"Propinquity"
By Lucawindmover
Harry groaned as he shifted another heavy box in his arms. A layer of dust swirled into the air and caused his eyes to water. If he wasn't careful he'd start sneezing again. Earlier he had started sneezing and couldn't quit for nearly fifteen minutes. He closed his eyes and held his breath for a moment, hoping that the dust would disperse a little before he had to breathe again.
"Alright there, Harry?"
Harry turned at the sound of Ginny's voice. She too was carrying a box of miscellaneous items. He, Hermione, and the Weasley's had been cleaning 12 Grimmauld Place for days now. They were taking the old house one room at a time, packing up or throwing out most of what they came across. Mrs. Weasley had sent Harry and Ginny off to the storage room with several boxes, hoping to keep them busy for a bit longer, as the latest Order meeting was still taking place. Mrs. Weasley had Hermione and Ron clearing out a set of old bookshelves, making more boxes for Harry and Ginny to carry.
Harry grinned. "I'd be fine if it weren't for all this dust. I think I've sneezed more times in the last twenty-four hours than I have in the last four years."
Ginny laughed and moved past him in the hallway. Harry followed her up the stairs and down another hallway to a room they were using for storage. Anything that they weren't going to throw out was going in this room. Mrs. Weasley had the door to the room propped open with a brick because it kept closing and locking. Ron had already been locked in the room twice, much to the other's amusement. Ron, however, hadn't found it too funny considering he had a tendency to imagine spiders were in every corner of the dank and creepy house.
Ginny carried her box into the room and sat it down on a stack of other boxes. She wiped a few beads of sweat from her brow with the back of her hand and let out a loud breath. She turned to Harry and smiled. "I can't believe Ron got himself locked in here twice," she said, sitting down on a grimy footstool. "You'd think he'd learn after the first time."
Harry laughed. "Yeah, but that's Ron for you," he replied. His speaking sent another small puff of dust up from the box he was carrying. Before he could stop himself, he began to sneeze. He tripped over the brick holding the door open and dropped the box, whose contents scattered across the floor by Ginny's feet.
"Oh Harry, are you okay?" Ginny asked, jumping up from her seat and helping him back to his feet.
Harry blushed and laughed nervously as he brushed dust from the front of his clothes. "Yeah, I'm fine. I just hate all this dust. This sneezing is really inconvenient."
Ginny gasped. "Harry, the door!"
Harry turned around to watch as the door clicked. When he tripped over the brick, he had moved it without knowing. The door had been closing slowly ever since and had now closed all the way. The click was the lock sliding into place.
They were stuck.
Ginny ran to the door, placing her hands against the dark wood and turning her head to look at Harry. "How did we let this happen?"
Harry stared at her, wide-eyed and stuttering.
Ginny pulled out her wand, causing Harry to finally get his voice back.
"Wait, Gin, you can't use magic. You're underage," he said, his own hand clenched around his wand.
Ginny sighed and rolled her eyes. "Yes, I know this Harry. But surely a simple Alohamora will get us out of here."
"Yeah, but we'd better not risk it. This isn't an emergency. Besides, your mum will be serving dinner any time now and when we don't show they're sure to send someone after us," Harry replied. He moved over to the footstool Ginny had been sitting on moments ago and flopped down.
Ginny, resigning herself to Harry's logic, seated herself on a box across from him and hung her head in her hands. "Well, now what?"
"I dunno," he answered. Harry looked around the room, taking in the sights. It was a small room, really, and must have been a bedroom at one point. There were windows on one wall, but they were covered in dark curtains and didn't allow for much light to access the room. Mrs. Weasley had seen to it to have a lamp lit in the room, so it wasn't nearly as dark as it should have been. There was an old chest of drawers on another wall, next to an equally ancient writing desk. The only other piece of furniture was a broken armchair, the same color black as the footstool on which Harry sat. The rest of the room was full to bursting with boxes of discarded items from around the house. Years, decades, perhaps even centuries of memories were contained in this small room.
"Well, I guess we could look around a bit. I don't think your mum was even looking at half the stuff she threw into these boxes," Harry said. He pulled a box next to him and peered inside.
Ginny furrowed her brow. "You don't think Sirius would mind?"
Harry chuckled. "Uh, Gin, he's the one having us chuck this stuff in here, remember. Surely he wouldn't mind if we looked at it a little."
Ginny grinned and blushed lightly. She moved over to sit on the floor at Harry's feet, ready to examine the contents of the box he had chosen.
Harry shifted nervously at her propinquity but shrugged it off as he began to pull items from the box.
"What is this?" Harry asked, pulling a three-inch figurine from the box. It was a perfect wooden replica of a wizard, dressed in robes and complete with a miniature wand. Harry held it out to Ginny who took it and smiled.
"I know what this is," she said, reverently turning the figure over in her hands. "This is a Dreaded Duelist. It was an old series of toys that were really popular when Charlie was little. Everyone wanted a set. I guess they were older than I had thought."
Harry continued to rummage through the box. "Dreaded Duelists? What was so great about them?"
"Well, nothing if you only had one. And even if you had two, you needed a board to make them duel," Ginny answered. She turned the figure over to see the initials 'SB' carved into the wooden base. "Aha! I thought so. Look here! This belonged to Sirius. He's even put his initials in the bottom. Bill and Charlie did the same thing with theirs."
Harry leaned over the box to look at the base of the figure. Ginny didn't seem ready to relinquish her hold on the doll as of yet. Harry couldn't help but grin. "I wonder why Sirius doesn't want to keep these?" he said as he pulled a few more things from the box.
Ginny frowned. "Well, he didn't really have a happy childhood, did he? I can see why he'd rather not keep mementos."
Harry nodded in agreement. He could certainly identify with Sirius about wanting to forget his childhood. He couldn't think of a single object from his aunt and uncle's house that he'd want to take with him when he was finally able to leave them for good, apart from what he had acquired within his time as a wizard.
Harry finally found what he was looking for in the bottom of the box, another figurine. This one was a witch with long, blonde hair and a pointed hat. Harry held it up and saw that Sirius's initials were on her as well.
"Oh, well done Harry! Now, if we just had a board we'd be all set!" Ginny exclaimed. She took the second figure from Harry and began to examine it as Harry looked back through the box. He couldn't find anything that even vaguely resembled a board, however.
Harry eventually threw his hands up in frustration, a wooden block in one hand and an old quill in the other. "Gin, I give up. I don't think there even is one in this box."
Ginny looked up from the doll and laughed at him. "Harry, you've got it in your hand."
Harry looked at the quill, the block, and then back to Ginny, thinking her mad. "You mean this block, right?"
Ginny laughed again and took the block from him. She turned it over in her hands a few times, as if looking for something. Harry saw her eyes light up as she found the button on one side and pressed it.
The magical world never seemed to be finished impressing Harry. The seemingly solid wooden block was now unfolding before him in the shape of a long dueling stage. Harry recognized it from the time Professor Lockhart had tried to begin a dueling club at school. The stage even came complete with little painted on-lookers who were moving around the edge as if trying to get the best view for the show. Harry grinned. He was now starting to see what the big deal was about Dreaded Duelists.
"Come on Harry. You take her and I'll take the other," Ginny said, breaking Harry from his observations of the stage. She handed him the witch and began placing the wizard on the board at her end.
"Now wait a second. Why have I got to be the witch?" Harry asked, mirroring what Ginny was doing. He placed the base of the witch inside a circle marked on the board.
Ginny just stuck her tongue out at him and Harry laughed. When he looked back down at his figure, he found that she had begun to move. It was now as if she were alive. Her feet were no longer attached to her base and she was pacing back and forth, muttering. Harry could actually hear her little voice down below.
He jerked his eyes up to Ginny with a fantastic smile on his face. "Ginny, do they talk? Can they talk to us?"
"Of course we can, you dolt. What do you take us for, porcelain?" replied the witch from the board. Ginny shrugged as Harry looked bewildered.
"Sorry," Harry said to the witch. For a moment he felt odd, addressing a doll, but figured he had seen or done many odd things since becoming a wizard, and surely this wasn't the strangest. "It's just I've never seen anything like this before."
The small witch nodded and curtseyed. "That's quite alright. But just now I've got to prepare for a duel against that gent down there. I've blown him apart on several occasions, but someone keeps putting him together again. It's been years since our last duel. I'll bet he's as slow as ever."
Ginny grimaced when she heard this last statement. She was now regretting her choice. She knew that she, of all people, shouldn't have worried about gender when choosing, as all of her brothers underestimated her because she was a girl. She sighed and figured she'd just have to remember that next time.
The two little figures walked to the middle of the stage where they bowed to one another amidst the applause of the painted audience. Harry and Ginny watched at the moved back to their opposite ends and began to fire curses at each other. Harry couldn't believe the tiny jets of magic flying from their miniature wands were real. However, when the first spell hit, a disarming spell from the witch, he realized that it was very real to the little participants.
Only moments had passed before the witch had effectively put the wizard down for the count. Harry and Ginny laughed as the tiny wizard's body stumbled around in search of its head.
"Well, I can certainly see what the fuss was about now," Harry said as they gathered the board up and placed the figures back in the box. He watched as Ginny stretched her arms over her head and yawned.
Harry couldn't help but yawn also. "All of this work has been exhausting. Have you guys really been doing this all summer?"
Ginny leaned back on her hands. "Yeah. You should have seen the kitchen before we got it back in shape. It was worse than Snape's classroom."
Harry laughed, "Well, I'll bet he felt right at home when he saw it then."
"Probably. But we don't get to see the Order members often. Mum has seen to it that we stay busy when they're having meetings. It's been so dull here, cleaning all the time. We hardly ever even see the light of day," Ginny said.
Harry reflected back to where he was not too long ago, laying on the ground outside of his aunt and uncle's window to catch the news. He had been miserable then, but at least he had been able to go out and about. Here he had his friends, but no freedom. He figured if he had to pick one or the other, he would pick where he was now.
"So Harry, why haven't you found yourself a girlfriend yet?" Ginny asked bluntly, catching him off guard.
Harry's face warmed at the question. He felt his voice trying to crack as he answered. "Uh, I dunno. Been busy I guess."
Ginny laughed. "Relax Harry. It's just me. But really though, who do you fancy? Some of the Ravenclaw girls in my year have a bet going that you like Hermione."
Harry laughed out loud. "Hermione? Oh, that's rich. Hermione is one of my best friends."
"Well that's why they say you like her. I mean, you're already friends, what's keeping you from jumping that little hurdle?" Ginny said. She lifted one of her hands up from the floor and grimaced at how dirty it was before placing it back where she had it.
Harry thought for a moment about Hermione. She had always been the brains behind their little trio of friends. He could always count on her to be there for him when he really needed her to be. But he had never had any romantic feelings for her and didn't think he ever really would. Besides, there was a girl who had already struck his fancy as of late.
"I like someone else," Harry said, answering her question.
Ginny raised an eyebrow. "Oh? And…"
"And I don't really want to tell you, alright?" Harry said, blushing.
"Oh come on Harry. You can trust me. I won't tell a soul," Ginny said, prodding him onward. She leaned forward, a mischievous light in her eyes.
Harry sighed. "Cho. Cho Chang is who I like. But I don't think she'll ever notice me."
Harry missed the slightly disappointed look on Ginny's face. Ginny still smiled sweetly at him, however, and offered her best advice. "Well, talk to her. Find out something she's interested in and talk to her about it. You have Quidditch in common, just start there."
He smiled at her logic. If it were only as easy as all that, he would have done so a long time ago. He laughed and shook his head.
Just then, the door swung open, nearly blinding the pair with the light from the hallway. It wasn't until that moment that Harry realized how dark the room they were in had become.
"There you two are! Mrs. Weasley was about to have a fit because she couldn't find you. I told her I thought you'd be here," Hermione said, propping the door open with the brick again.
Ron crossed his arms and leaned on the wall opposite of the doorway. "She thought something in the house might have gotten you. Figured after I'd gotten stuck in there twice that you two would've learned. Not feeling so smart now, huh?"
Ginny, who had teased him mercilessly the second time he was trapped, just stuck her tongue out at him and took Hermione's offered hand. She was pulled up from her place on the floor and Harry stood as well, moving to the hall.
"Dinner's ready, has been for a bit. If we don't hurry the twins will have eaten it all," Hermione said. Harry smiled and Ginny rolled her eyes.
The four of them made their way down to the kitchen, careful not to wake the portraits in the hall. Once they neared the kitchen, Ron asked, "So what did you guys do while you waited for us to find you?"
"We went through some of the boxes. If you had done that instead of freaking out, you'd have found one of these," Ginny said, holding up the little witch from the duel.
Ron slapped his forehead and Harry just laughed.
A/N: So what do you think? You guys are the best.
Update: As of July 5, 2011, this is a completed story. I wrote it ages ago, before the last book came out. All of my Harry Potter fanfiction used to be posted on another site. I've recently decided to move all of my finished stories here. I'll post the next chapter tomorrow. Thank you for reading and please review.
Also, I now have set up a separate Facebook account for my writing! www . facebook . com/Lucawindmover (minus the spaces). This is a great way to keep informed about updates, brainstorming, ask questions and give feedback. For authors, it's a great way to bounce ideas and keep in touch. I hope you will all friend-request me. It's been a lot of fun using this account to keep up with writing!
Disclaimer: I don't own anything. J.K. Rowling is the genius behind Harry Potter and those things related to Harry Potter. I just enjoy tormenting the wonderful characters she has created for us.