Disclaimer: All characters from the Harry Potter universe belong to J.K. Rowling, Bloomsbury Publishing, Scholastic Inc., AOL/Time Warner and associated companies. No offence, legal or otherwise, is intended by the online publication of this story. Neither is profit. Make love, not lawsuits!

Notes: Hermione dies on a mission for the Order. Harry and Ron try to cope. Post-Hogwarts. Inspired by, but not written for, the Sexual Healing challenge.

It had been bound to happen. To one of them. One of the three of them, and the other two would be left... behind. A triangle broken, a vertex lost. Hermione. Ron. Harry. Did it matter which one? Did it, when the sum total would be the same? Two. Only two. Nothing more.

It was Hermione. Brown hair, pursed mouth. Soft breasts cupped in callused palms. Parchment. Quills. The dusty thump of a book on the breakfast table, making tea slosh over their cups. A sharp voice waking them up in the mornings. This voice, this part of their lives. Hermione. Gone.

Ron went downstairs to get food, down to the little take-away nestled at the corner of their street--he made sure to go in plain-clothes, since Aurors weren't appreciated in this part of Hogsmeade, so close to the Hog's Head. No house-elves here, and neither he nor Harry had bothered going shopping since Hermione's death--nine days since then, and no milk in the house, no eggs, no bread. Ron bought the usual pasta, little Muggle-style boxes of it, now so popular here--and climbed back up the stairs to their flat, staying on the right hand side and close to the railing, where the rust furred under his fingers like an angry cat.

He found Harry sitting at the dining table, staring blankly at a map--flicking Hermione's quill in his fingers, leaving odd little splotches of ink on the parchment.

'Don't do that,' said Ron. 'You'll confuse the spots with the coordinates.'

Harry glanced up at him, eyes dry as they'd been for the past nine days--and then he pushed the map aside to make way for Ron's boxes, which heated themselves and popped open at the first touch of Harry's wand.

They ate quietly, the scent of fresh pasta somehow making the flat colder, older, more hateful. Ron thought, at various times, to say something--to break this silence he and Harry had been living in since... then. Neither of them had cried, not since the first day, and Hermione's parents had arranged everything to do with the funeral, so they hadn't even had a hand in that. Ron wasn't sure why that was important, but it was. It didn't help that Shacklebolt had given them leave for personal reasons, because Ron didn't need a leave, damn it, he needed to be out there working, away from Harry, doing something, or at least able to talk to Harry with the excuse of having work to discuss...

Why weren't they talking to each other? It made no sense. Surely this would be even more reason for them to--that is, they both loved Hermione, and they both missed--they both--they should be talking about this, but somehow they weren't, as though everything they said to each other made the shape of Hermione's silence only louder, as though every time they entered their bedroom and stood at opposite ends of that rumpled bed, Hermione's absence from it was made all the more visible. Perhaps they couldn't talk to each other because that would mean admitting--admitting that--

Ron was getting tired of this. He watched Harry get up and gather the dishes, the lamp-light sharp on white ceramic, on Harry's glasses. Harry washed the plates quietly, the running water of the sink loud in the silence--they'd gotten used to doing things the Muggle way now, since it took more time, filled up more space. Ron watched Harry's mask of a face, his quiet shoulders, and thought that they hadn't talked, hadn't touched, since then.

So when Harry finally turned and said: 'I'm going for a shower,' Ron pushed his chair back and got up. 'Me too.'

Harry's eyes darted to him, surprised.

They stood frozen for a moment, Ron's heart pounding quietly, thinking Don't turn this away Harry don't turn away don't, but Harry didn't, probably for no other reason than to avoid an argument, a conversation with actual words.

'Okay,' Harry said, and headed into the shower.

And it was startling how strange this felt, even though they'd done it so many times before--perhaps because Hermione was always present before, either in person or on the periphery, drawing maps in the kitchen while Ron and Harry fucked in the shower, or joining them when she wasn't at work. Now, it felt new, it felt strange--it felt like just the two of them, for the first time--it felt like Ron, you're going into a shower with Harry, you're going to fuck Harry, for the first time.

It was so new that Ron wasn't sure he'd go through with it, or that Harry would let him--Harry turned the stubborn knobs and waited for the cold water to heat up, steam clouding their faces a little and making this easier, making it easier to undress in jerky movements, palms flat against the slippery tiles for balance, until they were both naked and not quite looking at each other. Was it wrong, to do this? So soon after...?

Ron almost expected Harry to say You asked for this, but he didn't--he only climbed into the shower and got wet, hair growing heavy under the weight of the water and lashes glittering, cock soft between his legs. Ron followed, until they were standing close to each other under the hot battering of the water--and he simply let his mind shut down, let his hands do what they had always done, reaching for the bar of soap nestled in the wall's niche and soaping Harry with it, in firm, sure strokes across his chest, down his arms, kneeling to do his legs. It felt too perfunctory to mean anything, now--but Harry's cock still grew hard, by slow degrees, until Harry pulled him up to soap Ron as well.

They still didn't say anything--breathing harsh but almost silent under the roar of the water, their ears turning red with steam. They were both slick, glistening like fish, both hard and leaking and brushing against each other with little gasps, when Harry finally turned around and braced himself against the wall. Forearms. Elbows. Black hair clinging to the yellowed tiles, eyes closed, mouth open. Panting.

Do it, Ron expected Harry to say, but he didn't--his shoulder was almost unnaturally hot under Ron's mouth, his breath fogging the already fogged tiles in a startled whine when Ron finally worked his fingers in. One. Slick with soap and the little bath oil they had left, and they'd have to go out shopping for more and Two... Harry was tight, still so tight, strong narrow pulsing muscle all around Ron's fingers, Three, hips glistening with water as Harry began to move, impaling himself in slow undulations. Wait, Ron wanted to say, let me, but he didn't, although he found Harry's prostate and Harry bucked, suddenly, a startled 'Ah!' rising from his mouth to disappear into the steam.

It was easy then--with Harry sounding more familiar now, less like a stranger. Same sounds. His body, if not his mouth, saying the same things. Fuck me, Ron. Please now now now. So Ron parted Harry with both hands, holding him open as he targeted and slid himself in--Harry whimpering as Ron entered, inch after inch barely smoothed with soap and oil, past the tight, grasping ring and into the searing heat within.

Fire. Burning inside and out--under hot water, in Harry, though Harry was still hotter, so much more hotter, than anything else. He'd burn Ron to ashes if Ron didn't move, rub him to splinters if Ron did, but Harry decided for him, rocking back and forth, and Ron closed his eyes and bit softly on Harry's shoulder so that he wouldn't have to see this, see his own cock slide in and out of Harry, because it was too good and he wasn't supposed to feel this, not now, not with one of them gone, not with...

'Ah,' Harry said again, moving faster--and Ron finally gave in and obliged, feeling slightly distanced as he started to thrust, long and hard and slow and steady, deeper and deeper until Harry stopped trying to press back and only leaned forward onto his arms, lifted to the balls of his feet with each thrust. Like riding a wave, Ron thought, moving his hands down to grip Harry's hips, fucking him harder and harder just like he used to do, just like Harry liked it, just like Hermione liked it, Ron walking in on Harry and Hermione in the evenings, back from work to see Hermione on Harry's lap, moving, smiling over his shoulder... Or Hermione walking in on them, joining them, soft and warm and around and between and...

Missing, missing now--this empty space around them, just tiles and water and Ron's cock in Harry's arse, but it'd have to be enough, and maybe it was, and maybe it wasn't, but then Ron was shoving Harry hard into the wall, coming and coming and coming, hearing Harry cry out and convulse, his arm moving frantically, elbow brushing back against Ron's belly and Harry was jerking off, strand after strand of white come slapping the shower wall and sliding down, Harry's mouth open and making thick, hurt noises. 

It took Ron quite some time to move, after that--the wall supporting Harry supporting Ron--but when Ron did, slowly, pulling out of Harry in clinging inches, Harry opened his mouth and sobbed: 'Oh, fuck.'

The words were startling--the first words not related to work or food in nine days--honest words, words not spoken from behind a mask. Ron wanted to turn Harry around, look at him--but Harry's shoulders were shaking, his entire body, and Ron realized that Harry was crying, finally crying, arms still braced against the wall and head down. So Ron didn't turn him around after all--didn't step out to fetch the towel, still warm with Hermione's scent--didn't shut off the water. They only stayed like that, Ron's arms wrapped around Harry's waist, face buried in Harry's neck--skin numbing as the water grew colder, colder, but the sound of the shower covered the silence here, made it less audible, made it more bearable, and it was a long time before either of them moved at all.