Shadows

Rating: PG-13

Summery: "He painted a pretty picture for you, didn't he Ron, what with all of his colorful lies and empty promises, how could I possibly compete with that?" A series of events leads Ron to the dark side, can anyone bring him back?

Disclaimer: Anything you recognize, I don't own

A/N Here I am again, starting yet another story. Lol, I have way too many impulse ideas. This story is going to be my first Ron/Hermione and we'll see how it goes. Warning though, it is going to be rather dark so if you want light and fluffy I suggest that you look elsewhere.

Oh yeah, and even though I swore that I would never write in the first person point of view again I am anyway. This is all from Ron's perspective.

Chapter One

Prologue/Graduation Day

Do you know what it is like for your role in life to be the sidekick? My claim to fame is being the boy who lived's friend. His confidant, trusted advisor, his little helper. I realize that saying these things make me come off as bitter and jealous, but I'm not those things, really.

I love Harry as one would love any friend, but I can't help but to sometimes feel under appreciated, not noticed, a shadow waiting in the wings if you will. I understand that Harry doesn't want the attention, he didn't ask for it, and Lord knows that he doesn't bask in it; but at the same time I don't understand why he has it in the first place. He has said himself that out all of his encounters with he who must not be named he has only escaped based on guesses and pure luck. Why should one be famous for being lucky?

I've lived my entire life in the shadows. When I was young I always had the expectations of my brothers to live up to. I am not the youngest in my family, but I definitely have it the worst. Nothing is expected of Ginny, except to get married and give my mother lots of grandchildren. She's a girl so therefore the same rules do not apply to her. But me, I'm a boy, and when I become a man I will be anticipated to exceed the limitations set by five others. Even Fred and George, who were deemed the 'screw-ups' have found success in their joke business. Through their antics with their now numerous shops they have gained the respect and pride of my parents, as well as most of the community.

When I went to Hogwarts, I had dreams and aspirations that I would become greater than anyone in my family. I would stick out of the crowd, and not just because of my red hair. But before I even made it to the school I was sucked into the world of Harry Potter and thus I immediately became known as the sidekick. At first I was thrilled about the whole thing, I mean it was Harry Potter! But that novelty soon wore off as I realized that he was only human, he had the same faults that anyone had, he wasn't that special.

I had thought that my feelings were changing when we became friends with Hermione; I would no longer be the sidekick, with another member of the friendship we would become a group of equals. I should have known that I would never be Hermione's equal. She was, and still is come to think of it, the smartest person that I had ever met. So there I was, I had two best friends; one was the known as the savior of the wizarding world and the other was known as one of the smartest witches that the wizarding world had ever seen. And me, I was Ron Weasley, friend of the boy who lived and the brilliant bookworm.

These thoughts kept occurring to me as I sat patiently in my seat on the day of my graduation. I kept trying to pay attention, but it was hard being that it was all so horribly boring. At some point Hermione got up and gave a speech since she was graduating first in the class. And when I say speech, I do mean speech. This thing was long. I really did try to listen to her, she was my best friend, she deserved my attention. But when I heard her mention spew, ahem, I mean S.P.E.W, I couldn't help but allow my mind to wander. And this is where it got me, in the land of bitter thoughts and regrets.

Graduation can be one of the most depressing events of your life if you have no goals. I had no clue what I wanted out of life. Harry was heading off to auror training and Hermione was continuing with her education at one of the most prestigious schools in Britain. Maybe I would crawl into a nice big hole and wait to whiter up and die.

After an extremely long amount of time, I finally graduated from Hogwarts. When your last name is Weasley you learn very quickly to grow to hate anything that is in alphabetical order. By the time that I received my diploma the crowd was restless and the applause, minus the section that my family was in, was minimal. After I sat back down I briefly recalled the standing ovation that Harry had received when he accepted his diploma from Dumbledore with tears in his eyes. He always did love this school just a little bit too much.

After the ceremony was complete I found Harry and Hermione before we all began looking for my family. Hermione's parents where seated with my family looking a little uncomfortable about being surrounded by so much magic. However their mood seemed to change upon seeing their only child. While she had her little reunion with her own family Harry and I were congratulated by mine.

I soon grew tired of hearing the formalities that followed any major event and began to look around. My eyes lingered on my sister who seemed to be in a world of her own at the moment. I attempted to follow the direction of her wistful gaze but soon got lost in the sea of people. It only bothered me for a moment before I shrugged it off, Ginny always had been boy crazy, it was probably just her newest crush.

"All right everyone," my mother announced loudly, "I think that it's time to head back to the Burrow where we will continue the celebration!" She then proceeded to gush about how proud she was of the three of us and I tuned her out, she made this same speech every time one of us made some sort of accomplishment.

Eventually the 'celebration' was moved to the Burrow and I found myself hiding out from the rest of the crowd. I was horrible at hiding my emotions and the last thing that I needed was people questioning why this wasn't one of the happiest days of my life.

But I couldn't hide forever and eventually my father found me. Though I'm sure that it didn't take much effort, being that I was hiding in my room and all. I forced a smile onto my face and made up some lame excuse about how I was looking for something. He led me down the stairs where the rest of the guests were and I soon found myself laughing and reminiscing about the good ole days at Hogwarts. Maybe I was better at hiding my emotions than I had originally thought.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A/N Yeah yeah, I realize that this, like everything else that I write is strange. But, I'm really into this idea and I'm in this one for the long haul. It is going to eventually be a R/Hr story but a lot is going to happen before they get together. I am also aware that he seems kind of whiny, but he won't be like that for long. Ron is going to go to the dark side but that doesn't mean that I'm making him evil. Please review, I appreciate any kind of feedback and I would love to know what you all think about where this is going.