Chapter 139

"He said that?" she squeaked. 'Oh, no!' she thought.

"Yeah," he almost morosely replied. "I spent a long time thinking about it, analysing it, and I can see his point."

"And... as a result, you think you're in love with someone?" she carefully asked.

'I've lost him!' she thought. 'Oh, Merlin! I'm in love with him!... Where did that come from?'

"Yeah," he sighed. With a gesture he got them both moving again as they continued to walk up the path of the street that would take them back to her place.

"Can I ask who?" she asked. "If you want to tell me, that is."

Inside she was thinking, 'Whoever it is, I'll help him any way I can. But, I'm going to hate it.'

"It's the one person I know who cares for me, not who I am to them, not who I could be for them, not who they think I am," he replied. "Oh. And they're also female; just in case you thought I might've batted for the other team."

'Cho?... Possibly,' she thought. 'Katie?... Maybe... Ginny?... Merlin, no!―'

Screwing up her courage to hear her doom, she said, "It'll help if you stop beating about the bush and tell me who we're talking about, Harry."

"At risk of our friendship being irreparably harmed," he said. "And please believe me when I say I really, really, really hope that this doesn't hurt our friendship―."

"Harry―" she almost growled.

"You!" he suddenly blurted. Then cringed away, expecting 'Mount Hermione' to erupt.

That brought the girl to another sudden halt.

Again taking an extra step when she suddenly stopped again, but also stepping away in case she was going to hit him. He stood looking at her, blushing and expecting her to hit him.

She was again gawking at him.

"H-Hermione?" he tentatively asked. "Y-you're not going to hit me, a-are you?"

Suddenly, her jaw snapped shut and she dived at him. That drove them both to the ground.

"Oof!" he exclaimed, hitting the ground. He felt lucky his head hit the little grass strip between the path and the curb of the road.

"Oh, Harry! Oh, Harry! Oh, Harry!" she was babbling.

The female auror following them, Auror Second Class Weston, wanted to check the time right then but couldn't. She'd just have to try and figure out how long it was between now and when they got back to the house. There was a betting pool someone in the 'bullpen' was going to win.

Harry, though, was confused. Hermione was apparently trying to crush him to death with one of her hugs, while also trying to wrestle with him on the ground, all the while crying into his pullover 'hoodie'.

"Ummm... Hermione?" he asked.

Suddenly, everything stopped for a few moments. Hermione had stopped her babbling, wrestling and sobbing.

Again suddenly, she sat up on his upper thighs with what he quickly realised were her bits and had both her hands pressed flat on either side of his upper chest.

With a serious expression on her face she firmly asked, "Do you know how badly you scared me? I was going through my mind wondering who it was! Cho, Katie, Ginny, even Lavender!"

"Sorry," he quietly said. "I was trying to build up the courage to let you know it was you. You're not really angry with me, are you?"

She stared at him for a long moment before she said, "No. I can never stay mad with you."

Harry relaxed in relief.

"However," she said. And he tensed up again. "Don't you have a question you should be asking me?"

Confused, he lay there thinking about it, not wanting to ask the wrong question.

"Ummm... y-you're... okay with that?" he carefully asked.

"No, you git!" she snapped back and then actually did hit him lightly on the chest.

Harry felt devastated. She didn't like him loving her. She didn't love him.

"That's the wrong question!" she snapped again. "You're supposed to ask me if I would be your girlfriend!"

"Oh," he said, confused, before he understood what she meant. From the sudden swooping drop into the depths of despair his heart soared in joy. "Oohh!"

"Well?" she asked.

Neither teen had moved to stand up from the ground. Harry was still laying on his back on the footpath with Hermione sitting on his thighs with her hands on his chest.

"Hermione Granger," he more formally said. "Will you consent to be my girlfriend?"

"Yes!" she immediately and gaily cried, before diving forward and mashing her lips to his.

They were like that for a few long seconds, with Hermione crushing his lips with her own, before both teens heard a loud and pointed throat clear, "Huh-hmm!"

Hermione sat up straight again and both teens turned to the sound. Harry noticed on the other side of the front fence of a property they were passing, a little old lady wearing a wide brimmed straw hat, threadbare dress, light unbuttoned cardigan, wearing gardening gloves and holding a pair of garden scissors in her right hand.

"Oh! Hello, Missus Landringham!" said Hermione to the woman.

Harry could see the woman had obviously been kneeling in the garden along her low brick front fence and both of them had missed her. He could also see she was trying to put on a stern expression while trying to hide the fact she was happy for them. Her eyes were twinkling.

"Miss Granger," said the woman. "A young lady does not sit on her young suitor - on the ground, mind - and then try to bruise his lips with her own! It is unbecoming!"

Hermione blushed and said, "Ummm... Sorry, Missus Landringham." Then she slowly climbed to her feet.

Before Harry could move, the old woman then cast her stern gaze on him and said, "As for you, young man; don't you think you should be escorting Miss Granger home so you can ask her father if you may court her, first?"

Harry blushed scarlet before he scrambled to his feet. "S-sorry, Ma'am!" he exclaimed.

Then he quickly grabbed Hermione by the hand and tried to run back to her house while dragging her behind.

"Harry!" screamed Hermione within the first half dozen steps, as she was dragged along. "We don't need to run! Slow down!"

That brought Harry to an almost stop before he squeaked, "Sorry!"

Out of earshot, the old woman's expression turned into a smile. "Tch! The children of today. No sense of the proper proprieties!" she wistfully said. Then she giggled, before she dropped back to her knees and returned to her trimming.

'Wait until the bridge club hear about this!' she thought, cutting away a particularly misbehaving branch. 'Right on the outside path in front of my roses!' Then she giggled again.

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―==(oIo)==―

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As soon as they got back into the house - Hermione almost dragging Harry inside, this time - she ran off looking for her mother.

"MUU-UUM!" she two-tone called up the stairs.

Then was startled when her mother's voice called from her left in the parlour. "Don't shout, Hermione!"

The girl first whirled on locating where the voice came from before she then whirled on Harry and demanded, "Go find Daddy!" Then dashed into the parlour.

Standing there, Harry blinked a moment before he decided talking to her father was not something he wanted to do, just yet. Instead, he headed for the kitchen.

'I'd best go make sure Dobby's put all the groceries away, first,' he thought. 'And, hopefully, he's not started preparing dinner yet.'

He also knew the chances of Dobby not putting the groceries away, or that the elf had actually started dinner already considering the time, had nothing to do with it. Was he avoiding talking to her father? Of course not!

Then used the time to consider what he would be cooking for dinner that evening. He was muttering various recipes as they passed through his head while he was head down and bum up in the ice chest.

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