Chapter 4
"Harry,are you and Ginny coming to dinner tonight? I cannot wait to see her!" Hermione was heard from the kitchen. Ron peaked into the room, trying to catch a glimpse of the one man who might be able to make this odd dream disappear. Harry stood next to Hermione, smiling down at Eleanor. She was beaming back up at him, just as Henry was. Harry looked happier than he did yesterday in Ron's apartment, looking longingly after Ginny's retreating figure. He had a twinkling in his eyes that reminded Ron strongly of Dumbledore.
"Ron! There you are. Are you ready to start off for work?" Harry asked in a jovial manner.
"Er…sure, Harry. Let's go." Ron said, coming fully into the kitchen.
Harry led the way to the front door and turned back. "Good bye, 'Mione. I will be sure to tell Ginny that you are anxious to see her again."
"Why would you tell her?" Ron wanted to know.
"Ron, because he is married to her, of course." Hermione explained as she and Harry gave him questioning looks. "Are you all right, love? You've been acting rather peculiarly all morning." Hermione asked, concern written on her face.
"Yes," Ron said sheepishly, his ears turning red. "I just wasn't paying attention, that's all." He grinned at Hermione, hoping to convince her.
"All right. I'll see you after work, Ron." She stood on her tiptoes and gave him a quick kiss on the lips.
"Oooooooo," Eleanor and Henry said from the doorway of the kitchen. "Mummy and Daddy are kissing." The twins said tauntingly.
"Enough of that come on, back in the kitchen to finish your breakfast." Hermione corralled them back to the table. "Don't forget, we're having dinner at the Burrow tonight. We'll meet you there around six. Good bye Ron, Harry, have a nice day!"
Ron followed Harry out the door and as soon as he shut the door behind him, Ron turned to look at Harry. "Harry, you have got to help me."
Harry looked at his best mate for a moment before nodding slowly. "What's wrong? Are you and Hermione all right? Nothing seemed wrong…" Harry trailed off thinking.
"No, everything's fine with that, but I think I'm going mental." Ron said, looking at the ground.
"How so?" Harry asked with a small smile.
"That," Ron said pointing at the house they just came from, "is not my house. That is not my wife and those are not my children. Bloody hell, that's not even my door!"
"Ron," Harry put his hand on Ron's shoulder. "Of course that's your door. I helped you and Hermione pick it out."
"Quit patronizing me! That's not what I meant!" Ron said. "Look, yesterday, I went to sleep in my new flat in London, alone. I had no wife or children. I was a Quidditch player and you were not married to Ginny." Ron enunciated very clearly.
"Were you dreaming?" Harry asked curiously.
"No, because I have no idea what is going on now. I don't know when Hermione and I got married, when we had the kids, what I do for a living, what Hermione's job is, or even my own address! This is mental! When I went to bed last night, I hadn't even seen Hermione for five years. Could this be an alternate dimension, or maybe someone cast a spell on me!" Ron started muttering.
"Ron, you're really starting to scare me." Harry said warily.
"You! I'm starting to scare myself, here. I told you, I'm going mental!" Ron howled. "I know, ask me anything and I won't have clue!"
"Did you or Krum propose first to Hermione?" Harry asked, watching him closely, knowing that his Ron knew that Krum had never proposed to Hermione.
"What Vicky proposed to Hermione!" Ron asked, thunderstruck, trying to figure out why Hermione was with him when she could have been with Krum.
"All right, say, hypothetically, I believe you. What next?" Harry sighed.
"I don't know. I guess you have to tell me about my life here until we can figure something out." Ron scowled at the ground, kicking a pebble in his path.
"That I can help you with. Come on, we're taking the day off work. We can owl from my house, saying we're sick or something. Ginny should be gone by now and she should've taken the kids." Harry thought out loud as he quickly took a right at the next street.
Ron scrambled after him. "You have kids?"
"With Ginny." Harry smirked back at him.
Ron stopped with a disgusted look on his face. "Mate, this may be an alternate dimension, but she's still my sister and that's just gross."
"Sorry, mate, couldn't help myself!" Harry smiled at him as they came upon a nice brick house. Harry looked around the neighborhood and seeing that the street was deserted, took out his wand from his sleeve. "Alohomora." He tapped the door and it sprang open.
They walked into the quiet house and Harry led the way into the family room. He went to the bookshelf and started dragging his finger across the spines of the books, searching for a specific one. "Ah-ha!" Harry pulled down a navy leather-bound book and went to join Ron on the couch.
"What's this?" Ron asked as Harry dropped it into his lap.
"It's a photo album. This has pictures of the three of us back all the way from Hogwarts, but we can skip ahead a bit. I assume Voldemort was still in your dimension?"
"Of course, but you beat him at the end of Seventh Year after we went Horcrux hunting. After that, we went back to Hogwarts for our Seventh Year and graduated with Ginny's class. You went on to become an Auror, Hermione went back to be a teacher and I became a Quidditch player." Ron rattled off a list of events that happened in his own life.
"Well, close, but in this time, you never became a Quidditch player and Hermione did not go back to teach. You went into the Ministry into the Department of Magical Games and Sports and Hermione tried the S.P.E.W. thing for a while before becoming a reporter for the Quibbler."
"You're kidding! Hermione never would have worked for that magazine because of Luna Lovegood. They never agreed, Luna was too far out there and Hermione was too practical." Ron tried explaining to him.
"And that's what would have happened if Luna hadn't married Neville Longbottom and he hadn't brought her back down to Earth. Not completely, mind you, but enough that Hermione actually enjoys working there and they don't bite each others' heads' off about the reality of mythological creatures." Harry chuckled.
"Now, let's see. Here we are at our graduation with Ginny." Harry pointed at the picture of the four of them in graduation robes, all proudly holding their diplomas. The picture Ron was holding Hermione's waist and kept sneaking timid glances at her. Picture Ginny and Harry would watch Ron and Hermione, look at each other and blush, then shoot the camera a big smile as they moved closer together.
"What's this one?" Ron asked pointing to a picture of Hermione at a podium. Her hair was crackling with energy making it bushier than normal and she was pounding her fist on the podium trying to emphasize her point. Her face was flushed, as it always was when she was really frustrated and the audience in front of her kept backing away.
Harry chuckled. "That was her first appointment with the Ministry about House-elf rights. She was so mad that day; she wouldn't talk to anyone for a week. You tried to calm her down, but she started throwing things at you and conjuring those little birds to go after you. She came to your door a week later, in tears apologizing. According to you, you had a very memorable night." Harry smirked.
The next picture was of Ron and Hermione on a bench in Hogsmeade by the look of it. Hermione was sitting on the bench with her hands over mouth, tears cascading down her face, which was nodding. Ron was down on one knee in front of her with a small black box in front of her looking incredibly nervous. "That's your proposal. You didn't even say anything. You just got down and held the ring out. Lucky for you that Hermione understood you and yourmental ways, most girls would have waited for a flowery speech."
"I'm guessing Ginny wanted a speech?" Ron smirked.
"Yeah, she had Hermione tell me that it wouldn't be as easy if I wanted to propose to Ginny." Harry scowled.
"Our wedding, I suppose?" Ron asked looking at the next few that featured Hermione in a beautiful white dress and him in a black tux.
"Yup. This was at the ceremony. I was your best man and Ginny was the maid of honor. The ceremony took place on June 23 in the late afternoon. The reception was at the Burrow. Here is your first dance and the slicing of the cake." Harry pointed to two more pictures as he turned the page. "And here's your send off to your honeymoon. You went to the Caribbean for a month. Hermione came back very tan, while you were completely sun burnt." Harry chuckled.
The two spent the rest of the day cramming facts, dates, names and anything else that would fit into Ron's head. They went over all of Ron's siblings' marriages as well as the names of their children, the jobs that they all had and who their spouses worked for as well. Apparently, everyone was going to be at the Burrow tonight, and he would look like an idiot if he couldn't remember that his father had been promoted to the Head of the Magical and Muggle Cooperation Department and that his mother even had a job at Madame Malkins now that all her children had grown up.
"Are you ready, Ron?" Harry asked at a few minutes until six o'clock.
"I sure hope so, Harry." He looked pale, but determined, as they both Apparated away to the Burrow.
AN: I'm sorry this took so long, I had major writers' block. I'm on my own for the rest of the plot, I've taken as much as I know from the movie. I'm still not sure if I should have Ron go back to his own reality at the end or just have him stay here. What do you think? Please review!