shocfix (![[info]](http://www.insanejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} shocfix) wrote,@ 2005-02-01 04:00:00 |
 |
|||
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Godric's Hollow - Chapter Four: People - H/R - NC-17
Title: Godric’s Hollow
Author:shocfix
Pairing: Harry/Ron
Rating: NC-17
This is my Big Damn Table, turned into a multi-chaptered novella.
One hundred stories inspired by Broke Back Mountain.
Ron looks back on his life with and without Harry.
Chapter Four : People
Friends
OK.
What had been the most important thing in my life, since I was eleven years old?
Harry.
And, if it hadn’t been for that summer, well, having him back in my life would have been all I could have wished for.
So I was determined to be friends with him.
I tried very hard.
Probably only Hermione and Ginny noticed the occasional odd note in our friendship, but they were patient with us, and we gradually slipped back into our old closeness.
No one but Harry realised what his casual touch did to me.
Harry, being Harry, had been snapped up by the Cannons as soon as he returned from honeymoon.
When the news had landed on my desk at the Ministry – all new signings had to go through my department – I had whooped like a small child.
My first moment of pure happiness in a long time.
My dream come true, right?
Watching Harry play for the Cannons, and going home to Hermione.
Perfect.
He was as reckless a player as ever, so it was a good thing he was married to a healer.
Who came to all his games with me.
But that was OK.
I’d never been able to take my eyes off Harry when he played at school, so Ginny and I clutching each other when he dived was perfectly natural.
Natural.
Natural to care so much about my friend.
My Best Friend.
Enemies
So, I put my feelings away in a box, and threw away the key, just like Harry had done.
After a couple of years, it was second nature.
I had Hermione and my girls and Hermione was pregnant again.
I’d watched Harry closely when she told him our news, but his face had been open and happy and he had hugged her tightly.
I had my friend back, my brother.
And Ginny was so happy; she had confided in Hermione that she and Harry were trying for a baby, too.
I think that that was when things started going wrong.
Not with me.
I was being good.
I had made the only possible choice.
But Harry seemed to be having second thoughts.
You could see him staring at Ginny like a gnome caught in headlights when she talked to Hermione’s rounded belly.
You could see that it had hit him that this was it; if Ginny had a baby, he was hers for keeps.
Well, I could see it, anyway.
He was careful not to change towards Ginny, so he took it out on me.
Which was fair enough.
As I was the only person who knew he felt claustrophobic.
Even baby-centric Hermione noticed something was wrong. “Have you and Harry fallen out again?” she asked in bed one night.
“No,” I said quickly.
“You haven’t upset him? Because he’s being really horrid to you.”
“It’s fine, Hermione,” I comforted her. “Harry has some, um, issues, but it’s nothing I’ve done; he’ll be OK.”
I really believed that; believed anything else had been locked away.
But I hadn’t thrown away the key, had I?
Harry was the key.
Lovers
Harry and Ginny came over for dinner, yet again.
We were such stereotypical suburban couples.
It was sickening.
Some evenings I had to go into the bathroom and run my wrists under cold water to stop shaking.
But I was doing really well.
Until Harry and Ginny came over for dinner, yet again.
I was doing well, until I noticed that Harry wasn’t watching Ginny anymore.
He was watching me.
The hairs on the back of my neck stood up.
I was about to run when Ginny spoke. “Oh, Harry, please can I tell them?”
Harry smiled wanly. “Of course you can, Gin,” he said.
Hermione sat up straighter, her six month pregnancy in her lap.
“I’m six weeks gone,” Ginny announced beaming.
Hermione went into raptures and Harry looked at me. “Congratulations,” I said weakly.
He smiled.
My heart sank a little bit. He could never leave her now. Not that I’d leave Hermione and my girls, but the option was there.
Sort of.
After letting the girls run on for a few minutes, he interrupted. “I had an idea,” he said and they both looked up. My heart started racing, although I had no idea why. “Before you both, well, explode – I thought maybe Ron and I could go away for a week somewhere – sort of, male bonding thingy?”
The girls looked at each other. “Fine by me, if you can go in the next couple of weeks, before I’m off work,” Hermione said, shrugging.
“I think it’s a good idea,” Ginny said encouragingly. “You two have a busy year ahead of you, too!”
They both looked fondly at us and I wanted to kill him.
Doesn’t he think he should ask me if I want to go away with him?
Does he think I don’t realise what he wants?
Does he think he can just click his fingers and I’ll come running?
Harry looked down at his hands and swallowed.
He looked up and caught my eye.
“Sure,” I said, weakly. “It shouldn’t be a problem to get the time off work for either of us, the Quidditch season is over.”
They were both so pleased that we were making an effort; Hermione smiled warmly at me and I had to leave the room. She thought Harry and I would work through whatever our problem was before the babies came.
I felt like dirt.
I was half-heartedly putting stuff away in the kitchen when Harry came in and closed the door.
He looked very nervous and I closed my eyes and counted to ten. “You can’t just do this to me, Harry,” I whispered.
“We do need to talk about things, Ron,” he said. “We don’t have to do anything else.”
“You know we will,” I said dully and he shrugged.
“Please,” he said.
I nodded. “Just go home now, I need to get my head round the baby and stuff. Find somewhere for us to go, and I’ll go.”
****
Harry found a cottage in Northern Scotland.
“Why can’t you go somewhere sunny, like normal people?” Hermione asked.
“Since when has Harry been normal?” I asked, my back to her as I packed.
What was I supposed to say? We can’t go somewhere sunny – we’d come back without a tan, because we’ll have been fucking all week.
Harry and Ginny arrived and we said our goodbyes.
I felt like I was seeing everything through some sort of mist and all sounds were muted.
I wondered why I let him do this to me.
We Apparated to the cottage.
I snorted. It really was the perfect romantic location and I shook my head in wonderment. Did he really think we could just do this casually and then go home?
I threw myself in an armchair. “OK then, talk,” I said.
He sat on the coffee table by my feet. Too close. “Look, whatever happens, we can’t carry on like we have been. It’s destructive.”
I ran a hand over my face. “Harry, what is destructive is you fucking me every time you can’t cope with change in your life.”
He blinked. “I don’t…”
“You were freaked about trying for a baby, and now you need this,” I gestured between us, “because she is pregnant and you are stuck; you were freaked when you first came home; hell, you were freaked about You Know Who that summer.”
“No!” he snapped. “That summer… no, it… it wasn’t because I was freaking out. And when I came home, yes, I was scared... me… Ginny, but I saw you and I had to… and this… now…”
He closed his eyes. “I love you,” he said simply.
“Oh, Harry!”
“I know. I’ve messed everything up. But, I love you,” he sighed. “The past two years have felt like… like...”
“Like pressure building in a volcano,” I supplied, helpfully.
He leant forward and clasped my hand in both of his. “Yes!” he nodded frantically. “Seeing you, but not…”
“Harry,” I interrupted, pushing his hair out of his eyes with my free hand. “Are you suggesting we take a break like this to let off steam every now and again, and then go back to our wives?”
“No!” he said indignantly, and I raised my eyebrows. “That’s… just…. Yes?”
“Oh, Harry,” I sighed.
He looked so nervous, but I was there, wasn’t I?
I wouldn’t have been there if I wasn’t going to say yes.
To him.
To anything he wanted.
I pulled him up towards me and he made a surprised sound and then his eyes lit up and he was in my lap, straddling me.
And his hands were in my hair and his mouth descended on mine.
Mine.
He was right.
Right? This was far from right; this was so wrong.
But we needed it.
“Just every summer,” he whispered between kisses. “It’ll be OK,” as my shirt came off. “I have to be with you,” as he sucked on my neck. “It’ll be enough.”
“Shut up, Harry,” I said as I unzipped his jeans and slipped my hand inside.
He thrust into my hand as I rubbed him through his boxers. “So long,” he whispered. “Too long… want… yes…” and he came in my hand.
He laughed, shakily.
“Building like a volcano,” I sniggered.
Family
I know it was appalling.
But it worked.
After the first desperate coupling in the armchair, we had the best week.
And it wasn’t strained or rushed or silent, like it had been before.
Before, well, we hadn’t talked about it – we were seventeen - so the sex was the only was to connect like that.
But now? Now that we didn’t have to shag all day. Now we could go walking, or swim in the loch, or sit and watch the Muggle televisual, and our every touch was loving.
It was beautiful.
We had talked it through.
There is no way we could be together, but there was no way we could never see each other.
So, at home we would be friends; brothers.
But there; there I could sit under a tree, Harry between my legs – not like that – leaning back against my chest, and I’d wrap my arms around him, soaking him in, filling every pore with enough Harry to last me until the next time we could be together.
And then, with one last kiss, we Apparated home to our families.
Strangers
Our women were busy nesting, and didn’t notice anything strange between us.
My Annie was born that autumn and Harry was a doting, if clumsy, Godfather.
Ginny laughed when she saw him with the baby.
It was wonderful.
What our lives should have been like.
I know I’m a selfish bastard.
I had this perfect life, three perfect girls, perfect wife, and I really did wish that that was what I wanted.
Because what I really wanted had just been peed on by my baby daughter and had a look of horror on his face, as our oblivious wives laughed at him.
Teammates
But, you know what?
It was easier when Harry wasn’t losing it.
I know I was the one with the temper, but I could hold it together when Harry was.
And it was lovely watching him and Ginny preparing for the birth of their child.
She grew huge, and change wasn’t freaking him out this time.
I don't know if that was because we had recharged our relationship.
We didn’t have room for three kids in our flat, and Harry and Ginny had a tiny place, so we all decided to move. To become neighbours in Hogsmeade.
Yeah, I know.
Ginny was too big now to do much about the move, so she babysat while Harry, Hermione and I did all the work.
And it was wonderful, working together, after all that time.
Parents
That spring, the most amazing thing happened.
It wasn't something that helped our secret relationship.
But it helped Harry.
Maybe it was even something that would mean he'd not turn to me again.
And wasn't I in love with him, shouldn't I want what was best for him?
Shouldn't I want him to be happy?
Ginny had the baby; a baby girl, who they named Diana.
And the look on Harry's face when he brought her out of Ginny's room, to introduce her to the family, it was just beautiful.
The tiny person in his arms belonged to him; had his blood.
Children
The years passed.
My Charlotte – Charlie for short – was born, followed by Harry's Philip and, at long last, my son, Teddy.
I loved my girls, I did, but all of my brothers had boys, and they teased me about living with five women, so I can't deny I was stoked.
Especially as Hermione assured me that that was it.
Five was more than enough.
As it was, I kid you not, we had a timetable for the bathroom.
And, later that year, possibly an even prouder moment, when we all took Kate to King's Cross and saw her off to school.
Harry and Ginny came with, with their two, and Hermione cried.
And it was twenty years since we met on that platform.
Life was good.
So, you'd hope I was happy with my lot.
You'd hope that, at the end of each Quidditch season, when Harry and I went off for a week's fishing, that we actually caught some fish.
But we never did.
We never spoke about it, and I was used to the tension building through the year, like an itch under my skin.
Harry's dangerous Quidditch skills were legendary, and only I knew that he threw himself around like that on his broomstick because it was the best outlet to stop him falling on me.
We waited all year for that precious week, when we could be together.
When, the instant we reached 'our' cottage, I could taste him again.
Birth
We both had a lot to look forward to, the next summer.
I was waiting for Kate to get home from school; Lizzie had missed her sister, and Hermione had missed her good influence on her younger siblings.
Who knew it was Kate, rather than their mother, that the little ones listened to?
Harry and Ginny were expecting again, and my girls were next door every day, waiting for their aunt to go into labour.
One late afternoon in June, Charlie came flying through the hedge to say the baby was coming, and Hermione dumped little Teddy in my lap when she went to help.
It wasn't long before Harry turned up, bringing the rest of our broods with him.
The children played in the garden, eating whatever in our kitchen didn't need cooking.
Harry alternated between sitting beside me, clutching my hand and pacing up and down
We only realised the time when the sky darkened, and Lizzie helped me put the little ones to bed.
Harry and I stayed out in the garden, looking up at the flickering light in the bedroom of the house next door.
It was gone midnight when we heard a baby cry, and Harry vaulted over the hedge and vanished indoors.
Death
I have never needed anything more, but we didn't go away together that summer.
We didn't have a chance to recharge.
To make love out of doors.
To renew our unspoken vows.
There was too much to do.
Hermione did as much as she could, but she had five children of her own to look after.
Mum was in and out all summer, of course, and she was still able to hook a child out of a danger that she couldn't possibly have spotted behind her back.
And Harry.
My Harry tried his best.
To look after his three motherless children.
Title: Godric’s Hollow
Author:
shocfixPairing: Harry/Ron
Rating: NC-17
This is my Big Damn Table, turned into a multi-chaptered novella.
One hundred stories inspired by Broke Back Mountain.
Ron looks back on his life with and without Harry.
Chapter Four : People
Friends
OK.
What had been the most important thing in my life, since I was eleven years old?
Harry.
And, if it hadn’t been for that summer, well, having him back in my life would have been all I could have wished for.
So I was determined to be friends with him.
I tried very hard.
Probably only Hermione and Ginny noticed the occasional odd note in our friendship, but they were patient with us, and we gradually slipped back into our old closeness.
No one but Harry realised what his casual touch did to me.
Harry, being Harry, had been snapped up by the Cannons as soon as he returned from honeymoon.
When the news had landed on my desk at the Ministry – all new signings had to go through my department – I had whooped like a small child.
My first moment of pure happiness in a long time.
My dream come true, right?
Watching Harry play for the Cannons, and going home to Hermione.
Perfect.
He was as reckless a player as ever, so it was a good thing he was married to a healer.
Who came to all his games with me.
But that was OK.
I’d never been able to take my eyes off Harry when he played at school, so Ginny and I clutching each other when he dived was perfectly natural.
Natural.
Natural to care so much about my friend.
My Best Friend.
Enemies
So, I put my feelings away in a box, and threw away the key, just like Harry had done.
After a couple of years, it was second nature.
I had Hermione and my girls and Hermione was pregnant again.
I’d watched Harry closely when she told him our news, but his face had been open and happy and he had hugged her tightly.
I had my friend back, my brother.
And Ginny was so happy; she had confided in Hermione that she and Harry were trying for a baby, too.
I think that that was when things started going wrong.
Not with me.
I was being good.
I had made the only possible choice.
But Harry seemed to be having second thoughts.
You could see him staring at Ginny like a gnome caught in headlights when she talked to Hermione’s rounded belly.
You could see that it had hit him that this was it; if Ginny had a baby, he was hers for keeps.
Well, I could see it, anyway.
He was careful not to change towards Ginny, so he took it out on me.
Which was fair enough.
As I was the only person who knew he felt claustrophobic.
Even baby-centric Hermione noticed something was wrong. “Have you and Harry fallen out again?” she asked in bed one night.
“No,” I said quickly.
“You haven’t upset him? Because he’s being really horrid to you.”
“It’s fine, Hermione,” I comforted her. “Harry has some, um, issues, but it’s nothing I’ve done; he’ll be OK.”
I really believed that; believed anything else had been locked away.
But I hadn’t thrown away the key, had I?
Harry was the key.
Lovers
Harry and Ginny came over for dinner, yet again.
We were such stereotypical suburban couples.
It was sickening.
Some evenings I had to go into the bathroom and run my wrists under cold water to stop shaking.
But I was doing really well.
Until Harry and Ginny came over for dinner, yet again.
I was doing well, until I noticed that Harry wasn’t watching Ginny anymore.
He was watching me.
The hairs on the back of my neck stood up.
I was about to run when Ginny spoke. “Oh, Harry, please can I tell them?”
Harry smiled wanly. “Of course you can, Gin,” he said.
Hermione sat up straighter, her six month pregnancy in her lap.
“I’m six weeks gone,” Ginny announced beaming.
Hermione went into raptures and Harry looked at me. “Congratulations,” I said weakly.
He smiled.
My heart sank a little bit. He could never leave her now. Not that I’d leave Hermione and my girls, but the option was there.
Sort of.
After letting the girls run on for a few minutes, he interrupted. “I had an idea,” he said and they both looked up. My heart started racing, although I had no idea why. “Before you both, well, explode – I thought maybe Ron and I could go away for a week somewhere – sort of, male bonding thingy?”
The girls looked at each other. “Fine by me, if you can go in the next couple of weeks, before I’m off work,” Hermione said, shrugging.
“I think it’s a good idea,” Ginny said encouragingly. “You two have a busy year ahead of you, too!”
They both looked fondly at us and I wanted to kill him.
Doesn’t he think he should ask me if I want to go away with him?
Does he think I don’t realise what he wants?
Does he think he can just click his fingers and I’ll come running?
Harry looked down at his hands and swallowed.
He looked up and caught my eye.
“Sure,” I said, weakly. “It shouldn’t be a problem to get the time off work for either of us, the Quidditch season is over.”
They were both so pleased that we were making an effort; Hermione smiled warmly at me and I had to leave the room. She thought Harry and I would work through whatever our problem was before the babies came.
I felt like dirt.
I was half-heartedly putting stuff away in the kitchen when Harry came in and closed the door.
He looked very nervous and I closed my eyes and counted to ten. “You can’t just do this to me, Harry,” I whispered.
“We do need to talk about things, Ron,” he said. “We don’t have to do anything else.”
“You know we will,” I said dully and he shrugged.
“Please,” he said.
I nodded. “Just go home now, I need to get my head round the baby and stuff. Find somewhere for us to go, and I’ll go.”
****
Harry found a cottage in Northern Scotland.
“Why can’t you go somewhere sunny, like normal people?” Hermione asked.
“Since when has Harry been normal?” I asked, my back to her as I packed.
What was I supposed to say? We can’t go somewhere sunny – we’d come back without a tan, because we’ll have been fucking all week.
Harry and Ginny arrived and we said our goodbyes.
I felt like I was seeing everything through some sort of mist and all sounds were muted.
I wondered why I let him do this to me.
We Apparated to the cottage.
I snorted. It really was the perfect romantic location and I shook my head in wonderment. Did he really think we could just do this casually and then go home?
I threw myself in an armchair. “OK then, talk,” I said.
He sat on the coffee table by my feet. Too close. “Look, whatever happens, we can’t carry on like we have been. It’s destructive.”
I ran a hand over my face. “Harry, what is destructive is you fucking me every time you can’t cope with change in your life.”
He blinked. “I don’t…”
“You were freaked about trying for a baby, and now you need this,” I gestured between us, “because she is pregnant and you are stuck; you were freaked when you first came home; hell, you were freaked about You Know Who that summer.”
“No!” he snapped. “That summer… no, it… it wasn’t because I was freaking out. And when I came home, yes, I was scared... me… Ginny, but I saw you and I had to… and this… now…”
He closed his eyes. “I love you,” he said simply.
“Oh, Harry!”
“I know. I’ve messed everything up. But, I love you,” he sighed. “The past two years have felt like… like...”
“Like pressure building in a volcano,” I supplied, helpfully.
He leant forward and clasped my hand in both of his. “Yes!” he nodded frantically. “Seeing you, but not…”
“Harry,” I interrupted, pushing his hair out of his eyes with my free hand. “Are you suggesting we take a break like this to let off steam every now and again, and then go back to our wives?”
“No!” he said indignantly, and I raised my eyebrows. “That’s… just…. Yes?”
“Oh, Harry,” I sighed.
He looked so nervous, but I was there, wasn’t I?
I wouldn’t have been there if I wasn’t going to say yes.
To him.
To anything he wanted.
I pulled him up towards me and he made a surprised sound and then his eyes lit up and he was in my lap, straddling me.
And his hands were in my hair and his mouth descended on mine.
Mine.
He was right.
Right? This was far from right; this was so wrong.
But we needed it.
“Just every summer,” he whispered between kisses. “It’ll be OK,” as my shirt came off. “I have to be with you,” as he sucked on my neck. “It’ll be enough.”
“Shut up, Harry,” I said as I unzipped his jeans and slipped my hand inside.
He thrust into my hand as I rubbed him through his boxers. “So long,” he whispered. “Too long… want… yes…” and he came in my hand.
He laughed, shakily.
“Building like a volcano,” I sniggered.
Family
I know it was appalling.
But it worked.
After the first desperate coupling in the armchair, we had the best week.
And it wasn’t strained or rushed or silent, like it had been before.
Before, well, we hadn’t talked about it – we were seventeen - so the sex was the only was to connect like that.
But now? Now that we didn’t have to shag all day. Now we could go walking, or swim in the loch, or sit and watch the Muggle televisual, and our every touch was loving.
It was beautiful.
We had talked it through.
There is no way we could be together, but there was no way we could never see each other.
So, at home we would be friends; brothers.
But there; there I could sit under a tree, Harry between my legs – not like that – leaning back against my chest, and I’d wrap my arms around him, soaking him in, filling every pore with enough Harry to last me until the next time we could be together.
And then, with one last kiss, we Apparated home to our families.
Strangers
Our women were busy nesting, and didn’t notice anything strange between us.
My Annie was born that autumn and Harry was a doting, if clumsy, Godfather.
Ginny laughed when she saw him with the baby.
It was wonderful.
What our lives should have been like.
I know I’m a selfish bastard.
I had this perfect life, three perfect girls, perfect wife, and I really did wish that that was what I wanted.
Because what I really wanted had just been peed on by my baby daughter and had a look of horror on his face, as our oblivious wives laughed at him.
Teammates
But, you know what?
It was easier when Harry wasn’t losing it.
I know I was the one with the temper, but I could hold it together when Harry was.
And it was lovely watching him and Ginny preparing for the birth of their child.
She grew huge, and change wasn’t freaking him out this time.
I don't know if that was because we had recharged our relationship.
We didn’t have room for three kids in our flat, and Harry and Ginny had a tiny place, so we all decided to move. To become neighbours in Hogsmeade.
Yeah, I know.
Ginny was too big now to do much about the move, so she babysat while Harry, Hermione and I did all the work.
And it was wonderful, working together, after all that time.
Parents
That spring, the most amazing thing happened.
It wasn't something that helped our secret relationship.
But it helped Harry.
Maybe it was even something that would mean he'd not turn to me again.
And wasn't I in love with him, shouldn't I want what was best for him?
Shouldn't I want him to be happy?
Ginny had the baby; a baby girl, who they named Diana.
And the look on Harry's face when he brought her out of Ginny's room, to introduce her to the family, it was just beautiful.
The tiny person in his arms belonged to him; had his blood.
Children
The years passed.
My Charlotte – Charlie for short – was born, followed by Harry's Philip and, at long last, my son, Teddy.
I loved my girls, I did, but all of my brothers had boys, and they teased me about living with five women, so I can't deny I was stoked.
Especially as Hermione assured me that that was it.
Five was more than enough.
As it was, I kid you not, we had a timetable for the bathroom.
And, later that year, possibly an even prouder moment, when we all took Kate to King's Cross and saw her off to school.
Harry and Ginny came with, with their two, and Hermione cried.
And it was twenty years since we met on that platform.
Life was good.
So, you'd hope I was happy with my lot.
You'd hope that, at the end of each Quidditch season, when Harry and I went off for a week's fishing, that we actually caught some fish.
But we never did.
We never spoke about it, and I was used to the tension building through the year, like an itch under my skin.
Harry's dangerous Quidditch skills were legendary, and only I knew that he threw himself around like that on his broomstick because it was the best outlet to stop him falling on me.
We waited all year for that precious week, when we could be together.
When, the instant we reached 'our' cottage, I could taste him again.
Birth
We both had a lot to look forward to, the next summer.
I was waiting for Kate to get home from school; Lizzie had missed her sister, and Hermione had missed her good influence on her younger siblings.
Who knew it was Kate, rather than their mother, that the little ones listened to?
Harry and Ginny were expecting again, and my girls were next door every day, waiting for their aunt to go into labour.
One late afternoon in June, Charlie came flying through the hedge to say the baby was coming, and Hermione dumped little Teddy in my lap when she went to help.
It wasn't long before Harry turned up, bringing the rest of our broods with him.
The children played in the garden, eating whatever in our kitchen didn't need cooking.
Harry alternated between sitting beside me, clutching my hand and pacing up and down
We only realised the time when the sky darkened, and Lizzie helped me put the little ones to bed.
Harry and I stayed out in the garden, looking up at the flickering light in the bedroom of the house next door.
It was gone midnight when we heard a baby cry, and Harry vaulted over the hedge and vanished indoors.
Death
I have never needed anything more, but we didn't go away together that summer.
We didn't have a chance to recharge.
To make love out of doors.
To renew our unspoken vows.
There was too much to do.
Hermione did as much as she could, but she had five children of her own to look after.
Mum was in and out all summer, of course, and she was still able to hook a child out of a danger that she couldn't possibly have spotted behind her back.
And Harry.
My Harry tried his best.
To look after his three motherless children.