A/N. The plot thickens and the last scene of this chapter I never originally intended to write - the reason why I had Ron unconscious in TCC and dead here in TPP. I hope you enjoy it.
Chapter 31 - The Debt Collector
Harry got into his apartment, undressed and went straight into the shower. It was around one in the morning. He had just dropped off Delilah, his feet were killing him from the uncommon activity they had just been subjected to and his mind was exhausted thinking about the rest of the events of the previous night at Ron's. Unexpected seemed to be the theme which began with a trip to the local pastry shop to pick up dessert.
"I think I've pushed her over the edge," Ron said to him as they exited their building and began briskly walking towards the pastry shop a couple of blocks around the corner.
"What happened?"
He wanted to know and didn't want to know at the same time. Ron had definitely wanted him to come with him so they could have a more private chat.
"She's stressed."
That was obvious. The perfunctory greeting he got earlier was dismissive and quite unlike the usual welcome he received. Knowing what she had done with Roy, being stressed was a reasonable reaction.
"Wedding?"
"Among other things."
He wished Ron would just say it because he could sense that the pent up emotion in him was aching to get out.
"She had an affair in Toronto."
Look shocked, look shocked…wait… you actually are shocked. But how…? Why…?
"I know. I was as surprised as you are now. But it's true," Ron saved him from having to come up with something appropriate and truthful to say. "How could she, right?"
At that point the temporary numbing of his senses was gone and the first realization hit him. Ron did not know it was Harry as Roy she had the affair with. There were other disorganized swarming thoughts and questions in his mind. He picked one randomly.
"How did you find out?"
"Not important," his query was quickly parried off, "We talked about it."
"And…"
"She didn't deny it."
"And…"
"I told her I was fine with it."
"Are you?"
"If you spent eight years with someone, you'd understand. It was meaningless to her. She had her reasons."
He immediately acquired a newfound admiration for his soon-to-be-ex best friend but hoped Ron would elaborate on what those reasons were.
"What did she say?"
"She said she was sorry."
"Was she?"
"Can't picture her not being so."
"And the wedding?"
"I love her, Harry. I can't imagine not being with her."
"I see."
They got to the pastry shop and Ron went over to line up at the counter. What to think now…Ron knew about Toronto…she was willing to go on with this seemingly purely lusty relationship with Roy…she told Ron she was sorry…he believed her… the wedding was still on…what the hell was she doing?
Glancing over at Ron, he felt an enormous amount of sympathy for what he was going through. Harry never took him for a martyr. Ron loved her, he really did, for only one so much so would turn a blind eye to the very obvious implications of what Hermione did. And the reality of it was making him more nauseous about going through with his intent to stir up the pot after the Quidditch Finals. The guilt and anxiety were taking their toll on him. He wondered about the reasons Ron deluded himself with to justify her act of disloyalty, hoping they were really good ones. He wondered whether or not he would continue to be so blind if he knew Hermione wasn't as remorseful about the affair as he assumed she was considering she had done it again and was willing to carry on with Roy Hunt.
"So, anyway, I started thinking," Ron had rejoined him with a bagged pastry in his hand, as they started walking back to their apartment, "I haven't exactly been the best boyfriend all these years and with this wedding coming up she's having cold feet. You know how I'm such a klutz with talking around her, I'm not good at that sweet-talk shit but I just want her to know how much I love her."
"And you think she didn't get that with your reaction to Toronto?"
"I don't want to leave any doubt in her mind that marrying me is the right thing to do," Ron explained, "So, I let her read my journal."
"Your diary, from years ago?"
Ron's infamous diary was what kept him sane during their first year as Cannons. Harry wouldn't have mocked him while he was writing in it had he foreseen his plummet into depression and alcoholism then.
"Journal," Ron corrected. "I'll kill you if you tell anyone else, but I've actually kept it going all these years. You know, elderly habits die difficult."
"Not telling anyone," Harry assured him, kind of knowing what he meant.
"She's been reading it like she would some textbook, like she was going to be tested on it or something. She read it again this morning after getting back from her night shift. I'm almost regretting showing it to her at all. And I think that's what's driven her over the edge. You saw her in the kitchen."
He remembered.
"What was in it?"
"Stuff, you know, deep feelings…thoughts…emotions…"
Ron struggled. Fine, details would have to be skipped as both of them were really uncomfortable about discussing anything 'deep' of his.
"Got the picture. So what do you want to do?"
"I don't know, I just want us to get over this difficult patch and get married," Ron shrugged, "I don't know what to do because all this is freaking her out. What would you do?"
Great. He made like a fish out of water that would have included gill flapping if he had some. He wished the Finals were behind them so they could have their talk, too.
"See what I mean?" Ron saved him once again. "Where does one get help for something like this?"
"Just talk to her and be honest," that was rich coming from him. "She'd know what to do."
Harry was not so sure about that last bit and Ron seemed to think the same.
"Don't you think she's got enough on her mind right now?" Ron sighed.
The obvious conflict of interest was preventing Harry from making further suggestions but if Ron was concerned about this as he described it, it sounded as if Hermione needed a break from him.
Ron finally said just before they entered the building, "Sometimes I think I should just let her go completely, let her think this through with less pressure, and that if she really loves me she'll come back and it would all be better. But I can't because I don't think I'll survive if she decides not to come back."
He understood. His trip to the pastry shop with Ron had underscored what he already knew. Taking Hermione away from him was going to be brutal.
Harry got out of the shower, donned on pyjama bottoms and an old shirt, slipped into his bed, staring up the ceiling still wide-eyed.
That was the first surprise; Ron knowing about Toronto and being okay with it and Hermione carrying on with Roy despite the fact that Ron knew. What happened over dinner was quite unexpected, too. For one, he had never seen Hermione so inebriated. Having not seen her that way he did not know what to expect.
The biting sarcasm was odd and her treatment of her friend was even odder. He felt it similar to what she would reserve for one of his dates who she definitely disapproved of, guessing the alcohol unmasked that dislike a hundred fold. But then, she was the one who arranged for Delilah to come and from what Ron implied, she already told Delilah that they were going to go out dancing.
What puzzled him more was how she treated him, as if she wanted to kill him at one minute and snog him the next. There was the knife, the soup, catching her staring at him with a dreamy expression, lambasting professional Seekers, her implying that some Seekers did not play to win, and then her blow-by-blow account of how she enjoyed her and Roy Hunt's tryst a few nights ago. Why was she overtly flirting with him in front of Ron, Ron who had just forgiven her for her Roy Hunt transgression?
Once they were alone, his misgivings about their rushed interaction surfaced and he felt a compelling need to let her know how he would have preferred to do things differently. He would have given her an actual demonstration of the Wronski Feint had Ron and Delilah not been in the other room, for her proximity and competence at Quidditch talk were wreaking havoc on his resolve to keep his broom in the shed.
And when she suggested a desire to experience it he was jolted back to their reality. Drunk or not the implications of her words renewed nagging thoughts about what she had been doing and why she was doing them. He needed the 'reasons' Ron was latching on to for while Harry loved her, he was having difficulty justifying her actions with Roy and with him, especially since it was plain that she was staying engaged to Ron.
Did she know he was Roy or was she indeed merely playing with both of them, letting loose her wild side before settling down with Ron. Or was that just all booze talking?
He was done speculating. He needed the real answer. He wasn't sure where it would lead them but he could not go on pretending he was not in love with her, so he finally opened the door for them to start being honest; with her first, then if need be, with Ron.
As Delilah and Ron came back to the table Harry noticed a fleeting annoyed expression on Ron's face. He must have noticed how they jumped apart from a somewhat intimate conversation. The rest of that evening, Ron was casting them both probing glances. Guilty, he tried his best to not give Ron much more to think about, engaging him in a conversation about how the game plan was going to change as the Toronto team had just lost their superstar Seeker to a mishap at practice, making the Cannons sudden heavy favorites to win the Cup.
Harry was looking forward to talking with her again in private. And if in the end she decided to stick with Ron, it would hurt but at least he would be free of this burden he had brought upon himself.
Harry spent an eternity tossing and turning, sleep eluding him. His eyes were shut and his brain empty save for his intent to get some rest. It was frustrating because he could hear every sound in the dead stillness of the night. The ticking of a clock, the clicking of the airconditioning as it turned on and off, the whirring of his Sneakoscope?
Someone had just entered his apartment, and his Sneakoscope would only alert him of unfriendlies. The intruder was walking to his bedroom and not really making an effort to hide it.
By then he had his wand in hand and was out of his bed, poised to defend or attack if need be. He heard the doorknob turning…the door slowly swinging in...a hand with a lit wand emerging…
"Expelliarmus!"
The spell hit its intended target and the wand flew off into darkness.
"Ow!" it was a familiar voice. "Fuck, Harry, what did you do that for?"
"Ron?" he asked to confirm as he turned the lights on, seeing his red-haired friend trying to find his wand, "Well, what are you doing sneaking up on me like that? Are you crazy?"
"I didn't think you were home yet. I was going to leave you a note to see me as soon as you got in," Ron was holding up a piece of parchment.
"What's wrong?"
"We need to talk."
Twice in less than twelve hours. What now?
He put away his wand as they walked to his kitchen where they usually had conversations. They sat along the outside of the counter across from each other and Harry asked again.
"What's the matter?"
Ron struggled. Harry had never seen him so restless and serious. He would start to say something and then stop. Harry waited patiently until finally, he had to intervene.
"Just say it, Ron."
"Harry, you're my best friend. We've been through a lot together, a whole lot."
"Yes…"
Harry could only think that any talk than began with that would not be good.
"I wouldn't be doing this unless it was really important, and it's quite important to me. I need a favour, a huge one. I can't take no for answer." Harry did not interrupt, feeling his pulse quickening by the second as Ron continued, "You owe me."
What he said was so unexpected Harry didn't quite know what he was talking about at first. Then he remembered.
"You know what I mean," Ron said further, "From your, um, accident. I know it was so long ago but you owe me and you said it. I'm calling it in."
If he had to call that in then Ron must have been certain he was not going to be enthusiastic about being asked to do what he was about to be asked.
"It's about Hermione," Ron began, and a certainty dawned on Harry that the conversation would go bad very quickly, "I'm asking you. Stop messing with her."
"I'm not messing with her," came his immediate truthful response.
"You were flirting with her over dinner," Ron pointed out.
"She was flirting with me."
"She was drunk."
"Is that her excuse or yours? This is a conversation you should be having with her."
"This is not about her! I'm not blind," Ron had stood and was now red in the face, the veins on his neck angry as he continued to stand by the woman he loved. "I see how you look at her."
Harry had gotten off his barstool too, and met Ron's glare with an expression that betrayed him, wondering, had he been that obvious that even Ron noticed?
"How do I look at her?"
"I should have said something sooner. You've been looking at her like you do each and every woman you're about to sleep with. Tell me I'm wrong and I'll call you a liar."
Ron's blue eyes pierced through him like a cold sharp knife, waiting for a reply. He looked back at him, his heart pounding against his chest, and could not think of not being straight with him.
"I want to be with her."
There, finally, he said it. It was at that moment of his admission that he knew things would never be the same between him and his best friend. Harry had been prepared for a physical confrontation and while in the past Ron may have readily done so, he would have been foolish to get into a fight with an Auror.
"Curious what shagging her is like?" Ron asked, shaking from the effort of not letting loose the raging animal within him, icy sarcasm lacing every syllable, "She's just another girl to you. Is she the current flavour? For how long do you want her? A week or two, a month tops before you toss her out like an old rag like you usually do with your women and return her to me?"
"Forever. I want to be with her forever. I love her."
Ron laughed; a mocking, mean one.
"Don't be ridiculous, Harry. After all these years of just looking out for yourself, what makes you think you're capable of loving someone else?"
"Just because I haven't in a while doesn't mean I can't."
"Well, you can't with her. She's already spoken for."
"I think she should make that decision herself."
"She has. She's marrying me."
"She shouldn't because she doesn't love you."
"And you think she loves you? You should get Delilah to write you a potion script to get rid of your delusions."
"I don't know that she does but I don't know that she doesn't either."
"If you're feeling special because of her alcohol induced attention I should let you know that she does that all the time when she's had too much to drink. Think. Why would she want you? You have nothing to offer except maybe a good romp in the sack and we both know that grows old quickly with you. You're a womanizing, self-indulgent has-been whose life is not only aimless but a complete mess."
"Stop it, Ron…"
But Ron carried on, "She deserves better than you. She told me she pities you because she feels bad about what you've become. You're her charity, that's all."
"Stop it!" Harry repeated, tears streaming down his face.
"What's the matter? The truth stings, huh? Or is this part of the Potter act? What would others think of you now? You lying, two-faced, sneaky, son of a bitch!"
"Keep my mother out of this!"
"I'm surprised you're not making her an excuse for your behaviour...
That was all the verbal abuse he could take. He barely noticed and before he knew it he had decked Ron with a right hook, his knuckles stinging from the contact. Ron quickly got to his feet and with a cry charged into Harry head first, his broad shoulders catching his foe in the midriff and eliciting a grunt as their momentum caused them to crash into a glass cupboard, shattering its windows, shards raining all around them.
Ron caught him on the face with a left jab, splitting his recently injured lip again, but Harry was ready for his right, avoiding it and using Ron's off balanced position to push him away. He had regained control of his temper but Ron wasn't done. He had his wand out.
"Stupefy!"
Harry dove to his left as the spell hit his fridge, the blast creating a hole in it. He thought it hypocritical to ask Ron to stop now when he started everything.
"Levicorpus!"
He swore loudly as he barely avoided that one, thankful Ron's dueling skills were rusty. Ron had every intention to hurt him. He made an effort to get to his wand on the kitchen counter and just got it in time to unbind himself from the leg locking curse he just got hit with and dismissed the next spell with a shield charm.
"Let's talk about this!"
They were now both armed standing a few feet apart and one of them had righteous murder in his eyes. The spot Harry had punched was starting to grow a bruise and Harry's shirt was spotted with fresh blood from the cut lip Ron had given him. They were glaring at each other, both breathing heavily from their confrontation.
"This? Talk about this? You're crossing the line with her and you want to talk?! What's there to talk about?" Ron was livid and rightfully so as he sent another curse flying towards Harry.
"Protego!"
The spell bounced off on something in the background. Ron had tears of frustration and anger as he lowered his wand.
"I can't believe you would do this. You're my best friend. I trusted you!"
"I've tried but I can't let go of her either," he tried to explain, knowing it would fall on deaf ears. "I can't move on unless I do this. I love her and I have to know if she feels the same way about me. If you were me what would you do?"
Ron slowly raised his wand and pointed it at him again, trembling. Harry just looked at him, waiting, accepting, for he deserved whatever it was Ron was about to do to him.
A loud banging interrupted them. Someone, the super, was at the door.
"Are you okay, Mr. Potter!?"
He stood down and said to Harry, coldly, "You owe me. I'm calling it in and you can choose to do the honorable thing or not. Stay away from her."
"Mr. Potter?!"
Ron, who was closer to the door, walked towards it and opened it.
"He's fine, Jennings," he said to the shocked man standing in the corridor, giving Harry one last scathing look, "He's more than fine."
Ron left and Harry told Jennings that everything was indeed fine. After the man was gone, he shut the door behind him and appraised the damage he and Ron had done. At that moment, his apartment was a close reflection of his personal life. Chaos and destruction, and more to come.
It was only then that the challenge Ron had left him with finally sunk in; this debt that he was calling in, to honor or not to honor. Honor? There was a shortage in him of that lately. What Ron did not know was that he had already crossed the line and slept with her, twice.
It was a tall order. Stay away from her? It was unimaginable, quite likely impossible. And for what? He had asked Ron a favour a long time ago and owed him for that. He should have known that what he now recognized as an idiotic act was going to haunt him for the rest of his life.
And looking back, the secret he begged Ron to keep wasn't really worth this payback. That night, on his very last professional Quidditch game, he was sober and his falling off his broom was not an accident but a moment of weakness, of stupidity. It seemed important then not to let anyone else know, to not be scrutinized, to not be dissected, to not feel more pity from those around him than he was already subjected to and he asked the one person who did know not to tell a soul.
Ron did not agree. Harry begged, pleaded and bribed, not taking no for an answer. Finally he relented. Ron had kept his word all these years and, as lame as the reason for his asking the favour was, had a right to collect the debt.
A/N. Would you honor the debt if you were Harry?