Work Text:
The time after the war was without definition. It rolled forward, ever constant, as time does. Days turned into weeks, and then, in what felt like both a moment and a decade, it had been a year. Once life had slowed back to a normal pace, Ron was left with the stark reality that he was living in his parents' house and had no prospect of changing that anytime soon.
It wasn't that Ron wasn't working—he was; he just wasn't getting paid at the moment —something that was already a point of contention with his mum, and it had only been a few weeks.
He'd started helping George with the shop because he couldn't get it running again on his own, and it was an excuse to get out of the house. It was never meant to be a permanent arrangement.
But in the weeks Ron had spent rebuilding the shop, he'd become invested. So even if the pay was currently non-existent—they weren’t open yet—working with George was far more appealing than doing what his mum wanted and applying for an entry-level position within the Ministry, which, on the whole, sounded like misery personified.
Not that Ron would ever dare to voice that in front of his mum. He liked living, thanks.
Really, life at the Burrow would have been unbearable without Harry's company. He was Ron's saving grace, his voice of reason, and the only reason Ron hadn’t pulled all of his hair out yet.
"Look at me," Ron moaned, a picture of woe spread over his too-narrow bed, one arm thrown over his eyes, "I can't go bald; I'll be mistaken for a giant speckled egg."
Harry muffled his snort of laughter with his hand. It was very late. They were supposed to be sleeping, and if his mum caught them awake, there would be hell to pay: yet another reason Ron needed to get the hell out of this house. He was an adult after all, and if he wanted to stay up past his bedtime, then he bloody well didn't need his mum crawling up his arse about it.
Besides, these days it was the only time they had to talk. Harry might not have had a job, but his mum always found ways to keep Harry thoroughly occupied during the day.
"You think I'm joking," said Ron, "but just you wait, another year of this, and I'll be the egg man."
"So let's get a flat," said Harry, like that was the obvious answer.
"Mate, I've got about six Sickles to my name and a job that might not actually pay anything for months.”
Harry stretched like a cat before curling into a ball in the nest of blankets he'd made in the corner by Ron's chest of drawers.
"You'll be doing me a favour if you come with me," he said, yawning.
"Oh sure," said Ron. "A favour."
"Really, you would be. It's not like I can stay here forever. I feel bad enough already about how long I've been here, and your mum keeps asking what I'm going to do-"
Ron snorted; of course, she had.
"I think I'm going to play Quidditch, but they aren't starting the league up until next spring."
Ron frowned while Harry rambled about which team he thought he might play for. He'd gotten six offers in the last three weeks, so it was not like he was lacking in options.
It was only now dawning on Ron that Harry could leave at any time and if he did, Ron would be the sole object of his mother's overbearing attention; a truly horrifying thought.
"Besides," continued Harry, "I'd miss you; you should just come with me."
When he put it like that, Ron couldn't really say no.
"I'd be doing you a favour."
"Exactly," said Harry.
The next morning, Harry brought up moving out over breakfast. He was a far braver man than Ron, who, if given the option, would have put off telling anyone until everything was finalised and there was no going back.
Predictably, his mum was up in arms about the idea. Although it seemed she was up in arms about everything these days, and considering the past year, no one could really blame her. Still, Ron did not want to hear about how they were far too young to live on their own or all the harm that could befall them for daring to wander out into the big, wide world.
Harry wasn't deterred, and he managed to smile through most of her interrogations about where they might live and how they planned to keep from starving to death.
It didn’t take him long to find them a flat, but Ron was so busy opening the shop that he didn't see it until the day they moved in. The towering old brick building was something of a nasty shock. While he was prepared to make do in a cramped, crummy flat with bad heating and windows that wouldn't open, he was not ready for the opposite.
The flat was nice—too nice—and there was no way Ron could pay half of the rent, even after he got a proper wage. It was a sickening realisation, a nagging, panicked feeling that twisted his stomach into knots. But he couldn't bring himself to say anything because Harry was so happy.
He was the happiest Ron had seen him in ages, and when he gave Ron a little tour of their new home—they even had a balcony —Ron swallowed down his fears. He wasn't going to ruin this for Harry. They'd just have to figure something out; they always did.
It was a little strange at first with just the two of them after living in the Burrow for so long, but it didn't take long to fall into a comfortable rhythm.
Sometime during their quest to rid the world of Voldemort's Horcruxes, Ron had become a morning person. It had happened against his will, but it was now so firmly implanted in his brain that he woke up before six, whether he wanted to or not.
Since Ron's affliction of morning personhood set in, he'd taken over breakfast duty from Harry. Who, while a very good and increasingly creative cook, was rarely awake before Ron went to work.
Harry rarely voluntarily got out of bed before one. He didn't sleep well. It wasn't a secret, even if he tried to downplay how bad it was. But Harry wasn't fooling Ron, and in the weeks after they'd moved into the little flat, Harry's nightmares got worse.
Ron didn't care that Harry's screaming woke him up most nights—he was used to it, and if he'd wanted to, he could have cast a Silencing Charm on his bedroom door.
But he didn't, and he wouldn't, because the idea of leaving Harry to suffer alone made him queasy.
What normally happened was Harry would wake up shouting, waking Ron up in the process. Once Ron was sure Harry was fine, he'd go back to sleep, and in the morning, they'd pretend it hadn't happened.
But the worst nights, with the particularly bad dreams, sent Harry tumbling out of bed, into a sobbing heap.
Ron couldn’t stand hearing Harry cry. It pulled him out of bed, and down the hall into Harry’s room to try and coax him back into bed.
The first time it happened, Ron had been so exhausted that he’d just collapsed into bed next to Harry instead of dragging himself back to his room.
It was a bit of a shock in the morning. Ron had long since made peace with the fact that he'd only ever be Harry's friend and that things like waking up in his bed were simply not on the cards.
And yet, here he was.
But it was fine. Everything was fine. Ron could handle it. He got up, and got on with his day, and later that evening, after he got home from running around like a mad person at the shop, Harry was in a better mood than he usually was after a night like that.
And that was what was important, so Ron kept doing it.
Until, that was, one weekend when they ended up waking up at the same time. By then, Ron was so used to the arrangement that it didn't seem anything out of the ordinary to be waking up next to Harry. Harry clearly didn’t feel the same.
"Er," said Harry, blinking owlishly at Ron while he fumbled for his glasses on the nightstand.
"Monrin'," said Ron. He yawned and crawled over Harry with practised ease. "Do you want a coffee?"
Harry jammed his glasses onto his face. His usually wild hair looked a bit like he'd been electrocuted; half was plastered to his skull, and the other had acquired a defiance of gravity.
Ron stopped in the doorway.
"Coffee or not?" he asked.
Harry stared at him, and Ron waited for his brain to catch up. Harry was not a morning person. Not that half-ten was particularly early, but it did still technically count. These days it was a rare occurrence to see Harry out of bed before noon.
"Coffee," said Harry finally, and then yawned. "Thanks."
Their arrangement continued, and they still didn't talk about it, but that was fine. But it wasn't long until Ron was tired of pretending that he wasn't going to end up in Harry's bed.
If anyone was going to put an end to it, it was going to have to be Ron. That night, after he'd gotten ready for bed, he walked into Harry's room and crawled into his bed.
"Er—" said Harry, frozen by his chest of drawers in a pair of too-big trackie bottoms, his T-shirt half pulled over his head.
"I'm just going to end up here anyway," said Ron from under the duvet he'd pulled up over the top of his head. "Unless you want a repeat of me having it out with the laundry hamper."
"Right," said Harry slowly. He then spent far longer than Ron thought was entirely necessary shuffling around his room before finally switching off the lights and crawling somewhat stiffly into bed. It was long enough that Ron's brain had cranked into overdrive, worrying that maybe he shouldn't be here and that somehow he'd ruined everything.
An idea that was only reinforced by the fact that once Harry had wormed his way under the covers, he went to great pains to stay on the very edge of the bed. If Ron had been slightly more of a coward, he would have put his tail between his legs and ran away.
But it's not like running away would solve anything. All it would do was make things worse. Ron needed to wait it out. Neither of them was good at talking about things, but if forced, they'd muddle their way through—they always did.
As they lay together in the dark, trying hard not to move, every moment stretched on for what felt like eons. Eventually, Harry sighed a whole-body kind of sigh and rolled over so that his nose was about six inches away from Ron's.
"I hate this," he said, frustration laced in every word. It cut deep and painful, but Ron waited, digging his nails into his palms to distract himself from how much every molecule in his body wanted to flee.
"I hate that no matter what I do, I can't just sleep like a goddamn normal person—and it's not even just me—I wake you up, and then you have to take care of me, like I'm some kind of toddler, and you don't deserve that—"
"Harry," said Ron, cutting him off, "I want to be here."
Harry snorted, shuffling to press his knees against Ron's.
"You shouldn't have to be," he said. "I'm sorry you have to be."
"Merlin, you really are thick, aren't you?"
Harry must know how Ron felt about him. He had to and was just kind enough to pretend he didn't—or at least that's what Ron had thought. But now, there was a distinct possibility that Harry had never noticed, and Ron wasn't sure if it was a relief or deeply unspeakably humiliating.
"You only just noticed?" said Harry, chuckling.
His breath was warm on Ron's cheek, and even in the dark he could picture Harry's grin: shy, self-deprecating, and so painfully perfect.
Ron kissed him.
He grabbed Harry by his narrow shoulders, hauled him close, and kissed him so hard that it nearly hurt.
He didn't know why he did it, but he did. Maybe it was because he wanted Harry to know, or perhaps being together in the dark like this made him lose his mind.
But Ron did it, and immediately he regretted it.
"Sorry," he gasped, jerking away, and pressed himself against the wall next to the bed. "I shouldn't have—"
"Don't," said Harry, with as much force as he could muster in his shaking voice. Ron closed his eyes, sure that he'd just damned himself.
About half a second later, Harry launched himself across the small space between them. Ron's head slammed into the wall, bright white stars danced in front of his vision, but it didn't matter because Harry tangled his fingers in his hair, held him close, and kissed him with such wild hunger that it left them both breathless.
"Don't," said Harry, again, his voice raw. "Don't you dare try to take that back."
He clung to him, his shoulder shaking, tears soaking into Ron's pajamas.
"Promise me," said Harry, "promise you won't take it back."
"I promise," said Ron, wrapping his arms tight around Harry's shaking frame. He couldn't have taken it back now, even if he'd wanted to.
He carded his fingers through Harry's tangled hair, his cheek against the top of Harry's head.
"You should sleep," he said.
"I know," said Harry, once his tears had stopped. "But what if I wake up and this was a dream?"
Ron snorted. "Don't be daft," he said. "I'll remind you it's real in the morning."
In the morning, nothing had changed, and yet everything changed. The days continued on as they always did. Autumn came, then Winter, and now it was Spring again, and Ron never returned to sleeping in his own room. He had, however, developed the habit of stealing Harry's socks.
He was still terrified of the shaky, fragile thing between them and worried that even its mention would make the whole thing collapse in on itself like a house of cards.
They hadn't told anyone. Sometimes Ron wondered if that should bother him. It didn't. It was peaceful this way, even if it was annoying to hear his mum hedge Harry about his "non-existent" dating life.
And they wouldn't end up in the paper this way, with the private details of their lives splashed all over glossy pages. Not that the papers needed facts, as it was they were perfectly happy to print nonsense about Harry, his three illegitimate wives, and his secret child.
It was utter bollocks, but it upset Harry all the same.
"I don't know why you bother with those," said Ron over breakfast while Harry sat hunched over the table in an old hoodie three sizes too big, his smudged glasses perched at the very end of his nose, glowering at the front page of Witch Weekly.
"If they're going to insist on printing rubbish about me, I at least want to know what it is," he replied.
They had this conversation at least once a week. Harry didn't like attention from anyone, really, and he was slowly retreating, pulling himself further away from everyone who pestered him too much about his life.
He'd even walked away from the Montrose Magpies. He hadn't even played for them for a full week before he'd walked out halfway through his first Saturday practise and come slamming back into the flat, half-soaked and disgruntled.
"Aren't you supposed to be flying about up north?" Ron had asked, peering at Harry over the back of the sofa.
"I quit," said Harry, kicking off his soggy trainers with slightly more force than was strictly necessary. One of them bounced against the skirting board with a wet thunk.
"What? Why?"
"I want to play Quidditch, not talk about myself or my supposed lack of a love life," groused Harry, flopping onto the couch, half on top of Ron, still in his damp hoodie. "Merlin, and it's not like I don't want to make friends, but there's a line, you know?"
Ron hummed, hooking his chin over Harry's shoulder. "So what are you going to do? I know Wood will still want you for Puddlemere. George said he about had an aneurysm when he heard you were playing for the Magpies."
Harry sighed, "I don't want to play because I'm me—"
Ron scoffed, "Harry, Wood wants you because you're the best bloody Seeker in Britain, and you know it. Look, if you don't write to him first, I bet he'll try to break down our door in a couple of days anyway."
"Yeah, but haven't they got a Seeker already?"
"She's a provisional player."
The news of Harry's abrupt departure from the Magpies had spread, and by the end of the week, he'd received seven new offers. Three of them were from America.
But Wood won out in the end. It wasn't a contest; Harry wanted to play for him the first time, but didn't get an offer from the Puddlemere management until after he'd signed with the Magpies.
It didn't hurt that Wood swore on pain of death that, as captain, he would keep anyone from annoying Harry about non-Quidditch-related matters, and knowing Wood, he was good for it.
And Quidditch was good for Harry. It got him out of the house and gave him something to throw himself into, all of which was something he desperately needed. Harry wasn't good at doing nothing.
On the whole, things were good. Harry had Quidditch, Ron had the shop, and they had each other. They still don't talk about telling anyone, and Ron was fine with it, really.
Only sometimes, it didn't feel real.
Then Harry bought him a jumper.
It appeared at the foot of the bed one morning after Harry left for Australia for the biggest match of the season.
Ron didn't notice it until after breakfast. He was slightly bitter about missing the match, but he couldn't leave the shop, so there was nothing he could do.
The note pinned to the front of the jumper read:
Got this for you last week. It's not tickets to the match, but I hope you like it anyway.
It was a deep navy, so deep it was nearly black, and softer than any jumper Ron had ever owned. It was buttery under his fingers when he unfolded it, and warm when he put it on.
For once, the sleeves were long enough, and when Ron shuffled into the loo to have a look at himself in the mirror over the sink, he looked a bit like he'd nicked something of Malfoy's.
Ron didn't own things like this. At least he hadn't until now, and while there was a little voice in his head shrieking about it being too much , he ignored it.
It was a nice jumper. It was a cold Spring day, and Harry got it for him.
Ron was going to wear it because it was made to be worn, and if he didn't wear it today, there was a chance of it getting tucked away in a drawer for safekeeping, never to be seen again.
Besides, Ron liked it.
He spent most of his morning hunched over the sprawling desk shoved all the back corner under the stairs, comparing last month's sale with their current inventory so he’d be able to write their upcoming Apothecary order.
It was something Ron did every month and every month, it made his brain hurt—although at least now he'd done it enough times that he had a system, and that made it a little more bearable.
At lunch, George tromped down the stairs and settled himself on the end of the desk, dropping a neatly wrapped sandwich in front of Ron.
"Eat up," he said brightly, "we've got salt and vinegar crisps today."
Ron uncurled his spine, stretching his arms over his head, and groaned.
"Is it that time already?"
"It's past that time. I was concerned that you'd waste away down here before you ever got around to your lunch," said George, unwrapping an identical sandwich.
"Cheers," said Ron, and took a big bite.
They sat quietly together while they ate until George jabbed Ron hard in the shoulder.
"Have you got a date?" he demanded.
Ron burst out laughing. "Where in the name of Merlin did you get that idea?" he asked, still chuckling.
"You look nice," said George. "I've never seen that jumper before."
"Can't a bloke just look nice?"
"Sure, but it's you."
"Right, thanks," grumbled Ron.
"So, do you have a date?"
"No," said Ron, shaking his head. "I don't. The jumper was a gift from Harry. There's no secret girlfriend lurking about, I promise."
George just looked at Ron, his eyebrows raised as high as possible without removing them from his face. Ron wasn't sure what to do with that, so he ignored it, bringing up the sudden increase in the price of pickled eels, which felt like a safer topic of conversation.
Ron wore the jumper twice more that week out of spite. He could look nice if he liked. Besides, it was a nice jumper, and it ought to get worn.
Harry didn't get back from Australia until late Saturday night, and in the morning, when Ron woke up, unfairly early, so early it shouldn't be allowed on a weekend, Harry's feet were jammed into the backs of his knees.
Ron yawned and sat up, ruffling Harry's hair, before dragging himself out of bed. He didn't expect to see Harry until midafternoon and spent the morning puttering around the flat tidying before eventually starting a proper breakfast—it was really more like brunch—and it might not have been a true fry-up, but it was close.
Lured by the smell of bacon, Harry slouched out of the bedroom at a quarter past eleven, flopping down at the table sleepy, and rumpled. He was dressed in a pair of too-long trackies rolled at the waist and a thin, worn t-shirt that had probably been his cousin's.
"Morin'," he muttered, curling himself around the large mug of coffee waiting for him.
"When did you get in last night?" Ron asked from the hob, his obnoxious flowery apron tied around his waist and sleeves shoved to the elbows.
Harry yawned. "I dunno, sometime after midnight. You'd think that with magic time zones wouldn't be so rubbish, but I think they're worse."
"How'd the match go?"
"We won. It was close. Closest one this season, Wood was a nervous wreck by the break."
"Wood's always a nervous wreck by the break."
Harry chuckled. "I suppose," he said, adding a hasty "thanks" when Ron shoveled a pile of potatoes onto his plate.
It wasn't until after breakfast, when they started washing up, that Harry noticed the jumper.
"You're wearing it!" he said brightly, half turned from the sink, with soap up to his elbows.
"I'm wearing what?" Ron asked, brow furrowed, as he wiped down their little table.
"The jumper."
"Oh."
Ron was wearing the jumper. He hadn't even meant to, but it was just soft and warm, and he'd put it on without thinking.
Ignoring the blush steadily creeping up the back of his neck, he cleared his throat.
"I think it might be my favourite, actually," he said and immediately felt like the largest prat on the entire earth.
"It looks good," said Harry, still grinning, before he turned back to his dishes, humming what sounded like the Puddlemere fight song.
A pair of dragon-hide gloves turned up on the table a week later with a note scribbled on the back of an old receipt.
'To fend off the fanged fungi.'
Ron chuckled and fingered the thick, smooth, leathery gloves when he read it. He had spent the better part of the last three days moaning about George's new fanged fungi and that it had to be fertilised three times a day, and why did he have to do it? The bloody thing had ripped holes in three of his fingers already, and it hadn't bitten George once.
"If we didn't need the powdered fangs so badly, I'd just bin it," Ron had grumbled over dinner the night before. "But we do, and it's half as much if we harvest our own than if we buy it from Mulpeppers, and I swear they never measure right."
Then, over the summer, it was box seats, not just at one but three Cannon games, two of which Harry somehow managed to make it to.
In October, it was a coat with wool so fine that it would have made Malfoy green with envy, and November came with dragon-hide boots that had George threatening to steal them.
But it wasn't just big things; it was also scallops on a Tuesday, a piece of Ron's favourite chocolate with his tea, or a million other little things, half of which were impossible to put into words.
Harry had given Ron so many things that when he looked in the mirror, he saw an entirely different person than when they'd moved in.
He looked like the kind of person who looked nice just because they felt like it.
Ron liked that person. He liked being that person, but there was guilt, too.
Guilt that he didn't deserve this, and one day, Harry would notice and regret that he'd wasted all of this on him.
But that was dumb and simply not true.
Every one of Harry's gifts was him saying just how much he cared. Really, it wasn’t any different from when Ron made breakfast in the mornings. At first, it had just been toast and eggs, but now he had a signature cinnamon roll recipe and opinions on the correct way to make hollandaise sauce.
Besides, neither of them was very good with words when it came to how they felt, so for now, maybe they don't have to use words—at least not just yet—and they didn’t have to tell anyone until they wanted to.
But for now, things were good—the best they've ever been.
If asked, Ron would have said it started with the jumper, and maybe that wasn't true, but when it started, wasn't important. All that mattered was that it had, and now they had forever to make it last.