Star-crossed
Ron would have a fit if he knew. But he doesn't know, and Ginny works very hard to keep him from finding out. He's such a prude where she's concerned, always butting into her life. She knows it's because he worries about her, and because he still feels guilty about what happened during her first year. But she finds his hovering annoying.
Percy – well, he'd react worse than Ron. There's no telling what Bill or Charlie would say. Fred and George would make some awful off-color joke and then ignore the situation. Sometimes she wishes she were an only child.
She slips out of her bed in the sixth-year girls' dorm and makes her way down to the Common Room, carefully avoiding the squeaky floorboard halfway down the hall, and skipping the fourth step that creaks. It would be nice to have Harry's invisibility cloak, but that's gone now, along with Voldemort. It angers her to no end that no one will tell her exactly how Harry defeated Tom Riddle; she feels that she, of all people, has a right to know.
She shakes her head to keep from brooding about it. It's over and done. Part of her past. She should be more concerned with her future. She opens the portrait, careful not to disturb the Fat Lady, and steps out into the hallway. That's the first obstacle passed. She keeps close to the wall, flitting from shadow to shadow, creeping down the moving staircases, on her way to see her lover.
There are issues to be worked out. Among other things, her parents will not like that he is older than she by a considerable margin. He is also a teacher, and she a student – though this will change. She is willing to wait. He is proud and passionate about his work, and often unreasonably stubborn – doing things one way because "that's the way it's always been done."
She's not sure exactly when she realized that she loved him. It certainly wasn't love at first sight. But he was injured in a fight with Lucius Malfoy at the end of her fifth year, and it fell to her to take care of him for a while. He had to tell her much of how to take care of him while Madame Pomfrey was busy with other patients. As he mended slowly over the summer, they spent much time in talk. Oh, they argued too – he didn't think much of her theories about how to make Divination more of a science. But the arguments never turned personal.
Their first kiss – they'd been talking about what the future held for both of them now that Voldemort was gone. He'd spoken of leaving Hogwarts, and she'd taken his hands and begged him to stay. For her. He'd taken her in his arms and kissed her then, with the moon and stars as silent witnesses.
She reaches the first floor finally, and pauses to catch her breath. She hears old Filch in the next hall over; she is pretty sure he knows about her, but he's kept his mouth shut. She turns down a particular passage and knocks softly on the large door. It opens at her touch, and she calls softly into the darkened room, "Firenze?"