Disclaimer: The characters and events in this novel belong to J.K. Rowling, and no offense is meant to any Australians or anybody of Australian origin. Anyone else, however, is fair game.

"Bloody Aussies," said Ron darkly, rapping the door twice with his knuckles. "You know, they're such hypocrites. They spend all day getting drunk and they hate me just because I had a few too many bottles of butterbeer that time in Hogsmeade, when –"

"I know," said Hermione, smiling weakly, "when Madame Rosmerta said she couldn't believe how much you still looked like a first-year. But…you know, never mind."

"But what, but what?"

"Never mind, it's just," said Hermione, debating with herself for a moment before deciding whether to continue, "that's not exactly why they hate you."

"They HATE me? Why the hell would they hate me? Dislike's bad enough, but hate? What've you told them?"

Before Hermione could attempt to answer, a voice shouted from inside. "COME BACK LATER! THE WIFE'S HOME, JERRY!"

"Who's Jerry?" said Ron impatiently, and then began to shout at the door. "LET US IN! WE'VE GOT URGENT BUSINESS!"

"I DON'T CARE! GO AWAY!"

"Stupid old kangaroo," said Ron angrily. "Get out of the way, Hermione, I'll get the door open."

"Wait," said Hermione, suddenly urgent. "Ron, no…please, we can just come back later, they can't know about spells, they're Muggles now, remember?"

"And I've got to get their bloody permission to marry you, so move over while I blow the door down!" said Ron loudly.

"OI!" shouted the resident of the house. "DON'T YOU DARE KNOCK MY DOOR DOWN, I'LL CALL THE POLICE!"

"Who is it?" said a muffled female voice from inside. "Wendell, what's happening?"

"Some bloke's outside wants to blow the door down and talk to us," said Wendell.

The woman began to panic. "Oh, God, Wendell!" she cried. "It's the Mafia! Oh God, oh God, what did you do? I told you not to talk to that Italian man at the bar with your mates, I told you, and you didn't listen! Oh God, we're going to die!"

"We're not the Baffiya!" Ron shouted. "If you don't let us in, we're going to blow the door down!"

"It's Mafia, Ronald, and please don't," Hermione pleaded.

"YOU'D BETTER NOT!" shouted Wendell from inside.

"I'M GONNA, TRY TO STOP ME!"

"Oh, dear Lord, I've got to call the police!" said the female voice quickly inside the house.

"YOU'VE GOT ONE CHANCE!"

"I'M NOT LETTING YOU IN!"

"Ron!"

"Oh, come on, get a connection, get a connection!"

"One…"

"DON'T YOU DARE!"

"Two…"

"Oh, thank God, Officer Charles! Officer Charles, you've got to come quick! Freaks are attacking our house!"

"THREE!"

"Ron, no!"

"REDUCTO!"
The door smashed and the hinges detached from the wall, and the debris was blasted into the house, along with Wendell, who had been right up against the door. Ron charged in, Hermione behind him screaming at him please to stop, and Wendell got up, ready with his fists, while Ron readied his wand for another attack.

"Ron, stop!" Hermione shrieked, throwing herself at him and knocking the wand out of his hand, but not before Ron had shouted "Appolifus Solex!" The spell missed Wendell by an inch and hit a framed photograph of said Wendell accepting an award called The Toothbrush Medal for Fine Dentistry. The picture was lifted from the wall and began to zoom around the living room which they had entered through a small, cramped passageway from the door.

Monica Wilkins rushed screaming through the room and into the kitchenette on one side and came back brandishing a large pot. She sighted the picture assailing her husband and gave a cry of terror, and began hitting it. Ron, having regained his wand, shouted at the pot, "Appolifus Solex!" and the pot flew out of a frightened Monica's hand and began zooming around the room like the picture, knocking things off the mantelpiece which in turn started to fly around.

Hermione leaped for cover behind a plush sofa as a knife from the kitchenette flew towards her head, and it embedded itself in the wall, and Ron, horrified at what he had done, tried to rectify his mistake. "Iddobulus!" he cried, but immediately Hermione emerged from behind the sofa and, after evading a flying model of a root canal, cried out:

"Ron, stop, that's not the right spell!"

The spell that had been cast hit Wendell Wilkins in the chest, and for a moment it seemed as though nothing had happened. Then, Wendell began to rise, slowly at first, then faster, and he began to spin around frenetically, his arms outstretched, and he began to zoom around with everything else. Monica and Ron ran after him, trying to pull him down. And Hermione pointed his wand directly at him and shouted, "Descendo!"

The spell missed and hit the roof through which an enormous, marble, four-legged bathtub fell, crashing through the wood and crushing the coffee table as it fell on it. Monica, in her pursuit of her husband, tripped over the wreckage and into the bathtub. A few pipes had broken as a result of the bathtub's trip into the living room, and water began to pour like the falls of Niagara through the hole in the roof, drenching poor Monica as she struggled to get out of the tub. The newly applied pressure of the water pushed her down again, and Wendell flew through one of the falls, his propeller-like hands sending it spraying everywhere.

"Descendo!" Ron shouted at Wendell. "Descendo! Descendo! Descendo!"

A series of objects began to blast into the living room through the whole in the ceiling, and some formed holes of their own. The most prominent in the chaos was an enormous grandfather clock, which fell on the bathtub and would have crushed Monica had it not smashed against the rails around the tub and had not Monica thrown herself down into the depths of the water filling it. She rose, spluttering into the wreckage.

Ron, determined to rectify his mistake, shouted, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I can fix it! Reparo!"

"Ron, no!"

The grandfather clock fixed itself around Monica Wilkins, and when it was fully repaired, she found herself trapped inside it. She pounded her hands against the glass, her voice muffled behind it, and she struggled valiantly to burst herself out of it, but the door in the clock which was mean to be opened to wind up the gears had locked in the repairing, and Monica was hopeless.

"Oh, this has got to stop now!" said Hermione desperately. "Alohomora!"

The grandfather clock unlocked its door and Monica gasped for air as she ascertained her freedom. She rushed immediately for the telephone, and then, discovering that Officer Charles had hung up, threw it at the wall in frustration. Her expressions of anger were, however, interrupted, for she was forced to run around the room evading the thousands of things that were flying around. Ron rushed forward and knocked her down on the sofa, which grew exceedingly happy and began bouncing her up and down with its cushions.

"IMMOBULUS!" Hermione cried.

All the zooming objects, including Wendell, froze in midair.

Hermione seemed to relax a bit now that the chaos had ended, and then said, in a much softer voice, "Descendo."

All the floating objects, including Wendell, fell to the floor.

"There we are," said Hermione. "Now we've got to do what we came for."

She pointed her wand at a frightened but cowed Wendell, who shrank back a little. "This won't hurt a bit," she said gently. "Eruditio."

Wendell gasped for a moment and seemed to spasm, and a blue light coruscated from Hermione's wand and filled the room. His head lifted for a moment, like a fallen soldier lifting his head up to deliver his will and testament to a surviving comrade, but before he could say or do anything he fell back and sighed, and he was Mr. Granger again.

"Great, now that's done!" said Ron brightly. "Listen, Mr. Granger, I'm Ron Weasley –"

"Oh, it's you, is it?" said Mr. Granger glumly as Hermione moved to help her mother out of the bathtub and perform the charm on her. "What do you want?"

Ron refused to be cowed. "I'm here," he said, and then began to grow uncertain. "Well, I've come, well…I was sort of going to ask you…er…can I marry Hermione?"

"WHAT?"

"Thanks, bye!" said Ron hurriedly, and rushed to Hermione, who said reprovingly:

"Ron, I don't think you're making a good impression."

"Well then help me, please, you know how intimidated I am by this sort of thing."

Hermione smiled weakly. "Well, I do now." She got up and walked slowly across the room to address her father. "Er, Daddy," she said, "Ron's actually right, you know. We're…well, we're in love, and we'd like to get married, if that's all right with you."

Mr. Granger looked mortified. "But he's the bloke who was vomiting slugs!" he protested.

"Oh, that's why you don't like me?" said Ron, evidently relieved. "Oh, thank God…you know, Mr. Granger, I was actually defending Hermione when that happened."

"What?"

"Yes, he was," said Hermione, seizing the chance. "Daddy, it's true, there was this awful Slytherin who I told you about, Malfoy –"

"Oh, him," Mr. Granger growled. "Let me at him with a cricket bat and he'll never be the same again."

"I know, right?" said Ron. "He's such a little cowardly bastard, you know we were fighting a battle and he just kept running away and switching sides just to survive."

"He did?" said Mr. Granger, catching onto the subject with enthusiasm. "Well, give that bastard a little curse from me with that wand thing you've got, Hermione's been telling us about him, he started working for that Voldemort fellow, tried to kill that Dumbledore chap I met once at the station. Nice man, nice man, heard about his death and was crushed, that Dumbledore."

"I know, but that man who killed him actually did that on Dumbledore's orders."

"Is that a fact? Allegiances aren't really set with you people, are they?"

"Well, mine and Hermione's are, we were with Harry the whole time. He's killed Voldemort by the way."

"Really? That's…that's remarkable. I always liked that bloke, Hermione, why couldn't you have chosen –"
"Actually," said Ron quickly, knowing where the inquiry was going, "Harry's with my little sister Ginny."

"Ginny? You mean like a Ginny Pig?"

"No, Daddy," said Hermione patiently. "Guinea pig is pronounced like g as in go, but Ginny's pronounced the other way. But that's not really the point –"

"Right," said Ron simply. "So how about it, can I marry your daughter or what?"

"What? Oh, yes, yes, fine, if you must."

Hermione's mother walked slowly over to them. "What's happening?"

"Hermione's marrying this redhead bloke."

"Oh," she said, only betraying a hint of the surprise that was exploding like a volcano within her. "Oh, that's…well, that's…I don't know."

"Well, what happened here anyway?" said Mr. Granger, eyeing the wreckage. "Where are we? Is this Uncle Michael's house in London?"

"Er, no," said Ron, "but it's a bit like London."

"Yes," said Hermione. "We're on the outskirts of this town that's, well, sort of close to London, I suppose."

"How close?"

"Well…" said Hermione uncertainly.

"Melbourne," said Ron simply.

"WHAT?"

"Goodbye, we'll send you the wedding invitations when we're done with them!" said Ron quickly. He took Hermione's hand, and together they hurried out the door, leaving Mr. and Mrs. Granger goggling after them.

"You know," called Hermione from outside. "It is somewhat close to London, if you think objectively. Just look how many planets there are!"

"Well," said Mr. Granger after a while, "I suppose we had better pack."

A/N: Sorry it took so long to update. Patience is a virtue, as anyone who has tried to use a bathroom at a theater will know. Thank you lovely reviewers. If you haven't reviewed yet, do so or we will sue you (just kidding…OR ARE WE?) Hehe. We hope you enjoyed this little two-shot :D