There was a sound of shuffling in the kitchen and Hermione could have sworn she had heard Ginny's voice break through her dreams. She had been aroused from her sleep only moments after Ginny and Fred had left the room. Lifting her head, she looked round to find that there was no one in the kitchen.
As she turned her gaze to look across the table her sight met with the image of Ron. He was sleeping with his head turned to the left, leaning on his folded arms; his hair was a sleepy mess and his eyes were closed lightly. He looked so peaceful to her, she wanted to reach across and brush his fringe out of his face so that she could watch him more intently.
Why not? He's asleep, her mind was telling her, he'll never know.
Gathering up her courage, Hermione let her fingers creep across the table towards Ron. However, just before she could reach him he stirred and his eyes snapped open. Trying to cover her move, Hermione moved her hand sideways and grabbed the handle of the empty mug beside Ron's left elbow. Picking up her own mug and the two bowls, she pushed her chair backwards and got up so quickly that she almost overturned it.
'Morning,' Ron said groggily as he ruffled his fiery red hair, further messing it up and in turn rubbing in the left over cream from the night before. Quickly removing his hand from his head and he looked at it in confusion, then remembering what had gone on the night before he smiled and looked up at Hermione, 'I see you're suffering from the after effects as well?'
'What?' Ron indicated on his own cheeks the whisker marks gracing her own. Suddenly realising what he was trying to tell her Hermione wiped the back of her hand across her cheeks swiftly, 'Oh, right,' she replied before getting back to sorting out the dishes from the evening snack.
Ron laughed slightly, seeing that Hermione had only smudged the cream and that most of it was still splashed across her face. Standing up he made his way across the kitchen to her, then reaching into a drawer he took out a flannel and wet it under the cold tap. Taking a few more steps towards her, they found themselves a matter of inches apart. As Ron leaned in Hermione leaned back, not noticing the flannel Ron was holding.
'Come here a second,' Ron smiled; he reached out and placed his hand under her chin. Holding her still, he commenced in using the flannel to removed all traced of the cream from the night before, 'you know,' Ron said as he turned her face to the side and wiped her cheek, 'for someone so precise, your attempts at cleaning yourself up are rather shoddy. Almost Weasley-worthy.'
'That's what I'm aiming for,' Hermione replied as he turned her face the other way, 'now that I'm part of the family.'
Ron turned her face back towards him, 'method acting, I like it!' Dabbing her nose briefly with the tip of the flannel, he concluded, 'much better,' before removing his hand and going over to the washer.
'What do you know about method acting?' Hermione mused as she stared at him, 'that's a muggle thing.'
'Just because it's muggle you think I don't know anything about it?' Ron turned back to look at her.
'Well, yes actually. That's exactly what I think, Ron,' Hermione admitted.
'Then I suppose you don't know me very well,' Ron stated simply before shrugging and walking backwards out of the kitchen door, a cheeky grin spread across his face.
Hermione dropped the spoons into the sink and ran after him, reaching the bottom of the stairs she shouted up to him, 'you've been going through my things again, haven't you? Reading my books?'
From somewhere on the landing Ron replied chirpily, 'what can I say? You're a bad influence Hermione Granger.' With that the bathroom door closed behind him and Hermione sighed in a resigned manner before returning to the kitchen.
As the door clicked shut, Ron went across to the sink. For a minute he just stood there gazing at his reflection in the bathroom mirror, he looked at the cream that was streaked through his hair, the weary expression on his face; he looked awful, that was what only five hours of sleep did to him.
The only good thing was the smile plastered across his face, it looked out of place but Ron didn't care. She's put it there; she made him want to smile when he was around her. Her attitude and her expressions were what made him sublimely happy. He continued to stare at himself for a while thinking about the night before.
Hermione had been right, it was nice just to relax and be friendly around each other. He couldn't remember the last time that the two of them had spent time in each other's company and not started an argument. Last night had been special; the only downside was that Harry had told him that if something were meant to happen then he'd feel a change. This wasn't the change Ron had been expecting, this was a change which indicated that maybe they could just be brother and sister.
Ron rubbed his face with his hands and yawned; placing the plug in the sink he ran some cold water.
As his mind wandered to what had happened that morning he thought of how he had confidently gone to clean Hermione up. He remembered that he had caught himself off guard with this gesture, one minute he had been sitting at the table, the next he was cupping her face in his hand and cleaning off the cream from the night before. He had found himself using playful banter around her without even noticing. His hand tingled as he remembered how soft her skin had felt against his own.
No! he thought, I can't think about things like that, it'll just make things more difficult and awkward between us.
At this thought he plunged his hands deep into the tepid water, hoping to numb the tingling feeling in his hand so that it would go away so and he could get on with just being brotherly.
He splashed his face, wishing that he could wake up and find out that this was all a dream. He wanted to find out that Hermione's parents had not disappeared and that he and Hermione were still best friends who spent most of their time arguing about trivialities. Either that or he wanted their relationship to go back to one where they were brother and sister but still fought like cats and dogs, at least he could then still be able to hope.
Meanwhile, Hermione had headed back to the kitchen and began to do the washing up. Being brought in a muggle household, she didn't think to use magic for such a simple task and began to fill the bowl with hot water and washing up liquid that she was surprised to find under the sink. Dropping her hands into the bowl of water she started to scrub at the dishes, she became lost in her thoughts over what had happened the night before as well as what would happen today. It hadn't been an awkward situation that morning so she assumed that they should be ok around each other. After all, Ron hadn't seemed to fazed or reluctant when he had cleaned her face earlier.
As she thought of this she remembered the shivers that had run down her spine when he'd touched her, she also reminisced how tense she had felt when she had found him just inches away from her, how much she'd wanted to kiss him as he'd leant in moments later.
Shaking her head violently, she scolded herself, No Hermione! You can't think like that, those kinds of thoughts will get you into trouble. Just forget about your feelings for Ron; he's your brother now so treat him like a brother. After all, he's going to treat you like a sister, save yourself the heartache.
'Good morning,' came a cheery female voice from behind her, Hermione jumped almost five foot in the air in shock. Turning round she saw Ginny taking her place at the table ready for breakfast.
'Somebody's happy this morning, what's put that smile on your face?' Hermione asked once her heart had stopped pounding.
'Guess,' Ginny replied, winking at her.
'You know what? I don't even want to know,' Hermione flinched in realisation.
Ginny gave her a look of horror and disgust as it dawned on her as to what Hermione was thinking, 'oh come on, Hermione! Not that, I'm sixteen for crying out loud and anyway I came to bed early last night.'
'Did you?' Hermione asked absentmindedly, returning to the dishes and proceeding to dry them by hand.
'Yes I did, ye of little faith. Where were you?'
'Me? I was down here, I must have fallen asleep at the table,' Hermione declared bluntly. Ginny had to force herself not to laugh at the lack of information she was receiving from her, how reluctant she seemed to tell Ginny that she'd spent the evening with Ron.
In turn, Hermione was willing herself not to tell Ginny that she'd been with Ron the night before. If she told her then there would be a good chance of Ginny trying to set the two of them up, she wasn't eager to give her the starting point that she needed.