A/N: For the Unlikely Hermione Pairing Challenge and the "I Kissed a Girl" Competition. I'd like to thank the amazing betas: SoUsay234, who is quite amazing in making things sound lovely, and TamariChan, whose comments were helpful in the final cut. This is also for Laura, if she ever so chooses to read it, because it is something other than Romione.
She was Ginny.
She was the delicate little flower, the beautiful little rosebud. She was the girl in the family, the first in over a century, and she must be protected at all costs. She was the one with the ribbons in her hair and the stains on her apron. She was Daddy's little girl and Mummy's little helper. She was different – always basking in the attention her family gave her. And they were determined to make her happy.
At night, Mummy used to tell her how beautiful she would be when she was older. How she would look, walking down the aisle in a pearly white dress and her hair all done up - curled and vibrant and stunning. How she would fall in love with the perfect man, her Prince Charming, and together they would live happily ever after. 'Happily ever after' entailed mothering some children (a boy and a girl –or maybe three or four. Because she would follow in her Mummy's footsteps, and she would be happy.) And once she was happy, her life would be complete.
Growing up, Ginny was the proper young lady. The kind that would make any father want to bellow: "That's my girl!". The kind he would want to set up with his colleagues' children, or brothers' friends. And people would say, "Aren't they so cute together? Aren't they just precious?" And they would be, because they would be happy.
She was the blooming butterfly, sprouting from the teeny caterpillar, that only had the choice to be the greatest.
But Ginny wasn't always happy playing with her tea set that Daddy had given her, and staying prim and proper in her frilly dresses. Ginny wanted to really play. She wanted to get dirty, and wear overalls, and roll in the mud with Fred and George. She wanted Charlie to take her swooping on his broomstick, high above - so far that she could leave 'happy Ginny' behind, and become the Ginny that she wanted to be. So high, that she could forget herself and just be.
She was the youngest, the one that was always picked on. The boys would sit on her and roughhouse, but she was strong enough to protect herself - even without Mummy having to tell them off (though that helped a bit too). It really wasn't until she met him that she became truly tongue-tied and thought she'd realized where her happiness lie:
Harry Potter. The Boy Who Lived. Courageous and bold. He and Ron did things that would have any grown person trembling with fear, and Ginny suddenly knew who her role model was. Because Harry Potter didn't have to roll around in the mud to be happy or swop around on a broomstick, and he certainly didn't have to be all prim and proper and play with a tea set. To him it was a simple art, and he was always smiling. So he must be happy. And that was all that Ginny really wanted. But she never thought she could really get that far.
In her second year, she was the one subjected to that. She changed from a teeny, little caterpillar into a vicious moth, and left the butterfly she'd dreamed of being far behind. She was no longer a childish, innocent, little girl. Her thoughts of the world changed, and she didn't see the happiness anymore. Tom had told her happiness was just a matter of opinion. But then, were the stories that Mummy had spun not to happen? Were those broomstick rides late at night, with the wind in her face, nothing more than falsity? Her happiness had dwindled, and Mummy could see that. Daddy could see that. She was the little girl who had escaped protection and seen the world for what it was. She would no longer be kept in silence, and she refused to be just another damsel in distress.
Little Ginny grew up in the fast lane, in the midst of a war that had yet to be won. She rebelled against the rules in her fifth year. And in joining Dumbledore's Army, in rebelling against all everyone had ever wished for her to be with her Charming, she'd discovered that she didn't want to be rescued.
She wanted to do the rescuing. And she could think of someone who might just fit the bill:
Hermione Granger. The girl she had grown up knowing, loving. But Ginny had never noticed when the line between 'sister' and 'crush' had merged. And for goodness sake, her brother was destined to marry the girl. Now that Ginny could see that, though, she didn't have to play proper-lady fair. She could be in charge.
Ginny saw things the way they were. She saw how her brother hurt the girl that she loved. This girl that was clearly a damsel, drowning in her books and knowledge, with no one on the same level that she could relate to.
Ginny figured that she fit that character profile quite well.
Ginny had never really known happiness. She'd known what people around her called happiness. And she knew that Ron wasn't happy with Lavender and that Harry wasn't happy with Cho. She could tell that Hermione wasn't happy about where her options lie, and so Ginny had opened a new door for her.
She'd discovered happiness the first time that their lips had touched.
And happiness was much sweeter than she'd previously assumed.
There was never a problem in grown-up-Ginny's life. She still liked to sing and to be dipped while dancing, and occasionally she was too shy to speak. But she could hex someone without thinking twice for calling a certain, lovely, chocolate-eyed girl the 'M' word. Her life was complete, the way she liked it, just as Mummy had said.
That little girl had walked down the aisle, wearing a pearly white dress and her hair all done up, just like her Mummy had said. But she hadn't walked down the aisle to meet her husband-to-be, like they'd predicted. She'd walked down the aisle followed closely by another woman in a pearly white dress, with her long hair tickling her shoulders and her brown eyes shinning as they met at the end. The little girl had had lots of children, and she had been a Mummy – just like her own Mummy had. Only her children had never had a Daddy, but rather a Mummy in Hermione and Mum in her.
Happiness came in many forms, and Ginny liked to call hers 'Hermione.'
For she had been the woman to transform that little caterpillar into something beautiful, and this time Ginny was happy with the results.