Ginny keeps finding Harry and Ron lying on the lawn of The Burrow, their heads next to one another, staring up at the clouds going by. The first time she saw it, the June after the war, she stood in her window and just watched them. They weren't doing anything at all and, after not long had passed, she finds herself bored with it. If they're going to be strange, they can at least be strange and interesting! Fred and George are always good at that.

Were always good at that.

Ginny steps onto the stairwell, casting a longing look toward the bedroom door that once belonged to twins and she goes down the stairs. Hermione is sitting with Molly and they're discussing the possibility of going back to school in the fall. Hermione says Harry and Ron will never do it; Molly agrees. Determined not to be distracted by the fact that she might have to be dormmates with Hermione, Ginny asks for her for a moment and they stand at the window together, looking out at Harry and Ron.

"What do I know?" Hermione finally says.

"Loads," Ginny replies. "Mum says they'd be dead if not for you."

Hermione looks pleased with herself for a moment but admits, "I'd be dead if it weren't for them too. Honestly, I know where they are and that's enough for me."

Ginny thinks it's just odd enough to not look away from but Hermione returns to the kitchen table.

Harry and Ron return to the house not long after. Ginny almost asks but then something stops her – some deep instinct that takes her off guard. Ginny hasn't been afraid to open her mouth in years, particularly not when it came to mouthing off to brothers. She sits in Harry's lap, something she is sure wouldn't have happened in front of her mother had they not just fought in a war, and tries not to think about it. People were allowed to be on their own front lawns and The Burrow was essentially Harry's home now.

The next time Ginny catches them, back in the same position, she has just touched down from a broom ride, throwing the Quaffle around to herself. She had wanted a moment alone and had enjoyed it as much as she had been hoping. Ron and Harry are talking. Growing up, Ginny has learnt that, sometimes, being nosy was the only way to know things and she hid so that she could listen.

"Harry, you've gone mad."

"I've not! Look at it – it's clearly a Hippogriff."

"If that's a Hippogriff then Charlie's a dragon!"

"Well, do you remember what your Mum was like the morning we arrived in the flying car?"

They laugh and then Ron points upward. "That one, there. It looks like Hagrid."

"I do see the beard."

Ginny goes to put her broom away. Harry and Ron were cloud watching? But why? She reports this to her mother, who smiles in the way that implies if only Ginny were a little older, she would understand entirely.

"Don't worry about it, dear."

Ginny isn't worried at all. She's merely confused. Never, in all of her life, has she known Ron and Harry to cloud watch. An assortment of other things, of course. They might be losing their minds!

She tries it herself, one day, lying down on the ground and staring up at the sky. The grass is comforting, the sun bright in her eyes, and Ginny doesn't end up thinking of clouds but of Quidditch and of how blinding that light could be if she were trying to keep her eyes on the other team. It's slightly enjoyable but not overly so. She wouldn't do it more than once. Maybe it's because she's on her own although she doubted that second person could make that much of a difference.

It's the third time she spots them out the windows of The Burrows that she intentionally sneaks up on them, thinking that this time, without a doubt, that she will unlock the secret. They're lying in the same position, ears together, hands folded over their stomachs.

"That one looks like a Quaffle," Ron declares.

"A Quaffle is just a ball, Ron."

"Yeah, that means I'm right, though."

They are quiet for a moment and Ginny thinks that's the end of it. She takes a step forward, determined to ask what they are doing, when Harry says something that makes her shrink back again.

"I've been thinking about it a lot – that first train ride. What if I had sat in a different compartment? Or been put in Slytherin? Imagine how different things could have been."

"I think about that too," Ron admits. "More since … you know, the battle. What we could have done different, what we could have saved. I shouldn't have left you, Harry."

"You came back," Harry says, his voice full of forgiveness. "I know that the past can't be changed –"

"Time turners," Ron says. "Although, we might just make it worse. What has ever worked out for us?"

"I sat in the right compartment."

Ginny watches Ron's ears go bright pink, visibly from even the distance she was at and thinks that it's not at all like Harry to be that sappy.

"You know, Harry, I thought you were dead. And then, you weren't, not really, and after that, I looked at Fred, and I thought: he's not really dead, either. I wanted to believe that he'd get up."

"Collin Creevey."

"Remus."

They go back and forth, listing the dead. Somewhere around Crabbe, Ron also adds, "That cloud looks like a crab."

"Probably reporting us to Draco now."

They laugh together and then Ron says, "Tonks."

Ginny backs away from the two of them, her heart in her throat, deciding to leave them be. That night, though, Harry is kissing her in the garden while they're simultaneously pushing away curious gnomes, and Ginny admits what she heard and that she had been watching them.

"I thought you were both going mad."

"We might be," Harry says. "It's peaceful. And, I love you, and I love Hermione –"

"In different ways, though?" Ginny teases.

"Yes," Harry assures her. "But, you're not Ron."

"I can cut my hair, give it a good shot."

Harry kisses her again and then says seriously, "He's my best mate. It's different. And, sometimes, we wake up from seeing all of those horrible things and just lying there talking about clouds and then talking about school or winter holidays or Quidditch makes it not as terrible. It makes it feel normal again."

Ginny understands her mother's look a little better now. She thinks of the things that she keeps to herself, the things that she only shares with Harry, and the things she only shares with other friends. She closes her eyes and rests her head against his shoulder for a moment, thinking of the day she had lay in the sun herself. It feels more peaceful to think of it as not cloud watching but as being with a best friend and Ginny is suddenly very sorry, feeling as if she was intruding on something very sacred. She looks at him but Harry won't look at her, instead studying the garden fence. She could say something now but it would just keep causing him to look to the side.

"Harry?"

"Yes?"

"You do like me more than Ron, don't you?"

Harry looks at her again. "I love you more than Ron."

"That's not the same!"

"It's not," Harry agrees.

Ron sticks his head out the door. "Ginny! Harry! Mum says it's getting dark!" He looks over his shoulder. "Mum, I'm not saying that!"

Molly herself appears and shoes them both out of the garden.

"No grandchildren from you yet, Ginevra."

"Mum, if you must know, Harry was just confessing his love for Ron. They're getting together and Hermione and I are going to go drink our woes away with loads of Firewhiskey."

Her words hardly seem to phase Molly, who has raised too many children to be distracted by such a simple thing.

"Well, Harry and Ron won't give me grandchildren this young."

Harry and Ron can't look at each other anymore but they all go to bed laughing.

The next morning, when Ginny wakes up, she looks out her window and there's Harry and Ron on the lawn, sitting this time, mugs in their hands. Ginny can only imagine what they're saying and she lets the curtain fall shut again.

Some things, she knows, are between a boy and his best friend.

I'm rereading Harry Potter for the first time in years and I've been overwhelmed by the beauty of Ron's and Harry's friendship and I wanted to do a bit of a study from the outside looking in on two best friends who care about one another that much.

But, also, I've had a bit to drink and might wake up to find it's garbage but I thought, since it was just a fun, short exercise, it was worth sharing.

~TLL~