Summary: Hermione finds one of Ron's old sweaters and takes it. But what happens when Ron discovers what she's done? Fluffy one shot, R/Hr stuff. Read and review please!
A/N: Idea popped into my head. I said 'okay' and wrote it. Here ya go! Italicized lyrics from Undone (The Sweater Song) by Weezer.
Disclaimer: I don't own them, but I wish I did. Then Ron would dump Hermione like a used toothbrush and come date me.
Undone (The Sweater Song)
Do you want to destroy my sweater?
Hold this thread as I walk away
Watch me unravel, I'll soon be naked
Lying on the floor
I've come undone
She didn't know what had possessed her to take it. It was as if some imp had taken over her brain and said "Take it. It's his. You know you want it."
For most she suspected it wouldn't even feel like a crime. It was just a sweater, right? A two-year-old sweater that he never wore and she just happened to find in his room when she dropped her quill under the bed.
And she had only been in his room because she had forgotten the bloody quill the night before when she and he and their best friend had been studying. Studying in the boys' dorm because the common room was so loud and distracting. Studying, while she just wanted to yell at Harry to get out so she could be alone. With him.
And now Hermione stood in her room, holding the sweater tight to her with both hands and chewing on her lip in moral indecision. I stole, she told herself sternly, logically. That's wrong. Yet an entirely female part of her protested. He'll never miss it.
"He's got plenty more just like it," she continued to argue out loud, then looked around nervously. Luckily, no one was in the room since the entire House was watching the Gryffindor-Ravenclaw Quidditch game. She had pled a stomachache and escaped to her room before the boys could question her.
She did feel sick. The sweater burned a hole in her hands and she frowned at it. It really was an unassuming thing to be causing so much trouble. Maroon and obviously hand knit, with a large 'R' on the front. She traced the letter with her finger unthinkingly and then frowned harder.
It was ridiculous. She was smarter than this, more reasonable. She didn't sigh over boys like Lavender or those other silly girls. She was dignified and mature and—
And the sweater smelled like him. She had lifted it, moved her arm as if to throw it away from her, and the scent that was uniquely his—the smell of cinnamon and sweat and Ron—floated up and made her eyes go wide and dreamy.
Ridiculous!
She should return it to the spot under his bed where she had found it. She should. Or tell him she had it. What would he say, if he found out she had taken his sweater? She couldn't just say she had taken it! He would think she liked him.
Hermione nodded firmly. Her logic was inarguable. She couldn't give it back. She would look like a fool.
That argument won, she crawled into bed still holding the sweater. She slipped it over her head and smiled to herself. Even though it was two years old, it was still much bigger than her and the sleeves went past her stretching fingertips and the hem was nearly to her knees. She was wrapped in his scent and the softness of the sweater. She felt like she was wrapped up in him.
She fell asleep faster and easier than she had in months.
The sweater was addicting. After having it for only three weeks, Hermione couldn't even sleep without it on. She wore it in her dormitory and folded it almost religiously in her trunk during the day. If the other girls in her room noticed, they never said anything to her, although sometimes she caught knowing looks when she and Ron studied together; one brown head and one red head bent over books, nearly touching.
Sometimes she worried about him finding out, being angry or disgusted. Yet she couldn't bring herself to give it up, to give it back. Somehow it felt like she would be giving up on him. Him and her. Of all the possibilities she could see (perhaps she did have a bit of the Sight after all) between them.
She stopped worrying after a while though. He would never find out, she thought. Things would continue as they were before.
So when he did find out, it was a complete shock to her.
Ron scowled at his parchment in confused disbelief. "Harry, this says you can distill Uugroot to make the potion...but then two lines later it says distilled Uugroot is deadly when ingested."
Harry looked at the parchment. "Sorry mate, I must have missed something." He was reading over some Quidditch strategy, and his voice was distant.
"'Sorry mate?' This is my bloody homework! Oh, why did I let you take the notes for me anyway? The essay's due tomorrow!"
Hermione broke in, not looking up from her thick Charms book. "Shouldn't have waited."
Ron glared at the top of her head, then just contented himself with watching her for a little while. Her eyes flicked over the pages with astonishing speed and every time she turned a page a soft breeze from the heavy parchment sent a wavy lock of hair swinging in front of her face. She moved it back with a distracted hand and Ron followed the movement with his heart in his eyes. He wanted to touch that strand of hair, push it back for her and follow it with a sweep of his finger along her cheekbone. Her jaw. Her upper lip.
Harry glanced up and saw Ron staring at Hermione. Shaking his head in disgust, he poked his red-headed friend with his foot. Ron looked at him miserably. "Go for it." Harry mouthed, nodding to Hermione. Ron looked from him to her and back, then blushed furiously. Harry rolled his eyes.
"Hermione," He began, waiting until she focused on him. "I bet you have good notes from Potions. You and Ron should go up to your room and find them."
Hermione blinked, a slight pink tinge appearing on her cheekbones. "He should have been more responsible." She said primly, but she marked her place in her book with a stray quill.
Ron smiled at her charmingly and only Harry saw the pink deepen on her face. "Come on, Hermione," Ron persuaded, "I was sick that day. Heaving my guts out all over the loo."
Hermione's eyebrow lifted. "Well, since you added that appetizing image..." She stood and beckoned for Ron to follow her. Then she looked back and Harry, pleadingly. "Harry, don't you want to come with us?"
He leaned back and pointedly studied the next Quidditch maneuver. "I finished my essay yesterday, and I've really got to go over these moves. You two go on ahead."
Ron stood in the doorway of Hermione's room and watched as she tore it apart. She had looked all over for her notes and they didn't appear to be anywhere. Under her bed, in her dresser drawers—the entire room had been searched. Except...
"Hey, Hermione, could they be in here?" Ron strode over the trunk at the foot of her bed and lifted the lid. Ignoring Hermione's shocked gasp, he peered into the trunk. "Here they a—" The notes had been just on top and he'd lifted them out, but stopped mid-sentence when he saw what lay beneath them.
Setting the notes with care on the floor, he tentatively reached out and grabbed the object. It was one of his old Weasley sweaters, slightly faded and sad looking. He looked up, met Hermione's mortified eyes.
"Is this one of my old sweaters?" He asked, slowly, beginning to realize something both wonderful and frightening all at once.
She nodded. "From...fifth year, it looks like?" he confirmed. She nodded again. He blew out a breath and took the plunge. "Why do you have one of my old sweaters?"
A truly magnificent blush stained Hermione's cheeks and she gazed at the sweater as if it would help her answer. "I found it—under your bed—when I dropped my quill—and I—tookitImsorry." She finished in a rush.
"Yes," he said patiently, and she knew with despair that he saw through her, saw through the sweater and the lie she told him every day. She felt naked and exposed and humiliated. "Yes, but why?"
"Because," she blurted out, wondering in some distant part of her brain where her control had gone, if it had come undone with the rest of her. "I like it. It reminds me of you. Of your smell, and your eyes, and the way you always wear those sweaters even though you hate maroon, and..." She swallowed, feeling the blush spread until it covered her in a wave and desperately, illogically, she wished she had the sweater around her to give her comfort. "...and I can't sleep anymore without it."
She couldn't look at him, she was going to die of embarrassment, she was going to unravel into a pile of bushy-haired anguish and lie on the floor like the sweater. His sweater, which he had dropped on the ground as he came toward her. Oh. Merlin.
As he came toward her.
She was staring at his chest as he approached and stood mere inches away from her, watching as the Chudley Cannons logo on his shirt grew bigger and stopped. He put a finger beneath her chin and tilted her face up. She looked into his eyes and froze.
He didn't look disgusted or amused or like he pitied her. He looked serious and maybe just a tad bit...proud? "You," and his voice was low and more solemn than she had ever, ever heard it. "are so wonderful."
"Me?" she managed to squeak out, seeing herself reflected in his blue beautiful eyes and she looked as if she were about to be sick.
"You. You are so brave and brilliant and perfect and wonderful." He lifted his fingers, brushed away a lock of hair, let his hand linger. "And I, I have wanted to do this for a very long time."
"Ron, I—" Whatever she was going to say was lost as he bent and placed his mouth over her own. Hermione's eyes widened in shock before sliding closed, letting herself be lost. His arms slid around her waist and he pulled her to him as his lips moved over hers. She wound her arms around his neck and returned the kiss whole-heartedly, feeling safe and happy and complete. He held her close to his chest and she was finally where she had always wanted to be.
Wrapped up in him.
Lying on the floor
I've come undone