Chapter 2
AUTHORS NOTE: A quick thanks to everyone who read and reviewed chapter 1. I hope you enjoy chapter 2 as well. Oh yeah, I don't own these characters, they are the property of JK Rowling despite the fact that she screwed up the ending.
Ron arrived late to Transfigurations. He told his friends that Snape held him back, but didn't elaborate. Luckily, McGonagall launched into her lecture before Harry or Hermione could question him.
Harry was having issues of his own. When he and Hermione settled into Transfiguration, she chose the seat to Harry's right, which allowed him a crystal clear view inside her blouse again. That missing button, as well as everything else he was feeling concerning Hermione, was going to make concentrating on the lesson extremely difficult.
Overall, it was a weird day. Ron seemed lost in his own world and barely paid any attention in their morning classes. Harry, on the other hand, had spent his morning trying not to look down Hermione's shirt, but it was a battle he was losing badly. It even reached a dangerous level while they were eating lunch. A thirsty Hermione had stretched across the table to reach for the pitcher of pumpkin juice, and Harry got such an eyeful of her cleavage, he choked on his sandwich.
"I deserve this," he thought as Ron pounded him on the back as he struggled for breath. Hermione tilted her head and gave Harry a questioning look. He raised his hand towards her in an 'I'm okay' gesture as Ron continued pounding.
"I survived when the most evil wizard in history was out to get me, and now I'm gonna die because Hermione's missing a button." That thought made him laugh through the choking at the absurdity of his present situation. Hermione, who looked extremely worried now, came over and cradled his face in her hands.
That did not help his recovery whatsoever.
As for Hermione, she was extremely confused about her friends' behaviors. Every once in a while, Ron would look over at her with a quizzical expression on his face and then look away. Harry kept looking at her as well, but with an entirely different kind of look, a look that made Hermione's cheeks turn pink.
After Harry had recovered from his choking episode, Hermione had had enough.
"What is wrong with the two of you today?" She finally snapped at both of them.
"Huh…What?" Harry asked while Ron said at the same time, "Sorry, what did you say?"
She repeated her question only now she had her hands on her hips and she looked rather cross.
Ron looked at Harry, and they both looked at Hermione, shrugging simultaneously.
"Nothing."
"Damn, she even looks cute when she's angry," Harry thought.
"Hey, cut that out," he then scolded himself.
But the very next second, he was betrayed by his thoughts again.
"I wonder if her knickers match that bra?"
Harry's eyes widened. "Oh my God! I can't believe I just thought that way about Hermione."
"Somebody help me; I can't stop!" He squeezed his eyes shut, futilely trying to resist the picture of her in her underwear that had just formed in his head
"I think I'm having a hormonal breakdown," he mistakenly said out loud.
Oops.
"Harry?"
He vaguely heard someone say his name, but he was still busy fighting his image of a half naked Hermione.
"Harry!"
That time, he heard it for sure.
"Huh?"
"What did you just say?" Hermione asked, staring at him at him with an inquiring look on her face.
"Who, me?" Harry tried to think of something quick. "Nothing… I think?"
"See, that's what I'm talking about!" Hermione exclaimed. "What's wrong with you today?"
"I'm sorry," Harry said though he did not know what he was exactly apologizing for-his thoughts about her or the way he had been acting. "There's nothing wrong; I'm just distracted today, is all….honestly."
She contemplated what he had said for what seemed like a very long time but finally nodded her head and sighed, "All right, Harry."
Ron, for once, was very glad that all of Hermione's attention seemed to be focused on Harry.
"So then, what's with you?" she suddenly inquired, putting her other male friend in the spotlight.
Ron hadn't expected her to turn to him so quickly.
"Uh what? Oh--er-um…well, I'm just distracted."
Harry frowned and thought, "Hey, think up your own bloody excuse… that one was taken!"
By this point, Hermione was in no mood for another bizarre or evasive explanation, so she let it go. Besides, she desperately wanted to get to the library for a quick second. Harry had Snape's detention waiting for him, and he knew what that meant-three nonstop hours of fun.
Ron, on the other hand, had some serious planning to do so he started to head back to the dorms to think.
"I wonder how long the Polyjuice is good for," he asked himself, as he watched his feet and shuffled down the hallway.
"Oh man, I hope Pig doesn't find it; bloody owl gets into everything" he said as he began running toward his dorm.
His progress was slowed significantly by the staircases that were shifting all over the place.
"Every time I'm in a hurry this happens," Ron screamed as the stairs shifted him in the wrong direction for the third time.
"What-- does Peeves control you guys?" he bellowed angrily when the staircases finally lead him to the Fat Lady who, as his frustration mounted, took her sweet time opening the portrait because she 'didn't like his attitude'.
"Bloody castle… stupid paintings," he muttered under his breath as he sprinted across the common room and up the stairs. He let out a huge sigh of relief when he found the bag under his bed, safe and sound.
"Now what?" He asked himself as he sat on his bed.
Think.
"Hermione, can I talk to you for a minute?"
Hermione, who was talking to Neville in the Common Room, turned towards him and smiled.
"Sure, Harry."
"Where?" he asked, looking around with a slightly panicked expression on his face.
"On the couch," she replied very slowly, pointing in that direction.
"Oh yeah… sure, the couch." They both walked over and sat down.
"What did you want to talk about?" she began brightly.
"Well…I--uh, wanted to talk to you about...um…er…" then nothing else was said for what seemed like minutes. Hermione just stared at him and waited, but his mind was a total blank.
"Harry? Can I ask you something?" Hermione asked tentatively.
"Er, yeah," he managed.
"How did you know about my eyes?"
"What? W-What about your eyes?" Her friend said as his anxiety level started to rise.
"With Lavender in class today…how did you know the color was wrong?
"The color was wrong?" he repeated.
Hermione nearly laughed at his dumbfounded expression. "Yes. How come you said that?"
"Uh…because yours are darker?" he guessed.
"What?"
"I like your hair?" he threw out in a panic.
"My hair?" she repeated, taken aback.
"Do you fancy Ron?" he blurted out.
Hermione's expression took on a mask of shock. "What?"
"Are you in love with Har…me?
"What are you talking about?" Hermione was utterly confused.
"Uh…I gotta go," he said, and he bolted off the couch and sprinted towards the portrait.
Hermione stood from her seat on the couch and watched dumbstruck as her best friend ran away from her.
Ron was presently locked in a stall in the boy's loo located down the hall from the Common Room. Breathing deeply, he replayed the events that had just transpired with Hermione while waiting for the potion to wear off.
Everything had been going great. He was sitting on the couch next to her, trying to talk to her about what was on his mind. It was cool to just get some alone time with her. He may have been a little tongue-tied, but he was still composed.
That is, until she asked him about her eyes. He hadn't seen that question coming, and he panicked a little.
"If you don't know the answer, just repeat the question," he had heard someone say before. It was probably George. He gave it a try, but it didn't really work; she just looked confused, which only made him panic more.
"Think of something else!" He had thought.
So…he complimented her on her hair.
But that didn't work either!
And then….he turned into a babbling idiot just like with Fleur before the Yule Ball.
"I can't believe that I actually had the nerve to say, ugh," Ron dropping his head in defeat, whispered, "'Do you fancy Ron?'"
"Next, in a brilliant move, I asked her, "'Do you love Harry?'"
The look of shock and surprise on her face had scared him into action, and he just bolted. He rushed across the room only to bump into Luna. "What was she even doing in our common room?" he thought.
She had smiled, looked him straight in the eyes, and greeted him with a, "Hello, Ronald."
That had only intensified the panic he felt.
Nevertheless, he pulled himself together to say as he patted his chest for emphasis, "No, Luna, it's me…Harry."
Her smile had widened and she merely replied, "If you say so."
"You're killing me, Luna," Ron had thought to himself.
He looked back at Hermione, hoping she hadn't heard their exchange. He didn't think she did because she had turned and hadn't stopped, and also because she wasn't chasing him with her wand drawn, hurling hexes at him.
So, he felt he was safe from Hermione but he had still chosen to run for his life.
"Close call," Ron breathed as he stood in the stall.
Hermione had taken two steps towards the stairs before she stopped. She turned and looked back at Harry and Luna. Luna was still there, but Harry was no longer in sight.
"I have to at least ask," she thought to herself as she caught up to Luna.
"Luna?"
"Yes, Hermione," she replied in her usual dreamy manner. "How can I help you?"
"Well…why did you call Harry 'Ron'?"
"Oh, that wasn't Harry" Luna answered obviously.
Hermione wasn't really sure if she wanted to get into this with Luna, but if she wanted to know, she'd have to ask.
"What makes you say that?"
Luna just looked at Hermione and said, "Why, his aura of course!"
Hermione digested this information and then with a sigh probed, "What aura, Luna?"
"The aura that surrounds everyone, of course."
Her statement was said in such an obvious manner that it nearly infuriated Hermione.
She took a deep breath; this was way too much like Professor Trelawney's class, but she couldn't stop now.
"And you can see this aura?" she prodded.
"Certainly," the blond girl replied and nodded.
"Can you explain it to me?"
"Of course," but she didn't say anything more. Hermione gestured with her hands, urging her on.
Luna blinked, finally understanding.
"You see… everyone has an aura around them. It's sort of a colorful glow that is always surrounding you--and the color can lighten or darken based on your emotions or moods-but your color is, for the most part, your color."
Hermione nodded.
"Harry's aura is green, Ronald's is red, mine is yellow, and yours is blue…normally."
"Okay…" Hermione thought.
"So, in regards to this aura thingy, what you're saying is…everyone has their own distinct colored glow and-"
"-the Harry that just left here had an aura that wasn't green. It was red," Luna finished.
"But you said that Ron's is red," Hermione said, perplexed.
Luna smiled.
"So, Luna, if I understand you correctly, what you're saying is that if Harry can't be red… then Ron would have to look like Har-"
Hermione stopped in the middle of her sentence.
She clenched her fists.
"I'm gonna kill him," she thought murderously.
"Wow, Hermione," Luna said in awe as her eyes scanned her friend's body. "Your aura just got VERY dark!"
"That I don't doubt for a second," Hermione replied.
"And it's going to get a lot darker…for one red aura'd Weasley!" she muttered darkly.
"Excuse me?" said Luna, cocking her head.
'Nothing," she said as she tried to manage a smile for the other girl. "Thank you, Luna."
"You're welcome, Hermione. Glad I could help."
Hermione started to walk away but stopped and looking back, she asked, "Luna?"
"Yes, Hermione?"
"Normally…you said that my aura was blue normally…what is it now?"
"Recently, you have started to take on more of a greenish hue," Luna said mysteriously.
"Green?" Hermione wondered, remembering what the Ravenclaw had said earlier. "But doesn't that color belong to Harry?"
"Yes...yes it does," Luna replied and she skipped away, smiling all the while.
Although getting even with Ron was at the very top of her list of things to do at the moment, Hermione found her thoughts drifting to what Luna had said about her aura color changing to green-Harry's color.
Hermione sat Indian-style on her bed, pondering her latest findings. "First, do I even believe this whole aura thing?"
"Luna can be rather strange at times, but she can also be quite intuitive as well."
"There are far too many coincidences for me to just dismiss this," she reasoned.
To help her gauge these new discoveries, Hermione wrote all of her ideas down.
· Ron had volunteered to dump my cauldron.
· Harry didn't seem to know the details of what he had told Lavender about my eyes in Snape's class …and he would remember it, right?
· Harry asked me if I fancied Ron and then, if I loved him in that bizarre conversation a few moments ago.
· Luna calling Harry 'Ron'.
"Now that I think about it," said Hermione out loud as pieces of the puzzle began to fall into place, "Harry should still be in Snape's detention for at least another hour. And…. if I'm really honest about that blue to green aura thing, I have been thinking about Harry in a 'more than just friends' way a lot more lately than I have in a long time."
She had all the information she needed, but…
"So….what do I do first?"
"Hex Ron's bollocks off," her inner voice answered simply.
"Agreed," she said out loud. Then she shook her head. "No, I have to be reasonable."
"Violence is not appropriate…but...getting even in some other way….that will work."
A smirk slowly began to form.
Harry sat in Snape's detention, staring at the clock while he completed his assignment.
"Okay, one hour and 15 minutes down. One hour and 44 minutes and 44, 43, 42, 41, 48 seconds to go."
He straightened up. "48? What the--
Harry then noticed a satisfied looking Professor Snape returning to his desk as he stowed away his wand.
"Don't get so hopeful, Potter," he sneered.
"Ahhhh…..I have to get out of here!" Harry desperately thought as he dropped his head onto the desk in frustration. Just then, as if Harry had willed it, the classroom door opened and in strode Dumbledore.
"Excuse me, Severus…may I have a word with you? It is most urgent."
Snape's eyes briefly touched Harry's head before he bowed slightly at the Headmaster. "Of course, Headmaster…as you wish."
"Harry, dear boy, would you mind leaving us?" asked Dumbledore.
"No, of course not, Professor," Harry said fighting the urge to smile as he packed up his belongings, trying to look as if he was not rushing. He did, however, manage a mental fist pump as he made his way past Snape, but he was very careful not to make eye contact. He could feel an icy chill on the back of his neck as Snape's glare followed him all the way to the door, but he didn't care.
Dumbledore winked as Harry passed.
"I'm free… he may get me later, but I'm free now," Harry thought as he happily climbed the stairs out of the dungeons.
With his detention behind him, his thoughts were once again free to returned to where they had been all day…Hermione.
At present, all three members of the trio were lost in their own little worlds.
Harry was wandering the castle while trying to sort out his newly emerging feelings for his female best friend.
Ron was doing what he usually did when he was sad, happy, or confused…well, actually, he was doing what he always did; he was heading to the kitchen to get something to eat.
Hermione sat in the common room, trying to formulate a plan of revenge-or, erm, reasonable course of action.
Ron was sitting in the kitchen, eating an entire plate of baked goods given to him by Dobby. As he ate, he thought to himself, "Okay….that didn't go well, but I do have enough Polyjuice for another try. This time she won't get me with any unexpected questions."
At least, that was what he hoped would happen.
"I'll be calm and ready, now that I know what to expect," he thought, mentally preparing himself for Round 2. He felt better about things now. It was probably the full stomach that made him feel that way, but oh, well. After dinner, Ron would find a way to send Harry on some wild goose chase and try again.
"Yeah…things are looking up and damn, these cakes are delicious!"
Hermione sat on the couch, deep in thought and extremely indignant.
As she did so, she would sporadically vent out loud. Good thing the Common Room was quite empty.
"How dare he do such a thing…to attempt to trick me into revealing my feelings about Harry by impersonating him?"
She gave a small growl. "That was low….I'm surprised he didn't just hide under the invisibility cloak in Ginny's room when I slept over."
"Oh my God," she shuddered, eyes widening, "I've showered at the Burrow!"
"How do I know he hasn't--" she thought. Hermione drew her robes and hugged herself to stop the chill that passed through her as she contemplated the possibilities.
"No…Ronald would never--"
"Well… I would have thought he would never… right up until today."
Hermione shook her head. "No, he would never do that."
Still…she made a mental note to make sure she swept any room she planned to disrobe in with a privacy charm from now on.
"Fine!" she decided as she settled on a course of action. "If he wants to know how I feel about Harry, I'll just have to show him then."
Harry wandered the castle, aimlessly thinking things through.
"Is this just a hormone thing-this sudden attraction to Hermione?"
"Nah…I kind of dismissed that in Potions class, Lavender did nothing for me, but Hermione sure did."
"Okay then….what is it?"
"She's pretty….that's obvious," he said to himself.
Harry stopped for a moment, tilting his head in thought, "Actually… much prettier than I had ever realized."
"That's because you're an idiot!" his inner voice scolded.
"Shut up," Harry said out loud.
"How dare you speak to me in such a manner, young man!" A stuffy, old wizard in the painting that Harry had just passed snapped.
"What?" Harry looked around. "Who said that?"
"Disgraceful…the manners of the wizards today," the same wizard bellowed.
"I wasn't talking to you," Harry said, now facing the painting, slightly annoyed.
"Be off with you, you rude little scamp!" the old wizard ordered.
With a crinkled brow, Harry walked away, looking back with annoyance.
"Crabby old dinosaur…wasn't even talking to you….where was I?"
"Oh yeah….Hermione," he said as a slight smile appeared on his face.
"What is it about her? Well, she's probably the best friend I've ever had," he said matter of factly. Hermione is loyal… like no one I've ever met. She's always there for me, no matter what I get myself into. I can't even always say that about Ron, but her…nope, she never even hesitates. I mean, if I go somewhere, she goes with me every time."
"But why? What's in it for her?" Harry though looking puzzled. "She doesn't care that I'm famous or anything--never has."
"Maybe she just cares about you, you damn fool," piped up his inner voice again.
"You think?" Harry answered the voice.
"Duh," the voice replied, "Man, your dense!"
"Hey!"
Harry was seriously affronted.
"Well...maybe a little," Harry said once he thought about it for a second.
"It's time that I showed some Gryffindor courage and did something about it," he decided, nodding in agreement with his inner voice.
"Yeah…I think I will," he said as he strode off towards the common room with a sense of purpose.