Chapter 3


I woke up and stretched out my arms. The sunlight was streaming through the curtains, which had been drawn back. I began to panic, thinking I was late for classes when I remembered that it was Saturday. I also recalled that we would go to Hogsmead this afternoon and I became excited. Ron and I had planned to sneak away sometime during the trip. Harry had even encouraged it in a way when he asked if I would keep Ron busy so he could spend some time alone with Ginny.

I got out of bed and rummaged through my trunk for my favorite pair of jeans and my warm sweater, preparing for a cold December day. I glanced out the window and saw snowflakes drifting down, sticking on the panes of glass, and melting away. I put on my boots, grabbed my hat and mittens, and headed from the dormitory down to the common room.

When I reached the bottom of the stairway, I saw Ron standing in the corner of the common room, and even better, I didn’t see anyone else. He spotted me and smiled. I returned it and walked over toward him, but before I could reach him, Lavender Brown cut in front of me and got to him first.

“Hi Ronald,” she giggled. Ron’s eyes went from her and over her shoulder to me. He apologized by the look on his face. I raised my eyebrows, indicating that this was just another effect of our secret relationship keeping us apart. I strode over to the couch by the fire and I flopped down on the cushions, sighing as I did so. I glanced over at them. Lavender was flaunting her annoying, however bubbly, personality and would occasionally touch his arm or smile flirtatiously. Ron seemed uncomfortable and shifted his weight from each leg every few seconds. He kept stealing glances at me, begging me to intervene somehow.

I got up and walked over to Ron and tugged lightly on his sleeve. “You know, we better head down. Harry’s probably waiting for us. Bye Lavender.” I added before pulling Ron with me, heading for the door. Her icy stare followed me until we exited the common room. Ron blew a sigh of relief and smirked at me.

“Thanks for that Hermione,” he said gratefully. He scanned the staircases before he turned to give me a quick kiss and grabbed my hand and we continued to the Great Hall for breakfast. When a group of first years passed, we dropped hands and casually continued down the steps. We walked down to the Gryffindor table and I sat down across from Harry and Ron sat next to me. Ron began to nudge my foot under the table and I rubbed back.

“What took you guys so long?” Harry asked while he piled what seemed to be another helping of eggs onto his plate. I glanced at Ron who grinned back at me before answering.

“Well I was waiting for Hermione and then I got intercepted by Lavender,” Ron said rolling his eyes. I couldn’t help but feel a little jealous. I knew Ron didn’t feel anything for her, but it hurt me to know that if he wanted to, he could have an open and public relationship with her, unlike me.

“Oh,” Harry said with the same amount of loathing in his voice. “I understand. Speak of the devil.” Lavender walked into the hall and glared in my direction and sat on the other end of the table next to Pavarti. I turned back to my food and began absent-mindedly eating. “What’s her problem?” Harry questioned, directing it at me.

“I just tore Ron away from their conversation is all.” I continued to pick at my food and I felt Ron’s hand on my knee. He gave me an apologetic smile before resuming eating. He knew how I felt about her, I had told him. But he assured me that he felt absolutely nothing for her and everything for me.

“Well we better get going,” Harry said standing up from the table. Ron and I followed and all three of us walked out the front doors and headed for Hogsmead. As we neared the village, Harry nudged me and winked. That was my sign to take Ron away so he could catch up to Ginny who was walking not far ahead.

“Well there’s a new bookstore up the road,” I said directing my comment at Ron. “I’d like to go see what its like.”

“Hey Ron, why don’t you go with Hermione to check it out?” Harry asked. “I have a- um- few errands to run.” Ron glanced at me, a look of surprise on his face. He seemed shocked at how easy it was to go off by ourselves for a while. Then Ron followed Harry’s gaze to his sister. His ears began to flame and he clenched his fists. I lightly touched his arm and raised my eyebrows to say “calm down”. He took a deep breath and unclenched his fists and smiled.

“Sure let’s go, Hermione.” Ron pulled my arm through his, linking us together. We waved goodbye to a dumbfounded Harry who seemed confused about our sudden friendliness toward each other. Ron, however, didn’t seem to care for the moment.

“What’s gotten into you?” I posed to Ron as we made our way to the bookstore next to the Hog’s Head at the end of the street. He beamed down at me. “Why are you suddenly so happy?” I added.

“Number one, I’m happy for Harry and Ginny.” I was shocked by this statement. “I’m happy if they get to be at least nearly as happy as I am when I’m with you.” This made me smile back. We reached the bookstore and walked in as a bell tinkled on the door. I led Ron to the back shelves past the bookkeeper, a plump old woman with wispy red curls atop her head.

“And number two.” Ron kissed me unexpectedly and I dropped the book I had been examining. He laughed and picked it up from the floor, peaking around the corner to see that the woman hadn’t heard anything. “I get to spend the rest of my afternoon with the most beautiful girl in the world.” I set the book back on the shelf and pulled Ron back to the corner of the bookshop, far away from the old woman. “You didn’t really come here to read, did you Miss Granger?”

I smirked and shook my head. He pulled my coat off and dropped it on the floor along with my hat and added his jacket to the pile. I ran my fingers through his snow stricken hair and gazed at him. He was perfect, in my mind. He reached for my waist and brought me to him. I reached my lips up to meet his. We kissed slowly, taking in every part of each other. The kiss intensified and I pushed Ron up against the bookshelf and it knocked against the wall.

“What’s going on back there?” the little old woman cried. We tried to stifle our laughter. I turned my head to answer her and Ron began to caress my neck.

“Oh just bumped into the bookcase is all. No probl-” I replied, trying to keep my focus on answering the bookkeeper, but it was no use. Ron made his way back to lips and kissed me, his mouth parted. My tongue prodded the inside of his cheek as his fingers danced along my back underneath my sweater. I couldn’t seem to bring him any closer, even though I tried. We snogged for what seemed like hours, but might have only been a matter of minutes. Ron’s hands came to rest in the back pockets of my jeans and mine had come to be knotted in his red locks. We suddenly heard a foot tapping on the floor. We stopped and both turned pale.

“Oh I won’t tell anyone about this, uh, secret love affair under one condition. Ron has to be mine, at least when anyone else is around to see. Does that seem fair? I mean or I could go tell your good friend Harry. But, how would he feel if he heard his two best friends were sneaking around behind his back and didn’t bother to tell him about their budding relationship first? I don’t think he would like that. I don’t think he would like that one bit.”