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Home

by PinkTribeChick

"And then I'm with you . . . no longer alone . . . when I'm with you . . . it feels like I'm home . . . and you are with me . . . no longer alone . . . how could it be . . . it feels like I'm home . . ."

~Duncan Sheik~

This wasn't real. This wasn't happening. It hadn't happened. It couldn't be.

He kept telling himself it was all just a dream. He'd pinched and poked and punched himself, trying to wake up. But the some fresh, some fading bruises on his arms and legs only served to tell him, rudely remind him, this was no hallucination, no fantasy.

They were gone.

Forever gone.

Forever sleep.

He was the only one left.

Harry, Hermione . . . his entire family. All dead. Neville, Luna, Seamus, Dean . . . the list went on and on . . .

Voldemort was vanquished, but who was left behind to pick up the mess? Who would repair their world? Wizarding society as Ron Weasley knew it was gone. Hogsmeade lay in ruins. Most of Diagon Alley was ashes. Hogwarts had disappeared completely. A few businesses, Weasley's Wizard Wheezes included, as run by Ron now, tried to help people return their lives to some kind of normalcy, but it was a slow process. As was rebuilding.

He sat quietly at the dinner table at the Burrow, staring out the window as the December snow swirled wildly outside. The Burrow was one of the few vestiges of his pre-war life, his childhood, and his innocence that remained. And now it was all his.

And for the first time in his life, he realized he didn't want it. This was no longer home.

For a home was love and laughter. People - friends and family. His mother in the kitchen cooking while Harry and he played chess and Hermione read Hogwarts: A History for the hundredth time, with smells and sounds from the twins' experiments blasting forth from the floor above. Home was Ginny teasing him about something or other, getting his back up over nothing. Home was a good game of sibling versus sibling Quidditch in the big field outside. Home was Dad and his crazy chatter about rubber ducks, flying cars, and eckeltricity. But most of all, home was Hermione.

Hermione Granger-Weasley . . . only five days his wife . . . she'd been dead for five, almost six, months now. And he was a nineteen-year-old widower. She had been killed by Lord Voldemort himself in the prelude to Harry's last stand against him. Stabbed five times in the chest with a poison-dipped Muggle knife, one wound for each Horcrux she'd helped Harry to find and destroy.

Harry and Ginny died within a few minutes of each other, Ginny blocking Harry from the Killing Curse aimed by other Death Eaters while he dueled Voldemort. Harry died when Voldemort did, his last breath, drops of energy, and magical power finally finishing the Dark Lord off.

His brothers had died in various battles, which even now seemed like one long blur to him. He knew Fred and George had died at the same time. Bill had died trying to save Fleur during a battle at Beauxbatons. Charlie died on Bill and Fleur's wedding day, a message to Harry and the Weasleys from Voldemort to watch their backs. His parents and Percy died fighting at the Ministry of Magic, their bodies destroyed when the place exploded.

Ron was the only one left. And not without many, many scars . . .

A long scar vertically down his chest from the Sectumsempra curse, aimed by Gregory Goyle in the battle that ensued at Bill and Fleur's wedding.

There were scars across his back and shoulders from being whipped by Lucius Malfoy, his skin torn to ribbons. Malfoy had escaped Azkaban and taken Ron prisoner in an effort to secure the release of his wife and son, who had already died without his knowledge. Ron had managed to escape after three months of torture when he'd overpowered a mentally unstable Lucius as he brought Ron food. Hermione and Ron married as soon as Ron had been strong enough to stand for the ceremony after that.

But the physical scars were nothing to his mental scars. And most of all, to the pieces of a broken heart, shattered by all that he'd lost and seen. His loss was worth more than the freedom the wizarding world gained, in his opinion oftentimes.

He brushed away the tears that had begun to slide, previously unchecked, down his face as he turned to stare at his cup of tea.

"You alright, Ron?" a soft feminine voice came from the doorway. He glanced up to see Arabella Lowery there.

Arabella was Seamus Finnigan's girlfriend, or had been, before he died. Now she was alone, too, and eight months pregnant. Ron had promised Seamus he'd take care of her, so she lived at the Burrow with him, as did Remus Lupin and Ron's sort of sister-in-law, Gabrielle Delacour. Hagrid stayed over occasionally, but he had rebuilt his hut on the former Hogwarts grounds, and spent a large amount of his time helping to rebuild the castle to it's former glory, which Ron had donated a large amount of money to in memory of his fallen wife, best friend, and family. Lupin, Arabella, Gabrielle, and Hagrid had formed with Ron a makeshift family of sorts, holding on to what little they each had left of their former lives.

"Yeah, I s'pose," he said hoarsely. She padded into the faintly moonlit room, pulling her pink crochet shawl tighter about her shoulders before gently sitting down across from him at the table. Ron's gaze returned to the wintry weather outside.

"You sure?" she pressed. She was American and stubborn, always worried about him. Not that he blamed her. He was a right mess nowadays, and she had become his best friend. The only person he really let in.

"Yeah, I'm alright. Or hope to be. Someday," he assured her, running a hand through his bedraggled red hair with a sigh. Someday . . . he knew he couldn't go on like this forever. It was no way to live.

The clock on the wall showed it to be One in the morning. He had to work tomorrow, and as close as she was to giving birth, she needed her rest.

"Shouldn't you be in bed, Belle?" She gave a soft smile, rubbing her swollen abdomen lovingly.

"I don't really sleep much these days, what with the baby kicking and my stomach as big as a barn. I just can't find a comfortable position to sleep in," she replied. He smiled gently back, taking a sip of his tea.

Arabella had come to England to help fight for the Light side, recognizing as few outsiders did the threat that Voldemort had posted not only to the UK, but to the world as a whole, for Wizards and Muggles alike. During Auror training, she'd met Seamus, and they'd fallen in love. A year into training, she became pregnant and dropped out. Seamus died when she was only three months along. Ron had taken care of her since then. And whether he liked it or not, she'd taken care of him, too, helped him to heal, helped him to run the twins' shop, held him as he cried. He was luckier than most, he knew - fate had seen fit to give him someone to help him through, someone for him in turn to help. They were two people in the same boat.

Arabella got up and began to fix something to eat at the stove, and he observed her silently. She had dark brown hair that fell to her waist and curled at the ends. Her skin glowed alabaster in the soft, winter moonshine. She had blue-grey eyes and a pretty smile. She barely came up to Ron's shoulder, and she'd been very skinny before the pregnancy. Because of this, she looked more like she was a carrying a Quaffle under her nightshirt than a baby.

It occurred to him then that what she was carrying inside of her was more than just a baby. It was the future. Life was going on. Going on without Seamus, Hermione, and the others. This child would forever change Arabella's life, as well as his own, as he had sworn to take care of her and the baby. A new life changed things just as much as a death did.

And this child would look to him for guidance and love. Ron would be the closest thing he or she had to a father. He or she - would it be a boy or a girl? Could he love it? Was he ready to take care of a child, to be a parent? He'd never really thought about it before. And it was a strange, surreal thought. Scary, too. But a small voice inside of him said, Yes, you are. You can do this. The voice sounded a lot like Hermione's.

Why did life have to move on? Why did things have to change? Why did he live, when she died? What purpose was there to still being alive? Did life . . . fate . . . whatever . . . did it still have more for him to do? Could he ever be in love and happy again? Was he at all happy to still be alive?

Yes . . . yes, you are, Ron. You will survive, the voice said.

The notion made his head swim, and he began to sip his tea again in an attempt to calm it. He could smell the chicken noodle soup Arabella was making now, and his stomach gave a bit of an involuntary grumble in response. He'd not had dinner that evening.

He watched her come back to the table carrying a tray with two steaming bowls on it. As he did so, for the first time he saw how truly beautiful she was. As was her bulging tummy. She'd pulled him through, even though he hadn't wanted to keep going. He could and would love this child, just as he now found he loved her.

Arabella sat one of the bowls down in front of him.

"Eat," she commanded in her quiet but firm way. She then returned to her seat across from him and began to eat from her own bowl.

"How did you know?"

"Because regardless of whether you miss a meal or not, you're always hungry, Ron. That's one thing I know for absolute certain. Always hungry, you are," she replied with a smirk and a raised eyebrow. He grinned, one of those genuine smiles he rarely had nowadays, and began to eat.

They ate in companionable silence for a few minutes before Ron spoke again.

"Thanks . . . for everything, Belle," he said quietly.

"What do you mean?" she asked.

"You've kept me going these past months. Made me eat . . . take care of myself . . . get back to work. You gave me someone to worry and care about other than myself. I wouldn't have made it otherwise. So . . . thanks," he said with a nod. For now, that was the best he could do to show her how he felt, and it was enough.

Tears filled her eyes, making them more blue than grey, and she reached across the table with the hand she wasn't using to eat and took his large hand in her own tiny one.

"Likewise," she whispered with another of her sweet smiles. He smiled back.

After a few moments, they went back to eating in silence, hands still clasped across the table.

Yes . . . everything was going to be just fine . . .

And this would be home again . . .