Vanish

Hermione thought back to the boy alone in his room, sitting with the weight of the Wizarding world on his shoulders.

"Ron," she said and stopped quickly, nearly tripping over a hissing Crookshanks bolting up the endless spiral staircase of the burrow. Ron looked back up at her, his big blue eyes and freckles catching the morning light.

"I forgot something in Harry's room. I'll be right down." She doubled back before she could hear him grumble about surviving the fighting women in the house. She knocked quickly, but slipped in before she heard a reply, and closed the door behind her.

The bedroom still smelled like the Weasley twins - a mixture of boyish sweat and foul attempts at cologne charms. Nostalgia for a simpler time flooded her - when a wink from one or both of them would make her heart flutter. Harry Potter lay on the bed, his eyes half closed, his hair rumpled against the pillow.

"Harry," she sighed, "How are you?"

"Hermione, what's up?" He responded, not answering her question.

She stared across the room at her best friend, looking for any hint of pain, mental, physical, spiritual. But after years of constant heartache, he showed nothing but the same winning smirk and rubbed sleep from his bright green eyes. She couldn't help but smile - she knew he never felt safe unless surrounded by friends. An impulse that led to the death of his godfather the year before.

"Man, that telescope got you good," he said, and her fingers traced the bruise around her eye.

"Oh, I've had worse," she said, and she sat on the end of his bed. "I just wanted to know how you are, how you really are, what with everything…with Sirius."

Harry sighed and pushed his head back into the pillow. He tousled his dark hair with his hand, a nervous tick she'd come to recognize.

"I honestly don't want to talk about it."

She lay down beside him, and he scooted to make room for her.

"I know, Harry, but you have to talk about it. Not talking got you to the point that you believed your visions last year and..."

"Hermione," he said, and he cocked a smile at her and pulled her sleeping bonnet from her head. Her curls sprang free, and he wrapped one curl around his finger. She'd hoped saying the point bluntly would catch him off his guard, but clearly it didn't work.

"I'm ok, really," he said.

She sighed. You're lying, she thought, but she smiled back because it made sense. After he'd endangered everyone he cared about, of course he would be closed off.

"So, how's it been at the burrow so far?" He asked, separating the curl with his fingers. She slapped his hand away.

"Oh, fine, I've only been here since the night before last. Mostly it's just been Ginny and Mrs. Weasley acting absolutely batty about Fleur. Mrs. Weasley I understand since Mr. Weasley turns to mush around her, which is like…Come on, you're a grown man. But I don't understand Ginny. Why does she care if her brothers are into Fleur?"

"Well, she did say she was patronizing,"

"Well, yeah, but that's because Fleur is used to everyone acting like an idiot around her. To be honest, I was surprised Ginny wasn't affected."

"Oh, come on," Harry laughed. The rumble made Hermione put her head on his chest and her arm around his middle. It felt so good to be near him again.

"Just because she likes to make out with you when she's drunk doesn't make Ginny gay enough to be hit by a Veela."

"I suppose, but like," Hermione sat up, "Fleur isn't just any Veela. She is insanely hot."

"She is insanely hot," Harry said, the corner of his mouth twitching up.

"I could just watch her mouth move for hours and not hear a thing," Hermione said, and she laid back down, snuggling back into the crook of his arm.

"Did you notice the way she ends her sentences?" Asked Harry.

"It's like she's coming," Hermione whispered, and Harry laughed.

"Oh, Hermione, I've missed you." She shifted to her stomach to look into his eyes. He moved her hair away from her face.

"You know Harry," she said, "you look so much like your father, but you have..."

"Oh fuck off," he laughed, and he tousled his hair.

He looked back at her, and his eyelids drooped. She felt her heart flutter for the second time.

They'd had little moments over the years - holding hands in the dark, hugging a little too long. There were too many times when they were in mortal peril, or when Ron wasn't talking to one or both of them, or when neither could get who they wanted and so they found each other. They'd even been each other's first kiss in the third year when they waited for the dementors to come.

It ended when Hermione started dating Victor Krum, and her chaste sensibilities went out the window with the international quidditch player. Since then, she'd noticed Harry getting taller, growing into his body. She'd never wanted to date him - she liked being his best friend, but that didn't mean…

He kissed her.

"Harry," she said, smiling into the kiss. He grabbed a fistful of her hair, and instinct took over. She moved on top of him to straddle him.

"You came back into my room to comfort me, didn't you?" he said, biting her lip. "Well then," he pulled her closer by the waist of her pajamas, and she gasped.

He kissed her lightly, and she deepened it. He still tasted like sleep, but she felt her whole body awaken. Suddenly, it seemed far too long since someone had got her going. She felt her nipples stiffen against his chest, and she couldn't help but rock her hips along his.

"You know," he said, sitting up a little, "you look pretty cute with that black eye." He reached up and ran his fingers along the purple welt.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah, although I'm sure Mrs. Weasley could fix it for you,"

"Oh, whatever. I'll ask Fred and George when we see them in Diagon Alley."

"Still, I like it. Better than Dolohov's curse."

Hermione's breath caught in her throat, which just made Harry grab her ass and pull her closer. She grabbed a handful of his warm, worn shirt.

He'd talked, just for a second, about the department of mysteries about what happened to him, to both of them.

"Harry, please talk to me…" she started,

"Oh, unless, sorry," he said, and his eyes widened.

"Unless what?" She asked, feeling all the wrong parts of him stiffen beneath her.

"Unless, you know, Ron." She stopped kissing him, and her mouth hung open. She felt the deeply uncomfortable sensation of being asked a question in class that she didn't have the answer to.

"What about Ron?" Harry cocked his head and bit his lip, and Hermione rolled her eyes.

"Harry, that is ancient history, you know that, that's like, two-year-old news."

It was only partly a lie. Just because her miserable encounter with Ron happened two years ago didn't make it ancient history, but she was 99% sure it was history nonetheless.

She scooted closer to him and moved his hand up her shirt. He massaged her breast and lightly pinched her nipple between two fingers. Clearly, she hadn't been the only one practicing over the years.

"Are you sure," he asked, moving his kisses to her neck and then pulling down her loose collar to kiss her nipple.

"Yes," she laughed, and she rocked for a moment along the hardness blooming beneath her. He groaned.

"You know," she said, and she started to scoot backward along his legs, his face trailing after her nipple.

"It's almost your birthday. She pulled back the covers to see the hard length of him beneath his pajamas. She licked her lips, and she pulled them down to see his cock pop up to meet her.

"How would you like an early birthday present?"

"Fuck," he said, and he shifted up to see her better. She hadn't had any sort of encounter since Krum, and something about Fleur's presence and Harry's evident happiness at being in the burrow made her remember that with veracity. She bent over, and his smell made her hips buck behind her. She grabbed his hips and stuck out her tongue. She had just barely licked up his shaft when the door banged open.

"You lot better get down here now, before Phlegm..." Ginny said.

"Oh," Hermione cast the quickest confundus charm on her she could muster as Harry pulled up the covers.

"We'll be right there,"

"Oh, yeah, ok," Ginny repeated, backing out through the door, "fucking Phlegm," they heard her mutter. Hermione burst into giggles.

"God, I hope I don't get into trouble with the ministry for that," she said, but stopped laughing when she saw Harry's white face.

"What's wrong?" She asked.

"You don't think she noticed, did she?"

"Oh, I don't know, if she did it's not like she's never seen a cock before,"

"Yeah, but," his eyebrows furrowed, "what?"

"Oh, I just meant she's dating someone."

It seemed to hit Harry like a stinging hex.

"Oh wait, really? Who?" He asked, without a modicum of the calm he thought he was portraying.

"I'm not sure - she hasn't said because she doesn't want Ron to make fun of her."

"Oh,"

"What is it?" She asked, pulling herself off of him, her wet knickers growing cold.

"I thought she liked me." He sounded almost disappointed.

"Do you like her?" Hermione asked, and he barked off a laugh.

"Well, no, of course not - she's Ron's little sister. I just, I don't want to hurt her."

"Hurt her? What do you mean?" All thoughts of the birthday blowjob evaporated in disappointment.

"Well, I mean, come on, you know," he said with a cocky smile that he tried to play off as sheepish, and he ran his hands through his rumpled hair.

"She's always had a thing for me." This time, Hermione laughed.

"Harry, that was when she was a little girl - because you saved her life."

"Well, yeah, but…"

"She's dating someone else."

"Oh, yeah, right,"

"Yeah," she said, noticing an odd tension in his jaw. She looked down, and even with the covers still pulled tight over him, she could see he had gone soft.

"Come on," she said, and she stood up, sighing, her wet knickers slippery against her thighs.

"Let's go see what else Phlegm made for breakfast. Plus, I think we're supposed to get our OWLs today.

She helped him up from the bed and couldn't help but shake her head. Hadn't the boy who lived had someone fall out of love with him before?