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Author's Note: To those of you who expressed concern---this story is told from both Harry's point-of-view and Hermione's point of view. I'm switching off between each of them. I hope this isn't too confusing. This chapter is told entirely from Harry's point of view. Inspiration comes from the song "Yellow" by Coldplay. Thanks again for all the kind reviews! I hope you like this chapter…
Chapter 11
"Yellow"
Hermione's enthusiasm was contagious as she led me down the sidewalks of downtown Atlanta. We'd caught the bus from her neighborhood and I couldn't help staring in awe at the large buildings and the crowd of people that packed the sidewalks. As we walked along, she pointed out different landmarks and stores.
"You know, I think you missed your calling," I said, marveling at her.
"What's my calling?" she asked intrigued.
"I think you should be a tour guide or something like that. You'd be in your element. Your talent is wasted as a student."
She laughed. "Well, I'll keep that in mind when we have career counseling again."
"You know, you never really said what you wanted to do when you finished school?" I asked her, as she led me down another crowed sidewalk. "I mean, you said you wanted to do something meaningful, but you never really got into it."
"Well, to tell you the truth, I really don't know," she said thoughtfully.
"Really?" I said, amazed. "I don't think I've ever heard you say that."
"It's actually kind of scary, isn't it? I mean, thinking about what you're going to do for the rest of your life. I mean, as soon as you make that decision, it seems like everything you do, every choice you make, involves that. It's probably the biggest decision you'll ever have to make," she said meditatively.
"How do you do it?" I asked her.
"How do I do what?" she said, turning to face me.
"Know exactly how I'm feeling," I said, staring at her as if seeing her for the first time.
"It's a gift," she said, smiling cheekily at me. "Now, come on, I'm starving."
I stood there for a second, laughing at her, before following her into a small pizza place.
"Harry, you are going to love this, I promise," she said. "It's almost worth being here for."
We placed an order for two pizza slices---Hermione ordered pepperoni and mushroom for herself and I opted for pepperoni and green peppers. We waited in silence for our orders to come up and then took our tray of pizza slices and sodas to a table beside the window.
She was looking at me, and I smiled nervously at her.
"What?" I asked her.
"This is nice," she said. "I think this is the nicest time I've had since I've been here."
"Me, too," I said, smiling at her.
As we dug into our food, I couldn't help comparing this "date" to my date with Cho last year. Whereas things with Cho had been awkward and somewhat uncomfortable, I was completely at ease right away with Hermione. I suppose you could attribute this to the fact that we'd been friends for so long, but it was something else, too. Subconsciously, I knew exactly what it was, though I don't think I was ready to admit it fully to myself.
As we ate, we exchanged talk about our respective school lives. She inquired about Ron and Hagrid and was thrilled to hear Lupin had been rehired as Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher. She looked wistful as I told her about all that had been going on. I could see tears welling up in her eyes.
"I hate to do this," she said. "I cry at the drop of a hat lately."
"Well, you've been through a lot," I said, helpfully.
"So, have you," she said, returning my gaze. We stared at each other for a few seconds, that seemed much longer.
"So, um, how are your parents doing?" I asked her, trying to hide how nervous her gaze made me feel.
"Okay," she said. "Oh, Harry! I forgot to tell you. There may be hope for us."
I looked up at her and swallowed hard. She noticed this and quickly went on.
"I mean, hope for me to come back to Hogwarts," she said. "My parents are scheduled to meet with my guidance counselor on Monday. She's a nice lady, Ms. Reynolds. Anyway, she doesn't think I'm happy at Ramsey so she's going to talk to my parents and I think she might have some say in it. I know it doesn't sound like much, but it's something, isn't it?"
"Yeah," I said, happily. "I hope it works. You know that if I'm going to graduate, I'll need you there pushing me every step of the way."
"Well, I gave you that homework planner," she said. "You have been using it, haven't you?"
"That thing is evil, Hermione," I said, chuckling. "It's taken to insulting me every time I open it. It's said some crude things."
"It's supposed to stop you from procrastinating, Harry," she said, mock-seriously.
"It depresses me," I said. "I think maybe I should talk to Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia about recording their voices on it."
Her smile faded. "You know you never really talk about it too much."
"What's that?" I asked her.
"Your life with your aunt and uncle and cousin," she said. "I'd call them your family, but they are nothing like a family."
"Well, they're family in blood only," I said. I looked down at the table. This wasn't something I liked talking about. Come to think of it, I'd never really talked to anyone about it. "They certainly haven't shown me any kindness. Not once."
"What I don't understand, Harry," she said, hesitantly reaching across the table and putting her hand on top of mine, "is how great a person you turned out to be despite how you grew up. It must have been awful."
"It wasn't a picnic," I said, trying to crack a joke, but failing miserably. I'd never really wanted to talk about it before, but I felt like I could with her. I felt like I should with her.
"Usually if I kept away from them, they'd leave me alone, too," I said. "I don't know what I would have done if I'd had to live with them all the time. I mean, if I'd never received that letter from Hogwarts. I probably would have run away."
"That bad, huh?" she said pensively.
"Yeah," I said, looking back down at the table. "As soon as my days at Hogwarts are over, I'm never going to even think about them again. They'll just be a memory."
"Your mum and dad would be very proud of you, Harry," she said. "They'd be proud to know what a fine person and wizard their son turned out to be. I know that I am. I, for one, am very glad that you got your Hogwarts letter. You know, if you hadn't, I suppose I'd have been finished off by that mountain troll in our first year."
"Ron would have come after you," I said.
"I don't think so," she said. "As I remember, it was you that reminded him that I was in there in the first place. He'd probably have headed back to the tower with the rest of the students if it hadn't been for you."
We'd mentioned Ron before in passing, but now even though he was miles away, I could feel his presence all around us. I felt guilty for what I'd done. Here I was sharing pizza with the girl that he'd confessed to me that he liked. Here I was sitting here with her, feeling all sorts of strange, wonderful feelings about her myself. I had no idea, I suddenly realized, how Hermione felt about Ron.
As if she was reading my thoughts, she suddenly said. "You know, I love Ron, I really do. He's, well, he's Ron, and he's come a long way, but you know I don't think he and I would have been friends had it now been for you. We're just too different."
"Well, you know what they say opposites attract," I said, trying to covertly find out if she'd ever thought of Ron that way.
"Well, that might be, but come on, Harry," she said. "Could you imagine Ron and me in a relationship? My Lord, we'd kill each other. We're like oil and vinegar. We're much better off being friends, he and I."
This made me feel better, and I didn't know how to feel about that.
I nodded.
She looked down at her watch.
"We better get a move on," she said. "I have something I want to show you."
"Okay," I said. "Lead the way."
What she wanted to show me, to my surprise, was the planetarium.
"What's so special about this?" I asked her. "This is just like our astronomy class."
She smiled at me. "You'll see."
We paid our admission, which was only a couple of dollars each, and she led me past some exhibits toward the viewing room.
"It's really great, Harry," she said. "They have these telescopes set out where you can look out into the stars and they play music, and it's just absolutely fantastic."
"How did you find out about it?" I asked her.
"Kit," she said. "She's like the only friend I have here, but she's great. She took me here one night when she got tired of me sitting in my room moping. It really cheered me up. I come here a lot. It sort of reminds me of home, you know Hogwarts."
I nodded. From the look in her eye, I could see that this place meant something to her. It meant something to me because she wanted to share it with me.
We finally made it to the viewing area. It was an open area with telescopes set up around the grounds. There was music playing in the background and a couple of people were dancing in the middle of the grounds. Now, I would be the first to admit that I didn't know romance from anything, really, but this would definitely be something you could call romantic, even a blockhead like me could figure that out.
She took me over to one of the telescopes and we took turns looking up into the stars, trying to point out the different planets and constellations we could see. Hermione was taking another turn looking into the telescope when she gasped.
"That sky is amazing," she said. "Have you ever seen anything more beautiful?"
I looked at her, her face beaming and her cheeks flushed from the cold. Her hair was blowing in the breeze and the moonlight shining down on her, seemed to illuminate her.
"No," I said, looking at her. I knew, right then, that Hagrid had been right. Lupin had been right. They'd known all along, what I'd been too stupid and blind to see. She was a wonderful girl. She was a wonderful girl that I was falling in love with. Correction, she was a wonderful girl that I knew I was in love with. "I've never seen anything more beautiful, Hermione."
She took her eyes away from the telescope and stared at me. I had been looking right at her as I said that.
"You weren't even looking up at the sky," she said.
"I wasn't talking about the sky," I said.
A smile played at the corner of her lips. I hoped I hadn't made her uncomfortable by what I'd just said.
"Oh," she said.
I looked around at the other people situated around the grounds. A number of people had joined in at the dancing.
"Would you like to dance?" I asked her, extending my hand to her.
She smiled. "I thought you didn't dance."
"I don't, usually," I said. "For you, I'm willing to make an exception."
She stood there, staring at me.
"Don't leave me hanging, here, Hermione," I said, holding out my other hand to her. "It's embarrassing. If you're worried that I'm going to step on your toes, don't be. You have my word that I promise to try my best and not step on your toes."
She laughed. "Okay. You should be worried about your toes," she said. "I'm a menace on a dance floor. You could ask Viktor Krum. I think I stepped on his toes so much he had a limp by the end of the Yule Ball."
"Come on, Hermy-own-ninny," I said, taking her hand and leading her to the middle of the grounds.
She laughed and as we stood there listening to the music, we looked around nervously. She hesitantly put her hands on my shoulders and I, just as nervously, put my hands around her waist. Our faces were inches apart as we began to sway to the music. Within seconds, we were comfortable with each other and with the closeness of each other. She pressed her head to my shoulder. For the first time, in a long, long time, I felt light-hearted. I didn't have a concern in the world, save for the girl who was in my arms. I could smell the scent of her shampoo and it was nearly intoxicating.
"Look at the stars,
Look how they shine for you,
And everything you do,
Yeah, they were all yellow."
Holding her in my arms, I almost felt as if I couldn't breathe. I moved my hands from her waist to her back and
she, in turn, wrapped her arms tight around me. It was almost as if we were all alone, in our own little world.
"I came along,
I wrote a song for you,
And all the things you do,
And it was called "Yellow."
"So then I took my turn,
Oh what a thing to have done,
And it was all "Yellow."
"Your skin
Oh yeah, your skin and bones,
Turn into something beautiful,
You know, you know I love you so,
You know I love you so."
She lifted her head from my shoulder and our faces were inches apart.
"Are you cold?" I asked her, looking down into her eyes.
She shook her head.
"I feel warm," she said, looking into my eyes. I felt as if my knees were going to give way at any moment. "I feel warm all over and safe."
"You are safe," I said. "I'd never let anything happen to you. You know that don't you?"
She nodded. "Harry."
"Hermione," I whispered, feeling as if I was going to burst if I didn't kiss her.
"It's true, look how they shine for you,
Look how they shine for you,
Look how they shine for,
Look how they shine for you,
Look how they shine for you,
Look how they shine."
"Look at the stars,
Look how they shine for you,
And all the things that you do."
I could feel her breath on my cheeks. She was so close. I leaned in towards her and felt my heart racing as my lips met hers in a soft kiss. We pulled away, both somewhat shocked at what had just happened, but still holding on tightly to each other and not breaking eye contact.
Before I could catch my breath, we were kissing again, this time it was much more intense. When we pulled away from each other, I felt dizzy and breathless. I rested my forehead on hers and we stood there for a long time, holding each other.
"See," she finally said. "I said you weren't terrible at kissing."
We held hands as we walked back to the downtown area to catch the bus back to Hermione's house. We'd kissed a couple more times as we danced. It had been nice. It had been perfect. It had been wonderful.
As we crossed the street to get to the bus stop, I could feel Hermione tense up.
"What is it?" I asked her, turning around.
She'd put her hand up to her neck.
"My necklace," she said. "It fell off, Harry."
She looked around the road and scanned the sidewalk for her necklace.
"I think I see it," she said, running across the street.
I watched as she ran a few feet away and leaned down to pick up the silver chain. She held it up to me and started to walk back toward me when everything seemed to slow down.
I don't' remember seeing the car. It seemed to come out of nowhere. I screamed for her to get out of the way, but it was too late.
"HERMIONE!" I screamed. "NO!!!!"
I swam across,
I jumped across for you,
Oh what a thing to do.
Cos you were all "Yellow,"
I drew a line,
I drew a line for you,
Oh what a thing to do,
And it was all "Yellow."
Your skin,
Oh yeah your skin and bones,
Turn into something beautiful,
And you know for you,
I'd bleed myself dry for you,
I'd bleed myself dry.
It's true, look how they shine for you,
Look how they shine for you,
Look how they shine for,
Look how they shine for you,
Look how they shine for you,
Look how they shine.
Look at the stars,
Look how they shine for you,
And all the things that you do.y were all yellow,