Title: Boy II

Author: SkoosiePants

"Can I check this out?"

Hermione glanced up at the boy with a small smile. Baby steps. He was almost civil to her now. “Of course, Ash.”

He gave her a slight frown over the use of his proper name, but made no comment as she took the book out of his hands. She’d learned a few things about him over the past couple weeks. For one, he was as quiet as his father. He played Quidditch, but preferred the library to the pitch. He got top marks in all his classes, but hated Charms and had a passion for Herbology, of all things. Where he’d gotten that predilection from, she didn’t have a clue.

“I don’t hate you, you know,” he said suddenly, frown still firmly in place.

Hermione arched a brow. “Well, that’s certainly good to know. I don’t hate you either.”

He opened and closed his mouth, then cocked his head quizzically, as if not quite sure how to take her comment. Finally, he sputtered, “Do you...? I mean...” Flags of red stained the boy’s cheeks.

Hermione waited patiently for him to continue, face carefully banked of emotion.

He bit his lip and lowered his eyes, sticking his hands deep into his pockets. The gesture was so entirely Blaise that she felt her heart contract in her ribcage.

“Do you love him, then?” he mumbled, so low she almost couldn’t hear him.

This time, she didn’t have to wonder who the boy was talking about. “Once,” she started with deliberate slowness, “I loved your father very much.”

He screwed his mouth up into a sneer. "Once?" he snarled.

Hermione sighed. She just couldn’t win with him. "Come over here with me a moment, Ash. I want to show you something."

Shrugging with forced casualness, he followed her back through the stacks and into a small storeroom. She felt decidedly Slytherin-like as she dug out her advanced copies of Three hundred and One Venomous Fungi by Neville Longbottom and it's companion volume that was borderline Restricted Section material, Gene Splicing and the Venomous Plant.

"Is that...?" Ash's eyes grew wide as galleons. "Is that the completed research on snake-fauna hybrids?"

"Yes," Hermione answered nonchalantly. "Fascinating theories, really."

Ash shook his head. "I heard he actually created one," he said, breathless and staring mesmerized at the handsome leather-bound volumes. "I heard he was bitten so many times that he's virtually immune to any kind of poison now."

Neville Longbottom, the Invincible Snake-man. Hermione chuckled. "Mild exaggeration."

"May I?" he asked, flicking his gaze up from the books, one hand extended out to trace a finely etched title, his dark eyes gleaming with excitement.

"You can study them as much as you want," she replied, "as long as you don't take them outside the library."

He flashed a brilliant smile and Hermione decided that subtle bribery had definitely been a good move on her part.

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