What Has Become of the World?
Chapter 2: Harder than It Seems
------------------------------------------------
The sun filtered through the hangings and burned the outerside of Ron's eyelids. He groaned, covered his head with his pillow, and then realized there was a pair of arms wrapped around him from behind.
He groaned again.
Slowly trying to pluck her arm from around his waist, he pulled back the covers and crawled out of bed. Ron threw on a pair of trousers, not bothering with a shirt before tiptoeing out of his room so he wouldn't wake up…wake up… Damn, he couldn't remember her name.
He couldn't remember any of their names.
Not after Hermione. She's been everything he'd ever wanted in a girl, and so much more. She was beautiful, smart, and even funny when she wanted to be. The laughter she produced had always brought him out of any bad mood, but the memory of it now only stabbed at his heart. He didn't have to worry about her laughing much lately; she'd been in Azkaban for a little over a year.
He hadn't been stupid, though. She'd clearly loved Harry, and Ron had always hated being second choice to Harry. Call it jealousy, whatever. He hated being second string to anyone. It was all or nothing, and these girls had given him all, but it just wasn't good enough. They couldn't be her, and it killed him.
Ron huffed and wrenched open his refrigerator door, grabbing an ale and pushing it shut. He drug himself over to his kitchen table and plopped himself down in a chair, opening the beer and taking a swig. Down the hall the door squeaked. Damn, she was awake.
"Ron?" The girl said from the hallway. "Ronald, where are you?"
He sighed. "I'm in the kitchen." The girl-fuck, what was her name-poked her head shyly around the corner. He could see she was wearing one of his oversized shirts. They all did this, trying to look sexy for him. It was pathetic, really. They all thought they could get to his heart by sleeping with him. He almost felt bad for using them, but in the end, he didn't care. Hermione had hurt him badly enough, even if she hadn't done anything directly, but just knowing she'd gone with him out of pity made him infuriated with her. He never wanted to see her again, but he knew that, even now if she'd asked him to bed, he wouldn't hesitate. Fuck, he was so pitiful.
She sat at an angle from him at the table, staring at him with a crooked grin. He looked away from her and she placed her hands on his. "Last night was wonderful."
"Yeah," he said disheartened. "It was nice."
She stared at the ale in his hand. "Gaelian Cheer? I've never heard of…"
"It's imported," Ron said quickly, knowing full well that no muggle would know of the wizarding beer that he threw back constantly. Ron reached for a pack of smokes in the centre bowl of the table. He knocked the pack once on the edge of the table, forcing one of the fags up and settling it into his mouth. Throwing the pack back into the bowl, he took his lighter and lit up; taking a deep drag and puffing it back out. Instantly he felt the nicotine flood his veins and he began to relax. Merlin it felt good, especially after a night of lousy shagging.
"You know those are no good for you," the girl coughed.
Ron shrugged. "I know."
Their small talk was getting them nowhere, and he could almost feel the awkwardness she was feeling. After having slept with as many women as he did, he didn't feel awkward anymore, mostly because he didn't care. The only woman he cared about didn't want him, so why should he care about other women? Fuck `em all.
"Can I try some of that?" She asked, motioning to the ale he held in his hand.
Ron shook his head. "I don't have many of them left." The girl sighed and stood up.
"I'll make you some breakfast, then." She walked over to the refrigerator door and opened it, pausing for a moment before closing it again. He knew she'd seen all that he had in his fridge: case after case of Gaelian Cheer mixed in with a few take away boxes of mouldy food he reckoned should be tossed away.
He didn't care when she moved swiftly back to his bedroom, and came back out moments later, dressed fully in the scanty attire she'd been in the night before. A few tears fell down her cheeks.
"You're a pig," she shouted at him, before walking out of his door and slamming it behind her. Ron only sighed as he reached for the pack of cigarettes again, pulling out another one and lighting it off the old one, so that a red ember burned in the new fag. He put out the old one out in an ash tray nearby and sat back to puff away on his new cigarette.
What did Hermione see in Harry anyway? Ron couldn't see what Harry had that he didn't. They'd both been there to defeat Voldemort, and Ron had even helped to revive Harry after he'd killed his long-time nemesis. Fuck, he'd done everything he could have for his best mate, and this is how Hermione repaid him? Ron would never get over it, and he knew Harry still wondered why Ron had cut all connections with him after the war; after he'd broken up with Hermione.
She'd never come out and told him directly, and thought her a coward for that. No self-respecting Gryffindor was as much of a coward as she was when it came to their relationship. He imagined she'd fancied him since third year, and never said anything. Finally when Ron asked her out, it hadn't been anything like he'd expected. He'd expected her to jump in her arms and scream, "Yes! Yes!" as though he'd asked her to marry him, but she only nodded and said, "Okay," in that stupid way she did when she was contemplating a tough issue and made a rash decision to please her questioner. Knowing full well he should have never forced her into the relationship, he reasoned that she had never shown any signs of being distressed with the fact that they were together, so he continued to press on with their relationship. For a bit she seemed happy, but that had only been the beginning when it was all holding hands and kissing on the cheek, or even a peck on the lips. That was stuff they'd already done on a friendly basis, but he wanted to go further. He wanted to really kiss her.
That was when she had told him she was too busy with work to get into a serious relationship. His jaw had dropped, but he hadn't been surprised. It was something he was dreading, but it just didn't surprise him. He'd been expecting it, but hoped it wouldn't come. But it had. And he'd yelled, she'd cried. He'd demanded to know what other bloke was in her life. She'd said there wasn't another, and he'd called her a liar. He'd shouted that he knew she was in love with Harry and how sick it made him; so sick that he wanted to spew his guts all over Harry's dead parents' graves. Ron knew it was the jealousy in him that was forcing him to say such hurtful things, but Hermione didn't care. She loved Harry, and Ron knew she'd defend him over Ron. That night she had left, her eyes dry and stoic, and he'd never seen her again.
A few months later he'd read in the Daily Prophet about her arrest and sentence to a year or so in Azkaban for propositioning the House Elves to leave their masters by tricking witches and wizards into accidentally giving their servants a piece of clothing. He knew she'd gotten the idea from Dobby, who was essentially freed by Harry.
Fuck, Ron knew that Hermione loved Harry for his compassion, which was initially set off by that first House Elf he'd freed. After Dobby, however, Harry had showed about as much interest in SPEW as Ron had, which was very little. They'd allowed Hermione to put their names on her distribution list, but after their break-up he had stopped receiving newsletters. Hermione had found more followers, but Harry still remained second to her on the list, whether Harry wanted to or not.
It was a fruitless attempt on her part, Ron thought. She couldn't be sure that Harry even felt that way for her. It pissed him to fuck thinking how Hermione was wasting her energy, pining over Harry, when she had a perfectly good man waiting for her to return any day. Of course, Ron was about half, if not a quarter of the man he used to be, but if she returned to him, he'd be whole again.
Ron knew Ginny was having the same trouble after her break-up with Harry. She'd even gone so far as to find work at a strip club in London. Entirely by accident, Ron happened to come across Ginny at her new job and almost threw up. His little sister, the little redhead with the girly crush on Harry Potter was dancing half-naked as she straddled and bounced in a strange man's lap. Needless to say, Ron had rushed across the room as fast as he could and nearly pummelled the guy before security put him in place. Ron had pulled off his coat and draped it around Ginny's small frame, and she yelled at him, but still seemed to hug his coat tighter and tighter around herself. He could tell she was miserable, but she did it anyway; she danced for money even though she hated it with every cell in her body.
Her boss had excused her for the night, and even threatened to fire her if Ron came in again. They'd made their way to a pub down the street to talk about their recent heartaches and struggles. She'd told him about how she'd left Harry because of his drinking issues, so finished with him that she didn't care whether he died of alcohol poisoning or not.
"I'm so fucking sick of his drinking," Ginny hissed as she puffed furiously on her cigarette. She'd picked up the same terrible habit Ron had. "I mean, I care that he's depressed and upset about Voldemort, but if he'd talked to me in the least bit, I know I could have helped him."
"He's a bastard, Ginny, we both know that now."
She had looked at him with an eyebrow crooked. "Why's he got your trousers pinched?"
"He hasn't, really. I-I just-fuck. I think Hermione broke up with me because she's fucking in love with Harry."
Ginny scoffed. "Who knows what Harry's thinking. Remember in school when he'd shut up and not tell us anything?" Ron nodded. "Well it's gotten worse. He snaps at me when I even look at him, and half the time he's too pissed to even speak. And that's when he isn't just flat passed out. I almost thought of putting him in one of those homes, but was too afraid he'd get all upset and hit me or something, so I just left. I sent Kingsley Shacklebot after him though. It's all I could think of to straighten him out."
"You did the right thing, Gin," Ron said, putting his hand over his sister's. Ginny was really the only person he trusted in the world. They'd teased each other relentlessly, but in the end, they'd always had the other to lean on.
Ron glanced up to see a white-haired man looking at them through the window, but the man had run away before Ron could recognize his face.
"What are you looking at?" She'd asked him before taking the last puff of her cigarette.
Ron shook his head. "Nothing."
The phone suddenly rang, pulling Ron out of his revere. He looked at the fag in his hand and saw the ash had burned down to the filter before he'd taken a second puff. What a waste of a good cigarette.
The phone rang again, and he huffed, putting out the fag and walking over to answer it. "Hello?"
"Is this Ronald Weasley?"
Ron furrowed his brow and leaned against the wall of his flat. "Yeah, who's this?"
"This is Healer Mardling from St. Mungo's," the voice said. "Miss Lovegood is asking for you again. She says she's seen Hermione Granger walking out of Azkaban's gates."
"Fuck," Ron cursed over the phone. "Uh, yeah, I'll be right over." Ron slammed down the receiver before cursing again.
Luna Lovegood. He couldn't believe he'd ever agreed to be her secondary caretaker after St. Mungo's. Every fortnight it seemed he was over there, trying to calm her down. Deep down he knew she wasn't crazy like everyone was carrying on that she was, but he couldn't do enough to convince them to release her. Every two weeks she'd say that she saw the day Hermione was walking out of Azkaban, and they automatically thought she was mental.
Ron knew she wasn't. Of course she was seeing Hermione walk out of Azkaban…because Hermione would eventually walk out of Azkaban. It worried Ron that her primary caretakers could be so thick, when he'd once been deemed the thick headed prat.
The only thing that kept Ron from rowing with her healers over dispatching her was the fact that she had gotten a bit depressed after the death of her father. She had seen her mother die once, and then her father. Ron would never know what it was like to watch two of the closest people to you die at such a young age, but he understood her pain, and he sympathized with her. And he really didn't mind visiting her all that much.
He raced to his room, threw on a shirt, and ran back to his sitting area. "St. Mungo's," Ron said lazily as he threw his floo powder into the flame before stepping into it. Moments later, completely dizzy, he stepped out of the fireplace at St. Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries. He passed the Welcome Witch and headed for the lift, riding it up to the fourth floor and Wing 49. As Ron entered the room, he all but cringed to know what he would momentarily be in for…
"Hello there, young lad!" Gilderoy Lockhart shouted jovially. "Would you like an autograph? I can get you about fifty of them to share with your friends?"
"Umm, sure," Ron said, passing by the egotistical man quickly. "I'll pick up my stack on the way out." This seemed to satisfy Lockhart for the time, and Ron continued on back to where Luna would be.
"Is Ronald coming?" He could hear her asking one of the nurses.
"Of course, dear, your healer called him up only a few-well look who it is!" The lady shouted. "I told you he'd come, dear. Now I'll leave you two alone to talk for a bit."
Ron chuckled a bit and nodded towards the departing woman. "Still treating you like a child?"
"Worse," Luna replied, flopping back down onto her bed. "They think I'm completely mental."
"Are you?"
"Am I?"
"I don't know," he replied, sliding in next to her. She grabbed his hand like she always did, and passed on her vision to him…
It was a beautiful day; one of those days you'd curse if your work forced you to stay inside. The only problem was, in the middle of the sunny sky that stretched in all directions lay a single patch of deep black sky. He knew why it was black: the dementors.
Luna focused him in on the entrance to the prison, as a shrunken, bushy-haired girl stepped out of the doors, looking around and sighing before climbing into a boat that would take hear across the sea to brighter waters, and land that would take her back to Harry…
Ron couldn't watch any longer and wrenched his hand free from Luna. She sat up and ran her hands through his hair. It felt soothing, it felt…
"I know you miss her, Ronald," Luna said softly. "But she's gone. Even when she gets out of Azkaban, she'll be gone."
Ron's face grew harder, even though he knew she was right. "How do you know so much about my love life, Luna? How do you know it's true?" Ron stood up on wobbly feet.
"I can feel it in your aura; you love her very much, but she's communicated very different feelings to me…"
"So you've talked to her now?" Ron shouted, his sudden tears blinding him as he reached for anything sturdy to hold him. "What'd she have to say about Harry? Does she want to shag him? Does she want to fuck him sideways until neither of them can walk straight?"
Luna stood and reached for him. "Ronald, I know it's hard. I can help you get through the pain if you just watch…"
"I don't want to see any more of your fucking visions, Luna!" Ron was sobbing now, and collapsed on the empty bed next to hers. "I think they're right! You are mental, and that's why you're here!"
"Ronald." Luna was crying a bit now.
"No, don't use that on me!" Ron clutched at the sheets, wanting to tear them apart for the way she was stabbing at his heart.
And then she started humming Weasley is Our King, softly at first, and then a bit louder, or maybe she'd been humming it the same the whole time, and the blood pumping through his ears had just settled down a bit. Still sobbing, he let her take him into her arms as she rocked him back and forth, waiting for his tears to subside.
"I'm starting to think you're the mental one, Ronald," she joked. He chuckled dryly and calmed down as she petted his hair. "I know she hurt you, Ron, but you have to move on. I know how hard it is, and how much it hurts to love someone so deeply, and to not see that love in their eyes when you want it to be there so badly." He looked up at her, into her eyes and it depressed him to see her love for him burning a hole in his heart. He could only stare at her blankly before she sighed and moved off the bed. "Like I said, Ronald, try your hardest to get over it, or you'll end up in here with me."
He felt as though she was only half-joking, but saw a tear slip down her cheek before she slipped back into her bed and pulled the covers over her. That was his cue to leave.
Ron slipped out of the room quietly, luckily dodging Gilderoy Lockhart who was still furiously scribbling at pictures of himself. Taking the elevator down again, Ron passed by the Welcome Witch and disappeared in the floo network again before finding himself back home where he opened another can of his ale and lit up a fresh fag.
Back in ward 49, Luna was crying softly, and sniffling as she communicated with Hermione.
I'm so, so sorry, Luna. I wish I could get him to love you back.
Its okay, I, well I guess I'll be here until he comes to his senses.
I hope, for both your sake that won't be long.
Thanks, Hermione.
I'm a bit tired from the dementors and trying to get my mind through the wards, but I'll talk to you later.
You'll visit me soon?
Only a few days.
Luna smiled a bit. Hermione would be getting out in only a few days; hopefully she would bring Luna out of this slump, and back into the real world; a world Luna wished only to share with her Ronald.
------------------------------------------------
Well, that's chapter two. Thanks for all the reviews on chapter one! Keep `em coming. :)
Thanks to Rylee for her wonderful betaeing skills! :)
Hope you enjoyed this chapter, even though it was a little sad. :( I promise it gets better from here. :)
-->