Title/Link: The warmth of other sons
Team: Tutshill Tornados
Position: Beater 2
Extension Used: Yes 2
Reserve: No
Prompts: (object) Blanket, [dialogue] "If you need a hand just say the word.", [dialogue] "I know I should care…but I really don't."
WC: 1058
A/N and Triggers: Modern and muggle AU, break-up, losing family, mentions of therapy
Ron isn't sure if the offer is still open, it is way too early in the morning. His fingers tremble and bypasses searching the name completely in favor of typing in the numbers.
"Hello, Draco speaking," the voice comes out, slightly groggy. "Weasley?"
There is a beat of silence.
"Ron!" Draco's voice comes out a little more urgent.
"If you need a hand just say the word." The phrasing is clumsy, stuttered out by Rom into the phone and it is taking everything that Ron has to hold himself upright against the wall of the pub. It's a phrase, a Weasley phrase that means to ask no questions, to demand nothing but be prepared to help.
"Ok, I'm coming. Leaky Cauldron, right?"
Ron hums in reply. He still can't seem to string a coherent thought together. The air is cold and feels nippy. It is only then that Ron realizes he has forgotten his jacket inside. Briefly, for a minute, he debates about whether he should go inside to fetch it, but it has no sentimental value. It is just one of the very hand-me-downs he has gotten from his brothers over the years.
Before he loses himself in his thoughts for a minute longer, Draco's car pulls in. It is a sleek, white-thing, reminiscent of the rich kid he denies being. Ron slides into the front passenger seat almost too easily, like he has done this before. Which is true, he does do this often.
"Really, Leaky Cauldron, if Percy hears about this. The scandal" Draco's tone is snarky and purposefully light, there is a Weasley blanket on the backseat, and Ron reaches over to take it and wrap it around himself.
Draco's Weasley weighted blanket is so different from his own. Molly used patches of gray and green, and spent hours hand-embroidering lots of different dragons from the fairytale stories that Draco loved. Ron clearly remembers seething in jealousy the moment Molly presented it to Draco in their first joint family Christmas.
But that is old news, those feelings of jealousy and inadequacy, don't consume him as frequently anymore. He tries to remember all the techniques the family therapist taught him as a child, during the unpleasantness of the divorce.
"Breathe in the roses, blow out the birthday candles," Draco reminds him as they speed down the roads that Ron only takes by bus.
It does not take long before they stop in front of the park. It is too cold to get out of the car, so Draco doesn't force Ron to get out like he usually would have done.
"You know you have to talk about it. You can't keep going on like this."
Ron does not want to talk about any of it. He does not want to rehash to Draco, of all people, what rejection feels like to him. The worst rejection Draco has ever gone through is when Harry chose Ron over him at eleven. It is water under the bridge for Draco, but that moment still tastes like sweet victory for Ron.
"I know I should care…but I really don't."
Draco scoffs at that. "Your actions show that you do care, brother."
"Step-brother," Ron automatically corrects. He offers the edge of the blanket to Draco, who pulls Ron close to him.
"You do know it's ok to feel tied up about Hermione," Draco says.
"She wasn't supposed to leave like that." Ron can finally say the words without his voice breaking.
It does not matter which of his siblings pick him up, after a night out spiraling like this, or whose Weasley blanket he sleeps under. None of them comfort him the way Draco does, because in some very twisted way, only Draco knows what the grief of losing someone the way Ron lost Hermione is like.
Afterall, Draco came to them, with Lucius, after Draco had lost his mom. She had left without a word, and although Molly and Arthur were divorced, Molly had come down to smother them all with her love and remind them that even if they didn't get along that loving Draco like they did each other was important.
"You know, she taught me to say that. That if I needed a hand, I only had to say something, to reach out to someone. I always assumed that someone would be there, that Hermione would be there to fix everything."
"And it hurts that she is supposed to care but she doesn't seem to anymore, right?"
"Yeah," Ron replies, pulling the falling blanket around himself tighter. The weight of it all feels wonderful. It feels solid and grounding, but Ron is sure that some of it has to do with understanding too. "Why is it that I always call you, when I make shitty decisions because thinking of her drives me crazy."
Draco laughs at that, the sound is full and Ron can feel the rumble travel down Draco's chest. It is a sound that warms Ron's soul, because it was years before he ever heard Draco laugh when he lived with them at the Burrow. It was not from the lack of trying, Percy had read joke books, Fred and George spent hours targeting everyone but Draco in their practical jokes, and the worst had been Ginny who was so smitten by Lucius hair, even as a toddler that she had giggled with joy everytime Draco let her put bows in his hair.
"It has only been a year though," Draco says. "You were together forever."
"Only since eleven."
"My point exactly, forever."
"So can we stay like this for a while?" Ron asks, as the sun begins to come up. He doesn't want to think about Hermione anymore, thinking about her hurts.
It is way too late to attempt to make morning classes anyway. "However long you want. I'll tell you what, I'll even use daddy's card for the posh tea spot you like."
Ron can't help the laugh that bubbles out at that. "He's my dad too."
"Yeah, but who does Arthur let use the emergency only card?"
"Still, daddy?!"
"What! He has never said anything about it."
"That's because you entertain his awful sci-fi theories," Ron says.
And like that they stay, talking about everything under the sun, and Ron is grateful in that moment for having a brother like Draco.