Hermione looked up when the door to the study carrel opened. It was time for another of her tutoring sessions, this one being Potions with Lavender Brown. The other girl stood half in and half out of the doorway, still talking to someone – Parvati Patil most likely – as she came in, making plans to meet and discuss the newest Witch Weekly after her study session.

Hermione resisted the urge to roll her eyes. She would never understand just how those two could spend so much time on such fripperies as make-up and hair charms. Especially since both were barely doing average in their studies. At least Lavender had enough initiative to set up tutoring sessions to try to do better.

Lavender finally pulled herself away from her intense discussion of which of the Nine Inch Wands band members was better looking and entered the room with a mischievous grin.

"Of course, neither of them is really my type," she said to Hermione with a wink. "Do we really have to study today?"

"Snape is giving a practice NEWT on Thursday, Lav. Do you really think you are ready for it?"

Lavender pulled a face before joining Hermione at the table. She spread her notes out around herself and looked across at the other girl. "So, where do we start?"

Hermione watched her for a moment, wondering if she should worry about the look Lavender was giving her. Instead she decided to tackle the task at hand – attempting to explain corrosive portions.

"But why did they make Neville's cauldron dissolve?" Lavender's petulant tone grated on Hermione's ears. Hadn't she just explained that ten minutes ago? She looked up at the clock – no, it had been only five. This tutoring session was never going to end.

"Neville hadn't measured out his asp venom correctly. He added too much and the venom, being the active ingredient in the potion, overpowered the neutralizing agent."

Lavender just looked blank.

Hermione resisted the urge to lay her head on the table and give up.

"But… but, why did his cauldron dissolve last week when he added the dragon blood? It's not a venom."

"Because dragon blood is highly acidic as well and he forgot to add the buffering ingredient."

"Oh." Lavender looked back down at her notes. "But-"

Thankfully a knock at the door sounded, interrupting Lavender's next question.

"Hermione? Are you in there?"

The door opened to show Harry and Ron, who had obviously been looking for her. Suddenly she didn't mind that they had ignored her rule to not interrupt her tutoring sessions. Ron flopped down in a chair next to Lavender, while Harry just rolled his eyes and leaned against the door jam.

"Come on, Hermione," Ron protested, seeing that they had been in full blown study mode. "I can't believe that you're making Lavender study right now – it's a beautiful day outside."

"Ron." Hermione glared at him, then nearly jumped out of her seat. Was that a… her eyes widened, oh yeah, that was a foot. The nerve…

She glared at the three of them, then returned to Ron. "If you remember, we're having a practice NEWT in potions on Thursday. It'll do both of you good to study as well."

"Hermione, don't be such a spoil-sport," Ron grumped. Another glare from Hermione cut him off, just before Harry interrupted.

"Hermione, you've been in the library all day, and you've been spending so much more time here now than you even did studying for our OWLs. Can't you just take one afternoon off?"

"She's right," Lavender spoke up, "I really need to study for this test. I did horribly on the last one." Hermione didn't really notice, all her attention was on the foot - which had made its way up her leg only to be removed.

"Well, fine." Ron made a harrumphing noise under his breath as he stood and he and Harry left.

The door slammed shut with a bang behind them. Lavender echoed it by slamming her book shut.

"What-?" Hermione looked up from their notes, confused.

"I can't believe I forgot to put a locking spell on there!" The other girl exclaimed as she remedied just that – and Hermione noticed with pride the complicated locking spell was one she'd taught her herself. "Just think if we had been otherwise occupied when they came barging in!"

"Otherwise occupied?"

"Yes," Lavender sat on the chair next to Hermione instead or her seat across the table. "Otherwise" – she pushed Hermione's bushy hair out of her face and kissed the edge of her jaw – "occupied" She continued kissing along Hermione's jawline, and then covered her lips with her own, until at last Hermione pulled away from the passionate kiss.

"Lavender," she sighed, resting her forehead against Lavender's trying to ignore the hands loosening her tie and unbuttoning her blouse. "We have to study, remember?"

Lavender stopped and looked thoughtful for a moment before returning to her task of trying to remove as many clothes from them both as possible. "Um… no."

She wrapped her arms around Hermione and kissed her again to cut off any protests. Letting go, she felt overly proud at the dreamy look on Hermione's face. "I think we're done studying."

A finger to her lips stopped Hermione again, so she held her tongue as Lavender slowly pushed her shirt from her shoulders, placing kisses on the uncovered skin.

"Corrosive potions generally use acidic active ingredients such as venom's or dragon's blood because of their acidic properties."

Lavender placed another kiss on Hermione's shoulder. Then continued across Hermione's bare skin. "A buffering agent is used during the preparation to neutralize the active ingredients."

Another kiss found its mark, slowly changing Hermione's mind about studying.

"A charm is used when the potion is need to negate the affects of the buffering agent, rendering the potion corrosive."

This kiss was just below Hermione's ear, causing her to shiver. It was time for this torture to stop. She pulled away, pushing Lavender against the back of the chair she was in.

"You're right, I think we are done studying."