A/N: Thanks to my four wonderful readers. Heaven's been very kind to me, yes...lol. This chapter's longer than the last one, so have fun reading :)
Star429: Thanks a lot :)
Hermione and Harry 4 Ever: Seriously, this is my first time! I've just been spending too much time talking to Heaven...LOL.
May: One of the better stories here? I'm glad you think so! Hehe...:: happy dance :: I have a good story!
Tweak: 'Zat you, Josh? Quit changing screen names! Well, keep on goin'! It gets a lot darker. This chapter was probably as fluffy as the story gets.
Once again, thanks for reviewing! Here's chapter two for all of ya.
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The first light of dawn peeked through the windows of the Gryffindor common room, falling upon Harry's closed eyes. His unruly black hair was blowing gently in the breeze leaking in through the fireplace chimney, but everything else was in perfect peace.
Harry was slowly brought from his dreams by the golden sunshine filtering through the glass. His eyes fluttered open, and he saw that he was still in the common room. A bit confused, he looked around to discern why he hadn't retired to the dormitory. As he tried to get up, Harry finally realized what kept him in the common room.
"Hermione," he said gently, "we need to get up." She was sleeping unusually peacefully; usually, she tossed and turned in her sleep, but she thought that the softest bed in the world couldn't compare to Harry's arms.
With a stretch and a yawn, Hermione slowly brought herself to wakefulness. She, unlike Harry, knew exactly where she was and why she was there. She turned to face Harry and smiled tiredly.
"Do I really have to leave?" she asked.
"If people see us here, they'll probably start saying things like-"
"Bloody hell, tell me I'm not seeing what my eyes tell me I think I'm seeing!" The voice from the stairway to the dormitories startled Harry and Hermione, and they both jumped up from the couch, blushing, as though nothing had happened. All they saw was the surprised face of one Ron Weasley with Seamus and D, quite awake, stopped in their tracks behind him.
"If that made sense, I'd try," Seamus said to Ron, still unmoving. "But it sure looks to me like-"
"We both just woke up early and came down," Hermione said, feigning a yawn. Harry didn't have to fake it; he was still quite tired.
"Oh, really?" Seamus said. "I didn't notice you coming to bed last night, Harry." Harry stumbled over his words, trying to come up with a plausible story, but nothing came to him. He looked pleadingly at Hermione, but she seemed just as lost as he. Harry muttered something incoherently under his breath.
"That's what I thought," Ron said. "Finally, Harry. I can't believe it took you two this long!" Hermione glared at Ron.
"Sleeping with your best friend at age fifteen?" Dean said. "That's unthinkable." Ron backhanded Dean; as much as he loved teasing Harry and Hermione himself, they were still his best friends. Hermione, still not satisfied with Ron's slap, walked over to Dean with narrowed eyes.
"Are you implying that we did more than sleep last night?" she asked slowly. "Because if you are, you're wrong, first of all, and second, even if we did, that's farther than you've ever gotten with…that," she said, giving him a quick, mocking glance downward. Seamus' jaw fell, and Ron started laughing. He and Hermione exchanged a subtle low-five as she turned on her heel and walked back to the girls' dormitory.
Ron walked over to Harry, who had sat back down on the sofa. Harry was biting his lip, trying to find some way to explain what had happened to Ron. Ron, however, needed no explanation. The Weasley intuition had kicked in.
"It's okay, Harry, I know you didn't do anything. I would like to know how it happened, though. I've been trying to hook the two of you up for months." Harry looked at him in disbelief, and Ron smiled and shrugged.
Harry briefly related the past evening's events to Ron, who drank it all in calmly. "Sounds…exciting," he said after Harry finished. Harry only smiled. "So what do you two plan to do about this? Are you going to dive headfirst into a relationship? You know how Hermione is about guys. You're really lucky if she gave you a heartfelt kiss…or two, or three," he said laughing. Harry picked up a pillow threateningly.
"I know I'm lucky," Harry said. "I just can't believe it's taken me five years to finally understand just how lucky I am, both to have you as such a good friend and Hermione as…well, I still have to figure that out. We also need to figure out what to do with Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum over there," he said, pointing at Dean and Seamus.
"Oh, I'm sure Hermione can use a simple memory charm on them," Ron said.
Harry laughed. "I'd appreciate it if you'd not mention what happened last night to anyone. Not that I'm ashamed or anything; quite the opposite. I just don't want people getting the wrong idea about me, and especially about Hermione." Ron smiled and nodded his agreement.
"But are you going to tell them?" he asked.
Harry thought for a moment before replying, "If they ask, we'll tell them the truth, but I don't think I'll go waving it around in everyone's faces."
"Sounds good to me," Ron said.
"What do you mean, sounds good to you?" Harry guffawed. "I'm not asking you for your advice on girls. I've learned my lesson already!" Ron picked up a pillow in much the same way Harry had, although he skipped the threatening stage, and both of them started laughing uncontrollably as Ron and Harry began whacking each other with the pillows.
Hermione walked back down the stairs with the other Gryffindor girls into the common room to find Harry and Ron in a full-fledged pillow fight. Hermione rolled her eyes as she walked down, the other girls laughing, and grabbed the pillows in mid-throw.
"Stop fighting, you two," she said in a motherly tone of voice. "Honestly…boys…" Harry turned to Hermione and stuck his lower lip out. "Oh, don't go there with me, Harry."
"Well," Ron said, straightening himself out, "I'm off to breakfast. Will any of you ladies care to join me?" he asked. Ginny laughed at her brother, as did the rest of the girls, who walked out the door without Ron. "Why do I even try?" he asked, throwing his arms into the air before running off to join them.
Sighing, Hermione sat down on the couch. "Wouldn't you like to go, too?" Harry asked her.
"Actually, I wanted to talk to you for a second," she said. Just then, the rest of the Gryffindor boys came out of the dormitory into the common room. Fred muttered something about being able to eat a hippogriff, and they all began walking toward the door.
"Sure," Harry said, sitting down next to her. They waited for the rest of the boys to leave before resuming their conversation. "Is something wrong?"
"No, nothing's wrong. It's just that…about last night, I wanted to-"
"Nobody has to know," Harry said, cutting her off. Hermione sighed and looked deeply into Harry's eyes. She pulled away, knowing that she'd have been drawn hopelessly into him if she'd continued gazing into his twinkling green eyes. He'd read her thoughts again, though this time it was by intuition and not by magic. However, he still didn't understand her feelings completely.
"Harry, that's not…Okay, that's part of what I wanted to talk to you about, but it's not as simple as everyone not knowing. I just…don't want people getting the wrong idea."
"That's perfectly fine with me," Harry said, wrapping his arms around her. Hermione pushed him away, though.
"But I really don't want to jump into a relationship, Harry. I'm happy that you've finally taken a hint," she said with a laugh, to which Harry only glared at her teasingly, "but what if we have the worst breakup in the world? Our friendship means more to me than anything else."
"We could take it slowly," Harry suggested. "That way, if we do break up-emphasis on the 'if', mind you-we'll do so early enough that nothing will be…hurt." Hermione sighed and nodded to show her acknowledgement.
"If you're really serious about this, then let's go for it," she said happily.
In reply, Harry only wrapped his arms around her and pressed his lips to hers. Harry stopped himself (using every last ounce of self-restraint, which was what it took to do so) from going any farther than a small kiss there. Nonetheless, he kissed her lovingly and passionately, and she gave in willingly.
The soft touch of her lips left Harry wondering if heaven hadn't already converged with earth at that moment. Once again, the faint scent of raspberry drifted his way as he held her close. As he pulled away reluctantly, he slowly opened his eyes, willing the sensation brought by her soft kiss to stay.
"Are you hungry?" Harry asked her.
"Why, are you willing to give me more?" she asked slyly.
Harry rolled his eyes before replying, "I meant breakfast." Hermione blushed and started giggling. "Get your head out of the Harry Potter gutter," she thought to herself.
"Sure. I'm not very hungry, but why not?" He offered his arm, but she knocked it down and settled for taking his hand in hers as they walked out the door toward the Great Hall. Harry really didn't have much of an appetite, either, but to him, any excuse to be walking with Hermione beside him was reason enough to do anything.
It took them about fifteen minutes to get from the Gryffindor tower to the Great Hall. Ron gave them a quirky smile as they took their seats, to which Harry and Hermione both rolled their eyes.
They helped themselves to the platters of bacon, sausage, and hotcakes and ate quickly, wanting to get the day over with as soon as possible so that they'd be able to spend the evening alone together again.
The rest of the day, to their amusement, went by faster even than they'd hoped. Double potions with the Slytherins was relatively uneventful, even with Malfoy "accidentally" adding some gillyweed to Harry's Draught of Drought.
Transfiguration passed quickly with a few interesting glances from Hermione. She'd tried to be her usual patronizing self, but every time she looked at Harry, she seemed to have been unable to do anything but smile shyly and blush. She tried to hide it, but Ron caught it every time. As his just-desserts, McGonagall caught him giggling at Hermione and gave him detention.
"Ha," Hermione mouthed to him as he slouched down in his chair. He glared up at her with a muttered, "Thanks."
That evening Harry took a while at dinner to listen to Fred and George's new ideas for Weasley's Wizard Wheezes. He returned to the Gryffindor common room only a few minutes before curfew with pocketfuls of various things that he really didn't want to know more about.
The common room was surprisingly empty for that hour of night, Harry thought. He immediately began glancing around for Hermione, and he spotted her after only a few moments in front of the fire. She was lying on the sofa in which they'd slept as though it were a divan, writing in a small book by the firelight. Harry snuck up behind her and wrapped his arms around her shoulders, and Hermione jumped.
"Harry! You made me smear the page!" she cried.
"Sorry," Harry said apologetically.
"No problem." Hermione cast a quick erasing spell, and the book was good as new.
"What's that?" Harry asked curiously.
Hermione held it to her chest protectively. "It's my diary, and you can't read it!" She stuck her tongue out at him.
"Who are you writing about?" Harry asked, nosing further into Hermione's business.
"Who says I'm writing about anyone?" she said innocently. Harry, knowing better, exchanged his position behind her for a seat next to her as he walked around the sofa.
"You're writing about me, aren't you?" he said devilishly.
"No," Hermione corrected, "I'm writing about us." Harry certainly hadn't expected her to say that, and Hermione grinned at the look on Harry's face. "October the twelfth," she read aloud, forgetting about her previous comment that Harry couldn't know its contents, "The love of my life has finally agreed to be the one for me. I won't go into all the interesting details, but we've shared more than one kiss, and I know that he loves me as much as I love him, if that's possible at all."
Hermione closed the book, looking at Harry. She had a large, loving smile on her face that Harry simply couldn't resist. He cupped his hands around her face and brought himself so that his body was barely above hers and slowly brought his lips to hers.
She found that no amount of self-inhibition would be able to keep her from giving in to his kiss. Hermione was downright thrilled that after four years of friendship and seemingly wasted wishes, it had all led to this. She was surprised as Harry parted his lips and caressed her lips with his tongue. Her mouth opened slowly, and her tongue met his.
It was more than Hermione had ever wanted in her life. They alternated between engaging in a fierce dance with their tongues and kissing each other's necks. Their arms were wrapped around each other, and they were trying to be as quiet as possible. Despite her attempts at silence, though, Hermione let out a considerably loud gasp as Harry kissed her where her neck met her shoulder.
"Oh, I'm sorry," he said nervously. "I didn't mean to-" Hermione cut him off by kissing him even harder than before.
A few minutes later, they pulled apart, and Harry, who had shifted himself under Hermione, pulled her on top of him. She let her head fall onto his chest and felt his strength flowing into her. As she brought her head up, a tear fell into Harry's robes.
"What's wrong, 'Mione?" Harry asked, wrapping his arms tighter around her.
"Nothing. Nothing's wrong. Everything's just right." She smiled at him, happier than she'd ever been before, and lay on him once more before pushing herself off him. "We'd better get to bed before we have a repeat of last night," she warned with a quirky grin.
"Not that I don't like sleeping with you," Harry said jokingly, "but I think you're right." They stood and kissed each other good night before walking up the stairs to their dormitories.
Harry didn't fall asleep until a few hours later. Despite the beauty of the moonlight coupled with the twinkling stars, Hermione completely dominated his thoughts. In the next room, Hermione was having the exact same problem. Their thoughts were lost on each other, as were their hearts.
"Good night, Harry," Hermione whispered as she drifted off into sleep.
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Wow, that was quite long…lol! I really hope you all liked it. I'm starting to wonder if I should change the rating to R, but I'm not sure yet. Include that in your reviews, if you would, please. Thank you so much! And if you'd recommend this to any friends, please, do so! I'd be so happy if you could do that for me. I really want my writing to be read by as many people as possible. :)