When he thinks about it, he admits that the bad days have been few and far between. Auror training had gone smoothly and he's survived all of his missions with all of his limbs mostly intact. For the most part, the healers at St. Mungo's have had no problem healing the injuries he's accumulated during the past few years, and he's now a patchwork of scars and regrown bones. Hermione would always come rushing to the hospital, throwing open the curtains and glaring at him, and he would always be able to hear the words pouring out of her pretty little mouth before she's even had the opportunity to open it.
"Would it kill you to be a little more careful?" would usually mark the end of her tirade, then she would willingly sink into his arms and whisper to him how scared she'd been. He would always tell her he'd be more careful on the next mission, that it won't happen again, but he knows it's been quite some time since they both last believed those promises.
The bad days have been few and far between ever since the end of the war, and both he and Hermione have slowly learnt to deal with the demons that have followed them. There would be nights that she would wake up screaming, her hand flying to scratch at the scar on her arm. He would stop her, whisper to her that she wouldn't want to irritate the still-healing skin, and then he would mould his body around hers to cocoon her from the world. They would both struggle to go back to sleep, their heads filled with images of the past, of loved ones lost and a youth that had slipped through their fingers without them even having the luxury to notice.
The days following those nightmares would be sombre, the both of them tense due to a combination of sleep deprivation and the weight of the words that remain unspoken. She had tried to explain it to him, the nightmares and something called PTSD, and he believes that he had understood it but only on the surface-level. She had agreed with his sentiment and soon enough he had given up on trying to relate to her trauma and just resolved to comfort her with the words he knows and with the limbs he has.
The bad days have been few and far between, and he has come to appreciate the little things. Yesterday, Hermione had made him a full breakfast; the eggs were just the slightest bit overcooked and they both arrived at work 30 minutes late, but he made sure to thank her properly for her effort. Just this morning his coffee had still been warm when he took his last gulp, and Harry has yet to come to him with any complaints regarding his part of their written report.
He's laughing with Seamus when he sees it. The shock of white-blonde hair is what initially catches his eyes, a colour so unique to the man walking through the doors of their office. He looks every bit the Slytherin git he is, his robes screaming aristocracy and his walk almost the exact replica of his father's. His pointy chin is held high, hands wisely exposed to be empty of a wand, and his eyes blank as they stare right ahead at the door to Robards' office.
Seamus makes to stop the blonde just as he makes to walk past them but he's halted by the glare that Harry throws their way. The blonde continues on his way, nodding at Harry, a gesture that the other man returns much to everyone's confusion. They watch as Robards opens the door and gestures for the blonde to enter, ignoring the way the office has suddenly become quiet for the very first time in years.
He wastes no time—the moment the door closes he's advancing on Harry, eyebrows raised and stride undeterred by the look his best mate is giving him. It's a look he doesn't like, it's the look that tells him he won't appreciate knowing whatever it is he thinks he wants to know.
"What in the blood hell is Draco Malfoy doing here?" he finally voices the question that he knows is running through everyone's head.
For a while Harry doesn't respond, just looks at him while slightly shaking his head.
The bad days have been few and far between, but the words that leave Harry's mouth are enough indication that today would be one of those days.
"He's been approved for Auror training. Reckon he'd be starting tomorrow."
It's one of those things that they can't seem to agree to disagree about, and he isn't willing to rest his case. Hermione is curled up on their old couch, the cushions mismatched and repaired but still comfortable. He suspects that she's only half paying attention to him, her brain focused on the length of parchment paper gripped in her hands.
"I still don't see why you're making such a big deal out of this, Ron," she says, momentarily looking up from whatever passage it is she's reading to give him a pointed look. What she's pointing out to him he has no clue, so he returns her gaze with a disbelieving one of his own.
"It's Draco Malfoy, for Merlin's sake! Have you and Harry both forgotten that he's a slimy Death Eater?" He struggles to keep his voice in check, knowing how much she hates it when he resolves to shouting. "Who in their right mind would trust him to work in the Ministry, much less as an Auror?"
"Have you forgotten that both Harry and I testified for him in court?" she shoots back.
"I do remember that, actually, but I can't say I understand why you two did that," Ron mumbles, looking over her shoulder to read the parchment she's holding. His eyes catch the words Elves and Rights and he immediately turns away, already knowing what it is that's she's working on.
"We've been over this, Ronald. Me, Harry, Ginny, even Neville has told you he understands why we did it." She tosses the parchment paper onto the table in front of her, rising up from the couch and finally facing him. "He was a child. He didn't even want to be marked. He was lowering his wand, Ron, and he didn't identify Harry."
It's the same thing she'd told him the day she testified for the man. Harry had said something about his mum saving them all, and Ginny had taken Harry's side because he's Harry and she's Ginny. Ron can't even remember what Neville said to him, but he knows that the latter agreed with the other three.
"Hermione, he's a bully. He bullied you for years and he called you that foul name! How can you sit there defending him now?"
She rolls her eyes at him and gets up to stalk into the kitchen. The sound of her banging around the room to make coffee grates on his nerves but he keeps his mouth shut, waiting for whatever brilliant excuse she's going to come up with to defend Malfoy. At first the thought had disturbed him, the reminder that she had been the one adamantly insisting that Malfoy wasn't a Death Eater even when he was, and now one of the few people he knows who defends the man. Later on, he decided that it was just like any of her other projects; helping the downtrodden and the ones forgotten by society is what she does best.
He can't always fault her for it. Afterall, her compulsion to help even those who don't want her help (and those who don't deserve it) stems from her compassionate nature, the very aspect of her that he had grown fond of over the years. It's this thought that he holds on to as he watches her walk in with two mugs of steaming tea, the look in her eyes telling him she would have the last say in this argument.
"He may have been a bully, but he's not evil, Ron. Even you have to admit that."
He doesn't reply, only takes the proffered mug and gulps down the scalding tea that has far too much honey and not enough milk.
"Do you reckon it's his money?"
"No, Seamus," Harry responds, hand flying over the piece of parchment he's been writing on. The man had refused to let Ron and Seamus distract him from his frantic writing, interjecting himself into the conversation every now and then but never lifting his head from the paper. "He got into the programme fair and square."
"And how'd you know that?" Seamus asks, leaning against the cubicle walls with his arms crossed. "You pals with Malfoy now?"
This finally gets Harry to stop writing, turning around in his chair to look at both Seamus and Ron with a loud sigh. "Look, Robards asked me for a second opinion on Malfoy. He showed me the bloke's credentials and everything checks out. If it weren't for his name he would have been accepted immediately, no questions asked."
Ron scoffs and Harry's eyes turn to him, challenging him to disagree. Earlier that day he and Harry had almost the exact same conversation, and Harry had revealed that Malfoy had received all O's in his N.E.W.T.s. Ron raises an eyebrow, accepting the challenge by saying, "He may be smart, but his criminal record should have been taken into account."
Harry only shakes his head and makes a show of returning his attention to the papers. "You two need to come to terms with the fact that one day, one of you might end up becoming his partner."
Ron tells Harry to sod off and Seamus only laughs, exiting the cubicle to leave the two behind.
"Be honest with me, yeah? What's the real reason you're so accepting of this? And don't even remind me that you testified for him, Hermione already did that last night."
Harry laughs at this. "I'm not hiding anything from you, Ron. Malfoy got in based on his grades. He's not a Death Eater any more than you and I are."
Ron all but gags at the statement. "Don't ever bloody compare me to that git, Harry, I swear to Circe. Stop pretending that he's innocent, both you and Hermione. He's far from innocent and we all know it."
With that he walks out of his partner's cubicle, giving the man one last disbelieving look. Sooner or later Malfoy would slip up, show his true colours, and then he'd be out of the programme and preferably on his way to Azkaban in no time.
Malfoy does not slip up.
In fact, during the first six months of his training, Ron hears nothing but grumbled praises from his senior colleagues about the Death Eater's performance. According to the office gossip, the blonde is breezing his way through the character and aptitude tests and would soon be moving on to the formal courses of the programme. After the six-month mark the grumbles turn into actual compliments and he thinks his ears may bleed if he has to hear another person marvel at how Draco Malfoy is on his way to becoming "one great Auror".
The only comfort he finds these days is that, although they admit that Malfoy's good at his job, nobody wants to partner up with him. Being the only trainee around, Malfoy would often be seen working and training alone, but every now and then the higher-ups would require one of the people from Ron's batch to assist. The general consensus seems to be that everybody would benefit from this joint lessons of sorts; Malfoy would be able to complete the tasks that require a temporary partner and the Aurors who got in immediately after the war would be able to sample the rigid training that they had eluded.
He and Seamus have never been called and he thanks Harry for it, as the man must have put in the word that no good would come out of that arrangement. Ron rarely sees the infuriating blonde head in the office, but whenever he does he feels his blood boil and his magic thrumming through his whole being, a hex always ready on the tip of his tongue and the end of his wand. Malfoy no longer gallivants around like he used to in Hogwarts, the air of superiority that he used to carry around wherever he walked muted but not completely gone. Nowadays he walks with the arrogance of someone who knows he's better than everybody else but doesn't feel the need to shove the fact down people's throats and Ron absolutely abhors him for it.
"He's a wanker with a superiority complex," he says out loud to their table, a shot of firewhisky just starting to warm his stomach. "He walks and talks like he's some sort prince when all he is a Death Eater scum."
"Ron!" It's Hermione that immediately reacts to his words, her voice pitched low and her hand heavy on his arm when it smacks him. "Do you really have to bring that foul language here?"
"Hermione's right, you know?" Neville tells him, one of his hands playing with the shot glass and the other twitching on top of the table. Ron eyes it for a second before his gaze slides over to the hand lying just centimetres away from Neville's twitchy one. He follows the hand up and is not even surprised when he meets Luna's eyes.
The poor bloke has a crush on the Loony and is working himself into a seizure trying to find the courage to grab her hand. He's mulling over this information when Neville speaks again, still addressing him.
"He's quite decent now, Malfoy, I mean. He was perfectly polite when we were partnered up for his training."
"He's polite to you because he knows we'll send him to Azkaban if he puts a single pointy toe out of line," Ron responds, pouring himself another shot and ignoring Hermione's glare. "He's just pretending, and it's only been a year yet he's already convinced over half of the office that he's somehow changed. It's like you guys forget he's a Slytherin through and through."
"Really, Ronald? You're going to bring up old house rivalries now?"
"It's not just "old house rivalries", 'Mione, and you know it. It's like our Gryffindor courage—being a Slytherin means being a conniving snake," he all but spats the last two words, looking her directly in the eyes. He has half the mind to think that maybe he shouldn't be saying this right now, especially not with such a loud voice, but he pushes down the voice of reason and refuses to look away from her angry stare.
"Big word there, mate," Seamus chimes in, his laughter breaking the tension-filled silence. The others join and then he's tearing away from the staring contest with his girlfriend in favour of giving the muggle bird to the shorter man.
Everyone silently agrees to stop talking about Malfoy for the rest of the night, but he can practically feel the waves of anger rolling off Hermione. For a few moments he just lets her simmer in her anger, pointedly ignoring the hole she's burning into the side of his face. After a while he puts down his drink and moves to wrap his arm around her waist.
"I'm sorry," he whispers against her ear, delighting in the sight of the goose bumps breaking out on her arm. "I don't want to fight, 'Mione. I'm sorry."
She doesn't say anything, but slowly the tension in her body drains away and she relaxes enough to rest her head on his shoulder. He knows for a fact that this won't be the last argument they have about Draco Malfoy working in the ministry, but in that moment, he chooses to ignore the problem and just enjoy their time with their friends.
Ron and Harry are sent for fieldwork in Greece to monitor a little town that's been suspected of housing Voldemort sympathizers. Unsurprisingly, their respective romantic partners talk both of their ears off about not dying.
"I'm serious, Ron," Hermione hisses at him over dinner, her soup barely touched as she had spent the last 20 or so minutes reminding him that he absolutely cannot die. "The last time you were injured you had to stay St. Mungo's for a week, recovering!"
"Listen, 'Mione, I really appreciate your concern but I'm an Auror and I need you to trust me because I know what I'm doing," he insists, talking around a mouthful of garlic bread. "We both knew it would be dangerous work, didn't we?"
She huffs, spooning cold soup into her mouth, all the while glaring down at her bowl. He knows she's only worried, but the way she says things makes him feel like she doesn't quite trust him to be competent enough for the job.
"I still think you and the others should have undergone the same training as everyone else before you," she finally says, her tone hesitant. She must be remembering the last big row they had about this particular topic, and both the thought and her words make Ron roll his eyes at her.
"I've been an Auror for more than three years now, Hermione, that's the same amount of time that the others spent training."
She looks like she wants to argue but the expression on his face must stop her, her lips clamping shut instead and her attention returning to the bowl in front of her. They eat in silence after that, neither looking at each other, and when they're done Ron volunteers to do the dishes. Like her, he hasn't mastered the cleaning spells his mum is famous for but, unlike her, he doesn't claim that he's just used to cleaning it the muggle way.
With the dishes put away he goes to find her in the small living room, poring over the details of their mission. He moves to sit beside her on the couch, letting her read the document for the fourth time since he gave the copy to her.
"I'll be okay," he murmurs, plucking the parchment out of her hand when he sees that she's no longer reading it. "Harry and I are a good team—we'll keep each other safe."
"Just promise me you won't engage them unless it's absolutely necessary," she pleads, turning her large eyes to look at him. "I know you want to go above and beyond all the time but please, just don't be reckless."
"I'll keep that in mind," he says instead, not trusting himself enough to promise such a thing. Everyone in the office knows that Robards is preparing Harry to be his successor, and with his best friend on the path to greatness, Ron is also eager to prove himself worthy of his job.
He watches her eyebrows pull into a frown and pulls her into his arms, kissing the top of her hair. "I'll come home to you, like I always do. Believe me, yeah?"
That night she has another one of her nightmares and he apologizes with his words and with his hands that he'll be gone for a month, leaving her alone to deal with her night terrors. In the morning he doesn't wake her up, simply presses a kiss to her lips and leaves to meet Harry at the apparition point.
Unsurprisingly, they both get injured but manage to survive the mission. The backup they called arrived just in time to round up the last wizards still running about, shooting curses at everyone, and both he and Harry had been rushed to St. Mungo's. He doesn't have any broken bones this time and it only takes a matter of minutes for the healers to fix him right up. Harry, on the other hand, had been hit with a nasty curse that had him bleeding profusely.
The healers were in the process of forcing blood replenishing potions down his partner's throat when Ginny came running into the room, taking one good look at her boyfriend and all but collapsing into the chair beside Harry's bed. Her eyes snap to look at Ron, a question in her eyes, and he responds with a nod. He knows that look, knows that she's far too distraught to ask him outright if he's okay, so he moves to give her and the healers some space.
"Is he going to be okay?" she turns to ask one of the healers, an elderly witch performing diagnostic spells on the injured wizard. "Why is he still bleeding so much?"
She starts arguing with the healers and Ron takes it as his cue to leave. Ginny doesn't even acknowledge him when he moves to the door, her eyes firmly on Harry's face and her hands clasped around his bloody one. He uses the hospital's floo network to return to the office, heading straight to his cubicle to write down the details that he remembers from the last twenty-four hours. He shakes his head at the other Aurors still in the office who startle at his appearance. They look like they want to ask questions, but he just keeps walking until he's seated at his desk, furiously writing on a piece of parchment.
His hands shake, the image of his best friend lying on the hospital bed and staining the white sheets with his blood still etched clearly onto his brain. When Robards returns and summons him to his office, Ron does his best to look like he isn't shaken. He relays by mouth what had happened, how the surveillance had been uneventful at first but had quickly taken a turn into dangerous territory a few weeks into the mission.
Robards nods at him after he finishes relaying the information. "Take the rest of the day off, Auror Weasley. I've been told that Potter is likely to regain consciousness tomorrow. Go home and rest, you deserve it after all that."
Ron tells himself it's the older wizard's way of saying that they did a good job, so he does an awkward little salute and leaves the office. He debates visiting Harry but decides against it, knowing Ginny would alert all of them if his best friend were to wake up.
He gets home to an empty flat and all but collapses on the bed, shoes and ruined clothes still on his body and likely leaving bits of blood and dirt on the mattress. He tells himself he'll clean it up later, right after he's done resting his eyes…
He wakes up to the sound of the floo activating and hurried steps sounding from outside the room. The door to their bedroom flies open and in comes a visually dishevelled Hermione, hair wild and chest heaving with every laboured breath.
Her eyes seem to take in the darkness of the room and his figure sitting upright on the bed before she's advancing on him, a finger jabbing at his chest. "Where have you been?" she asks, voice tinged with an almost hysterical tone. "I've looked for you everywhere! I had to hear from Smithson that Harry was in St. Mungo's bleeding to death, and I couldn't even find you there nor where you at your office. You didn't think to tell me you were back?"
"I'm fine, thank you for asking," he snaps back, her line of questioning instantly annoying him. He flings the covers off his body and stalks out of the room, ignoring her baffled spluttering.
"Ron, what is wrong with you? I've been worried sick for weeks and the moment you get back you don't even think about telling your girlfriend that you're safe and alive?"
"While you were worried, I was out there, in the field, and my best friend is bleeding to death as you've so kindly put it!" His voice turns into a shout towards the end, his frustration winning over the rational part of his brain telling him to put an end to this fight. "So why don't you lay off my back, yeah?"
"He's my best friend, too!" she shouts back, her arm flicking about, probably casting non-verbal silencing charms. "Would it have absolutely killed you to stop by my office before heading back here? Robards told me he sent you home hours ago and—"
"I was tired, Hermione, what can't you understand about that?"
"—I had to learn from Malfoy that you haven't visited Harry since he got there—"
"What in the blood hell was Draco sodding Malfoy doing in Harry's room?"
This gives her pause, her face flushed and her hands balled into tight fists that were shaking by her sides. He has no doubt that he looks about the same as her, probably even worse off. He barely stops himself from insisting that she speak up, settling for crossing his arms over his chest and giving her a half-annoyed half-expectant look.
"He said he was working with the healers, apparently Robards called him in to see if he knew the dark spell that was used on Harry."
"What? Sure, he knows the spell, he's a bloody Death Eater for Circe's sake. Why would Robards think Malfoy would help Harry?"
Her temper visibly flares at this. "I don't know, Ron, maybe because Robards knows Malfoy's not a Death Eater anymore and he expects people from his Department to assist whenever they can? Perhaps your superior is keen on trusting people that he hires to do their duty right?"
Ron just scoffs at this, waving a dismissive hand in front of her and moving to enter the kitchen, his original destination before she had roped him into a screaming match right in front of their shared bedroom.
"'Mione, honestly, I just want to eat a decent meal without having to listen to you tell me how much of an awful boyfriend I am for wanting to just go home after nearly dying on a mission," he tells her, his back to her as he rummaged through the fridge for something to quiet down the rumblings of his stomach. He only turns back to look at her when he emerges with enough ingredients for a sandwich.
There are angry tears in her eyes and he immediately regrets blowing her off, immediately wishes he had been a bit more patient with her. He sets the food on the table and tries to reach out to pull her into a hug but she moves away, wiping at the tears that had managed to escape.
"I'm going to stay with Ginny at the hospital," she says, already turning towards the floo.
"I don't think they'll let you stay there, love," he calls out. "Family only, I believe."
"Well then, I suppose this is a good time to bring up the fact that I'm what they fondly refer to as the Golden Girl," she mutters, voice dripping with sarcasm. She steps into the floo, tosses the powder with one last look at him, then shouts her destination.
He returns to his unmade sandwich, his jaw clenched as tight as his fists and his appetite completely gone.
Harry's awake when he comes to visit the following morning, stopping by right before work. The man grins up at him, but he still must be in a lot of pain as it comes off more like a grimace than a good-natured smile. Ginny is by his side, holding his hand, and Hermione is surprisingly absent from the room.
Surprising as she hadn't been in their flat when he woke up, and it didn't seem like she had even returned at all during the whole time he had been asleep.
There's an accusation in Ginny's eyes that tells him she knows about what happened, but he ignores his younger sister, turning to Harry and clasping his other hand. "You had me worried there, you do know that, right?"
"I don't know, actually, do tell."
"Shut up, Harry," he says, the two of them laughing quietly while Ginny just shakes her head, an amused expression warring with the concern still on her face. "So, Malfoy was here?"
"Ron—," Ginny starts, but Harry is already nodding his confirmation. She sighs, retracting her hand from Harry's hold and moving to grab the book lying on the bedside table. "Robards thought Malfoy might have an idea about the curse that hit Harry, and he brought this for the healers to confirm his guess."
Ron eyes the proffered book, warily taking it from Ginny's hold and examining the front cover. The words are in a foreign language, one he suspects to be Latin. He hands it back to Ginny and turns to Harry. "So, he knew what hit you?"
"Even helped perform the counter-spell," Harry once again confirms, not seeming even the slightest bit staggered by this fact. "I'll be able to come back to work tomorrow, mate."
Ron quickly pushes down the negative thoughts he's having over Malfoy of all people helping Harry, leaning down to clasp the other man's hand again and telling him he'll see him tomorrow. He leaves the room just as he hears Ginny uselessly pleading with Harry to at least take the rest of the week off to recover.
The thought that Draco Malfoy went to St. Mungo's, helped the healers identify the spell that had nearly killed Ron's best friend, and performed the counter-spell that had saved Harry's life—it's disturbing, to the say least. He spends the rest of the morning resolutely working on paperwork, hellbent on keeping his head from trying to dissect this information to shreds much like what Hermione would do when faced with a situation she can't quite understand (yet).
Hermione. At the reminder of his girlfriend, he feels his chest fill with guilt. The witch had been worried about him, and although she had resorted to nagging, he can no longer convince himself that he did nothing wrong. He thinks about the days he had spent away from her during every mission he's ever completed, the thought of returning to her waiting arms pushing him to do his job better, to get it over with faster.
He decides to swing by her office for lunch to fix things between them, because they're who they are—they get into big, explosive rows that usually has one of them storming off, but they always make up somehow. He would apologise for whatever insensitive comment he might have made, and she would admit that she could have also handled the situation better.
Ron feels dismayed that their reunion after six agonisingly long weeks had not followed any of the scenarios that had played in his mind, but he knows he can still fix this, and they would make it up with each other.
Because that's what they always do.
Hermione forgives him. It's one of those fights that takes more than just a sincere apology, promises that he won't do it again, and a nice dinner to fix. For days she acts lukewarm around him, responding to his attempts at reconciliation but wary of forgiving him all too quickly lest he make the mistake of assuming he would get away with doing something like that again.
So he woos her: brings home a bouquet of flowers for the first time in a year, cooks for her to the best of his nearly non-existent abilities, and initiates the conversations he'd rather not have. He listens to her telling him what he had done wrong and how much it had hurt her, and she urges him to tell her his side.
She cries, and she tries to hide the fact that she's crying but he knows her—knows how she cries for house elves and other creatures she has deemed to be the oppressed minority, knows how she would defend a garden gnome from being terrorised by children, and knows that she feels so much, perhaps too much, all at once despite her being the rational brains of the Golden Trio.
He loves her for it, so he tells her, and he kisses away the tears and she allows him to finally feel her. The days that had stretched between them had done nothing to his memory of her body underneath him, her skin still the same smooth expanse interrupted by the occasional battle scars, her voice still the same breathy lullaby that does the exact opposite of what a lullaby should be doing—it wakes up something inside him that only comes alive when he's around her, when he's inside her.
When he comes her name is the sound that leaves his lips, and in that moment, he knows they'll always be meant for each other.
Hermione visits him and he scoops her up into a bear hug, lifting her off her feet and twirling her around. Her laughter fills his cubicle and he momentarily forgets that he's swamped with overdue reports and that Harry is out on a mission with Robards himself.
"Are you ready for lunch?" she asks, tucking a stray curl behind her ear and grinning up at him.
He feels his own smile slip a bit, his eyebrows drawing together in confusion. Did they make plans? "What?" The memory hits him just as Hermione's expression turns into a frown, her arms loosening their hold around his waist. "Bollocks. I totally forgot, love, I'm so sorry."
"Oh. I… that's quite okay, did you have other plans?" She looks like it's far from okay, but they have been making an effort to fight less after their big row about three weeks ago and so she probably doesn't want to incite another one right then and there. He had been careful to avoid voicing his irritations with Malfoy's continued success in training and he and Hermione have had blissful weeks together ever since.
"No, I just haven't finished the reports I was supposed to hand in today and I'm kind of cramming them," he reluctantly admits, his eyes flicking down to the long length of parchment he's still working on. Again, he curses Harry's brilliant timing.
"The Andrew case?" Her voice has risen a bit and her arms have completely fallen away from their embrace around his body. He misses the contact as soon as it's gone but he knows what she's going to say next. "I've been reminding you about that since last week, Ron."
"I know, okay? You don't have to nag me about it now when I'm already so stressed." Like usual, the moment the words are out of his mouth he immediately regrets them. He sees her eyes flash with hurt and anger and he grabs her hands, bringing them to his lips in an effort to fix the situation. He breathes a silent sigh of relief when she doesn't pull back.
"Look, I'm really happy you came by today. Sorry I forgot about lunch." He hopes the sincerity in his voice is enough for now, as he sees no other way to finish the reports without skipping on the meal.
She sighs, her hands slipping away from his grasp. Hermione smiles up at him, a small one that says she knows there's nothing to be done about it now. "Don't worry about it, let's just reschedule."
As she walks away from his cubicle without a backward glance at him, he realises that it's always been significantly easier to deal with her anger than with her disappointment.
He doesn't quite understand the image before him. Just a few minutes ago he had been in a meeting with the rest of the office, discussing information about a raid that would be conducted next week. He had left the room with Harry, the two of them talking about a report they were supposed to get started on and just about to go downstairs to meet Hermione for lunch.
Several feet away from them, standing in front of the entrance to the office, is Hermione. The peculiar part is how Draco Malfoy is standing beside her. Even more peculiar is that they appear to be engaged in some sort of conversation that has Hermione flinging her hands around in wild gestures and Draco's arm crossing over his chest.
Even from this far away Ron can tell that the blonde git is smiling. He pokes Harry with his elbow, pointing towards the direction of the anomaly, and the other man seems alarmed for a moment. They both start to make their way towards Hermione, Ron certain that whatever Malfoy is currently saying to her would be something foul and prejudiced.
Just as they're about to reach them the situation takes a dive into what is the most bizarre thing he has ever seen in his life; Hermione snorts, not a sarcastic one, but a snort of air that is followed by genuine laughter. Malfoy, as predicted, is smirking, but even Ron can see that it's not a smirk filled with contempt.
He finds himself completely flummoxed by the interaction that he stops dead in his track a few metres away from them. Harry keeps walking, shooting him a look as he passes him, and quickly inserts himself between Hermione and Malfoy.
"Hey, what's going on here?"
Ron gets his feet to move and he makes his way to stand beside Hermione, his hand finding hers and his eyes staring straight into Malfoy's. The smile on the blonde's pointy face disappears with their entrance, his expression a carefully constructed mix between indifference and outright boredom. The witch, either oblivious to the tension radiating from the men around her or simply unwilling to recognise it, keeps grinning.
"Malfoy here was telling me that the secret to a more palatable antidote to Veritaserum is, what was it again?" she pretends to ask. "Right, three medium-sized eggs from a Fwooper." She laughs again and Ron watches Malfoy struggle to keep himself from smirking back at her.
"Try it, Granger, I have no doubts that you would have no problems convincing one to give you some of her eggs," he drawls, the bored inflection of his voice grating on Ron's nerve. He nods to her, then to both him and Harry, and promptly walks away.
It's not until they're in the cafeteria, their small table protected with about a dozen silencing charms by Harry, that Ron begins to confront Hermione.
"What in Merlin's balls was that, 'Mione? Why were you joking around with Malfoy?"
"I wasn't joking around with him, Ron, it was actually heading towards an argument about the benefits of using Cinchona pubescens over Cinchona officinalis in brewing a blood-replenishing potion," she says, the speed at which she speaks almost causing him to go cross-eyed. "And even if I were joking around with him, what would be wrong with that?"
"What would be wrong with that?" he repeats, his tone incredulous and his eyes nearly bulging out of their sockets at her. "What do you mean, what would be wrong with that? He's Malfoy! He's a Death Eater!"
He notices a few people throwing surreptitious looks towards their table and he whips his wand to throw several concealment charms around them. All the while he watches Hermione fuming in front of him, her nostrils flared and her fists wrapped tightly around her utensils.
"Ron, don't you think you might be overreacting some?" Harry interjects before either of them could speak. "If Hermione wants to have a conversation with Malfoy at work then there's nothing wrong with that."
"Thank you, Harry, it seems my boyfriend has somehow deluded himself into thinking that I have to ask permission from him to talk to ex-Death Eaters working at the same place as I do."
"Really, Harry? You're siding with her?" Suddenly, their seating arrangement makes him angry. Harry and Hermione sit on the same side of the table, opposite from him, and he finds it aptly symbolic of how they all stand on this Malfoy issue.
"As a matter of fact, I am. I already told you, Ron, Malfoy's a decent bloke nowadays and has been for nearly two years now. You need to stop insisting that he's a Death Eater because he simply isn't."
Ron turns to Hermione, his anger blinding him, making his tongue loose. "He wanted people like you dead, 'Mione. He wanted Voldemort to kill mudbloods, are you really forgetting that?"
"What the hell, Ron?" It's Harry that reacts first, his eyes going wide at the use of the slur and his own hands balling into fists on top of the table.
"It's true! Just because she wants to see the good in everyone, it doesn't mean there is actually any good in there to see."
He looks at her, his chest tightening at the sight of her eyes filling with angry tears, but he pushes the guilt down and holds on to his own anger. She moves to leave but he beats her to it, rising so suddenly he almost sends the whole table crashing. "Don't bother, I'll leave. Enjoy the rest of your lunch break."
At first, he refuses to apologise to both of them. Harry had confronted him the day after the big blowout fight and they almost settled things with fists. In the end he told Ron how much of an ass he was for treating Hermione like that and made him promise that he'll do everything to fix their relationship.
Harry had not been amused with Ron's response that had been mostly a noncommittal nod of his head, but that was all he was getting.
Hermione had refused to talk to him for over a week, kicking him out of their shared room and making him sleep on the sofa in the living area. The first few days he doesn't even try to talk to her, still adamantly holding on to the belief that for once, he was the one in the right. However, as most of their fights go, he later realised his mistake and only then does he try to mend things between them.
It takes a long time, one of their longest fights in all of their years together, but they eventually reconcile, and he finally gets his spot back in their bed and in her arms.
He pretends he doesn't notice that things aren't quite the same after that.
"I've been offered a promotion," she says after swallowing a bite of her salad. "If I accept, I'll be working in the same Department as you and Harry."
His eyes widen at this. "As an Auror? I thought you've had enough of chasing after dark wizards." That's what she had told everyone when they had asked her why she wasn't joining the other Auror recruits, and to this day he had always thought it would always be true for her.
"No, no. I'll be in the legal team," she clarifies. "Kingsley personally offered me the position, he said I could start a week after I accept the promotion."
The smile that rips its away across his face almost hurts, but then he's rushing to pull her into a tight embrace, overjoyed by the news. He had always thought that she just isn't meant to be slaving away at the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures all her life, that she had always been meant for something greater than that. It's a wonderful bonus that she would now be working in the same Department as him and Harry, practically just a few skips away from each other.
They're both laughing, smiling at each other, and he even steals a few kisses here and there. "I'm so happy for you, 'Mione. This is where you belong, making actual change and not just pushing paper and fighting against red tape."
Her smile falls a little but he attributes it to her thinking about all the times she had to stay up late due to ridiculous revisions that had no other purpose other than to stall her pursuits for equal rights. They return to their food but the atmosphere between them is significantly lighter than it had been in months.
Ron starts to believe that life may be heading back to the good days but then he remembers that Malfoy's training ends in a month.
The day Hermione transfers he immediately visits her new office, lifting her off her feet and twirling her around in the air for a few seconds. Her laugh warms his heart and her kisses makes his fingers tingle for something more, but he just kisses her back and tells her how good her office looks.
She's leading him by the hand, circling the office as if it were much bigger than it really is, telling him how she'd like to add a few plants here and there, hang up some more art works and pictures. Her smile is infectious, brightening up the room effortlessly, and he thinks she really does look like she belongs there.
"Listen, 'Mione, I booked a table at this restaurant to celebrate your new job," he says, holding her face in his hands. "What do you say? Would you like to have a really fancy dinner with me?"
If possible, her grin just grows even brighter. "I would love to have dinner with you, Ronald Weasley."
When their lips meet in a slow, languid kiss, he feels the toll of the last few months draining away from his body. He finally feels as if The Grandest of Rows, as Harry and Ginny liked to call it, back in the ministry cafeteria is finally behind them for good. Between her new job and him making progress as an Auror, he thinks the good days are finally eclipsing the bad again.
He can only hope that he isn't wrong.
A week after their successful dinner, Harry proposes to Ginny. They suspect that he had done it in the quiet of 12 Grimmauld place, as everyone had been surprised to see the large diamond sitting comfortably on Ginny's finger that hadn't been there before. He's happy for them, even feels his eyes get the slightest bit glassy when Ginny runs up to hug him and Harry whispers to him that he better have dress robes befitting of a "best man".
He asks him what a best man is, and the brunet just laughs, clapping him on the back in the awkward way that Harry just does things.
Everyone is happy for them, no one happier than Molly of course, but Ron is happy for them and he sees Hermione trying to discreetly wipe at her eyes when she finishes embracing Ginny. He's happy that his sister got engaged to the man she's been in love with since she knew how to develop a crush on someone, and he's happy that she's happy with whatever way Harry had proposed to her.
But when he looks at Hermione, at her bare finger, clapping along with everyone else, he knows that he wouldn't ask her in private like Harry had asked Ginny. Ron knows in his bones that when he finally asks the question, he would declare to the whole of wizarding Britain how much he loves the witch standing beside him.
Somehow, he doesn't doubt that she would say yes.
Malfoy is given the only cubicle left unoccupied, thankfully for Ron it's the farthest one from his own space and it's sandwiched between the wall and Ernie Macmillan's cubicle. Robards makes a speech to welcome the only graduate, one that is heavily laced with reminders to trust his decision and his ability to judge one's character with frightening accuracy.
"Lastly, and as some of you may already know, Auror Malfoy is a skilled Occlumens. As part of his duties, he has offered to train anyone who wishes to learn both Legilimency and Occlumency. That would be all."
With that everyone goes back to their respective cubicles while Ron makes his way to Harry's. Seamus is already there, eating one of the pumpkin pasties Ron's mum had sent over. "Here to rant to Harry, then?" the Irish asks, crumbs flying out of his mouth with every word. "Don't bother, he already told me he won't be hearing any complaints about Malfoy today."
"Who in the blood hell would want to take lessons from him?" Ron asks anyway, grabbing one of the pasties and taking a huge bite out of it.
"Didn't Molly give you your own pasties? Stop eating mine," Harry says, hiding away the treats much to the other men's disappointment. "To answer your rhetorical question, I would take lessons from him."
"What?" both Ron and Seamus ask, in the same time and using the exact same tone of disbelief. Ron continues, "I don't know what you're trying to prove, mate, probably still going on about the not Death Eater anymore thing, but you've gone completely mental if you think you want to take lessons from Draco Malfoy."
"I'm not trying to prove anything, Ron. I never got to finish the Occlumency lessons with Snape, and it's something that could really be useful for the job," Harry explains, as if it made any sense at all.
Ron throws his hands up and shakes his head at his best friend, turning around to leave the cubicle before they get into another fight about Malfoy. He doesn't particularly care that the git in question would be within hearing distance of their shouts, but he does care about Robards' reminders. Just as he's about to enter his cubicle he sees Hermione's head pop in from the entrance and their eyes meet. She holds up rolls of parchment and beckons him to come to her.
"Hey, what are those?" he asks, giving her a quick hug. She had been adamant that they refrain from any displays of public affection, and he sees that even an embrace like that has her blushing and looking around the office for nosy watchers.
"I believe they're yours, you forgot them at the table this morning at breakfast." She hands them over with a shake of her head but she's smiling and it makes him smile, too. "I'm going to head out for a meeting, actually, and I may not be back until much later."
He nods, stashing the parchment into his robes. "I'll walk you to the lift," he tells her, already leading the way. They stop in front of the lifts, waiting for one to take her, and he asks, "What's this meeting about?"
Before she can answer, they hear someone walking behind, and the both of them turn at the same time to see Malfoy making his way towards them. He stops when he's just a few feet away from the two of them, his hands tucked inside the pockets of his trousers. "Granger. Weasley."
It's the first time Ron's heard him acknowledge him in the three years that he's been training to become an Auror, yet somehow the way his name rolls of the snake's tongue still sounds so familiar to his ears. It's the way the git says it, he decides, with that bored tone and the judgment simmering just underneath the aristocratic drawl.
Ron wants to spit at him, but he holds himself back. Barely. "Malfoy."
"Malfoy," Hermione says in return, her tone completely neutral whereas his had been full of barely concealed disgust. When the blonde only nods and moves to face the lifts, Hermione's eyes flash to warn Ron, his mouth already opening to protest.
The lifts arrive and Ron sees that there's only one other person inside, a witch that he doesn't even recognize. "I'll come with you, 'Mione. I'll walk you outside."
Malfoy has already stepped into the lift, one eyebrow arched as he and the other Ministry worker wait for them to get on.
"Ron, go back to work. That's complete unnecessary," the last part is whispered so low that only he can hear, but he hears the warning all the same. Don't make a scene, don't make the same mistakes as last time.
Every inch of his being wants to argue with her, to tell her it isn't safe to be riding a lift with Malfoy, but he keeps his mouth shut and watches her take the spot nearest to the opening. With one last look at him, Hermione disappears behind the closed doors of the lift.
His jaw clenches, because right before the doors had closed and the lift had taken them away, he could have sworn he saw the amused smiled on Draco Malfoy's face.
She gets home safe that night and only rolls her eyes at Ron's distress. He tells her he had been worried sick that something had happened to her, that Malfoy had somehow harmed her.
"Ron, he's an Auror now, not a Death Eater. At this point, you're the one being prejudiced."
That shuts him up, not because he agrees with her but because he's gotten tired of reminding them again and again what kind of person Draco Malfoy is. Instead of arguing any further, he tells her he's glad he's safe and then proceeds to walk out of the bedroom.
She doesn't even follow him out.
Three months into his job and Malfoy still doesn't have a permanent partner. The two assignments he's been given he'd had to complete on his own, and the git had seemed unaffected by this. With Neville's resignation, citing that he wants to teach Herbology at Hogwarts, their numbers were simply uneven and so no one was available to become Malfoy's partner, much to Ron's delight and Malfoy's apparent disinterest.
Ron would never say it out loud, especially not in front of Harry and Hermione, but he's glad that the arsehole has to do all his jobs alone. He would have to write reports on his own, he would have no one to back him up if one of his surveillance missions go suddenly awry, and he most certainly doesn't even have anyone to talk to in the office except Robards and Harry, and even that was extremely rare.
"Heard Ernie there tried to talk to Malfoy today, maybe tried for a little pureblood reunion," Seamus tells him. The both of them have their eyes on Malfoy, standing in line at the cafeteria and looking as if he had expected all of the peasants to bow down to him for gracing them with his presence. "Apparently Malfoy hadn't even noticed that the poor bloke was standing right in front of him, had his pointy nose buried in a book or some shite."
Ron isn't surprised that Malfoy is still acting like the pureblood snob he is, probably thinks lowly of Macmillan despite the other's pureblood status solely because he was a Hufflepuff. He doesn't voice any of this because Hermione's sitting right in front of him, her own nose buried in a book. Harry rolls his eyes at the two and keeps eating his sandwich, and for a moment their table is quiet.
Seamus nudges him after a few minutes, subtly gesturing for him to look towards where Malfoy's taking a seat by himself. The table is unsurprisingly empty and several feet away from theirs, and despite the lunchtime rush, no one tries to sit with him. Ron catches a few wizards looking around for a table with seats left, spotting his table then seeing that they would have to share a table with Draco Malfoy, and promptly walking out of the cafeteria.
He turns to look away from the pariah and return to eating his food when he sees that Hermione has been watching the same scene as him. Her eyes dart around, looking at the nervous wizards and witches who keep avoiding Malfoy's table, then they settle on the man himself.
Ron's not sure, but he thinks he sees pity in her eyes as she briefly watches Malfoy sitting all alone. She doesn't catch him watching her and he doesn't say a thing about it.
She's pissed off about the dishes and, somehow, she's also pissed off that he doesn't want to read her draft for a new law she's trying to pass.
"I don't understand how you expect me to read that and be of any help, 'Mione, you know that's not my thing." He's grumbling, he knows, scrubbing at the plates harder than necessary and making a ton of noise just to show his annoyance. "Do you think I don't have work to do? Papers to write?"
"I only asked you, Ronald, because it's research on pureblood traditions, and seeing as you're a pureblood—," she cuts herself off with a groan, and even with his back to her he can almost see her pacing back and forth. "Sod it, I'm sorry I thought you could give me insights on something you have knowledge on that I clearly don't."
"Have you seen our family, Hermione? Do you think we practice "pureblood traditions" in our household?' he asks, whirling around and spilling soapy water every which way. "I already struggle with my own paperwork and you want me to worry over yours?"
"Forgive me for asking my boyfriend for a favour!"
He turns back to the dishes, resuming his angry scrubbing. "You know you can ask me anything, just don't expect me to be able to help you with your job by reading over 15 metres of parchment for you."
She doesn't say anything in response to that, and he hears her stomping away. Lately their fights almost always end up that way, with one of them walking away and the other giving them space to cool down. This time Ron doesn't chase after her because he wants to get the bloody dishes done, one less thing to have her nagging him about. When he's finished, he moves to the living room, not surprised to see that she isn't there, and plops down on the sofa to watch some telly.
He keeps the volume on the lowest setting that he can still hear, knowing how much she hates it when the thing get too loud, stating that it distracts her from her readings. He keeps watching for an hour or so, his mind mostly removed from the muggle show and instead reeling from their recent fight. He only shuts it off when he feels exhausted enough to know that he'll most likely fall right asleep once his head hits the pillows, an ideal situation to avoid getting into another row with the irate witch.
She's lying on the bed, facing away from him, but he knows she's still awake. When he slides into his spot, he can feel her stiffen beside him, so he keeps a respectful distance between them that only ever exists when they're fighting like this.
"If you think he's changed, why don't you ask Malfoy for help? He'd know all about pureblood traditions," he whispers, moving around so his back is to her and his body is precariously close to the edge of the bed. His heart is beating fast in his chest, knowing that the comment would further annoy Hermione, but there's no way for him to grab the words from the air and shove them back inside him so he just waits for her to respond.
For a long moment there's only silence from her part, stretching out long enough that he begins to suspect that she hadn't even heard him in the first place. He thinks she may have already fallen asleep, so he stops fighting to keep his eyes open, gives in to the urge to slip into unconsciousness.
"Maybe I will."
She's watching him again, this time her brows are drawn together as if she's trying to figure him out. Ron doesn't think Hermione knows that he's aware of what she's doing and, although he's tempted to ask why she stares at Malfoy for a few seconds every time she sees the bloke, he doesn't know if he wants to bring to light his observation.
Sometimes she would look at him and there would be confusion in her eyes, sometimes it would be something akin to pity, and sometimes there would be something in her expression that he can't quite put a name to.
He keeps eating, his eyes flicking away from her face when he sees her begin to turn away from her scrutinization of Malfoy. He knows that if he were to ask, she would only explain how she feels bad for the bloke being the greatest pariah of the wizarding world.
It's just pity. He knows it for sure.
They've been fighting more, but the fights have grown shorter as Ron has gone into the habit of simply walking away whenever things began to get too heated for him. They would make up, promise to do their best to not get into another row, and then things would be peaceful for a few blessed days before one of them sets the other one off.
It's exhausting, having to fight with her all the time, but he knows that it's just because of the stress of her new job and the fact that she's been helping Ginny with the wedding preparations. He tries to be more understanding of this, he really does, which is why he resolves to make things better between them to ease some of the problems off her shoulders.
Ron visits Hermione's office, planning to surprise her with takeout from a muggle restaurant she loves so much, only to find no other than Draco Malfoy lounging one of the chairs in front of her desk. He sees red at the sight, Hermione sitting behind her desk, the two of them sporting similar poses: arms crossed over their chests, an eyebrow raised in challenge, and a ghost of a smirk playing on their lips.
It strikes him then how similar they are, but he quickly stomps down on the thought as he finds that it disturbs him to no end.
"What in Merlin's balls do you think you're doing here, Malfoy?"
Hermione looks up then and he thinks it's alarm that flashes across her face, her eyes widening for a fraction of a second. He wants to scoff, knows she's worried he'll make a scene and maybe even get into a fight with the snake, so he pushes away from the door and goes to place the bag of takeout on the table. From where he's standing, he easily towers over the blonde still sitting on the leather chair, face impassive and fingers steepled in front of him.
"I asked you a question, Malfoy," he grits out, jaw clenched fists in clear view.
"I'm sure Granger can explain that you, Weasley," the blonde finally answers, rising from the chair and dusting off his robes. "No need for me to do it for her."
He's about to grab the Death Eater by his shoulder but Hermione's hand shoots out, stopping him. Malfoy exits the office without so much as backward glance, closing the door behind him and leaving Ron alone with his girlfriend.
"He just came by to lend me some books, Ron. You can calm down now." She gestures to the stack of books sitting on the corner of her table. "Is this Chinese takeout?"
He ignores the last question. "Why is Draco Malfoy lending you books?"
She sighs, gesturing with her hand for him to pick up one of the books. When he does, she starts explaining, "I bumped into him at the atrium the other day and I mentioned that I'm working on eradicating the laws biased towards pureblood. He said he'd look in their library for the journals his ancestors kept, the ones that had helped pass these laws."
"He could have just given you the books and been on his merry, slimy way. He didn't have to sit down and chat with you," he argues, setting the book down with a little more force than absolutely necessary. Hermione raises her eyebrow at this.
"I can't seem to find the problem with him chatting with me. If you haven't noticed, no one talks to him here, Ron. It's almost been a year since he officially became an Auror and yet he still doesn't have a partner, Harry told me he keeps volunteering for the more dangerous assignments all on his own! Why can't you just be a little bit more forgiving?"
He feels his eyes bulge out upon hearing the last bit of her tirade. "Forgiving? Why should I forgive him when he has done absolutely nothing to ask for my forgiveness? For anyone's forgiveness?"
"He's apologized to me," she bites out, jaw clenched as tight as his and eyes challenging. "And to Harry, to Ginny, Luna, Neville. He's apologized to everyone who gave him the chance to."
Instantly, he feels the hot flash of betrayal strike his chest. "Why is this the first time I'm hearing about this?"
Hermione throws her hands up, as if he's the exhausting one. "Because you hate the man! You would just say something about his apology being fake, that we shouldn't believe a word out of his mouth. You would just argue with me if I had told you, and I am getting so tired of arguing about Draco Malfoy."
He wants to say more, wants to argue that she still shouldn't have kept that that from him, wants to tell her how hurt he feels. Instead, he clamps his mouth shut and slumps down onto a chair, the one Malfoy hadn't been using, and just watches her as he watches him back.
"I don't want to argue with you about him anymore. If you don't want to give him a chance, fine, but don't make it seem like I'm not allowed to form my own opinions on someone's character based on sound observations and treat them according to those observations."
He still doesn't answer, simply blinks up at her until she huffs and settles down onto her own seat. When she asks him if they can just eat their lunch in peace, he wordlessly sets out their food. They eat in silence, and when he leaves, he takes the trash out with him without saying goodbye to her.
They don't fight about Malfoy anymore, but not because Ron starts believing that the git has somehow changed. He resolves to let his friends and girlfriend believe whatever they want to believe, knowing that in the end they would see with their own eyes how wrong they are. Whenever he sees Harry talking to Malfoy, he feels that familiar flare of betrayal somewhere in his chest, but he never acts on it. No one brings up the git's name when he's around and he never brings it up, either. Along the way, he starts thinking that he could just pretend that the man simply doesn't exist.
It's a hard task to accomplish when he notices how easy it is for Hermione to talk to the blonde. He breaks his "No Mention of Malfoy" rule one night, confronting her after once again seeing him lounging inside her office.
"Are you friends now? With Malfoy, that is."
It's a quiet question. He tries to keep his voice light, non-accusatory, but he knows he can't hide the accusation from his eyes so he keeps them trained on his pasta.
"I wouldn't go as far to say that him and I are friends, no."
"Then how far would you go?" At this, he finally looks up, letting her see the doubt clouding his eyes.
If she's offended by the question, she doesn't show. "I'd say we have the same relationship as you two—colleagues, only I don't mind talking to him."
He shrugs, pretends to redirect his attention back to his food, but inside he struggles to believe her words. He wouldn't put it past her to actually befriend the git, and he swears he would sooner watch Voldemort himself rise from the grave than see Malfoy be integrated into their bubble.
He's on his way to an emergency meeting when he hears her laughter, unmistakable in its timbre and its ability to make him feel warm things in his gut. He rounds a corner to see her chatting with Malfoy and another woman from her part of the department.
When he watches the man say something to her, causing her to laugh even harder, the warmth in his stomach turns to ice. He has a feeling that if he were to ask her again if she's friends with him, the answer would be dramatically different.
He gets a ring. It's simple, a style he knows she would love, with a diamond that's not too big nor too small, a band that's not too thick nor too thin. A ring that would look perfect on her, and both Harry and Ginny agree that she would love it. He tells them he's going to propose soon, maybe after the wedding, maybe once the two come back from their honeymoon, and they encourage him.
"It's about time," Ginny says, handing him back the box. "What made you finally get a move on?"
He tells them he feels it's finally the right time. He tells them he knows that the timing would be perfect, that the proposal itself would be perfect. He tells them that when he looks at her, he no longer sees his girlfriend, that he's started to see his wife.
He doesn't tell them that he's scared that if he waits any longer, something might happen that would take her away from him.
Some would argue that their argument in her office might have been the beginning of the end. It starts with the little things: he forgets the last time she made breakfast for him and the last time he made tea for her. She spends a day at the Burrow without him and doesn't try to convince him to come with her. That same day, she doesn't kiss him when she gets home and he doesn't ask how the day went. They stop brushing their teeth together in the mornings because she starts waking up earlier than him to get a head start. When Harry finally, finally gets promoted to Head of the Auror Office, she doesn't tell him that she knows his own promotion will come soon enough, that he just has to wait because she knows he works just as hard as Harry does.
Little things, but then they start becoming bigger.
He gets sent to a mission and she doesn't nag him about it. She kisses him goodbye when he leaves and he tells himself it's only his imagination making him feel that her lips have become cold against his. When he gets back, he "forgets" to swing by her office to tell her he's safe, once again heading home to sleep. He can't tell if he's surprised or not when she doesn't get mad, simply hugs him and tells him she's glad he's home safe. Somehow, even her embrace feels distant.
Then even bigger things happen.
They fight at the annual Ministry Christmas party and he lets her storm off with tears in her eyes. He doesn't bother looking for her before going home, and when he finds the door to their bedroom locked he simply resolves himself to sleeping on the couch, all the while thinking it unfair that he always has to be the one kicked out of their room.
She stops clinging to him after waking up from a nightmare. Instead, she gets up from the bed and tells him he's going to make some tea to calm herself down. She doesn't say it in a way that would make him feel like his arms are no longer a source of comfort for her, but feel it he does all the same.
They stop going home together. She throws herself into a new legislation, one that keeps her beyond busy and he thinks she would have excitedly told him about it if only these big things just stopped happening to them.
Through all this, through the small things that become bigger and the big things that keep popping up, he knows he should do something. Some days he feels like he's watching their relationship crumble right in front of his eyes, the pieces slowly but surely falling to his feet. With a little liquid courage, he goes to Harry for advice, but his best friend only tells him that he should be talking to her about it and not to him. He begrudgingly accepts that he's right, but when he promises that he'll talk to her, that he'll make it right, that he'll do everything to fix it, that soon he'll pop the question and everything will be alright, he knows it's a lie.
A part of him feels like he can't be the only one who's noticed. To say that Hermione is smarter and more intuitive than he is would be the understatement of the century, so he finds it hard to believe that she hasn't noticed the gaping hole forming in the middle of their relationship. He waits, waits for her to acknowledge how she's changed, how she's noticed that things aren't the same between them, waits for her to make the first move towards fixing them, but none of that ever comes.
He keeps noticing small things that become bigger and bigger until he feels suffocated by them, and maybe she's become suffocated too because one day he comes home to find that she's already sitting at the table, but instead of having dinner in front of her she has the box clutched in her hands.
The box, the one that he had kept inside the drawer on his side of the bed. The box that contains the ring, the perfect ring, the ring that he had foolishly hoped would fix things.
When he notices the tears cascading down her cheeks, he allows himself to half-believe that they're tears of joy. When the first words out of her mouth are "we need to talk", he allows himself to half-hope that she only thinks it's too soon, that she still has so much to do before she can settle down and start a family with him.
When he finally gets to look into her eyes, he accepts what he knows to be true, because during the small things that kept getting bigger and bigger, he had noticed something else. Had noticed the way she still watched, the way she kept staring, the way she continued to glow and emit the same warmth through her eyes that she used to give him.
He had noticed that those things didn't disappear; she still glows, just not around him.
"There's someone else. It's Malfoy, isn't it?"
He can tell that she's not expecting this. She looks at him, eyes swollen and red, lips trembling, and he sees guilt mixed with surprise written all over her face.
"You found out," she finally says, voice barely above a scratchy whisper.
"Always the tone of surprise."
"I didn't have an affair with him, if that's what you think. I just—"
As she speaks, he realises that he's angry. What had she said before when she was trying to tell him about that PTSD thing? The five stages of grief? If he remembers correctly, it begins with denial, but Ron had already gone through that these past months, when he kept noticing the small things and the bigger things and the way Draco fucking Malfoy made his girlfriend laugh and smile. No, he's done with denial. He's skipping over to anger now.
"I know. You want to know how I know you didn't have an affair with him?" he seethes, relishing in the way her mouth slams shut mid-speech. "Because I know that he's a bigoted Death Eater scum. He'll never want you just because you have muggle parents. He's a pureblood elitist and he'll never look at you past your blood status. You know this, Hermione. You can't possibly be that blind."
"I do. I know all that. I never had plans of telling him, Ron. He'll never want me, he can never love me, but it doesn't matter because you deserve someone who wants you. You don't deserve someone who fell in love with someone else. You deserve someone who can love you the way you love them."
She pushes the box towards him and he feels well and utterly confused. "You're throwing this away, you're throwing us away, for a man who would never want to be with you, much less love you? You're throwing us away to have nothing with a person who would never even deem you worthy of the magic you possess? Are you serious, Hermione?"
"What would you rather I do, Ron? Stay here, with you, pretending that I still love you when all I think about when I look at you is how I wish, I wish we would have just stayed as friends. That way I wouldn't have to hurt you like this."
"That's a load of codswallop and you know it."
She doesn't immediately reply, only rises from her seat. That's when he notices the bags at her feet, which she proceeds to magically shrink and stuff into the pockets of her jeans. "You can have the flat, Ron. I'll stay at my parents' house for now while I look for a new one."
"Don't do this, Hermione. We can talk about this. Please."
Ah, another stage of grief: bargaining. At this point, he feels ready to drop to his knees to beg her to stay.
More tears slip free from her eyes and she reaches out to cradle his face in her hands, kissing him softly on the cheeks. "I'm so sorry," she whispers against his skin. When she pulls away, he sees something wet on her lips that makes him realise that he's also crying. "Goodbye, Ron. I hope one day you find it in you to forgive me. I would like to become your friend again, if you would allow it."
She steps back and he wills the tears to stop blurring his vision, tries to wipe at his eyes so he can see her apparate away, but he can't bring himself to lift his arms and only hears the tell-tale crack. He isn't sure if it's the sound of her leaving or the sound of his world splitting down the middle. He tells himself he'll follow her, in a minute, once the ground stops shaking and once the lead in his stomach stops weighing him down, keeping him rooted to the spot.
When he collapses into a heap on the floor, his last coherent thought is how he wishes he had done something sooner.
He wants to ask her if it's possible to go back to certain stages of grief. Yesterday, he had thought he was already in the bargaining stage, but today he feels like he's back to being angry. He knows there's no way in hell, no chance at all for Malfoy to pursue Hermione, but he's clearly not thinking straight when he puts silencing charms on his feet and on the blonde's cubicle. He knows Malfoy, knows he's a slimy Death Eater scum with extraordinary talents in occlumency, but he also knows that the git has a bad habit of putting down his walls when studying a case.
He gets his chance when the man turns in his seat and Ron whispers the word that gives him access to Malfoy's dark mind. At first, he only sees the details of the case he's working on, but he pushes harder, using the anger thrumming through his veins to fuel his magic. It takes a while but then he sees it, sees the person he had been so sure he wouldn't see in the dark recesses of Malfoy's twisted brain.
He sees her at their office, talking to both Harry and him. Ron notes that his face is blurred, the image focused solely on her. He then sees her at the last Ministry Christmas party, her eyes red from unshed tears and Ron remembers the argument they had that night that had caused her to appear like that. Suddenly he sees her face up close, looking at him, but he knows she's actually looking at Malfoy. It's the day he apologized to her. More images of her follow as he roots around, frantic in his searching, his heart splintering under the weight of this revelation.
Malfoy had fallen for Hermione right before everyone's eyes, but she had been too blind to see and him to blind to notice that the feelings were reciprocated.
Ron wants to fire hexes at the both of them.
Finally, he sees the face of Narcissa Malfoy, peering up at him with pity in her eyes. "Tell her, at the very least. You deserve a chance at happiness, Draco."
Suddenly he's being pushed out of Malfoy's mind, the Occlumency walls coming up faster than his subpar Legilimency can counter. He's ejected from Malfoy's thoughts and out of the man's cubicle with a punch to his face that sends him straight to the ground. He welcomes the pain blossoming on his cheek, relishes it and prepares to deliver his own punches. He lands one, hits Malfoy on the bone of his brow, before someone hauls the blonde away from him and another person drags him up from the ground, holding him back from pummelling the scum.
"You had no right," Malfoy seethes, the venom in his words reminiscent of the way he used to talk to everyone else, back when he thought he was above all of them simply because his father would hear about it. "You had no fucking right, Weasley!"
"Fuck you, you Death Eater—"
"Ron. Malfoy. In my office. Now." Harry has placed himself in the middle of the two men, his wand out but pointing downwards. Ron knows that his best mate wouldn't hesitate to put them in limb-locking spells and levitate them into his office if they don't comply, so he shrugs off the person still holding onto him and marches his way to the Head's office.
He doesn't sit down, just stands in front of the desk and waits for the other two to enter. Harry locks the door behind him and rounds on them. "Can either of you explain what happened out there? I could suspend both of you right now for disrupting the work place, you do know that right?"
It's Malfoy that speaks, but instead of looking at Harry he's glaring right back at Ron. "Why don't you ask Weasley why he attacked his co-worker? Why don't you ask him why he performed an unauthorized Legilimency spell on a fellow Auror? Unless it is authorised, then I'll be taking my leave. Just say so, Potter, I'll be happy to leave this fucking place if you authorised that."
"Cool it, Malfoy. I didn't authorise anyone to perform any spells on any of their co-workers. Ron, that was both reckless and illegal. What were you thinking? I could have your badge taken for that!"
"What, you don't have to ask him why he did it? Is he afforded the privacy of not sharing with all of us the reason why he had to root around my brain, looking for—"
He gets interrupted by frantic knocks on the door, and Ron feels his anger inflate when he hears Hermione's worried voice. "I'm coming in!"
He watches Harry scratch at his scar, too tired to argue with her. When she enters, she takes a good look around the room, eyes flickering over Malfoy's face before landing on Ron. She takes her time, surveying the damage, before turning to Malfoy. "Why did you do that? Why would you hit him?"
Ron hadn't expected to see her so soon, feeling his chest further splinter open upon seeing her frazzled appearance. She looks an equal mix of angry and worried, hair wild and cheeks flushed.
It's only been a day and he already feels empty without her.
"Ron provoked him. There might be serious legal repercussions, Hermione. He performed Legilimency on Malfoy." Harry looks and sounds tired, moving to sit behind his desk and put his head in his hands. He looks like he already regrets accepting the promotion.
"You what?" she screeches, marching over to him. "What were you thinking, Ronald? You could be removed from the force for that!"
He sees it then, a flash of panic in Malfoy's eyes. He thinks that his secret will be revealed, he thinks that Ron would tell Hermione what he found inside the blonde git's head. For a moment, he considers doing it: spitting in her face that she's wrong, apparently a Death Eater scum like him can love her, but he hesitates long enough that he watches as Malfoy comes to his own conclusions.
He watches as the realisation dawns on Malfoy; that Ron doesn't want to reveal his secret. He watches as the blonde tries to come up with a reason as to why Ron wouldn't want to immediately tell everyone what he saw, to embarrass the other man and rub it in his face that Hermione would never want a Death Eater like him, that he's disgusting for even thinking of her, for wanting her and thinking that he could ever have her. The longer that Ron does none of that the longer he gives Malfoy to figure out the truth.
He had always been smart like that, even Ron can begrudgingly admit it. He had been the top student in their class, just second to Hermione herself, and it shows in the way he's calculating the silence that stretches between Hermione's question and Ron's response. His eyes, cold and grey, flicker between Ron's tightly clenched jaw and Hermione's disbelieving and nervous face. Ron watches as he glances at their hands, not touching, not intimate, not together.
He sees the exact moment Malfoy realises it, sees the way his eyes rove over her face, sees the flash of hope that he tries to tamper down. Ron watches as his indecision costs him the chance to make sure that the two never find out about their feelings for each other, watches as it affords his lifelong rival the confidence to hope for a chance with her.
He's a Slytherin through and through. Eyes as sharp as a snake, lending him the ability to be deathly observant. He's cunning, and Ron has no doubts that he'll do everything to make sure that he's come to the right conclusion; that Ron doesn't want Hermione to know about Malfoy's feelings for her because he's scared of what she'll do with that information.
With his hesitation, Ron had basically handed over victory to the snake.
So he unpins his badge, tosses it over to Harry without looking at the man, ignores Hermione's indignant cry, and marches away from the lot of them. He ignores her calls, ignores the way the others watch him curiously as he exits the scene and the office. When he rounds a corner, he catches a glimpse of Harry holding Hermione back from following him.
Perhaps Harry had come to the same conclusion as Malfoy.
He ends up in the Three Broomsticks and that's where Harry finds him that night, sloshed but somehow still coherent.
"He loves her," he says by way of greeting, gesturing to Madam Rosmerta to bring over a new bottle of firewhisky. "That's what I saw in his head."
Harry looks only mildly surprised, as if he had half-suspected that already. "Why didn't you tell her that?" Even as he asks, Ron knows he already has some idea as to what the answer will be.
"She found the ring yesterday, then she broke up with me. Apparently, she's also in love with him. But you knew that already, didn't you Harry? You knew it somehow, even back then in your office. How?"
"I saw the way he looks at her, and while I was taking Occlumency and Legilimency lessons from him I noticed that he seems to think about her often," his friend quietly admits, taking the bottle from Rosmerta and thanking her. "I didn't think anything would come of it. I thought, maybe I was just seeing things. This is Malfoy we're talking about; he can reform himself, maybe enough to become friends with half-bloods and muggle-borns, but I hadn't thought he would actually fall for anyone who isn't a pureblood. Obviously, I was wrong."
Ron doesn't answer, contents himself with making Harry try to fill in the uncomfortable silence that follows his revelation.
"I'm sorry I didn't say anything," the brunet finally says. "Do you want me to talk to her? Is she still in your flat? Where are you staying?"
"She left me the flat, mate. Said I can have it and that she'll stay in her parents' old house. You can try to talk to her but I don't really see the point, if I'm being honest."
"What? You're just going give up then?" It's the accusation and the disappointment in his best friend's voice that finally gives him the energy to be angry again. He slams his hand on the table but Harry only blinks at his outburst, whipping out his wand and throwing silencing and disillusionment charms without missing a beat.
"Give up? What would you know? Your relationship is perfect, you're getting married, you've probably never had to watch your partner slowly but surely lose interest in you. You don't truly know what it's like to watch her fall in love with someone else while deluding yourself into believing that you're just seeing things, so don't lecture me about giving up, Harry." It feels good, to release some of the pent-up anger, and he feels the tears begin to stream down his face just as he watches as the challenge in Harry's eye deflates. "I know when to fold, I know when to accept that my King is compromised, I know when it's checkmate and there's no going back."
Harry doesn't say anything in return, and he doesn't have to. Ron knows he's right, knows that they both know that no amount of talking or begging could make Hermione change her mind. She's steadfast to the point of being recklessly stubborn, and once she makes a decision she sticks by it. They both have no doubt in their minds that if she had decided to end a relationship spanning more than five years, it was not a decision made lightly. She had probably been stewing in it, over-analysing every little detail before coming to the conclusion that she would rather break up with him that pretend for a second longer that she's still in love with him.
Ron thinks he would have also come to the same conclusion given enough time. She had just been one step ahead, like how she always is.
Epilogue
Neville and Luna get married just a little over a year after Harry and Ginny's own ceremony. He got invited, and along with his invitation came a warning from his best mate and his sister.
"Hermione will be there," they had told him, watching him closely. "Malfoy was also invited. They would probably come together since, you know, they're together."
Ron had snorted, not bothering to look up from the shelves he had been inspecting. He had made a point to jot down that they were running out of whiz-bangs before replying, "You don't have to warn me to behave myself. It's been more than a year."
And he does behave himself. He sits sandwiched between Harry and George, and his heart only hurts a little when he finally spots her with her hand tightly clutched in his. She waves to them, her smile cautious, and lets Malfoy lead her to another table where Blaise Zabini and Theodore Nott are seated.
Ron doesn't even comment that Neville let not just one but three Death Eaters into his wedding.
Throughout the ceremony, he can't help but watch her. He watches as he leans to whisper something in her ear that has her covering her mouth to contain her laughter, glee apparent in her wide eyes that never once stray to look at Ron. He watches as he watches her watching the bride and groom vow eternity to each other, her eyes glassy and his eyes filled with devotion. When Malfoy leans in to kiss her cheek, she chuckles, wiping at her eyes and leaning forward to steal a quick kiss from his willing mouth.
It should repulse him, but he finds that he can no longer hate them for finding each other. When he watches them dance together, he sees that she looks at him the way he had wanted her to look at him when they were still together. When they had broken up, Ron believed that he would hate for Malfoy to be someone deserving of Hermione's love, but now he can't even bring himself to truly feel remorse as he watches him spin her around.
When she stops spinning, she lands in his embrace and they stay like that, just rocking from side to side. She opens her eyes and finally meets Ron's. He feels like a whole conversation passes between them, one filled with endless apologies, hopes that they can become what they were before they ventured into a romance, and promises that they will try to find each other in a new light.
He nods at her and when she smiles back, he finally accepts that in his arms, she has found happiness.