I do not own Harry Potter...or else I wouldn't be broke...alas.
Unbeknownst to Harry, as he stripped off his jacket and shirt he was being watched. Not by the Dark Lord. Not by all of the fuzzy little woodland creatures that populated to forest. Not even by the crazed fan girls who insist that somehow, it's completely possible and somehow plausible for them to be in the story at all.
He was being watched by his best friend.
Ron had finally found them, after his brief moment of going AWOL. Considering the fact that Hermione would probably skin him alive, he figured he would probably have a better chance if he faced Harry first. They had fights before, and this would be no different. He shivered in the cold, wondering what the hell Harry could possibly be doing half naked in the winter. Then, to his complete and utter shock, his friend did something completely retarded: he dived into the pond in front of him.
He was going to freeze to death, that much was certain. Halfway through the process of diving in after him, one foot dangling in midair and hands pointed together for the jump, he found himself faced with two very conflicting emotions. The first one, the right one, the one that he would probably follow through with and tell his descendents about late at night around the fire, was the urge to dive in after his friend and drag him to safety. Save Harry, save the Boy Who Lived, yet again. Then, of course, it would be, "thanks, Ron, thanks for being such a good friend," and back into the shadows he would fade. Worse yet, in his absence, Harry and Hermione had probably bonded, or some other emotional shit like that. Ron gritted his teeth as he thought of the two of them, laughing together about him, how he hadn't been good enough. His family, they thought of him as a failure. His teachers thought of him as lazy. Hermione, well…she thought of him as nothing. But it was what he would do, he would save his best friend, the war would be won, Harry would shine, and he would be shunted to the side.
Yet again.
But still, lurking in the back of his mind, slouched against the wall with a soggy dog end hanging out of one corner of his mouth and a somewhat mad expression of glee on his face, was the idea that maybe, just maybe, for the first time in his life, he could walk away. Act like he had never seen Harry's suicidal dive, go and find Hermione. Come back, find Harry's frozen carcass and weep as if he had no clue what had taken place. As for the war, he could fight. He had helped his friend enough in the past that he was just as good, if not better at the spells that were required to finish what they had started. Maybe for once in his life, he could shine. He could impress the girl of his dreams, his family, everyone in the wizarding community… and cause them all a great deal of pain by depriving them of their beloved savior. Hermione, he couldn't hurt her like that. And how could she possibly love him, settle for less than the "best"… they would never be happy. But she could be happy, not with him, but with the person he was contemplating letting drown.
Harry still hadn't come up yet, and it had been a full five minutes. Ignoring the sick little voice in his head that kept whispering, "You know you're going to regret saving him…." and listening, miserably, to his conscience, shouting, "You ass, you can't just let him die and break her heart," he jumped in, grabbed his worst enemy around the chest, and drug him to safety.
He wouldn't have been able to live with himself otherwise.