He looked around, checking for people sneakily spying on him. No, the coast was clear. He grabbed at the book, hurriedly stuffing it into his shopping bag then quickly placing his Quidditch robes on top of it. He grinned to himself, very macho.
Once in the Gryffindor Common Room, he ran up to his dormitory, closed the door, placed a quick locking charm on it and opened his bag. Inside it, he found his Quidditch robes and cast them aside, he wasn’t looking for them. He reached his hand into the bag again and drew out a large, golden stained book with a pink tassel running through the middle. On the cover was a large, pure white quill writing in pink ink the words, ‘
How To Write a Love Letter by Romeo’. He shook his head; stupid name.
He opened the book to the first page and found yellowing parchment covered in glistening hearts. What in the love of Merlin had he gotten himself into?
But there, on the page appeared the words of the book, so Ron bent down and read what they said.
Welcome to ‘How To Write A Love Letter’ - your handy self help guide on the art of writing a love letter., DO NOT under ANY circumstances tell your love about this book. It will RUIN the ENTIRE point of it.
1. First pick a suitable candidate for your affections (preferably someone who won’t rip the letter up into small pieces and tell everyone about it (it also helps if you do actually like them).
Well, that bit was easy, Ron supposed. He definitely knew of someone he would like to give the letter to. The only problem was, would she rip the letter up into small pieces as the book said and tell everyone about it? He didn’t think so. She wouldn’t do that, or so he hoped.
2. Decide what parchment said letter will be written on. Perhaps a love heart background? Or smelling of perfume?
This was a little trickier. Did she even like love heart or scented paper? He’d have to ask her. But how could he drop that into casual conversation? He could see it now;
“Yeah, Quidditch was great, shame about us losing. By any chance do you happen to like decorated paper smelling of roses?”
“What are you talking about?”
“Nothing, nothing.”
She would look at him as though fearful for his health and say, “Okay then. Are you sure that you‘re alright?”
That really wasn’t a good thought, he'd have to ask her in a much more subtle way. But how? Sending her a letter asking her would be pointless. First of all she’d know who Pig was and he wasn’t keen on using a school owl, he’d used enough of them to last him a lifetime. Secondly, he might as well tell her he liked her in that letter, not send her two, - he didn’t want to seem desperate.
Ron shook his head - the situation was getting more confusing by the minute, and his head was starting to hurt. He decided he’d worry about it in the morning and go on to the next step.
3. Make sure you have some RED INK at hand as BLACK does not look good. Far too grubby. Also now would be the time to decide what new writing you will write the letter in or he/she will know it’s YOU sending the LETTER.
Please Note: Stencils are enclosed in the back of this book.
Wow, he’s thought of things I couldn’t have done, thought Ron,
who knew about the red ink? He also seems to have a strange fixation with capital letters, but I’ll overlook that. Ron was contemplating buying some of the red ink needed for the letter at the next Hogsmeade trip, when a noise at the door brought him back from his thoughts. He had locked the door and now someone was shouting at him to let them in. He stuffed the book back into his bag which he threw onto the floor and cast a charm towards the door to unlock it.
“Bloody hell Ron, why’d you lock the door?” said Dean, walking into the dormitory frowning.
“Oh, I…no reason,” replied Ron, his eyes shifting to the floor below him.
Dean looked from Ron’s crimson cheeks and wide eyes to his ruffled bed sheets, and a grin appeared on his face.
“Oh, right, I get what you were doing,” he said, raising his eyebrows up and down. “But you know, you could have just used the shower instead of locking the door,”
“What? What’s the shower got to do with anything?” He looked at Dean’s wide eyes which seemed to convey a message to him. “What - no, I wasn’t doing
that!”
“It’s alright, Ron, perfectly normal,” said Dean, who picked up his Transfiguration book, winked at Ron and then headed down the stairs.
Oh great, thought Ron,
stupid damn book. He should never have got the stupid thing in the first place. He reached to where his bag lay on the floor and pushed it as far under his bed as he could before following Dean down the staircase.
As he reached the bottom of the staircase, he realised that no one was in the Common Room, it must be dinner. Feeling a little annoyed that Harry hadn’t waited for him to come down, he turned on his heel to go towards the Great Hall. Suddenly he stopped, a bright piece of parchment on the notice board caught his attention, showing the next date for Hogsmeade: two weeks away.
Excellent, he thought to himself,
excellent.
Ron was in Hogsmeade, eating an arrangement of chocolate and it was nearly Christmas. Life was good. Hermione tugged on his arm. “Come
on Ron, I need to buy Christmas presents for my parents.” He let her pull him through the snow covered streets to a small shop glistening with tiny red and gold stars that hung from the ceiling. “Isn’t it pretty,” said Hermione, marvelling at the decorations.
Ron just grunted. Did she really expect him to say ‘yes’?
After Hermione had got her parent’s presents, they headed towards the Three Broomsticks in an attempt to see Harry and Ginny.
“They better not be doing anything dodgy when we walk in,” Ron said to Hermione, who laughed.
“Like what? Heaven forbid enjoying each other’s company?” She laughed again. “I thought you were okay with them going out?”
“I am, I just don’t like seeing proof of it! There’s only so much I can take without being permanently scarred!”
Hermione shook her head and muttered something under her breath. “Okay then, do you want to go somewhere else?”
Ron was just about to shake his head when a thought popped into his head. “How about the Post Office? I need some new ink.”
Sat down on his bed in the Gryffindor Boys dormitories, Ron rubbed his hands together in a pathetic impression of an evil dictator. “Stages two and three are now in motion.”
In the Post Office, he had bought the necessary red ink and found out what paper his intended receiver of his letter liked. By pointing all the different kinds out and asking Hermione which one she thought was the nicest, he was sure that even if she didn‘t like his letter, she‘d want to keep the paper.
He grabbed the book from under his bed and opened it to the second page.
4. Decide how the letter will be presented. Will it be a poem, a sonnet or a riddle? Also, it is advised you DO NOT write in your usual style.
Hmmm, this is a hard one, Ron thought, biting his lip in concentration. He’d never been the type to be able to write a poem, never mind for someone else. He gulped and grabbed his parchment and ink. Here goes, Ron thought, make or break time. After many dismal attempts, he had something on the verge of passable for a love letter. Admittedly, not his best work but it would have to do. Ron wasn’t wasting another two hours, he needed food.
Returning from the Great Hall, having told Harry he needed to be alone, he set about reading the next stage of the book.
5. So, you’ve done ALL four stages? Now is the hard (or easy) bit: SENDING the letter. It helps if you use an owl that ISN’T yours, otherwise the sender of the letter will, unfortunately, be obvious - sorry! Finally add a DATE and TIME to meet the receiver of the letter and you are ready to go.
Ron dropped the book on the floor, his face ashen. Only five stages to the book and it had cost 10 whole sickles! Then he remembered that he hadn’t actually bought the book and laughed, thinking of all the poor people who had.
Anyway, now was the time to put the fifth and final stage into action.
He picked up his ‘sonnet’ and wrote at the bottom:
“To find out the writer of this letter meet him at 6 tomorrow (Monday) at the entrance to Gryffindor Common Room.”
Ron nodded his head and folded up the letter;, he knew it wasn’t a work of art, in fact it wasn’t even as good as a bad piece of art, so he sighed and scooped the letter up in his hand.
After going up to the Owlery and grudgingly using one of the school owls to send his letter, he returned to the Common Room.
“You alright, Ron?” asked Harry.
“What? Why wouldn’t I be? I’m fine!” He was ranting and he knew it - and what's more, so did Harry.
“It’s just you seem a bit…tense,”
“What, me? No, why would I be?”
Harry raised his eyebrows and slid down his chair holding his book up to cover his face, “Well, I don’t know, something about a book called, 'How To Write A Love Letter' maybe?”
Ron gawked at him. “How do you know about that?” he whispered.
“I have my ways, plus I found it under your bed,” he replied. “Don‘t worry, I’m sure Hermione‘ll love it,”
Ron’s mouth looked like it was starting to ache, so as Ginny walked past and kissed Harry on the cheek, she closed it for him.
“How - how do you know it’s for Hermione?” he asked, talking very fast.
Harry looked genuinely confused. “Who else would it be for? Wait, it’s not for her?”
Ron shook his head violently. “No, no, it is for her, just - just how did you know?”
Harry just stared at him. “I may be stupid, but I’m not that stupid, you’ve liked each other for ages!”
“Wait - she likes me back?” His heart was thundering in his chest - was Harry really saying what he thought he was?
Harry frowned. “Yeah, is that a problem or something?”
“Are you kidding? That’s great! Great!”
Ron was waiting at the entrance to Gryffindor Common room, pretending to tie his shoe lace just in case Hermione didn’t show up.
He was nervous, his back was starting to ache and his hands were sweaty. What if Hermione didn’t turn up? If she did, what would she say when she found out it was him who had sent the letter? Would she be angry? Surprised? Disappointed? He hoped not the latter, he didn’t know what he’d do if she didn’t want the sender to be him. He took a deep breath and as he did so someone tapped him on the shoulder. A light, hesitant touch.
“Ron?” said Hermione. “What are you doing here?”
“Me?” Ron said in a voice that wasn’t his own, “N-nothing, what are
you doing here?”
Hermione looked at the floor then straight into his eyes, her cheeks flushing. “I’m…waiting for someone to show up,”
“Oh, really?” said Ron, his voice still high. “How nice.”
“Are you okay, Ron? You don’t sound like yourself,” Hermione commented, a combination of worry and suspicion on her face.
“Me? Fine. Fine…I’m fine,”
She was starting to tap her foot impatiently, looking all around her. “You haven’t seen anyone around here, have you? Only I‘d have thought they‘d have shown up by now. It is five past six.” She said the last bit mainly to herself, but Ron still heard her.
He knew he should tell her now, she must be getting really annoyed. But how could he do it? It might ruin their perfectly good friendship. Harry had said she liked him, but if that was true why was she there, waiting for someone she didn’t even know to turn up?
He must have been thinking for quite a while as Hermione turned to him and said in a defeated voice, “Well, I’m going to go, it seems they’re not going to turn up.” She smiled weakly at him and turned away.
What else could he do? In a split second decision, he grabbed her arm. “Hermione, it was me.”
When she looked puzzled, he elaborated. “It was me who wrote you that letter asking you to come here, you haven’t been stood up or anything, I just didn‘t know how to tell you…it was me.”
Hermione’s face, already red from impatience grew even redder. “Oh just shut up, Ron,” she almost shouted., “I know it wasn’t you, you always have to make a joke out of things, don’t you? Well, this isn’t funny, okay? You don‘t have to feel like you need to pretend just because I’ve been stood up.” After a moments pause she turned to leave then suddenly whipped her head round to look at Ron. “How do you know there was a letter?” she asked, trying to keep her voice calm and staring at him strangely.
“What?” asked Ron, taken aback.
“How do you know there was a letter?” she repeated wildly. “Did he tell you? Was this all a joke?”
Hermione looked like she was about to cry and Ron knew he couldn’t let that happen, he had to make her see it was him so he said the first thing that popped into his head. “What, what are you on about?” he spluttered. “
I sent you that letter, of course I sent you the letter, you think I’d just make it up for a laugh?”
When she looked unsure, he told her, “Check the writing, I didn’t disguise it very well, it’s mine.”
Hermione pulled the folded letter from her pocket and opened it. She looked to the bottom of the parchment and frowned. “That doesn’t mean you wrote it,” she said, looking him in the eyes.
“It’s my writing,” he said weakly, shrugging.
Hermione stared at the parchment once more and considered it for a while. “It is your writing,” she said slowly.
Ron nodded and a massive smile over took his face. “It’s not a joke. You really think I’d do that?”
Hermione looked deep into his blue eyes and seemed to be deciding something. “No,” she said slowly. “No, you wouldn’t.” There was a long, awkward silence until she smiled and said, “You really sent me that letter?”
“Yes.”
“And you’re not just joking?”
“No!” Ron exclaimed. “You’re…you’re not disappointed are you?” he asked, looking at the floor, not entirely sure that he wanted to know the answer.
He felt Hermione tip his head up to meet her eyes, not taking her hand off his chin as she said, “Disappointed? Of course I’m not disappointed, do you know how long I’ve been waiting for you to tell me you liked me?”
“Really?”
She grinned and moved closer to him. “Yes,” she said quietly. Feeling her breath on his lips, he shivered. Then, they were both moving their heads towards each other until they finally met. It was quite a while before they came up for air.
She tasted like chocolate, Ron thought later, holding her soft hand in his.