Ginny's face had completely transformed by the time she turned around to face Ron that Harry found himself feeling sorry for his friend despite knowing that he had it coming.

"What the hell were you thinking, Ron?" Ginny did not raise her voice when she got mad, but that did not mean she sounded any less intimidating.

"What?" Only Ron could appear clueless in this situation.

"Are you really that stupid?" She might not look like it but Harry knew she was fuming by now.

"I have no idea why you're so pissed off all of a sudden and I don't see why you have to insult me instead of telling me what's wrong." Harry shook his head, this was not going to end well.

Ginny took a breath before calmly listing, "Let me break it down for you: Your first mistake, to show up without letting us know beforehand. Your second mistake, to not leave immediately once you had realised that we had guest. Your third mistake, to make an idiot out of yourself and to act all rude in front of our guest. Your worst mistake, to try to provoke our guest to fight you over a trivial joke."

Ron seemed to realise he was in the wrong but he defensively replied, "It's not like I've never shown up like this before and you two didn't seem to have a problem with that before. And I did ask ponytail if he would mind me staying, he said it's okay himself. If he didn't mind, I don't see why you have to make such a big deal out of it. Also, in case you didn't notice, he was the one who had challenged me first." Maybe Harry should say something but he had learned long ago not to interfere when these two were fighting.

She pressed a hand on her forehead then shook her head before saying, "I can't believe I have to explain this at all. Of course we won't have too much a problem before with you showing up unannounced when we were not entertaining a guest. Since we had a guest tonight, you should have known enough to just leave. Just because Draco was nice enough to actually say he was okay with you staying doesn't mean it's appropriate and not extremely rude of you to stay and that it didn't reflect badly on us as hosts. And if you really believe that to be a challenge, I-I don't even know what to say… Anyway, why did you have to show up randomly at all?"

"I told you, I just wanted to show you the Cannons poster… I'd just won the most awesome prize and I couldn't show it off to George because he always calls the Cannons losers so I came because I thought at least you two would show some appreciation and excitement for me even though you aren't fans. Sometimes it can be so difficult when your wife doesn't care about Quidditch and you can't share your passion with her, not that we have much time to talk these days… not that I'm complaining..."

Ginny sighed and seemed to soften a little bit. "I know it's difficult when Hermione is so busy all the times but it's no excuse for you to disrespect our privacy… Normally I could care less which team you support but not when your timing is so terrible and when you still don't seem to see how wrong you were. Harry, I need to get out of here, good luck talking to him." With that, she left the two best friends alone. All things considered, it had not gone as bad as Harry had expected.

Harry was sitting across from his best friend after he had cleared the table, the Potters and Draco had finished Draco's wine earlier so the two friends were each drinking a bottle of butterbeer now.

"Gin will forget about it in a day or so, don't worry about it."

"Of course I know, she's my sister too. Besides, I'm not worrying about it."

"Hmm...Right." He took a sip to consider his words before saying, "But she got a point, here we were trying hard to make a good impression to Draco then things immediately got so awkward the moment you showed up."

"Personally, I don't understand why you two even bothered when he had witnessed most if not all of your worst embarrassments and humiliations back then, in fact, I'm pretty sure he had delighted in witnessing those…" Harry had to suppress his urge to glare at his friend, "... but I'm sorry if I got a bit carried away. It's just that whenever I saw that ugly smirk on his face, I feel like he's mocking me."

Remembering the amused expression on Malfoy's face the whole time the former rivals had sat together earlier, Harry could understand why Ron would get pissed off even though he still thought his best friend had overreacted. "Hmm… I believe he might have found some of the things you said or did interesting or amusing, but I can guarantee that he's not mocking you."

"Maybe." Ron did not sound too convinced. He drank a large gulp then put down the empty bottle before staring at it for almost a minute. "Why did you invite him to dinner anyway? I understand why you organised the Easter gathering with Andromeda, Teddy and Sc… his son, but this seems much more personal than that."

Oh Merlin, here it comes… as much as Harry wanted to say it was his freedom to invite whoever to his home for dinner to delay this conversation about the gathering with Ron, he knew that it was inevitable the moment he had make Hermione invited Ron for him and he certainly did not want to risk displeasing his friend that he would end up backing out. "Hmm… there were a few reasons, I wanted to return his favour because he was very hospitable on Christmas day, Ginny wanted to know him better too now that I have become friends with him and… I suppose I was also worried that he'd feel uncomfortable in our home and would end up acting all formal and awkward in front of Andromeda and Teddy during the Easter gathering that I wanted to prepare him for the setting."

His friend nodded with an unreadable expression. "I guess it makes sense." Ron made to take another gulp only to remember he had finished the bottle. "You mind if I take another?" He asked even though he was already on his way to the kitchen.

Harry replied a bit unnecessarily, "Go ahead."

Ron took a short glance at his bottle and said, "I guess you don't need another yet." Harry looked down to see that he had barely drunk half of the bottle. His friend was back to his seat in a moment, where he immediately took another large gulp, at least it was just butterbeer instead of fire whisky.

"Harry?"

"Yes?" He felt quite certain he knew what Ron would ask next.

"Why did you have to invite me to your Easter gathering through Hermione instead of asking me yourself?" His best friend sounded uncertain, insecure and perhaps a bit hurt.

Ron did not wait for an answer before continuing. "We have known each other for thirty years, after everything we have been through, I thought we could tell each other everything… And you know what, mate, I'd have said yes too even if you have asked yourself."

Harry hated to displease anyone, let alone hurting his best friend, so he could only reply with the truth. "I didn't ask myself because I was worried… I remembered what you had said on Christmas day so I was afraid that you would say no if I have asked. On the other hand, there's no way you could say no to Hermione."

Ron looked confused, "What did I say on Christmas day?"

"Y-You couldn't see yourself becoming friends with Draco." He did not want to repeat it because he felt like Ron had been gradually warming up to Draco and this would remind him of his earlier position on the matter.

"Oh, that."

"Sorry if you're offended in any way but I truly didn't realise you'd felt this way, at the time I just wanted to maximise the chance for you to agree to come. I really want you to be there."

"For you or for the ponytail?" He asked a little bitterly.

Harry was quiet for a moment, not because he did not know what to say, but because he knew he had to word this accurately to show that he truly meant his words. "For me. I have been planning this gathering for quite a while and I really want to get this right but I need your support. As productive as I have been feeling for improving my relationship with Albus, I sometimes get scared that I'm unconsciously doing the same thing I had done to Albus before the disasters to James and Lily now, so your whole family's presence would be a great help for me. And I don't know if Hermione has told you… but Albus had been having nightmares since the incidents and I don't really know how I can help him… " He felt like he had been trying so hard yet achieving so little when it came to Albus' nightmares that he could not get himself to continue even though a part of him really wanted to share with Ron because he felt like his friend, who had roomed with him for years when his nightmares had been worst, would be able to understand.

Harry could immediately tell that Ron did not know from his opened mouth and worried expression. "She d-didn't tell me about Albus' nightmares… I'm really sorry, Harry."

Ron stood up with his bottle and walked around the table so he was now sitting next to him instead, before he awkwardly patted him on the shoulder. "I know how worked up and worried you got when Al got lost… It must be hard for you to see him like that when you used to have nightmares so often yourself… Merlin, I don't really know what I should say… It had been disturbing enough back then to just hear your sleeptalk and scream all the times without having your nightmares myself… I can't imagine seeing Rose havi..." Realising he was doing a terrible job in comforting his friend, Ron awkward trailed off. Instead of feeling upset by Ron's counteractive attempt in comforting, Harry could not help giving a faint smile in response thinking about the fact that his best friend was even worse than him when he considered himself to be a pretty bad comforter. Somehow this seemed to be more effective in cheering him up than the kind of "right" responses Ginny and Hermione would give.

"Getting this right feels like one of the few things I know for sure that would help… This probably sounds a bit far-stretched but I feel like I can cheer Al up by cheering Scorpius up. I don't know if you have seen the way Al lighted up when he's around his best friend, but Scorpius is great at making Al smile and laugh and it's only natural for him to get even better at it when he feels more loved and supported himself. At first I had been planning this for Scorpius and Draco, then for Teddy and then for Andromeda too, but now I feel like I'm doing it for Al as well, I just want to do whatever I can to distract him from the… traumas and nightmares. Al seemed excited when I wrote to him about the gathering, so I definitely feel like I've been doing the right thing so far."

"Even though it sounds like the most roundabout way to cheer a person up I've ever heard, the crazy thing is I can actually see it working, or I guess it isn't crazy at all, it seems to make sense with those two… Do you think I can forget seeing them hugging each other for a whole minute on the platform? A whole minute! I don't believe I have hugged you for longer than five seconds, right? Hmm, maybe ten seconds tops, but no way as long as they hugged, hug. You're my best mate but I don't think I can bear hugging you for that long, no offense. It'd just be too awkward." Harry laughed out loud not only because Ron made it sounded like the boys hugged each other for a whole minute regularly, but also because his friend had voiced the exact thing he had thought when Ginny had first suggested that the boys might love each other romantically, that he and Ron had been in no way as close to each other as Albus and Scorpius were.

"I don't see anything funny about this." Ron muttered.

"If you say so." It felt good for him to laugh now that the dinner as well as the worst part of this conversation with Ron was over that he let himself downed a large gulp of his butterbeer in silence, to think about nothing except for how delicious the creamy drink tasted.

Ron coughed once to catch his attention, "Hmm… Harry, you know why I'd have said yes to your invite even if you had asked yourself?"

"Why?" Harry had not realised this was something he wanted to know but now he was genuinely curious.

"Because I wouldn't want to miss out on seeing how this plays out." Harry would never say this in his face but Ron was certainly quite nosy at times.

"Also, I want to see... something for myself."

"See what?" He hated that Ron felt the need to suddenly act all secretive, he must have known Harry would want to know what this "something" was.

"To see if… if my Rose is really not interested in S… the ponytail's boy." Harry was feeling more and more convinced that Ron's worry was unnecessary, but he did not say anything as he did not want to be the one spreading rumours about his own son's sexuality, especially when their speculations could very well be proved false later. In any case, he could only hope that his friend would not do anything too embarrassing during the gathering.

A/N: Thank you so much for the lovely comments I've received from last chapter. I've made some minor changes there but I gotta admit it wasn't bad to begin with. I know that I've bitten off way more than I could chew with this story and it can be especially frustrating at times like this. I guess that's the main cons of publishing while I'm still writing a story that sometimes I can't focus on the bigger picture and it's hard to go back to make big changes. Of course I can't afford to finish writing everything before posting now so I can only try to keep things in perspectives the best I can while taking it one chapter at a time.

Thank you for your patience, I understand that it's not fun to follow a long on-going story but I do make the effort to update as regularly as I can. Please comment because comments are my biggest motivations ;)