Realisation

REALISATION

Despite the terrible incident that had occurred at the end of his sixth year at Hogwarts and the knowledge that worse was probably still to come, Harry had been having a rather enjoyable time at The Burrow. It was now only two days until Bill and Fleur's wedding and Harry had found himself swept up in the commotion along with Hermione and the entire Weasley family. He had found reasons to smile again whilst staying at The Burrow with his friends and one thing that he decided made him smile the most was the fact that Hermione and Ron had become so formal and nice to each other. They had been exchanging glances and smiles and Harry was convinced that something was going on between them, not that he was surprised in the slightest after their behaviour during their sixth year. He remembered how he had debated the pros and cons of Ron and Hermione dating each other, but since Dumbledore had died and the full realisation of what was to come had hit him, he had thrown this mental list out the window. He was now happy for them and hoped that they were actually together and that they weren't still too scared to take that first step.

Harry was now sitting in Ron's room with his best friends and Ginny. Harry had been surprised that Ginny was still speaking to him after he broke up with her a couple of months before, but soon after Harry had arrived she had told him that she would always be there for him whether they were together or not. That had been that. Ginny had stayed true to her word and acted as if nothing had happened between them. She laughed and joked just as before and Harry wished so hard that they were still together. He knew he only had himself to blame for keeping them apart, but he wanted to protect her. He was sure he was doing the right thing. At least, he hoped he was.

Harry's thoughts came back to the present time and he looked at Ginny who was sitting next to Hermione reading "Witch Weekly". He wondered briefly if it was still printing articles about him.

"I'm tired," Ginny yawned as she closed the magazine.

She stood up and headed for the door before turning around to look at Hermione who had been surprisingly quiet all day.

"You coming?"

Hermione nodded and stood up to leave. Both Harry and Ron said goodnight to the girls before returning their attention to the chess match which Ron was winning. Harry started debating whether to move his Bishop or Knight when a sudden shout came from the doorway.

"Why won't you kiss me?"

Harry's head shot up to see Hermione looking red faced and glaring angrily at Ron. He turned to look at Ron, who was staring at Harry with a look that suggested he would kill if provoked.

"I'm pretty sure she's talking to you mate," Harry told him tentatively.

Ron's face relaxed as this realisation set in and he turned to look at Hermione.

"What do you mean?" Ron asked quietly.

"You told me you fancied me back in the hospital wing and even though you and Lavender finished months ago, you still won't kiss me," Hermione explained in rather a shrill voice.

Ron and Hermione were not officially together yet? Harry couldn't believe his ears. Worse still, it looked as if Hermione wanted to get to the bottom of this problem right here and now. Shouldn't he leave? He suddenly had a sinking feeling that he was trapped within the room unless Hermione moved from the doorway.

"Well...um..." Ron was stammering.

"Well?" Hermione asked.

Surely one of them would soon realise that this was a conversation he was best left out of.

"Well, what about you? I'm not the only one," Ron was now saying. "You could have done something about it too."

"I tried to kiss you two nights ago when we were alone in the sitting room, but you jumped out of the chair and ran out to the garden claiming that your mum was calling you," Hermione cried back.

Apparently neither of them remembered that Harry was in the room at all and their argument had now progressed to the stage in which he thought it would be awkward to interrupt them.

"She was calling me!" Ron shouted back at her.

"No she wasn't. She was upstairs at the time!"

Harry began to wonder what his chances of survival would be if he were to jump out of Ron's bedroom window. Probably not good seeing at he was on the top floor. Ron began to mouth soundlessly as if he was hoping some well-chosen words would simply materialise from his vocal chords and Hermione continued to glare at him as if daring him to reply.

"Am I just too hideous?" Hermione finally asked.

"That's stupid. If you were hideous then I wouldn't fancy you," Ron replied.

"Well, I don't know if that's even true anymore because you haven't shown me that you do."

Harry was starting to think that his chances of survival from the free fall out of Ron's window might actually be greater than if he were to stay and be forced to listen to this rather personal argument. Suddenly Harry saw a glimmer of hope as Hermione moved further into the room and away from the doorway, but as Harry began to slowly edge towards to exit, she shut the door firmly behind her. What was happening? It was as if Harry was in the middle of a nightmare and he couldn't wake himself up. Was he completely invisible now? He contemplated for a few minutes how great it would actually be to turn invisible without the use of a cloak, until the shouting brought him back to the horrible reality that was facing him. Hermione had not only shut the bedroom door behind her, she was now standing directly in front of it.

"You haven't even told me that you fancy me back!" Ron bellowed at Hermione.

"I said that I feel the same!"

"That's not the same thing!"

"Well, I do fancy you. In fact my feelings are probably more than that, except I can't explore them, because you refuse to do anything about it," Hermione screamed at him.

Harry began to wish that Ron would just stop the argument by grabbing Hermione and kissing her. Not that he particularly wanted to watch his friends snogging, but it would be better than the current situation.

"You probably just said that because of what I said!"

This was Ron though and if anyone was good at saying the right thing at the right time, it most certainly wasn't him. Harry wondered if any of the other Weasleys could hear the argument and would soon be coming to save him. He doubted it. They probably didn't even realise that he was in the room. When Ron and Hermione argued, people usually just let them get on with it, so the chances of someone coming to save him looked extremely bad. Harry just sat on the bed and hoped they'd hurry this one up.

"Honestly! I open up my feelings to you and you just throw them back in my face! I don't know why I bother!" Hermione was yelling.

"Well, I don't know if they really are your feelings. You only said it after I said that you hadn't told me you fancied me!" Ron shouted back.

This was getting ridiculous. Harry looked at the end of the bed and realised that Ginny had left her "Witch Weekly" magazine behind. He picked it up and decided to have a flick through it. The first page stating the most eligible bachelors caught his eye as it had him listed at number one. What was the world coming to? Harry suddenly noticed that the room had become silent. Harry chanced a glance at his two friends and saw that they were just staring at each other from opposite ends of the room. He noted that unfortunately Hermione still hadn't moved from the door.

"This is pointless," Hermione finally said in a much calmer voice.

Harry mentally agreed.

"I'm just going to go. See you in the morning," she continued as she opened the door.

Finally Harry was going to be free.

"Hermione wait!" Ron cried out.

Or maybe not. Hermione was now standing in the open doorway once more. Ron began to walk towards her.

"The thing is, you're one of my best friends and I just thought it would be strange to kiss you. I don't want to ruin anything," Ron was explaining in a rather quiet voice.

"Does that mean you'll just never kiss me?" Hermione asked in a small voice.

Ron began to smile and was now looking at Hermione in the same way Harry had seen him look at her many times when he thought she wasn't paying attention. It suddenly dawned on Harry that he had not only seen this coming since last year, but he had seen it coming from almost as long as he could remember. Ron had always looked at Hermione in a slightly different way to anyone else and Hermione had been just the same. He began to see the meaning behind their previous arguments and especially the reason behind their big flare-ups, like at the Yule ball back in their forth year and their stint of not speaking to each other in their sixth year. He had known that jealously had been a cause at the time, but he still hadn't seen the real reason. They loved each other. They really and truly loved each other. Harry began to smile at this idea, after all love was important. Hadn't Dumbledore made that clear? Harry bit his lower lip as a vision of Ginny popped into his head.

Ron was still smiling at Hermione and slowly but surely he brought his face lower towards hers. She was now smiling back at him and after what seemed like a long time, their lips finally met. It seemed strange for Harry to witness his two best friends, whom he had known since they were eleven, kissing each other. Unfortunately they were kissing in the open doorway and even though he had a warm and happy feeling inside him, Harry still longed for freedom... and Ginny. Suddenly there was a tap on the window behind him. Harry turned around and saw Ginny hovering outside on her broom. He walked over to the window and quietly opened it.

"Hi there, thought you might need rescuing," she whispered.

"How did you know I was in here?" Harry asked.

"Well I heard the argument start and I knew that you hadn't been able to escape so here I am. Sorry for the delay, I couldn't find the key to the broom shed and my parents were out walking and Fred and George thought it was funnier to leave you in there."

"The twins knew I was in here?"

"Yeah, I had to tell them why I needed them to magically open the broom shed and they just found the whole thing funny," Ginny answered.

Even though he had been awkwardly trapped in the room with Ron and Hermione, he couldn't help smiling. He climbed carefully out of the room and onto the back of Ginny's broom. They flew down to the ground and Harry thanked Ginny for the rescue.

"So, I see they sorted things out at last," Ginny said.

"Yeah, but they're not the only ones that got some things straightened out," Harry replied.

He looked at Ginny sideways and took her hand. She smiled back at him and they walked in silence all the way back to the house.