Harry arrived only five minutes late. Which he was pretty proud of considering that he had to run to his office to put on fresh clothes and look like he hadn’t just had a make out session in a hidden alcove, like some horny teenager. Hermione apparently didn’t feel the same, if the disapproving look she shot him, as he stumbled out of the floo, said anything.
“Honestly Harry, I can’t believe you. How do you manage to be late every Saturday, like we haven’t been doing this for multiple years now!”, Wow, she must be pretty stressed if she’s getting that worked up over him being five minutes late. “What excuse is it this time?! Did you get stuck on a moving staircase again or what was it last time? Ah yes a student managed to stick your feet to the floor and you, an ex-Auror with a mastery in Defense didn’t know how to get unstuck?!”, at some point Hermione had started pacing. Harry shot a begging look at Ron, who was sitting on his chair at the dining table and had already started eating, completely unbothered by his wife’s rant.
Looking back towards his other best friend, who was now giving him a pointed look, waiting for an answer, Harry decided it would probably be best to answer before she could get worked up again. “Actually, Neville needed me for something. If you ask him, he can confirm that I was with him!”, he rushed out as Hermione got ready to call him out on his weak sounding excuse. I was true though, because technically, he did spend his time with Neville, just not in the way he made his friends think.
With a huff Hermione turned around and made her way to the table. “Let’s eat before dinner gets cold.”
If Harry had to describe the meal with two words, it would be tense and awkward. Any tries at conversation sounded forced and were met by equally forced sounding replies. Hermione kept glancing at him as if he could break down crying at any moment and Ron ignored both of them in favour of eating his dinner without getting involved in their drama.
As soon as everyone had finished eating, she folded her hands on top of the table and begun talking while staring at him as if this was a conference or meeting instead of dinner with friends. “Harry”, she began pointedly “Ron and I-“, at that, Ron looked at her with betrayal as if to say ,why are you involving me in this’ “-have been very concerned.” It became apparent, that she was waiting for an answer. “Why have you been concerned about me, Hermione?”, he indulged her. “We are concerned because ever since you and Ginny broke up, you have been spending all your time at Hogwarts. I gave you time to get over her, because even though you said it was a mutual break up, it obviously still had to have hurt.”, he’s pretty sure he knows where this is going. “But even after months you didn’t get to know anyone. But every time, I tried to set you up with one of my colleagues, you refused. I introduced you to so many strong, intelligent and nice women but you didn’t even try to go on a date with a single one of them!”, looking at her, getting all worked up over this, he couldn’t help it anymore.
He burst out laughing, tears rolling down his face at the absurdity of the situation he found himself in. Seeing their confused expressions he decided to take pity on them. “Did- did Ginny and I not tell you why we broke up? We realised that we were both really gay and absolutely not into each other that way. Your colleagues were probably really nice women but I’m not straight so I never would have been attracted to them, like at all.”, still out of breath and laughing, he watched their matching looks of confusion turn to looks of realisation.
Out of nowhere, Ron looked like he just made a groundbreaking connection and started laughing uncontrollably. This time it was Harry’s turn to be confused. “Merlin’s balls Harry-“, Ron pushed out between laughs, “so you and- you and Neville- that explains so much- I was so confused why you kept talking about Neville, but now it all makes sense.”, a heavy blush settled across Harry’s cheeks at the mention of his, in hindsight, very obvious pining for his colleague.
“Oh Harry, but why didn’t you tell us? Don’t you trust us?”, Hermione looked like a kicked puppy. “Gods, of course I trust you Hermione, I trust you both with my life!”, he rushed out, “We just didn’t want to make our relationship public at the time. That is actually something I wanted to tell you tonight. Me and Neville are dating and I wanted to ask, if I can bring him with me next Saturday?”, he got audibly more unsure towards the end of his question. Hermione, always the mum-friend, immediately went to reassure him, that of course Neville could come and they would love to meet him as his partner. At that Ron got a protective look on his face at the thought of making sure that Neville was good enough for his best mate.
With the tension resolved and everyone reassured, the evening ended a lot more calm than it begun.
———-
After Harry had left Ron came to a conclusion that he really should have earlier.
“Oh gods- that’s why he was late, because him and Neville- oh eww, I did not want to know that…”
“Oh grow up Ronald, Harry is not some 25 year old virgin. You know, him and Ginny probably had sex. And as long as he’s happy I don’t care what he and Neville get up to, unless he’s late again.”
“Hermioneeee! Why would you say that?!”