4 August 1992

Ron knelt down in front of the peony bush, eyes narrowing as he scanned the thistles. Then, suddenly, he heard the telltale rustle and he lunged forward, seizing the offending creature by the ankles in a single swoop, catching it completely by surprise.

Ron got to his feet, holding the skinny creature up tightly and ignoring its attempts to disengage itself. "This is a gnome."

"Gerroff me! Gerroff me!"

Harry's jaw dropped, and Ron grinned. "This is what you have to do," Ron explained, as he lifted the gnome over his head and began to swing it around and around in a circle. Harry stared at him, his mouth still open in what Ron presumed was a silent cry of shock.

"It doesn't hurt them," Ron reassured him. "You've just got to make them really dizzy, so they can't find their way back to the gnomeholes."

Harry blinked. Then, he nodded, still looking rather alarmed, and Ron couldn't help but marvel—for what was undoubtedly the millionth time—at the fact that Harry Potter, the Boy Who Lived, knew less about the Wizarding world than Ron had at the age of five.

Turning back towards the hedge, Ron suddenly released the gnome's ankles. With a squeak of terror, the pest soared at least twenty feet into the air, finally landing with a thump in the meadow beyond the hedge.

Fred, who had been crouched over a hydrangea plant, attempting to tackle an exceptionally evasive gnome, let out a loud snort. Ron turned around to look at him.

"Pitiful," Fred said, shaking his head. "I bet I can get mine beyond that stump."

Ron glanced back at the hedge, spotting a lone tree stump that was about forty feet away. He looked at Fred. "You're on," he said, holding out a hand to his brother, who shook it with a grin. "All right, let's make a game out of this, Harry." Ron hunched back over the peony bush and snatched up two more gnomes, holding one out to Harry, who eyed it apprehensively.

"Are you sure it doesn't hurt—?"

"Positive," Ron said firmly, resisting the urge to roll his eyes. "C'mon, youngest Seeker in a century—let's see how good of an arm you've got."

Harry reached out and gingerly took the gnome by the ankles. However, rather than mirroring Fred and George, who were spinning their gnomes very exuberantly, he simply walked over to the hedge and leaned over it to drop the gnome onto the grass.

Ron groaned, "Harry, you shouldn't—"

But Harry had already jumped a foot into the air and let out a yelp of pain. The gnome, plainly realizing that its predator was an amateur, had sunk its teeth into Harry's thumb and was clinging onto it for all its worth. Harry let out another cry of pain, and began to shake his right arm furiously.

"Aim it over the hedge," Ron advised him, wincing as the gnome bit down harder.

Harry did as he was told, and a moment later, the gnome had flown far and clear off of his hand, surpassing Fred's tree stump by quite a few yards.

"Wow, Harry!" Fred let out a whoop of amazement, clapping Harry soundly on the back and craning his head to look out towards the meadow. "That must've been fifty feet!"

Harry grinned, looking rather embarrassed as he nursed his bleeding finger.

"Mum can put that right for you in about a second," Ron told him, nodding towards the Burrow's backdoor. "D'you want me to go ask—?"

"No," said Harry, very quickly, and Ron raised his eyebrows. "I—er—I'll just help you lot finish de-gnoming first." He wiped his finger on his jeans and walked back towards the flowerbed.

Ron nodded slowly, frowning, but Harry did not catch his gaze again. So, Ron shrugged, and bent down to pick up a gnome.

The four of them worked in silence for several minutes. The gnomes were beginning to crowd around in earnest now, turned curious by the disappearance of so many of their number. Everywhere Ron looked, inquisitive, tiny, leathery heads were poking out of holes in the soil.

"See, they're not too bright," George said to Harry, picking up six gnomes at once. "The moment they know the de-gnoming's going on, they storm up to have a look. You'd think they'd have learned by now just to stay put."

"Yeah, but that would make our job ten times harder, wouldn't it?" Ron grumbled, pitching a rather foulmouthed gnome into the air. It swore loudly as it ricocheted away.

"Well, I suppose we should be grateful that a de-gnoming's the worst of our punishment," George sighed, casting a furtive, backward glance at the house. "Remember that time we pushed Percy into the pond and broke his wrist? She made us scrub the entire bathroom without magic."

"I think it's ridiculous she's punishing us at all," Fred muttered, kicking a gnome up into the air and catching it. "I mean, we were just trying to save Harry from that hellhole—"

"We took Dad's car," Ron reminded him, yanking a particularly fat gnome away from a rosebush. "He's spent three years restoring that Anglia. It's his love, his passion—"

"—and it's his fault he didn't lock the shed," Fred finished, smirking. Ron grinned.

"D'you think he'll be angry?" asked a quiet voice.

Ron, Fred, and George all looked around. Harry was holding three gnomes, looking worried.

"Who, Dad?" scoffed Ron. "Nah, he rarely shouts. He'll probably be quite impressed with us, actually."

"And I have a feeling Mum's going to be yelling at him a lot longer than she did us," George snickered. He took on a very high-pitched tone. "Arthur Weasley, how dare you enchant that car!"

Fred and Ron laughed.

"She seemed really mad before," Harry said nervously, looking over his shoulder at the Burrow's kitchen window.

"Not with you," Ron promised. "She just wasn't pleased that we left without telling her, especially since Dad's been at work all night. She likes knowing we're all safe."

Harry sighed, chucking the three gnomes over the hedge. "Maybe you shouldn't've come to Privet Drive," he said miserably. "I didn't want you all to get in trouble—"

"Harry, relax," George said bracingly.

"Yeah, honestly," agreed Fred, shaking his head. "Don't flatter yourself. We really don't need your help to get into trouble around here."

George laughed and winked, and he and Fred wandered over to the other end of the garden, where a cluster of gnomes was peeking out from behind a Flutterby bush.

But Ron continued to look at Harry, who was staring down at his feet. He wasn't smiling.

"Harry."

Harry didn't look up.

"Harry."

At last, Harry met his gaze, biting his lip.

Ron sighed. "Harry, this is how it always is," he said in a low voice. "We do stupid stuff, Mum yells at us a bit, and we move on."

"But—"

"Look, if Fred, George, and I hadn't come and got you from your aunt and uncle's, it would've only been a matter of time before Mum and Dad showed up themselves," Ron reasoned. "I told you—Mum likes knowing we're all safe. That includes you."

Harry closed his mouth and blinked several times. "What?"

Ron shrugged. "You're my best friend, Harry," he said seriously. "And as your best friend, it's my responsibility to make sure that you don't spend your entire summer locked in your bedroom, getting food through a flap in your door."

Harry grimaced. "You saw it?"

"It was kind of hard to miss," Ron conceded.

Harry was quiet for a moment.

Then— "Erm…thanks, Ron," he said awkwardly, without looking at Ron.

Ron felt his ears turn red, but he nodded, avoiding Harry's eye, as well. "Anytime."

There was another pause.

Ron cleared his throat loudly. "Well, we should finish up out here," he told Harry. "I still have to show you my room…and if we're lucky, Mum'll let us take you down to the village later!"

Harry grinned, already reaching for a gnome that was attempting to sneak back into the rosebush. "I can't wait."

Author's Note:

Teehee, I love these awkward twelve-year-old babies.

Anyway, this is the first in a set of fourteen one-shots I will be posting over the next few months for the Cinema Competition on HPFC. The prompt for this story was Ferris Bueller's Day Off. I had to write about a friendship, and I chose Harry and Ron. And I also had the option of using the following quotes: "My father spent three years restoring this car. It is his love. It is his passion." "It is his fault he didn't lock the garage." ...they fit perfectly with this cute little scene from CoS I chose to expand on. :)

Hope you enjoyed this. I'd love to hear your thoughts!

Ari