Rating:
PG
House:
Astronomy Tower
Characters:
Harry Potter Ron Weasley
Genres:
Romance Slash
Era:
Multiple Eras
Spoilers:
Chamber of Secrets
Stats:
Published: 08/01/2003
Updated: 08/01/2003
Words: 4,889
Chapters: 1
Hits: 1,826

Invisibility is a Sweet Ally

Maddy

Story Summary:
Harry and Ron go for a walk in the middle of the night, and an innocent spider makes Ron get much more than he bargained for. Ron/Harry slash.

Chapter Summary:
Harry and Ron go for a walk in the middle of the night, and an innocent spider makes Ron get much more than he bargained for. Ron/Harry slash. (the summary's cheap, I know. Hopefully, the story isn't)
Posted:
08/01/2003
Hits:
1,826


Invisibility is a sweet ally

They had absolutely no reason to sneak out of the tower that night. Not that it hadn't happened before, during sleepless Saturday nights where they wanted to see what other students might be up to - or other teachers, although the thought of those actually having a love life kinda made them sick, no matter how much Hermione scolded them for behaving like kids. But this time, they hadn't planned it or anything. And Ron was very much asleep already when Harry finally got out of his bed and tiptoed to Ron's one, carefully peeking past the velvet hangings.

He couldn't see anything; the soft moonlight didn't reach the enclosed bed. So he tiptoed back to his bedside table, took his wand and whispered 'Lumos', then pulled the hangings slightly apart, just enough for him to slip his head inside. Ron was sleeping, curled up in a ball, facing Harry's side of the bed. His brows were knitted in concentration and his hands where lightly balled up into fists, his flaming red hair sticking in all directions, surrounding his pale face like a halo of fire. Harry's hand froze a few inches above Ron's head, the flickering blue light caressing the sleeping boy's features just like Harry's eyes, softly, tenderly.

He hadn't been able to fall asleep. He had tossed and turned, counted sheep, thought about Divination and History Of Magic classes, tried not to think altogether...all in vain. And, covering and surrounding every attempt, there had been one thing, which just plainly refused to go away: Ron's smiling face. But not just any smile, oh no. It was the smile Ron had had on about two weeks ago, when Harry had...well, actually, Harry couldn't think of any special reason for the way Ron had smiled at him, looked at him, in the middle of breakfast, with sparkling blue eyes, keen and bright, and how they had seemed to gaze at Harry's face longer than they ought to have. Nonsense, Harry firmly repeated himself for the fifteenth time that night. It had just been a smile, nothing more! Ron had smiled at him countless times since they knew each other, and this time hadn't been different in the least. ...yeah, but I still think he had no reason to smile at me that way!

He didn't ponder on why exactly he thought Ron needed a reason to smile at him; he had discarded that thought a week ago, after a very long, frustrating and unproductive conversation with himself during the blissful oblivion that were Professor Binns lectures.

Still lost in thoughts, Harry hadn't even realized he had reached out, and looked at his left hand - which was gently stroking Ron's hair - as if it was a stranger's one. He wondered if he had ever touched his hair before; he didn't remember doing so, and he certainly didn't remember it to be so soft and velvety. Ron stirred in his sleep and smiled; Harry's hand froze in mid-movement and he held his breath.

To no avail; Ron's eyes fluttered open. It took him a full minute to really wake up and acknowledge that it was still night and that Harry was there, and when he did he immediately smiled up at him, then yawned loudly, mouth opening wide and eyes shutting tight. Harry took the opportunity to yank his hand away, wondering if Ron had had time to notice.

Ron re-opened his eyes and smiled again. "Couldn't sleep?" he asked, his voice still heavy with dreams.

"No," Harry said, shaking his head slightly. "...and I was wondering if...well I just came to see if you were maybe not asleep 'cause..."

"Harry?" Ron asked, cocking his eyebrow.

"D'ya want to go for an invisible walk?" Harry asked quickly, wondering why something he had asked Ron so many times had suddenly been so hard to get out.

Ron seemed to ponder the proposition for a while, stretching one more time, then staring lazily at the dark ceiling of his bed. His eyes turned to Harry, he yawned, then sat up and said: "Sure."

*~*~*

They had done this countless times...but never on a Thursday night. And very soon, after long cold corridors and empty classrooms, the two boys were forced to admit that nobody was out. Even Filch seemed to be snoring in his bed, along with his damn cat, for Harry and Ron didn't come across either of them once.

"He's probably keeping his strength for the week-end," Ron said with a smirk.

Harry chuckled by pure reflex, but his thoughts were elsewhere. Walking so close to Ron for more than thirty minutes hadn't helped clear his mind, to say the least. And why exactly did you think that'd help?

"Not much to see, hm?" Ron asked after a while and yet another empty room.

Harry was staring at the back of Ron's neck - Ron was slightly ahead of him - and it took a few seconds for the word to reach his brain, which was all filled with red hair and pale skin: "What? Oh, yeah. Yeah, I'm sorry," Harry said, grimacing. "I shouldn't have taken you out of bed, it was selfish." He hadn't meant to sound cross or self-pitying, but that's how it must have sounded anyway, because Ron turned his head to him, frowning and smiling at the same time:

"Hey, I'm able to make my choices myself, thank you very much. You didn't force me," he added, only smiling now.

Harry scratched the back of his head. "Yeah, I know. But well..." He sighed, searching for something to say, then: "...wanna try one last room?"

"Sure, why not?" Ron said, and for a fleeting second Harry saw a glimmer in his eyes, like...like Ron was like...flirting with him, or something! Okay, stop that train of thoughts right now!

The two boys started walking again, without much hope of finding anything worth the travel, when suddenly Ron stumbled away from the wall, his back colliding with Harry's chest, and accidentally stepped on Harry's left foot.

"Hey!" Harry hissed, but didn't push Ron away from him. Ron's eyes were still fixed straight ahead.

"Sp-spider..." he moaned softly, pointing at a black moving thing ahead of them.

Harry rolled his eyes up: "You wouldn't think it's been six years you're in Hogwarts..." he sighed, smiling slightly. "I'd think you'd be used to spiders by now."

"Well I'm not," Ron said stubbornly, still staring at what looked like nothing more but a moving shadow. He stood there, back to chest with Harry, for a few seconds, obviously waiting for his friend to do something about that spider. As nothing happened, he finally tore his eyes away from the wall and spun round to face Harry, eyes wide. "Can't you make it go away or something?!" he almost begged, feeling foolish but unable to feign coolness.

Harry gave him a small sympathetic smile, but it grew rather wobbly as he stared more and more intently at Ron's face, his expression undecipherable.

"What?" Ron whispered.

Harry didn't say anything, just kept staring.

"Harry?" Ron raised his eyebrows, then quickly glanced behind him to check that the spider didn't make any funny moves towards him. He froze when he felt something soft caressing the side of his cheek, and his first thought was "It's on me!!!". He turned his head back to Harry in slow motion, ready to ask him if he had a spider on the cheek, but then he saw that Harry's arm was outstretched and seemed to end exactly where the supposed monster was. Ron's heart calmed down a bit, but his brain went completely numb. He opened his mouth, wanting to say "Harry?" again, but no sound came. Harry was staring at his cheek, eyes wide and sad, and his fingers were moving ever-so-slightly across it, in a much nicer way than spider's legs. Spider... Ron was about to turn his head again, his fear stronger than the weirdness of Harry's actions, but Harry whispered:

"It's gone. Up and away."

Ron shivered, not liking the thought of not knowing where that beast from hell had gone, but then Harry's hand slid up and cupped his cheek. Ron felt something tickling his leg and jumped, instinctively pressing himself against Harry and gripping his shirt tightly. Harry gasped, and his hand slid to the back of Ron's neck. He sighed softly, and his breath brushed against Ron's cheek.

Something was definitely weird with Harry, Ron thought. And yet, strange how much he wanted to see what would happen. How much he wanted something to happen. He looked into Harry's eyes and thought that they were quite a beautiful colour, and it startled him because he wasn't prone on noticing that kind of stuff, especially about guys. After all, it had taken him ages to even realize that Hermione was a really pretty girl.

"Harry?" Ron breathed, as Harry seemed to have frozen on the spot.

Harry flinched, like his name on Ron's lips had hurt, and his eyes seemed to be imploring with Ron not to utter another word...

...for fear his sudden determination - to ruin the most wonderful friendship one could ever wish for - might wane.

But Ron went on speaking. "Y'know," he whispered, feeling a bit guilty when Harry's eyes tinted with sadness; "When we went into the Forest...with the spiders..."

Harry nodded, wondering why Ron was talking about that right now. Wondering why he couldn't have just shut up and let Harry go on with his self-destruction plan.

"Well..." Ron went on. Harry could have sworn Ron blushed. "Y'know, I didn't say it of course, but...I would have really wanted you to..." Yup, he was blushing, there was no doubt about it. Ron looked down, then seemed to poise himself up for Harry's laugh and looked back up: "Like...take my hand or something..."

The words had barely left his mouth that Ron felt like digging a big black hole and hide there for the rest of his life. What...what was that about?! his brain stammered, looking at him like he was completely insane. And you didn't even want that!! You just almost did it every two seconds, but you didn't want him to do it!! What the--But he didn't have time to either dig or speak, because Harry wrapped his arms around his back.

Ron blushed harder and chuckled. "It's a bit late now..." He considered pointing out that it was also much more than he had asked for, but he thought it would be impolite to do so when Harry, who was always so reserved and almost never displayed any physical sign of attachment, was suddenly ready to overcome that just to reassure his best friend.

Harry smiled: "Well, y'know what they say, better late than never, right? ...plus," he added more softly, "You never know when that spider might come back."

Ron didn't seem to really appreciate the joke, and Harry couldn't blame him. He didn't say anything. Actually, he didn't know what to say. Harry was looking weirder by the second, and he didn't like that. As if it wasn't enough to be out in the corridors, at night, in slippers (which right then wasn't much better than being barefooted in Ron's mind) with a spider running lose just behind his back! Now his best friend had to go all weird-y on him, staring into his eyes. Suddenly he realized that one of Harry's hands had crept back up behind his neck. He hadn't even felt it. And Harry looked so sad, and so...determined, too. Determined for what?!

Harry's heart had stopped beating at least a minute before. He didn't remember ever being so nervous, not even in front of Voldemort, not even in front of Snape when he had failed to make his potion correctly; he just...he was sure he was going to blew it off. But he just couldn't help it. He had never had Ron so close to him ever since...ever since those feelings came out. It was too good a chance to miss, wasn't it?

Harry took a deep breath--an inner deep breath; his lungs seemed to have gone out of service--and closed the very shallow gap between his lips and Ron's. He couldn't stand the view of Ron's blue eyes, widening like mad, so he closed his eyes, but didn't move away. His whole body heaved up and down as he sighed, tentatively pressing harder against Ron's unresponsive mouth. This was what it was all about--what the world was all about. The smoothness of Ron's lips. Harry had craved it for some time - oh, he wasn't stupid. He had known all along why a mere smile was putting him in such a wondering frenzy. He just didn't want to acknowledge it, didn't want it to be true - but now that he was actually tasting it he knew that kissing Ron was both the best and the stupidest thing he could have ever done. Now he would always know what he couldn't have.

Because, given Ron's non-reaction, Harry knew he would never taste his lips again. Which in turn made him want to dare lick Ron's lips, to actually taste them, not just feel them, but this was too much to ask his body, his brain and his heart, they would never be stupid enough to agree.

Ron couldn't have said if his thoughts had come to a stand-still or were multiplying like rabbits. Nothing seemed to make sense anymore, and the only certainty - if it could be called that - was the feel of Harry's lips against his. Ron's eyes finally relaxed and he blinked several times, washing the sting away. He waited, and waited, perfectly immobile, wondering if Harry would kiss him forever.

After five seconds that felt much, much longer for the both of them, Harry finally pulled away, unconsciously licking his lips. What now?

Harry opened his mouth, but no word would come out. Worse, he had absolutely no clue about what to say. "Oops, tripped and fell on your lips"? "Just wanted to check if maybe the spider was inside your mouth..."? or "I drank twenty Butterbeers before going to bed and I thought you were Cho"? After a few seconds, Harry started panicking, persuaded that Ron would shout at him if he didn't speak soon. "May--" he coughed; "Maybe we should go back to the tower?"

This was not what Ron had been expecting, that much Harry could tell. After staring at Harry like he was barking mad, Ron nodded, his sudden sad expression unnerving Harry passably, and they set off, making their way back to the Fat Lady in absolute silence, painfully reminded of just how close you had to be while walking under an invisibility cloak.

*~*~*

Harry was lying on his back, staring at the ceiling of his four-poster bed. He had wrapped one of the red curtains around the bed table, and the candle was casting flickering waves of light on it. The four same words kept turning around in his head, and no matter how hard he tried, he couldn't tune them out: You've lost Ron. You've lost Ron. You've lost Ron.

But his lips had been so soft, so smooth, so heavenly...why couldn't they be dry, or slimy? Then maybe he wouldn't be wishing to gods that he could kiss him again, maybe he would have stepped back from Ron with a disgusted face and laughed and maybe they would still be friends...Uh, no, maybe we wouldn't be friends if I had done that either...

"Harry?"

Harry jumped out of his skin and looked to the left of his bed; Ron was there, appearing as suddenly and silently as a ghost, the velvety curtain curving around his back.

"W-What?" Harry stammered, unable to decide if he was happy that Ron wanted to talk to him again so soon, or mortified because it couldn't really mean anything good.

"Can I come in?"

"S-sure..." Is he going to try and strangle me?

Ron seemed to hesitate, then carefully sat on the covers, knees bent, with his back turned to Harry's feet and his toes hiding under Harry's pillow. He waited two seconds, then blurted out: "Why did you kiss me?"

Harry let out a very faint: "Oh." He squinted at Ron, then murmured: "....are you sure you want to know?"

"Yeah. I've just figured out there was no way I could sleep until you'd told me."

Harry stayed silent for a second or two, wondering what answer he could give Ron. In the end, the only answer that came to his mind was, indeed, the truth. "Well...I did it coz I wanted to?" It had almost been a question, as if Harry was asking for Ron's approval.

But Ron immediately asked: "Why did you want to?"

Harry let out an awkward chuckle; Ron looked very much like an eager-to-know-everything-about-everything child. "Coz I fancy you?" Please don't ask "Why do you fancy me?"...

But Ron didn't ask. Instead, his eyes widened slightly for a second, then he looked thoughtful, and finally said: "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to--"

"It's alright," Harry interrupted, scooting up on his pillow a bit; "It's true, I kissed you, so...I guess I owe you some explanation...though I don't know what explanation to give, apart from the fancying you thing." He paused. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have. But you were just...I don't know." Great. Maybe I should be a lawyer when I'm old. Natural talent.

"Is that why you wanted to go out tonight?" Ron shyly asked, his fingers playing with the frayed bottom of his pants.

"No. I just...well, I did want to spend some time with you, alone. But I...never planned to kiss you." It wasn't supposed to be any different from the other nights... Harry suddenly wondered why he kept saying the stupid stuff out loud, and keeping the sensible stuff inside.

"Why didn't you tell me before?" Ron asked after another few seconds. He was examining his feet like they could maybe answer the questions better.

Harry rolled his eyes, suddenly feeling very weary. "Tell you what? 'Hi Ron! You know what? I think I'm smitten with you. After all, you're some handsome bloke! May we snog?'?"

"Well, no, maybe not like that, but..." Ron stammered, blushing. Harry fancied Ron might have been blushing about the "handsome bloke", but he knew this was highly improbable as the whole "fancying you" part was probably foremost on Ron's thoughts.

"What could I say?" Harry asked, his tone bitter.

There was a long silence, during which Ron didn't look at Harry once, playing with a loose thread on Harry's pillow with his toes. Then he finally peeked up and asked: "Did you like kissing me?"

"...yes," Harry answered. There was no point denying it.

Weirdly, Ron seemed to be rather pleased by this. "...If you could, you'd...you'd kiss me again?"

"Why, yes, Ron," Harry answered acidly, deciding to ignore the hurt look on Ron's face. "I'm afraid the fancying only got worse with the kissing." He stopped, sighed, and continued, more softly: "...but I don't want you to stop being my best friend. It's just a stupid crush! It'll pass."

To his surprise, Ron seemed deeply offended by that last remark.

"Wha--"

"I'm only a crush?! A stupid crush?" Ron spit out, his cheeks taking on the unmistakable Fight Flush; his hands were clutching his knees now.

Harry gaped at him for a few seconds, unbelieving, before chuckling in a rather hopeless way. "Oh Ron please don't do that."

"Don't do what?" Ron asked, defiant.

"It's hard enough to tell you that I have a crush on you, so don't act offended when I'm trying to make it look...to make it sound less of a big deal!" Harry exclaimed, finally sitting up. "What d'you want? Me to declare my undying love for you? Coz that surely would make things simpler between us, right?"

Ron's hands loosened their grips, and he looked ashamed as quickly as he had looked angry. "No, but..."

Harry sighed, pointedly staring into Ron's eyes, no matter how much he wanted to look anywhere but there. "You're not a stupid crush. But it will pass! I just want us to remain best friends. I should have never kissed you, I know. ...although I can't say I'm really sorry for doing so," he added, thinking that he might as well play his cards on the table; not like anything he could say could make things much worse anyway.

Ron nodded for a reason Harry couldn't fathom, back to gazing at his own feet. Harry looked at him for a while, wishing more than ever that he could read minds, and before long the temptation of Ron's round pink cheek was too strong and Harry slowly reached out and caressed its curve with the back of his fingers. The skin was as soft as Ron's lips had been and Harry, who had only planned to briefly touch it, just to attract Ron's attention once more, found that his hand didn't feel like going away so soon.

As planned, Ron's eyes shot upwards as soon as Harry's hand touched his face, but there wasn't fear or anger in them, just surprise. Then, as Harry's hand lingered, surprise turned into...Harry couldn't have said what it turned into, but something definitely happened.

"Harry?"

"Yes?"

"...you promise not to hate me?"

"Why would I hate you?!" Harry exclaimed, his hand falling back at his side. "It's not your fault if--"

But Ron's lips were on his and he found he couldn't speak anymore, and this couldn't be real but god it still felt good, and Ron's lips weren't moving away, they were only moving forward, pressing against Harry's mouth and Harry didn't know what to do so he pressed back against Ron, his eyes wide open staring at the slight flush creeping under Ron's left eye. Ron's lips stirred then, and they were kissing, really kissing, nothing like what Harry had done in the cold corridor a mere hour before. And every time Harry thought it was over, then Ron would keep on kissing him, his wet tongue creeping out to take a lick at Harry's lips and staying there until Harry's tongue decided to see what was going on and liked it there; and then his tongue was inside Ron's mouth, or maybe it was Ron's tongue that was inside his mouth, he couldn't have said, and it felt really weird but at the same time it felt quite splendid, and then suddenly Ron wasn't kissing him anymore.

Harry opened his eyes, wondering when he had closed them, and saw Ron mere inches from him, his big blue eyes watching him intently, his lips red and swollen; the flush under his left eye had crept all along his face and as always the freckles were standing out like Braille on pink paper and a part inside Harry wondered if a blind man could read them but his brain was blank.

"Now at least you've gotten a real kiss," Ron finally whispered, before looking thoroughly embarrassed, then downright horrified.

Harry looked at him, silent, then slowly lied down again, on his side, staring at the flicking flame on his bedside table.

"Harry--"

"It's okay," Harry said in a voice that didn't really sound like his own.

"...good-night, then," Ron said after a tense silence.

"Good-night."

Harry closed his eyes. Ron was going to go back to his bed and hopefully tomorrow things would be okay again. As okay as they could be, that is. Why did Ron have to kiss him? How was he supposed to get those thoughts away, now that Ron had given him the slightest hope that maybe, maybe he had feelings for him too? Now he would never, ever look at his best friend without thoughts of their kiss(es?) invading his brain!!

Harry felt a surge of anger, but kept his eyes closed, wondering why the bed wasn't moving at all. Did Ron go away already? He'd better! Now that he's ruined my life!! Harry thought very dramatically, inwardly glaring at his best friend. The mattress moved slightly, and Harry tensed, waiting to hear Ron's footsteps on the cold stones of the dormitory.

"Harry?" It was Ron's voice alright, and very close. Harry opened his eyes, ready to shout at Ron to just go back to his bed, but Ron's face was only inches away from his own and this was enough to make Harry forget about pretty much everything. His emerald eyes widened a bit, but he didn't say anything.

Ron was chewing on his lower lip, looking nervous. "Can I...can I sleep with you? I mean in your bed, not--not with you," he added promptly.

Harry's eyes widened considerably more. "W...why?" he asked. You dumbass!! Was it so hard to just nod?

But against all hope, Ron smiled, then blushed slightly. "Uh...I'm not sure I've got the answer to that, actually..." he whispered, avoiding Harry's gaze. But somehow it seems wrong to leave you like that...

"Oh." Harry didn't know what to say. Of course he wanted Ron to stay but...wouldn't it make things even worse? With every passing minute his feelings for Ron were getting more solid, so after one entire night sleeping inches away from him... "S-sure," he suddenly said, giving Ron a wobbly smile and scooting further to the right side of the bed. Ron turned around and settled himself under the covers.

"D'you...d'you want to share the pillow?" Harry awkwardly asked, since said pillow was lying between them, Harry's head resting on its left side. But Ron's upper body turned towards the bedside table and he reached out for Harry's wand; pushing the drape open with his arm, Ron muttered "Accio pillow". Floating away from Ron's bed, Ron's own pillow gently landed on his lap, and he put the wand back on the table, before blowing the candle and turning back to Harry.

Harry didn't say anything, but was glad the darkness prevented him from seeing Ron's face, and vice-versa. He felt dejected. Of course he wouldn't want to share a pillow, are you stupid or what?! But the fact that Ron hadn't even bothered to answer Harry's question was...well, it hurt.

"I don't know why I'm doing that," Ron whispered in the dark.

Harry didn't know what to answer. You've already said that before, I've got it! he thought angrily, blaming Ron for staying because in the end if was only making things harder for him. Between this sudden turn-about and Ron's kiss, he was starting to wonder if maybe this was Torment Harry Potter Day in Ron's diary. He was half-expecting, half-hoping that Ron would rise up and go back to his own bed, saying that no, he really couldn't deal with that. But Ron didn't move.

"Harry?"

"What?" Harry whispered, a little too harshly.

There was a silence, then Ron murmured: "Good-night."

Oh. "Good-night," Harry answered, feeling like the stupidest king of Stupid Land.

Night settled down around them, but Harry knew Ron wasn't even trying to sleep, because his breathing would have been far louder. He wondered what Ron might be thinking, but didn't dare speak again. Minutes passed, half an hour maybe, but it was so dark inside the bed that even after all that time, Harry still couldn't make out Ron's face. So when he felt something soft brushing against his own left hand - the right one was pressed under his cheek - Harry almost squealed.

He thought he heard a gasp, and then things were fumbling against his hand, as if bumping against it by accident. He almost took his hand away, but then he recognized the things as being Ron's fingers (or else, some cut left hand was wandering on his bed, which wasn't a very pleasant thought), slightly trembling and slightly clammy, and he didn't move. Slowly and shyly, after having traced the outline of Harry's hand, Ron's fingers probed Harry's thumb away from his index finger, obviously intent on slipping past. Harry relaxed his hand a bit, feeling like he couldn't breathe anymore. Was he asleep? Ron couldn't...Ron just couldn't--the fingers brushed past Harry's palm and came to a stop, Harry's thumb caught between thumb and forefinger. ...maybe Ron was asleep, and when he'd wake up he'd be all freaked out, thinking Harry had taken advantage...Harry tensed and unconsciously tried to get his hand away, which only precipitated things; for Ron instinctively tried to get a better hold of him, and suddenly they were really holding hands, fingers awkwardly intertwined, palms brushing against each other.

Harry let out a helpless sigh that sounded more like a squeak.

"Harry?" Ron's voice suddenly whispered.

It took Harry several seconds before finding back his own voice. "Yeah?"

Ron's fingers tightened slightly around Harry's. "...we'll still be friends, right?"

Harry hadn't the slightest idea what Ron meant, but he nodded anyway. "Yes, yes of course we will."

"...good."

Harry frowned in the dark, ready to torture himself all night with those last seconds, but his body decided it was much too late for that and fell asleep.

And all night long, the boys held hands.

THE END. (To be continued...)