Chocolate Frogs, Anyone?

It was a normal night in this particular suburb of England. Most of its inhabitants were fast asleep, because they had jobs to go to, schools to attend.

Among the people who were awake, was a girl by the name of Hermione Granger. She was hunched over her study table in her bedroom, reading a particularly thick volume on animagi.

Finishing a page, she swiftly turned it and was both eager and disappointed to find that she had only one more page to go. By now, the words had become blurred and swum in her vision as she blinked rapidly, fighting a losing battle with sleep.

She was very determined when it need be and she was not going to stop when she was so close to being done.

"Got to finish this book by tomorrow," she murmured to herself, her eyes traveling slowly down the page.

When she had read the last sentence, she shut the book with a triumphant nod. She stifled a yawn as she got up and moved to her trunk where she somehow managed to find enough space to fit her book and shut her trunk for the last time, locking it with a simple, but effective, Muggle lock.

Hermione then got into bed and just when she was going to turn off her bedside lamp, her eyes wandered to a calendar located right beside it.

"This same time tomorrow, I'll be back at Hogwarts, starting my sixth year... It seems like only yesterday that I got my acceptance letter," she said to herself, turning off the lamp and letting her mind wander.

She remembered her first impression of Hogwarts, how she had felt so insignificant compared to the ancient castle that loomed over her, looking so very foreboding.

Sure, Hermione seemed all knowing at times and knew everything from the top of her head (oh so everyone thought) but still, she wouldn't know how life would have been like in Hogwarts without her best friends: Ron Weasley and Harry Potter.

Suddenly, jade eyes engulfed her vision and Hermione couldn't help feel almost lightheaded at the intensity they held.

"Who would have thought I would fall for 'The Boy Who Lived'?" she sighed, shaking her head desperately, as if that would get rid of all her confusion about the boy called Harry Potter.

Harry had such a mysterious past. Orphaned at the age of one and being the sole survivor of the "Avada Kedavra" curse, all he had left was a tiny lightning bolt scar on his forehead. Since then, he had to live with the Dursleys, a horrible Muggle family that despised magic of any sort. She had met them last year and the encounter wasn't exactly pleasant...

It was a known fact that every girl in the wizarding world has had a crush on him at one time or another. She knew from personal experience. I mean really, she had to live through five years of Parvati and Lavender, giggling and talking about the 'famous cutie'. It took everything she had not to gag when they go into this mode of theirs.

The thing was that she never expected she would be one of those girls, and that was what scared her. For so many years, he had been her best friend and nothing more but without her awareness, it slowly changed until he was something else to her... Something so much more...

Hermione Granger wasn't stupid. She knew there was one word to describe Harry. What was the word you may all ask? Hot. Yes, it was the perfect word to describe him.

"Too bad he's so dense to notice it..." she muttered, as she slowly drifted into sleep, dreaming of Harry Potter and those haunting eyes of his.

The sun was shining brightly as Harry Potter stepped onto Platform 9 3/4. Another year away from the Dursleys--Harry sighed in relief at the thought. He didn't know if it was his imagination or not, but the Dursleys seemed to be getting more harder to handle with every coming year.

This year, believe it or not, he had to spend a day trapped in their musty cellar and had to tar their roof because his Uncle had some weird urge. On top of that, Dudley's girlfriend had chased him for personal revenge (Yes, Dudley has a girlfriend, hard to imagine, right?). To say the least, summer was definitely not relaxing.

More than ever, he couldn't wait to go back to Hogwarts and just be with his friends again, despite Professor Snape's potion classes. Speaking of his friends... where were they? Ron and Hermione had promised to meet him here and there was only a couple more minutes until the train to Hogwarts arrived.

Just as this thought manifested in his head, he heard a faint "Harry!" to his far left. He turned to see Hermione waving at him happily, her Prefect badge catching the light at her sudden movements.

"Hermione!" he shouted, running towards her. He halted before her, "What took you so long?"

Hermione was clearly exhausted as she breathed rapidly. "My parents and I were stuck in a traffic jam and I almost thought I wouldn't make it. Imagine running as fast you can with a trunk that weighs a ton--not a pleasant thought let me tell you."

Harry smiled amusedly at the girl--no woman, before him. A woman with eyes that sparkled with curiosity and with wavy hair that had loosened over the years to settle gently on her shoulders. All of this while radiating such warmth and energy... What he wanted more than anything in the world was to make her his.

"What am I thinking?" Harry questioned himself incredulously, shaking his head slightly. "Hermione is one of my best friends... she's nothing more than that." However, as he came to this decision, a dull ache in his heart proved him wrong.

"Harry? Harry!" Hermione said worriedly. "Are you all right? You seemed kind of out of it for a moment there."

"Everything is fine!" Harry exclaimed, wearing a rather strained smile and laughing forcedly. "Just peachy keen..." he muttered to himself, just as the loud whistle of the Hogwarts train pierced the awkward silence that had settled between the two and they hurriedly got on, wondering the location of their red headed friend.

Moments ago, Ron Weasley had burst into the compartment where only Harry and Hermione sat, red in the face, which sharply contrasted with the red of his hair. Mumbling something about a funny prank and Draco Malfoy he said something resembled "See you later!" and was in and out of the compartment within a minute flat.

However, when they heard the words "prank" and "Draco Malfoy", well they knew indefinitely that Ron wasn't up to any good. Muttering something about being childish and immature, Hermione ferociously flipped through a Transfiguration textbook as Harry looked at the book with interest.

"What are you reading, Hermione?"

Hermione looked up startled and a confused "Huh?" escaped her lips. As Harry's question sank in, she answered promptly, though obviously embarrassed at not being alert at all times.

"Remember the Advanced Transfiguration class Professor McGonagall thought we should both take this year? Well, I was just looking over the material we would be covering. It's rather thorough, as a matter of fact."

"I still don't know why I said yes," Harry said sadly, shaking his head in sorrow. "What could I have possibly been thinking?"

"Oh come now Harry! Professor McGonagall chooses only the best students to be in her Advanced Class, you know that," Hermione chided, glancing at Harry briefly. "And I hardly see how you can be so worried. To us, it'll be a piece of cake!" Grinning widely, she shut the book, which emitted a satisfying 'thump'.

"I'll take your word for it Herm," Harry said, smiling brightly in response.

Then without warning, Harry brought his hand forward and his fingertips grazed Hermione's cheek. She froze at the contact, however little, and she heard Harry whisper shakily, "There was an eyelash."

Nodding simply at the answer provided, she raised her eyes to meet a pair of jade eyes fixed upon her.

For once, in the entire time that they had known each other, Hermione recalled she had never really looked at Harry Potter--had ever looked into his eyes.

It was so easy to get lost in them. Though she made weak attempts to resist, they had been futile and the power those eyes held took over her. She did not think she could support herself as she could feel her knees go weak and an icy sensation run through out her body.

Hermione only then realized that she was mere inches from his face. She could feel his warm breath and the distance between them, in her eyes, began to shrink considerably.

Just when she doubted the end result of this little predicament, the train lurched unexpectedly sending Harry's lips crashing onto Hermione's.

Harry didn't know what possessed him to do it. It had been a casual action to begin with, but when his fingertips made contact with Hermione's skin, it was anything but casual.

He drew back quickly and the words that escaped his lips seemed like they belonged to someone else.

"There was an eyelash," was the answer that came out, and it sounded simple enough.

He vaguely sensed Hermione nodding in response for at that moment she had raised her eyes and he had felt overwhelmed with the depth of them.

And at the precise moment, Harry realized that Hermione wasn't just some girl. Even throughout their friendship, it had been something more, though both had been too stubborn to admit it. Now, he had to learn the hard way that he shouldn't have ignored the way everything just hurt when she was so close, yet so far.

Wave after wave engulfed him and left him inwardly gasp for breath at both the open sincerity and the intensity they held. Harry would gladly be lost in them forever, if it meant gaining a special part of Hermione and that fact meant the world to him.

He felt himself being drawn to her and the magnetism between the two increased as the distance between them decreased with each passing second. Funny thing was that a half of Harry had wanted this for so long while the other half was regretting for ever considering such a thought.

Then suddenly, through the mesh of doubts and thoughts clouding Harry's head, he felt himself being launched forward--right onto Hermione's awaiting lips.

Hermione wasn't naive, as her friends perceived her to be. She had her share of kisses (and yes, one of them was with Krum) but she never thought the day would come when she would be finally kissing Harry Potter.

She had always dreamed that her first kiss would be with him, but although that ship had sailed, she still considered herself extremely lucky to be doing the impossible with Harry.

Though it was a simple kiss, it was definitely her most memorable one because of the fact that she had wanted it for so long. She never thought that it would become a reality, a wonderful reality.

Hermione felt shivers run through her body and felt her mind go numb. All that mattered was the feelings brought on by Harry's lips--the only thing that registered in her mind.

This was Harry's first kiss. Yes, it was embarrassing to admit that it took 16 years of his life for this to happen, but it was all he thought a kiss should be.

Fireworks, wedding bells--everything seemed to sound out in full blasts and dazzling colour and Harry was blinded and deafened by it all.

However, they seemed like small nuisances, something that can easily be ignored compared to the knowledge--the knowledge that this simple kiss connected him and Hermione with a deeper bond than their current friendship.

And the feelings behind it all?

Well they were simply indescribable.

And this precise moment in the blanket of time?

Simply unforgettable.

The teens pulled back slowly, slightly breathless, suddenly aware of their surroundings. They then continued to look at each other as if trying to memorize every detail that they could about the other.

Hermione broke the ice as she released a nervous laugh.

"That certainly was something."

"Yeah..." Harry murmured, " something else all together..."

They then averted their eyes, unwilling to divulge anything else and an awkward silence settled between the two for the second time that day. Just when Harry and Hermione were willing to talk, they interrupted one another.

They froze for a few seconds and unexpectedly; they burst out laughing, uncontrollable fits pouring out. They felt such ease that for that period in time, they completely forgot about their awkward situation.

When they did remember, they abruptly stopped but by then, they both realized they were just fooling themselves.

After this new realization had hit them, the two felt themselves leaning forward, ready to share another kiss; wouldn't you know it that Ron chose to enter the cart at that very moment, unaware of what exactly he was interrupting.

In a most definite happy mood, he was nothing but smiles as he sat himself across from his two best friends.

"I got Draco Malfoy good. He'll think twice before he messes with us again. He'll never be able to live this one down!" Ron exclaimed, sweet triumph radiating from every pore of his body.

The redhead blushed slightly as he continued, "That's something he'll forget. That boy will definitely be coming back for more..." he laughed a little self-consciously and then continued, "Oh by the way," as Ron said this, he brandished a large bag that had been previously hidden from view.

He opened the bag and asked Harry and Hermione, a mischievous gleam in his eyes, and a slight smirk that adorned his face.

"Chocolate frogs, anyone?"