Disclaimer: I don't own Ron Weasley or anything else JKR dreamed up. I just like having fun without the epilogue.
Echo
He wondered.
She watched.
It wasn't something he did all that often. Though he did do it more than the women (sister, ex-girlfriends, sister-in-laws, mother) swore he did.
He just never need to in all honesty. It wasn't that he was simple or shallow. It was more that his world -as he viewed it- was pretty much black and white.
And those few and far between times that it wasn't, he just asked around. He didn't have to have an answer or even the answer in those moments; he just needed to see what others saw and he could work from there. In the end, it wasn't that he was lazy or incapable of forming an opinion, he just had more important things on his mind – like making sure his men returned alive from every mission – and on his plate – preferably bringing them home in one piece-, than to play mind games with women who seemingly had nothing else to do with their lives.
If that was what made him a confirmed bachelor at twenty-six with a grand total of two relationships under his belt, then so be it.
Even if he hated his cold, empty bed at night.
Ron wanted nothing more than a family to come home to at the end of the day, just like everyone else. He just didn't dare breathe that desire to a soul.
However, at that moment he found himself with a more interesting puzzle. One that had messed with his mind since he noticed he was being watched at the Ministry's annual "We kicked Old Voldie's Arse" ball months before -and then after several other events after that.
He just couldn't help but wonder why the soon-to-be Lady Malfoy kept watching him.
She watched Ron Weasley every chance she was presented.
That evening's charity event for St. Mungo's was no different.
She had done it since they were students together, even though she doubted he knew who she was. He always gave her a gentle smile when he helped her to her feet but so did everyone else.
It had never mattered to her then when she had first noticed him. She just had.
It never even mattered if he actually noticed her. She had braces on her legs, and a frustrating speech problem, along with the humiliating stutter, that made her accent even more unintelligible. There was nothing about her that she wanted to be seen. Especially by him. So she had kept quietly to the crevices and shadows of the stone walls.
She found herself enjoying life more when she watched him – in the hallways, the Grand Hall, on the Quidditch pitch, in Diagon Alley (if she was lucky). So she did so any way and with any chance that presented itself to her. There was something about him apart from his easy-going, lop-sided smile that first drew her in (and the gentleness of his hands helping her to her feet).
Her attention quickly moved to the way he carried himself in graceful lopes that would often quickly give to instances of clumsiness. Those moments were charming and made him so real in her fantasy.
She envied him and the easy way he moved, for her braces kept her movements restricted to the most stilted of walks and the more common moments of falling down stairs when someone rushed by her.
Eventually her fascination with his ability to move gave way to the colour of his hair - the brightness of the red sun at sunrise and sunset. The length of the waves that begged to be mussed . The fringe his blue eyes would forever hide behind. Hair that could never hide - unlike her voice, her speech. One of the many things she had forgotten about her own self in trying to hide from the world at large. A world she was acutely aware of from a young age, didn't want her; no matter if her blood was pure.
Then finally, her heart came to see the person he was with all his faults and all his worth: the loyal friend; the fiery temper; the gentle giant; the persistent 'foot-in-mouth' sufferer.
A person she came to fancy and eventually love as she faithfully watched him from the shadows. She longed for the courage to just say something, much more than the simple 'Thank you' that barely slipped through her mouth each time he helped her to her feet, the fading of her voice having already begun. There were even moments of her wishing for the sheer guts to 'create a meeting' like Pansy Parkinson, her sister's best friend, her erstwhile surrogate sister (who had always appeared to be more attached to her than Daphne), was famous - or better yet - infamous for doing.
Until the day her world fell apart. The day he disappeared was the day her heart broke.
Late at night, sheltered in the secret passages of her family's home while her parents and sister fed the world stories of how their poor, mute, crippled little pureblood finally withered and died, she prayed for his safety and his return. And in the silent hours (even while her fingers picked at the muted instruments) that filled her day, she wrote about everything she could recall about him: his smile, his hair, his temper even.
As the days crept on she started to worry she would forget him. It only led to her writing more in her journals and her prayers that much longer at night.
Then one day while staring at a picture of him which she had cut out from The Daily Prophet, something she had never known burst from within her. More than a glimmer, but a rush of courage filled her body. Courage to simply walk up to him and introduce herself.
And in those lonely hours, with only books and her beloved instruments for company, her voice learned to sing with every note she plucked from their nearly silent strings. Astoria worked hour after hour on each word of the English language until her tongue worked properly against her teeth and in her mouth, though her stutter remained.
However, it was for nothing.
In those frantic moments of tears, hugs, murmured promises, wishes, apologies from her parents and sister after they believed it was safe for her to come out of her hiding place, the picture on the cover of discarded The Daily Prophet caught her eye.
There kissing for all the world to see -her love with Hermione Granger.
Her heart shattered into a million pieces. Pieces she knew could never, would never be glued back together again. She wasn't that strong a person.
Or that trusting, nor willing to risk anything ever again.
She never pretended otherwise. She carried her secret carefully buried with in the depths of her being, near her soul. She simply returned to the comforts of the shadows that had protected her for so long.
The darkness that was her comfortable friend.
When people would ask her for a date, she would politely turn them down. When her mother tried to set her up, she simply refused. When her sister or any of Daphne's friends tried to blindside her with double dates, she often would apologise to her 'date' before leaving without a second thought or glance.
And when her father at first bribed, and then threatened -she simply packed up a few things, took what money she had squirrelled away from her pocket money over the years, and moved out of her parents' home. She quickly found a flat, and eventually found a job -thanks to her harp- in Muggle London.
Astoria came to do what she had always done without anyone's notice - live her life alone.
It was the first time since he had noticed her watching him that he could himself return the 'favour'. His disastrous break-up with Hermione now a thing of the past, especially since she had showed up this evening with the Wizarding World's favourite playboy they loved to hate, Blaise Zabini.
When Ron had first noticed Asteria Greengrass watching, his mind started working through all the people she could be working for as a spy. Ron had even started a file until two events ago when he realised, while trying to watch her as he went from conversing with Bill to fighting with Hermione, that she was only watching him as her eyes took to having a shimmer of sympathy.
With a somewhat careful plan, he had purposefully angered many of his family and friends that evening so he could watch her alone from the convenient shadows along the edges of the room. All of them accused him of being obsessed with a case that no one could recall any information about, nor any information that he would be willing to provide. Between hurt and angry looks directed at him by his friends and family, Ron just kept his back to the wall, while he identified his exits and planned a strategy to reach and utilise each and every one, as he casually sipped at his drink.
The longer the minutes stretched by, he pondered why Asteria Greengrass was so covertly watching him even though by appearances she was intimately engaged with the various individuals that her and Malfoy continuously conversed with while the evening passed. Well, Malfoy conversed with as she appeared to communicate with her hands.
He had to admit her skills were amazing. To the point, it was clear, that this was a skill she learned over a long period of time. You didn't have to be a trainer for Aurors in stealth (which Ron was) to know that natural talents only took you so far. The ones really good at it had the scars from lessons learned the painful way. The thought even crossed his mind that he should bring her in as a guest lecturer or tell Kingsley that Asteria Greengrass should be teaching the new recruits and not him.
His mind carefully started going through all the information in the file he had collected about her when he thought she was a spy, to the binder it had evolved too when he realised she wasn't. Information that had been some of the most challenging to obtain, especially since it required him to get more than one Slythern, most of the Hufflepuffs, and a few Ravenclaws drunk on more than one occasion after spending an incredibly painful evening with a drunk Ginny (he visibly winched at that thought) and a tipsy Luna to even find a starting place.
Hufflepuff.
Her hair no longer the dark blonde of her school years, but a dark brown that rivaled the
black night.
Daphne Greengrass' baby sister. Yet, Pansy Parkinson acted more like one Ron quickly found out than Daphne did, and she was definitely more protective -a lioness about her cub as one Hufflepuff recalled and then proceeded to regale Ron with an entertaining story of how Pansy stole his 'manhood' after he drunkenly made a pass at Asteria Greengrass.
Wore leg braces. Some weren't sure if she still did; others said she still did -she just avoided stairs at all costs. But they weren't entirely sure about that.
Played the harp and the piano. Taught lessons and played professionally in Muggle London to this day.
Every one thought she had died just before her fifth year. Only for her to reappear after the Battle of Hogwarts, though she never returned to Hogwarts. She had tutors for the next three years until for some reason she packed up, moved out of her parents home (a scandal at the time for unknown reasons -or at least reasons no one including a very drunk Pansy would talk about as far as Ron could tell), and finally shunning the Wizarding society for a Muggle life in London.
But for Ron -as he watched her gently smile as Draco kissed her lightly on the cheek, her hands softly gesticulating- it was the mystery of voice, or the lack of one.
Everyone he spoke to had said she was mute. No one knew as to why this had come to pass, that she just was. They all remembered her using her wand or a piece of parchment and quill to communicate as a youth; then with her hands after she returned to Wizarding society upon her engagement to Malfoy.
Everyone except one Pansy Parkinson. She never described her as being mute or referred to her as being so. Pansy would simply describe her as quiet and painfully shy. Until Pansy become so drunk that Ron would find himself carrying her half-sleeping to her flat.
It was in those moments she would softly cry when Asteria's name came up in conversation until she would pass out from the drink with the word 'Echo' on her lips.
Echo. His mouth softly whispered as Asteria softly smiled in his direction as Kingsley approached her and her fiance.
Something was up.
Asteria knew it, the longer her eyes covertly watched Ron Weasley. In all the years she had watched him in their shared spaces, he was never the kind of person to be alone for that long. Even during his fourth year when she knew he was fighting with his best friend. Another one of the Gryffindors or his sister or his ex-girlfriend were always with him.
But not at that moment.
He appeared to be content to sit along the edge of the room in shadows sipping a drink. As the time grew later, she noticed that not a single person approached him.
She was thankful when Kingsley approached her and Draco. It allowed her to look in a more direct manner at Ron to see if she could figure out why that evening was so different from the thousand that had come before.
However, the longer she tried to figure it out while she conversed with Kingsley (who thanked her and Draco profusely for their donation to the new children's wing at St. Mungo's) and the other St. Mungo's board members who took the same exact moment to approach them, the more confused she became.
In all honesty, she thought for a moment that he was occupied with watching emher/em.
That simple thought scared her to no end.
When her heart heard her mind's suggestion, it took hold desperately. The thought of Ron Weasley looking at her, watching her was more than a desperate wish; it was her heart and her soul's longed-for desire. One she had carefully suppressed day after day, month after month, year after year.
Until now.
The room's temperature continued to rise as her heart beat faster. Her throat became strangely parched. Her mind started to wander as glimpses of her deepest fantasies started to play:
His hand -weathered and calloused- caressing her face before wrapping around the back of her neck.
His breath hot against her skin as he whispers her name.
His lips softly brushing against her dry lips at first before pressing harder into her own.
His arm wrapping itself around her body; pulling her closer; holding her tighter; molding around her.
His soul breathing life into her own.
His heart first speeding up, just as hers, until they fall into a gentle rhythm-
"Asteria." Draco's soft voice brought her back to the St. Mungo's charity ball. Her eyes first found Ron's location several steps closer to her with Pansy by her side.
Turning her head to Draco, she silently asked him, "What?"
"Are you okay?" he whispered gently as his arm squeezed around her waist. At that very moment, she noticed that he wasn't the only one staring at her in concern: several of the St. Mungo's board members as well as her fiance's lover. The very reason she found herself in this situation playing fiancée, and soon to be wife of Draco Malfoy, since his family couldn't accept he was gay, and society would have nothing to do with the idea of two Death Eater's sons being together.
Asteria forced herself to be back to the here and now, and to not focus on whether maybe Ron Weasley was watching her, or how she had become the very thing - a trophy wife- that she had sworn not to be, and what her estranged sister was now. With a quick flick of her hands, she simply lied, "A little hot. I'm going to step outside for a moment."
Smoothly as Theo Nott translated what her hands said to the group at large, Draco whispered in her ear, "Would you like me to escort you?"
She gently shook her head no. With a smile on her face, she made her excuses and moved away from the lie she had become.
"So I have a theory." Pansy purred without any pretence, breaking Ron's focus from watching Asteria Greengrass. "Actually, I'm not the only one with the theory but that may be beside the point. At least for the moment."
"And what would that theory be?" Ron replied with a sigh, his head turning to look at Pansy all dolled up in a dress that was form-fitting without revealing too much but saying more. The brilliant red dress probably made her look desirable to most of the men in the room. It strangely did nothing for him, even though it probably would have a few months ago, when he hadn't realised that someone was watching him. Someone who was softly beautiful in a way Pansy could never be. In a way most women never were.
"Why you and Granger never worked out. And you and Lavender before that. And why you never made a move on me since that horrendous thing you and Granger called a break-up."
Mildly intrigued, Ron let her take his drink. He crossed his arms, and with a roll of his eyes (because he didn't want her to know he was intrigued), he asked, "And why is that?"
"Well, you and Granger never worked because she is too much like your family - opinionated and loud. Something I think you may have tired of long before you even got to Hogwarts whether you knew it then or not."
"And what about me and Lavender?" Ron didn't want to admit that Pansy actually had hit that answer on the head.
"She's too overtly about sex and affection. She's the kind of girl who thinks to properly love someone and have someone love them, they have to spend every waking hour together. And you are the kind of guy to need your space. As such you want a woman who is independent as well. And well, Lavender is about as independent as a fungus."
Ron officially hated that she was probably right on that one as well. Instead he pressed on, "Well that now leaves why I never asked you out?"
"I'm too much like your sister." Ron couldn't help but look at Pansy like she had grown a third eye which made her laugh. "Think about it. I'm loud and opinionated like your sister; I'm independent to a fault; which means you treat me like I was her. Something you did after I got 'drunk' with you more than one time."
"Excuse me?" Ron spurted thinking back to all the times he had to carry what he believed to be a fairly drunk Pansy home.
"I guess this is the best time to tell you that I don't drink. Hate the taste. Though obviously this means that I'm a fabulous actress, maybe I should give it ago- but anyway this isn't about me, it's about you. And I want to know is when are you going to stop her from making the second biggest mistake in her life?"
"Excuse me?" Ron was too befuddled to answer her question because nothing the woman had said in the last thirty seconds made any sense to him.
"Okay it's really the third. Because I think she misses Daphne more than she lets on and vice versa but they were always two stubborn idiots if there were ever two. But all that aside when are you going to stop her from making that mistake?" Pansy in a calm manner said as she gesticulated wildly to where Asteria Greengrass was standing with a group of people including her fiance.
Ron shook his head and stood up away from the wall that had been supporting him for the best part of the last hour. Holding his hands out towards Pansy, he shook his head and muttered, "You have lost your mind woman."
"And if I told you your sister agrees with me on this one, would you then do something about that?" Pansy remarked. Her face contorted to look like something which smelled funny had passed under her nose. "I can't watch that sham any longer. Go and do me and your sister a favour, and save that girl from herself. Oh and you from yourself while you're at it."
Unfortunately, his mind and body couldn't process anything at that moment. Ron stood there blinking at Pansy like an idiot.
"Oh my gods, your sister was right. You are as thick as a bog." Pansy sighed with exasperation. After throwing her hands up in the air, she started again very slowly and with corresponding -and fairly theatrical hand gestures, "Asteria Greengrass. Making a huge mistake by marrying that queen she calls a fiancé just so he has an heir while he beds that dragon -okay overgrown lizard, but you get the point. You. Ron Weasley. Go riding in and sweeping her off her feet like the knight you are -in a disgusting honourable manner, makes me want to hurl quite honestly- and you may -quite possibly- find the something or someone you need. Got it?"
He was about to say something to Pansy when out of the corner of his eye, he saw Asteria Greengrass start to slump. Ron took several steps before he realised what he was doing. Watching Draco support her, he felt someone tapping on his arm.
Turning around, he growled at a smirking Pansy Parkinson, "What?"
"See shining knight," she replied with a smile, gesticulating at him. "Now go and save the princess from that nasty queen over there and his pet dragon." She pointed over to where Asteria was standing. "Over there."
All Ron could do was growl while Pansy laughed as he followed Asteria towards the doors. He never wanted the first sister, and now he was evidently stuck with two.
Unfortunately, Harry stopped him before he could reach the doors that would have taken him outside the ballroom. And possibly a future.
He could only hope.
Asteria gently patted her face with cool water in the toilets, desperately hoping to cool her over-heated face. She couldn't believe she had nearly fainted in the ballroom in front of all those people.
When she looked up in the mirror, to check her appearance before heading back to the ballroom, she noticed she was no longer alone. There leaning up against the wall, with a smirk on her face was Ginny Potter.
"Do you have a moment? I have a theory that I think you might find intriguing."
Asteria started to pull her wand out from the pocket of her dress, planning to tell the woman standing in front of her that she didn't have time, she had to return to her fiancé but she didn't have a chance. Before she could react, Ginny summoned Asteria's wand from her and said:
"There really is no need for this." Ginny said, as she pocketed the two wands. "And don't worry, you'll get it back in a moment. I really just want you to listen to me for a moment."
Asteria really didn't know what to do. No one had ever cornered her in such a way, except for Pansy and she wasn't much in Asteria's life at the moment. Nor had she been since Asteria made the decision to take Draco up on his offer of marriage, and a comfortable life in exchange for an heir which she still could raise.
"I know you are in love with my brother, Ron. It took Pansy and I a while to figure it out, but we did. The funny thing is that we didn't realise you were until he started bugging everyone and their uncle about you."
The breath that was in Asteria's lungs rushed out suddenly, forcing her to breathe deeply as she leaned against the sink. She thought she had always been so careful; that her love was carefully buried within her, next to her soul.
She didn't know what to make of the change in Ginny's smirk, for it evolved into a sweet simple smile as she handed back Asteria's wand.
Ginny didn't say anything else until her had was on the door leading back into the hallway that would take her to the ballroom. "Pansy kept trying to tell me that he would be perfect for you and I didn't believe her. Until now. He's a good and loyal man but if you should hurt him, I'll take Pansy down and then you."
With a shaking hand, Asteria tried to write something in response but she couldn't and didn't have time before Ginny disappeared into the hallway.
Ron had been searching for Asteria for what felt like hours. When he had finally escaped Harry, he couldn't find her outside. Then he searched for her though the ballroom again, but to no avail.
Half-way through searching the lobby, he finally found her. Or maybe she found him. It was all so confusing when he realised she was standing in front of him.
Suddenly, with her so close, the freckles that skimmed her nose and the tops of her cheeks, he remembered her as the years melted away in Ron's mind:
The dark hair eloquently piled on her head, fell down in long curls that were blonde in colour. The sides pinned up by simple combs.
The dark green ballgown morphed into a Hogwarts uniform: white blouse, grey cardigan, grey wool skirt, a yellow and black tie, a robe with the Hufflepuff emblem. The leg braces glinting in the afternoon light.
The lobby disappeared into the Grand Staircase. He had just watched a younger Gryffindor knock her over in his excitement to escape lessons for the day.
But this time instead of helping her to her feet, his hand went to her face and he whispered, "I remember your voice."