Trying to get down to the nitty-gritty with these two. Let the show-down start.
I own nothing. Not even Hugo's sandals.
"Have you left a seat for me?
Is that such a stretch of the imagination?"
Hermione kept her word. It wasn't her fault Ginny didn't.
The secret she had kept for much too long weighed upon her already-strained shoulders, and she grasped the handle of the mop tightly for support. Hugo banged about in his room, slamming the closet door and issuing the distinctive 'thud' of jumping off his bed, but she was deaf to all things except the flood of emotion raging inside of her. How had it all happened like this? How had she ended up here, keeping other people's secrets and raising someone else's child as though her were her own, loving him as though he were too? And where did Ron factor into all of this? How had he become the reason for her leaving to being utterly uninvolved in the path her life had taken?
She wondered (and not for the first time), if she had not done it, if she hadn't hid her wand behind her back when he took her into the hallway to speak to her in private, if she hadn't said those horrible words when he wasn't looking, if she hadn't told him to go back inside and rejoin the party when he stared back at her with those blank, beautiful blue eyes...what then? If she had never planned to leave the country, if Ginny hadn't come to her that night, would she have kept the baby? Would Harry and Ron still have become Aurors? How would that life have looked?
Ron could never have kept the secret from his best mate, but she often entertained such a fantasy. Again and again she had revisited it through the years, replaying the daydream until it was as comfortable and easy to slip inside as her favorite frayed dressing gown. What if they had run away together? Where would their lives have led them if they decided to raise his nephew as though he were their own?
Her heart sped up as the familiar visions played themselves out in the secret place hidden in the back of her mind. So close, here it was, all she had ever wanted, and all she had to do was bite her tongue and she might have it.
She had her chance, but just how far was she willing to go to take it?
But then again, when she had already gone this far off the edge of the mountain, what was another running leap into oblivion?
She had only meant to toe the edge though, when she started this...whatever this was. She hadn't meant to take it as far as it had everything had ended up going. In the beginning, keeping Ginny's secret was almost nice. It was, above all else, something to keep her mind off of missing Ron. Almost, because nothing other than the imperius curse could truly stop his face from haunting her every thought, and almost because the word 'missing' didn't even come close to describing the agony she felt when she lay alone in bed at night and could all but hear his voice in the deafening silence.
So she re-evaluated her priorities, and eliminated that time wasted in trying to find sleep which never seemed to come, and instead focused every moment (in between creating this new life for herself or obscuring her old one) with filling her head with strategies and plans and lies and secrets. She would have felt almost as though she were hunting Horcruxes again, had she not been so horribly and resoundingly alone this time. But it worked, kind of, and if she needed rest then her body would simply give out on top of the books she clung to so desperately, kindly supplying a page to cushion her cheek upon. At least she still had her books, the only constant in a life that was spinning wildly out of her control.
Besides, sleep was such a waste when there were a hundred problems that needed her attention, anyway. Apparating in Ginny's condition was out of the question, as was having Hermione's minuscule efficiency in America connected to the floo network when she was supposed to be stuffed away in a dorm room studying. A rendezvous in Hogsmeade had to suffice, though meetings were few and far between. The passage into the Hogshead had been sealed up tight after the battle, leaving only regularly scheduled school visits as their only option. Carrying Harry Potter's first-born child did not earn one quite the privileges expected…that is, when one was trying desperately to conceal the fact that such a child existed. The morning (evening and night) sickness did not go unnoticed, and finding a charm to illusion Ginny's ever-expanding stomach grew more and more difficult as she advanced into her third trimester. And then there was the issue of the delivery. Despite the hours that Hermione spent combing through medical journals, for the first time in her life she had to admit there were some things you just couldn't learn from a book.
The Christmas holidays would bring her to almost forty weeks, and they worked feverishly to ready themselves for the child's arrival. If Hogwarts believed Ginny was going home to the Burrow, and everyone at the Burrow thought she was visiting Hermione in America, then no one would suspect she was actually inside some busy European muggle hospital under a pseudonym, lying nervously in a bed while her shaking hands clutched at Hermione's as they waited for her labor to be induced.
"RAWR!" A loud squeal of adorable ferociousness erupted from across the room, and the noise brought Hermione out of her memories.
Thankfully.
Hugo came running towards her as fast as his little legs would carry him, hands curled into claws and pearly white teeth bared less-than viciously while he continued to growl at her. Launching himself at her leg, he clung to her limb tightly, playing a game she was very much well-acquainted with.
"Eek, do I have a dinosaur on me?" his mother responded in mock-terror, shaking her leg in a feeble attempt to rid herself of the beast. "Oh no, a big T-Rex has got my leg!" Looking down at her attacker, she immediately noticed the shoes he had donned, and laughed in spite of the fact that she was supposedly terrified. "Ron, its November! You can't put him in sandals!"
He ran a hand through that hair of his, "Yeah, yeah, but those were the ones he wanted to wear. I mean, how was I supposed to tell him no? And besides, I put socks on him…to keep his toes warm?"
She rolled her eyes at the sight of her son wearing a thick pair of socks underneath his vibrantly colored dinosaur sandals. "He can be quite persuasive, I'll sympathize with you on that. You would have to have the emotional ability of Snape not to be plied by that pout."
Ron lifted his sheepish eyes and clapped his hands triumphantly as an untarnished memory brought itself back into being. "So what you're saying is that I actually have feelings now? I guess someone doesn't have the emotional rage of a teaspoon anymore, then, do they!"
She couldn't help but to laugh with him at the recollection of her juvenile outburst. "Don't get ahead of yourself there. You still were outsmarted by a three-year old! He's just a child, you know, and you've got to learn how to hold your ground with him or he'll walk all over you!"
In an instant, as though someone has splashed ice water over his head, his face became solemn. "Do I?"
The change in his voice caught her off guard. Then she realized what she was implying with those words and the smirk left her mouth as well. To say such things indicated that there would be another occasion for Hugo to ply Ron with his big eyes and quivering lower lip, that there was a future where…
But she didn't know what the future looked like, so she dealt with this the way she had grown accustomed to.
She ignored it.
"Would you mind setting the table?"
"Yes, actually, I would." He said, flatly. "Hugo, go wash your hands for dinner, please."
The boy looked up from his mother in astonishment. "But I-"
"Now, Hugo." His voice left no room for argument.
"Mum?"
Hermione swallowed, hard. "It's okay love. Just wash up really well, okay?"
He eyed them both warily, and let go of her leg with hesitation. It was obvious that even the toddler could feel the tension between them. But he was a Weasley boy, through and through, and he always obeyed his mother…eventually.
He felt Ron fidgeting beside her, but she resisted the urge to turn to him. Instead she kept her eyes trained on her son as he made his way to the bathroom, dragging his feet as he went. Every few steps he would turn around to glance back at her, his eyes narrowed and suspicious, but she was there ready with a smile. A strained one, albeit. But that vanished from her face when she heard the man next to her speak.
"I want a second chance."
"What?" She asked in surprise, head snapping from Hugo's retreating form to Ron's face. He was gripping the edge of the counter, knuckles white and his face stretched tight with anxiety. He looked exactly how she felt, and made that unsettled feeling in the pit of her stomach tumble painfully. She had been expecting anger, yelling, accusations…but not a plea for permission.
"I know you think you were looking out for me, and I know you think you did the right thing taking him away from me, but you didn't. You can bluff and shout and throw spells around to try and convince me otherwise all you want, but it isn't going to change my mind or anything else about this situation. Because for once in your life Hermione Granger, you were completely and totally wrong about something-about everything."
Disbelief crowded her mind, and she struggled to speak, to put into words something that would refute him, but nothing came to her. "Ron…" she all but implored, but he didn't seem to hear her. He kept speaking, his voice lowered for Hugo's benefit, but the passion in his tone steadily rising with every word he gave utterance.
"Absolutely bloody wrong. God, you have to see it don't you? You have to realize what you've done here, the damage you've caused to everyone involved! You can't just play around with people's lives here, Hermione, it isn't up to you to decide what, what..."
"What is for the greater good?" she whispered, the old adage like vinegar on her tongue.
He looked at her sharply then, his blue eyes clear and piercing, and in that moment she felt as though they were teenagers locked inside that musty old tent again, and all the emotion they had shared in those bitter months pass silently between then. She was sure he felt it too, for when he spoke his voice was resolute.
"I can't forgive you, not yet, not for what you did...but I'm not going to let you walk away again."
She wished he would, but as much as she knew she needed to, she wasn't sure she could anymore.
"This whole...gods, this. I don't know what else you could call it, this thing that you've done, but it's a mess, a bloody horrible catastrophe. I was ready to hate you, you know? When I found out where you were, I came fully prepared to tell you to go to hell and then go back about my life, content in spending the rest of my life convincing myself you weren't worth it."
Because she wasn't.
"But I was wrong."
No, he wasn't.
"I can't do that, Hermione, because it would be a lie, and between the two of us, I think we've had enough of those to last us a lifetime. I can't turn my back on you, on either of you. I, We have to try and fix this, or at least give it a shot to see if there is anything left to be fixed. Because there has to be. I could be there for you, both of you. I know I've missed so much already, but I don't want to miss another moment in your lives. I want us to be together, all of us."
Moisture pooled in her eyes. "Ron, it's not that simple."
"I never said it would be. Besides, when has anything ever been simple concerning you and I?"
She gave him a sad smile, acknowledging the truth in his words. "We have our own lives now Ron. You in Wizarding England and Hugo and I here in muggle America. They don't intersect, they can't.
"Why can't they?"
"Don't do that." She said, clenching her fists at her side.
"Do what?"
"Oversimplify this, all of this. Don't act like we could work, like you can just drop everything and-"
"I know it wouldn't be simple, haven't you been listening to a damn thing I've said?" He slammed his fist against the counter again, and the noise it made caught them both off guard. Simultaneously, they both swung their heads around to peer in the direction of the bathroom door. Faintly, they could still hear the sound of running water, and when Ron turned to face her again, his expression was ashamed.
"Hermione..." He rushed to her, reaching as though to grasp her shoulders but pulling away at the last moment, his fingertips trailing through the air. She longed to mimic his actions, to wrap his hands in her own and hold on for dear life, but held back. "I would do whatever it takes to be a part of your lives, because I want this Hermione, more than anything, do you understand? I want you, and I want Hugo, and I want us. No matter what."
"Ron, you don't even know what that means! You don't even know if there could be an us!"
"But I'm willing to try. Are you?"
Ginny shot up to a sitting position, her blood pressure monitor spiking with the surge of activity. Hermione, who had been curled up in the chair at her bedside and attempting to fight he exhaustion which consumed her very being, was brought out of her half-awake, half-asleep fog by the noise. Groggily, she jumped to her feet, rushing to her friend's side.
"Ginny, what is it?"
"I can't." Her face was expressionless.
"What? What do you mean? Is something wrong, is the baby okay? Should I get a nurse?"
"I can't do it."
"Do what? Do this? But women have babies everyday, of course you can do it! Are you feeling alright, have your contractions quickened? Ginny, I'm going to go get the nurse, you need-"
From her hospital bed, she reached out just as Hermione turned to leave and latched onto her arm with a steely grip. "No, don't go. Please, you have to listen. I can't give my baby to a stranger."
"What? What are you talking about, I thought we had this all sorted?"
"I…I just can't! I can't bear the thought of strangers raising my baby! What if they are horrible, like Harry's aunt and uncle? There are too many terrible people out there, and I have to know he's safe!"
Hermione's brow furrowed in confusion. "Ginny…what are you saying? Do you want to keep the baby?"
"No, I still don't think I could do that, not now at least. But you…Hermione, you have to take care of him. I need you to take my baby."
This chapter is actually the first part of what was previously the last chapter. I did a little editing, some tweaking here and there, trying to make Ron's feelings a little more understandable. I don't know if I succeeded, but go ahead and have a looksee and tell me what you think!