Camping

'You cold, Gin?' Harry whispered into the darkness, keeping quiet so as not to wake Ron and Hermione.

'Yeah,' she replied, a little shakily because of the chattering of her teeth.

He reached out an arm towards her, guessing where she was in the pitch black of the tent. The arm wrapped tightly around her waist, pulling her closer towards his body. The nylon of her sleeping bag scraped against the nylon of the mat she was lying on, and he froze momentarily, afraid of waking Ron and Hermione.

But they stayed fast asleep, exactly as they had been for the past 3 hours. Well, their sleeping bags are much thicker than ours, thought Harry.

They lay in silence for several minutes, Ginny still shaking madly in his arms.

'No better?' he whispered softly into her ear.

'No,' she shook her head. She was colder than she'd ever been in her life, very uncomfortable on the little sleeping mat, and all she'd had for tea cooked on the stupid camping stove was some pretty disgusting stew thing. That was it. She was never, ever going muggle camping again.

A few more minutes went by, before, 'Do you wanna come in here, Gin?'

'Where? Your sleeping bag?'

'Yeah, why not? You'll fit,' he replied, and Ginny heard the sound of a zip opening.

'Okay,' she said and unzippped her own sleeping bag. A draft of freezing cold air hit her and her shivering increased tenfold.

It was such a relief to slip into Harry's sleeping bag, warmed by the heat of his body, and have him do up the zip around her. He wound his arms tightly around her waist and pulled her close to him. She settled her head on his shoulder, in the gap there that seemed to be made just for it. Their bodies fit together seamlessly as they both closed their eyes, now very much happy and contented.

Maybe this muggle camping isn't so bad after all ... Ginny thought as she drifted easily into a peaceful sleep.

'WHAT THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING?'

Ron's voice woke the happy couple early next morning. Harry, still half asleep but very much alarmed by Ron's behaviour (which, Harry reminded himself stupidly, I should have been expecting), fumbled around with the zip of the sleeping bag so that Ginny, although not completely out, wasn't crushed so tightly against him.

'COME ON HARRY, WHAT THE BLOODY DO YOU THINK YOU WERE YOU DOING?'

'Just sleeping, Ron,' Harry replied with a yawn, a very much exasperated tone to his voice.

'Well then, was it really necersary to sleep IN THE SAME SLEEPING BAG?' he asked.

'We were both just cold Ron, that's it. God, grow up,' Ginny replied, nestling back into Harry's arms.

'Yeah, you know how cold it gets up here in Winter,' Harry added, wrapping his arms tightly around Ginny again and settling in for a little more rest, all thoughts of keeping Ron from getting annoyed completely out of his mind. He wanted to focus on the one thing in his arms, the thing he cared most about in the whole world.

But Ron obviously had other thoughts on his mind.

'She's just 17, Harry!' Ron shouted, trying unsuccessfully to get some sort of decent reaction out of the couple.

Hermione was sat behind him, watching the scene with a bemused expression and looking very much as if she'd been waiting for it to happen.

'Yeah, like I said, Ron,' Harry replied, still very calm, 'we didn't do anything.'

'Oh come on Harry - No self-respecting and straight guy could lie like that in a sleeping bag pressed against a women wearing only pyjamas and not feel anything for her'

Harry, guessing at what Ron getting at, didn't reply.

Some, like Ron, would think that because she had had no obvious and immediate effect on him and his body, that he didn't love her.

They may say he felt not a single emotion for her, even that he was gay.

Others however, would know that Harry and Ginny's relationship went deeper than that, deeper than just physical attraction. Sure, he would feel those things for her, when he saw her in her in little clothing, when they kissed, when she whispered those words in his ear, mainly when she wanted him to.

But that night he just felt love for her; love and nothing more.

They didn't need to do anything more. Just being together in each other's arms was enough.

Enough for them. And enough for their love.

Well, for that night anyway.