CHAPTER TWENTY ONE

Ron sat awkwardly in the waiting room chairs. He was still angry with his mother and trying to resist the urge to kick the small coffee table in front of him. April was running ten minutes late and it wasn't helping his temper. His mind drifted back to that morning, with his mother fussing over him and going on and on about how he really did need someone with him.

Ron gave up resisting the urge to kick the table and aimed a good swing at it. It made a satisfying bang and shifted over half a foot. The receptionist gave a disproving look and scratched noisily away with a quill. Ron glared at her before pulling the table back to where it was.

The ticking noise of the clock was driving him insane and making every minute feel like five. Eventually April's door swung open and a tall looking wizard stepped out. He had ragged hair that matched his clothes and had clearly been crying.

Two aurors apparated into the room and led the man out. Ron shifted chairs as they went past so he could be as far away from the man as possible. Lilly strolled out the room stuffing a book into her satchel.

"Hello Mr Weasley," She said sarcastically.

"Hi," said Ron distractedly while trying to watch the man walk down the hall through the small window in the door, "Who was that?" he asked.

"Can't tell you." said Lilly, clicking her fingers in front of his eyes, "Which you are well aware of. Anyway she's ready, you can go in now."

Ron huffed and walked into April's office.

"Sorry about the lateness, they were late arriving and, well, it's not his fault the ministry couldn't organise a piss up in a brewery!" Laughed April, holding out a box of cat shaped biscuits. Ron took one and nibbled it's tail, letting the warmth of the cinnamon spread across his tongue.

"Don't do that!" cried April, her eyes widening in alarm.

"What? What have I done?" Asked Ron quickly putting the biscuit back on the table.

"You can't eat it's tail first! That's cruel! You need to bite it's head off." Said April showing him with her own biscuit.

Ron took a deep breath and stuffed the whole biscuit in his mouth at once. "Better?" he snapped through a shower of crumbs.

"Yes much better. Thank you." she said smiling. "Now today we are going to start off with some painting!" she said happily. She waved her wand over a bunch of paint pots and paper.

"Painting?" said Ron, sitting back away from the paints.

"Yes painting."

"But there are no brushes."

"That's what these are for." said April, wiggling her fingers at him and smiling.

Ron looked down at his own fingers without thinking. He sighed. "What do you want me to paint?"

"Anything you want. Someone you've been thinking about, how they make you feel. Happy thoughts and sad thoughts. Anything." said April

He looked down at the paper, it looked scarily white. Ron dipped his finger into a pot of blue paint. He watched it drip back into the pot.

"Do you want some help? I always find the first bit the most difficult." Asked April moving carefully to the seat next to him.

Ron nodded and wiped his finger clean. April made a paw shape with her hand, splatted it in the brown paint and splatted her hand onto the paper. She gave him a big grin and wiped her hand clean.

Ron stared at the blob of paint and found himself thinking of Lacy's hair. He drew out a rough person shape with bright eyes. He worked on using his nails to get finer lines of detail, such as the border of her coat and the way her eye lashes fell against her cheek. It took him over half an hour before he was happy with it.

He held up the picture to examine it. It wasn't half bad, considering he'd done it completely with his fingers. It looked a lot like her, he felt her top should be purple though rather than blue like her hair. There were only a limited amount of colours and the painting looked to blue currently.

Ron dipped his finger into the red paint and moved it towards the painting. He watched as a single drop of paint fell and splashed on the pictures heart. Ron took a deep breath and watched as another drop fell and another. He scooped up more red paint and let it fell on the page. He picked up the paint pot and tipped it over the picture.

Ron and April watched at the paint ran off the picture, on to the table top and then pooled on the floor.

"I don't want to do this any more." he whispered

"Don't want to do what?"

"Hurt people… everyone ends up covered in blood. It's unbelievable how much blood comes out of someone. Fr… Fred died from a head wound, or partly because of a head wound. He was just covered in blood. So was George, he didn't even cut himself but it poured out of him mouth and nose…. There's always so much blood!" Ron cried burying his head in his hands.

April watched his tears drip down onto the pool of paint leaving little clear circles.

"I'm sorry," he sniffed wiping his nose. "I'm being silly."

"No you're not, you're being human. Nothing wrong with that." Said April firmly.

Ron looked at her like she'd grown another head before nodding.

"Ron… who was it that told you that it was 'silly' to cry?" Asked April slowly.

"My mum, to start with. It's not like dad was all that fond of it either." mumbled Ron picking at his fingers.

"Who's the girl in the painting?"

"Her names Lacy, she works for the ministry." Ron smiled at the thought of her.

"Ah yes I've heard of Lacy. She's meant to be a lot like Tonks, isn't she?"

Ron shrugged. "I guess so."

"Did you like her? Tonks I mean." asked April using the toe of her shoe to swirl the paint around the floor.

"No! I mean.. no. She… she was well… she was lot older than me… I mean more...more like a teacher." Spluttered Ron.

April smirked at him. "Really? Well a lot of people have crushes on their teaches at some point. I know Lilly had planned a wedding with her first history teacher."

"Tonks was a family friend, it wouldn't have been right." said Ron slowly, "And mum wanted me to end up with Hermione. She really wants a muggle-born in the family."

"Why?" Asked April looking surprised

"Well, we're a pure-blood family and she doesn't really like that. Thinks it would be better if we had a muggle-born."

April glared at the wall and stabbed her pen at her notebook.

"You OK?" asked Ron slowly.

"Yeah. I'm fine." said April relaxing slightly, "It's just... well it's no different is it? Loving muggle-borns or hating us. It's still making us something we're not; something different! I'm no more or less of a witch than any other!" April crossed her arms over defiantly.

"Well... I don't think they've ever looked at it like that." Said Ron thinking.

April shook herself, "No, people never do." she sighed and waved her wand over the paint on the floor, where it neatly flew back into the pot.

She picked up Ron's picture. The paint had dried now, cracking slightly at the thickness on the paper.

"Do you want to keep this?" She asked holding it out to him.

"Umm yeah, if you don't mind." said Ron.

"Not at all, I think it's a good lesson for you."

Ron looked at her confused.

"Not everything that first looks like blood is. Sometimes when we wait, let things dry, it doesn't look like blood any more."

Ron looked back at the picture. April was right; the paint had kept its brightness whereas blood darkens as it dries. He scraped away the paint covering Lacy's face and stared at it. Maybe what covered her wouldn't be blood. Just paint.