"Not From The Start" Ron/Hermione, PG
Title: Not From The Start
Ship: Ron/Hermione
Rating: PG
Warnings: straight-up fluff
Summary: Ron did not love Hermione from the first moment he saw her.
Ron did not love Hermione from the first moment he saw her--in fact, he thought she was a right twat, an opinion he made clear in his high-pitched impressions of her spellcasting, which occured nightly in the boys' dormitory until Seamus yelled for him to shut the bloody hell up when the curtains to all the four posters were shut and Ron was still echoing Wingardium Leviosa.
He did not love her when they first became friends, in the very beginning, Hermione was a friend of Harry's with whom Ron begrudgingly associated and only over time did his icy thoughts on the matter of Hermione Granger melt to something he could define as a close acquaintance-ship. (He would not tell Hermione this, not because somewhere in him he knew they were friends and that would hurt her, but because she would go on for days about how "acquaintance-ship" was not even a word.) Besides, it was nice for someone to inform him of the dirt on his nose time to time, despite the condescending nature of this certain someone's words.
Even when he woke from being pummeled by a giant, white queen in an oversized game of chess, with Hermione trembling above him with tears in her big eyes, he did not love her, did not feel anything toward her, even though her tears were dripping from her cheeks and spilling onto his. He only wished that his brain would quit knocking around his skull the way the keys zoomed around the room he had only just left. Hermione was wiping a conjured cloth across his forehead when he woke and despite her fright her hand was still steady and her strokes so even and kind, not rough in the least, he faked his lapse of consciousness for a few moments longer just to feel the coolness of the water dripping on his skin. It had nothing to do with Hermione, he mused to himself in the hospital wing hours later. It was the water, the feel of the liquid dripping into his hair and on his sore arms when he finally sat up and Hermione began to soothe the rest of him before they embarked on their journey back to the unforbidden corridors of the school.
When Ron was coughing up slugs in the cramped warmth of Hagrid's cabin, and Hermione's soft fingers stroked his forehead, where damp hair clung to the skin, he still did not love her, but was thankful her steady hands were always available to touch his skin when he was ill, her touch was like his mother's: careful but with a certain force that he noticed in all of the women he knew, it was even evident in his younger sister, who seemed sweet but whose rage carried a particularly venomous bite. Sometimes he wondered if there was still some of Tom Riddle in her, but the chickens were fine, milling about the garden, and most of the time she was the same Ginny who never shut up.
Ron does know the first moment he loved Hermione, he remembers everything about the moment: the way the air tasted and how the light moved in her eyes and how her hair brushed her shoulders and how her lips pressed together when she was reading something intently, which in that moment, she was. He was thirteen and she was newly fourteen, with curves she didn't quite understand and so she hid, for Hermione did not want to display anything she was not entirely sure of, and she looked up at Ron, who was cross and sour at the loss of Scabbers, and something changed inside of him, something slipped and something came into focus. Hermione looked golden in the sunlight, as if she had stolen all the light from the world and dusted it across her, and Ron retreated, his heart swollen in his chest and tongue too big in his mouth to let him form words.
"What is it, Ron?" Hermione snapped, still golden and beautiful and bright.
"Your cat," he stammered, still strangled by his heart, which had newly taken up residence in his throat, "your cat killed Scabbers!"
The light only grew brighter with Hermione's quick temper. "What?"
"Your ruddy cat had Scabbers for lunch! I bet he sucked on the bones afterward and tried to have Neville's toad for desert!"
Further in the common room, Neville was made aware of the row between his fellow Gryffindors by the mention of his toad being devoured by Crookshanks, and he rushed up the stairs to check and see if Ron's claim was true.
Hermione's hand, which had been tangled in Crookshank's orange fur, was now raised, her finger pointed close at Ron, wavering only slightly with her anger. The cat, disturbed by his owner's sudden move, arched his back and hissed at Ron before scampering quickly to the windowsill, padding around in circles before resting and watching the argument take place across the common room with lazy, disinterested eyes.
After a moment, when her hand fluttered back down to her lap, expression displayed more hurt than anger, her lips tight together and eyes big with melancholy and confusion. Several thoughts raced through Ron's brain, attempting to reach the finish line that was his mouth, one of the thoughts suggesting apology to smooth out the wrinkles on Hermione's forehead while the other (the thought that reached his mouth first) offered to continue the arguement, for how dare Hermione look so pained, how can she hurt him with that look?
Flabbergasted, Ron watched as Hermione gathered her books and quills and parchment, spilling ink that she was too flustered to remove from the armchair, and she clumsily stomped up the stairs.
After Hermione's departure, Neville came down from the boys' dorm, gently holding his uneaten toad in his hands.
"Crookshanks didn't get at Trevor. What's the matter?" asked Neville after Ron stared blankly but did not reply. "Cat got your tongue?"
Ron's voice came back to him slowly, and with much effort he replied, "Something like that."
fin
Ship: Ron/Hermione
Rating: PG
Warnings: straight-up fluff
Summary: Ron did not love Hermione from the first moment he saw her.
Ron did not love Hermione from the first moment he saw her--in fact, he thought she was a right twat, an opinion he made clear in his high-pitched impressions of her spellcasting, which occured nightly in the boys' dormitory until Seamus yelled for him to shut the bloody hell up when the curtains to all the four posters were shut and Ron was still echoing Wingardium Leviosa.
He did not love her when they first became friends, in the very beginning, Hermione was a friend of Harry's with whom Ron begrudgingly associated and only over time did his icy thoughts on the matter of Hermione Granger melt to something he could define as a close acquaintance-ship. (He would not tell Hermione this, not because somewhere in him he knew they were friends and that would hurt her, but because she would go on for days about how "acquaintance-ship" was not even a word.) Besides, it was nice for someone to inform him of the dirt on his nose time to time, despite the condescending nature of this certain someone's words.
Even when he woke from being pummeled by a giant, white queen in an oversized game of chess, with Hermione trembling above him with tears in her big eyes, he did not love her, did not feel anything toward her, even though her tears were dripping from her cheeks and spilling onto his. He only wished that his brain would quit knocking around his skull the way the keys zoomed around the room he had only just left. Hermione was wiping a conjured cloth across his forehead when he woke and despite her fright her hand was still steady and her strokes so even and kind, not rough in the least, he faked his lapse of consciousness for a few moments longer just to feel the coolness of the water dripping on his skin. It had nothing to do with Hermione, he mused to himself in the hospital wing hours later. It was the water, the feel of the liquid dripping into his hair and on his sore arms when he finally sat up and Hermione began to soothe the rest of him before they embarked on their journey back to the unforbidden corridors of the school.
When Ron was coughing up slugs in the cramped warmth of Hagrid's cabin, and Hermione's soft fingers stroked his forehead, where damp hair clung to the skin, he still did not love her, but was thankful her steady hands were always available to touch his skin when he was ill, her touch was like his mother's: careful but with a certain force that he noticed in all of the women he knew, it was even evident in his younger sister, who seemed sweet but whose rage carried a particularly venomous bite. Sometimes he wondered if there was still some of Tom Riddle in her, but the chickens were fine, milling about the garden, and most of the time she was the same Ginny who never shut up.
Ron does know the first moment he loved Hermione, he remembers everything about the moment: the way the air tasted and how the light moved in her eyes and how her hair brushed her shoulders and how her lips pressed together when she was reading something intently, which in that moment, she was. He was thirteen and she was newly fourteen, with curves she didn't quite understand and so she hid, for Hermione did not want to display anything she was not entirely sure of, and she looked up at Ron, who was cross and sour at the loss of Scabbers, and something changed inside of him, something slipped and something came into focus. Hermione looked golden in the sunlight, as if she had stolen all the light from the world and dusted it across her, and Ron retreated, his heart swollen in his chest and tongue too big in his mouth to let him form words.
"What is it, Ron?" Hermione snapped, still golden and beautiful and bright.
"Your cat," he stammered, still strangled by his heart, which had newly taken up residence in his throat, "your cat killed Scabbers!"
The light only grew brighter with Hermione's quick temper. "What?"
"Your ruddy cat had Scabbers for lunch! I bet he sucked on the bones afterward and tried to have Neville's toad for desert!"
Further in the common room, Neville was made aware of the row between his fellow Gryffindors by the mention of his toad being devoured by Crookshanks, and he rushed up the stairs to check and see if Ron's claim was true.
Hermione's hand, which had been tangled in Crookshank's orange fur, was now raised, her finger pointed close at Ron, wavering only slightly with her anger. The cat, disturbed by his owner's sudden move, arched his back and hissed at Ron before scampering quickly to the windowsill, padding around in circles before resting and watching the argument take place across the common room with lazy, disinterested eyes.
After a moment, when her hand fluttered back down to her lap, expression displayed more hurt than anger, her lips tight together and eyes big with melancholy and confusion. Several thoughts raced through Ron's brain, attempting to reach the finish line that was his mouth, one of the thoughts suggesting apology to smooth out the wrinkles on Hermione's forehead while the other (the thought that reached his mouth first) offered to continue the arguement, for how dare Hermione look so pained, how can she hurt him with that look?
Flabbergasted, Ron watched as Hermione gathered her books and quills and parchment, spilling ink that she was too flustered to remove from the armchair, and she clumsily stomped up the stairs.
After Hermione's departure, Neville came down from the boys' dorm, gently holding his uneaten toad in his hands.
"Crookshanks didn't get at Trevor. What's the matter?" asked Neville after Ron stared blankly but did not reply. "Cat got your tongue?"
Ron's voice came back to him slowly, and with much effort he replied, "Something like that."
fin