Ah yes, I decided to put up another Harry/Ginny fic, just because I missed the pairing a little. Quite honestly, thus far, I'm not quite as satisfied with this first chapter as I was with "Divine Intervention", but hmm... I like the story so far, and I hope you do too!

And if it's a bit cliched, I hope you will forgive me, because, after all, this is fluffy fanfiction.

So read, and if you like, review. I'm not sure if this will be well-received, so review so I know whether or not to continue.

Thank you much!

"Come on Mikey," she coaxed, trying to keep the panic from her voice as she set a glass of water in front of the little four-year-old boy, "Rinse out your mouth for Ginny!"

The boy complied, grabbing at the glass of water as he swayed from side to side. "Ginny," he groaned, paling slightly, "I feel sick."

Oh, how had this happened?

One moment, she had been babysitting the child, and the next she had fallen asleep on the couch. It really wasn't her fault; she had been up the previous night reviewing for Potions before she came back to school after Christmas vacation.

And the next thing she knew, she had been rudely awakened by the sound of breaking glass. On following the sound, she had found, to her horror, that little Mikey had found his way into his father's liquor cabinet and was now in the process of downing a bottle of, well, she wasn't sure.

But for certain, it wasn't a good thing when a four-year-old got into the liquor cabinet and started drinking unidentifiable substances.

And so, doing the only rational thing she could think of, she had wrenched the bottle from his hand, set it back in the cabinet, cleaned up the broken glass from some other bottle of wine (while praying that he hadn't had a drink out of that one too) and brought him into the bathroom and was now in the process of cleaning the boy up.

"Please tell me its just apple juice," she muttered to herself.

Much to her dismay, no matter how many times she cleaned out his mouth, the vacant look in his eyes and the slurring of his words still gave away the fact that something was wrong with him.

Oh lord.

And the Raesfelds would be home any moment now.

As if reading her thoughts, two loud pops sounded from the other room, and she didn't need to look to know that Mikey's parents had just apparated home.

"Ginny? Mikey, darling?" Mrs. Raesfeld called out, her shrill voice echoing throughout the house.

And despite her protests, Mikey struggled out of Ginny's grip and ran over to his mother, zigzagging across the room as he called out, "Mummy!"

The woman gasped, rushing over to gather her son, demanding, "What's wrong, darling?!"

Needless to say, the evening did not end well.

In fact, as Ginny trudged up to her room, she sighed glumly.

How, how could anyone possibly fail at babysitting? It wasn't exactly the most difficult thing to do- yet she had lost her job anyway.

"Oy," she groaned, flopping onto her bed. Her arm came in contact with some glossy photographs strewn about, and she turned onto her side to look at them.

Ah, pictures of Ben.

With one swift movement, she swept all the pictures off of the bed.

Stupid boys.

She really had the worst luck with them, and she was beginning to suspect that they were all insensitive, hormone-driven pigs.

Climbing off of her bed, she made her way over to her closet, fishing around until she pulled out, with grim triumph, a shoebox with bold letters proclaiming "PAST boyfriends" on it. The "past" part was capitalized, for emphasis. She rolled her eyes, crawling over to gather up the photographs. She paused for a moment, looking at the boy, smiling happily in one photo, blowing her a kiss in one photo, and in the one that made her snort with derision, mouthing, "I love Ginny."

"Oh yeah," she told the photo angrily, before tossing it into the box, "That's exactly why I found you snogging the brains out of some fourth year, hmm?"

Like she had said, insensitive, hormone-driven pigs.

After putting every last photo into the shoebox, along with some mementos (the hideous zebra striped socks he had bought her, which at the time she had considered an "adorable" gesture), she shut it, stacking it neatly into the closet with her other shoeboxes.

She regarded the boxes marked by year at Hogwarts (first year, second year... all the way up to sixth year, the box she was still filling as the year progressed) and smiled with satisfaction. They were so neatly marked! One day, if she wanted to scrapbook her whole Hogwarts experience, she would only need to come into this closet and grab the boxes categorized by year and open them up. Inside those boxes were envelopes filled with pictures, each envelope marked with the event and date.

That was the way she liked it- neat and orderly.

Too bad her life was nothing like her closet.

She noted, with a slight frown, that there had never been a "present boyfriend" box. She'd never been with any one boy long enough for that to occur. Ah if only she could mope away forever, staring out the window at the bleak, gray sky.

But she had things to do.

Namely, studying for Potions.

She groaned, getting up reluctantly and shuffling over to her desk where she gazed down at the heavy Potions book with dread. She was only failing the subject because Snape was out to make her life miserable! Yes that evil, evil man was, well, the epitome of evil!

Evil, evil, evil...

It made her twitch just thinking about him.

But, she had to study sometime, or she'd end up a failure in life. Actually, the way her parents described it to her, she'd end up a vagrant on some street corner in muggle London, living off meat from any stray cat she could catch.

And although exaggerated, she had to admit that the image was not a pleasant one. So she opened the book, lay on her stomach on her bed, and began reading about the properties of some potion or another.

In three minutes flat she was asleep.

The next morning, she trudged downstairs with the sinking feeling that, unfortunately, there were only two more days until she boarded the Hogwarts Express and returned to Snape's class of doom. She didn't mind all of the other classes quite as much- in fact; she had fairly decent marks in most of her classes. But ugh, that one class made her life absolutely miserable, and she wasn't looking forward to returning.

Besides, with the swarms of teenage males at school, she was bound to find yet another dud clinging to her arm, only to realize later that he was snogging some fourth year behind her back.

Yes, she was still a little resentful about that.

The whole family, plus one Harry Potter was downstairs, already eating breakfast. Hermione was at her own home this Christmas, much to Ron's disappointment.

"Hi," she mumbled, running a hand through her rumpled hair.

She was relieved when her parents looked up to give her sympathetic smiles, but said nothing. Apparently, they had thought it better not to mention her, err, now jobless state, and she was glad. Really, imagine how much worse the breakfast conversation could be.

"Ginny dear, Mikey didn't have a hangover from last night, did he?"

The thought of her mother even saying that made her snort in amusement.

Sitting down, she grabbed a plate and happily filled it with scrambled eggs and bacon. Really, breakfast food always made her feel better. What could be better than the fatty goodness of bacon, or the cholesterol-laden joy that eggs brought?

As she munched away, once in a while pausing to take a swig of orange juice, Mrs. Weasley bustled in with more food. "Ginny darling," she said warmly, giving her daughter a pat on the head. "How's that boyfriend you wrote home about? I forgot to ask you, with all this holiday excitement."

Ginny nearly choked on a mouthful of scrambled eggs.

After swallowing, with some difficulty, she looked up and gave her mother a wan smile.

"Well," she explained. "He's not my boyfriend anymore. He's a stupid git who should be flushed down a toilet and..."

She paused, seeing the disapproving look on both Mr. and Mrs. Weasley's faces.

"I mean," she amended, "He's a horrible person. And," she added, on seeing that they both were still frowning slightly, "I won't kill him, or torture him in any way."

Her mother beamed proudly at her, "That's my girl," she patted Ginny's head fondly, "Not taking after your violent brothers, I see."

Ron had looked up with interest the moment Ginny had said those four words- "he's not my boyfriend"- and was now waiting for his turn to speak.

"So," he grinned at his little sister in a way she found rather disconcerting, "You're single now, are you?"

For some reason, he nudged a very confused Harry as he said this.

"Um, yeah," she replied, "That's what I said."

They returned to their breakfasts, Ginny once again becoming reacquainted with her good friends, bacon and eggs.

That is, until Mr. Weasley put his newspaper down abruptly and looked at her. "Ginny," he said, frowning slightly.

Again? What was with everyone and frowning at her today, anyway?

"Are you doing better in Potions?"

Oh. Okay, that made sense.

She sheepishly shook her head slightly, muttering in reply, "I'm trying; I really am! It's just a very difficult class for me..."

Her father frowned again, but soon enough, he brightened up. "I know," he suggested, "You could be tutored by someone."

Hermione, Ginny thought, would certainly help her. And she'd certainly learn quite a bit from the girl.

But for some reason, before she could even agree, Ron had jumped up and joined the conversation excitedly. "Harry could tutor her!"

All eyes at the table stared at him dubiously.

"Me?" Harry asked, raising an eyebrow. "Are you serious, mate? Haven't you noticed the marks I've gotten in Potions for the past, oh, almost seven years? Wouldn't it be better for Hermione to tutor her, or something?"

Ginny really had to agree with the boy.

"Oh it's fine," her brother replied dismissively, "It doesn't matter what marks you got. I mean, she's a year younger, so you should already know all the material she's covering, right?"

"Err..." Harry ran a hand through his hair, baffled by his best friend's behavior, "I suppose. But Hermione would know the material too..."

Ron seemed frustrated by this. Secretly, so that no one else at the table would see, he kicked Harry's shin.

Harry gave a hiss of pain and shot his friend a resentful look, but finally grudgingly agreed with him. "Sure," he muttered, rubbing his shin, "I could tutor Ginny. I mean," he added sarcastically, "Ron apparently thinks I'll be so much better at this than Hermione."

Mr. and Mrs. Weasley, though obviously a little dubious about Harry's skills in Potions class, smiled gratefully.

Ginny looked confused by the whole situation but smiled a bewildered little smile at Harry, murmuring, "Thanks Harry. That'd be great. I think," she addressed to everyone as she stood up with her empty plate, "I'm going upstairs to shower."

Well, she thought as she climbed upstairs, this would certainly be interesting.

After breakfast, Harry tugged Ron into his room, demanding, "What in the world are you doing?"

"What are you talking about?" Ron asked, feigning innocence, which, unfortunately, was not one of his strong points. His wide-eyed inquisitive look came out more as a bug-eyed stare.

Harry shifted uncomfortably at the strange expression on his friend's face. It was plain creepy, if you asked him. "Why do you want me to tutor Ginny anyway?"

Ron sighed, trying to look pitiful. "Look mate, it's my sister, and I care for her. She needs help in school, and," he continued, sounding sickeningly sappy, "I really don't want her to fail. I just want you to help her out."

Harry looked unconvinced. "Um Ron?" he reminded. "I'm terrible in Potions, remember? It's my worst subject, mate! She'll fail even more miserably if she's got me teaching her. Why would you pick me of all people to tutor her?"

Ron shrugged, pausing in contemplation for a moment (which Harry had to admit, was rare). Suddenly, his face lit up as he came up with the answer. "You know," he replied smugly, "How you're not doing so well in Potions? Well Hermione always says that the best way to learn is to teach someone, right? So you'll be learning too!" He grinned triumphantly.

"Okay," Harry agreed grudgingly, still unconvinced by his friend's argument. But as for the whole learning through teaching thing- he couldn't really find anything wrong with that. And, although he was still a little worried that he'd make an absolutely miserable teacher- he had certainly warned Ron.

"Splendid!" Ron grinned, slapping his friend on the back happily. "You two can start this afternoon!"

And what's going to happen," Harry pondered under his breath, "Now that Ron's taken an interest in both mine and Ginny's education?"

It was a question, unbeknownst to him at the moment, that both he and Ginny would spend the next few months exploring.