Gryffindor Investigations

(no, there's no slash, or even het, this time around--it's just to get the Golden Trio reunited)


In his entire life, Ronald Weasley had never wanted to see a spider more than he did at that moment.

The monstrous Aragog, or any of his man-eating children, would have been welcome. Barring them, Ron would rather have had Fluffy growling at him, the jarred brains from the Ministry wrapping themselves around him, or even Lord Voldemort himself, complete with coterie of Death Eaters, with every wand pointed at him and glowing the evil, sickly green that heralded the Avada Kedrava Curse.

But none of those terrors were forthcoming. Instead, Ron was faced with a simple front door to a flat on a side street in Croydon, with a name almost as familiar to Ron as his own neatly printed next to the bell.

*Aragog, you never looked so good.*

Ron took a deep breath, told the butterflies in his stomach to go sod off, and told his feet to stay exactly where they were, then hesitantly pressed the button next to Hermione’s name.

No response.

*Maybe she’s not home.*

He pressed it again, a little longer this time.

*Maybe she’s not home!* Puzzled before, hopeful now.

And then, from the other side of the heavy door, a rich, warm, slightly-muffled voice called, “Hang on!”

Panic suddenly seized Ron, the panic of a rabbit surrounded by hungry wolves. He fought down the urge to bolt for the stairs, and fought the trembling that was threatening to start in his muscles, even as the eyehole slid open for a brief moment, and then shut again with a loud snap.

Ron waited, his body tense with anxiety.

And then he heard a muffled incantation, the two locks snapped open, and the door slowly opened to reveal an equally-tense, and equally-frightened-looking, Hermione Granger.

“Hello, Hermione,” Ron said quietly. “You’re looking well.”

“Thanks,” Hermione replied. She hesitated, and then continued, “You…look well, too.”

“Um…thanks.”

There was an uncomfortable silence, punctuated by nervous fidgets on both sides.

Finally, Hermione said, “Um……well……come in,” and stepped aside to allow him into the flat. Ron knew that he could be a little on the dense side, but even he caught the symbolism implicit in the gesture. He stepped cautiously over the threshold, and began to remove his jacket. Hermione wordlessly held out her arm; he gave the jacket to her, and watched as she hung it up on a peg next to the door.

The front door opened into a small hallway, with a small kitchen to the left and a larger sitting room to the right. As was always the case with Hermione, everything was neat and orderly, with none of the clutter that had driven her insane during the brief period she and Ron had lived together. The furniture was not new, but Hermione apparently refused to allow the concept of “shabby” to enter her home.

“Can I……get you anything?” Hermione asked. “I’ve got tea, coffee……no butterbeer, I don’t think, but I can always run out and get some.”

“Tea will be fine.” Ron felt a fleeting feeling of pride that his voice didn’t crack. “You don’t have to go to any trouble, though.”

“It’s no trouble,” Hermione said quickly, “no trouble at all. Just come into the kitchen and I’ll fix us something.”

She led him into the small, immaculate kitchen, opened an overhead cabinet, pulled out a pot, filled it with water, and put it on to boil. A glass jar next to the stove told Ron where the tea would be coming from.

“Thanks.” He thought desperately, trying to come up with something, anything to say. “Um…so, how long have you been living here.”

“About three ye—oh, for Merlin’s sake, Ron, let’s STOP this!” she cried, slamming her hands down on the counter hard enough to make Ron jump in surprise. “We’ve been friends for half our lives—why are we being so damned polite?”

Ron flushed, and his gaze dropped to his shoes. “Direct as always, aren’t you, Hermione?” he asked miserably.

“Not always,” she said, taking his hand and guiding him to the kitchen table. She gently pushed him into a chair and sat down next to him. “If I were always direct, we wouldn’t have had that last fight.”

“No,” he replied, looking up into her eyes, “no, I guess we wouldn’t have.”

“Ron,” Hermione said, her eyes welling up with tears, “I am so, so sorry I said all those things to you. It was the foulest thing I’ve ever done in my life, and I would give my soul to take it back.” And now the tears did fall, quiet tears of genuine regret.

Involuntarily, Ron’s hand moved to Hermione’s face, his thumb moving to brush the tears away. “Yeah, well……I was a git. If I’d told you what was bothering me instead of letting you get more and more upset……I was a git,” he said again.

“I’m so glad that you and Harry are together,” she said. “You two need each other, you know. You’re just not complete without each other.”

“Well, we’re both a bit thick,” Ron smiled, the first genuine smile he’d had since he first decided to talk to Hermione. “We needed someone to point it out for us—and how many times have you done that?”

“Too many,” Hermione said, her tone much more relieved. Impulsively, she threw her arms around Ron and hugged him, and he wrapped her in his arms and held her tightly.

*Just as I’d hold Ginny, or Mum,* he realized. The passion he’d tried to feel for her all those years, the feelings he kept expecting to have, were completely missing—and he wasn’t anxious to try to find them.

They broke the embrace, and he looked deeply into her eyes. There was affection there, and relief—but no love, and no passion.

“Well, I feel like an idiot,” he chuckled.

“Why?”

“I was afraid you were going to get hysterical at me, throw things, screech curses, that sort of thing.”

Hermione favored him with one of her patented exasperated looks. “Ronald Bilious Weasley,” she said in a voice that somehow managed to match his mother’s, “do you really think I’ve needed to resort to anything so crude since we were in school?”

He laughed again, this time more easily.

“No, I’d simply turn up on your doorstep at Grimmauld Place and hex you while you were sleeping,” she continued. “Ginny and I developed some really nasty ones right after she finished Hogwarts……”

“You wouldn’t dare!” he gasped, still laughing.

Her only response was a thin smile.