He Left Handprints on Her Heart

He Left Handprints on Her Heart- Chapter 3: Hearts Break

Hermione withdrew from Ron's touch. If he leaned in to kiss her mouth, she turned her head and offered her cheek. If he attempted to hold her, she pulled away from him. Their bedroom was a cold and lifeless place these days. He longed to touch her, kiss her and make love to her again. Things simply could not continue on this way. It was making them both miserable.

On his lunch break, Ron made arrangements for Rosie to stay with Harry and Ginny for the night. It was Valentine's Day, and he felt bad for asking, but he was desperate. He feared that if he didn't do something soon, there would be too little of his marriage left to salvage. That was not a chance he was willing to take. Harry assured Ron that he and Ginny would be happy to have Rosie stay with them. Ron could tell from the concern on Harry's face that the strain in him and Hermione's marriage had not gone unnoticed. Harry was worried about his two best friends.

With arrangements for Rosie squared away and his work nearly complete for the day, Ron picked up his cloak and started for home.

~ ♥ ~

Ron arrived at their flat only to find his wife sitting at the kitchen table with her head in her hands. Hermione was clearly not having a good day. As Ron approached, he could tell that she was crying, and there was something bright yellow that had spilled all over the floor which, upon closer inspection, was paint. Their daughter was sitting in the middle of the paint puddle kicking her arms and legs, giggling and squealing happily as drops of yellow dripped from her red pigtails.

First, Ron attempted to lighten the mood. "Love, next time you decide to paint our daughter, you could at least send me an owl. I mean, don't get me wrong, I like yellow. It's a fine choice, but I might have wanted to add some stripes or something, you know, for decoration."

Hermione's crying grew louder.

Well, so much for trying to make her laugh. It was worth a try. Ron attempted to pull his wife's hands from her face, as he whispered, "Hermione, please don't cry. It's not so bad. Just a little paint's all. It'll clean right up. Come on, baby, what's wrong?"

"What's wrong? What's wrong?" She was practically screaming at him, and it wasn't difficult to see how angry she was. "I'll tell you what's wrong, Ronald Weasley!"

"Okay, Hermione. Tell me what's wrong. I've been asking you for weeks." He finished the last sentence with a frustrated sigh. The mood swings this pregnancy had brought on were terribly unpleasant and, more often than not, left Ron utterly bewildered. Hermione vacillated between laughing and crying, with no clear impetus for what caused the laughter to become tears. The one thing that remained unwavering was the coldness she had shown toward him the last few weeks. He tried to be patient, but Hermione had a way of twisting everything he said around. No matter what he did, it was never the right thing.

Everything she had been holding inside for the last few weeks came pouring out as the words tumbled from her mouth. "This was a mistake. A huge mistake. What were we thinking having another baby? I'm not ready for this. I can't do it. I don't want to do it. I'm a terrible wife. I'm a complete failure as a mother. I'm not cut out for this, Ron."

"Hermione—"

"No, stop. Just listen. Your mum managed to raise seven children. I can't even paint a nursery without the one child I have managing to cover herself in a yellow blob of paint." She was rambling, only broken pieces of sentences reaching his ears, between her sobs.

Ron tried to put consoling arms around her, but she was having none of it. She rounded on him, finger pointing in his face. Merlin, I hate it when she does that. She knew he hated it when she pointed her finger in his face. She was purposely trying to provoke his temper. Don't lose your cool, it will only make things worse. Take a deep breath. Okay. There, that's better. Ignore the finger pointing.

"This is all your fault, you know," she said glaring at him, finger still extended in his direction.

"Somehow I thought it might be," he said in a defeated tone. Nothing would placate Hermione when one of these mood swings hit, and there was simply no point in challenging her. It was best to just let her scream, rant, cry, or whatever else she needed to do until the wave of hormones passed. He was doing his best to play the part of the understanding husband, but when Hermione threw a fit and there was no other word for this—it was clearly a fit she really tested a bloke's patience. Still, he tried. "What can I do to make it better, love?"

"Don't patronize me. Stop talking to me like I'm a child, Ron. This is not the life I want. I hate it. I don't want to do it anymore. Make it better? You can't take this baby back. I'm stuck," she said pointing to her stomach. "You can't make it better."

This time, her words were too much. He threw up his hands in defeat. He couldn't do this alone. She had to want it too. As much as he loved her, maybe she just didn't feel the same anymore. "Is that what you want, Hermione? You can leave if you want. I'd never force you to stay where you don't want to be. Love you way too much to make you unhappy, but I can't do this anymore either. I can't bear hearing how miserable I make you and how unhappy you are with your life—your life with me." It would break his heart if she left, but he wouldn't hold her where she didn't want to be. Those words were the cruelest she had ever spoken to him. How long had she 'hated' living with him? Had she only stayed because she felt she was 'stuck'? Had she really said she wished she wasn't carrying his baby?

The hurt must have shown on his face because her eyes went wide when she looked at him. She seemed genuinely surprised that her words had the power to wound him. Usually, he would let her rant on until the crying spell ended. He would accept what he had believed was her sincere apology, and they would move on. Not today. She had gone too far this time.

"So what's it going to be, Hermione?"

His question was met with silence, and he assumed she must have made her decision to leave long before tonight. He wouldn't make it any harder for her. Through clenched teeth, he asked "Where do you want me to send your things?"

She looked truly startled when his words reached her ears. "What? You want– Okay." She visibly broke in front of him. The tears came faster, and she was having difficulty catching her breath.

Why did she seem so surprised? Had she expected him to beg her not to go; to keep her here even knowing how unhappy she was with him? Did she really have such a low opinion of him that she could think him that selfish?

Her voice was soft when she asked, "Do you want me to go, Ron?"

"You know I don't. Do you want to be here?"

As Ron waited for an answer, he reached down to scoop the yellow mess that was his baby girl from the floor. She had just spotted Crookshanks, and he felt certain that if he didn't take hold of Rosie, they would soon have a yellow Kneazle to match their daughter.

The sobbing was louder still. "I don't even know who I am anymore, Ron. I say things to intentionally hurt the people I love the most. The words come pouring out of my mouth, and I seem to have no ability to stop them once they start. I am such a bitch. I don't even like to be around myself."

"I love you."

"Why? Why do you love me? I don’t deserve it. I constantly belittle and yell at you. I have no patience with our child. My cooking is edible on occasion, but it's never good, no matter how closely I follow the recipe. The house is constantly a mess. How could you possibly love me? I refuse to let you touch me. I shove you away every time you try to kiss or hold me."

"Do I need a reason to love you? I love you because I love you. Nothing more; nothing less. I wish you wouldn't push me away, but I can't make you want me."

"I can't imagine why you would want someone as useless as me to stay here. I tried to make dinner for you tonight. Of course, you can probably still smell where I burned it. I tried to paint one room, and only managed to get paint on the kitchen floor and on our child—not one drop of it on an actual wall. Merlin, Ron, I am such a horrible person. You should be the one pushing me out the door, begging me to leave."

"First of all, I would never want you to leave. You burned dinner, big deal, I don't care. It's nothing to get upset about, and it hardly makes you 'horrible' or 'useless.' Hermione, you are stressed out. You're going to have a baby, which has your hormones raging out of control."

"That's right. Thank you so much for reminding me that I'm fat too—pregnant, useless, fat, horrible and undesirable. I know you've been thinking it for weeks. I see how you look at me."

"Stop it!" he shouted, only lowering his voice when he felt Rosie startle in his arms at the sound. He took a deep breath, trying to get his temper under control. "I did not say that, Hermione. I'm not talking anymore because you just twist it all around. If I've been looking at you in a way that upsets you, then I'm sorry—No—Hell, I'm not sorry. You're my fucking wife. I want you. That was lust you saw, not disgust, but I'm not surprised you don't recognize the difference anymore. You twist everything else I do around, why not the way I look at you? And stop telling me what I've been thinking, since you clearly have no idea. If you want to leave, fine, but don't expect me to make it any easier for you to justify going by telling you I don't want you. I miss you, Hermione. I don't know why you won't let me touch you, kiss you or make love to you, and you won't tell me. What do you want from me?"

She cried harder. He tried to pull her close to him, tried to stroke her hair, dry her tears, anything to make this stop. She recoiled from his touch. "Stop. I don't want your pity, Ron."

He was furious. She had pushed him away at every turn, and his pride and confidence were wounded. "I'm not doing this anymore, Hermione, I can't. It kills me when you act like my touch repulses you. I don't know what you expect from me. I married you because I love you, and I want to be with you, but I can't live like this. If you don't love me anymore, you should go. That's what you're waiting on—for me to make it easier for you, give you permission so you won't feel guilty for leaving. Don't feel guilty, Hermione. You have my permission." His voice was loud again, and he had no desire to shout at his wife, nor did he want to lose his temper again in front of his daughter. "I'm not going to argue with you anymore tonight. There's no point. I don’t want to scare Rosie by fighting with you. You've already decided what you want. Just go."

At the sound of her name, Rosie reached up to wrap her arms around Ron's neck and laid her head against his chest. The sound of them fighting, their raised voices and the tone of their words, had caused her to become quiet. She felt the tension in the room, even if she didn't understand all of the words that were said. Ron smiled down at the child in his arms, and squeezed her reassuringly.

Rosie was clearly still enthralled with the yellow paint that covered both her and the floor, and she reached up to place a yellow hand on Ron's face. "Daddy, look."

"I see. That's yellow." Ron gave Rosie's paint-soaked pigtail a small tug.

"Pretty," said the wide-eyed child. Ron couldn't help but smile. Other than his daughter's red hair and freckles, in looks, she was Hermione in miniature.

"No, not pretty," said Hermione in a particularly annoyed voice. "It's a mess. Look at you, Rosie."

The child's lip began to quiver at her mother's tone, and Ron shot Hermione an angry, but pleading, look careful not to raise his voice. "Hermione, you don't mean it. You're mad at me. Don't take it out on her. I'm sorry I fucked up your perfect life by getting you pregnant again, but there's nothing I can do to fix that now. It's too late. You might have told me seven months ago having my baby would make you so bloody miserable."

When Hermione looked at him this time, he saw no anger in her face. She was ashamed of herself; ashamed of the words that had cut him so deeply. The sound of her own words as he repeated them back to her had shocked her. He watched as many different emotions crossed her face. The feelings seemed to collide inside her, as the realization of what her own words may well have cost her registered on her face.

Even after all she had said to hurt him, it broke his heart to see her standing before him trembling and pale. She looked like a scared little girl, tears rolling down her face, as she seemed to struggle to find the right words. She opened her mouth as if to tell him something several times, only to close it again, seeming unable to form the words she sought. In fact, all she managed to choke out before leaving the room was, "Ron, I don't know what to—"

Hermione ran from the kitchen to the bathroom and slammed the door hard. Even with the door between them, Ron could hear her crying, harsh sobs that seemed to tear at her chest and throat. In all the years he had known her, and through all the dangers they had faced together, he had never heard such heart wrenching cries from her...and it broke his heart to hear them now. How had things gotten out of control so quickly?

As he sat there lost in thought, Rosie caught his face between her sticky, paint-soaked, little fingers, "Pretty Daddy."

End of Chapter 3