Faultlines Chapter 13: Last Match of the Season Pt1, a harry potter fanfic

Author's Note:

Firstly, apologies to all of you who have been waiting on tenterhooks for an update; I struggled with this chapter more than any before it. I knew where I wanted to go, and how I wanted to get there, but getting it on the actual page was like wading through treacle. Obviously, if I was one of those writers whose chapters were only 1,000 words rather than 20,000 it wouldn't take me quite so long, but there you go, once you commit to a Pinky Brown story, you're in it for the long haul...

And secondly, don't hate me, but the last chapter has turned into something of an epic, so I've ended up having to split it into two parts. Not because I like to keep you hanging on or because I'm particularly evil, just because it works better that way. You'll see why when you read it. So let's just say this is the beginning of the end...

This one's for Doug, who's had to put up with my horrendous Chapter 13 writer's block and subsequent lack of contact for weeks. Sorry, Doug (hangs head).

PB x

Chapter Thirteen: The Last Match Of The Season (Part One)

---

One quick shower and a hasty apology to my parents later, and I'm practically running what feels like the entire length of Hackney Marshes. Why does the Quidditch pitch have to be at the furthest end of the field? I feel sick with a mixture of excitement and fear at the thought of seeing him again. Six days and it feels like a lifetime. I shouldn't have left it this long. I shouldn't have let him leave in the first place. I shouldn't have - Oh, there are a thousand things I shouldn't have done. At least today I get a second chance to put them right. Third chance, I should say. How many chances is he going to give me? How many chances do I deserve?

---

I haven't even thought about what I'm going to say to him. 'I love you, I miss you, I need you. I'm sorry. Come home. Please, just come home.' But what if he doesn't want to listen? If he refuses to even see me? What then? No, I can't think that. He won't refuse to see me. He won't. Even if my sudden arrival at the side of the pitch throws his concentration so much they end up losing the match 200-nil. Oh, God, I really shouldn't try to laugh and breathe at the same time. A coughing fit forces me to pull up short, bent double and with my hand pressed to my chest. My head is pounding, my eyes are streaming, my lungs hurt, and I'm wheezing like an asthmatic old man. Well, that's what happens when you try to run the length of eighteen football pitches, especially when the only exercise you usually get is turning the pages of a heavy book. And Ron. And Ron. Filled with renewed purpose, I straighten up, take a deep, calming breath and start running again.

---

Finally, I see the familiar glint of the goal hoops up ahead, by the trees. But, wait - something's not right. Action seems to have stopped, for some reason. Only a handful of players are still in the air, the rest are either making their way down to the ground, or have already landed. A few are even shirtless and hugging each other, as though in celebration. I glance at my watch. 12.42 p.m. The match has barely lasted for three quarters of an hour. Surely it can't be over already? As I approach I can see Ron, dismounting from his broomstick at the side of the pitch. I'd recognise him from a mile away, but especially today. The midday sun is blazing down and his hair looks brighter than ever.

----

I speed up my pace, feeling my heartbeat speed up too. He is talking to one of the other team members and hasn't seen me approach, but as I get within earshot I can see Louis the Nigerian goalkeeper spot me and mutter a few words to Ron, who turns around slowly and stops dead when he sees me. Louis seems to melt away beside him until it is just the two of us standing there. He doesn't look surprised to see me; on the contrary he looks as though he was expecting it. For a few long seconds neither of us says a word, as though hoping the other one might speak first. I force a nervous smile onto my face.

"We need to talk."

He scrutinises me for a few more seconds, then he nods.

"Alright," he says, simply.

He wipes the sweat from his forehead with the back of his hand and wipes it on his trousers. He looks very hot and sweaty, and rather tired, too. His hair is damp, his face is pink with exertion, and his t-shirt is sopping wet and stuck to his body. He pulls it roughly over his head, revealing a bright orange Cannons t-shirt beneath it and giving me a flash of an expanse of clammy white skin. He notices me looking and flushes slightly.

"Sorry," he mumbles, "I'm a bit sweaty."

There is a slightly awkward moment, the sort we used to have all the time in sixth year, when one of us would catch the other staring at them and we'd both look away hurriedly, embarrassed. I am not sure if I should even be looking, now we are no longer - together? To cover the awkwardness, I pretend to have only been interested in what he is wearing, and point at his chest.

"Is that for luck?"

"What?"

"The Cannons shirt."

He nods. "Yeah, well, I wore it under my kit when we won the end of year cup at school, so..."

"And it still fits?" I joke.

"No," he says, not smiling, "It's a different shirt."

"Oh."

My feeble joke has fallen somewhat flat, and now I don't know what to say, how to play this situation. We stand there awkwardly for a few seconds, then:

"Ron!"

Anna pulls up beside us breathlessly, having sprinted halfway across the pitch to get here. She doesn't look at me or otherwise acknowledge my presence in any way.

"You alright?" she demands, fiercely.

Suddenly I realise how much she cares about him. She likes him, yes, but she also just likes him. They're friends. She doesn't want to see him get hurt again. She was the first person he went to when we argued last week, after all. Not Harry. Not Mike. Not one of his brothers. Her.

Ron gives a minute nod. "Yeah."

She scrutinises him for a few seconds as if trying to work out whether he's telling the truth or not, then seems to decide to take him at his word. "Alright, well, we're all going back to ours to get changed, then it's pa-ar-tee time! Dad's got a load of beers in specially. You coming?"

"Um…" He seems to take an age to answer, and then he says, in a carefully light tone, "Yeah, maybe later."

She punches him lightly in the arm. "Aw, c'mon, you've gotta come! It's the last match of the season!"

I feel a sense of guilt that this is something really important to him, and because I am here he can't go. It is on the tip of my tongue to say he can go if he wants to, that its fine, and I don't mind, but the truth is I do. So I keep quiet and leave it to him to decide, my heart in my mouth.

"Everyone else'll be there!" she persists.

"Yeah, I know. Maybe."

She finally spares me a glance, as though acknowledging my part in this. "Okay, well, you've got my mobile number, so just give me a call from a pay phone when you're ready and I can let you know where we are. Some of us thought we might go clubbing afterwards, you know, once the old gits have gone to bed. Be great if you could come. You still owe me a drink for Wednesday, remember?"

He nods. "Okay."

"Cool. And Ron -" She makes a start towards him as though she is going to give him a hug, then changes her mind. "You were brilliant today."

"Thanks," he says, flatly.

"Call me anyway, yeah?" she pleads, her eyes fixed on his as though she is trying to communicate something silently without my knowing. Which is probably, 'When the bitch dumps you again, I'll be right there waiting to pick up the pieces.' I watch this little tableau feeling very much like an interloper.

Presumably he has silently answered her question, for she nods, and runs off again. Ron watches her go, and then turns back to me, finally meeting my eyes: "I really need a drink."

I wait while he fetches his satchel from the side of the pitch, then we start walking slowly across the grass towards the main road, him automatically adjusting his long stride to mine.

"It's a good thing I got here when I did," I tell him, every word out of my mouth sounding strange and awkward to me now, "Or I'd have missed you. I didn't expect the match to be over so quickly."

"Nor did I," he says with a grimace. "Shortest match I've ever played. Thirty seven minutes."

"What happened?"

"Jimmy got a Bludger to the head three minutes in and fell off his broom. He's alright," he adds hastily, seeing my horrified expression, "Just a bit concussed. Anyway, it meant we had to play the rest of the match with only six players. And one of their Chasers is really good; you need two Beaters just to keep him away from the hoops at the best of the times. Today all there was between him and the goal was me - trying to hold off all three Chasers single-handedly - and Louis."

He says the last name with a slight tone of disgust and I remember his rant about the Nigerian Keeper's lack of skills from last week.

"I played my arse off, but it just wasn't enough. Makes that hundred-nil drubbing we got last month look like a picnic. Final place in the league: twelve out of seventeen."

I don't know whether to sympathise or express astonishment that there are five teams even worse than they are.

"I'm sorry you lost," I tell him, "I'm sure you played your best, though."

I am thoroughly aware that my words must sound feeble next to Anna's passionate, 'You were brilliant today' but it is the best I can do. I wish I had got here earlier, so he could have seen me standing at the side of the pitch, known I was there for him.

"You were just unlucky, that's all," I tell him, soothingly. "If Jimmy hadn't fallen off his broom…"

He shrugs. "We'd still have been shit. We just wouldn't have been able to blame a stray Bludger hit by the other team."

"You don't seem that upset."

Another shrug. "I'm a Cannons supporter, I'm used to disappointment." He gives an ironic laugh, then brightens. "Anyway, it's not all bad. Me and Louis have been talking… He doesn't particularly want to be Keeper; it was just the only position available when he joined. So we're gonna swap. Just for the first three matches in September, see how it goes, you know?"

I can hear the hope in his voice.

"Anyway, Barry reckons the team needs a shake-up, so he's gonna let us do it. Marek's going back to Poland next month, so we'll need a new Chaser as well. I said I'd put the word around at work. It's always the problem with London teams. Hardly anyone's actually from London, they're all from somewhere else in the country, like me and Jimmy, or Poland and Nigeria, like Marek and Louis. Eventually they bugger off back to their own countries, and you're left having to train up yet another new player and hoping they'll fit in. Still, it might work out okay, 'cos obviously the new Chaser'll need to get in some scoring practice, so we can train together."

Please let it not be a girl, I think to myself.

"I mean, it's been nine years since I played in goal -"

A jolt goes through me. Has it really been that long? I remember that last match at the end of sixth year as though it were yesterday. We'd kissed for the first time just a few days before, and we were both still slightly dazed by the dramatic turn our relationship had taken. Everything was new and thrilling and wonderful. Fast-forward nine years and it seems we've come full circle. The irony is not lost on me.

"- so I really need to get some serious practice in over the summer. Maybe go training two or three times a week, you know?"

I almost laugh. So much for no more Quidditch for three months.

"That's good, though. That Barry's giving you a chance to prove yourself."

"Yeah," he says, uncertainly, "I hope I don't let him down. He's going out on a bit of a limb for me already, to be honest. But it would be nice to actually win something occasionally. I'm sick of losing things."

I am not sure if he is still talking about Quidditch.

"Maybe if we get some new blood in we might actually stand a chance. Dave's forty next year; he can't possibly expect to keep playing forever. I know it's only Sunday League, but it's hard to make yourself get out of bed at ten o'clock on a Sunday morning when you know you're just going to lose again. A bit of a shake-up should do us good. I don't know what we'll do if Anna leaves too, mind, she's about the only decent player we've go-"

"Anna's leaving?" I interrupt, trying not to sound too excited at this news.

His pale blue eyes bore into me. "Maybe," he says stiffly. "She wants to go full-time at the shelter, but it's a shift system, so she'd have to work some Sundays, and then she'd have to give up the team. Which would be a disaster, because good Seekers are hard to find."

"Maybe you could coax Harry out of retirement?" I joke.

He shakes his head. "The whole point of joining up in the first place was to get out of the house and meet new people. This is my team, my friends. Look, do you mind if we stop and sit down for a bit? I really need a drink."

I look up and realise that this conversation has taken us all the way through the back streets of Hackney and to a pub on the main road.

"Oh. Of course. I'm sorry, you must be exhausted."

He shakes his head. "Just thirsty."

We sit on opposite sides of a bench in a rowdy pub beer garden, and I note that Ron orders a lime and lemonade rather than the pint of beer he might usually have. I wonder if he's made a conscious decision not to drink because he knows how much is riding on today. Or because there are some things he wants to say to me, that he needs to be sober for. Or maybe, pipes up the voice of reason in my head - which sounds uncannily like my Mum - he's just thirsty, like he said.

---

She's right, I do have a tendency to over-analyse things. Two whole weeks I spent worrying whether it was too soon to get him an anniversary present, whether it would be appropriate, what I should get him, whether I should even mention it... My God, I agonised over that decision! Ron obviously didn't think about it at all. He just saw something in a shop window, thought, "Hermione'd like that", and bought it for me.

---

"I think I'm gonna get some crisps," Ron announces, attempting to extricate his long legs from the footwell of the bench. "Do you want anything?"

"You know, you really shouldn't eat crisps if you're dehydrated. They're packed full of salt."

"Right," he says, dryly, giving me a look that suggests he's only just about managing to refrain from rolling his eyes at me. "I'll bear it in mind."

He slouches off in the direction of the bar and I inwardly curse myself. Why did I say that? I came here to make amends, not criticise.

He's back shortly with a second round of soft drinks and a packet of salt 'n' vinegar crisps for himself, which he proceeds to methodically work his way through in silence, not looking at me at all.

I watch him licking the crisp residue off his fingers across the table. The sun is behind him and his hair, which has grown back to something approaching its normal length now, is so blazingly bright I have to squint to look at him. He catches me staring and frowns.

"What?" he says, defensively. "I'm hungry."

"Your hair's grown back."

The frown immediately dissolves into one of his trademark grins. "Yes, it has. You like it?"

"You know I do. You look like you again."

"Something for you to hold onto?" he teases.

"Something like that."

He chuckles softly and returns to his drink.

---

He seems rather quiet and thoughtful today and it gives me hope. At least he's not snapping my head off as I thought he might do. At least he's not in that sarcastic mode where everything you say just elicits a nasty little comment or unhelpful derision. He seems to want to talk about it too. If there was no hope, if he thought it was really over, why would he even be here? He could be in the pub with his friends, drowning his sorrows and having a good time. On the minus side, a quiet and thoughtful Ron makes it harder for me to know what he's thinking. At least if he was shouting at me I'd know the truth.

---

"So," I say, tentatively, "How's your week been?"

A shrug. "Alright, I suppose. Considering," he adds, pointedly.

He glances up and catches my eye, a brief expression of guilt flickering across his face. "What about you?"

It's been the worst week of my life.

"It's been… not so great, actually."

He nods in understanding. "Yeah, mine's been a sack of dragon dung as well."

We both laugh, then stop again just as suddenly, realising at the same time that there's really nothing to laugh at in this situation.

"How are Harry and Ginny?"

They hate me, don't they?

"They're fine, as far as I know."

"As far as you know?" I repeat.

"Yeah, well, I haven't seen them that much, have I?"

"You haven't?"

Please don't have been staying at Anna's…

"Well, I've had practice every night, so…"

"Oh. Yes, of course."

That still doesn't answer my question.

He gives a short laugh. "Although I might as well have not bothered, for all the good it did us."

"Well, it wasn't your fault Jimmy fell off his broom… A - Anna said you played really well."

"Yeah," he says distractedly, rubbing the back of his neck where the sun is burning him. "Look, would you mind if we went somewhere else? I'm gonna fry if we sit out here much longer. Maybe a park or something?"

"We could go down to the river," I suggest, "It's usually a few degrees cooler there because a sea breeze comes up from the estuary."

"Fine," he says, irritably, downing the contents of his glass and getting to his feet, "What are we waiting for?"

---

We end up in Victoria Embankment Gardens, the little park between Charing Cross station and the Thames. Ron flops down on his back on the grass and lets out a big sigh of satisfaction, and after a moment's hesitation I sit down awkwardly beside him, folding my legs neatly under me. I watch as he yanks off his shoes and socks and rolls his trousers up to the knees, stretching out his toes blissfully in the cool grass.

---

We talk for a while about this and that, but after a while conversation peters out completely and his eyelids flutter closed. I am not sure if he is actually asleep, or just dozing. Still, I take the opportunity to watch him, lying there flat on his back with one knee bent up, his mouth slightly open, and one large hand resting gently on his stomach. I am seized with the urge to lie down beside him, snuggle up to his sun-warmed body, and press my lips to his pale, freckled cheek.

---

God, it's like fifth year all over again. Yearnings I can't act on. Feelings that threaten to overwhelm me. Not being brave enough to say all the things I want to say to him. I know I should say something, I know that we need to talk about this, it's just that now there's so much more to lose. And I already know what it feels like to lose it.

---

Finally, when I can stand it no longer, I get up and go to the kiosk to buy ice lollies. When I return, he has rolled over onto his stomach, and I lean down and press the icy cold wrapper against the back of his neck. He yelps and half-rises from the ground, his expression of panic transforming into one of relief when he sees me standing there, and then delight when he sees what I am holding.

His eyes widen. "Is that for me?"

"Who else would it be for?"

"Oh, God, you're wonderful!"

I turn my head to hide my blush of delight, even though I know he would say the same thing to anyone who brought him food. Even a Cornetto-bearing Viktor Krum would probably raise a smile.

He tears off the wrapper and his face dissolves into blissful joy as he bites into it. "God, that's good," he mumbles.

Not for the first time, I wonder at how easy Ron is to please. A shady patch of grass, an ice lolly, and he's utterly content. I wish I could say the same.

---

We lounge about on the grass for several hours after that, not talking or doing anything much. It's nice just to be together, especially after the awful week we've both had, but the whole time a kind of pall is hanging over us. I can never really relax because I know what's coming, what has to come, if we are ever to resolve this. Ron must know that too, but he at least seems happy to just lie on the grass and enjoy these few hours of peace for what they are. Neither of us seem to want to raise the difficult subject of us, we just cling on to normal for as long as we can.

---

There is the odd moment, of course, where the silence seems tense with words yet unspoken, but those moments pass, and time moves on. If we were properly a couple, this would be one of those glorious, endless long summer afternoons where you do nothing but be, and be together, and all seems right with the world. But we're not, so we just lie here, a few feet away from each other, but somehow miles apart.

---

Eventually, we realise it's half past five and we should probably eat something, so we reluctantly leave our perfect little patch of shade and wander up into Covent Garden to look for somewhere to eat. My limbs feel pleasantly tired and stiff after lying down for so long, and we're both so ridiculously relaxed that if the circumstances were different, I might have suggested we just go home and sleep. It's still relatively early, so just at the time where cafes are closing for the day and restaurants are not yet open, or so empty as to be soulless. We look in a few windows, but nothing inspires us.

"What about here?"

"Mm," I say, noncommittally, "I'm not sure. It doesn't look very clean."

We move on up the road. "Pub?" he suggests, gesturing towards one where a large group of drinkers, smokers, and mobile-phone jabberers are spilling out onto the street.

I shake my head. "Too busy."

We walk another few hundred yards, and Ron stops outside a little café with a hand-written blackboard menu outside.

"What about here?" he asks, hopefully, "They've got seats, look."

"Ron," I say severely, "I am not eating somewhere they can't even spell chedar."

The corners of his mouth twitch, then, without any warning, he takes my face in his hands and plants a big kiss in the middle of my forehead. I stare at him, astonished.

"What was that for?"

He merely smiles enigmatically. "Oh, nothing. It's just... good to you have back, that's all."

I don't know what to say. "Well… thank you. I think."

He has already moved on and is looking in another restaurant window at the menu. "Do you fancy Italian? What about that little place we used to go to in Hampstead? Is it still there, do you think?"

He's full of surprises today. I wouldn't have thought he'd want to go anywhere that might remind us of our old life, when we were happy, but apparently he does.

"I've no idea," I say, still a bit stunned from the unexpected kiss, "It might be nice, actually. Do you think they'll remember us?"

He chuckles. "I doubt it, after two years."

"It's not cheap, though. Have you… have you got enough Muggle money on you?"

Best to bring this up now if it's going to be an issue later.

"No problem. I thought I'd be going out clubbing, didn't I?"

"Oh. Yes, of course."

I'd forgotten about that. Obviously he hasn't, though. I wonder if he's still contemplating the idea of actually going. Although he did say he thought he'd be going out clubbing, and that does seem to suggest it was something that was going to happen but now it isn't. Yes, because Ron's definitely the type of person to consider his tenses before he speaks...

"Although -" He glances at me and hesitates. "Well, if we're going out to eat somewhere nice, I should probably go home and get changed first. I can't really go out for dinner in my sweaty Quidditch things, can I?" He laughs, nervously. "I'll put people off their food!"

My stomach lurches. "You want to go home?"

He shrugs. "Just to get changed."

"Right."

I don't want him to go, mainly because I am uncertain as to whether this is just a convenient excuse, and he has no intention of coming back. Not to mention that I don't want him to bump into Ginny and get talked out of - or into - something.

I pretend to look for something in my bag so I don't have to look at him, but I can still feel him watching me.

"I don't have to," he says, quietly. "If you'd rather -"

"It's fine," I say, stiffly, still unable to look him in the eye.

He shivers slightly in the cooler evening breeze and I notice his arm has come up in goose bumps.

"You're cold."

He shakes his head. "I'm fine."

"Didn't you bring a jumper?"

"No, well, I was only going to Quidditch and back, wasn't I? I didn't think I'd need one."

"Well... do you want to go home and get one?" I ask reluctantly.

He hesitates. "No, you're alright."

"I don't mind waiting."

We look at each other.

"OK," he says, uncertainly.

"So, shall I meet you at the restaurant, then?" I ask, trying to keep my voice as neutral as possible.

He scrutinises me for a few long seconds, apparently thinking. "No," he says, decisively, "I've got a better idea. Give me your hand."

"What?"

He doesn't reply, just takes my hand in his before I can protest, and I instantly feel the familiar wrench of Apparition.

---

Seconds later when I open my eyes we are standing outside Harry and Ginny's house. I let go of his hand and stare at him.

"Are you sure?"

He nods. "Sick of all the messing around." He fishes in his pocket for his keys. "Come on."

I hold back. "No, I... I'll wait outside."

He ignores me, just grabs my hand once more and pulls me inside, into the front room where Harry and Ginny are sitting and glance up automatically when we enter. They both look astonished.

"Alright?" says Ron gruffly, "Don't get up, we're not stopping."

He pulls me through the living room, out into the hall and up the stairs to his room, where he pushes the door open and switches on the light.

I blink.

I always knew that Ron was prone to untidiness, but this... I'm sure that somewhere underneath the piles of clothes, damp towels, old magazines and assorted detritus strewn everywhere, there is a bed, and a wardrobe, and possibly even a floor, but you can hardly see them for stuff. It is an incredible mess. Ron tosses his broomstick onto what I can only assume must be the bed, then turns back to me, notices my hesitancy, and grins.

"You should have seen it before I tidied up," he jokes, then his face grows serious again and he stands there awkwardly watching me staring at the war zone that is his room.

"Umm..."

We smile tentatively at one another, then he remembers "Oh! Jumper!" and picks his way across the room to where there is a large wooden chest of drawers, all the drawers open at different angles and the contents spilling out onto the floor like innards. He pulls out the nearest jumper and, turning his back on me slightly, gives it a surreptitious sniff, pulls a face, and quickly shoves it back into the drawer. His face is bright red when he turns back to me.

"Sorry," he mumbles.

"What for?"

"Well..." He shrugs. "You know... it's a bit of a tip, isn't it?"

That's the understatement of the century.

"Why did you let it get this bad? You could tidy it up in seconds with a flick of your wand."

"Yeah." He looks a little embarrassed, as though the thought has only just occurred to him. "Dunno really. Look, um, would you mind if I had a quick shower? I'll be really, really quick, I promise."

"No, of course not. Go ahead."

"I just feel really manky, you know?"

"It's fine."

"You could wait downstairs if you want. I mean, if you'd rather not have to touch anything in here."

I picture myself sitting in awkward silence in Harry and Ginny's front room and shake my head. "I'll wait here."

"Well... if you're sure."

He pulls a none too clean looking towel from amongst the twisted mess of clothes on the floor, grabs some other random clothes from the heap, his face still crimson with humiliation, and leaves the room, avoiding my eyes the whole time. I move aside some of his clothes and perch gingerly on the edge of the bed to wait.

---

I wonder why he hasn't bothered to tidy the room. It would only have taken him a few seconds with the right spell, after all. The room is tiny - about the size of his old childhood bedroom at The Burrow, in fact, and realising that sends a pang of guilt through me. He could have magically expanded it just as easily, though. He didn't have to put up with it being this small. I remember him complaining bitterly on that first night he returned about the "sad, single bed" he had to sleep in. Well, he could have expanded that too. All I can think is that he didn't want to sleep on his own in a double bed, because he never had before, and it just reminded him that I wasn't there beside him.

---

I think… the reason he hasn't bothered to keep it tidy is because he hates it here so much. Because if he tidied up and made it feel like a proper home, he'd have to admit that he's really living here, with his sister, not just staying here as a temporary fix. Temporary, after nearly two years.

---

I wonder at him getting changed in the bathroom rather than in front of me, too. That doesn't suggest he still thinks of me as his girlfriend, does it? And yet, that kiss… alright, it was only on the forehead, but it makes it even harder to try and read him, what he wants from me, from tonight, from the future. The signals I'm getting so far are almost all positive, and I hardly dare hope that if things continue like this, I might be spending the night in his arms after all. Maybe even in this bed. I smile to myself. Of course, we'd have to expand it first...

---

Wanting a distraction from my own thoughts, I gingerly pull out a magazine from under a pile of socks and can't help laughing. It's the February issue of "Cannon Balls", the Chudley Cannons' monthly fan magazine, and beaming out from the front cover beneath is their new Peruvian Seeker, 'The Lad From Lima', Hernan Castillo. His wide grin reveals several missing teeth, and he bears a remarkable resemblance to a chipmunk. In another photograph he's shaking hands with the Cannons' much-derided and abused (by Ron, anyway) owner Ned Astley. I've heard Ron and Mike drunkenly bellowing the fans' song about him and his unconvincing wigs on more than one occasion.

"Ned, Ned, what's that on your head?

Is it ali-ive, or i-is it dead?

Why don't you just wear a ha-at instead?

It looks like two squi-ir-rels fuuucking…"

I heard the song long before I saw a picture of Ned Astley, and the awful thing is how uncannily accurate that description is. If I recall correctly, there's an even more obscene second verse about Mr. Astley's rumoured sexual practices, which really doesn't bear repeating.

"Interview with Hernan, pages 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7." I turn to page 3 and start reading.

---

Ron's back in ten minutes as promised, wearing cleanish clothes and with damp hair and smelling slightly of peppermint. He gives me a sheepish smile and tosses the wet towel on top of the bed where he found it. I try not to wince - it's not my towel or my bed after all - then suddenly notice what he's wearing and start to laugh.

"What's that?"

"What's what?"

I point my finger at his t-shirt. "That!"

He grins. "Oh, that... it was a birthday present. D'you like it? It's cool, isn't it?"

He is wearing a white t-shirt with a Mr. Tickle cartoon on the front. Not many men would be happy to be seen out in public in a Mr. Men t-shirt, but then I suppose Ron wouldn't get the reference. He looks rather endearing in it, actually. In a faintly geeky kind of way. But cool? No. But then, he doesn't care about that kind of thing, about looking like an idiot in a kids' t-shirt or a pound shop Santa hat. Some people might consider it a negative trait, but I don't. He spent his entire childhood caring what other people thought about his clothes and pretending not to, and now he just genuinely doesn't care anymore. Fuck them all. I think that attitude - that glorious, sod the world attitude - is what allowed his pride to let him come back to me after everything that happened, and is why he's standing here now, still trying. So what if everyone else thinks he's making a huge mistake? Sod them, he wants to at least try. No, he hasn't given up on us yet, I'm sure of it, and I'm not going down without a fight either.

"Not cool, then?" he asks, looking amused.

I shake my head. "No, I like it. It suits you."

He laughs. "Right, because he's got long skinny arms like me and he's orange?"

"And presumably, ticklish."

"Actually, I kind of assumed he was the one doing the tickling. What with the long arms and all."

"Yes, all you need to do is get a little blue hat and paint yourself orange and you'll have your next fancy dress costume all ready."

He laughs out loud. "Yeah, but then I'd have to go naked, and I'm not sure anyone's ready for that sight just yet! Still, I suppose painting myself orange is the only way I'm ever gonna get a tan…"

He pats the front pockets of his trousers - wallet, keys - and the back pocket - wand - and looks at me expectantly.

"Right, then. Are we ready?"

"Weren't you going to take a jumper?"

"Oh, yeah. Good point."

He grabs a rather nice grass-green hooded sweatshirt with kangaroo pockets from the nearest heap of clothing and pulls it on over his head. "I suppose if we're going out in Hampstead I should probably hide Mr. Tickle." He chuckles. "God, that sounded filthy!"

"Only to you," I retort.

He grins. "Actually, it could be worse, she wanted to get me one that said 'Nobody Knows I'm A Lesbian'..."

I start to laugh, but then the laugh dies in my throat.

"She?"

He immediately stops smiling too. "Anna," he mumbles, "It was a present from Anna."

He twists a finger self-consciously in the hem of the t-shirt, and for almost a full minute neither of us seems to know what to say next, then we both start speaking at once.

"It's a good present."

"So, shall we go and get some dinner, then?"

"Yes," I nod, getting to my feet and forcing a smile on my face, "Let's go and get some dinner."

---

The restaurant is just as I remember it. The same crisp white linen tablecloths, the same dishes on the menu, even two years later, and the same second-rate oil paintings of Italian scenes on the walls. Ron turns straight to the desserts page of the menu and reports gleefully that they still have the twice-baked triple chocolate soufflé.

"That's the only reason you wanted to come here, isn't it?" I ask, affecting a weary sigh.

"Absolutely!" he grins, and we both laugh.

I suddenly remember that the last time we were here, Ron stormed out in a huff and I left shortly after, in floods of tears. It's not the best of omens, but I push it to the back of my mind. We share a bottle of wine - so much for staying sober - and some garlic bread, and I note that Ron fails to make his usual joke about there being no kissing later. Maybe he just assumes there's already no chance of that happening.

---

Neither of us wants to break the mood by bringing up the subject of us, but we both know it's got to happen sooner or later. It's why I am here, after all. He just seems to have forgiven me a little bit just because I have made the first move, as though that was all he was waiting for. I think my Mum was right; he meant for me to come after him. He doesn't even seem angry anymore, although I know that can't last. We're talking like the old friends we used to be, not like two people who only a week ago were ripping each other's hearts out.

---

"I hope it's not going to be another really hot summer," he grumbles, pulling the hem of his t-shirt away from his body and fanning himself with it. "I mean, what happened to spring, that's what I'd like to know. Bloody English weather. Snowstorms in March, torrential rain in April, and August weather in bloody May!"

"Well, it is nearly June," I say, reasonably. "And anyway, if it's hot earlier in the year it usually means a cool summer."

Ron looks as though he can hardly dare dream of such a thing. "Is that true?"

"I don't know," I admit, starting to laugh, "I might have made it up."

He laughs too. "It's alright for you, anyway. You go a nice brown colour and look all sexy in your little vest tops and flouncy skirts and sandals. I just spend the entire summer sweating like a pig and looking like I've fallen into a vat of tomatoes."

I can't help laughing. "Yes, but in a good way..."

"Do you remember that heatwave we had a couple of years ago when it hit forty degrees? God, I thought I was gonna die!"

"How could I forget? I was living with you, remember?" I adopt a whiny drawl. "'It's too hot, I can't sleep, I'm dying, why can't it rain, why can't we move to Norway, why can't it be September already, I can't sleep, it's too hot, I'm dying, don't touch me, I can't sleep, it's too hot -'"

He makes a half-lunge for me across the table and I shriek and laugh out loud. "NO, don't!" A woman at the next table glares at me.

"Was I really that bad?" he asks, hanging his head in pretend shame.

"You were impossible," I smile.

"Well, it wasn't my fault!" he protests, indignantly, "Forty degrees is ridiculous. It wasn't even that hot when we went to sodding Egypt, for God's sake." He shakes his head in disbelief. "It shouldn't be allowed to get above about twenty degrees in this country. We're not built for it."

"You're not built for it, you mean…" I tease, and, feeling daring, I reach across to ruffle his hair.

He automatically jerks backwards out of my reach, and there is a horrible moment of physical awkwardness between us, made even more so by the nervous laugh that escapes my lips.

"What, did you think I was going to hit you or something?" I joke, weakly.

He looks mortified. "No, of course not. Sorry. It was just a reflex thing. Sorry."

Silence. Ron picks up his now empty wine glass and puts it down again.

"Anyway, it's ridiculous," he mumbles. "Forty degrees… hah..." His voice tails off into mutters.

"That was the summer we went to the South of France with my parents," I remind him, in a transparent attempt to change the subject.

"Was it?" he asks, doubtfully.

"Yes, 2003."

"Typical," he jokes, "The worst heatwave for about a century, and we decide to go on holiday somewhere three hundred miles closer to the Equator!"

We both laugh, and I silently vow never to complain about Ron's ability to joke his way out of any awkward situation ever again.

"I was looking at some of the photographs the other day, actually. There was a great one of you with one of those enormous watermelons from the market, do you remember?"

He raises his eyebrows. "I remember dropping it trying to get it into the boot of your dad's car, and it rolling down the hill and nearly causing a pile-up…"

We both laugh, and relax a little.

"That was a great holiday," he says, reminiscently, "Being driven around everywhere was brilliant. Much more fun than Apparation."

"I could have done without my dad giving you that driving lesson, though. I don't know what he was thinking, letting you loose behind the wheel. In a hire car!" I shake my head in disbelief. "He's far too laidback for his own good sometimes…"

"Hey!" he protests, affecting outrage, "I didn't crash it, did I?"

"Only because you were in an empty car park! Even I couldn't crash in an empty car park!"

He laughs. "You're just pissed off because your dad said I was a better driver than you."

It's my turn to pretend to be outraged. "He did not say that!"

He looks annoyingly smug. "He did. He said when he gave you your first driving lesson, you nearly reversed into a ditch."

I am genuinely outraged now. "Oh, the big, fat liar! Anyway, it wasn't a ditch, it was a horse trough!"

Ron, who is midway through drinking a glass of water when I say this, accidentally snorts half of it up his nose, and I laugh so much at that, I get a stitch. Which, of course, only makes him laugh even more.

"Stop…" I beg, clutching at the pain in my side, "Please… hurts... too much…"

"I… can't…" he gasps, shoving his fist in his mouth in a desperate attempt to muffle the sound of his laughter.

"People… are… staring!"

"Don't… care!"

"You know, that was... our last... holiday together."

His laughter ceases so abruptly, it is like I have flicked a switch.

"Where's the bloody waiter?" he grumbles, as though I haven't even spoken, "We need some more water here." He presses his empty glass to his forehead in a futile attempt to cool himself down. "I tell you, if we get another summer like that this year, I'm moving to Shetland. Nice sensible summer temperature of about eleven degrees."

I seize upon this change of subject gratefully. "Yes, and near-constant rain, and a very long way for my parents to come and visit."

"We could Side-along them. And at least it would stop your Mum making any more surprise visits..."

"Yes, well... I did tell her… if you're going to turn up unannounced at the house of a young couple who've just moved in together, you've only yourself to blame if you see or hear something you don't want to."

"You were the one who gave her a spare key!"

"For emergencies! Not to let herself into the flat when she thought we were out to drop off a housewarming present!"

"To be fair, she did knock first. It's not her fault we were too, uh, preoccupied to hear the door." He starts laughing. "I think that was about the only time I've ever seen you go as red as me. Honestly, I nearly pissed myself when we went into the front room afterwards and found that brand new rug and a note from your Mum! Your face!"

"Yes, well... My mother's famed dry sense of humour. 'I waited ten minutes but you seemed as though you might be busy for a while, so I've gone for a coffee around the corner. If you get this in the next half hour come and find me. If you don't - well, I'd say enjoy your weekend, but you seem to be doing that already. Give my love to Ron.'"

He chuckles. "Yeah, that 'Give my love to Ron' was hilarious. I can just imagine her saying that as well. She's got the driest sense of humour in the world, your Mum."

---

My Mum. I remember yesterday - the laughter, the crying, the revelations - and suddenly the whole reason we are here seems to come out of nowhere and hit me in the face. We should be talking about the future, not the past. We should be trying to sort things out between us. And yet, I can't seem to bring myself to break the mood, and a busy restaurant doesn't seem like the best place for such a private conversation. I don't really want the couple at the next table to know that my boyfriend slept with someone else after I dumped him, or that I am a crazy jealous bitch, but I imagine they'll go home feeling better about their own relationship, at least.

---

Actually, maybe a busy restaurant is exactly the right place for this conversation. At least he can't shout and swear at me, and I can't cry. We can't make a scene here; we'd actually have to have a proper, serious, adult conversation about our relationship. Unless he decides to storm out like he did last time we were here, of course. I wonder if he remembers that. I wonder if the waiters do. I wish we hadn't come here now. I wonder why he suggested it. Oh, stop it, Hermione. It's Ron. He doesn't do ulterior motives. He suggested it because he doesn't go to restaurants very often and this was probably just the first one that came into his head. That and the twice-baked triple chocolate soufflé, of course.

"I saw her yesterday," I tell him.

"Who?"

"My mum. We… we had a good long talk."

Ron just looks at me and doesn't say anything.

"I realised a few things."

He glances down at his empty plate and rearranges his knife and fork. "Yeah?" he says, in a cracked sort of voice.

"Yeah."

I take a deep breath. Okay, so maybe this isn't the best place for this conversation, but we've spent the last eight hours in each other's company without resolving anything at all, and it's getting late. One of us has to make the first move. Apparently, it has to be me.

"Ron, I -"

With impeccable timing, the waiter appears and starts clearing away our plates, loudly.

"Would you like anything else to drink, sir, madam?"

"No, thank you," I say, briskly, wishing he would just hurry up and leave.

"Can we see the dessert menu, please?" interrupts Ron, eagerly.

"Certainly, sir."

The waiter produces a couple of menus and hands them to us with a flourish, before leaving us alone again.

"I thought you were having the chocolate soufflé?" I ask, unaccountably irritated.

He shrugs, but doesn't look up from his perusal of the menu.

"So why do you need to see the menu again?"

"I like to keep my options open."

I stare at him. "Do you?"

"Yeah, well, I might change my mind, mightn't I?"

"But you like the chocolate soufflé. You always have the chocolate soufflé."

"Not always."

"Yes. Always." I don't know why I'm getting so annoyed about this.

He cocks his head on one side and considers. "Well… they might run out of the chocolate soufflé. Then I'd need a back-up."

"A back-up?" I repeat.

"Yeah. I mean, obviously, I'd rather have the chocolate soufflé - the chocolate soufflé is my favourite thing in the whole world - but if for some reason I can't have it… well, it doesn't mean I'm gonna give up pudding, does it?"

The waiter returns.

"Actually," says Ron, brightly, "It's not really the weather for a hot pudding." He turns to the waiter. "Have you got chocolate ice-cream?"

"Of course, sir."

"Right, well, I'll have that, then. Hermione?"

I have lost my appetite all of a sudden. "I'll just have a coffee."

"Oh, come on, have a pudding with me, it won't kill you!"

"I'm not hungry."

"Nor am I, but that's not the point. It's pudding. There's always room for pudding. Have some ice-cream."

"I really don't want any."

"If you change your mind, I'm not letting you have any of mine."

"Fine." I turn to the carefully blank-faced waiter, who has no doubt heard this exact exchange between a million other couples. "Just a white coffee, please. Decaff with skimmed milk, if you have it."

When I look back Ron is watching me across the table with his arms folded and a half-resigned, half-amused expression on his face.

"What?"

He shakes his head. "Decaff coffee, skimmed milk, no pudding… you need some pleasures in your life, you know."

"Well, that's what I've got you for," I say, without thinking. He stares at me for half a second, then explodes into laughter, causing several people at nearby tables to stop their conversations and glare at us.

"Ah," he says, mischievously, when he has recovered, "But I'm only your second favourite thing after books, if I remember rightly."

"Well…" I lean forward and lower my voice conspiratorially. "I'll let you into a secret... I lied."

He looks as though all his Christmases have come at once. "I get first place over books?"

"You get first, second and third place over books. And fourth, fifth, sixth and seventh."

Ron has gone positively pink with delight now, although some of it may be the wine.

"Ron," I begin, trying to steer the conversation back to the subject at hand, "I need to tell you -"

But he isn't listening.

"Excuse me!" he calls across the restaurant, waving wildly at the waiter and causing yet more diners to turn and glare at him, "Can we have two spoons with the ice-cream, please?"

"Ron, I told you, I don't want -"

"Tough, you're having ice-cream with me. Even if I have to feed it to you myself." A wide grin spreads across his face. "Now there's an idea…"

He deliberately kicks my foot under the table and I realise that the moment to raise the subject of us has well and truly passed. I know it probably isn't healthy, for us to keep putting it off, and to sit here flirting with each other and practically playing footsie under the table when there are Things We Need To Discuss, but right now, I just don't care.

After we have finished our coffee and ice-cream, Ron sits up and stretches his arms over his head.

"Shall we get the bill?" he asks, stifling a yawn.

"Okay."

We sit there for a few more minutes, pay the bill, and still don't move. I don't want to leave just yet. I don't want that moment of awkwardness when we get outside and aren't sure if it is the end of the evening or not, whether we should be saying goodbye.

---

And besides, the longer I can keep him here with me, the less likely he is to remember he has another offer. Maybe even a better offer. Somewhere else he could be. Someone else he could be with. He's practically on a promise, after all. What was it she said? "Call me anyway, yeah?" He went to her last week when we argued, and I'm not at all confident he won't do it again. Bloody, bloody Anna. She's not even here and yet the presence of her hangs over us like a cloud. We've had the chance to have this conversation twice now, and both times he's been the one who cut it off before it could go any further. Maybe he's trying to tell me something. Maybe he's trying to say that it doesn't matter. Maybe just me being here, coming after him… maybe that's enough.

---

Or maybe I'm just kidding myself. Even if we don't have this conversation now, it still has to happen sooner or later. I need to explain some things. About Anna, and the reasons I left. I need to tell him he is the only thing I want. And there are things he needs to tell me, too. About his relationship with Anna, even though half of me doesn't want to ask, for fear of the answer. About how he feels about me, about us, about the future. And I need to ask him to come back. I need him to come back. I don't think I can bear even one more night without him.

---

"Sodoyoufancyawalkthen?" he asks, abruptly, sounding as though he has been building up to asking the question for quite a while.

"Yes!" I blurt, with relief, "Yes, I really, really do..."

---

We walk for a while across the Heath, taking advantage of the last few dying rays of sunshine and talking of old times, then stop and sit on a bench for a rest. We both fall silent and just sit there enjoying each other's company and the peace of our surroundings. At some point, though, the silence stops being companionable and starts becoming rather tense and pointed. I know we're both thinking the same thing, that darkness is falling, and we still haven't talked about what we came here to discuss.

---

And yet, I know that as soon as this conversation starts, that's it, there's no going back. I know we're both going to end up saying some hurtful things to one another, and I know he's going to lose his temper and shout at me. Once this starts, once I move the first pawn, it won't stop until it's over. One way or another. At least until that moment when one of us finally breaks the silence there's still hope.

---

I glance sideways at him. He's sitting low on the bench with his legs stretched out in front of him, hands stuffed in his pockets, just watching the sun sinking behind the horizon. Neither of us has spoken a single word in over twenty minutes. I wish I knew what he was thinking.

---

"So, are we going to talk about this, then?" His voice is low, but firm.

I look at him, but he keeps his gaze fixed firmly ahead.

"I… I hardly know where to begin."

He nods. "Right. Well… shall I start, then?"

I can hear the tension in his voice, and wonder if he's been sitting there for the last twenty minutes preparing this little speech in his head. This is already not going the way I had hoped, and I wish I had found the nerve to have this conversation earlier, when I could have got my point across first. Now, of course, it's too late. I can only nod, and after a few moments of silence he lets out a long sigh, runs his hand quickly through his hair, and begins.

"All I ever wanted -"

He stops again, weighing his words carefully.

"All I ever thought about, the whole time you were gone, was what it would be like if we got back together. What I'd say to you, what you'd say to me." He gives a short laugh. "Obviously, you'd be crying and saying how sorry you were, how you'd never do it again, how you'd been so miserable without me..."

"I was!"

He ignores me. "And then we'd have a big row and fall into bed, and suddenly everything would be alright again, and it'd be like you'd never left. Which is pretty much what happened, only -"

He stops again, and for almost a minute he doesn't say anything at all, then he sucks in a deep breath and says, quietly, "What I never thought about was that I might not be able to forgive you, or that you wouldn't be quite as grateful about it as I thought you should be."

"I am grateful!"

"No, you're not. You're… you're angry, and jealous, and resentful, and I think you kind of hate me a bit for the Luna thing, which I should have seen coming, to be honest, and I think… I think I kind of hate you a little bit, too. Maybe even more than a little bit."

"Ron…" I plead, but I can't go any further. What do you say to someone who tells you they hate you?

"The thing is, Hermione, that's actually okay. It's probably even sort of normal, after everything that's happened. We both kind of hate each other. But - and this is the bit that makes me want to punch myself in the face - I still -"

He stops again. "I'm still here, aren't I? I should be in the pub with my friends, having a laugh, getting nicely drunk, and instead, I'm here, having an argument with you. I chose to come here, knowing it would just end up in an argument with you. What does that tell you?"

I can only shrug.

"Well, apart from the fact that I'm a total sucker for punishment, it should tell you what you already ought to know. How much I -"

He makes a frustrated sort of sound and changes tack again.

"These last two years… I would have done anything - anything - to have you back, Hermione. It was the only thing I wanted. And now I've got my wish, and it's nothing at all like I thought it would be. I mean, you seem to want me around, but five minutes later you're snapping my head off and I don't know why. I know why I'm angry, but I don't know why you are. Is it just the Luna thing? Is it just because you've got used to living on your own and you're fed up with picking my socks off the floor? Is it something else? Something I've said? Something I've done?"

I open my mouth to speak, but he doesn't wait for an answer.

"The thing is, it's not just you, either. The other day, you laughed at something I said, and I was suddenly so angry, all I could think was, 'You don't get to be happy, not after what you did, not after everything I went through because of you. It shouldn't be that easy.'"

He turns to me with wide eyes. "Seriously, what's wrong with me? I was angry because you were happy! How fucked up is that?"

"You know, I wake up sometimes and wonder what the hell I'm doing here. Like... this is what I wanted, you're there next to me, everything's supposed to be back to normal, but... it isn't. I don't know what to do about that. Sometimes I just want to run as far away from you as possible and never come back. And it's ridiculous, I should be happy about it, I should be -" - he makes ironic air quotes around the word - "grateful to God or fate or whatever that I got what I wanted, and some of the time I am, but the rest of the time… When it's good it's really good, but when it's bad…"

He rubs his face wearily. "I just... it's like we're broken, Hermione..."

"No," I say, urgently, "No, please - you don't understand -"

"No, you don't understand! I don't think you've got the slightest idea how hard it's been for me to come back here, when every other sodding person I know thinks I need my head examined! I have thought about leaving nearly every single day, Hermione. I would have done if - if -"

"If you hadn't been sick."

"Yes!"

"Why?"

"Because… because you just seemed so angry with me all of the time. I thought you were gearing up to dump me again, so I thought I might as well get in first."

"Get in first?"

His face registers first shame, then anger. "You really don't get it, do you? Do you know how many people told me what an idiot I was to take you back, how you'd just chuck me again and I'd only have myself to blame? I couldn't go through all that again. So, well… I just thought, at least if I leave first, I won't have been dumped twice by the same girl. 'Cos that would have just been totally pathetic."

"Why did you think I was going to dump you again? I was never going to… to… not for a second!"

He shrugs. "Well, that's what it felt like."

"We knew it wasn't going to be easy, we knew there'd be rows… I was never going to leave, Ron. I've only just got you back. And I'm sorry if you felt I was angry with you. I didn't mean to be. I was just… confused. I thought I was what you wanted but you kept talking about another girl. I couldn't work out your relationship, where she fitted in, where I fitted in. I felt like the third wheel. She made you laugh, and I was just so uptight and afraid…"

"Of what?"

"You leaving."

"Me leaving?"

"Because you could, Ron. I couldn't leave, it was my own flat. Not that I wanted to. But you… it just felt like everything was hanging by a thread, and at any minute I would say or do something wrong and you'd just leave, and I wouldn't be able to stop you. Even when we were happy I always had that fear at the back of my mind."

He stares out into the distance for several long seconds. "I thought about it," he admits. "I thought about it a lot. I just couldn't believe it could be that easy." He gives an ironic laugh. "And I was right, wasn't I? It wasn't."

"It would have been fine if it hadn't been for Anna."

"Don't blame her for this!" he says, hotly.

"I'm not," I say gently, "I meant, if it hadn't been for my jealousy over Anna."

He doesn't say anything for a few seconds, then he says, "Yeah, but it wasn't just that, was it? There were lots of reasons. It wasn't just the jealousy thing. There was all that stuff going on in my head too."

"Why didn't you?"

"Leave?"

I nod.

He grimaces. "Apart from the dodgy saveloy, you mean? No idea. Triumph of hope over experience?" He gives a short unhappy laugh. "I suppose… I suppose every time I thought about it I kept picturing myself back in my sad little room at Harry and Ginny's on my own again, and that… that was worse."

"At least you were getting laid," I muse, before I can stop myself.

"What?"

I look up at the tension in his voice. "Oh. Sorry. It's what you said to Ginny when she asked if you were happy here. Don't you remember?"

He bites his lip and looks away. "Not really."

I shrug, helplessly. "Well, you were a little bit drunk."

We sit there in silence for a few long seconds then he blurts out, "Did I really say that?"

"You were joking," I say, lamely, "It was just a joke. I didn't take offence by it."

"It was a stupid joke if it was," he says, angrily. "I didn't mean it."

"I know you didn't."

"That's not why I came back."

"I know, Ron."

We sink into silence once more, him gnawing his fingernails and looking miserable, me watching him out of the corner of my eye.

"All I do is make you unhappy," I mumble.

He doesn't say anything. He doesn't deny it.

"Ron...?"

He shakes his head, and I realise he isn't even listening. "I thought if we just got back to normal again like nothing had happened, if I just didn't think about it... I'd be able to forgive you, but..." He tails off, looking lost.

"It's not that easy?"

"No," he admits, "It's not."

"Do you think you'll ever be able to forgive me?" I ask timidly.

A shrug. "I can't tell you that. I don't know myself."

"Well, when…?"

"It's been five weeks, Hermione. Five weeks! You can't possibly expect me to suddenly get over everything that's happened after only five weeks."

"I know," I mumble, suddenly feeling hopeless and overwhelmed and blinking back the tears that threaten to slide down my cheek. We sit there in silence for several minutes, just staring out at the darkening night sky.

"Do you know what I was thinking last Sunday after I left?" he says abruptly.

I give a small unhappy shrug.

"Fuck you. That's what I was thinking. Fuck you for doing this to me again."

I don't know what to say to that. There are only so many times I can say, "I'm sorry".

He plucks a leaf from the bush beside him and starts shredding it in his hands. "But then I started thinking about what you said."

"Which part?" I ask, alarmed that he might have taken something I only blurted out in anger or frustration, to heart, and been dwelling on it all week.

"About how I would feel if it was the other way around. If I'd seen some bloke put his hand on your leg."

I watch his long, slender fingers destroying another leaf. "And?"

"I'd want to chop his fucking hands off," he admits, with a fierceness that sends a shiver through me.

"Y- you would?"

He looks horribly ashamed all of a sudden. "Sorry. I shouldn't have said that, should I? But it's true. I can't help how I feel, Hermione."

"Well, I can't help how I feel, either! That's what I've been trying to explain to you. I know it's not logical to be jealous of Anna, but I can't help it. When I see you together… something just snaps inside me. Like you used to be with Viktor."

"It's not the same thing," he says stubbornly, "You went out with Viktor. He was your first kiss. Me and Anna are just friends."

"I know, but… you and I were just friends. You and Luna were just friends -"

"Yeah, ten years ago! And she was your friend too!"

"No, I know, but - I'm trying to explain - it's different with Anna. You act like a couple. You flirt with each other -"

"We don't fl-"

"You do, Ron! It doesn't matter whether you mean to or not, you do! For God's sake, she was practically sitting in your lap last week in the pub! She buys you presents!"

"It was my birthday!"

"She buys you girlfriend presents!"

He gives a snort of disbelief and I can see that I am losing him. I watch him pull another angry fistful of leaves from the bush beside him and let them scatter to the floor at his feet.

"She's my friend," he growls.

"Friends don't put their hands on friends' knees."

"Sometimes they do! For fuck's sake, she had her hand on my knee, it's not like she was sucking me off in front of the whole pub!"

Anger surges within me and I have to physically restrain myself from slapping him. "This isn't a joke, Ron!"

He mutters something that is no doubt sarcastic under his breath.

"What did you say?" I demand, my voice quivering with anger.

"I said," - his tone is positively dangerous now - "That's exactly what it is. A joke."

I gape at him. "You just admitted you understood how I feel! You said you'd feel exactly the same way! Why are we arguing about it if you understand?"

"Because… because... that's not the point! I explained that to you! I told you she didn't mean anything by it, I told you she's like that with everyone -"

"I don't care about everyone! I care about you!"

He gives an ironic laugh. "Do you?"

"How can you even ask me that? Of course I do!"

"Oh, right, so you care about me, but you don't believe a word I say…"

"I do believe you! It's Anna I don't -"

"Yeah, obviously! That'd be why, when I told you nothing was going on with Anna, you started accusing me of shagging practically every girl I've ever bloody met, then, would it?"

"No, I -"

This whole argument is running away from me. I was stupid to ever think it would be as easy as just coming here and explaining my point of view in a calm, reasonable manner. That he would just accept my apology without question and welcome me back with open arms. The whole plan seems laughable now. An argument isn't one-way. I, of all people, should know that. He was never going to sit here and listen politely while I listed my points in order. This isn't an essay.

"If you'd just let me explain -"

He shakes his head. "What's there to explain? You're supposed to trust me, and you don't, do you?"

"I do!" I protest, but my words sound hollow, even to me.

Ron makes a noise of disgust and kicks at the ground with the heel of his shoe.

"No," he mutters, angrily, "You don't."

I open my mouth and close it again. "Fine," I say resignedly, "You want my trust… tell me what happened on your birthday."

"Oh, not that again!"

"Yes, that again! I know I haven't gone about it the right way, but if you'd just been honest with me from the start…"

"I didn't lie to you," he says, through gritted teeth.

"You didn't exactly tell me the whole truth, either."

"Yeah, well, I didn't think it was any of your business… Seeing as how we weren't going out anymore, because you dumped me..."

"Fine. I deserve that. But you must see it from my point of view… You told me you went to your Mum's for a meal, and then I found out from Anna - not from you, from a complete stranger -"

"She's not a complete stranger!"

"Not from you! - that actually you'd been out clubbing with her instead, and when I asked you about it, you refused to talk about it. What was I supposed to think?"

He gives a violent shrug. "You were supposed to trust me," he mutters.

"It's not that I don't trust you, Ron, or that I don't believe you, it's just… I'm asking you to please, just tell me the truth. Tell me what happened on your birthday, and then we need never have this conversation again."

"Nothing happened!"

I finally snap. "How do you expect me to trust you if you won't be honest with me?"

"There's nothing to tell -"

"I've already heard most of it from Harry and Ginny anyway, so you might as well just tell me."

He gives a visible start. "Oh."

"Yes. Oh."

He is silent for almost a whole minute, then his shoulders slump in defeat, and he mumbles, "It's nothing, really. I just had a big row with Ginny, that's all."

"What about?"

"Stuff."

I bite my lip in frustration. Fine, so he's not going to make this easy for me. "What stuff?"

He gives a heavy sigh. "Oh, you know, the usual. Me being a selfish fuck-up and wasting my life. That sort of thing."

"And this happened where?"

"At my Mum and Dad's. I was just... well, you know, it was my birthday! I didn't exactly want to be spending it with my entire family, and I definitely didn't want to make a big thing of it, but you know what my family are like. You're never allowed to be on your own, not for five fucking seconds."

"Why did you want to be on your own?" I ask, curiously.

He fixes me with a glare. "I just did. You know why."

I feel my face growing hot under cover of darkness. Because of me.

"And that's what you and Ginny argued about?"

He sighs loudly again. "Sort of. I was late - two and a half hours late, to be precise - and she -"

"Why were you late?"

"I was in the pub." He gives a mirthless laugh. "Could you have guessed? With some blokes from work. I was only going for one but then everyone kept buying me free drinks because it was my birthday and the longer I sat there the more I didn't want to go home, I just wanted to stay in the pub and get quietly drunk. Anyway, I knew they'd all be sitting there waiting for me and that everyone would just have a go at me when I eventually showed up, so I just decided I wouldn't bother. Fuck the lot of them."

"So why did you change your mind?"

"Oh, you know. The usual Weasley family guilt trip. 'Mum's been slaving away all day in the kitchen, and we've all made a special effort for your birthday, the least you can do is turn up on time and be grateful!'"

"Then what happened?"

He shrugs. "I had a giant row with Ginny and I left."

"Where did you go?"

An ironic little laugh. "Stonehenge."

"What?"

"Well, I realised I'd never seen it, so..."

It's my turn to shake my head. "Okay. So you went to Stonehenge. Then what?"

He averts his eyes from mine. "I went to meet Anna."

A shiver goes through me. This is it, the truth at last.

"Oh. At her house?"

"At the pub. You know, where she works. She said if I came in before eleven she'd buy me a birthday drink, and it was a quarter to eleven, so... I was always going to go there anyway, though. She was my excuse to get away from Mum and Dad's early."

I try to keep my voice level. "So you stayed with her?"

"Yeah, but I know what you're going to say, Hermione, and you're wrong. It wasn't like that. It's still not like that. She's my friend, that's all. I slept on the sofa."

"I wasn't going to say anything!" I protest, even though that is exactly what I am thinking.

"Barry lives there too, don't forget, and her brother. It's not a big house, Hermione. Do you seriously think I could get away with shagging his daughter under his own roof and still be on the team?"

I can only shrug. It does seem like a valid point.

"You don't believe me, do you?"

"I don't know. I want to..."

"Look, I like Anna -"

"She's beautiful."

"You're beautiful!"

"She makes you laugh."

"Harry makes me laugh, but I don't want to shag him!"

"And she's smart, too, and tall, and sexy, and -"

"You're all of those things! Well, except the tall bit. Hermione, this is mad, I -"

I cut him off quickly, not wanting to go any further down this path. "So what happened then? You just stayed at her house for one night, did you?"

He frowns. "I thought you said you'd already heard most of this from Ginny," he says suspiciously.

"Yes, but -"

"Then you'll already know I stayed there the rest of the week, won't you? Or were you just trying to catch me out?"

"No! I wouldn't -"

He laughs, bitterly. "You don't trust me at all, do you?"

"It's not about that -"

"That's exactly what it's about!"

"No. It isn't. It's about you not being honest with me. If you had just told me you'd gone clubbing with Anna on your birthday instead of avoiding the subject -"

"I didn't tell you because a) it wasn't any of your sodding business, and b) it wasn't my birthday! If you'd asked me what I did on the Saturday after my birthday, I'd have bloody told you! Do you want a list of everything I've done and who with for the whole of the last two years? November 18th 2005: I went to the pub with a couple of guys from work, I had two pints of beer, and I got a Cornish pasty on the way home! Fuck's sake! Why do you even care that I went clubbing with Anna anyway?"

"You hate clubbing!"

"I've been once, Hermione! Well, twice now. I didn't really like it much the first time, no, but does that mean I'm never allowed to do it again? Jesus!"

I am silent for a few seconds, feeling somewhat chastened by his outburst. "Why didn't you just tell me all this before?"

"Because I didn't think it was important! All I did was stay a few nights at a friend's house after an argument with my sister, how the hell was I supposed to know you'd make so much of it? If I'd known you were sitting there stewing about it for the last five weeks, of course I'd have told you! But you didn't ask, Hermione! If you'd just asked..."

I bite my lip and blink back the tears.

"Anna's my friend," he says, coolly, "And yeah, I think she's brilliant, actually, but that doesn't mean I want to go out with her. She told me this story once... she went to a nightclub, met this bloke, went back to his place and shagged him, then he fell asleep and she got bored and went back to the club, where she got off with someone else. She's just a little bit scary, Hermione."

"Oh," is all I can think of to say, although my heart is already feeling lighter.

"If it hadn't been for her... that night we went out clubbing was the first time I've been out of the house in months. She said I needed taking out of myself. She said…"

He flushes slightly.

"I was complaining about not being able to meet women, and she said it was because even though I was single, I wasn't acting like it. Everything about me was telling women I already had a girlfriend, because mentally I was still thinking of you as my girlfriend, even though I hadn't seen you in nearly two years. If it wasn't for her I might have gone on like that forever. Still thinking that one day you might change your mind. Maybe if you'd met someone else it would have been easier, but as long as we had Harry in common, there was always that connection. I knew - or I thought I did - that you hadn't met someone else, and as long as I could cling to that, there was still hope. Pathetic, I know."

"It's not pathetic," I mumble.

"Well, yeah, it is," he says dryly, "But anyway, that's why she suggested we go to this club. Stop me moping around."

"It was her suggestion, then?"

"Yeah, obviously. How many nightclubs do you think I know the names of?"

"What sort of music was it?"

He shrugs. "Dunno. That thumpy-thumpy kind of rubbish. Not really my sort of thing."

"Did you dance?" I realise that I'm asking a lot of questions, but I need to know.

"A bit. If you can call it dancing. Took me about three hours to properly relax and enjoy myself. Didn't help that I was surrounded by loads of blokes with their shirts off, mind."

"What?" I say slowly, realising what he must mean, "You don't m-?" I stifle a laugh. "Ron... did you go to a gay club?"

He grins sheepishly. "Yeah, well, Anna said that was the best place to meet women 'cos there wasn't much competition and they were all off their guard."

"Excuse me? Off their guard?"

He holds his hands up in mock-defence. "Hey, she's the one that said it, not me! She said they'd be all relaxed and happy 'cos they didn't have to worry about some drunken idiot trying to chat them up, or whether their hair looked nice, or having some bloke checking out their arse. So, you know, you could get talking to them without any of the usual pressure."

He shoots me a nervous sideways glance, as though asking for my permission to continue.

"Go on..." I say, wearily.

"Anyway," he goes on, flashing me a grateful smile, "Once you were getting on alright, they'd start to think, 'Mm, he's a nice bloke, shame all the good ones are gay', at which point you casually let it drop that you're not gay, and they get all excited and jump on you. Well, that's the theory, anyway. Anna says that straight blokes who go to gay clubs are better in bed because they're more comfortable with their sexuality."

This is such a bizarre line to hear from Ron's mouth that I laugh out loud.

"What?" he demands, pretending to take offence, "You're saying I'm not?"

I just shake my head, laughing too much to speak, and when I've finally recovered, I ask, "So did you?"

"Did I what?"

"Meet any girls."

He grins. "No. Well -"

My heart does a little back-somersault.

"Not unless you count the woman I was standing next to at the bar who I offered to buy a drink and told me to, 'Fuck off, Ginger'…"

I laugh out loud. "Oh, dear!"

"I mean, how did she even know I was trying to chat her up, anyway?" he asks, indignantly, "Do I look particularly straight or something?"

He actually sounds offended, and I am seized with the desire to give him a big, warm hug.

"You weren't wearing your Mr. Tickle t-shirt, were you?" I tease.

"No!" he retorts, and then looks thoughtful. "Maybe that's it, maybe I don't dress well enough to be gay. Or maybe she saw me trying to dance."

"Or maybe, Ron," I say, dryly, "It's just that gay men don't usually go around buying strange women drinks."

He brightens. "Oh. Yeah. That would probably be it, then."

We both laugh.

"So did any men try to chat you up?" I ask, mischievously.

He flushes slightly. "No. Well - I dunno, do I? I'm not that good at reading the signs with women, let alone blokes. I did ask Anna what I should do if anyone tried to talk to me, and she said the number one thing I shouldn't do was what all straight blokes in gay nightclubs always do, which is to panic and blurt out, 'I'm not gay!' So this bloke started talking to me at the bar, and I didn't tell him I wasn't gay, like she said, and we ended up chatting for about an hour. Nice bloke, actually. From Torquay."

I hide my smile. Trust Ron to find someone from Devon to talk to.

"Anyway," he says, going even redder, "It was a bit embarrassing, actually, 'cos then he asked me for my phone number, and obviously I'm not on the phone, so… well, I told him that and he went a bit mental, called me a wanker, and stormed off." He throws me a pleading look. "What the hell was that all about?"

"Ron," I say, gently, "Everyone's on the phone these days."

"I'm not!" he says, hotly.

"No, because you're a wizard. Which I presume you didn't tell him?"

"Well... no," he admits.

"So try looking at it from his point of view. He'd met someone he thought was interested, invested a good hour of the evening talking to you, only for you to not only snub him, but apparently lie about it to his face, too. It probably looked as though you were leading him or something."

"Oh," mumbles Ron, now looking about as red-faced as I have ever seen him, "Yeah, I see what you mean."

I shake my head. "I can't believe we're even having this conversation."

"Nor can I, let's talk about something else."

I ignore him. "So that was your sole attempt to chat up girls, was it?"

He gives a rueful smile. "Well, I did get talking to this Japanese girl… I thought I was doing really well 'til she stood up and I realised she was only about four foot ten. Seriously, I felt like Hagrid."

I burst out laughing and he grins. "Well, I'm glad you think it's funny. My spectacular failure with women."

"It's not funny, Ron. It's wonderful. I'm glad. Although the thought of the terrified expression on your face surrounded by a load of sweaty gay men with their tops off... now that is funny..."

"It wasn't because they were gay," he protests, "It was because they were naked and sweaty. They'd shake their hair about and the sweat would fly all over the place, it was disgusting."

"So you didn't take your shirt off, then?"

"No, I did not! Come on, Hermione, you've seen me without my shirt on before, it's not something innocent members of the public should be subjected to."

"Oh, I don't know..."

He smiles slightly. "Anyway, they had those funny lights that show up everything white, like bits of fluff on your clothes and girls' bras. Or me with my shirt off. I'd have been lit up like a Christmas tree."

When I have stopped laughing I shake my head and ask, "So Anna was giving you pulling advice, was she?"

"Sort of. She's a bit more upfront than me, though, so I don't know how useful it was. She'd just go up to some bloke she liked the look of and start talking to him, and I'd never do that. Not without a few drinks in me first, anyway. I suppose it's easier if you're a girl."

"Not necessarily."

"Well, it's easier for Anna, anyway. It's ridiculous, we went to a gay nightclub and out of the three of us, me, her and Adam - two blokes, one actually gay - the straight girl was the only one who pulled."

I stare at him. "What, she got off with someone?"

"Not just got off with, actually went home with. I was asleep on her sofa about two hours later when she came in and she told me all about it. Unfortunately."

We are both silent for a few seconds.

"See?" he says pointedly, "Would she have done that if she fancied me?"

I remain silent.

"Exactly!" he says, with an air of triumph, as though that's the last word on the matter.

---

I am not so sure myself. And anyway, this was nearly three months ago, it's entirely possible that she didn't fancy him then but has realised she does since. A lot can happen in three months. Maybe that four days he spent at her house after the argument with Ginny was the bonding experience that brought them together. Seeing her literally rush to his defence earlier was something of a wake-up call. It's more than just that she fancies him. I think she might actually be in love with him. Of course, I would never tell him that. He wouldn't believe me, for a start. He'd think it was just me being jealous again. And besides, based on bitter experience, that's something he's never going to work out for himself unless she admits it to his face. I cross my fingers in my pocket that she gets those extra shifts at the shelter she's been wanting so badly.

---

"Did you tell her?" I ask, trying to keep my tone light.

"Tell who?"

"Anna!"

"About what?"

I just raise my eyebrows at him and he instantly stops pretending he doesn't know what I'm talking about.

"No, I didn't tell her! Why the fuck would I tell her? What was I supposed to say? Oh hi, Anna, by the way, my girlfriend thinks you fancy me? I don't think so."

"Well, you must have said something... didn't she ask why you were there?"

"She doesn't fancy me, Hermione," he says stubbornly, "I'm not that irresistible."

I can only shrug.

He shakes his head. "I don't know what your problem is. Anna likes you."

"No, she doesn't. She's just pretending she does so I look bad next to her."

He sighs and rubs his eyes, wearily. "Do you know what she said about you, the first time she met you?"

My insides constrict unpleasantly. "What?" I ask, weakly.

"She said you were much classier than she expected!" He beams at me, as though this is somehow a massive compliment.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

His smile wavers. "What?"

"What had you been saying about me that led her to believe I wouldn't be classy?"

He looks horrified. "No, that's not - you've got the wrong end of the stick! She meant you are classy, that's what she meant. Just because, you know, she knew me, so she obviously didn't expect I'd have managed to pull someone like you, that's all."

"Pull?"

"Go out with, then."

"Stop digging, Ron, you're making it worse."

"No, no, she meant because, you know, I'm like a three and you're an eight -"

"I'm a what?"

He looks uncertain. "You're an eight. You know, out of ten."

I can't decide whether to be pleased that he thinks I'm an eight, or offended that I'm being measured in this way.

"So what's Anna?"

"What?"

"If I'm an eight, what would you say Anna is?"

He opens his mouth and closes it again quickly. "Anna's a seven," he says, just a fraction of a second too late.

I shake my head. "Nice try. Anna's obviously a nine."

He doesn't say anything for a few long seconds then he sighs. "Give me a break, Hermione, I'm trying here."

"What, by marking me out of ten?"

"No, that was just - I'm trying to say, Hermione, that I know I'm punching above my weight with you. That's what Anna meant, she just meant, she didn't expect someone like me to have a girlfriend like you. You're, you know, classy, and I'm... well, me..."

I have finally run out of objections. "Well...thank you," I say, grudgingly.

"You're a hard person to pay a compliment to, you know that?"

"I know. I'm sorry. Mum says I should take things more at face value and not analyse them so much."

He holds his hands up in mock-defence. "I'm saying nothing."

We smile awkwardly at each other then look quickly away.

"You're not a three, Ron."

He raises his eyebrows at me as if to say "Yeah, right".

"And I'm certainly not an eight, although it was nice of you to say I am. I really think I'm more of a five, to be honest."

Two can play the self-deprecation game, Mister.

"No way are you a five," he says, automatically. "I'm more like a five…"

"Well, if you're a five and I'm a five, I reckon that makes the two of us together a perfect ten…"

He laughs out loud. "I knew there was a reason I asked you out!"

"Because I can count?"

"For your brilliant mind, of course."

"Well, I hope that wasn't the only reason…"

"No, there were, uh, a couple of other good reasons too…"

"Leave my gently rolling hills out of it, please," I say, primly.

He chuckles. "Must I?" he asks, in a wistful voice.

I slap his arm lightly, and we both laugh, then I remember the reason we are here, all the things I promised myself I'd say.

"Ron…" I say, tentatively, "About Anna…"

His face clouds over immediately. "What about her?"

"I just need to explain some things."

"Do you?"

"Yes!"

He just shrugs and folds his arms defensively across his chest.

I take a deep breath. "When I met Anna… the moment I met her I knew she liked you. I knew I had competition. You probably didn't even notice, but that first week I went out and spent an absolute fortune on new sheets and scented candles and sexy underwear -"

He bristles. "Well, I didn't ask you to! I don't care about all that stuff, you know I don't!"

"Yes, I know, I just... I suppose I just felt as though I wasn't enough for you anymore, on my own."

His mouth falls open in shock. "What? Why?"

"Because I messed everything up so badly and why would you still want me after that, when you could get an Anna? She's smart and beautiful and funny -"

He throws his hands up in frustration. "Oh, for fuck's - we've been through all this, Hermione! I told you, you're all of those things!"

"Yes, but she didn't dump you and ruin your life, did she?"

He opens his mouth to retort, and then clamps it shut again. Apparently even he can't think of an answer to that one.

"You see? You see why I was so scared? And then that Sunday in the pub -"

"Oh, Christ, not this again!"

"Just let me finish! That Sunday in the pub… OK, I admit, I'd had a couple of glasses of wine, and I was a bit wound up because you were late, but it wasn't just that… I wanted to spend time with you, not all your friends as well."

He sighs, wearily. "Hermione... apart from work and Quidditch I've hardly left your bloody house in over a month. I couldn't have spent any more time with you if we were glued together."

"Yes, but... I know that, but... That's not the point! I wanted to spend time with you, and from the moment she arrived, you hardly looked in my direction for the rest of the afternoon!"

"That's not true -"

"Yes, it is, Ron! You and Anna with your little in-jokes and teasing… I might as well have not been there, for all the attention you paid me!"

I am aware that I sound like a sulky child whose feelings have been hurt, but I cannot help myself. I fold my arms angrily across my chest.

"You made it quite obvious that you didn't want me there, Ron, and I could only think of one reason why that might be."

"Fine!" he snaps. "Yes, okay, you're right. But not for the reason you think. If you'd bothered to make an effort with Anna, I wouldn't have minded that you wanted to come too. But no, you just sat there with a face like a wet weekend and hardly said a word all bloody afternoon, except to make snide little remarks about how I'm afraid of spiders or how shit the team is! Every time I tried to talk to you, you bit my head off, you could hardly be bothered to be polite to my friend, and when you did talk to her, you just went on for ages about gorgeous Vicky and his big, strong arms! You tell me, Hermione, is it any wonder I didn't want you to come after that?"

I stare at him, tears pricking the back of my eyes. Oh, God, that's exactly what I did.

"You just didn't want to look bad in front of her," I mutter, guiltily.

"It's not about her... Oh, God, you really don't get it, do you? This is my thing, these are my friends, this is the one thing I've got that is just mine, Hermione. Not yours, not Harry's, not any other sodding member of my family's. Mine!"

He jumps to his feet and starts pacing angrily back and forth in front of the bench.

"Quidditch keeps me sane, Hermione! For a couple of hours a week I don't have to think about you, or the fact that I live with my sister, or what a total fucking mess I've made of my life, I can just whack the shit out of a ball with a bloody great bat for a couple of hours and that makes me feel a million times better! But you couldn't even let me have that, could you? No, you had to go and ruin it, just like you ruined everything else!"

I stare at him, aghast. "I've ruined it? How?"

"Because every single person in my life, Hermione, knows you too. All my friends, my family, my workmates... I don't suppose that even crossed your mind, did it? When you walked out on me? This was the one place I could go where I don't have to talk about it if I don't want to, where people aren't tip-toeing around the subject all the bloody time, where I could just come and have a drink and a laugh and not have to think about you. I can just be Ron; I don't have to be Poor Ron Who Hermione Dumped. So thanks for that, now I suppose I'm gonna have to find a new set of friends who don't think of me as that pathetic loser who keeps getting dumped by the same fucking girl!"

"Nobody thinks -"

"Shut up, I'm talking!"

I am shocked into silence.

He takes a deep, calming breath. "And Anna… Anna is the only person I can be myself with. She doesn't keep reminding me about you when I just want to forget about it all. She doesn't treat me like I might chuck myself under a bus at any minute. If it wasn't for her and the other guys on the team -"

"She's not a guy, Ron!"

"I know she's not, I'm just saying… I'm just trying to explain that she's been good for me, Hermione! She's got me out of the house, she gets me to try new things, she makes me laugh… she makes me feel normal again… Why the hell would I ruin that by trying to get off with her?"

I can only shrug helplessly. "I'm sorry."

"I know you're sorry!" he spits, "You're always fucking sorry!"

"Ron!" I protest, shocked.

"Oh… fuck off!"

"I can't argue with you when you're like this, Ron."

"Oh, I don't know, you seem to be doing a pretty good job!"

"Fine," I say, and I can hear my voice shaking, "If that's what you want, that's what I'll do. But just in case that's not what you want, and you're just saying that because you're angry with me, I'm going to sit here on this bench for five minutes first, OK? Then if you still want me to - to fuck off - I will. You never have to see me again."

We stare at each other, him breathing hard, his whole face tense with anger, his hands clenched into fists by his sides.

"I'm going for a walk," he says abruptly, and without another word turns on his heel and strides away across the Heath.

---

I sit and wait for him to come back for five minutes, six minutes, seven… I am certain he will come back once he's calmed down - I know him, after all - but the doubts are starting to creep in. Nine minutes, ten, eleven…

---

Finally, after twelve of the longest minutes of my life, I see a familiar flash of red hair approaching through the late evening gloom. He is walking slowly, painfully slowly, back to me, his hands shoved deep in his pockets and his head bent, eyes firmly fixed on the ground. He sits down beside me on the bench, and for almost a full minute neither of us speaks.

---

"I'm sorry I shouted at you," he mumbles, finally.

"That's quite alright," I say, with as much dignity as I can muster. "I'm sorry I made you that angry."

There is a long silence. I wait for him to speak, but he doesn't say anything.

"Do you know how much it hurts to hear you say that Anna is the only person you can be yourself with?"

"I meant these last six months," he mumbles, "Before me and you got back together. That's all I meant."

"Do you talk to her about us?"

He shifts uncomfortably in his seat. "Not really."

I am unconvinced, and I think he knows it.

"I just… sometimes I just need someone else to talk to that isn't you, Hermione. You can understand that, can't you? Me and Harry… we don't really talk anymore. Not about you, anyway. Not about much of anything, to be honest."

"Well..." I say, hesitantly, "Could you at least try and talk to me about things? Don't you think maybe that's been our problem these last few weeks? Neither of us has been straight with one another; we've just been bottling up our feelings. And that's not us. That's never been us."

Ron just shrugs.

"Look," I sigh, "I know you said that sometimes honesty isn't the best policy, and I do understand what you mean, but I really think that us being completely truthful with each other is the only way this is going to work. I'm not going to keep anything back from you, not my worst fears, my doubts, anything."

I take a deep breath. "My name's Hermione and I'm a jealous girlfriend."

He laughs out loud, then realises I'm not joking, stops himself abruptly and averts his eyes from my gaze. Finally he just says, quietly, "Okay".

"And I know you said you didn't want to hear any more apologies, either, so this is the last time I'm going to say it, but I am sorry, Ron. I don't have any excuse for my behaviour, except that from the second you came back I realised how much I needed you, and how empty my life had been without you. The thought that I might lose you again... I know it was irrational, but it didn't feel like it at the time. You have to understand; I didn't know what you felt about things because you didn't want to talk about anything."

"I'm not saying it's your fault," I add, hastily, when he shows every sign of objecting, "I suppose I just let my imagination run riot. When I met Anna... your relationship with her just seemed so free and easy compared to what we were going through. You had all these little in-jokes and references to people and places I didn't know. I was jealous, I admit it. You got on so well, you made me feel like the outsider. And I don't care whether you believe me or not, but she does like you. Women can just tell. It's how I knew Lavender liked you before you did. It's why I was so angry with you. I was sure you must know. It just seemed so obvious. It was fear, too. I was terrified you would choose her over me and I'd be left alone again."

"It was never a case of choosing, Hermione. She's not… she's just my friend, that's all. I've never thought of her as anything else."

"But you can see, can't you, why I felt like I did? I always thought I was the only one you wanted and now there's Luna and Linda and Lavender and Anna… it's not just me anymore..."

He stares at me for a few seconds, then he runs a hand through his hair wearily and sighs. "How many times do I have to tell you it's always been you? It's been you since I was fourteen years old, Hermione. It's been you for so long I can't even remember when it wasn't you. And besides, I'm twenty-six. I've had one proper girlfriend. I've - you know - with two women. I'm not exactly going for some kind of record here, you know. And in case you haven't noticed, you're up to four yourself."

I frown. "What do you mean?"

"Well..." - he counts on his fingers - "Vicky, McLaggen -"

"That was one drunken kiss at a party!"

"Linda was one drunken kiss in a pub."

I start to protest, but then have to concede the point.

Ron resumes counting. "Vicky, McLaggen, me..." He glances up at me pointedly. "Jeff..."

"Jeff?" I am slightly dazed. "I thought you didn't care about Jeff?"

"Of course I care about him! What, are you nuts?"

"You never mentioned anything!"

"What was I gonna say? 'Um, Hermione, you know that bloke you didn't sleep with around the time I was shagging Luna...?'"

He has a point. "Well, yes... okay..."

He shakes his head in disbelief. "I can't believe you thought I didn't care about him. After Krum and McLaggen!"

"That was a long time ago."

"So? I'm still me."

I just stare at him blankly.

He throws up his hands in frustration. "Oh, my God! Why d'you think I came to pick you up from work that time?"

"What do you mean?"

"I wanted to see what the bastard looked like! Christ, Hermione, for someone who's supposed to be smart, you can't half be thick sometimes..."

But a slow smile is spreading across my face. "You do care..."

He rubs his face wearily. "Of course I care... I wish I didn't sometimes, but there you go."

Feeling giddily reckless with happiness and relief, I take his face in my hands and plant a big wet kiss in the centre of his forehead.

He looks bemused. "What was that for?"

"Being jealous of Jeff."

To his credit, he laughs. "You are nuts. I'll remind you of this next time."

"There won't be a next time."

"There better bloody not be."

"I'm sorry," I tell him, sheepishly, "I should have realised."

"Yeah, well..." He shrugs. "We should both have realised."

We catch each other's eye and start laughing at the ridiculousness of it all, of us.

---

Is that it? I ask myself, relief flooding my body. Is the argument over? Is it too soon to ask him? 'Come home with me.' Maybe it is too soon, but that doesn't mean I want this evening to end. I don't want to let him go yet. I don't want to let him go at all.

---

If I hadn't left, if the last two years had never happened... we'd be walking home down Highgate Hill about now, back to our little flat. Ron would put the kettle on and run himself a bath, and I'd change into my pyjama trousers and slippers, just like we always used to. We'd spend the evening doing all those boring Sunday night things, like ironing our work clothes (me) and making our sandwiches for the next day (him), and be tucked up in bed - asleep - by half past ten. Boring? Maybe so, but if I had a Time-Turner I know where I'd rather be right now, what I'd rather be doing.

"Shall we go and look at our old flat?" I ask, hopefully, "Since we're in the area. It might be nice to see it again."

"Um…" He frowns, and I remember too late that his memories of the flat are not such happy ones.

"We don't have to."

"No," he says, in a tone that suggests it's just about the last thing in the world he wants to do, "No, if that's what you want. I don't mind."

---

Ron gets quieter and quieter the closer we get to the flat, and I wish I had not suggested it. Reminding him of things he might otherwise wish to forget was perhaps not the best idea in retrospect. And I had forgotten how dirty and noisy Archway is. The same group of drunks hanging around the tube station necking cans of cheap cider and trying to cadge spare change from passers-by. The same heady mix of traffic fumes and dirt and overflowing rubbish bins and unpleasant food smells. I brought someone who hates London to one of the busiest, noisiest, dirtiest parts of the city. It was nice on the Heath, quiet, peaceful. We should have stayed there.

---

Ron has stopped to examine a bright yellow police scene of crime sign outside the tube station. A stabbing.

"Did you see anything?" he reads aloud, "No, thank Christ, I was two hundred miles away."

We both stare at the sign, suddenly depressed, and then at each other.

"Let's not go and look at the flat," he pleads. "I don't want to see it. Let's just… go somewhere else."

I nod. "Okay," I say, relieved. I don't feel much like stirring up old - bad - memories either.

I watch all the people streaming in and out of the tube station and a long-forgotten question makes its way to the forefront of my mind.

"What were you doing on the tube?"

"The tube?" he repeats, confusedly. "I wasn't on the tube, what are you talking about?"

I flush. "Oh, yes, I know. I'm sorry. It was just… something you said a few weeks ago…"

He raises his eyebrows quizzically and I stumble on, wishing I had not spoken the thought out loud.

"You said... you said there was a time you... you burst into tears on the tube. No, wait!" – for I can see him tense straight away and the way his face clouds over and his jaw clenches - "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to pry, I just... I wondered why you were on the tube, that's all. You never get the tube."

"Does it matter?"

"No, of course - I just wanted - it wasn't about that… it was just…"

I speed up, tripping over my words in my hurry to explain. "Last July, when I heard about the bombs going off in London… that's the only reason I asked."

I hear myself give a nervous laugh. "This stupid woman Claire came into my office that morning and told me that some bombs had gone off on the tube, and a lot of people had been killed. Some bombs! And even though I knew you never used public transport, and there was no chance whatsoever of you having been caught up in it, my first thought was still of you…"

"You can't have been that worried," he mutters, testily, "Or you'd have sent me an owl."

"I sent Harry one. Asking if everyone was alright, but it was you I was thinking of. I couldn't relax until I heard from him."

He is silent, apparently mollified by my explanation.

"Were you on the tube that day?"

He shakes his head. "It happened in the morning rush hour, didn't it? I had an early meeting over at the Tornados ground, so I didn't know anything about it 'til I got back to the office that afternoon, and someone told me to just go home again. They closed the Ministry."

"They closed it? Why?"

He shrugs. "I suppose a lot of people have Muggle relatives, so they needed to make sure they were okay. There are no phones in the Ministry either, of course, so anyone who needed to contact a Muggle friend or relative had to leave the building to do it. They shut down the whole London transport network, and I think they must have closed the schools as well, because quite a lot of people had to leave to pick up their kids and take them home. A few of us who didn't have people we were worried about stayed on for a while, but then we thought we might as well just go home too."

He shakes his head in a kind of horrified awe. "It was really weird being out on the street. All the shops, all the offices, everything was shut. No cars, no buses, no taxis, no traffic at all. No planes flying overhead, even. I've never seen London so quiet. Everyone was just walking, trying to get home. I walked home myself, actually."

"Why?"

A shrug. "I don't know, I suppose I just wanted to be part of it like everyone else. Hear what people were saying, find out what had happened. And it was the middle of the afternoon so it wasn't like I had anywhere to be."

We are silent for several minutes after that, the mood now a sombre one, and then I remember how we came to be talking about this in the first place.

"So what were you doing on the tube?"

He gives an unhappy shrug. "I dunno. It was just a way of killing time, that's all. I didn't want to go home, but I didn't want to be in the pub either, so I used to just get on the Circle Line and go round and round… for hours, sometimes."

He falls silent for a few moments, lost in the memory, then seems to remember I am there, and forces himself back to the present.

"I only did it for a few weeks," he says, defensively. "It's not a great place to be when you're… not feeling your best. Too many people, bad air, bad light... Sometimes I'd read the newspapers people had left on the seats, sometimes I'd just sit there and try not to think about what a total mess my life was. Hence, the bursting into tears. People don't want to see that on the tube. They move away from you. I don't blame them, I'd probably be the same myself. They just want to shut out all the madness and get home as soon as possible. There are some seriously fucked up people on public transport. I saw a lot of arguments. Some actual fights, even. Saw a really drunk bloke in a suit nearly fall under a train. And a lot of dirt, and vomit, and mad people shouting. If I wasn't depressed at the start of those three weeks, I sure as hell was afterwards."

He sighs, heavily. "Kind of reminded me why I hate London, in fact."

We both stare at the police scene of crime sign.

"Do you think it was them?" he asks, randomly.

I am confused. "Who?"

He gestures towards the sign. "Those kids that mugged me. The stabbing."

"I don't know," I say, helplessly, "It's not very likely. It was six years ago, after all."

"Yeah," he says, distractedly. "I wonder about that sometimes."

A jolt goes through me. He still thinks about it? "You… you do?"

"Yeah. You know, all the other people they probably mugged after me. They were fourteen or fifteen then, they'd be about twenty now… chances are they'd have moved on from sticking up strangers with a kitchen knife."

I don't know what to say. He's probably right, but I don't want to admit it.

"I should have stopped them," he says, quietly.

"No, you shouldn't!"

"Yeah, I should. If I could have just got to my wand in time I could have scared them off. Maybe even stopped them doing it again."

"Ron, you had a twelve inch kitchen knife against your stomach, don't be ridiculous! There was nothing you could have done that wouldn't have been stupidly dangerous! The second you went for your wand, they'd have - they'd -"

But I can't finish the sentence. The thought of what might have happened is too horrifying to contemplate. The bright yellow police scene of crime sign in front of us is a stark enough reminder.

"Ron," I say, urgently, "I don't want to move back here. I think we should get a flat together, somewhere new. Maybe in the country. Somewhere with no memories for either of us. I think it's what we need. A fresh start."

He stares at me, his expression unreadable. "Are you sure?"

"Absolutely. I think it's the right thing to do."

He is silent for a few seconds, apparently thinking, and then he says, "Would you move to Devon?"

"Yes, I would. I'd go anywhere with you."

"Could we get a dog?"

I laugh out loud, high on possibility. "We can get two, if you want!"

He frowns, for some reason, and looks away from me again, burying his face in his hands and screaming quietly into them. A few muttered swearwords escape his lips. I watch him, not understanding.

"Ron...?" I ask, fearfully.

He takes his hands away and turns to face me, still not quite able to meet my eyes.

"Look... I know I should have said this earlier, but... I've been thinking about this too. I've been thinking about it a lot, in fact. And it's not that I don't want to, you know, eventually, but... I just think it's too soon. I think -"

He takes a deep breath and forces himself to meet my gaze.

"I think we need to work this out, ah, separately..."

And just like that, my little dream breaks clear in two.

---

A/N: Alright, yes, I AM evil, I admit it! Sorry! But I had to split this chapter somewhere, and as I've said before, I do love a good cliffhanger.

By the way, that Ned Astley song is annoyingly catchy. I've not been able to get it out of my head for days, and have had to be very careful not to accidentally sing the words out loud. (Well, it would be hard to explain that one away at work!)

OK, so now there really IS only one more chapter to go... (Yes, really. I wrote the last paragraph months ago, so I know exactly how this is going to end) I'd love to know your ideas on what's going to happen. You'll be wrong, of course, but it would be fun to hear them…

Review, review, review!

PB x