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I'll hold you when things go wrong

Summary:

Ron has always struggled with insecurity and jealousy since he was a child.

However, Ron has grown up. And while he loves his mother, if she's making him choose between her and Harry...

Well, Ron knows where he stands.

Notes:

Title from lyrics to the song "Dusk Till Dawn" by Zayn ft. Zia.

Work Text:

Ron isn't sure how they've ended up where they are.

Actually, that's a lie. He knows exactly how they've ended up here.

Here, where Harry's no longer invited over for Sunday dinner at the Burrow. Here, where Harry's no longer invited over for Christmas. Here, where Ron's mother has decided that Harry is no longer worthy of her affections, of being a part of the family that adopted him when he was a small child without any other family.

Ron knows exactly how they got here, no matter how little sense it makes and how angry it makes him at his mother.



Growing up, Ron was always aware that while he was loved, because he knew his parents loved him, he wasn't as important as his siblings, he wasn't worth as much effort, or time, or care. Of course, if he were to say that to either of his parents, they would be scandalised and deny it. He knows that.

He knows his parents likely believe that they've spread their love equally amongst their children.

He also knows that it isn't true.

He's... Well, he hasn't exactly made peace with it, but his time with the mind healer—Hermione's idea for all of three of them about six months after the war when they were still utter messes of PTSD and fear without any improvement in sight—taught him to accept it and not dwell on it. His mind healer had been very smart, and for the first time in his life, Ron had a healthy avenue to express his feelings of inadequacy, his jealousy, and his many insecurities.

Turns out that parents who love you can still leave your emotional and physical needs unmet. And they won't even necessarily know it.

But Ron has dealt with that. And he knows that the mind healing—therapy as Hermione calls it—did the three of them good. He doesn't think that they would have been able to renovate Grimmauld Place into a home—for all three of them, Ron knows he never wants any one of them to be left behind or alone ever again—without it. Nor would he and Hermione have gotten back together again after they decided they needed to just be friends, to grow up and mature without the complications of love and romance, without it.

Which would have meant they wouldn't have Rose.

And Rose is worth everything to them.

The interesting thing about growing up with your emotional needs unmet, of having had therapy for it to recognise the signs, is that Ron is now hyper aware of Rose's emotional needs. The same way Harry is hyper aware of ensuring that Rose feels wanted, enjoys helping what little she can at her age, and has things and a room that is all hers; the same way Hermione is ludicrously aware of Rose's dental hygiene and while encouraging her thirst for knowledge, trying to avoid letting her walk over other people in conversations.

Because that's the thing, isn't it.

Harry may not be part of Ron and Hermione's romantic relationship—though sometimes, in the back of his mind, Ron wishes they loved him and were loved by him the way they love each other—but he is still very much Rose's third parent.

Her favourite parent, even.

Things were... Things were so good. Amazing, even. They'd finally fallen into place after the war. They had healed, they were whole—despite Fred's loss—and they were a family.

And then Harry and Ginny decided that they were better off as friends, and Ginny went on to pursue her dream of being a Quidditch player.

And suddenly, mum had turned cold to Harry.

It started gradually, hardly noticeable at all.

She'd speak over him at dinner, making a face as if it wasn't on purpose—though it would become clear that it very much was. She'd stop asking him if he wanted seconds, if he was full. She stopped commenting on how skinny he was—the way she does anyone this side of rotund—and she stopped pinching his cheeks.

Ron, hyper aware of Rose, was the first one to notice. He noticed it before even Harry himself.

He just didn't know what it meant.

And then it all came to a head last Christmas.

They were unpacking their gifts, the fire was roaring, the room was warm and comfy, and they were laughing and talking.

And then Harry opened his yearly sweater present. The one all of them get, every year without fail, and inside was a lovely, store-bought, plain green, knitted sweater.

Ron's heart fell to his stomach, he stopped breathing, and then his heart broke as he watched his best friend's heart break right then and there, right in front of the family that had taken him in and had become his. The family whose matriarch had just decided that Harry wasn't worthy of them anymore.

They had managed to distract the kids to ensure they didn't know what was going on—bloody hell, it would break Rose's little heart if she knew.

When they came home that night, Ron and Hermione pulled Harry into bed with them, wrapped themselves around him, and held him as he wept his heart out.

They didn't let him sleep in his own bed for two weeks afterwards, desperate to show him that they still love him, regardless of Molly's damned choices.

Ron's still not sure how well they succeeded.

Still.

Harry took up a teaching position at Hogwarts. He stopped coming to Sunday dinner at the Burrow because he knew he was unwelcome, and Saturdays became Rose's "Harry day", the one day of the week that's entirely about her relationship with him. Because Merlin be damned if Ron's gonna allow his mother's petty spite over nonsense reasons ruin Harry and Rose's relationship.

The only reason he and Hermione even keeps going to the Sunday dinners is to try and persuade Ron's mother to get over herself and apologise.

So far, she's adamantly refused, and Ron is running out of patience with her.

How bloody well dare she?

Of course, Ron realises that he's ashamed of his father who's just letting it be. Who hasn't said a damned thing or even protested a little bit.

Isn't that how it's always been, though? Mum makes a decision, and no matter how petty or spiteful it is, dad will just go along with it silently. Some token protests perhaps, but always weak ones and never especially effective ones.

That, or he just agrees with it. Perhaps he thinks the same thing mum does about Harry, and that's why he's not saying anything.

....... Perhaps it's not fair of Ron to think so. After all, he doesn't know what happens between his parents when he isn't there... but disagreeing in private is not enough, not in a situation like this.

Which is why Ron is also disappointed in his brothers, all of them silent and letting the whole thing play out.

Ginny, Ron understands. They've spoken about it, and she's already fighting mum on several other fronts about her choice in haircut, her choice in fashion, her bloody job.

Ginny may always have been the Favoured Daughter, but that, Ron has realised as an adult, does not mean it's a pleasant or happy position for her. Instead it's always been a role she's chafed in, a role that has gone against her natural inclinations.

When you're fighting three battles on your own, it's understandable that you don't have the strength to fight another for someone else... No matter how dear they are to you.

So yeah, Ginny's off the hook with Ron, but the rest of his siblings aren't. Every time he and Hermione try, they're silent. They look away. They avoid the topic.

The odd one out being Charlie who hasn't been home since that Christmas, who confided in Ron that these tendencies of mum's were exactly why he decided to move to Romania in the first place—dragons or no dragons.

All in all, Ron is starting to reach the end of his tether. He cannot stomach many more Sunday dinners at the Burrow without his best friend, without the last member of his family. He refuses to let them be like the Blacks—burning off whomever they suddenly don't like from the family portrait. Harry may not be family by blood or marriage, but he's family in all the ways that matter anyway.

"Ron? How are you?" Hermione's voice is soft and her hand gently squeezes his shoulder.

He sighs. "I'm not sure how many more dinners I can stomach, Hermione. I'm not sure how much longer I can keep trying."

She buries her face in his hair then and her arms slide down around his shoulders.

"We'll do it until we fix it. We cannot let her do this to Harry. He deserves so much better." The words are muffled in his hair, but they make Ron smile slightly. Always the voice of reason, their Hermione.

Every now and then he's reminded of just how dead he and Harry would have been very early on without her.

And always the self-loathing comes for how horribly he treated her at times, of how horrid he let himself be to her. But he's worked on that too, because it doesn't help Hermione, it doesn't take away her hurt, and it makes it about him and his feelings. Hermione says it's all water under the bridge, that he's more than made up for it since... So it's up to Ron to take her word for it and let her be the judge of what should be done about it.

"I love you, you know," he murmurs, just to remind her.

She laughs. "I know that. I love you too."

There's silence for a while, only broken by a loud crash that has Hermione shooting out of the room yelling "Crookshanks! No!" as Ron laughs himself silly.

He may not have liked that dumb kneazel back in the day, but the orange menace has grown on him since, and they get along quite well these days. It's nice, really. Especially when Crookshanks joins him in reading the newspaper—though you won't catch Ron admitting that.

Now if only he could get his mother to see reason, there would be nothing wrong in the world.



So here they are.

Harry permanently uninvited to Sunday dinners and doing as good a job as he can hiding how utterly gutted he is about it even months later.

Here they are.

Ron is staring at a letter from his mother, delivered by their new owl Sissel, and feeling like he's about to explode in rage. He slams the letter down on the table and forces himself to leave the room before he does something stupid.

At least Rose is visiting a friend's house for the evening and Harry's at Hogwarts, because he doesn't want either of them to see him like this.

"Ron? Ron!"

He takes a seat on his and Hermione's bed and tries to breathe through the anger. Tries to collect himself rather than simply lose his head as he always did as a child.

Oh, Sunday dinner has been moved to Saturday this week. Something has come up, has it? Oh and it would be ever so lovely if they could make a whole day's affair of it, would it?

Ron gnashes his teeth together. She knows exactly what she's doing. His mum knows that Saturday's are Rose-and-Harry days, and now she's trying to get Ron and Hermione to bring Rose with them to the Burrow on a Saturday instead. She's trying to use Ron, Hermione, and Rose to show Harry that he's not as important to them as she is, as their "real family" is.

Well bloody buggering fuck to that.

He's had enough and he's going to put his foot down.

"I read the letter..." The bed gives way slightly under Hermione's weight next to him.

"We're leaving Rose at home with Harry," he says immediately. "And we'll only be there for lunch, we won't stay the whole day."

Hermione leans her head on his shoulder, and her thick curls tickle his cheek as she nods.

"What do we tell Harry?" She always do go for the hard questions.

"I don't know. If we tell him the truth it'll just break his heart again... But I don't want to lie to him either." He doesn't. He never wants to lie to his other best friend. Because both of them are, Harry and Hermione. It's the three of them, a trio. Hermione may be his wife, and he's in love with her, but first and foremost she's his friend and he loves her.

That's why they broke up in the first place, to make sure they reached that place of maturity. Otherwise they likely would have ruined their relationship at some point down the line, and that is just about the worst thing Ron can imagine. Losing her, losing Harry, losing Rose... Losing any one of them would be intolerable.

"We tell him we're going to lunch at the Burrow, because Sunday dinner was cancelled," Hermione finally says after a long period of silence. "That is not a lie at all, we're simply not mentioning the details that would hurt him."

Ron turns his head and kisses her cheek.

They'll get through this, one way or another.

One way or another.



"Bye mommy! Bye daddy! Me and papa Harry will have lunch here!" Rose's face is luminescent as she grins in Harry's arms, waving her hand so enthusiastically that her red curls bounce around.

Harry gives them a smile—one that is only happy in part and holds a lot of sadness too—and waves at them with his free hand, though much gentler than Rose.

"Bye Rose, bye Harry." Hermione smiles. "We'll see you in about two hours, okay?"

Ron gives Harry a grin. "You be good now," he says and has to choke down a laugh when he sees Harry's quite obvious wish to give him a two-fingered salute.

His humour, however, ends up short lived.

As he steps out of the fireplace at the Burrow, just behind Hermione, he sees his mother's warm smile falter when she realises that Rose isn't with them. And then, for the briefest of moments, so brief Ron would have missed it had he not been looking right at her, she sends a glare at Hermione. Then she's all smiles again, brushing off her apron.

"There you two are! You're the last two to arrive—except for Charlie, the dear said he couldn't make it today either unfortunately. Where is Rose today?"

Such an innocent question.

Or would be, from anyone else.

"Oh, it's her Harry day, today, so she's back at Grimmauld Place with him," Ron says, watching his mother closely.

Just as before, she briefly glares in Hermione's direction before she plasters her smile back on and turns on her heel.

"I see. What a shame, I would have liked to see her."

Just then, for the first time in his life, Ron hates his mother as much as he loves her.

Because he realises, right in this moment, that his mother thinks that this is all Hermione's idea. That Hermione is somehow keeping Rose from her. That if Hermione and Ron decided to call their romantic relationship quits and divorce, to become friends only the way Harry and Ginny did... Ron's mum would do to Hermione what she's already done to Harry.

The way, he realises with a start and a wave of shame, she acted towards Fleur before she and Bill finally married, hell, almost up until Victoire was born.

He presses his lips together to keep himself from saying something stupid. He needs to keep his temper in check...

But his mind has been made up.

Lunch is delicious, as it always is, but Ron can barely manage to choke anything down. Everything he eats leaves a sour taste in his mouth and the more he sees his family laughing and joking and talking as if no one's missing, as if someone who could and should be here isn't missing, the angrier he gets.

He ends up just blurting it out in the middle of his father's ramblings about some muggle thing he's found that Ron honestly couldn't give less of a bloody fuck about.

"We're not coming for Christmas this year."

The conversation at the table entirely halts in its tracks and Ron can almost feel everyone's stares. He glances at Hermione, and as he sees her dropped mouth he takes her hand and squeezes it gently under the table in apology. He should have told her he was going to do it before he did.

Too late now.

"I... What?" Molly stares at him, her face paling and then quickly flushing. "What do you mean you won't be here for Christmas? Has something come up?"

Ron squeezes Hermione's hand again.

"No. Nothing in particular." Ron focuses on his breathing, counts his breaths and keeps his face placid as he stares down his mother.

She blinks rapidly and frowns thunderously. "Then... I don't understand, why aren't you coming for Christmas? Honestly, Ronald, that... And to talk about it now, when it's barely June..."

"We'll be celebrating Christmas with Harry."

The words have the intended effect, and Ron watches his mother pale again. In the corner of his eye he can see Fleur quickly bundle Victoire up—despite the girl's protests—and exit the room as if she had a dementor on her tail.

"Ronald!" His mum clutches at her chest as if he'd just said something incredibly hurtful to her. "Don't be ridiculous!"

"I'm not. I'm just tired of you having decided that Harry's inclusion in this family was very much conditional and that somehow you have the right to decide whether or not he should be included."

He glances at his father, pale and closed lipped, and his brothers, none of them able to meet his eyes.

"Ronald! Harry... Harry did something quite unforgivable and I—!"

"Oh bollocks, mum!" he snarls, interrupting her mid-sentence. "How dare you suggest that Harry and Ginny deciding that they're better off as friends and having a mutual and amicable breakup somehow makes him the second coming of bloody Voldemort."

"Ronald!"

"No! I've had enough of this. I've tried to make you see reason gently for months. You broke his damn heart for a bloody nonsense reason, and I've had enough. You clearly wanted me to choose between you and him, here's the thing mum: I choose him. Forget Christmas, we won't be coming over for a single Sunday dinner either from now on." He stares his mother down unflinchingly, the grip on his fork so hard his knuckles are growing white. He feels Hermione's nails dig into the back of his hand and he finds it grounding.

"How can you..." she sobs, pulling up a handkerchief. Maybe she's honest, maybe she's trying to make him feel sorry for her, but he honestly doesn't care.

"How can I? How can you? How do you look yourself in the mirror every morning knowing that you deliberately and cruelly took an orphan's new family from him out of sheer spite? I've long since grown used to the fact that I'm less important to you and dad than my siblings, but I'll be damned before I let you continue to do this to Harry."

His mother sputters and his father finally finds his voice.

"Now hold on here, Ron." Arthur gets out of his chair. "You are not less important than your brothers or your sister! Where on earth have you gotten that idea?"

So that's what his father has a voice for, huh? Nothing about what mum is doing to Harry, but rather Ron's view of how his parents see him.

"You are not less important than your siblings, Ron! Honestly, where have you gotten such a horrible idea from?" Molly looks utterly scandalised.

Ron looks between his parents.

"From growing up in this house. From how you treated me. From the fact that my mind healer said it was likely that my deeply rooted insecurity and problems with envy came from that I had my emotional and in some cases even physical needs unmet as a child. And unless you want to claim that it's the same for all of my siblings and you failed all of us in our upbringing..."

"Unmet emotional needs?" His mother looks aghast. "Unmet physical needs? We've done our very best to take care of you and all of your siblings! Ronald."

But Ron remains unimpressed and he knows he's right.

"What colour is the sweater you knit me every year, mum?" He looks at her, and he can see how badly the questions throws her.

"It's maroon. Of course it is, it's your favourite colour and you look splendid in it."

In the corner of his eye, Ron sees George wince and bite his lip while Bill closes his eyes. Percy freezes in his seat. They know, at least.

"I hate maroon. It is, in fact, my least favourite colour. But by the time I was ten years old, I had already realised that there was no damn point in telling you because you never remembered anyway. Just like you never ever could remember that I don't like corn beef, so while the rest of my siblings get sweaters in colours they like and got their favourite packed lunches, I only ever got my least favourite of both. And I knew, early on, that it didn't matter if I told you. Because you never remembered my damn preferences anyway."

She gapes at him, her breathing growing laboured, and her eyes flit wildly across the table. He sees the moment she realises that Bill knew, George knew, Percy knew, and Ginny knew. Because they've always known that he doesn't like maroon. He's complained about it enough.

"That's what my mind healer meant by unmet emotional needs. The fact that you so clearly didn't remember me or my preferences, because I was only ever the Son Who Wasn't A Daughter. I know you love me, I've always known that." He shakes his head. "But sometimes, mum, that just isn't enough."

She collapses into her seat like a doll with its strings cut and stares at him blankly, the battle suddenly having gone out of her. Ron finds that he's genuinely surprised about that, but he also realises that he doesn't actually care.

His father, however, suddenly looks up and meets his eyes.

"And the physical needs?"

"A wand is one of the most important things a wizard owns. They choose the wizard, and an unsuitable wand will stunt the magical growth of a child and diminish the capabilities of an adult wizard." Ron certainly knows more about wandlore now than he ever did as a child. It's only as he's grown older as he's properly understood just how terrible it had been for him to have been given Charlie's old wand.

"We couldn't afford one! You got a new one later, didn't you?" his mother suddenly says, just below a shout. Her drive to defend herself suddenly coming back in full force.

"The same year you couldn't afford to buy me a seven galleon wand... You bought Hermes for Percy for fifteen galleons."

Percy flinches, but not as much as Molly does. Ron realises that Percy likely never made that connection. That their parents got him an expensive owl for becoming a Prefect at the cost of his little brother getting his own bloody wand.

"That's... that's not..." she stammers, her voice shaking.

"I figured at the time that it would be fine. I could handle one year, right? And then next year I'd get my own wand and if money was still short, Ginny could have Charlie's old wand."

His parents flinch again, and so does Ginny, because they all know what actually happened that year.

"And then you took Ginny wand shopping, and oohed and aahed over her new wand, and there I stood. With Charlie's old wand. And you didn't buy me a new one." He laughs then, though it's entirely without humour. "I didn't even get a new one when Charlie's old one broke. I spent my entire second year of Hogwarts with a wand that hadn't chosen me and which I had been forced to try and repair using spellotape. Despite how dangerous broken wands can be, due to the high risk of them backfiring. Which it did. Multiple times. And the last time left Lockhart in the Janus Thickey ward for life."

As a child, Ron had almost thought that fitting. After all, Lockhart's greatest wish had been for fame and a good reputation, and he'd stolen the memories of others to gain it. To have it ripped from him was only fair, wasn't it? Except now, Ron sees how bad it is. The witches and wizards he stole from will never be known, because only Lockhart knew who they were, and Lockhart himself... Not to mention, a broken wand that could cause that much devastation had been in the hands of a twelve year-old for a year at that point.

He knows Hermione's had a nightmare or two thinking about what could have happened. Ron has deliberately avoided thinking too much about it.

He clears his throat. "This isn't what we were meant to be talking about, though. I didn't mean to bring up all of this. However... I have made another decision: My family will not be coming to any future Sunday dinners either, not until the last part of it is welcome as well. Because regardless of your sudden and misguided dislike of Harry, he is our best friend. Furthermore, he's Rose's third parent, and I'm done depriving both of them of the time they deserve together. It's been hard enough due to Harry spending the weeks at Hogwarts."

He looks away from his parents then, and turns his attention to Hermione instead. She's smiling, just slightly, and there are tears in her eyes. Ron thinks she's proud of him, and he knows she supports him in this decision.

"Well then. We're taking our leave. Sorry for leaving in the middle of lunch, but I think we have somewhere else to be now."

He moves to put his plates away, and Hermione follows his leave. He makes sure that she's the first one to leave through the floo, however, and he waits just a while before he steps through himself.

"Don't think you can change my mind with insincere attempts, however. You need to take a long hard look at what you're doing. And that goes for both of you, because dad... You're not innocent in this. You just stand by and let mum do what she wants, regardless of how hurtful and petty it is."

He laughs then.

"I still haven't forgiven you mum for deliberately sending Hermione a small Easter egg just to show her that you believed every single one of Rita Skeeter's lies about her. You could have just owled us. You had a direct line of communication to both me and Harry, and you could have easily have found out the truth if you'd just asked. But you didn't. And instead you chose to hurt Hermione's feelings."

He shakes his head, and looks at his siblings, all of them hunched in on themselves at the kitchen table—Fleur still hasn't come back, he's glad she got Victoire out of there before she had to see the whole thing—and he wonders if they feel guilty for not standing up for Harry.

"Guess that's just what you do."

He steps into the floo and lets it take him away from a place that has always been his home, and many of the most important people in his life.

As he steps out of the floo in Grimmauld Place, however, he sees the rest of them. His family. Harry and Rose and Hermione.

He's not always been a great friend, and not always a great boyfriend.

He's been a knob head and downright cruel at times.

But Ronald Weasley has grown up since, and he has no intentions of leaving these people behind again. He has no intention of deserting them when they need him ever again.

He's chosen his loyalty over his envy.

He's chosen love over the easy way out.

Yeah, Ron Weasley has grown up.

And he's long since learned to take care of the people he loves the most in the world.

So that's what he'll do.

Come what may.