"I"ll still be here when you come back down," Hermione said to Ron, scowling. "I'm not going up with you."

For his most recent birthday, Fred and George had bought Ron a new broom - they could afford it now since the joke shop was doing really well, and were practically falling all over each other trying to see who could be more generous (though they were still within reason - they were generous but not stupid.) Ron was torn between annoyance (at having to accept nice things from his older brothers) and utter joy (It wasn't a Firebolt, but a Nimbus 2001 was almost as good).

The joy had finally won out, and now Ron was attempting to share that joy with everyone else, including his reluctant maybe-girlfriend, Hermione. Their status wasn't clear as of yet - they were still in the very awkward phase of their relationship. Ron was probably not helping the awkwardness by bugging Hermoine to go flying with him, even though she didn't like to.

"Please?" he begged. Somewhere he'd gotten the notion that it'd be romantic and was not letting the idea go. "Pleasepleaseplease? Everyone does it."

"Ugh, I can't believe you," Hermoine replied. "Everyone keeps house elves too, but that doesn't make it okay."

Ron barely resisted an eyeroll. "Come on, Hermione. You did that muggle thing, what, skying? over your winter break."

"Skiing, Ron, skiing. That was completely different, as I had my feet on the ground at all times."

"Hermione, it's not dangerous at all." He gave what he hoped was a winning smile.

"Right. And Harry's fallen off his broom at least once that I know about, had his arm broken once, god knows what else has happened when he's been riding that thing- and then there was the time he was being cursed until I lit Snape's robes on fire."

"More a stroke of luck than anything," Ron muttered. "And anyway, Harry's just had really bad luck. There are no Dementors here, no Dobby, and no Quirrel. It'll be-" they were walking as they spoke, and Ron suddenly tripped over a loose cobblestone. "Ow!" he exclaimed as he tripped.

"Ron!" Hermione tumbled after him, landing on top of him. There was a very awkward pause. "Um, are you okay?" Hermione exclaimed when her brain resumed functioning, scrambling off of Ron. She noticed that he was bleeding a little bit on his right elbow.

"Huh?" Ron asked, and then followed her gaze to his elbow. He shrugged it off. "Of course I am, silly. No one can stop the great King Weasley."

Hermione chuckled weakly. "Okay. But you can't even stay on your feet- how do you expect to stay on a broom?"

"Hermione." Ron fixed her with a stern gaze. "I haven't fallen off once. Give me a little credit, will you?"

"Well," she replied, "I suppose it helps that no one's trying to kill you..."

"That's right!" Ron agreed, almost staring at her.

"...All right, all right!" Hermione said, giving in. "Just...don't fly too high, okay?"

Ron grinned. "Promise. Just tell me if I get too high." He mounted his broom. "Climb on and hang on tight." Hermione climbed on behind him, and Ron Weasley gave an even happier smile - because it was really all just an excuse to have her arms around him.