LEARN AND LET GO

Disclaimer: This is a non-profit tribute to the works of JK Rowling who created and, together with her publishers and licensees, owns the characters and settings elaborated herein.

A/N: Thanks to all my reviewers and especially to my previewers, Bellegeste , Cecelle and Lady Memory.

Lunch with Neville was a welcome break in a day of present-shopping. His work at Villeroi Gardens absorbed and exhausted him; they hadn't met since the day he caught her here with Severus. Was that only five months ago?

"Why do you keep looking around?" she asked.

"Er, Snape's not joining us this time, is he?" asked Neville.

Hermione almost dropped her spoon. "Why should he be?"

"Ginny said you're practically engaged." He prodded at his sorrel sundae thoughtfully.

"We're just friends," she said, wiping rose and redcurrant ripple from her sleeve.

"That's what people always say."

And they never believed denials, so there wasn't much point arguing. Hermione sighed.

"Aren't you going to tell me I'm insane? Everyone else has."

He took a bite, then another bite.

"Do you think you're insane?" he asked.

She grimaced. "Sometimes I wonder." Like when his eyelids suddenly seem enticing. "He's quieter than I expected. Gentler. More forgiving. I like him a lot. But it still sometimes feels like I'm looking for a pot of gold in a minefield."

Neville's brow wrinkled. "Isn't that where Muggles usually keep their gold?"

"Not that sort of mine. A minefield is like, erm, hundreds of exploding cauldrons buried underground where you can't see to avoid them," she said.

"Oh." His brow smoothed. " Stands to reason you'd find the gold and I'd find the explosions, then."

"For as long as I've known you, you've been as miserable as a dragon at Gringotts." Minerva said. "You turned it aside when Pomona asked, but we've all noticed the difference, and been glad of it. You needn't be afraid to tell me. Is it Hermione that's sweetened your temper?"

Severus flattened his mashed potatoes with the back of his fork. "Not directly. We're just friends."

"People always say that." She cut another sliver of beef.

"She doesn't want more," he explained.

Her knife stilled. "And what do you want?"

He fluffed up his potatoes and flattened them again. "When has that ever mattered? I told you I'm not the sort of man a teenager falls for. Even one as sensitive as Hermione."

"Then I understand even less."

He smiled a little. Just a little. "I have learnt not to undervalue friendship. She's encouraged me to do what I should have done a long time ago. Face the past, learn from it and let it go."

Over at the Gryffindor table, brown eyes burned.

"I wish I could transfigure him into a turkey for the holidays and serve him up for lunch," Ginny said. "With parsnips."

"That's going a bit far," Colin argued. "Your mum'd go spare."

"Just look at him! Smirking away because Hermione won't give him up! I've owled everyone," Ginny complained. "She just won't listen to reason."

"You owled her parents?" Colin asked in horror. "She'll kill you." He realised his mistake when Ginny's eyes gleamed. 'I'm an idiot. Of course she didn't think of them. What pureblood ever remembers Muggles?'

"Maybe not quite everybody," Ginny said.

A/N Villeroi Gardens has been mentioned before (ch 9) as the reason Neville couldn't come to Hermione's birthday dinner.

Sorrel is a rather sharp-tasting herb, harmless in small quantities, poisonous in large. Wiki likens the taste to kiwifruit or sour wild strawberries. A rather unusual choice for an icecream flavour, but wizards do seem to have some strange tastes ;~P

Ginny's eyes are "bright brown" in canon. (CoS, ch 3)