A/N: I wrote this last-minute in response to the last contest. I almost killed myself trying to get it done, and then circumstances prevented me from submitting it. I figured I might as well post it after I took the time to finish it. Reviews are, as always, greatly appreciated. Fixed a few errors…
Disclaimer: I, of course, do not own any of the characters, plots, etc. of the Harry Potter series. They belong to the incredibly brilliant J. K. Rowling. This is simply my attempt to exercise my imagination.
Saying Goodbye
"Ron!"
"Good morning, little brother." Ron groaned as light flooded into his tiny bedroom. The one night when the Ghoul in the attic decided not to perform its noisy ritual…He rolled over and pulled his Chudley Cannons duvet over his head in an attempt to block out the unwelcome brightness.
"Get out," Ron, in a state resting somewhere between sleeping and waking, mumbled angrily into his pillow.
"Now is that any way to greet two wonderful brothers who come bearing gifts?"
Gifts? Ron's ears perked up a bit, and a fuzzy image of a Firebolt floated from right to left across a hazy grey background.
"Maybe we shouldn't give it to him, the ungrateful dolt. Whaddya reckon, George?"
"He doesn't deserve it." George agreed with his twin brother. One of the twins gripped the black cannonball in the Cannons logo and unceremoniously ripped Ron's shelter from the bed.
"Last chance." By this time, the cold air had jolted Ron into full-consciousness.
"What is it?" Ron questioned, sitting up in bed and rubbing the sleep from his blue eyes. When he opened them, he saw his older twin brothers, Fred and George, standing beside his bed. At the foot was a large box wrapped in brown paper.
"What is this?" Ron asked a second question. By now, he had certainly learned to be wary of "presents" from Fred and George.
"Late birthday-end-of-term present," answered Fred.
"Open it," the twins spoke together this time.
Ron scooted closer to the head of his bed—away from the suspicious package. "What's in it?"
"Open it already. We have a ton of things to do today, not one of which is standing here while you attempt to refuse our offer."
Cautiously, Ron inched forward and ran his hand along the box, searching for the seam. When he finally found one, he slowly pulled back on it and ripped the paper.
Fred yawned.
The box was heavy, Ron noted. But it didn't have any holes it, so he knew that it wasn't some very live and very vicious monster that would eat him. At least he hoped. …But that didn't mean that it wouldn't be dangerous.
George yawned.
Ron only took his eyes off of the box for a moment. He slid his digits under the lid and pushed. It fell back, hanging off of the edge of his bed. Ron sighed. More paper.
"We don't have all day, ya know," snapped Fred.
"We could help you if you like," offered George, pulling out his wand. Without further ado, Ron ripped the paper out of the box. A shiny, burnt gold piece of material fell over the side and slid onto the bed.
"It's not…?" he gasped.
"Not very bright, is he?"
"Sadly, no."
"Dress robes. New ones." Ron pulled the stunning rusty yellow robes completely out of the box and shook them so that he could see every centimetre.
"You see," began Fred matter-of-factly, "after the ball last year—"
"We decided that your appearance was an incalculable embarrassment," continued George.
"One that could be easily avoided in the future."
"But, but," spluttered Ron, now standing before a mirror to scrutinize himself, holding up the robes in front of him. He grinned. They were alright. As good as Harry's.
But a small voice in the back of his mind, which oddly resembled his mother's, nagged him. Still clinging to the top of the dress robes but letting his arms fall to waist level, Ron turned to his brothers.
The two smiled casually, attempting to look bored but not quite succeeding. To them, part of what they owed Harry had been repaid. They now felt free to put some of the remaining Galleons (and there were quite a few of them) to good use and buy additional ingredients for their experiments.
When Ron could ignore the voice no longer, he spoke. "Where—how—"
"Articulate little brother we have, eh Fred?"
"Brilliant. He has the intelligence of a garden gnome," Fred answered.
By now, Molly's voice was so strong in Ron's head that the insults failed to register. Not that it would matter if they did. Ron was used to the twins' abuse by now. It had started a long time ago and continued relentlessly through all of his fifteen years.
"Where did you get the money?" he croaked. Ron had found his voice.
Fred glanced at George. George looked at Fred. "We've been working hard. We perfected another product."
Fred quickly picked up on George's thoughts and finished for him. "We had some advance orders."
Ron grinned. He wondered what the twins were up to. "What kind of product?"
Fred frowned. "You'll find out soon enough."
"Be patient, and maybe--if you're not too annoying, mind you--we'll show you later," supplied George.
A light of hope was growing inside Ron. Still, he mused, that would take a lot of advance orders. "How much are you charging that you had enough to get these?" He somehow managed to loosen the grip of one of his hands long enough to gesture to the dress robes.
Fred and George emitted twin sighs of exasperation. Now extremely annoyed, Fred snapped, "Don't you know it's rude to ask about the price of a gift? Keep your mouth shut or we'll take them back."
"We had enough to get those. Don't worry about it." George had a little more patience, but his was wearing thin too. If only they hadn't decided to get the robes so soon. Still, even with Harry's insistence, he felt awkward spending the Triwizard winnings without doing this favour that Harry had asked of them.
George watched Ron closely, attempting to will him to take the robes without question. "Oh, and mind you try those to make sure they fit properly."
Ron continued to wage war in his mind. But--why? Oh-no. Ron groaned inwardly. The voice was back, this time though, it was his own. Recognizing the voice instinctively, he made his concerns public. His eyes narrowing suspiciously, Ron questioned the twins yet again. "Why did you give me these?" He shook the dress robes, which now hung from his right hand only.
"Ungrateful," whistled both Fred and George in a low tone.
"I told you—" George attempted to continue. Fred was too busy spewing further insults.
"Look," interjected George, "do you want them or not?" Fred fell silent and looked expectantly at Ron.
"What's the catch?" Ron remained suspicious. Given his previous experience with Fred and George, this was not unwise. A tremor shook Ron's tall frame as the memory of the soft fur of his teddy bear transforming into the bristled, writhing legs of a spider flooded back with such force that he felt the legs tickling his arms.
"No catch," responded Fred quickly.
Ron raised an eyebrow. No catch? Impossible.
"With a business to run, we can't have members of the family going around dressed like old biddies," Fred spoke again, scratching his nose impatiently.
"Yeah, it's very bad for business," agreed George.
A slow grin was beginning to make its way across Ron's face. New dress robes-- for him! He couldn't believe his luck. Still, something didn't seem quite right.
"Er, now that you mention it..."
Uh-oh, thought Ron, his spirits falling. The fairy dancing in his heart flitted strait into the wall and tumbled all the way down into he pit of his stomach, landing hard on its face.
"We would appreciate it if you wouldn't let Mum know about this."
"Otherwise the questions and the situations that would arise would prove a bit—"
"Messy," Fred and George completed the sentence in perfect unison. All three brothers were used to this occurrence by now. They disregarded it and turned to more pressing matters. It was not long before the twins received their answer.
"Wouldn't dream of it," Ron smiled at them. The fairy had, by this time, fully recovered and was currently tiptoeing its way back into his heart. "Thanks guys," he continued, still unable to believe his good fortune. "Wow. I don't know what to say." Ron whistled as he once more held the robes up to examine them.
"A 'thank you, most amazing and best brothers a bloke could ask for' would suffice," suggested George.
"But if you really felt like doing us favours…" began Fred, pausing to enjoy the startling effect the phrase had on his younger brother. Fred smiled. He loved playing games, and even after all these years, Ron was still a tad gullible.
"You could always—"
Ron thought that he knew what was coming. "Become your personal house elf?" he uttered miserably. He really liked these robes, and the prospect of not looking like a girl at the next occasion that called for them was, needless to say, extremely enticing. Yet, at the same time, the idea of cleaning the socks of the twins almost made him gag. Life was like that. Ron supposed that he'd have to give the robes back if it was a choice between being a slave and looking good a few times a year.
"No," replied Fred, stroking his chin, "although that's not a bad suggestion. We'll remember the offer if we ever need something in the future." Ron groaned—audibly this time. Why did he have to open his big mouth?
"We were thinking more along the lines of making sure Mum can't take the robes back if she happens to find out about them earlier than we'd like."
Ron frowned, creating lines of concentration on his forehead. "How?"
"We were thinking…" George said a second time.
"Something along the lines of--"
"Getting rid of these." George pointed at Ron's old robes, which presently served the most-useful and least-painful purpose of acting as a cover for Pigwidgen's cage.
"That way," George reasoned, "you won't have dress robes without this new set."
"So Mum can't make you take them back," Fred finished for his twin.
"Brilliant," breathed Ron, dissolving into a relaxed grin.
"We know," chorused Fred and George.
The next moment, Ron's forehead was once-again wrinkled, and the corners of his mouth curved downward instead of up into a smile. "Mum'll notice if I bin them."
"Who said we were talking about binning them?" responded George with a wink.
"No," Fred moved closer. "We were thinking of something a bit more safe. A bit more--" The familiar gleam in his eye gave him an almost mad-scientist look. When Fred finished the sentence, he spoke in a dangerous whisper, "permanent."
"But I still need something to cover the cage of this stupid feathery git." Ron poked the bars through the maroon fabric, causing the door latch to rattle and the entire owl cage to teeter dangerously on top of a pile of old school books.
The twins remained unfazed by this new problem—a characteristic that made their famous pranking possible. "So leave a piece. You can't wear dress robes that are severed and torn."
Ron immediately thought of the ends of the sleeves where he had magically removed the lace cuffs. Saying that it wasn't the best job of magical tailoring was an understatement. Those damn threads that his unpractised magic left behind had tickled his wrists and hands all throughout the Yule Ball.
Ron glared at the bit of sleeve spouting from the summit of the cage. He wanted nothing more than to tear it to pieces, shred it beyond recognition, to… "rip and dismember," he finished aloud. Although he wasn't sure that you actually could dismember a robe. He made a mental note to check with Hermione.
"Rip?" scowled Fred. "Dismember?" Disappointed, he shook his ginger head. "Ronald, Ronald. How ordinary. That was only meant to be the first step."
"Well, what else can I do, burn them?" responded a rather pink-cheeked Ron in aggravation. Silence followed his statement, and then he knew. That familiar gleam retuned once again to shine in the brown eyes of the twins, confirming Ron's suspicions. "You want me to burn them." It was a statement, partially of disbelief and partially of admiration.
"That's definitely much more permanent."
"Absolutely; there's no way Mum will be able to salvage them then. At least I don't think so…" George waved his hand to dismiss the concern as a mere trifle, only to be thought of if the unlikely situation should happened to arise. "Plus, burning is much classier."
"I agree," Fred stated simply. "There's just something about burning. It's like a ceremony, a ritual. It has much more meaning. Greater symbolism…" He continued, but Ron remained on the "symbolism" part.
Why was Fred talking about symbolism? It sounded almost academic of him. Nevertheless, the idea was steadily growing on Ron. It would be like a ritual: out with the old, and in with the new.
Using a severing spell--not much more deftly cast than the original one that had stripped the lacy cuffs from his mouldy sleeves--he removed a good portion of the material. Ron was sure to leave just enough to completely block out the light from Pig's cage. Otherwise, the tiny owl's incessant hooting would drive him to insanity.
Kicking the badly frayed scraps of material away from his beloved Cannons- adorned bed, Ron pulled out his wand with pride. Pointing it carefully at the pile, he spoke the incantation. "Incendio." Instantly, the aged stuff caught fire.
"Excellent," George commented as the three sat nearby on Ron's bed, watching the robes transform into a pile of ash.
Fred extended his hands as if to warm them. "I couldn't have done it better myself." Ron simply glowed, basking in the rare compliment. The flames licked at something unseen, and tiny cinders floated across his small room coming to rest where they pleased.
Perhaps he stared too long, but Ron squinted at the image he saw within the now-dying flames. No, it couldn't be—
Before he had time to take a closer look, approaching footsteps interrupted his thoughts. Fred and George looked at each other wide-eyed.
Then, the three Weasleys leapt into action. Ron clawed at his new dress robes and somehow managed to wedge them under his mattress. Fred roughly kicked the large box that had previously held the aforementioned robes into the darkest corner beneath Ron's bed while George vanished the scattered tissue paper with a wave of his wand.
Less than a second later, the door opened a crack and the culprits breathed a sigh of relief--Mrs. Weasley would never enter like that. They were correct. Ginny poked her head in the door, crinkling her nose at the smell of smoke.
"I don't know what you're doing, but Mum's getting suspicious, so you'd better—oh my God," she breathed. As the room was small, the source of the odour was not difficult to locate. "Mum's going to murder you. I'm getting out of here. Goodbye." With a flash of red hair that matched the flames of the fire, Ginny was gone. The door clicked behind her.
Fred cleared his throat. "Speaking of going," he began nervously. Their mother was positively frightening when she was angry—Fred knew. The twins had been told off countless times, but it was still far from pleasant.
"We have a lot of work to do," George rose. "Goodbye, Ron, and good luck." The two disapparated with a faint "pop."
Ron wished he could apparate away from this mess, but he would have to wait almost another two years to take his test.
"Ron!" called the ever-approaching voice of his mother. "What are you doing up here?" When the door swung open, Ron jumped guiltily.
With the trained eyes of the mother of seven children, Mrs. Weasley wasted no time in spotting the cause of her trip to the peak of the house.
A jet of water issued forth from her wand, but it didn't really matter as far as Ron's mission was concerned. She was too late. All that remained was a pile of black dust.
The robes were gone.
Fuming, Molly Weasley left the pile and turned to glare at the guilty party before her. Under the fierce gaze of his mother, Ron's eyes fell to his bare feet. "
"RONALD WEASLEY!" He winced. "What do you think you're doing? You could have set the entire house on fire!"
Really, he thought, she's exaggerating. It was just a small fire.
"…could have all been killed."
Yep, definitely going overboard now. Sighing, his eyes wandered to the wet pile of ash.
In it, he saw Padma Patil and the scowl she had worn from the time she saw those robes of his. Then she faded into the blackness. Goodbye, and good riddance, he thought. In spite of the yelling, Ron smiled to himself.
"—and wipe that smirk of your face, young man. This is NOT funny." Ron thought it in his best interest to cease smiling.
But he did not stop staring into the ashes of his former robes. Now, the black eyes of Bulgarian seeker Viktor Krum peered out at him from beneath furrowed brows. Next, Krum whirled across the Great Hall, Hermione in his arms. This time, Ron scowled.
"—that's right," the voice of Mrs. Weasley cut in. "I'm going to leave that mark on your floor and you can show everyone how stupid—"
Ron caught and held on to this last word. Stupid, that was the word to describe dear old "Vicky." But Krum had left to return to Bulgaria with the other Durmstrang. So what if he was still writing to Hermione. He, Ron, was here.
Ha! he thought, making an effort this time to control the curving line of his mouth. Goodbye, Vicky!
"Well?" Ron snapped to attention. He risked a guilty glance at his mother. He hadn't really been paying attention to what she'd been shouting at him.
"S—sorry?" he mumbled, doing his best to look it. He supposed he actually was sorry. But only to have been caught.
Burning those horrible robes, as Fred had implied, released not only the Yule Ball, but also Ron's entire fourth year: his fight with Harry, his worries about the safety of his best friend, and finally, the death of Cedric and the return of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named.
Ron remembered all of these things. He remembered his fourth year, but it was time to burn the past. If he was to move on to live in a word where—He-Wh—Voldemort—had returned, he had to say Goodbye to his past notions and worries and prepare himself to live in the present, so that he could work toward the future.
"SO what was that?" Mrs. Weasley asked, jabbing her wand at the ash clump on his floor.
"Nothing much," replied Ron, desperately trying to suppress a smile and thus avoid another long telling-off. "It was just some old school stuff that I didn't need anymore. Some bad memories," he finished under his breath.
But apparently he had said the wrong thing—again.
"SCHOOL! You're burning things from school! How do you ever expect to—"
Ron sighed and decided however much his mum hollered at him, it was worth it.
Glancing over to the spot where his new dress robes remained hidden. He smiled inwardly, even though he didn't understand everything he'd seen and felt this past year.
Yep, it was worth it.
Suddenly, the pile vanished, leaving a misshapen black circle burned into the wooden floor. Ron glanced up at his mother who, somewhat miraculously, had ceased her yelling. Her wand was extended once again in the direction of the former-pile.
Ron couldn't help but feel ecstatic at the disappearance of those hideous, charred dress robes. Minus the chewing out, this had been a red-letter day. With an intentionally loud huff, Mrs. Weasley stormed out of Ron's room after one more admonishment he had failed to hear, but sounded something like "twins" and "bad influence."
Making sure to listen as his mother's footsteps made their way to the very first floor of the Burrow, Ron turned and immediately tugged his new modish robes free from where they were wedged under his mattress. Stepping up to the mirror, he made to slip them on but decided that he'd better shower first. It wasn't that he was overly concerned with hygiene, he just didn't want to foul up his brand new robes.
His. Brand New. Robes. Wow.
Carefully folding the robes and hiding them back in their box, Ron made for the bathroom. But before he closed the door behind him, he peeked back into his room. Taking one final look at the scorch mark his bedroom floor proudly wore, he nodded in satisfaction. And when he spoke, it was in a clear, confident voice, meant for no one in particular to hear:
"Goodbye."