It puzzles me when people cite LOTR as the standard of “simple” or “predictable” or “black and white” fantasy. Because in my copy, the hero fails. Frodo chooses the Ring, and it’s only Gollum’s own desperation for it that inadvertently saves the day. The fate of the world, this whole blood-soaked war, all the millennia-old machinations of elves and gods, comes down to two addicts squabbling over their Precious, and that is precisely and powerfully Tolkien’s point.
And then the hero goes home, and finds home a smoking desolation, his neighbors turned on one another, that secondary villain no one finished off having destroyed Frodo’s last oasis not even out of evil so much as spite, and then that villain dies pointlessly, and then his killer dies pointlessly. The hero is left not with a cathartic homecoming, the story come full circle in another party; he is left to pick up the pieces of what was and what shall never be again.
And it’s not enough. The hero cannot heal, and so departs for the fabled western shores in what remains a blunt and bracing metaphor for death (especially given his aged companions). When Sam tells his family, “Well, I’m back” at the very end, it is an earned triumph, but the very fact that someone making it back qualifies as a triumph tells you what kind of story this is: one that is too honest to allow its characters to claim a clean victory over entropy, let alone evil.
“I can’t recall the taste of food, nor the sound of water, nor the touch of grass. I’m naked in the dark. There’s nothing–no veil between me and the wheel of fire. I can see him with my waking eyes.”
So where’s this silly shallow hippie fever-dream I’ve heard so much about? It sounds like a much lesser story than the one that actually exists.
+1
You know how Frodo leaves Sam with the legacy of the quest – the job of bearing witness to what happened – and the duty to finish and protect his writings?
Tolkien lost all but one of his friends in WW1. He was founder member of a literary club at school – the TCBS. There was a larger group and a core of four. They all stayed friends, they kept writing and sharing their work with each other. And they were almost all killed. One of them, Geoffrey Smith, wrote this to Tolkien in 1916.
My chief consolation is that if I am scuppered tonight – I am off on duty in a few minutes – there will still be left a member of the great T.C.B.S. to voice what I dreamed and what we all agreed upon. […] May God bless you my dear John Ronald and may you say things I have tried to say long after I am not there to say them if such be my lot.
And that was his last letter. There’s something eerie about the way he seems to have pegged Tolkien as an eventual survivor.Sam’s survival (and his emergence as the true hero of the book) are beautiful because they’re suffused with loss, because they’re not the grand conquering heroic narrative that on some level was “supposed” to happen.
Tolkien possibly only survived because he got trench fever – a particularly nasty disease carried by lice – and got sent home because he was desperately ill. Considering how the rest of his unit fared, it probably saved his life. Unpleasant and unglamorous, but if not for that, we wouldn’t have LOTR. I’m sure survivor’s guilt was a factor – as was a sickening sense of dread when “The War to End All Wars” didn’t, and his son went off to WWII.
TLOTR has some of the type of valorization of war that you find in the Old Norse and Anglo-Saxon literature that JRRT loved and studied and taught because he loved that style and it’s deeply fitting for cultures like the Rohirrim, but it’s also full of the slog of war, the waste and tragedy, and the irrevocable damage that even victorious survivors carry for the rest of their lives. Frodo’s symbolic “death” is also resonant for survivors of what was called “shell-shock” then and PTSD now.
I mean, it’s not Game of Thrones. It’s not gritty in the same way. But the protagonist of LOTR was minor gentry from a backwater nobody’d heard of, and the REAL hero who saved the world by saving him was his gardener. All the great kings and queens and lords and ladies in the story are background characters compared to the story of the little people. Literally little people, but symbolically too.
I could never have loved the Lord of the Rings if not for the Hobbits.
Tag: tw: trauma
I don’t think Grinston is a thing but if it was I’d feel pretty meh. But Emma’s said in interviews she wasn’t really interested in former HP costars. I get it, imagine if you ended up with someone you’d known since primary school? It happens but not often imo. Tangent: do you ever sort of feel that the epilogue couples were a bit unrealistic? I find it difficult to believe every one of the characters ended up with someone from school. I understand the narrative resolution but still.
Apparently, it is a thing. People I follow on here often reblog posts tagged with it (although, for obvious reasons, that’s not why I follow them). I’m pretty meh about it as well. No disrespect to people who do ship it, but it’s not my thing.
I can’t say I blame Emma Watson for making that clear in interviews. They were all growing up in the public spotlight, and the media does take an (in my view, anyway) unhealthy interest in the love lives of young actors, especially the female actors. I remember (with disgust) that a British tabloid published a weekly countdown to the day Emma Watson reached the age of sexual consent. It was disgusting to see that in the public spotlight.
Heck, the one time she did admit to having a small childhood crush on a co-star (Tom Felton, to be precise), the media went hay-wire over it. Tom Felton’s girlfriend even got hate-mail and online abuse over it from people who shipped Emma Watson with Tom. Tom and his girlfriend ended up breaking up (not sure if it was because of that, but it might have been a factor), and apparently him and Emma aren’t as close anymore because of it (at least, according to what I’ve heard).
I think some people like to imagine that the actors are similar to their characters in that way; that they’ll develop feelings for their co-stars in the same way that their characters do for the other characters. But real life often doesn’t work out that way.
Like I said, I’m not going to hate on people who ship it, but it’s not my cup of tea. Especially if it impacts on real-life friendships and relationships.
But onto your second question. I personally like Ron and Hermione as an end pairing, since I think they genuinely work well as a couple. They’re a couple I can see being in it for the long hail, since their personalities mesh so well. And they’re not just two random teens falling in love either; they are best friends who’ve known each-other since they were children.
Sure; it might be a little bit of a stretch to assume Hermione’s rough edges became softened over time, but I think that it is possible for those.
Harry and Ginny, though….?
I’m not sure. I guess I’ve never really been as interested in them as a couple compared to Ron and Hermione. I personally don’t mind Harry and Ginny as a couple, but I’m not really fussed when I see them paired with other people either. I’m pretty vocal about my enjoyment of the Luna x Ginny and Luna x Harry pairings.
In terms of personalities, I think Harry and Ginny work okay, but their personalities don’t mesh as well as Ron and Hermione do (at least, in my opinion). Ginny’s got a fiery spirit; much like Harry does. I guess I always thought they’d both need someone with a more calming presence around them. That’s why I like the idea of a Luna, Harry and Ginny poly relationship.
There is also the slightly-problematic aspects of Ginny and Harry’s relationship; the ‘does Ginny love Harry or the-boy-who-lived’ conundrum which many in the fandom discuss, the fact that the build-up to their relationship is very subtle compared to Ron and Hermione’s, and the issue that (aside from being the man Ginny loves) what does Harry actually offer her in a relationship? It’s a complex set of issues which I personally don’t feel comfortable discussing, as I can hardly give the pairing a fair reading. I’ll leave that to people who are more interesting in the pairing.
Not ALL of Harry’s fellow students married each-other. Luna married Rolf Scamander; someone who never appears in the fandom. Cho Chang married a non-magic person (the only person of that generation to be explicitly stated as having done that). Presumably, background characters’ post-second war lives were never really discussed. It is possible that shared experiences in war creates bonds with people that can’t really be replicated with anyone-else.
Thanks for the message, @albus-dumblewhore; hope that answered your questions!
Lol I know it’s a ship, I just don’t think it’s a thing IRL, that’s all.
I remembered about Luna and Rolf, I just wonder where they would’ve met if not at Hogwarts? It seems like everyone with the exception of Cho and Percy married someone they knew in school in some capacity. I can’t think of anyone else, a lot of the post-grad pairings haven’t been touched on so far as I know.
I like Ron and Hermione as a couple, I just wonder how realistic a lot of the main post-war pairings are. There’s a case to be made for the bond between those who have suffered a significant amount of turmoil together, certainly, but whether or not it’s particularly healthy or realistic is certainly up for debate. I don’t imagine any of the relationships between Hogwarts students who survived the second war would be free from complications, but I also concede that in terms of children’s/YA literature the purpose is not necessarily to convey realism to the audience.
It sort of makes discussions regarding “problematic” stuff in the series difficult imo, mostly because I feel certain character flaws are generally blown out of proportion or taken out of context. Most of the flaws in each character are there on purpose to either make them a more realistic character or to exemplify larger issues in wizarding society ie the allegory for our own, re: Ron’s prejudices toward werewolves or half-giants (revealed upon his initial discoveries of Lupin and Hagrid’s heretiges respectively). I also see people really tearing Hermione apart for keeping Rita Skeeter in a jar in book 4, and honestly I don’t read too much into things like that. It’s not because I’m not a critical reader, more that the purpose of things like that seems to me to be intended as silly, funny bits that aren’t meant to be taken so seriously.
So when it comes to analyzing ships, there are a lot of things from the epilogue I’m not sure I agree with, but I also concede that A) no fan would ever have been 100% satisfied with the canon conclusions, full stop and B) a lot of times with children’s literature it’s important not to fall down the rabbit hole and overshadow the real problems with the text with more passive issues that aren’t necessarily meant to be interpreted in a positive way.
In terms of post-war traumatic bonds… I have PTSD, and one of the things I love about the series is the child-friendly portrayal of trauma. That being said, while I understand it’s possible, in my irl experience with the illness I find that the way my trauma shapes my relationships is not particularly health roughly 99% of the time. I don’t take tons of issue with the canon ships because it’s not a hill I necessarily want to die on, I just wonder what would’ve happened if Harry had been allowed to take a bit of a vacation from being a wizard cop and making babies and he’d had a bit more time to… idk, reflect. Heal. 🤷🏻♀️ that’s what fic is for I suppose
Everything Comes to Light
Title: Everything Comes to Light
Prompt: Random Words (Lumos)
Description: Realizations happen in the dead of night at The Burrow. Post DH.
Author: @jdaisyj
Rating: T (mild language)
“Lumos.”
The fifth floor landing lit up softly from the glow of Ron’s wand as he stood outside of his bedroom door, his gaze fixed at the darkened staircase ahead.
“What do you reckon?” Harry’s whispered words directly over his shoulder were so quiet that they’d have gone utterly missed had it not been so silent in the house around them.
“Don’t know. I know I heard something though.”
The pair stood in the doorway, the hair standing up on the back of Ron’s neck. He KNEW he’d heard something. What the hell it was he couldn’t say, but it had woken him from a dead sleep and sent ice through his veins.
Then, from somewhere several floors below, there it was again. So soft that it was barely perceptible, but it had Ron moving instantly – Harry following without question on his heels despite the fact that he had no idea what the hell they were charging toward.
Ron took the fourth floor landing at a jump, the sound growing louder, striking his heart like an anvil. He couldn’t get his legs to move fast enough and he had to fight down cold panic from making his feet numb.
Harry’s heart slammed against his ribs as they finally got close enough for him to be able to tell what the soft, muffled noise was.
“Holy shit, is that Hermione?”
They’d reached the third floor now and Harry was struck by the fact that he could only really tell that the sound had been sobbing within the last few steps. How the hell Ron had even heard it, let alone had known to take action was a complete mystery.
His thoughts were fleeting however, as the moment Ron burst into the room – wand held high – the sight that met them was as unexpected as it was heartbreaking.
Their other best friend was sitting on the floor beside her bed hugging her knees to her chin, her too thin frame wracked with sobs. She looked as if she had no idea they’d just burst into the room with wands out as her sad, haunted gaze stayed fixed to a point on the floor in front of her. She looked utterly lost.
Ron dropped his wand the moment he saw her and bee-lined it straight for her, the fear of a specific threat gone and his focus square on Hermione.
Harry stopped in the doorway, watching helplessly as Ron dropped to his knees in front of her – his large hands immediately grasping her upper arms softly, rubbing up and down in an effort to soothe her.
“Shhhh, love, what happened? What’s wrong?”
As if only noticing he was there in the moment he spoke, Hermione’s eyes met Ron’s for the first time since they’d entered the room.
Her reaction was instantaneous. As if she was scrambling for the last life boat off of a sinking ship, she threw herself at Ron with a force that knocked him backward.
Throwing one arm around her and another behind himself so he didn’t fall completely onto his back, he landed squarely on his bum and braced as she climbed into his lap, throwing her arms around him and burying her face in his neck.
“I’m so sorry, Ron. I tried, I tried.”
Ron lifted the hand that had braced their fall and stroked it lovingly over her hair. Harry wasn’t sure if he was even conscious of the fact that he’d started rocking her gently. She looked so tiny in his long arms.
“What are you talking about, love? What do you mean you tried?”
Her voice cracked with sobs. “I close my eyes and I see her, laughing over me. I… I see all of them. Everyone’s d-dying and we’re next and I can’t be strong like you and Harry need me to be, I can’t! I’m s-so sorry, Ron.”
Ron pulled back slightly, dropping his hand from her hair to her cheek with a tenderness Harry had never seen from him.
“The only thing we need you to be is alive, ‘Mione. Alive and here with us.” His voice dropped to the merest whisper. “Here with me.”
Hermione’s grip tightened around Ron and he kissed her, the barest brush of lips across her temple, before he buried his face in her mass of wildly curling hair.
“I love you, Hermione. You’ve taken care of us this far. It’s my turn now.”
Harry’s eyes went wide as Hermione’s sobs began to quiet.
Holy shit. Love.
He knew Ron loved Hermione, knew they’d both loved each other for so many years that it was simultaneously amusing and infuriating that they’d both stubbornly refused to take the risk and admit it to one another. He just had no idea that those days of longing stares and jealous rows were over. Finally.
“Shit – I thought she’d be fine for awhile, she was sleeping so soundly when I left.”
Harry glanced over his shoulder to see Ginny standing behind him in the doorway.
“What do you mean, ‘fine for awhile?’”
Ginny shuffled her feet and looked down, her entire demeanor uncharacteristically guilty. “She practically ordered me not to say anything. You know how…authoritative…she can be.”
Harry saw movement out of the corner of his eye and turned toward his friends again in time to see Ron stand up, cradling Hermione in his arms as if she weighed nothing. Hermione’s face stayed burrowed in his neck.
Turning toward the door, he took a step toward Ginny. “She’s not sleeping, is she.”
He’d posed it as a statement, not a question. Ginny glanced at Hermione, torn between loyalty to her friend and loyalty to her brother. Blood clearly won out as she met Ron’s eyes and shook her head.
“She wakes up a few times a night. Nightmares.”
Ron’s expression darkened. “Meet me in the kitchen. This isn’t over.”
Confusion knit Ginny’s eyebrows as her brother pushed past her, a now still and quiet Hermione Granger in his arms.
“Wait, where are you taking her?”
Ron didn’t bother to stop as he responded quietly on his way up the stairs. “She’s sleeping in my room. We tried it mum’s way, now we’re trying it mine.”
Slowly making his way up the steps, he turned onto the fourth floor landing and began his ascent up the last flight as Hermione nuzzled her nose into his neck, causing goose flesh to erupt up and down his arms.
“I’m so embarrassed.”
Ron scoffed, “Yeah, being human is so ridiculous of you.”
To his extreme relief, he felt her lips lift in a small smile against his neck just as he’d made it back to his own doorway. He held onto that relief as a means of blocking all of the other sensations that assailed him whenever she was this close. When he could feel her lips and breath against his skin.
It wasn’t time to focus on that right now. It was time to take care of her, like he’d just promised. Though, if he was being honest, he’d made that promise in his mind the night they’d escaped Malfoy Manor.
He would never let her suffer again. He’d spend his life ensuring her safety.
The Chudley Cannons zoomed in and out of their posters around the room, tossing a quaffle spiritedly and narrowly missing a very determined bludger as Ron carried Hermione the few remaining feet to his bed and laid her down on it.
She watched as he sat down beside her and reached for his blankets, pulling them up around her as he tucked her in.
She was struck with just how much he was like his mother in this way. When someone was important to him, he took care of them. It was so very Ron that she allowed herself to sink down into his mattress, her heart filling up as she watched him adjust his bedding around her.
Reaching out, she took one of his fussing hands into hers – his clear, blue eyes lifting to her own.
“I love you, Ron.”
She’d told him for the first time between soft kisses in his four poster after the final battle and had told him almost daily in the week and a half since, but she never grew tired of watching his eyes melt every time she said it.
“I love you too.”
He leaned down and brushed a soft kiss to her lips, then another – his full mouth lingering on hers with each pass.
He could spend hours, days, kissing this woman. She was so warm and her scent filled his nostrils when he was this close, making his head spin. It still floored him that he could do this. That he was finally allowed to show her and tell her how much he loved her. How much he wanted her.
Lifting his hand to brush his fingertips lovingly down her warm cheek, he deepened the kiss for the merest second – torturing himself with the taste and feel of her tongue against his own- before pulling back and gazing into her impossibly intelligent eyes. They glittered up at him with such love and trust that he couldn’t help wondering for the millionth time how he’d gotten this lucky.
Lifting his hand again to gently brush her hair back from her forehead, he smiled softly down at her. “Sleep. I’m going down for tea, I’ll bring you up a cup.”
She snorted haughtily, the sound encouraging him about her mental state the way nothing else could. “You’re going down to interrogate your sister, you mean. Don’t you dare try and bully her, Ronald Weasley. I didn’t want everyone worrying about me while there were so many other things to worry about and she was only doing what I asked. If you so much as cock an eyebrow at -”
“Oi, settle down before you start shaking the walls you nutter, I get it.”
They stared at each other for a beat before he dropped another quick kiss to her lips and stood up.
“Be back in a tick.”
“Hurry.”
With a lopsided smile, he turned and left the room – their casual intimacy soothing a heart that had yearned for exactly this, with no hope of it actually happening, for so many years that he didn’t know if he’d ever get over the fact that it actually had.
Harry and Ginny were sitting across from one another at the table, half drunk cups of tea in their hands, by the time he made it into the kitchen.
“I laid your cup out. Water’s hot.” Ginny said, watching him warily.
“Cheers.” He walked across the room to make his cup, his back to the newly reunited couple. When he spoke, his voice was quiet.
“How bad has it been, Gin?”
Ginny watched her brother as he turned slowly and made his way to the table with his cup, sitting beside Harry. His demeanor was casual, but she knew her closest sibling too well. When it came to Hermione, casual was the last thing he was.
With a final pang in her stomach at betraying her friend’s secret, she decided they’d already seen enough on their own for the jig to be good and up. It would be far more helpful for Hermione to just tell them the truth, like she’d wanted to from the beginning.
“It hasn’t been great. Some nights she just wakes up and sits by the window to read for a bit. Other nights she wakes up screaming. There are times when I have to try and rouse her out of a dream. Those are the worst. She can’t seem to bring herself out of it on her own and it takes her ages to calm down once she’s properly awake.”
Leaning back, she crossed her arms in front of herself, the concerned look on her face melting slightly to one of mild surprise. “It usually takes me awhile to calm her down afterwards. You managed it far quicker than I ever have.”
Ron’s eyebrows shot up, the idea that Hermione had been suffering for almost two weeks when he could have easily been doing something about it making his stomach ache. “Why the bloody hell is this the first I’m hearing about this?”
Ginny threw her hands into the air in exasperation. “I told you Ron, she forbade me to say anything. Do you think I wanted ‘sneak’ written across my forehead for all time?”
Ron leaned his face closer to her across the table, his eyebrows slammed down into a dangerous scowl. “No – I mean, why haven’t Harry or I heard her having one of these nightmares before tonight?”
His sister sighed. “She wards the room every night before bed. Seriously, a silencing charm would be enough, but she throws up some serious magic.”
Ron raked his hands over his tired face, the ache in his stomach growing. She was warding the room as if the war was still raging and she was still in that sodding tent. She’d been scared shitless for days and where had he been? Sleeping up in his comfortable bed with no clue that the love of his life was suffering.
Ginny’s heart went out to the agonized expression on her brother’s face as she continued on. “She was out like a light tonight, fell asleep with a book across her chest. I took the charms down off of the room so I could nip down here for a quick snack and be able to get back in. I honestly thought she’d be fine, she seemed to be sleeping so deeply.” Her own eyebrows lowered in confusion as she regarded her brother. “I didn’t even hear her, how the hell did you?”
Harry turned from his tea to look at Ron. He’d had the exact same question.
“Dunno. Guess I sleep lighter these days.”
From the slight blush that crept up his red-haired friend’s neck and lit up his ears, Harry’s suspicions were confirmed. Ron was completely gone over Hermione, so much so that he was utterly in tune with her, even when they weren’t together. Maybe it was a wizard thing or maybe this was just how love was when it ran as deep as his clearly did. Whatever the reason, Harry knew for a fact that there would be no going back. His two best friends in the world belonged to each other now.
Ginny seemed to come to the same conclusion and her lips curled in a teasing sneer that only a sibling could master. “You sleep like troll and you know it.” Her eyes rolled dramatically. “Ugh, you’re so disgustingly in love it makes me want to vomit.”
Ron’s ears were crimson, but his mouth turned up in a surprisingly good natured grin given that he’d never really responded to teasing all that favorably. “You’re one to talk, d’you think I don’t have ears? What was that I heard mum shrieking at you for yesterday? Something about you and some poncy savior of the wizarding world in the broom shed?”
It was Harry’s face now that went up in flames as the mortification of the day before came back at him in full force. Ginny’s face was the color of her hair.
“Shut it, you enormous arse.”
Ron leaned back in triumph, knowing he’d scored a checkmate.
Harry cleared his throat. “Well, think that’s my cue to head back to bed.”
Ginny rolled her eyes with a soft smile. “Coward.”
The boys chuckled as Ron flicked his wand toward the cupboard, sending Hermione’s favorite cup toward the kettle on the stove to be filled. Ginny moved toward the stairs, Harry at her heels to say goodnight and he turned to the tea steeping on the counter to give them a bit of privacy.
He couldn’t help but smile at how easily Harry and Ginny had been able to fall back together. As he heard the unmistakable sound of a chaste peck on the lips behind him, he couldn’t think of anyone who would love her more or treat her better. Still didn’t mean he wouldn’t hex his best friend’s bollocks right off if he hurt her.
Turning around once he heard Ginny start back toward her room, he met Harry’s eyes for a moment before he shifted them away from Ron to glance around the room, his hands going awkwardly into the pockets of the sweatpants he’d been sleeping in.
“So, you reckon I should kip down here on the sofa?”
Ron looked at him in confusion before realization hit him and his eyes softened. Harry was trying to give them time alone. As tempting as the idea was to have Hermione all to himself for the night, he walked toward their mutual best friend and clapped him on the shoulder.
“Nah, come back up to mine. Hermione’ll feel safer with both of us there and if mum figures out that I’ve got her in my bed she’ll be less likely to go completely spare if we’re chaperoned.”
Harry smirked and the two boys began making their way up.
“So, you and Hermione? I mean, I knew there was some sort of understanding when she spent the night in your bed after the battle and the big mid fight snog, but when we got here she’s stayed with Ginny and you guys have played it so cool. You’re properly together now?”
Ron smiled softly. “You could say that.”
Harry still couldn’t get over how love struck his friend looked. He’d had a front row seat to the entire Lavender debacle in sixth year. He’d never once seen this look on Ron’s face when he talked about his bubbly, blonde girlfriend. He supposed it shouldn’t surprise him now though. He’d be lying if he said he hadn’t seen Ron look this way about Hermione before. If he thought hard about it, he could probably find instances of it from as far back as second year.
The pair walked on, passing Ginny’s room and beginning the climb to the fourth floor.
“That’s excellent, Ron. Long time coming.”
Ron smirked. “You could say that too.” His expression grew serious and when he spoke again, his words were quiet and utterly sincere. “Not to sound like a total git, but I’m marrying her, Harry.”
Harry stopped in his tracks, forcing Ron to do the same. “What? When?”
Ron shrugged. “Dunno yet. Someday. Hopefully sooner rather than later. I’ve waited for her longer than I’d even like to admit. After everything we’ve survived, I don’t wanna wait anymore. I love her, Harry. No point in waiting when that’s not ever gonna change.”
Harry felt his face split into a grin and he started walking again, Ron following suit. His thoughts flashed instantly to Ginny and he realized he felt
exactly the same way about her. There was no reason not to be together anymore – really and truly together. Isn’t that what they’d fought for? The right to live their lives how they wanted? She had a year left of school, they’d have to take things a little slower for now, but Harry knew that twenty years from now he’d wake up and it would be her face gazing at him across the pillow. He was suddenly anxious for that to start as soon as possible.They reached the bedroom and the boys peered in carefully, Ron’s wand again casting a soft light inside so they could see. Hermione was fast asleep, her bushy hair laying in a mess of curls all over Ron’s pillow as she clutched his quilt beneath her chin. The expression on her face was serene and content and it warmed Harry’s heart to see that she clearly loved Ron as much as he loved her. Being in his bed, surrounded no doubt by his smell, obviously comforted her in a way that nothing else had been able to.
Setting her tea down on his nightstand, he lowered himself into the bed beside her, gathering her in his arms as he lay down on his back. She didn’t hesitate to roll toward him and snuggle up on his chest, her hand gripping the fabric of his t-shirt gently as she continued to sleep peacefully. Ron let his eyes drift closed at the utter contentment he felt with her in his arms. He didn’t care what he had to do, they wouldn’t be spending another night apart. Not ever again.
Harry settled into the cot and the boys looked at one another with a smile.
“Night, mate.”
“G’night, Ron.”
“Nox.”
THIS IS BEAUTIFUL!
Headcanonsandmore 