A/N: So… I was intending to start on storyboarding for the re-write on my OM when I saw a particular image this morning and the mind took off running before I could strap on my trainers. I eagerly wrote coyotelaughingsoftly and she begged me to write the idea. So, here it is. Rated T for a hint of innuendo, angst, and well, no lemons but plenty of pepper. Special guest starring - a vase, courtesy of Anotherkate.
Finally, my solicitor wanted me to remind everyone HP belongs to Jo. I control the plot and the gas on the stove in my own house. - DG
"Ron, what are you doing?"
He looked up from the parchment notes on the table in the basement dining room.
"Is that a recipe?"
"Yeah, I reckon it is."
"Why are you looking at lamb stew recipes?"
"Because I want to do something nice for your parents since they made dinner two weeks ago."
"You want to cook for them? Are you mental?"
"No," He huffed. "But they got shirty with me and I want to show them that I can make an effort too."
"You don't have to, Ron."
"Hermione, I want to do this. I can't let your parents think that I'm not trying to make an effort with them."
"There's nothing you have to prove, Ron. They know you're it for me. There will be no one else in my life."
"But your Mum yelled at me the last time we ate over there."
"Ron, she yelled at me too. That was an expensive vase that broke accidentally."
"I didn't mean to knock it off when I was reaching for the buttered peas." He ran his hands through his hair. "And we did fix it, right? She didn't have to leave teeth marks in my arse over it."
"No, that's my job. But she was upset, thinking that her grandmother's vase was broken. That's why she yelled at you then she yelled at me for repairing it without asking her first."
"Oh, so it wasn't just me."
"No, Love, it wasn't. Mum still gets irate when I do magic."
"Anyway, I want to do this. I want to show them I can do things the Muggle way, and not just with Magic that still makes them uncomfortable. I don't want them thinking I'm a layabout."
"And I said you have nothing to prove, with them or me, either."
"I feel like I need to."
"Nonsense." She sat down across from him at the table.
"Quit contradicting me. I'm doing this, you're going to help me, and that's my decision."
"Well, if you're going to be shirty about it, we'll do this. When do you want to do it?"
"I want to cook them dinner when we go over there Saturday."
"I still say you're being mental. You don't have to cook them dinner." She looked away from his notes.
"Don't take that tone with me. I spent plenty of Sundays with Mum, when I wasn't working, learning how to cook. She likes my Lamb stew."
"You, cooking? Why haven't you told me this?"
"It's because I wanted to surprise you at some point. You've been home for three weeks and I wanted to have a nice dinner made for you."
Hermione walked around the end of the table and stood between his splayed knees. She smiled and it only grew more intense. "You are incredibly clever, Ron Weasley."
"Thanks," he grinned. "Now, we'll apparate over there and then I can send you to a grocer to get what we need."
"Are you sure you have everything that Molly cooks with?"
"Yeah, I'm sure. I've made it a half-dozen times now and she said it's good."
"OK then. We'll do that."
"Wait. Do your parents like lamb stew?"
"Well, if I can't find lamb, I'm sure a nice beef roast will work too. They like stews, with plenty of potatoes, carrots, peas, and onions."
"Can we get that at the store? Do we need to purchase it somewhere special? Do we have to go to a butcher's counter to get lamb?"
Hermione rolled her eyes. "We don't have to go to a butcher. We can get those things at a Muggle grocer. I'm sure that Tesco's will carry it, or Aldi's."
"What are those?"
"Those are the names of the stores, dear. I don't always shop at the one around the corner from the Ministry. They charge too much, sometimes."
"Oh, ok. But I don't have to bring over pans, or pots, or anything else, right? She's got those things I'd need to cook with, right?"
"Yes, dear, she does. But we'll go over and check before you start cooking so nothing's missing from the recipe. Will that suffice?"
"And if we're missing something, we can pop over to the Burrow to get it. Right?"
Hermione leaned in and kissed Ron on the forehead. "Yes, love, we can."
Ron stirred the stew again while adding a sprinkle of pepper. He'd made it according to Mum's directions. The pot looked a little wonky. Hermione said it would work just fine when she handed it to him. Even the lid looked strange, like it locked into place. But he did as Mum taught him, from browning the meat and using flour to make taste better.
He finished browning the meat and threw in the sliced onions. He then poured in the broth they bought to go into it, too.
Hermione had her wand out, spelling the knives to slice the carrots and potatoes for the stew.
"What are you doing?" Jean snarled. "You can't use magic to control those knives. They can get someone hurt."
"I'm watching them while they work, Mum." Hermione continued to focus on them and not her irritated Mum in the doorway.
"No. I absolutely forbid you using magic to control something so dangerous in my kitchen. You cut them by hand or don't cut them at all."
"Mum, it's probably safer that I'm cutting the vegetables this way than by hand. Trust me, it's perfectly safe."
"No. I forbid it in this house."
"Mum, you're being unreasonable."
Jean stormed out. Hermione ceased her wand towards the knives and they fell with a clatter. Ron stirred the onions, knowing that a row was coming that would brew faster than a badly formed potion in a cauldron.
Hermione stormed out and in seconds, rowing could be heard all the way to Whitehall.
Ron scooped up the potatoes and carrots into the pot and put the lid on it, hearing it click. He went after them with the intention of diffusing the row that was already boiling over in the study.
"Why do you refuse to obey my rules in this house, Hermione?"
Ron froze in the doorway and watched the Granger women going at each other. He felt a strong hand on his shoulder and knew that the Men were staying out of the fray.
"You said you wanted dinner at 7pm sharp. To make that deadline, when we arrived back at the house at half five would demand that we prepare some of the meal magically."
"My rule of no magic in this house is ten times more important that keeping to a bloody serving deadline. You disrespect me and your father in ours house by using magic again. You wanted an excuse and conveniently used one."
"That's not true and you know it!" Hermione yelled.
"Don't you take that tone with me, young lady! I've had enough of your disrespectful behavior – "
"Disrespectful? I was cutting vegetables for your dinner? How are my actions disrespectful?"
"I've had enough of your insolence, Hermione!"
"Merlin, Ron and I do something nice for you and you get swotty with me over how I do it! I can't believe how," Hermione bit off the rest of her retort and stormed out of the room.
"Well? Are you going to stand there like a lump or going to get her to see things my way?"
"Mrs. Granger, I'm going to calm Hermione down and hopefully, by the time I'm finished, dinner will be ready. Excuse me," he followed Hermione into the kitchen once again. He chased her through the slowly closing door and found her in the carport, breathing heavy.
"Hermione?"
"I was trying to get dinner on the table at 7, like she asked." She breathed hard, like she was laboring to catch her breath. "I didn't want or need to hear her snide comments about not having dinner ready when we said. But then she saw me working with magic and decided that I was being disrespectful."
"You couldn't have done anything today to appease her. You know that, right?"
"I'm trying so hard to make things work with her and anything I do just isn't enough for her."
Ron took a step closer before wrapping Hermione in his arms. "You're doing fine, love. I know it's hard but we'll keep proving to her that Magic is a source of good, especially with us."
She looked up and he smiled. Her face was a mess and even her teeth stood out but that didn't matter to him. "I love you. Thank you for being here."
He kissed her quickly. "Come on, we'll eat dinner and then have pudding and we'll – "
A deafening roar erupted behind the kitchen door followed by a very loud bang!
Ron shoved Hermione behind him, wand drawn for the danger and pushed the door open. He expected Death Eaters, or a rampaging rabid hippogriff behind the door.
"The bloody hell?" two voices spoke at once.
Ron took a step through the mudroom and saw what could only be described as a disaster.
"Oh shite," He groaned.
Hermione shoved Ron aside and stared at the oven. She stepped into the kitchen and didn't notice Jean standing in the doorway towards the dining room, gobsmacked at the disaster her kitchen was.
"Ron," she spoke and couldn't fathom an answer.
"What happened?" Jean asked redundantly.
Hermione peered at the now broken stove and oven. The top had fallen through into the oven space, with the pot lying at a forty five degree angle. The lid to the pot was embedded in the ceiling and the door to the oven was lying on the floor.
"Everybody all right?" Ron asked.
"Hermione, what happened?" Jean interrupted.
"Ron? When you put the lid on the pot with the stew, did it click?"
"Well, yeah. That's the pot and lid you gave me from the cabinet. I put it on when I went to see about you and Mrs. Granger rowing."
Hermione wiped the tears from her eyes. "Mum, I'll replace your stove immediately."
"What are you on about, Hermione?" Robert asked from the doorway.
"I accidentally handed Ron a pressure cooker, not a dutch oven. When he put the lid on, I guess it locked and the pressure built inside the cooker. We came in from the garage when we heard the explosion."
Robert pushed past Jean into the kitchen to survey the damage.
"Dad, I'll right this today. I should have been in here keeping an eye on the stove. But I was upset," Hermione drifted off again, not completing her thoughts.
Robert pulled the pot out of the baking compartment and looked inside the canister. "Well, Ron, I dunno about the rest of the kitchen, but your stew smells terrific."
"Mr. Granger, I – "
"Hermione, you blew up my kitchen. How can you be – "
"Jean, enough. Might I remind you that you started it, by laying into her by using magic in this house?" He put the pot on the island in the middle and looked at the rest. "Ron, see if you can reach the lid up there. I at least want it out of the sheetrock in the ceiling."
Ron stretched his large hand upward towards the ceiling, letting his shirt ride up and exposing bare hipbones and plenty of freckles and ginger hair below his navel. "Not quite there. Hermione, get me a step-stool or a chair or something I can reach it."
"Ron, wouldn't – "
"No, just get me a chair," he huffed and saw her comprehension kick in. She pulled out the two-step stool from the pantry and he stepped on it, finally reaching the embedded lid in the ceiling. He wrenched it out and looked it over. "I can't tell if it can be repaired or not," he spoke quietly.
Hermione handed it to her Dad while Jean stood in the other doorway, quivering in anger.
"Jean, why don't you go to my study? I'll be in shortly with the kids so we can talk." He gave them one particular look while escorting his wife out of the room. "Five minutes," he mouthed before leaving too.
Hermione pulled her wand before sealing the room.
"Hermione, what are you doing?"
"We've got five minutes to repair the kitchen for my mistake. "
"You sure that's a bright idea?"
"It's either that or we're kicked out of the house again for another 2 months. I want Mum in my life, even if she'd mad at me, than not and leaving the kitchen destroyed. Besides, replacing that stove will set us back about five hundred galleons. I dunno about you, but that is all I have in my vault at Gringott's and I'm not spending it on a new stove for Mum."
"Since you put it that way," he replies before pulling his wand from his jeans pocket. The couple worked quietly and quickly, repairing the ceiling and also the hinges on the door to the oven. The top was trickier, so Hermione worked on it.
"There. That should be all the repairs we need."
"Will it work after we used magic on it?"
"There's only way to know," She spoke confidently before putting her hand on the knob. "It's a gas stove, not electric, so it shouldn't be that problematic."
"Do be careful," he whispered.
Hermione turned the knob and she watched the fire erupt from the pilot light. "Whew," she whispered before checking all of the other dials and knobs.
"And the oven?"
She opened the door and heat blazed out. "I reckon it works."
She turned everything off and looked at Ron. "Ron, I'm so sorry I ruined your dinner."
He smiled. "Things happen. I'll tell you sometime about when Fred nicked Mum's wand while she was making dinner and the mess that ensued when she couldn't find it. But since your dad said it smelled good, let's try it."
Ron shoved in a wooden spoon into the stew and took a bite. "Bloody hell, it is good. Get us some bowls, would you?"
Hermione procured four bowls and handed them to Ron. "Ron?"
"Eh?" He asked through a spoonful of stew.
"Where's the bread?"
They looked around a second before Hermione spied the open cabinet door on the island. She looked inside and started laughing. "Found it but I don't think it's edible." She pulled it out and burnt like a Hebridean Black and as hard as one of Hagrid's Rock cakes.
"Damn. I knew I forgot something."
They carried four bowls and spoons into the study and Mrs. Granger's recriminations.