Chocolate and Confidences
By Laura Schiller
Based on: Harry Potter
Copyright: JK Rowling
Harry snapped awake with a pounding heart, an aching head, and a feeling like old parchment in the back of his throat. He had dreamed of the Chamber of Secrets: slime on the walls, the Basilisk's scales gleaming in the torchlight. Worst of all, in the dream he had been Tom Riddle's memory, smiling as the life drained out of the girl on the floor.
The water pitcher by the window was empty.
Harry got out of bed, his bare feet cold even on the carpeting, alert for the hiss of Parseltongue in spite of himself. All he heard, however, was the even breaths and occasional snores of his housemates, Neville muttering in his sleep, and the faintest echoes of applause from Ron's Chudley Cannons poster. Ron himself was fast asleep. Harry sometimes envied his friend's powers of recovery after danger; was it a born trait, or did it simply come from growing up with a proper family?
He crept downstairs, his hand against the rough stone wall, careful not to wake anyone. All he wanted was a glass of water from the bathroom next to the common room.
Once he reached the common room, however, he realized he was not the only one awake.
Ginny Weasley was curled up in the armchair closest to the fireplace, still dressed except for her shoes, staring into the mug of hot chocolate Dumbledore had given her five hours ago. Not even the warmth of the firelight could bring color to her face.
It didn't surprise him.
She jumped when she saw Harry emerge from the shadows.
"Just me," he whispered. "Sorry. Couldn't sleep." He raised his empty glass in explanation.
She put down the mug on a nearby table, lowered her socked feet to the floor and straightened her robes, all without looking him in the eye. He passed her silently on his way to the boy's bathroom, filled his glass, and emptied it in a few cold swallows. He filled it again, intending to bring it up to his dormitory, but something about Ginny's figure huddled in that armchair made him pause.
He may have saved her, he thought, but not completely. Part of her was still trapped in the Chamber. But he wasn't Dumbledore, or Mrs. Weasley, or anyone else with a gift for comforting people. What could he possibly do or say to get her out?
"Uh … " He gestured to the mug on the table, with its marshmallows floating in chocolate. "Isn't that cold?" Idiot, he told himself.
She took a sip from it and shrugged. "Yeah."
"I can warm it up again," he said. "If you like."
"Okay."
What did it say about him that he went to bed with his wand in his pyjama pocket? If it were ever to go off by accident, he would be in trouble. Still, he couldn't help it. Being prepared was the only way he could fall asleep.
He must have tapped the mug too hard or mispronounced the incantation, because the chocolate came to a rolling, raging boil. A marshmallow bounced right out and down Ginny's sleeve, making her gasp. She hurriedly set it down, then met Harry's eyes with such an odd blend of shock and amusement that they both wound up shaking with silent, stifled laughter.
"Sorry about that," he said. "Too cold, and now it's too hot. Like 'Goldilocks'."
"Who?"
While she fished the marshmallow out, blew on it and ate it, he began to ramble about the old story his teacher had read in Muggle kindergarten, barely knowing what he said. Anything to keep that little smile on Ginny's face. Soon enough, though, it faded again, and her eyes drifted away from his to focus on the shadows along the floor.
"How do you do it?" she said suddenly.
"Do what?"
"Everything." She looked down at her hands, clasped tightly in her lap. "Get dressed, brush your teeth, go to class … pretend like you're fine, like everything's normal, after … "
Harry sat down in the opposite armchair, struggling for an answer that would be both honest and encouraging. Truth be told, he had no idea how to do that; it had simply never occurred to him to do anything else.
"You've got to," he finally said. "You can't just give up. Or else … or else it's like Voldemort wins."
She shivered at the name, but did not protest.
"It's not … it's not only him," she said. "I mean it is, of course, but … but it's also me. How could I be so stupid? Writing in that diary, telling him everything, letting him … " She put her hands over her face and sobbed.
"You're not stupid," Harry said fiercely, surprised by the rush of anger he felt on her behalf. "Don't even think that. How many people would have thought of flushing that thing down the toilet? If I hadn't been stupid enough to pick it up, it would've stayed in Myrtle's bathroom and good riddance."
She wiped savagely at her eyes, which were almost as red as her hair.
"But then I stole it back," she muttered. "And I – I just had to – to brag to him about it. Tell him he couldn't hurt you. And he just … "
"He was posessing you. You weren't yourself."
"Still … why couldn't I … "
"Riddle fooled everyone at this school for years, even the teachers. Even Professor Dumbledore didn't see through him until it was too late."
Ginny lowered her hands. "Really?"
He nodded. "Last year, he possessed Quirrell for the longest time without anyone noticing. He's had almost seventy years to practice being a dark wizard, remember? And you're what, eleven?"
"So?" she sniffed. "You're twelve."
"I was lucky," he replied. "Also, I had a lot of help. Ron, Hermione, Fawkes, the Sorting Hat … my mother."
He hesitated over this, as it was deeply personal, but Ginny's patient, listening silence confirmed him. How much more personal did it get, after all, than saving someone from her own diary?
"She died to save me," he said. "That's why Voldemort couldn't kill me. Not because I'm special or anything like that. Because of her."
Then Ginny said something that surprised him; something he would never forget.
"You are special, Harry," she said, brown eyes glittering in the firelight. "Everyone's special if someone loves them."
Something about the look on her face made her blush, pull her legs up into the chair, and wrap her arms around her knees so she could hide her glowing face.
"That was silly," she mumbled. "Something Mum says. I shouldn't have said that."
"No," said Harry. "No, it's … " He cleared his throat, trying to dislodge the knot of emotion that was caught there. "Thanks," he finally said. "But then … that goes for you too, doesn't it?"
She looked up.
"Your parents," he said. "Your brothers. You're special to them."
Slowly, she nodded.
"So … take care, okay?"
It came out sounding awkward, but he knew she understood what he meant. When he handed her the cup of hot chocolate, she sipped from it and gave him a shaky smile.
"It's just right now," she said.
"Baby bear temperature?"
She laughed softly.
He stood up to leave, but the way she spoke his name in the silence of the room made him turn back.
"Harry?"
He looked over his shoulder.
"Did he … did Riddle tell you … " She took a deep breath. "Did he tell you it was me who sent the Valentine?"
He felt his face heat up and the bottom drop out of his stomach. After the ordeal they had been through, he had almost forgotten that she was in love with him. For one wild moment, he was afraid that his behavior had encouraged her, that she would expect him to become her boyfriend and he would have to turn her down. She was pretty, and a lot stronger than he could have guessed, but dating was a foreign territory to him and one he hoped he wouldn't have to cross for any years.
He had forgotten, however, the way great danger can mature a person, even over a period of hours. When he nodded in answer to her question, she set her jaw, with a look that reminded him of Ron during a chess match.
"That wasn't what I wrote, you know," she said. "All that rubbish about pickled toads … I bet Fred and George messed with it, you know how they are." A certain glint in her eye made him suspect that this particular prank had not gone unavenged.
"I just wanted to tell you… " She wrapped her hands securely around her chocolate. "All those idiots who believed you were Slytherin's heir … "
"Yes?"
"I didn't believe it," she said, in one breath. "Not for a second. That was all."
"That's good to know," said Harry, and he meant it.
He could make a guess at what she hadn't said, what she might have written in the original Valentine that never reached him. But he did not want to know, and she sensed that; just as clearly, she was telling him not to ask.
They were very young, which meant that these particular emotions were too much for them as yet … but it also meant that they had all the time in the world.