InsaneJournal

Insert Foot - R/Hr - PG-13
Title: Insert Foot
Author: shocfix
Pairing: Ron/Hermione
Words: 1000
Rating: PG-13 for language

Well, I seem to be writing a Ron/Hermione fic.

You know, Ron and Hermione Weasley – the most perfect couple evah?

*flails and hugs everyone*

Well.

Um - warns for DH spoilers...


Insert Foot
****
“Oh, sweet buggering mother of fuck, what the hell was that?” I wailed, hopping in circles as I tried to grab my throbbing foot.

“Ron, shush,” Hermione admonished me from the doorway.

“Rosie’s asleep,” I hissed, limping tentatively back towards the bed and sitting down. “And she’d be a sight more concerned about seeing her poor daddy in pain than you are.”

“Though in language more appropriate for someone not yet two, I can only hope,” Hermione said.

I pulled my foot up into my lap and prodded at it.

Hermione waddled closer, but, without stopping to examine my poor foot, gingerly lowered herself onto the bed with an ‘oooff’.

I pouted and flexed my toes.

“How did you injure yourself, anyway?” she asked wearily.

I opened my mouth to describe the exquisite agony, before being thoroughly distracted as she unbuttoned the front of her nightdress and reached for her jar of anti-stretchmark oil.

I was an old hand at this, second time round and all – I hadn’t even blushed when she discussed the ingredients of the oil with Neville and he suggested a cucumber gel – but I defy anyone to be able to carry on a normal conversation while watching their wife’s slippery fingers massaging fragrant oils into their almost visibly expanding breasts.

“Ron?” she finally prompted.

“Huh?” I said, blinking and shutting my mouth.

“How did you hurt yourself?” she asked, rebuttoning and reaching awkwardly for her hairbrush.

I dutifully passed it to her and she regained her balance and took down her hair and started brushing it out.

I reached down under the bed, to retrieve the object that had wounded me.

It was a book.

Well, it was under Hermione’s side of the bed, of course it was a book.

But it was about the size and weight of a house brick.

I flicked to the back.

“Eight hundred and ninety-nine pages?” I said.

Hermione grunted, finished plaiting her hair and climbed precariously into bed.

“What can you possibly say in eight hundred and ninety-nine pages, that couldn’t be squeezed into about three hundred?” I asked, opening it at random. “I bet everyone says stuff ‘bracingly’ and ‘enquiringly’ and ‘determinedly’, instead of just saying stuff.”

“It is a complete and utter classic, by a famous Muggle writer, and I am not going to discuss literature with you at this time of night,” she said sternly.

Hermione is genuinely big on adverbs.

“I don’t want to discuss literature,” I said, getting into bed beside her and automatically helping her adjust the three pillows under her bump and between her knees. “I want to know why this,” I found the title page, “Les Thingumy can’t use shorter words, so unsuspecting husbands don’t injure themselves, tripping over this brick of a book. Did he get paid by the word?”

She sniggered.

“What?” I said.

She bit her lip.

“What?”

“He isn’t called Les Thingumy,” she said, obviously trying not to laugh. “The book is called Les Miserables. It’s French.”

I tutted as my ears heated up; well, how was I supposed to know the names of Muggle writers?

“Whatever,” I said dismissively. “So, it’s by…”

I stopped and frowned down at the book.

I frowned up at Hermione.

“Victor Hugo,” she said.

“Mmmm,” I said, counting to ten in my head, like I had promised Ginny I would, until Hermione was safely delivered. “Good, is he?”

“What?” she asked, raising an eyebrow and obviously not missing my tone.

“Good, is he?” I repeated. “Your favourite writer?”

“He’s OK,” she said slowly. “May I ask what you could possibly have against him, besides the weight of his books?”

“What could I possibly have against good old… Vicky,” I finished in a sort of embarrassed, strangled whisper.

“Excuse me?” she said, struggling upright against her mound of pillows. “Have you entirely lost your mind?”

I grunted.

“Ron?” she prompted, in a low, dangerous voice.

“What?” I asked.

“Are you telling me you are now jealous of a long dead French novelist, on the grounds that I once kissed someone called Viktor?”

“Certainly not!” I said, with some dignity, sitting up to face her.

“Ron?”

“It’s just a bit suspicious,” I muttered. “I did wonder where you got the name ‘Hugo’ from.”

Her eyebrows shot up into her hairline.

“What?” she gasped.

“Well,” I said, fully aware that I was digging my own grave and wondering whether the bed in the spare room was made up. “It’s not a family name on either side, and I did wonder where it came from, but if seems it’s some subtle way to name our son after your ex…”

“What is wrong with you?” she breathed, struggling out of bed and standing over me. “Can you really be that insecure? After we’ve been together for ten years? Married for five? Our daughter is asleep in the next room – a daughter that I could have complained you’d named after Madam Rosmerta if I was as suspicious as you are and who…”

“Aha!” I crowed.

“Aha, what?” she said, her fists attempting to rest on hips that merged with the huge bump where my son slept.

My son.

I was such a bastard.

“I’m sorry,” I said, deflating instantly.

“What?” she said, wrong footed, but still frowning at me, her fists clenched by her sides.

“I’m an idiot,” I said. “It just… took me by surprise, that’s all.”

“Ron,” she said. “You don’t really think…”

“Not if you don’t,” I interrupted.

We gazed at each other and I held out a hand and she narrowed her eyes, but let me help her back into bed.

She settled into her nest of pillows and I lay down beside her and looked at her beloved and irritated face.

“I’m sorry,” I said again.

“You really are an idiot,” she said.

“You know me,” I said. “Open mouth, insert foot. I don’t know why you put up with me.”

She snorted.

“You know me,” she said. “Open mouth, insert…”

She stopped, bit her lip and shook her head.

“Hermione Weasley.” I grinned. “Did you just make a dirty joke?”

She blushed and Noxed the lights.

“That’s my girl,” I said approvingly.