Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or any of the characters.

A/N: Thanks to ObsessedRHShipper, who is beta-ing this story.

Chapter Thirty-Six

The Truth

Hours later, Ron came home with a loud pop that indicated that he was drunk, though the fact that he was stumbling around the flat proved that too. When he spotted Hermione on the couch with a book in her hand, he smiled and said, "Hey Mione."

Hermione had to stare at the book she had, not having read a word of it, to make sure that she didn't show any of the pain or worry she had been going through in the hours that she waited for him. Instead, she concentrated on the considerable anger she was feeling and finally looked up to glare at him. "Where have you been?"

"I went to the pub," Ron shrugged and laughed as if he thought that should have been obvious.

"I've been waiting for you for hours, Ronald," Hermione said in her deadly even voice that seemed to cut through Ron's drunken stupor for a moment. "I asked you to come home after work."

"Sorry," Ron said, quickly getting upset at her last comment. "Seamus told me a bunch of the guys were going to go to the pub to listen to the Puddlemere - Cannons match; someone had to go and represent the Cannons!"

Hermione put the hurt she felt that he would rather be with a bunch of drunken idiots than her aside, but she couldn't ignore the pain she felt that he didn't even care to tell her that he wasn't coming home. "Why didn't you send me an owl to tell me that you wouldn't be here?"

"I figured you wouldn't have been home anyway," Ron shrugged, walking into the kitchen to get himself something to drink, not sure if it was going to be another beer or just water.

"I told you that I was going to come home at five," Hermione pointed out coldly.

"Yeah … but you usually have to work late even if you plan on coming home at five," Ron said from the kitchen; he could smell the aroma of the meal she must have made there, but could not see any other evidence of it. He knew that he had reacted badly to this whole situation, but he had been so angry after work; he knew that he was going to say something stupid, so he wanted to have a few drinks first so he could calm down. Then the game was on and he got absorbed and tried to convince himself that Hermione wouldn't really have minded anyway. In the past, she had never been upset when he stayed out late; although he knew today was different, he was too upset to care.

Now, however, he knew that it was wrong of him to avoid this and that he probably just made things worse. He grabbed the purple potion that was in one of the cabinets and drank it, sobering him from the fogginess that he had drunk himself into purposely that evening. He turned around to find Hermione in the doorway of the kitchen; her arms were crossed and a scowl was on her face.

"I've always owled you when I knew I was going to work late and I've never worked late after telling you that I would be home!" she hissed at him and Ron winced. His head was pounding; it was something that was going to go away in a few minutes but was really bad right now.

"It's nice that you can take the high ground, isn't it? You always like to be right," Ron muttered. He hadn't wanted her to hear that, but, of course, she did.

"High ground … you're the one that purposely …" Hermione started to say with her voice becoming shrill at the injustice of that statement. He was the one that had avoided her … hurt her by not coming home.

"Do you think that tonight is the only problem we've got?" Ron questioned. He got close to her with his eyes sparkling with fury. He was such an idiot for allowing her to have this opening when he wanted to be angry. He could hardly keep the scowl on his face as he saw the pain in her eyes. He wanted to comfort her, and tell her that he was sorry and would never do this again, but he couldn't. His pride wouldn't let him, not to mention he was sure that if he just gave in now things would only get worse. He was going to find out why she was pushing him away… one way or another, this problem was going to be solved.

"No," Hermione answered softly this time, bowing her head.

"Do you think that I haven't realized what you've been doing for months now?" Ron then questioned, and she looked at him confused. Ron felt more upset at the fact that she didn't know what he was talking about so he spat out the answer, "You've been going to work so much because you want to avoid me!"

Hermione gasped. Her eyes went wide because she had thought that he hadn't noticed her lack of appearance at all, let alone realized that she had been doing it on purpose.

"Don't bother with that shocked expression," Ron huffed, walking into the living room so he could pace and trying to control the anger that was threatening to spill over. It was a losing battle. "You can't deny that you've been hiding behind your job … working a hundred fucking hours and getting a million things done …. when I know that you don't have to do them.

"Then when you fucking do come home, you can't even fucking look me in the eye!" Ron threw up his hands in frustration, giving up on the pacing and walking towards Hermione again. "Then suddenly this morning, I'm fucking desirable again … you can just ditch work at the snap of finger as if it doesn't even matter. If that's true, then why the fuck haven't you been home!"

Hermione felt cold inside; she was not really grasping all that Ron was saying, but knew that she had been handling everything wrong. "I …" she had tried to say, but Ron was still shouting and couldn't hear her.

"... so yeah, I went out tonight … I'm not at your beck and fucking call for whenever you feel that itch that you can't scratch."

Hermione now felt that she had been slapped in the face; a cold fury was going over her as she heard what he thought that morning was about. While she had felt that it had held promise, he thought that she was just shagging him because she felt the need. "If that's what you think of me, it sounds like I'm a pretty bad girlfriend … why do you bother even putting up with me?" she questioned in her deadly voice.

"I don't know," Ron muttered dejectedly.

Hermione felt all the anger drain from her as those words hit her ears; her arms that had been crossed fell towards the floor because she was unable to hold them up anymore. Her heart sunk to her stomach and the tears that she had wanted to shed all night started to brim in her eyes. He didn't want her. "You … you don't love me anymore," the question escaped her lips before she could stop them … she was too numb from his words to filter her thoughts.

Ron sighed, his hand reaching out to comfort her, but he couldn't move. "Of course, I still love you," he said softly. It was killing him to see the pain she was going through, but he still couldn't move.

She looked up at him; the numbness she felt was punctuated by what he had just said. "You don't think that's a reason?"

"Sometime love is not enough," Ron mumbled, and felt his own heart break at the words. He knew that he wasn't making her happy for months now, and he'd been miserable as well.

"So you don't love me enough," she nodded her head as if she should have expected that answer. Her voice was hollow of all emotions and he knew that she was shutting down.

"You're questioning my love, when you're the one that's been pushing away from me?" Ron asked incredulously, immune for a moment to her pain because of the shock. "You've been avoiding me by working. You've been refusing to tell me what's bothering you until I finally gave up asking. You can't even bring yourself to kiss me anymore … and now you're questioning the love I have for you?"

Hermione looked at him in shock. Sure, she had been going to work more, but she told him about every problem she had. Well, except for the fact that she was waiting for him to ask her to marry him… becoming more depressed when he hadn't … starting to question if he really wanted to …

"Crap," Hermione hissed at herself as the tears really started to flow down her cheeks as she realized that this was her own stupid fault. Of course, Ron would notice her growing wariness and react to it in his own way. She took a step towards him and leaned her head against his chest. She could tell that he was confused by her movements, because he didn't wrap his arms around her, although he did put his hands on her waist. "You're the one that hasn't kissed me anymore," Hermione countered again without thinking. "For the last week you've stopped before we even get started …"

"How can I kiss you when I can feel that you're reluctant to?" Ron questioned softly this time. He wasn't sure what was going on, but he could feel that she was starting to open up to him again.

"I was waiting for you to initiate things," Hermione mumbled in his shoulder in admittance.

"You … what?" Ron said moving his hands up to her upper arms so that he could push her away and look into her eyes.

"I thought that you didn't want me anymore," she whispered in a small voice, hating the look of pain that filled Ron's eyes as she said that.

"Why?" Ron questioned, trying to think of something he did that might make her think that, but he couldn't come up with anything. She shook her head, not wanting to answer his question. He felt like forcing her to tell him, but he knew somehow he shouldn't do that right now. Instead, he looked into her eyes and said as firmly as he could. "Never question the love I have for you. I want you in every way."

"Forever?" Hermione questioned.

"Hermione, I've told you this," Ron said exasperated now. "As soon as you walked into my life, you became my life. All my plans … everything … you're everything to me."

Tears were now flowing freely from her eyes and he cupped her cheek to wipe them away only for more tears to come. She felt so horrible for putting him through all this. Why had she let her old insecurities get to her when she did know that he felt this way?

"I'm so sorry, Ron," she cried, burying her head in his chest again and this time his arms wrapped around her. "I'm been such an idiot. I just thought that … and I didn't want to…" She couldn't think of what to say before she stepped back yet again and looked him in the eyes. "You know that's what I want too … right. I want everything you just said and more."

Ron smiled at her… more like beamed at her, and then kissed her soundly.

O

Their limbs were tangled together as they breathed contentedly in each other's arms. "I wish I had said something sooner," Ron sighed, "We've been so miserable because I just let it go …"

"No, Ron. This was my fault," Hermione sighed.

"I know," Ron chuckled. It wasn't often that she admitted she was wrong, but she had said this more than once already; she must really have felt bad. He was still wondering what had happened that made her doubt him. "Hermione … are you going to tell me?"

"Tell you?" Hermione questioned as innocently as she could, but she couldn't pull it off. She knew what he was talking about, but she still didn't think she should tell him.

"Why did you come to the conclusion that I didn't want you?" Ron questioned, unable to keep all the hurt he felt that she could believe that after everything he said and did to show the opposite.

"It's nothing," Hermione shook her head. "You don't have to worry … I'm not going to doubt it ever again."

"That's not what I'm worried about," Ron grumbled, hating that she still wouldn't tell him. "I just want to know what I did to make you think that," he pleaded this time.

"Ron … you didn't do anything," Hermione said miserably again while stroking his cheek, "I've just …. Well, I was waiting … er … I'll just have to be patient," she stumbled trying to think of how best to say this, but was sure that she didn't do it well.

"Patient?" Ron questioned looking into her eyes and trying to put all the pieces of together. "You've been waiting … for me … to …" he said slowly still trying to think of what she was saying and Hermione's eyes widened before she lowered her head into his chest. "Question our future?" he was now muttering and then gasped. Without thinking, without even making sure that his thought forming in his head was right … not even sure how he came up with the conclusion … he blurted out, "You wanted me to ask you to marry me!"

"What?" Hermione said looking up; her eyes were wide and she gave a forced giggle. "No … that's not it," she lied feebly. "I …"

"That is it," Ron said finding it hard to breath. "You're a horrible liar, Mione."

"I'm not ly-," Hermione tried to protest again, but Ron wouldn't hear any of it.

"How long?" he demanded. "How long have you been waiting for me?"

"I …" she was going to try to lie again, but she knew there was no point. "When Harry and Ginny announced their engagement," she mumbled.

"That was more eight months ago!" Ron gasped, now starting to realize why she might have thought something was wrong when she had been waiting so long for him to ask her to marry him. However, he never thought that she would have been ready so soon. They were only twenty-four and he thought she wanted to establish her career more before getting married. He thought he had another year at least before she would want that. "And you've just been waiting for me to say something?" he finally asked, trying to gather his thoughts.

"Well, not just waiting, I've been trying to give you hints," Hermione said. When he looked at her, she listed as many as she could remember leaving for him and Ron groaned.

"That's what all that was about," Ron shook his head. "I had no idea."

"I've noticed," Hermione sighed and then started laughing uncontrollably.

"What's so funny?" Ron asked, smiling before she could even answer.

"Only you could make months' worth of fretting feel so ridiculous in one conversation." Hermione shook her head and then leaned up to cup his face, looking into his eyes with all the love she felt right now, "Only you could make me feel this good after being an idiot for so long."

"That's good to know," Ron returned her look, before he pulled her down for a deep, sensual kiss.

Hermione pulled away much too soon for either of their liking, because she had to ask one more question before she could enjoy this moment fully. "Ron … what does this mean?"

"Mean?" Ron repeated, not sure he was following what she was asking.

"You know what I want now … I know what you want …" she tried to come up with a way to say this, now deciding to just say it bluntly, "are we enga..."

"No," Ron said before she could finish her question and she looked at him curiously. "Sorry … it's just …" he paused and then smiled, bringing his hand up to cup her face and make circles on her cheek. "I still need to ask you."

She smiled at him knowingly, "Okay."

"What does that smile mean?" Ron questioned.

"I knew you would want to ask," Hermione explained, "I thought for a while that I might ask you myself, but I knew you would want to be the one to do it. Ginny agreed …"

"Ginny knew about this?" Ron groaned.

"I needed someone's advice," Hermione said, "I've never tried to get a boy to marry me before."

"Maybe you should have gone to someone better, since she didn't seem to help you much," Ron pointed out, annoyed that his sister knew this but also happy that Hermione had gone to her. "Why didn't you go to Fleur … aren't you two good friends?"

"Oh, I had her help too," Hermione admitted, "And I wouldn't put their help down so much. I'm sure that their advice would have worked on most people … I just happen to be in love with someone that's really thick."

"Oi!" Ron complained and Hermione laughed, knowing that the serious part of their conversation was over. She also knew that she didn't have anything to worry about anymore and that thought filled her with joy.