Disclaimer: See Part 1.
Author's Note: Thanks, everyone, who read and reviewed the last part. I hope this next part satisfies.
Masquerade
Part 3
Harry drifted awake slowly, reaching out one lazy arm for Helena-to find just his bed.
Half-reluctantly, he cracked open one eye and then in another moment, opened both eyes as he realized she was gone. He paused, half-hoping that she might have just gone to the loo, but the utter silence in the flat disproved that and he pushed himself up, the last remnants of sleep leaving his mind to be replaced with something like depression.
She was gone.
She must have just crept out in the night. Just as if... just as if... it had only been a meaningless one-night stand.
His gaze fell on his glasses on the nightstand by the bed-or, more accurately, the piece of paper beneath it and he almost scrambled over to grab it, slipping on his glasses hastily.
And then stared at the note, feeling the vague beginnings of something like hurt inside his chest.
Harry, thank you for a wonderful night. I'll never forget it.
Helena.
Only those two brief sentences and nothing more.
He let the note fall from suddenly nerve-less fingers as he fell back onto his bed. Was that all their night together had meant to her, then? He'd thought there had been a connection, that it had been the start of something special.
He'd been wrong. It really must have just been a one-night stand to her. And if he hadn't been thinking in those terms, well... he'd been wrong. That was all. He'd made a mistake. It had just been one night of sex-great, fantastic, mind-blowing sex-but nothing more. And there was absolutely no reason to feel so disappointed or oddly hurt.
Or so he told himself bracingly.
Harry sighed and shut his eyes, and then took off his glasses so he could turn over and bury his face in the pillow, wishing he could just fall back asleep, wishing he hadn't woken up yet in the first place.
He pushed himself up again. He could still smell the scent of her on his pillow, and the scent of her brought back the memories of everything else, too-the feel of her, the taste of her, the softness of her skin...
Damn it. Just the scent of her on his pillow was arousing him again.
He had the niggling sense that the scent was somehow familiar to him-but of course it was familiar. He'd smelled it just the night before while dancing with Helena and afterwards...
Harry stood up abruptly. A shower was what he needed, to clear his mind-and his heart?-from these futile memories and thoughts about Helena.
He glanced down at himself ruefully. A cold shower was what he needed.
Harry was eating a piece of toast and staring moodily into his cup of pumpkin juice when Ron finally stumbled out of his room, yawning. "Morning, Ron."
"Morning, mate." Ron paused and then added, belatedly, "Happy birthday."
"Thanks." Harry managed a somewhat wan smile. Thanks to Helena's sneaking out in the middle of the night, he wasn't feeling particularly happy, but that was his own problem.
It was evidence of how groggy Ron still was that it was another minute or two before Ron blinked, looked around, and then asked, with a grin that bordered on a smirk, "Say, where's the girl you left the club with?"
"She left," Harry answered briefly, his tone curt enough that anyone else would have taken the hint and abandoned the subject. Anyone but Ron, that was.
Ron's answer was a hoot of laughter. "Which means she was here to begin with." Ron wiggled his brows at Harry in an exaggerated leer. "See, I told you a shag would do you good. So, how was she? I only got a glimpse of her in the club but it looked like she had some nice curves."
Harry slanted a glare at Ron. "Shut up, Ron." Normally, he could shrug off Ron's occasionally crude humor but this morning, for some reason, he found he'd lost most of his tolerance.
Ron gave Harry a curious but still mostly teasing glance. "Y'know, for someone who just had a shag, you're awfully touchy. What, was she not a good shag?"
Harry abruptly put down his cup with enough force it was a minor miracle it didn't break (or would have been a minor miracle if Hermione had not placed Unbreakable Charms on all their dishes and cups when he and Ron had first moved in to the flat.) "That's enough, Ron!"
His voice didn't rise much but there was enough suppressed intensity in it that Ron was momentarily subdued.
There were a few moments of rather strained silence which Ron broke by saying, mildly, "Mum said we should get to the Burrow around noon, if that works for you."
Harry was immediately ashamed of himself. It wasn't as if Ron had really said anything offensive; he was over-reacting to the morning's disappointment of waking up to find Helena gone. He'd only just met her, he reminded himself. And so what if they had had sex?
Really great, life-altering sex, an irritating little voice in his head spoke up and he promptly squelched the thought-only to have another voice pipe up that it hadn't felt as if he'd just met Helena. No, after those first few minutes, he'd had the odd sense that he'd known her for years...
If he'd been more given to sentimental fancy, he supposed he might even have thought that it had seemed as if he'd been waiting his entire life to meet her-except that couldn't possibly be the case.
He'd imagined it. It had been pure, wishful thinking on his part, he told himself firmly. Wishful thinking to try to convince himself that what he'd felt for her hadn't only been physical lust-to convince himself that their night together had been the start of something good, something real and lasting, and not just a one-night stand.
Whatever the case, it was over and done with. He would put Helena from his mind, he told himself.
With that resolution in mind-and in the spirit of conciliation since Ron hadn't deserved his snapping at him-Harry grinned at Ron. "Maybe we should show up closer to 1 rather than noon so we can avoid having to help getting things set up."
Ron returned the grin. "Now that's a brilliant idea." He paused and then added, "But when Mum asks why we're late, I'm going to tell her it was all your idea. She won't yell at you."
Harry made a face at Ron and threw a few crumbs from his toast at Ron. Ron ducked, laughing, and Harry knew that his bad temper had been forgotten.
If only he could forget about Helena so easily, he thought, half-wistfully and half-gloomily.
~
Hermione was late.
That was almost the first thing he noticed when he walked into the yard of the Burrow that afternoon.
Hermione was late. In anyone else, he wouldn't have thought anything of it but in Hermione-well, Hermione was never late except in extreme circumstances. He certainly couldn't remember the last time Hermione had been late to one of their get-togethers.
He accepted Mrs. Weasley's hug and kiss on his cheek before he asked, "Hermione's not here yet? Did she mention any reason for it?"
Mrs. Weasley shook her head. "No, we haven't heard from her. I assumed a patient got rushed in as she was about to leave."
Which would, normally, have been a plausible explanation but Harry remembered that Hermione had said she had all day off today, for his birthday, so she shouldn't have even gone in to St. Mungo's, let alone been delayed by work.
It was odd and a little unsettling. He knew, in some corner of his mind, that he was over-reacting but after the long months of the War, he'd acquired a healthy dislike of anything out of the ordinary because, for him, anything out of the ordinary usually meant something dangerous, if not actually life-threatening.
Hermione being late-even for his birthday party-was not the sort of event that should trigger worry-and yet... Harry couldn't help the flicker of unease, the beginnings of concern. He knew Hermione and he knew, too, that she would not be late for his birthday party unless something extraordinary had happened. And in his experience, anything extraordinary was almost inevitably bad.
He managed to smile and finish greeting the rest of the Weasleys and everyone else that Mrs. Weasley had gathered together, was pleasantly surprised to see Professors McGonagall and Sprout, as well as Hagrid. But even as he smiled and laughed, one part of his mind remained on Hermione and her inexplicable absence.
Finally, just when he'd decided that if Hermione didn't show up within the next five minutes, he was going to Floo call her flat and, if she wasn't there, was going to go to St. Mungo's himself to find her and make sure all was well, Hermione arrived.
His back was to her as he talked to Mr. Weasley and Bill but he knew she was there, somehow sensed her arrival even before he heard the familiar sound of her voice. He excused himself from Mr. Weasley and Bill so he could greet her, catching up with her as she turned away from Mrs. Weasley.
"Hermione, you made it. I was just wondering where you were," he said, as casually as if he hadn't spent the time since he'd arrived worrying about her.
"Oh, Harry, hi. Happy birthday! You've got perfect weather for a party today, too!"
Harry blinked, a little taken aback. There was something... not quite right... about Hermione. Her smile seemed a shade too bright and she wasn't meeting his eyes, was making a show of looking around.
He drew nearer, putting a hand on her arm. "Why were you late? I was a little worried," he admitted. Whatever it was, he expected Hermione would be herself again, quick to reassure him that all was well; it was her way, in the few times he ever admitted aloud to worrying.
Hermione stilled, stiffening almost imperceptibly at his touch. "Oh, some work just came up. It was nothing, really, Harry. Oh, I should go say hello to Neville. I wanted to ask him something."
So saying, she left him quickly, leaving Harry feeling decidedly confused and not at all reassured. No, there was something wrong, he decided, something preoccupying Hermione. He could tell.
In the course of the next half hour or so, Harry quickly revised his thinking. It wasn't only that something was wrong; that 'something' clearly had to do with him. Hermione was behaving oddly around him.
She went from chatting with Neville and Ginny to exchanging a few laughing words with Ron and then, went on to talk to Mr. Weasley, Bill and Fleur, Charlie, George, Luna, Ginny and Neville, Dean, Seamus, Oliver Wood, Kingsley Shacklebolt, Hestia Jones, Professor Sprout, Hagrid, and Professor McGonagall-or, in other words, every other person present at the party except for him.
Harry smiled and laughed as he talked with Ron but he kept half an eye and half his attention on Hermione. Yes, it was definitely something to do with him.
It wasn't that Hermione had not spent much time with him; that, in and of itself, wasn't so unusual. What was odd was the fact that she had never even glanced in his direction. Usually, he realized, even when they were both speaking with other people, Hermione had a way of glancing around and catching his eyes and they would exchange fleeting smiles or looks of shared amusement or understanding. It was just their way and not something he'd ever really thought about before. Now, today, Hermione had yet to glance his way even once. And he felt suddenly, strangely bereft-lonely-- without those shared glances with Hermione.
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Hermione reach up to push her hair back a little impatiently and, for no reason he could identify, his eyes were caught and held by the curve of her jaw as she faced away from him as she talked to Professor McGonagall. And for one crazy second, he could only stare, suddenly mesmerized by the line of her jaw where it met her neck. His mouth was abruptly dry and he could only think-stupidly-that he wanted to bury his lips in that spot, that lovely curve where her jaw met her neck.
He had a sudden flash of bittersweet-and arousing-memory, of kissing that same spot on Helena's neck, of the taste of her skin, of the way she'd gasped and reached for him...
He abruptly hauled his thoughts back from where they'd wandered, appalled at his own insanity-his stupidity. Helena had been a one-night stand; she'd made that perfectly clear by her own actions. So he wasn't likely to ever see Helena again-and Hermione was Hermione, his best friend Hermione. He wasn't even attracted to Hermione in that way-not really. He wasn't. He couldn't be.
It was only that he hadn't had a shag in a long while until Helena and then she'd been so.... hot... and his body was missing that, missing her.
That was all. It had to be all.
And Hermione was still not looking at him. It was as if he wasn't really there at all, for all the attention Hermione had paid him after her quick, even perfunctory greeting.
So much for having a happy birthday, he reflected half-wryly, half-glumly. First, Helena had made her lack of interest in any sort of real relationship with him clear by leaving the way she had. And now Hermione-his best friend-was acting as if he was a stranger.
And it hurt. He'd been disappointed to wake up and find Helena gone, yes, but for Hermione to ignore him… that hurt him on a much more fundamental level. This was Hermione, after all, and he wasn't sure he knew how to function without her as his friend. She was the one constant in his life since the moment he'd met her, even more than Ron.
And he couldn't stand to have her ignoring him.
On the thought, he found himself crossing the lawn to where Hermione was talking to Professor McGonagall, almost before he'd consciously decided to do so.
Professor McGonagall unbent enough to give him a quick smile of greeting, as she continued telling Hermione about some research that was being conducted.
Hermione glanced over at him as he approached and he could almost see her entire body still, tense, as he stopped beside her. Harry inwardly flinched-what had he done?
He waited until Professor McGonagall stopped speaking before he interrupted, "Sorry, Professor, but I wanted to ask Hermione something important."
"Of course, Harry. We can continue our discussion later, Hermione," Professor McGonagall added.
Harry put his hand automatically on Hermione's back to lead her away, somewhat removed from everyone else, and tried very hard not to wince at how Hermione seemed to stiffen at his touch. She didn't quite flinch away from him but she was certainly not at ease.
"What's wrong, Hermione?" The question was blunt, although he kept his voice quiet, mindful of the people around them.
Hermione gave a little laugh that sounded almost natural and would probably have fooled almost anyone else-but not him. "Nothing's wrong. Why do you ask?"
"Hermione." He invested a wealth of meaning in her name.
"Really, Harry, it's nothing," she insisted, her eyes flashing up to his and then just as quickly looking away.
Harry sighed. "Are you mad at me?" He didn't even try to hide the hurt he felt, knew it was clear in his tone. With anyone else, he might not have been so obvious-but then with anyone else, he wouldn't have felt so hurt either.
That got a reaction. Hermione's eyes flew up to meet his and remained. "Of course not, Harry! Why would you think that?"
"Hermione, you barely spoke ten words to me when you arrived and you haven't looked at me at all this entire afternoon."
"I'm not mad at you, Harry. I- I'm just a little preoccupied today but I'm not mad at you. Honestly, Harry, I'm not."
"What's preoccupying you? Can I help?"
Hermione's expression seemed to freeze for a moment and Harry mentally frowned, but then Hermione shook her head, giving him a fleeting ghost of a smile. "No, thanks, Harry. I'll be okay. I- I'm sorry you thought I was mad at you."
Harry lifted one shoulder into a shrug and gave her a slight smile. "It's okay. I just don't like thinking you're mad at me, that's all."
Hermione's expression softened and she gave him a quick, soft smile, one of the affectionate smiles she occasionally gave him. "Well, I'm not mad at you, I promise."
He was never sure why but something about her smile, something about the honest affection in it, caught at his heart and his mind.
And then in one quick, impulsive movement, she went up on her toes and brushed her lips against his cheek.
And he froze. He was somehow very aware of the warmth from her body, the touch of her breath against his cheek and then the soft brush of her lips-and, fleeting as it was, he reacted, feeling a flare of heat.
He dragged in a quick breath-
That scent. He caught the scent of her hair in a fleeting whiff as she drew back and left, moving away from him to return to Professor McGonagall.
He stared.
It was impossible.
It couldn't be.
For one finite moment, his mind flatly rejected what his senses, his body, were telling him.
Then reality fractured.
It was her.
Impossible. Unbelievable. Shocking. But true.
It was Hermione.
Hermione had been Helena.
Same height. Same figure-now that he looked, he could see that. Same scent.
In the chaotic tumult of his mind (and heart), one thought-one inane thought-stood out in his mind: well, now he knew why he'd felt so comfortable with Helena from the first.
He suddenly realized who it was that Helena had reminded him of-and why. Helena had reminded him of Hermione.
It was Hermione.
Harry's entire body froze; he could swear his heart stopped.
He'd had sex with Hermione. It had been Hermione that had kissed him like that, touched him like that… His mind flashed back to the way she'd pleasured him, how she'd licked him and-
He shoved the thought away, trying (with less success) to squelch the flare of arousal at the memory.
It was her.
Hermione had been Helena-but why? He could guess that she must have used a small glamour to disguise herself-but why? Had she wanted to trick him-had she been laughing at him all along for not recognizing her-but no. No no no! Almost before the thought had fully formed in his mind, he rejected it. He didn't understand why but he knew she hadn't set out to deceive him out of any malice. He might be confused about her reasons-he'd never felt so utterly at a loss in his life-but he knew Hermione hadn't only meant to trick him. She wouldn't. She would never. He might not know anything else but he did know that. He knew it the way he knew his own name, the way he knew how to fly. Even if nothing else in his life made any sense-and at the moment, he rather felt that way-he knew he trusted her, trusted that she would never deliberately deceive him.
His mind circled back helplessly to the one stark fact, the searing memories, from the night before. He'd had sex with Hermione…
He- she- his thoughts stuttered.
"Harry!"
Harry started and turned to see Ron, giving him an odd look.
"What's up, mate? And why are you staring at Hermione like she just sprouted another head?"
Harry bit back a burst of hysterical laughter. If Ron only knew…
"I- it's- uh- I was just… thinking… about something…" he stammered.
Ron gave him one last, curious look before he shrugged a little. "Okay, whatever you say. Mum's about to bring out the cake."
The cake. Oh, right. It was his birthday, Harry reminded himself, trying to regain some sense of… of… reality.
He felt as if the world had tilted on its axis, as if the sky had suddenly turned green and the grass had turned blue.
He'd had sex with Hermione!
He shoved the thought away. He couldn't think of that now. Later. He would think about it all later. He would try to understand this strange, new reality later.
But for all his efforts to push it out of his mind, the rest of his birthday party was a loss, at least as far as Harry himself was concerned. It was an exercise in endurance and (im)patience since no matter how he tried, he could not entirely shake off his preoccupation. He managed-just barely-to keep from staring at Hermione, from trying to recognize Helena's features in Hermione's-but keeping his thoughts away from Hermione was completely impossible. And it was not helped by the fact that he was incredibly aware of Hermione. Even without looking at her, he knew when she smiled, when she laughed, knew where she was and who she was talking to at any given moment. His usual awareness of Hermione had been magnified until he could almost swear he could sense her, could feel her breathing even from across the lawn, as if the air was somehow different just because she was there.
Really, given the complete confusion of his thoughts and emotions, he actually thought he did rather well at hiding it and acting like his usual self. But by the end of the afternoon-the party being somewhat truncated since Harry was not, for once, at all inclined to linger at the Burrow-he'd had to be jolted out of his thoughts several times, Ron had given him several odd looks, Mrs. Weasley had asked him, twice, if he was feeling well, Mr. Weasley had asked him if everything was alright, and he'd almost been knocked to his knees by a pat on his shoulder from Hagrid, coming when he hadn't been prepared for it.
All told, Harry had never been so thankful in his life to leave the Burrow and return to the privacy of his flat. And for the first time, he could not concentrate on a Quidditch match that Ron watched via Remote Apparition after dinner. He stayed to watch it (because he knew if he didn't, Ron would probably have sent him to St. Mungo's to make sure he wasn't ill) but he could not concentrate on it.
He suddenly remembered how Helena-Hermione-had mentioned Drakesmith's Wronski Feint and suppressed a sudden laugh. She'd heard of it all right; she had, after all, been right beside him and Ron when it had happened and heard all of his exclamations over it.
And how Helena had claimed only to have met Hermione a few times…
Helena. Hermione.
He could think of nothing else, memories of the evening and their one night together playing through his mind. He wavered between feeling a little annoyed-at Hermione for whatever had made her pretend to be Helena but mostly at himself for not realizing who Helena really was, when, in hindsight, it was so obvious-and amusement at the irony of some of what Helena had said and arousal at the memory of how hot Helena-Hermione!-had been and, overshadowing it all, was utter confusion. He was confused about why Hermione would have done such a thing and even more confused about what he was supposed to do now.
He'd had sex with Hermione. He'd been aroused by Hermione-still was aroused by Hermione, by the memory of her body. He wanted Hermione.
And he didn't know what he was going to do about it.
He couldn't simply act on his desires-that would only risk a friendship he could not risk. He knew that without even having to think about it; now that he knew, he could never have 'just sex' with Hermione.
But he didn't know if he could have-if he wanted to have-anything more than 'just sex' with Hermione either. Which brought him back to his original questions-why had Hermione pretended to be Helena and just what was he supposed to do about it?
~To be continued…~