Author's Note: Hi everyone! This is the next chapter of the story, which I hope you all like so far! It actually takes place 2 months after chapter 9-(Hermione's pregnant for 4 months). Thank you so much for your lovely words in your reviews; they just help me go on in an indescribable way... Just thanks! :)

I hope you like this chapter of the story; I believe it's really intense, yet kind of soft and... I don't know how to describe it, so you have to read and find out for yourselves, I guess...

While I was writing this chapter, I was listening to the song 'Good Times Gonna Come' by Aqualung; I believe that if it wasn't for the song, I wouldn't put all this emotion I believe- and hope- there is in the chapter; the music and the words are intense and amazing, yet this is not a songfic or something...

Anyway, I'll let you read now... Enjoy! :)

Healer's Wounds

~The Pain's Spreading~

Ron returned home after a day of not so hard work. His head was dropped down and he sighed audibly when he felt the familiar scent of the place hitting with welcoming force his nostrils. He liked the scent that hugged him for years now, but that particular day, he found it extremely suffocating. He took some steps, so he reached the entrance of the living room, where he sensed some little movements. He turned his head a little bit and saw Hermione sitting on the large sofa, reading, like always, some book. He stood there, just staring at her form wistfully, feeling his inside warm a little bit, just like every time he saw her. Then a thought popped into his head and he felt horrible for making such decisions, but he knew that things had been awful between them lately and there wasn't any other way, at least for the time being.

For two months now, he was doing whatever he could do so he would approach her some and make her understand how much he had regretted his mistakes and how badly he just wanted to work things with her. But the point was that, whatever he did, it was all just rubbish for her; she wouldn't believe him and she would make a really acidly painful and sarcastic comment, that would be stuck in his mind and his heart for some days. She would do things that she would never do to him or anyone else for the matter (once Ron thought sarcastically that mistrust and pregnancy hormones were a deadly match, with the insufferable meaning of it), like letting Crookshanks wander in his room, her waking him up at the oddest hours because she just wanted to 'do some walk around the house' –which of course included his room, as well and at this particular moment of her stroll, she would remember to sneeze loudly or 'accidently' shut the door noisily- and the list was going on the same way.

But Ron knew that the hardest part was the one that was apparent for some weeks till now: she was completely ignoring him, whether he was talking to her or standing before her or being in the same room; she was just giving him the same attention as she would give him if he was a mere wall (even though she was paying more attention to walls as well…). The whole situation was uncomfortable and sometimes it even annoyed him, which as a result, would bring big rows between them, and this would finally let Ron receive some desirable attention to him. But what he felt most about this whole new routine of theirs was pain and sorrow, because so far, his attempts were downright unsuccessful and Hermione seemed to keep her attitude and her thoughts about him still very unbending.

He stared at her frame some more, this time his eyes rested on the little bulge that was currently replacing her once flat abdomen. This instantly brought a small, melancholic smile on his face and he let the little amount of warmth he instantly felt, spread as much as possible in his soul. Even though things with his wife weren't the best, he just couldn't stop loving her and he had already loved the little one that was growing inside her, even though Hermione didn't let him be close to it.

He must have been there just staring at them and thinking for some time, as he suddenly noticed that Hermione was looking at him with that icy expression on her face that she was using a lot lately- at least to him. He took a calm, deep breath and looked at her calmly and straight in the eye, intending on not stopping staring at her until she would break under it and speak to him, even with the rudest comment she would think of- even though he didn't actually crave that sort of responding from her. A few minutes passed just like this, her looking at him with pity and coldness in the eyes, while he was staring piercingly, yet peacefully at her as he was standing under the doorframe of the living room. That until Ron noticed that the expression in her eyes started to change, and from coldness, it became mere nervousness and the powerful supremacy transfigured to uneasiness. Ron felt surer at the moment.

"What are you staring at?" she finally snapped, even though her voice was rather shaky; that made Ron want to smile with mere triumph, but he decided against it. He took a couple of steps closer to the sofa, his eyes never leaving hers.

"I was just looking at our little baby… As long as you don't let me have a closer look at it, I'm saying 'hello' to it my way." he replied collectedly and approached her some more. With mere satisfaction, he saw her blushing a little bit. "Besides, we have to talk." he added

"About what? You know, I'm not actually in the mood of hearing this dull voice of yours." Hermione commented instantly but Ron knew better than letting this sink into him, so he just answered her.

"I made some decisions and I'm sure that you should know about them as well, as we're temporary living with each other and such." Ron suddenly caught with his eyes a mere hint of sorrow in her own ones, but a second later it was gone, of course.

"And what's so important that made you start thinking about things; I thought you had given up persuading your brain to start to function once again." Ron just ignored once again her constant comments, knowing that if he replied to her, he wasn't going to get to his point, which was the reason of this conversation. He inhaled deeply and he finally said it:

"I'm going to live somewhere else." He instantly saw Hermione's eyes widen, pure surprise apparent on her physiognomy. She stood up slowly and looked at him carefully, not being probably sure if he meant that he said.

"What?" she said incredulously and her eyes narrowed disbelievingly. Ron just exhaled his breath noisily and tried again, this time more urgently and stoutly.

"I'm going to leave and stay somewhere else for a while; probably at Harry and Gin's, until I see what I'm going to do with all of these." Hermione looked at him carefully for a moment before speaking.

"You won't leave from here." she told him with some sort of finality in her tone; that made Ron start to feel anger waking inside him like a beast when it smells food, and he glared at her with disbelief.

"Oh, really?" he said with cold sarcasm clearly evident in his voice. "And I'll stay here to do what, exactly? Observing the shape of the mugs and talking to the mirrors- because that's the only thing that seems to listen to me anymore!"

"And what do you actually expect from me, Ronald?" Hermione exclaimed annoyed.

"Giving me a mere chance to show you that I love you and that you're the most important part of my life, but of course, the only thing you want to catch from all the things I say is my swearing and my stupid comments, that's all!" he raised his voice with anger evident in it. Hermione looked somewhat offended by his words and glared icily at him.

"Do you believe that you deserve such a chance? Do you honestly believe this?" she said with her now high-pitched voice. It was Ron's time now to throw her a poisonous glare; he took him a moment to gather his wits again.

"Then why don't you just let me go?" he said to her in a dark, low voice that made her eyes widen for a second. Then she looked furiously at him.

"Because do you honestly believe that I can stand all these?" she said incredulously and looked at him in a way that implied that he should know already the answer to this. Ron couldn't understand where this conversation was leading to.

"Well, I saw you enjoying yourself all this time; what sort of conclusions should I make about your feelings then, Hermione?" he snapped angrily but Hermione exhaled furiously and her eyes started to shine from a sudden… wetness.

"I'm not talking about whatever's happening inside these walls!" she cried out. "I couldn't care less about what stupid conclusions you're making, but I care about the others' opinion, Ronald!" Ron was really confused now and felt a little wrinkle appear on the value between his eyebrows, as they started to come closer to each other.

"What are you talking about?" Ron blurted out; his angry, rather raw, tone in his deep voice seemed to stay with him all this time. Hermione looked at him sorrowfully and he could notice with some fear that there was some vulnerability in her eyes as well.

"Almost the entire wizarding world's talking about us, Ronald!" she cried out and she couldn't held on more: her tears fell freely on her face. Ron felt his eyes widened, as he was peering at her face, and noticed that his heart sank abruptly.

"What?" he asked her immediately, as he couldn't believe that the messages his ears sent to his brain cells were right; he must have heard wrong…

"The news are spreading quickly, Ronald; everyone knows about your suicidal attempt and now they're gossiping about us, wanting so badly to know what caused you to try to put an end to your life." Hermione explained the situation and let more tears wet her pale face; Ron just couldn't believe it.

"B-But… I've never seen something like that happening at hospital." he spoke his thoughts out aloud, his voice calm but fragile at the same time; he wanted to cry himself, but he didn't dare to do so.

"Of course you've never seen anyone near you doing this; they're all afraid of you noticing and then trying to harm yourself again, because you'd probably feel like letting everyone down." Hermione said to him and she peered at his eyes with the emotional pain burning her beautiful ones. "But they're not as gentle to me as they are to you… The whole Department knew about this in less than a week and do you know how dreadful it was… how dreadful it still is… just seeing them staring at you, observing every move or expression or word of yours, trying to find something that would lead them to the solution of this 'unsolved mystery', like our life is a board game." she told him in a low voice and let a small sob escape from her lips. Ron couldn't see her like this; it was like stabbing him mercilessly in the chest and a million times worse than that. He swallowed his scream and blinked back the liquid substance that's threatening to escape from his eyes. He tried to find some reassuring words to comfort her, but he couldn't find any. He gave up when he heard her voice once again.

"So don't you dare leaving this house!" she exclaimed acidly with this shaky voice of hers. Ron didn't catch that and confusion took the best of him.

"What does this have to do with me leaving the house?" he asked disbelievingly and saw the fury on her characteristics instantly.

"Why are you so oblivious and stupid? Can a person have such a huge charisma, honestly!" she explained and Ron forgot all about comforting and soothing, reassuring words; his anger levels raised in a tick.

"Oh really?" he couldn't held his sarcasm on anymore. "I guess then that your charisma is to attract all the bloody fools of this planet like a magnet; what a charisma as well! I'm just wondering why did you say 'yes' when I proposed to you; it seems now that you made it out of force rather than love!" Hermione's eyes almost got out of their rather puffy sockets.

"How dare you saying that!" she screamed and then took a shaky breath before she opened her mouth again to probably continue, but Ron immediately cut her off.

"Are you saying about me?" he yelled, his face was all red at the moment. "You're the one who's pretending that no one's there when I talk to you and you're the one that saying all these things to me and doing all these comments so you could hurt my feelings, while I'm just trying to say to you that you're my entire world! I'm sick of this, trying to say how damn sorry I am about ruining our life, while you're just refuse to hear me-"

"Oh…!" Hermione cut him off rather loudly as her orbs widened worriedly and looked down; on her face appeared a painful expression. But Ron was just too angry at the moment to observe any of these.

"'Oh'? What happened; you thought of another reason that I don't deserve you or did you-"

His sentence lost somewhere in the midair, as Hermione's 'oh' repeated once again, this time it was more urgent and painful, though, and her palms automatically went to the little bulge in front of her. Ron's blood drained all from his face and his orbs went twice as large from the pure shock that was washing him. He ran towards his wife and quickly made her gently to sit on the sofa.

"Deep breaths, my dear; just take deep breaths…" he whispered soothingly, yet extremely urgently, and he unconsciously grasped gently her hand and squeezed it comfortingly. He kneeled on the floor in front of her, with his wide eyes never leaving her from their sight, while he was praying with all the power his soul could muster not happening anything to them, and mostly, because of his stupid outburst.

Hermione, after a brief moment of utter shock and slight pain in her belly, seemed to follow his instructions and took shaky, deep breaths, while her trembling palm grabbed in return his and didn't let it go. Ron, when he saw her slow progress, he nodded reassuringly with his head and smiled expectantly up to her, as he was squeezing back her hand.

"That's it, Mione; very nice…" he whispered smoothly, but still loud enough for her to listen. "Slow, deep breaths, Hermione and everything's gonna be fine, just take deep breaths… Breathe in… Breathe out…" he said and repeated his gentle instructions a few more times for her to follow, until her pain was gone. The woman slowly leaned on the back of the couch and tiredly closed her eyelids, her breathing slightly uneven. Ron stared at her sadly and a bit of anxiously.

"Are you feeling any better?" he asked her softly a minute later, still a bit worried about her and the baby. Hermione slowly opened her eyes and looked down at him tiredly.

"Yes…" she whispered and just looked at them for a long, very long moment before she spoke again: "Thank you." Ron's heart jumped momentarily from the surprise and then from the pure gladness these two words of hers made him feel; he gave her a small smile in response.

"It's ok; besides if it hadn't been about my anger, this wouldn't have happened. I'm sorry for that as well…" he whispered sadly and looked at the dark brown, wooden floor for a short moment before he looked back at her. Her face was holding an unreadable expression right now and Ron didn't know how to react to this, but a second later, he felt icy cold air surrounding the skin of his left hand, as hers was pulling away from their strong entwinement, from their life-depending, at least for him, bond. The coldness from the hand painfully went over to his emotionally dying heart, which was thumping extremely slowly, like it wanted itself to put an end to the life of this miserable creature. But this time, as much emotional pain as he received, he didn't want to put an end to this; well, not so abruptly at least…

"You have to stay here." Ron suddenly heard her voice hitting his eardrums with an unemotional and somewhat restrained tone in it; the sound made the man turning his stare from the far corner of the room to her. "You must stay here; I couldn't stand more humiliation at work if they found out some way that you don't live here with me anymore and we shouldn't get Harry and Ginny to all these, as well. And I guess… I guess it would be useful if there was a healer here, just to prevent things like this one and check on the baby." Hermione finally said and looked straight ahead, not looking towards her husband at all. Ron understood her reasons, they were totally rational, but a small part of his brain wanted to know if they was any other reason for not letting him go- one that was similar to his… He wasn't sure about it, though; frankly, he wasn't sure for almost anything right now, maybe with the exception of knowing that he loved them with all his being…

"I'll stay." he just said to her a couple of minutes later, but he couldn't find the courage to rest his eyes on her figure- there would be consequences. There was no response from her part and that hurt him a little, but he wouldn't let her see his tears…

"You should eat something; it'd relax you some and provides you vitamins- you both need vitamins right now." Ron spoke again and after taking a quite deep breath, he stood up from his kneeling position; he instantly felt the mere numbness at his knees, but he didn't give much thought to it. He glanced at his wife and saw her nodding her head once as an answer to his words. Ron didn't stay a second more in the room and went to the kitchen. His sudden run out of the room was partly because of his will to make her something to eat; mostly it was because he couldn't stay a moment longer in the same room with her- her presence was bringing him so much pain at the moment and he wanted to escape from this reality for a moment, until he would be all alone and he would set his emotions free, like he did almost every night for this past two months.

He slowly made her a sandwich with everything was needed for her and the baby's nutrition and poured some milk in a glass. He went to the living room and found her sitting on the sofa, her eyes shut and her face seemed to be peaceful. He gazed at her glowing face for a minute, examining the details he knew so well for many years now, and thought for a moment how it could be if she smiled to him once again. He soundlessly left the plate and the glass on the coffee table in front of the sofa and he leaned down to her with caution.

"The food's on the coffee table …sweetie…" he whispered softly so he wouldn't wake her up if she was lightly asleep, but still inform her, knowing that his message would reach the now resting mind of hers sooner or later. He had the urge to kiss the top of her head, just to feel the softness of her curly locks on his skin and just for the perfect scent of hers to reach his soul and warm it a little; but the man decided against it as he straightened his back slowly, his eyes glued on her face.

"Goodnight, Hermione. Goodnight, little one…" he whispered, almost inaudibly this time, and he started to make his way towards the guests' room. When he entered it, he slowly and soundlessly closed the door behind him, before he took his wand from his pocket and put a silencing charm on the room. He gently put the wand on the surface of a small desk there was in the room and then he looked at the empty wall next to the door. With slow steps he approached it and he stared at it for a moment before he abruptly hit it with all the strength he could muster at his tight fist. When his knuckles made the painful contact with the wall, he screamed with a combination of physical, emotional pain and pure agony. Blood started to pour out of his sores but he didn't observe it; he didn't care now for small things such as blood on his hands.

"It wasn't supposed to be like this!" he screamed and looked at the ceiling with a vulnerable, yet angry, expression on his face, and then he let his impatient tears hit his face again and again and again… "Why is it like this? WHY?" he screamed and while he was crying and sobbing, he started to throw every single thing he would find in his room: the night-stand, the table, every single thing in the room, like he was insane. He broke glasses and mirrors and punched wooden and brick and glass surfaces with his bloody fist and ripped violently the curtains, until there was nothing more to destroy, so he collapsed on the floor near his bed, letting his arms and his head drop on the soft material of the blanket on the bed. He cried and sobbed loudly, with his head in his trembling arms, painting his face with hot, scarlet liquid. He cried and bled more, on his face and his sore hands a blend of tears, blood, sweat and sorrow, but he couldn't care less about his awful state; he just wanted to have her again, to hold her in his arms, and soon enough, he wanted to hold their little baby, too. He wanted them whole. He wanted some peace.

And while he was crying and sobbing and thinking about the good times he wished they would come, his eyelids drifted shut and he fell asleep in what seemed to be a setting-free slumber…

- Well, I really hope you like this one; the whole part at the end was an ispiration of the moment, to be honest... I just hope it didn't freak you out or something; Ron- along with Hermione, of course- has a really rough time...

-And of course, this is the time I need your REVIEWS!!! Please, I want so badly to know what you think of it...

- And I'll try to update as soon as possible. Until then... :) xxx