Lost and Found

The sun was shining and the giant squid was sunning itself in the shallow part of the lake as Harry walked around the shore. He kicked little rocks, not noticing where his feet were taking him, still thinking about why Hermione had seemed so distant lately, thinking about the last six months and what had gone wrong between them.

As he came around a bush, he saw the very person he'd been thinking of sunning herself on the shore of the lake. His stomach did funny little flip-flops. Did he really want to talk to her? Should he turn around and beat a hasty retreat back to the castle before she saw him?

While he was deciding, he noticed as if for the first time how much Hermione had changed over the winter. Now that warm days had come to Hogwarts she had shed her school robes and was wearing a pair of jeans rolled up to her knees and a sleeveless cotton blouse that seemed to Harry much tighter than he remembered Hermione's clothes being at the start of the school year. Hermione was fanning herself with a sheaf of papers while staring at a book in her lap. Harry couldn't help but notice how the buttons of her shirt strained as she bent over the book.

Harry felt even more like he should go back to the castle instead of study Hermione's curves. Too late. She looked up suddenly and Harry blushed.

"Oh!" she said, startled. Either she was blushing too or she was sunburned.

"I was just, er, thinking about...a swim," Harry said, inching his way toward her.

He flopped down on the ground next to Hermione, who was fanning herself madly with her papers.

"I was just studying for exams," she said. "I didn't expect to see you here."

"Divination let out early," Harry said, "because Neville set a tablecloth on fire when we were supposed to be burning incense for Seeing trances."

Hermione didn't say anything, but made a big show of finding a bookmark and closing the book on her lap carefully.

"You're looking pretty tan, Mione," Harry said, unable to stop looking at her smooth brown arms and the way her neck curved up to meet her chin. "Somehow I didn't picture you as the sunbathing type."

"What? Oh, I come out here to...study... sometimes. It's really quiet, you know, except for the squid." She still didn't look at him. She was making a big show of stuffing the book back into her already full book bag.

There was a long silence. Hermione stared at the squid. Harry stared at her profile, wondering how he could ever have thought that he knew Hermione, really knew what she was like deep down inside.

A bee droned lazily past Harry's nose and then landed on Hermione's head, buzzing angrily as it became tangled in her thick brown hair. Harry freed the trapped bee and his hand got caught up in Hermione's tresses.

"What do you think you're-" Hermione turned to look at him, shock and anger on her face.

"Bee..." was all Harry managed to say before his hand slipped under her hair, his fingers caressing her neck tenderly. She didn't pull away from him, which made his nervous stomach do even more flip-flops. She just stared at him, her mouth slightly open.

"Mione," he whispered, "I've been a prat can you...ever... forgive me?" Their lips met as he drew her to him so quickly that she didn't have time to protest.

She struggled at first, but as the kiss deepened, Harry could feel her yielding, melting into his arms as he drew her closer. His tongue tasted her deeply, probing for the girl he thought he was gone forever from his life. His hands roamed over her shoulders and down her back, caressing her with a wildness that Harry thought had been lost between them.

She yielded to his gentle pressure and lay back on the grass, her hands fluttering about his shoulders. Harry stopped kissing her long enough to look down at her face - flushing too suddenly for a sunburn. He thought she looked more beautiful than he'd ever seen her before. Suddenly he forgot the past six months and all the harsh words and all the tears. It was enough just to have this beautiful creature in his arms again.

"Mmmm," he murmured, nuzzling her neck, "I've missed you, Mione." He kissed her neck, softly at first and then with increasing passion. He felt warm all over, too warm to be just the heat of the day. Being so near her was intoxicating. He felt suddenly like a house elf drunk on too many butterbeers.

"Let's stay here all afternoon, hmmm?" he breathed into her ear as he prepared to nibble her earlobe in just the right way, the way that used to make her giggle and sigh once upon a time.

"No," she moaned, turning her face away from him slightly. "No, I can't...."

Harry felt her stiffen slightly beneath him. Puzzled, he stroked her hair and looked into her eyes, now troubled.

"Oh, Harry," she said with a hint of sadness in her voice. Her eyes brimmed with tears and she looked away from him. "You can't stay here. That is, I'm supposed to...supposed to..."

"Meet someone?" Harry asked incredulously. All he got for an answer was the slightest quivering of her lower lip. She was fighting back tears.

"There's someone else? All this time there's been someone else?"

"Oh, Harry," she pleaded, "it's not what you think, but I can't-Please don't ask. Please don't."

"Anyone I know?" he said thickly as he drew back without taking his eyes off Hermione, whose shocked eyes were staring at someone or something behind Harry.

"Well, look who it is," drawled the voice of Draco Malfoy from somewhere quite close. "Sorry I'm late, darling."

~~~