Chapter 5: The Spare

For Harry, planning the funeral was an absolute blur. Until the actual day, he seemed to float around in a fog, his brain barely attached to his being.

The day of Ron Weasley's funeral was cloudy and ominous, but Mother Nature seemed to have mercifully spared the rain, at the very least. It's not like it made Harry feel any better, though.

A now visibly pregnant Hermione wore all black, a shawl draped over her face. Rose clutched her mother's hand, wiping back tears as her father was laid to rest. After the earth had covered him up, and everyone else had left, the little girl flung herself at the spot and began to sob. A depressed Hermione could only stare.

"Why did you have to go, Daddy? Please come back! I'm sorry!"

Harry quietly approached and sat down on the ground, Indian-style, gathering Rose into his lap. She sniffled into his shirtfront.

"He's never coming back, is he?"

Harry almost lost it right there, freshly reminded of why that was their new reality. He shakily let out a breath. "No."

"Did dying hurt Daddy? Does dying hurt?"

Harry started, flashing back to when Voldemort hit him with the Killing Curse in the Forest. Almost instinctively, he echoed the words Sirius had spoken to him.

"Quicker than falling asleep….. I bet," he tacked on. Technically, he wasn't supposed to know what death was like, and he didn't want to frighten Rose.

The little girl angrily wiped at her tears. "It's not fair! It's just not fair!"

"No, sweetheart, it's not fair."

"Who will be my Daddy now? Who's going to play Quidditch with me? And read me stories?"

And in that moment, Harry made a decision. "Well…. I will. We can do all the things you and your Daddy used to do, Rosie. I'm your godfather, after all, so I bet I could fill in convincingly." OK, that last bit came out a little lamely, but honestly, it was amazing he was even speaking in complete sentences at this point. "Would you like that?"

Rose sniffed and nodded.

"That's my girl. Come on, your mother's waiting." And Harry carried her back to Hermione.

Later that day, Harry stepped warily into his home in Godric's Hollow. Ginny came rushing up to him in the foyer, eyes filled with tears and clutching her own pregnant stomach.

"Teddy and the boys are asleep. Hermione and Rose get home safely?"

Harry nodded. "Yeah, I Apparated them back." He couldn't get out any more before pulling his wife in for a hug, letting her cry on his shoulder and he on hers.

"I'm so sorry, Ginny….."

She sniffled. "There's nothing you could have done, Harry. I know it, and so do you. I…. think things will get easier with time. Though for Mum, I have no idea, having to take another blow like this….." She stepped out of his embrace and composed herself.

"Fancy a cup of tea? I'll probably head to bed afterwards. Merlin knows I could do with the sleep, block out the world for a little while."

She kissed him and then retreated to the kitchen. Harry trudged into the sitting room and plopped down on the couch, exhausted, rubbing the bridge of his nose to get the circles out from under his eyes. All his mind could do was replay the scene of Ron and his last words to him.

"Watch over my flock…. watch over my flock…." Why did that phrase sound so familiar?

Harry suddenly started, sitting straight up as a lightbulb went off in his head. He called for his wife over the whistle of the teakettle.

"Hey, Ginny? Gin? We got a Bible anywhere?"

Moments later, Harry was digging through the back of a sock drawer per his wife's direction, finally excavating the battered King James edition used at his and Ginny's wedding. Following a quick Google search on his Muggle phone, he flipped through the pages until he finally found it.

"John, Chapter 21, Verse 16: And again Jesus said, 'Simon, son of John, do you love me?' 'Yes, Lord,' he answered. 'You know I love You.' Jesus told him, 'Watch over my flock.'"

And for the first time, Harry understood. This was it. Ron had left him a clue - an order, really, one he had already answered to with Rose at the funeral. He would watch over his best friend's family, his family. Protect them. How could he do anything else?

Besides, Ron himself had said it best: What is family for?