“Well, sure, maybe, but you’re forgetting one small problem. In order to learn how to shut our minds, we also need to know legilimency. Anyone in the Order who knows is too busy to ask them to do one more thing anyways.”

“I’ve thought about that, too. I have this book that I’ve been reading, that goes into detail about legilimency and occlumency. The theory behind it, how to perform it, and the like.” Hermione stood up and went over to Ron’s bookshelf. 

Ever since arriving a couple weeks ago, she’d sort of taken over a lot of the space in Ron’s already small bedroom. Not that he minded. His bookshelf was always scarce to begin with, so it wasn’t an imposition for her to use the space. He watched her reaching for a book on the top shelf. She was on her tiptoes and her fingertips were barely able to graze the book she wanted.

Rolling his eyes, he got up and grabbed the book for her. “Honestly, woman, are you a witch or not?” his eyes shone as a smirk tugged playfully at his lips. He handed her the book.

“Oh, stop it! That retort is so first year, don’t you think?” Hermione brushed past him and sat on his bed, patting it for him to join her. She opened the book to the theory. “See? So, you would cast legilimens while I tried to empty and clear my mind to block you from seeing anything.”

“So you’re suggesting we practice on each other?”

“Y-yes, I’ve been practicing what Snape told Harry back in fifth year when he was supposed to be learning.” Hermione pretended to be reading through the book.

“...Alright. I suppose you’ve got a point.” Ron got up and shut his door. He locked it and cast silencio so that no one would know what they were up to. He turned to face her. “You’re sure you want to try this?”

“Why wouldn’t I be?” Hermione asked.

“Well, what if I do manage to see inside your mind, and you can’t block it?”

Hermione bit her lip. She hadn’t really thought about that. “Well, we’ve known each other long enough that I’m sure there’s nothing there that you don’t already know.” She hoped her lie was convincing enough. Honestly, if he did see anything there, then maybe that would be easier than actually admitting her feelings to him.

“Okay..are you ready?” Ron held up his wand as she closed her eyes and did her best to clear her mind. “Legilimens!”

For a brief moment, Hermione felt a small tug in her mind, but then nothing happened.

“I told you it wouldn’t work,” she heard Ron say.

“No! I felt something. There was a small tug, as if a door was trying to open into my mind. Ron, I think you were onto something! Try it again, but really mean it!” Hermione urged him on.

Ron was still a bit worried about invading her privacy, but she seemed so serious about this, so he tried again. This time he saw the tiniest flashes of moments in his own mind. It wasn’t enough to decipher what was happening, but he saw a young Hermione outside, and then Hermione in the dress he thought she wore to the Christmas party. The spell fizzled out, and he was back in his room.

“Whoa…” he said. “You okay?” 

She nodded. “Did you see anything?”

“Yeah, but really quick flashes of things.”

“It’s a weird feeling. Like I’m trying to push against you.”

“Do you want to stop?”

“No, try it one more time. Just give me a second to clear my mind again.”

“Okay.” If Ron was being honest with himself, he wanted to see more of that memory from the Christmas party. He used that desire to drive the spell as he cast Legilimens one more time.

Hermione was definitely fighting back this time, but instead of letting her win, he pushed back with the spell. It was as if the spell found the weak spot in her defense, and pried it open. All of a sudden he saw her at the Christmas party again, and she looked miserable. She was hiding from McLaggen, and he watched her leave the party early and enter an empty classroom with tears streaming down her face. She didn’t say anything in the memory, but he heard her thoughts echo in his own brain, ‘What were you thinking? Of course he’s not Ron! No one is.’ He watched her mind wander back to when she’d asked him to go and wondered what went wrong.

Ron broke the charm. “Shit! I’m sorry!” He said, rubbing his eyes, as if trying to erase what he’d just seen.

Hermione was staring blankly at him, her face burning from a mixture of embarrassment and exertion of trying to fight him off. “You….you fought back,” she said faintly.

“I-I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have-” Ron started to say.

“N-no, you’re right. If it was a death eater, they wouldn’t give up.”

“Do you want to switch?” Ron didn’t necessarily want her prying into his own mind, but at the same time, he felt he owed her as much.

“We don’t have to if you don’t want to,” Hermione said.

“It’s fine, really. Reckon you’re right, after all. I should have an idea what it feels like,” Ron admitted.

“Okay, well, try and clear your mind then,” Hermione told him.

Ron shut his eyes and forced himself not to think of anything, which was easier said than done. He heard Hermione say “Legilimens” and felt a weird sensation of pressure on his mind. He found himself saying over and over again, think of nothing, as he tried to keep the door to his mind shut, but he felt her break the wall as he saw himself arguing with Hermione after the Yule Ball. He tried to push her away from it, but he felt Hermione dig in deeper with the charm and more of those memories were revealed. 

He felt the anger and hurt of every time she’d chosen Krum over him when she wrote those letters, saw him try and make up for his stupid jealousy by buying her that perfume for Christmas, as if that was going to make her notice him more than Krum. Then he saw her ask him to Slughorn’s party, followed by the row he had with Ginny a few days after. 

Hermione yelped and broke the charm when she heard Ginny scream, ‘Even Hermione’s snogged Viktor Krum’ and saw Ron sputtering in anger. Her wand fell to the floor as Ron was squeezing his eyes shut and rubbing his temple. “Bloody hell, Hermione!” He should have known this was a bad idea.

“You...you….” Hermione was having trouble forming words. Ron knew this never ended well for him. “Is that why you iced me out? Why you… I’m going to kill her,” Hermione turned toward the door and made to unlock it when Ron strode over and put his hand on the door.

“No...Hermione, don’t. It’s not her fault,” Ron told her. 

“Yes, it is! Are you joking? She ruined everything!” Hermione tried to push Ron out of the way, but he was too tall and muscular against her small frame to make any difference.

Ron took a deep breath, but held firm. He’d had a lot of time to think about that whole fiasco, and it was time he finally admitted it out loud. “No, Hermione, it was my fault. I’m the one who reacted like a bloody idiot. Sure, I was pissed about it, but I was also hurt that you didn’t tell me yourself. I was the only one who didn’t know!”

“So you chose to shut me out instead of confronting me about it?” Hermione questioned.

“Well, yeah, since I always gave you a hard time about Krum, bringing it up wouldn’t have helped anything. Knew that from experience, so I wanted to deal with it on my own.” Ron tried his best to explain it to her so she would understand, but he felt like he was mucking it up.

“But if you had brought it up, then you would have known that I never- well it doesn’t matter now does it,” Hermione said as she gave up trying to leave and walked over to sit on his bed. She put her head in her hands.

“Hermione, I am sorry. I wanted to go to that party with you.” Ron sat down beside her, and reached out for her hand.

“Then why did you snog her?” Hermione looked at him, and all the hurt he’d caused her hit him like a ton of bricks. 

“I- Because she was interested, and wasn’t afraid to show it, I guess. I was only just starting to cool off, and then the whole Felix thing happened, and I just took it as you thought I was rubbish at quidditch and needed a potion to perform well.” Ron couldn’t believe he’d actually admitted that. He supposed she’d already seen everything leading up to it, so he owed her the honesty.

“But-” Hermione tried to say, but Ron cut her off.

“I know,” Ron said. And he did. He knew deep down that she thought he was good at quidditch, but Hermione was never one to outwardly praise anyone. 

“I’m sorry.” Hermione finally said. “I do believe in you, you know.”

“I know that now.” Ron said. “And I’m sorry for not talking to you about it...and rubbing that whole mess of a relationship in your face.”

She looked at him again. “We’re okay, right?”

“Yeah,” Ron offered her a small smile, and against his better judgment, reached his arms around her to pull her in for a hug. To his relief, Hermione hugged him back.

Before she pulled away from him, Hermione said, “Maybe we should leave the occlumency alone after all.”

“Yeah, I’d be okay with that. Wanna see if there’s any leftover biscuits downstairs?” Ron asked, changing the subject.