In the end can they just pretend?
Ronald Weasley had hit rock bottom, his life as he knew it was over. He had lost everything. Well not everything, but it felt like the life he had imagined for himself was over. And his family wasn't helping him. Th...
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"Are you hungry Ronald?" Claudia's voice announced the moment they had stepped out of the small seamstress' building. The two had been arguing in regards to who was going to pay. Ron had wanted to pay considering the suits were for him. Yet Claudia refused to allow him knowing that he was only getting them because she expected him to dress a certain way for the wedding.
"I could happily get something to eat." Ron agreed almost instantly. He usually ate dinner not longer after returning home from work, and he was running about three hours late and his stomach was not appreciative of that fact.
"Great I know this really nice little place around the corner we could stop in." Claudia seemed to take his words with a happy feeling as she began to lead him around the small side roads of which they were surrounded by.
The pair would weave between streets at a very fast pace as they headed in the direction of the place Claudia wanted to eat in. Ron did not know what to expect for the place they were going to stop in, whether it would be incredibly posh. He had a suspicion it might just be, that seemed very much to be the kind of lifestyle Claudia was used to. Therefore, when she began to slow on a certain street which looked much like every other they had walked down he was confused. Because from what he could see there was no clear restaurants around them, nowhere really which overly looked as though it was still serving food that late into the evening.
"It's just the next place up ahead." Claudia indicated motioning over to the building that looked like every single house on the rest of the street, other than the small little sign which hung above the door. The name of the restaurant was written in French a language Ron did not understand well enough to be able to read and therefore he allowed himself to be led inside.
"Bonjour table for two?" The waitress asked, quickly changing to English the moment she had set her eyes upon the pair of them. They were taken to a small table in the back lit mainly by candlelight.
"May I get you a glass of wine whilst you look over the menu?" From the sound of the waitress' words it seemed like it was going to be a very posh restaurant.
"Can I get a glass of red, what would you like?" Claudia instantly responded before questioning Ron on his option.
"I'll have some red too." Ron quickly agreed but wasn't sure what to think. Before his eyes cast down to the menu, at first he thought he was going to be stuck as he could not clearly recognise anything on the menu. Though found that very quickly he was able to notice a few things he could eat. Some items definitely were on the posh side but more and more seemed to be casual, in a strange combination. Plates were served relatively fast and Ron had to admit he was pleasantly surprised in regards to how well the food went with the wine even when it was a little more relaxed. Claudia also seemed to have not picked something extremely posh having gone for something which almost mirrored his own choice.
Conversation also did not seem to be difficult to maintain. Claudia would talk after a glass of wine or two. And Ron was quickly starting to see more of her. Understand more of her. Yet he had to see her emotionless state completely crack. Though with the more relaxed she became, the more open she seemed the more he was willing to try and find out just how to completely crack the state she put out to the rest of the world.
And as Claudia sat opposite him, she was starting to wonder just why so many people seemed against spending time with the man. As to why whilst his best friend got nothing but fame for everything they did together that Ron remained so much in the background. So easily forgotten. She noted that it would not be incredibly stupid for him not to have lots of women fighting over him, for there to be so many people excited that this relationship with his last girlfriend was over so they had a chance with him. But this did not seem to be the reality and she could not see why.
"No I'm being like completely serious right now. Stop laughing." Ron exclaimed as he continued to attempt to recount something from his childhood. Though each time he tried to get any further in the story Claudia had interrupted him with her own laughter. And as her eyes began to water from the intensity of her laughter Claudia let out a snort. Before clamping her hand over her mouth at the sound.
"Did you just snort?" Ron questioned just like they were in a scene out of romantic comedy film.
"No." Claudia replied just like a liar. She laughed at her own words giving herself away at the same time.
"It sounded so stupid." Ron's words were teasing in nature and they seemed to land well.
"You look pretty stupid right now." Claudia's own response this time was missing any fire it could have contained as she fired back the first words she thought of. The pair stared at one another before laughing gently.
"So you're trying to tell me that the reason you're scared of spiders is because of your older brothers. It must be nice having so many of you around to spend time with." Claudia moved the conversation back to the information he had willingly shared with her.
"Yeah I suppose it is." Ron contemplated his answer a little unsure where the conversation was heading and of his own response. His relationship with all of his siblings was not the best, he had only recently started to have a decent relationship with Percy again a year or so ago, Charlie still lived hours away on the other side of Europe. And then there was Fred. The brother he'd never get to speak to again.
"Pansy is great as a sibling but she's awfully overbearing. Sometimes I wish there was one more of us to kind of equal things out a little bit. Maybe having a brother would be nice." Claudia noted the look on Ron's face and turned the conversation away from his siblings and onto her own.
"What would he have been called do you reckon?" Ron followed her slightly different topic of conversation pulling himself out of his own mind and back into the tiny little restaurant they were sat in.
"My mum had a thing for older fashioned names like classics so he could have been a David or something." Claudia pondered herself, she knew her name and her sisters were more on the old fashioned spectrum and went with the first name that had come to her head.
"David Parkinson, no way that's such a bad name."
"Oh go on then, what name would you pick out?"
"Hugo." And Claudia would go onto to remember his name choice, even if he himself could not.
