From: Anonymous
Word: Light
Word Count: 1,381
For Hermione, there's something very rewarding about getting to the end of another day, especially now that she has two small children that are constantly in need of her devoted attention. She loves Rose and Hugo to pieces, but that isn't to say that they aren't both a pain in the arse. Because they are. It's hard enough on the weekends when Ron is there to be a husband and father, but on the weekdays when he's at work or on missions it's honestly just downright exhausting. Today was another one of those days, which is the reason why Hermione is so glad it's over. That she's made it through. Every day that she survives life with her gorgeous husband and beautiful children, she's able to reward herself with a little mental check on the calendar.
She does it every night while brushing her teeth- brushing one's teeth is a definitely the symbol for "my day is over and I will now go to bed". That's when she's able to pat herself on the back for all the good work she's done that day. Tonight, as she's doing so, she suddenly notices that one of the lights on the ceiling is flickering in an out. Putting down her toothbrush and spitting out her toothpaste, she meanders into the bedroom to see her husband on the bed reading an Auror report.
"Work away," she says firmly. "It's bedtime."
He puts away the report with very little reluctance.
"Mmmm. Bedtime," he says, stretching his arms over his head and exposing a delightful strip of extremely white skin. "Wait- bedtime or bedtime?"
"Just bedtime for tonight, love," Hermione laughs, pulling back the covers and slipping into bed next to her husband. "Rosie accidentally charmed one of your auror reports to read aloud to her again, so I'm afraid she'll be having nightmares."
"Oh, Rose," Ron sighs, pulling Hermione against him and kissing the top of her head. "Well, I never say no to a good cuddle anyways."
"Oh, good, I'll tell Harry. Sometimes he gets lonely when Ginny's off reporting on Quidditch Games and needs someone to snuggle with."
"Ta, Hermione," Ron says sarcastically, eyes following her arse as she stretches over to turn off one of the lamps, something of which she is fully aware.
She smiles in the dark and waits until she's burrowed herself back against him before saying,
"I'm just kidding, love. I'd never loan out your cuddling. You're so good at it that Harry would become addicted and take away my Ron time."
He starts laughing hysterically at this mental imagine, and Hermione is forced to stuff her sleeve into his mouth so as to ensure that he does not wake up the children. At the foot of their bed, Otter barks indignantly.
"Shhhhh!" Hermione says, exasperated. "I can't shut you both up, and we have a sleeping baby!"
Ron breaks off his guffaws, idea of waking up Hugo too intolerable to ignore.
"Sorry, love."
They fall into a sleepy silence, Ron's hand lightly stroking Hermione's back, Hermione's thumb circling the back of her husband's hand.
"By the way," she says suddenly, tired voice breaking through the silence that is lulling them both to sleep, "the light in the bathroom is flickering. Can you fix it?"
"Hermione," Ron groans. "What did I tell you about assigning me chores right before we're about to fall asleep?"
"Sorry, sorry," she apologizes hastily. "I just thought of it and had to say it."
"Well, now I have to go change the bloody light bulb."
"No, you don't have to! Wait until the morning."
"No, because I'll forget and then it'll become this big thing and we'll start bickering and-"
He goes on, but Hermione stops listening because she's too busy being proud of him for maturing to the point that he actually understands what she's going on about when she yells at him to get work done. She wants to hug him and kiss him and touch him and praise him about this, but instead she just raises her eyebrows and says,
"Ron, if it's so important that you fix the light bulb tonight, go do it now instead of spending the next twenty minutes whining about what would happen if you didn't do it."
There's a pause as he makes an ugly face at her, which she reciprocates by sticking out her tongue. This goes on through several minutes and several faces, until Ron finally huffs,
"Fine. But if I'm getting out of bed, you're coming with me."
"No!" Hermione says in protest. "That wasn't part of the deal! I have two children to take care of all day tomorrow."
"And I have bad guys to reprehend for selling illegal drugs that could potentially kill muggles."
Hermione narrows her eyes.
"Just which do you think is more important, Ron Weasley?"
He pauses for a moment to gape at her, then shoves back the covers and pulls them off of her.
"Let's go," he commands. Hermione notices with a shiver that he has just used his Auror voice. She happens to love his Auror voice.
"I hate you," she informs him as she gets out of bed, shivering in the cold.
"Yeah, that's why you married me," he says grumpily.
She starts to laugh, and he turns around to look at her with a happy grin on his face, knowing that he's absolved their row with one grumpy sentence. Somehow, he feels that this moment is the perfect example of their marriage, all in the course of a few moments.
Hermione flicks on the light to the bathroom while Ron finds the step ladder, grabbing it and a spare light bulb from the closet. He spots the one that has been out for about a month now (it really has been driving Hermione crazy- she's annoying OCD about these things) and sets up the ladder underneath it. Meanwhile, Hermione sits on the counter to watch him play the role of Mr. Fixit. She closes her eyes for a moment, leaning against the mirror, and yawns hugely. When she opens her eyes to check on her husband's process, she realizes that all she can really see of him is his plaid clad arse, which is right in front of her eye line. Grinning like the cat that got the cream, she crosses her legs, fixes her eyes on his bum, and just stares at it unblushingly, knowing that there's nobody there to stop her.
"Hermione, can you grab that… what are you doing?"
Right. Except for the owner of that arse.
No, scratch that, she's the owner of that arse. It just belongs on Ron's body.
"Staring at your bum," she mutters under her breath.
"What was that?" Ron asks in a sing-song voice.
"Nothing, honey!" Hermione replies, smiling winningly up at him.
"I think you were staring at my keister."
"Can't a woman stare at her husband's butt in peace?" Hermione inquires, tone exasperated.
"Go right ahead, Mrs. Weasley," Ron smirks, turning back to finish fixing the light bulb.
As they sit there in the bathroom in the middle of the night, Hermione suddenly becomes conscious of how much she adores this moment. The bathroom is quiet. The bathroom is peaceful. There are no screaming children in the bathroom, there is no hyperactive dog. It's just the two of them in their home, in their bathroom that is off to the side of their bedroom. Theirs. They don't even need to talk in the bathroom, because it's late and it's night and, besides, sometimes it's easier not to talk than to talk. Sometimes one can say more.
Her husband finishes fixing the light bulb far too quickly for Hermione's liking. She reluctantly hops off of the counter and ambles tiredly into the bed, pulling the covers back over her body. Ron follows suit soon afterwards, wrapping his body tenderly around her as he kisses her shoulder. It seems to wake her up a little bit.
"Ron," she starts tentatively, "I think it's bedtime."
"Mhhhmmm. Bedtime," he agrees. Then his eyes pop open. "Wait- bedtime or bedtime?"
"Bedtime," Hermione tells him, and he lets out a quiet cheer before shucking his pajama bottoms off under the covers.