Dining together was a unique experience. Harry was positively beaming with joy about the return of his brother-in-arms. Ginny and Bill were firing questions at him. He wasn't able to finish an answer before the next had been be asked.
'You visited Borobudur?' Ginny exclaimed. Her voice had been slowly rising through dinner, and was now an unusually high pitch, 'Is it true that wizards are taught a spell on the top level?'
'Yes,' Ron said, remembering the old master on the top level fondly, 'though I still have to find a use for that particular spell. I spent the night on the summit. The view is unbelievable. You can never imagine how many stars are visible on a cloudless night.'
'When were you there?', Fleur asked. Where Bill and Ginny were interested in the sights he'd seen, and the magic he'd come across, she was more interested in the trip itself. She'd asked him about practical things, like how he'd traveled, or how he'd payed for everything.
'Second year on the road. I spent the winter around the equator, since I had no real snow gear with me.'
'Where did you go next?' Harry asked. It was one of the few questions he'd asked since dinner had started. Ron turned his head and made eye contact. He could feel a grin forming on his face while he saw an identical one on Harry's.
'Bali,' he replied, 'couldn't very well visit Indonesia without making a stop in the number one party island now, could I?'

The evening slowly proceeded. Ron was enjoying himself, recounting his travels and catching up with the events in Britain. He'd heard that the ministry was reforming. It seemed like Shacklebolt was an excellent minister, quickly reforming poorly functioning departments and promoting hard-working ministry officials. Everyone's faith in the ministry seemed to have improved. The war had effectively destroyed the people's trust in the ministry of magic, and under Kingsley, that trust was now largely restored.
'After that,' he said, resuming his recounting of the events in Japan, 'I decided I'd seen enough of Tokyo and I moved into the mainland. Spent a few weeks in a monastery.'
'You were in a monastery?' Ginny asked, an incredulous look on her face, 'You?'
'For about five weeks,' Ron replied, 'but the diet of half a handful of rice and some beans didn't really suit me. I did enjoy myself though. Played a lot of Go there.'
'Aren't monasteries supposed to teach you about yourself?' Harry asked, 'You make it sound like a spa.'
Everyone laughed at that. Bill laughed most, and had spent the entire evening with a wide grin on his face. Ron had the feeling Bill was very happy he'd returned.
'I did learn a lot. It was a muggle monastery, and those are very strict. Did a bit of soul-searching there. Found out a lot about muggles too.'
'Like what?' Harry asked with unfeigned interest.
'Like how they can achieve things so close to the border of magic with self-control and the mind. The old masters spent most of their time meditating, and when they did, I swear I could feel.. something. Perhaps that's why one of them contacted me at the end. Told me he saw me being different from the rest, and that there was little left for me to learn here.'

Ron looked around the room. He saw Fleur and Bill, leaning against each other. They were holding hands underneath the table. Fleur seemed to be studying her husband's face, while he was still focused single-mindedly on Ron. Ginny and Harry weren't touching, but exchanged glances to each other nearly every minute. The contact never lasted more that a second, but it told them everything they were thinking about none the less. It was endearing, though admittedly, a little mushy.
'How are mum and dad?' he asked.
'Fine,' Bill said, 'it took a while for them to get used to an empty house, but one of us visits nearly every day, so they are never alone.'
'Mum's a lot less protective of us nowadays,' Ginny interjected, 'I guess there's something to thank the war for.'
Each of the Weasleys grinned at this. Leave it to mum to need a war to change her habits.

'I noticed a guitar on your back,' Bill said after cleaning the last of the desert from the table, 'you play?'
'Yes, though I'm not really brilliant or anything.'
'Care to give a demonstration?' he asked hopefully.
'Sure.' Ron stood up from the table and walked out of the room. He opened the guitar case and extracted one of his most treasured possessions. The guitar was unremarkable. Not of special brand, and bought for a discount, Ron loved it dearly. There were a lot of good memories attached to that instrument.
'I'll need to tune it,' he said carrying it in, 'hang on.'
'You took lessons?' Ginny asked.
'No,' he said, strumming one of the strings. The tune was deadly. He'd replaced the original plastic strings with unicorn tailhairs. Those produced much rounder sounds, but also tended to get out of tune much earlier. 'I just practiced a lot. Traveled with a Dutchman that played. He helped me get started. After that, it sort of grew on me.'
After a few more plucks on the strings, Ron guessed it was back in tune. He struck a few chords. Fleur involuntarily cringed, they were Celestina Warbeck's. An evil grin flashed on his face, and soon everyone was laughing.

With the laughter going on, Ron picked a song. One of his favorites. He deftly struck the first notes, softly replacing the sound of laughter in the room with the sounds of the guitar. The notes were sweet and high, traveling up and down the tone ladder with ease. Ron closed his eyes. He'd played this song so often, he didn't need to see his hands or the guitar anymore, and like always, that single image came to his mind's eye. The one image he always saw playing this song.

Everything about you is how I'd wanna be
Your freedom comes naturally
Everything about you resonates happiness
Now I won't settle for less

Give me all the peace and joy in your mind

Everything about you pains my envying
Your soul can't hate anything
Everything about you is so easy to love
They're watching you from above

Give me all the peace and joy in your mind
I want the peace and joy in your mind
Give me the peace and joy in your mind

Everything about you resonates happiness
Now I won't settle for less

Give me all the peace and joy in your mind
I want the peace and joy in your mind
Give me the peace and joy in your mind

Ron knew his voice was a bit nasal when he was singing, and that his singing voice was average at best. The song was also relatively high, and he couldn't reach some of the notes, which came out rather out of tune. He received a large applause none the less. His eyes were still closed, and he could still see her face in front of him.

Even Teddy, whom had been lying asleep in Hermione's hands nearly all evening long, was clapping his hands. His eyes opened and he focused on him. He seemed healthy and happy. Ginny had mentioned that Harry had half-raised him so far, and had been spoiling him horribly. Teddy's smile was infectious. His hair, brown at first, was now a violent shade of red. Ron's eyes left Teddy and searched for Hermione's. When they found her, Ron noticed they were glossy, and a second later, a tear crept down her cheek.
'Sounds like you've been enjoying yourself,' she said, getting up. She turned to Bill and Fleur, stating curtly: 'I'll check to see if Victoire is still asleep in her room.'

Ron was afraid she might react like that. Part of him agreed with her. He'd had enjoyed himself on the road, doing what he wanted without anyone else's interference. He'd spent a lot of time like that, not thinking about what others might say or feel about him. In that time he had been selfish, sometimes to the point of extremes. Those two weeks of partying in Berlin had been selfish, as had been the weekend in Belgrade. Parties every day; drinking, laughing, meeting new people, meeting women. He'd been clumsy in the beginning; self-aware. That had soon given way to a nearly nonchalant, witty routine though, which turned out to be highly effective. Looking back, he figured he needed that attention in the beginning, especially when he was feeling depressed. After a while though, that need had started to dwindle. He hardly ever sought out women since then. He'd only shared the bed with one woman during his third year on the road, and none in the last.

That last year had been solitary. Though several wizards and backpackers had offered to join him, he always refused. He wanted to travel alone. America had been a blissful country, the wildlife parks seemingly endless in size and beauty. He'd spent springtime in Yellowstone, one of the happiest times in his life. Just sitting there, on the grassy surface, looking out over a small creek and surrounded by trees, Ron felt a tranquility he had not felt before. It wasn't much later that he'd felt homesick for the first time in over a year. The feeling was heart-rending, nearly nauseating. He'd unconsciously changed his plans for Florida into plans for New York, something he'd later both regret and thank.

On his way there, other new feelings emerged, which he uncharacteristically recognized immediately. He'd felt them first when he was hitching a ride on the interstate. A family had pulled up, driving a Toyota. Father was behind the wheel, mom sitting at the passenger side, and their two children were seated in the back. 'Hi there, stranger,' the father had said, 'need a ride in the back?'
The two children, both around the age of three or four, were playing together, and he had spent the entire trip in the back feeling a desperate longing for what that family had. There was only one person he could have that with. There was only one person that could fill that particular dream. And she'd just run off upstairs.

An awkward silence hung over the dinner table, broken by Teddy requesting a children's song. Ron smiled at him, then ruffled his hair.
'I'll play you any song when I come back down,' he promised, 'go think of some you want to hear.'
Ron put down the guitar and got up. The others remained quiet as he made his way to the stairs. Apparently, they understood this was going to be a private moment. He made his way up with familiar ease, and found Victiore's bedroom easily. From the sounds that came from the other two childrens's rooms, Dominique and Louis were fast asleep. Hermione was standing in the middle of Victoire's room, looking at the tiny small form of the blonde girl. Ron stepped into the room and stopped inches away from her. He could smell her familiar scent, her sweet fragrance. He had not found a similar scent anywhere in the world.
'I know it sounds easy,' he whispered, 'like I'd forgotten about everything. For a while, I tried to. I'm not proud of how I left, nor of leaving for so long. I just had to leave.'
'Oh,' she whispered ominously. Ron knew instantly she was angry, 'and that make it okay, does it? You feel the need to leave without notice and I'm supposed to be happy with that?'
'Hermione, don't be like that,' Ron pleaded softly, 'I was messed up. Struggling with Fred's death, avoiding the overwhelming attention that everyone was giving us, I just wasn't me. Not that last year. Not that year where we tried so hard to be together, and everything we did somehow made us feel more apart.'
'At least I was trying,' Hermione whispered, 'I felt like I was the only one keeping us together.'
'You weren't,' Ron said, 'I tried my best. I really did. I was feeling all these emotions about Fred, about us, about the world. At one point, I couldn't discern what I felt about anything. Feeling itself slowly seemed to dim, like I'd drawn a shutter on my emotions. After we decided to take a break...' Ron could now feel Hermione's tension rising; it hadn't been a clean break, 'I realized I couldn't feel anything. I started planning that evening, and left a few weeks after that.'
'So you stop feeling, and makes it okay to break our hearts?' she countered, 'Do you have any idea how your family took your sudden disappearance?' Her voice was rising now. 'How Harry felt, losing his best mate? How I felt..'
He silenced her by touching her waist with his left hand. It was an old gesture, from just after the war. She stopped talking immediately.
'Like I said,' he whispered after a moment, 'I'm not proud. Not of leaving so suddenly, nor of staying gone for so long. But I did need it. I needed to escape. Escape the people on the street, the people in the super. I needed to think, to feel. I needed the only thing you couldn't give me. Space. Space to find myself again. Space to put my thoughts in order.'
Hermione was silent then. He knew she was still angry. He'd be, if he were in her shoes.
'I left, because I couldn't find myself. I left and traveled all the world, and bit by bit, found myself back. But the better half of me had never left. The better half of me, was here. With you. That's why I returned. I want us to be together. I want us to be more than what we were looking for that first year after the war.'
'Any you think I'll just forget this,' she asked sarcastically, 'That I'll just pretend like you never left me without telling me where you were headed?'
'No,' he said, his voice barely audible even for her, 'I'm not asking you to forget. I'm asking you to understand. To understand the reasons I had for departing. If you understand them and still don't want to be with me, that's fine. It'll hurt like hell, and I'll likely never recover, but it'll be fine.'

Ron turned around and walked back out of the room, leaving Hermione. She'd need time to mull things over. She'd need time to figure out exactly how she felt. And time was something he had a lot of.

When he came back down, Teddy immediately cracked a smile. He wanted to hear "Bob the Builder"'s song. After three children's songs and the anthem of the Hollyhead Harpies (Ginny could sometimes pass for a child), Hermione came back down. She sat down next to Ginny, whom she sought eye-contact with immediately. Hermione had gone back to Hogwarts to finish her N.E.W.T.s, and had thus spent a year with Ginny. The two had developed a strong bond that year. Teddy was tucked into his own bed at Shell Cottage by Fleur, and when she returned, the group moved onto the soft sofas at the other side of the room. Ron sat in a plushy sofa near a fireplace, Harry, Ginny and Hermione were seated on the couch, and Bill was on a loveseat with Fleur half on his lap. They spent the rest of the evening and most of the night talking together. Hermione now asked questions too, although admittedly not as much as the others. She was smiling though, so Ron hoped she was feeling better. Right before she left with Harry and Ginny for the night, she suddenly asked him if he would play that first song again.