Doesn’t Anything Else Writhe? - H/R - PG-13
Title: Doesn’t Anything Else Writhe?
Author: shocfix
Pairing: Harry/Ron
Words: 1300
Rating: PG-13

Written for the hprwfqf First Round.

My prompt was…

At Hogwarts :- 7. Ron becomes the first person to touch Harry's scar besides Harry. It's a big deal to Harry.

It seems to be a Missing Moment at Christmas in HBP – hence the lack of smut!


Doesn’t Anything Else Writhe?
****
I went up to bed on Christmas day absolutely drained.

The Minister had gathered Percy up and Disapparated and everyone had been left rather flat.

I washed my hands and face and blinked wetly into the mirror as I brushed my teeth.

I didn't have my glasses on, but I thought that Ron was looking at me in the mirror.

"What? I asked and he shrugged.

I towelled my face dry and reached for my glasses. He was still looking at me, very levelly and seriously. "What?" I asked again.

He opened his mouth to reply, but the mirror beat him to it, "Answer him, Ronnie," it said and sniggered and he just shook his head, gathered up his stuff and went back up to his room.

I followed him up to find him already changed, sitting cross-legged on his bed in boxers and a t-shirt.

He was still looking unusually serious, so I turned my back on him to get ready for bed.

When I looked at him again, he was twirling the stupid My Sweetheart necklace around his fingers and frowning at it.

Maybe he was just worried about Lavender. His girlfriend. God, it was still hard to think of Ron with a girlfriend.

"You're hard to shop for," I offered, sitting beside him on the bed.

He looked up, surprised. "No'm not," he snorted. "Sweets or Quidditch."

I shrugged. "I guess she'd've known that, if you'd ever talked."

He snorted again. "She doesn't know me, does she?" he asked.

"Um, no."

He sighed.

"Look, Ron, make the effort when we get back to school," I said. "Get to know her."

Ron scrunched up his nose.

“I don’t really want to,” he said.

“God, Ron, don’t let Hermione hear you being such a sexist rat.”

His face fell.

“Sorry,” I said. “Look, make an effort with Hermione, then.”

He panicked. “With Hermione?” he squeaked.

“To make up with her,” I explained, knowing he’d thought I meant something about the snogging.

He slumped. “That wasn’t what I meant, anyway,” he said.

“What wasn’t?” I asked patiently.

“About Lavender not knowing me.”

“Oh.”

“I meant I’m wasting all this time with someone who knows nothing about me.”

“Except how you taste…”

He glared at me. “Yes, thank you, Harry.”

I sniggered.

“And I wasn’t thinking about Hermione,” he sighed. “I was thinking about you.”

“Me?” I said, raising my eyebrows.

“Not like that,” he said. “Will you stop interrupting?”

“Sorry.”

“I should be spending more time with you…”

“I don’t mind.”

“I watched you with the Minister, earlier,” he overrode me.

“Oh,” I hadn’t expected that.

“He wants the Chosen One onside, doesn’t he?” Ron asked.

“Yeah, like a Ministry Mascot.”

“They all want a piece of you, don’t they?”

I shrugged again. “Yeah.”

He looked fiercely at me. “Then I should be there.”

“Where?”

“By your side; heading them off; taking care of you. I’m supposed to be your second,” he finished pitifully.

“You’re daft as a brush,” I said gently.

“Thanks a lot,” he said, looking hurt. “I’m trying to apologise for not being there when you need me.”

“You’re there; there is nothing to apologise for. It’s OK,” I said.

“’Tisn’t,” Ron said, fiddling with his necklace and managing to snap off the S. “Fuck.”

“Hey,” I said and he looked up. “I’m a big boy, I don’t need you to hold my hand all the time. Yeah, there is the usual load of crap being dumped on me, but I sort of like you being Lavender’s ‘weetheart’ – gives me something to laugh at, OK?”

“So, I’m just the light relief around here?” he said, half smiling at me.

“It is funny,” I pointed out.

“What, the necklace?”

“The whole thing,” I said, gesturing at him.

He looked down at himself and frowned.

“It’s always funny when a couple is writhing like eels in the Common Room,” I explained and he snorted. “But it’s even funnier when it’s you.”

He pouted.

“Look, it’s normal stuff for our age,” I said. “Just what I need, a bit of normal.”

“Well,” he sighed. “Just let me know if there is anyone else I can snog for your amusement.”

I raised my eyebrows. “Do you really want me to answer that?” I asked. “Because she…”

“No,” he interrupted. “Not….” He made a vague gesture and sighed and I shook my head.

They’d been so close. “She’s not really…”

“Leave it,” he interrupted again.

I sighed.

Suddenly he narrowed his eyes and looked me up and down carefully. “Maybe you should do some writhing of your own,” he suggested.

“That would look ridiculous,” I sniggered.

“Not on your own, idiot,” he huffed. “Of your own, with someone.”

I tried very hard not to blush or think of his sister. “No one wants to writhe with me,” I said casually.

He laughed. “You’re kidding,” he said. “Half the girls in school would, given the chance, not to mention Terry.”

I shoved him. “Possibly there are girls who would writhe with the Chosen One,” I said. “But I don’t want his cast-offs. And you know that Terry only has eyes for you.”

“Very funny,” he said, shoving me back and pinning me to the bed.

“You know the state he’s been in since you made the Quidditch team,” I laughed, trying to push him off me, but he was far heavier and held me down easily.

“Shut up, Harry,” he said. “But you’re right,”

“About Terry?” I said, biting my lip to stop a giggle escaping.

He gave me a look so pointed you could sew with it. “About wanting to writhe with someone you actually know,” he said carefully. “It’s bad enough with me and Lavender; I mean, we don’t know anything else about each other, but I do at least know that she actually fancies me. You have all the Chosen One crap, too.”

His eyes flicked up to my forehead and he slid off me, propping himself on an elbow to look down at me.

So many people stare at my scar, but it had been years since Ron had looked at it.

I remembered how impressed he’d been on the train, the first time he’d seen it. And how quickly he’d moved past that.

Suddenly, he reached out and brushed the hair off my forehead.

I held my breath.

“Harry?” he whispered and ran a fingertip softly down my scar.

I swear I felt sparks leap between us.

It was the most intimate thing anyone had ever done to me.

I know I was staring at him and that I wasn’t breathing, and he jumped and looked back at me when I finally took a great gasping breath.

“Sorry,” he said, meeting my eyes and pulling his hand away.

I grabbed at it.

“No,” I breathed. “Don’t be.”

“Stupid thing to do,” he muttered, his ears turning pink.

“No,” I said firmly. “It’s… it was… no one has ever done that, before.”

“Never?” he asked.

“Never. Who would?”

He made his ‘Fuck-I-hate-the-Dursleys-I-wish-we-could-have-taken-Harry-in-sooner-and-given-him-a-proper-childhood’ face.

“It felt,” I didn’t know how to describe it. “It felt like magic,” I finished lamely.

“Well,” he shrugged one shoulder. “It’s a magical scar – look at the pain it gives you.”

“But it never felt good before,” I said.

He scrunched up his nose as he thought. “Well, it was caused by the Death Curse, it’s never felt…” he trailed off.

“Love?” I suggested.

“Uh, yeah, I guess,” he said, his ears flaring pinker as he realised I was still holding his hand.

I let go, expecting him to move away, but he didn’t.

He looked me in the eye as he reached up and caressed my scar again.

“You are loved, Harry,” he murmured. “And I reckon that that is important. And we are gonna find you someone who wants you and not the Chosen One.”

I smiled dopily up at him, feeling his magic, his love, whatever it was, soaking into my skin.

“And I’ll get to laugh at you writhing like an eel, for once,” he laughed.

But, at that moment, I wouldn’t have swapped the chance to writhe with Ginny for the feeling I got lying beside my best friend.