First Kiss

Ron looked at Hermione, snuggled in one of the plush hazel-colored rockers at their flat. He found it fascinating to watch her read; to gasp as the plot took an unexpected turn, chuckle quietly when a character made a simple little joke or mutter to herself at an irrelevant factor in the book. It let him see so much of the Hermione she'd hidden over the past eight years they'd known each other. She gazed up, meeting Ron's intense blue eyes.

"What?" She asked with a giggle as a slight blush swept across her cheeks.

"No, it's nothing." He shook his head. "Just... do you remember the first time we kissed?"

Hermione smiled inwardly. Of course she remembered. She would have had to been hit with a strong memory charm to forget and even that was doubtful.

It was the summer before their third year; they'd been in the Leaky Cauldron sitting room, introducing their pets to each other, correctly, as opposed to when Scabbers, or Pettigrew, really, had been attacked by Crookshanks. The cat jumped from Hermione's arms, as cats so often do, and began twining himself in between Hermione's legs. The young Hermione had not realised her cat was there and went to move. She tripped over the cat, creating a domino effect and toppled on to Ron. Their lips pressed together, an air of awkward surrounding them. They separated, of course, to hide their blushes and the obvious fact. They liked it.

They fought intensely all year, trying to prove any witnesses to the kiss wrong and trying to keep anyone off the trail. It had worked. Not one person suspected they kissed.

Hermione returned to the present. "What about the kiss?" She inclined.

"Well, Crookshanks is part Kneazle, right? And they're intelligent, so it looks as thought your cat set us up."

"Hmm." Hermione trailed off, slipping out of her socks and padding barefoot over to the bed where Ron sat, sitting on his lap. "So it seems. Thank you Crookshanks." She said to the cat, who was curled up in a wickerwork basket.

And they kissed. Her hand was in his hair, his hands cupping her cheeks. It was intense, passionate and the first of many to be shared that night.