?'

'I have every intention of it, yes,' Ginny smiled. 'But I'm knackered, what d'you say we just go to sleep?'

'You've read my mind,' said Harry after stifling a yawn. He was exhausted, both physically and emotionally. Ginny fell back against the mattress and slid over so Harry would have room to lie beside her. When he didn't move, she patted the spot beside her and raised her eyebrows. 'You want us to – er, I mean, you want me to stay here? What about Hermione?'

'Dunno.' Ginny shrugged. 'She'll just have to bunk with Ron tonight,' she offered, a suggestive smile tugging at her lips.

'Oh, Ron'll love that,' Harry laughed.

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When Ron announced that he was going to check on Ginny and Harry, Hermione jumped up and insisted that she go instead. Ron gave her a curious look, but sat back down, as if he understood. She offered a smile as she scurried out of the room, leaving Ron alone to stare at the chess set until she returned and made her next move.

Hermione then proceeded to climb the stairs to Ginny's room, hoping she wasn't about to walk in on anything too wanton. She noticed the door stood ajar, as if it hadn't been properly closed, and peeked inside. Harry and Ginny were in each other's arms, asleep on her bed.

It wasn't what she expected, and Hermione then had to ask herself exactly what she had expected. Either way, she was glad it had been her, and not Ron, who walked in on this. Her ginger haired friend wouldn't have taken too kindly to Harry lying on his little sister's bed, his arms draped around her, their faces inches apart.

She knew she should wake Harry; tell him to get to his own bed before Mrs Weasley came to check on them and shrieked with indignation, but she didn't have the heart to. She had known Harry for the better part of a decade, and had seen him truly happy only a few times. This past year, dealing with the loss of Sirius, and now Dumbledore, had taken a lot out of her friend, and she couldn't help but notice the small smile that was spread across Harry's relaxed, handsome features.

And Ginny, the poor girl hadn't been sleeping at all lately. They'd come down to breakfast every morning and she'd look like the living dead. She slept most of the day – at least that's what Hermione assumed she did, when she was shut up in her room.

She crept out of the room and made her way back downstairs to Ron. It was slightly after midnight, and the rest of the Weasley's had long since retired to their bedrooms.

'It looks like I'm sleeping with you tonight,' she said quietly when she returned to drawing room. He jumped, clearly not expecting her to appear out of nowhere – with a statement like that, no less – and almost sent the entire chessboard flying.

'What?'

'Well,' she began, 'Harry and Ginny are still in her room. Normally, I would be put up in the twins' bedroom, but there's a full house tonight, except for Bill. So,' she said, 'unless you want me falling asleep in the bed next to Charlie, I'm going to have to use Harry's bed, which, incidentally, is in your room.'

Ron stared at her for a long time, his brow furrowed. He finally asked, 'Why is Harry still in my sister's room? It's well past midnight and I don't see what they could be doing that would –'

'Obviously not that, you git,' snapped Hermione. 'They're asleep. Harry's using my bed.' Okay, so that last part was a lie, but it was the only way Hermione knew to calm Ron down and keep him from shouting so loud that he woke the whole house.

'You – you called me a git!' Ron gaped.

'Yes, I suppose I did,' she shrugged. 'Anyway, if you have a problem, you can always stay down here, but I'm going to bed – in your room.'

Ron's ears turned a slight pink, but he nodded and choked out, 'Yeah, yeah, I'll be up in a minute ...' Hermione nodded and went back up the stairs, hearing Ron mutter something about Harry having planned the entire thing, just to torture him.

Hermione frowned. Was spending a little extra time with her really torture? Hadn't they just spent quite a few hours alone in the drawing room, hardly even bickering at all?

Perhaps she had misread the entire evening, because she had had a perfectly lovely time.

Sighing, Hermione entered Ron's room and changed out of her robes, wondering why boys – namely, Ron – had to be so terribly difficult.

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'Bloody wanker, Harry is. He's done this on purpose, I bet ... just to torture me, to get a rise out of me. He and Ginny, well, the both of them are going to wish the Death Eaters had gotten them once I'm through.'

Ron took his time gathering up the chess pieces that night, trying to give Hermione enough time to change and fall asleep before he went upstairs. He didn't want to barge in on her changing, mostly because he knew he would stare and she would hit him. If she was awake, she'd probably want to have a long conversation about Harry and Horcruxes and what lay in store for them all.

He didn't much enjoy talking about the future, when it came to things like that. He had no problem discussing future careers, what he, Harry and Hermione will do after You-Know-Who is gone. That was good, positive thinking, as far as he was concerned. But Hermione, on the other hand, was more practical. She wanted to think of how they'd get rid of You-Know-Who, because until they did, they couldn't even begin to pursue future careers.

Sometimes, he privately consulted her about those things, but it was very rare. Unfortunately, it gave her the idea that it an acceptable conversation topic, so she very frequently had long, drawn out discussions about it. Ron wouldn't've minded so much, but she was so clever and complicated that everything she said just went right over his head, and probably Harry's, too. Bloody exhausting, is what it was.

After lingering in the drawing room for a few minutes, he extinguished the remaining candles with his wand and made his way up to his bedroom. His and Hermione's bedroom. He liked the sound of that. "His and Hermione's bedroom" sounded much better than any other title that he could think of, including "His and Lavender's bedroom."

Sometime, during their years at Hogwarts, he and Hermione had crossed the friend barrier. For Ron, it was around fourth year, with the whole Viktor Krum fiasco. Perhaps it was even before that, but he was never forced to confront his feelings until the Yule Ball. She looked awfully pretty that night. He didn't know when it happened for Hermione, but he was pretty sure that it did. After Viktor went back to Bulgaria, they had loads more arguments about him and they fought more passionately than they used to. Although he wasn't positive, he was fairly certain that Hermione had given him the silent treatment because of his relationship with Lavender. Was she jealous? And then there was that McLaggen bloke. Did she really like him, or had she only been trying to get back at Ron? If that was why, it had definitely worked.

They had, of course, reconciled. Ron and Lavender split up, and ... he assumed that Hermione dumped McLaggen. Who knows, maybe something would happen between the two of them now. They were pretty close during the funeral, when he had wrapped her in his arms and she allowed him to comfort her, something that had rarely happened in the past.

He walked into his bedroom and saw that Hermione was climbing into bed – his bed.

'Er – Hermione, that's not Harry's bed, that's, er, mine,' stammered Ron. As soon as he said it, he wished he hadn't. Hermione sleeping in his bed was one of the hottest things he'd ever seen, heard of, or imagined, throughout his entire life. He should have just gotten into Harry's and made himself comfortable.

'Oh, right ... I didn't – I must have forgotten,' Hermione mumbled. Ron highly doubted that, though. He, Ginny and Hermione (but mostly just he and Hermione) had spent loads of time in his room the last few weeks. Not to mention each and every summer since third year. Surely, by now, she had mentally distinguished between his and Harry's beds. And even if she hadn't, wouldn't the orange Chudley Cannon sheets have given it away?

He was about to make a suggestive comment about her and his bed, but he stopped short when he saw the look she gave him. She scowled, trudged over to Harry's bed, got under the covers and rolled over so she was facing away from him, without so much as a "goodnight".

What was with her?

She must have been angry, because she wasn't even reading.

Ron didn't know much about books and spells; he wasn't particularly good in school. He didn't have a vast vocabulary, and he was barely capable of doing his own homework. He wasn't too informed on girls (though he did learn a few things this passing year), or Dark wizards, or Muggles.

But if Ronald Weasley knew one thing, that thing was Hermione Granger.

She was a creature of habit, far more predictable than Harry or Ginny or anyone else in his life. When she was bored, stressed or anxious, happy or angry – or any other emotion that a human was capable of feeling – she read. In fact, in the six years that he'd known her, he could only recount a few times when he had seen her without her nose in a book, mostly during battles, like the Department of Mysteries, or this year, at Hogwarts. She practically lived in the library, especially when OWLs were approaching.

But right now, she wasn't reading.

Perhaps, to an outsider, that didn't seem like a big deal, but to Ron, it meant something. Hermione was either absolutely, completely exhausted and wasn't capable of holding her eyes open any longer, or she was feeling something so extreme that she was restless and dissatisfied, even with a good book at her disposal.

Of course, Ron could never ask her what was going on. She'd either snap at him, saying he wouldn't understand, or she would cry hysterically over the silliest thing, and he would have no hope of consoling her.

'Best leave it for Ginny,' he mumbled before turning on his side, putting his back to her.

After a while, Ron's breathing was starting to even out when Hermione gave a quiet, frustrated sigh and turned over. He opened his eyes but said nothing, merely listening, waiting for her to make another move.

From what Ron could tell, she had just stood up and crept across the floor to a place near the doorway. Was she going to the loo? No, Ron thought, she's getting a book.

Hermione's book collection resembled that of a small library's, and the Weasley's didn't read very much, so any book lying around the house would undoubtedly belong to her. Since she was rarely without a book in hand, it came of no surprise to anyone anymore to find a textbook lying around in the kitchen or the drawing room or, as the case was, one of their bedrooms.

Ron shut his eyes and focused hard on listening to Hermione's light footsteps as she made her way back to Harry's bed. He heard a barely audible groan of protest as her next-to-nothing amount of weight settled back onto the mattress. It was so quiet that he barely heard her when she whispered 'Lumos' and opened her book.

Merlin, thought Ron, she really should have been Sorted into Ravenclaw.

No sooner had the thought entered his mind than Ron had already vanquished it, counting his lucky starts that she had ended up in Gryffindor, where she belonged.

What would his life be like, if Hermione hadn't been there, in his Gryffindor house, to share it with him?

For starters, his sister would be dead. Hermione and her endless amounts of research were the sole reason Harry and Ron had known where to look for Ginny, and how to get to her. Harry wouldn't have been able to save his sister if it hadn't been for her.

He would never have completed his homework assignments on time, or, if he had, he would've gotten "T" on everything. He wouldn't have passed any of his OWLs, except maybe Defense Against the Dark Arts, since that class had been Harry's obsession and not Hermione's.

He wouldn't have joined the Quidditch team, because he wouldn't have been made Prefect and, therefore, his mum wouldn't have bought him his Cleansweep. And he would still be a huge fan of Viktor Krum's, if he hadn't asked Hermione to the Yule Ball in fourth year.

He and Lavender wouldn't have broken up ... or perhaps they wouldn't have gone out at all. Yes, that was likely. The only reason Ron even considered her was because he needed to snog someone, just to prove to Ginny that he could. Her comments wouldn't have bothered him so much if she hadn't mentioned Hermione and Krum. The thought of her snogging him was enough to make Ron's blood boil. He wondered if she'd kissed McLaggen. If she did, he would surely make it his goal to hunt that git down and kick his arse.

He would probably be snapping at everyone left and right, because he wouldn't have her to row with and help him cool off. Ron and Hermione were notorious at Hogwarts for their rows. They fought all the time, every chance they got. They never held grudges, though – well, hardly ever. The occasional incident that really got under their skin was expected, but being the amazing friends that they were, they were able to look past it within a few days, or weeks, if it was really bad. She was always there for him, in that sense. When he was worried about Quidditch (or she, about OWLs) they would bicker, just to get their minds off of their individual, yet equally important, impending dooms.

He suspected that they would be bickering quite a bit, now that they were sure the Final Battle was rapidly approaching, and it was putting a great weight on their shoulders.

Though he tried to never discuss Harry with her, as he felt it was a nasty thing to do and that he was going behind his friend's back, he did voice his concerns occasionally. It occurred very rarely though, only when his head was particularly full of thoughts and he needed to articulate some of them, or risk his brain exploding from over-use.

Now was one of those times.

'Hermione?' whispered Ron. She stayed perfectly quiet, most likely trying to make him think she had fallen asleep. 'I know you're awake ... in fact, I'd be willing to bet a large amount of Galleons that you're reading Hogwarts:A History.'

He heard her sigh with contempt before saying, 'Yes? What do you want?'

He frowned. This was not how he wanted to start their conversation. He was going to be serious and voice his concerns to her. He was going to get personal, something that had rarely happened before in his life.

'D'you think this'll be our last adventure together?' He tried to put it as delicately as he could, while still managing to get his point across. It wasn't the type of thing he just wanted to blurt out, being as blunt as possible. He didn't think asking her if she thought they'd all be killed in the same tone he'd ask her to pass the pumpkin juice was appropriate.

'What do you mean, Ron?' she asked, seemingly more interested. 'Do I think we'll split off and go our separate ways once we're through with V–Voldemort? Or do I think one of us will die in the process?'

'The – the second one,' he feebly muttered. She said nothing for a moment, considering what he had asked.

Her answer finally came, in the form of a short and firm, 'No.'

'No?'

'No. I don't think this will be "our last adventure together," as you put it,' she stated. He rolled over to face her, and found her watching him. The way the light of her wand hit her face made her look exceptionally lovely. He was suddenly very aware that he was alone in his bedroom, in the middle of the night, with her. He was also aware that he could legally do magic, so there would be no trouble casting a Silencing Charm ... if they needed it.

'Why not?' he asked, as he forced himself to forget the wanton thoughts he was having about his best friend.

'Because,' she explained, 'it just can't be. We've been through far too much for something stupid like this to tear us apart.'

'This isn't something stupid, Hermione,' lectured Ron. 'You-Know-Who's a scary wizard. And, while his real job is to kill Harry, he'll have no problem killing us, as well.' He sighed. 'I dunno what I'm getting at. I guess what I'm wondering is: D'you ever feel like the next fight might be your last? I mean, we've been lucky so far. We've escaped without anything too serious happening. What if our luck has run out?'

She climbed out of bed, shuffled across the room at sat on the edge of his. He sat up and shifted his legs, which were in danger of being sat on, to make room for her.

'Ron,' she said, taking his hand in hers, 'everything is going to be fine.'

'How can you be so sure?' he asked, seeking reassurance, although the feel of his hand in hers made all his worries disappear entirely.

'The way I see it, we've been friends forever,' she smiled. 'Sure, we only met in our first year, but it feels like I've known you – and Harry – my whole life. You're like family to me.' Ron's heart sank, though he wasn't completely sure why. 'Well,' she said quickly, 'you're not like family.' He couldn't help but notice the way she accented "you're" and the funny way it made him grin like an idiot. 'But you know what I mean.'

'Yeah, I do,' he admitted.

'So you see, what the three of us have here is a lifelong friendship. We'll be with each other until we're all old and grey. I can just feel it,' she continued, her eyes twinkling in the light still coming from her wand. 'There's no way something bad will happen, and we won't get the chance to find out if my theory's right. There's just no way.'

It was hardly the answer Ron was expecting from her, but it made him feel good, just the same.

'You can always do that, you know.'

'Do what?'

'Act as if the problem in front of you – no matter how serious or complicated it may be – is just another textbook question. You can handle anything I throw at you,' said Ron. She beamed up at him, a slight blush creeping onto her cheeks. 'How can you do that?'

'Well, I've thought about it a lot myself,' she admitted. 'Being Harry Potter's best friend is a dangerous job, you know. It's not like we aren't targets, too.' Ron opened his mouth to protest but she continued quickly, 'Not that I'm complaining, or anything. I make an effort to be involved. I try hard to help Harry, and not because I feel obligated to in any way. It's just that sometimes, to an outsider's perspective, you and I are guilty by association.' She paused. 'I often wonder what it would be like it I lost you – or Harry – during a battle. And frankly, I don't think I'd be able to handle it. Just thinking about it used to give me butterflies,' she said. 'So I convinced myself that everything would be okay, because if I couldn't believe that, I think I would have gone nutters a long time ago.'

'Wow,' he said dimly. 'I try not to think about stuff like that, but sometimes I can't help it. You're basically the only one I can talk to, though. I can't say anything to Harry, he'd just feel guilty and act like it's his fault, when it isn't. None of my brothers would understand, and the twins would just make fun of me. And Mum would go mad if I brought it up around her or Dad.'

'You're the only one I can talk to, too. None of my family understands anything about what's happening in the wizarding world right now. In fact, I haven't really even told my parents about last year, at the Department of Mysteries. They know the general story, but I kind of skipped over the part about my serious injuries ... and the fact that Sirius –'

She stopped abruptly, and Ron nodded, thankful that Harry wasn't there. He was fairly certain Harry was okay with it by now, but he didn't want to push it.

'So, anything else you'd like to throw at me?' she asked.

Well, I'd like to throw you down on this bed and snog you until Mum calls us down for breakfast in the morning, Ron thought.

'No, can't think of a thing,' he replied, smiling and hoping she wouldn't notice how red his ears were turning.

'Okay, then. Goodnight.'

'Goodnight,' he said. Before he realized what he was doing, he kissed her lightly on the forehead. She acted like it was no big deal; perhaps she was too shocked or embarrassed to mention it, because got back into Harry's bed without another word and immediately blocked out the light of her wand.

Apparently, Ron thought with a smirk, Hermione didn't need to read in order to have pleasant dreams tonight.

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