- Chapter Five -

Needed Apologies and Deserved Captaincy

Hermione headed along a deserted corridor on the seventh floor silently, her thoughts on the conversation that she and Harry had just been having. When Harry had first approached her after lunch, she had thought it would've been about Ron, who was yet to apologise to her. She had not, however, believed that it would be to make plans for reforming Dumbledore's Army. She promised she would, straight away, do what she had meant to do days ago and collect some books from the Room of Requirement for them to study from, though.

She came to a stop at Barnabas the Barmy's large tapestry and looked around at the blank stretch of wall opposite. She bit her lip and paced up and down in front of it a couple of times, whispering, "I need to enter the DA room and borrow some books for our classes", while concentrating on what the room had looked like when she'd entered it last.

Suddenly, an ornate polished door appeared out of nowhere in the blank wall and she hurried forward, seized the brass handle and opened the door to reveal the spacious DA room.

Glancing around at the many wooden bookshelves that lined the walls and the silk cushions that were scattered across the floor, Hermione couldn't help but let a smile come to her lips as she remembered how much fun she had experienced in this room. She headed over to the nearest bookshelf and ran her index finger across the spines of one shelf of books and pulled the occasional one out, feeling it would come in handy.

Nearly twenty minutes passed until she finally felt she had enough books down to satisfy Harry. She sat down on one of the cushions and started packing them into her bag, feeling that reforming the DA was truly a good idea after all and would be, without a doubt, fun. They had yet to ask for Dumbledore's permission, but neither Hermione nor Harry felt in a great rush. The headmaster would most likely allow it.

Hermione was just zipping up her bag, a smile still on her lips, when the door of the room opened. She looked up quickly, only to see Ron standing in front of the now-closed door, a rather uncomfortable expression on his face. They looked at each other for a moment before Hermione looked back down and finished zipping up her bag. When finished, she looked back up at Ron; he was watching her with the same uncomfortable expression on his face.

"Harry said I would find you here," he said finally, walking further into the room and taking a seat on the closest cushion, a couple of metres from where Hermione sat on hers.

Hermione, who was about to stand up and leave, stay seated and looked at him carefully. His expression still hadn't changed and there was something there that Hermione had never really seen there before. What it was, she couldn't quite put her finger on. All she knew was that he obviously had something to say and she was, without a doubt, going to hear him out.

"Why did you want to find me, Ron?" she asked quietly, not looking at him but instead at her bag, which was bulging with books.

"I wanted to apologise," he replied with a shrug that Hermione didn't see.

Hermione looked up at him. He was looking straight at her, his deep, sky blue eyes seemingly darker than usual. As much as she had wanted him to apologise, she never actually thought that he would. It was actually quite rare for Ron to ever apologise after they had a fight and now that he was, Hermione really didn't know what to think.

"I'm sorry for being a prat," Ron said, "bringing up your and Krum's relationship and making false assumptions about it. I should've believed that you and Krum were never anything more than friends right from the beginning, but I didn't. I shouldn't have kept persuading the subject."

Hermione frowned and looked back down. She definitely hadn't expected Ron to apologise to that extent!

"Why did you keep persuading the subject, Ron?" she asked. "Why couldn't you accept, right from the beginning, that Viktor and I are no more than just friends? Why do you get so jealous and upset every time the subject of Viktor Krum comes up, even if you're the one that brings it up in the first place? Why don't you like him? What's he ever done to you?"

"I dunno," Ron said uneasily, while his mind, to his great annoyance and uncertainty, screamed, "He stole you!" He looked at Hermione, taking in her pleading expression. "I dunno… I guess he just … gets to me, is all…"

Hermione frowned at him. "What do you mean, he gets to you, Ron?" she asked, moving to her knees on the cushion and looking straight into his eyes. "You hardly know him and ever since fourth-year – the Yule Ball – you've held a grudge towards him and I don't understand what your reason for that could possibly be. Before I went with him to the ball, you were acting as though he was the world's greatest celebrity, fussing about how much you wanted his autograph…" She watched as Ron moved uncomfortably, the tips of his ears going pink. "Why are you so jealous of him, Ron? You really have no reason to be…"

"I have my reasons," Ron muttered irritably, looking away from her.

"What reasons, Ron?" Hermione asked quietly. "I really feel I deserve to know…"

Ron stayed silent for a couple of minutes, staring at the cracked Flo-Glass that hung on the wall. He slowly turned his head until his eyes met Hermione's again, an irritated expression etched into his freckled face.

"I dunno why I even bothered coming to apologise to you, Hermione," he said, standing up but not taking his eyes off her. "I should've known you'd ask me questions I either don't know the answer to or don't want to answer. It's like your favourite hobby or something…"

He turned and made towards the door, but Hermione, admittedly desperate to have him back as a friend, leapt to her feet.

"No, Ron, wait, please don't leave," she pleaded. Ron stopped in his tracks and turned slightly to look at her. "I'm sorry I asked the questions. I can tell they made you uncomfortable, but I really feel I deserve at least one straight answer here. I'm tired of you always bringing up Viktor and accusing me of having feelings for him when I always fancied someone else, not Viktor. I just want to be able to go a full week without Viktor's name coming up. That way, I can avoid having another fight with you over the subject of him. I really don't like him as any more than a friend and a pen-pal, Ron and I want you to believe that to its full extent."

Ron stared at her with a vacant face, taking in every word she had said, before giving her a lopsided smile. "I believe you," he said eventually.

Hermione smiled and hurried forward, wrapping her arms around his neck. "Thank-you, Ron," she said, tears welling in her eyes. "I really don't think I could stand you avoiding me any longer."

"I'm sorry," Ron said awkwardly, patting her on the back slightly, hoping she would let go of him soon, but at the same time wanting her to stay there.

"Damn," Ginny said as she slowly and silently re-closed the door of the Room of Requirement.

She and Harry had followed Ron there to see what he said or did and, to their disappointment, it hadn't exactly ended up being the show they had hoped it to be.

"At least they're back on friendly terms," Harry said as they headed down the corridor together. "Give them a while and hopefully their feelings will come out and everyone will be happy."

"I really don't know why he just didn't confess his feelings for her when she asked why he was jealous," Ginny said thoughtfully. "That hug could really have turned into a kiss if he just let it all out, even if he's not – well – certain of exactly how he feels. I'm honestly ashamed of having such an oblivious prat for a brother… He seriously needs to wake up and notice how he feels about his female best friend – kiss her – anything!"

Harry stayed silent and tried hard not to imagine his two best friends snogging. It had been so long since he had kissed Cho under the mistletoe before Christmas. He was over Cho, he knew that for sure, but lately, every time someone mentioned kissing or he saw a couple at the act somewhere around school, he immediately pictured her under the mistletoe, tears in her eyes. He would never forget the events leading up to and the bliss he felt during his first and only kiss.

Harry mentally shook his head to clear his thoughts as he descended the stairs to the sixth floor and looked around at Ginny who walked beside him silently, a puzzled expression covering her freckled face. She unblinkingly watched where she was going, evidently in deep thought with her dark brown eyes narrowed slightly as they headed towards the next staircase.

"What's up?" Harry asked her, being truly curious as to what was running through her mind at that moment.

"I'm just…" She looked at Harry carefully. "Has Hermione ever told you that she's never been kissed?"

Harry's eyebrows rose to meet his messy hair. "Um … no," he replied with a shrug. "I sort of always, to myself, imagined she and Krum might've… Why?"

"The other day," Ginny said slowly as they headed down another set of stairs, "when she admitted to liking Ron, she said she's never been kissed and that … she wanted to be … before her birthday. She asked me what it was like to be kissed and I told her as much as I could remember and over-exaggerated a bit. To tell the truth, it's been a while since I've been kissed."

Harry frowned. "I thought you were going out with Dean?" he said quietly, his stomach doing a very strange twist that he couldn't quite explain.

"Oh, I am," Ginny said, going a little pink in the cheeks as she looked down. "Dean just hasn't really kissed me since we first got together. I mean, sure, he gives me tiny little kisses on the cheek and occasional kisses on the lips, but our first real kiss has really been the only." She shrugged and gave Harry a false sort of smile.

Harry felt uncomfortable, but didn't entirely understand why. A strange, almost tempting feeling ran through his body and with every mention of Dean and the word "kiss" from Ginny's mouth, a strong, complicated and confused emotion overwhelmed him and pounded in annoyance. He didn't know what was causing it, though.

He looked at Ginny out of the corner of his eye, trying to push his confusion aside. He could tell by the look of confusion and slight sadness on her own face that she didn't much want to discuss the lack of kissing going on in her and Dean's relationship and quickly turned the conversation to himself.

"I haven't kissed anyone since Christmas," he said, before mentally punching himself. She didn't want to know about his pitiful kissing experience! However, she did in fact seem slightly interested and looked at him in a gesture to continue. "After the last DA meeting before we left for Christmas break – with Cho."

Ginny made a disgruntled sound and looked away, feeling annoyed. "Nearly three years I tried to get you to notice me and for two of those years, all your attention was on Cho Chang, the beautiful Ravenclaw Seeker that had guys all over the school dropping at her feet. I had no chance against her so I ended up with Michael and who'd he leave me for? Cho Chang!"

"I'm sorry, Ginny," Harry said. "I swear you're as annoyed with her as I am. She yapped on about Diggory all the time when I didn't feel ready to discuss it and then she went and accused me of seeing Hermione as well as other girls while I was with her."

Ginny made another disgruntled sound and looked at Harry carefully. "I started to fancy you a bit at the end of last year again," she admitted, looking away as a pink tinge crept in amongst her freckles again. "Luna and I were sort of concocting a little plan for me to kiss you, but then Dean, well… you know…"

Harry felt a pang in his heart and he stared at Ginny in disbelief. He hadn't even suspected she had liked him again! Pushing those thoughts aside he realised she had mentioned Luna and frowned.

"How has Luna been lately?" he said. "I mean, I spoke to her very briefly about the DA the other day in the Great Hall and she seemed as loony as ever, but I haven't seen her around much."

Ginny shrugged. "I heard Ravenclaw fifth-year's have been getting detention from Professor Krum quite a bit over the last week. That and our homework pile is huge. She probably hasn't had much of a chance to escape. We'll see her once the DA is running again don't you worry. I was talking to her in Herbology the other day and she seems really excited about it."

Harry nodded, his thoughts back on what Ginny had said about having had feelings for him. "Ginny," she said slowly as they headed across the cavernous Entrance Hall towards the outside grounds, "why did you have feelings for me?"

Ginny smiled and stopped in front of him, facing him. "Because you're everything," she said, and with that she headed away in a slow run towards the lake, where Seamus and Dean were throwing stones.

Harry, with her words repeating themselves in his mind and his heartbeat irregular, sighed and slowly headed in the opposite direction to visit Hagrid for the first time that term.

DUMBLEDORE'S ARMY ("DA")

The DA is a Defence Against the Dark Arts group/class held at least one night a week!

Run and organised by students (Harry Potter, Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger), a maximum of forty new members are wanted for when we reform on September 18!

Places to join this group are available to all Gryffindor, Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff students fifth-year and above with exceptions to original members!

If interested, please inform one of the organisers mentioned above to be given further details!

ORIGINAL MEMBERS: Our re-forming meeting is being held at seven o'clock on September 18 in our usual room. New members shall also be there and arrangements will be made from then! Please come!

(Please keep the information on this notice concealed from all Slytherins or suffer consequences! – Ron Weasley.)

Harry, Ron and Hermione stood in Dumbledore's office anxiously as the headmaster ran his twinkling blue eyes over the notice carefully. When he reached the end, he chuckled, rolled up the parchment and looked at the three of them through his glasses.

"I am, without any doubt, willing to have the DA reform," he said with a smile. "The fact you are not allowing students from Slytherin house to join is however discriminatory and I am unable to allow it. I do understand your reasoning for not wanting any of them to take part, but I am afraid that you will have to be fair and give them the option."

Harry and Ron exchanged dark looks, and then looked at Hermione, who was walking forward to collect the notice back off Dumbledore.

"Thank-you, Sir," she said as he handed it back. "We'll make the changes to the notice as soon as we get back to the common room."

Dumbledore gave the three of them a short nod and they left after saying goodbye.

"Well that's bloody brilliant, isn't it?" Ron said snappily as they headed down the revolving staircase and back out into the second floor corridor, the wall with the stone gargoyle sliding back into place behind them. "Now we have to put up with Malfoy!"

"Well, not necessarily, Ron," Hermione said calmly. "We still have the number limit and if Malfoy approaches us wanting to join, we'll just say we've reached that limit, even if we haven't."

"Hermione," Harry said dully, "that's a great idea, but what if Malfoy and his clan are the only Slytherins who want to join. We can't say no to them then, can we? Dumbledore'll know something's up if there's no Slytherin members."

Hermione smiled weakly. "If that happens, then we'll try to teach Crabbe and Goyle a really hard spell to practice on Malfoy. The worst that can happen there is that they actually do it properly."

Ron snorted slightly and decided it really couldn't be all that bad.

Come lunchtime next day, Hermione was counting the many names she'd written on a piece of loose parchment.

"Twenty-nine," Hermione finished, looking up at Harry. "There's still room for a few more. We did say we wanted forty at the most. But –" she ran her quill down the line of names – "We don't have any Slytherins as yet –"

"Then you can write our names on that little list of yours, Granger," drawled the familiar voice of Draco Malfoy behind them. "Me, Crabbe and Goyle."

"Oh, and me," simpered Pansy Parkinson, who had now joined, a smirk forming on her pug-like face as she hooked her arm through Malfoy's.

Malfoy scowled, disgusted and nudged her off before heading away.

Harry, Ron and Hermione exchanged dark looks before Hermione proceeded to write their names down. She placed her quill down with a weak sigh, having a fair idea as to what Ron was going to say next.

"Well that definitely puts a groan on the excitement of reforming," he said, chest-fallen.

"Yes, well, it was bound to happen, wasn't it?" Hermione replied dully. "At least we can hope they'll muck up badly and, with Dumbledore's permission, we'll have to kick them out. I highly doubt they'll work efficiently or the way we want them to – they're just in it to ruin it for us."

"I just hope they don't ruin it too much," Harry murmured. "If they do, then I'll just have another reason to kill Malfoy because I swear I will if he does!"

Hermione looked at Harry warningly as a happy sigh sounded behind them and signalled the arrival of Ginny, who enthusiastically took the seat next to Harry. "Well, all the Ravenclaw DA members are excited about Wednesday," she said with a grin. "I was just over with Luna and thought I'd check that they were all going to be at the meeting. Cho tried to convince that Marietta friend of hers to rejoin but she immediately declined, thankfully. Cho's going to be there, though."

Harry nodded absently and looked down at his plate, honestly not caring if Cho turned up or not just as Dean, Seamus and Neville took seats across from them. Harry distantly heard Ginny mutter something under her breath as they did so and watched curiously as she reached over and grabbed the unbuttered dinner roll from his plate. Looking at her, she grinned and cheekily took a bite in front of him before screwing up her nose and pulling the dish of butter towards her.

"Have any of you seen Parvati?" Seamus asked, looking around wildly.

"Her and Lavender are over with Padma at the Ravenclaw table," Ginny said absently, buttering the roll. "Most likely talking about boys and Divination as usual. They kept me up most of last night with their gossiping travelling through their floorboards to my dormitory. I'll never understand how Hermione can sleep through it!"

Seamus gave a nervous sort of laugh and let his eyes travel straight to the Ravenclaw where Parvati sat talking to her twin sister and Lavender. His eyes didn't move for the rest of lunch.

Harry, ignoring the others amused comments about Seamus's obvious infatuation with Parvati, looked at Ginny. "So, Ginny, about the DA, do you want to –" The sound of someone clearing their voice behind him interjected and he looked around to find Professor McGonagall standing directly behind them.

"Potter, I am pleased to finally tell you that I have decided to make you Gryffindor Quidditch Captain if you are willing to accept?" she said.

Harry looked at her, both surprised and pleased, before nodding numbly.

"Wonderful," McGonagall said with a very small smile. "Here is your badge and, as you should already know, Chaser try-outs are on Friday at five o'clock." She turned to Hermione. "Miss Granger, as a senior prefect I expect you to supervise."

Hermione nodded. "Yes, Professor."

Professor McGonagall's thin lips formed another tiny smile and she handed Harry his badge: A scarlet background with a gold lion and broomstick imprinted with a scarlet "C" for Captain in the centre. The professor headed away as Harry took it from her with a small "Thank-you", a smile spreading happily across his face as he looked down at it with Ron thumping him on the back in congratulations.

Friday morning dawned with a smile for Harry. He was highly looking forward to that evening when he would be conducting the Quidditch try-outs. He had organised the current Gryffindor Quidditch players to be there and had pinned reminder notes on the message board in the common room.

At five o'clock, Harry, along with his scarlet and gold-clad team headed down to the Quidditch stadium to find a dozen Gryffindor students from different years standing in the shadows of the stands with broomsticks held anxiously in their hands. Harry beamed around at their nervous faces until his eyes landed on Ginny who looked the calmest of the group.

Harry gestured them to follow him and led the way through to the change rooms, where he instructed them to sit down.

"OK, when we get out onto the field, our current players – that is, Ron Weasley as Keeper, Katie Bell as one of our Chasers, Andrew Kirke and Jack Sloper are our Beaters and me, Seeker – will get in the air. Then, two at a time I'll call you up into the game and we'll play like it's a regular team practice match. Katie will pass around the Quaffle and I expect you, if you can, to attempt to score with Ron defending your shots."

It sounded quite simple, but when they headed out onto the field Harry found many of the students trying-out were either too nervous to fly properly, they naturally couldn't or they hadn't listened to his instructions correctly.

Aaron Fehling and Joanna Fitzpatrick went first. Joanna, a blonde third-year, clutched her broom too tightly and seemed to have an awful lot of trouble keeping on course. Aaron, who reminded Harry of a younger and slightly thinner Neville Longbottom, fell dramatically to the ground after rising only two metres and ran away looking very embarrassed and upset. Thankfully, the next two, Lavinia Jones and Kayla McKenzie were much more confident and better on a broom, though they each seemed to lack speed and catching ability. A young and quite pretty girl, Lara Sursok, who Harry had heard quite a lot about, went next with a boy named Jarod Suffield, who ran away to throw up before he even mounted his broom. Lara went alone to show off her graceful Chasing ability alone and, in Harry's mind, got a tick next to her name.

Finally, after two other pairs, one of which scored question marks next to their name, it was Ginny and a surly-looking boy with dark blonde hair called Benjamin Ferrara's turn to try.

Harry watched carefully as Ginny flew beautifully across the stadium, becoming mesmerised by the way that her golden red hair floated angelically behind her as she soared. He watched steadily as she caught the Quaffle easily in her right hand when Katie threw it to her. She confidently headed straight towards Ron at goals, dodging a Bludger Andrew Kirke had hit her way. Harry's heart pounded strangely in his chest as she raised the hand holding the scarlet ball and made to throw it, tricking Ron at the very last minute and scored through the far left hoop as he dived right.

Ginny did a little loop around the hoop, a huge smile on her face and Harry looked around to see Benjamin arguing with Jack Sloper about hitting a Bludger towards him when he had least expected it. Harry shrugged to himself and gestured his players to the ground where the students that had tried-out were standing patiently.

"Alright, well, you all did really well in my opinion," Harry said once they'd all joined him. "I've decided Lara and Ginny will fill the Chaser positions and Mark and Wayne will make good reserves. Other than that, thanks for trying and I'm sorry I couldn't accept you. If you're ready, you can all go to dinner."

Harry watched as everyone but Ginny and himself made their way off the pitch and towards the castle. Once out of sight, Harry turned to Ginny, taking in the huge smile on her face.

"Thank-you so much, Harry!" she cried happily, wrapping her arms around his neck in a hug through her excitement. "I swear I wanted this so badly you wouldn't believe! You're a brilliant captain, Harry! Oh Merlin, I could kiss you right now – Oh, what the hell –!"

What happened next caused Harry so much shock he couldn't move or react: She kissed him. She just leant up on her tiptoes and pressed her lips to his in a quick, instantaneously heart-stopping kiss.

Harry blinked, looking at her bewilderedly as she let go of him and gave a tiny, slightly choked giggle, her cheeks painted pink. She absently bit her lower lip, looking into his shining eyes, a smile curving her mouth's edges. She backed away a couple of steps, still looking at him.

"Thank-you," she said again, and with that she turned, leaving Harry staring at her retreating back with that same amazed expression, his heart beating fast in his chest and confusion building up to engulf his brain.