The Simplest of Emotions

By: Lance Walker

Rating: PG-13-for language, sexual innuendo, possible sexual situations (we'll see where it takes me)

Spoilers: All Books

Disclaimer: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.

Story Note: It is three years after the graduation of Ron's class from Hogwarts. More importantly, however, it is the third year after the end of the Second Voldemort War, and the start of the Dumbledorian Concord. The war is over, and the world is rebuilding, but Ron is not. Since his graduation he has locked himself away in his room in the burrow and lived the life of a hermit. Now, after these three years, he has decided to enter into the world again. On his first day into the world, his twenty- second birthday, however, he learns something that shocks all the foundations of his life, and threatens his return to hermitage.but this time, Ron will confront the mystery, and in so doing, confront the past he so wants to forget. Ron's problems, however, seem to be nothing compared to what the wizarding world is facing. Will he be able to handle it all? Or will he go back to where he is safe.possible still safe. His resilience, as well as the resilience of the whole wizarding world will be tested as things unravel, new and old horrors are released, and people thought long dead, find a way back into the light.

Author's Note: Any and all questions, comments, or suggestions can be sent to me at any time, and I will appreciate them immensely! This process is extremely hard and time consuming, but I have finally found another passion.might as well hold on to it ;)

Chapter 2

A Party to be Remembered

I blasted into the kitchen where mum was working hard on my birthday feast. I gave her a kiss on the cheek.

"So, what are we having?"

I sat back to drink in her dazed expression and tried to act innocent. "What?"

Molly Weasley spoke up then. "I thought I was seeing a ghost! Bless me; you've left your room!! I knew that this day would come!" She began to fret over me with endless kisses on the cheek and several salty tears falling from her joyous eyes.

"Oh come now, mum.it was going to happen sooner or later, and what better day than my twenty-second birthday!" I opened the refrigerator and pulled out a bottle. I blew the cap off with a spell and then said, "I'm going to call Harry and tell him to bring more of this stuff."

Mum glanced at me. "No, that's okay, I'll tell him when he calls to make certain of the final plans. It's 'Smarkloft,' right?"

I chuckled. "'Smirnoff,' mum. Smirnoff Ice."

She looked up. "I still don't think you should be drinking that, dear."

I laughed once more, an apparent record for me, as I left the kitchen in search of the party invite list. As I searched I heard mum clattering around in the kitchen. Finally, she called out to me. "Ron, have you seen my favourite frying pan?"

I smiled and answered. "Mum, do I ever cook?" It wasn't a lie, just an omission of the truth. She took the line and I went back to looking. Apparently she believed the fact, and didn't notice the increased pounding of the enraged ghoul upstairs. I finally found the invitation list in the Floo powder jar. I unrolled the parchment and smiled. Leave it to mum to invite every wizard and witch I had ever known.

Glancing over the list I mentally checked off names of people I hadn't seen since Hogwarts days. Angelina and Oliver were coming with their two bouncing children, Eric "Bludger" Wood and Douglas "Snitch" Wood.I had yet to ask.

My eyes fell on Harry's entourage that included Cho, Sirius Black (with his American wife and three children James, Lily, and Sirius Jr.), Professor Lupin (still a bachelor, I'm afraid), and several other high-ranking members of the wizarding world, including half the Chudley Canons Quidditch team.

Several of my former Hogwarts teachers were invited, but I didn't expect many to show as most would have to be at the school to watch the wizards and witches in training of today. The people who would be there for sure were Headmistress McGonagall, Madame Pomfry, Professor Flitwick, Hagrid, and Professor Snape. Professor Snape! I thought, screaming the name like an obscenity in my mind. Looking back on my years at Hogwarts, Snape was not a person I remembered as being a blessing. Granted, he saved our lives several times, but he still made daily school life hell. Oh well, if he actually showed I'd smile and bear it. He had been named a hero after the final battle, and I can honestly say if it weren't for him more students would have died. I heard from Parvarti herself that Snape held off a score of Death Eaters himself as he tried to escape with the students who weren't fighting from Ravenclaw into the Forbidden Forrest where the centaurs and Aragog had formed somewhat of an alliance (upon the urgings of Hagrid) to provide shelter for the students of Hogwarts.

The list was two rolls long, and I began to get the impression that this wasn't the only list. For some reason one name at the very end of the second roll was only half written, as if the person who had been writing it got distracted before he or she realized they were out of room.

Looking over both rolls one last time I counted at least twenty people I had never met before in my entire life, which wasn't surprising as Weasley get togethers were always big occasions anyways, and also I noted that several people were missing from the list that I would have added, but I can see why mother wouldn't have (like inviting Norbert the dragon, for example).

I took the time to take note of any people who hadn't yet replied to let my mum know they were coming, and Fleur Delacour was one of them. She was under Charlie's name, which surprised me, as I didn't know that they had made their dating (also known as sex with benefits to Charlie) official. Hoping that Bill and Charlie would both still be alive at the end of the night I finished glancing over the rolls.

I don't know why, but I found myself looking and hoping to find Hermione's name on the list.but of course it wasn't there. It never would be.

Quickly dropping the paper, I walked out into the garden where Bill and Charlie were setting up several extremely long tables with their usual competitive flair. Wiping a single tear from my eye, I looked around for a moment and spied Ginny reclining in the same chair she had been before, reading a book by some Muggle psychologist named Freud rather than the Harry Potter books she had been reading before, which were stacked high on the wicker table next to her chair. Before offering my services to my brothers, I decided I could waste time talking to my sister. Before I sat down, she stated, "You've locked yourself in your room for three years because you have suppressed sexual feelings towards mum."

I immediately thought that wizardly labor would be better than this. I stuttered. "Where did you get that idea?"

"Sigmund." She meant Freud, but she said it as if they were on a first name basis.old chums, actually. "He says that all things return to sex, or the lack of it, I suppose." She smiled at her quippish joke.

"You have no idea what my sex life is like...I have a sex life!" I said, blushing, as I had never actually HAD a sex life except almost that one time with Hermione before.but I wasn't going to let Ginny know that!

"If you count your hand as a partner.but if not, your sex life is nonexistent." She laughed. Ginny may be smarter than us all.but she could still be a 20-year-old bitch sometimes.

I walked away, hoping that my two older brothers would be kinder to me. They saw me coming, and Bill lost concentration and dropped the immense table he had zooming across the lawn in a crash course towards Charlie's unsuspecting table which was floating indolently around the lawn. It fell to the ground with a clatter as Bill yelped. "Shit, mum will be furious if she finds us destroying the bloody furniture again!"

Charlie laughed. "Damn it, Bill, you are always getting me into trouble with that storm of a woman! And besides, it's always you playing with the furniture anyways!"

Bill stared harshly at Charlie, but before he could maim his brother (and not just for the reason he had just been accused of several things, but I somehow thought it was more for the theft of the notorious Veela, Fleur Delacour) they all turned at the sound of a very loud voice. "Bill! Charlie! Did you say what I think you said?!"

Bill stammered, "Sod it, mum.they're just curse words! We are a bloody thirty years old and it isn't-"

Charlie cut him off. "No, mother! We were just saying what a great mum you are to all of us! Simply marv!"

Mrs. Weasley pulled her head back inside the window it had been stuck out of and we all immediately burst into laughter.

"Crikey, Bill! You never admit to mum that you have a foul mouth. That would dash her beliefs that all but Fred and George are angel children. We can't have that, now can we?" I was still laughing.

Charlie looked at me with a smile. "You seem in a better mood today, Ron. I'm glad to see that after so long."

I almost answered, but Ginny, who had just walked up to us on her super- model legs, snorted. "He has finally come to grips with his repressed sexual feelings. He's decided to shag mum."

I let out a string of expletives as I chased her across the yard with mum's voice ringing out again, "Ron? Are you using foul language?"

******

I opened the door with an enormous grin on my face to combat the surprised expression on my best friend's face. "Harry! Come in! Let me take that for you!" I grabbed the two packs of Smirnoff Ice that Harry was carrying and let him pass. I pulled Cho in gracefully and gave her a small peck on her cheek-a slightly green cheek. The gorgeous oriental was wearing a deep blue dress robe that shimmered in the bright sunlight falling through the large window in the living room. Her hair was pulled up with a small clip and then let to fall down like a fountain in thousands of small ringlets of raven down her back. She gave me a weak smile and then quickly headed for the bathroom. Harry looked nervous, "She isn't feeling well.stomach virus or something." He was fidgeting, so I didn't press it.what is there to worry about with a little sickness? Harry was dressed to the nines as usual. His lucrative business as Editor in Chief of the most popular wizarding publication in the world offered him the ability to spend his money freely. His clean pressed dress robes were the latest fashion, but his hair still didn't cooperate with much else than washing it and shaking it out. The mop sat on his head in the manner of the "messed" look that had started to sweep the Muggle children.

I joked as we walked down the hall. "Madam Pomfry has been invited, she could look at Cho later!" Harry joined my laughter, but I could almost swear that his cheeks tinged a bit green as well.

Suddenly, I was worried. "Harry.is something wrong?" I put the drinks down on the kitchen table. "You seriously don't look well." And it was true. Harry looked as if he was functioning on about three hours sleep, and his whiskers were shaggy rather than the neat cut he usually kept. I led him upstairs and into my personal bathroom where I handed him my trimmer, which I hadn't used since I had stopped growing a goatee long ago.

He passed over his face closely as I asked again. "Harry.what's wrong? You look like hell! Does this have to do with Cho being sick? I'm sure she's okay, mate. Just a stomach virus like you said."

Harry put my trimmer down and sighed, "Ron.there is something I need to tell you.and.well.I think you should-" He began, but the bathroom door opened and Cho walked in, her face looking less green, and he stopped. Cho smiled. "What are you ladies doing in here, eh?"

Harry smiled that same smile he had smiled since the first time he ever laid eyes on Cho. He spoke up. "Oh nothing, luv. Ron was just lending me his razor.mine died this morning." He said the last bit a little forcefully, as if wanted Cho to agree, which she did, but I still took note.

Cho spoke again. "Ron, your mum was looking for you. She said she needed you two to help her take the refreshments outside." Cho left, and Harry gave me a shrug that said I'll tell you later. He walked past me and I followed eagerly.

It turned out that my mother did not need our help after all as my father apparated in from work at the moment we got down stairs. He immediately levitated the whole of the refreshment and drink table outside into the lawn, where several wayward tablecloths were dancing around thanks to the spells of Bill and Charlie. Harry, Cho, and I walked outside and were immediately greeted with the smiling face of Sirius Black and his charming, beautiful wife, Emily Black. The "puppet show" was for the benefit of their three children who were dancing around underneath the flying tablecloths with glee.

Sirius walked up to me, placed two hands on my shoulder, and then gave me a big, fatherly hug. When he finally pulled back he said, "I'm glad to see you out and about, Ron.it really killed me to see you in so much pain." I smiled. His name cleared by the Ministry (with the help of Dumbledore), Sirius was able to come out of hiding. He had been living in America since the whole Dementors event during my third year, and that was where he had met the woman who now occupied his arm. Since he came out of hiding, he had been able to become a full time father for Harry, as was his job as Godfather, and I had become something of an adopted son to the Black family.

I thanked Sirius, gave Emily a small kiss on the cheek, and welcomed them to the party. I turned around to survey the garden that was still slightly empty, but I knew that before the night was over, it would be full of old friends.

******

I was sitting at the head of one of the long tables set in the lawn. Thousands of floating candles-courtesy of Bill and Charlie, apparently flying things were their specialty-illuminated the darkness, allowing this one place in the entire street to be light in the darkness of the night.

Everyone was laughing, and I laughed along as Harry told a story from our first year at Hogwarts. His deep, reassuring voice rang across the lawn from his seat at my right hand. "Well.if it hadn't been for the simple fact that my wand got stuck up the thing's nose, Ron and I would have been jam! While the thing was trying to get my now thoroughly mucus coated wand away from his nostril, Ron pulled off the wingardium leviosa spell which had been giving him so much trouble, and in the process, knocked out the troll with his own club!" Everyone clapped at the ending, and I joined in. The story reminded me of Hermione.just as every other story from Hogwarts would.

At that moment Remus Lupin stood up from a table over, where he was sitting with Sirius and his family and raised his glass. "This is to you, Ron, a great student, but an even greater friend." "Hear, Hear!" rang out from everywhere as they all toasted this. I looked around once again at all the smiling faces. Everyone had made it, even Neville Longbottom, who had actually turned out to be a very tall, handsome wizard. Dean Thomas was nodding his enthusiasm along with everyone else at his table where he sat next to Seamus Finnigan.

Suddenly a smell wafted across the lawn, and all heads turned to see my mum walking with three whole tables of food floating in front of her, helped by the twins. Everyone cheered and clapped at the sight of all the food, which mother had been slaving over all day. She set the tables down, and then Professor McGonagall, who had taken Dumbledore's position as Head of Hogwarts after his unfortunate death, stood up.

"As a Headmistress trying desperately to fill the large shoes left behind by our dear Albus Dumbledore, I will do my best to maintain his flair for social comments. If I recall correctly, Dumbledore would say 'Nitwit! Blubber! Oddment! Tweak!' at such an occasion, and I suppose I shall, too. If anyone would enjoy seeing what a top-notch man you've become, Ron, it would be him. He used to always point you out to me in the halls and say, 'That Weasley child will be something special to the world, more so than any Weasley before him.' I would think simply that the only thing you offered to the world was an incessant need to be late to class!" Everyone laughed at this, and she continued. "But I now see that he was right. Of all the Weasleys, you are the most well rounded, down to earth, and the one with the brightest future. You may not be the top-notch leader or the joke business entrepreneurs or the dragon trainer or Charm Breaker or the super model.even if you have stolen some hearts tonight with your handsome features! But you are most definitely a Weasley who could be any of the above and more. Congratulations, Ron, on the behalf of Hogwarts, myself, and of course, Dumbledore. I'm sure he himself has taken time from his current Great Adventure to stop his action and peer down on our gathering with a smile and a wish for future happiness. You've become more than a wizard.you've become a man. We welcome you to the world, and a world that today is far safer. It has been three years since the end of the Interregnum, five since the death of Voldemort himself, and the wizarding world is finally beginning to come out of its state of fear. The boom in population has ensured our survival, strengthened our economy, and boosted our hopes and dreams. As that generation is born, your generation, Ron, is taking hold of the world as it is. You are coming back into a world that still has much rebuilding to do, but with your help, I'm sure things will go smoothly." She raised her wand and charmed the food, which immediately was transported to all the tables where plates suddenly began to fill. She looked at me for a moment, and I nodded my thanks to her after wiping a tear from my eye.

I was enjoying the magnificent food when something landed on the table in front of me, right in the mashed potatoes. "Errol! I thought you weren't flying letter routes anymore!" My own personal owl, a great horned owl named Astarael from a fantasy book by a Muggle author named Garth Nix I had once read, was currently out delivering a package to the Granger family for me. I picked the poor owl up from his perch in the potatoes, and he promptly dropped the letter he was carrying on my plate. After seeing that I had got it, he immediately went to eating the potatoes off of his feathers.

Looking over the letter I popped the seal and opened it. Becoming more confused with every sentence I finally got to the end and let out a gasp. I read it again just to be sure, looked up and around to see if anyone was laughing at his or her cruel joke. No one was.this wasn't sent by anyone at this party. What the hell? I thought, reading it another five times. I felt someone's eyes on me, and I looked up to see Harry looking at me worriedly. I stood up, excused myself and then ran inside. Collapsing in the living room, the tears began to flow. I felt a hand on my back, and I looked up to see Harry and Cho standing behind me. "What is it, Ron?" Cho asked.

I handed her the letter and she and Harry read it. They both practically collapsed at the sight. "T-this can't be." Harry stammered, looking over the letter again.

"No.it can't.we all know what happened.it can't be." Cho said, handing the letter back to Harry and brushing a wayward lock of hair out of her face and behind her ear.

I took the letter back again, looked at the conclusion. It was signed: Much Love, yours forever and always, Hermione Granger.

.to be continued in Chapter 3, Multiple Bombshells

Okay.special thanks out to my Beta, Jenny(SorcressGrey), and my grammar queen, Mel! Also, another shout out to AngieJ whose Trouble in Paradise fanfic continues to inspire me. You are amazing! Also to all the great people in the forums who have helped so much with my initiation into the realm of fan fiction. Like Ron I've stepped out of one life, and into another, and it is not an easy task I can tell you, but with everyone's help I will survive. Thanks to the reviewers (all of you are listed below).it is good to know that you guys liked my story!

******

.And here is my little thank you to all of those who reviewed Chapter 1!!!

Don't worry about Hermione, or at least as you might assume from the end of this Chapter, don't count here out (Thanks to you HGWeasley!). Thanks so much for the review and I hope to please in the next chapter even more.I'll try to twinkle a bit as well ;) (Thanks for the great review, Twinkle.and the smilies!). Thank for the review Jess! We'll continue the madness in UY, as always, I'll see you around there! (Tovaneres). Thank you so much for teaching me a new word, and I'm glad you'll return for the next chapters.metafication.I'll have to remember that! (Thanks SJO for the review and the word!) Finally I see your review, Aless! Thanks for all the private critiquing sessions ;) (Your review got "published" as well dear.thanks for the Review!). Your writing is very good as well, Victoria! I can't wait till our next RPG! (Thanks for the review VictoriaAnne). Lol.everyone has mentioned the Hermione thing, I hope the end of Chapter 2 has people wondering. Wet behind the ears is an English phrase meaning "still inexperienced". People who haven't been doing things for very long are still wet behind the ears ;). (Thank you so much for the grand review Ainadilwen!)