Written for Round One of the HPFC Wishful Thinking Competition. I don't own Harry Potter.
{ten}
This is the day when he makes everyone proud—his family, his friends, yes, everyone. This is the day where he stops wishing it would happen because it actually is happening.
He is marrying Hermione. He is the boy who would never grow up, who had no future, who had only one-dimensional dreams that would never come to life. He's marrying, and he's going to have a family. It's the final seal of approval on his life; he's been an Auror and he's fought Death Eaters and he's done so much, really. This is just as important because it's personal. Not everyone can fall in love with Hermione Granger.
{nine}
He should have thought of the aftermath.
Married life isn't easy—Hermione likes living in the Muggle world, and he hardly understands it. She insists he can't keep confunding driving examiners for the rest of his life, and yes, that's true, but he'd rather take the easy way out. You're just lazy, she snaps at him.
He snaps right back, I'm not lazy, okay? I just think there's better things to do. Still, inside he knows that it's the best he can do.
{eight}
His family visits the first Christmas after the marriage, and Hermione is pregnant. She insists on getting to know what gender the baby is as soon as possible, but he definitely doesn't want to go to a Muggle hospital to find out. He doubts there's a spell to learn the gender of the baby, either.
Molly insists on choosing the baby name, but he thinks that he can do this himself. Oh, poor Ron; he could never manage to raise a baby. He wishes people would just stop and he'll show them (no, he won't; he's not capable).
{seven}
They go shopping for the baby and he's utterly bewildered. Why does a baby need such. . .well. . .babyish wallpaper? What's wrong with normal wallpaper? Hermione has researched what formulas are healthiest, so she hurries through the aisles and he tries to keep up with the shopping cart. Also, he's dreading the idea of changing diapers.
Hermione's pregnancy makes her snappish, and when he jokes that that isn't anything new, she shouts at him for a solid ten minutes and then stomps out of the house. He reminds himself that he's going to have a baby, and people will be so proud. That's why he can stand this.
{six}
"I think we should name the baby Rose," she says offhandedly one day. She explains about all the things her initials might stand for, and how none of them are too embarrassing, but he gives her an odd look.
"How do you know it's a girl?" Maybe she's just trying to defy name stereotypes of some sort, if the baby's a boy.
She shrugs and says she got herself tested a month or two ago, and then he yells at her for not telling him. She yells right back that she can do whatever she wants, and if he doesn't like it, he can just leave.
He does.
{five}
It feels like he's searching for the Horcruxes all over again—or rather, supposed to be but instead leaving. Ron knows leaving is not the behavior of a Gryffindor, but he doesn't care because he is his own person. He can make people proud without anyone's help.
Of course, a little voice tells him mockingly. This is how you'll make everyone proud of you.
He doesn't listen. Not at all.
{four}
After roaming around the Muggle world for a week, he's completely lost. He spends most of his money on bus fare, although he's not really going anywhere. Also, he steals newspapers from Muggles' lawns. The news seems boring and it won't help him, and anyway, none of it's about him, so he tosses it away, but he keeps taking more to see if there's anything about a husband who left his wife. He won't go home to his family—not ever again, because now his home is with Hermione. At least, it's supposed to be.
He finally returns to her with his pride at his feet.
She's already had the baby.
{three}
The baby's been named Rose, and she has the barest traces of red fuzz on her head and shining blue eyes. He tries to make up for everything he's done to Hermione by protecting Rose, little Rose, who laughs and gurgles but still stares at him in this Hermione way. It's an okay, I'll forgive, but I won't forget way—and he hardly blames her, because what kind of father isn't there for his baby when she's born?
Hermione is the same as always, but sometimes she looks at him like she's not sure he's there. He tells her he loves her, just to assure her he's there, but she doesn't believe it. He's not sure he does, either; the old Ron shouldn't have had to say it.
His family comes over to visit them and they say, "oh, Ron, you're back!" They make jokes and hug him, and he's reminded it's all right. Always.
{two}
Over a decade later, he has a new baby named Hugo, though now he's not much of a baby anymore. The family sees Rose off to Hogwarts, and he feels sad because now he's letting her go. Still, he can't hold onto everyone forever.
"Make me proud," he tells her on the platform, but he's joking when he says it because she already has. He thinks that maybe that's true he's already made everyone proud, too. Maybe.
{one}
He returns home with Hermione and Hugo, who wants to go to Hogwarts now, but she says it's not yet his time. Hugo is unhappy that Rose has left, but Ron assures him Rose will always return. He'd know—people will always come back, he says, and they come back better than before.
He hopes so, anyway.