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I don’t like your little games
Don’t like your tilted stage
The role you made me play of the fool
No, I don’t like you
I don’t like your perfect crime
How you laugh when you lie
You said the gun was mine
Isn’t cool, no, I don’t like you
The past few days are the same old, same old for Hermione. She keeps her head down, focuses on her school work, and does everything she can to avoid her former best friend and his girlfriend, who just so happens to be her dorm mate. Wash, rinse, repeat.
When they first got together, she was angry, sad, and heartbroken over the whole thing. She thought Ron was going to Slughorn’s party with her, that it was a date. Only to have her fantasy bubble rudely popped by Lavender’s bubble gum lips attacking her man.
It’s not attacking if he kissed her back.
True, but Hermione’s not convinced he did it because he wanted to. She sees the way he still looks at her when he doesn’t think anyone else is looking. Lavender’s not who he wants, she’s sure of it.
Hermione thrashes around in her bed as she recalls the conversation she had with Lavender the night before the match. She told Lav that she and Ron were going to a party together. She’d staked her claim. And Lavender had laughed with a joyous little squeal, saying how happy she was for Hermione. That Hermione deserved happiness and Ron was hers for the taking.
Lavender played Hermione as a fool, and swooped in when she let her guard down, stealing Ron for herself. It was the perfect crime.
As much as Hermione was ready to throw in the towel and let her win, but then she comes up with a plan. It’s diabolical, maniacal even, but if she pulls it off, it just might be the perfect revenge.
But I got smarter, I got harder in the nick of time
Honey, I rose up from the dead I do it all the time
I got a list of names and yours is in red, underlined
I check it once, then I check it twice, oh
Ooh, look what you made me do
look what you made me do
look what you just made me do
look what you made me…
It’s a month later and the scene is set. The concealed note was placed on Ron’s pillow during her free period this morning, charmed to reveal itself once he retired to his bed that evening. She fills the Transfigured flask with the potion she’s been brewing secretly at the Out of Order stall in the girls’ second floor bathroom and heads to Gryffindor Tower.
She goes about the rest of her evening, pretending to wallow while she’s shut behind the curtains of her four-poster bed. Instead of spending the hours doing her homework, she meticulously paints each nail a vibrant shade of fuschia and applies the same amount of makeup Lavender does each morning.
When Lavender finally enters the dorm for the night, Hermione waits with bated breath for her to fall asleep. The minutes tick closer to midnight, and with ten minutes to spare, Hermione silently retreats to the bathroom to steal a strand of hair from Lavender’s hairbrush.
The transformation is quick, though Hermione doubts she’ll get the taste of daisies and bubblegum out her mouth any time soon. With a deep breath, she exits the bathroom stall and checks her appearance in the mirror. If she didn’t know it was herself behind the blonde waves and heavy makeup, she’d have no idea.
She places one last swipe of pink lip gloss over her lips and throws her cloak over her body, concealing her identity. After one last check that Lavender is indeed sleeping soundly in her bed, Hermione heads down the stairs, shedding the cloak before she emerges into the common room.
Her heart nearly beats out of her chest when she realizes her plan worked. There’s Ron, sitting on the sofa in front of the fireplace, waiting for Lav. Little does he know, it’s really her .
I don’t like your kingdom keys
They once belonged to me
You asked me for a place to sleep
Locked me out and threw a feast
Ron offers a weak smile as he rubs his hands over his pajama-clad legs. Hermione’s suspicions about his eagerness—or lack thereof—for the relationship are confirmed when the smile doesn’t reach his eyes. She wonders if he only met ‘Lav’ here because he’s a good person who doesn’t like to let people down.
“Didn’t get enough earlier?” he asks with a soft, uneasy chuckle.
Hermione’s lips curl into a coy smile. “Never.”
She sashays to him, closing the distance before straddling his lap. The old Hermione would have never done this, even as someone else. But desperate times call for desperate measures.
Her hands cradle Ron’s head and her fingers comb through his soft red locks. The ginger shade clashes with the vibrant pink, but it’s okay, it won’t be for long—at least she hopes.
Despite her lack of experience, her lips automatically find his, and though it’s stickier than she’d prefer, it’s everything she ever hoped for. The kiss quickly becomes deeper, and Ron’s hands find their home on her hips. She grinds into him and feels him hardening beneath her.
It’s everything she ever dreamed of until the realization sinks in and nausea threatens to take over. He thinks she’s Lav, and apparently Lav’s body does this to him. But that only stems more anger, and she pushes forward. Until he suddenly breaks away.
Breathless, she forces her mind to focus. “W-what?”
“You’re not using—er, you—you usually use tongue.” His cheeks turn pink and his eyes crinkle in confusion.
Shit.
She should have known. Needing to act fast, she says the first thing she thinks of. “Oh, um, I guess I wanted to try something new.”
“Why?” Ron’s gaze hardens and Hermione thinks he might be onto her.
She shrugs, trying to play it off. “Because I wanted to make sure I checked all of the boxes.”
“What boxes? Wait, does this have to do with the thing you wanted to ‘talk’ about?”
Talk about what? I didn’t specify that I wanted to talk about anything in that letter…
But it doesn’t matter. With more quick thinking, Hermione jumps at the opportunity.
“Yes, as a matter of fact it does.”
“Okay…”
Time to take back what’s rightfully mine.
“Well, you see, I just wanted one more good snog before—” Hermione cuts herself off, nibbles on her bottom lip, and gives the best sympathetic ‘Lavender’ look she can muster.
“Before what?”
“Look, I’m really sorry, Ron, but it’s not working out. Kissing you after the match was a heat of the moment thing, and you’re just not doing it for me. I just needed to make absolutely sure with one last snog.” Hermione scrambles off his lap and plays with a lock of blonde hair that’s characteristic of Lavender. “I just figured I’d do you the favor of making our break-up a bit more private than how we got together.”
She waits for him to say something, anything, but he simply stares at her with wide eyes. They remain in this stalemate for another minute before Hermione checks the clock and realizes her time is almost up. She needs to get out of there.
“So, um, I guess I’ll see you around?” She takes a few steps backward before turning to bolt up the stairs.
As her foot hits the first step of the girls’ staircase, she hears a faint, “Er, yeah, alright, I guess.”
Ripples flow through her body as she transforms back to herself, and she can’t help but smile as she retrieves her abandoned cloak and heads to bed.
He didn’t even fight it.
The world moves on, another day, another drama, drama
But not for me, not for me, all I think about is karma
And then the world moves on but one thing’s for sure
Maybe I got mine, but you’ll all get yours
The next morning, Hermione waits a little longer than usual to get ready before breakfast. Lavender and Parvati are already up and heading down the stairs when she emerges from the bathroom.
When she heads down for breakfast a few minutes later, she’s met with a raucous in the common room. Lavender is lighting into a thunder-struck Ron. She’s screaming and insisting she never broke up with him and if he wants to end things he should just say so, and it takes everything in Hermione to keep a straight face.
But as she walks by the scene, she grabs the strap of her messenger bag, her still-pink nails in plain view. And when she catches Ron’s eye during the onslaught, she knows he sees it, and a little smirk escapes as she clambers through the portrait hole.
Ooh, look what you made me do
look what you made me do
look what you just made me do
look what you made me do