He grimaced as he looked into the old mirror. The room was run down and looked grimy and unwelcoming, but to Harry it was like paradise, a haven in the ugliness that had been surrounding him. He himself looked terrible. His eyes were bloodshot and there were large shadows carved into the flesh below. This was not how he would choose to look when seeing her again, but he had no choice. And if she really cared for him (and sometimes in his worst moments he believed that she never could forgive him everything he had put her through this last year) she wouldn't care what he looked like. He snorted as he gazed at his face, amused by his own vanity. Any normal person would be proud of his achievements and be sure of his reception as the hero who destroyed the darkest wizard of all time, but not Harry. No, he stared at himself in the mirror and was unhappy with what he saw. He knew it was because he wasn't in love with a normal person. Ginny was a spitfire in human clothing and he could never entirely predict how she would react. One thing he was sure of was that she would understand what he had done and why; she knew how crucial defeating Voldemort had been. Oh yes, she would understand, would likely applaud his actions intellectually. But he still wasn't sure if she could forgive him for leaving her without saying goodbye, for allowing her to think he was dead. Her voice tearing through him as he lay in Hagrid's arms had caused him the most pain. Ron and Hermione, Professor McGonagall, they all made his heart bleed with the pain of deceiving them, but it was Ginny's voice that almost caused him to give it all up, to reach out to her to reassure her that he was OK. It was in her voice that he could hear the agony of love ripped away by death.
Seeing her afterwards in the Great Hall with her mother as they mourned the loss in their family while also quietly celebrating the downfall of Voldemort was heart wrenching. He felt as if he was unable to intrude on that time so he waited, taking himself off with Ron and Hermione until he could find the right words to use in order to explain himself to her. Since then he had seen her, talked to her, even laughed with her but neither of them had broached the subject that loomed between them; so they were awkward with each other and instead of getting easier with time Harry was finding the important conversation harder and harder to instigate.
Taking one final look in the mirror, Harry steeled himself. Tonight he was going to talk to her. Tonight he was going to find out once and for all if there was hope for their relationship. He took a deep breath; he would talk to her after he had a few drinks with the still-celebrating throng to calm his nerves. He grabbed his money bag and headed down the stairs to the main bar of the Hog's Head Inn.
Sitting with her head on her mother's shoulder, Ginny was nonetheless acutely aware of Harry and his position in the Hall. She was not a weak person, by any stretch of the imagination, but the terror she felt over his safety had not waned with the fall of Voldemort's body to the floor. She didn't think it would ever completely disappear: the horrific image of seeing his lifeless body held aloft in Hagrid's arms with Voldemort crowing over it was indelibly etched in her memory. Only by keeping him firmly in sight was she able to relax at all. She noticed as he disappeared under his cloak and a burst of fear shot through her. But soon after she noticed Ron and Hermione start and get up and leave the room. For the moment he was OK; he was in good hands with those two and she needed to turn her attention to her mother. Molly had aged a decade that night it seemed. The burst of adrenalin that had caused her to rush in and attack Bellatrix Lestrange had leached out when the witch had died and had left her a pale shell. Ginny pulled away from her mother and looked her in the face. Molly's lips quivered as she looked first at Ginny and pushed her hair back off her face with a watery smile, then glanced around the room. As the sun rose the group around them had swelled with new arrivals eager to see for themselves that the hated wizard had been defeated at last. They were surrounded by joy and grief which was reflected in their own faces as they looked around. As much as Ginny longed to be with Harry, to talk to him, to reconnect on some meaningful level, she knew that right now her mother needed her the most. So she remained where she was, snuggled with her mother's arm around her waist, and closed her weary eyes.
In the days that followed she grew more and more frustrated. Harry was distant with her, awkward and nervous. He was almost the way he had been back when they were getting together: unsure of himself, of her and the reception of others around them. She was lost in a maelstrom of feelings; needing him with an almost physical ache but still raw with the pain of losing Fred. Ginny desperately wanted to have a real talk with Harry but for once she didn't know how to approach him. There was a huge gap between them, caused by Fred's death and his own, and she couldn't bridge it; she needed him to cross back to her. She sat lost in thought at the bar as the others danced around her. The wake they had held for the battle dead was over and the celebrations for the freedom of their world and way of life were beginning. Harry was in the midst of the group and she was getting more and more frustrated as she wished him over to her side, to finally discuss what was uppermost in her thoughts of him. As if he had heard her call, suddenly he was there beside her. She smiled up at him and said in a horribly forced voice 'Hi Harry, great party, isn't it?' She grimaced as she said it, and to cover her awkwardness she really looked at him and noticed the nerves playing over the well-known, beloved features. She smiled to herself; it was OK, he wanted to talk now so everything was going to be alright. She took his hand and drew him out of the room and into the mellow night.