The Secret Diary of Ron Weasley aged 16 & 1/2

A/N: Thank you so much for all the reviews. Sorry I’ve been so long in updating! Anyway, I’ve responded to a couple of points about the story in the ‘recommendations’ thread on the forum, if you’re interested.

My Birthday!

Am now seventeen and a MAN!

Have received the following presents:

• One book on how to apparate from Hermione (she always gives the best presents)
• A hideous knitted waistcoat from mum ( I blame Witch Weekly for its awful knitting patterns)
• A brew your own butter-beer kit from Harry (nice one!)
• Charm Her Knickers Off: A guide to romance the wizard way, by Bentley Drummle* from Fred and George (no comment)
• New keeper gloves for Quidditch from Ginny (she must have saved her pocket money for months!)
• One banjo – unidentified origin. (will become musical genius!)

Can’t learn to apparate till the summer holidays though, as can’t practice at Hogwarts.

Was waiting all day for the surprise party from Harry and Hermione – after all, they were giving each other such funny looks when I was in the hospital wing – but it never happened. They must have realised I was on to them…

Charm Her Knickers Off is proving highly educational. I have learnt the following:

1. Girls don’t like having their bra straps vanished, even if they are letting you kiss them. Hmmm.
2. Reading women’s romance novels gives you an insight into what they want from a man.

Asked Seamus what he thought about point number two. He gave me a copy of The Vacillations of Fanny Adams that he pinched off his mum in the Christmas holidays. It’s absolutely filthy! Apparently women want to be slammed up against walls and have their bodices ripped by evil men in breeches and moustaches? Surely not…

Have set up my butter beer brewery. Have followed the instructions almost exactly, but have added a few extras of my own. It’ll be ready in two weeks – Seamus pointed out that this is just in time for St Patrick’s Day! Perfect.

Double potions was horrible today.

Was sitting as usual playing hangman with Harry as Snape droned on and on about essence of hellebore. Usually he gets his little pet Malfoy to help him with demonstrations, but today was me. ME!

Had to stand and stir the stupid cauldron while Snape chucked things in it. Sure he was standing needlessly close. Sure also that he was looking at my arse when I bent down to pick up some toad bowels he dropped (on purpose?).

Wonder if anyone else suspects anything? Have started to see double meanings in everything Snape says…

‘First we drop in the essence of Hellebore. Stir faster, Weasley. Faster boy!’ Blimey.

‘Then we grind up the beetle wings. Grind harder Weasley!’ Bloody hell.

‘You should submerge the jobberknowl feathers with a sharp, thrusting motion – we do not want these to float to the top, or dissolve. I said thrust!’ Oh god.

‘By now your potion should look black. Black and sooty…’ Argh! Shut up, shut UP!

‘You may return to your seat now Weasley.’

Was a nervous wreck by then, hands sweating, stomach churning. Snape was smirking at me in a horrible way. Have awful feeling he is toying with me…

Have begun trying to sweep my hair back from my forehead dramatically, like Lord Huntington in The Vacillations of Fanny Adams. It stays back for about half the day, but seems to want to stick straight up all the time after that! Dean has suggested using lard? Interesting idea.

Hermione tried to corner me today and said ‘Ron, there’s something I need to talk to you about.’ Just when I was planning my answer (I feel the same way my darling) Harry bloody well barged up to us and interrupted! Trust him not to realise that something was going on – he is really slow at picking up deep undercurrents of emotion. Considered turning my back on him and pushing Hermione into a wall Lord Huntington-style, but am a little too scared of her to do that, to be frank.

They went and had a quiet argument in the corner of the common room, but I couldn’t hear what they were saying, apart from the odd phrase:

‘…course he doesn’t suspect…’

‘I am NOT being a coward…’

‘…thick as mince…’

Huh. Harry obviously doesn’t want to ruin the dynamic of our little group by letting Hermione declare her feelings for me. I would always spare time from our passionate lovemaking to have a game of gobstones with Harry – he should know that. Imagine saying Hermione was thick as mince though! He’s either very brave or very stupid.

Match Day – playing Hufflepuff!

That Zacharias Smith is almost as bad as Malfoy when it comes to bad temper. He was strop, strop, stropping around before the match, complaining that Lee Jordan is too biased as commentator and puts everyone off, and flapping his robes around. Who does he think he is – Lucius Malfoy? Didn’t help that every time he ponced up and down in front of the stands, loads of girls started sighing with longing. I even heard Ginny muttering to Vicky, ‘If it wasn’t for Draco, I’d definitely be interested…I have a thing for stroppy blondes!’ Is there no end to her bad taste?

Match ended up being a draw – don’t know what Harry was playing at! He wasn’t concentrating at all and caught the snitch when Hufflepuff had just scored a goal, because he was staring into the Gryffindor stand.

A note fell out of his Quidditch robes in the changing room – it just said ‘I’m wearing your Christmas present.’ Who could have sent him that? I mean, I know he gave Ginny a pair of socks for Christmas, but would that be enough to distract him from the match? Unless he has some kind of perverted foot fetish. Gross! No wonder he spends so long helping Hermione knit stuff for the house elves – he gets turned on by woolly SOCKS! What a weirdo.

Hermione was looking pretty hot today – in fact I’m almost sure she was wearing a lacy bra! Yum…

Had a really dirty dream about some blonde girl. Why can’t this happen in real life – why?

I can’t go on with this frustration! This is not the way my seventeenth year is meant to be panning out!

I don’t want to be single, horny and desperate, average at Quidditch, freckly, skint, own a banjo I can’t play, with a sister who is out of control and going out with my arch-enemy!

What I want is to have a girlfriend (Hermione, preferably) who can’t get enough of me, I want to play Quidditch for England on weekends when I don’t have prefect duty, I want loads of money, a motorbike and a sister who listens to me. This is what I want! Why can’t I have it? Why?

Have tried lard on my hair today. It’s slicked back really well! I look very imposing and debonair. Might take my arms out of my robe and wear it as a cape. Need a riding crop too, but not entirely sure what that is?

Later: Care of Magical Creatures was a disaster. Disaster! So humiliating.

Lesson was Billywigs and their Wily Ways. Hagrid let go a big swarm of the mucky things and we were supposed to note their flight patterns and then catch them in a net…bloody things headed straight for me and got stuck in all the lard.

Low point: Harry came to my rescue and vanished the lot of them – but vanished my hair with them! Now am completely bald and look insane. Thought Malfoy was going to do himself an injury he was laughing so much. Have got a big hat with earflaps on, and Harry is looking up hair growing spells. Huh.

High point: Hermione and the other girls can’t seem to stop rubbing my bald head! They think it feels nice! If only my head wasn’t the only bit they wanted to rub.

Have begun learning to play my banjo. Seem to have a natural aptitude for it!

Later: Hermione says that if I play ‘The Lumberjack Song’ one more time, she’s going to start screaming and she doesn’t think she’ll be able to stop. Switched immediately to ‘my old man’s a dustman’ (bet she’s impressed by my repertoire).

Later still: Dean Thomas started ending himself laughing when he saw me playing the banjo. He said with my bald head it was like something out of ‘Deliverance’. Dunno what he’s talking about, some Muggle nonsense no doubt.

Even later: Hermione explained that the ‘Deliverance’ thing meant I look like a half-wit. She thinks I should stop playing now. The woman has no music in her soul!

Midnight: Huh. Hermione just came storming down from the girl’s dorm, took my banjo off me, cracked me over the head with it and stormed back upstairs again. Philistine. Noticed she was wearing bed socks – I’d better warn her about Harry…

Have noticed that Luna is surprisingly clumsy for a girl. Was standing at the foot of a flight of stairs, stopping the first years from sliding down the banisters, when she slipped and practically fell on top of me! I caught her round the waist just before she fell over. She was very apologetic but it was ok – she’s tiny really, hardly weighs a thing! I said that to her and she went pink. Realised that I still had my hand on her waist and started to go pink myself. It’s so humiliating that I still blush at my age! Even the top of my head went red! Got a grip on myself (not literally!), lowered my brow Lord Huntington-style and swept off.

She had really nice perfume on though.

At last Harry has made a hair-restoring potion! Will try it after lunch.

Lunchtime: ARGH! Have grown really long ringlets all over my head! Cannot go to Herbology like this. Will try and give myself a haircut in the prefect’s bathroom.

Later: Was terrible trying to get to the bathroom. Not only did Justin Finch-Fletchley pat me on the bum (he claimed he thought I was Susan Bones from behind) but Snape saw me too! He gave me a very lingering look and flicked his own hair at me. EEEEEWWW!

Thankfully Luna appeared and offered to help. She says she cuts her dad’s hair all the time. Was a bit worried by this as have seen pictures of him in the Quibbler and he looks pretty mental, but that might just be the bulging eyes. Didn’t need to worry, as Luna seems to be a hair genius. Might even recommend her to Hermione if I’m feeling brave. Luna managed to make me look almost cool! Felt nice when she was running her fingers through it to even the ends up – very soothing. At one point she was facing me and I looked right at her and…no, shouldn’t be thinking things like that. She’s not Hermione!

Hogsmeade day today. Felt pretty cool with my new hair cut. Unfortunately met the twins on a delivery to Zonko’s, who started calling me ‘Gilderoy’ and asking for my autograph. Maybe hair is a bit big on top?

Later: Just caught sight of myself in the window at Honeydukes. Definitely looking HOT today! Twins are speaking rubbish as usual. I am a red haired DYNAMO! Will walk through Hogsmeade and smirk at any girl who looks at me in a longing way.

Later still: Only attention I got was an idiotic old witch who was looking for the Leaky Cauldron. I stuck her on a train and she gave me a sweet with bits of tissue stuck to it. Bloody Malfoy shouted ‘Is that your new girlfriend Weasel? Didn’t know you were a granny banger!’ and all his evil minions ended themselves laughing. Didn’t deign to reply to his immaturity. Wish his balls would dry up and drop off though.

Having a clothing crisis. Seem to have grown out of everything recently, and trousers flap above my ankles in a very un-cool way. Was contemplating the problem (turn all jeans into shorts? Ask mum for new trousers and risk getting knitted ones?) when Harry and Hermione barged into the dorm, giggling. Harry looked horrified to see me and went all red and speechless. Realised my woolly socks were clearly on show beneath my too-short jeans…why have I never realised his weird obsession before? He really needs to get a grip! Took my socks off immediately and threw them into the corner of the room, then said ‘Is that better Harry?’ He just gawped at me, as did Hermione (she should really watch out – her knee socks probably drive him insane) so I scarpered. The strain of being saviour of the wizarding world is obviously getting to the poor bloke.

Double history of magic is plumbing new depths of dreariness. I mean, do we really need to read the Chronicles of a Dwarf King who wrote down what he had for breakfast every day? (And it was always rocks. Sometimes with a little warm gravel.)

Hermione says those who forget the past are condemned to repeat it. I suppose that makes sense – if I don’t remember all this stuff, I’ll probably have to re-sit the exam!

St Patrick’s Day!

My home-brewed butter beer should now be ready! Hope that everyone appreciates the delicate flavourings and subtle aroma.

Seamus is very excited about the butter beer. We’re going to sample a bit before Charms this afternoon to see if it is ok for general consumption. Seamus says he has a high tolerance to alcohol, being Irish, and will be unaffected if have made beer too strong.

1.30pm: Have sampled the beer – think it’s alright, if a bit stronger than usual. Have had one glass each before Charms.

2pm: Professor Flitwick is very amusing today! Can’t stop giggling to self.

2.30pm: Have a bit of a headache now. Very sleepy too.

5pm: Going to have a little Irish Toast with the butter beer before dinner. No one but Seamus seems all that keen though.

6pm: Sod dinner! Butter beer is marvellous! Love Seamus – he’s my new best friend!

7.30pm: Never knew I was this witty and eloquent! Seamus finds me very amusing. Hermione keeps tutting and folding her arms. Don’t think we’re being that noisy. Think I’ll tell the farting joke again.

9.45pm: Have gone on expedition to find Room of Requirement! This is a brilliant idea from Seamus – after all, we really, really need some naked ladies and some snack foods…

10pm: Have found Room of Requirement! Me and Seamus concentrated really hard – hope he concentrated on naked ladies cos I concentrated on food…

10.05pm: Room of requirement bloody good fun – no ladies, though, Seamus got distracted. But plenty food and lots of fancy dress clothes! Seamus is a genius! Will impress Hermione by wearing something sophisticated and…. Ooooh! Lederhosen!

10.15pm: Me an’ Seamus look great. Am making sandwiches for everybody in Gryffindor – mmmm, starving! Seamus wants chocolate spread an’ cucumber. Blurry bread keeps falling off table…

11pm: Back in common room. Gryffindors are NO FUN! Won’t join in conga, or eat my sandwiches. Will just have fun by ourselves, then! Where’s my banjo?

11.30pm: ‘I love to go a-wandering, along the mountain traaack…’ Seamus knows loads of Austrian folk songs!

12 midnight: La, la, la! Oof. Have got braces* tangled in chair legs…

1am: Just going to rest my eyes for a minute. Wish Seamus would stop singing…

5am: WHERE THE HELL AM I? Oh god…

5.15am: What am I lying in? Urgh, have face in half-eaten prawn and pickled beetroot sandwich. Why did I think that was a good idea?

5.30am: Back in own bed. Will just close eyes for a minute.

9am: No, no, no! Am meant to be in Defence Against the Dark Arts! WHAT ON EARTH AM I WEARING?

9.10am: Found robes hanging from chandelier in common room. Wonder who put them there? Don’t want to know why I woke up wearing lederhosen and a fur coat. Must be someone’s idea of a joke. Have to get to the classroom…

10am: Just caught Seamus’ eye. Have had terrifying flashback to dancing on a table both wearing lederhosen and slapping our arses. Maybe this was a dream – can’t have really happened!

10.10am: Think I might have sung a bit, but not sure what…

10.15am: Harry is humming ‘Edelweiss’ under his breath and smirking.

11am: Just about to have double Care of Magical Creatures. Seamus looks worse than I do. He reckons that if he could just puke he would feel better. Harry suggested the ‘Millicent Bulstrode’ method, but don’t think my stomach can take it either…

11.30am: Harry and Dean just used the ‘Millicent Bulstrode’ method to great effect on Seamus.

‘Imagine kissing her,’ Harry starts off. ‘With her thick, slobbery lips, and her acne rubbing against your cheek…’ Seamus goes slightly green.

‘Yeah,’ added Dean, ‘and her moustache tickling you…’ Seamus goes even greener.

‘And her lovely breath from all the cockroach clusters she eats…’

‘And imagine if she undid her shirt, I bet she’s got a hairy chest…’ Harry adds with relish. Seamus retches slightly.

‘And her bra’s probably all grey and stained from all the food she spills down herself,’ Dean says.

‘And she smells like vinegar and cabbage, and she wants you to take her knickers off…’ That did it. Seamus ran off to the bogs and came back five minutes later, looking a million times better.

‘Bloody hell,’ he said. ‘Talk about projectile!’

Are all horrendously late for Care of Magical Creatures, but was worth it.

Low Point: Everyone in corridors is singing The Happy Wanderer: ‘Valderee, valderah-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha.’ Either that or telling me how nice my knees are. Bloody Seamus! This is all his fault.

High Point: Luna came to tell me that she’s very impressed that I wore lederhosen, as it’s a well-known fact (hmmm – fact?) that dancing in leather trousers keeps bad spirits away. She seemed overly interested in seeing the lederhosen I wore last night, but the house elves have taken them away to get the beetroot stains out.

Feel better today.

Launched the remaining butter beer out into the lake in a barrel. Never, ever drinking again.

In deep trouble with McGonagall. She says the mer-people got hold of the barrel and had a really noisy party last night. Apparently they kept Snape up all night, and when he went down there to complain, the giant squid squirted ink all over him.

Think this may not go in my favour…

Ginny told me today that she’s asked Malfoy to stay at Hogwarts over the Easter holiday so ‘we can get to know him better.’

I said ‘You mean he wants to spy on us so that he can tell You-Know-Who about it, and get even further up his arse than his dad was!’

She replied ‘Well, that is just ******* typical of you, you never give anyone a ******* chance you complete ******* ******!’

Think Ginny may have Tourette’s syndrome. Her language is quite outrageous. Also have horrible suspicion she has learnt most of it from me. Should never have let her come with me to that Chudley Cannon’s game in the holidays – my language tends to get a bit colourful. But the referee was a ******** ****.

Ginny apologised for her temper tantrum yesterday. She just wants us all to ‘get along.’ I told her we’d all get along fine if Malfoy was a) a decent human being b) less girly-haired c) amenable to me kicking him in the nuts whenever he annoyed me. This triggered another strop from my sweet tempered sister. Honestly, if I could just get Malfoy to overhear one of these mood swings she wouldn’t see him for dust!

Divination today. Think Professor Trelawney has finally gone off her rocker. Claims she now has a spirit guide called ‘Tufty’ who is a giant squirrel and connects her to the world of the dead. He gave her a message from Lavender’s bunny rabbit Binky, who apparently said ‘I’m in my happy place now.’ Harry asked how a squirrel could understand a rabbit, but Trelawney ignored him. Glad Hermione wasn’t there, she would have hit the roof.

Luna has started coming round to the Gryffindor common room quite a lot and hanging around with Ginny – don’t think she’s getting on with the Ravenclaws any better. Turns out she’s a bit of a whiz at wizard chess, so we’ve had a couple of good games. I’ve beaten her so far, but she has a pretty bizarre technique…she says she just asks the chess pieces where they want to go. She says the white knight’s a bit of a coward, but the rest of them are not bad at all.

High point: Hermione saw me playing chess with Luna and rolled her eyes! Definitely jealous – although Luna was whispering to a bishop at the time.

Low Point: Luna calls the pawns ‘prawns’ and giggles every time she says it.

Think Pig has a crush on Hedwig – it’s really embarrassing. He flew in behind her today at breakfast and jumped on her back, just as she was delivering a letter to Harry. She started shrieking and flapping her wings, with Pig clinging on for dear life and trying to hump her. She sent the milk jug flying over Hermione. Hopefully he was just being playful.

Later: Hagrid says that Pig’s been trying to hump Hedwig and any other female owl for days! He has turned into a ‘flaming nuisance’. Hope this isn’t due to lack of proper role models (i.e. me). Might stop getting him to deliver me Warlock magazine – it has some very sexy pictures in it which might be addling his mind.

Low Point: Hagrid is making me help him build a special enclosure for Pig while he’s going through puberty (or as Hagrid says, ‘acting like a randy bugger’).

High Point: Group of fourth year girls got to see me swinging a hammer about and generally looking manly. Wish I hadn’t hammered my finger while they were watching, but managed to hold back almost all of the tears.

Double potions was nightmare as usual. Snape doesn’t seem so friendly since the giant squid incident – he still has a strangely grey complexion.

‘It is a real pity…’ he sneered after I messed up my potion for the third time, ‘…that the rules have been changed for student punishment. These dungeons used to have a real purpose. I remember my potions master giving me a thorough spanking for forgetting to add essence of musk ox to my memory potion…’ then his eyes went all dreamy and a very disturbing smile crept over his face. Just as he muttered something that sounded like ‘can we use the manacles tonight sir?’ Malfoy said ‘Professor?’

He snapped back to reality, took ten points off me and sat for the rest of the lesson fingering a cane he keeps in the corner and throwing nasty glances in my direction.

I’m afraid. Very, very afraid.

Have to have that idiotic Malfoy sitting at our table for the Easter weekend. Mum has started siding with Ginny over this as well – typical. She sent him an Easter egg and started going on about ‘poor little fatherless mite’ in her letter. Calling Malfoy a ‘poor little mite’ is like calling a blast-ended skrewt ‘adorable’. He made a huge production of eating the egg really slowly in front of me as well and grinning, until I could have smacked him one right in the face.

Seemed to have a strange effect on a few of the girls though – especially when he started licking the chocolate off his fingers. They all started sighing and giggling to each other. They must be disgusted by his bad table manners as well…

Ginny has obviously had some kind of talk with Malfoy which means he’s had to be on his best behaviour. Ha! This gave Harry and me ample opportunity to torment him at dinner.

Harry: That’s some interesting hair you’ve got there Malfoy.

Me: Yes, how do you get it to look like that?

Malfoy *preening*: Well, I…

Harry: I mean, it looks like feathers

Me: Little baby chicken feathers

Harry: Little baby girl-chicken feathers

Malfoy: mrurghmfl!

Me: Sorry?

Harry: What was that?

Malfoy: I SAID…

Ginny: SHUT UP

Ginny: All of you!

Ginny: I think it’s pretty!

Harry: *quietly* cheep cheep!

Me: cheep!

Really nice weather today. Me, Harry and Hermione got permission to take a boat out on the lake. Malfoy and Ginny were out in one as well and were obviously getting Harry and me back by snogging disgustingly and holding hands and sharing their sandwiches in a pathetic lovey-dovey way. It makes my stomach HEAVE!

I accio’d one of their oars while they were mid-tonsil-tennis though! Ha! Hahahaha! That’ll teach them!

Later: Hermione made me row back out and give it to them. So unfair, it was quite cold by then and Harry and her got to keep warm under a blanket on the shore while they waited for me. They might have given the blanket to me, selfish gits. I was going to ask Hermione to tuck it in round my…dammit! Shouldn’t think about Hermione doing that while I’m writing, I’ve spilled ink down my trousers.

Am in a really good mood today! No divination as Trelawney had an emotional trauma and is resting – something about a black cat, the number thirteen, someone walking under a ladder and a pair of new shoes being put on a table. Dumbledore said something about ‘spontaneous implosion’.

Quidditch practice went really well too – think my new hair is more aerodynamic. Oh, the cleverness of me!

Can barely manage to write this. Came back from library late tonight and saw Harry and Hermione.

Together.

Feel like the picture has been branded onto my mind. Harry kissing MY Hermione, with his hands in her hair! She looked so pretty too, when he stopped kissing her for a moment – her cheeks pink and her eyes all half-closed and sexy. Then she saw me, and her face went grey.

Ginny came back to the common room at that precise moment. She realised what had happened straight away, and took me upstairs to bed.

Later: Can’t believe it. Hermione and Harry have been secretly going out for MONTHS. Ginny says they didn’t know how to tell me!

Feel like I’m King Arthur and Lancelot has taken my Guinevere.

*****************************************************

A/N: Sorry to end on such a sad note! Bless him. He’s still thinking about knights though, if you’ll notice, so maybe he’ll bounce back from this better than you think…

References:

*Bentley Drummle is a character from Dickens – Great Expectations. He marries Estella, but is pretty horrible to her, so probably wouldn’t know much about charming anyone’s knickers off.

*Braces – I think in the US you call braces ‘suspenders’ – would that be right? As in the things you hold your trousers (pants) up with? In the UK suspenders are what you hold your stockings up with. So if I had Ron wearing suspenders, the whole scenario would have been ever weirder. Ah well…

Lord Huntington is from The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Bronte, who is a terrible drunken cad, but pretty sexy by all accounts…

The Vacillations of Fanny Adams – title adapted from The Vacillations of Poppy Carew by Mary Wesley.

Billywigs and their Wily Ways – Billy Connolly did a sketch called ‘Tarantulas and their wily ways’ in his ‘Billy and Albert’ show. I can’t really go into this in too much detail (as this is a PG13!) but I think Ron would have appreciated it.

Lumberjack Song – Monty Python, obviously.

My Old Man’s a Dustman, he wears a dustman’s hat, – I have a feeling George Formby used to sing this. And explaining who George Formby is makes me feel tired, so you’ll just have to google him! It suffices to say that this is a fairly old British (cockney?) song, usually accompanied by a banjo.

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