Fic: Before Me 11 (Harry Potter, HarryxRon)
Title: Before Me
Fandom: Harry Potter
Words: 2,570
Warnings: None
Rating: PG
Author's Note: Only three more (planned) chapters left! I've been tinkering with the idea of a sequel series, but I'm not sure if there would be any interest in it.
Harry lowered the fork from his mouth. "We need to talk?" He repeated, clearly confused at my sudden insistence.
"Yes," I said but that's all I could manage. I was so overwhelmed and too eager to get things out in the open with him that I wasn't sure how to behave.
Completely ignorant of my internal struggle, Harry looked around the empty kitchen. "Do you want to do it here?"
"No," I practically yelled at him. Panicking, I turned and headed towards the winding staircase encircling the Burrow. I knew I ought to check to ensure Harry followed, but I was too preoccupied with trying to recover my senses and pushing away the anxiety coursing through my nerves to look behind me. As we climbed and climbed up to my old bedroom I thought of ways to start this insane conversation. "How was it seeing Ginny again?" or "I overheard what you said in the garden. Was it true?" or "You love me, and I love you, wanna snog each other silly?"
By the time we reached my bedroom landing, I was starting to sweat so after opening the door, I pulled off my sweater. I heard Harry gasp and looked behind me in alarm only to see him red-faced and wide-eyed.
"You okay?" I asked, lazily flinging my sweater on my bed. I saw it land on the edge of the spare bed that was Harry's when he'd stayed at the Burrow during the summer holidays before returning my attention to Harry.
"Yep," Harry managed to squeak. His gaze had zeroed in on my bed and I had a wild image of us entangled in it amid passion. I smiled as Harry's blush deepened as if he'd just had the same naughty thoughts as me.
My Gods, could it be true? Did Harry fancy me?
The stuffy, musty smell of damp dust that always permeated my bedroom after it rained temporarily transported me through years of memories of rainy days and nights.
My bedroom was treated more like an attic than the actual attic now. Boxes of various sizes lined the far side of the room. They were neatly stacked from floor to ceiling, so perfectly placed that they must have been enchanted into putting themselves away.
The side that remained my boyhood bedroom held mementos of my life there. Broken chess pieces that had lost the magic to repair themselves at the game's end, an empty ink pot, feather quills that were run down to their quicks, my yearly Hogwarts letter inviting me to attend another year, and the accompanying list of required supplies (there was no letter from a seventh year as I had been deemed unsavory by the ministry while Voldemort's supporters had control over the legendary school) were scattered on my desk and a chest of drawers.
The old comforter and pillow remained. New bedding had been the first purchase I'd made for the apartment. It was surreal being here. Was I ever small enough to live here?
As soon as Harry entered he began tidying up my forgotten messes. His need to clean to help settle his nerves, a trait he developed growing up with the Dursleys as if everything would be alright as long as things were clean, was something I tried not to begrudge him for.
I let him pick up, knowing it would soothe him. "To be honest, I'm not sure how to begin." I helped out, opening my trunk to store my old things from school.
Harry handed me the half-filled-out Auror application I'd abandoned when I'd grown unsatisfied with my answers. "Why don't you start with why we are having it here."
"Oh, yeah, uh, for privacy, mostly. I also wanted you to feel comfortable enough to speak freely." I stuffed the paperwork into the trunk.
"I figured as much," Harry pulled his wand out, aimed it at the door, and cast a silencing charm. He was always more confident in his spellwork than I was. He sat on the spare bed and looked stoically up at me. "Okay, you've gotten me alone, so what do you want to do now?"
I slammed the trunk closed and sat on it. I cleared my throat and scratched at the back of my neck as my nerves crept in. I still itched for a cigarette, but there was no way I would smoke in the house. "So, uh, I'm gonna say something and then ask you something, and I want you to listen and take your time in answering, okay?"
"Er-okay," Harry reached for my sweater and pulled it to him. He folded and unfolded it trying to disspell his nerves.
"I like men."
Harry's face scrunched up in a grimace. "I know."
"I know you know. What I don't know, well, I mean, I could guess based on your actions...but what I want you to do is tell me how you feel about it."
Harry was visibly uncomfortable. I wasn't sure if my sweater was gonna make it home intact by the way Harry was messing with it. I was tempted to just lie and say that I changed my mind. We could end things, but I hadn't changed my mind. I might hate seeing him so distraught and it hurt to know that it was because of who I was that caused him so much distress.
I spun on the trunk, looking away from him. I knew it would help ease some of the pressure he was under. It took a while, but I learned how Harry never liked being the center of attention. Back in school, I'd been obsessed with standing out as a person instead of being just another Weasley. I hadn't been able to understand how someone who was already known and adored by the wizarding world over didn't enjoy their fame. I'd been too full of my insecurity to make a name for myself to recognize Harry had no tools to deal with the constant watching and waiting for him to live up to some unknown ideal- for him to entertain them with constant victories or an epic downfall.
To my shame, I had been one of those people. Growing up learning the hero who was the Boy Who Lived was so great he'd already saved our world before he could crawl was so mind-boggling I didn't think he was real.
When I met him on the Hogwarts Express and he introduced himself, I thought he was joking. No way the savior was some child the same age as me in hand-me-down clothes (I was well versed in the hand-me-down look and could spot it a mile away) and broken eyeglass frames. And I was right. He wasn't the savior; he was just Harry-a smartass kid who didn't know magic and feared letting the legacy of a family he hadn't grown up with down.
He was just some skinny kid with messy hair and piercing green eyes I couldn't look away from. And now he was a skinny adult with messy hair and green eyes I couldn't look away from, who might love me the way I loved him.
Giving him the time he needed to collect his thoughts helped. I heard him shift on his bed and sigh heavily.
"It upsets me."
I couldn't help but look at him. He'd taken his jacket off and now sat cross-legged on the bed, his bowed head making it difficult to see his expression.
"It upsets you?"
"Yeah." Harry's head hung lower as if ashamed by the admission. He sighed again. "It feels like you've been lying to me."
"Harry-"
His head rose at the sadness etched in my voice. He looked close to tears. "Please, Ron, let me say this," he pleaded.
I swallowed my questions and nodded to him.
I wasn't sure if it was a lack of trust that I would remain quiet or if he just needed the extra boost of confidence that speaking into the room without being able to see gave him clearly, but he took his glasses off.
"Back in school, I saw how close you and 'Mione were getting. For years I've watched you guys flirt and fight each other. It was frustrating, but it made sense. And while I was interested other people, my heart always longed for you. Though I didn't know that at the time. Not having had friends my age I thought it's natural to feel the way I had towards you while we were growing up, and while I didn't share those feelings with others as our friendship circle grew, I would easily dismiss it as you being special because you held the title of being my first friend. Because that made sense. And then, after the war, you and Hermione made it official, and that made sense. And even your eventual breakup, while heartbreaking, made sense. I thought it would lead to you guys making up and you would get back together, because, you know, that made sense. You did makeup, but you never got back together. Instead you...you went out that Adam fellow and for the first time you didn't make sense to me anymore. So I clung to Ginny and we were both miserable. I thought I could be just as happy with her as I would..." He didn't finish the sentence and sighed again. "But who was I kidding, right? In what world would such a cowardly plan work? And I think I resented you for that because after everything we've been through, if I ever thought you like blokes, if I had known there might have been a time where I could've had a chance...I would have taken it. But it didn't matter, because even when I confessed to you how I felt, nothing changed between us, and I just-"
"Stop talking," I snapped, getting to my feet. I couldn't listen to him anymore.
The sound of my voice brought him out of the trance his confession had put him in. He sucked in a breath and releasing my poor sweater, he buried his head in his hands. "Ron, I'm sorry. I-"
"I said stop talking. I can't believe-" I couldn't form thoughts let alone speak them. How long had he? Since when did he-? "When did you confess?"
Harry flinched at the question. "Oh, er, that night we got home from the bar, the night we kissed," Harry said quickly as though the memory pained him as his words conjured it.
I wish I loved you the way you want me to. My life would be so much easier if I did.
"You remember that night?"
He shook his head. He lowered his hands, his eyes squinting as he tried to focus on me without his glasses.
Gods, he was so cute.
"Not at first. I've been freaking out about doing whatever I could to make things work with your sister. But then when you tucked me into bed I felt so loved that I couldn't not say anything. I was so happy to hear you say it back, but I was too drunk and sleepy to stay awake. I thought I'd dreamt it all. But then you told me that we had kissed which meant everything I thought was a dream wasn't and that I had said it aloud. I couldn't believe it because you didn't treat me any differently. We'd finally said it, but we weren't together. I had no choice but to think that you could only ever love me as a friend."
The words Harry once spoke in a drunken stupor now took on a different meaning. He wasn't saying he knew I was in love with him, he meant that he had been in love with me and his life would be much better if he could love me as only a friend.
"No wonder you couldn't tell." I laughed, feeling crazy. "I've been in love with you before I even knew what that meant. The reason why I seem to act the same way around you is because I've felt the same way about you forever."
Harry put his glasses back on and laughed too, although his laughter was more nervous than crazed like mine.
I couldn't believe this was happening. "Aren't we the biggest of idiots?" I asked walking a few steps over to him.
"Yeah," he agreed.
"Harry, I'm going to make this incredibly clear, alright?" I said, crouching in front of him. I placed my hands gently holding them. "There was never anyone else. I'm in love with you."
Harry's lips were pressed together like he was holding back a cry. His eyes were wide and shining, and I wanted to kiss him so badly. I switched from my crouch and fell to my knees. I needed the stability kneeling gave me as I cupped the sides of his head in my hands and gave in to my long desire to kiss him. I pressed kisses to Harry's face-on his forehead, cheeks, and brows-before Harry whined for a real kiss. So I gave him that too.
Harry wrapped his arms around me, drawing me close as our lips finally met.
I once hoped our first kiss would've tasted like fire whiskey and cigarette smoke. Funnily enough, our first kiss had barely qualified as a kiss and had been absent of any flavor. I thought I'd lost my chance to learn what we would taste like, I was so glad I was wrong.
"Treacle," he moaned absently.
Well, that was unexpected.
"What?"
"You taste like a treacle."
"How?"
"Oh," he blushed. "I may have taken the twins's potion. I wanted to see if the tart would taste the same. But we came up here before I could try it."
I chuckled. I loved how we both wanted to know if the potion would have worked that way. I made a mental note to tell the twins still needed to work on the formula if kissing counted as food.
"What do you think I'd taste like?" Harry asked.
"It's supposed to be our favorite dessert, right?"
"Yeah," he confirmed.
"Then there's only one thing it could be," I smirked. "Just you, Harry."
He laughed, the sound vibrating between us. We pressed our foreheads together grinning like the two idiots in love that we were.
"Gods, you're so damn cheesy."
"I thought it was sweet."
"I guess it was," he answered pulling on my shirt, silently asking for another kiss.
I hummed delightedly as I obliged his request. "Harry, I love you. Sorry for not saying it sooner."
"It's okay," Harry promised. "I know now. I love you, too."