FIC: With Silence and Tears [Ron/Pansy]
Title: With Silence and Tears
Characters/Pairing: Ron/Pansy
Rating: R
Warnings: none
Disclaimer: Harry Potter characters are the property of J.K. Rowling and Bloomsbury/Scholastic. No profit is being made, and no copyright infringement is intended
Word Count/Medium: ~2000
Summary: She hurts and hurts and hurts, and every time he goes back.
Creator's Notes: Massive thanks to drarryisgreen, my lovely beta. The title is from the poem When We Two Parted by Lord Byron. Written for hprare_cliche.
They were eating dinner around the dining table in silence, as they usually did. Tonight the house-elf had made them rack of lamb crusted with Dijon mustard with potatoes, green beans and baby carrots. It was delicious, but Ron noticed Pansy was picking at hers as if it was made of dirt. She'd been the one who insisted on the house-elf, yet she rarely ate the food - every night it was the same. He felt irritation surge through him once again, and managed to suppress it as he speared a baby carrot with his fork. The metal clinked against the fine china, and Pansy huffed. Ron ignored her.
"I want to leave you," she said into the silence.
Ron felt as though he had been hit by the Killing Curse; his food turned to ashes in his mouth. He looked at her to see if she was joking; Pansy did have a strange sense of humour sometimes. She was staring at her still-full plate. Ron's world narrowed to her black bob, her full plate, the smart blouse she was wearing. The diamonds he had given her for their tenth wedding anniversary winked from around her neck, as if conspiring with the joke.
"What?"
"There's someone else."
Ron felt numb. Who? As far as he knew, Pansy didn't even know any single men who she spent time with outside of work.
"Who?" he managed to croak out.
"It doesn't matter," she said.
"But… we just booked that holiday to France. You said you were ready for kids soon. How am I going to cope? This isn't fair." Ron knew he was whining but he didn't care. "You can’t just leave."
Pansy looked at him for the first time possibly that whole day, Ron realised. They drifted around the house when they weren't at work, and apart from dinner they never seemed to end up in the same room. Pansy would be in the greenhouse, and Ron would be in the living room. Or Ron would be in the bedroom, and Pansy would be in the library. He didn't know how long that had been happening for. Well, their relationship had had its ups and downs, but Ron had thought things were getting better.
Ron liked his life, sad as it was. He played Quidditch on a Wednesday evening and Sunday lunch time. He read books and played Wizard’s Chess, he went to work and came home, and he was content.
And now he felt the foundations of his life crumble. No, that wasn't right, he decided. It was as if they had simply vanished, like the carpet he was standing on had been whipped out from under him and he was reeling, trying to regain his balance. Every memory they had had together soured in an instant.
"Why?" he asked.
"I don't love you anymore." She was looking down again, fiddling with her napkin.
"Did you ever love me?"
"Yes… Maybe… I don't know."
Ron's mouth opened once or twice; he was lost for words. He was making strange sputtering noises, but he couldn't stop them, as if they were coming from someone else far away.
"Goodbye, Ronald," she finally said. She stood up, folded her napkin and placed it on the table, smoothed her skirt, and left the room. She closed the door gently behind her. Ron wanted to scream, slam doors, punch things. But all he did was ask Wanda to take his plate away, then finished the glass of wine in front of him.
"Thank you, Wanda," he said mechanically.
"You're welcome, sir!" she said in her squeaky voice, bowing.
Around and around and around in Ron's head it seemed as there were voices, just outside his range of hearing, whispering or shouting obscenities and cruel words. Pansy's voice, over and over again, saying "I don't know if I ever loved you," and suddenly Ron felt himself going backwards through his life with Pansy and seeing everything in a different way. Every late night she worked, every weekend he went away with Charlie, took on a sinister meaning. He found himself wondering if he was the last person to have been in his own bed.
Who was it? Who was he?
He had to know.
Her desk, first. That's where he'd go. He felt totally calm, but in his heart he knew he wasn't behaving rationally. He stormed into the library and over to the desk. They'd bought it five years earlier, supposedly for them to share, but Ron never used it and it had become Pansy's.
It was the kind where a shutter could be pulled down to protect the contents, and it was locked.
Ron disdained magic for a moment, grabbing hold of the shutter and rocking the whole desk back and forward. Definitely locked. With a grunt of frustration, he slammed his fist down on the shutter, then pulled out his wand and shouted "Alohomora!"
It unlocked. He supposed Pansy would have known it was futile locking it, but that was Pansy - it wasn't so much about the action so much as the message it sent.
He rummaged in the desk, flinging bits of parchment, quills and bottle of ink onto the floor. He wasn't sure what he was looking for, but the very action of the destruction soothed his broken heart - temporarily.
There was nothing; as he scanned each piece of parchment, there was nothing.
The bedroom, next.
He pulled apart the bed, looked under the mattress, threw the pillows across the room. He looked in the wardrobes, pulling the clothes and blankets out of them. Nothing. Under the bed, there was nothing.
He sat back on his heels, feeling impotent.
He needed to get out. He needed to speak to someone. He needed a Firewhisky.
He should have Flooed first to make sure it was okay, but he didn't think, and Apparated to straight outside Hermione Williamson's door.
"Ron," she said as she answered his knock. "This isn't a good…" She saw the look on his face and stepped aside wordlessly, holding the door open.
Her husband sat on the sofa in the living room, hugging their two children as he read them a story before bed. All three of them looked up, confused.
"Hi," said Ron awkwardly. "Hello Rose, Hugo. And Edward, of course. How are you doing?"
Edward opened and closed his mouth twice, then Hermione came to save Ron.
"Sorry darling," she said to her husband. "My friend needs me."
Edward nodded resignedly.
"Ron, why don't we go through to the kitchen and I'll make you a cup of…" she looked at him again "… Firewhisky?"
Sitting at Hermione's kitchen table with the Firewhisky burning pleasantly in his throat and stomach, Ron felt immensely grateful to Hermione.
"It's Pansy," he said.
"What has she done now?" Hermione sighed.
"She says she wants to leave me. There's someone else."
"Oh Ron," said Hermione. "Not again." She buried her face in her hands.
"Things were just getting better again… getting good."
"Ron… She can't keep doing this to you. It seems like it's every other month you show up like this because of something she's done or said."
"It's not like that," Ron insisted.
"Please accept that this is it, over. All she does is hurt, hurt, hurt. You know none of us have ever approved of her. She's still the same spiteful Slytherin bitch that bullied us in school. I don't know what you ever saw in her."
Ron shook his head. "She's not like that. She's different when we're alone together. She can be so funny, affectionate…"
Hermione took hold of his hands, and Ron was reminded uncomfortably of their first kiss, and of their break-up simultaneously.
"Last time she told you she didn't love you, and you still went back, and she was there, and you just pretended none of it ever happened. The time before that, she told you you weren't allowed to see me anymore, despite spending all her spare time with Draco bloody Malfoy. The time before that, she told you she'd always hated your family and wouldn't, and I quote, 'piss on them if they were on fire'. Why do you want to be with this woman?"
"Everyone says stupid things when they're angry."
"Ron, she wasn’t even in an argument at the time. You were at Sunday lunch. With your family."
"Well, it was a bad joke."
"It wasn't even a joke, though."
"Hermione, stop it. Please."
"What do you want me to say, Ron? Yeah, I'll try and get you back together? That I'll say whatever you want to hear, just like I do every time you show up here? Well, not this time."
"But I still love her…" He couldn't imagine letting her go; his life without her would have no meaning. He felt tears rise to choke him like Devil's Snare.
"I know. I know you do. But I too can't keep doing this, Ron. It's too upsetting. I get involved, I give you advice, and you ignore every word I say and go running straight back to get hurt all over again. If you go back, please don't come here again. It's just too hard."
Ron left.
He went back to the house. Thankfully, Wanda had tidied the mess that he'd made in the library and the bedroom; Ron didn't think he could have faced clearing it himself.
He crawled into bed fully clothed and laid there thinking back on all the times that Pansy had hurt him over the years, but he just couldn't and he kept thinking about anything else instead. The first time he'd made her laugh, when they met in Rouen after the war; the first time they had made love, in a luxurious hotel and Ron had marvelled at the silk sheets and Pansy's porcelain skin; the way they had held each other after Pansy's mother had died. Pansy had been the ice to Ron's fire.
He didn't know when he'd fallen asleep, he just knew that when he awoke it was pitch dark but that she was there.
He sat up in bed, and there she was in the doorway. He could see the silhouette of her white blouse and her pale skin. She looked like a ghost.
He held a hand out to her wordlessly, and to his surprise she took it. She perched on the edge of the bed and when he put a hand on the back of her neck and kissed her she didn't pull away.
She let him lay her down on the bed and take off her clothes, and his. She let him kiss her neck, her shoulders, her breasts and stomach. He couldn't stop touching her; he couldn't keep his hands off her.
Their lovemaking was slow and Ron took his time, savouring every moment, but it was over too soon even so and Ron knew now why they called it heartache. Every breath he took was pain in his chest; it felt like somebody was sitting on his ribcage. He tried desperately not to cry, but couldn’t stop himself. And still he wouldn't let Pansy go, touching her, kissing her face, holding on to her as if to say 'Stay, stay with me please.' They had not said a word since he saw her.
He heard her fall asleep, her breathing changing, and although he fought it he couldn't stop himself from joining her.
When he awoke, she wasn't there, but the scent of her perfume lingered in the air. He'd go downstairs, he thought, and she would be there, reading the Prophet with a cup of black coffee and a croissant, and they would pretend like nothing had happened, like they did every time.
The divorce papers were sitting on the breakfast table, waiting.
Characters/Pairing: Ron/Pansy
Rating: R
Warnings: none
Disclaimer: Harry Potter characters are the property of J.K. Rowling and Bloomsbury/Scholastic. No profit is being made, and no copyright infringement is intended
Word Count/Medium: ~2000
Summary: She hurts and hurts and hurts, and every time he goes back.
Creator's Notes: Massive thanks to drarryisgreen, my lovely beta. The title is from the poem When We Two Parted by Lord Byron. Written for hprare_cliche.
They were eating dinner around the dining table in silence, as they usually did. Tonight the house-elf had made them rack of lamb crusted with Dijon mustard with potatoes, green beans and baby carrots. It was delicious, but Ron noticed Pansy was picking at hers as if it was made of dirt. She'd been the one who insisted on the house-elf, yet she rarely ate the food - every night it was the same. He felt irritation surge through him once again, and managed to suppress it as he speared a baby carrot with his fork. The metal clinked against the fine china, and Pansy huffed. Ron ignored her.
"I want to leave you," she said into the silence.
Ron felt as though he had been hit by the Killing Curse; his food turned to ashes in his mouth. He looked at her to see if she was joking; Pansy did have a strange sense of humour sometimes. She was staring at her still-full plate. Ron's world narrowed to her black bob, her full plate, the smart blouse she was wearing. The diamonds he had given her for their tenth wedding anniversary winked from around her neck, as if conspiring with the joke.
"What?"
"There's someone else."
Ron felt numb. Who? As far as he knew, Pansy didn't even know any single men who she spent time with outside of work.
"Who?" he managed to croak out.
"It doesn't matter," she said.
"But… we just booked that holiday to France. You said you were ready for kids soon. How am I going to cope? This isn't fair." Ron knew he was whining but he didn't care. "You can’t just leave."
Pansy looked at him for the first time possibly that whole day, Ron realised. They drifted around the house when they weren't at work, and apart from dinner they never seemed to end up in the same room. Pansy would be in the greenhouse, and Ron would be in the living room. Or Ron would be in the bedroom, and Pansy would be in the library. He didn't know how long that had been happening for. Well, their relationship had had its ups and downs, but Ron had thought things were getting better.
Ron liked his life, sad as it was. He played Quidditch on a Wednesday evening and Sunday lunch time. He read books and played Wizard’s Chess, he went to work and came home, and he was content.
And now he felt the foundations of his life crumble. No, that wasn't right, he decided. It was as if they had simply vanished, like the carpet he was standing on had been whipped out from under him and he was reeling, trying to regain his balance. Every memory they had had together soured in an instant.
"Why?" he asked.
"I don't love you anymore." She was looking down again, fiddling with her napkin.
"Did you ever love me?"
"Yes… Maybe… I don't know."
Ron's mouth opened once or twice; he was lost for words. He was making strange sputtering noises, but he couldn't stop them, as if they were coming from someone else far away.
"Goodbye, Ronald," she finally said. She stood up, folded her napkin and placed it on the table, smoothed her skirt, and left the room. She closed the door gently behind her. Ron wanted to scream, slam doors, punch things. But all he did was ask Wanda to take his plate away, then finished the glass of wine in front of him.
"Thank you, Wanda," he said mechanically.
"You're welcome, sir!" she said in her squeaky voice, bowing.
Around and around and around in Ron's head it seemed as there were voices, just outside his range of hearing, whispering or shouting obscenities and cruel words. Pansy's voice, over and over again, saying "I don't know if I ever loved you," and suddenly Ron felt himself going backwards through his life with Pansy and seeing everything in a different way. Every late night she worked, every weekend he went away with Charlie, took on a sinister meaning. He found himself wondering if he was the last person to have been in his own bed.
Who was it? Who was he?
He had to know.
Her desk, first. That's where he'd go. He felt totally calm, but in his heart he knew he wasn't behaving rationally. He stormed into the library and over to the desk. They'd bought it five years earlier, supposedly for them to share, but Ron never used it and it had become Pansy's.
It was the kind where a shutter could be pulled down to protect the contents, and it was locked.
Ron disdained magic for a moment, grabbing hold of the shutter and rocking the whole desk back and forward. Definitely locked. With a grunt of frustration, he slammed his fist down on the shutter, then pulled out his wand and shouted "Alohomora!"
It unlocked. He supposed Pansy would have known it was futile locking it, but that was Pansy - it wasn't so much about the action so much as the message it sent.
He rummaged in the desk, flinging bits of parchment, quills and bottle of ink onto the floor. He wasn't sure what he was looking for, but the very action of the destruction soothed his broken heart - temporarily.
There was nothing; as he scanned each piece of parchment, there was nothing.
The bedroom, next.
He pulled apart the bed, looked under the mattress, threw the pillows across the room. He looked in the wardrobes, pulling the clothes and blankets out of them. Nothing. Under the bed, there was nothing.
He sat back on his heels, feeling impotent.
He needed to get out. He needed to speak to someone. He needed a Firewhisky.
He should have Flooed first to make sure it was okay, but he didn't think, and Apparated to straight outside Hermione Williamson's door.
"Ron," she said as she answered his knock. "This isn't a good…" She saw the look on his face and stepped aside wordlessly, holding the door open.
Her husband sat on the sofa in the living room, hugging their two children as he read them a story before bed. All three of them looked up, confused.
"Hi," said Ron awkwardly. "Hello Rose, Hugo. And Edward, of course. How are you doing?"
Edward opened and closed his mouth twice, then Hermione came to save Ron.
"Sorry darling," she said to her husband. "My friend needs me."
Edward nodded resignedly.
"Ron, why don't we go through to the kitchen and I'll make you a cup of…" she looked at him again "… Firewhisky?"
Sitting at Hermione's kitchen table with the Firewhisky burning pleasantly in his throat and stomach, Ron felt immensely grateful to Hermione.
"It's Pansy," he said.
"What has she done now?" Hermione sighed.
"She says she wants to leave me. There's someone else."
"Oh Ron," said Hermione. "Not again." She buried her face in her hands.
"Things were just getting better again… getting good."
"Ron… She can't keep doing this to you. It seems like it's every other month you show up like this because of something she's done or said."
"It's not like that," Ron insisted.
"Please accept that this is it, over. All she does is hurt, hurt, hurt. You know none of us have ever approved of her. She's still the same spiteful Slytherin bitch that bullied us in school. I don't know what you ever saw in her."
Ron shook his head. "She's not like that. She's different when we're alone together. She can be so funny, affectionate…"
Hermione took hold of his hands, and Ron was reminded uncomfortably of their first kiss, and of their break-up simultaneously.
"Last time she told you she didn't love you, and you still went back, and she was there, and you just pretended none of it ever happened. The time before that, she told you you weren't allowed to see me anymore, despite spending all her spare time with Draco bloody Malfoy. The time before that, she told you she'd always hated your family and wouldn't, and I quote, 'piss on them if they were on fire'. Why do you want to be with this woman?"
"Everyone says stupid things when they're angry."
"Ron, she wasn’t even in an argument at the time. You were at Sunday lunch. With your family."
"Well, it was a bad joke."
"It wasn't even a joke, though."
"Hermione, stop it. Please."
"What do you want me to say, Ron? Yeah, I'll try and get you back together? That I'll say whatever you want to hear, just like I do every time you show up here? Well, not this time."
"But I still love her…" He couldn't imagine letting her go; his life without her would have no meaning. He felt tears rise to choke him like Devil's Snare.
"I know. I know you do. But I too can't keep doing this, Ron. It's too upsetting. I get involved, I give you advice, and you ignore every word I say and go running straight back to get hurt all over again. If you go back, please don't come here again. It's just too hard."
Ron left.
He went back to the house. Thankfully, Wanda had tidied the mess that he'd made in the library and the bedroom; Ron didn't think he could have faced clearing it himself.
He crawled into bed fully clothed and laid there thinking back on all the times that Pansy had hurt him over the years, but he just couldn't and he kept thinking about anything else instead. The first time he'd made her laugh, when they met in Rouen after the war; the first time they had made love, in a luxurious hotel and Ron had marvelled at the silk sheets and Pansy's porcelain skin; the way they had held each other after Pansy's mother had died. Pansy had been the ice to Ron's fire.
He didn't know when he'd fallen asleep, he just knew that when he awoke it was pitch dark but that she was there.
He sat up in bed, and there she was in the doorway. He could see the silhouette of her white blouse and her pale skin. She looked like a ghost.
He held a hand out to her wordlessly, and to his surprise she took it. She perched on the edge of the bed and when he put a hand on the back of her neck and kissed her she didn't pull away.
She let him lay her down on the bed and take off her clothes, and his. She let him kiss her neck, her shoulders, her breasts and stomach. He couldn't stop touching her; he couldn't keep his hands off her.
Their lovemaking was slow and Ron took his time, savouring every moment, but it was over too soon even so and Ron knew now why they called it heartache. Every breath he took was pain in his chest; it felt like somebody was sitting on his ribcage. He tried desperately not to cry, but couldn’t stop himself. And still he wouldn't let Pansy go, touching her, kissing her face, holding on to her as if to say 'Stay, stay with me please.' They had not said a word since he saw her.
He heard her fall asleep, her breathing changing, and although he fought it he couldn't stop himself from joining her.
When he awoke, she wasn't there, but the scent of her perfume lingered in the air. He'd go downstairs, he thought, and she would be there, reading the Prophet with a cup of black coffee and a croissant, and they would pretend like nothing had happened, like they did every time.
The divorce papers were sitting on the breakfast table, waiting.