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Special Services in the Room of Requirement Chapter 3
🕑 Added 2022-10-19 15:59:02 +0000 UTCThe walk back to his room was quiet. Most of the students in Hogwarts were back in their common rooms at this hour. The rest would be in the library, returning to their houses, or in the Room of Requirement.
Merlin, that room. Harry wondered what it would look like filled with the men and women in his year. There would be a couple dozen of each; all of the men would be packed inside of the room, pressed up against the various holes spread throughout, while the women would be on the other side servicing or being serviced. It must be incredible.
After experiencing what the Room of Requirement had to offer, Harry quickly found that all of his nervousness and concern had washed away. Excitement and desire filled their place. He seriously considered going back right now for seconds, but he knew that he had to tell Hermione about this first.
What would she think about it? She could be repulsed or just as interested in it as he was. Like him, Hermione hadn’t been with anyone since she broke up with Ron just a week after the war’s end. They were going their separate ways in life and neither of them thought that they could make it work. Since then, Harry hadn’t so much as seen Hermione look at another guy like that.
Well, Harry knew he’d soon find out as he reached the Gryffindor common room. “Magna facta,” Harry said at the portrait of the Fat Lady, causing her to dip her head slightly and swing open.
Stepping inside, Harry quickly noticed how devoid the common room was of seventh year students. It seemed like every man and woman in his year and the one below, which had been merged together, were gone. There was only Hermione, sitting quietly by the roaring fire with a book on transfiguration in her hand, keeping a watchful eye on the lower years as they played around the room. As the portrait door opened, her eyes immediately shot over and met Harry’s, and her face lit up with genuine happiness at seeing him.
“Harry!” Hermione beamed, causing dozens of heads to turn his way.
Harry grimaced, still somewhat uncomfortable with the attention he received. If he thought it was bad when he was younger, it was nothing compared to what he got after he killed Voldemort.
Harry quickly made his way across the common room to Hermione’s side. “Hey,” he said as she put down her book.
“Hey yourself,” Hermione replied. “You were gone for quite a while. Did you find your book?”
Harry shook his head. “Well, actually, Neville told me that Hannah found it. Said she’d bring it back to me at breakfast.”
“That’s good then,” Hermione smiled. “Can you imagine the reaction you’d get from Madam Pince if you lost one of her books?”
Harry chuckled awkwardly at that. Hermione cocked her head to the side and gave him a concerned look. “Is everything alright?”
“Yeah,” Harry said, glancing around at the numerous students that were around them. “Do you think we can head upstairs to talk?”
Without even questioning it, Hermione got up and started to follow Harry to the staircase that led up to the Head Boy and Head Girl’s rooms. It truly was heartwarming to see that even after everything they’d gone through together, she still trusted him implicitly.
They walked up the winding staircase until they were out of view from the common room below and in a small corridor. They waked past the first two doors, which led to the Head Girl’s room and the shared bathroom respectively, and went to the third one. The door swung open automatically at Harry’s presence, magically divining his intent to go into his room.
The Head Boy and Girl’s rooms were smaller than Harry had expected when he first saw them. Each was about half of the size of the dorm he shared with Ron, Dean, Seamus, and Neville. They had large, king-sized beds with a couple of bedside tables on either side of it and a wardrobe in the corner on the right side of the bed. There was a desk and chair beside a small fireplace, and two comfortable armchairs on the other side of it.
Harry never had many possessions to fill up the wardrobe or the few shelves that sat along the walls. He had placed a few books and gifts he had received over the years, but most of the surfaces remained bare. At least, they had until Hermione started spending more time in here. She had brought books, spare clothes, and various other odds and ends to keep handy here, filling up much of the empty space Harry had.
As Harry seated himself in one of the armchairs, he felt more than saw Hermione looking at him curiously.
Though it was tempting to dance around the issue to prevent any awkwardness, Harry trusted Hermione enough to know that she would listen to what he had to say and support him regardless of her opinion on the matter. So, he just jumped right into it. “Neville and the others that stayed at Hogwarts last year are running glory holes in the Room of Requirement,” Harry blurted out.
When Hermione didn’t react, Harry frowned. He had expected some type of reaction from her: confusion, amusement, incredulity, but there was nothing immediate. In fact, it took several seconds before she cracked an awkward chuckle.
“Very funny,” Hermione said strangely, as though she couldn’t tell if he was making a joke or not.
“I’m serious.” Harry leaned forward in his seat towards Hermione. “When I went back to the Room of Requirement, I found Neville in there. There was a room within the room with dozens of holes in it. Neville told me that it was a way for them to blow off stress last year without having to go through the process of building up a relationship with someone who could be taken or killed by the Death Eaters. They decided to bring it back again even though the war is done. It seems like almost all of the seventh year students, both the ones in our year and the one in the year below us, are taking part.”
As Hermione listened to his words, Harry could see her slowly coming to terms with the situation at hand. “Are you serious?”
“No, I’m-” at Hermione’s glare, Harry dropped the rest of the joke. “Yes, Hermione, I’m being serious right now. They’re probably all going at it right now.”
“Wow,” was all that Hermione could manage to get out. She sat there in stunned silence for a moment, processing what Harry had just told her. Eventually, her eyes refocused back on Harry. “Wait, you said that almost all of the seventh year students are in there right now?”
“Well, I don’t know if they’re all there right now, but Neville said that they all take part,” Harry explained.
Hermione’s brow furrowed. “Why weren’t we invited? Not that I necessarily want to go,” Hermione added quickly with a flustered expression on her face. “I just wonder why . . .”
Harry grimaced and shifted in his seat. “Apparently, everyone thinks we’re dating.”
Hermione snorted. “That’s ridiculous; we’re not dating.”
Harry shrugged. “We have spent a lot of time together, and some people have spotted you slipping into my room at night. They just assumed that we had to be together.”
“Oh,” Hermione sighed. “I guess it does look that way, doesn’t it?”
Harry nodded along. “But I told Neville that we weren’t, so he said that we’d be welcome there.”
Another moment of silence passed between them. Harry could see Hermione’s brain fighting to figure out how she felt about the situation. For all that she’d grown and changed over the years that he had known her, she was still an analytical woman at heart. Harry let her think for a while, letting her process things at her own pace before he’d reveal the last piece of information to her.
“Do you . . .” Hermione began awkwardly.
“I already tried it, just before I came here,” Harry explained. Somehow, Hermione managed to look both surprised and unsurprised at the same time. “Look,” Harry began, “ever since Ginny and I decided we were done for good, I haven’t had much interest in dating anyone. You know as well as I do as to how much attention is on us because of our roles in the war. It’ll be years before people can look at us like normal people, and maybe not even then. I don’t know how I’m supposed to navigate forming a relationship around all of this baggage that I have to carry around with me. So, when Neville revealed this to me, a way for everyone to deal with their natural urges in an anonymous, safe way, I decided it was too good an offer to pass up. I understand if you aren’t interested-”
“I never said that!” Hermione interjected, blushing like mad as she squished herself back into the chair.
Harry couldn’t help it, he snorted and started to laugh at Hermione’s reaction.
“Shut up,” Hermione mumbled, picking up the cushion from behind her and throwing it at Harry’s head. “You’re not the only one with needs you know. It’s been hard, between dealing with getting over Ron and all those nightmares.”
“Yeah, it has been,” Harry replied soberly. “That’s why this seemed like a good idea to me.”
“So . . . how was it?” Hermione asked.
“Seriously?” Harry snorted.
Hermione’s blush returned in full force. “I just want to know what its like. I don’t need all of the little details about what went on between you and . . .”
“I have no clue who was behind the wall,” Harry answered Hermione’s unspoken question.
“Right,” she nodded, “but was it good? Did it . . . help to relieve some of the stress?”
“I’d say so,” Harry answered, his own cheeks turning a little pink at discussing this with his best friend. He wasn’t an especially shy boy anymore, but it was still an awkward new talking point between the two of them. Harry knew he’d better get used to it though; there would probably be a lot more talk about this between the two of them in the future.
“Hmm,” Hermione bit her lower lip as she considered it. “And you’re sure its completely anonymous?”
“Well,” Harry grimaced at the disappointed look on Hermione’s face, “Neville said that its kept anonymous, but people could figure it out. You can hear each others voices for one, but its a little muffled. No one goes around naming names if that’s what your worried about.”
“I just . . .” Hermione huffed in frustration. “What if someone figures out its me on the other side and tells the press?”
Harry would be lying if he hadn’t had the same concerns himself, but he didn’t want to not go again after experiencing it for himself. “What if we get Neville to make a contract like we had for the D.A.? We can make the punishment a lot stricter this way too, and hopefully it’ll keep all of us safe from anyone who’d try to hurt us.”
“That sounds like a good idea,” Hermione said, perking up a bit. She gazed off to the side. “Do they have a regular schedule for this?”
“I don’t know,” Harry admitted. “Neville said that they meet a few times a week after class or before curfew, but I don’t know anything about a schedule. We could ask him tomorrow; I think he’s a bit busy right now back at the room.”
Hermione fell back into silence. When she spoke again after a few moments, she was a bit quieter than before. “This all sounds nice, but,” Hermione wrung her hands together nervously, her eyes glancing up to meet Harry’s. “I’m still a virgin.”
To say that Harry was surprised was an understatement. Ron and Hermione had practically disappeared those first few days after the war ended; Harry had just assumed that they had been together. “You and Ron never-”
Hermione shook her head clearly. “No, not that. It just wasn’t the right time after the war, and then everything around us started moving so quickly that we barely had any time for each other. And then we broke up.”
Harry wasn’t quite sure how to approach this with the care it needed. He knew it was different for girls losing their virginities compared to guys, but he had never gone through that experience with anyone before. “I haven’t had sex before either,” Harry admitted. “For most of the same reasons as you gave I suppose.”
Hermione didn’t look to surprised at that; maybe Ginny had told her. But, it did bring this thoughtful look to her face. “I don’t want to lose my virginity to some faceless guy through a wall,” Hermione began. “I always imagined doing it with someone I truly cared about.”
Hermione bit her lower lip and glanced nervously up at Harry, and suddenly he realized what she was about to propose.
“Harry, before we go out and try this thing, would you want to-”
“Yes.”
The words were out of Harry’s mouth before Hermione finished asking the question. He knew the answer as soon as he realized the question. He might not be in love with Hermione, nor her in love with him, but they still deeply loved and cared for each other. If she wanted her first time to be special, then he’d damn well make it so. He owed her that much at least for all her help over the years.
Hermione shot him a nervous smile as she blushed. Harry was sure he was just as red as she was, but he didn’t care. “I’ll set up a special night for just the two of us later this week,” Harry told Hermione.
“I’d like that,” Hermione said as she pushed herself up out of the chair and quickly made her way to Harry’s side. Harry tried to stand up too but Hermione reached him first. She threw her arms around him, wrapping him up in a tight hug and pinning him back against the chair. They stayed like that, finding comfort in each other’s arms, until they eventually fell asleep.
