AN: This is my first solo attempt at fanfiction that I'm actually posting—I lost or did not finish the others. I don't really know why that's important, but there you have it. This was inspired somewhat by my reaction to 15 year old Harry—which was mostly to feel sorry for 15 year old Ron—and contains spoilers for the 5th book in abundance. It takes place during the Christmas holidays of the gang's 6th year.
Title: Um, I just made one up on the spur of the moment, so if anyone can think of a better one, by all means, make a suggestion.
Disclaimer: I'm poor, really poor. Really, REALLY POOR. Please don't sue me and take what little money I have; I need that for my trip to Italy in the spring. I have never claimed to own Harry Potter nor any of the characters therein—obviously not, otherwise I wouldn't be so poor, right?—nor should this paltry triviality be construed as such a claim.
"Yelling and Screaming and Pitching Fits"
Chapter 1: Holly Jolly
Number 12 Grimauld Place was exceptionally gloomy. The elf heads had finally been removed along with the shrieking portrait of Mrs. Black. It had been refurnished and the halls had been hung with holly and mistletoe for the season. The floors had all been polished to a meticulously high gloss. Removed were all signs of age and wear to reveal stark but very real beauty underneath the corruption of the ancient, noble, austere, and mostly evil House of Black. There was no reason to be ill-tempered or poor-spirited with the house full of Weasleys and members of the Order of all shapes—most of those shapes courtesy of one Nymphandora Tonks. The Christmas holidays had come and Harry Potter and his friends, Ron and Ginny Weasly and Hermione Granger were all well received at the headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix who while wary of the lack of activity from Voldomort, were glad for the break. There aught to have been great cheer in every corner of the house.
And yet...
As festive and merry as it all looked, there was no real cheer to be found at #12. Partly, this came from the sorrow at the absence of Sirius Black, the former owner of the house who last year at this time had been every inch the delighted host. But most of it stemmed from discord between the current owners, or more precisely, discord from one of the current owners directed at the other who seemed not to notice and was the only apparently tranquil soul in the enormous and packed-to-capacity house.
Harry didn't care. He knew perfectly well that every one was on edge, uneasy and generally, miserable due to his and the professor's falling out, and he didn't care. No, the thought after consideration, he did care. And furthermore, he was glad. Why should they be happy when he was so decidedly not? In truth, wasn't that why he was so furri9ous in the first place? Wasn't the professor's refusal to display any grief over Sirius' loss what had angered him in the first place?
Harry worked and reworked his way around the room he an Ron were sharing—as co-owner of the house, he supposed he was entitled to any room he wanted and he wanted Sirius' old room, but that was where He was staying and he'd be damned if—Harry's rather enraged thoughts were cut off when his roommate entered noisily.
"Harry, will you please cut out all the pacing?" his friend pleaded in that long-suffering, resigned manner he'd picked up over the last year and a half dealing with Harry's mood swings on top of Hermione's nit-picking. Not to mention the increased work load at school and dealing with his little sister dating. "You're going to wear the finishing off the floor and I'm the one who finished it."
Harry paused halfway between Ron's overflowing trunk and his only slightly tidier one and looked up. "You finished it with that super-durable magical finishing. It's supposed to withstand up to 100 years of wear." Saying this, he continued hi trek, head down, arms folded behind his back, and mumbling angrily under his breath.
The youngest male Weasely shook his head, rolled his eyes heavenward and shrugged in a "why me" gesture he found himself making all too often these days. Stealing himself to the inevitable bull-headedness of his friend, Ron marched up to Harry and stopped the shorter boy by the simple expedient of stepping in front of him and grabbing his hunched shoulders. "Well, that's true enough mate, but between this summer and the last three days, I'd say the floor's got another three months, tops. So give it and me a break. It's the holidays; try and get into the spirit at least a little."
Though he knew he sounded like a petulant and particularly spoiled child, Harry could not repress a disgruntled "Why should I?"
"Because you're driving everyone completely nutters!" came Ron's instant and irritated reply. "Hermione is so upset she hasn't once asked me if I've done my homework, and I'm so upset that I have. Tonks' face keeps twitching and I mean literally twitching and coming out completely different than it started. She wandered around for two hours yesterday looking like a cross between Trewlawny, Snape, and a blast-ended skrewt before she realized it. Mum hasn't yelled at anyone, not even Mundungus! Even the twins haven't exploded anything or tried to get someone to test their latest crackpot invention in two days! That's got to be some kind of record!"
Harry, for all the image of a Trewlawny/Snape/skrewt amused him, kept his face stubborn and resentful. "He doesn't seem to mind."
Ron fought his impulse to punch Harry in his grimacing mouth and settled for using reason. It was a last resort as reason had never been his forte, and he severally wished for Hermione before he thought back on how riled she now was and how she attacked Malfoy in the third year. She might have followed that impulse to give Harry a good crack to the head. "So what! Forget him, Harry! He's dealing with it his own way and your behavior isn't going to change that!" He sounded angry and argumentative, he knew—a far cry from Hermione at her best, all smug condescendence and absolute surety of her own knowledge—but his argument was valid, and Ron was proud at his first attempt at logic.
Harry, it seemed was less impressed. "You sound just like Hermoine! 'Let him deal with it his own way'!"
"And you sound just like a jackass! Please explain how ruining a perfectly good vacation is going to improve the situation any!" He shoved away from his friend as he really didn't want to hurt the colossal jerk and such close contact when he was this angry could be detrimental to that desire. Unfortunately, in his anger, Ron shoved just a mite too heartily and Harry wound up sprawled out half on Ron's bed and half on the floor.
Harry looked surprised, indignant, and just a little bit comical from Ron's viewpoint, but no worse for the ware, so Ron went on. "If I sound like Hermione," he said more calmly looking down at Harry, "just consider how often she's wrong. If he doesn't want to care, that's his business and you can't do anything about it. But you locking yourself up in here most of the day and coming out sporadically only to make everyone miserable is my business, and it stops now.
"Sirius is dead and has been for more than seven months; you're angry, sad, and frustrated—" Harry tried to break in with an enraged command to not try and tell him how he felt, but Ron ran right over him. "I get it, Harry, I do. I may not feel exactly what you do, but I understand. You need someone to be angry at, and since he doesn't seem to care, he's a likely target, but everyone else. . . we didn't do anything to deserve this treatment, Harry and neither did you. Quit making the entire Order the casualties of your private war. Come out of this damn room and spread some fucking Christmas cheer before I shove some holly-jolly down your throat."
With that, Ron left the room and Harry thoroughly impressed with the fact that he'd managed not to punch him.
AN: I know it's a short chapter, but that's really all that there is to say on it. I'm halfway through writing the second, and hopefully it will be longer and up soon.