Christmas of Surprises

Christmas of Surprises - chapter 5

December 28th

As usual, Hermione awoke first. She felt Ron lying beside her and relished the feeling of not being alone in her bed. She realised she'd thought 'as usual' and smiled -- four nights, and she was treating this as normal? Soon, when term began again, it would have to be just a memory. She started to think about their future after leaving Hogwarts when, hopefully, the two of them could be together permanently. But her daydream ended when she remembered the conversations of the previous day, and Harry's fear that she might be a target for Voldemort's indirect revenge on Harry. She herself might become just a memory ... could the teachers really stop the rumours? Would Harry really curse pupils who spread rumours? Did it matter if they didn't stop -- perhaps Voldemort wouldn't really attack her over a rumour? Maybe he'd think the rumour was deliberately planted by someone like Malfoy, who she knew had wished her dead in the past.

While Hermione was still thinking about that, Ron woke and opened his eyes. Like Hermione three days before, he was puzzled for a moment by the slightly unfamiliar look of the room, before he remembered that this time they were in her dormitory. He turned to look at her, and touched her face. She gave him a puzzled look.

'You've been crying in your sleep,' said Ron softly.

'Oh,' she said, wondering if he'd guessed why.

'You really are worried about what Harry said, aren't you?'

She nodded sadly. 'You guessed. I was just lying here wondering if Voldemort would think that the rumours were just made up, planted by Malfoy or someone.'

'So he wouldn't do anything about them? I hope so.' He frowned. 'I don't think we can count on it though.'

'We?'

'Oh. I was hoping you wanted this to last. We never did talk about that though, did we?'

She smiled. 'I do want it to last.' She moved over far enough to kiss him. 'Were you worried that I wanted to move on and be with someone else? That I was just using you as practice, to be ready for someone else?'

'I ... didn't know. If you don't though, then it's "we". Or "us" -- oh, whatever. You know what I mean!'

She giggled, and tickled him.

'Hey, don't touch the green bits,' he mock-protested, tickling her in return.

It was another half-hour before they remembered to get out of bed. They saw Crookshanks was asleep on Lavender's bed, having apparently got bored with trying to find somewhere on Hermione's blankets that stayed still enough for him.

When they finally got down to the common room, Harry was already there, reading a paperback book. From the speed with which he put the book down beside his chair, out of sight, Hermione suspected it was the book her mother had sent. She grinned at Harry, but didn't say anything about it.

Ron said to Harry, 'How did you sleep then?'

'Pretty well. How about you?' As soon as the words were out of his mouth, he realised what he'd said, and blushed.

'Wonderfully,' said Hermione, grinning at him and then at Ron. She didn't want Harry to know how much he'd upset her.

Ron nodded back at her. 'Yes, definitely.'

The three of them went down to the Great Hall for breakfast. Snape was there again, and spoke as soon as the three had sat down. 'So, Potter, I hear you are now threatening to curse other students.' McGonagall looked at Snape in alarm.

'Only if those students are spreading malicious rumours which might lead Voldemort to attack other students, and the teachers do nothing to stop it,' said Harry calmly. He noted with pleasure that Snape winced at the name 'Voldemort', just as Ron did. To his surprise, Snape said nothing further, not even taking points from Gryffindor, possibly because Dumbledore and McGonagall were present.

After breakfast, the three Gryffindors went for a walk outside again. Ron pointed out to Harry the still-present circuit of footprints around the lake. Harry chuckled at it.

Hermione had something else on her mind. 'Harry, you said you didn't want anyone to be your girlfriend. What about Cho Chang last year? Or have you changed your mind?'

'Well, for one thing, I haven't actually even spoken to her since the Yule Ball ...'

Ron muttered, 'Everyone's obsessed with that stupid Yule Ball. I hope we don't have another one while I'm at school.'

'... and after Wormtail killed Cedric because of what I thought was the right thing to do, I probably won't ever be able to speak to her. But that was all before Voldemort's return. It didn't seem as dangerous then.'

Hermione nodded in understanding. 'I never imagined when I was being attacked by trolls and Basilisks that those were the good old "safe" days.'

Harry looked at her in surprise, but then saw that she was smiling. 'I don't think our time here is going to be remembered as Hogwarts' best years,' he admitted.

They strolled about for a while, talking about those years, wandering over to Hagrid's locked-up hut and talking about where he might have gone for Dumbledore. Ron and Harry were doing most of the talking, and Harry looked at Hermione and asked, 'You're very quiet. Are you dwelling on what I said? I really didn't mean to depress you.'

'I was thinking of the Basilisk. You said I was attacked for being your best friend, not your girlfriend. You aren't going to stop being friends with us, to protect us, are you?'

Harry frowned. 'I don't want to.'

Ron looked at him in surprise. 'Do you mean you are thinking about it?'

'You said yesterday that you were glad we were going to stay friends, even though the two of us are also lovers now. Now you're changing your mind?' said Hermione.

Harry nodded. 'It'd be safer for you both.'

'And more dangerous for you! You'd never have got to the Philosopher's Stone without us, and without Ron, Lockhart would have managed his Memory Charm on you! I know we've never managed to be with you when you confronted Voldemort, but we still helped!' protested Hermione.

Harry looked at her. Even without her concerned expression, it was obvious how worked up she was about the possibility of losing him as a friend, as she hadn't said 'You-Know-Who'.

'Cedric was with me at the end of the Tournament,' he said quietly. 'I'm glad neither of you were ever with me.'

'You can't just shut everyone out, though,' said Ron.

'You'd just be giving in to him,' added Hermione.

'You keep saying I'm letting him win. This isn't a game of wizard chess, it's your lives. Both of you,' said Harry wearily. 'And face it -- now, more than ever, you've got each other. You aren't going to want a third person in your lives, are you? You need each other, though. What would have happened if there'd been enough potion for two of us to get through and confront Quirrell? I think Voldemort would have reacted the same as he did to Cedric. You'd be as dead as Cedric, Hermione. How could I live with that? He thinks he needs me though, which means I'm actually less at risk.'

Ron and Hermione looked at each other, neither of them able to think of a way to convince Harry otherwise.

Soon it was lunchtime again, and they went back to the Great Hall, putting their cloaks and scarves on the unused Gryffindor table.

Snape was once more absent from lunch. Ron claimed that he was cooking up something without turkey leftovers in, in his Potions classroom. A few of the others, including Harry and Hermione, laughed at that. Harry suggested that at the beginning of next term, they'd be learning Potions made from turkey flesh and turkey feathers. Ron and Hermione laughed dutifully, and Dumbledore and Flitwick smiled, but nobody else did.

After lunch, they returned to the common room. Harry and Ron started a game of Exploding Snap. Hermione decided to read at least some of the book her mother had sent, and found it lying on her bookbag. She looked over at Crookshanks, who was dozing in front of the fire again. 'Have you been reading this, Crookshanks?'

The card Harry had just played exploded, which may have explained why he blushed at that point. Hermione chuckled at him. 'I am finally going to read my own book,' she told them, and sat down to do so.

The common room was quiet, except for occasional explosions from the cards, the crackling of the fire, Crookshanks' purring and Hermione's occasional giggles as she read some of the tips and techniques in the book. Usually, when she giggled, she also looked up from the book to study Ron. He was finding this slightly unnerving, even while he tried to guess what section she was reading. Finally, he asked, 'What makes you keep giggling?'

'I keep finding things I can imagine us doing,' she said with a smile. Harry put his hands over his ears, which made her giggle again. 'Didn't you do that when you were reading it yesterday?'

'I was mainly just surprised at all the things people have dreamt up over the years,' he said. 'Did you see that thing with the mouths?'

'Yes. I liked the diagram, but it doesn't look very practical -- and I don't quite understand how your part of it works.'

Ron blushed and coughed. He hadn't understood it either. Harry closed his eyes as well, which just set Hermione's giggles off again.

'We have got to get You-Know-Who into Azkaban, so Harry can have some fun and stop blushing,' she said.

'And we'll be able to stop worrying about rumours.'

'Yes.' She looked back at the book. 'While you were reading this, did you ever think about adding to it?'

'Adding?' spluttered Ron. 'Is there something strange nobody's thought of yet? I doubt it; and I didn't even get to the last few chapters!'

She laughed. 'This is a Muggle book, so it doesn't consider any magic aids at all. No charms, no potions, no transfigurations ...'

'I am not going to let you transfigure me into anything! I did read the chapter about toys, thank you!'

'I didn't mean that.' She looked at Harry. 'Should we stop and let him see and hear again?'

Ron nodded, and tapped Harry on the shoulder. Harry cautiously opened his eyes, and took his hands away from his ears.

'We've stopped now,' she told him.

'Please tell me you're just getting all this out of your systems while there's nobody else here. You aren't going to keep talking like this when they're back, are you?'

'It'd stop the rumours. OK, there would be a lot of new ones -- but they'd be closer to the truth!' she said.

'My true love speaks sooth,' said Ron.

'What? Is that in that book too?'

'I read it years ago in some old novel,' said Ron.

'Didn't you find the section on "olde-worlde courtesy and flattery" when you read this?' Hermione asked Harry.

'No, I only read the first three cha- ...' he stopped, suddenly realising she'd tricked him into admitting reading her book. 'I bet there's no such section! You just wanted to make me admit reading it!'

'Well, it was fairly obvious,' she said, trying not to giggle as Harry's face went a deep red. 'I don't mind, Harry. It's my book, but it's not as though it's personal ...'

'Not personal? Haven't you got further than the acknowledgments yet?'

'Of course I have!' She held the book towards him, edge-on so that he could see that she'd read a bit more than half of it. 'But it's a general book -- it's not about me, is it? It's not like reading a diary.' She went back to reading the book, while Ron got Harry's attention back to the Exploding Snap game.

'You didn't say if you were going to stop talking like this,' said Harry, playing a card.

'It's not me that keeps saying these things,' said Ron, in a hurt voice.

'Do you really mind, Ron?' she asked. 'OK, Harry, I'll be restrained again.'

Ron raised his eyebrows at her. 'There's a chapter about that.' She giggled.

Harry rolled his eyes. 'Now you're both doing it!'

Ron shrugged. 'She's a bad influence, you see. I was led astray by an older woman.'

Hermione laughed and pretended to point a wand at him to curse him.

*

The rest of the day passed in much the same way. That evening, Ron and Hermione didn't wait for Harry to go to bed first, but went up to Hermione's dormitory.

After making love, they lay there relaxed. Hermione asked, 'How upset would you really be if Harry and Ginny became lovers when she was older?'

'Don't spoil it,' groaned Ron.

'You didn't expect me to stay a virgin forever. From the rumours you asked me about, you weren't even sure I still was one. I know she's your sister, but do you expect her to never get married? To never have a lover?'

'Stop it!'

Hermione stroked his chest. 'It's double standards, you know. You don't mind assuming that Fred and George have had sex, and that Percy hasn't. Is that just because they're all older than you, or because they're boys, and Ginny's a girl?'

Ron turned toward her and stroked his hand slowly down the middle of her back, hoping to make her stop.

'Mmmm -- but you didn't answer me.'

He sighed. 'Well, they are older.'

'But that's not really what bothers you, is it?'

'You know why we've been protective of her, and worried about her.'

'You're not even old enough to remember that.'

'No. It's just something I picked up from the others when I was small, and then Dad eventually explained about how they'd finally had the daughter they'd been longing to have, and they didn't even know for the first month or two if she'd live.'

'But she did live. She's not a helpless premature baby now, is she? She's a teenager. She's just over ten months younger than you.'

'She's only fourteen!' said Ron.

'And next month she'll be fifteen -- almost two months before you'll be sixteen, and more than six months before Harry's sixteen.'

Grudgingly, Ron agreed.

'I'm five and a half months older than you. Harry's five and a half months older than Ginny. Why is their age a problem?' said Hermione, challenging him.

'It doesn't matter. You know what Harry said about not endangering any girl.'

'I know,' she said quietly. 'I just wondered -- if You-Know-Who wasn't a problem any more -- how you'd feel about them getting together. Ginny will probably be a lot older than sixteen by then, unfortunately. He's not going to go away soon, is he?'

'He did save her from Riddle,' said Ron reluctantly. 'So he's already defeated one version of You-Know-Who to save Ginny's life. So I suppose if she was older, and was sure about it ...'

'Then you'd be happy for them?'

'I suppose so.'

Hermione slid her hand down. 'Ooh. You might not be ready for Ginny to have a boyfriend, but you're ready for something!'

Ron laughed and pulled her closer.