Two Tickets to Rome

Summary: Two strangers. One train. A ten-hour journey. Who said magic can't happen on a train ride to Rome? StillMagical!RonHermione – Romione AU

A/N: Thank you for all the feedback on the first chapter of this story. It delights me that you enjoy my writing. Also, a special thanks to Gja03 for pushing me to update another fic of mine. To AzureAlquimista: it will all become clear soon. Very soon;)

Capitolo due: Exploring the Train

At some point – in the noise of Italian chattering and the turning swishes from Ron's Rubik's Cube – Hermione had fallen asleep.

She dreamt of Hogwarts, of Viktor Krum's face when they'd kissed at the Yule Ball, and of Luna's colourful shoes. Then, the dream turned into a twisted tale of loneliness and anxiety.

She was standing alone in the middle of the corridors of Hogwarts, watching pale faces glide by, as if they were ghosts and not students.

The more she concentrated on finding her friends, the blurrier the faces became.

She tried to spot her fellow Ravenclaw Luna, but she was unable to find her blonde locks in the chaos. In her dream, Hermione was too fearful that she would find the blonde only to realize that the bleached hair would belong to cruel Malfoy.

As she became more and more frustrated in her dream, the faces turned to fog, and all she could see were colours.

The colours swirled around her, until suddenly, a fiery orange smudge passed her. It took away her breath like the wind on a stormy day.

She felt freezingly cold. The orange mass turned to her, and she imagined that she saw a face in full clarity. A face with light blue eyes and red hair.

Hermione felt something stab at her heart, like an old memory refused to be forgotten. It took her by surprise so suddenly, that she woke herself up.

With a racing heart, she sat up in her chair on the train.

The familiarity of the chattering Italian and the sound of the air conditioning calmed her down. She looked around to see if anyone had noticed her in her sleep.

She met no eyes and let out a deep exhale. It would be silly to disturb other people on the train, Hermione thought.

Her gaze settled on Ron on the opposite side of the seats. He hadn't moved much since before she'd fallen asleep. Hermione shook her head, trying to clear the dream from her mind.

A little hope grew in her chest, making her lightheaded. What if Ron really was a wizard? Maybe she had dreamt the truth, that the sight of him had awakened a deeply buried memory of seeing him at the wizarding school?

It was silly, she concluded. Of course, he wouldn't be a wizard just because he was British, and lightly resembled an orange blur from her dream.

Still, her mind kept wandering back to her dream, and the odd possibility that they had something extraordinary in common.

Fixed on his pale, sunburnt face, her eyes lost focus. He was reading some kind of magazine, so deeply focused that he didn't realize her glance at him had turned into a full-blown, glazed-over stare.

Hermione toyed with the idea that he maybe was a wizard. What house would he have been? Would he be pureblood, half-blood, or Muggle-born like herself? Not that it mattered to her what kind of blood that ran through his veins.

He must be a half-blood or Muggle-born, she concluded. Otherwise it would be unlikely that she found him on a train.

Looking away, she wondered what house he'd be in at Hogwarts. Maybe he'd be a Ravenclaw like herself, seen as he liked solving (or in his case: not succeeding in solving) the Rubik's Cube. And he read too…

Hermione looked out the window again, breaking out of her reverie.

It was a way to entertain herself, she reminded herself. She was in no way interested or fascinated by the red head on her train.

Finding the view dull, she turned to her travel companion.

"What are you reading?" she asked.

He looked up, an askew smile evident on his face, "An extremely disinteresting paper,"

"It's still better than the view," she chuckled back.

"I couldn't agree more," Ron answered, "Vineyard fields are great to look at, but only to some extent,"

Hermione laughed. It felt great, like some of the pressure that had been building up in her chest since her dream, dissipated with the laughter that bubbled out from between her lips.

"Are you hungry?" Ron asked her abruptly, "How would you like trying to track down a vending machine with me?"

It was the first sign of anything remotely exciting to do, and as the situation was, she jumped at the chance, "Yes!" she said, a bit too excitedly, "Let's go exploring,"

Looking back at their seats, Ron added, "Since we have reserved seating, do you think it's alright if we just leave it?" he waved at the humble luggage they'd both brought.

"It's probably alright. It's a long-distance train," Hermione stated, and they went searching.

It took half an hour of squeezing between space-eating passengers, talking with train employees in broken Italian, and a lot of laughs, to finally arrive at the vending machine.

As it turned out, the vending machine closest to where they'd been sitting, had been just around the corner behind them – the opposite way they had walked in search of it. It had given them both a good laugh.

Hermione noticed more and more frequently how Ron's face lit up when laughing. His cheeks would deepen in colour, swallowing up his freckles. His eyes stood out more, that way.

When they returned to their seats, both of their faces were flushed. Hermione felt refreshed, yet sweaty and disgusting from the humid air in the train. The cold soda she'd purchased at the vending machine helped somewhat.

She looked over at Ron who was holding a snack bar in one hand. With the other, he was trying to solve a sudoku from the disinteresting magazine from before. It didn't look like he managed well.

It occurred to her that Ron made her feel seen in a way that she rarely had felt previously. It was strange. She had only known him for a few hours, yet it felt like an eternity.

He had lent her his Rubik's Cube. It felt nice having some new entertainment. Although he tried giving her helpful tips, she still had a hard time trying to solve it.

"How long did you take before you managed to solve it?"

"I finished it when you were asleep," he answered. So, he had noticed, she thought. It made her feel warm inside. She felt the need to remind herself he was still a stranger.

The dream was still haunting her. She had a wicked feeling that she'd seen him before today. It was like there was an old memory that was trying to resurface from the deep of forgottenness.

She shrugged it off.

"You'll probably take no time," he said reassuringly.

"There are plenty of hours ahead for me to try," she replied. With an afterthought, she added, "I'm looking forward to exploring Rome,"

"You're going to Rome as well?" the pitch in his voice was high. It almost sounded hopeful, "Maybe we could explore a bit of Rome together too? Hell, at least there's more to explore there than here to the vending machine,"

The blood gathered in her face, "Yes! That would be so nice!"

Contrary to her expectation, his face darkened instead of lighting up with one of his sweet smiles. With furrowed brows, she asked what was wrong. He replied, "I'm having some trouble with this sudoku,"

"Maybe I could look at it?" Hermione offered, still feeling giddy from his proposition for in Rome.

He looked at her. She noticed how his ears had turned red.

"Catch," he smiled and threw the magazine to her.

It ended up on the floor halfway between them. They both reached to the paper. Their fingers met, and Hermione let go as if burned. Once again, she could feel the heat collect in her cheeks.

"Sorry," he said awkwardly, handing her the magazine.

During the exchange, the pages had turned, and Hermione got a glimpse of the article in her hand. She squinted, thinking she'd imagined how the picture on the front had moved.

Hermione gasped.

It was a wizarding magazine.

She froze. Maybe she had been right all along about seeing him before.

Ron was a wizard. Hermione couldn't believe it. The Ron she had met on a Muggle train in the south of Italy, was a wizard. What were the odds?

But more importantly, why in the world would he read rubbish like The Quibbler?