Never On Time by Nicole

Rating: PG
Genres: Drama, Romance
Relationships: Ron & Luna
Book: Ron & Luna, Books 1 - 5
Published: 15/10/2003
Last Updated: 15/10/2003
Status: Completed

After making plans to meet up with a friend, Luna Lovegood oversleeps, and when she arrives at
their meeting place, unexpectedly saves her friends’ older brother. R/LL. The incantation for the
Bat-Bogey hex is credited to Nell (Steel Lily). (Note: Though I do ship D/G, I've gotten
attracted by Neville/Ginny as being possible canon, and it is hinted at in the story.)




1. Never On Time
----------------

**Never On Time**

**By:** Nicole

**Summary:** After making plans to meet up with a friend, Luna Lovegood oversleeps, and when
she arrives at their meeting place, unexpectedly saves her friends’ older brother. R/LL. The
incantation for the Bat-Bogey hex is credited to **Nell** (Steel Lily).

She rolled over in her bed tugging the covers up to her chin. Something in her brain was telling
her to get up, but the cold morning air when she threw the covers away from her body told her to go
back to bed. And she listened to the side that told her to stay where she was. At least, until she
realized that she was late.

“Oh no.. Oh, no! Ginny’s going to *kill* me! I was supposed to meet her downstairs at 8:30!
This is horrible, absolutely horrible.” Luna rushed around her dormitory, getting dressed, and it
was a good thing she had laid out her outfit the night before, because otherwise, she probably
would have put on a shirt that actually looked like it went with her skirt when it was on the
hanger.

She slid her feet into her shoes, and grabbed her bag off the table next to her bed. She threw
some things into her bag, and dashed out the door. She ran past Padma Patil and Anthony Goldstein,
who were discussing their prefect duties, barely ackowledged Mandy Brocklehurst’s greeting, and
even almost bumped into Nevile Longbottom, who was conversing with Dean Thomas about art in the
corridor next to a painting with a fat lady in a pink dress.

After about five minutes, she finally reached the staircase that she recognized as being the one
that led to the Entrance Hall, and she decided to catch her breath for a moment. She didn’t stop
completely, instead assuming a leisurely pace. Halfway down the stair case she heard some voices.
She recognized one of them as Ginny’s brother, Ronald. The other one, she thought sounded vaguely
familiar, and after a moment, she realized that Ronald was arguing with none other than Draco
Malfoy.

“So you think just because you’re in Slytherin, you can take points off of another Prefect,
Malfoy? Professor McGonagall specifically told us all that we are not allowed to take points off
from one another!” Ronald was clearly in a tiff about something, Luna thought, but from the stories
she had heard from Ginny about Malfoy, it seemed he had good reason to be.

“Slow down, Weasel, you don’t want to overload your brain do you? I think you’ve said enough for
one day, how about I teach you a little lesson in how to shut up?” Malfoy sounded as though he
wasn’t really worried, but Luna thought he should be. She crept slowly down the staircase, pulling
out her wand and being careful not to make any movements. Luckily for Luna, and for Ron, Malfoy was
the one who was standing with his back towards the staircase.

She was still out of their sight, but she could see them perfectly, due to her instincts keeping
her in the shadows. She had a fleeting memory of fiery red hair brandishing a wand at the blond
git, and the shout of *“Advocato verspertilios!”* her closest friend had boldly flung at
Malfoy never failed to bring a smile to Luna’s face. This moment was no different in that aspect,
although the memory of it gave her a very interesting idea.

“I hope Ginny won’t mind my taking a trick from her book by using that bloody spell,” Luna
muttered to herself. She was sure Malfoy and Ron were too engrossed in their argument to be aware
of anything else, but she was talking to herself underneath her breath just to be safe. She cleared
her mind of all thoughts, except those about what she was about to do. It was honestly very
nerve-wrecking, she thought, doing something like this with no backup. But then she realized that
wasn’t true. She did have backup, except the person had no idea she was around, and didn’t even
know he was her backup.

Steadying her breath, she was wondering if the spell would have s much effect if she just
whispered it, but strongly. Her Ravenclaw logic was telling her that it probably wouldn’t work as
well, and she decided she wouldn’t attempt it with whispering, because Malfoy would certainly try
to find her then. She was raising her wand to cast the spell, when she felt movement behind
her.

“Careful, she might notice us!” One female was there. Something about that voice sounded very
familiar, but in her focus on the current task at hand, Luna didn’t register whom the voice
belonged to right away.

“She looks like she’s on a stakeout to me, Red.” And there was a male voice as well. Listening a
bit closer to the sounds of footsteps, she deduced that there were only two people, and the male
voice had sounded just as familiar as the female voice. In fact, the female had sounded
suspiciously like… No, it couldn’t be. Surely she was still at breakfast, wondering when Luna would
show up. However, Luna’s curiosity was getting the better of her, and she was sorely tempted to
turn her head and see whom the people were.

However, before she could do so, the people suddenly fell to the floor, but not loudly. It
sounded as if one of them had gotten down and pulled the other down after, but she couldn’t
tell.

She finally looked over her shoulder to see if she could make out anyone. Directly over her
shoulder, her eyes met a freckled face, containing a pair of warm brown eyes, and framed by long
red hair. The other face she saw was slightly plump, though not anywhere near what it had been a
couple years ago, with dark blue eyes, and short brown hair. Lo and behold, Luna had been right in
her suspicions of whom the female voice belonged to.

In fact, Ginny Weasley was currently in the company of one Neville Longbottom. If Luna had
bothered to look closely, she might have noticed a small bit of lipgloss just below Neville’s
mouth, but she had turned her head back to the front, and contemplated on asking Ginny if she
minded her using that certain spell.

“Ginny!” Luna hissed, startling the red head ever so slightly. “You wouldn’t mind if I borrowed
your trick of using the Bat-Bogey Hex on a certain git, would you?”

“Mmm.. Oh, no, Luna, I wouldn’t mind at all…,” Ginny answered. Luna decided that even though
Ginny sounded a bit preoccupied, it would still be all right for her to use it, so she steadied her
arm, and pointed her wand straight at Malfoy. She then decided she’d count to three before casting
it, to ensure she’d be quick.

“One.”

Ronald and Malfoy seemed to be arguing about something else.

“Two.”

Harry and Hermione entered the Entrance Hall from outside. They were holding hands and were both
covered in snow. Hermione leaned her face up to kiss Harry’s cheek, but Harry turned his head
toward hers, and she wound up kissing him on the lips.

“Three.”

Harry and Hermione disappeared into the Great Hall, taking no notice of Ron and Malfoy.

“*Advocato verspertilios!*” Luna cried, watching the light speed towards Malfoy, who only
heard, but thought since he couldn’t see the light, it had been somewhere else, like inside the
Great Hall, or down the stairs to the left of the Entrance Hall.

As the hex took effect, Ron looked a bit alarmed, and knew where the hex had come from. He
headed up the stairs, and halfway up, he met Luna, who had started her way down. At first, he
didn’t register that she had been coming from the direct area of where the spell had originated,
but when he did, he spoke.

“Luna?” he asked, turning back around, as she had passed him when he stopped.

“Yes, Ronald?” she replied. She was wondering if he had put two and two together, but knew if he
had, he wouldn’t beat around the bush about it.

“Would you happen to know anything about the Bat-Bogey Hex that appears to be affecting Mr.
Malfoy? You appear to be coming from the area the spell originated, and—‘

“Actually, that was me who hexed him. I thought you might find it a bit amusing, though I did
notice afterward that you seemed a bit shocked by it.” Luna interrupted him in mid-sentence, and
the last thing he had expected, he admitted to himself, was for her to admit that it was her. He
had actually thought his sister was the one who cast it. However, the voice had not been Ginny’s,
his mind reasoned, so of course it wasn’t her. However, that didn’t keep him from wondering where
Ginny was.

“Luna, you wouldn’t have happened to see my sister would you?” Ron asked, simply out of habit of
wondering where his sister was. He knew Ginny had a habit of spending time with Neville, and
thought Neville was a real gentleman, and that if Neville and Ginny were to get together, she would
definitely be treated well. “I saw her in the common room, but I haven’t seen her down here.”

“As a matter of fact, she’s with Neville, and they were behind me at the top. However, they were
a bit wrapped up in their own activities to truly notice what was going on.” She hoped she had been
just vague enough that he still understood what she was talking about, because she wasn’t sure of
how he would react to his sister doing things like that with Neville. To her surprise, he didn’t
seem to mind.

“Oh. Well, tell her I want to speak to her when she has some time. If you can’t get her, I’ll
snag her after Quidditch Practice tomorrow night,” he sounded fairly reasonable right now, and she
was wondering what would happen if she.. She dismissed the thought from her head. There was no way
he’d accept that! ‘You never know until you try,’ the reasonable side of her mentioned. The other
side of her mind was silent, as if admitting defeat.

She mentally pulled herself together in preparation for this, and when she thought he was
slightly in another world, she pressed her lips to his. They were soft and slightly warm, which was
surprising due to the weather. All thought of temperature rushed out of her head, when all of a
sudden he started to kiss her back. She wrapped her arms around his neck, one hand on his upper
back, the other behind his head, tangling in his red hair and pulling his head closer. His arms had
wrapped themselves around her back, and one hand was twisting her blonde hair around his
fingers.

Somehow, though neither one could say exactly, they wound up with Ron’s back pressed against the
wall and Luna standing on the step above him. They also didn’t know how long they went without air,
but what they could remember was Harry and Hermione making some very interesting comments, and then
themselves breaking apart and trying only slightly to neaten their appearances. The only bad thing
about Harry and Hermione having caught them was the fact that Ginny and Neville found out, and both
couples teased them, but it was well worth it in the end.

When spring arrived, Ron decided to take Luna on a picnic, and she was about fifteen minutes
late, and had come, it appeared, from Hogsmeade, where most of the students were. She arrived with
a large package in tow, which turned out to be a set of practice Quidditch robes exactly like the
playing robes of Ron’s favorite team, the Chudley Cannons.

“Happy Birthday, Ronald Weasley,” Luna murmured, after he had kissed her very fervently as a
thank you for the best present he’d ever received for his birthday.

“A very happy birthday indeed, Miss Lovegood. If you keep bringing me presents like that, or
saving me from gits, you can be late for things all you want.”

And let it be known that Luna was (almost) never on time for anything involving him from that
day forward.



