A/N: Howdy. I've realised that if I bribe myself with fanfic writing as a reward, I do uni work a lot quicker so a one-shot happened. Hope you enjoy the fruit of my labour.

Disclaimer: J.K Rowling hit the jackpot because to her work is writing Harry Potter.

"Ron!"

"Sorry."

"I am being serious now-"

"Last time. Promise."

"You've really finished?"

"Yes."

"Sure?"

"Yep."

Still unconvinced that Ron was being truthful, Hermione settled her head on his shoulder and rested a hand on his stomach where it had been moments before. Her fingers traced a crease in his t-shirt and she wondered when it had last been ironed. He had been living here at the Burrow again for nearly three months and he still hadn't got used to keeping his clothes clean. In fact, Hermione suspected that without his own room in which to hide his dirty clothes, Ron had been better off when they had been on the run.

Had it been any other time, Hermione would have probably mentioned this, but right now it was a lazy Sunday evening, they were filled with Mrs Weasley's classic Sunday Roast and were both far too content lounging around on Ron's bed – or at least they would have been if it wasn't for the shifty look on Ron's face. Hermione braced herself and waited.

Sure enough, a matter of seconds later, Ron's right hand darted across and poked her breast.

"Boob."

"If you do that one more time-"

"Boob."

"Oh, that is it."

Hermione forced Ron onto his stomach and, while he was still shocked by her sudden movements, managed to clamber on top of him. He tried to break his arms free, but Hermione had them pinned under her legs so the worst his hands could do was tickle her shins. Fighting back giggles (she was meant to be annoyed after all), Hermione pushed Ron's head into his pillow as he feebly tried to push her off.

"Repeat after me," she instructed, "'Hermione's breasts are not my personal playthings.'"

"But they ar-OW!"

She had pulled his hair.

"Hermione's breasts are not my personal playthings," came Ron's muffled voice from somewhere in the pillow.

"Thank you," Hermione said primly and rolled off him. "I'm glad we could resolve that in a mature manner."

Ron snorted as he moved back into his original position with his arm behind her head as though it was the most natural thing in the world. Hermione found herself smiling once again because, not only were they a couple, but they were acting like one. Her legs had snuggled in between his without her having to think about it, his fingers were curling a lock of her hair around themselves and neither of them were blushing or avoiding eye contact.

Hermione glanced up to see if Ron looked as serene as she felt and saw he had an oddly dreamy expression on his face.

"What?" she asked, frowning a little.

Ron didn't appear to be paying attention and continued looking out into the distance. "Hmm?"

"What were you just thinking?" she reiterated. She nudged him a little to try and get a reaction of some sort.

"Oh." He twisted his head slightly to look down at her. "Nothing."

With a sigh, Hermione rested her chin on his chest. Ron's attention snapped to her, apparently sensing that his answer was far from satisfactory.

"Ron, we said complete honesty."

"I'm not lying about anything!" he protested.

"I'm not saying you are," placated Hermione. She raised herself onto her elbows and let her fingers straighten out his fringe that had become a state when someone had shoved his head into a pillow. "But every time we thought something and didn't tell the other is another day we weren't together. If we were open before, we could have had this months - even years - ago."

The truth of her words washed over him and Ron looked a little sheepish. The idea that they could have been this comfortable play fighting and casually touching each other years ago was so painfully beautiful to Hermione. They could have danced at the Yule Ball. They could have hugged in celebration of a Gryffindor Quidditch victory. They could have kissed under the mistletoe at Slughorn's party. The nights they had spent in the tent needn't have been so cold and lonely.

He could have carried her schoolbag and she could've held his hand. Some of the Slytherins would have laughed and some of the younger students would have pulled faces, but it wouldn't have mattered; they would have been too caught up in each other.

Now, they would never know what that felt like because they had both been too shy, stubborn and stupid to say anything. So, when they had finally admitted their feelings to one another, they had agreed to never hold back. Never again would they impede their own happiness.

"I was-" Ron sighed and his ears started to show the signs of reddening. "It's stupid-"

"I still want to hear it."

Their eyes met and Hermione watched him accept that there was no hiding away this time. Slowly, a smirk spread across his face. Hermione recognised that smirk and now had a rough idea of where his mind had wandered.

"I was just wondering," he said quietly, eyes locked with hers, "about how weird it would be if started using dirty talk."

"Weird?" Hermione frowned. She decided to focus on that part of the sentence in the hope the rest could be forgotten.

"Well, it'd be hot as hell, but I dunno…" he tailed off.

"What?" There was something about the way he was looking at her that made her a tad uneasy.

"Oh, Ron," Ron squawked in what was clearly meant to be an impersonation of her, but sounded more like an elderly aristocrat, "it'd be just splendid if you were to insert your penis into my vagina-"

Without further ado, Hermione started pinching every inch of him that she could reach as Ron curled into a protective ball and continued his impression through his laughter.

"I'm sure it would bring me to climax forthwith-"

One of Hermione's hands managed to breach the barrier Ron had turned his limbs into and twisted one of his nipples.

"Ouch!" he cried, rubbing it. "Why are my breasts allowed to be your playthings?"

"I do not speak like that!" she snapped at him, pointing at him for good measure.

"One would never befoul the air with such-" Ron was eventually cut off when Hermione clamped on of her hands over his mouth.

"Just because I am well-spoken," she told him through gritted teeth, "does not mean I speak like Queen's cousin!"

Ron rolled his eyes as if to say "whatever" and Hermione removed her hand.

"Do hurry along with the foreplay, Ronald, as one must see to the corgis-"

This time Hermione started tickling his ribs.

"Okay, okay," Ron laughed, holding his hands up in surrender. "I'm sorry!"

Hermione gave him her sternest look before curling up next to him again. Something about the way his voice quivered that time told her that he had learnt his lesson. Part of her felt a little guilty, but he must have noticed that winding her up like this always led to minor physical assault by now. Perhaps he secretly enjoyed it as much as she did…

Ron pulled a strand of her hair away from her face as he planted a kiss on her forehead, reminding her that he was her boyfriend first and a punchbag second.

"I could talk dirty," she stated far more confidently that she felt. Right now she couldn't think of anything more awkward. What would she say? Well, she knew the sort of things that fell into the category of dirty talk, but actually saying them without laughing or being mortified was a different matter altogether.

Still, she thought as she chanced a glance at Ron, it was worth saying it to see the look on his face. Clearly his ever-active imagination had gone into overdrive as his eyes were wide and he hadn't taken a breath since she had spoken. He licked his top lip, trying to act as casual as possible.

"Go on then," he dared her. Hermione smiled at him, but it soon dropped into a look of horror when she saw that he was serious.

"I-I can't do it now," she spluttered indignantly.

"You really can."

Hoping to distract him, Hermione leaned over Ron, letting her hair tickle the sides of his face. She tried to maintain eye contact – they both did in fact – but both pairs of eyes kept slipping to the set of lips that were moving gradually closer.

"Maybe I'm going to surprise you sometime?" Hermione said quietly.

"Yeah?"

"Yes."

"Sometime soon?"

Loving the build-up to the inevitable as much as the act itself, Hermione prolonged it by rubbing her nose against his long one, unable to hold back a chuckle. The wait for that first kiss had been painful; the gap between every kiss since seemed to grow in intensity. Smiling, Ron had wound his hand into her hair and kept twitching his mouth towards hers.

"Maybe."

Finally their lips met and only then did Hermione truly feel the weight of her feelings for the man she was currently half-lying on. The exchange was slow and lazy, but so had the rest of their movements that day. There was none of the frantically probing tongue that Ron always seemed to use when he was feeling particularly enthusiastic, nor any of the moaning that Hermione usually did, as she slowly lost herself in the moment – just a simple kiss that was anything but.

After what could have been years or even decades, Hermione pulled away, biting her bottom lip which was already swollen. It took Ron a few more seconds to finally open his eyes, but, when he did, Hermione felt herself tear up at just how perfect and ordinary and spectacular that moment was.

"What?" breathed Ron as he tucked some of her hair behind her ear and cupped her cheek.

Hermione pressed a kiss onto his rough palm before leaning into it. "Nothing."

"No," he chided her with a roll of his eyes, "every time we don't say stuff a pixie dies or something so spill."

As she tried to organise her thoughts into a coherent sentence, Hermione settled down against him again, hugging him tightly and rubbing one of his jean-clad legs with her foot.

"I'm just thinking how lucky I am," she whispered into his shoulder.

Ron quirked an eyebrow at her. "To have successfully avoided having to talk dirty?"

"No," she said simply, knowing that she hadn't won that argument and would have to live up to her promise at some point. It didn't matter though; each step they took together would be as natural as the ones that had preceded them. "To have fallen in love with my best friend."

A/N2: Thanks for reading!

While this is marked as complete, it may turn into a short fic dump at some point because I have a lot of Ron and Hermione lounging around in bed plot bunnies and this seems a good place to keep them. Just so you know, there won't be any smut, but I may have various other characters show up, such as Rose and Hugo or Harry or whoever. Anybody hoping for Prof. Flitwick may be disappointed though.