Christmas of Surprises

Christmas of Surprises - chapter 6

December 29th

When Ron woke, he found Hermione awake already as usual; she'd been watching him as he slept. She reminded him, 'Everyone will be back on the second. We've only got four mornings after this one, until our next chance.'

They made the most of that morning's chance, and when they'd showered, dressed and gone downstairs, they found Harry anxiously checking his watch, while Crookshanks stretched out in front of the fire and tried to catch the edge of his robes.

'Oh good,' he said. 'We're late for breakfast, but should get there before it finishes.'

'You could have gone down without us,' said Ron.

'That would make it pretty obvious that you two hadn't got there, and people might wonder what you were both doing instead,' said Harry, as they went along the passageway leading to the quickest set of stairs down to the Great Hall. 'If anyone asks, I think Hermione should have been waiting in the common room for us, and I was trying to get you to wake up.'

'OK.'

'Thanks, Harry,' said Hermione.

Nobody did ask, though. Following breakfast, as it had started snowing hard, they returned to the common room, where Hermione did some more of her homework, and persuaded the two boys they should do the same. Harry grumbled about the amount of preparation they were already having to do for their O.W.Ls. They stopped for lunch, which had so few turkey leftovers that Ron hoped they were the last of them. After lunch, there was more homework, although Hermione finished hers soon after, and went back to reading the book her mother had sent her.

'You'll have to hide that from Lavender and Parvati,' commented Ron just after a long giggling fit and several glances by Hermione, comparing the diagrams in the book to Ron sitting there frowning back. She nodded at him and went back to reading, and stroking her cat, who'd jumped up on her lap when she'd put away her homework and got the book out.

After another hour or so, Hermione had finished her book and was holding one end of Crookshanks' piece of string while he chased the other end. Harry found he'd left a textbook in his dormitory, and went up to look for it. Ron watched him go.

'I didn't want to say this in front of Harry, but when you said you wanted this to last -- did you mean really last? You know, like marriage and everything?'

'Did you just propose to me?' asked Hermione, grinning.

'Ah ... I suppose I did, yes. Well?'

'I don't know,' she admitted. 'My parents told me they both had what they thought were their true loves as teenagers, but they didn't stay with them. Eventually they met each other, fell in love and got married.' She draped the piece of string over Crookshanks' back so she could concentrate on Ron. 'I'd like to think we really will stay together. But I just don't know.'

'Is that a "no"?' asked Ron, surprised and hurt.

'Oh, Ron, I didn't mean it like that! It wasn't a "yes", but it was a "maybe". Harry's already pointed out you're probably not old enough to propose. I'm sorry, Ron -- can we carry on as we are, and see how we feel when we leave school?'

Ron nodded slowly. 'My parents met at Hogwarts, and fell in love here. Bill told me that at least once, they got back to the common room at four in the morning!'

Hermione giggled. 'We're much better behaved then. So your parents stayed with their first loves, and mine didn't. I hope that difference isn't hereditary. Right now, I do want to stay with you. I just don't know how I'll feel when I'm eighteen or whatever.'

Ron looked at the stairs to see if Harry was coming back yet. 'There was one other thing. You know my family doesn't have much money. They wouldn't be able to afford anything much.'

'For a wedding, you mean? Well, it's traditional -- among Muggles, at least -- for the bride's parents to pay for the wedding anyway.'

'Oh. Well, if it's traditional, that's OK. But there's afterwards as well.' He stood up. 'I mean, look at my robes. Yours fit. Look how short mine are.'

'There's an advantage to that though,' she said, giggling again.

'What, that I never forget if I put my shoes on, because they're easier to see than anyone else's?'

'No. If your robes fitted you, I'd have noticed as soon as I put them on the other day that they were too long, and weren't mine, and we'd have had to think of a way to tell Harry. Even though you're taller than me, our robes are about the same length, so it worked out just right, didn't it?'

'It was an easy way of telling him,' agreed Ron. 'But that was just an example -- maybe I'll be the first rich Weasley, but I don't think so. None of us ever seems to manage to earn much, and we couldn't borrow anything from my parents to help us rent somewhere to live.'

'But I don't think ...' Hermione began, when there were footsteps on the stairs.

Ron said, 'He's coming back.' and sat down again, and Hermione turned to watch Crookshanks attacking the string again.

Harry reappeared. 'Oh good, you're not up to anything!' he joked.

'Just talking. You probably don't want to know about what,' said Hermione.

Harry held up his hands, a gesture which looked odd with a book in one of them. 'Fine! I won't ask!' He sat down. 'Guess where I finally found this -- it had got under my bed.'

After tea, they returned to the common room. Hermione offered Ron her book to read, and he decided he would. Harry and Hermione played another two games of wizard chess. Ron looked up from the book occasionally, blushing, and watched the chess for a while before reading further.

When the second game ended, Hermione asked Ron, 'Do you want to go and try page 37 now?' Ron blushed and nodded. Harry blushed and groaned at them.

Hermione looked sternly at Harry. 'Why are you blushing? Have you memorised page 37?'

'No! I can just imagine the sort of thing it is.'

'I don't know what's on it, I just thought it sounded like a good page number,' she confessed, grinning at him. She stood, and took Ron's hand. 'If you bring the book up, we can look and see what is on that page.'

Once upstairs, they found that the page was actually the last page of a chapter, and just read 'will find that these ideas can spice up a flagging relationship, bringing new vigour and enthusiasm to bedroom activities and hopefully prolonging a marriage.'

Neither of them could see any way of trying that out, so it was easier for them to simply carry on as they had been.