2002

Ginny rolled over, expecting to find Harry lying next to her, but instead finding a cold, empty bed. She moaned and opened her eyes.

'Harry', she whined, still half asleep, 'Harry what are you doing? Come back to bed'.

There was no reply.

'Harry?'

Silence.

She groaned and closed her eyes again. God only knew what he could be doing. She lay there, warm and happy, for awhile, hoping that Harry would soon stop doing whatever he was doing and come back to bed for a bit. Soon she got tired of waiting.

'Harry!' she yelled vaguely, to the house at large, not knowing where he could be. When there was still no answer she decided to get up. She pulled on one of his baggy t-shirts and wandered downstairs. He was nowhere to be seen. What could he doing? She decided to ask Hermione if he had said anything to her, and so grabbed some floo powder and stuck her head in the fire.

'Mione?' she called loudly 'anyone home? Ron? Anyone?'

'Ginny' shrieked a voice from inside the house, 'Oh my god how are you? It's been ages!'

'Hermione, I saw you yesterday.'

'Oh yeah! Well it feels like ages! It's so weird, you being married to Harry, me being married to Ron. We're so grown up now. Sometimes I wish we were back at school. It was so simple then.'

'Excuse me? Simple? You were fighting Voldemort every other week!'

'Oh, you know what I mean! School was so much more… you know'

'umm..'

'Oh come on, you must miss it'

'Oh yeah, I totally miss being left out of the loop in every single cool thing you guys ever did… speaking of which, do you know where Harry is? I haven't the foggiest.'

'Yeah. He and Ron went on an early morning raid this morning. Someone tipped off the Auror office about some potential dark items in an old house. Just a routine mission really. He must of mentioned it?'

'Oh! Yeah he did now you've reminded me! I don't know what's wrong with me recently. I've got a memory like a sieve!'

'you're probably just stressed. You've had a lot of work with the wedding and all'

'Mione, the wedding was like 6 months ago!'

'Ugh! You know what I mean!'

'I guess. With the Harpies winning the league last season, we've been doing a lot of extra practice to stay on form.'

'There, see? No need to worry'

'I wasn't!'

'Yes you were! I know you.'

'Ha, well maybe a bit, it just feels like I'm getting old too fast, you know?'

'Ginny, you're 21'

'Yeah I know I'm being silly! Anyway, it was great to chat, but I have to get ready for work now that I know that Harry's not been abducted'

'Okay then, see you!'

'Bye!' and with that Ginny popped back into her own sitting room.

A while later, when she had finished quidditch practice for the day, Ginny was sitting reading the Daily Prophet with a cup of tea when she realised that Harry was still not back. He'd been gone a long time. Presumable the raid had turned out to be more complicated than they'd thought. She was just taking a sip of tea (black, two sugars) when there was an almightily thud from the other room. Ginny jumped and spilt tea all down her t-shirt, and the new sofa that they had only bought a couple of weeks ago.

'scourgify' she muttered, flicking her wand absentmindedly.

'Ginny?' a voice yelled from the other room

Ginny, who, in her annoyance at the tea, had forgotten about the noise a couple of seconds ago, shrieked.

'Who's there?' she asked nervously, running towards the voice with her wand raised.

'Gin, keep your hair on! It's only me!'

Ginny opened the door to reveal Hermione standing by the fireplace, delicately brushing ash off her robes.

'Merlin Mione, you scared me! I got tea everywhere!'

'Oo tea! Any going?'

'I just finished the pot. I can make some more though.'

'That would be lovely'

'black, brown, green, breakfast, earl grey?'

'Earl grey if you've got it'

'Of course I've got it! I just offered it to you!'

'Oh yeah!'

Ginny put the kettle on while Hermione launched into explaining the reason for her sudden appearance. It transpired that while Ginny had been enjoying the quiet day to herself, Hermione had spent the afternoon, and much of the morning, worrying.

'It's just, they've been gone for hours', Hermione explained, 'they're never normally this long. Ron said it was just a straightforward raid. They should have been back ages ago'

Ginny, starting to feel a bit guilty at her lack of consideration for her husbands welfare, assured Hermione that they would be fine.

'They're probably back at the office doing paperwork. Or down the Leaky caldron. They'll have just forgotten to tell us.'

'Yeah you're right.'

At that moment there was a pop and suddenly both Ron and Harry appeared in front of them, covered in blood.

'Why is he always covered in blood?' Ginny muttered to herself.

Hermione screamed and both of them shot up, Hermione talking very fast about all the spells she knew and which would be useful but maybe they should go straight to St Mungo's and why on earth had the Ministry let them come home in this state in the first place, until they realised that both the men had massive grins on their faces.

'Ha! I told you she'd get like this', Ron grinned at Harry, 'Girls get so worked up over a little blood!'

'Ronald Weasley! You are covered in blood! Your face is caked in it, and you expect me to calmly finish my tea when you suddenly appear in the kitchen?'

'That's what Ginny did' Harry commented, elbowing Ginny in the ribs, 'Do I look handsome and rugged, babe?'

Ginny rolled her eyes.

'Please explain why you are covered in blood!' Hermione was not going to let it drop.

'Cos we thought it would be funny'

'Funny?' Hermione exclaimed.

'Yeah, we thought it would be a good laugh to leave the blood on and see your reaction'

'You didn't disappoint Hermione!'

Hermione sighed.

'But it is your blood?'

'Yeah. There were some aggressive gnomes in the garden'

'Gnomes did this?'

'Yeah! Like I said, they were aggressive!'

'Well', said Ginny, 'You look like you could do with a nice cup of tea and a sit down. I'll put the kettle on.'