(A/N) Sorry for the delay! Enjoy!

George woke up in the morning in a blur. He could not remember how he had gotten to his bed, he just remembered the latter end of the party. Once he had gotten his hands on the bottle of wine, most of the night seemed hazy for him. He remembered vaguely dancing and singing, and then somehow ending up lying on his bed fully clothed. He rolled out of bed and dragged himself to his washroom. He finally made it to the mirror and noticed his hair matted and face wet, as if he had been crying all night. Dark circles under his eyes greeted him unhappily, and a light stubble formed across his chin. He leaned forward against the sink as the mirror commented.

"Oh dear."

"Shut up," said George as he shut the mirror and picked up the toothbrush to brush his teeth. He went over his normal morning routine, adding a pepper-up potion to his breakfast, and soon felt ready to go to work. As soon as he made it to the labs, he saw Hermione sitting working on a bunch of his patent paperwork. In a sudden epiphany, he recalled the rest of what occurred that night.

"Hey," said Hermione nervously. He ignored her and went to the front of the store to clear some stuff up.

Hermione groaned and leaned against the table. She had way too much to drink last night, and slow reflexes seemed to be the blame for everything. Or at least, that's what she told herself was the blame for everything. She rubbed her eyes with her fingers and continued to fill out more paperwork. She tried not to think about dancing to the music last night. She tried to forget his hands on her waist, or his lips touching hers. She tried to forget how she felt when his hand would brush up against her arm. She tried to forget the goosebumps, and her quickening heartbeat.

"Stop it Hermione!" She said to herself. "Stop it."

O0o0o0o0o00o0o0o0o0o0o0o0

"You look beautiful," said Ryan standing up as Hermione walked into the main waiting room. "I mean, Jesus Christ." He smiled. Hermione couldn't help but blush.

"Thanks, you look good too," she said.

"Nah, just work clothes," he said. "Well shall we? I have reservations at Le Petit Fleur, hopefully you like French food. I mean I never know really, it's hit or miss. I mean, their dessert is really good, and boy can they cook a steak—"

"I'd love to," Hermione interrupted. She laughed and they both walked out of the hospital. "Where is it?" She asked as they walked down the street.

"Just a couple blocks down from here, I only work around the corner, Wall Street," he said flashing his teeth.

"Oh?" Hermione asked, clearly preoccupied. They walked in relative twitchy silence towards the restaurant. The cars and the chatter and the smell seemed to drown out any prerogative for conversation. Hermione spent the entire walk thinking about George, and how nauseated she was when she heard the simpering sing song voice of his secretary. It was shocking though, from her voice she did not sound remotely the type of woman that George would ever consider, or was she? She attempted to chase all thoughts of George from her head as she felt Ryan's arm moving her out of the way of a hot dog cart that was packing up and moving.

"Shit," she said laughing. Ryan laughed alongside her.

"You alright there?" He asked. She nodded.

"I'm fine," she said thoroughly embarrassed. As soon as they walked four more blocks, however, they finally arrived at a small French bistro.

"Here we are then," said Ryan. "Le Petit Fleur." He butchered the French severely, and seemed to know it. They both sat at a small table outside, lit up only by candles and streetlamps, and the headlights of a swarm of cars. Still, In New York City, this was as peaceful and as quaint as they get.

"I gotta be honest," said Ryan after they were seated and menus were given to them, "I haven't been on a date since a couple of disastrous blind dates after my wife died," he said, a tone of sadness in his voice. Hermione smiled reassuringly.

"Well if it makes you feel better, I haven't had a date in over 4 years, having a child and being in medical training kind of puts a damper on that. So I'm just as stunted as you are," she said with a smile. His face grew brighter and his eyes crinkled as his nervousness began to fade. He slapped the table with his hand and picked up the menu.

"Oookay," he said, "what am I going to eat?" He asked himself while looking through the menu. A waiter came by and asked if they would like anything to drink.

"A bottle of your nicest wine," he said grinning. Hermione smiled as the waiter walked off.

"Always pamper your dates?" She asked.

"Only the pretty ones," he winked. She sighed a little and turned a slight shade of pink. She was not used to being referred to as pretty. The rest of the date went well enough, he was nice, polite, intelligent. He was everything Hermione was looking for, including also having paternal skills, and a daughter, which was definitely a plus. All in all, he was rather perfectly boring. His jokes were tame, he talked endlessly for hours often about nothing, yet thinking he spoke of everything. She noticed the way he gestured a lot with his hands and when he laughed, his entire body responded with it. Isn't the worst, she thought.

"So you know where I work," said Hermione, "What do you do?"

"Publishing consultant," He said sheepishly, "It's not that flashy or as lifesaving, but I work for a bunch of different publishers and help them pick out different pitches for novels, short stories, poems, you know. I always read a lot as a child, seemed the only way to go." He looked sheepishly down at his baguette.

"That's brilliant," Hermione said, suddenly really excited, "I love reading. Seriously, when I was at school, that's all I could do, I was just buried in the library." She smiled at him and he returned the favor as their food was brought to them. The rest of the date went very smoothly as they spent the entire time discussing various books they had read and he asked for her opinion on a couple pitches he was reviewing at that time. As they walked out of the restaurant, Ryan looked at Hermione and smiled.

"This has been great," he said. "Really great." Hermione grinned back.

They both began to walk uptown.

"Where do you live again?" He asked.

"82nd and Columbus," replied Hermione, "You?"

"Oh only a couple blocks from me," and then he laughed, "well that makes sense since our daughters are in school together." Hermione laughed as well.

"Do you want to share a cab?" He asked. Hermione nodded.

"I'd love to," she said as he waved a cab over. The cab ride was fairly silent, both of them were unsure of what to say or do. They both sat beside each other and Hermione took in the view of the city from the cab and took in the lights and the sounds and the people, the normal crowd.

"So Melanie tells me that she and Anna are good friends," said Ryan. Hermione nodded.

"Yeah, they get along pretty great. Sometimes I get a little worried about them though."

"I know, I keep on hearing things from the principal about their silly pranks and general…tomfoolery," he said sounding out the last word slowly.

"Tomfoolery?" Hermione giggled. Ryan laughed as well.

"Yeah, that got away from me for a bit." He sighed, "You know what bothers me though, if the actually took the intelligence that they channel into their little schemes and jokes into something…well, something productive, well there'd be no stopping them!" He exclaimed. Hermione nodded her head vehemently.

"I'm actually surprised they turned out to be class clowns, its usually boys that do that," he added a second later. Hermione kept on feeling the lump rising from her stomach to her chest, and then back to her stomach. It was as if her nerves were playing a game of ping-pong, and no, it wasn't just any kind of game. It was the kind of ping-pong tournaments from the 1960s where the US and China would be fiercely competitive with each other.

"I mean I guess now gender just means nothing," said Hermione.

"Yeah I guess so," Ryan said. They finally arrived in front of her house and after paying the cab driver Ryan joined Hermione.

"You really didn't have to," she said. He shook his head.

"I'm the man, I should pay. Besides, I'm glad to." He grinned. Hermione smiled as well. He took her hand in his and kissed it softly.

"Madame," he said winking cheekily. "I'm sorry…he corrected himself, Doctor." Hermione smiled and leaned up and kissed him lightly on the cheek. She then ran up the stairs and opened the door, turning around once and waving. He smiled and waved back. As she entered, she heard him call after her.

"When can I see you again?" He asked. Hermione shrugged, turning around and holding the door open with her foot.

"I don't know," she said, "I guess, well, Thursday is Thanksgiving." She admitted. He nodded as well.

"Yeah I guess it is," he said.

"I have the day off," she said. He walked up the steps to join her at the top.

"Me too," he said taking a small trace of her hair and moving it behind her ear, smiling.

"Would you and Melanie like to come with me and Anna to the parade. I have tickets for one of the sections, and well, my mum and dad couldn't make it because my mum apparently need all day to cook dinner, but I mean…if you would like to…join us, I mean." She began to stutter over her words as she felt his hand slowly moving up and down her arm.

"I would love to," he whispered by her ear. He then lightly kissed her cheek, and she returned by kissing his mouth, and he returned the gesture wholeheartedly. They parted, slightly out of breath.

"Well," said Hermione, "I'll see you Thursday?" He nodded.

"I guess you will," he replied. "We'll meet you here then?" Hermione nodded unable to really speak or say anything. He leaned down, kissed her softly once more and then walked down the steps to the street. Hermione watched him as he turned onto the next street, she then turned around, took out her key and entered the brownstone.

"So I've just finished cleaning the back room, put some stuff away," said Hermione walking to the front desk after Emily and Verity left for the day. George merely grunted. "There are some items on the table, I didn't know if you wanted me to throw them away or not, I figured you would want them." Hermione continued, "But the ones I was not sure about I put on the large table." He grunted again. She stared down at her shoes. "So I'm just…going to go now," she said, "Ron's leaving tonight so we're grabbing dinner with my parents and going to a show in muggle London, should be good, so if you don't need me anymore—"

"Actually," George said as she was leaving, "I was wondering if you could help me with some of these inventions, I'm just not quite getting the spells at the same time and holding stuff together is hard…I just really need another person. You just have to hold stuff together, and I'll do the enchantments." He said. Hermione nodded.

"Sure…" she said awkwardly putting her jacket and bag down and then going over to help him without a second thought. "Only for another hour though." George flashed her a big grin and they continued working, an hour turned into two, and she kept on adding fifteen minutes until—

"No, sorry mum dad, maybe next time he's in town, I was just going to floo him so he didn't leave. Yeah just got real caught up at the store—okay thanks." George looked up as he was assembling some things together.

"Can I use your floo?" Hermione asked. George nodded as she raced upstairs. He remotely unlocked his apartment so she could get in. Of course he felt bad practically making up reasons to stay, he didn't want to keep her away from his brother, and yet he did. He was falling for the girl who saved him, falling fast and hard. Hermione came down moments later with tears in her eyes.

"You okay?" George asked. Hermione shrugged and then shook her head quickly, her talk with Ron didn't go as well as she would have hoped.

"Ever since the party last night, everything has been going wrong—never mind," she said sitting down on a wooden bench and working on mixing potions for the canary creams.

"What?" George asked, pretending to be nonchalant. When she did not answer, he stood up, and walked over to her and straddled the bench beside her so he was facing her. She purposefully looked away.

"He thinks there's something going on between us," she said. "We spend a lot of time together, and he refuses to believe its just friends or professional."

"Well—Is there?" George asked softly. Hermione turned to him; shocked he would even bring that up.

"How could you even ask me that?" Hermione asked him angrily, "I mean, you kiss me last night, so there's obviously something, you don't talk to me all day. Finally, when I'm going to meet Ron because it's his last day here until, well, January, then you decide, 'Oh I need some sodding help.'"

"You could have left, but you stayed," he pointed out. She suddenly stood up and he mimicked her movement and stood in front of her. She shook her head and looked down. She turned and faced away from him, and he walked slowly up to her, putting his hands on her upper arms and gripping them softly, but firmly. "Hermione," he whispered in her ear. She turned around and buried her face in his chest.

"I don't know," she whispered beginning to cry harder and he began to stroke her hair.

"Me neither," he honestly answered as she cried even harder.

"No," she said after a while. "I'm with Ron, I'm happy George!" She ran out of the room and out the store.

"Well FINE!" George yelled after her, slamming the door shut as she left. He then pulled out his wand and cast a locking charm, and then proceeded to sit down on the stairs facing the door, head in his hands. A few moments later, he saw her face standing despondently at the door. He stood up slowly, uncast the charm and opened the door. As soon as she entered the store, he took her in his arms and kissed her, lifting her up as she did, and she responded with enthusiasm.

They both down on the stairs, she was nestled in his arms. They remained like this for several minutes, he was content in holding her petite form and she was happy within his broad form. They were both comfortable with each other, even long after she stopped crying. He leaned down and kissed the top of her forehead as she wiped her tears several minutes later.

"He left," Hermione whispered.

"What?" George asked,

"He left before I had the chance to explain," she said. He clenched his jaw.

"Seriously?" He asked. "Tosser." He added. Hermione let out both a giggle and a sob one traced her cheek with his hand. She stopped it with hers.

"Not here," she said. He cocked his head.

"Why?" He asked. Hermione shrugged.

"It just—I just—Anyone, including your mum and dad can walk in. And when it comes to me, I'm balancing on a tightrope with your mum, and unless I actually know where this is going, I don't think I can actually tell anyone yet." She admitted. He nodded, furrowing his brow.

"Where then?" He asked. Hermione shrugged, and suddenly her face lit up with an idea.

"So, basically, the cottage by the lake is mine in case I ever needed a quiet place to study, according to my grandmum…we could go there," she said. George smiled.

"Now?" He asked. Hermione sighed and noticed although his arms were no longer wrapped around her, they both were clasping each other's hands. Even this slightest bit of contact thrilled and terrified her. She let go of his hand, stood up and winked and disapparated. He stood up, confused as hell, but turned in his place and appeared in front of the lake.

She stood on the beach, calmly looking out at the stars beginning to form overhead, a deep streak of red splattered across the horizon. Her hair blew in the breeze, it was as if this was all a dream and he would wake up any second. The wind came faster and she wrapped her arms around herself. He quietly walked over to her, the gravel of the beach crackling underneath as he made his way over. The tall grass seemed to blow over as the wind picked up more and more.

He put his hands reluctantly on her shoulders and then caressed the length of her arms from behind. He then wrapped his arms around her waist, and she gripped onto his lower arms silently. He buried his face in her neck, getting lost in her hair and skin. They stood that way until the last of the sunset was finally visible over the horizon. Clouds were beginning to form overhead, further darkening the sky, stars peeking out from in between every cloud. Crickets chirped in the distance, and the sound of a car from a far off road could be heard.

After a moment, Hermione leaned her head on his and they both breathed deeply, smelling the fall air. She then turned around and kissed him softly at first, hesitantly, her arms around his neck. He kept his arms around her waist as they began to get lost in each other. They parted after several seconds, the dark sky hiding their flushed faces.

She said nothing; she did not need to say anything. She put a finger to his lips and took his hand in hers. She led the way, up stairs that were hidden in the small cliff's face, opened a small gate that appeared at the top, climbed a steep cobblestone pathway to a small cottage nestled in the fells. She took her wand, murmured a small incantation and the door opened creakingly for them. The inside was dark, and the wooden floorboards protested a little at their sudden intrusion. She let go of his hand.

"Wait right here," she said as she walked to the end of the hallway. Suddenly a light flickered on and the entire front hallway was bathed in light. He followed her up the stairs silently and they ended up in a rather airy loft type bedroom.

"Wow," he said.

"I know, it's not much," said Hermione humbly. George scratched the back of his head with his hand.

"Not much?!" He exclaimed, "Hermione, if I had a place like this, I would never leave." He said. They both stood awkwardly on opposite sides of the room.

"Hermione, maybe we should talk about it," he said softly. She shook her head.

"No," she said softly, "What is there to talk about anyway?" She asked walking up to George slowly, wrapping her arms shakingly around his torso. He put his hands on her shoulders.

"Are you—are you sure you want to do this?" He asked.

Hermione nodded.

"I'm sure," she said. George then leaned down and captured her lips; this time there was no hesitation or anything except pure need.

0o0o00o0o0o0o0o0o000o0o0o

George woke up slowly, body aching all over. He was confused; he did not know where he was or what had happened. The last thing he remembered was stepping out into the street. His eyes began to adjust to the darkness of the room, and he noticed someone leaving.

"Hey!" He called, "Anyone there?"

George you're being delirious, he thought, there was probably no one there to begin with. He suddenly felt groggy, a new dose of pain killers were administered and he began to close his eyes. He woke up the next morning to nurse bumbling about. She was pretty short and reminded him a lot of Madame Pompfrey, except for her Brooklyn accent.

"Well, hello sunshine," she said cheerily fixing his blankets. "Mind if I open the blinds?" She asked. George tried shaking his head, but realized his neck was in a brace.

"No," he said croakily. The nurse smiled reassuringly.

"You may want to close your eyes," she said before she turned on the lights. He did. The sun bathed the room in a bright white glow. He could hear cars and horns being blown off at full blast.

"Well hello Mr. Weasley," she said, checking his chart. "Don't try to move too much, you got out of surgery a few hours ago. The car crash did a number on you, but you are one of our lucky ones. They want to keep you here for a few more days of observation, it might be as long as a week," she said checking his IV drip. He nodded curtly.

"What happened to my things," he asked softly.

"Oh don't try to talk too much, anesthesia tends to dry out your throat, I'd give you water but the surgeries make that impossible so I have some ice chips." she placed a couple of ice chips against his mouth and he felt much better. "Oh and your things?" She asked as he raised his eyebrow a little angrily. "Well your wallet is in that dressing table drawer over there, " she pointed, "and your clothes were pretty much damaged and covered in blood. We folded up whatever was left and put them on that chair. Sorry sir," she chirped.

George could feel each and every one of his brain cells dying individually as she chattered away. He began to try and remember bits and pieces of the crash, he remembered his wand splintering as it had been in his jacket pocket and had been crushed, he groaned inwardly. His only possible ticket out of there gone. He lay back and concentrated on trying to move his fingers and toes, but to no avail, they were either in casts or he was just way too weak. He sighed beginning to feel sorry for himself, this was the kind of thing he tried to avoid for the past ten years. By working non stop, and filling his non working hours with meaningless shags, he could actually avoid feeling the actual pain of everything that ever happened to him. Suddenly, he heard a voice that made him want to rip out his IV and jump out the window.

"Georgie!" The annoying voice of his secretary hit him immediately. He closed his eyes as soon as she walked in. She always sounded like she tried to be Betty Boop but failed miserably. She picked a place near his head as he pretended to be asleep.

"Oh Georgie!" She crooned, "I know we promised to just be professional, but how can I be professional when you are lying here looking so alone. I promise I'll take care of you!"

"Ryan! Shut up," Hermione said in the locker room talking in her cell phone, "No seriously…seriously? Well if you tell me that American television is better than British television, I'm actually going to come down there and kill you. Proof? Uhhhh…we started the concept of American Idol, Doctor freakin' Who?! Star Trek was not—"

"Something funny Granger?" Her head resident asked as she jumped. "Or is there a better reason you're not joining pre-rounds?" Hermione groaned slightly and joined the group as they made their pre-rounds so that she could quiz her interns later.

The morning shift was rather uneventful, she did not have any surgeries scheduled that day so she spent the entire time charting and doing her dictations at the nurse's station.

"Mia, darling, could you get the patient in room 2714 his next round of meds? I'm just swamped today with the flu picking up more," the nurse that reminded Hermione a lot of Madame Pompfrey said. She was new, and the fact that she reminded the young resident so much of the older mediwitch made it hard for her to remember her name. So as to not cause doctor-nurse drama, she acquiesced, bored to death with the pile of patient's charts that loomed in front of her. Without even checking the name, she grabbed the chart and headed down the hall quickly when Jenny joined her.

"UGH!" She yelled, "Mark just won't talk to me anymore. I mean, he took me off of his rotation, I want to do general surgery, I'm freakin' good at me and he just TAKES me off. I mean, seriously, SERIOUSLY?"

Hermione stopped in front of the room, and faced Jenny.

"Jenny, you need to confront him about this. Talking to me won't help…actually screaming in my direction won't help. He'll just keep getting worse if you don't do something to make it better," she said calmly. Jenny groaned.

"Mia…I don't know what I'd do without you…just don't say I told you so. Just when I thought we were moving forward—"

"Jenny, I'm not listening to this anymore, " Hermione said holding her hands up to her ears as Jenny tried to talk. "La la la la," she sang, opening the patient's door and entering the room. She turned around and stopped dead in her tracks.

"Hermione!?"

(A/N) ha ha, I know I'm cruel and mean. Sorry for the later update, papers due right and left. But you know how you can get quicker updates? Review!! :D Let's try and get at least ten :D

If I get 10 reviews, I promise, I will update by next Wednesday at the latest. You help me, I'll help you :D

Love you guys!!