Cappuccino After Eleven
Romione Stans: Happy you like it – and, already on it!;)
TheaMama: Hmmmm… ruler of the galaxy has kind of a nice ring to it, doesn't it? I can't help but feel very tempted to take up your offer. In the meantime, I hope this update will do nicely;)
Chapter Fifteen
The Photographs
In the morning, Hermione and Harry both accompanied Ron to the train to the international Italian Floo network station. Inside her pocket, her fingers lay curled around the photograph Harry had taken of them – sleeping snuggled up close together in the couch.
She was going to miss him. Harry had given another one of the photographs to Ron, who had carefully put it in his backpack. Hermione had noted how carefully he'd made sure it didn't get wrinkled like the rest of everything in the bag.
All three walked together to the train station, while they talked together in loud voices. To Hermione, it all sounded so unnatural. She were carrying Ron's smallest bag over her shoulder, and it kept pushing into her leg as she walked.
She tried to focus on the conversation, but slipped into thought instead, only awakened by Harry's loud, "Don't you agree, Hermione?" at something she wasn't entirely sure of.
They arrived five minutes before the train was leaving, and between finding the right train track and getting the ticket, only a few precious seconds were left before he would disappear on the train forever.
They hugged, with Harry and Hermione pressing into Ron's sides.
"We're going to miss you," Harry told him, muffled by Ron's shirt.
"It's not going to be the same without you," Hermione supplied too.
The brakes of the train shrieked, and it came to a stop.
Before Ron entered it, he turned around once more for one last hug to each.
He spared Hermione for last, and when he let go, his hand encased hers softly, and their eyes lingered a little too long for anything besides …
Was he going to kiss her?
Her breath stopped in her throat.
She melted more into his touch.
A whistle blew and Ron's eyes widened.
For a second, he was torn between running onto the train, and staying with them, but then he swallowed, made a hesitant decision, and leapt back to catch it before it left him behind.
Hermione still felt the warmth of his fingers where they had entangled with hers.
She was laying still in bed with the memory of his face as he waved out the window of the train.
Hermione didn't know what to feel about the whole thing.
She hoped he was going to write, but he hadn't last time. Granted, he had tried, but what if he wouldn't be able to make it this time around?
She snuggled up in one of her thick comfort blankets and prepared to wait for the silence. For the letters that would never come. For staring at the blank S.P.E.W. pin.
Hermione was just about to let the tears fall when she heard a series of rapid clicks against the window.
Puzzled, she blinked away the tears and tore the curtains away from the glass.
On the other side was a small, ruffled-feathered owl with tiny glass eyes. It impatiently tapped the glass once more, before almost falling off the ledge in a drunken woozy motion.
Hermione reached out to grab it and placed her hand behind its body to keep it from falling. The owl didn't grateful at all and kept puckering at the window as if it didn't even see her.
Attached to its leg was a thick, folded envelope.
She removed the string keeping it secured to the pudgy owl and opened it.
In big, crooked letters, Ron had written, "ATTEMPT NUMBER THREE,"
The sheet letter sheet was thick and rigid.
And below it, in smaller, even less graceful letters, "I finally understood laminating. My owl Pig has navigation problems, I think he flew into a window once. And now, a pond or something. Anyway, he came back all wet with my smouldering letter. I hope you get this, Hermione. And if you're not Hermione Granger, can you make sure she gets it?"
She skimmed the rest of the letter a couple more times, each time getting stuck at the last sentences.
"I will be back for three of my exams in two months. I was hoping we could meet again then,"
It was signed 'Ron', with the R weirdly angled. For some reason, she felt like it was typical him – nonchalant, a bit strange, but also pretty in his very own way.
Hermione let out a strangled laugh, and then the tears started rolling down her cheeks.
He made it – he sent her that letter!
This time, she didn't need to expect the silence. This time, he'd keep in touch.
Relief welled up in her, and she let out a relieved sob.
"Thank you," she whispered and sighed.
A smile broke through the tears, and she got a sight of herself through the mirror.
Hair frizzled, eyes blurry and swollen. Her nose was red, and she were clutching the thick laminated letter as if it were a lifeline.
And she immediately broke out in laughter.
Ron had come back to her. And he intended to stay.
Hermione found her own pen, lightly tapped it against a blank sheet, and started drafting her reply.
"ATTEMPT NUMBER ONE," she wrote as the headline.
"Pig made it," she worded out loud as her quill danced over the paper.
Hermione felt the relief flood in her chest at the thought. She caught another glimpse of herself in the mirror and gave herself a curt nod.
With a pinch of courage, she wrote, "Since Harry's flat will be occupied, you can stay here in mine with me. If you'd like to,"
She considered writing that he'd save money as a good excuse for him to stay over at hers but reconsidered. She remembered the slight reaction he'd had to Harry's charity, and she knew he didn't want to accept money from others, perhaps even if he needed it.
At last, Hermione overlooked over her letter, only then seeing how different it was from Ron's.
She half-snorted, half-laughed to herself, seeing the difference between his crooked letters and her fine lines.
She hoped he would say yes to staying with her for exams. If not, she would see him somewhere else. But most importantly, she would see him, somehow, either way.
She let her fingers glide over the photograph of them sleeping on the couch – the photograph they both had a copy of.
Two more months.
Hermione was already counting down the days.