Ron Weasley slowly lowered himself down in a big, comfy chair in the dusty sitting room of number twelve, Grimmauld Place, utterly exhausted. He, along with Hermione and Ginny had just uncontaminated one of the many rooms in the oversized mansion the Muggle way. He hated being underage and unable to use magic during the holidays since his brothers, Fred and George, could magically clean all they wanted, without breaking a sweat.
‘Well,’ said Hermione as she flopped down in the sofa across from him, ‘I never knew a house could be so filthy.’
‘No one has lived here for a long while,’ Ginny reminded her as she walked into the room. ‘What baffles me is why we have to clean it.’
‘To help the Order,’ said Ron and Hermione sardonically, reciting the words that Mrs. Weasley had told them many times before.
‘What do you want to do?’ Ron asked the two of them.
‘I think we should do our homework,’ Hermione said predictably. ‘Have you two even started? Ron, it’s our O.W.L year, you know, so it’s very important that we start it off right…. I mean, this year affects what N.E.W.T classes we get into, which determines our jobs, which—‘
‘Hermione,’ said Ron in a low, strained voice, ‘can I please skip the O.W.L lecture today?’
Hermione’s face broke into a slight frown, but she conceded with a nod.
‘Say Ron, why don’t you and I play chess?’ Ginny suggested while getting up to sit at the table that held the chess set.
‘Alright,’ Ron agreed, getting up from his chair to join his sister. ‘Hermione, do you want to play?’
Hermione shook her head. ‘No, I’ll just read,’ she said before taking out the new Defense Against the Dark Arts book and opening it to chapter four, where she had left the night before.
The three of them didn’t speak for the next few minutes; the only sounds in the room were Ron and Ginny’s commands and the occasional ruffle of a page by Hermione’s book. This was how it had been for most of the summer. They would clean, eat, and then relax in the sitting room every day, playing chess, talking, or in Hermione’s case, reading.
Ron and Hermione, surprisingly, were becoming closer. Ron found that he could easily talk to Hermione about his one source of worry: Harry.
Harry had been locked up at the Dursley’s all summer, with no knowledge of the current status of the Wizarding world and with the empty letters Ron and Hermione sent him. Every day, they would anxiously peer into the sky, happy for a glimpse of Hedwig’s snowy white feathers, but they seldom saw her. For this, Ron didn’t know how to feel. He hoped Harry wasn’t angry with them and that the only reason Harry wasn’t writing was because he was busy, but Ron knew his hopes were pipe dreams. What was there for Harry to be busy with at Privet Drive?
‘Bishop to D10,’ said Ron after carefully strategizing his move. The bishop slid towards one of Ginny’s pawns and knocked it over with his stick.
‘Damn,’ Ginny cursed, shaking her head. ‘I don’t know why I play chess with you, Ron…it does absolutely nothing for my morale.’
‘Chess isn’t supposed to do anything for your morale,’ replied Ron, scratching his chin.
‘No, but it sure is nice when it does,’ Ginny said, smiling.
‘Ginny!’ Mrs. Weasley called from downstairs. ‘Will you come here for a moment?’
Ron peered at his sister over his king.
‘What’d you do, Gin?’ he said, grinning.
Ginny rolled her eyes at him.
‘I didn’t do anything,’ she said, though she looked nervous as she got up from the table. With a hurried goodbye, she left the room.
‘Want to play chess, Hermione?’ Ron asked, propping his head up on his hands to look at her.
‘Not right now,’ she said distantly, waving her hand and staring down intently at her book. ‘Maybe later.’
‘Right,’ said Ron, nodding and then looking back down at the chessboard. He idly fingered one of the many broken stones while his mind drifted to Harry. Once again, Harry was haunting him. He wanted to hear from his friend. Was Harry’s scar becoming an issue? Was he okay? Did he need therapy?
‘Hermione,’ said Ron aloud, his eyes not leaving the chessboard. ‘I’m still worried about him.’
A sigh escaped Hermione’s lips. ‘So am I,’ she said miserably. ‘Can you imagine what’s going through his head right now? I know he’s going to do something stupid, I just know it.’ She sighed again, and shook her head. ‘I don’t even want to think about it.’
‘Neither do I,’ said Ron, dropping the stone piece on the table and getting up. ‘I’m hungry, are you? We should get some food.’
‘Uh, sure,’ said Hermione, looking rather put out. She rose from the couch with a slight frown on her face.
‘Hermione,’ Ron said abruptly as they walked out of the room. ‘You frown a lot, did you know that?’
‘I do?’ she asked, surprised.
Ron nodded. He had noticed that over the summer. Hermione’s frowning seemed to get more frequent overnight. He noticed because her brow would furrow and her mouth would screw up into a little pout and her eyes—oh, her eyes—would darken mysteriously and turn un-Hermioneish. It gave him a feeling of unsettlement to see her frown. She looked exactly like a child when she frowned.
‘Well—er,’ said Hermione uncomfortably, ‘I didn’t know that. Thanks for telling me. I’ll try not to frown so much.’
‘It was just an observation,’ Ron told her. ‘I don’t mean it as an insult or anything.’
‘I know you didn’t, Ron,’ said Hermione. ‘I never said you did.’
‘I know,’ said Ron. ‘Right…of course.’
They both nodded.
‘Oh,’ said a very startled Mrs. Weasley as she almost bumped into Hermione on her way down the hall. ‘I’ve been looking for you two. The drawing room needs dusting.’
Ron groaned.
‘Mum,’ he whined. ‘It’s a drawing room. No one uses it, so dusting isn’t needed.’
Mrs. Weasley stared at him sternly before shoving a hand rag into his and Hermione’s hands.
‘It’s just right down the hall,’ said Mrs. Weasley silkily, pointing to a door behind her.
Hermione nodded, and followed the older woman’s finger into the room with Ron sulking behind her muttering about child labor.
‘And don’t dawdle,’ Mrs. Weasley called as Hermione entered the room. ‘Dinner’s in a short while.’
Ron grunted and followed in after Hermione. The minute he walked into the room, a cloud of dust smacked him hard in the face, stinging his eyes and tampering with his allergies. He heard a faint sneeze from Hermione and let out an automatic ‘Bless you’ only to take a taste of the grimy dust in front of his face.
It’s sour, Ron thought bitterly, forcing out an over-exaggerated cough to rid himself of the foul taste.
‘We better start dusting,’ said Hermione from the other side of the room. He saw her outline swatting helplessly at the dust with her hand rag.
‘Yeah,’ Ron choked out, emulating Hermione’s swatting with his own hand rag. Surprising enough, it was a little helpful, but the dust would return in a matter of seconds, so he gave up and crossed the room to start dusting the furniture.
Hermione was in the process of standing up on a chair to reach the top of the bookshelf so it could be dusted when she lost her footing and toppled backwards. Luckily for her, Ron was right behind her, and instinctively caught her around the chest.
‘Oh,’ she said, her hand flying to her forehead. ‘Oh, thank you, Ron.’
Ron nodded and put her gently back to her feet. He noticed his arms were around her chest—her swelling, heavily breathing chest—and his ears turned an impressive shade of pink.
‘You’re welcome,’ Ron croaked out, his arms snaking away from her chest and returning to his sides.
‘We should probably start cleaning,’ Hermione said nervously.
‘Yeah,’ said Ron, nodding. ‘I reckon we should.’
And with awkward smiles, they returned to the rough work of dusting the filthy room in a content silence.
Author's Note: This story was written long ago, and I found it while leafing through my files, so I decided to post it here on MuggleNet. Thanks for reading!