Ginny Weasley and the House of Broken Men

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Days passed peacefully at the cottage; Ginny falling into an easy pattern of caring for Sirius, flooing her mother for and with reports, taking care of household chores, flying drills on her broom, and swimming in the cold ocean. Sirius was improving rapidly, becoming more and more active daily and had even begun to murmur in his sleep. The time passed easily for her, though she couldn’t decide if she felt like she was dreaming then, or if the past four years had all just been a nightmare. She was considering the situation at length as she de-gnomed her garden one sunny morning. Ginny bent absentmindedly to lure one of the little buggers out of the ground, caught it, and straightened to twirl it by its feet when a second gnome flew squeeling past her head. Ginny jumped and dropped her gnome, it scampered off under a large hydrangea, and drew her wand. Standing only a few paces behind her was her smiling brother Ron.
“Shouldn’t you know better than to let people sneak up on you?” He teased.
“Shouldn’t you know better than to sneak up on me?” Ginny said threateningly, waving her wand ominously in front of his nose.
“Do you got anything to eat? I’m starving!” Ron grinned at her, “make me something? I’ll finish up here for you,” he offered.
Ginny laughed and slugged her brother playfully in the arm, making her way inside to get some lunch together. She’d only just begun to pull out bread and ham for sandwiches when she head a great, “Oi! Ginny! Got any scones? I’d really like some scones…ooooh sandwiches!” Ron entered the doorway, clapping his hands together. He walked over to the cupboard and pulled out a few biscuits for himself. “Oh! I’ve got news!” Ron sounded very excited.
“Doubt it’s something I haven’t already heard from Mum,” Ginny said, shaking her head.
“Not this you haven’t, it’s about Fred and Angelina. They don’t want to tell Mum till everyone’s around to see her face. Angelina’s got herself preggers!”
“More like Fred’s got Ang—Oi! You shouldn’t have told me that! Oh bloody hell Ron! How am I going to pretend to be surprised when Angelina tells me now!” Ginny smacked him in the back of his head with a towel, “don’t you know that’s not the sort of thing you tell people until the people it’s about tell people first?”
“No. Why? They told me? Why shouldn’t I tell you?””
“Because Angelina will want to tell me! That’s how it works! Honestly Ron, don’t you understand anything that doesn’t have to do with food, Quidditch, chess, or food? There is something called insight y’know? It comes with sensitivity!” Ginny was furiously chopping a cucumber. Ron just looked puzzled.
“You’re barking mad, you know that don’t you, Gin?” She glared daggers at him, “So how’s Sirius?” he inquired.
“He seems to be coming out of it, every day he’s a little more responsive. How are you doing without Harry around. You haven’t heard from him yet, have you?”
“No, not yet. It’s alright without him, bit boring really. Hermione’s absolutely lost it, pretends like the war never happened. She spends most of her time with McGonagall, scheming. I think they’re going to write a book or something, Hermione can’t believe how few books were written in the last few years. Can you believe that? We’re all at war with Hermione in the middle of it and she’s surprised that no one found the time to pick up a quill!”
Ginny snorted out a laugh and handed her brother a sandwich, “Can you really not believe that? I certainly do. So what are you going to do with yourself now? Are you going to become a career Auror or are you putting that all behind you?”
“Well…” Ron swallowed, “I don’t really know what to do. Quidditch is still off so I can’t do that right away, I’ve got to train up for it anyway, I’ve had enough fighting with Death Eaters to last me a good long while. I’m not Moody you know, I don’t live for it. I…well…I thought I might go Harry’s route for a while. Not with Harry, that is, but go off on my own a bit, have a few of my own adventures.”
“Oh, Ron! Haven’t we all had enough adventures?”
Ron looked sheepish, “Just little adventures, Ron’s adventures, see? Not Harry’s-destiny-that-Ron-is-helping-him-fulfill. I want to have a go at the world for myself.”
Ginny took a long look at her brother over her tea cup, “You’re leaving now, aren’t you?”
“Well…I have talked to everyone else and everything, let mum cry all over me…there’s just one more person I have to talk to and I was…sort of…hoping you’d go with me…”
Ginny put her cup down and put her hand over Ron’s, “Of course I’ll go with you,” she said softly.

* * * *

“Hello Daddy,” Ginny said, kneeling to place a posy of flowers on the grass in front of the stone she caressed with her other hand. Tears shimmered in her dark eyes.
“Hey Dad,” Ron said, standing beside his sister, his voice tight, “so, I’m going away for a while. The war is finally over and…well, we won. That last battle was something…but I guess you probably saw all that. Thought I might take some time away from all of this. Maybe spend some time in the muggle world, even,” he knelt down and took Ginny’s hand, “we’re all doing alright, but we miss you a lot. Mum especially, she really misses you…it’s hard without you.”
Tears rolled silently down Ginny’s face, “Sirius is back, dad, something happened when Harry killed You-Know-Who and Sirius is alive. He’s lying up at my place. Mum and I think he’ll wake up soon. It’s really exciting.”
“Oh and Fred and Angelina are gonna have a baby! Except I wasn’t supposed to tell you that, Ginny tells me there’s these rules for parents getting to tell people, so I they’ll probably be up here soon to tell you too, so try to act surprised, alright?” Ron laughed sadly.
“It’s okay, Ron,” Ginny whispered.
After a while spent sitting by the grave, Ron finally stood up and said, “Well, I think it’s time I was off, I’ve got the whole world ahead of me,” he helped Ginny stand, then gave her an enormous hug.
“Love you, Ronald.”
“Love you too, Gin, and you, Dad,” Ron gave a wave and was gone.
Ginny sighed and bent to press a kiss to her father’s headstone, and then she too was gone.

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A.N: There IS smut to come, I very, very promise. Please don't forget that reviews are like CHRISTMAS to authors and even if you don't want to do that, it only takes a click to rate so please, PLEASE give me feedback.