Ruby Reds by SHOULDBEHHR

Rating: R
Genres: Drama, Romance
Relationships: Harry & Hermione
Book: Harry & Hermione, Books 1 - 7
Published: 01/08/2008
Last Updated: 04/05/2010
Status: In Progress

Harry had spent his entire afternoon aggressively pursuing Hermione, and she was very confused.
She had no idea what had come over him, or why he was suddenly so attracted to her. She had always
hoped that some day he would fall for her, but she wasn’t really prepared for today to be that
day.




1. Pursuit
----------


I do not own these characters; they are the property of JK Rowling.

Authors Note: For this story I need to thank a few people, my wife who offered ideas whenever I
got stuck, and my two betas’ on this one, Digitallace, who helped me early, and Viopathartic, who
helped me late. They fixed my mistakes and offered helpful suggestions. Thank you all. Just as a
side note, Harry is a bit OOC in this story, and others are as well. To anyone who read my first
story, trust me, this one is very different. Hope you enjoy it.

Ruby Reds

Harry sat in his Defense against the Dark Arts class and all he could think about were Hermione
lips.

It had all started at lunch. Hermione was just eating a plum, nothing out of the ordinary, she
favors fruit, she’s a dentist’s kid. She was actually eating a very juicy plum and she was having a
hard time controlling the juice. It was a drippy mess but it made her lips shine.

Their eyes met and he smiled at her and pointed to his chin and then at her. She got the
message. She gave him a slightly embarrassed smile and found a napkin to clean herself up. She
mouthed a soundless ‘thank you’.

In her embarrassment Hermione bit her bottom lip. Which made her lip very plump and red and it
was still so shiny from the juicy plum that he couldn’t look away.

“Oh my God….look at those *lips*,” he thought as his mouth dropped open slightly. “Man I’d
love to kiss and nibble on those for the rest of the afternoon,” he daydreamed as he stared.

Hermione noticed him staring at her and became very self-conscious. “Harry….Stop staring at me,
I know I’m a mess but it’s not polite to stare!”

“No…you’re not a mess, you look amazing!” he blurted out, and instantly regretted.

She froze, right where she was, mid bite, and her eyes bulged slightly.

Ron’s attention immediately snapped to Harry’s direction.

Ron for years had been on constant watch for even the slightest *hint* of an attraction
between Harry and Hermione. So far there really hadn’t been any, today there was, and he was on
full alert.

“What I meant was,” Harry stalled, thinking as quickly as he could to get out of I present
predicament. “You looked like this cute little kid all drippy and smiley is all.”

Hermione looked annoyed, but Ron had lowered his guard a bit, and that was a good thing.

“Better to have Hermione a little annoyed at me, than to have Ron on 24 hour *keep Harry away
from Hermione duty*,” he reasoned.

“Especially if I’m looking to get me some of that,” he thought as an evil grin spread across his
face.

He wiped away his smile quickly and shrugged towards Hermione offering a quick, ‘Sorry’ as she
cleaned herself up. She frowned at him in reply. The slightly annoyed look on her face caused Harry
to chuckle softly.

“I’ll make it up to her,” he assured himself as he studied the fullness of her lips, “yeah, by
mauling those bad boys.”

“Shit…Ron’s watching me again.”

“Hey….how about them, Cannons?” he asked the redhead.

Happily, as if he hadn’t just been staring daggers at Harry, Ron shifted gears and began a
nonstop droning on about his favorite teams’ chances of winning their upcoming Quidditch match.

“Whew…that was close,” he thought as he ventured a quick peek and those succulent ruby reds of
Hermione’s, which were quickly becoming an obsession. “Oh yeah….this isn’t going to be easy.”

Harry’s attitude toward life had changed recently. While his buddy Ron had a family, and a life
expectancy, Harry didn’t really have either so he had decided to live his life to the fullest.

At the moment, ‘to the fullest’ meant the girl sitting across from him.

Hermione could feel his eyes on her, again, as they sat in their second class of the afternoon.
She couldn’t see him, but she knew he was staring at her.

“Third time since lunch,” she reminded herself. She *accidentally* dropped her quill in the
aisle on her left and snuck a peek at Harry through the strands of her hair as she picked it
up.

“Yup….emerald green eyes boring right into me,” Hermione confirmed as she noticed Harry lean
forward in his seat to stare even *more* intently at her as she picked up her quill.

*Where* exactly, his eyes were focused, she wasn’t sure.

“I can’t believe this! He’s never done this before, Ron sure, quite often actually, the bloody
pervert, but Harry, nope, first time. For Merlin’s sake, he wasn’t even being subtle about it, he
didn’t have his books open and he wasn’t even pretending to pay attention. Luckily, he was sitting
in the very back of the class or everyone would have noticed what he *was* doing, and what he
*wasn’t*.” she thought.

“Man I love springtime classes.” Harry was thinking as he sat in the last row of seats, staring
at Hermione *again*. “Ahh, no stuffy robes….it doesn’t get any better than this.”

Harry leaned back in his chair and stretched his legs out in front of him. He interlaced his
fingers behind his head, looking completely content. “Short plaid skirt, little white cotton
blouse….all was right with the world.”

He suddenly leaned forward. “Oh man…Yeah, like I didn’t see you push the quill off your desk,
Hermione, just like I’m not seeing your skirt ride up when you put your leg in the aisle to pick it
up.”

“Does she know what she’s doing to me? Okay, she’s back in her chair now….good.” Harry was
defiantly enjoying that he could see the outline of her bra right through her white cotton
blouse.

“Damn I’m horny today….for her!”

“Shit, class is ending, won’t get as good a seat in Transfiguration.”

All around him, students began packing up their belongings as they prepared to head to their
next class.

“I think she knows,” he thought. “She has always known what I was thinking, and if she does now,
she’ll be blushing when we get up to leave.”

She was out of her seat now.

“Are you coming?” she asked.

“Not yet, but I guarantee you’ll be the first to know,” he said to himself as he leered at her.
“Yup…those cheeks are pink,” he noticed. “I wonder what color they would be if she knew
*exactly* what I was thinking?”

“No, you go ahead, I’ll catch up, I just have a question for Professor,” he said.

“Yeah I’ll bet! Like what was that *entire* lesson about as I missed the whole bloody thing
because I was too busy *staring* at my best friend!” Hermione wanted to say, but she replied
instead, “Okay, I’ll see you in Transfiguration then.”

He nodded.

As she went through the door she took a chance and glanced back at him. Harry’s eyes quickly
darted from her ass up to her face, and he just smiled quite innocently at her.

She smiled back…. uneasily.

Harry arrived in their next class just as the lesson was beginning. He walked into the classroom
like he didn’t have a care in the world. His eyes found her immediately.

“Hey,” he greeted as he flopped into the seat on her right. He then leaned far over and
whispered into her ear.

“Can I borrow your Dark Arts notes?”

His lips actually brushed her ear as he said it. She leaned her head away so she could see his
face straight on. Her eyes were as big as saucers, and her mouth hung open in shock.

“I can’t believe he just did that! He practically nibbled on my ear,” she thought as she
examined his face. In answer to his question, all she could manage was a very weak, “Sure.”

He smiled--she was staring right at him. “Look at those gorgeous lips,” he marveled again as his
eyes were riveted to her mouth.

“Oh my God!” Hermione thought. “Ron just stared at me.

I’ve always known Harry was more aggressive than Ron, but….”

“WOW!”

“What do I do now?” After all this time, this was not an issue she had expected to have.

“I shouldn’t really be surprised, I mean…. it’s only natural, we’ve been so close for so long
but….”

“Harry is after me, and he’s being very aggressive about it.”

“Am I reading this wrong?” she wondered. “I don’t think I am, but…. I guess I could be. Maybe
I’ll just see how the rest of the day goes,” she concluded.

Harry’s lips on her ear had definitely gotten her attention.

“Damn, Ron’s watching again,” Harry noticed. “I knew that ear thing was risky, but it was worth
it. I’ve definitely given her something to think about.”

“Man she’s hot!” he thought, unable to help himself.

“I’d better back off a smidge and let Ron relax again.”

But he didn’t.

“See how the rest of the day goes.” That was what she had said to herself just a few hours
before.

“*How did it go?* I’ll tell you how it went! During the afternoon, he rubbed my shoulders
twice, rested his hand on my back, and I know he was sizing up the clasp on my bra while he was
back there. If my skirt was made of a flammable material his eyes would have set the damn thing on
*fire*. Then there was his ultimate horn dog moment of the day in Herbology. As he went around
me to get to his seat, he slid past my bum so slowly and so close that when he was finally passed I
thought to myself, ‘Oh my God, I hope that was a wand in his pocket’ and then I checked the back of
my skirt just to make sure he hadn’t left anything behind. *That’s* how the rest of my day
went!”

“I wonder if he’s under some kind of spell?” she thought to herself as her afternoon came to a
close. “Is there such a thing as a *horny* spell?”

“I don’t think so, but if there is, he must have been hit with the damn thing *twice*! I’ve
been pursued before, but *never* like this!”

“Okay….so *maybe*, I leaned into him ever so slightly in Herbology.” she admitted. “But,
other than that, I didn’t instigate any of this.”

Harry was pretty happy; he’d had a decent day. He hadn’t gotten a damn thing done since lunch
time of course, except for hitting on Hermione.

“Hermione,” he though dreamily, as he closed his eyes and reviewed his afternoon in his head.
This thing for her had intensified as the day had gone on. Just a look or a smile from her, and his
blood raced in all directions.

Okay, well…. mainly south.

It took all his will to stop himself from walking up to her and attacking those ruby red lips
and running his hands over her whole body.

She was making him nuts! He’d wanted girls before but never, ever, like this.

There had been at least one encouraging sign so far.

“She definitely leaned into me in Herbology, no doubt about it, it was subtle, but she did
it.”

After dinner, which was fairly uneventful by the day’s standards, the three friends sat in the
common room together. Well actually, Harry and Hermione sat on couches opposite each other while
Ron sat on the floor between them.

Ron sitting between his two friends was *not* a coincidence. He was suspicious that
something was up with them and sitting on the floor would allow him to keep an eye on the both of
them.

There was definitely a tension there; it was thick and it was entirely sexual, from what Ron
perceived. That kind of tension between his two best friends was the one thing in the world that he
did *not* want to exist.

Hermione sat on one couch reading, *Hogwarts a History: The Revised Edition,* while sucking
on a lollipop.

Where she got the pop, both Harry and Ron had no idea, but Harry was enjoying watching her with
it *very* much.

Hell, at this point in the day, he would have found it sexually arousing if she was eating a
tuna fish sandwich. It didn’t really matter, if her mouth was moving, he was horny.

If she new what she was doing she didn’t show it. She was just reading, like a hundred nights
before, nothing out of the ordinary. She wasn’t pulling the lollipop out of her mouth and running
her tongue over it or anything like that, she was just enjoying a lollipop.

Harry was mesmerized.

He was in a lollipop trance; he watched as the lollipop stick moved from one side of her mouth
to the other, obviously, all the movement being caused by her tongue.

The though or her tongue wrapped around anything was….making him decidedly uncomfortable.
Hermione would occasionally take the pop out of her mouth and hold it in the air for a second or
two while she read or flipped a page. She’d twirl it a few times, and then right back into her
mouth it would go.

She seemed completely unaware of what was happening around her until she looked up, and noticed
Harry staring at her and then she looked over at Ron, who was also staring.

She looked from one to the other then removed the lollipop from her mouth and said.

“What?”

Neither of them said a word.

“What?” she said more forcefully, before adding, “Its sugar free!”

Both Harry and Ron looked at her like they had no idea what she was talking about. Then, Harry
went back to his magazine and Ron decided to play chess with Dean.

She watched them for a second, confused; she wondered what their problem was, and then she went
back to her book….and lollipop.

And then she started with the leg.

She was sitting with her legs crossed—right over left and she started bouncing her extended leg
up and down slightly as she read. Every time she did that, Harry saw *way* too much of her
thighs.

After about ten minutes of torture, he collapsed face down onto his couch.

“Harry….are you okay?” Hermione asked worriedly after she sucked the juice off her lollipop so
she could speak.

“I’ll be fine,” he replied, voice muffled, with his face buried in a couch pillow.

She was quickly off her couch and kneeling next to him. “Are you alright? Is there anything I
can do to help?”

He turned his head slowly, and his eyes captured her concerned but beautiful face.

“Damn….ruby red lips….Again!” he groaned. “Stupid lollipop!”

He took a deep breath.

“Hermione,” he began. “I’d like nothing more, than for you to be able to help me with what’s
wrong.”

“What *is* wrong Harry?” she asked cautiously.

He lowered his voice to barely above a whisper, and asked, an eyebrow raised, “Do you
*really* want to know?”

His green eyes burned into hers and she felt a blush rising.

“Because if you *do*…. I’ll show you,” Harry finished, shifting slightly on the couch.

Hermione was startled by his reply. She didn’t doubt for a second that he would do exactly what
he said, but…. she broke his gaze. Her nerves had faltered.

After staring at her for a very long moment, he let out a disappointed sigh, and then said to
her. “I think I just need to spend some quality time in the bathroom.”

“Oh, so…. your stomachs upset?” she asked halfheartedly, deep down knowing that was not what he
was saying.

He gave her a slight smile and snickered, “Yeah….*something* like that.”

As Harry started to stir, Hermione backed up to give him room to get off the couch, but he did
something she hadn’t expected. He put his right arm up on the back of the couch and hoisted himself
up and over so that he landed behind it.

“I’ll see you later,” he bid her, as he hurried towards the stairs.

“Harry?” she called after him nervously.

He stopped and looked back over his shoulder at her.

“Yeah?”

“Why did you….?” she asked pointing towards the couch he had just climbed over.

He looked down for a second, as if choosing his words carefully, and then he met her gaze, and
for the second time in the last minute Harry repeated, “Do you *really* want to know?”

She just looked at him, confused as ever. When she didn’t answer, he took off up the stairs two
at a time.

Hermione stood glued to the spot. She had no idea what to do next. Harry had been aggressively
pursuing her all day, and when he finally offered to, ‘Put his cards on the table’-- so to speak--
she had backed down, *twice*.

“I’m such an idiot,” she groaned. “I’ve been waiting for *years* for him to notice me and
now that he finally has, I lose my nerve.”

“What’s wrong with me?”

She had just left the common room, and she was now wandering the corridors of the castle,
thinking things through.

Harry hit the top of the stairs, and veered toward the bathroom, reached for the knob, and
stopped dead.

“No, damn it! This is not how this day is going to end!” he concluded as he looked at the
bathroom door.

“I need to be more *aggressive*. I will kiss those gorgeous lips of hers before this day is
through.” He nodded his head in approval of his new strategy.

With that, Harry turned and went right back down the stairs.

“Where is she?” he wondered as he looked around the common room. Ron and Dean were in the corner
playing chess and a few other students were hanging around, but Hermione was nowhere to be
seen.

Hermione wandered around the castle for a while, lost in thought. She came to the end of long
hallway and had two choices: left or right. At the moment, though, she had no idea what to do,
about anything it seemed.

She heard footsteps in the corridor behind her, she turned and she saw Harry coming straight for
her.

He was walking at a very determined pace and as he reached her he didn’t stop. He slammed into
her and wrapping his arms around her, drove them both backwards until they hit the wall.

She was absolutely stunned, first by the force with which he had hit her and then by the force
with which they had hit the stone wall.

In the two second from his impact with her to their impact with the wall his tongue was in her
mouth and hard at work. He was also caressing and fondling her as he pinned her against the wall
with his body.

“I have to touch her skin, I need to feel her body, caress her,” Harry thought as he raged with
desire.

He un-tucked Hermione’s shirt and ran his hands across her flat stomach and over her sides and
around to her back.

She was totally blown away by what was happening.

“Oh my God, this is *unbelievable*,” she thought dizzily as Harry’s tongue roamed freely in
her mouth, and as his hands roamed freely everywhere else.

“Okay, if this is where we’re going with this Potter, *then let’s go!*” she decided as her
pent up feeling for him burst forth.

She threw herself into her present situation completely. Her hands where in his hair and she
pulled him close. She attacked his mouth just as aggressively as he was attacking hers.

He worked his hands back around to her stomach and then up to her breasts, which, after pushing
her bra up, he fondled and caressed. She moaned into his mouth at the feel of his hands on her, and
then gasped when he broke their kiss to capture her breast with his mouth.

She hadn’t even realized that he had unbuttoned her blouse. He lingered over each breast
lovingly, running his tongue over her nipples and sucking gently.

He was driving her absolutely *insane*. She had never felt *anything* so wonderful.
She threw her head back, closed her eyes, and just *enjoyed*.

When he had finally finished with her breasts, she pushed him back a step so she could look at
him.

Hermione stared directly into Harry’s eyes with a look that could only be described as
‘mischievous’. Then she grabbed the front of his shirt and *yanked* it open, tearing every
single button off. She smiled at him as they listened to the sound of buttons rolling around the
deserted corridor.

Hermione leaned in and began planting soft kisses on his chest.

Slowly, she worked her way up to his neck, while her hand found its way down to his crotch.

Harry couldn’t help but let out a low growl when she slid her hand down the front of his pants
and held him, and began stroking him.

He wouldn’t have thought he could get any harder, but he was wrong, under *her touch* it
was possible.

After she had pushed him right to the brink, she stopped, stepped back, and smiled at him.

Now it was *his* turn to be surprised.

All Harry could do was stand there and stare at her. Her breathing quickened, her eyes turned
dark, and her hands were clenched into fists. She couldn’t control herself either.

*“Good*!” he thought.

Harry glanced down at his ruined shirt, he didn’t care one bit, and at the bulge in his pants.
*That,* he was hoping to do something about! Then he gave her a fairly *evil* smile and
pounced, attacking her again.

Harry leaned into her and captured her tongue with his. He then reached around behind her and
slid his hands down the back of her skirt.

Her skirt was now riding low, about half way down her bottom, and he began kneading and
caressing the gorgeous ass he’d been staring at all day.

While groping her, Harry actually reached down far enough to lightly brush the wetness between
her legs. He heard her gasp and then sigh ever so softly. Hermione then began to gently glide up
and down against his hand in the hope that it would be left right where it was.

She whimpered slightly when he removed it, but when he tried to break their kiss, Hermione bit
his lower lip so he couldn’t get away.

He finally pulled loose and ran his finger over his lip. Harry stared in amazement when his
finger came away bloody. His surprise was not lost on Hermione.

She bit her own lip in an ‘I’m sorry’ kind of way and gave him a shy smile. “*Shy my ass*!”
he thought. He returned her smile with a sly, mischievous smirk of his own. With that, he lifted
her up and as if on cue, she wrapped her legs around his waist.

He then began biting and nipping and sucking on the delicious spot just below her left ear.
Hermione’s breathing was becoming ragged as she leaned into every attack that he made on her
neck.

She began whispering his name over and over again very softly, imploring him to keep going, to
*never* stop.

Then, they heard a noise in the hallway and froze.

Hermione had her arms over Harry’s shoulders and her legs fastened around his waist. Her blouse
was open, except for the top button, and her bra was pushed up over her breasts. She could only
*imagine* the state her hair was in.

Harry had her pinned against the wall, and his hands on her ass as he held her in place. His
shirt was hanging completely open, and his lip was bleeding.

Simply put, this was not a position they wanted to be caught in.

Harry put her down very slowly as they both waited and listened.

Hermione fixed her bra and was attempting to button her blouse as she hid behind his taller
frame. He stared down the hallway in the direction of the noise.

They both listened intently for the noise to repeat. When it did not, Harry turned back to face
her. He pushed his glasses further up the bridge of his nose, looked her up and down, and nodded
slightly.

Hermione met his gaze. She brushed a few stray hairs away from her eyes and smiled sheepishly at
him.

He then reached down, took her hand, and pulled her after him down the hallway. Harry’s ruined
shirt billowed in the breeze created by his aggressive pace.

“You and I are *not* finished, not by a long shot.”

“You don’t here me complaining, do you?” Hermione answered as she trailed behind him still
trying to fix her outfit.

“I’m not backing down Harry, not anymore,” she said.



2. Revelations
--------------

Authors note: As always, I need to thank my wife, who is the first one to read my stories, and
gives me her honest opinion, which I truly value. Then there is my beta, Viopathartic, who
continues to help me get my stories into postable shape. Thank you ladies, I couldn’t do it without
you!

**Chapter 2**

Harry was determined to resume what he and Hermione had started in the hallway--and as quickly
as possible. He walked down the corridor at an exceedingly rapid pace with Hermione in tow.
Hermione was occasionally forced to run for a step or two to keep up with him, but he was pleased
to note when he looked back at her that… she was smiling.

Even as they were walking away, the noises in the hallway, now sounding like footsteps, had
resumed, and they were getting closer. Neither Harry nor Hermione had any clue as to who was
following them, but they did *not* want to be found.

They had business to finish.

Trailing behind Harry as he led her down the hallway, Hermione struggled to button up her blouse
with only one hand.

“*HARRY*?” called a voice that echoed down the hallway towards them.

The couple stopped. Hermione put her hand on Harry’s arm. “That sounded like Neville.”

They stood in the deserted hallway looking at each other. She could see the longing in his eyes
and the growing sense of impending disappointment. She knew that’s what it was because she was
positive that her own eyes were reflecting the same sentiment.

“*Harry*,” she said in a slightly pleading tone, her hand still holding his arm. “I think
we need to see what he wants. He wouldn’t have come looking for you if it wasn’t important.”

“*No*,” Harry answered as he pulled away from her and dejectedly kicked the floor. He
angrily walked in a small circle around the tiled hallway, his open shirt billowing around him.
“He’s probably found some stupid new *plant* he wants to tell me about.”

“*Harry*,” she repeated a bit more sternly this time.

“*Why*?” he whined at her from a spot a few feet away.

He took a deep exasperated breath and shook his head. He knew he was screwed. There was no way
he was going to win this argument. He stood with his hands on his hips and stared at the
ground.

“*Son of a bitch*!”

Hermione smiled at the look of displeasure on Harry’s face. She then closed the gap between them
and Harry leaned into her so that their foreheads were touching.

“Patience is a virtue Harry,” she whispered as she raised his chin so that they made eye
contact.

An exhausted Neville rounded the corner into the hallway and he was about to yell in triumph—he
had *finally* found Harry---but he stopped dead.

Harry and Hermione stood before him with there eyes locked on one another. The two of them were
standing less than a foot apart. They weren’t touching or talking but Neville was enthralled.

There was something in the way they were gazing at each other; it was so....so
*passionate*. He instantly felt guilty, as if he had intruded on a very private moment.

Neville was unsure of what to do. Neither of them had even glanced in his direction since he’d
appeared. They were obviously aware of his presence but they hadn’t said a word or acknowledged him
in any way.

“I’m gonna just stand right here and *wait*,” he thought, “When they are ready, they’ll let
me know. I *will not* ruin their moment by speaking.”

Harry knew Neville was close, but he didn’t care. He was totally lost in Hermione. His
*encounter* with her earlier, was the most alive he had ever felt in his whole life. The feel
of her skin, the softness of her lips, and the passion in her eyes, made his blood boil. He had
never wanted anything or anyone more than he wanted her.

If *bloody* Neville hadn’t interrupted, he would have *rocked the world* of the little
brown eyed witch before him. He smiled at that thought and leered at her, and as if she had read
his mind, she smiled and leered right back at him.

A wordless promise passed between them as they gazed at each other.

*We will finish what we started*.

Harry finally spoke. He hadn’t broken eye contact with Hermione, but he did ask Neville.

“You need me, Nev?”

Neville had been staring down at his feet trying to make himself as invisible as possible. He
was slightly startled by the sound of Harry’s voice as it echoed through the predominantly empty
hallway.

“Umm…uh, well uh, yeah, Professor McGonagall sent me to find you,” the boy stammered.

“Any idea what about?” Harry inquired as he turned to face his friend.

“No, sorry Harry, I have no idea. She just asked me to find you,” Neville replied
apologetically.

Hermione had turned her back towards them and walked a few steps down the hall. She had realized
that her blouse was not buttoned correctly and she wanted to fix it, hopefully before Neville
noticed. There would be no way for Neville *not* to notice Harry’s shirt. She chuckled quietly
to herself as she remembered the look on Harry’s face when she had torn it open.

“I have to go,” Harry said to her after she joined him and Neville. His voice dripped with
resentment.

“Do you want me to come with you? Hermione asked as she smoothed out her blouse, which was now
buttoned properly and brushed a few stray hairs from her face.

“Neville, can you give me a sec?” Harry asked their friend as he nodded ever so slightly in
Hermione’s direction.

Neville got the hint. “Yeah….yeah sure Harry. I’ll uh, wait right around the corner, umm….over
there.” He said as he walked backwards in the direction he had pointed. He gave a nervous little
wave towards Hermione, who leaned around Harry so she could see him better, and then smiled and
waved back.

Harry and Hermione watched him go.

The second Neville was out of sight Hermione leapt off the ground and wrapped herself around
Harry.

“*What the--*” he muttered in shock as Hermione rained down kisses upon him. Harry, caught
off guard by her attack, staggered backwards into the wall. He regained his balance quickly and
swung Hermione around so that she was now the one with her back to the wall.

Their tongues were furiously exploring, and there hands were everywhere. She was running her
fingers through his already disheveled hair while he gave her a vigorous chest massage as he pinned
her up against the wall. When they finally broke their kiss they both took a much needed deep
breath and simultaneously said, “Wow.”

He put her down. She re-smoothed out her outfit and he did what he could with his hair. She then
drew her want and pointed to his shirt with a quick, *Reparo*.

“Thank you,” Harry said as he looked down at his shirt which was once again whole.

“You’re welcome,” Hermione smiled at him.

“God you’re gorgeous,” he said as he placed his hand behind her neck and drew her in for a
gentle kiss. She stepped to him and placed her hands on his hips as she kissed him back.

“Gotta go,” he said when they broke apart.

“Where should I meet you?” Harry asked as he raised an eyebrow and winked at her.

“I need to head back to the dorm for a minute but I’ll meet you in the common room, and we can
*go* from there,” Hermione purred at him as she placed her hands on his chest.

Harry walked backwards towards the corner where Neville was waiting as Hermione’s hands
unhurriedly dropped away. His eyes drank in every detail about her, and he smiled the whole time
until he finally disappeared from sight.

Hermione watched Harry turn the corner. She hugged herself tight and leaned her head back as she
hopped in place squealing with delight. She had never been so happy in her life. After years of
waiting for Harry to come around, it had finally happened. She walked back to her common room
grinning from ear-to-ear the whole way.

Neville fell into step with Harry as they walked quickly down the corridor towards McGonagall’s
office. For most of the trip Neville said nothing because Harry seemed lost in thought, but he,
unable to stop himself, finally asked, “Are you and Hermione….together?”

“Kind of looks that way, Nev, but can you keep it quiet? There are other peoples feelings
involved here, and Hermione and I are not really ready to deal with those just yet.”

“Sure, Harry, I promise; I won’t say anything to anyone,” Neville assured him.

“Harry, can I ask you another question?”

“Yeah, go ahead,” Harry replied as they walked.

“Well…what happened to your shirt? You know…before?” the nervous Gryffindor asked sheepishly, as
he avoided looking directly at Harry. Harry smiled and chuckled to himself as he thought about what
*had* happened to his shirt and how to reply.

“Actually Neville, that’s something I’d rather not get into at the moment,” Harry told him as
they continued walking. Neville looked somewhat embarrassed at having asked that question, and he
nodded in understanding at Harry’s answer.

Harry and Neville arrived at McGonagall’s office. Neville stopped and stared at Harry as they
reached the office door unsure of what to do next.

Neville, finally backed up a step before stammering, “Harry, I really am sorry about….” and he
trailed off, too embarrassed to finish.

Harry reassured him, “Its okay Neville. Really.” His friend smiled gratefully and turned to
leave, but Harry called after him. “Neville”

The tall boy turned back towards his friend to see Harry with a finger to his lips. Neville
nodded, smiled and set off as Harry closed the office door.

_______________________________________________

Hermione slowly drifted through the castle heading in the general direction of her common room.
She was completely lost in the happiness she felt. Twenty-four hours ago, Harry had been
*just* her best friend; *now* he was so much more. She got chills just thinking about
him--his hands touching and caressing her, and his mouth, the things he had done with his mouth!
Every nerve ending in her *entire* body was alive at the mere thought of what he had done to
her and the prospect of them both doing so much more together. She smiled and picked up her pace;
she had something special for him to see, and when her excitement overwhelmed her, she actually
started to run.

“Come in Harry, have a seat,” the Headmistress greeted him.

“Thank you Professor,” he replied politely as he settled into the comfortable overstuffed chair
in front of her desk.

“I have something most unsettling to speak to you about,” McGonagall began as she paced slowly
behind her heavy oak desk. “This….sort of behavior is severely frowned upon at Hogwarts.”

Harry nervously adjusted his position in the chair, wondering if a rat fink in one of the
paintings had turned him in. As McGonagall continued speaking, Harry started to drift away. He
began to smile as he thought about a half naked Hermione backed up against the wall while he
fondled her and…..

“*What did you just say,* Professor?” he asked quizzically as he snapped out of his
lust--filled haze and actually caught some of what she was saying.

“I said that it *appears* as though a love potion may have been placed into your drink at
lunch today.”

His mind was humming; all he could think about was his entire afternoon and evening spent
*lusting* after Hermione.

“Young Miss Weasley” she continued, “was overheard confessing to a group of her fellow students.
Do you have any reason to believe that the information given to me could be true?

“*Ginny*?” he repeated, “*Why would Ginny--*” His thoughts were flying around in his
head at lightning speed. Then, Hermione’s smiling face appeared and filled his consciousness, and
he asked, “Are you going to let Hermione know?”

“I’m sorry Harry; I don’t understand your question. Why would I let Miss Granger know? Do you
believe Miss Granger may have been affected as well? Did you share your drink with her at lunch?”
McGonagall asked as she stared at him and waited for an answer.

The ramifications of what McGonagall had told him had just crystallized in his head. He began to
worry that irreparable damage to his relationship with Hermione was now a *very real*
possibility.

If what he had done to Hermione was the result of a potion that only he had been given, then
that would mean that what *she* had done, or allowed him to do, she had done out of
*true* affection. If she even *suspected* that he didn’t *truly* return her feelings
after what had happened between them, then even their friendship would be over. *Hermione, no
longer in his life!* The anger in him began to build until he finally exploded.

“*THAT FUCKIN BITCH,*” Harry screamed with murder in his eyes as every old lady doodad and
thingamabob on McGonagall’s desk shattered into a million pieces.

“She just ruined my life!” he wailed in anger as he headed for the door. “Where is she, oh…I’m
gonna *kill* her.”

“STOP!” McGonagall shouted forcefully as she blasted Harry with an *Immobulus*. “*Mr.
Potter* you will refrain from using that type of language in my presence and your behavior at
the moment is *totally unacceptable.”* She looked over the shattered remains of her treasures
scattered across her desktop. “From your response I take it that you believe this rumor to be true.
*However*, when you are released you will come back, sit down and restrain yourself or I will
be forced to do it for you. *Then* we will discuss this further.”

Harry seethed with anger--mostly at Ginny, but at the Headmistress as well. He took a deep
breath and attempted to calm himself. When he felt his composure starting to return he inquired
through gritted teeth, “Will you *please* release me from this spell, Professor?”

To which McGonagall replied, “*If* you are quite finished.”

________________________________________________

Hermione reached the common room and climbed through the portrait. Dean and Ron had just
finished their game of chess. “Hey, Hermione,” Ron called to her. “Where’s Harry?”

He glanced around for his other best friend. Before she had the chance to answer his question he
blurted out, “Bloody hell Hermione, what happened to your hair?”

She had started to smile as she remembered the tussle with Harry that had led to the present
state of her hair, but instead she found herself scowling at the redhead and replying defensively,
“It’s windy!”

Ron jerked his head back in surprise at her answer and asked, “*In the castle?*”

She furrowed her brow once more and snapped at him, “What is this, the Inquisition? Go bother
someone else.”

She then ran up the stairs to her dorm leaving a startled Ron mumbling to himself. “Must be
*that* time of the month…..snapping at me for no reason.” He then grumpily shuffled away.

Hermione heard what Ron had said but she smiled as she bit her lip. “No, it’s *NOT and*
thank goodness.” She opened her door, threw herself onto her bed and lay there with her arms spread
wide. She stared at her canopy and thought about Harry.

“Oh,” she said as she scrambled off the bed and over to her dresser as she remembered why she
was in her room in the first place. She yanked open her top drawer and began rifling through it,
desperately searching for what she knew was in there somewhere.

She emitted a slight, “Yes,” when her fingers touched the soft silky black fabric. Hermione
looked around before pulling out the black bra and panties trimmed with lace.

She had been shopping in Diagon Alley over the summer, preparing for the start of the school
year when she saw it. Lingerie wasn’t really her thing; she was definitely more a book kind of a
girl, but it was a very pretty set. As far as some of the sets available in the shop went, it was
modest by comparison. So naturally, she adored it instantly.

She checked the door to her bedroom and then tucked the underwear under the front of her shirt
and sprinted to the bathroom smiling. The silky underwear against the flat of her stomach felt
wonderful, and she couldn’t wait to finally be wearing them.

She started to strip out of her present outfit before she had even closed the bathroom door. Two
seconds later she was down to her everyday bra and panties and then down to nothing.

Hermione looked at herself closely as she stood in front of the mirror. “Not too bad,” she
observed, although a wisp of insecurity did flash through her thoughts. She pinched her waist from
the sides, and then she ran her hands down over her hips. “Not overly hippy,” she thought as she
hit her hips with the heels of her hands. Then she focused on her breasts, turning sideways while
she sucked in her stomach. “Not very large, but I’m not built like a boy either,” she critiqued
while staring at her profile. She put her hands over her stomach.

“Pretty flat,” she nodded. “Though a little softer than I would like it to be,” was her opinion
as she scrunched up her face. But, all in all, she was fairly pleased with her assessment.

Now it was back to business.

Hermione picked up the lingerie and smiled. She then stepped into the panties. She felt the
smoothness of the silk as it glided up her calves, across her thighs, and wrapped itself snugly
around her bottom. She got a slight chill as the cool soft fabric of the bra caressed her as she
slid it on. It almost felt as if fingers were very gently brushing along the sides of her breasts
and she imagined that it was Harry teasing her. She closed her eyes for a second and expelled a
long breath.

Now that she had finished putting the lingerie on, she felt transformed. Something about the
feel of the material and the sleekness of the lines it created made her feel sexy, and pretty.

She smiled broadly.

She turned to the side again to check her profile in the lingerie and she thought, “He’s gonna
go nuts when he sees me in this,” and she got a little giddy.

Hermione pulled herself together and put on her skirt and blouse and headed down stairs to look
for Harry.

________________________________________________

Harry sat quietly in the chair across from McGonagall’s desk. Once the headmistress felt he had
calmed sufficiently, she released him from her spell and ordered him to sit. She then explained to
him that some of his fellow classmates had alerted her to a conversation they had overheard
regarding Miss Weasley and a love potion. Unfortunately, Ginny had left for a weekend of shopping
with her mother and Miss Delacour, so she was unavailable to be questioned until Monday.

Harry numbly absorbed everything he was told. He shook his head and all he thought was,
“*Why?*” He had known forever that Ginny had a crush on him, but he couldn’t believe that she
had resorted to a love potion to try to get him.

Had Ginny’s stupid potion caused the uncontrollable horniness he felt towards Hermione? He
didn’t really know, but he knew he had never felt that way about *anyone* before. *Had
felt*? Yeah right, that was a joke; he *still* couldn’t control his ‘blood flow’ where
Hermione was concerned and judging by the growing bulge in his pants, which was being caused this
very second, by the mere *thought* of her, the feeling wasn’t dissipating at all. For Merlin’s
sake, he hadn’t even seen her in nearly an hour and he was *still* in ‘go’ mode--big time.

“Professor, how long does a love potion last?’ Harry was finally able to ask after discreetly
adjusting his problem.

The headmistress quickly replied, “I don’t know Harry. Without speaking directly to Miss Weasley
to find out what she may have used I won’t be able to give you a true answer. Normally, though,
these types of potions last from mere minutes to a few hours. Only a truly gifted witch could make
one that could last as long as a day.”

Harry listened to her then fidgeted in his seat as he tried to figure out a way to say what he
really wanted to ask her. “Professor, are there….other types of maybe similar potions that would,
well….affect a person strongly but in a little different way?”

He finally managed to sputter out his question while avoiding her gaze at all costs. He had also
just that second come to the conclusion that he probably should *not* have asked that
question.

McGonagall folded her arms in front of her and then stared at him for a very long time. She had
a quizzical, yet somewhat disapproving look on her face. McGonagall had definitely gotten the gist
of what he had asked and didn’t seem too happy about it, but apparently she wanted clarification.
“What *exactly* are you tying to ask me Mr. Potter?”

Damnit.

“Oh great …I just went from Harry to Mr. Potter,” he thought. “That’s not good….and sure, like
I’m really just gonna come right out and ask my ‘grandmotherly type figure’ if there is a spell
that would make me so damn horny for my best friend of six plus years that I was all set to fuck
her standing up in a very public hallway of this very fine school not an hour ago? And…if I could,
that’s exactly what I’d be doing right now!”

“Go ahead, ask her *that*!” his thoughts dared him to say. He dropped his head into his
hands and then ran his fingers through his hair as he contemplated his reply.

“Actually, Professor, I think I’m good answer-wise.” He then stood up to leave her office. He
needed some time to think. She let him go this time saying as he left, “All right,” but she was
watching him very closely.

Harry just mumbled a quick “Thanks” as he went out the door.

He was screwed and he knew it; he was left, right, and sideways screwed, as far as he could see.
There was just no way around it. What was he supposed to do? He didn’t really have a choice in the
matter.

He knew that there was no way that Hermione *wasn’t* going to ask him about his meeting
with McGonagall the second she saw him. So, that ruled out *not* telling Hermione about the
potion.

“Well, I know I couldn’t do that anyway.” He actually felt like a bastard for even letting such
an idea run through his head. He had to think more clearly, but it wasn’t going to be easy.

“Yeah, no kidding!” It’s just that he desperately wanted Hermione, and he was sure that she was
waiting for him to meet her at that very moment. He was also pretty damn certain that any chance
they had of picking things up where they had left off was totally gone. “*Thanks, Ginny*,” he
venomously spit.

“So…Okay, I have to tell Hermione about the potion,”

Once I do, there will be no way to convince her that what had happened between them was real,
and he knew that. He also couldn’t be completely certain that his feelings weren’t in some way
chemically enhanced.

“What the hell was in that damn potion anyway….Viagra?” I’ve been perpetually hard for like
*hours*. That’s not normal, right?” he wondered.

“I know I’ve never felt this way before. Could it have been a coincidence that today was the day
I *finally* noticed Hermione *that way*? Damn right it could,” he thought. “But
*her* logical mind is *never* in a million years gonna buy that. So it looks like I’m
going to have to convince her.”

“It was real, I believe that, and there’s no way I’m gonna let that bitch Ginny take that from
me, or Hermione. No way!”

“I’m gonna find her, tell her, and hang on tight,” he decided and that was the plan for the rest
of the night.



3. Cause and Effect
-------------------

Authors note: Thank you to everyone who read and reviewed chapter 2. I appreciate it. Here’s
chapter 3. It’s called ‘Cause and Effect’ and that basically sums it all up. I hope you enjoy it,
and let me know what you think when you’re done.

**Chapter 3**

Ginny gathered up her books as her boring last period class had finally come to an end. “Well
it’s about damn time! I can’t wait to get out of here,” she thought. A broad smile appeared on her
face as she headed for the door. She stopped in the doorway and looked both ways as a river of
students flowed past the open door. She entered the flow and skillfully managed to weave her way
through the throng of students bustling through, or milling about in the hallways of Hogwarts.

She was extremely excited, a long weekend of shopping with Fleur in Paris. What could be better?
Sure her mother was going also, but she wasn’t going to let that ruin things. She was happily lost
in thought as she strolled down the hallway. She hadn’t noticed that Lavender and Pavarti stepped
away from the wall as she passed and fell into step behind her.

“Isn’t it sad?” Lavender said to Pavarti in a mischievous way as the two friends’ huddled close
together. She had made sure she spoke loud enough to be overheard.

“Oh yes it is, poor thing, she obviously doesn’t have a clue,” replied Pavarti.

“I know, all the years of pining for him up in smoke in a single afternoon, the poor dear.”
Lavender replied.

Ginny stopped, so did the two older Gryffindors behind her. The hallway had miraculously emptied
out, a normal Friday afternoon phenomenon at Hogwarts as the students scattered to the wind. There
were very few people within earshot when Ginny said to the pair without turning around.

“What are you two prattling on about?” making no effort to hide her annoyance.

“Isn’t she being brave?” Lavender asked Pavarti in an extremely sympathetic tone.

“Yes, I don’t know how she’s doing it? I wouldn’t be holding up so well if it was *me.* I’m
sure of that.” Pavarti dripped with sympathy.

Ginny turned to face the two girls. She dropped her backpack on the ground and crossed her arms
in front of her and angrily confronted the pair.

“Enough! Spill it you two, what’s all this nonsense about?”

Although they may have been momentarily startled by Ginny’s anger they both recovered quickly
and there expressions changed back to masks of sympathy once again. Lavender reached forward and
placed her hand on the younger girls shoulder and began, “Gin, it’s okay; you don’t have to be
brave around us. We feel your pain. Let it out. You’ll feel much better if you share.”

Ginny looked at Lavender, confused by what she had said. Then she looked at the hand on her
shoulder with a raised eyebrow, and then back at Lavender. Lavender understood the implication,
remove that hand or get bat bogied. She quickly removed her hand but her expression never
waivered.

Pavarti was eager to get in on the *fun* and she stepped forward.

“Ginny I’m so sorry things between you and Harry are over. We all know that you’ve been crushing
on him for years. It must be devastating to realize that he’s moved on.”

“What the hell are you two cackling about? Harry and I are fine!”

Ginny was starting to get annoyed. The two of them looked so smug and condescending. Whatever it
was they knew that she didn’t they weren’t really being sympathetic at all, they were deliberately
trying to make her upset.

“Bitches,” the young redhead thought to herself. “I won’t give them the satisfaction.”

“I don’t have time for this,” she said dismissively as she turned away from the girls. Her red
hair went flying as she bent over, picked up her bag, and slung it over her shoulder, and then
started to walk away.

Lavender waited until Ginny was a good ten feet away before she said, loud enough to be sure the
youngest Weasley heard her, “If the guy I was in love with was *eyefucking* a certain bookworm
buddy of his in every class this afternoon, I know *I’d* be interested.”

Bull’s-eye!

Ginny stopped dead at Lavenders words and she contemplated what she had heard for a second.

“*Hermione*,” she thought and closed her eyes. “Of course, who else?” Hermione was the one
person she feared she could *actually* lose Harry to, and her heart sank.

Lavender smiled with satisfaction toward Pavarti as the two girls exchanged a quiet high five,
“I just thought you *might* be interested Gin.”

Ginny’s mind was racing, she was angry, and she was hurt, which was just what they had wanted
from the start. “I can’t give them the satisfaction of knowing they got to me. How do I turn this
on them? Think of something!”

An idea clicked in to her head, and after composing herself Ginny smiled sweetly and turned
towards the pair.

“Girls, I appreciate your concern. I’m truly touched by your heartfelt sympathy, but it’s not
necessary. I *know* what Harry’s been up to all afternoon, but unlike you two, I know
*why* he was behaving that way. Have a nice weekend girls, I’m off to Paris to shop.”

The matching smug looks on Lavender and Pavarti’s faces were instantly wiped away. Neither girl
had expected this turn of events, or foreseen it as even a remote possibility. With wide eyes they
looked at each other and then bolted towards Ginny who was smiling as she turned and walked
away.

“Wait Gin, what do you mean *you know why*?” they both blurted out as they pushed and
jostled each to get close to Ginny to hear her answer.

Ginny smiled to herself as she thought, “If the two fashionistas in front of her just totally
ignored that she had said she was going to Paris for the weekend to shop, then they were hooked and
ready to be reeled in.”

“Ginny, *please* tell us,” they begged in unison.

“Well, since you two were so obviously concerned about my wellbeing,” her voice dripped with
mock appreciation. “I guess I *could* let you in on my little secret.” Ginny’s confidence had
returned, and the two gossips before her were ready to gobble up whatever she threw their way, and
she knew it.

Ginny motioned for the girls to follow her into a secluded alcove just around the corner from
where they had been standing, which they did enthusiastically. Once they were somewhat secluded
Ginny looked around and then leaned in close to them and began.

“Obviously you two are aware of my feelings for Harry,” to which the girls nodded in unison. “I
know he has feelings for me too, he’s just a bit, shy, or ahh awkward around…, *oh for Merlin’s
sake*, he’s bloody *dense* when it comes to women, right? *You* should know all about
that,” she said as she gestured towards Pavarti who was in complete agreement as she remembered the
Yule Ball fiasco. “I decided he needed a little, shall we say…. encouragement, so to speak. So, I
put a dab or two of love potion is his drink at lunchtime, to give him a little…..romantic
aggressiveness.”

The girls gasped in shock at the deceitfulness of the redheaded witches plan. They actually were
beginning to see the youngest Weasley in a new and positive light. To use a love potion on ‘the boy
who lived,’ was way out there guts wise.

“Ginny, I’m impressed,” Lavender said with shock and surprise still evident on her face. “Hey,
wait a minute,” Pavarti chimed in with a confused expression. “Then why has he been drooling over
the bookw…I mean, Hermione all day and not *you*?”

Ginny frowned at the accusation, “*Because…* she stepped in front of me to ask him some
bloody question, so…..”

“Oh, that sucks,” Lavender replied as she shook her head with displeasure at the situation. “I’d
be pissed if she got in the way of *my* hard work.”

Ginny looked at her, “Nah, it’s done,” she waved dismissively, “he’ll be over it soon
enough.”

“That must have been one *really* strong love potion Gin, because he was on her like white
on rice the *whole* afternoon,” Lavender finished.

“Yeah, you better be careful with that stuff, he looked ready to shag her brains out every time
I saw him.” Pavarti added.

Ginny frowned a bit, but tried to hide it as she stepped back and prepared to leave. “Girls it’s
been a little slice of heaven spending this time with you both but, I’ve gotta go and you’re
holding me up so, have a nice weekend.”

“No! Wait!” they both cried as they gripped her arms to keep her from leaving. “You can’t leave
*now*! Where did you get the love potion? Did you make it yourself? Was it hard to make? What
do you do now? Do you take another shot at Harry? We *have to* know!”

“Sorry, but as I said earlier, I’m off to *Paris* so*,* gotta go*,*” and she
pulled herself loose and headed down the corridor leaving Lavender and Pavarti in her wake in
stunned silence. The youngest Weasley took a deep breath and then smiled to herself as she rounded
the corner.

Lavender and Pavarti stood dumfounded as they stared at the spot where Ginny had just been.

Pavarti finally turned to Lavender and asked, “Did she say she was going to *Paris*?”

“Huh? What, Paris? Uhh, I think so” Lavender replied with a puzzled expression on her face as
she stared at the empty hallway in front of her. “Damn….she *did* say Paris didn’t she?” She
looked annoyed at first, but then she just shrugged her shoulders and said, “Oh well, too late to
ask about it now.”

“I still can’t believe she gave Harry a love potion,” Lavender gossiped as she and Pavarti
linked arms and headed down the corridor together. “Neither can I,” Pavarti answered wide eyed as
she shook her head in disbelief. “She’s *finished* if Harry finds out.” Both girls stopped
dead. They looked at each other and smiled truly evil smiles. “Should we?” Pavarti asked. “Hell
yeah, why not? She did it, not us,” her best friend replied and they ran down the hallway
laughing.

On the long quiet walk to Hogsmead village to meet her mother, Ginny had time to think.

There was only one person she truly felt was a threat to her fairytale ending with Harry Potter
and that, was Hermione Granger. Cho had meant nothing, she knew that, but Hermione was different.
First off, they had both been raised as muggles, so they had that in common. From the very
beginning, Hermione was *always* at Harry’s side. She had been with him through every major
challenge in his life. They were also way too in tuned with one another. They didn’t even have to
speak; they could communicate with only a look. The bond between them was *extremely* strong,
stronger then either of their bonds to her brother. Wasn’t it only a matter of time before they
both realized they had something special, and their relationship became *more than friends*?
“Merlin, I hope not!”

“Now I’m depressed,” she mumbled grumpily. “Why the hell couldn’t she bond with my brother for
Merlin’s sake?” She then angrily kicked a rock that rocketed down the road bouncing and tumbling.
When she had calmed down some, she thought about how, what she had just said sounded and she
chuckled. “*Bond* with my brother,” and she continued to chuckle until, “Ewww,” she then
shuttered in disgust. “There’s a mental picture I *really* didn’t need.” “You know what, I’m
not gonna worry about Hermione right now, I’ll deal with her, when I get back.”

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Harry headed for his common room, relieved to be out from under McGonagall’s questioning gaze,
but deeply concerned about what was to come. While he was furious with Ginny, he needed to stay
focused on Hermione.

“I’ll deal with Ginny later,” he muttered angrily. As he continued walking, he was trying to
plan out in his head what he wanted to say to Hermione when he saw her.

“That is, if I can control myself long enough to not shag her brains out the second I see her!”
“Oh crap,” he muttered dejectedly as he rolled his eyes, he then adjusted *himself* for what
seemed like the thousandth time since lunch.

“I should just let the son of a bitch swing free for Merlin’s sake, and save myself the
trouble,” he said out loud as he headed down the dark and deserted hallway. He allowed himself a
momentary chuckle as he thought of the scene that would create. “I can see it all now, ‘The Daily
Prophet’ headline, ‘The Boy who Lived’ is now the ‘Boy who’s Hung’, right on the front cover.
Probably sell them a *shipload* of papers!” His momentary silliness was quickly replaced with
anxiety as his thoughts turned back to Hermione.

“Okay…. Relax….you can do this,” he tried to reassure himself as he took a few deep breaths. He
ascended the last staircase that lead to the ‘Fat Lady’s’ portrait and the common room behind it.
Hermione would be waiting for him inside, happy, and beautiful, and completely clueless concerning
the news to come.

Harry stood before the Fat Lady for at least a minute, agonizing over what was about to happen.
He stared at the ground as he stood there running his hands through his perpetually disheveled
hair. Finally, he circled away from the portrait. “*Fuck*,” he shouted, louder than he had
actually intended as he leaned his head back in anguish.” *I really don’t want to do this*,”
he said to no one in particular as he tried to think of a way out of the mess that Ginny had dumped
him into. He continued to pace back and forth in the corridor for a few moments as he worked up the
nerve to do what he so desperately *didn’t* want to do.

Hermione was fidgeting with the hem of her skirt as she sat on the couch by the fireplace. She
was anxiously waiting for Harry, and she was getting worried. Harry had been gone quite a while,
far longer than she had expected. The brightest witch of her age hoped everything was okay. She
brushed a stay hair from her eyes as she looked up at the clock. She hadn’t bothered to fix her
hair at all. Harry had been the cause of her messy hair, and fixing it would be, *kind of* be
like erasing what had caused it, and she wanted as many reminders as possible of what had happened
between her and Harry. She smiled at the memory, but reality soon set back in, and she looked back
up at the clock.

“Two more minutes, and then I’m going to go look for him,” she determined.

Just then, the portrait swung open, and in stepped the man she’d been waiting for.

Hermione was instantly elated at seeing him, and she leapt off the couch and bounded in his
direction, hair flying and eyes sparkling. But…Halfway to him, she stopped, and her good mood was
instantly dispelled. The look on his face was not good*, not at all*. He looked very worried,
and her heart began to race. They slowly closed the distance to each other, and she took his hand
in hers as she reached him. He was staring down at the floor, and had not yet met her worried gaze.
She tilted her head to the side to try to see into his eyes as she said, “Harry? “Harry, please
look at me.”

He took a deep breath and raised his head and looked into her beautiful, but concerned face. She
was gorgeous, and he put his hand to his chest as he felt his heart skip a beat.

.

He steadied himself, and began, “Hermione, I need to tell you something. **I** don’t think
it’s a really big deal, but…”

In her opinion, the look in his eyes completely contradicted what he had just said.

“What? What is it?” she added, almost pleading.

“Here, come sit,” he said in as normal a voice as he could manage. He then led her to the couch
and they sat down. “I’ve got something to tell you, that will sound worse than it actually is, I
hope. Because I don’t believe it, I mean, I don’t think it matters, or mattered at all, but, you
need to know.”

“Harry, what are you talking about? Please tell me, whatever it is, just say it.”

“Alright…Hermione…what happened between us,” he began.

Hermione was instantly struck with terror. If he had said that, Voldemort was on his way up the
stair, it would have been less scary to her than having him begin a sentence with, ‘what happened
between us’. Her mind went into panic mode and she pulled away from him as all the color drained
from her face and her eyes showed insecurity, and fear.

Harry, realizing that Hermione was about to lose it, reached up and took her hand and then
blurted out, “*No, no, wait* it’s not what you think. I don’t regret what happened, not for a
second. What happened between us, being with you, like that, is the most alive I have ever felt in
my *whole* life. You are the most…amazing, sexy, smart, wonderful girl, I could….,” and he
trailed off.

She had relaxed a bit and she allowed him to pull her back down to the couch, her total panic
had been downgraded to only extreme worry, but for Harry, now came the truly scary part.

“Okay, here it is….today…. at lunch….it *seems* that Ginny,” and he paused.

Hermione furrowed her brow; panic had been replaced by confusion.

“Ginny…. **may** have put,” and he took a deep resigned breath, “a love potion in my drink,”
he finished as quickly as he could. He then, very sheepishly, braced for her response, hoping
against hope that she wouldn’t melt down.

Hermione understood what Harry had said, and what it actually meant, to them both, and her
expression changed dramatically. Harry watched as her face transformed before him. It took on a
mixture of sadness, *embarrassment*, and then, abject *humiliation*, and he watched as
her heart broke right in front of him. She got up from the couch, and tears began to well up in the
corners of her eyes, and then, they suddenly *exploded*.

Harry was mesmerized. He knew, and fully expected that she would get upset, but he had expected
anger. He had never seen Hermione cry like that, a deep wracking cry that involved her whole body.
He felt sadness like he *never* had before. The girl, who was his rock, had just totally
broken down. When he had regained *his* composure he took a step toward her.

“NO….DON’T,” she shouted through the tears, as she brought her hands up to her face and very
slowly, backed away from him. She stopped her retreat, and trying to be brave, she wiped away the
flood of tears that were cascading down her cheeks and looked at him. He stared back at her, unsure
of what to say, or do. So….he just stood there, staring at her. She tried her best, but her pain
was too great, she just couldn’t hold her tears in, and her crying resumed, full force. And in a
flash, Hermione was gone, up the stairs to her dorm, before he could react.

“HERMIONE, WAIT!” he screamed, and he finally took off after her. Unfortunately for him, she had
gone up to the girls’ dorm, where no male could follow, but he wasn’t gonna let that stop him. He
was halfway up the stairs, and thought he might actually make it to the top when the stairs
suddenly transformed into a slide. He dropped like a rock, and he slammed into the cold hard stone
chin first, which split open instantly and gushed blood. His glasses had flown through the air and
shattered when they landed. He was then unceremoniously depositing in a bloody heap on the common
room floor.

He got up and stared at the staircase. His now blinding rage at Ginny, for causing all this,
coupled with his *absolute* *need* to get to Hermione made him more determined then ever
to get up those stairs.

The boys’ tower was slowly emptying into the common room. The Gryffindor boys were curious as to
what all the commotion was about. What they saw surprised them. A furious and bleeding Harry took
run after run up the stairs to the girls’ dorm. Each time he got about half way up, then the stairs
would change, and down he’d go. As he slid down he would wail for Hermione. His screams got more
desperate with each attempt.

On attempt number five, Dean turned to Neville as the two boys stood in their pajamas watching
Harry, and remarked, “I saw the Coyote do this once in a Road Runner cartoon, I’m telling you, if
Harry straps an Acme rocket to his back, I’m gonna *totally* lose it.” Neville looked at Dean
with zero comprehension, “*What*?” he replied looking completely bewildered. Dean waved him
away, “Never mind, Muggle cartoon, guess you wouldn’t understand.”

The entire population of the girls’ dormitory was now huddled around the top of their staircase
watching Harry’s attempts, all except one. Hermione was laying face down on her bed crying
uncontrollable. She had a pillow wrapped around her head to drown out the sound of her name filling
the tower with every attempt Harry made to get to her.

On his seventh try, as he was sliding backwards down the stairs; Harry wedged himself sideways
to stop from sliding any further. He then preceded, hands on one wall and feet on the other, to
slowly inch his way up. This captured the attention of all the guys gathered at the foot of the
stairs and they began cheering him on.

“*GO, GO, GO*, GO,” they chanted louder and louder as they pumped their fists in
encouragement. But, it was not to be, two feet from the top, the stone walls widened outward on
Harry, and down he went, again.

As he hit the bottom, Harry was *furious*, he had never been so angry. He raged at the
castle for denying him access to Hermione, and at Ginny for causing their pain. Everyone, girl and
boy alike, stood back and stared in dumbstruck silence as he got to his feet and stormed from the
room.



4. Frustration
--------------

Authors Note: I have finally finished chapter 4. This took longer to write than I would have
liked, but sometimes real life gets in the way. Thank you to everyone who reviewed chapter 3 for
me. The response was a pleasant surprise, and I certainly appreciate it. As always, a special
thanks goes out to my wife, she is my idea sounding board, and I value her opinion. Well here’s
chapter 4, I hope you enjoy it. Please let me know what you think.

Chapter 4

Hermione sat on the couch by the fireplace with Harry, listening to him *try* to tell her
something, but he wasn’t doing a very good job of it so far. She was being very patient. All she
really wanted to do was snog his brains out. She also wanted to show him her special underwear.
Actually, she was willing to let him find out about *them* on his own, she was also eager to
pick up where they left off earlier in the evening.

And then, he said it. “What happened between us,” and he stopped.

Her heart skipped a beat, her eyes got big, and she had trouble breathing as she brought a hand
up to her chest and rose from her seat.

“*Oh my God…..Oh my God*, he is going to say that what happened between us was all a big
mistake! He doesn’t think of me like *that*, he just had a momentary lapse in *judgment*,
and he’s *sorry!* Why else would he begin a sentence that way? *Oh God*….please, don’t
let this be happening,”

Harry quickly clarified what he had *meant to say,* and Hermione was able to breathe
again.

Hermione let him pull her back down onto the couch, but only because he was saying such
wonderful thing to her. Harry said that he didn’t regret what had happened at all, it made him very
happy. He told her she was amazing, and sexy, and wonderful, and she started to relax, *but*
he hadn’t finished yet.

He then told her that he feared that Ginny had *done* something.

Hermione greeted that statement with quizzical indifference. “Who cares about Ginny?”

Whatever she had done couldn’t possible compare to what Hermione *thought* Harry had been
trying to tell her.

She waited for him to finish.

He took a deep breath, held onto her hand and told her about Ginny and the potion, and
*everything* she had feared became reality.

Hermione thought the worst instantly. “He didn’t *love* her! It was just the *potion*.
It wasn’t *her* he wanted, he was just a horny, lust filled robot, and she happened to be
handy…….*and* she had *let him!*”

She didn’t even remember standing up, but she was on her feet, hugging herself tight. She looked
at him, and felt *utterly* humiliated. He, to his credit, looked upset as well, but he
couldn’t even *begin* to visit the place she was in now. Seventeen years of insecurities all
came crashing to the forefront. She was unattractive, and bossy. She was an outcast as far as the
other girls were concerned. Nobody could possibly desire a bushy haired, formerly buck toothed,
bookworm like her. Then the tears began. Her heart had broken. She had guarded her feeling for
Harry for so many years. She had locked them deep inside, and had come to grips with the fact that
they would always be ‘just friend’. She had accepted her role, and then, *today* happened, and
*everything* changed.

Harry had wanted her, he had *vigorously* pursued her. She had not given in because of her
insecurities, and then in the hallway….. She could control herself no longer, and she let her
feelings for him out, all at once, but it was a lie, from *his* side anyway.

She cried like she never had before, and he just *stood* there, saying *nothing!*
Hermione had to get away from him, so she fled up the stairs. She could hear him on the stairs
behind her, chasing her, but she never looked back, she just kept going. She flew through her
bedroom door, and dove onto her bed crying harder than ever.

Harry was screaming her name, over and over on the staircase. She had to block it out, she could
not think about Harry, or she would die of a broken heart. “*Stop, please stop*,” was all she
could think as she wrapped her pillow around her head to block out the sound of his voice.

All Harry could think about as he followed her up the stairs was that he needed to reassure her
that it was all *real*. Tell her a thousand times if he had to. But the fuckin stairs had
stopped him. He called out to her, pleadingly; he needed to explain, to help ease her pain. He had
*never* seen Hermione so hurt, and it was absolutely *killing* him. He had finally
realized, as he sat bloody and battered on the common room floor, how much he loved her and not
just as a friend. He hadn’t truly known what love was until he saw the hurt in her eyes and felt
the physical *pain* her being hurt had caused him. It was the most powerful feeling he had
ever felt. It had rocked him to his core. And now…now that he understood what it was that he felt
for her, he was more desperate than ever to get to Hermione, and tell her.

And the bloody castle would have none of it!

Mercifully, Harry had *finally* stopped yelling her name. Hermione lay on her bed still
sobbing uncontrollably, but her bad night had the potential to get much worse. All the girls who
had been standing around watching Harry lose his battle with the stairs flooded back into the dorm
and headed straight for her, to find out what had gone on between them.

*Incredibly*, Lavender shooed them all away. Maybe she sensed that she might have
contributed to the bizarre situation, and she may have felt a touch of guilt. Whatever the case,
she did not want anyone bothering Hermione at the moment, and she was adamant about it.

Hermione never even looked up as the crowd around her dispersed. She continued to cry as she lay
facedown on the bed with her arm tucked under her. Her wild hair provided ample cover to obscure
her face from prying eyes.

An eerie calm permeated the girl’s dormitory. Most of the Gryffindor ladies were *dying* to
speculate as to what might have happened between Harry and Hermione. They were curious to know what
could have caused the extreme behavior they had witnessed from Harry, and were seeing now from
Hermione. It was potentially **so** juicy, yet out of a *grudging* respect for Hermione,
most refrained, there were just slight whispers here and there.

After a while Hermione was finally able to bring her emotions under control. She continued to
lie in bed, but her tears, for the moment, had been spent. The unbearable weight of the emotions of
the day had worn her out, and she drifted off into an uneasy, restless sleep.

Harry exploded out of the common room leaving behind dozens of his fellow Gryffindors totally
stunned by what they had witnessed.

His anger toward Ginny grew with each and every step he took down the corridor. He wore no
glasses, as he had lost them when he fell the first time. His chin was bleeding, his elbows were
bloody, and the knees of his pants were torn out. Harry walked down the hallway clenching and
unclenching his hands into fists. As he powered down the hall the wallpaper on either side of him
was being sliced to shreds as if sharp claws were opening the walls up. Harry didn’t even
notice.

A though went through his head.

“**ACCIO GINNY**,” he roared with all the power he could muster as he reared back and then
fired forward with his wand out the window in front of him. The window exploded out, and the wand
began to pull hard in his hand. He was forced to grab it with both hands to keep it from pulling
away from him. He began pulling back on the wand with all his might.

Ginny Weasley stood in front of a mirror in a small wizard’s boutique in Paris twirling to
admire the gorgeous blue muggle dress she was trying on, when suddenly she was spun around and
lifted off her feet. She was being sucked through the air feet first towards a small vortex that
had opened in the ceiling at the front of the shop. She screamed, and then called out for her
mother.

“*MOM, Help me!* *What’s happening?”*

Molly Weasley bolted out of her seat so quickly that her chair was knocked backwards into the
clothing rack behind it. The sight of her youngest, and only daughter, being sucked toward a vortex
to ‘who knew where’ had spurred her to quick action and she leapt off the ground and grabbed both
of Ginny’s hands with hers. Her weight had been enough to momentarily slow Ginny’s ascent as
Molly’s feet once again made contact with the ground. She was immediately joined by Fleur who also
grabbed a hold of Ginny and began pulling her back down as well.

Harry nearly lost his grip as he was jerked forward about three feet toward the window by the
extreme force exerted against his wand. As his front foot made contact with the stones below the
window he braced himself with both feet. Harry then bent his knees and *pulled* back as hard
as he could, letting out a guttural roar as he did so. The muscles in his arm and legs quivered
from the strain as he fought with all his might to regain control of his wand.

Ginny, Fleur, and Molly were suddenly and unexpectedly pulled forward as Ginny headed for the
vortex once again, kicking and screaming. Molly screamed for the three salesgirls from the shop to
help them. The combined pull of the five women began to slowly bring Ginny back down. Molly took a
second and fumbled around in her pocket and drew her wand. She pointed at the vortex and muttered
something the five other women could not make out. Then, as if a knife had sliced through the
center of a game of tug-or-war, the connection was broken. The five women pulling Ginny were
propelled backwards into a rack of women’s blouses. They came to rest piled on top of each other,
and the cloths, all of them aching and disoriented.

The head salesgirl was the first one to find her voice as the other women moaned and groaned and
checked themselves for the bruises they knew where there, or at the very least were coming.

“So ladies, you are taking the blue dress, right?” she asked as she nodded her head for
emphasis. Her question was delivered in a tone that left Molly Weasley with little doubt that it
was not *actually* a question at all, but more a statement of fact. Molly, relieved that their
ordeal was over, grudgingly nodded in agreement.

Harry was pulling as hard as he possible could when suddenly the connection broke. He flew
backwards, his arms flailing in an attempt to help him regain his balance, but to no avail. He
crashed to the floor hard and his wand flew backward over his shoulder. It landed on the ground ten
feet behind him and eventually rolled to a stop. He laid there on the castle floor in stunned
silence staring at the stone ceiling above him for a long time, resigned to defeat. Eventually, he
sat up. He was aggravated and annoyed and he shook his head in disbelief.

“Why me?” he asked no one in particular as he stood up and brushed the dirt from the castle
floor off his hands. “*I don’t deserve to lose my best friend like this! It’s not*
*fair!*” he roared, as the happiest day of his live had been turned into his worst day
ever.

Harry could not face the prospect of spending the night in the dorms, not with all of the
questions that it would undoubtedly entail. He knew he couldn’t face that at the moment. Not now,
no way! He headed off down the corridor hoping that the room of requirement would appear so he
could bed down for the night. It did, and in he went. He dropped onto the bed fully clothed, still
bloody, but too damn worn out to do anything about it, and in minutes, he was asleep.

Neville Longbottom lay in his bed wide awake. He was very troubled by what he had witnessed in
the common room just a short while ago concerning Harry. Earlier in the evening he had come upon
Harry and Hermione in the hallway and there was *zero* doubt in his mind that they were
together, and in love. What he saw in the common room defied logic. How could things between them
have fallen apart *so fast*? Whether it was proper or not for him to peek around the corner at
them back in the hallway earlier, he had done it, and was blown away by what he had seen. Harry and
Hermione were all over one another. He’d seen them together, only like a thousand times in the last
six years, but not like that! It was impossible to tell where Harry ended and Hermione began. He
truly believed if they hadn’t known that he was standing ten feet away, they would have shagged,
right there, in the hallway, no question.

He took a deep breath as he lay in bed remembering.

“Whew!” he exhaled, as the vision of what his two friends had been doing began to fade from his
mind.

“So, what *happened*?” he wondered. “Must have been McGonagall, whatever she said to Harry
must have upset him. But then, why was he pleading with Hermione? Was *she* the one who was
upset?” Hermione hadn’t talked to McGonagall as far as he knew. “I don’t understand. This whole
thing makes no sense.” He shook his head, rolled over onto his side, and lay there wondering as he
tried to fall asleep.

Ron Weasley was in his bed, which was two down from Neville’s, wide awake as well. Harry’s bed
sat empty between them. Where his best friend was, Ron had no idea. Although, to Ron, it was
obvious that Hermione was the cause of whatever was upsetting Harry.

“What the hell did she do to him?” he wondered. Ron was extremely unnerved by that, *whatever
it was*, that had taken place in the common room. He was totally at a loss to explain it. He had
*never* seen Harry behave that way before, *ever*! He knew he should probably go look for
his friend, but he also knew that when Harry was angry like *that*, it was just best to leave
him alone until he calmed down.

“Hermione *better* tell me what the hell she did to him,” he growled, still more than a
little annoyed about her ‘inquisition’ crack from earlier in the night. Ron had somehow managed to
forget that it was *his* remark about her hair that had prompted her response. He was
convinced that Hermione had upset Harry, like she had upset him when she snapped at him, and he
wasn’t going to let her get away with it. He would confront her, first thing tomorrow, about what
she had done to upset Harry.

___________________________________________________________________

Minerva McGonagall sat behind her desk, slowly sipping a southing cup of tea. She had more or
less finished up her work for the day and was just relaxing before heading off to bed. The
Headmistress still felt a nagging uneasiness about her conversation with Harry. The boy was
obviously upset, which was no surprise, but he was also just as obviously hiding something from
her. Something had happened between Harry and Miss Granger, of that she had no doubt, and if that
*question* he had attempted to ask her was any indication, she wasn’t sure she wanted to know
what it was.

“Teenagers…..they are so clueless, I’m amazed they take so long to figure things out.” She’d
suspected for years that Harry and Miss Granger, would eventually end up together, but they
continued to muddle along, clueless as ever.

“But today was different,” she said to herself. “He was very upset. I thing it might be prudent
if I made some inquires.”

She looked across the room at the portrait of Albus Dumbledore that hung on the wall between two
former headmasters. His beautifully ornate frame was empty at the moment; he was not in his
painting.

“I wonder where he could be so late,” she wondered as she looked at the old grandfather clock to
her right and spied the time. “Albus, are you there?” McGonagall called as she got up from her
desk, tea cup still in hand, and heading across the room towards the empty frame. As she did so,
she watched for any signs of movement from within the painting.

Finally, the former Headmaster appeared, jutting his head back into view.

“I’m sorry Minerva, where you looking for me?” Dumbledore asked. “I was *unavoidable* drawn
into a deep philosophical discussion that was raging among my fellow portraits about the pros and
cons of earwax as a flavor of Bertie Botts Every Flavor Beans.” He smiled a playful smile, and
winked at her in his whimsical way.

When his lighthearted attempt at humor failed to elicit the response he was hoping for from his
successor, his tone changed, and he asked her with all seriousness.

“What is it that’s troubling you Minerva?”

McGonagall pondered his question for a moment as she set down her tea cup. She was slightly
apprehensive about bringing up a student’s private affairs with Dumbledore. But, considering the
student was Harry Potter, she thought it might be best to seek his advice.

“Albus, I had a somewhat disturbing conversation with Mister Potter early this evening, and I’m
hoping that maybe you could offer a fresh perspective on the situation.”

She then relayed to the former headmaster all that had transpired in her office concerning
Harry.

Dumbledore listened, nodded in understanding when it was appropriate to do so, and let her tell
the whole tale before he spoke.

“Minerva, Harry is no longer the young boy he was when he came to us. He has grown into a fine
young man. But, if as you suspect, something may have taken place between he and Miss Granger that
could have been potion induced, then it is our duty to investigate the matter. We both know that
such an occurrence could have a great affect on the well being of two of our most gifted
students.”

McGonagall nodded in agreement. “What do you suggest, Albus?”

The wily old Headmaster thought for a moment. “I shall make some discreet inquiries among my
fellow portraits as to whether or not any of them has seen anything out of the ordinary in regard
to Mister Potter or Miss Granger today. The castle and the ground are large, but with a little
luck, someone may have seen something that could shed some light on the situation.”

Both Dumbledore and McGonagall agreed that it was a bit too late to be rousing some of the
painting occupants. So it was decided that Dumbledore would begin to make inquires first thing in
the morning.

“Thank you Dumbledore, I truly appreciate your help in this matter,” the Headmistress relayed to
her former headmaster with a nod of appreciation.

“Minerva, as you know, I will always assist you in any way that I can.” And with that he bowed
his head and disappeared from the painting.

______________________________________________________________________

Bright and early the next morning, before the students were up and about, McGonagall was back at
her desk preparing for the day ahead. Despite the fact that it was a Saturday, school business
still needed to be addressed. The Hogwarts Headmistress could very often be found at her desk
before sun up, and this day was no exception. As she was rustling through the papers on her desk
she was startled when a gentle cough from the row of portraits broke the predawn silence.

“Forgive me Minerva, I didn’t mean to startle you,” Dumbledore apologized.

“That is quite alright, Albus.” She replied as she raised and hand to her chest to try to coax
her heartbeat back to normal. “Are you preparing to make inquires so early?” she asked the gray
haired old wizard.

“Actually, that will not be necessary as I have already acquired all the information that is
needed.”

McGonagall looked at the former headmaster with a slightly startled expression. She had not
expected such an answer.

“Tell me Albus, is it as bad as I have feared?” she whispered to him in a low tone. “Your
expression is not hopeful.”

“While some of the portraits were more reserved in what they were willing to divulge, others
were far more forthcoming about what they had seen,” he answered.

“What I can tell you Minerva is this. That yes, there was indeed an ‘encounter’ between Harry
and Miss Granger, which was *most definitely* romantic in nature. But, as I’m sure you will
understand, it would be *the height of impropriety* for me to elaborate on the specific
details of their encounter. Unfortunately for me, said details were relayed to *me* most
graphically, but also of course, in the strictest of confidence. I will add though, that while
their *liaison* may have indeed been instigated by Mister Potter, it would seem that our Miss
Granger was, shall we say, at the very least a most active participant. And.” A sly smile reached
the old Headmasters lips before he finished. “It would appear that she was in fact, at times, the
aggressor.”

McGonagall’s face instantly registered the incredible shock she felt at the last of Dumbledore’s
words.

“Oh my,” was all she could manage as she stared at Dumbledore’s smirking face. “Our Miss
Granger? Good heavens, I never would have guessed it.” She shook her head and brought a hand up to
her cheek

“Oh my indeed,” she remarked again.

Dumbledore wasn’t sure, but it seemed to him that the slightest hint of a blush appeared on the
aged Headmistresses face just before she chuckled softly to herself and smiled.

When she had recovered from Dumbledore’s somewhat surprising news, her expression turned more
serious once again as she posed the following question to her predecessor.

“So Albus, what do you suggest we do now?”

“Minerva, while I defer to your judgment, of course,” he said as he nodded to her. “I believe
that this may ultimately be a situation that would be best left to the parties involved to sort
out. However, a friendly word of advice, gently offered, could be helpful if needed. Now, Miss
Weasely, on the other hand,” Dumbledore grumbled as his demeanor changed completely. “It is my
opinion that she should be sternly spoken to upon her return to the castle. Her offence is quite
serious, and her fate in regards to this matter will need to be decided.”



5. Confrontation
----------------

Authors’ note: To all the helpful souls who made me aware of the fact that I had indeed spelled
Seamus wrong **repeatedly**, this fix is for you. I’ll be more careful next time, I can
guarantee you that!

Chapter 5

Hermione was lying in her bed wide awake as the early morning sun began to rise above the
horizon and push its way through the castles windows. She had been awake now for over an hour
crying softly and thinking about all that had happened to her in the past twenty four hours. As
devastating as the events of last night were to her, she could think of nothing else. Her pain was
tremendous, but it was also strengthening her resolve.

“I *won’t* let this destroy me, no way! I’m stronger then that,” she whispered fiercely to
herself as she wiped away what she vowed would be the last tears she would shed about
yesterday.

An annoyed look crossed her face as she fidgeted in her bed trying to find a comfortable spot.
She wasn’t having much luck. She had been lying awake in the bed for too long. Her beautiful
lingerie set, which was sexy and provocative last night, was now just a nuisance as she tried to
get comfortable.

“Damn underwear, I need to get these off,” she hissed. While the underwear was really *not*
the reason for her discomfort, the lingerie was definitely a reminder of what almost was, and she
now found them completely distasteful. She rolled over and looked around the room. Not a soul was
stirring. “Good,” she thought. Hermione quietly slipped out of bed, and forgoing her slippers,
headed straight for her dresser. With a fresh set of clothes now in hand, she ran as quietly as she
could across the cold stone floor to the bathroom. Once inside, she locked the door and leaned with
her back against it for a few moments, all the while hugging her clothes tight.

Hermione nodded to herself. She had made up her mind. She now knew how she would handle her
‘Harry’ situation. She pushed herself away from the bathroom door and set about her business. “What
happened between us was private,” she mumbled under her breath as she padded around the bathroom.
“Its nobodies business but ours,” she told herself. “God, I *really* hope nobody else finds
out about this. But either way, Harry and I will need to calmly sit down and discuss what happened
between us,” she rationalized before continuing. “Okay, I *know*, it’s going to be
*extremely* difficult, but we need to do this, and as soon as possible. We can’t let this
linger. We’ll need to *deal* with what happened,”

She put her toothbrush down on the counter and slowly leaned in towards the mirror. She locked
eyes with the girl that stood before her. “You can do this,” she tried to convince the bushy haired
girl reflecting back at her. Her eyes welled up slightly as she momentarily thought of the damage
Ginny’s stupidity had caused. “No,” she hissed angrily as she slammed the cup of water in her hand
down on the counter more forcefully that she had intended. Through sheer force of will she *did
not* let her tears fall, as she had vowed she wouldn’t. The young witch took a deep breath and
composed herself once again. “You can do this!” she repeated as she continued to stare at her
reflection.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Molly Weasley stood with her hands on her hips glaring at Ginny. “*What did you do*?” she
demanded to know from her only daughter.

“Me? Nothing Mom, I swear. I have no idea what that was about,” Ginny assured her mother
gesturing in the direction of the vortex.

Fluer, who was standing nearby, watched intently as mother and daughter argued back and
forth.

“*Ginny*, someone doesn’t just ‘*accio*’ you without a reason. Whoever it was
certainly thinks you did something. ‘Accio’ is an excessive way to try to get in touch with someone
young lady. So it doesn’t sound like *nothing* to me.”

Molly waited for an explanation.

Ginny said nothing; she just stood staring at her mother.

“That’s it.” She dismissed Ginny with a wave and headed for the door. “I’m going to contact your
father. He’ll know if someone was looking for you, then we’ll get to the bottom of this.”

“Mom honestly, I haven’t done *anything,* to *anyone*. It *has* to be some kind
of mistake.”

In the very back of Ginny’s mind her conversation with Lavander and Pavarti flickered by for a
brief second. She quickly dismissed it as a possibility, and followed her mother across the store
pleading her innocence.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Hermione, dressed in jeans and a simple pullover with her hair pulled back into a very bushy
ponytail sat all alone in a fairly remote corner of the great hall. She was pushing the sausage and
eggs on her plate around with little enthusiasm. She was not actually eating anything, she wasn’t
very hungry. She had decided to sit off by herself rather than sit at her usual table this morning.
Even though she was sure that the dozen or so students who were at breakfast that early, were
constantly glancing her way and whispering. At least she was far enough away as to not actually be
able to hear what they were saying to each other. Sitting at the Gryffindor table, after last
night, would have been too much to bear, even as empty as it was. She was planning to pretty much
steer clear of just about everyone today. Maybe she’d spend her time in the library. On a beautiful
Saturday like this, the library was not the *in* place to be, she could expect to be left
alone for the most part, she hoped.

Suddenly, there was a loud crash at her table that startled Hermione so much that the fork she
was using flew right out of her hand.

Ron Weasley stood before her with both of his hands tightly gripping the corner of her table as
he leaned over her menacingly. She looked up and seeing who the insensitive clod was, she snapped
at him.

“What the *hell* is wrong with you? You scared me half to death.” She then glowered at him
before she leaned back on the bench she was sitting on and looked from side to side for the fork
she had lost. She hadn’t really paid any attention to him once she saw who it was. If she had, she
would have seen the angry flush rising above Ron’s ridiculous orange sweater with the big giant ‘R’
on it.

“You’re mad at *me*?” he bellowed. “What right do you have to be mad at *me*? *What
the hell did you do to Harry yesterday*? I saw how upset he was, and I’m sure *YOU* had
something to do with it.”

Hermione froze where she was, halfway back up to a sitting position. Her mouth dropped open it
shock. She could not believe what her ears had just heard. Ron was accusing *her* of upsetting
Harry. That accusation, coming from a *Weasley*, pushed her over the edge. Hermione clenched
her hands into fists, her right hand still holding the fork she had retrieved from the floor beside
her. She then slowly rose up off the bench, shaking with anger.

“*What*? *What did you just say to me*?” Hermione nearly shrieked as she poked him
hard in the chest with the fork.

The fifteen or twenty students who were eating their breakfast began watching carefully.

This was getting interesting!

The hall got *very* quiet. All the student chatter instantly stopped. They all wanted to be
sure they would be able to hear every word that Ron and Hermione were saying. They were, and they
were not disappointed.

“*Hey*, watch it,” Ron cried as he brought a hand up to his chest and began rubbing the
spot where she had poked him while he backed away from her.

Hermione had no intention of letting Ron get away. She followed him, still brandishing the fork
and boiling with rage as she advanced.

“*My fault, y*ou’re accusing *ME* of upsetting Harry! *You are the most mindless,
clueless, unknowing, insensitive git I have ever met!*” she shouted. And each adjective she
shouted was punctuated with a poke of the fork for emphasis, each poke harder than the one before
it.

Ron was confused. He was the one who was supposed to be angry! The insane Hermione advancing on
him was actually hurting him with that damn fork. He tried to still show his anger by accusing her
again, but most of the fight had gone out of him, all he really wanted to do was run.

Ron’s attempt at a comeback came out as a very lame, “Whatever you did, you better not do it
again,” as he continued to back peddle while pointing a finger at her.

But she was still following him and screaming at him. *“You have no idea what you’re talking
about. Why don’t you go ask your SISTER! She caused all THIS! So help me Ronald Weasley, if you
don’t get away from me this instant, today will be the saddest day of your life!”*

Ron rebounded and returned fire. “Don’t give me that, Ginny’s not even here, so don’t go blaming
this on her, Hermione!”

That was it, Hermione shrieked as tears of anger ran down her face, and she ran at him.

“Oh crap!” he muttered as she closed the distance between them. He turned to run but he collided
with the corner of one of the tables. Luckily for him, it spun him in the direction he needed to
go, which was away from the advancing Hermione. As he reached the Great Hall door, she flung the
fork at him as hard as she could. The fork imbedded in the huge oak door, right where Ron had been
just seconds before, as the door slammed shut behind him. Emotionally distraught, Hermione fell to
her knees, brought her hand up to cover her face, and cried.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Harry woke with a start. He was momentarily disoriented at finding himself not in his own room.
He threw his legs off the bed and sat up. His heart was racing, about what he couldn’t quite
remember. There was just a vague remnant of a dream finishing its escape from his consciousness. He
covered his face with his hands, and then raked them up through his hair as he tried to chase the
last vestiges of sleep away. He stood up too quickly, and his whole body creaked. He winced. His
elbows and knees were sore and his chin was throbbing. He said Hermione’s name out loud as he
crossed the room and headed for the sink. He needed to speak to her, and soon. He needed to tell
her everything he didn’t get to tell her last night.

Harry stopped dead. “Wait! I need to think this through.” He circled back towards the bed. “I
can’t just go rushing up to her, and blurting out a million things. That’s not gonna work. I need
to think about this a little bit. Okay, what am I gonna say? I have *no freakin clue*. What if
Hermione won’t listen to me? What do I do then? Why would she even *think* that everything
that happened between us was just the potion?”

He stood still and thought for a moment, and then shook his head in disgust.

“I can’t believe I’m such an idiot. There she was,” and he gestured with his hands at the ground
in front of him as if she was actually standing there. “The whole time, and I didn’t even notice.
Well at least I’ve noticed *now,* and I’m *not* going back to being just friends. I
can’t, I want more.” With his mind made up he headed off to find Hermione, forgetting that he had
intended to clean himself up a bit by at least washing away the dried blood.

The first place Harry headed was back to the common room to look for her. He was in no mood to
answer a shitload of dumb questions from his house mates about yesterday, so they better not ask.
He reached the Fat Lady, and instead of going in, he asked her if Hermione had come out.

“Yes she did, about a half an hour ago.” Before he had a chance to get away she remarked. “My
goodness you are a mess. What on earth happened to you?”

Harry just grumbled at her and ignored the question before asking if she could point him in the
direction Hermione had gone. The Fat Lady waited for a moment for a reply to *her* question,
but realizing that one was not forthcoming, her unenthusiastically gestured in the general
direction of the great hall. He never even said thank you as he ran off in the direction that she
had pointed.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Ron mumbled to himself as he walked through the hallways back to the common room.

He grabbed the neck of his sweater and pulled it out so he could see the damage Hermione had
done with her damn fork. “She’s a total loon! I can’t believe she stabbed me. She upsets Harry,
blames it on *my* sister, and then attacks me. She must have a damn chemical imbalance. I
can’t believe I actually liked her!”

Ron was so busy grumbling as he rounded the corner that he never saw Harry until it was too
late. Harry had been running with his head down and he caught Ron right on the left cheekbone with
the top of his head. Harry brought his hands up and held his head as he bent over in pain and
circled away. Ron fell backwards into the wall. He saw stars, an entire galaxy of stars actually,
full of pretty colors. He slowly slid down the wall until he came to rest in a sitting
position.

“You okay?” Harry asked when the pain had subsided enough that he could open his eyes.

“Bloody hell Harry that *really* hurt,” bemoaned Ron as the stars started to fade from his
field of vision. “What the hell is your hurry? Hey wait, what was all that crap about in the common
room last night?”

Harry whole body tensed up, and he gritted his teeth. This was not something he felt like
sharing, *especially* with a Weasley. Although this mess was not Ron’s fault, it was difficult
for Harry to keep from feeling that there was some guilt by association, fair or not. He was not
angry with *Ron*; he was more distrustful of another Weasley, but he had no intention of going
over the whole ‘yesterday thing’ with him anyway.

Seamus Finnegan appeared, seemingly from out of nowhere. “Bloody hell guys that was a wicked
collision. You both okay?” he said as he placed a hand on Ron shoulder, and then looked towards
Harry. “Where were you guys heading in such a hurry?”

“Down to the great hall,” Harry replied as he winced after touching the now growing lump on his
head.

Ron struggled to his feet and his eyes lit up. “Trust me Harry, you do *NOT* want to go
down there, crazy witch tried to kill me. Look,” he said, as he lifted up his shirt revealing a
great number of red spots on his chest. Do you have any idea what these are?” Ron said as he
pointed to his chest. Both Harry and Seamus looked at Ron, then at each other before Harry guessed,
“Uhh, freckles?”

“Freckles?” Ron screeched at the pair. “The hell you say. They are NOT freckles. That crazy
bitch Hermione stabbed me like ten times with a fork.”

At the mention of Hermione’s name, and crazy bitch in the same sentence, Harry’s green eyes went
black, and he lunged at Ron with his hands outstretched intending to choke the life out of his soon
to be *former* best friend. Luckily for Ron, Seamus was close enough to blunt some of the
force of Harry’s charge by getting his body partially between them. The three boys swayed back and
forth in what would have appeared to be a very bizarre dance to anyone happening upon the scene.
Seamus tried to stay between Harry and Ron. Ron tried to get Harry’s hands off his neck, and Harry
did his best to strangle Ron for what he had called Hermione.

Seamus shouted at Harry. “Harry let go, *have you lost your mind,* it’s Ron. Let him go
Harry, will you let him *go* for Merlin’s sake, *let him go*!” All the while Harry
demanded of Ron, “Don’t you EVER call her that again, EVER. You hear me? EVER!” Ron was only able
to manage a few strained gurgling sounds due to Harry’s hands being securely wrapped around his
neck.

When Ron was *finally* able to get Harry’s hands lose. Seamus pushed them apart, and held
on to Harry as Ron collapsed backwards against the hallway wall.

“What is wrong with you?” Ron whimpered as he slid to the ground a few feet from the still angry
Harry. “I stuck up for *you*. I told her I was pissed that she upset *you*, and then she
tried to kill me. Then I warn *you* to stay away from *her* because she’s loony, and you
try to kill me. *What the hell is going on around here? Has everybody gone insane?*

Ron struggled to his feet. “You know what, the hell with you Harry, and the hell with Hermione
too, I’m done with the both of you.” And with that said he trotted off down the corridor, looking
back occasionally to make sure Harry wasn’t following him.

As Ron turned a corner and disappeared from sight Seamus let go of Harry and took two steps away
from him. “Harry, have you gone mad?” he asked in a low tone. “That was RON you were strangling,
you know, your best mate. Why the bloody hell would you do that?”

Harry was now pacing around in a circle in the corridor. He looked at Seamus “You heard him!” he
growled as he pointed vaguely in the direction that Ron had gone. “Didn’t you? You heard what he
called Hermione! What was I supposed to do, just let that GO?”

Seamus slowly backed away. “But Harry, he’s your *best mate*; you don’t do that to your
best mate.”

“And friends don’t say that about other friend either.” Harry retorted as his pacing slowed
down. He seemed to be calming down a bit, and he stopped and leaned against the wall.

“Okay …..Fine.” Harry threw his hands up into the air in disgust. “So maybe he caught me at a
bad moment, but still, friend or not, I’m not gonna just stand there and let someone say that about
Hermione, that’s never gonna happen.” Harry’s angry eyes challenged Seamus to say something
more.

Seamus just stood and stared at the determined look on Harry’s face, he said nothing.

With seemingly nothing left to say Harry tore off down the hallway towards the great hall to
find Hermione as a still shocked Seamus stood and watched him go.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Ron could not *believe* the day he was having. He would have bet *anyone* a million
galleons that what just happened to him, could not have happened. Hermione, the girl of his dreams,
had stabbed him repeatedly with a fork. And not ten minutes later, Harry, his best friend, had
choked him. Something was **really** wrong. His two best friends, “former best friends,” he
muttered angrily to himself, were absolutely bonkers. There was no other explanation, they had both
gone mental. “But why?” he wondered as he rubbed his neck and then slowly lowered his hand to his
still sore chest.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Harry had slowed his pace some as he was now out of Seamus’ sight, but he was still in a hurry
to find Hermione. He turned the last corner leading to the great hall and he bumped right into the
person he was looking for.

Hermione was looking back over her shoulder at the doors of the great hall to see if anyone had
come out behind her. No one had, but she was sure that the show she and Ron had put on would reach
full blown tall tale status by lunch. She lowered her head in despair, and that’s when she collided
with someone. She looked up startled. Then she saw *who* she had bumped into and her eyes grew
to the size of saucers and her breath hitched in her throat. Harry stood before her. He had no
glasses on, which made his amazing green eyes stand out *even* more. His chin was caked with
dried blood. His shirt, which for a fleeting second she recognized as the one she had torn open
last night, was badly stained, no doubt from his dripping chin. His hair, which was always a mess,
was far worse than normal. Despite it all, she couldn’t help thinking that he was the sexiest man
she had ever seen and she blushed slightly for thinking it. Then she turned to run but he was too
fast, a seekers reflexes in action, he grabbed her left arm as she turned to go. She froze, closed
her eyes, took a deep breath, then opened her eyes and turned to face him.

“We need to talk,” Harry began. She nodded her head.

“I know,” she replied almost breathlessly as her eyes glazed over. He thought she might cry, but
then she seemed to pull herself together. He drank her in, stared into her beautiful brown eyes,
red rimmed and puffy, but none the less, beautiful, warm, inviting. “God, look at her,” he thought.
He stared, hypnotized by her. Hermione was caught as well. She did not want him staring at her like
that. I did things to her that, at the moment, she was trying hard not to think about. He was still
holding her wrist. She broke his gaze, and looked down at her feet as she began to speak.

“Harry, I think *tha*….” There was movement in front of her. As she raised her eyes to see
what it was, Harry’s lips crashed hard into hers.

Stunned….again! That was twice in the last twelve hours.

They back peddled slowly until they hit the cold stone wall. Harry’s tongue was once again in
her mouth. The sweet caress of his tongue dancing with hers was beyond erotic. All rational thought
was instantly gone. She was completely at his mercy. Harry released his grip on her wrist and slid
his hand down to hers and interlaced their fingers. He wrapped his other arm around her waist and
drew her close. Her free hand rested softly on his chest. He was aroused, full of desire. It was
coming off him in waves that crashed over her, burying her beneath them, she was drowning in
him.

Somehow, incredibly, a tiny spark of reason flared up. Her mind, inexplicably, found the
strength to work again. She fought every impulse she had, that screamed at her to let go, be his,
which was what she wanted so badly. But, she opened her eyes. She hadn’t even realized that they
had been closed from the second he had started kissing her. She then began to push him away. He was
backing up. His neck was now stretching to keep his lips on hers, but she was gaining ground. And
then her lips were free. She took a deep breath. Pushing Harry away took more courage that she had
thought she possessed. It was probably the hardest thing she had ever done because he was what she
wanted more than *anything*, but not from a potion, not like that.

Harry looked up, startled. Then he stared at her. His green eyes were mesmerizing. He licked his
lips slightly as he held her gaze.

She shivered.

“He shouldn’t do that. It’s *way* to hard to resist him when he smolders like that,” she
thought. He leaned in again, but she turned her head as he did. He ended up kissing just the corner
of her mouth. He had missed her lips by just enough that she could still focus.

“No Harry, not like this, not from a potion.”

Those words, said out loud, got his attention.

“No Hermione, never, it was *never* a potion, I believe that. I can feel it.” He was still
very close. Her hair gently brushed his face as he leaned into her shoulder and inhaled her smell.
He closed his eyes as the sweetness of her scent overpowered him. He gently nuzzled her neck with
his nose and his warm breath sent shivers up her spine as he whispered gently to her, “Never!
Never, Hermione, it wasn’t a *potion*, it was just *you*.

She felt herself falling again, he was *incredibly* hard to resist. But she did it. She
slid to her right, and he nearly fell into the wall head first as his head lost contact with her
shoulder and neck. He was surprised by her movement, but now, now she was two feet away and
retreating. He had been so intoxicated by her that his mind had drifted a bit and now she was
getting away from him when he *needed* her to stay. He needed to convince her that his
feelings were all real.

She stopped her retreat, and then she hit him right between the eyes with the one argument he
couldn’t win.

“I’m sorry Harry, but not once,” she began as she held up one finger for emphasis. “*Not once
in six years* did you ever show me even a *hint* that you were attracted to me. Not one
time, and I looked for it Harry. I hoped and I looked, but it wasn’t there. No, it had to be the
potion. All those years, and nothing, until *yesterday.* There’s no way Harry, you can’t
explain that away.” Tears started to trickle down her cheeks. He didn’t know what to say. She was
backing away faster and faster now, holding up one finger and repeating, “Not one time,” as she
shook her head

“Wait,” Harry held up his hands up in a stop sign trying to coax her to remain where she was.
“Just wait Hermione. If that’s true, and it was all just a potion, then why do I still feel it then
huh, explain that!” He was trying to appeal to her sense of reason. “It was *yesterday* at
lunch Hermione, and I still can’t think of anything but YOU!” he said, pointing at her. “No God
damn potion lasts that long and you know it!” His anger got the best of him for a second as he
realized that his argument was not getting through.

She had never stopped backing away, or shaking her head no. “I’m sorry Harry, I….I don’t believe
you.” He watched as she continued to shake her tear streaked face from side to side. She finally
brought her hands up to her face and ran down the hallway.



6. Complications
----------------

Authors Note: *Hey everyone, I’m back! I realize that this chapter took me* **forever**
to *write but it’s finally done! I’ve only written one other story, so I’d never hit any kind of
writers block before, but I sure as hell hit one on this chapter. I had a thousand words of this
written in like, early November, and then nothing, not one stinking word for months. So, because of
that, I need to send out a very special thank you to my wife for her help. She gave me some really
good suggestions a week or so ago, and they actually got me writing again. I hope you all like this
chapter, and please will let me know what you think when you’re done. Also, S-E-A-M-U-S*…....
*it’s burned into my subconscious! lol*

Chapter 6

Hermione made her way back to her room and sat on her bed for a moment to think. She went over
and over in her mind what Harry had said to her in the hallway, after he kissed her, AGAIN! She
wanted desperately to believe him, but logic made her skeptical.

“Okay, let’s look at this rationally. **Either** Harry, my best friend of six years, now
fancies me as he said, to the point where…” She paused as images filled her head. “Oh my God, I
can’t believe that we almost shagged in the hallway.” She covered her mouth as the shock of what
had almost happened between them yesterday really hit her. She shook her head to dispel the memory,
but once it was gone she exhaled very deeply to.....settle herself. Okay, now that she was back in
the real world, the one where she and Harry weren’t about to shag each other senseless, she could
think straight.

“**Or**…. he’s under a very powerful love potion. So… how do I prove which it is?” Hermione
pondered. “Well….I guess I’m going to have to do a little research to find out for sure. I should
have thought of this sooner!” She mentally kicked herself for not thinking more clearly over the
last twelve hours.

She grabbed a quill and some parchment off her desk and bounded out of her room, and headed for
the library. Hermione felt lighter and more at ease than she had felt at any moment since last
night. She had a purpose. There was problem to solve and she was going to find the answer. That’s
what she was good at, very good at. As Hermione walked to the library she couldn’t help but think
that for the first time in her life she truly wanted to be *wrong*. She smiled with hope that
she might be, and quickened her pace. Just the prospect that Harry could actually want her *for
real* as badly as he had wanted her yesterday made her body tingle with excitement. “Wait, don’t
think about that right now,” she told herself. “It’s way too distracting!” A small shutter shook
her anyway.

__________________________________________________________

As the day progressed the buzz around the school reached a fever pitch. All anyone could talk
about were Harry and Hermione. The day began with a retelling of the events that took place in the
common room the night before for anyone who hadn’t witnessed them. This was quickly overshadowed by
Hermione and Ron’s blowup at breakfast. But by lunch Harry’s attack on Ron had trumped even the
breakfast gossip. At the Gryffindor table Seamus had just finished relaying to his fellow
classmates, Neville, Dean, Lavender and Parvati, how he had singlehandedly saved Ron’s life. They
looked at him skeptically about the saving Ron’s life part, but seemed to believe the bulk of what
he had told them. It was all just too weird.

Dean had been the only one at the table who had witnessed Hermione’s battle with Ron as he sat
eating his breakfast that morning.

“No really, she said that,” Dean relayed to Lavender, almost pleading to be believed. “I
swear.”

“You’re telling me, that Hermione said that Ron should go ask his *sister.* That
*Ginny* was the one who had caused all this craziness?” Dean just looked at her and nodded his
head. Lavenders mind was turning. She looked over at Parvati who had a somewhat guilty look on her
face. They were both thinking the exact same thing. Lavender leaned towards Parvati and said to her
in a low voice, “Do you think?” Parvati shrugged her shoulders and replied, “I don’t
know….maybe?”

Seamus and Dean both said “What? Tell us!” Lavender looked back at Parvati once more but she saw
that she wasn’t going to get any help from her; all she got was another shrug of the shoulders.

Lavender scanned the room to see if anyone could overhear what she was about to say. This caused
the other four students at the table to also look around. They peered in all directions, and once
they were all satisfied that the coast was clear, they leaned in as Lavender began her tale.

“Okay, so yesterday, in like all our afternoon classes. Right?” she nodded towards Parvati who
enthusiastically agreed. “Harry was *majorly* hitting on Hermione. He was practically
*drooling* on his desk every time she moved. But no one seemed to notice,” she said with some
indignation. “Just me, Parvati, and uhh, obviously Hermione, but she seemed pretty flustered by the
whole thing. It was really weird. It started in Defense class and got *worse* all afternoon. I
*actually* saw him nibble on her ear in Transfiguration. You should have seen the look on her
face…”

“What! No way….Harry bit Hermione’s *ear*….*in class*?” Dean interrupted. “No, I don’t
think so!”

“Listen you git, I was *there*, I *saw* him do it, and so did she,” the blond girl
replied angrily as she gestured towards Parvati. “I swear to God, Hermione looked like she was
gonna have a stroke or something. There was *no way* she saw that coming.”

During Lavenders story Neville sat on the edge of the conversation. He didn’t add anything, or
seem overly surprised by what he was hearing. None of the other students really noticed. Parvati
did look over at him once while Lavender spoke but she assumed the slight frown on his face was due
to embarrassment and nothing more.

Lavender put her hands up for emphasis, “Okay, so here’s the rest. When we left our last class
of the day, Parvati and I happened to run into Ginny.” Both Dean and Seamus began to look at her
with a weary eye. She noticed the looks on their faces and responded with a quizzical, “What…we
did? It wasn’t like we were *waiting for her* or anything.”

Parvati, at that moment seemed to find everything in the room more interesting to look at than
the group she was sitting with. They all noticed.

“Well….do you want to hear this or not!” Lavender asked the boys who were looking at her through
narrow, suspicious eyes.

Both Dean and Seamus squeaked out slightly frustrated, “Yes’s”

“Good, well all Parvati and I did was, well we just *mentioned* to Ginny that Harry, most
of the afternoon seemed somewhat *interested* in Hermione is all.”

Both boys pulled their heads out of the tight circle they had been leaning into and once again
cast a very skeptical eye at Lavender.

“Fine…if you don’t want to hear, I’ll stop.” She turned away from them and looked up toward the
ceiling and then around the room as though she was admiring the rooms’ architecture.

Seamus, in a somewhat defeated tone spoke up. “No, go ahead, we want to hear.”

A bubbly Lavender quickly turned back to them and leaned in to get even closer than before.

“Okay, so here’s where it gets good. Ginny said, that she knew Harry was drooling over Hermione
because she had given him a love potion”

“Bullshit!” Dean snapped at Lavender, startling the whole group. “Hermione wouldn’t do that to
Harry!”

“Will you *please* pay attention? Hermione didn’t give Harry the love potion you idiot,
*Ginny* did!”

Seamus spoke up. “I’m confused….If Ginny gave the potion to Harry, then why was he so into
Hermione?”

Lavender rolled her eyes as if she was dealing with complete morons. Be*cause*……Hermione
was the first person he saw, duhh!”

Dean and Seamus furrowed their brows as they tried to wrap their brains around what they had
just been told. Very slowly the light of recognition went on and they nodded their heads as it all
started to make sense. Or so it seemed, until Dean’s face grew perplexed once again.

“So how does this all figure in to what’s going on with them. It only makes sense if they were
together. Something did happen between them in the common room after dinner while I was playing
chess with Ron. They were talking, it didn’t make much sense, the part I heard anyway, but then
again, I wasn’t really paying attention. Harry did go up stairs and then like, less than a minute
later, he came back down and left through the portrait.”

“Was Hermione there when he left?” Parvati asked.

“I don’t think so, but like I said, I wasn’t really paying attention,” Dean answered.

“Did anyone see them anywhere it the castle together?” Seamus asked the group.

Dean, Lavender, Parvati, and Seamus all shook their heads, but Neville slid slowly down the
bench away from them. They all turned and looked at him, then at the empty space between him and
them, and then back at him.

“Neville,” Lavender said in a honey sweet voice. “Do *you* know something?”

“Umm, ahh, no, not really,” he stammered.

“Neville,” she said more ominously this time. “You *do* know something don’t you?”

“Uhh, no, not much, I mean, no I don’t.”

“***Yes you do*!** Spill it Neville,” Lavender ordered.

“Well….it’s nothing really.” Neville replied.

“Well if it’s nothing, then you can tell us, right?”

Neville looked from face to face as they all stared at him.

He let out an exasperated breath and dropped his head.

“Okay, I did see them together in the hallway last night after dinner,” he informed them.

“And,” Parvati coaxed. “What were they doing?”

Neville replied, “Nothing, just standing.”

Lavender chimed in, “Standing? How? Where? Just standing? No, you’re not telling it all, come
on, give.”

“They were *just standing, alright!* They weren’t *doing* anything. McGonagall sent me
to find Harry and I found them together. I told Harry that McGonagall wanted to see him. Then he
and I left, and Hermione said she was going back to the common room. And that’s all.” Neville
blurted out. He then refused to say another word as he folded his arms across his chest.

“McGonagall huh?” Lavender asked. “I…I mean *we*,” she began as she pointed at herself and
then Parvati. “We told McGonagall about Ginny and the potion,” Lavender admitted as both she and
Parvati lowered their eyes in shame.

Neville was still sitting at the table with them, but he was lost in his own little world. There
was no way he would, or even *could* have described the heated way that Harry and Hermione
were looking at each other when he had found them. Yeah, they were just standing, but that was by
no means *all* they were doing. He had also neglected to mention what he had seen them do
*to* each other when he had left them alone for a moment so they could ‘talk’.

At present, he was more than a bit annoyed about being interrogated by Lavender, and he grumbled
under his breath. “No way….. I admitted to having seen them, but I definitely wasn’t gonna say
anything about all the buttons!”

Then Neville froze as if he were petrified, which he was, but with fear. He had mumbled that
last part a *great deal* louder than he had intended. He looked up and saw Dean, Seamus,
Parvati, and Lavender, and all four of them were now staring at *him*.

“*What buttons*?” Lavender growled at Neville as she slowly rose to her feet.

Neville rose also. “I didn’t say anything!”

Parvati spoke up. “Yes you did! I heard you, we *all* heard you say something about
buttons.”

“*No I didn’t*,” a very worried looking Neville spat back.

Lavender pointed an accusing finger at him. “I *knew* you knew more than you were saying
Neville, now spill it! What about buttons? All the buttons on what Neville, someone’s shirt?”

Now, both Dean and Seamus were paying attention! The prospect that shirts may have been
unbuttoned made this thing a *whole lot* more interesting, especially if one of the shirts was
Hermione’s. They smiled at each other because they knew they where both thinking the same
thing.

Neville on the other hand, slowly started backing away from the table as he watched Lavender
closely, and then, he *bolted* for the door.

A surprised Lavender glanced at Parvati; they smiled at each other, and then they both took off
after him.

Dean and Seamus watched as the girls ran off after Neville. Both were disappointed that they
wouldn’t be getting to the bottom of this button thing. It was too bad, but they shrugged it off,
and then they began to look over what was left on the lunch platters for something else to eat.

Hermione was proud of herself. She had found a good strong love potion very quickly as she
searched through the rows of books on such spells in the library. The ingredients for the spell she
liked had been easier to obtain than she had expected. A few of them were in the advanced potions
kit she owned, and she had managed to scrounge up the rest, mostly with Dobby’s help. Hermione then
took all of the ingredients, the book, and her cauldron to Moaning Myrtle’s bathroom to brew it up.
It had taken Hermione over two hours to get the potion right, but it was done! She poured the
proper amount of the love potion into a half a glass of pumpkin juice that she had also brought
with her. She held up the clear glass and stared at its contents as she thought to herself.

“I hope this stuff works. I better go find Harry and tell him what I’m doing so he can keep an
eye on me after I drink this mess.” She rolled her eyes. “That’s kind of like letting the fox guard
the henhouse, but…. He *is* the one person I trust more than anyone else.”

She knew that drinking the love potion herself was not the proper way to run an experiment, but
she couldn’t just *give* it to someone. Hermione was certain that she would get in *huge*
trouble if she used it on anybody else. “Hopefully by the end of the day I’ll have my answers.”

Hermione stepped out of Myrtle’s bathroom with the glass in hand, being very careful not to
spill in. She peered down into the glass as she walked, checking to see if the potion and the juice
were separating at all.

An exhausted and sweaty Neville rounded the corner at the far end of the hallway and began
running in her direction. A confused Hermione stopped walking and just stood watching as Neville
approached her, panting. Then she had an idea.

“Wait…. *Neville!* He knows about Harry and me. *He* can keep an eye on me!” The
thought of letting Harry watch over her, while exciting as hell, scared her to death. If she
couldn’t control herself around Harry when she was *not* being influenced by a love potion,
what would happen when she was?

Neville pulled up to a stop in front of her.

“Hey Neville,” she said as she furrowed her brow in confusion as to what he was up to.

Before Hermione realized what was happening, Neville had reached out and taken the glass from
her hand. After quickly muttering “Thanks, Hermione,” he turned to see if Lavender and Parvati were
gaining on him and he raised the glass to his lips.

A panicked stricken Hermione screamed for him to stop, and reached for the glass, but she was
too late.

Neville swallowed a mouthful of the very sweet tasting pumpkin juice, and just as he did,
Parvati Patil came into view.

Neville’s face instantly morphed into that of a lovesick puppy, and he was staring intently at
Parvati. Without taking his eyes off her, Neville held out the glass which Hermione quickly took
from him.

“*No*!” Hermione moaned in a whimpered tone. “This can’t be happening.”

But it was.

On seeing the look on Neville’s face Parvati had stopped dead a good fifteen feet from him. She
was immediately run into from behind by Lavender.

“Sorry,” her friend muttered, and then she too noticed the moony look on Neville’s face.

“What the…..? *What’s the hells* *wrong with him*?” Lavender asked the dumbstruck
Hermione as she gestured towards Neville. Hermione could do nothing but stand there staring at the
half empty glass in her hand.

“*He drank it*!” she finally said in disbelief, and then she looked up at Lavender. “He
wasn’t supposed to. It was for *me*, not *him*.”

A somewhat annoyed Lavender walked towards Hermione and chastised her, “Come on Hermione, get
over it, what’s the big deal, it’s just pumpkin juice.”

“No it wasn’t! It had a love potion in it!” she confessed.

“WHAT!”

Parvati’s eyes snapped from the love struck Neville, who was now smoothing out his hair and
grinning at her like a lecherous used car salesmen, and bore down on Hermione.

“*What do you mean there was a love potion in it*?” Parvati shrieked in disbelief.

“Just what I said. I was going to do an experiment to see if the potion Harry…”

Hermione stopped, and quickly shifted her eyes back and forth between the two girls to see if
they had caught what she had started to say.

Of course, Lavender pounced immediately, “*What, what* was that about Harry?” Before
Hermione could answer, they were interrupted by Neville, who finally spoke.

“I love you!” he crooned towards Parvati.

“*What*?” she said, totally aghast.

“Oh great,” Hermione muttered.

“I need you. We belong together my raven haired beauty.”

Neville continued spouting declarations of love as he advanced slowly towards her.

Parvati pointed at him, “Neville!” she harshly said as a warning, hoping that the tone of her
voice would get him to stop. It didn’t, so she slowly began to back away.

“Somebody help me,” Parvati pleaded, as she looked over at the girls. “Guys, please! Fix him.
You can’t do this to me,” she begged.

“We don’t need *them* my love. All we need is…. *each other*,” Neville spoke in a
breathy voice as he stared into Parvati’s eyes, which resembled those of a deer caught in the
headlights.

Lavender began to giggle, but Parvati was horrified. She looked to the girls once more hoping
desperately that they were going to help her, but both Lavender and Hermione just stood there
staring. Unsure of what else to do, a panicked Parvati decided to run; she turned, and took off
down the hallway. As she did, a very amorous Neville sprinted after her, spewing poetry as he
ran.

“Darling, my love for you is like a red rose……*Wait*, come back my sweet ….Come back!”

Lavender turned to Hermione. “Can I have that a second?”

“What this?” Hermione replied as she held up the half empty glass, which Lavender quickly took
from her hand.

“What do you want it for?” Hermione asked suspiciously.

Lavender smiled, “I want to give the rest of it to *Parvati*. It’d be too damn funny, don’t
you think?” And the silly blond burst out laughing.

“Give me that!”

Hermione angrily snatched the glass back. “I don’t have time for this now, I’ve got to go and
rescue *Parvati*. You know, you could try being *helpful,* after all she *is* your
best friend!”

“Yeah, well whatever, but because of *you* and *your potion*, I think I’m gonna have
an entertaining afternoon. So, thanks!” Lavender turned and headed down the hallway in the
direction that Parvati and Romeo had gone, laughing as she went.

An annoyed Hermione was watching Lavender go when she felt a hand gently touch her arm.

She turned to see Harry standing beside her, and her breath hitched in surprise. “He needs to
stop doing that!” she thought, “Well….At least he didn’t kiss me this time.”

Deep down, she actually felt a twinge of disappointment; she had enjoyed kissing him very much.
But…..That aside, she was very grateful to see him.

“Oh my God, Harry, I’m gonna be in so much trouble,” she cried as she engulfed him in one of her
patented killer hugs.

Harry accepted the hug gratefully; he enjoyed the feel of her body pressed tightly against his.
But, she was upset, so he decided he wouldn’t act on any of the ideas that were flooding his head
at the moment; he would stay focused on what *she* needed.

“It’ll be okay Hermione, whatever you need, I’m here for you.” At hearing his pledge to help
her, Hermione tightened her grip.

After releasing him from the hug Hermione stood up on her toes and kissed him quickly.

“Thank you Harry,” she whispered as she stared into his eyes. He was startled, before he had
time to react to her kiss it was over.

“We have to find Neville, but first I need to get rid of this!” she said as she held up the
glass. Hermione darted quickly into Myrtle’s bathroom, and was back out in a flash.

“What was that?” Harry inquired.

“Don’t worry, I’ll explain, but we have to go,” she told him.

She reached out and took Harry’s hand, and pulled him down the hallway after her. As they ran,
Hermione began talking very quickly; something about catching Neville to save Parvati. She really
wasn’t making a whole lot of sense so far, but he wasn’t worried about it. He’d sort it all out
eventually. He was actually just glad she wasn’t crying. So, he willingly went with her, as he
always did.

_______________________________________________________________



7. Chaos
--------

Authors note: As always, thanks to everyone who left me a review on chapter six. I really enjoy
hearing what you think of a chapter. I *especially* like the reviews where you comment on
specific things, and make guesses, or suggestions as to where you think or hope the next chapter
will go. It shows you’re *really* into the story, and what writer doesn’t love that!

Of course, I also need to thank my wife for all her help. She’s a great sounding board as I’m
writing, and she gives me her honest opinion, whether I like it or not. But, to be fair, she’s
*is* usually right, so I grumble, but I listen. Well, that’s about it for now, so …. here you
go, chapter seven. Enjoy!

PS I thought I’d be able to end this story with chapter seven, didn’t happen, so there will be a
chapter eight.

Chapter 7

Ginny Weasley sat on the couch in Fluer’s living room, pouting. After the incident last night
her mother had suspended all shopping privileges until she could get to the bottom of it. Molly had
spoken to Arthur, who was shocked by what had happened to his daughter. He said he would speak to
Ron to see if he knew anything, and to be sure that he was alright.

Arthur had just contacted Molly back with news from Ron. Molly finished her conversation with
Arthur and turned to her daughter.

“*Ginny!* What on earth did you do to Hermione Granger*?”*

“*Hermione*? I haven’t even spoken to Hermione, since like, lunch time Thursday. I haven’t
done *anything* to Hermione. Why?”

“Well, it appears that Hermione stabbed you brother with a fork over something she said that
*you* had done to her!” Molly barked, hands on hips.

“Mom I *swear*, I haven’t done *ANYTHING* to Hermione!”

“Ron seems to think that **she** was the one looking for you last night.”

“Mom, if it *was* Hermione, I have *no* idea why.”

That’s you last word then?”

Ginny nodded.

“That’s it, we’re going *home!*” Molly turned and headed for the bedroom to pack.

“**NO**, there’s no reason to go, nothings happened today, I’m fine.”

Molly turned on her. “*You’re fine, you’re fine*, what about your *brother*, huh
missy? What about your brother being hurt because of *you*. You need to get your priorities
straight young lady, and right this minute! **We’re going home!**”

Ginny was speechless. Her mother had never spoken to her like that before. She was the baby;
she’d *always* gotten her way. She began to seethe, and then she grumbled under her breath,
“Granger….you’re dead when I get back!”


-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Ron sat on his bed stunned. He had just finished speaking with his father. It seemed obvious to
Ron that Hermione had gone *totally* mental. From what his mom had told his dad, someone had
tried to ‘accio’ Ginny from Paris. After what Hermione had screamed at him at breakfast about all
her troubles having been caused by *Ginny*, Ron had no doubt he knew exactly *who* that
*someone* was.

“But what about Harry?” he thought. “Had she infected him somehow? What if she had Harry under
some kind of spell? God knew she was smart enough to come up with something like that,” he assured
himself. Then he speculated, “The *real* Harry would never have attacked me, but maybe, a
Hermione puppet Harry would. She’s always forcing her way in between us. Yeah, that *had* to
be it.” Ron reasoned. “How am I gonna fix him? I’m no good with spells. Wait; there was that muggle
movie I watched that time on vacation, about getting rid of evil and junk? They did it; maybe I can
do it the muggle way too.” He sat on his bed with his head in his hands, racking his brain to
remember the name of the movie.


-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Neville chased his new true love *all over* the castle, with Lavender trotting behind him
smiling from ear to ear. He actually managed to catch Parvati once, and tried to kiss her, but she
turned her head just in time, and ended up with his tongue in her ear. Parvati screamed bloody
murder! Lavender had saved her that time by putting a body bind on Neville, but once Parvati had
run off, she let Neville go.

“What a great day!” Lavender smiled as she skipped after the retreating form of Neville. She had
no doubts that he’d find Parvati again, and she’d be there to watch. “Damn that Hermione, she
should have given me the rest of that potion for Parvati,” she grumbled. Then she stopped and
thought about it for a second, “*Actually*……….this might just be more fun!” she decided and
continued on her way.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

A running Harry and Hermione raced through the corridors looking for Neville. They heard a blood
curdling scream from somewhere up ahead of them. They stopped running for a second and looked at
each other.

“Could have been Parvati?” Harry said.

“Definitely female!” Hermione replied.

“Unless she kicked him!” Harry winced.

“Huh?”

“Never mind,” and he grabbed her hand and took off again.

Dean and Seamus were in the hallway up ahead.

“Hey buttons,” Dean smirked as they ran by. Harry stopped and turned back towards Dean with a
testy look on his face. Dean nodded past him, but Hermione pulled Harry after her.

They continued in the direction of the scream. “Why did he call you ‘buttons’?” she asked as
they ran.

“I don’t know, but…….he wasn’t calling *me* buttons….. he was calling *you*
buttons!”

Hermione stopped dead.

“*What*? What do you mean *ME*?” she said horror struck.

She started to go back. Harry stopped her, and made eye contact, “Fixing your little love potion
problem?”

She growled and went with him, glaring over her shoulder.

“That’s just great,” an indignant Hermione began. “I’m never speaking to Neville again!”

“Come on Hermione, Neville? He wouldn’t do that to us.”

“Then where the hell did ‘buttons’ come from?” she asked, gesturing back towards where Dean had
been.

Harry smiled and shrugged, but Hermione was just ramping up.

“*Oh sure*, It’s no big deal, what do you care, *you’re* ‘*The Boy who Lived’*,
‘*The Chosen One’*, but me, I’m gonna be stuck with ‘*Buttons Granger’* for the rest of
my life!”

Harry turned his head away from her and swallowed a laugh.

“Yeah, yeah, very funny, ‘Buttons Granger’ ha-ha, go ahead and laugh you plonker!”

With that, Harry lost it. She angrily pulled her hand from his.

Then he offered, with as straight a face as he could manage.

“Well…..maybe he meant you’re as *cute* as a button?”

*“You shut up!”*

Harry lost it again.

Hermione began to stalk off back the way they had come.

Harry ran around her and cut her off. “Wait, wait Hermione, I’m sorry. How bout I hit them both
with a *really* strong memory charm, huh?” he said as he lifted her chin.

She looked skeptical, “yeah?”

“Yeah, for you, sure…..when I’m done with them, they won’t even remember what the hell a button
*is*, okay?”

She still wasn’t too sure, but she managed a low, “okay,” and she let him take her hand
again.

“*Please* Harry,” she begged as they ran. “I don’t want to be known as ‘*Buttons*
Granger’. Do you have any idea what it would be like if **Ron** ever heard that? It would
*never* stop,” she finished sounding totally defeated.

“Don’t worry….. I promise you, I’ll take care of it.”

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Molly dropped Ginny off in Hogsmeade and shooed her off to the castle. Ginny was very put out;
she had *not* had a very good weekend. It had started to suck Friday afternoon, and went
straight down hill from there. First there was Lavender and Parvati, and all that Harry drooling
over Hermione crap. Then there was that nearly being sucked through a vortex thing. Now, her mom
was pissed at her, for like the first time *ever*, and worst of all, she hadn’t really gotten
to *shop,* in *Paris!*

*“Son of a bitch!”* she groused*.*

**And……**

Ginny thought, “Who had caused all her troubles? Why *Hermione Grangers, that’s who!* She’d
undoubtedly done something to bewitch Harry, that was obvious. She had tried to ‘accio’ me for no
reason at all, she stabbed my brother, which pissed off my mom, *and all of that* lead to me
not getting to shop!”

She grumbled and seethed as she walked.

“I’m gonna ‘bat bogey’ the bloody hell out of her the second I see that frizzy haired, man
stealer!” she venomously spit. “I don’t know why she’s chosen to ruin *my* life, but payback’s
gonna be a bitch.”

And she smiled.


----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Ron was busy rummaging through his trunk looking for things he could use. Then he looked around
quickly. “Shit! If I’m saving Harry…. then I’m going through his stuff too!” He had remembered the
name of the movie he had seen about destroying evil, and was attempting to gather up supplies,
but….he wasn’t having the kind of luck he had hoped for. The guy in the movie had cool stuff; Ron
was not going to have anything as good to work with.

“How am I gonna make a………?” he trailed off as he dug deeper through Harry’s trunk looking for
something he could use to fashion what he needed. He rose out of Harry’s trunk empty handed. He
scratched his head and looked around the room. “Guess I’ll have to go with that then?” He frowned
slightly and then shrugged as if to say, oh well, and then set about making what he needed from
what he had.


----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Parvati Patil was horrified. If she hadn’t turned her head Neville’s tongue would have gone
halfway down her throat. It was bad enough that it had gone into her ear, which was *totally*
disgusting. The inside of her ear was still wet, and she made a face as she wiped at her ear with
her hand. “Thank God for Lavender! If she hadn’t come along and stopped Neville,” she shuttered at
the thought. “I need to get as far away from him as possible. I need to find someplace where I’ll
be safe. Damn it, I knew we shouldn’t have ratted out Ginny, this is some kind of sick payback,”
she thought as she hurried down the hallway. She turned and her eyes went wide as she saw Neville
heading in her direction. “NO!” she screamed, and she took off. “*How?* How did he get loose?
Lavender had him!” she whimpered as she ran.

“Wait my darling. Come back! I love you…..Your ear tastes like chocolate!”


-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Ron had finished crafting what he needed. He stepped back to assess his handiwork, “Well……could
be worse….. I guess.” Then he shrugged. “Don’t really have much choice now do I, so it’s just gonna
have to do,” he decided.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Parvati reached the first floor. She spied the early dinner crowd heading into the great hall,
so she decided to head that way. “Safety in numbers,” she reasoned as she ran past a confused
looking group of first years. “Move it,” she hissed at them and the scared group instantly
scattered.


-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Ginny Weasley violently kicked open the front door of the castle. It flew open so hard and fast
that when the metal door handle hit the ancient stone wall, it caused a spark to fly up. “I’m
back,” she said under her breath ominously. “Where are you Granger, its payback time,” she growled.
“You started this, and *I’m* gonna finish it!”

Just then the object of her ire came into view. She spied Hermione as she jumped down the last
three steps of the lower staircase, and then took off towards the great hall behind Neville, who
had just gone in. *And*…. adding insult to injury, the frizzy headed witch, was holding hands
with *Harry!* Ginny pulled out her wand, readied herself, and marched off towards a great hall
showdown.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Harry and Hermione burst through the doors of the great hall. They stopped just inside and
surveyed the room before them. There were no professors yet as it was only 4:45, and dinner didn’t
even begin to be served until 5:05 at the earliest. There were about thirty students or so, but it
was loud already. Then they saw why. Neville was standing on one side of the Gryffindor table, and
Parvati was around the other side. She was pointing at him.

“You stay away from me Neville, I’m warning you!” As she said this she reached up, and making a
face of pure disgust, wiped what she hoped was the last of his saliva from her ear. She ran to her
left, and Neville ran right, trying to get to her, all the while he pleaded with her.

“My love, you are the light of my life, I dwell in darkness without you. Please my love, run
away with me, and be mine forever!”

Harry and Hermione were momentarily frozen by the absurdity of the scene before them. They were
quickly startled out of their stupor when Parvati screamed, “YOU,” and pointed at Hermione with
fury in her eyes as she jockeyed back and forth to make sure the table *stayed* between
herself and Neville.. “This is all *your* fault!”

“It is not! I was just trying to fix things. Ginny started it all.” Hermione yelled back.

“Hello stupid! You want to fix something, fix *him*!” Parvati shrieked while gesturing
toward Neville.

Hermione turned to Harry, “Did she just call me *stupid*!”

Before Harry could answer, a reply came from behind him.

“Yes she did you stupid cow, and now you’re mine, *frizz ball*!”

Hermione and Harry turned.

“YOU!” they bellowed in unison as they both stared daggers at Ginny and snarled.

The first hex from Ginny’s wand flew high and wide of Hermione.

Harry wasn’t worrying about hexes, he ran right at Ginny. She saw him coming, screeched in panic
at the look on his face, and ran around the Gryffindor table, ending up at Parvati’s side.

“Harry?” Ginny pleaded, “*What did I do*?”

“Does a *LOVE POTION ri*ng a bell, Gin?” He snarled at her. “You totally *ruined* what
happened between Hermione and me, and so help me, if I can’t fix it….!”

“Just what the hell *did* happen between you and her, Harry, huh? I leave here for one
weekend and what; you’re cheating on me with my brothers’ girlfriend?”

Both Harry and Hermione were stunned by what Ginny had said, and **everyone** in the great
hall had their eyes trained on Harry, waiting for his reply. Even Neville had momentarily stopped
his lustful pursuit of Parvati.

They were *all* startled when Hermione screamed, “*I am NOT your brothers
GIRLFRIEND!”*

Ginny spat back at Hermione. *“You shut up, SLAG; I’m* talking to my boyfriend*!”*

Hermione flinched as if she’d been slapped.

Harry’s eyes went wide. “*What* did you just call Hermione? And…. I am not now, and never
have been *your* boyfriend!”

Hermione looked around at the stunned faces near her.

“Did she…Did she just called me….. a *slag?*”

They nodded.

Hermione angrily headed for the redhead, drawing her wand as she advanced, and warning all. “So
help me, if *one more person* calls me names….”

Ron Weasley burst into the great hall loudly, and drew the immediate attention of most of the
students present.

“Hermione,” he bellowed. Ron was holding something in his hand. It looked to be a cross like
thing. On closer inspection, it actually appeared to be his wand and a bread stick tied together to
make a ‘T’ shape. All who saw it were confused, and then he bellowed as he held it up facing
Hermione. “You… EVIL TEMPTRESS.” But before he was able to finish his sentence, his words were
frozen, as was the rest of him, by the ‘patrificus totalus’ spell whipped from Hermione’s wand that
hit him right between the eyes. Ron dropped like an anvil.

“Bloody IDIOT,” Hermione angrily hissed.

Ginny, looking to take advantage while Hermione was distracted, fired a ‘bat bogey’ at her, but
unfortunately for Ginny, it was blocked by Harry.

Both Hermione and Ginny looked over at Harry.

Then a dumbstruck Hermione turned back toward Ginny, mouth agape, disbelieving what the young
redhead had just done.

“You tried to *bat bogey* me?”

“You froze my brother!” Ginny accused.

“Fine!” Hermione nodded. “It’s now open season on Weasley’s.” With that, Hermione fired a spell
at the cups of pumpkin juice on the table right in front of Ginny. The cups exploded, and pumpkin
juice flew everywhere, but mainly, it flew all over *Ginny*.

Ginny stared down at her outfit, which was now freckled with a billion tiny orange spots, to go
along with the three or four *huge* stains now decorating it.

Hermione smiled with satisfaction.

“Oh, now you’re *dead* Granger!”

Harry and Hermione’s eyes met, and then Harry raised his wand toward Ginny, but Hermione put up
her hand, “Its okay Harry, I’ve got this,” and she smiled.

A furious Ginny growled, and began firing ‘bat bogeys’ hexes in *every* direction hoping to
hit Hermione with at least one.

Hermione on the other hand, kept exploding cup after cup of pumpkin juice all over an
increasingly angry Ginny.

Neville Longbottom had used the Ginny distraction to ease his way towards Parvati, who had
momentarily stopped paying attention to him. That is of course until it was too late. He grabbed
her and Parvati shrieked in surprise. “Kiss me, my love.” Then Neville silenced her scream by
slipping his tongue deep into her mouth.

From behind everyone, back near the doors of the hall, a strangled cry rang out.

Luna Lovegood stepped over the prone and petrified Ron Weasley and in a sniffled sob wailed,
“How could you Neville. You said **I** was your true love in the broom cupboard just yesterday,”
as tears streamed down her face.

*That*, little bit of news got everyone’s attention, as mouths throughout the hall dropped
open in shock.

Nobody…..saw *that* coming.

Right after Luna, a skipping Lavender entered the hall. On seeing the predicament Parvati was
currently tangled in, she covered her mouth with both hands to stifle her laughter.

Luna’s outburst had momentarily gotten Neville’s attention. This gave Parvati an opportunity to
push him far enough away so that Harry was able to hit Neville with a body bind.

Parvati angrily turned toward Lavender. “You think that’s funny? Huh? I’ve been running for my
life from Neville, who *somehow* managed to get loose from *you,* and now you’re
*laughing* about it!”

“Don’t blame *me. Hermione* started all this,” Lavender shouted back.

Hermione, who’s patronus was now flying around the room deflecting Ginny’s hexes as the students
in the area ducked and cowered under the tables, looked over at Lavender seriously affronted at the
accusation. She climbed up onto the table and shouted at Lavender.

*“I didn’t start this, SHE did.”* And she pointed at Ginny.

“*Hey*, I wasn’t even *here*, so don’t go blaming this on *me*!” Ginny bellowed
back at Hermione.

“You did too cause this mess.” Harry snapped.

Ginny, startled by Harry, threw at ‘bat bogey’ in his direction before she realized who had
spoken.

Harry deflected the hex easily, and then stared at Ginny in shock. Ginny’s eyes went wide.

“Harry, I’m *SO SORRY*, I didn’t realize it was *you*,” she pleaded, and then
screaming her head off she ran toward the main door as Harry ran after her.


---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Minerva McGonagall entered the great hall and was struck speechless by the chaos she saw before
her. A petrified Ron Weasley lay at her feet holding what looked like a breadstick cross. A
wailing, crying, Luna Lovegood stood ten feet in, saying over and over again through her tears,
“You said you loved me!” Lavender Brown and Parvati Patil stood hands on hips, and nose to nose,
screaming at each other. Miss Granger was standing on *top* of a table, wand at the ready.
Neville Longbottom seemed to be in some kind of a body bind and he kept shouting over the din,
“Parvati, I love you,” as he hopped in her direction. The remaining thirty or so students could be
seen cowering under the orange spotted dinner tables. And…… Ginny Weasley, covered, from head to
toe, in what looked to be pumpkin juice, was running toward the head mistress repeatedly screaming,
“I’m sorry,” over her shoulder as a very angry looking Harry Potter chased after her.

“**SILENCE!**” The head mistress shouted, and then she waved her wand and froze every person
in the room. They could all hear her, but they could not move a muscle.

“This is *UNACCEPTABLE* behavior!” she shouted. “*When* I release you, I will see, Mr.
Potter, Ms. Granger, Mr. Longbottom, Misses Patil, Lovegood, Brown and Weasley, in my office!”

She then turned to leave, and semi tripped over the still petrified Ron. “Whoever did this to
Mr. Weasley will please *UNDO* it immediately? *Do I make myself clear?”* As she reached
the great hall doors, she flourished her wand over her shoulder and everyone was released.

Hermione climbed down off of the table she was on. The students that McGonagall had called began
making their way to the doors to follow the head mistress to her office. Ginny stayed very close to
McGonagall, and kept peaking over her shoulder to see where Harry was. Harry glared at Ginny for a
moment, and then stopped to wait for Hermione, who had just un-petrified Ron. Hermione then also
released Neville with an “I’m sorry about all this.” Neville, who was no longer showing the affects
of the love potion, nodded to her. Either the head mistress had released him from the potions grip,
or, it had finally worn off. Luna slowly sobbed her way from the hall, and Parvati and Lavender
bickered quietly and elbowed each other as they walked.

Hermione whispered to Harry, “I’m so dead. I made the love potion Neville drank. I’m gonna get
in *so* much trouble.”

Harry reached out and took her hand, and gave it a gentle squeeze.

“Maybe you won’t, but…. if you do, I’m pretty sure you’re not gonna be the *only* one.”



8. Punishment
-------------

*Authors note:* My intention was to end this story with chapter 8. To that end I have
written over 7000 words, but I am STILL not done. So….. I have decided to break what I have written
so far into chapters and post them. Whenever there was a natural break in the action I made that a
chapter. That means chapter 9 is done as well. With 9 I still have some editing to do while I
continue writing what will be chapter 10. I want to send a special thank you to those of you who
have encouraged me to finish this, and have also waited patiently for me to do so. And as always,
thank you to my wife for basically being my beta. And to those who left me a review on the previous
chapter. I received a lot of really great reviews for chapter seven and they were much appreciated.
Well, that’s about it, I hope you like this chapter and the next one will follow soon.

Chapter 8

Professor McGonagall, eyes straight ahead and jaw clenched, led her little band of miscreants
back to her office.

“*Not a Slytheryn in the bunch*,” she fumed internally, *“Those were **Gryffindor**
students behaving like wild animals!”*

Harry and Hermione, along with Ron, Luna, Parvati, and the others all trudged off to what they
expected would be, certain doom, at the hands of their pissed off headmistress.

Harry tightened his grip on Hermione’s hand, attempting to reassure her. She gave him a slight
smile, but it never reached her eyes.

The rest of the group walked like condemned zombies towards McGonagall’s office, all except
Ginny. She was staring daggers at Harry and Hermione’s linked hands.

Harry, as if sensing her gaze, shifted his focus and made eye contact with the redhead. She met
his stare for a moment, and then averted her eyes.

‘*Damn.* He’s still pissed? For Pete’s sake it was just one tiny little hex. He blocked it
anyway. You’d think he’d be over it by *now* for Merlin’s sake!’

She peeked back at him, but Harry had turned his attention back to Hermione.

Ginny shook her head. “*That’s not right.* He’s supposed to end up with *me*, not
*her*! Bushy hair know-it-all causes this whole freaking *nightmare*, and then **she**
gets Harry anyway! No way, that’s *not* happening. ” Ginny groused.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

McGonagall reached her office, opened the door, and shook her head as the group filed in.
Lavender, Parvati, Ron and Ginny all moved to the left, while Harry, Hermione, Neville and Luna all
went right. Luna made sure she kept Harry and Hermione between herself and Neville. Once they were
all in McGonagall slammed the door closed.

“In all my years here at Hogwarts, I have **never** witnessed such abhorrent behavior from a
group of students, let alone students from *my* former house. You should all be ashamed of
yourselves, and to that end I am taking one hundred points from Gryffindor.”

There was considerable amount of feet shuffling and bowed heads from the group at this.

McGonagall continued, “I have no idea what mischief sparked such riotous behavior, but I can
**guarantee** *each and every one of you*, that I **will,** most assuredly, get to the
bottom of this!”

The Headmistress looked over the students before her. “Miss Lovegood, what is you issue in this
ridiculousness?

Luna, who had just downgraded from tears to sniffles, pointed at Neville as she ramped back up
again and wailed, “He told me he loved me, and then he *kissed* Parvati.”

McGonagall rolled her eyes.

A contrite Neville then pleaded, ““*I’m sorry* Luna, I didn’t *mean* to.”

Parvati spoke up, “Don’t you apologize Neville, it wasn’t *your* fault.” She then turned an
accusing finger towards Hermione, “It’s was hers.”

Hermione retorted, “*Mine*? That’s not fair! What happened with Neville was an
accident.”

“Oh…. And was it an *accident* that his tongue ended up in my EAR!” Parvati shouted back,
causing Neville to blush.

Harry then leapt to Hermione’s defense. “If it wasn’t for Ginny, *none of this* would have
happened!”

“ME? I wasn’t even HERE.” Ginny screeched.

Ron, who had been eating his breadstick cross, leaned around Ginny and pointed at Harry, “He
tried to choke me!”

Harry returned fire, “You called Hermione a bitch.”

Hermione squeaked in surprise as her mouth dropped open.

Ginny jumped forward.

“Well, she is a bitch! She tried to accio me back from FRANCE!”

“I did *not* you little liar! Everyone knows that that spell wouldn’t work from a CONTINENT
AWAY!”

“Yeah, well tell that to the FIVE people it took to keep me from going.”

Harry startled out of watching the back and forth by the mention of it taking **five** people
to stop Ginny from coming when he summoned her.

“Five people, really?” He nodded his head slightly, impressed with himself.

Ron blurted out, “Yeah, well Hermione stabbed me with a fork,” and he lifted his shirt to show
everyone his chest before finishing, “Numerous times, and I have witnesses!”

Most of the occupants of the office averted their eyes at the sight of Ron’s pail, freckled
torso, but Hermione fired back.

“You accused me of upsetting Harry you git!” still hurt from having been called a bitch twice in
the last minute.

Parvati then rounded on Lavender, “and you….you thought it was *funny* letting Neville go,
I thought you were my friend, you Judas. So, what I went through was all just a big *joke* to
you?”

“Well…YES!” Lavender replied with a straight face.

Hermione then interjected quickly, “Lavender asked me for the rest of the love potion Parvati,
so she could give it to YOU when Neville was around.”

“That’s just evil Lavender. Why would you mess with people like that?” Neville commented,
shaking his head.

“*Oh what do you care*? At least you were actually *getting* some.” She replied as she
looked Luna up and down.

“And who is *your* boyfriend these days Lavender?” Luna asked sweetly, knowing full well
that at Lavender was single. Most of the group tried to hide their smirks at the startled look that
appeared on Lavenders face.

“*That will be quite enough, all of you***!**” McGonagall demanded. “So help me, I am
getting tired of this nonsense. If another word is uttered by ANYONE, that person will most
assuredly regret it. Am I understood?”

Each and every one of the students nodded in understanding.

McGonagall continued. “Now I want this whole sorted tale from one person, and one person only!”
she said as she looked at all of them threateningly. “Is that possible?”

Harry spoke up. “I *think* I can do it professor.”

“Go on then, as for the rest of you, if there are any, and I mean *any* interruptions,
punishment will be swift, do I make myself clear?

“Okay well, during the course of the day yesterday, I kinda got umm,” he stammered, running his
hand through his hair. “You see, well… I started to have feelings for…..for Hermione.” This was not
how Harry wanted to introduce this topic to his friends. He scanned the room looking at the group
around him before his eyes settled on Hermione who had blushed slightly at his words. What he
didn’t notice was the exact same tinge of pink on his headmistress’s cheeks as well, seeing as how
she knew *exactly* what had taken place yesterday between the two of them.

“Well… when I couldn’t take it anymore, I kissed her,” he finished.

“*YOU WHAT*,” shouted both Ron and Ginny in unison.

McGonagall successfully silenced both Weasley’s by swiftly raising her wand and pointing it in
their direction while glaring at them. Once she was sure the Weasley’s would remain silent
McGonagall nodded to Harry, who continued.

“Well…then Neville showed up, and told me that you,” he glanced at his headmistress, “wanted to
see me, and it all went down hill from there. You said that students had told you that Ginny had
put a love potion in my drink at lunch.”

Ron, Luna and Neville all gasped at what Harry had revealed, but Ginny reacted quickly.

“*WHAT?*” Ginny shrieked as she rounded on Parvati and Lavender. “*You went to
McGonagall?* Ginny was outraged. “*How could you*? For your information*, I NEVER EVEN
**HAD** A LOVE POTION,”* she screamed at them.

You could have heard a pin drop in McGonagall’s office. Both Harry and Hermione, along with
everyone else in the room, stared at Ginny startled by what they had just heard. Nobody said a
word; they just stood looking at the young redhead who glared at them all defiantly.

“*Fine*, I lied, I made it all up, there was no love potion okay, so what! *What the
hell’s the big deal anyway*?”

Harry tore his eyes away from Ginny and looked toward Hermione.

“*I told you. I told you it was real!*”

Harry glanced back at Ginny, torn between choking the life out of the youngest Weasley, and
going to Hermione. But…..As she always would, Hermione won out, and he headed towards her.

“Harry I….How could I know? Or believe?” she sputtered.

“You never….”

Before she could finish that thought, Harry had wrapped his arms around her, and drawn her into
an incredibly steamy kiss that lasted for what seemed like minutes, too long, as far as those
standing around and watching were concerned.

“Wow,” Harry uttered breathlessly as their kiss finally came to and end. “As good as I
remember,” and he smirked at the kisses visibly overwhelmed recipient.

“Now…. I’m gonna kill Ginny,” he said as he turned away from Hermione and started to head toward
the young redhead, who quickly ducked behind her big brother.

Harry hadn’t gone two steps when Hermione reached out and grabbed his hand and spun him
around.

“Oh no you don’t.” She flung her arm around his neck and proceeded to snog him senseless.

After what was *surely* an inappropriate amount of time to snog someone in front of
classmates and their headmistress, McGonagall cleared her throat.

“Excuse me.”

When neither Harry nor Hermione responded, she tried again, this time a bit more forcefully.

“*Excuse me*.”

The two broke apart. Hermione, still with her arms around Harry neck shrugged, “Sorry couldn’t
be helped,” smiling the whole time.

“Can we go now professor,” Harry asked.

“Well, *no* Mr. Potter. Just because you seemed to have worked out….” She coughed into her
hand and then gestured toward Hermione, “your issues with Miss Granger here. That does not excuse
the chaos I witnessed in the Great Hall, so no, you are not excused.”

“Now to business, Miss Lovegood, you are free to go.”

Luna nodded, looked toward Neville, sniffled, and then headed toward the door.

“Mr. Longbottom, do you have anything to say about the situation you found yourself in.”

Neville made eye contact with Hermione for a moment before turning back to his Headmistress.

“No professor. What happened to me was my own fault. I took the glass from Hermione’s hand
without even asking her what was in it, and then I drank it. She’s not to blame.”

Hermione piped up, “No Professor, it *is* my fault; I made the potion he drank.”

McGonagall held her hand up toward Hermione. “Relax Miss Granger, I will get to you later.
Neville, you are free to go. Good luck with Miss Lovegood.”

Neville nodded, blushed slightly, glanced quickly toward Hermione, and then headed out to find
Luna.

“Miss Patil, you may go.” Parvati nodded to acknowledge her Headmistress, and then glared
daggers at her former best friend as she turned and left the office.

“Now to you Miss Brown, I am *very* disappointed in your behavior in all of this; it is
unworthy of a Gryffindor. But, I believe your betrayal of Miss Patil’s *trust* will end up
costing you more than any punishment I would impose on you. I expect restoring that trust will take
significant time and effort on your part. Now move along Miss Brown before I decide something more
is warranted.”

The remaining student left in the office seemed to find their feet very interesting at that
moment.

“Mister Weasley.”

Ron tentatively raised his head and looked at McGonagall.

“Yes Professor?”

“I’m not sure I can even *begin* to comprehend your thought process in all of this, and I
am not even going to try. Quickly, explain yourself.”

“Ahh, well I…uh, well….I thought Hermione had upset Harry and uh, I may have said a thing or two
that *might* have upset her a little bit.”

He looked over at his bushy haired friend and seemed to wilt slightly at the death glare she was
sending his way.

“I may have…. s*lightly p*rovoked her, somewhat, a little, maybe,” and then he shut up.

“Do you care to explain,” she gestured toward his half eaten cross he was holding.

Ron looked down at the object in his hand, and then quickly put his hand behind his back.

“Umm, No professor, I’d really rather not,” he said as he shook his head.

“Very well, you are excused Mister Weasley.”

“Now, as for the three of you, first, Mister Potter, what you did in regard to the summoning of
Miss Weasley was extremely dangerous and reckless. While I understand the details of the situation
that caused you to behave in such a matter, better that you may think actually.”

Both Harry and Hermione looked at each other, and then back at their Headmistress. There was no
mistaking what she was implying.

She continued, “You would do well to show a greater level of restraint when it comes to letting
your emotions get the best of you. Over the last two days you have made it abundantly clear that
you are severely lacking in this area. Heed my words Mister Potter, unchecked anger can be very
dangerous to you, and those around you. Have I made myself clear?”

“Yes Professor, I understand.”

“Good, I don’t expect to see you behaving in such a manner ever again.”

Harry nodded.

“You may go.”

“I’d prefer to stay,” he said as he gave Hermione’s hand a good squeeze of reassurance.

McGonagall glared in his direction.

“You may wait *outside* for Miss Granger.”

Harry squeezed Hermione’s hand again, and she thanked him for his support with the look in her
eyes, despite not saying a word.

Then to her surprise he leaned in quickly and stole a kiss.

“I’ll be right outside,” He assured her, and then he turned and headed for the door. Ginny
caught his eye as he was leaving the room and received an angry glare for her troubles.

As Harry closed the door behind him McGonagall turned to face the two remaining students.

“Now as for you two, I am most disappointed in you both. That display you put on in the Great
Hall alone was….” McGonagall shook her head, flustered. “I can’t even begin to find the right words
to describe it.”

Hermione and Ginny lowered their heads in remorse.

“Well, Miss Granger.”

Hermione looks up at her Headmistress to accept her fate.

“You knowingly broke a school rule by making a love potion. While I *am* sympathetic to
your reasons for doing so, that does not change the fact that you did indeed break the rules. You
have caused great distress to poor Neville and Miss Lovegood. Normally an infraction such as the
one you have committed would guarantee you no less than five days detention.”

At McGonagall’s pronouncement Hermione visible slumped.

“However………..due to the circumstances which compelled you to do what you did, I think *one
day* will be a sufficient punishment for your offence. You will do your detention with me on
Monday after your classes.”

Hermione bowed her head in disappointment. She had never received a detention in all her years
at Hogwarts, despite the many transgressions of school rules that she, Harry, and Ron had
committed.

She swallowed hard and replied, “Yes Professor.”

McGonagall turned to Ginny, “Now, as for you Miss Weasley. Of all the offenders in this entire
sorted affair,” McGonagall waved her arm in wide sweeping arc as she spoke. “It is with *you*
that I am most displeased. *Your* actions caused nearly two days of rule breaking and general
lawlessness the likes of which I have never seen here at Hogwarts!”

Ginny began to defend herself

“But *Profes*…”

Before she could finish her plea she was abruptly cut off by McGonagall.

“I don’t want to hear it. If not for you, none of this takes place. Unfortunately, telling a lie
to a classmate in *not* a punishable offense. I shall most assuredly notify your parents as to
what took place here this weekend. Aside from that, and my **sternest** of warnings to watch
what you choose to say in the future, and to whom you choose to say it, you are regrettably, free
to go.

Ginny was stunned, Hermione dumbfounded.

Hermione stood with her mouth open staring at her Headmistress.

“**That’s it... She walks away!”**

**“***Excuse me* Miss Granger?” The Headmistress, taking exception to Hermione’s tone of
voice, stared her down.

“While I am sorry that in this instance Miss Weasley’s punishment does not truly fit her crime.
Miss Weasley lied to a classmate, which is all she is actually guilty of. Her lie may have become
much more, but she could not have foreseen that. So yes, she is free to go.”

Ginny, having been dismissed, bolted for the door before McGonagall could change her mind. As
she entered the hallway she spied Harry leaning against the wall on the opposite side, waiting for
Hermione. They made eye contact briefly before Ginny dropped her gaze and scurried away as fast as
she could.

Harry crossed the hall just as a stunned looking Hermione appeared in the doorway.

“*What*? What happened?”

No reply.

He usher Hermione into the hallway.

“Hermione, what happened?” Harry asked a second time.

Hermione looked up at him, “I got detention.”

Harry pulled her into a hug. She did not hug him back; her arms remaining at her sides.

He stepped back, “It’s okay. It’s not that bad, it’s only detention. Could have been worse, you
could have gotten whatever McGonagall gave Ginny. You should have seen her, she ran out of that
room like someone was chasing her.”

“Harry…..Ginny got *nothing*, no detention, *nothing*,” Hermione finally managed.

“*WHAT*? She didn’t get *anything*? You mean, just *you*! ” He was
flabbergasted.

Hermione nodded.

“She causes this whole damn thing and walks away *unpunished*? You gotta be kidding me. How
is that fair?” He was livid.

Hermione just shrugged her shoulders.

Harry began pacing around the hallway. “We can’t let her get away with this. She has to pay, and
I’m gonna make sure that she does.”

“No Harry don’t, I don’t want to get in any more trouble. I just want to forget about the whole
stupid thing, okay? We’re together; let’s just forget about Ginny, please…Harry, for me, please?”
she pleaded.

Harry stared at her for a long time. He wanted to do as she asked, but his anger was still
boiling way to close to the surface for him to let it go.

Hermione stepped to him and wrapped her arms around his waist and laid her head on his chest and
in as soothing a voice as she could manage, said to him,

“Harry, *please*.”

She looked up at him.

He stood stock still, but eventually replied, “I’ll try, but no promises, I’m not ready to let
this go yet.”

“But you’ll try?”

“I’ll try, for you.”

“Thank you.”

He grunted in reply, and then emitted a gruff, “Lets get out of here.”

A.N: If you were not prepared for this to end the way it did trust me, it is a long way from
over. I promise! Please don’t forget to leave me a review. Thanks.



9. Consummation
---------------

Authors Note: *Hello everyone, here it is, chapter 9. It took longer than I though it would to
edit this. As always, thanks to all who reviewed chapter 8 for me, it is much appreciated. Finally,
our hero and heroine get down to business. I hope you all enjoy this chapter, and please leave me a
review to let me know what you thought. We’re in the home stretch people. There is only one more
chapter to go. Well, enjoy this one, and I’ll be back again soon.*

Chapter 9

Hermione trudged her way over to the table where Harry was sitting in the library. She flung her
book bag onto the table with a resounding *thud*.

“I don’t ever want to have to do detention again,” she hissed with annoyance.

Harry looked up at her and nodded sympathetically as he closed the book he was reading.

With furrowed brow Hermione asked, “What is that you’re reading?”

“What this?”

He picked up the book and tossed it away from him onto the table.

“I don’t know, just something someone left here.” He stood up and gave her a quick kiss.

Hermione looked over his shoulder at the book, “‘Obscure Spells and Enchantments’,” Hermione
read aloud. “I wonder who was reading that. Is it interesting? ” She picked it up and began
flipping through the pages with curiosity.

“No, not really, I was just looking it over while I waited for you. So detention was bad
huh?”

Hermione frowned at him. “McGonagall made me write lines.”

Harry rolled his eyes, and knew it was a mistake instantly by the look on her face.

Harry put his hands up as Hermione folded her arms in front of her chest and stared at him with
raised eyebrows.

“Now wait. I don’t mean to be unsympathetic, but you, more than anyone else know the levels of
detention I’ve had to endure over the years. I’m sorry, but there are a hell of a lot worse things
than having to write lines.”

He made his point and her demeanor softened instantly. She closed the gap between them and wound
her arms around his neck as his encircled her waist.

“You’re right, and at least it’s over, and that whole nightmare is behind us.”

He smiled at her and then leaned in and kissed her passionately, to which she enthusiastically
responded.

When Madam Prince began clearing her throat in their direction they packed up their stuff and
headed back to the common room, only stopping occasionally for a quick snog along the way.

The next afternoon as they were about to separate to head to their respective classes, Harry to
Divination, and Hermione to Ancient Runes, he grabbed her hand before she could get away and pinned
her against the wall and began furiously snogging her. He put his left hand on her waist before
sliding it up her side and stealing a quick squeeze of her breast. This caused her to gasp in
surprise, and push him back a few inches as she looked around.

“*Harry*, someone could have seen that. We’re in a hallway for goodness sake.”

He chose to remind her with an evil glint in his eye that he had been *far bolder* with her
in a hallway before, or had she forgotten?

“*No*, I have not forgotten! But in case you haven’t noticed we are not *alone* in
*this* hallway!”

“Well then *maybe* I need to get you alone,” he said raising one eyebrow.

She retorted, “Well then maybe you do.”

“Good, something to look forward to.”

Hermione smiled, and as she started walking away he quickly shot his left hand under her little
plaid skirt and grabbed her bum.

She jumped and squeaked, “*Harry*,” and gave him a reproachful look as she continued on her
way, but as she looked back at him, the smirk on his face told her he was not the least bit sorry.
He was also staring intently at her with a look that made her heart beat faster. It was the same
look he had given her the other night in the hallway, just before he’d kissed her. Knowing what
that look meant, an excited chill ran up her spine and she hurried off to class.

Harry watched her go with a lustful grin plastered all over his face, and then he turned and
headed to the nightmare that was Divination.

Harry sat on the couch in the common room waiting rather impatiently for Hermione to return
from, he’d be damned if he could remember exactly where she had said she had *needed* to go.
All he cared about at the moment was that she wasn’t *back* yet.

“That’s it! Where the hell is she?” He stood up and hurried through the portrait. He didn’t know
which direction to head in, so he stood in the hallway in front of the portrait talking to
himself.

“Okay, she’s probably gonna come from…..” and he looked thoughtfully in both directions trying
to decide which way he thought she might come from.

“That way!” he said as he pointed to his right and started off in that direction.

He headed straight and then turned left. By the time he had turned his second corner Harry
spotted her, she was walking quickly back toward the common room. Hermione looked up, saw him, and
stopped dead. They now stood about fifteen feet apart staring at one another.

He licked his lips. Hermione saw *that* look in his eyes again, the look she *really*
liked. It made her blood boil.

He finally spoke to her, “I’ve been waiting for you.” His voice implying far more that the
fifteen minutes he had sat in the common room.

Hermione stared deeply into his eyes, and then she let the satchel she had slung over her right
shoulder and the books in her left hand crash to the ground all at once. The echo of her things
hitting the floor thundered through the deserted hallway.

“I know you have,” was all she said.

They practically ran at each other, each of them instantly as hot and bothered as they could
possible be.

They exploded onto each other in a frenzy of hands and lips. They tore at each others cloths,
untucking each others shirts as they both had a burning desire to feel the hot skin beneath.
Hermione ran both her hands up the back of Harry’s shirt as she kissed him and she slowly let them
glide over the smooth expanse of his back.

Harry went for what he really wanted immediately and slid his hands up from her stomach towards
her breasts but was foiled by the buttons of her shirt at his wrists. He broke their kiss, made eye
contact with her, smirked, and then did exactly what he had wanted to do.

He tore her blouse open, and he did so with such force that buttons were bouncing around the
hallway a good twenty feet from them.

Hermione gasped in surprise and shock and then looked down at herself, glad that she had worn a
sexier bra than normal that morning. She raised her head back up and growled at him just before she
threw herself at him as hard and as fast as she possible could, wrapping her legs around him in the
process.

Harry staggered backwards at the force of her attack and he struggled to get a good hold of her
as she rained kisses on his face and lips before burying her tongue deep into his waiting
mouth.

Harry pulled his lips free and leaned down and began biting and nipping and sucking on the
delicious spot just below her left ear. Hermione leaned into every attack that he made on her
neck.

She began whispering his name over and over again very softly, imploring him to keep going, to
*never* stop.

Harry, for his part, had absolutely no intention of stopping, not now, not ever. He was drunk
with the sound of her voice huskily whispering his name as she allowed him to devour her. But, he
pulled away from her for a second and put her down. Ravishing her neck was not even close to what
he *really* wanted to do to her.

Hermione’s eyes betrayed the bewilderment she momentarily felt when he stepped back. Then she
saw the raging lust still burning in his eyes, and she relaxed again.

Harry locked eyes with her, and then he reached up under Hermione’s skirt, and hooked his
fingers into the elastic waistband of her panties and began slowly lowering them down her long
gorgeous legs. As he brought them down, he dropped to his knees in front of her to help her step
out of them, which she did. She tangled her fingers in the unruliness of his hair as he kneeled
before her. He held her gaze, and slowly began moved toward her.

Hermione Granger gasped loudly, and her mouth dropped open in complete and utter shock when she
felt the wetness of Harry’s tongue delicately caress her most private spot.

*“OH MY GOD,”* she blurted out before she could stop herself.

She looked down in amazement at the top of Harry’s head, which had disappeared under her skirt.
She could not *believe* what he was doing to her, but she was by no means going to ask him to
stop.

Once he got started Harry gently pushed her thighs apart for better access. Hermione adjusted
her feet slightly to give him the room he was looking for. She leaned back against the wall for
support, and placed her hands on Harry’s head to steady herself. As he worked hard to please her
she closed her eyes and reveled in the pleasure he was giving.

As it turns out, Harry was *very* good at what he was doing. His amazingly active tongue
glided over and then sucked gently on the spot she wanted him to hit almost from the second he
started. It didn’t take very long at all for the moans coming from Hermione to grow increasingly
louder. When he felt her thighs started to quiver, he worried she was getting close so he slowed
his pace down and began roaming around with his tongue instead of just concentration on her most
sensitive spot.

“*Hell no* Granger! When you do finally come, it’s gonna be with me buried *deep*
inside you,” he thought as he worked.

Finally, with one long slow sweeping pass of his tongue, he pulled back.

Hermione opened her eyes, and looked down at Harry’s face.

“You are…..*gifted,* Mr. Potter!” She placed her hand over her heart hoping to calm its
frantic beating down a bit as she struggled to catch her breath.

“More likely, lucky,” he smirked back at her.

She reached down and cupped his face in her hands and pulled him up to her, and furiously kissed
him again. When she was done, she let go of his face and grabbed him around the waist. She spun him
around so that now he was the one backed up against the wall, and then she turned the tables on
him.

She groped for his belt and began frantically undoing it. He tried to help her, but she smacked
his hands away, and then kissed him quickly as she worked. As he had done with her, she sunk to the
ground before him as she lowered his pants and boxers. She stared, wide eyed, admiring his
nakedness before tucking a stray hair behind her ear. Then she reached up and grasped him firmly
and lowering her head she took the very tip of him into her mouth.

“*Holy Shit Hermione!* I can’t believe you’re….you’re actually…..Holy shit! Oh my god that
feels good.”

Harry stared in disbelief as his best friend worked her way up and down slowly, letting him
slide deeper and deeper into her warm waiting mouth.

If what he had done to her made her feel *half* as good as what she was presently doing to
him, he swore to himself that he’d do *that* for her *whenever* she wanted. What she was
doing, which was beyond amazing, all the slow drawn out ins, followed by the slower than slow outs,
caused him to shutter, and his knees damn near buckled. The fact that *Hermione* was the one
doing *it* was almost more than he could stand.

While she was…. busy, Hermione reached around him and held his butt cheeks firmly in her hands.
Harry was started to clench and unclench them and being the clever witch she was, she assumed if
she didn’t stop soon, it would all be over. Harry had plastered his back against the wall and was
in fact just about ready to come when she stopped.

“Holy shit, that was amazing! You’re amazing!” he breathlessly uttered to her.

She smiled at him. “It was good?”

“GOOD! Good doesn’t even come close!”

With that Harry pulled her to her feet and spun her so her back was once again against the wall.
He then reached behind her right knee and lifted her leg as he leaned in and kissed her
passionately. She could feel his hardness pressing right up against her. Hermione broke their kiss
momentarily, and looked down. Then she reached between them and took him in her hands and guided
him slowly to her entrance. She kissed him again, and then hugged him tightly around his neck as he
eased his way into her.

“Oh God Harry,” she moaned into his ear.

“You okay? He whispered in return.

“Uh huh,” she nodded in reply as she felt him bury himself completely within her.

Once Harry was inside her all the way, he reached around and hoisted her up. She wrapped her
legs around him as he pinned her to the wall.

“Oh my god Harry…please….oh please don’t stop,” she implored him as he eased in and out of
her.

“I won’t….*I swear I won’t*, I don’t ever want to stop doing you, I-I mean *this*…I
mean….”

She chuckled slightly by his ear at his befuddlement, and rested her head on his shoulder.

But then…. she whispered, *ever so softly,* next to his ear.

“I love you.”

Harry was intensely concentrating on what he was doing, and he was breathing hard. It was
actually getting rather noisy in the hallway, between the moans and groans they were each making,
but he heard her. Damn right he heard her.

He moved his head from beside hers and looked her in the eyes. She kissed him quickly and pulled
back. He stared at her, and saw the love, and the passion, and the desire etched on her beautiful
face and he uttered a nearly breathless: “I love you too,” back to her. Through it all Harry
continuing on with what he was doing, which was pumping in and out of Hermione as fast as he
could.

Harry loved her, he had said it, and she could see it. Hermione hugged him more fiercely than
she ever had before.

Now that the declarations of love were over, Harry concentrated on finishing what they had
started. He wanted Hermione to come and he wanted to look at her face as she did. He slid in and
out of her in long steady strokes. He wanted her to feel him slide all the way in and then all the
way out. It was also stimulating as hell for him.

As he kept it up Hermione began getting louder and louder.

“Oh god Harry…. Please…..oh Harry…… oh I’m gonna…….oh god, oh god, Harrrryyy!”

She came, load and hard, and he stared at her beautiful face as she did.

She had gripped him tighter and tighter and screamed his name as she came. When it had passed,
her death grip around his neck loosed as she exhaustedly leaned on him. Watching her was the last
straw, just as she relaxed and slumped forward he groaned out her name and came as well. He came in
a tidal wave that exploded deep inside her, his best friend, and the love of his life.

When he finally stopped repeating her name, the two slumped forward against the wall and just
held each other, they were both totally spent.

Harry slowly eased out of her, and Hermione put her feet back on the ground but she continued to
hold on to him as her legs were still shaky from her orgasm.

Hermione’s head rested flat on Harry’s chest. She listened to his heartbeat as it began to slow
down. Harry held her close and rubbed her back.

“Harry?”

“Hmm?”

“I can’t believe we just did that.”

“Do you regret it?”

“No….but I still can’t believe you and I just had sex in a hallway.”

“I’ve been *dying* to do that since Friday.”

“Really?”

“Absolutely!”

“How come? Why? What brought all this on?”

He chuckled at her questions. With Hermione there were *always* questions.

“You know what it was?”

“No, I don’t.”

“It was your lips, from that plum you ate the other day at lunch.”

“Really?” she said surprised.

“Yeah really, they were **so** red, first from the plum, and then from that damn lollipop you
had that night. You drove me *insane*.”

She chuckled to herself and burrowed into his chest hugging him tightly.

“I’m glad. I’m glad this happened.”

“Yeah? Good, me too,” Harry said as he pulled himself together.

“Come on, let’s go,” and he began leading her down the hall.

“Go? Go where?”

“To find someplace a little move private that a hallway.”

“Why? Do you….? *Again*?” she sputtered at him in surprise as she fixed her blouse.

While Harry nodded his head to show her that yes ‘again’ was *exactly* what he had in mind
Hermione muttered under her breath in a barely audible whisper, “So, the lollipop did work.”

Harry stopped dead in his tracks and stared at her in disbelief, “*WHAT? What did you just
say?”*

Hermione just kept walking, and then spun to face him as she continued to walk backwards away
from him.

She gave him her best innocent face.

“Who *me?* I don’t know what you’re talking about, I didn’t say *anything.*” And then
she turned and ran, hair flying as she did so, down the empty corridor, laughing.

Harry was momentarily startled when she ran, but then he took off after her. He chased the
brunette down the hallway and as he did so he could not remember ever feeling happier.

But…..way in the back of his mind there was that one stray thought that *wasn’t* about
Hermione, and that thought was about getting *even* with Ginny Weasley.