"Ordinary Days," Ron/Hermione, rated R. It's surprising how much you can learn without ever really trying. Set after HBP but not particularly spoilery for it.

Ordinary Days

Hermione's never really paid attention to Ron. She's paid attention to Harry, because when he grows suddenly quiet or looks off into the distance or rubs at his scarred forehead it's a clue to something; who he is, or how he's been hurt, or what's going to happen next. She's paid attention to her teachers, because that's the whole point of being in school, whether anyone else thinks so or not. She used to pay attention to the girls in her classes who seemed to have the secret of popularity, although she's decided she doesn't particularly want it.

She's still been learning all the small things about Ron, without actually trying: the way that he shovels sugar into his tea in the morning, the spikes and blots of his handwriting, the way he looks when he's bored in class (which is often), the way he paces restlessly in the common room. She knows how he looks when he plays chess, bent over the board with a serious frown. Even then he's not quite still, but his restless motion is tamed into sharp, purposeful moves, as it sometimes is when he's flying, in the rare golden moments when he isn't at war with his body or gravity but masters both.

But she hasn't been paying attention, so it surprises her when at breakfast he hands her the kind of jam she particularly likes before she asks for it. It surprises her again when she walks into the library where Ron and Harry are sitting with their backs to her and Ron says "There she is" without looking up from his parchment, having only heard the sound of her steps on the stone floor. She hasn't thought before about the fact that he's been learning her, too.

And when she's sitting on his bed in the Burrow that summer, door charmed shut even in the empty house in case anyone comes back early, she doesn't think he's surprised when she pulls off her shirt and slips the straps of her bra off her shoulders. She's not surprised when he kisses her, or when he brushes his fingers across her bare nipple. There's nothing they need to say. He reaches around and tries to unfasten her bra until she reaches back to do it herself. His warm fingers rest in the hollow between her shoulder blades.

She knows that she's going to be on top, straddling his lap and pressing down onto him, in just a few minutes. The sun won't have moved more than an inch across the quilt on his bed. She expects it's going to hurt, because they say first times do, but there's no way not to have a first time. He will come in her, and she will learn what his face looks like when he does, and how his head tilts forward onto her breast, and how his breath feels against her skin.

And she still won't know everything, and she wonders how long that would take. He rests his hand on her hip, very much like the familiar way he holds a cup.

"Take your shirt off," she says, and he does. Playing Quidditch shirtless has left him heavily freckled but still not tanned. When she brushes her fingers over his nipple she might as well be touching his arm, but when her hand rests on his stomach just above the waist he goes very still, and there's that look of focus, as if he were playing chess, or flying.

He starts unbuttoning his trousers without asking her if it's all right. He knows she'd say if it wasn't. Nevertheless, she says "I want to have sex with you," because she thinks it's the sort of thing that needs to be said.

"Oh, good," he says without laughing at her, and it's not until then she realizes she's been expecting that he will. Instead he looks desperate in a way that makes her unbutton her own jeans and slide her underwear off with them. She's wanted someone to want her that much. She doesn't feel beautiful, and she doesn't care. She feels hungry, and that's all right because she won't have to stay that way.

The sun is warm on her skin. Ron tries to kick his trousers off, which is not a graceful maneuver even for him. He knocks over an abandoned teacup on the nightstand in the process, which clatters on the floor, and he swears.

"I'd better clean that up."

"I think this is more important, don't you?" Hermione can't help pointing out.

"Right," Ron says, flushing red. He climbs back up on the bed, and Hermione watches him with interest. He's still wearing his shorts, but she can see the shape of his erection clearly through the thin white cotton. He raises his chin, stubbornly refusing to let this be ridiculous. The sunlight is turning his bare feet gold.

She's thought that after having sex with Ron she would know everything about him, but maybe it'll only tell her what having sex with Ron is like. And that's worth knowing, but maybe the rest can only be learned the way she's learned so far, bit by bit on ordinary days. It could take months. It could take years.

That might not be a problem, she thinks, and pulls him forward into the sunlight for a kiss.

Tags: fic, harry potter, hp: ron/hermione