A/n: Sorry, guys, I've been pretty busy since summer started, and I had severe writer's block at the end of the chapter. But here it is, and I hope you enjoy it!

Oh, and slightly bad language. Just a teeny-weeny bit, for drama's sake.

The Tales of Weasley the Father
By dieselwriter

Chapter 3: The Tale of Insecurities

Ron had been away on an Auror assignment for the past three days, so upon Apparating home, he opened the front door in readiness to greet the site he usual found after his missions.

Hermione was still at work at the Ministry, so the first thing he found was a note, explaining how to get dinner ready. When entering the kitchen, he found his son in his usual spot at the kitchen table, grinning broadly at Mrs. Puckle, who served as babysitter while he and Hermione were both away. She was surveying the chess board that sat between Hugo and herself, searching for a move that, as Ron could tell, would lead to checkmate by his son quickly.

"Well, how's my family?" Ron asked, dropping his rucksack on the table and leaning over to kiss Hugo on top of the head.

"I'm about to win!" Hugo smiled up at him.

"Yes, he is," grumbled Mrs. Puckle as Hugo laughed.

"Sorry, he gets that from me," Ron said. He stared at his daughter's empty chair and suddenly realized that his usual reception was missing someone. "Where's Rosie?"

"She's upstairs, Mr. Weasley," Mrs. Puckle answered, as she finally made a play on the chess board.

"You can call me Ron, Mrs. Puckle."

"As soon as you start calling me Agatha, Mr. Weasley."

Ron smiled as he left the room to head upstairs to find his daughter. Hermione never called Mrs. Puckle by her first name, and yet the eighty-year-old witch always seemed to be able to call Hermione by her first name. Hermione found this quality endearing; Ron found it annoying. But even he couldn't complain about her great babysitting abilities. Whenever his mum wasn't available to baby-sit, Mrs. Puckle was always right next door, ready to come over to spend an afternoon with the kids.

Upon reaching the top of the stairs, Ron checked Rosie's bedroom, but found no trace of his daughter. He looked in Hugo's room, but was met again with an empty bedroom. He checked his own bedroom on a hunch, and heard Rosie huffing in what sounded like consternation from the bathroom. Ron entered the loo and was met with quite a sight.

His daughter had what looked like an entire bottle of Sleekeazy's Hair Potion poured on her head. Her mirror reflection looked guiltily at her father's reflection, and then she turned around to shine him a bright smile.

"Welcome home, Daddy! How was your trip?"

Her face fell as Ron raised an eyebrow.

"What on Merlin's green earth are you doing?"

"Just…trying something new with my hair…."

"Why?"

Now she started looking upset, at which Ron felt incredibly uneasy.

"Bobby Benson was teasing me about my hair again and…well… I just wanted to see if this stuff would tame it," she answered, holding up an empty bottle of Sleekeazy's Hair Potion.

"Did you even attempt to read the directions before pouring all that goop on your head?"

"It wasn't working! A knut-sized amount isn't enough to fix this hair!" Rosie cried.

"I don't see why you're so concerned with your hair anyway," Ron said. Seeing his daughter's face, he knew he had said the wrong thing.

"Well of course you don't see anything wrong with it, Dad. Mum has the same hair; you have to like it! But Bobby was with his friends and they were all making fun of me…and I just don't like my hair!"

Ron walked over to his daughter and tried to run his fingers through her hair. He couldn't make it an inch before his fingers stuck in her mane of rock-hard hair.

"Rosie, there are some things about yourself you just can't change. Magic can help with a lot of stuff, but it can only do so much. You'll just have to accept your hair, or else keep it like this for the rest of your life. And I think you'll find the former a lot easier."

But Ron felt even more uneasy upon seeing his daughter look at her reflection in the mirror. Ron recognized the look on her face, and couldn't believe he was seeing this look on his nine-year-old daughter's face: she looked insecure.

"I've told you how I got these, right?" Ron asked as he rolled up his sleeves to show off the faint scars still residing on his arms.

Rosie looked at her father's scars, interested with this new tactic. "Yes."

"Well, I don't mind showing them off now, but when I first got them, I wasn't so fond of them. In fact, I remember talking to your Uncle Harry about them…."

"You whore."

The woman backed away from him, tears streaming down her cheeks.

"I never meant it to get this far!"

"The hell you didn't!"

His giant fist collided with her jaw, and the woman fell to the ground in a torrent of tears.

"I swear it! I love you, and only you!"

"LIAR!"

He lifted her up only to hit her again.

"No, stop! Please!"

He picked her up by the throat and squeezed tightly. She began to choke and splutter, and just as her eyes rolled into the back of her head, a voice shouted from behind him.

"STOP!"

He dropped her to the ground, where she lay still.

"Incarcerous!"

The spell hit him before he could react, and scorching hot ropes wound their way up his arms. He couldn't move, couldn't say a thing…but his arms were on fire….

Ron's eyes flew open as he sat up and waved his arms about in a wild attempt to cool them off.

His nightmare had left him in a cold sweat but the scars on his arms felt the same as they did on the night he received them.

But after a few minutes they cooled down, so much so that he was able to move his curtains aside to reach for the water beside his bed.

"Trouble sleeping?"

Ron nearly fell out of the bed.

"Merlin, Harry, are you trying to kill me?"

"You didn't answer my question."

Ron tried to relax as he reached out for the water at his bedside table once again.

"I'm fine, mate, just a nightmare."

But Harry grabbed Ron's arm as it reached for his water.

"What…Ron, what is this?"

Ron snatched his arm from Harry's and retreated back into the safety of his four-poster.

"It's nothing, Harry…they get a little inflamed sometimes…."

"A little? Ron, they look the same way they did your first day in the hospital wing!"

Ron looked down at his tender skin, following the raw scars that wound their way up his arms.

"It's funny, Harry. I didn't used to have many dreams at all…but since these came along," he said, lifting his arms up in the air fruitlessly, "I have these nightmares all the time. And they're not even my nightmares…according to Madame Pomfrey, they belong to whoever's brain got a hold of me.

"My scars always get irritated after I have a nightmare…she said it would happen for a while, but they'll become less frequent as time goes on."

Harry was silent for a while, so much so that Ron had thought he had gone back to sleep. He was about to roll over and try to do so himself when Harry spoke out again.

"So that's why you've been wearing long sleeves? Even when it's been as hot as it is?"

It was true. Ron had been hiding his scars the past three days to avoid awkward stares and disgusted looks. It was bad enough that they looked gross, without everyone wondering where they had come from.

"I don't think you should hide them."

Ron quirked an eyebrow at Harry.

"Harry, just because you have a small, cool-shaped scar on your forehead doesn't mean the rest of us with big nasty burn scars want to show the world."

"Hang on," Harry replied, holding his hands up in a defensive position. "I didn't mean that you should put them on display or anything…but I hope you're not ashamed of them."

"Your scar shows people that you beat the most evil wizard in existence; my scars show people that I'm completely useless in battle and that I'm an idiot. How exactly am I supposed to not be ashamed of these things?"

"Useless? How could you possibly think that?"

"I got Ginny, Luna, and I separated from you guys, I couldn't protect my younger sister when that Death Eater grabbed her, I got hit by a spell that made me completely loopy, and as a result I summoned a brain to myself, which resulted in these," Ron said, sticking out his arms for emphasis.

Harry was quiet again, and Ron took that as a sign of him finally winning the argument, meaning he could go to sleep once again.

"My scar shows people that I'm lucky. Your scars show people that I'm the idiot, not you."

Ron sighed heavily, realizing Harry was not willing to let this go so easily.

"How do you mean?"

"I was a year old. If Voldemort had tried to strangle me with his own hands instead of trying to kill me with a spell, I wouldn't be here talking to you. And if I had used Occlumency, I would have realized that Sirius wasn't in the Department of Mysteries, and none of this would have happened to you."

"Harry, they're just burns…they're not that big of a deal," Ron replied immediately, putting into action the plan he and Hermione had come up with during their days in the hospital wing on how to handle Harry should he blame himself for their injuries.

"You think so, yeah? Then what's wrong with wearing short sleeves tomorrow, for a change?"

Ron put a hand to his forehead and smiled wryly; Harry had won.

"So why are you up so late giving me fashion advice? I didn't wake you up, did I?"

Harry took off his glasses and slid back under the covers.

"I figured it'd be nice to give advice to the one having the nightmares for a change," he answered with a smile.

"So…moral?"

"Brain burns give you nightmares?"

Ron sighed, wondering if his daughter had paid any attention at all to what he had said.

"No," he replied, as he moved to the sink to turn on the tap. "Come on; let's get that gunk out of your hair."

Rosie moved under the sink and for the next few minutes, Ron's fingertips turned wrinkly as he washed the potion out of his daughter's hair.

"Hey Dad, I beat Mrs. Puckle in less than twenty moves!" Hugo shouted as he entered the bathroom, but stopped at the doorway as he saw his father and sister. "Whoa…what happened to you, Rosie?"

"I was trying something different with my hair is all," Rosie tried to reply huffily, but all she got for her troubles was a bump on the head as her head accidentally hit the tap.

Hugo raised his eyebrows in surprise. "Why? What's wrong with your hair? It looks like Mommy's."

Ron smiled at his son before looking down at Rosie. She was frowning in thought, as trying to work out a math problem. Something must have clicked, for the frown was gone to replace a grin of her own.

"It does," Rosie said suspiciously, as if trying to decide whether this was an insult or not. "What's wrong with that?"

"N-nothing!" Hugo said, clearly confused with his sister's defensive attitude. "I like it!"

Ron stepped aside with a small smile on his lips as his daughter looked at her reflection in the mirror. Her sopping auburn hair was already curling as she, too, smiled.

"Thank you, Hugo," she replied as she went over to hug her brother.

"Eww, gross, you're dripping all over me!" he replied as he squirmed out of the hug to hide behind his father.

"Hey, don't include me in this!" Ron said, sidestepping around his son so Rosie had an open target.

"Come back here!" Rosie shouted as her brother dashed out the bathroom before she could grab him. "I want a kiss too!"

Hugo's gag was heard from the hall.

"Thanks, Dad," Rosie said, hugging Ron tightly, before turning to chase her brother out the door.

Ron shook his head, confused by the scene, but in no way upset by it. He heard the front door open and close from downstairs.

"What is going on here?"

Ron followed after his children out of the room and down the stairs to meet his wife at the front door. She had her hands on her hips as she gave her husband an amused look.

"Why is Rosie hunting Hugo down for a cuddle?" she asked, seeming just as confused and happy as Ron was about it.

He shrugged before going over to give her a kiss and a cuddle of his own.

"Welcome home."

A/n: Please tell me what you think! And expect another update this weekend for a Tale of Fathers- just in time for Father's Day! ;)

Thanks as always to those who have reviewed. I truly appreciate your support!

P.S.: Mistress of Craziness, I especially appreciate your review. Thanks for taking the time to write, and I hope this chapter had enough Hugo in it for you! Don't worry, next chapter has more Hugo focus, like this chapter had Rosie focus. I love Hugo...there's no way I'd ever ignore him!