When someone is in deep thought their surroundings don't really seem to matter to them. Hermione told me that once in response to when I asked her how she could just spend hours on end in the library. It seemed such an impossible feat in my mind. Constantly I was darting from one thing to the next and the idea of anything quiet put me on edge. I simply just wasn't used to the quiet growing up with such a large family. The library and its silence, no matter how many times I indulged Hermione, could never help me keep my focus on my work. She in turn would look at me puzzled as I completed my work in the middle of the common room oblivious to the chaos going on.

I never appreciated silence and never thought I would. Yet here I, Ginny Weasley, was proven completely wrong. Despite the weather dropping into freezing temperatures I didn't care or notice that I wasn't wearing a coat. All I cared about was getting to that tree. Maybe if I spent some time sitting there I could figure out these thoughts that kept pulling me in all different directions. Or at least I hoped that would happen.

My mind was racing over the event that just happened. I traced my lips with my finger for seemed like the hundredth time.

The lips he had kissed.

Free

By: Whisper's Song

Disclaimer: I don't own anything related to Harry Potter or the brand. JK Rowling does.

"Freedom in general may be defined as the absence of obstacles to the realization of desires" - Bertrand Russell

It would be a pretty safe bet that by now all of the Wizard community knows my name or at the very least my last name. Surprise no longer covers my face when strangers come up to me to say hello, instead I try to be as warm as I can while still attempting to move along. I know that my hair is what gives me away every time and being the only girl in the family only helps to narrow down who I am. Some faint memories come to mind from when I was younger and I always have to smile at them. When you're young you think it's incredible that people know your name and they're just willing to give you free treats or a chocolate. There's no real comprehension connection that the only reason those events happen are because your brother is friends with the single most famous wizard of all time. You just think it's all fun and games.

When I first came to Hogwarts I was aware that I was somewhat popular. Some people did know my name and boys seemed to come out of nowhere for the opportunity to ask me out or to hang out around me. What more could a pre-teen want? I was in teenage bliss. My brother was best friends with Harry-freaking-Potter and Harry just happened to be my crush. While most girls dreamed of how to get him to know their name he spent practically every summer over at my house. I was convinced that with some time he would notice me the way I noticed him.

Yet as I got older it I started to figure out what was going on. I figured out how I was getting the perks and the attention. The fun started to fade into annoyance because to people I was just a name with famous association. It didn't feel like I was a real person to people and it felt unfair that my siblings had had the chance for people to know who they were as they were older and grown up before Harry. My image to people was that I was the baby of the family who had a tall mountain to climb to carve a piece out for myself.

Then my image changed once again: I'm simply the girl who was dumped by Harry Potter.

When he had first asked me out it seemed like the natural next step. My patience had paid off and to everyone it seemed like I would be an obvious choice of girlfriend. I was his best friend's sister which was something out of a cliche fairytale and I was someone that could be relied on to not talk to the media. My mother nearly flew over the moon when she found out and with Ron's approval our relationship started its course. Despite Harry's celebrity it was a normal relationship. We did homework and meals together. We walked around the grounds in our free time and spent the holidays together.

Then seemingly out of the blue after nine months the relationship was over. After a seemingly normal final feast of the school year Harry gently let me down. Truly he was a gentleman about it and wanted to make sure I would be alright. It was one of the things I admired about him, his ability to care about others and his loyalty to them. I told him that we would just be friends instead, no hard feelings, and not to hesitate in deciding whether to come over to the house this summer.

No one bothered to wonder why he dumped me. All anyone cared about was that Harry Potter had rejected someone and that took one more person out of the running. People speculated it saying I wasn't good enough because of my family's lack of wealth or that I wasn't pretty enough. Another theory, spread by some idiots, was that I was some love sick crazed stalker of Harry's and had crossed a line or two. That theory was worth a laugh until some people started to believe it and I started getting hit on by some creepy people.

Sure I'm no Cho, but I certainly tried my best. It's a weird feeling when you discover that your significant other is in love with another person. Harry never outright said it, and while I'm not Hermione I'm no dummy. I know Harry made an honest effort with the relationship and tried to ignore his feelings for her, but I knew that when rumors started of Cho being single that I would be put aside. It was no surprise to me when I opened the paper to find a picture of him and her out. Ron, I think, expected me to either pitch a fit or burst into tears at the sight of the picture, but instead I said only that I was very happy for Harry. Ron had to do a double take at me in utter shock. It was as if he were seeing me for the first time as an adult instead of a stuttering eleven year old following closely behind him under his protective shadow.

Everything went to hell when the war broke out. Suddenly Hogwarts wasn't a haven anymore, but instead, for a time, a silent war zone. No one could have an opinion for fear of retaliation. Families were torn apart with some fleeing the country, some staying behind to fight, and some on the run into hiding. There was this appearance of calm, but just underneath the surface there was this tension that threatened to take over everything.

My brother was missing. Harry was missing. Hermione was missing. My mother and father were gone most of the time with Order business as were Bill, Charlie, Fred, and George. Percy was Merlin knows where until the battle itself. There was no one to rely on except myself and what was left of Dumbledore's Army. It was about survival, waiting for word about Voldemort or about who had died. Then without warning we were called into battle and it in an instant years of preparation were put to the test, leaving Harry victorious.

The aftermath was the hardest. The training was easy. Casting spells and studying dueling techniques were things Hogwarts and Dumbledore's Army had well prepared me for. It was something to take your mind off of reality and it was something you were never really alone while doing. While the fighting was hard it couldn't hold a candle to the aftermath. After all the deceased were identified it became a revolving door of funerals. A hundred goodbyes and a thousand memories that I would spend forever trying to preserve so that I would never forget anyone. We had won, but in a strange way it seemed everyone had lost at the same time. Years had been added onto us in a blink of an eye, and no one could ever be the same.

Hogwarts wasn't completely demolished but it was a shell of its former self. After two years of restoring the castle back to its original state Hogwarts re-opened for students. Along with the new students the old students who were still enrolled, but never graduated, before the war were invited to come back as well. Most of my friends refused to return to complete their schooling at the castle after everything that had occurred and instead transferred. I chose to return though. It wasn't an easy decision I will admit. There are some spots in the castle I can't be near because I know who died in that spot, but I know they would've wanted me to come back here. They died so that none of us would have to live in fear ever again, and I would honor them by graduating from here.

In the end it was determined that I would re-take sixth year completely which I had no problem about. I was glad to unlearn everything from that year and the blatant brainwashing that went on. So after I completed two years I would graduate.

It was never my intention to get into another relationship so soon after the war. Never in my lifetime would I have ever considered that I would willingly spend time with my brother's, Harry's, and Hermione's worst enemy. I hated him as much as I hated anyone involved on Voldemort's side. The mere thought of his family made my skin crawl. His family helped a monster who gave my friends no choice but to be scarred for life or simply killed them. As far as I was concerned once Voldemort fell I truly believed his family would be the last thing I would ever willingly think about.

Everyone was shocked that Malfoy would return back to Hogwarts including me. All of the children of the surviving Death Eater families had either been arrested or transferred to another school. No one thought Malfoy would dare show his face this side of the pond anytime soon. In return for their testimony Malfoy and his entire family were spared from any charges. It was a generous offer but by then the whole story had come out in the papers including the plot about Dumbledore. Rita Seeker saw a family torn apart by war and immediately made the Malfoy family drama her next meal ticket. Despite its over exaggerated descriptions of the war the facts about the family were surprisingly accurate for her. Although the whole family itself was so all over the place no one could make up something like that if one tried.

In the end I felt pity for Malfoy surprisingly enough. His pampered existence meant he never had a chance to mature properly. He was a spoiled prince to be polite about it. All of his thoughts were carefully manipulated and dictated by what his family expected to upkeep their image. It seemed his life was a never ending hamster wheel of expectations and actual wants constantly fighting one another until Malfoy had to come up with his own defense mechanisms. He put down people in an extreme extent to make himself feel better about his own inadequateness and flaunting money to prove he was worth something because he felt worthless. I think he thought becoming a Death Eater would quiet his doubts about himself, but once again his inability to truly mature came back to bite him. He become a Death Eater without thinking about what that meant. He became trapped in something much bigger than himself. All in all he was a product of his environment for the most part. He wasn't a complete rotten apple after all turns out. It was clear he loved his parents and his parents equally adored him.

It doesn't excuse everything he had ever said or done because he had still chosen to say and do those things with a conscious decision. Yet it helped me understand where those actions and words had come from. My whole life he had been, to me, a very black and white almost villainous caricature. He was bad and we were good. Instead I saw him as a person with just as many gray areas as anyone else.

When Harry didn't attack Malfoy at the first feast and when Malfoy gave a small nod of respect to Harry people understood where they stood: no longer through and through enemies, but not on good terms. They were just respectful and that was the only label that could be applied to them. Everyone should follow their example as such. I simply avoided him at first. It had been almost three years since I had studied any kind of magic and unfortunately was incredibly rusty. Ironically I had turned a bit into Hermione.

Well I had been avoiding him until I was waiting under a tree on the grounds waiting for my date to appear. Well I assumed he thought it was a date but for me it was simply a good time. My plan was to focus on completing schooling and getting some sort of job to stabilize my life before thinking about a serious relationship, but until then I was still a red blooded female that could still get her kicks once in a while.

After a short time I realized that most likely I had been stood up. I was about to cut my losses and return back to the castle when I heard humming. Nothing makes a person feel dumber then realizing there was another person on the other side of the tree you had been standing in front of for thirty minutes and never knew it. Curious, I looked around the tree to find Draco Malfoy of all people humming while doing his work.

Honestly it felt odd to be around him strangely enough only because I had never been around him alone. There had always been friends or Ron or Harry hovering around close by. Very rarely had he directly spoken to me and I had never spoken to him at all. Certainly I had talked about him though as all the girls did back then. He was still tall, of course. Blonde hair? Still there. Piercing gray eyes you didn't want too focused on you? Absolutely. His trademark smirk was alive and well as he apparently figured out the right answer to a homework problem. In this instance he seemed harmless, like any other student, just sitting there with his parchment in his lap and a book opened on the ground in front of him.

It was starting to grow dark and while Malfoy was comfortable to stay there I wasn't. Silently I looked at him one last time before turning back around and made my way back to the warm safety of the castle.