A/N: R/Hr fic based on the song "Face Down" by Red Jumpsuit Apparatus. ALSO: The kiss in Deathly Hallows never happened. That's the only way this makes sense. xD
"Do you feel like a man when you push her around?
Do you feel better now, as she falls to the ground?"
Ron scrunched his nose as he pushed the hair out of his eyes to look at the menu. "Uhm, I think I'll have the grilled pheasant with mint sauce," he decided, closing the menu and handing it to the waitress. He was fairly certain she had been in her fifth year at Hogwarts when he was in his seventh.
"Is that all?" she asked. Ron nodded. She smiled wearily at him. "Coming right up, sir."
As he watched her walk back into the kitchen, he wondered if this was what she really wanted to be doing with her life. She didn't seem very happy. He snorted as soon as he had this thought. He was twenty and he didn't even know what he wanted to do. He'd tried Auror training with Harry— too much hard work, he thought, but Harry loved it. His father then offered him a small desk job at the Ministry, bur Ron had declined it. He didn't want to end up like Percy. And no way was he playing Quidditch— his interest in playing the sport ended in his sixth year.
His reverie was abruptly disturbed by a voice he hadn't heard in three years. "Jonathon, please, I wanted to eat at that new French restaurant. We always come here; can't we go somewhere else for once?"
Ron slowly turned his head to see the source of the voice, and he couldn't believe it. The last he had heard, Hermione was one of the top editors of— he chuckled—textbooks. She looked amazing. Her hair wasn't all how he remembered it— instead of long and bushy, it was cut at her shoulders in a straight, sleek manner. Ron was dumbfounded and wondered why she didn't wear her hair like that while they were in school.
Apparently, he wasn't the only one who admired her, for she was holding hands with a man sporting a haircut that looked as though he had done it himself with his wand. He was very large and broad, slightly reminiscent of Crabbe or Goyle. Or Hagrid. As Ron observed how he also had his arm around her waste, he felt a surge of jealousy in his chest and he had to take deep breaths to quell it.
He fumbled out of his seat to go talk to her. He hadn't seen her in years and she wasn't getting away without knowing he was here. As he quickly walked toward her, he tripped over someone's purse, and he would have fallen flat on his face had he not stuck his hands out and caught himself. He could already feel his entire face reddening, as it always did in embarrassing situations.
Someone shuffled over to him as he was sitting up and brushing his clothes off in an attempt to look nonchalant. "I'm fine, I'm perfectly—" he started to say, but then he got an up-close look at Hermione Granger, who appeared to be equal parts worried and shocked.
"R—Ron?" She asked in disbelief. She was wearing makeup. Since when did Hermione wear makeup?
"Er, yeah. Hi, Hermione," he said quietly, standing up to his full height.
Blinking for a few seconds, she threw her arms around her neck, crying, "Oh, Ron, I haven't seen you in forever! Where have you been all this time?!" She was smiling extremely widely and Ron couldn't help but smile back, even though the Jonathon guy was looking like he wanted to Confund him.
"Oh, I've been… you know… around." Around. Nice answer, Ronald. Very well-phrased.
Hermione still smiled despite his less-than-articulate answer. Ron noticed she hadn't taken her arms from their position around his neck. He liked it. They seemed to fit.
"What have you been doing? I hear that Harry is an Auror, is that what you're going for?"
He shook his head quickly. "Oh, no. That was way too much work. And—"
"And Ron Weasley can't have too much work, can he?" She smirked and placed her hands on her hips in a mock-angry fashion. "You haven't changed at all."
He blushed even more. "Yeah, well… You… I mean, you look… different."
"Is different good?" she asked, her smirk deepening. His eyes widened. Was she flirting with him— in front of her boyfriend? He glanced nervously at Jonathon, who was clutching his wand and grinding his teeth.
Hermione followed Ron's line of vision. She grabbed his hand and led him over to Jonathon. "Jon, this is Ron." She chuckled at the rhyme. "He and I went to Hogwarts together. We used to be good friends."
Jonathon grunted and stuck his hand out, reluctantly. Ron stared at it, looking for anything he could have put there to harm him or any charms that could have been placed on it. It seemed fine, so Ron grabbed it lightly, and then gasped from the pain when Jonathon closed his hand and shook it almost violently.
"Nice to meet you," he managed to say when Jonathon released him as he massaged his hand.
Jonathon turned to Hermione and ignored his sentiment. Grabbing her wrist, he pulled her toward the exit.
"Where are we going?" she asked, tugging her arm in an effort to get him to let her go.
"We can, ah, go to that French restaurant like you wanted. I changed my mind."
"Well, I want to stay here and talk to Ron! You can go if you like, but I'd like to visit my friend. Now please let me go."
He didn't, he simply tightened his grip on her wrist. "Come on, we're leaving. Now."
She frowned. "No, Jonathon. Let go of me, you're hurting me!"
Ron's heart rate rose and his hand twitched toward the wand in his pocket. "Jonathon, I think you better let her go right now."
He received an extremely dirty glance from Jonathon at this. "This is none of your business, Measly. Stay out of it." He tried once again to take Hermione with him. She winced and Ron could see tears forming in her eyes. That did it.
He pulled out his wand faster than he'd ever done and yelled, "Sectumsempra!"
Blood erupted from several deep gashes that appeared on Jonathon's face and arms. He screamed and released his hold on Hermione to clutch his face in pain. Ron took this opportunity to grab Hermione and run out of the restaurant. "Come on, we're getting out of here," he panted.
Once they had gotten far, far away from the restaurant, he turned them into an alley. He placed his hands on her shoulders and he noticed they were both splattered with Jonathon's blood.
"Are you okay?" he asked her, keeping the anger in his voice to a very, very minimum.
She could only stare at him incredulously. "I can not believe you!"
He frowned. "What?! What can't you believe, that I just saved your life from an abusive—"
"You used a Half-Blood Prince spell! After all this time, after all you've learned, you're going to use a spell Harry learned from Snape?!"
He blinked once, twice. "You're thinking about the spell I used? I rescued you, Hermione!" His eyes sought hers. "Are you gonna be okay?"
She waved off his question, though he noticed her hand was just barely shaking. "I'm fine; I'm going to be perfectly fine."
"No, no you won't be. Why do you let him treat you like that? You deserve so much better than that prick…" I would treat you better.
"I—I don't know, it's just, Jonathon makes me feel so… normal. I'm not super smart or brainy, I'm just normal."
Ron tucked a strand of bloody hair behind her ear. "But you're not normal, Hermione. And that's good. You're… bloody smart, and funny, and pretty, and I don't see why anyone would not like you just as you are."
She blinked and smiled a small smile. "Well, that's very kind of you, Ron, but why would you say that?"
He frowned. He wasn't expecting that. "I guess because I…" He didn't finish his sentence; he couldn't. What would he say?
"Yes?"
His throat was suddenly dry. He swallowed loudly and conspicuously and licked his lips. "Right. Er. I—" He took a deep breath, gathered his thoughts, and decided to just get it all out in one sentence. "I think you're amazing and I can't believe I ever let you go and I want to spend every single day with you to make up for when we left Hogwarts and I, I just…" He sighed and looked at her. "I love you, Hermione. I always have. Ever since I saved you from the troll."
She looked up at him and her eyes were sparkling even though the sun was behind the clouds. Reaching up, she squeezed him in a hug, but it had none of the same implications as their earlier one. This one had promise, a future. There were no pretenses between them. It was just the two of them, there, together. And suddenly Ron realized it didn't matter where he was going or what he was going to be. Just that Hermione was going to be with him.