Almost Like Brothers
Notes: This story takes place between the third and fourth books. It's sort of AU in that Ron and Percy don't exactly show up in the fourth book best buds. However it does fit in rather nicely, so I leave my own readers to decide whether or not this could actually have happened. I have heard that in England they don't have graduation ceremonies, but for my purposes, they do.
Disclaimer: All the characters and the setting in this story belong to J.K. Rowling who created them in the first place. I am not receiving any money for this.
(Thanks to Mere for the Beta and Elske for the title. (Merelyn25 and Cariad on ff.net)
******************************************************************* Almost Like Bothers
Percy threw his bag down on his bed and sat down with a sigh. He stared blankly at his beige walls with their chipping paint, the sagging ceiling, the pristine desktop with clearly marked folders for his various classes. Everything was in its place, where it should be, just the way he'd left it the autumn before. For the past seven years, Percy had only seen this room during the long summers and a during winter breaks.
Graduation was over. The terrible ritual he had been dreading since first year, but for different reasons. At first it had been a distant sign that he was going to be on his own with no one to help guide him through his life. Then it had been the goal of becoming Head Boy looming over his head, another thing he would have to achieve to prove to his parents, and himself, that he was good at something. But the day before, even knowing that he had reached all those goals, graduation had still held not thrill for him, no sense of achievement. All that was left was the hovering question of.what next?
A soft knock on his door jolted Percy from his thoughts. No one ever knocked on his door; why were they starting now? His parents, Bill and Charlie all assumed it was their right as his elders to come barging in whenever they felt like it. Fred and George never needed an excuse either and Ginny was always attached to some other sibling when she came in. And Ron.well Ron never came into Percy's room, or anywhere near Percy for that matter, if he could help it.
"Go away!" he called to the person at the door.
For a moment there was silence. Then the knock came again.
"I said, go away!" Percy half-expected whoever it was to give up on being polite and just walk in, but the knock came again.
"Let me in Perce," came the soft voice from the other side of the door. Ron? Well, today was a day of firsts.
With an exaggerated sigh that he hoped would discourage his younger brother from staying long, Percy pushed himself to his feet and walked over to the door.
"What do you want?" he asked, irritably, swinging the door open and walking back across his room without giving Ron a second glance.
"I um.." Ron cleared his throat and started again. "I was uh.wondering.I guess.how you were doing. You know, now that you've graduated and all."
"I'm quite fine Ron," muttered Percy, seating himself at his desk and opening a folder. "I rather busy right now so if you don't mind.." Percy looked suggestively at the door.
"Oh.yeah.well.um," Ron stammered. "Well, I just wanted to um.ask you because.well it will be my.um.fourth year next year and so I guess I'm further from the beginning than the end now. So.I.was just wondering.you know.how it felt and all." Ron's voice cracked on the last word and he turned a brilliant shade of red.
It was the cracking voice more than the halting request that made Percy actually think about his younger brother's question seriously. It seemed Ron had rather abruptly started to grow up.
"I mean, everyone tells me that you're ready for graduation when it finally comes around," Ron rushed on. "But then they all told me I'd be good a Quidditch when the time came and well.that never happened and.."
"You wanted to play Quidditch?" Percy asked, interrupting.
Ron looked at him as though Percy had just asked if Whomping Willow were a bit dangerous.
"Only since Charlie came home with that Nimbus 1000 his sixth year!"
"Oh," said Percy, wondering how he could have missed this important detail in Ron's life.
There was silence for a moment. Then Percy remembered Ron's question.
"I guess it feels.um.kind of empty," Percy said without really thinking.
"Empty? How do you mean?" Ron asked eagerly.
Percy sighed. "Well, I worked for seven years so that I could graduate well, but I never really planned at all past that. So now I don't really know what to do."
Ron took a moment to turn this over in his mind. "But aren't you going to work at the Ministry? Isn't that what you always wanted?"
Percy stared at him. How on earth did he explain to a brother he had scarcely spoken to in the past seven years that he had no interest in following in his father's footsteps? Percy just shook his head.
"Oh. Then what do you want to do?" Ron asked, trying to mask his curiosity.
"I.well I always wanted to teach," Percy muttered, blushing.
Ron burst out laughing. "You? Teaching? You'd kill the poor buggers you had for students."
Percy's embarrassment turned to anger. "What do you know? I've tutored a bunch of kids at school, and they always told me that I really helped them to understand the material. One kid went from failing Potions to receiving top marks!"
Ron stopped laughing abruptly. "Really? I never knew you even liked tutoring."
Percy looked down at his hands, his anger evaporating. "Yeah, well. Not too many people know about that." He looked up at his brother, forehead creased with thought. "We used to know everything about each other, remember, and now we barely recognize each other. When did that happen?"
Ron was silent for a long time.
"You know I had forgotten," he said quietly. He laughed a little to himself. "Remember that time we went to Magical Menagerie when I was six?"
Percy joined his laughter. "Fred ate the vomit flavor Bernie Bott Bean and was sick all over the place."
"And Mum told you to keep and eye on me. Left us by the hippogriffs."
"You decided it would be fun to go riding on one of them and when Mum came back you were halfway up the goddamn fence." "What happened?" Percy asked when their easy laughter died. "We were great friends then."
Ron shrugged. "Then you went to school I guess. You changed."
"I did?"
"Yeah. When you came back you were.different somehow. You would have never have let me get halfway up a fence again that's for sure."
"I didn't *let* you get up that fence!"
Ron raised an eyebrow. "Your exact words were, 'Climb up quick before Mum gets back.'"
Percy turned red and mumbled something that sounded very much like "did not."
"But when you came back from school you were suddenly all responsible about everything. Whatever any adult told you, you'd follow to the letter. And you never wanted to spend any time with me. You were always doing work."
"Well, I had to, Ron. Bill and Charlie were gone. Someone had to be an older brother."
"They were never like that," Ron protested. "They had fun every now and then. Maybe I should be asking you what happened."
"Not all of us had three older brothers to follow around when they went to school."
"Like you would let any of us follow you around, Percy! You were always too busy being Perfect Prefect or Head Boy," shot back Ron bitterly.
"Fred and George and I were still there if anything went really wrong, and you had Harry and Hermione to be with. It wasn't the same. And Dad was expecting me to be another Bill or Charlie. I'm not like them. It didn't come easily for me."
Ron stared at his older brother thoughtfully.
"I felt the same way, when I went to school, but I had you all to live up to as well," Ron said finally. "I just didn't even try I guess."
"Well you did have friends to support you. I never did."
"Oh come on, you must have had some friends while you were at Hogwarts."
Percy laughed bitterly. "No one was interested in a skinny little dork with glasses that took up half his face. And no one wanted to risk Marcus Flint to try to get to know me. And later I was so far gone into my schoolwork no one cared to make the effort." //Including my family,// he thought.
"What about Penny?" Ron protested.
Percy gave a snort. "Yeah, that didn't really work out very well."
"But you must have been friends for awhile. You must have at least *liked* each other."
"Look I really don't want to talk about it with you, okay?"
"Come on, I promise I won't make fun of you."
Percy smiled wryly. "I believe your exact words were 'You? Teaching? You'd kill the poor buggers you had for students!"
Ron looked properly embarrassed. "Sorry about that. But really, why did you stop going out with Penny? I remember how much you liked her the beginning of last year."
"The truth is I never really *liked* Penny, as anything other than a friend, and Penny only wanted to be able to tell her friends she had a boyfriend. Eventually she got tired of me and broke it off."
"But why did you go out with her if you didn't like her as anything other than a friend?" Ron asked, confused.
"I.never really had a friend, so I think I mistook the way I felt about her as something more. And she kept making such a big deal about it, how I was so sweet and so thoughtful. And when she was petrified.I sort of over dramatized it in my mind, made her into something she wasn't. Then the next year when we met up again, I realized that the real Penny was smart and nice, but not all that realistic."
"So you broke up with her?"
"Not exactly. Justin Finch-Fletchley apparently started flirting with her and he was a little less obsessed with schoolwork than I was, so she broke it off. I have to say, though, I wasn't to sad to see it end."
"Are you at least friends now?" Ron asked. "I haven't seen Penny since the beginning of third year."
Now Percy looked genuinely sad. "No.I guess she only wanted me as a boyfriend, but.you should feel really fortunate that you have such close friends."
Ron shrugged. "Well, having a friend like Harry is sort of a mixed blessing anyway."
"You two seem inseparable."
"We are. And Hermione too. But sometimes its hard. I was always the least important brother and now I tag along behind Harry who has all sorts of amazing things happen to him. I guess I'm permanently a sidekick."
"What about Hermione?"
"Hermione's just too smart for her own good," muttered Ron. Percy laughed.
"You two will find yourselves married with two kids one day," he told Ron with a chuckle.
"Harry will probably get her too," Ron muttered. Then his eyes widened when he realized Percy had heard him.
"I see how it is," he told Ron with a grin.
"I didn't mean it like that," Ron mumbled, coloring. "I just meant that if they.well then I.oh bugger."
"Of course you didn't," Percy told him with a suggestive smile.
"You, I don't think I've seen you smile in years," Ron told him with a look of amazement on his face.
Percy paused for a moment. "I guess I haven't been doing much smiling recently," he said thoughtfully. "I hadn't realized."
"You look.different when you smile. More normal. And when you joke around."
"I haven't really had the chance. I got so lost in schoolwork that I forgot why I wanted to do so well in the first place."
"Why do you want to do so well?" Ron asked. "You're not stupid. You could do well even without killing yourself all the time."
"I can't just be good enough. I have to be the best.at least at something." Percy stood up restlessly and glanced at the stack of papers on his desk. "I can't do anything well but that." He gestured to the papers.
"At least you have *something*," Ron complained. "I'm sandwiched between the hero and the brain. There's no room for me except as the eternal sidekick. Even if I tried I couldn't be as good as either of my friends. I just look silly for trying."
Percy turned to look at his brother, surprise clear on his face. "But everyone likes you so much. I mean besides your close friends. Everyone is envious that you have such close friends for one thing."
"Really? I never though anyone even noticed me."
"They do," Percy said, looking out the window distantly. "I hear people talk about you. You get along well with people. That's important. I never could."
"Oh.uh, thanks," Ron stammered, embarrassed. "I never really thought that was any kind of achievement."
Percy looked back at his brother. "It is. I guess it just shows how good you are at it that you never noticed. I've always been.envious of how easily you and Fred and George make friends. Especially you. I mean, Harry and Hermione would do anything for you."
"You're envious of me!?" Ron asked, his eyes wide. He stood up and faced his brother. Percy realized abruptly that Ron was almost his height. It seemed so strange to talk to his baby brother Ron like an equal. Maybe it was because he never really had. He placed his hands firmly on Ron's shoulders.
"You've really grown up since I last talked to you, Ron," he said softly. "I guess I spent so much time treating you as a younger brother I never stopped to see you as a person." He looked at his brother in wonderment for a moment, and then released Ron's shoulders. "Maybe that's why you always felt inferior. If so, I'm sorry. I think I was a little intimidated by my older brothers' success, so I made up for it by trying to make you feel younger. I'm sorry."
Very suddenly, Ron moved forward and embraced Percy. Then he abruptly let go and skittered back a few steps, looking very embarrassed. He stared at his feet for a moment before moving towards the door.
"I uh.better be.um.going. Er.Mum will be wanting me to help with supper and all. I.um yes, goodbye." Ron moved out into the hallway. Just as he was about to shut the door he leaned inside Percy's room again.
"Its nice to have you back again, Perce," he said, looking Percy in the eye. Then he closed the door and was gone.
Percy stood in the center of his room, staring at the closed door for a moment. He still felt traces of his brother's arms around him. How long had it been since he had been hugged by someone? A long time. A slow smile perked at the corners of his mouth. Slowly they stretched until a broad grin covered his face.
"You know," he told the empty room. "It's rather nice to be back."
*******************************************************************
Notes: Awwwww. Isn't that just the cutest little.um, stopping now. Anyway, as all of us with siblings know, this won't be the end of their bickering, but now maybe it can be friendly bickering. Okay, enough excusing. Please review.
Notes: This story takes place between the third and fourth books. It's sort of AU in that Ron and Percy don't exactly show up in the fourth book best buds. However it does fit in rather nicely, so I leave my own readers to decide whether or not this could actually have happened. I have heard that in England they don't have graduation ceremonies, but for my purposes, they do.
Disclaimer: All the characters and the setting in this story belong to J.K. Rowling who created them in the first place. I am not receiving any money for this.
(Thanks to Mere for the Beta and Elske for the title. (Merelyn25 and Cariad on ff.net)
******************************************************************* Almost Like Bothers
Percy threw his bag down on his bed and sat down with a sigh. He stared blankly at his beige walls with their chipping paint, the sagging ceiling, the pristine desktop with clearly marked folders for his various classes. Everything was in its place, where it should be, just the way he'd left it the autumn before. For the past seven years, Percy had only seen this room during the long summers and a during winter breaks.
Graduation was over. The terrible ritual he had been dreading since first year, but for different reasons. At first it had been a distant sign that he was going to be on his own with no one to help guide him through his life. Then it had been the goal of becoming Head Boy looming over his head, another thing he would have to achieve to prove to his parents, and himself, that he was good at something. But the day before, even knowing that he had reached all those goals, graduation had still held not thrill for him, no sense of achievement. All that was left was the hovering question of.what next?
A soft knock on his door jolted Percy from his thoughts. No one ever knocked on his door; why were they starting now? His parents, Bill and Charlie all assumed it was their right as his elders to come barging in whenever they felt like it. Fred and George never needed an excuse either and Ginny was always attached to some other sibling when she came in. And Ron.well Ron never came into Percy's room, or anywhere near Percy for that matter, if he could help it.
"Go away!" he called to the person at the door.
For a moment there was silence. Then the knock came again.
"I said, go away!" Percy half-expected whoever it was to give up on being polite and just walk in, but the knock came again.
"Let me in Perce," came the soft voice from the other side of the door. Ron? Well, today was a day of firsts.
With an exaggerated sigh that he hoped would discourage his younger brother from staying long, Percy pushed himself to his feet and walked over to the door.
"What do you want?" he asked, irritably, swinging the door open and walking back across his room without giving Ron a second glance.
"I um.." Ron cleared his throat and started again. "I was uh.wondering.I guess.how you were doing. You know, now that you've graduated and all."
"I'm quite fine Ron," muttered Percy, seating himself at his desk and opening a folder. "I rather busy right now so if you don't mind.." Percy looked suggestively at the door.
"Oh.yeah.well.um," Ron stammered. "Well, I just wanted to um.ask you because.well it will be my.um.fourth year next year and so I guess I'm further from the beginning than the end now. So.I.was just wondering.you know.how it felt and all." Ron's voice cracked on the last word and he turned a brilliant shade of red.
It was the cracking voice more than the halting request that made Percy actually think about his younger brother's question seriously. It seemed Ron had rather abruptly started to grow up.
"I mean, everyone tells me that you're ready for graduation when it finally comes around," Ron rushed on. "But then they all told me I'd be good a Quidditch when the time came and well.that never happened and.."
"You wanted to play Quidditch?" Percy asked, interrupting.
Ron looked at him as though Percy had just asked if Whomping Willow were a bit dangerous.
"Only since Charlie came home with that Nimbus 1000 his sixth year!"
"Oh," said Percy, wondering how he could have missed this important detail in Ron's life.
There was silence for a moment. Then Percy remembered Ron's question.
"I guess it feels.um.kind of empty," Percy said without really thinking.
"Empty? How do you mean?" Ron asked eagerly.
Percy sighed. "Well, I worked for seven years so that I could graduate well, but I never really planned at all past that. So now I don't really know what to do."
Ron took a moment to turn this over in his mind. "But aren't you going to work at the Ministry? Isn't that what you always wanted?"
Percy stared at him. How on earth did he explain to a brother he had scarcely spoken to in the past seven years that he had no interest in following in his father's footsteps? Percy just shook his head.
"Oh. Then what do you want to do?" Ron asked, trying to mask his curiosity.
"I.well I always wanted to teach," Percy muttered, blushing.
Ron burst out laughing. "You? Teaching? You'd kill the poor buggers you had for students."
Percy's embarrassment turned to anger. "What do you know? I've tutored a bunch of kids at school, and they always told me that I really helped them to understand the material. One kid went from failing Potions to receiving top marks!"
Ron stopped laughing abruptly. "Really? I never knew you even liked tutoring."
Percy looked down at his hands, his anger evaporating. "Yeah, well. Not too many people know about that." He looked up at his brother, forehead creased with thought. "We used to know everything about each other, remember, and now we barely recognize each other. When did that happen?"
Ron was silent for a long time.
"You know I had forgotten," he said quietly. He laughed a little to himself. "Remember that time we went to Magical Menagerie when I was six?"
Percy joined his laughter. "Fred ate the vomit flavor Bernie Bott Bean and was sick all over the place."
"And Mum told you to keep and eye on me. Left us by the hippogriffs."
"You decided it would be fun to go riding on one of them and when Mum came back you were halfway up the goddamn fence." "What happened?" Percy asked when their easy laughter died. "We were great friends then."
Ron shrugged. "Then you went to school I guess. You changed."
"I did?"
"Yeah. When you came back you were.different somehow. You would have never have let me get halfway up a fence again that's for sure."
"I didn't *let* you get up that fence!"
Ron raised an eyebrow. "Your exact words were, 'Climb up quick before Mum gets back.'"
Percy turned red and mumbled something that sounded very much like "did not."
"But when you came back from school you were suddenly all responsible about everything. Whatever any adult told you, you'd follow to the letter. And you never wanted to spend any time with me. You were always doing work."
"Well, I had to, Ron. Bill and Charlie were gone. Someone had to be an older brother."
"They were never like that," Ron protested. "They had fun every now and then. Maybe I should be asking you what happened."
"Not all of us had three older brothers to follow around when they went to school."
"Like you would let any of us follow you around, Percy! You were always too busy being Perfect Prefect or Head Boy," shot back Ron bitterly.
"Fred and George and I were still there if anything went really wrong, and you had Harry and Hermione to be with. It wasn't the same. And Dad was expecting me to be another Bill or Charlie. I'm not like them. It didn't come easily for me."
Ron stared at his older brother thoughtfully.
"I felt the same way, when I went to school, but I had you all to live up to as well," Ron said finally. "I just didn't even try I guess."
"Well you did have friends to support you. I never did."
"Oh come on, you must have had some friends while you were at Hogwarts."
Percy laughed bitterly. "No one was interested in a skinny little dork with glasses that took up half his face. And no one wanted to risk Marcus Flint to try to get to know me. And later I was so far gone into my schoolwork no one cared to make the effort." //Including my family,// he thought.
"What about Penny?" Ron protested.
Percy gave a snort. "Yeah, that didn't really work out very well."
"But you must have been friends for awhile. You must have at least *liked* each other."
"Look I really don't want to talk about it with you, okay?"
"Come on, I promise I won't make fun of you."
Percy smiled wryly. "I believe your exact words were 'You? Teaching? You'd kill the poor buggers you had for students!"
Ron looked properly embarrassed. "Sorry about that. But really, why did you stop going out with Penny? I remember how much you liked her the beginning of last year."
"The truth is I never really *liked* Penny, as anything other than a friend, and Penny only wanted to be able to tell her friends she had a boyfriend. Eventually she got tired of me and broke it off."
"But why did you go out with her if you didn't like her as anything other than a friend?" Ron asked, confused.
"I.never really had a friend, so I think I mistook the way I felt about her as something more. And she kept making such a big deal about it, how I was so sweet and so thoughtful. And when she was petrified.I sort of over dramatized it in my mind, made her into something she wasn't. Then the next year when we met up again, I realized that the real Penny was smart and nice, but not all that realistic."
"So you broke up with her?"
"Not exactly. Justin Finch-Fletchley apparently started flirting with her and he was a little less obsessed with schoolwork than I was, so she broke it off. I have to say, though, I wasn't to sad to see it end."
"Are you at least friends now?" Ron asked. "I haven't seen Penny since the beginning of third year."
Now Percy looked genuinely sad. "No.I guess she only wanted me as a boyfriend, but.you should feel really fortunate that you have such close friends."
Ron shrugged. "Well, having a friend like Harry is sort of a mixed blessing anyway."
"You two seem inseparable."
"We are. And Hermione too. But sometimes its hard. I was always the least important brother and now I tag along behind Harry who has all sorts of amazing things happen to him. I guess I'm permanently a sidekick."
"What about Hermione?"
"Hermione's just too smart for her own good," muttered Ron. Percy laughed.
"You two will find yourselves married with two kids one day," he told Ron with a chuckle.
"Harry will probably get her too," Ron muttered. Then his eyes widened when he realized Percy had heard him.
"I see how it is," he told Ron with a grin.
"I didn't mean it like that," Ron mumbled, coloring. "I just meant that if they.well then I.oh bugger."
"Of course you didn't," Percy told him with a suggestive smile.
"You, I don't think I've seen you smile in years," Ron told him with a look of amazement on his face.
Percy paused for a moment. "I guess I haven't been doing much smiling recently," he said thoughtfully. "I hadn't realized."
"You look.different when you smile. More normal. And when you joke around."
"I haven't really had the chance. I got so lost in schoolwork that I forgot why I wanted to do so well in the first place."
"Why do you want to do so well?" Ron asked. "You're not stupid. You could do well even without killing yourself all the time."
"I can't just be good enough. I have to be the best.at least at something." Percy stood up restlessly and glanced at the stack of papers on his desk. "I can't do anything well but that." He gestured to the papers.
"At least you have *something*," Ron complained. "I'm sandwiched between the hero and the brain. There's no room for me except as the eternal sidekick. Even if I tried I couldn't be as good as either of my friends. I just look silly for trying."
Percy turned to look at his brother, surprise clear on his face. "But everyone likes you so much. I mean besides your close friends. Everyone is envious that you have such close friends for one thing."
"Really? I never though anyone even noticed me."
"They do," Percy said, looking out the window distantly. "I hear people talk about you. You get along well with people. That's important. I never could."
"Oh.uh, thanks," Ron stammered, embarrassed. "I never really thought that was any kind of achievement."
Percy looked back at his brother. "It is. I guess it just shows how good you are at it that you never noticed. I've always been.envious of how easily you and Fred and George make friends. Especially you. I mean, Harry and Hermione would do anything for you."
"You're envious of me!?" Ron asked, his eyes wide. He stood up and faced his brother. Percy realized abruptly that Ron was almost his height. It seemed so strange to talk to his baby brother Ron like an equal. Maybe it was because he never really had. He placed his hands firmly on Ron's shoulders.
"You've really grown up since I last talked to you, Ron," he said softly. "I guess I spent so much time treating you as a younger brother I never stopped to see you as a person." He looked at his brother in wonderment for a moment, and then released Ron's shoulders. "Maybe that's why you always felt inferior. If so, I'm sorry. I think I was a little intimidated by my older brothers' success, so I made up for it by trying to make you feel younger. I'm sorry."
Very suddenly, Ron moved forward and embraced Percy. Then he abruptly let go and skittered back a few steps, looking very embarrassed. He stared at his feet for a moment before moving towards the door.
"I uh.better be.um.going. Er.Mum will be wanting me to help with supper and all. I.um yes, goodbye." Ron moved out into the hallway. Just as he was about to shut the door he leaned inside Percy's room again.
"Its nice to have you back again, Perce," he said, looking Percy in the eye. Then he closed the door and was gone.
Percy stood in the center of his room, staring at the closed door for a moment. He still felt traces of his brother's arms around him. How long had it been since he had been hugged by someone? A long time. A slow smile perked at the corners of his mouth. Slowly they stretched until a broad grin covered his face.
"You know," he told the empty room. "It's rather nice to be back."
*******************************************************************
Notes: Awwwww. Isn't that just the cutest little.um, stopping now. Anyway, as all of us with siblings know, this won't be the end of their bickering, but now maybe it can be friendly bickering. Okay, enough excusing. Please review.