Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.

Alright. Here it is. Finally.

Best Laid Plans...

Harry closed the notebook and it on the desk before leaning back in his chair. Molly Weasley did not do as Harry suggested. "I'd rather hear it from you, Harry," she said to him shortly before he and Hermione left the Burrow. "You will tell me when you are ready." Several months passed before Harry finally had the nerve to tell her, and the rest of the family, the truth about what had happened. In all that time, she never asked him or put any kind of pressure on him to tell her anything, allowing Harry the time and space to build up the nerve to finally speak the truth. The first anniversary of the Battle of Hogwarts was the day that he chose to finally say what needed to be said. It seemed like the most appropriate time. The events from a year before were again weighing heavily on everyone's minds, and it was easy for Harry to find a moment to break the truth. Since that day, Harry had grown to appreciate the fact Molly insisted that he be the one to tell his story. He would have regretted leaving that task to her husband.

The grandfather clock just down the hall from his study began chiming off the hours. It tolled six times. Harry looked up towards the ceiling. His bedroom was the room just above this one. Closing his eyes, Harry could imagine Hermione lying there, curled up under the sheets, sleeping peacefully. He allowed his mind to imagine running his fingers through her hair and just losing himself in their fragrance. He so wanted to return to her once more and let the warmth of her body sooth him into sleep.

Yet sleep was not something he could have right now. His heart was racing, beating far too fast to let him fall into slumber. A sudden surge of adrenalin was coursing through his veins now, exciting him to an anxious state. Hermione would be up soon, in hour, perhaps two because of their late night. Then he would have to tell her, a task that Harry was suddenly finding to be almost insurmountable. It wasn't so much saying the words that were the problem. Instead it was more the way in which he had to say them that was the problem. He simply had to tell her in the right way. He couldn't just go blurting them out, although that was his first inclination. It would be the simplest and easiest path to take, but he seriously doubted that Hermione would want to hear them in that way. Harry wished that she were more like a normal person who enjoyed having a nice lie in on Sunday mornings. Then he might have more time to come up with some idea of how he might tell her what he felt for her. As it was, Hermione's insane idea of sleeping in was getting up by eight o'clock. Truthfully, he wouldn't have it any other way. Hermione wouldn't be Hermione if she didn't do something like that.

Over the next several minutes, Harry racked his brain trying to come up with a solution to this little problem. He managed to come up with several options, none of which seemed like really good ideas. After discarding the blurt-out idea, the thought of some kind of grand gesture might be the way to go, but even then, none of those ideas seemed very good. Harry even went so far as to contemplate proposing marriage. On the surface, this wasn't a bad idea, really. It would tell her how he felt about her, and marrying Hermione was something he ultimately wanted.

However, this idea was not without certain complications. He did not have any sort of engagement ring. It wouldn't be right to propose without having one of those at hand, but this really was not his main concern. What concerned him more was that they had never once talked about where this relationship might be going, a fact that was a little disconcerting. Despite his instinctual belief that she felt the same about him, the idea that Hermione would not at least mention a possible future together could mean that she treated this relationship the same way he once had. Before he could even think about proposing marriage, Harry needed to know where he stood with Hermione first.

There was something else that had to be considered also: how to take their relationship public. They had gone to great lengths to keep their relationship secret, even from the Weasley family. That meant not dating in public, at least not in places where other witches and wizards frequented. In the muggle world, they could be just a normal couple. Thankfully, the muggle world was far bigger than the wizarding one, which made things easier. Places like Diagon Alley or Hogsmeade were where they had to be careful, although this was more of a slight inconvenience rather than real problem. All they really had to do was not stand too close to one another. Until recently, this had not been very hard for Harry as he had refused to think of Hermione as his girlfriend.

Then there was work. Hermione worked as a Senior Assistant in the Beings Division of the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures. This meant that they both worked at the Ministry. However, since Hermione liked to come into work very early, they never arrived together, and her office was two floors away from Harry's, which meant that their paths rarely ever crossed during the usual working day. Most of the time they only saw each other during their regular lunch every Wednesday in the Ministry's staff canteen. Since everyone knew they were good friends, totally ignoring each other completely might appear as though they were trying to hide something.

All in all, Harry was confident that only Hermione's parents knew that he was romantically involved with their daughter. Since, they were muggles, and therefore, not in much of a position to tell anyone from the wizarding world it seemed alright to let them in on the secret. The hardest part was not telling Hagrid, but as much as both of them loved their former Care of Magical Creatures professor, they also knew that his tongue tended to slip from time to time, especially when he went down to the pub.

The reasons for their secrecy were really nothing more than a simple desire for privacy. Both of them remembered well what happened in the weeks that followed the Battle of Hogwarts. There was no denying how famous Harry was, and Hermione's close friendship with him, coupled with her little run at Lord Voldemort shortly before Harry dispatched him permanently, meant that she too had gained a substantial amount of celebrity as well. Needless to say, there was a lot of speculation surrounding both of them, in particular, just how close their friendship truly was. All of this in a time when they were trying to build a new friendship that was never intended to become romantic.

This speculation was sparked by that kiss to his forehead when everyone thought Harry was lying dead on the grass just outside of the castle. The kiss was nothing more than a way for her to say goodbye, but inevitably, the story of it got out. The Daily Prophet, Witch Weekly, and a half-dozen other periodicals began to pervert the kiss into some far flung fantastic notion of some heated romantic affair. Harry and Hermione did not do anything help themselves either. They were seen together, in public, on more than one occasion. It didn't matter that they never held hands or kissed or did anything else that would ever give anyone even remotest notion that they were involved with one another. The mere fact that they were together was enough to lend credence to rumors.

As it always does, the gossip died down after a few weeks when it became quite apparent that there really wasn't anything going on between Harry Potter and Hermione Granger. People moved on and became interested in other celebrities. From time to time, some rumor or other cropped up. Most of them disappeared quickly, mainly because they were so outrageous that few people took them seriously. A recent rumor had paired Harry with Arthur's assistant, Harriet. Harriet was a nice lady who clearly had some kind of crush on him, but she was also a bit scattered. Except for the fact that Harriet did not go around constantly predicting Harry's certain demise, she reminded him of Professor Trelawney. The thought of dating Harriet was almost enough to send shivers down his spine.

The rumor mongering wasn't the real problem. Instead, it was all of the stares and the hushed whispers that were directed at both of them. Harry was long used to this sort of behavior from others, having experienced it for a good portion of his life. He barely even noticed it and ignored it when he did. Hermione, on the other hand, had not been accustomed to that sort of conduct when it was directed towards her, and she never did fully get used to it. There were also the pestering questions that people kept asking her about Harry. This continued for months after the rumors died down. Women wanted to know what kind of kisser Harry was, what his bedroom looked like, and even the size of a certain part of his anatomy. It was slightly amusing to her at first, but after a while it became quite an annoyance. More than a year went by before the questions finally stopped. For Hermione, these were the reasons she wanted their relationship kept on the quiet side.

Harry's concern for keeping their relationship out of the gossip columns, on the other hand, had less to do with the public reading about his love life and more to do with keeping those he cared about from discovering the truth by reading the newspapers. He was most concerned about how Molly would receive the news, really. He wasn't terribly worried about the rest of the family. They would probably welcome the news that Harry had moved on and found a new love. Molly, on the other hand was a different story. It had taken her a lot longer, and Harry doubted that she would ever truly be over the loss of Ron and Ginny. He had always heard that the worst experience for any parent was to bury their own children. When he finally had told her about his relationship with Ginny, the news had saddened Molly even more. It would have made her very happy if Harry had been able to really join her family. Now, Harry was concerned over how she might take the sudden news that he was in a long-term romantic relationship with Hermione. When it did happen, he owed it to her to be the one to tell her.

Over the past few months, Fleur had only served to reinforce his concern. She had taken it upon herself to play matchmaker for Harry, attempting to set him up with her cousin, Amelie. She even showed Harry a picture of her cousin. Amelie shared the same veela grandmother as Fleur, and like Fleur, Amelie was absolutely gorgeous. Harry remembered seeing her at the wedding. In all honesty, from what he could recall of her that day, the photograph did not do Amelie any justice either. "I 'ave shown Amelie your photograph too, 'arry. She sinks you are very 'andsome," Fleur told Harry, hoping to entice him into meeting her cousin. Harry was always appreciative of her efforts, and as appealing as Amelie was, he wasn't interested in dating her. So far he had always been able to come up with some kind of excuse not to meet Amelie.

Through all of this, Molly had not seemed overly appreciative of Fleur's efforts to find a girlfriend for Harry. She had been polite by not saying anything or trying to force Fleur to put a stop to her attempts. Instead, it was more the not so subtle looks of disapproval that Molly gave whenever Fleur so much as mentioned Harry and her cousin in the same sentence that clued him in to this fact. This only served to confirm his belief that she might not like the news that he was involved with Hermione. Still, Molly was one of the strongest persons Harry had ever known. She might not like the news at first, but she would come around in the end. His happiness was more important to her than something like this. If Harry was happy, she would probably grow to accept it. Everything would be alright, so long as she heard it from him first.

Harry found it hard to concentrate with all of these thoughts and ideas running through his head. At a time like this, the only thing that could help him was flying. Every now and then, when he was having trouble wrapping his head around a problem, or when he simply wanted some time to himself, Harry liked to grab his broom and take to the skies for an hour or two. It helped him to clear his thoughts making all those little problems or stress to melt away, if only for a little while. When he landed, he was more relaxed, more focused, and the solution to whatever problem he was facing would usually come soon thereafter. Sadly, he didn't get to fly very often. Living in a muggle neighborhood made it a somewhat difficult prospect. He had to confine his flying to the hours after midnight, when the rest of the world was soundly sleeping in their beds, and if the moon was out, he had to use the disillusionment charm to make himself invisible. Tonight, however, was moonless, not requiring that. Harry looked at his watch. It would still be dark for another hour at least. He had enough time for a quick flight.

Harry rose from his chair and quickly made his way to the hall closet, where he donned the warmest clothes that he could find and grabbed his broom which was tucked neatly behind the hanging coats. With his Firebolt lost somewhere between Little Whinging and Andromeda Tonks's house, Harry was left broomless. He ended up purchasing a refurbished Cleansweep a couple of years ago. He had given some thought to getting another Nimbus or even one of the new Mark-2 Firebolts, but those brooms were meant to be used often and ridden fast. It seemed pointless to spend all that money on something he would get ride only periodically.

With his broom in hand, Harry quietly made his way to the door and out into the back garden. It was even colder outside than he had expected, making Harry glad that he had bundled up so much. The garden, though average in size, was surrounded by higher than normal fences, another one of his steps towards privacy. He quietly took the steps down into the garden and towards its center where a stone birdbath, left over by the previous residents, sat. A tap of his wand on the stone, and the birdbath began glowing in bright, red color. It was a beacon charm, meant to help any witch or wizard find their way. Harry started using it after his first flight from this back yard. He discovered that at night, all of the streets in this neighborhood looked the same, and after landing in the backyard of a house two streets over, he decided it might be a good idea to have something to help him find his way back home. He wasn't worried about the bright red glow attracting too much attention. Only people with magical ability could see it.

Harry straddled his broom and kicked off the ground. He rose gently into the air, just high enough to clear the roofs of the surrounding houses, and then leaned forward, sending himself and the broom flying off to the South. Before long, he was out over the open fields and away from the city. Looking up into the sky, he could see thousands of stars twinkling. More importantly, all of the anxiety and jumble of different thoughts had drained away with the first blast of cold air to his face. His mind became centered and focused, but not exactly where he wanted it to be. Harry found that his mind was straying back to that night after he and Hermione left the Burrow. As much as he tried to concentrate on figuring out his little problem, his mind kept going back to that night. After a few moments, Harry let his mind wander to where it wanted to go. It was that night that put him on the path that led to where he is now.

They left around dusk that night, after several hugs from Mrs. Weasley and a promise to return next Sunday for dinner. It was still warm outside, the afternoon breeze had long-since subsided. They walked silently for almost a minute. Harry thought he should say something to break the silence but wasn't quite sure what. Thankfully, he did not have to. "Congratulations on becoming an auror, Harry," Hermione said. "I know how badly you wanted that. I'm really happy for you."

Harry stopped and looked at Hermione. She wasn't just saying it to be polite. She really was happy for him. "Thanks," he said back to her. "Listen, Hermione, I'm really sorry about what happened."

"Harry, I know you are, but please, I don't want you to be. I didn't do anything to stop it either. We did it, together, the two of us. I'm not going to let you put this all on yourself. Now, if you don't mind, I'd prefer it if we didn't discuss this here. Between what we did and seeing you here for the first time since then, it's just been too weird. I really do wish I had picked some other place for us to meet."

"Yeah, I was wondering about that. Why did you choose here?"

"Well, I thought if we spent some time near each other, without having to talk about what happened we might get to feel more comfortable around one another when it was time to have that conversation."

"And you don't feel comfortable being around me yet?"

"No, Harry, it isn't that at all. I just didn't expect how I'd feel about being back here…you know…without him around. It was harder than I'd expected."

Throughout this entire day, the unusual feeling that Ron and Ginny were not here had been pushed to the back of his mind. He had been far more worried about the effect Hermione's presence would have on him. Harry suddenly felt bad that he had not given them more thought and at how easy it had been to push them from his mind. Then, even in the moonlight, he noticed the tears welling up in her eyes. She didn't look as though she were about to break, "I'm sorry," she said while wiping her eyes, "I thought I was past all this."

"Hermione, you don't need to apologize for anything. I understand. It's been hard. I know that. You can't expect to get over it all so soon. You've got to give it time. That's all either of us can do."

"Thanks, Harry." Hermione said, with a faint smile.

"Now, why don't we get out here. Wherever you want to go is alright by me."

"Umm…I was sort of thinking we could go to your house…if that's alright, I mean."

"Sure, I suppose," Harry replied, surprised that Hermione would want to go there of all places. "That's alright with you?"

"Well, it's not as though there are a lot of places open on a Sunday night, and I honestly don't fancy going to a pub. I was going to suggest that we go to my parents' house, but it's a bit of a mess right now. I still haven't finished unpacking yet. Besides, I kind of want to see all the things you've done with your place."

"Alright, fair enough."

Hermione apparated them both to Harry's house. Harry's ability to apparate not withstanding, Hermione refused to allow him to apparate on his own. He had neglected to take his Apparition's exam. It had been alright for him to apparate when they had been on the run as fugitives, but now that Voldemort and his Death Eaters were gone, Hermione's always-obey-the-rules nature took over. She forbade Harry to apparate anywhere on his own until he passed his test. The previous few minutes had given him some hope that everything between them would be okay, something that Harry had not wanted to ruin by arguing with her over something as petty as apparating without a license. More importantly, it meant that she still cared about him and that somewhere in there, the old Hermione he had known before the war and the Battle was still lurking, waiting to return.

When they arrived at the top front step of Number Twelve, Grimmauld Place, Harry opened the door and ushered Hermione into the house. "Wow, Harry! This is amazing!" she exclaimed upon seeing the newly painted entry way. "I can't believe you did this all by yourself. I can't wait to see the rest of the house."

"Well, I've only really managed to get the ground floor and parts of the first floor done so far," Harry responded.

"That's alright. I wouldn't have expected you to get it all done in three weeks." Hermione quickly answered with an excited twinkle in her eye.

"Okay, follow me then. I'll show you what I've finished so far." Harry slowly led her through the house showing her each of the rooms he had painted. He told her the story of his first attempt at painting the entry way, which had her laughing almost uncontrollably. Overall, she seemed impressed by Harry's work. She walked through each room studying each wall carefully, looking for some kind of mistake or missed spot, but much her surprise, could find none. That didn't mean she could not come up with a few suggestions. According to her, Harry needed to get new curtains and upholstery for the furniture to match the new color of the walls.

Nearly three quarters of an hour had passed before the finally settled at the kitchen table. They had not been here together since the time they had been planning their infiltration of the Ministry almost a year before. Now, they were here for an entirely different purpose, one that was almost as delicate as getting into the Ministry had been. Harry would have preferred doing this in the sitting room. He could tell almost immediately that it was the room Hermione liked the best, and more than anything, he wanted her to feel comfortable. Instead, they just ended up here, each with a butterbeer in their hands, waiting for the right moment to start up the conversation they originally came here for.

"I see you went with my color suggestions," she said smiling, almost looking proud with herself.

"Yeah. I decided to try you suggestions on the sitting room, and after I finished it, I figured you had a better handle on it than me. So, I decided just to go with the choices that you'd written on your list. All except that bright yellow color you put down for the stair case. I couldn't stand that one."

Hermione laughed a little. "To be honest, I didn't like it either, but I thought we should keep our options open."

"I can't imagine what Kreacher would have thought of such a bright color either."

"Speaking of Kreacher, where is he? I'd like to say 'Hello' to him."

"I don't know. He's around somewhere…probably upstairs with his mistress or something. I could call him if you like."

"No, that's okay. Don't bother him," she said before falling silent. She took a sip of her butterbeer before focusing her eyes to a small stain on the table top while Harry sat not really knowing what to say next. Then Hermione finally looked at him and asked, "Harry, I'm curious about that night. Why did you kiss me?"

Harry took a deep breath, finally glad that she had broken the silence and found a way to start their conversation on what really mattered. Unfortunately, he did not have a real answer to her question. All Harry could do was look down at his butterbeer and say, "I don't know really. I just saw you there, crying, and for whatever reason, I just felt like kissing you. I wish I had a better reason why," Harry said rather sheepishly. "All I can say is that it felt like the right thing to do at the time, but I want you to know that I wasn't trying to advantage of you."

"Of course you weren't, Harry. I could never believe that you would. You're far too chivalrous to do something like that to anyone. I was really just sort of wondering if there might be some other reason why you kissed me. I mean we had been getting very close to one another, and I thought maybe there was another reason."

"No. There's no other reason I can think of. I mean I care about, Hermione, but not in that way. When you kissed me back, did you do it because you had another reason?"

"What? N-no Harry," Hermione said quickly. "I kissed you back for the same reason you kissed me…because it felt right. It made me feel better. It made me forget about everything. You're a very good kisser, Harry," she added, her face turning slightly red at the admission. "It all felt so good that I didn't want those good feelings to end. I wanted to do everything possible to keep them going. Then I sort just lost control of myself. I think that's why we slept together that night. We had both been feeling so horrible for so long that we wanted something, anything that could make us feel better."

"Yeah, it did feel pretty good," Harry said thinking aloud.

"Well, most of it did."

"Most of it?" Harry asked completely shocked that she could not have enjoyed everything they did together that night.

Hermione, suddenly realizing that she had said something unexpected and insensitive, spoke quickly. "Oh no, Harry," she said putting her hand on top of his. "It's got nothing to do with you. It's just that a woman's first time…you know…well let's just say it isn't the best experience for us."

"I'm sorry, Hermione," Harry said, suddenly feeling bad that he had not been more considerate. "I wish you would have told me, or something."

"Harry, there's not really anything you could have done to make it any better. But don't worry. The rest of it was nice…quite wonderful actually. There was the kissing, of course, the way I felt just holding you and feeling your body pressed against mine, and there was that one part where you did that thing, that was amazing, Harry. Where on earth did you learn how to do that?"

Harry looked at her slyly, raising one eyebrow. "I could ask you the same question."

"What are you talking abo…oh right. That. Ummm…I…ummm...gosh…"

Hermione's face turned redder than Harry had ever seen it before, and he decided to spare her further embarrassment. "That's alright Hermione," he said chuckling slightly. "You don't need to tell me anything. I'd prefer not to know."

"No, it's alright. It's not like I'd done it before, Harry. I just read about it, and it sounded…interesting."

"You read about it?" Harry asked in disbelief. Hermione liked to read, that was a given, but he would never would have thought her desire for knowledge would extend to something like this.

"My mother likes romance novels, and a couple of summers ago, in the time before I went to the Burrow, I was a little bored, and I picked one of them up." Harry could not tell if Hermione was more embarrassed about her recently-tapped skills in the bedroom or that she had picked it up from one of those trashy romance novels people buy in airports or at newsstands.

"I didn't realize those novels were so detailed about that sort of stuff."

"Oh it wasn't, not really. I got the gist of it from what I read then sort of guessed about the rest."

"That was some pretty good guesswork, I'd say."

"Thanks," Hermione said.

For a moment, an uncomfortable silence set in before Hermione admitted something Harry never thought she would. "You know, Harry, I'd be lying if I said I hadn't thought about doing that with you again."

"I know what you mean," Harry unexpectedly replied. In that instant, the memories of those satisfying moments of passion and lust were quickly moving to the forefront of his thoughts. He gazed over to her. From the look on her face he could tell that it was clearly on her mind as well. Harry could see that they were, once again, moving towards making the same mistake, but he was not going to allow that to happen again. "You know we can't do it again, right?" he said in a sobering tone.

"No, we can't," Hermione responded, sounding almost disappointed.

"It's not that I don't exactly want to. It's just that…

"I know. A night of pleasure isn't worth risking our friendship."

"Exactly. So, I guess the real question now is how to fix things and just be friends again."

"Harry, there really isn't anything that can be done to fix this. We had sex. That is something that will always be between us from now on. The only thing we can do is to figure out how to make this a part of our friendship what we have now and learn to live with it."

"Alright. So, how do we do that?"

"Well, the way I see it, we need time and to do one of two things."

"Which are?"

"One, we can give each other space, not see each other for a while, and maybe, with a little time, we can get through this."

"How much time are we talking about?"

"That's the thing. I'd say at least a year, possibly more. That's why I don't like that idea. I don't think I could spend the next year of my life without you being a part of it Harry."

He agreed with her on that. The prospect of not seeing Hermione for a year of more was slightly unsettling. "Then we go with the second option, which is?"

"Well, we do the opposite. We spend lots of time together, and hopefully, by doing so we will get relaxed enough around each other that sleeping together won't be such a big deal." Harry preferred this option over the first but still saw one glaring problem with it. He was about to mention it when Hermione beat him to the punch. "It's pretty clear that both of us are interested in trying it again. Just minute ago that was what we were both thinking about; at least that's what I was thinking about." Harry nodded in agreement and she continued, "The obvious problem is that by seeing each other so much, we run the risk of giving into our physical desires, but I think if we keep our heads and stay in control, we should be alright." Hermione paused for a moment, letting the idea sink in his head before asking, "So, what do you think?"

Both plans had their bad points. Although she never said it, the first could very well bring an end to their friendship altogether. Friendships tended to do that sort of thing when so much time was spent apart, and Harry wasn't willing to chance that at all.

Of course, the second plan left some questions that Harry couldn't help but ask himself. What would happen if they didn't keep their heads and let themselves lose control? Would they try again or would they just give up let the friendship die away? There were no answers to these questions, at least none that could be given until if and when they actually happened.

Despite these possible problems, Harry felt that the second plan had a decent chance of salvaging their friendship. He was willing to hazard the possible chance ruining everything just to rescue his friendship with Hermione.

"Harry? What do you think?" she asked again.

"I say…it's worth a shot," Harry answered.