Continental Holiday

CHAPTER-2

"Hermione?" Harry was careful to approach her slowly, ready to back off in case she didn't want company.

"Hey Harry." Hermione took a shuddering breath. "I'm sorry, we just..." and she plunged her face into his shoulder and started crying. She stayed this way for a few minutes before she seemed to gather herself.

"I'm sorry Harry. I know we shouldn't be fighting. I thought we had agreed to not talk about any of this until we got back to England." Hermione sat up and brushed the tears off her cheeks with her sleeve. She stood up and started pacing back and forth in front of Harry.

"Don't apologize Hermione. You can't just put your life on pause."

"Don't tell me you actually agree with him?" She rounded on Harry, giving him a look that would probably melt a man on the spot if it had been anyone else.

"No Hermione, that's not what I meant." Harry sighed. He was trying to keep his cool. Shouting wasn't going to help things. "I meant that if you and Ron have stuff to work through then you can't just press pause and deal with it later."

"Isn't that what you did when you told Ginny she couldn't come?" Hermione shot him a filthy look. It hit Harry a little closer to home than he'd ever care to admit.

"That was different."

"How Harry? How is it any different?"

"For one, she didn't spend the year living on the run like we did. Not that Hogwarts was a cakewalk mind you, but I thought we were the ones who needed to get away. You told me that yourself."

Hermione seemed to deflate a little at Harry's logic.

"Not to mention that ultimately it came down the fact that I wanted you two with me. Not her. You're the ones I can barely stand to have out of my sight, not her."

Hermione's eyes went tender at this statement. "Harry..."

"It's true and you know it." Harry was stating a fact. Even the moments he thought he wanted to himself usually turned into fitfully finding his way back to them.

"Well it's pretty hard to stay mad at you when you say things like that." Hermione took a seat next to Harry again. "Thank you. Though, you probably shouldn't tell her that you feel that way about me."

"Why's that?"

"Let's just say Ron is not the only Weasley to have a little green monster."

Harry sighed. The jealousy the Weasleys was really tiresome. "Don't they think that if there was anything between us that we would have acted on it by now?"

"Well, maybe we wouldn't have." Hermione answered simply. Harry wasn't sure he followed her and it must have showed on his face. "Sometimes is takes people awhile to figure these things out Harry. I'm not saying that's what is happening with us, but it does happen. I'm just trying to say that they're not exactly being that unreasonable."

Harry frowned; he had not been expecting Hermione to defend Ginny and Ron like that. Hermione again picked up on his train of thought.

"I'm not exactly defending them Harry. They still are too overbearing and jealous when it comes to you and me, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't be more aware of how we act around each other sometimes."

The two sat in silence for a few minutes. Harry was unsure about what Hermione had said. He didn't think it was fair that he and Hermione had to change anything when they both had done nothing to prove that they were disloyal to their respective partners. Deciding to put the thought aside for the moment, Harry stood up. It was time to find Ron.