Disclaimer: It's Rowling's.
A/N: This is the seventh fic in my series of one-shots inspired by song lyrics I've misheard over the course of my life. The real lyric in this case is "I've seen you walk unafraid" from "City of Blinding Lights" by U2.
Sharing Number 12 Grimmauld Place was a good idea. Ron's financial situation would have forced him back to the Burrow or Shell Cottage otherwise, at least for a little while, and Harry—well. Harry would have been alone. He and Ron both understood why Hermione had decided to go back to Hogwarts and graduate—she was known as the brightest witch of her age for a reason—but it was hard without her, and Harry was sure it would have been even harder if he'd been separated from Ron, too.
It was hardest on nights like this. Auror training had been hard that day; the trainees had been forced to practice resisting the Imperius Curse, and the Unforgivable Curses always gave Harry flashbacks. He and Ron slept in separate rooms; it would have seemed silly to share, given how many bedrooms Grimmauld Place had, but on nights like these Harry wished he'd had the courage to say to hell with silliness, because spending the night alone was awful. But his courage seemed to have died along with Voldemort, and now he was reduced to creeping down the corridor with a lit wand and wishing he'd managed to ask Ron to bunk with him back when they moved into the house.
The door to Ron's room creaked open, and Ron stirred in his bed and then sat up, rubbing his eyes, as Harry walked toward him. A few years ago, he would have slept through someone with a lit wand walking into the dormitory, but then time hadn't been kind to any of them. He slept more lightly now.
"Hmm?" Ron grunted. He blinked his eyes open. "What's going on, mate?"
Harry looked at his feet. "Just nightmares."
"'Bout what?"
"The Imperius Curse."
Ron said, "You know you don't have to do this whole Auror thing, right, mate? Like, people will understand if it's too hard or whatever, and I'll fight them if they don't. You've done enough saving the world for a lifetime."
"So have you, and I don't see you quitting," Harry groused.
Ron held up a hand and started ticking off points on his fingers. "First of all, it's not like I haven't thought about dropping out. And secondly, I haven't been through half the shit you have. I didn't face Quirrell or enter the Chamber of Secrets or compete in the Triwizard Tournament, and I was gone for months last year. I missed Godric's Hollow and tons of miserable camping and all of that. Hell, I was raised by parents who loved me, and you didn't get that after you were a baby. And third, we're all allowed to have different reactions to shit. Even if I'd gone through everything you had and somehow come out fine, it's not like there would be a rule that you had to be fine, too."
"I still feel like I'm failing everybody," Harry admitted, taking a seat on the floor against the wall and leaning his head back, looking up at Ron. "Like I'm breaking when the whole point of me was that I wasn't supposed to break."
"Mate, I've seen you walk on flame," said Ron seriously. "You have never failed me. You're fucking amazing, okay? And I don't mean that you're perfect, because nobody is, but I do mean that you've always given me at least as much as you've owed me, and I think absolutely everyone in the world can say that much about you. And guess what? It doesn't all rest on your shoulders anymore. Voldemort's dead. You killed him. You did it. The big evil is defeated, and what's left is the little stuff. The rest of us can handle it, if you need us to. That's not failing us. And fuck—just about anyone would break after what you've been through. Just let me help make sure it's not irreparable, yeah?"
"Yeah," said Harry, and then: "When have you seen me walk on flame?"
Ron ducked his head. "Okay, maybe not literally. I was thinking of the time the Room of Requirement was burning and you made us go back in there for Malfoy and company. You weren't walking on flame, but you were flying through it, and it was pretty damn impressive. You were the youngest Seeker in a century for a reason."
"Right," said Harry. "I don't remember you being so impressed at the time. 'If we die for them, I'll kill you,' I believe you said."
"Yeah, well, I didn't know if I'd survive it at the time," said Ron.
"Story of my life," Harry replied.
"True," said Ron. "Are you feeling better about this?"
"Yeah," Harry admitted. "Since when did you get smart about this stuff?"
"Since I lived with Bill and Fleur," Ron answered. "They both kind of . . . know things about . . . brains and shit."
"Oh."
"So are you going to be okay? I won't ask you about how you feel about continuing with Auror training right now because I know that's a big decision, but like, do you think you can go back to sleep and go back to training tomorrow?"
"Yeah," said Harry. Then he took a deep breath and said, "Canwesharearoom?"
"Huh?"
"I hate waking up alone in my room," said Harry, quietly but more clearly, staring at the floor. "I got used to the dormitory, and then the tent. And now I have nightmares and then I wake up scared and I'm just . . . alone."
Ron scrambled out of bed and grabbed his wand from his nightstand. "Reckon this'll fit through the door?" he asked, gesturing to his bed.
"Um, maybe?" said Harry. "It would help if we could shrink it, probably."
"Where's Hermione when you need her?" Ron muttered. "Whatever. It's your house. If we bang it up a bit, that's fine, right?"
"Yeah," said Harry. "Probably what Sirius would've wanted, anyway."
Ron cast a hovering charm on the bed and the two of them guided it tentatively through the doorway and down the corridor. Fitting it through the doorway into Harry's room was somehow even harder than getting it out of Ron's room, but they managed. And then there was the matter of moving Harry's bed over a bit so that there was room for Ron's bed with a bit of space in between the two beds.
"Reckon we should try and get some sleep now, yeah?" said Ron once the beds were in place.
"Yeah," said Harry. "Thanks."
"Anytime," said Ron, crawling under his covers and yawning.
That was the best thing about Ron, Harry thought as he got into his own bed. Ron really would move his bed in the middle of the night anytime if Harry asked.