For QLFC S5 - Round 1

Ron is half asleep and running on the last dredges of his coffee when he receives the first one.

It's a plain white envelope with a university logo stamped on the back. By the time he realizes that it's probably not for him, he's already gone and torn the top of it off.

Oops.

He should probably stop here, he thinks. He should most definitely not peek through the contents— but isn't it already open anyways?

In the end, his curiosity wins out.

He skims through it quickly. 'Congratulations on winning this esteemed scholarship' yada yada yada 'our esteemed school' and so on and so forth. Ron rolls his eyes at the overly formal language and stops reading.

He flips it back over, noting the name and address. 'Hermione Granger', the envelope proclaims, 'Flat 3, Smithe Street'.

Ah, so that's what the problem was. Ron lives at Flat 3, Smith Street. But the two streets are nearby anyways. Ron tucks the envelope in his back pocket and makes a mental note to stop by and deliver it before work.

.

Ron rings the doorbell a couple times, then steps back to wait. He isn't sure what he's expecting. Maybe they'll be the typical university student with permanent eye bags under their eyes. Or maybe they'll be one of those types of people who work two jobs, have a full course load, and maintain their social life all at once.

But then the door opens and a girl with the pouffiest hair he's seen stands in the doorway. "Can I help you?" she asks.

"Yeah, I got your mail by accident. Here you go," Ron says. "I'm over at Smith Street without the 'e'. They must've gotten it mixed up."

She takes the envelope from his hand, and stares at it for an uncomfortably long amount of time. Ron wipes his sweaty hands on his jeans. He's delivered the message; that should be his cue to leave.

Then he realizes that she's looking at the ripped, jagged edges of the envelope. Yeah, that's definitely a judging expression on her face.

"I thought it was mine," he adds, belatedly. "Er, sorry."

"Oh," she says. "Okay. Thanks for bringing it over."

She steps back in and the door shuts with a click behind her.

.

Ron relays the story to Harry, later.

"So I went all the way out of my way to return it, and this tiny ass girl answered the door—"

"Ron, everyone is tiny compared to you," Harry says dryly. "Even me."

"I don't think you're the best example to pull up," Ron grins. Harry shoots him such an intense glare in response that Ron wonders if he should be extra wary on April Fools Day. (But who is he kidding, he's always extra careful on that day, and Harry knows that. Harry would probably do something on an inconspicuous day instead.)

"But anyways, as I was saying before you so rudely interrupted me," Ron continues. "This girl answers the door and she's giving me the side eye 'cause I tore the envelope." He mimics her stony expression.

Harry laughs. "Well, it's not like you'll be seeing her again."

"Yeah, I guess so. What are the chances?"

.

They're both wrong.

Ron finds himself standing at her door a second time, this time with a postcard from her parents in Australia. As it turns out, not only does the postman deliver the mail to the wrong mailbox, but sometimes even the sender writes in the address wrong.

"Sorry, what was your name again?" Hermione asks.

"Ron," he says. "Ron Weasley."

"Ron," she repeats. "Sorry you keep having to come over her. I moved in just recently. I'm Hermione, by the way."

"Nice to meet you, Hermione," Ron says.

"If you don't mind me asking, why don't you just send the mail back? There should be some type of system in place for this, right?"

Ron just shrugs a shoulder. "I could, but you know how long it takes for things to go through the bureaucracy, especially if there's been an error. You live close enough anyways."

"Ah, ok. Thanks again then." Hermione nods politely at him, before closing the door behind her.

It doesn't stop. He gets everything from her university letters, to her bills, to her pen pals (who even has pen pals anymore?), to more postcards from her parents. So they develop a system of sorts. Three rings of the doorbell for when he comes over to deliver mail.

Sometimes she's there when he goes to deliver her mail, sometimes she's not. On the days she isn't, Ron likes to grab a sticky note and stick it onto the envelope with a (bad) doodle and 'It was sent to me by accident again' scrawled on it.

.

"Do you want to call in and ask them about your whole mail problem?" Harry asks, weeks later. "It must be annoying having to go all the way to Hermione's flat to deliver her mail."

It's not that annoying, Ron wants to say.

"Yeah," he says instead.

He calls in the next day to ask about it. He's referred to manger upon manager, until finally, he's reassured that 'the problem is top priority and will be resolved as soon as possible'.

Ron scoffs at that. Knowing them, just the paperwork involved will take half a year. He resigns himself to becoming a personal mail carrier. He's not as upset at the idea as he thought he'd be.

.

When she opens the door one morning, she looks like hell ran her over twice, and then one more time for good measure.

"Crikey," Ron says.

"That bad?" She groans and buries her face in her hands.

"Sorry, yeah. Here's your mail, by the way." Ron hesitates, and then on whim asks, "D'you wanna come for coffee with me and a buddy? You look like you need it, no offense."

Hermione looks startled. She looks torn, glancing between her flat and Ron.

But then: "Sure," she agrees. "That sounds lovely."

Ron let's out a breath he didn't even know he was holding.

As it turns out, Harry and Hermione get along swimmingly. The unfortunate side effect of it is that they like to tag team tease him too.

"Harry, stop," Ron moans, after Hermione is in stitches over Harry's retelling of Ron's unfortunate puking incident in high school. "You swore you'd never mention it again!"

"I swear a lot of things. Not all of them I keep," Harry says, eyes glimmering in mischief. It's unbelievable how everyone labels Ron as the bad influence. No one else in the world seems to be able to tell what a cheeky brat Harry really is. 'Good, considerate student' his ass.

But their little get together ends when Hermione mentions she has to go study, with a regretful tilt to her head. The two of them assure her that it's fine, that she should go out and slaughter her midterm. Hermione scribbles her number on a napkin and they all promise to meet again sometime.

Then she's gone in a rush of activity and it's just the two of them.

"So." Harry says.

"So?" Ron asks absentmindedly as he triple checks that he's entered the right number in his phone. He wonders if it's too early to send a text already.

"So," Harry says again. "What was that all about?"

So maybe Ron had brought Hermione to him and Harry's weekly meet up without telling Harry. Harry hadn't said anything about it, other than a puzzled eyebrow raise. Maybe he deserved that vomit story after all.

"So she's the person whose mail keeps getting sent to your place?" Harry asks.

Ron drums his fingers on the table. "Yeah, that's her."

Harry hums in acknowledgment. "Are you interested in her?"

"...yeah," Ron says softly. "I am."

.

"If you have time, do you wanna come in?" Hermione asks, out of the blue one day. "I can grab you a cuppa."

Ron blinks. "If you don't mind," he says.

"Of course not!" she insists, and ushers him inside. "After all, you always have to deal with my mail and come all the way over. It's the least I can do."

Ron walks in slowly, taking her flat in. Even though both their places have the same general structure, there are two very different feels to them.

Hermione all but shoves him into an armchair and tells him to "make yourself at home" and she rushes into the kitchen. Ron gets up and follows after her, to help out or... something. He doesn't know.

The fridge in the kitchen catches his eyes first though. Scattered all along the fridge door are all the sticky notes he had attached to her mail. The badly drawn doodles stick out like a sore thumb in between images of her family and her university schedules.

Ron feels his face get hot. Hermione turns around to scold him for getting up, but he can see the words visibly die in her throat.

Her face turns very, very red. "Don't worry about it," she says brusquely, but the effect is spoiled by her still red face and the fact that she won't look at him.

"I was just wondering if you needed any help," Ron says, rather dumbly.

"No, I'm done," she says. "Come on, move it! Back to the living room."

.

His call to the post office had been successful. While rifling through his mail one morning, he received an envelope from them stating their 'deepest apologies' with 'assurances that this will not happen again'. He then received a text from Hermione saying 'I just got an apology letter from the postal office! I guess that's the end of this chapter'. He sent back 'Haha, I guess so'.

That had been two weeks ago. He hadn't seen hide nor hair of her ever since.

Ron thunks his head down on the table. "Harry, what do I do?"

"Ask her out like a normal human being?" Harry suggests.

"No, not that."

"Then I've got nothing for you," Harry says, shrugging.

Ron groans.

"You've got her number. You even know where she lives. Aren't you guys friendly enough to hang out... even as friends?"

Ron sighs. "I guess so," he concedes. "But it's just hard, you know. She's pretty well out of my league, and I don't know how she feels about me either."

Harry gives him an indecipherable look. "You don't know until you try," he offers.

Ron presses his cheek to the table, thinking.

.

This is crazy. He's officially gone crazy.

Ron is standing in front of Hermione's flat, an envelope written by him clutched tightly in one hand. Before he can lose his nerve, he presses the doorbell three times.

The door opens startlingly fast. He hopes he isn't imagining the way her face lights up.

"Another one for me? I thought they had gotten that sorted out?" Hermione asks.

Ron desperately hopes that the blush spreading across his face isn't as prominent as he feels. He was never a good liar.

"Yeah," he says, shifting uncomfortably. "One last one, I suppose. I won't keep you— I know you're probably busy studying."

"Oh," she says. She examines her toes. "Yeah... I guess. I'll see you around then."

"Yeah. Night 'Mione," Ron says, the endearment slipping out almost naturally.

She smiles at him. "Night, Ron."

She steps in, and the door shuts with a soft click behind her.

Ron backs into the wall of the hallway, so he doesn't obstruct anyone's path. He wonders if this is gonna work. What if she leaves the envelope sitting on her kitchen table and doesn't open it until much, much later?

Oh god, this definitely isn't going to work.

Five minutes pass. Then ten. Just as he's about to reach the fifteen minute mark, the door in front of him slams open. Ron is instantly alert. Hermione stands in the doorway, clutching his opened letter in one hand.

She takes several long strides forward until they're standing face to face.

"I uh— I guess you read it?" Ron asks, his voice turning up into a meek question.

"Yes," she says emphatically. "And yes, I'll go out with you, you giant dork."

"Oh," Ron says faintly. "Really?" He wants to slap himself across the face.

"Yes, really!" Hermione hesitates. "Do you want to come in? I have a little bit of time."

Ron peers past her shoulder and notes the papers and textbooks scattered haphazardly everywhere. He highly doubts she has any time at all, considering its finals season.

So Ron shakes his head, a rueful smile on his face. "No," he says. "I know you're busy. But I'll see tomorrow?"

"Tomorrow then," Hermione says, and it sounds like a promise.