| Part Ten |
Hermione strode angrily around her room.
Why did he have to do that? She had finally given in to the idea that he had forgotten, and she had decided to accept it and forgive him, and then he had to go and ...
... And announce her birthday to the house like it could have been anyone's.
But the way he looked at her.
Hermione stopped pacing, and threw herself roughly onto her bed, grasping her head in her hands.
A knock sounded on the door. She lifted her head to answer.
"Go away, Ginny!" she called, but heard the door open all the same.
"Ginny!" she repeated, "I said -"
But she broke off, because her visitor was ...
"Not Ginny," said Ron, with an apologetic smile, as he let himself in. He was carrying a small parcel as if he didn't know how it had got into his hand.
No. No. If Ginny and Harry had worked out some plan to make her forgive Ron for being such an insensitive, forgetful ...
"I'm so sorry, Hermione," he said, and the voice inside Hermione's head shut up abruptly.
He continued, "I have no idea how I could have forgotten. And I admit, I did forget. Can you ever forgive me?"
Hermione stared at him, at a loss for words for what might have been the first time in her life.
"What's that?" she asked dully, wanting so much for it to be what she thought it was, but also wanting it not to be, because that would prove that Ginny and Harry had set this up, and Hermione needed so badly for it to have come from Ron himself.
"This?" Ron stared again at the alien object in his hand. Hermione's heart sank, fearing the worst.
"Um," said Ron. "Is it stupid if I got you a birthday present, even though I forgot your birthday?"
Hermione could only stare at him mutely.
"I mean," he continued hurriedly, "I didn't get it to give to you tonight, I got it last summer and didn't know when to give it to you. So I suppose it isn't really a birthday present, but it is from me, for you."
He held the parcel forward, tentatively. Hermione, her hands almost shaking, reached out to take it.
She pulled away the paper, and for a moment, simply failed to process the information her eyes were giving her.
Ron seemed to be worried that she didn't like it, so he kept speaking to try to explain.
"I even learned a few lines, that reminded me of you."
He opened the book in her hands, to a poem entitled "XIV Juegas Todos Los Días ..." and turned over to the second page. His finger traced a single line, as he read it in Spanish, and then English.
"'Cuánto te habrá dolido acostombrarte a mí,'" he said. "'How you must have suffered getting accustomed to me.' It's like how you've put up with me all this time, even though I'm a complete idiot."
"You're not," said Hermione, and before Ron could protest or she could let herself think, she put down the book and stepped directly into Ron's arms and kissed him.
Ron made a surprised little noise in his throat, and tilted his face down to give the much shorter Hermione better access. His arms moved around her in just the way she had wished for so long.
Hermione could hardly believe she was finally here. Now that her lips were on Ron's, she was willing to admit that she had wanted this since Fourth Year, maybe earlier. Maybe since the first moment she'd seen him, on the Hogwarts Express with the dirt on his nose.
She'd dreamt about this moment, lived it in her mind, known exactly how it would feel when it finally happened.
How could she have been so naïve?
Hermione didn't know why she'd always imagined Ron to be a fantastic kisser. She knew perfectly well he'd had no experience at it whatsoever.
Only she could never had dreamed that his technique would be this poor. His lips were too slack, there was entirely too much saliva involved, and he hadn't the slightest idea how to use his tongue.
Hermione drew back slightly, staying within the circle of Ron's arms.
One of his strong hands was tangled in her hair, the other resting lightly on her waist. A look of utter bliss lit up his pink, freckled face.
He was beautiful.
Hermione reached forward again, her eyes already falling closed. If Ron was going to become a better kisser, he was going to need a great deal of training.
She knew just the witch to give it to him.
The line of poetry quoted in this scene - in both languages - actually comes not from the book mentioned in Part Nine, but from the bilingual edition of Selected Poems by Pablo Neruda, edited by Nathaniel Tarn and published by Houghton-Mifflin.