Fic: Damage Control, Harry/Ron
Title: Damage Control
Summary: All was well. Sort of. Except for the damn press.
Pairing: Harry/Ron
Rating: R at most (innuendo and an f bomb or two)
Word Count: 1212
Written last week for
shocolate, who inspired me (what else is new?)
“Bug up your arse? Ron asked, as Harry slammed shut yet another cabinet door.
“No, nothing,” was the only response he got, and muttered, at that. People tended to write Ron off as oblivious to people’s moods, but even he would have been hard pressed to ignore this big of a change in Harry since they’d woken up.
Well, it would have been hard not to do anything but come down from that particular moment, given that Harry had awoken in the best possible mood-with Ron doing things with his tongue that were still illegal in many countries.
For the most part, Ron tended to just let Harry stew when he was feeling this particular way-what bloke always wanted someone nagging him about his feelings all the time, anyway? For all he knew it could be a bit of gas, or worry about the paperwork he hadn’t quite finished the night before (when Ron locked Harry in his office, bent him over the desk and…well, that was private, really, but it had involved making an awful mess of the case against Yaxley, hadn’t it?) Anyway, he wasn’t a girl (always wanting to discuss feelings and all that shite) and as much as he loved Harry, he knew that sometimes Harry needed to be left alone to stew over things in peace.
Unless it became apparent that Harry wanted to talk about what was bothering him, which might have been the case here.
Ron got up under the pretense of pouring another cup of tea, running his hand over Harry’s shoulder as he did so. Harry turned in response to the affectionate gesture, but he didn’t shrug away, so Ron had a pretty good idea that it wasn’t something he’d done, anyway.
The sugar bowl was nearly empty, so Ron went to the pantry to refill it. On the way back, he got a clue to the problem when Harry’s face blinked out at him from a blurry photograph in a newspaper on the worktop. That wasn’t much of a surprise, but seeing himself there (standing behind Harry, his arms wrapped around Harry’s waist) was.
Not that it was a problem-in fact, something about that picture made Ron’s chest constrict as a wave of emotion washed over him. They looked good like that. They looked like-well, not a couple of blokes having a fling-that was for sure. His own large frame surrounded Harry’s (protectively, it seemed) and Harry’s eyes were closed and he was smiling and Ron could almost feel the way he’d leaned back against him, welcoming the affection, his arse nestled just so…
Yeah, good picture. And while he knew that Harry preferred not to have their personal life offered up for the entire Wizarding world to see, it didn’t warrant this sort of reaction, did it?
Until Ron saw the title, anyway, and as he read it, the sugar bowl slipped from his grasp, shattering and scattering sugar all over the floor. Harry rushed forward to clean up the mess but Ron just reached for the paper, hoping that he’d misread.
Harry Potter-the boy who loved too much?
Sources close to the Potter/Weasley romance say that trouble is brewing for the Boy-who-lived-to-save-us-all. And unnamed source close to the unhappy hero assures us that Potter, 23 is trapped in a highly toxic relationship. Ron Weasley, 24-aspiring Auror and part-owner of the wildly successful Weasleys Wizarding Wheezes-can be heard belittling the young hero to the point of tears, manipulating all of his free time, alienating his friends, and generally making him miserable. Fellow Auror team members report that Potter is showing up to work bruised and battered. What is more, there are rumours that Mr. Weasley, who is said to be prone to fits of jealous rage, has been himself keeping time with a former classmate and rival Draco Malfoy, sending poor Harry into the arms of former flame Hermione Granger. “I always knew they would end up together,” says the friend, who declined to give her name for fear of retaliation by Weasley. “She’s the only one who ever truly understood him, and that horrid boy has been jealous of his fame and money for years. Everyone knew it at school.” When asked for a comment on the rumours of her rekindled romance, Miss Granger, 24-Undersecretary for the newly formed Department of Creature Rights-had no comment, other than a laugh and a quirk of her beautifully shaped eyebrow.
Harry glanced up as Ron began to shake, and he looked for a moment as if he expected Ron to explode. Ron did, of course, with a booming laugh that filled the room, making Harry eye him with nearly the same expression of annoyance that he was giving the offending paper.
“Sn’t funny,” he said, as Ron clutched his side, snorting in a most undignified manner.
“Oh, come on, Harry, I thought you were going to stop letting this shite upset you.”
"Not when it’s about you,” Harry retorted, scowling.
Ron leaned on the counter, holding out a hand to help Harry off his knees, lowering his face to encourage Harry to meet his eyes. “Do you believe that rubbish?”
“What? No, of course not. As if you could ever hit me. As if I’d let you.”
“And Malfoy?”
Harry snorted under his breath. “Yeah, right. The fucker.”
“So what does it all have to do with us, anyway?”
Harry frowned. “I don’t want people thinking those sorts of things about you.”
Ron shook his head. "Do you honestly think my…our family believes that kind of crap?”
“ No,” Harry admitted, swallowing hard, apparently touched (as always) that Ron included him in that.
“D’you think any of our friends believe?”
“No…well, yes…maybe some?”
“Maybe so,” Ron admitted. “But fuck ‘em. The others will set them straight at some point. Or they can just look at my face or even that bloody picture to know I’m mad for you.” Ron picked up the paper, crumpling until it completely disappeared in his large hands. Then, he seemed to change his mind, smoothing it and tearing off the photograph with surprising care.
The rest he wadded up with even more enthusiasm then the first time. “Come on,” he said. And Harry followed, wondering what he was planning to do.
Harry grew even more curious as they made their way over to Pig’s cage. Once again, Ron unfolded the paper, this time laying it out over the bottom of the cage, saying “Only good for pissing on, yeah?”
Harry grinned.
“Well, it was either that or burn it. I like this way better,” Ron said, and smiled that stupid lopsided grin that always sent Harry’s heart racing. He held his arms out for Harry, who walked into them, tucking his head into Ron’s neck.
Ron tightened his embrace. “And speaking of loving too much-” He let his hands wander, grinning as Harry’s body responded. “We’ve got an entire day off and the press looking for you, so there’s no point leaving the house. My idea of the perfect day, really. Gonna love you in the bed and on the sofa and in the shower and in front of the refrigerator and in the back garden and on the roof….”