InsaneJournal

Cookies - R/Hr - PG-13
Title : Cookies
Rating : PG-13 for language
Summary : Ron loses a bet
Word Count : 1172

Written for andropotterist’s 'I Love a Man in Uniform' Challenge


The seventh year Gryffindor Boys’ dormitory was a mess. Chocolate Frog wrappers and Butterbeer bottles littered the floor, and five seventeen-year-old boys were sprawled on the floor, in various states of undress.

Dean Thomas had just jeans on. Seamus Finnegan just his school shirt over his boxer shorts. Neville Longbottom just his trousers and a sock. Harry Potter just trousers and his loosely knotted Gryffindor tie. Row Weasley just his Chudley Cannons boxers.

Yes, it was poker night, and a bottle of Firewhiskey, several boxes of chocolate chip cookies and a pack of cards were scattered on the floor in the middle of their rough circle.

“Two pairs, kings over threes,” said Ron, smugly, laying down his cards with a flourish. Harry, Dean and Neville had folded already and just grunted.

Seamus smirked. Ron gulped. Seamus grinned. Ron swallowed. “Full house,” said Seamus and placed his cards, reverently on the carpet.

“Fuck,” said Ron, “aww Seamus, I’m down to my boxers, mate.”

“You lost the hand, Weasley,” Seamus shrugged and appealed to the rest of the room.

“No way, Finnegan,” Ron took a long drink from the bottle of Firewhiskey and glared at the tipsy Irishman.

“Rules are rules,” Seamus started, but Harry interrupted him.

“Maybe a forfeit would be enough, Seamus,” he muttered, wrinkling his nose, “you don’t really want those boxers, do you?”

Seamus exhaled noisily and looked around the room, with narrowed eyes. On the wall above Ron’s desk was a montage of Weasley photographs. Charlie and George flashed past on broomsticks. Percy looked up from his desk and frowned. Ginny stood proudly in her Girl Guide uniform, a box of cookies clasped in front of her.

Seamus looked at the boxes of cookies on the carpet and smirked. He bent and whispered in Dean’s ear. Dean’s eyes lit up and he nodded vigorously. “OK. You agree to take a forfeit instead?”

“Fine Seamus, what do I have to do?”

Seamus handed Ron a box of cookies. Ron looked confused. “You take this box of cookies, Head Boy, and you go up to Hermione’s room, and you knock on the door, and you sell them to her.”

“Is that all? Fine, let me get dressed.” Ron shook his head and looked relieved. He’d get a lecture from Hermione about drinking and about gambling and about abusing his Head Boy’s privileges by coming up to a girl’s room, but it could have been far worse.

Seamus snorted.

“What?”

“Yes, get dressed Ron, in Ginny’s old Girl Guide uniform.” And Seamus and Dean rolled on the floor, clutching their stomachs and laughing.

“Very funny Finnegan,” Ron’s ears were flushed and he glared at Harry who had started to laugh weakly “yeah great idea Dean. But actually, Ginny hasn’t worn that in years, she doesn’t have it at school with her.”

“Yes she does, Ron,” said Harry, earning a fiercer glare and then a narrowed eyed look from his best friend, “she brought it up to wear on Halloween. Gin is still downstairs, working, I’ll just nip down and ask her to get it.” Harry staggered to his feet and wobbled out the door, still bare chested.

*****

Twenty minutes later, Ron stood in by the side of his bed, wearing a very short Girl Guide skirt and blouse. Ginny’s badge for Firecraft stitched proudly to his chest.

“Just the one badge, Gin?” queried Harry, who was lounging on his own bed and grinning.

“Well, Dad wanted me to try the Muggle Girl Guides, but once I made fire without using matches they didn’t want me back.” Ginny was kneeling behind Ron, on his bed, hairbrush in hand, deftly plaiting his hair. “I bet you regret the long-haired Rock Star look now, Ron,” she giggled.

Ron sighed for the forty-seventh time and tugged his skirt down for the sixty-fifth.

“There,” said Ginny hopping down to admire her work. Everyone stood round to look at Ron.

“Go on Ronalda,” said Dean “Ginny will go with you, up those blasted stairs, to make sure you go through with it.”

Ron sighed for the forty-eighth time, picked up his box of cookies and trudged out the door.

Down the stairs, through the blessedly deserted common room and up the spiral stairs to the Girls’ dormitory, cursing the fact that he was Head Boy and the stairs didn’t throw him back down, cursing Ginny who skipped and sniggered at his side. Then, at the turn of stairs that took him to the seventh year girls’ room, she stopped and shoved him in the small of the back.

He staggered forward and came to a stop in front of the door. The door behind which lay the two most irritating giggly girls in the whole school, and the girl he thought of, both dreaming and awake. The girl he had spent all term trying to impress with his new mature, Head Boy attitude. Bugger.

A deep Gryffindor breath and he knocked.

The door cracked open and Lavender’s face peeped around it. Without even reacting to his appearance and without missing a beat she called over her shoulder ‘Hermione, Ron wants you,” and returned to sit on her bed with Parvati.

Ron could hear her tutting before she pulled the door open wider, and then she was standing before him. She was barefoot, and wore just Jeans and a blue t-shirt. Her hair was pulled up in a messy bun. Ron thought she looked fabulous, and he wished he wasn’t wearing an eleven-year-old girl’s short skirt, and he wished he didn’t have to say “Good evening Miss, you look like one smart cookie. I’d like to share a box with you.” Dean and Seamus had sniggered over smuttier versions, but had finally agreed that just using the word ‘box’ would be enough. Hermione hopefully wouldn’t even notice the slang meaning, but Ron would still blush.

Hermione looked at him. She looked at his bare, freckled feet; his knobbly knees, his long legs, disappearing under the ridiculous skirt; the band of freckled stomach visible below the tightly stretched blouse; the box of chocolate chip cookies, clutched in his large hands; the pink flushed face and the plaited red hair. She met his bright blue eyes and shook her head.

“Truth or dare?” she hazarded.

“Nope,” he shook his head, “strip poker and I paid a forfeit to Seamus instead of forfeiting my boxers.”

Hermione flushed too. “Oh,” she whispered “well, why send you to me? Because I‘m so straight laced and boring they thought I’d be shocked?”

Suddenly Ron felt that he had no more dignity to lose. “Actually no,” he said, straightening his shoulders and straining the thin material further, “they sent me to you because they know that I have been trying so hard to make a good impression on you this year. Because they know that I want your good opinion more than any other. Because they know that I am crazy about you.” And he stepped forward, took her in his arms and kissed her.