He hadn’t asked how Harry was doing. He had been afraid of what the answer might be. It had been well over twentyfour hours since it all had happened and now Ron wanted to know, he needed to know.
His mother had been in earlier but unfortunately he had slept through the entire visit, his mind and body still weak from the prolonged exposure to the Dementors. Now he was awake, desperate for answers yet there was no-one there to ask. It had begun to grow dark outside again. Ron didn’t have a clear idea what time it might be. His moments of clarity had been fleeting during his first number of hours that he lay in hospital.
Ron and Harry were similar in many respects; neither could be considered a genius when it came to study and school. Both struggled their way through many of their subjects. Each teenager had his own particular gifts, Harry was a particularly good flyer while Ron was no mean tactician, making him a natural at the game of chess. They saw eye to eye on most things which is what started them on the road to friendship, and by now had gone through enough dangers and adventures to make them firm and best friends.
However until Ron’s recent brush with the dementors, he had never fully appreciated what it might be like to be Harry. Now Ron could imagine better than anyone what it must be like to have as your worst memories the dying screams of your mother and the picture of your GodFather falling to his death through the veil in the Department of Mysteries. Never before had Ron wondered at what Harry’s worst fear might be. He had forgotten that the powers of the Dementors lay not only in their ability to make their victim relive their worst memories, but also their worst fears. He had forgotten until he had found himself faced with the terrifying power of the Dementors himself.
Ron considered getting out of bed and going to find out how Harry was doing, but didn’t know if his body had gained enough strength to stand on his own. And anyway he didn’t fancy wandering around the corridors. He might have bumped into Hermione and that was more than he could handle at the moment.
He hadn’t seen or spoken to her since that night he had woken to find her crying by his bedside. His mother had tried to talk to him about it, gently prying, trying to tell him that he should forgive Hermione, but Ron had remained resolute, saying he didn’t want to see her. He didn’t give his reasons, never openly blaming Hermione for what had happened, but he would not be swayed into seeing her.
His mother had obviously put it down to the fact that it was Hermione who had been the catalyst for everything that had happened even if it had not been of her own free will. She didn’t realise that it wasn’t a matter of forgiveness for Ron, it was a matter of fear.
Ron was still haunted by nightmares. He had not mentioned it to his mother, but knew from her concerned looks when he woke to find her by his bedside that she had witnessed his uneasy tossing and turning. He knew that she had begged the healers for a dreamless sleep potion to allow him to rest easier, but they had refused; in order to recover from the trauma that had happened, he needed to let his subconscious relive and accept it. And so Ron still found himself being woken repeatedly by his own shouts, his skin and hair soaked with sweat, his heart racing.
While he was still having nightmares, the subject of his nightmares had changed and Ron was now reliving his worst fear, the one that the Dementors had tortured him with. It was the fear that made him sweat and call out. It was the fear that translated itself into a nightmare that always ended the same way – Hermione was dead.
Ron tried not to think about it when he was awake, but at times like this when the ward was quiet and there was no one around, it filled his every thought. The nightmare was always the same. It started with an attack. There were death eaters everywhere firing spell after spell. He could see Hermione in the distance and desperately tried to get to her. It was then that the green light of the killing curse would brushe past him, hitting Hermione squarely in the chest…. The only elements of the dream that seemed to change were Ron’s attempts to reach her in time. No matter what he did differently however, the curse always hit her and Ron always woke up screaming her name.
That was the worst bit. At the moment it was okay, anyone who heard him calling out Hermione’s name would assume he was reliving the Dementor attack, not reliving his own private hell.
Ron remembered a time when giant spiders would have been his worst fear. That had all changed as adolescence had arrived, not to mention the return of Voldemort. At around the same time, two things had crystallised in his mind,
1. Hermione was not a boy (It had suddenly become obvious to his hormone infused brain) and
2. He couldn’t bear it if anything were to happen to her.
Being a teenager, more precisely a teenage boy, Ron didn’t equate his feelings to love. No. He didn’t know when exactly he had started to feel so protective of her. It had come on so gradually that he had hardly noticed. He put his slight infatuation with her down to hormones, and his worry for her safety down to the fact that she and he had been best friends for five years.
He had never truly realised that losing Hermione was his greatest fear, not until the Dementors had sorted through his memories and fears and seized upon that one.
Now Ron felt like a curtain had been drawn back from a part of his emotions that he had never seen or understood before. His feelings for Hermione ran deep and the realisation of this scared him.
So he had pushed her away, told everyone that he didn’t want to see her, told himself that it was just a phase and he would grow out of it.
He didn’t seem to realise the hurt he was causing Hermione. Her constant pleas to Mr and Mrs Weasley to talk to him appeared to be falling on Ron’s deaf ears. His parents had tried to make him see sense, and it broke their hearts to see Hermione’s heartbroken face then they would tell her yet again that Ron didn’t want to see her.
Ron sighed and closed his eyes, preparing himself for another broken sleep.
Hermione, being a teenage girl, and as such being that bit more perceptive of her own emotions as well as others, had recognised some time ago that she had feelings for the lanky redhead. Not wanting to make things awkward between them she had not acted upon those feelings. Knowing Ron as she did, she knew he would never figure out how she felt, (not without serious help anyway,) so maintaining the status quo of their relationship seemed like the sensible thing to do.
She had kept up this pretence for the past year, a flimsy house of cards designed to protect her from getting hurt if he ever found out she liked him, and to protect the friendship that she had with him, and that she valued so much.
The house of cards had blown away without offering any resistance when he had held her face in his hands that night after he had woken from his nightmare. He had looked into her eyes, and she knew, she just knew that he felt the same. It had lasted but an instant but it was enough. That was what made the current situation so much more terrible to bear.
Hermione had returned to the hospital corridor to enquire after Harry. She had given up asking for Ron, finding Mrs Weasley’s sympathetic looks too much to endure.
Remus had spent the afternoon talking to him about Sirius and aspects of Sirius’s life that Harry knew nothing about. Dumbledore had visited him again after this, and had seemed more content with Harry’s condition. He advised again that Harry was still gravely ill, but there was a seed of hope. Harry seemed to have risen slightly through to foggy depths of unconsciousness and appeared to be responding better to light stimulus.
Relieved with this slightly better outlook on Harry’s health. Hermione had sat for sometime listening to the others talking quietly as they continued to maintain their vigil outside Harry’s room. Ginny looked a little more at ease for the first time in days, and for the first time ever, Hermione began to realise just how strong Ginny’s feelings were for Harry. It was as if she was willing him to live, willing him to fight the darkness. She had taken to visiting him several times just to talk to him, to stroke his hair and tell him about all the great games of quidditch that they would have once he was better. Ginny never left his side without kissing him on the cheek and whispering in his ear that she would be back in no time.
Dumbledore watched this interaction unseen, and his worry seemed to ease a little every time he saw it. Harry, he felt, was getting ready to fight the darkness, it was just going to take a little more time, a little more patience on all their parts.
Hermione shook herself when she realised she had been staring at Ginny, who was looking at her quizzically with a smile on her face. Hermione smiled back, and making a private resolution, she rose from her seat and walked down the corridor until she stood, hesitant in front of the door leading to Ron’s ward.