Be You Blythe And Bonny

By Richan

(A silly little story/songfic inspired by the Dixie Chicks song of the same name)

A side story to the 'Trick and Treats' universe.

Disclaimer: I don't own anyone you recognize. The plot's my own, as insane as it is.

Warnings: Even more insanity. If you've been reading the series, you know that by now. ^_^

AN: Yes, I'm reloading this. I wasn't exactly happy with the title, hence, a revisit.

You can't afford no ring

A shriek came from the direction of the bathroom, waking Ron from the sound sleep he'd been quite enjoying. Still half in that state, he moved a hand towards where Hermione should be and found a cold spot. Oh. That meant the scream came from her.

What!?

Scrambling out of bed, Ron rocketed into the bathroom to find his girlfriend sobbing over a piece of plastic.

"Mione?" he asked tentatively. He knew better than to demand just what was going on. After six years of being friends and then two dating, he knew that to demand Hermione to tell him something was Just. Not. Done.

Sad, cinnamon coloured eyes looked mournfully at him and held up the little piece of plastic.

All Ron saw were a couple of blue lines running across two wells in the top of it. "What's this?"

Hermione sniffled. "A pregnancy test."

Ron's heart stopped beating for a moment before restarting twice as fast as it had been going. "What!?"

His girlfriend sniffled again and wiped her eyes. "I'm pregnant."

You can't afford no ring

"I'm not telling my parents," Hermione said after the both of them had cleaned up. She felt very refreshed after taking an extra long bath. Well, that's what she'd been planning all week until she realized that she'd missed her period. Still, she wasn't panicking - she left that to Ron most of the time - and had shrugged it off as stress from the last month in which she had been trying to changed things at the Ministry since she had become the new Vice Minister of the Department of Magical Creatures where she was trying to get werewolves off the list so that Percy, the Vice Minister of Wizard Relations, would have to put up with Sirius' protests over the treatment of his lover and would-be fiancé - if the Ministry would let him marry the man.

"Why not?" Ron asked as he took a break from shoveling food in his mouth.

Hermione shook her head at her boyfriend. His eating habits hadn't changed a bit in the seven months since they'd graduated from Hogwarts. She still loved him, though, even though he had the table manners of many of the animals Hagrid had presented in Care of Magical Creatures.

"Because I've tainted their image of being their little girl," Hermione reasoned. She continued when Ron opened his mouth. "All of my life, I've tried to live up to their expectations of being their good little girl, and as much as I want to tell them that I'm not, I don't want to hurt them like that."

Ron nodded, and Hermione could almost see the wheels turning in his head with that. She knew that Ron felt the same way sometimes, even though his parents knew just how much trouble he had gotten into over the years with Hermione and Harry.

"What about everyone else?" Ron asked a little later.

Hermione nodded. "We can tell them when we go to The Dog Pound for Remus' birthday party next week. I just want to make sure that I am really pregnant before we tell anybody else."

Ron nodded.

"Are you okay with this?" she asked.

He shrugged. "I think it hasn't really sunk in just yet," he said. Then he brightened. "Mum's going to be so happy - her first grandchild!"

Hermione smiled. She loved Molly Weasley as much as her own mother. Added to that was that she was perfectly fine with Hermione living with her youngest son and not even close to getting married. Her parents wouldn't understand, but Molly did since she and Arthur had had both Bill *and* Charlie before they got married.

In fact, Molly had been surprised when Harry's parents had been married more than seven months before Lily had gotten pregnant and he was their first. More than half of all wizarding families had at least one child before they got married. It just simply worked that way. If the father lived the day after the mother gave birth, it'd be a good marriage.

I shouldn't be wearing white

And you can't afford no ring

Two days later, Ron and Hermione were sitting in the mediwizard's office. Ron's family had been going to see Mr. Frederick since he had started his practice when Arthur had been a child. That didn't mean to say that the man was old - far from it. If Albus Dumbledore was old, Mr. Frederick was a child compared to him.

Now Hermione was seated nervously on the bed as Ron watched from the chair next to it. It had finally sunk in that she could be pregnant and in nine months - give or take - there would be another mouth to feed. He had buried his head at that thought. Even though both he and Hermione had good jobs, she wouldn't be able to work for a couple of months once the baby was born. Plus there was the question of needing help watching the baby once Hermione did go back to work, and that was expensive. It was why his mother had stayed at home, because by the time one child was ready for daycare, another was on the way.

Mr. Frederick came into the room wearing a big smile. "Congratulations! It looks like you'll be having a bouncing baby girl in about eight months."

Ron didn't hear any more than that because he passed out.

You finally took my hand

It took a nip of gin

But you finally took my hand

"You're what!?"

The phrase was echoed slightly as ten people shouted it into the air, some of them obviously missing their cues.

Hermione nodded happily as Ron sighed. She knew that he was still moaning about the fact that she had made him wait until today to tell his family. Once he had woken up in the mediwizard's office, he had been quite excited about the baby. Hermione thought it might have been due to the fact that yes, she really was pregnant and now was a good time to panic.

Now, though, she felt like panicking as well.

She didn't think she was the mothering type. She'd rather be reading a book than anything else, unless it involved Ron and then no holds were barred.

Hm. Maybe she should talk to somebody about it. Not Molly. The woman was the most maternal person she had ever met and wasn't quite the right person to talk to about this.

Looking around the people gathered for Remus' birthday, she found herself looking at Harry. Her best friend was chatting easily with Fred and George while Snape hovered nearby. Now that was a romance nobody had seen coming. At least not until that week before Christmas when Harry had asked for their advice.

Finally seeing her chance, she pulled Harry off to the side and glared at Snape. The older man sent a glare back at her before going over to talk to the one other person Hermione knew he could stand - the birthday boy himself. Plus, it made Sirius mad which she knew was a bonus in the potions master's eyes.

"Harry?"

He gave a bright smile. "Congratulations, Mione!"

She gave a half-smile and pulled him over to the couch. "Can I ask you a question?"

"Sure," Harry answered with a nod.

Hermione wiggled a moment, trying to figure out the best way to put her question.

"Mione?"

She realized she'd been zoning. "Oh!" She wrinkled her nose as she realized that Snape had popped back up near them. "Do you think I'll be a good mother?"

Hermione knew she'd made a mistake by asking that in earshot of Snape, but tried to ignore his snort anyway. She wasn't about to say anything about him to Harry, not while her best friend was totally besotted with the man and quite willing to take him on when no one else wanted to touch him with a ten foot pole.

It was rather lucky for her that Harry nodded. "Yes, Mione. You're caring and a good friend. You'll need both of those attributes - " Hermione was wowed with the influence Snape was having on her friend's vocabulary " - when your kid gets older. Do you know if it's a boy or girl?"

She nodded. "A girl. Dr Frederick says that the due date's around August 20th or so."

Harry was wearing a knowing smile and Hermione knew - just *knew* - what he was thinking. Well, she was thinking the same thing in that she must have gotten pregnant the night after the big Christmas bash the twins had put on at their store. Fred and George had spiked both the punch and egg nog, and while it had been funny watching Ginny deal with being the drunk for the first time ever and Molly yelling at the twins for making her 'baby' that way - is was disconcerting for her to know that most everyone they knew had a good guess as to what they had been doing later that night.

That reminded her - what would her parents say? Because they would obviously know just what she and Ron had been doing when she'd told them that they were doing nothing of the kind.

Hermione knew at that moment that her boat was sunk in that particular moment. Now all she had to do was to wait until the last possible minute to let her parents know, preferably when she was in the delivery room.

You can't afford no ring

I shouldn't be wearing white

And you can't afford no ring

Ron stared at the two people on the doorstop. 'Oh shit,' ran rampant through his mind for a couple of seconds before he realized that the woman was saying something.

"Is Hermione at home?" asked Dr. Elizabeth Granger. The older woman was wearing a neat, green dress and somewhat strappy white shoes with matching handbag. Ron absently noted that she was wringing a handkerchief in one hand as he took this in.

His attention then abruptly switched to Dr. Michael Granger. The older man's graying hair was impeccably combed and his stylish yet sedate three-piece suit was crisp and subtly stated money. Dr. Granger was wearing a wavering smile as he asked, "Her last letters have been a little strange and we wanted to check in on her. May we see her?"

Ron nodded in stunned shock. Oh boy, this one's going on the books.

He went looking for Hermione, who was last seen trying to separate the last box of books she'd had sent from the office her so that she could continue working.

The last two months had not been pretty.

First there had been the scare that had sent Ron into full shock. He'd gotten a call at work saying that Hermione had fallen from a ladder and would he please meet her at St. Mungo's? Then he'd come home last week to discover that she'd been trying to move the couch the old-fashioned way - forget that she's a witch and could have used magic.

And in the meantime he'd had to put up with some wacky mood swings that made him wish desperately for this whole thing to be over with and then he was never going near Hermione ever again as long as she was ovulating (a new word helpfully sent by Harry, who was getting a big kick out of this since neither he nor Snape could get pregnant and didn't have to worry about such things ever).

"Mione?"

A bushy brown head popped up from behind the couch and whatever she'd been doing back there Ron didn't want to know. All he knew was that his girlfriend's parents were waiting patiently to know that their little girl was all right and he knew there was going to be a problem when she walked into the room looking like she did.

"What is it, Ron?" she asked as she attempted to dive back down to she'd been in. "I'm busy at the moment."

"You're parents are here?" he half-asked.

Ron watched as Hermione's face grew red before paling to a shocking white that looked strangely reminiscent of Snape and now he would have an awful time of getting it up if he kept on thinking that way.

"What?"

Her voice was soft and harsh at the same time, the soft utterance holding the most fear Ron had ever heard coming from Hermione. Reluctantly, he nodded and pointed to the door.

"Yep."

Ron saw her sigh as she walked around the couch, her hand resting on the swelling of her stomach. He thought it was quite sexy at times - meaning when she wasn't cranky from a hormone overload - but he couldn't tell her that because she wouldn't understand.

He tried to give her an encouraging smile, but it faded as soon as she walked through the door to the living room. Three. Two. One.

Scream.

Hey. He'd timed that pretty good. But now he had to go help Hermione deal with her hysteric mother without being killed by her father. Tricky, but he'd gotten through worse things. Of course, they were all Harry's fault, but he wasn't about to say something like that. Ever.

"Ron!" Hermione's shout shook the walls.

That was his cue.

Momma don't approve

Daddy says he's the best in town

Momma don't approve

"I'm guessing that your parents didn't take the news very well, huh?"

Hermione glared at Harry, who seemed to shrug it off. She supposed that he'd built up an immunity to murderous stares over the last year or so, but she wished that it would still work all the same. The two of them were meeting in Hogsmeade since she'd needed several things for the wedding and *another* fitting for her robe, since she'd gotten even bigger than last week, and with five days before the ceremony was supposed to take place, Hermione was becoming slightly frazzled with the entire thing.

"No," she ground out between her teeth. "Mother did not take it well."

Harry looked surprised. "What about your dad?"

Hermione had to laugh at that. Yes, her mother had been screaming bloody murder and everything in between - "My baby's been ruined!" had popped up frequently in her hysterical soliloquy - but her father had been strangely quiet until Ron had made his way to the room. "He asked if Ron wanted to marry me and Ron said 'whenever she wants to,' and so he slapped Ron on the back and asked where the nearest cigar shop was because it was time to celebrate."

Harry smiled at this. "And your mother probably turned on him at that point, right?"

She nodded. "Yes. But once she realized she'd gotten sidetracked from my 'problem' she said that we'd better get married as fast as possible or she was disowning me."

As soon as the words were out of her mouth, Hermione knew she hadn't have said them. She knew that Harry had always craved a loving family and had embraced both her's and Ron's families as if they were his own. A rift between Hermione and her mother was almost like a rift between Harry and her mother. She tried to mend the situation.

"Dad told her that if she did that she'd be the one disowned because they were getting a grandchild out of the deal and it was fine by him as long as he got to spoil it."

Hermione sighed in relief when she saw Harry smile but knew that he was still down about the news. Perking up, she knew what she could say, even though Ron wanted to do it. He would understand why she said it, though.

"We'd like you to be the godfather, Harry," she offered. Then she laughed as Harry fell out of his seat and was staring up at her from where he was sprawled on the floor.

"Really?"

Hermione nodded. That would keep him until Ron asked him to be his best man at the wedding. She smiled to herself as she watched Harry wax poetic about the job and how he was going to try his hardest. Both she and Ron had fought over whom Harry would get to stand next to. Ron had finally won her over when he pointed out that it would look funny to have Harry standing next to her with his sister - who even though she knew Harry was noot into girls at all was still trying and hoping that this was just a faze. Hermione had sighed and gave in, saying that it wouldn't happen again.

"Have you and Ron thought up a name yet?" Harry was asking when Hermione brought herself to the present.

Shaking her head, she said, "we've gone through about twenty books picking out names, and nothing seems right."

Harry nodded. "Could I suggest one?"

Hermione was intrigued. Harry was taking this better than either her or Ron had, even in the beginning. "What were you thinking?"

"Blythe."

Hermione smiled. "I like it. What made you think of that?"

"'Sigh you no more ladies,

Sigh no more

Men were deceivers ever,

One foot in sea,

And one on shore,

To one thing constant never,

Then sigh not so,

But let them go,

And be you blithe and bonny,

Converting all your sounds of woe,

Into hey nonny nonny!'"

She smiled again while wondering just where Harry had learned that.

Harry gave a sheepish smile. "Sev and I have been reading Shakespeare lately, now that school's almost out and we've corrected exams."

Hermione hid her laughter at just imagining Harry and Snape lounging together - which was, frankly, quite disturbing - reading out of the same book. No, she wouldn't be going down that path of thought.

She liked the name. If her recollections were correct - it was foolish of her to doubt herself but she did it so rarely - that Blythe meant "joyful one."

It sounded quite appropriate.

You can't afford no ring

I shouldn't be wearing white

And you can't afford no ring

Three weeks.

That's all the time that Hermione's mother had given them before she put her foot down.

Ron didn't understand the entire reason that she'd given just *why* he and Hermione *had* to get married ASAB or whatever it meant. Right away. Emergency situation.

Which was why he was tugging on the collar of his best robes listening to Harry snicker beside him at the antics of his dad and Hermione's dad while they waited for the ceremony to start. Over the last three weeks, Ron had grown to like Hermione's dad even more than he already had. Mike, as he'd told Ron to call him, had been thrilled that he was going to be a grandfather, and while he had wanted Hermione to wait a couple of years, it was fine by him that it was happening now. He knew that his daughter was headstrong, and as long as she knew what she was doing, so be it. Plus, Ron could add in the fact that Mike and his father had become 'buddies' since the ultimatum had been passed down. The two men had been exchanging stories of their wives' pregnancies, embarrassing any said child that had been produced by such a thing immensely.

Now, instead of ushering guests like both wives' had planned, each of them were handing out cigars - both men had approved of the tradition, no matter that it was rather old fashioned nowadays - before seating said guests and trying to light the damn things. All of which was entertaining Harry and distracting Ron from what was going to happen.

Finally, the ceremony was over, and after Ron's family had thoroughly frightened some of Hermione's relatives, he was the one who was laughing as one of his new wife's cousins had taken a fancy to Harry and he couldn't throw her off.

It wasn't until he was dancing the first dance after dinner that Ron finally realized that he was married, and while it wasn't worth it to panic, he did take a couple of seconds to think over what got him to this point. He'd liked Hermione for two and a half years before he'd gotten the guts to ask her out, which happened to be the exact same time she'd done the same thing. Then two years of dating before the Christmas that would change their lives had been wonderful, barring the week Harry had sent them into a panic when he'd disappeared after that last battle with Voldemort.

Ron smiled as Hermione laid her head on his shoulder. He could feel her stomach move against his body; their daughter was going to be as feisty as her mother.

Ron couldn't wait.

Baby's on its way

Say I do and kiss me quick

'Cause baby's on its way

Two months later and Hermione was not smiling. At all. No, she was in too much pain to think about using any of her facial muscles for something other than yelling for lots of numbing potions. In the barrel-size vial, never mind the little two-sip-sized one that Madam Pomfrey was trying to dose her with.

Both Ron and her had been invited to Hogwarts for a little celebration - as if Dumbledore's one-hundred-and-fifty-fifth birthday would be little. It had been quite fun even if she did feel rather like a whale. Hermione had gotten a chance to talk with some intelligent people on childbirth, namely Pomfrey (and Snape, who knew *lots* of potions to help) besides Dr Frederick, who reminded her a little too much of Dumbledore when he knew something that she didn't.

It was when she was woken up at two in the morning that panic set in. An intense pain had seemed to shudder through her entire body, ripping a scream the likes that Hogwarts hadn't seen in eons that wasn't produced by Peeves' - or the Marauders' - antics.

Now she was screaming bloody murder not unlike her mother three months ago, but this time it was for Ron's death and the basic 'give me more drugs' screams that most women shout while in labor.

This was it. No more children after this for her. Even if Ron managed to live through what she was planning to do to him.

Another scream found its way from her throat, followed by a "Hello gorgeous" muttered by Harry, who Hermione had wanted after Ron complained about his broken hand and had fainted for the fourth time in an hour.

She should have kept to her own sex like Harry. He'd been wise enough.

"One more push, Hermione," Madame Pomfrey told her after using suction to clear the baby's mouth.

Harry sent her a beaming smile. "Just one more and you'll have a beautiful daughter, Mione."

Hermione tried to smile, but pain was foremost at the front of her mind.

There was another contraction and a release of pressure and then a small wail.

"It's a girl!" Madame Pomfrey said as she held the baby up for Hermione to see.

She gave a wobbly smile before lying back on the mattress. She closed her eyes to catch her breath for the afterbirth.

"Hey, sweetie," came Harry's voice from right beside her.

Hermione opened her eyes to find a bright red face scrunched up, a little red and gold cap placed on wild silvery hair.

"Say hello to your mum, Blythe Dallas Weasley."

Her hands shook as she reached for her daughter.

Merlin. To think that she and Ron had created this blessed little creature. Already she could see that it would have her type of hair, although the color was neither (the baby books had said this could happen and then it fell out to re-grow to its natural color). It was definitely her nose and Ron's chin and Ginny's cheeks.

Rubbing a gentle finger across one pink cheek, she whispered, "Hello, beautiful."

You can't afford no ring

I shouldn't be wearing white

And you can't afford no ring

Ron stared through the window at the tiny creature in the crib. He hadn't gotten enough courage to actually go in there and hold her, although Harry had taken advantage of his godfather status and held her up several times for the various Weasleys and nonesuch that had congregated in front of the *rarely* used nursery in Hogwarts. Vague thoughts of Hermione telling him that they'd had need of such a thing back in the days of Mad Eric's reign of terror sometime around 1430 or 1340 in between goblin wars, but he couldn't be bothered by them.

'Wow' was the only word that ran through his head.

A thump on his back startled him from his thoughts. Turning around, he found himself surrounded by his brothers.

"Glad you got the job, Ron," Charlie was saying as Fred and George shook both his hands. Percy was shaking his head in shame that Hermione was six months pregnant by the time they'd actually began planning their wedding - or even saying they needed one in the first place - and Ron wondered why he and Penelope had ever gotten anywhere while they were dating and she was living the high life in Paris with Draco Malfoy. Bill was puffing on one of the many cigars their father had taken to keeping in one pocket of his robes at all time, ready for the announcement of his first grandchild's birth.

"What made you decide on her name?" Ginny was asking as she came up to them, Neville Longbottom on her arm.

Ron smiled at her, pleased twofold. First, he really was a father - at nineteen, which freaked him out when he really thought about it; and second, that she'd given up on Harry when she'd seen him give the most disgusting (in his words) and romantic (in Hermione's words) to Snape at their wedding reception. Of course, now he'd have to look out for bumbling nieces and nephews who tend to blow up Potions labs in the next ten years or so, but at the moment he could accept almost anything. But, really, if they were as beautiful as his daughter, he'd take them any way he could.

"Well, we got Blythe from Harry," he told his siblings. "It's from one of Shakespeare's plays."

Percy nodded. "Much Ado About Nothing."

All Weasley siblings looked at him for a second before returning to the conversation.

"And Dallas from an old book Hermione found at work. The woman who wrote it was named Dallas Weasley."

They all quieted down.

"Weasley?" Charlie asked.

Ron nodded. "Yep. She wrote 'A Treatise on the Relations Between Wizarding and Muggle Peoples in England' in 1742."

"Well," Fred finally said, "Hermione really does fit into this family after all."

Ron glared. "And she didn't fit before?"

George smacked Fred before saying, "This just confirms it, Ronniekins. Besides, any woman that would want to marry you has to be just as crazy as the rest of us."

While they had been talking, none of them had noticed Harry slipping past them into the nursery. A tap on the glass broke up their conversation and they all turned to find him holding the sleeping child, the Gryffindor blanket half-falling off her.

Ron stared at her for a moment before realizing that this was the moment. Walking through the doors, he held out his hands for his daughter. As Harry put her in his arms, he knew that life could not be any more perfect than this. Well, if Hermione let him back in her bed would be the best, but he could definitely handle it.

******

End :)