Well Butter My Butt And Call Me A Biscuit
A/N Written AEONS ago for the GT Towerstock challenge (i.e. watch out, it's mad as a snake). Watch out also for the random American woman that turns up sporting a ridiculous Southern accent – it's okay, I'm English. She's not just there because I'm American and therefore I must have American characters in my fics – it was one of the requirements for the challenge.
Warning: Fluffier than a half-sucked Fizzing Whizbee that's spent five years in the inside pocket of Hagrid's overcoat.
"Check-mate!" said Ron triumphantly over the tiny screams for mercy as his bishop violently beat Harry's king to the ground with his staff. Harry sighed resignedly and sat back in his chair with a stifled yawn. It was the Christmas holidays and only six Gryffindors had chosen to remain at Hogwarts, so the common room was empty except for Harry, Ron, Seamus, and Ginny, who was curled up on a sofa in the corner reading a book. Seamus had been watching Ron and Harry's game while taking periodic swigs from a hip flask. By now he had given up offering the others a sip, since they always refused, and to be quite blunt was getting pissed.
"Where's Hermione, Ron?" asked Harry.
"How would I know?" said Ron irritably. You could have cut the tension between the two of them with a knife recently, and Ron seemed to resent the implication that he in particular should know where Hermione was.
Ginny lowered her book and answered for him. "She said she had to do some prefect stuff. She won't be long." Then she disappeared behind the book again.
Seamus bounced out of his seat to pace around the room restlessly, slightly unsteady on his feet. He went to stand behind Ginny and started reading out loud in a silly voice over her shoulder.
"The moon came out: they walked home together: he seemed to have come to her because he needed her so badly, and she listened to him, gave him all her love and her faith…" He stopped reading and leaned over to look at the cover. "Sons and Lovers, Ginny? I'm shocked at you, reading trashy romance novels at your young and tender age."
Ginny looked up and grimaced slightly. "It's by D.H. Lawrence, a Muggle author. It's classic literature, not a trashy romance novel."
"I'm sure I've heard of him," mused Harry absently. "Didn't he write that 'Lady Thingummy's Lover?'"
Ginny looked up with amusement in her eyes. "Yes, 'Lady Chatterley's Lover.' It's not as good as this one, or I think so anyway."
"Ginny?" interrupted Ron. She looked up at him, and as one voice he and Seamus chorused, "Nobody cares!"
Seamus took another long drag from the hip flask and giggled. Yes, giggled.
"Seamus, maybe you've had enough for this evening," said Ginny, looking concernedly at him. "You're actually swaying."
"No, no, nonono. See, I'm swaying gently in the breeze due to my naturally willowy build." He drained the remainder of the flask and fumbled in his robes for a pocket to put it in.
"Harry, Ron, perhaps it would be best for you to quickly get him to bed, before McGonagall comes?" Ginny was right, thought Harry. Seamus would be in deep water if a professor caught him like this.
"Grammar! GRAMMAR!" cried Seamus, who was actually very well spoken most of them time. "Split infinininitive. Hmm, funny word, infinitive. You can start sayin' it easy enough but just when do you stop?"
"Okay, I think Ginny's right. Perhaps you should come upstairs now," said Harry. Seamus winked suggestively at Ginny and said, "But then again: grammar? Why, Harry and Ginny speak the language of lurve. Who needs grammar?"
"OK, come on Seamus," said Ron, taking Seamus by the arm and leading him towards the stairs. "Coming, Harry?"
Harry looked at Ginny, but she was engrossed again in "Sons and Lovers" and seemed oblivious to her surroundings. "In a minute," he said. Ron shrugged, gave Harry a funny look and started up the staircase to the boys' dormitories. Halfway up Seamus stopped, turned, and said mysteriously, "Don't stay up too late, you two, eh?" before vanishing into the dormitory. Harry began to tidy the chess pieces away, every so often glancing involuntarily at the curled up form of Ginny in the corner. He picked up the chessboard and bag of pieces and was about to go up to the dormitory when Ginny looked at him over the top of her book and asked quite out of the blue, "Do you think they'll ever get together?"
Confused for a moment, Harry frowned at her. "Who?"
Ginny rolled her eyes. "Ron and Hermione, of course!" she said. "They've been pussyfooting around each other for months. When will they just realise how they feel about each other?"
Momentarily forgetting his tiredness, Harry put the chess set down and went to sit next to her on the sofa. He grinned. "Well, the question is, when will Ron realise how they feel about each other? It's pretty obvious to everyone except him he's crazy about her."
Ginny was looking at him strangely. "Yes, it is, isn't it? Maybe he should get his act together and realise it before she finds someone else."
From Ginny's expression and the hard edge in her voice Harry got the distinct impression they weren't talking about Ron and Hermione any more. "Well, you know us blokes," he said uncomfortably. "Sometimes we don't know how to express our feelings." Ginny folded her arms and glared at him. "Ginny," he said in a blushing, tentative attempt to be a sympathetic ear, "is there something wrong?"
She slammed the book down on a nearby table and brushed her long red hair off her face so Harry could get the full advantage of the annoyed expression in her normally so soft brown eyes. "Wrong, Harry? Is there something wrong?" She sounded positively incensed. Harry leaned automatically backward a little in case she tried to hit him with something. He had seen the infamous Weasley temper in action, though never in Ginny. According to her brothers, she was the worst of them all. "After six years, six years, Harry, you have the… nerve… to ask me if there is anything wrong?"
"Um," said Harry, whose mind was having trouble concentrating on her words when she looked so… fiery, and so, so… Harry gulped… sexy. More so than usual. Her eyes practically shot flames and her hair was a wild tumble of bright tresses, which Harry, not for the first time, had an irrepressible urge to run his hands through. Tentatively, he reached out and brushed a stray lock off her face. Ginny's mouth fell open slightly in sheer surprise as he gently started to run his fingers through her hair, a curious look of extreme concentration on his face.
"Harry?" she tried shakily, trying to gather her senses enough to string a coherent sentence together. "Are you okay?" He looked in an almost hypnotic state as he stroked her hair gently.
"So soft… so very soft…" he mumbled. "See how it sparkles in the light…"
"Harry, just what-" But Ginny was incapable of finishing her sentence due to the fact that Harry had cupped her face in his hand, looked into her eyes, and kissed her on the lips.
But before Ginny had a chance to react the portrait of the Fat Lady swung open. Harry and Ginny sprung apart instantly, looking round in surprise as a plump, middle-aged woman with curly brown hair stepped into the room, followed closely by Hermione. "Well, butter my butt and call me a biscuit!" said the woman in a strident voice with a Southern accent as she looked around the common room. "The ole place ain't changed a bit!" She caught sight of Harry and Ginny, who were sitting at opposite ends of the sofa looking guilty. "Dooo-Jesus, even down to the sight of two young lovebirds sittin' there all innocent tryin' to act like butter wouldn't melt. Sorry to interrupt y'all but I was jus' here to take a look at the ole common room on my way to see t' Dumbledore's bird, is all. No, Miss Granger, it ain't changed one bit since I was here. Thank you for takin' the trouble to bring me up here."
"Not at all, Doctor Macarthur," said Hermione politely.
Harry sat there immobile, physically incapable of moving his limbs. He had kissed Ginny. He had finally kissed Ginny. He hardly knew where to look, though it definitely wasn't going to be in her direction. Where had this sudden madness come from? One minute she'd been angry with him, and the next he'd suddenly, from somewhere, got the courage at last to kiss her.
The American woman had been walking round the form room with a grin on her face. She stopped and, as if remembering the purpose of her visit, said briskly, "Now, let's mosey on down to Professor Dumbledore's office, where we'll find a patient for me, I do believe."
"Of course, Doctor Macarthur." Hermione went to lead the way out through the open portrait hole when a feathered brown shape flew in through it, circled the room and alighted on the back of the sofa. It was a bird of prey of some kind, and it let out a harsh cry and shifted on its perch when it saw Doctor Macarthur.
"Well, it looks like my patient's done and found me," she said. "Huh, Fawkes, old friend?"
"But- Fawkes is a phoenix, not a…" Harry searched for the name of the bird "…bird like that," he finished lamely.
"Buzzard" supplied Hermione knowledgeably.
"Yes, normally he is a phoenix. That's why Dumbledore's sent for me, to see if I cain't sort out his little problem. See, magical birds are tricky creatures to handle, 'specially phoenixes. Sometimes there comes a time in a bird's life when he has problems with his identity. He feels he needs to reassert his individuality as a person, and phoenixes, being mighty special creatures, often change their form as a way of compensating for their emotional inflexibility. Now I'm an expert in the investigational field of ornithopsychology, and Dumbledore's asked me to drop by and see if we cain't all work through this together."
Fawkes flew to sit on her shoulder and let out another harsh cry. The American woman ruffled the feathers on his head playfully. "That's right boy, 'cause if we cain't sort this humdinger out then grits ain't groceries, eggs ain't poultry, and Mona Lisa was a man. Anyhow, let's get goin'. I trust you can lead the way, Miss Granger?"
"Yes, it's not too far to Professor's Dumbledore's office." Hermione looked from a blushing Ginny to a still more blushing Harry with an arch, knowing look before leading the way out through the portrait hole.
As the portrait swung shut behind them, Ginny and Harry turned to each other, each a fetching shade of pink and not very keen to look the other in the eye.
"So, Ginny-" said Harry at the same time as Ginny burst out, "Harry-"
There was a moment of confusion but on Ginny's insistence Harry continued to speak. "I'm sorry about, you know…"
"That's okay." Harry's heart sank at the cool way she was behaving, but he inwardly pulled himself together. He could at least give it his best shot. He had been putting off doing this for months, and it was about time he bit the bullet and took a chance.
" Ginny, I've been a bit of an idiot for the past, well-"
"Six years," supplied Ginny. Harry blushed a deeper shade, but gathering his nerve he blurted out quickly,
"I know I've been stupid for never noticing you before, but lately I've just got to realise, well, what a great person you really are and how beautiful and funny and caring you are, and I was perhaps wondering if you might like to, you know…" God, that sounded pathetic, thought Harry.
"Might like to what, Harry?" asked Ginny, being mercilessly and deliberately obtuse. She gave him a wide-eyed innocent smile.
"You know… go out with me." He winced inwardly.
"Hmmm." Harry's heart fell as Ginny considered it with an impassive expression, looking down at her entwined hands. Why wouldn't she look him in the eye?
He stood up to go, looking downcast at her silence, muttering, "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have asked. It was a stupid idea anyway."
Ginny jumped up. "I'll be the one to decide that, thank you very much," she said hotly. "And I happen to think that's one of the best ideas you've ever had." Her eyes sparkled mischievously.
Harry looked at her speechlessly.
"Well, don't just stand there like someone who fell out of the stupid tree and hit every branch on the way down. Kiss me again before I change my mind." Harry took a step forward, enfolded her in his arms and willingly complied.
A while later they heard a door opening and they broke the long kiss reluctantly. Seamus Finnegan came into view outside the boys' dormitories, waving a half empty bottle of Ogden's Fire Whisky in one hand. "Ginny! Harry! Babies! Right now! More babies! Bring on the babies! AHHHH!" he shouted, and then somehow managed to trip over his own foot and collapse in a heap at the top of the stairs.
"This has certainly been an interesting evening," Ginny commented as Ron, acknowledging Ginny and Harry with a nod, dragged Seamus' unconscious form back into the dormitories and made a great show of closing the door firmly behind him.
Harry chuckled. "Yes, what with drunken Irishmen, American bird psychologists, and phoenixes with identity crises, it's been one hell of a night." He sat down on the sofa and Ginny snuggled close. He put an arm round her and kissed the top of her head affectionately.
"You know what, though?"
"What?"
"I couldn't be more glad it happened." Harry held her closer to him and they exchanged a warm, passionate kiss, full of joy and hope and the promise of things to come.
THE END
A/N Well, I did warn you. Feel like hitting the button below and leaving a teeny-weeny little review, even if it's only to lambast my poor idea of Southern dialect? Go oooon…