A/N: Thanks so much for continuing on with this story, and sorry for leaving off on a bit of a cliffhanger last week. Let's see how it shakes out!

The weekend had been a nightmare. Hermione had spent most of the time torturing herself over what could've happened that spurred Ron to suddenly flee from her house as though it was on fire. There were plenty of possible reasons, none of which were good for her. Of course, there was nothing but radio silence from him all weekend. Part of her wanted to just text him and ask or even go to his house and just knock on the door and force him to talk, but she couldn't bring herself to do that. What if he just confirmed her worst fears? She wasn't sure she could handle that level of rejection.

To make matters worse, Hannah was out of town with her family to some remote cabin up north, and she didn't even have cell phone service. That meant there was literally nobody for Hermione to talk with about the dilemma, and by the time Monday rolled around, she was eager to find her best girlfriend as soon as she got to school.

There was still the small matter of her morning companion, though. Several weeks ago, she'd promised Ron that she would take him to school every morning. Even though things ended as awkwardly as possible between the two of them, she still didn't intend to strand him without a ride. So she showed up in his driveway like normal, wondering if he'd even pop out of the house or not. She decided to give him a maximum of four minutes; it had never taken him longer than that in the past. As soon as his front door opened and he sauntered toward the car, her stomach twisted on itself so violently that she thought her breakfast might make a repeat appearance all over the steering wheel.

After exchanging perfunctory greetings, it was silent the entire way to school. Ron alternated between scrolling through his phone and looking out the window, but either way, his gaze never landed on Hermione. And as soon as she parked the car, he jumped out, mumbled a quick thank you, and dashed off to a different entrance.

Needless to say, by the time Hermione laid eyes on Hannah, she was desperate to talk over her situation.

Hannah smiled as she saw her friend power-walking toward her. "Hey, Hermione, how was your–"

"Bathroom. Now."

Before Hannah could make sense of what was happening, Hermione had pulled her into the closest ladies' room, pushing the door shut behind them before turning to her friend.

"I'm sorry, I hope you had a great weekend and all, but I just have to talk to someone about this or I might explode," Hermione said, a sense of panic in her voice.

Her friend looked back at her with raised eyebrows, clearly apprehensive about the upcoming conversation. "Umm, okay?"

"Friday afternoon."

"Ahh yes, practicing with Ron," Hannah said with a mischievous grin. Suddenly, though, she registered the look of pain in Hermione's eyes, and her expression morphed into one of concern. "Oh no, practicing with Ron. Don't tell me…well, what happened?"

"So he was acting weird all day, right? Like, super nice and super attentive."

"Right, I remember. I thought it was kind of cute…"

"Me too, at first. But then, we arrive at my house and things are becoming, like, a little…spicy, maybe?"

"Spicy?" Hannah seemed like she didn't know whether to be excited or mortified.

"Like, he was definitely flirting. I'm famously bad at recognizing that kind of thing, but even I could see it. And so anyway, I kind of started flirting back a little bit and we ended up turning on As Long As You're Mine to practice."

"Well, naturally. Flirting can only lead to one thing, and that song is perfect for it."

Hermione nodded. "That was kind of what I was thinking. But so anyway, we're both really going for it with the choreography, and when we got to the end, he didn't even hesitate. I haven't been kissed before, so it seems odd to call it the best kiss of my life when it was the only kiss of my life. But, like, this was the best kiss of my life."

"Wow, that's–"

"And it just kept going, long after the song was over he kept kissing me."

"Well," Hannah replied with an excited bounce, "that's great! I'm happy for you, really!"

"But then…"

Her friend's expression dropped. "Oh no. I'm almost scared to ask, but what happened next?"

"Then he left!" Hermione yelled. She was unconcerned by a girl passing through their conversation on her way to the toilet. "Just stopped kissing me and immediately left! Made up some excuse about having to do a chore for his mom or something? I don't know, he was out the door before he could even explain."

Her friend's eyes were flitting around the small, fluorescently lit room. The wheels were clearly churning in her mind, going through the same possibilities that Hermione had thought through time and time again over the weekend. "Okay. Umm, and since then?"

"Nothing. Absolutely nothing. I gave him a ride to school this morning and he barely said two words to me. It's like we've gone back to being…I don't know, even less than acquaintances."

"Weird. I mean, it might make a whole lot of sense, but–"

"What do you mean might make sense? How does it make any sense?"

Hannah placed her hands on Hermione's shoulders and tried to catch her focus. When their eyes finally connected, Hermione took a deep breath, trying to stabilize herself. "Calm down, okay? I completely get why you're freaked out about this, but you're not helping yourself if you can't think about it rationally."

Rationally? Rationally? How was she supposed to think about any of the past few days rationally? It's been a roller coaster of emotion unlike she'd ever experienced in her life!

"I'm trying, really. But you know about my history with him. This goes deep. If I've done something to ruin our relationship, it's about a lot more than just never being able to date him. We're talking about the longest and, no offense, probably deepest friendship I've ever had potentially going down the drain. It's life-altering."

"First of all," Hannah started in a calm and soothing voice, "no offense taken, I understand. But second of all, just stop and think for a moment. Like, really think about his possible motivations here. I'm sure I haven't thought about it as much as you have, but in my mind, I have two main thoughts. One, perhaps he realized that he was pushing the limits of professional behavior and felt like he was dragging you with him. From what you've told me, Ron has always been somewhat protective of you. What if he just felt like he crossed a line and was embarrassed?"

"I mean, maybe, but–"

"Or," Hannah continued, not allowing herself to be cut off, "and with all of the evidence I have at my disposal, I'm leaning towards this one…he likes you. A lot. You've been sitting around worrying about blurring the lines between character and actor ever since the cast list was posted. Well, what if you weren't the only one? What if he realized that he was letting himself spill over into his character a little too much? He knows how much this show means to you. I'm sure he doesn't want to screw it all up by letting his feelings interfere."

An exasperated huff flew out of Hermione's mouth. "Even if you're right, which I doubt you are, it's already been screwed up. How am I supposed to kiss him on stage now?"

Overhead, the warning bell rang, notifying students throughout the building to wrap up the conversations and get to class. Hermione glanced at herself in the mirror, adjusting her hair and running her hands over her face. What was she supposed to do with any of that information?

"Look, I don't have the answer to this; there's only one person who does. I think you know what you need to do here. I'm not saying it'll be fun, but you've got to talk with him. Probably soon, before anything has a chance to fester."

Hermione groaned and threw her bag back over her shoulder. Why did her friend have to be right in suggesting that she do the most uncomfortable thing possible? "I know, you're probably right. But what if it just makes things worse?"

"Well…I'll admit, it's a risk. But wouldn't you rather know one way or the other instead of tormenting yourself over a hypothetical?"

"I don't know, at least if I'm the one tormenting myself, I'd be familiar with my oppressor."

"Hermione…"

The logic was sound, leaving Hermione no option but to nod. "Right. Okay, I'll try. We usually run into each other at lunch. Maybe we can rip off the band-aid then."

"That's the spirit," Hannah said with an enthusiastic punch to the shoulder. "Just be honest with him. You've been friends forever, I'm sure it's not insurmountable."

"I hope you're right. Because I don't think I can go back to the way things were before."

Summer Before Ninth Grade

August 15th

Dear Diary,

I feel blah. Just blah. The last couple weeks, all blah. I'm sorry I haven't written in a while. I think I just haven't had the energy or motivation to do so. Which is stupid, it's not like I've been that busy. The summer camp I was working at finished a week and a half ago, so the last ten days or so have just been me being lazy. Basically, I'm trying to say that I have no excuse. There were no plans that were getting in the way of me writing more often, but it just…hasn't happened.

No plans. It's funny because I should've had plans. Well, not funny. It's actually been quite depressing. Let's start from the beginning.

You probably remember my entries from earlier this summer, diary. They were chock full of Ron Weasley mentions, probably because we were spending literally ALL of our free time together. Sometimes Harry would join us as well, but usually it was just the two of us. Ron would hang out at my house, we'd take long walks around the neighborhood, and we'd often wind up at Mario's around lunchtime. It went from just a Friday afternoon thing to an every-other-day thing for a while. I'm pretty sure I gained some weight because of it, but whatever. Nothing else mattered because Ron and I were having so much fun. I didn't care about spending time with anyone else. He was all I needed and I was so happy.

But then…ugh, I haven't mentioned this yet, but I suppose I should tell you about the weirdest part of the summer. It happened a little over two weeks ago. Some new superhero movie opened, and Ron really wanted to go see it. It looked entertaining enough for a summer blockbuster, so I was happy to go with him when he asked me. I figured that Harry or some of our other friends would be coming too, but when my parents dropped me off, Ron was waiting there by himself.

He was wearing a button-up shirt and a pair of pants that looked fairly new, certainly a far cry from all of his other shorts and jeans with holes and grass stains all over them. When I kind of made fun of him about it, he got all red. Well, what did he expect? He didn't look like RON.

But anyway, once we got up to the ticket booth, he jumped in front of me and paid for my ticket. And if that wasn't enough, we went to get popcorn and drinks and he paid for all of that too! I told him I would get the snacks because he got the tickets, but he insisted. In the back of my mind, I remembered Parvati talking to Padma about how Seamus had asked her to the movies and paid for everything. By the end of the movie, they were kissing in the back of the theater! But…it was Ron. That couldn't have been what he was thinking (or what he wanted), right? Even if it was kind of what I wanted…

Anyway, I could barely focus on the movie because I couldn't stop thinking about whether I was on a date or not. He clearly never said "date", and I racked my brain trying to think of anything he said when he asked me that might clarify his intentions. But I couldn't come up with anything. So we watched the movie. One time, we reached into the popcorn at the same time and our hands touched. I liked it, but come on, how cliche is that? He pulled away instantly and shot to the other side of his seat as far away from me as possible. Certainly not date-like behavior in my book. And then the movie ended, his mom picked us up, we talked about the movie a little bit on the way home, and that was it.

Since then, everything has been TOTALLY different. Every time we have plans to hang out, he cancels them last minute. I keep asking if he wants to go to Mario's or just hang out like we used to, but he always says he can't. Football practice started, and I know that means a lot to him, so he's there a lot. But not all the time. I don't know, I just hate that he doesn't seem to want to be friends anymore, especially when I thought that we could've been close to being MORE than friends. Did I screw something up? Did I do something wrong? Was I supposed to kiss him in the movie theater and now he's mad at me because I didn't? Because…well, I happily would've kissed him! I would LOVE to kiss him! The theater, my house, his house, Mario's, even in the middle of the sidewalk…ANYWHERE!

But now it seems like I've lost my chance. I guess I never had one to begin with. And instead of enjoying the last few weeks before high school starts, I'm spending most of my time in my room, breaking down and crying sporadically over what I've lost. Not only is any chance of us ever being in a real relationship gone, but I've also been abandoned by my best friend. It hurts to even write it. How is someone supposed to deal with all of that at once AND start high school in a week and a half? Seriously?

Love, Hermione Granger, Age 14

For once, Hermione wished time would slow down. She was dreading the ringing of the bell that would release her for lunch. As soon as it sounded, she would have no excuse not to have an uncomfortable conversation with Ron. Clearing the air would be a relief in the long run, but she legitimately had no idea how the conversation would go. It was going to be a fight just to have the talk, though, given how it was so unlike him to ever be serious even for a moment. But they'd gotten into the mess together, so what other way was there to get out of it?

As she walked down the hall, her eyes were scanning the crowd for any sign of his telltale ginger hair, but he was nowhere to be found. Usually, he was coming from upstairs where his math class was held, but she couldn't track him down among the hordes of students descending to the lunch room. Even though she knew it would be best to get the unpleasantness over with, part of her was starting to feel relieved that the conversation might be put on hold. At least, of course, until she nearly ran right into him as he was exiting the cafeteria.

"Oh, sorry!" she said, barely avoiding a splash of his chocolate milk landing on the front of her sweater.

His eyes were pointed at the ground as he shook his head. "No, my fault. I should have…yeah, my fault."

"Are you–wait, are you leaving? Lunch just started?"

"O–Oh yeah," he stammered. "Yeah, I've gotta run. Class, you know."

The tightness in her chest clamped down even harder as she stood there and watched him lie to her face. Still, she furrowed her brow and played dumb. "But your class just ended. You have lunch now."

"Yeah, but I need to work on something. Umm, for class."

Okay, enough of this. Rip off the band-aid, right? We're doing this now.

"Ron, can we…?"

Pulling him off into a side hallway and away from the masses, she leaned against the painted cinder block wall, effectively blocking him from going anywhere.

"Are you okay? Are…you know, are we okay?"

"Yeah, totally fine," he said. His tone was nonchalant, but he couldn't stop shuffling his feet and cracking his knuckles inside the pocket of his hoodie. "Why, are you okay?"

"I want to be!" she answered with a sullen sigh. "But…I mean, let's be honest with each other for a minute. We said it wasn't going to get weird, and it got a little weird."

"No, it's not weird."

"You…don't think it's a little weird?"

"Nah, it's cool."

What?! How could he possibly be serious right now?

"But…Ron, you practically sprinted out of my house as soon as we finished one run-through of our song and haven't said a word to me since. If that's not weird, I don't know what is."

Throwing his head back, he took a big swig of his drink before wiping his mouth with the sleeve of his jacket. "Yeah, I told you, I had to go help my mom with something. It was my fault, I should've remembered in the first place."

"Really?"

"Really."

"And you're sure it had absolutely nothing to do with the fact that we'd just shared a pretty intense kiss?" she posed, glaring straight into his shifting eyes.

He shrugged. "I mean, I guess that was pretty shitty timing on my part. Sorry about that, I guess I wasn't thinking."

It couldn't be that simple. There was no way he happened to remember that he'd made plans with his mother at that exact moment, right? Everything about his recent actions told her that he was lying, but short of accusing him straight to his face, she was running out of options.

And to top it off, her eyes were starting to moisten thinking that their kiss meant nothing to him.

"Okay," she continued slowly. "I mean…it still felt a little weird to me, though."

Ron pulled his backpack over his shoulder and started moving to his right, but she shifted her position to cut off his exit route. "Yeah, that's my bad. I should've been, uhh, more sensitive I guess."

"I don't want you to feel like you have to–because, well, they're my emotions, not yours, so it's not your responsib–ugh, I don't know."

"Right, but still, I get it. It's tricky. Anyway, I do have to run. See you after school?"

Shoulders slumping, there was nothing left to do but admit defeat. "Yeah. Okay."

As soon as she slid out of his way, he started off down the hall.

"Ron?" she called after him.

He spun around, but he continued walking backward. "Yeah?"

"You're sure we're okay?"

The lopsided grin that used to set her world on fire suddenly shattered any remaining hope. "Never better."

Hermione watched as he turned a corner and slipped out of sight. How had things gone so terribly wrong? How could he not have felt a thing about what had happened between them? A breakdown was coming, she was sure of it. The only important thing was to make it to the bathroom before embarrassing herself in front of the entire school.

Once she was safely ensconced in the girl's bathroom, tears started pouring from her eyes. She locked herself in one of the stalls, leaning against the back of the door to keep her from falling. Sobs were involuntarily escaping from her lips, and no matter how hard she tried to silence them, her cries could probably be heard outside the door.

But none of that mattered. The only thing that mattered was Ron's words, the daggers he'd so casually thrust into her still-beating heart. His complete apathy, his indifference toward her feelings, his denial of everything she knew she'd observed with her own two eyes…how could it be possible that she was talking to the same person who had shared those moments with her just a few days ago?

Everything she thought she understood about him and their relationship had been incorrect, nothing but a stupid teenage girl's fantasy world that had finally clashed with the unyielding, brutal nature of reality. If she had any hope of continuing the musical and her friendship with Ron, the last few minutes had illustrated with ruthless clarity that she needed to abandon any hope of a romantic entanglement.

Still, that was substantially easier said than done. As she continued to huddle by herself in the bathroom and cry, her mind wouldn't accept the new task at hand, instead focusing solely on the disappointment of her misunderstanding.

How could I have misinterpreted everything? How could I have been so blind to the truth? He never cared about me like that. The kiss meant nothing to him.

But it meant something to me!