Disclaimer: I own nothing related to the HP universe.

A/N: Another update! Aren't you proud of me? My muse refuses to work on other stories until I finish this, so here it is! A long, nice final chapter for you. I hope this ties up a few of the loose ends. I am getting so many reviews that I was seriously tempted to delay this update so that I may get more of them... nah. Won't do that to you. -smiles-

BuckNC: You will find out why in this chapter, tee hee hee. Thank you for reviewing!

Yav aka Shibs: Yes, those will be answered in this final chapter. Thanks!

bleedingheart666: And I love you for reviewing! Thank you, and this is a quick update for you!

Plum Blossoms: I know how it may get confusing in the last chapter. I hope this chapter will make everything clear! I do have a few other stories, and will be very happy if you go and check some of them out. -hint hint-

Snidget-And-Co: Oh, the Death Eaters meant business and they were for real, but they did achieve in "tricking her feelings to come back." Do I look like the angsty kind to you? Ron is fine, as you'll find out soon enough...

Vulcaine7: Thank you! -blushes and fidgets-

me: Thank you!

hollyg20: As I am a SS/HG shipper, it is really hard for me to refrain from putting a bit in this story... sorry. -grins sheepishly- I hope this quick update comes as a pleasant surprise to you! -winks-

BakaAngel: -chews on cookie- Thanks for the treat. I am glad you like the story!


Christmas.

Many people would pay a fortune to have a white Christmas. I am not sure I like it that much, though.

White walls, white tiles, white covers, white pillows, white bandages, white patients. Not snowy white, but sterilely white, completed with the pervasive smell of antiseptic.

It was indeed the whitest Christmas I had ever experienced. I hoped with all my heart that I would never have to experience it again.

I swallowed bitterly as I turned my gaze to the man lying on the bed and shook my head. I could be spending Christmas here next year as far as I knew. And the year after that. Salazar know when Ron coming around.

I took the brass basin from under the bed and went to the far end of the room and filled it with cool water. Carrying it gingerly back to the bed, I then carefully moved the many Get-well-soon and Christmas cards on the nightstand aside. The Weasleys had come earlier this morning, bringing many presents and cards. Ginny brought the bunch of roses that were now sitting in a vase on the tray, adding a bit of color to the horridly dull room. Mr. and Mrs. Weasley hugged their youngest son, Fred and George joked a little, and Ginny just sat by me, holding my hand, whispering nothings. When they left, Mrs. Weasley gave me a bone-crushing embrace and kissed me. I could not bear her gratitude, not when her son was in a coma because of me.

As I put down the basin, cautious of not wetting any of Ron's presents and absentmindedly thinking of when he would be able to open them, I realized that for the first time in days the Weasleys had stopped prying me away from Ron and telling me to get some rest. They have given up on me, I thought as I looked into the water and noted that I, as they had pointed out, did look terrible. Weariness had pulled purple bags beneath my eyes and racked my lips dry.

But it was not the weariness that caused me to look awful, it was something else. I dipped the towel into the water. It was the guilt etched so obviously on my face. Yes, guilt. And despair. I learned very early on that emotions hurt, and always thought that in order to protect itself, my mind had figured out a way to get rid of feelings. I always reckoned that my feelings had gone away naturally. It wasn't until now I realized how much effort I had to put in to suppress them.

I twisted the soaked towel with both my hands. Hard.

I tried to hold my tears. I tried to tell myself that I could not feel. Just like I couldn't feel much about my Dad, so couldn't I feel for Ron. I loved him so much that I could not possibly feel anything for him.

Or my heart would be broken.

However, the sight of him laying there, completely oblivious of anything, disillusioned me. I could no longer deceive myself. No matter how hard I tried, no matter how much I convinced myself, no matter how real it seemed sometimes- I did possess feelings, and at this time, I could no longer muster the strength to smother them. They ran loose and rampant, taking over my body and my soul, as if they had to make up for the past years when they were contained in the darkest corner of my heart.

I folded the wet towel and began to clean his face.

If he would open his eyes now, I would see in his pupils a grieving girl, and he would widen them in surprise. When had this girl learned to grieve? When had sadness regained its position in this girl's heart?

She had learned to feel again when the man she loved laid motionless in front of her. And he would smile in triumph, telling her that he had finally succeeded. He had restored her to her former sensitive self.

But at what price?

I rubbed his neck slowly, and told him that it was not worth it.

I'd rather never to feel a thing again than to see him like this.

I wiped his arm, then lifted it to clean its other side. Routinely, nonchalantly, like I did everyday, like I would for many days, weeks, months more. It was the only little thing I could do, and in some way, I was contented- maybe, maybe I could stay with him forever then- until guilt came again and washed the thought away.

I moved to his fingers. He had long, strong fingers, that laid delicate between mine now, that wouldn't tousle my hair anymore. I held them, wiping them one by one, wondering what they would feel like when they were warm and holding me- when suddenly, a jolt. A tiny throb, more like, but definitely movement.

"Ron," I gasped, throwing down the towel and standing up. I bent over and watched his eyes. Nothing. Nothing.

"Ron," I pleaded again and cupped his face with both my hands. Then-

A twitch!

Hope!

"Healer Meek! Healer Randall!" I cried, barely holding my hysteria in. That was a twitch, I was sure of it! I ran out of the room. "Healer! Healer! He's awake! Healer! Anyone!"

My voice hit the walls of the empty hallway and died. I ran down as the seemingly endless walls and doors dashed past, my padded footsteps heavy on the tiles.

"Anyone! Please!" My voice was watery and weak, mixed with relief and panic. I bumped into someone. I did not stop to apologize. I ran on in a daze, my vision temporarily impaired- until a familiar streak of blue crossed the corner of my eye.

"Healer!" I practically threw myself at him. To his credit, the healer did not freak out. He merely drew out his wand and said a spell. Immediately a warmth I had never known, like the hug of a mother, enveloped me. My breathing slowed and I stopped before the two of us would collide.

"Miss Lovegood," Healer Meek smiled good-naturedly. "Nice to see you out exercising once in a while."

I was not in the mood for humor, and even with the calming charm on me, I couldn't help but grabbed his hand. "He's 'wake," I panted as I tugged the skilled healer. He did not need any further explanation or persuasion to move. Taking on brisk steps and a professional air, he matched along the corridors as I broke into a jog to keep up with him, using a 'Sonorus' on himself and requesting several healers to come with him. As my lungs contracted painfully for the second time of the day, I slapped myself on the forehead mentally for not thinking of magnifying my plea for help.

When we busted into the Intense Treatment Ward, three healers were already there. My eyes wandered on them before settling on the two persons standing next to the bed- a very-worried Hermione, and my Potions professor with his arm around her shoulder. Snape looked up into my eyes, and I knew at once that it was him that I had bumped into earlier.

Healer Meek rushed over and immediately began firing questions at his team. Some of them gave their various readings of Ron, some too busy to bother. I took a step closer.

And took a step back.

Looking over to the swarm of healers bustling about and Hermione standing there with tears in her eyes, I realized that my mission here was over. Ron was awake, the ones that mattered were present, and it was time for me to leave. I might be able to stay before, when my shell of protection was still intact; but now that it was shattered and I had nowhere to hide behind, I would have to find a place to lick my wounds. Maybe someday, it would stop hurting so much, when I stopped feeling again. But I highly doubted that.

I took one last, long look at the whiteness of the room, and turned to leave-

when a sound pinned me to right where I was.

"Luna."

I turned to the bed. The healers parted a little and they were all looking at me. I looked back, and there was Ron struggling to sit up, a healer holding his shoulders and trying to push him back onto the bed.

"Luna," he called once more, his voice so weak that it was nearly drowned in the humming of the Maintenance Spells in the room, but it pierced straight into my ears.

I strode over to his side, not knowing what was shown on my face. Everything, I believe.

He gripped my hand tightly when I was beside him, like a falling man would to a piece of rope. I placed my other hand on his, and he gripped that, too.

"Don't leave me," he croaked.

So I didn't. I would never be able to say no to him. And as the healers busied themselves around me, I stared at our solidly entwined hands, and mused that there would be time later to tend the bruises.


I woke with a start, and sat up jerkily. I had fallen asleep on my chair. The moon had decided not to come out this night, and the room was very dark. Instinctively I turned to the bed, looking for the sound that had woken me. In the midst of the dreary hum of the magic, I could hear Ron's labored breath.

I lighted the candle with my wand, and looked over at him. His cheeks were tinted in an unnatural pink. I laid a hand on his sweaty forehead- he was feverish.

"Ron," I shook him slightly and fumbled for the wet towel. Cooling it with a charm and placing it on his forehead, I shook him again. The healers had warned me about a possible fever and had left behind a potion before they departed. Even though it was not something to panic about, Ron would have to consume the potion.

"Loony," he whispered with a strange smile. I sighed.

"You have to take your medicine," I said.

"I don't want to," he pouted, still not opening his eyes.

"You have to," I whispered sternly and placed both my hands on his arms in an attempt to get him to sit up. "C'mon-"

My words were cut short when he flipped his hands in lightening reflexes and pulled hard. I stumbled and fell onto him, both my hands grasping the front of his hospital pajamas. He chuckled lowly above me.

"You don't seem very ill to me," I murmured crossly and thanked in my heart for the dim light that would hopefully hide my blush. I began to push myself away from him.

He pushed my head back with a big hand, and held it there. I felt his chest rising and falling. The movement calmed me, and I stayed in that position for a long time, lost, until he cleared his throat.

"I love you, do you know that?"

The words were magnified in his ribcage, and tenfold more in my head. I stood up hastily as if I had been burnt.

"Ron," I bent over and looked into his eyes. I couldn't decide whether they were diluted in the candlelight. "You're delirious. You have to drink the potion."

He sighed, but did not protest any further and took the potion in one gulp. Moments later, he was snoring serenely beneath his covers.

I, unfortunately, was deprived of the privilege and sat wide-eyed until the first sunray seeped through the curtains.


"It's a beautiful morning," he said, stretching his arms.

I ignored him and continued arranging the fresh bunch of roses Ginny brought in earlier. Over the week I had learned quite a few things about Ron Weasley, one of them being that he was a morning person, much to my annoyance.

"I wonder what's for breakfast," he said, putting up a lopsided smile.

"Eggs, sausages and toasts," I muttered beneath my breath. "Same as every morning, as you very well know." And not even that could dampen his mood, which just depressed me further. I was never fond of mornings, and being seriously deprived of sleep for a week was not helping.

"Come on, you little miss sunshine," he joked, and patted the bed. "Come here."

"I am busy," I told him, fixing the flowers and moving the bottles of potions around. Two days ago he moved into this private room, neat and free of magical hums. Unfortunately, there wasn't much to distract me here- the room was much smaller, and there was only so much area that I could clean about.

He knew this, of course. So he just sat there quietly, with his unnerving eyes following my every movement, until I ran out of things to arrange. I swore to myself that I would not look at him. He could read me too easily now, and I wasn't comfortable with that. Defiantly, I turned my back and began to untie the curtains that I had just tied minutes ago.

"Luna," I could hear his small sigh. "What are you doing?"

I turned away from the window and twisted my hands together, hating the tension in the air. It made my hands clammy and my heart thump painfully in my chest.

"Come here, sit with me."

I obliged, and sat down on the edge of the bed. The satin sheets were cool under my legs. He shifted back to make room for me, and my elbow bumped into his knee as I moved.

"Sorry," I mumbled.

"Where are you going?" He grabbed my arm and stopped my shying away. I glanced at him. His eyes were serious.

"Do you have something to say?" I asked, not understanding why it came out like a whisper. Just get it over with, my mind urged. It had been like this for several days, and I knew there could be no further postponement to the issue.

What issue?

This I did not know. And fear for the unknown was the greatest fear of all.

"Yes, in fact I do," his voice dropped as well, and the thumping in my ears grew until it hurt so much that I could not speak. I nodded.

"There's something that I should- I meant to, tell you long ago," he began, his voice suddenly uncertain. "But somehow I never- this is harder than I thought. You'll just have to listen."

I shrugged to show him that I had no intention to interrupt.

"I like you, Luna," his eyes were on mine now, and I felt as if all wind was knocked out of me, but I made no attempt to look away. "I have liked you for a long time."

When did he place his hand on mine? Again I did not take it back. I doubt that I could even if I'd tried. I felt like I was a puppeteer, only all strings of control were cut off, and the puppet had come to life, and I was helpless but to watch the drama before me unfold itself.

"-so long that I couldn't remember," he was saying. "Was it when you crash-landed on me that day? Was it when I carried you to the Hospital Wing? Or was it when I discovered that you were devoid of any kind of emotions? I don't know. The only thing I know is that I like you, more than anything else, even more than the mild crush I was having on Hermione at that time. I like you so much that I came up with a plan."

"A plan."

"Yes, a plan... that would allow me to be special in your life, a plan that would let me see you regularly and spend time with you alone, a plan that would bring back your feelings, and hopefully develop some towards me..."

"A plan, as in... calculation."

He shook his head and smiled sadly.

"No, Luna. Desperation. Visiting you in the Hospital Wing, seeing you turning cooler and cooler, as if you wanted nothing to do with me-"

I opened my mouth to say something, but he continued without pausing.

"Don't you see it now? It's something I came up with in desperation. Merlin curse my plan," he spat the word. "I lied to Dumbledore, I lied to myself, and most of all, I lied to you."

"I don't understand."

He forced a laugh. "You never do, or so I thought. And that's the root of our misery."

"Kindly speak in English, please," with my head reeling, I really could not deal with riddles. I rubbed my temples wearily.

"I am a fool. And a coward. If only I had seen it- it was right there- you were so clearly in love with me!"

As my deepest secret was being reaped out of my chest and laid bare in front of him, my initial response was to deny. But before I could as much as part my lips to protest his presumptuous exclamation, he laughed again, this time with a glint in his eyes.

"Don't you dare to say otherwise. I read it in your diary."

"My dia- how-"

"The spell you used... let's just say it hasn't worked too well."

"How dare you-"

"The Latin for 'word' is verbum, I think. But that's not the point," he placed an arm around me and pulled me closer. I was too stunned to react. "The point is, you had feelings for me, and that's why you were cold to me. I, of all people, should have noticed it earlier.

"But I am only human, and I guess my own feelings blinded me somewhat. I couldn't bear the thought of, of just greeting you in the corridors and seeing you in the Great Hall during lunch, so terribly polite and- just friends. So I came up with this idea."

"So, the whole therapy thing is a fraud?"

"No. I honestly wanted to... restore you, if you don't mind the term. You've no idea how much it pained me to see you go through everyday as if nothing matters. Your blank face troubled me, even in my dreams, and I made it my mission to bring something, if not joy, into your life. I want to make you smile, because that is the most beautiful thing to me.

"And this has become another purpose in my life, besides my Auror trainings... I want you to know that many times, many, many times, it is you that kept me working through the week... the thought of you, waiting for me at the weekend. It's a sort of a goal-line to me."

I stared at him, my head screaming for myself to wake up. Ron Weasley, confessing his love for me? It was too dreamy to be true. On the outside, I kept my cool and gave nothing away, except maybe the chewing of my lip. I tried to make it look like a thoughtful gesture rather than a nervous one.

"I looked forward to meeting you every week, and always struggled when I had to leave, to be away from- anyway, I know this would not last. One day you would graduate and have your own life, but I never gave up the hope that one day you would have your feelings back, and you would then understand what love is. I waited week after week, praying that you would come to know the emotion called love, when I could tell you, how much I love you."

"But I know it all along."

"You told me you didn't, remember? And I believed. The coward in me stopped me from telling you my true feelings. If only I had listened to the Griffindor instead..."

"Then I wouldn't have suffered for so long... the weekly tortures..." my voice broke and the tears I tried so hard to hold at bay tumbled down.

"If only... if only, oh, I am sorry, I am sorry."

He continued murmuring until my sobs subsided. Pushing a stray tear from my cheek, he said,

"At times I- I was so anxious to force you to be happy and treated you like- a project, as you described. I am really sorry, Luna. I didn't mean to."

My tears welled up again and threatened to fall at his sincere tone. I brushed them away as furtively as I could.

"However, I must point out that- ahem," he cleared his throat, a slight hint of amusement on his lips. "That the many- erm, how should I put this- things that seem to elicit your jealousy regarding Hermione, ah, they're entirely imaginary and based on no truth whatsoever."

My cheeks burned. I was so embarrassed that I didn't even reprimand him for reading my private journal.

"I did not rush here every week to see Hermione, and when you saw us in Hogsmeade, she was helping me to choose your Christmas present. At any rate, we are and will always be only friends, and she knows all about my feelings to you, so-"

"She knows?" I gasped. Merlin, she must have held her side and laughed every time I threw her a sour glare.

"Everybody knows," he raised an eyebrow. "Are you kidding, Luna? I was nothing but obvious. As in obvious with a capital 'O'."

I groaned. "No you were not."

"Why do you think I was all upset about Keyes?" He rolled his eyes. "Because his brain looks bigger than his arse? No! Merlin, because he was with you! I was so depressed and ready to give up when Ginny told me that you two were just friends, like Hermione and I."

"What? Ginny-"

He cut me off by taking both my hands and pressing his lips against mine. Our first kiss was everything I imagined: his moist lips on my dry ones, his long nose and my flying hair getting in the way, and it was perfect.

"I hope that clears up any doubts that you were having," he said when we broke apart, his forehead touching mine. It was the first time I looked so closely into his pupils, and they reflected a lovely girl with dirty-blond hair and a smile on her face. So not me, but at the same time, so definitely me.


"You know, Luna, I planned on confessing when we return to Hogwarts," Ron said one day, after his ritual 'what a beautiful morning' speech. I busied myself around the room, preparing for his returning home later that afternoon.

"But since we never made it to Hogwarts, and I nearly got killed, I thought, 'Hell, I really don't want to die with her not ever knowing that I love her,'" he went on, apparently not minding my lack of response. "And now, I am going to do something totally out of character."

"Which is?" I asked absentmindedly, focusing my energy on shrinking his robes.

"I am going to quote something from Dickens," he said proudly.

I stopped for a second, making sure that I wasn't hearing things. "Since when did you pick up on Muggle literature?"

Then he started reciting, his voice deep and full of meanings.

"I loved her simply because I found her irresistible. Once for all; I knew to my sorrow, often and often, if not always, that I loved her against reason, against promise, against peace, against hope, against happiness, against all discouragement that cold be. Once for all; I loved her none the less because I knew it, and it had no more influence in restraining me, than if I had devoutly believed her to be human perfection."

"That's from the Great Expectations," I said softly after a moment of silence, my back still facing him.

"Yes," he replied gently.

"Out of character, indeed," I turned to him and was again surprised by the softness on his face.

"Hermione often quotes that when talking about Snape."

"Then why are you quoting it to me?" Walking over to him, I asked.

"Because it's the true," he replied, standing up. He lifted my face and stroked my cheek with a finger. "Also because I know you've been wanting to ask."

"Why do you love me?" I asked anyway.

"People say that when you love somebody, there is no reason behind it. I think that's true," he paused. "But only because there are so many things I love about you, that I don't know where to start."

He leaned down and captured my lips, and I smiled into the kiss. For the first time in many, many years, I felt whole again.


A/N: That's it folks! I hope the chapter is not too sappy for your taste. Stay tuned for the epilogue, which should be up in a week... thanks for the reviews, and keep them coming! I love you all! Anonymous reviewers, please leave your email address if you wish to be put on the mailing list.