…

People quietly left the Room of Requirements, either talking about the lesson or their plans for the holidays.

Harry Potter was watching them leave when he saw one of the DA members, Cho Chang, heading for the door. He wanted to call out to her, to say something-anything-but she had already left with her friends from Ravenclaw.

His best friends, Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger, walked over to him as his shoulders slumped. Ron's younger sister, Ginny, was right behind them.

"Harry, are you alright?" She asked, noticing his look. Hermione simply looked at Harry with a knowing look.

"Huh? Oh, yeah," replied Harry not too convincingly. "Thanks though, Ginny, for being concerned." Ginny blushed and nodded.

"Right, well," she stammered. "Um, I guess I'll go now; I promised to meet up with some of my friends." Harry nodded.

"I'm coming too," interrupted Ron. "One of them said that they could beat me in chess!"

Ginny snorted as her brother walked alongside her. "Don't think too much about what Jennalyn says; she's full of hot air at times. You two would make a good pair, actually."

She smirked when Ron sputtered. His loud protests could be heard even when they left the room, leaving Harry and Hermione alone.

Hermione nudged him in the shoulder. "Go on, Harry."

Harry looked at her, confused. "Huh? Aren't you coming?"

She shrugged. "I don't think you need me around; there's still some time before Cho gets back to her common room. Besides, I need to make sure nobody left anything and finish some of the holiday homework so I might as well do it here."

"But you'll be alone," stated Harry, still confused. "And Cho's already left with her friends; she's probably already made it to the tower, though I don't know why I would go after her."

"Harry, you like her," said Hermione, looking at him with an exasperated look. "And she likes you, doesn't she? Why else would she be looking around for your attention during the DA meetings?"

Now, despite what people thought, Harry was not stupid. He could be a bit slow at times, but he was not stupid.

"Hermione," he started, sticking his hands in his back pockets. "Cho's nice, but I don't really know; she was…nice to look at when I was fourteen, but she's still upset over Cedric." His voice cracked slightly at the deceased wizard's name. "To her, I'm just the guy he saw last before…you know. Besides, we wouldn't really work out. Aside from Quidditch and the DA, what would we talk about? I liked her because she was pretty and into Quidditch."

"Oh," said Hermione, suddenly avoiding his eyes. Harry blinked, taken aback by her shyness.

"Hermione, what's wrong?" He asked worriedly, afraid he had upset her somehow.

The truth was that Cho was not the only girl that Harry fancied; he just thought it'd be better to show his attraction towards her and not Hermione, out of fear Hermione would reject him. He didn't want to risk their friendship. Besides, he was sure that Hermione liked someone else.

"Nothing, Harry," replied Hermione, looking back at him. "So you don't like Cho then?"

Harry shook his head. "No, not really. I want to thank you, by the way, for helping me out; you don't think I've noticed, but I'm not clueless as to the little hints you drop for Cho once in a while." Hermione blushed. "But if you're going to stay and do your homework-and by that, I know you mean revise for the tenth time-I might as well stay and do mine too."

The corner of his mouth quirked upwards when she gaped at him in surprise.

"How did you know I was just revising?" Hermione finally asked. "And we might as well head back to the Common Room before it gets too late; we can't risk getting in trouble."

"Of course not, Miss Or-Worse-Expelled," replied Harry as they left the Room of Requirements, chuckling at her embarrassed look. "I've known you for five years, Hermione; I think I can figure out you probably finished the homework for the next two years as well. You've probably gotten the next ten years planned out on a color coded chart or something."

"Harry," exclaimed Hermione, swatting his arm lightly as she laughed. "I do not!"

"Fine, fine," said Harry, laughing as well. "The next five years then?"

His friend responded by swatting him again, still laughing. It wasn't really funny, but it was nice to laugh during these times.

They arrived at the Common Room, where Harry gave the password and the portrait swung open so they walked in to greet a nearly empty room.

"I guess everyone already went up to bed," said Hermione. "You can head up too, if you want."

"I'm not really tired," replied Harry. "And I already promised to do my homework with you, remember?" He went upstairs to get his bag and then rejoined her in front of the fireplace.

For a while, the only noise in the room was the cackling from the fireplace and the scratching of quills frantically racing over the parchment.

And then Harry noticed Hermione's writing had slowed down and she was constantly blinking as her head occasionally bobbed up and down in a jerky fashion. He placed his quill down and walked over to her, gently touching her shoulder.

She jerked awake as she looked up at him. Her cheeks turned pink as he gave her a look that was a mix of amusement and concern.

"Hermione, if you're tired, you should go to bed," he said. "It's already late. And you don't want a repeat of third year," he added when he saw she was going to protest.

Hermione closed her mouth, pressing her lips together; even with the Time Turner, she had been extremely tired and stressed. "Of course not, but my essay…"

"Can wait until tomorrow," finished Harry firmly. "Go get some sleep, Hermione. You don't want your lack of sleep to affect your class participation, do you?"

"No," replied Hermione bashfully. Normally it was her who lectured Harry and Ron, so it felt sort of odd for their roles to be reversed. Nevertheless, he was correct and at least he wasn't nagging her like she admitted she did at times.

Absently, she wondered why he was acting so…gentle and logical all of a sudden. She didn't believe her best friend was stupid, more like Ron had a bad influence at times when it came down to actually working, but he wasn't normally so attentive towards her.

Not that she minded, not at all.

If she was being honest, Hermione rather liked having Harry's attention on her. Oh sure, she knew he didn't look at her because of her looks or anything more than a friend, but he still paid attention to her and everyone appreciated being noticed once in a while.

Or maybe it was just because she had had a small crush on him since first year. There was something about a boy jumping on the back of a troll to save a girl he rarely knew that made a girl's heart beat a little faster.

But of course, he would never like me like that. She thought a bit sadly. It was true; Harry liked girls who were pretty and into Quidditch, two things she was not.

"Come on, Hermione," said Harry, jarring her from her thoughts. "We can finish the rest of our work tomorrow and the essay's not due until next week anyways."

Hermione looked up at him, about to voice her agreement, when she froze. A petrified look was on her face and Harry, confused, looked up to see what she was so shocked by and froze too upon seeing the mistletoe dangling above them.

And because it was magic mistletoe, there was no escaping the barrier set around it until the two people underneath kissed. And because Fred and George Weasley could, they had placed charms on it so that the two 'victims' would only be released if it was a real kiss, and not a peck on the cheek.

"H-Hermione," started Harry, blushing madly. Honestly, she looked no better.

"Um, well," she stammered. "It's alright, Harry; I mean, I-I know it wouldn't mean anything and it is tradition so…"

"Yeah," was all Harry could manage.

They stared at each other for several moments before Harry swallowed and, summoning his Gryffindor courage, leaned forward until their lips were grazing each other cautiously. They were most definitely treading into dangerous areas.

Neither of them was prepared for Hermione suddenly leaning forward to complete the kiss with an uncharacteristic passion, which a startled Harry quickly returned. When he placed his hands around her waist gently, the kiss turned sweeter and slower.

A minute or two later, they separated and stared at each other.

Hermione saw the nervousness and slight fear in his emerald eyes, but she also saw a glint of something. Her heart skipped a beat when she realized it was affection; not a sisterly or friendly affection, but affection meant for someone you fancied.

Meanwhile, Harry saw the curiosity and bashfulness in her almond colored eyes, as well as something as. Her eyes suddenly lit up and he realized she was staring at him in the same way he often stared at Cho last year and, when she wasn't paying attention, Hermione as well. His heart began to race.

"So…" Hermione started, trying to fight the urge to smile goofily like an idiot.

"So…" Harry struggled to do the same. "Would you like to go out with me?" He finally blurted out, much to his horror.

Hermione's face, however, broke out in a huge grin. "Yes!" She exclaimed joyfully before blushing and calming down. "I mean, yes, Harry; I would like that a lot."

The two of them smiled at each other for several seconds before they suddenly blushed and hurried to put away their things, saying hurried goodnights before racing upstairs with idiotically large smiles of content to congratulate themselves and celebrate.

Meanwhile, several people appeared from their hiding spots behind the couches and bookshelves.

"Ha, I told you they would get together," exclaimed Dean triumphantly, shooting a look towards Seamus.

The Irish boy grinned. "Ay, you did; shame, Granger's quite a catch."

"As if you would have a chance," snorted Lavender. "Now come on, Seamus, hand over the Galleons. You lost the bet!" Seamus continued to grin as he passed her the golden coins. "Stop scowling, Parvati; you lost the bet too!"

"Honestly, I still think he deserves a weepy girl like Chang," sniffled the Indian Gryffindor, still upset by her disastrous date at the Yule Ball. Nevertheless, she handed her friend the Galleons as well.

"I thought he would have ended up with Ginny Weasley, to be honest," piped up Angelia, handing over Galleons as well. "She seemed to be his type."

"Don't let Ron hear that," said Neville. "He'd up screaming and possibly punching Harry."

"Oh, you're just upset because he scared you after asking her out last year," replied Alicia. "Not that it matters now, since you've been eyeing Luna Lovegood for the last few weeks. By the way, could you take her share of the winnings to her next time you see her?"

"Sure," said Neville, ignoring the first part of what she had said. "We have to let Professor McGonagall know that she was right as well. Even Snape admitted they would get together eventually!"

Fred and George laughed.

"No, he said that 'Potter would be too idiotically dense to figure out the right woman was right in front of him, not that the idiot deserved to have a brilliant witch like her' I believe," corrected George.

"Sounds like he knows a bit something about young, unrequited love," remarked Fred, grinning.

"Ugh, let's not talk about Snape's love life please," exclaimed Lavender, making a face.

Seamus yawned. "Yeah, let's not; wow, I'm beat." He stood up, stretching his arms; he had been stuck behind the couch between Lavender and Alicia for about an hour, not that he was complaining. "'Night everyone."

Everyone murmured a 'goodnight' before they eventually trudged up to their respective dorms as well.

Meanwhile, two certain dark haired people slept soundly with content smiles on their faces. And for the first time a few months, one of them failed to have a nightmare.

Yes, there was a still a war with many people dying, but none of that mattered at the moment.

All was well.

…

I don't own Harry Potter.

Um, so yeah…the first Harmony story I've written a while…hopefully, I've improved since then…

I didn't know how to end it so sorry if it was kinda lame.

Um…yeah…I think that's it, right? Right…

Don't hesitate to tell me what you thought or if you spotted any mistakes!

Merry early Christmas, or Hanukkah (that already ended, didn't it?) or Kwanzaa, or whatever is it you celebrate!