#ron

You put your pen down and lean back with satisfaction. Merlin, you’ve done it. All your work is complete. There’s nothing particularly pressing to study for, no more essays in need of revising, and your readings are all complete and ready with notes for their respective classes. If you didn’t know better, you’d say you’ve actually earned some time off.

For a Ravenclaw, that’s no easy feat. You swear your professors pile on extra work when they have a room full of blue-robed students in front of them, something about wanting to challenge their brightest students to their greatest potential. As any true Ravenclaw, you do find your work fascinating, but you wouldn’t mind a break every now and again.

And, for once in your storied academic career, you’ve actually managed to earn yourself one. Stars above, you think the last time you were this caught up on your work was first year. You look out the library window happily. The sun is shining still, and the weather charms you’ve cast all promise clear skies for the next few days. Maybe you’ll take a book out to read on the grounds, or walk around the lake for a bit–

All of a sudden, your view of your perfectly free afternoon is blocked by someone slumping down in the chair opposite you. Your forehead creases and you try to peek around them still, but one look at Ron Weasley and you know you won’t be getting off that easy. You fight a tortured sigh. Ron may be staring at you beseechingly, but surely your perfect afternoon isn’t gone quite yet. Maybe he’s just here because he’s lost and he needs directions to the Quidditch pitch. Why else would he be in the library? 

The only other times you see Ron between these hallowed bookshelves are when he’s trying to hunt down clues with Harry Potter about whatever dangerous thing is currently terrorizing your school, or otherwise trailing after Hermione and begging her to do his homework. Only, you haven’t seen Hermione in here for a while, which means that he’s probably moved onto a new target.

You cast a terrified glance Ron’s way. You’ve hardly interacted with Ron the whole time you’ve been at school, and can count on one hand the number of times you’ve spoken over the past years. Surely, if he wanted to dump his schoolwork on someone, he’d pick a victim whose name he knew, right? And that isn’t you, right?

Ron still hasn’t moved, and the hopeful possibility that he might be here for someone else grows more slim with every passing moment. Still, you try anyway. “Are you here looking for Hermione?” You ask desperately.

Ron shakes his head quickly, sending tousled copper locks flying. “No, no. I actually wanted to talk to you, Y/N.”

Hex and double hex. He knows your name after all. Steeling yourself, you ask, “Why did you want to see me?”

Ron nods slowly, clearly glad you haven’t chased him off quite yet. “I need your help with class.”

“What class?” You ask airily, trying to pretend as if your hopes of a work-free afternoon aren’t vanishing by the minute. “I’m sure you’ve got tons of friends in all of them.”

Ron scratches his head, looking up at you bashfully. “Well, that’s the thing. I’m having trouble following the lectures but I go to my friends on so much stuff that I think they’re going to get sick of me if I keep asking. Besides, Harry’s not much better. We’d just be clueless together.”

“The blind leading the blind,” you murmur sadly, half to yourself. “If this is about homework help, I still think Hermione would be a better bet–”

“I don’t want your homework answers,” Ron says in a rush, clearly anticipating this. “I just want– I need someone to help explain some of the concepts, that’s all. Like, tutoring, I think?”

He whispers ‘tutor’ as if it were a dirty word, and you suppose to a Gryffindor, it might be. You’re certainly staring at him as if he’s lost his marbles. “Why do you want me to tutor you?”

Ron flushes. “I know we haven’t exactly talked a whole lot before, but you’re super smart, everyone says it. Besides, I felt safe asking you, I guess. I see you in class, half the time you’re just staring out the window like me but you manage to get good grades even despite zoning out. I want to know how you do it.”

You feel your own face starting to heat up. You won’t deny that you appreciate the compliment to your intelligence, but his observation of you losing focus in the lecture hall isn’t off the mark, either. You try to pay attention in class, really, you do, it just happens that so much of what the professors say on a day to day basis isn’t entirely useful for completing your assignments. The teaching staff clearly love what they do, and they can go on rambling detours that never come up again. You’ve gotten a rough sense of what information is useful and what isn’t, the rest can be tuned out once it’s clear it isn’t important. Besides, the grounds of Hogwarts are beautiful, much prettier than a stuffy classroom, and–

“I’ll help,” you say, surprising both Ron and yourself. “It’s just about paying attention to the right things, that’s all. I’m sure you’ll pick it up quickly.”

“Great,” Ron says, cracking a broad grin. “I’m excited to learn the Y/N Method.”

You chuckle in spite of yourself. “It’s just a few tricks I picked up, nothing special.”

“I’d argue with that,” Ron says wryly. “From my point of view, it looks pretty special indeed.”

The desk in front of you suddenly demands all of your attention, and you stare earnestly at the completed page of Charms writing as you mumble, “It’ll wear off once we start working.”

“Agree to disagree,” Ron says glibly, and for some reason that makes your stomach do a slow loop in your chest. “I’ll see you tomorrow morning, then? If that works for you?”

“Sure,” you say before you can stop yourself. “See you then.”

Ron flashes you one last smile, then disappears from the library as if being there too long is physically painful. You watch him go and try to remind yourself that he’s only doing this to save his grade, that he’s picked you on a whim. It doesn’t entirely stick in your head.

You’re only half certain that Ron is actually going to follow through with this, but sure enough, the redhead comes traipsing up to your table the next morning. You’ve opted for a secluded desk in an empty classroom, giving you plenty of space to spread out your books and even draw on the blackboard if need be.

Ron glances around curiously as he takes a seat opposite you. “Nice place to study. Though I guess I’m used to seeing more people in here at a time.”

You shake your head dismissively. “I think they use this room for fifth-year History of Magic study hall, but they won’t host that class for another few hours. We’ll have plenty of time. Plus, I figured you wouldn’t mind avoiding any onlookers.”

That thought had occurred to you this morning, that Ron might be embarrassed to be seen tutoring you. He’s got loads of brothers, he probably doesn’t want to get noticed by any of them, certainly not with you.

However, Ron just looks confused. “I don’t care about them. ‘Sides, they’d probably be jealous I managed to convince you to do this.”

You look at him, surprised. “Jealous? Why’s that?”

Ron’s eyes widen like saucers. “What? No reason. It’s because you’re, uh, smart! Yeah, you’re super smart. They’re jealous that my grades are going to be good.”

He nods hastily, and you have to bite back a smile. “Well, I’m happy you believe in me. For what it’s worth, I think you’re a pretty clever guy, too.”

Ron scoffs. “You wouldn’t say that if you saw my Potions essay. I think there’s more red ink after Snape’s done grading than my actual writing.”

You lift a shoulder in a casual shrug. “Well, maybe I’ve got you beat in the classroom, but from what I hear you’ve been in plenty of scary situations. You’ve got to think quickly on your feet to survive half the stuff you have.”

Ron brightens. “You really think so?”

“I do,” you answer honestly, “Unfortunate that most of our grading comes from essays, not defensive practicums, then.”

“Yeah,” Ron agrees fervently. “I don’t think there’s any way to make spellwork as interesting as fighting Dark magic.”

“I wouldn’t be too sure about that,” you reply.

Ron gives you a highly doubtful look. “You can’t be serious.”

“I am,” you say crisply. “Here, I’ll convince you.”

With that, you start your first tutoring session with Ron. By the end of it, you’re not sure he’s entirely swayed to your point of view, but he has got the hang of a few tricky Transfigurations and his notes for the latest Potions assignment are greatly improved, so you’d consider that a win. Better yet, he’s actually smiling ear to ear as he leaves, not cursing your name and running for the hills. In fact, he even goes so far as to ask if you can do the same thing in a few days.

You agree, and let him walk you to your next class; Divination, which the two of you have together. One of your friends from Ravenclaw gives you a stunned look as you slide into your usual seat next to her. “Were you just with Ron Weasley? Since when have you hung out with Gryffindor athletes?”

“Shut up,” you tell her matter-of-factly.

Your friend stares, baffled, between you and Ron, who’s gone over to sit with Harry in a nearby corner. “No, seriously. He was laughing. I didn’t predict the two of you getting on together in my last tea leaf reading.”

“I’m going to predict your imminent doom in my next tea leaf reading if you don’t drop it,” you say tartly.

Your friend has the presence of mind to change the subject, although she does keep eyeing Ron, who for some reason has started grinning as he buffs up his crystal ball with the edge of his sleeve.

Ron meets you at the end of the week, griping about Binns’ inability to be interesting for once in his already-over life, and the next week, too, where he goes on for quite a while about the seemingly identical swishes and flicks Flitwick is having you all memorize for an upcoming exam. For someone who’s seemingly so annoyed about schoolwork, though, he does seem to spend an awful lot of time in tutoring, and he has this habit of making jokes and then looking up at you with big, hopeful eyes to make sure you laugh.

And laugh you do, more than you expected. Ron has a way of making you smile even in spite of yourself. Your friends have started to comment on your recent swing of good moods, but you just shrug and say that you’ve been doing well in your classes. They accept that reason well enough.

It’s not just you who’s been doing well in class, though. To the great surprise of his friends and himself, Ron has been steadily improving in his schoolwork, consistently pulling decent grades out of seemingly nowhere. He’s not getting perfect scores, but he’s understanding the material more than he ever did before. The professors have started to notice, too; after Ron earns three straight ‘Exceeds Expectations’ on Charms assignments without ever having to bug Hermione for free answers, Flitwick passes by your desk at the end of class and mutters, “Ten points to Ravenclaw.”

You glance at him in surprise. “For what?”

He just smiles. “A Ravenclaw ready and excited to share their wit with the other Houses is an excellent example of our students indeed. Well done with your tutoring, I am sure Mr. Weasley appreciates the help.”

You stare at him incredulously. “Thank you, sir, but how did you know it was me?”

Professor Flitwick looks around the room serenely. “A wizard never tells. Unless it is to help someone learn, of course.”

With that, he walks away, leaving you to wonder about just how obvious you’ve been with your happiness over Ron’s success. That happiness starts to come with some trepidation later on, though, as during your most recent tutoring session, it occurs to you that Ron may not want to keep this up forever.

He had come in happy, brandishing a Potions practicum write-up with an ‘E’ written regretfully across the front. “Snape looked like he wanted to murder me when he handed it over, but look at that! Merlin, a few more of these and I’ll be set for life. Maybe I’ll start tutoring you.”

Something in his wording gives you pause. “You’re happy with your grades, then?”

“More than happy,” Ron says gleefully. “Never thought I’d see stuff like this in my life. Mum’s over the moon, keeps writing about how I might make Prefect with grades like these.”

A weight settles over your chest. “Does that mean you feel like you’re done with tutoring? If you’re happy with your results?”

Ron glances up slowly from his paper, registering at last that the look on your face isn’t as pleased as his. “Well, I guess. You’re probably busy anyway, wouldn’t want to bother you.”

“Wasn’t a bother,” you murmur under your breath. “I liked doing it.”

“So did I,” Ron says back hesitantly. “But you’re right, I should quit while I’m ahead.”

Although he just got here, Ron shoots to his feet, and stares at you awkwardly for a few moments before raising his hand. “I’ll, uh, see you around, then?”

“Yeah,” you whisper back.

Ron hangs out for a second longer, as if waiting for something that never comes, then turns and slowly slinks out of the room. You watch him go, feeling as if you’ve lost something you could never get back. This moment was always going to come, you knew that, and if it wasn’t now it would be later in the year when the Quidditch season kicked up in earnest. Still, it hurts even more than you expected.

You sit there, all alone in your little classroom. You don’t have any work to do, you wrapped up your essays and practices earlier today in anticipation of today’s tutoring session, but the time off doesn’t fill you with the same joy as it had several weeks ago. Instead, you just feel lonely, wishing there was someone else here who would make you laugh and smile at you over quiz questions on the ingredients of a Pepperup Potion.

You’re starting to discover that you’ve really blown everything when footsteps echo in the hallway outside, and all of a sudden Ron is back again, pushing himself through the doorway and up to you again.

“I just realized, I was wrong,” Ron says through hurried breaths, “I don’t want this to end. I don’t want to stop talking to you. You can tutor me about anything you want. I like hanging out with you, Y/N. I haven’t just been doing this for the grades. It’s been all about you for quite a while now.”

You look up at him, speechless, then finally manage to eke out, “Me too.”

His face splits in another one of those beautiful smiles. “Good. Good! Just– just wanted you to know.”

Ron falls into a seat opposite you, slinging his bag onto the ground again. “Shall we get back to it, then? What are we studying?”

“We don’t have to study anything,” you say, getting courage out of a place you didn’t know existed until just this moment. “Maybe we could, you know, just hang out and get to know each other. Maybe even get lunch or something.”

Ron nods excitedly. “Yeah. Yeah, I’d like that. Harry said I should do something like that. He’s the one who told me to come back in here, you know. He saw me walking around like a rejected first-year and told me to get my head in order. Guess he was right.”

You send a silent thank-you out to Harry Potter and remind yourself to get him something later. Maybe a homework or two. “I think he was.”

Ron smiles over at you, the sunlight streaming from a nearby window and coalescing on the copper of his hair, the shine of his eyes whenever he looks at you. If you didn’t know better, you’d say that Ron really, really likes you. If you didn’t know better, you’d say that you feel the same way about him.

harry potter tag list: @blondsauduun, @cameronsails, @neewtmas, @lovesanimals0000, @with-inked-solace, @sher-lokid7, @eclliipsed, @frenchgirlinlondon, @23victoria, @ilovexavierthrope, @faerieroyal

The late afternoon sun slanted through the single window of Ron’s bedroom at the burrow, painting the familiar, worn wooden floorboards in stripes of gold and shadow. The distant, comforting sounds of his family moving about downstairs were a world away. Here, in this private, sloping-ceilinged sanctuary, there was only the sound of my sharp, ragged inhale and the slick, wet slide of skin on skin. Ron was behind me, his chest a solid, sweating wall against my back, his strong arms bracketing my body as he held himself up on his elbows. Every one of his thrusts was a deep, deliberate conquest, a slow burn that was building into an inferno. I was on my hands and knees, the worn quilt of his childhood bed bunching beneath my clenched fists, my head bowed, a curtain of my hair sticking to my damp neck and shoulders. 

“Oh, God, Ron!” I gasped, the words breaking apart as he drove into me again, hitting a spot that made my vision spark. 

His pace was relentless, a steady, powerful rhythm that spoke of hours of teasing build-up in the crowded kitchen, of stolen touches and loaded glances during the Sunday family lunch, of the frantic, clumsy climb up the stairs where we barely gotten the door locked before our clothes started coming off. Now, there was nothing clumsy about it. This was pure, focused need. 

One of his hands slid from the mattress, smoothing up the sweat-slick curve of my spine. His fingers were calloused from Quidditch and Auror training, a roughness that contrasted perfectly with the gentle reverence of his touch. He traced the knobs of my vertebrae, then fanned his palm out over the small of my back, holding me steady, anchoring me as his hips pistoned forward. 

“Look at you.” He breathed, his voice a low, gravelly rasp against the shell of my ear. His breath was hot. 

“Just… fuck, Y/N.” 

His hand left my back. It traveled around my hip, fingers splaying across the trembling plane of my lower stomach for a moment, feeling the deep, internal impact of his own body. Then his fingers dipped lower, through the damp thatch of curls, and found the swollen, aching nub of my clit. The contact was electric. I cried out, a sharp, startled sound, and my arms buckled. My chest hit the mattress, my face turning to the side, gasping into the quilt. The new angle was devastating, letting him sink even deeper, and now with the clever, circling pressure of his fingers, the coil of pleasure in my belly tightened impossibly fast. 

“Ron, I’m… I’m gonna…” 

“I know.” He grunted, his own rhythm beginning to fray, becoming harder, less controlled. 

“I know. Let go, I’ve got you.” 

His words were the final key. The tension shattered. Pleasure detonated through me, a white-hot wave that started where his body joined with mine and radiated out of my fingertips, my toes, the roots of my hair. My inner muscles clenched around him in rhythmic, fluttering pulses, milking his length, and a broken, sobbing moan was torn from my throat. That was all it took for him. With a choked, guttural sound that was pure Ron- raw and honest and desperately satisfied- he drove into me one last, final time and held himself there, deep. I felt the hot, liquid pulse of his cum inside me, an intimate shock of heat that seemed to prolong my own crashing waves. 

For a long moment, the only sounds were our ragged, syncopated breathing and the distant caw of a garden gnome being chased by his brothers. The air in the room was thick with the scent of sex, of our mingled sweat, of the dusty, magical warmth that always permeated the Burrow. 

Slowly, carefully, Ron withdrew. He collapsed onto his side beside me, his skin glowing and flushed, his freckles standing out in stark contrast. I simply lay there, boneless, my cheek pressed to the quilt, every nerve in my body singing a quiet, satisfied hymn. He shifted. I felt the bed dip as he moved closer. His hand, gentle now, brushed the hair from my face, tucking it behind my ear. His fingertips traced the line of my jaw, then my parted lips. I turned my head just enough to meet his gaze. His blue eyes were dark, pupils blown wide, and filled with a look of such awed, open affection that it made my chest ache almost as much as the lingering tremors between my legs. 

He stared at me, his gaze traveling over my flushed face, my damp hair, my body sprawled in exhausted, sated abandon across his bed. A slow, lopsided smile spread across his face, the one that always made my heart stutter. He leaned in, his lips brushing my temple in a kiss so soft it was barely there. 

“You’re breathtaking like this.” He murmured, the words a warm puff of air against my skin. 

My eyes fluttered closed. A slow, lazy smile of my own touched my lips. I turned fully onto my side, facing him, and draped a heavy leg over his hips, pulling him closer. The evidence of our passion was a sticky, cooling patch on my inner thigh, a reminder that felt more like a promise. 

“Like what?” I whispered back, my voice hoarse. “A complete mess?” 

Ron’s smile widened. He shook his head, his nose nudging against mine. 

“No. Sated. Mine. Real.” His hand slid down to cup my backside, possessively, pulling me flush against him so I could feel him. 

“Utterly perfect.” 

He kissed me then, a deep, languid exploration that tasted of salt and me and him. It was a kiss that held the echo of our frantic coupling but spoke of the slow, lazy hours we still had ahead of us, hidden away from the world. His tongue traced my lower lip, and I melted into him, my own hands coming up to tangle in his shock of red hair, still slightly damp at the temples. 

He broke the kiss, trailing his lips down my neck to the sensitive hollow of my collarbone. His hand on my arse began a slow, kneading massage that was both soothing and arousing.

“Don’t move.” He murmured against my skin. 

“Just let me… let me look at you for a second longer.”