DISCLAIMER: None of the characters, or the setting, or even the ship belongs to me. They all belong to JK Rowling, plus anything else that someone may recognize from the books. I'm just playing with Harry and Ginny; repeat, this is purely for fun, no profit to be made at all. And now, the feature presentation...
She stomped down the hallway, her mind roiling. How could she have-! She knows I'm not a little girl anymore!
Ginny ran to the bathroom, fuming and perhaps a tad firmly closing the door behind her. She didn't want to see anyone right now. If she did, she might end up spending some time in Azkaban.
She whirled around to face the mirror and screamed at her reflection. It was only then she noticed that there was someone else there, close enough in this tiny room that she could almost feel their body heat. She slowly turned around and almost gasped out loud.
Harry Potter was standing there with a towel that had apparently been hastily wrapped around his waist, leaving his bare chest in full view.
She had forgotten that he was spending Christmas holidays at the Burrow this year at her mum's invitation. Harry, for his part, was looking at her uncomfortably and clutching the towel with both hands.
She caught herself staring into his emerald-green eyes, lost for what could have been years or minutes. She reached up to move away a lock of dark hair that disrupted her view, but quickly pulled her hand back to her side. He coughed lightly.
Blushing, she turned away. How was that, every time she had convinced herself she was over him, he proved her wrong? He looked anywhere but at her while they stood in a moment of awkward silence.
"Um, I…" he trailed off.
She looked up.
"What?" she asked, tucking a stray strand of hair behind her ear.
"I um… that is, what did you want?"
She just stared dumbly at him.
No, don't think about him, you're dating Dean now, a voice in her head told her.
Yeah, but Dean is worth a flobberworm when Harry Potter….
NO, the first voice said firmly.
He stood there, awkwardly awaiting an answer as he scratched the back of his neck. As if by magic, his gesture broke the hold on her tongue his presence had created.
"Um, I didn't know there was somebody else in here. I guess I should have knocked," she replied nervously.
Merlin! Its just Harry.
Just Harry. In nothing but a towel.
Yeah, Just Harry in Nothing but a Towel.
The room suddenly seemed awfully small and crammed. Was this the same bathroom in which she had cried over Harry ever noticing her?
Surely not, that one was much bigger.
She backed up towards the door and put her hand on the knob, but it wouldn't turn. She turned around and looked at the doorknob in dismay.
She had forgotten that if you slammed it, the door would get stuck. And when this door got jammed, it moved for no one. She banged on it and tried pushing and pulling with all her might, but to no avail.
Darn.
"I would- uh, that is- the door is jammed…" she trailed off under his suddenly intense scrutiny.
After a moment, he broke his gaze and looked at the floor, his cheeks red. She stood there, unsure of what to do. After a moment she looked around, but the window was too small for her to even stick her head through. The only other thing in the room was the toilet, shower, his clothes, soap and a wet washrag.
"Well, this is wonderful," she said, "We'll likely be stuck here for a while, since Mum has everybody else busy decorating, and no one knows we're here."He looked up.
"Yeah …" he trailed off.
They stood there a moment, avoiding looking at each other
"Well, here," she said, "I'll turn around so you can get dressed," she said suddenly, putting action to her words as she did so. After a moment, she heard the sound of cloth rustling as he picked up his clothes and put them on. She tried very hard not to listen. Once, he brushed her arm as he worked to dress in the small bathroom, which caused her to jump slightly.
"You can turn around now," he said in an odd tone of voice.
Blushing, she did so and looked at her hands, which had suddenly become immensely interesting for some reason.
"Well, this is awkward…" he trailed off, as if he didn't know what to say.
She laughed.
"Oh, no, not at all, I spend all of my free time stuck in tiny bathrooms with guys" she joked nervously, trying to keep her voice even.
"Anyways," he changed the subject quickly, "We should probably try to get out of here."
She nodded.
"Yeah, if Ron caught us in here, it wouldn't be good." She said, thinking, More for Ron than me...
He nodded in agreement.
"I'm not strong enough to open the door. Do you think you could?" she asked.
"I don't know," he replied. "Let me see."
After a moment of dancing around in the small bathroom and trying to avoid touching one another, he was standing in front of the door.
She watched as he struggled, once managing to get it to wiggle, but ultimately the door remained stubbornly closed.
"Here," he said, "Let's see if together we can't get it open."
She hesitated, but nodded after a moment and got right in front of him so that both of their hands were on the knob and her back was pressed right up against his front.
They were barely both able to fit in there, but they got it. They struggled and struggled, but weren't able to move it any farther than he had before. After a while, they stopped and just stood there, catching their breath, although she was having a hard time of it. For some reason, she was slightly light-headed.
"Um…"he began.
"Oh, yeah, sorry."
She tried to move, but in the small space, only succeeded in falling on top of him. Although he had broken her fall, she had ended up severely twisting her ankle. Harry backed up enough to allow her to sit on the floor right in front of him. She tried to move her ankle, but the pain nearly made her cry out, and she realized she wouldn't be able to get up until someone opened the door.
Blushing, she said, "I think I twisted my ankle, and I won't be able to move until someone can help me up."
He didn't reply.
"I'm sorry. All this is my fault, if I had just calmed down some or paid attention to where I was going, we wouldn't be in this mess."
"No, I should have locked the door," he said. "What were you so angry about anyway?" he asked.
"Oh, Mum was being overly-protective again. She acts like I'm two years old, and haven't already been through four and a half years of school," she fumed. "She doesn't realize-" Just then he shushed her. She realized it was because someone was walking by the door.
"Hey!" she called.
"Hey, we're stuck!" he echoed.
A familiar male voice seeped through, muffled by the door.
"Hearken, I do believe I hear our sister's voice." someone said in a much too serious tone. Now she recognized it as her older brother Fred's voice. Uh-oh.
"Why, I do believe you're right. It appears that she is having a secret meeting with someone," his twin, George, called through the old wooden door.
The only thing worse than one of her brothers finding her in here with Harry was two of them finding her in here with Harry.
"You know, this was a good choice. You can lock the door and Mum will just think it's stuck," Fred said.
"Absolutely right. I knew this girl was our sister!" George replied.
"It's not locked, it is stuck, you prats!" she called out. "I was mad at Mum and didn't realize that there was someone in here, and when I slammed the door it got stuck. Could you help us open it?"
"Are you sure?" one of the twins asked.
"Yeah, we wouldn't want to interrupt you," the other assured her, and she could hear them start to walk away.
"FRED AND GEORGE WEASLEY IF YOU DON'T OPEN THIS DOOR, WHEN I DO GET OUT I WILL HEX YOU INTO NEXT WEEK! AND YOU BETTER NOT BELIEVE I'LL GO EASY ON YOU!"
She had found that impersonating her mother usually got what she wanted from her brothers, and it didn't fail this time either.
Although Harry seemed a little startled, after a moment of hurried footsteps from down the hall, the door swung open to reveal her brothers' tall frames standing right outside the door way, both with their wands out as if they had simultaneously tried to magic the door open. Quickly she got up, only to fall again when she put weight on her ankle.
"Could you help me up, please?" she asked not a little impatiently.
"Why, look at this, Gred. It's our dear little sister."
"Well, I do believe you're right, Forge. I didn't know she was there."
She simply glared at them as Harry quickly scooted out from underneath her and helped her up from behind.
"Thank you, Harry," she said with an air of dignity and barely concealed rage at her brothers.
"You're welcome," he nodded at her, "But I've got to…. that is I need… I'll see you later," he excused himself and proceeded quickly down the hall to Ron's bedroom.
"Oooh, Ginny, the famous Harry Potter's got a crush on someone!" George cooed as Harry left earshot.
"Yeah, Ginny, we'd better stop letting him hold plates around you, or we'll lose all our dishes." Fred said seriously.
Ginny snorted.
"Yeah, well I'm dating someone else now, in case you've forgotten what our dear sweet brother Ronald told you," she said.
The twins looked at each other sagely and Fred pronounced,
"Yeah, but I've seen the way you look at him when you think no one is looking, and the way he looks at you when he thinks no one is looking."
"Whatever, Fred. If he cared about me like that…." she left it hanging.
"Why was he blushing so much if he didn't like you?" George teased her.
She opened her mouth, but closed it again, like a fish trying to breathe.
They started walking off.
"Later, baby sis."
"Good bye," she managed to get out, still reeling over the thought that Harry Potter might like her. But then she laughed and dismissed it as brotherly teasing. After all, this is Fred and George we're talking about. But even as she thought it, she knew they would only tease her that way if they'd found something to encourage the notion.