No Means to Use the Stove

Family is There for You

"Exactly. The point not being the damn book's title but the fact that it's a wizarding book!"

"Oh."

"Yes. So, what are we going to do?"

"We have to tell Charlie!" Hermione sputtered hastily and managed to take a few running steps before Ron grasped her arm and made her stop.

"Halt! Wait a minute. Calm down and think." He held her firmly, large hands on both of her shoulders. "Is that really a good idea?"

"My..." she wriggled in his hold, "of course it is! He is miserable! He needs to know she remembers him!"

"He is miserable. Can I remind you why? Or to put it more clearly, because of whom? And what do you know about him being so miserable? He seemed fine yesterday."

"Ron! You can't be so daft! He didn't use the pensieve! He was crying, for Heaven's sake! He hit his hand and there was blood and he laughed and..."

"He cried? Charlie?" For a moment, Ron's determined expression seemed to falter. Then it returned, now strengthened with a great deal of stubbornness. Hermione was vaguely reminded of her mother-in-law. Obviously hearing about Charlie's desperation had triggered some inbuilt protective Weasley-gene in Ron. Maybe she had made a mistake when telling him. The thought flashed through her mind and was confirmed when she heard him shoot: "And you think we should torture him some more? She left him. She didn't want to make up. She wouldn't even bloody talk about it with him."

"Ron! Honestly!" Inwardly, she winced hearing her own voice. She sounded exactly like her fourteen-year-old self. She tried to calm down and continued in a tone she hoped sounded adult: "Ron, I thought you liked Anna. How come it's now all her fault? I know Charlie is your brother and I love him, too, but you could even try to be objective. He used Obliviate on her!"

"I was objective enough until Harry told me what she said when Charlie tried to apologize - without even knowing what for, if I may add! She practically told him to go to...you know what...and said she never wanted to see him again. And then she forced him to cast Obliviate on her!"

"Ron! Nobody would do that!"

"She did! It wasn't Charlie's fault! Or are you now saying that Harry is lying? She said she didn't want to remember any of us or anything of Charlie. I'm not exaggarating! Harry was trying to make excuses for her and bloody understand her and still he told me so. I don't know what she really said. It must have been something pretty nasty if that was Harry's version."

"Ron! If she hates Charlie and never wants to see her again, what is she then doing here, next to the Leaky Cauldron, reading a wizarding book?"

"How should I know? Probably scheming up some new way to make Charlie miserable! And she somehow managed to botch up his Obliviate! "

"For which I sincerely cheer at her!"

"Want to give her some cheers for dumping Charlie, as well?"

"Ron! Listen to yourself! I know Charlie isn't into arguing like we are, but Anna could very well be. Just think about what you have said to me while fighting. If you had meant all of it and if I had believed all of it, there would have happened worse things than modifying one's memory between you and I."

That stopped Ron in mid-rant. She watched her husband doing a double take, blushing - it was sweet how he still blushed, at the age of twenty-five - and finally grinning a bit, embarrassed. She had noticed earlier that he really wasn't all behind his words, but had rather been defending his brother out of loyalty. Now he seemed half-relieved to let her win.

Ron had been quite upset when Harry and Charlie had come back from Anna's apartment and Harry had told them the news. He hadn't liked the idea of Obliviating Anna and he hadn't believed they would do it. It had been a disappointment for him when they had. And Ron was too loyal to easily give in to being disappointed with his brother or his best friend. Therefore, in order to accept what they had done, he had, in his mind, moulded Anna into a coldhearted bitch who deserved it. Now, Hermione had given him a way to see things so that neither Anna nor Charlie necessarily ended up a fiend and he was more than happy to accept it.

"Yes..." he muttered, pondering. "Charlie knows how to fight all right, but he bellows and yells like the rest of us Weasleys. He couldn't possibly handle...your way of fighting, for example."

"I yell as well," Hermione defended herself quickly. Now it was her turn to be embarrassed. She knew what Ron was talking about and she wasn't proud of that particular aspect of herself.

"Yeah, you do and you nag too, but you have learned new ways to fight, as well. When you are really angry, you can be cold and calm and talk like you meant it all even though you really are so pissed off you can hardly think straight. Blast, it's horrible! Much worse than yelling. Somehow when one's yelling it's easier to see they don't mean it all. When they are all calm it feels like they're ripping your entrails out with a dessert spoon, like they didn't bloody care!"

"I do care!" She was feeling horrible.

"I know that, love," he squeezed her shoulder reassuringly, "I know that's a way of defence. But Charlie doesn't. Neither us Weasleys nor his dragons could have taught him that. And Harry, he can be all calm and coherent until he gets really mad. Anna must have just stood there, looking cold and satisfied with herself and those bloody prats couldn't see she was upset and frightened. Charlie thought she hated him and Harry nobly thought she should be let to make her own decisions. I should have gone there instead of Harry. I just couldn't imagine they'd be both so thick."

"Look who's speaking," Hermione shot, but she was smiling at him, proud that he had learned to use his sharp perception for understanding other people instead of only chess-moves.

"So, what are we going to do, then?" he returned to the question that had initiated their loud act of disagreement which had even gathered them some elusive audience.

Hermione bit her lip, thinking hard. "I don't know for certain," she finally admitted.

"You know," Ron said slowly, "maybe we have looked at it from a wrong angle. Maybe we shouldn't be talking to Charlie but to Anna."

"But of course!" Hermione cried enthusiastically. "We can first determine what she remembers and how she remembers it and then how she feels about him!" She whirled around and practically ran towards the coffee shop where they had seen Anna.

The table at the window was abandoned. On it, there was only a half-eaten chicken roll beside a nearly empty cup of coffee.

Ron looked at the table and then at his wife's disappointed face. "Maybe we should have asked her to wait while we fought," he then said sarcastically.

"At least this proves she does remember things she shouldn't."

"Would be nice to know what she will be doing with that knowledge."

She was going to retaliate, but suddenly froze and paled. "Ron... do you think they know at the Ministry? That the Obliviate failed, I mean? "

"I don't think so. Unless someone tells them, and I'm certainly not going to. And anyhow, I don't think it failed." Ron was thinking hard, running his hand through his hair.

"What do you mean?"

"Charlie can't lie for his life and Harry was there with him. They Obliviated her all right."

"But how is it then possible..."

"She knew why they came. Harry told she said it at once. She knew about Obliviating." Ron stopped for a moment and asked then: "What would you do, Hermione, if you were without your wand and you couldn't run away and you knew someone was coming in a few hours to Obliviate you?"

"Well...I would naturally..." she stopped in mid-sentence. " Damn it, Ron! You're right! How didn't I see it?! Why didn't anybody tell me she knew?! Crikey! God! Merlin!" She was dancing around on the pavement in her frustrated excitement and it wasn't for long that Ron could keep his pretence of being serious. Gradually she calmed down enough to grasp the biggest problem in hand: "This may change it all. So, what are we going to do, then?"

Ron wiped the grin off his face and concentrated. He hesitated for a moment, weighing different options in his mind, trying to find one that would satisfy Hermione as well as himself, be useful when thinking about the bigger picture, and was possible to accomplish. At last he said: "Maybe we could go to see Charlie and feel him out a bit, see how he is doing."

Even with his long legs, Ron had it hard to keep up with Hermione as she purposefully strode towards the Leaky Cauldron from where they could Apparate without being seen by muggles.