Harry dragged his feet into the dreary, dungeon classroom, planning on taking a seat next to Dean, or Neville, or anybody, but seeing that Dean and Neville were already sitting next to each other, he sat down next to Hermione. Fate had obviously had its own, predictable, plans.
She didn't acknowledge his presence at that moment, which didn't matter, because Professor Snape's oily voice soon echoed within the dungeon as he began their lesson. Harry lazily took down notes, his mind awfully blank from the absence of Hermione chastising him to pay attention and whatnot.
"After copying the ingredients down, I want you to start. We'll be testing these on Mr. Potter right before class ends…" The malicious look from Snape and the offhand comment (or rather, threat) as he bore his eyes into Harry's didn't faze him. He had more important things to worry about.
Harry grabbed a few figs for slicing as Hermione worked on the spiders' legs right next to him. After cutting the required amount of figs, Harry placed it into the cauldron and started upon the newts' tails.
"You're being unreasonable," Hermione whispered out of the side of her mouth, but her eyes not peeling away from the spiders in front of her.
"What do you mean I'm being unreasonable? The directions say clearly that we put the figs in first!" Harry whispered back vehemently.
Hermione stopped working on the spiders and looked crossly into Harry's eyes. "That's not what I'm talking about, and you know it."
"I'm sorry okay? What do you want me to do about it?" He swiped the first newts' tail off violently.
"I want you to stop acting like a prat!" Hermione spat. "You're stressing over nothing! I feel like you don't believe me when I say that I'm not cheating on you."
Harry knew that they weren't having a secret affair, but he just couldn't get over the fact at how much knowing about Benji made him upset. He was just about to open his mouth and say something, when the sound of billowing robes came up behind he and Hermione.
"I would greatly appreciate it, if you two Gryffindor loudmouths would keep quiet during my lesson. Detention, both of you, tonight in my office."
"Look what you did," Hermione said immaturely, but too peeved to care.
"Let's make that tomorrow night too. Eight sharp," Snape said to them. Harry and Hermione were wise enough to not say anything further, though there were quite a few obscenities flashing in both their minds.
* * *
Harry decided to skip dinner that night so he wouldn't have to walk down to Snape's office with Hermione in stony silence. So when the clock chimed eight times, he made his way out of Gryffindor Tower and down below to the dungeons.
He met Hermione at the door to Snape's office, and the two of them gave curt nods to each other. She knocked lightly on the door and a few seconds later, Snape swept it open, looking menacingly at them. Without so much as a word of greeting (or even an insult) Snape led them inside the Potions classroom and directed them to a gigantic cauldron practically overflowing with soap and water.
"There are jars on my desk that need cleaning. I want every one of them spotless before you go back." He left, slamming the door with a deafening noise.
Hermione took off her school robe and rolled up the sleeves of her blouse. "Might as well start. This is going to take a long time."
Harry hurriedly took off his school robe and rolled up his sleeves as well. Snape's desk held countless jars, all of which seemed to have a layer of sticky, black stuff.
"Ugh… what was in here?" he asked, disgusted. He picked one up, and even at arm's length, he could smell a putrid odour emanating from it.
"I don't think we want to know," Hermione said, plunging her first jar into the cauldron of soap and water. "Snape left us some sponges over there," she said casually.
"Nicest thing he's done to us," Harry said. He heard something that sounded like a light laugh, but when he turned around, he only saw Hermione sniffing and continuing to clean the jar underneath the water. Harry grabbed a sponge and set to work as well.
For the longest time, none of them said a word, and Harry thought that this was torture. Time was going slow, he was cleaning God-knows-what out of jars that smelled funky, and he couldn't even start a conversation with his girlfriend… or… at least he thought she was still his girlfriend.
All of a sudden, something slimy made contact with Harry's hand. He let out a yelp. "Augh! I touched something!"
Hermione snickered. "It was just my hand," she said. Then sobering herself up, they worked quietly again.
Harry timidly looked at Hermione from across the giant cauldron. Her head was bent down as she gave full concentration to the jar she was cleaning, but he could tell that she was feeling the way he was right now. Feeling around underwater, he took a hold of her hand.
"Ack! Something's got me!" she cried, fighting to yank her hand out of the water.
"Relax, it's just me," Harry said. He felt her loosen up and with a shy smile, gave his hand a squeeze. Then she wiggled it out of his grasp and went back to cleaning. "Hermione… I just want to say…"
"It's okay, Harry," she said before he could finish his sentence.
"No… no it's not okay! It's-"
Hermione sighed and ceased scrubbing furiously at the jar. She looked at him squarely in the eye and said, "Harry, I'm glad you know that it's not okay, what you did. But… maybe we should… take a break or something. I want to know for sure that you trust me, so in order to do that-" she spoke slowly so he could absorb every word "- maybe we should spend some time apart as boyfriend and girlfriend… so we can think about it."
A dull thud signaled Harry dropping his jar in the cauldron of water. His head was spinning and his limbs ceased working.
"Are you breaking up with me?" he asked, scared at what her answer may be.
"No!" Hermione quickly responded. "No, I'm not breaking up with you. I just think… maybe you should re-evaluate your trust in me." She apprehensively looked up at him. "I-I'm sorry. But I think it's for the best."
Harry swallowed multiple times. Turning away from her gaze, he fished out the jar from the bottom of the cauldron and set to scrubbing. After a few long seconds, he sighed dejectedly. "If that's what you want then."
The detention couldn't have been over fast enough.
* * *
"It's Hogsmeade weekend this week," Ron said excitedly over breakfast the next day. "You doing anything with Hermione?"
Harry looked down the table to see Hermione reading The Daily Prophet in the company of Ginny, which she sometimes did so it didn't appear suspicious to Ron. But Harry knew better…
"No." He suddenly didn't feel hungry anymore.
"Really? Didn't you tell me earlier this week that you were doing something--?"
"We're taking a break." There, he had said the damned words. Ron was shocked into silence.
When he finally opened his mouth, he said, "Seriously?"
"Seriously," Harry repeated, dully scraping his fork against his plate.
"Wow, mate, that's… that's tough," Ron said. "What happened between you two?"
As Harry watched Hermione not take her eyes off her newspaper and do so much as look at him, sitting only a few seats away, he answered, "I don't want to talk about it."
* * *
Harry skipped lunch again that day only to avoid watching Hermione ignore him. Well, she really didn't ignore him, but her behavior was just so much different than he was used to. He was used to a warm smile or the occasional kiss on the cheek for a greeting… not a timid smile and a stuttered "good morning". He was used to her sitting down with him at mealtimes and laughing with him and Ron and taking a hold of his hand under the table. He wasn't used to her sitting seats away from him at all meals, avoiding eye contact.
He pulled at some stray threads on his bedspread, glad that everyone was down in the Great Hall eating. He felt alone, so he was alone.
He stopped picking at the thread and rolled over on his bed to lie down on his back. He stared bleakly at the ceiling, wanting to bash his head in for screwing up royally.
His plan didn't work out. Hermione was just too smart.
And contrary to some movies' portrayal, a jealous boyfriend doesn't always turn out into a romantic situation. Rather, it drilled you down into the ground and left you for dead.
He raised his hand to look at his watch and saw that lunch was almost over. He really didn't want to go to class… it was Potions and Hermione was the only person he sat next to in that class. Ron had chosen not to take the N.E.W.T. Potions class and Dean and Neville (who was surprisingly accepted) usually sat next to one another.
Harry didn't like the feeling of Hermione not being his girlfriend. He never thought he'd experience this feeling as he had first thought she wouldn't become his girlfriend, but now that he was… he hated it. He hated it so much. He had to have her back.
He loved her and he had to show her that he trusted her.
Maybe it was time that he started working on a new plan.