A/N: ...Remember when I said I shouldn't have posted this story at the time I did? I was right.

I'm incredibly sorry for the (nearly, but not quite) year-long wait for an update. I have had a whirlwind year and fan-fiction had to be put on the back burner as I dealt with real life.

Secondly, I'm sorry to make my return with such a short chapter. There was no clear cut off point and it was either have a few very short chapters or have an excessively long second chapter then revert to small chapters afterwards. I went with the former.

That said, I can promise that at the very least, the next two or three chapters should be up in a decent timeframe. It's taken me a while to come back into this story and fix it up but I have made sure to get the next several chapters set to go. And I am actively working on the rest!

So without further adieu...

Chapter Two

"Courage, dear heart" -C.S. Lewis

Ron had imagined, perhaps more so than could strictly be considered normal (though his life could hardly be seen as normal) how they would look when they were grieving. It was a bit difficult not to, considering he was on the run from one of the most dangerous wizards of all time. There were his warped thoughts, from when he'd been wearing the locket, in which his family lowered their heads, perhaps shed a tear or two, then disappeared back to their daily lives, all secretly thinking that it wasn't much of a surprise, that they'd even been expecting it, really. He had tried firmly to bury those thoughts down with the others like them, deep within him. There were also his thoughts from when he had gotten his head back on straight. The ones where he could practically hear his mum's weeping, could picture quite clearly the matching looks of shock, and then despair, on the twins' faces, and the exact hunch of Bill's shoulders…. When he'd had those thoughts, he had had to close his eyes for several minutes at time, focusing only on the gentle hum of the breeze rustling against the canvas of the tent.

Then there was reality. As it turned out, for all his imaginings, he had gotten their grief all wrong. For one thing, he hadn't thought he'd be there to actually experience it. In his head, he had always been the one they'd be grieving for. But that wasn't the only thing. His family's behaviors were all completely different from how he'd pictured them, however vivid they had been in his mind. Perhaps grief was one thing that couldn't be predicted. It certainly was something that couldn't be prepared for, that he knew. Because he had tried. And he would venture that they had too. All of his efforts had collapsed as soon as he'd taken a long enough look at Fred to know that he was gone.

His mum had stopped weeping a while ago, and was now sitting along one of the house benches with a blank look on her face, her hand rubbing circles around his dad's palm. Charlie was pacing, hands clenched into fists. Bill hadn't managed to look calm and in control, as Ron, who thought Bill to be the strongest of them all, the steady force amongst them, had imagined (or perhaps hoped) he would be. Instead, he was shaking against his wife like a small child, as Fleur whispered in his ear. Percy was there, but he looked lost, shattered, out-of-place, as if he wasn't sure he was welcome but wouldn't ask for fear that they'd actually ask him to leave. And the way he'd pictured the grief of the twins was automatically void because…because…he gave a choked sob and rubbed his face furiously at his eyes. He wished Hermione were there. But she'd disappeared with Harry to give the family "space." He didn't want space. He wanted closeness. He wanted to be brushed up against her, his hand in hers, feet locked together. Like they had been last night.

The briefest of smiles crossed his lips. Last night. Or day, really. They had stayed in the prefect's bathroom all morning, their feet swirling in the tub, with the water charmed to stay warm beneath them. Best of all, they'd let their minds wander, for the first time in months, to something other than war. They'd talked about absolutely nothing of importance. Silly things, like their favorite colors (blue and orange), like their preferred flavor of Florean Fortescue's ice cream (mint for Hermione, butterbeer and chocolate for himself), like whether the other would rather be stuck in Moaning Myrtle's lavatory for a week or spend even one more double period of Care of Magical Creatures looking after Hagrid's Blast-Ended Skrewts (after a long deliberation, both had settled on Myrtle). He'd even gotten her wound up and blushing furiously by referring to her as his girlfriend in an offhand comment. They'd had several more kisses. She'd had him laughing so hard he'd nearly fallen into the tub. There, with the steam from the hot water and her head on his shoulder, he'd felt as if he were somewhere far away, in some alternative universe in which the previous year hadn't happened and Voldemort had never existed and everything was easy and simple and good.

By the time they'd dragged themselves out of the bathroom at the sudden arrival of a Ravenclaw prefect hoping for a shower, it was well into the afternoon, and the majority of the castle was asleep. They'd crept back to Gryffindor tower, climbed through the portrait hole, and moved quietly past the group of girls sleeping in the armchairs by the fire, whose crackling flames offered the only light in the common room. She'd paused at the bottom of the staircases, looking at him. And, in a sudden fit of bravery he was almost certain he wouldn't have indulged had he not been so exhausted, he'd grabbed her hand and pulled her towards the boy's staircase, consumed by how intensely he needed her to stay with him. She'd made no protest, and they'd ended up falling asleep side by side in his tiny four-poster bed.

Suddenly he was filled with longing for her. For the briefest of moments, he even considered excusing himself to go look for her. He desperately sought the distraction. He wanted to be anywhere but there, in the room with his family, a thought that in itself made him feel incredibly guilty. But of course he could never do it. He couldn't leave them.

Still, reality was so much worse than anything he could have thought up, and sitting there in the thick of it was taking its toll. Earlier, the injured had all been moved to the main infirmary, or else to Mungos if they were too poorly off, and the house tables had been replaced. Then, after the morning meal, the great hall had mostly cleared out, leaving the space to mourners. It was not a good environment. On the one hand, the noise seemed to be overpowering. Every cry, every scream, every plea and shriek and whimper, seemed to amplify and merge into a sound so deafening he felt as if they were all drowning, each and every one of them, in the combined weight of their mutual misery.

On the other hand, there was an unsettling stillness. Moments when the noise faded into the background and dimmed eventually into total silence. Despite the professors, walking briskly down the aisles between the tables and pausing to crouch amongst families, despite the women whose mouths hung open in seemingly suppressed cries of anguish, despite the run of new arrivals as they dashed into the hall and towards a professor or Order member to demand, in various levels of desperation, to see their loved ones, not a peep or a hum escaped. In these moments, all that seemed to exist was an unnerving calm that he found himself increasingly lost in. In these moments, he thought he'd never before felt so alone.

It wavered between the two. Too much noise, then too little, then too much again. Head in his hands one way or another. By the time his parents were ushered away by a grim Flitwick, for some sort of meeting to discuss the transportation of Fred's body, he felt hollow.

He had to keep reminding himself, tomorrow he would go home. Tomorrow he would see the Burrow for the first time in months. He only had to make it one more day. It was the first time in his memory that he so desperately wanted to leave Hogwarts, to be as far away from the castle as possible.

Ginny excused herself as soon as their parents were out of sight, and he moved to take her now vacant seat next to George. They weren't supposed to leave him alone, and he supposed it was time for him to take a turn. He was thankful his brother had his head down, because he didn't think he'd have been able to look him in the eye right then. Immediately, he understood why none of his other siblings had lasted very long in this particular post. There was nothing to say, and yet it felt wrong to say nothing. "George—" he began, not sure where he was going even as he spoke.

"I don't want to talk, Ron," George murmured, not looking up. Fair enough, Ron thought. Silently he was glad, which immediately added to his guilt. Was this what it was going to be like from now on? Would he be unable to hold a conversation with his own brother forever?

He buried his own head in his hands, taking a few deep, shaky breaths in attempt to calm himself.

One more day. Just one more day.