A/N: A continued thanks to all my reviewers. I've gone back and worked a bit on this chapter and the next adding roughly a page to a page and a half to each. So, seeeeeeee reviews hopefully equal better work.
Ok, So here it is. I was hoping despite my schedule that I would be able to update this week and I was. I hope you enjoy!
Chapter Six
"Ginevra, that's the third tea cup you've broken today what's wrong with you?" Molly admonished as she gave a flick of her wand and repaired the cup to its proper state.
"Sorry Mum, I just don't know what's gotten into me today." Ginny was trying to help her mum around the kitchen hoping the distraction would make time speed up, it was moving awfully slow this morning and that just made her nerves worse. Hence, the three broken tea cups.
Molly came over to Ginny and placed a hand on her shoulder. "Are you sure you are ok?"
"Yes Mum, I'm fine, I just seem to be channeling a bit of Tonks today." Molly made a clucking noise with her tongue as if to say that was certainly true and went on about her business.
Hermione had been sitting at the kitchen table looking over notes about her wedding. "Ginny why don't we go out to the pond or something."
"Yes, dear, that might be a good idea, maybe you just have a bit of spare energy you need to wear off, I've got lunch covered even with the crowd we're expecting today. You go on and enjoy being outside. Where is Maddie? Why don't you take her with you."
"She's with Ron I believe, somewhere around here." Hermione answered.
Ginny slipped out of her apron and followed her friend out the back door. They walked around the garden and out the garden path that led to the pond. Hermione didn't say anything thinking Ginny just really wanted to be left to her thoughts for a while.
"Ginny, are you ok, really? Besides just being nervous."
Ginny continued on for a while. "Yeah, I think so. It's just my stomach is in one gigantic knot."
"Do you want me to go and rummage in your Mum's potion cabinet? Maybe she has some calming potion."
"No, I tend to get too relaxed on her recipe, I at least need to be somewhat alert."
"Understandable."
They continued to walk around the pond and through the trees for a little while longer.
"Why don't we head back towards the house, maybe if I play with Maddie for a while it'll calm my nerves. What time is it by the way?" Ginny asked nervously.
Hermione checked her watch "About ten till eleven. I think Ron told Harry to be here around12:30 since we were planning on eating around one this afternoon."
The two girls made their way back around the pond and headed back up the garden path. Just as they reached the back side of the garden and were about to enter the gate Ginny stopped dead in her tracks, Hermione running into her back.
Omph "Ginny watch where…."
"Shhhhhhh."
Hermione straightened up and listened. Ginny turned and whispered "He's here."
Hermione mouthed and gave a quizzical look. "Already?"
"Listen."
Hermione strained her ear and sure enough she could hear her fiancé talking to Harry in the distance on the other side of the garden.
"Come on then." Hermione grabbed Ginny by the wrist and was trying to get her through the garden gate.
"Where's Maddie?" Ginny questioned.
"Don't know, we need to figure that out as well, but come on now or never."
"Let's cut around the garden and go in the front door and see if I can find Maddie first." Ginny anxiously whispered. She hadn't seen Harry yet but she had heard him.
"Ok, then I'll take her upstairs to play or something."
Ginny just nodded at her friend and then turned so that Hermione would follow her along the back and side fence of the garden and around the side of the house to the front porch. Ginny entered the family room and looked around. Her dad was snoozing away in a chair taking his "Sunday Morning Nap". Ginny could hear a familiar giggle coming from the kitchen and her mother talking. She followed the sound and when she rounded the corner her mum had Maddie sitting at the table and eating a lemon biscuit.
"Mummie! Guess what, Uncle Ron took me up on his broom this morning!"
"Really?" Ginny questioned. She had not given her brother permission to do that and she would have to speak to him on that matter, but now wasn't the time. Maddie was expounding on her broom ride to Hermione.
Ginny surveyed the room. Either her mum was playing things really cool or she still had no clue who was out in her backyard talking to her youngest son. About the time Ginny reached the other side of the kitchen her mum looked up through the window over the sink and gave a start.
Ginny covered the distance and came up behind her. "Shhhhhh."
Molly looked at her daughter quizzically. "What do you mean to shush me?" She asked harshly.
Maddie was staring at her mum and grandmother intently.
"Hey Maddie, want to go up stairs and play? I bet we can find a cool puzzle or we can draw pictures." Hermione was picking the little girl up from the table.
"Can I show you what we learned in ballet class this week?"
"Of course." Hermione ushered the child out of the kitchen and Ginny stared back at her mum.
"Yes, I know he's here, and yes I've known he was coming. And no you are not to make a fuss over it."
Molly looked a little perplexed.
"Not my doing actually, Ron and Hermione." Ginny stated crossing her arms.
"Ohhhh…..well?"
"I'm…I'm…" Ginny was starting to shake slightly.
Her mother took one of Ginny's hands in one of hers and with her other gently tilted her daughter's chin up so that she was looking at her.
"It's ok Ginny. Just, go and talk with him. That's the first step, even if all it is, is Hello."
Ginny nodded. "First I have to get something." With that she flicked her wand and the next moment a small box flew down the stairs around the corner and into the kitchen to Ginny's outstretched hand.
Molly nodded and gently turned her towards the back door while keeping one eye out in the back yard.
Ginny placed her trembling hand on the door knob and turned it till she heard the click that said the door was open. She stepped out into the warm morning sun and set her eyes on her brother. He was standing so that he was looking at the Burrow and Harry's back was to it. They were on the far side of the lawn near her father's shed and the broom storage. The grove of trees just beyond.
I can do this she thought, just keep your eyes on Ron.
Ron noticed the movement behind Harry and gave his sister a short, quick, discreet nod as if to say, come on, it's fine.
Ginny made the first ten steps at a fast determined pace and then her resolve started to wane and she got slower and slower until the last few were as if she was treading in mud. Ginny stopped about five feet from Harry when she saw his shoulders straighten and he turned his head in her direction.
Ginny froze. The day was warm around her and she was shaking as if she was standing in a snow drift.
Harry turned and looked back at Ron and then at Ginny.
"Ummm, I think Mum mentioned something about needing me in the kitchen or what not. Why don't you two take advantage of the nice weather and hang out, out here?" Ron was so not being smooth about this Ginny thought, but then he was her brother and she knew he lacked tack and skill sometime.
Ron started to make for the door, Harry's eyes on his back. Ginny stopped him as he walked by her. She stood on her toes and whispered in his ear, where even he barely heard it. "Keep Maddie inside till I ask for her. Hermione has her upstairs playing."
Ron nodded and then gave Ginny a kiss on the cheek whispering in her ear. "It's going to be ok, trust me. Just don't lose your temper too quick or anything, ok?"
Ginny smiled faintly at her brother and then nodded and letting Ron go.
He briskly covered the space between them and the Burrow and Ginny slightly winced when she heard the door close. Harry turned his eyes from the place where Ron had disappeared back onto Ginny.
"Hi."
Ginny could not say anything her mouth felt as if it was full of cotton.
"Are you still not going to say anything?" Harry looked a bit disappointed.
"Hey." There that was better than dodging and leaving.
They stared at each other for a few moments.
"You've ummm…changed Ginny. I mean you just look a little different. You're hair is different, shorter and well, I don't know, I can't place it." Harry looked down at the ground struggling to think of something, anything to say to make this situation a bit more comfortable.
"I can say the same for you." Harry nodded as Ginny continued. "We've grown up a bit I suppose. Time does that to people."
"Were we not then? I mean grown up?"
Ginny remembered the harsh realities of the lives they had all lived not so long ago. It seemed like yesterday, yet ages ago at the same time. "No, yes, I mean, well…we were more grown up than some of our peers, but I guess not as much as we are now, due to the circumstances we've lived through."
Harry looked a bit puzzled and then shrugged his shoulders. "I guess."
Ginny didn't feel like this conversation was going anywhere good. She didn't know how to start the conversation she knew they needed to have. They both stood there for a moment looking around nervously.
Ginny walked past Harry then, still clutching the box in her hands to her chest. She headed past her father's shed and out towards the grove of trees. She turned and looked at Harry over her shoulder. "Walk with me Harry." Ginny was nervous and figured the action of walking could help calm the nerves a bit.
Harry stuck his hands in his jeans pockets and followed. Relived that she had a) actually spoken to him and b) hadn't hexed him, yet.
"I don't want every nosey git in the house staring out the kitchen window." Ginny stated over her shoulder. Harry nodded understanding. He didn't know who all was in the Weasley household at the moment, but knew that whomever was there, they were probably all looking out of some window into the back yard.
-----
Ron sighed as he turned from the window in Maddie's room that overlooked the back yard. He looked over at Hermione and muttered "forest". She simply nodded her head as she placed another piece into the puzzle that she was working on with Maddie.
Ron came to sit next to them on the floor.
"Who is that guy you were talking to Uncle Ron?" Maddie didn't even look up as she continued to work on her puzzle. Ron gave Hermione a fleeting glance.
"Well, ummm. He's a friend of mine from school." Ron figured short precise answers were best.
"Ohhh." Maddie looked up at this point." I saw you talking to him when I was in the kitchen with Grand Mum eating biscuits. Is he going to stay and eat?"
"Don't know pumpkin. We'll have to wait and see."
"Can I draw him a picture?"
"Sure, he might enjoy that."
Maddie got up from the floor, the puzzle forgotten and went to gather her crayons and parchment.
-----
They walked for a few moments in silence. Every time Harry would try to come into step next to Ginny she would change direction or her pace so that they were never walking too close to one another, plus he noticed she was clutching some parcel to her chest as if her life depended on it.
"Why don't we sit here?" Ginny suggested. They had come to a spot where two trees had fallen and made natural benches to sit about five feet apart. Ginny sat down on one, Harry on the one opposite. He tried to catch her eye, but she wouldn't look up at him.
"Look, Ginny, if you totally hate me, I understand. I know…"
"I don't hate you Harry." She spoke it so softly that Harry wasn't sure he had heard her at all.
"What?"
Ginny swallowed and it took a lot of effort to make her voice loud enough. "I said I don't hate you. I never have and I never could. I..I was hurt, though."
Harry hung his head. He didn't know what was worse. He had been prepared for Ginny to hate him, for him to have to defend himself against any hex that Ginny could throw at him, but for her to sit there and say she didn't hate him and the sound of her voice when she had said he had hurt her, was almost too much.
"I'm sorry Gin. I….."Harry stumbled around for a moment in his head. "I really am. I don't know what else to say. There is nothing I could do I know, to make that up to you."
Ginny looked up then and stared at Harry sitting across from her. He looked as if he was being tortured mentally. As if there was a pain deep behind those green eyes. "Why Harry, why didn't you come back, you promised me." Her voice was steadier now, full of determination to understand, even if it was soft and low. It was pleading to understand the reasons why. She looked back at him once more, staring at him, to see if she could read his mind to see if she could read his heart.
"I…, I don't really know. I was scared for the most part."
"Scared?" Ginny asked incredulously. Here was the guy sitting across from her, who had defeated the darkest wizard ever to live and he was scared to return home?
"Gin, I had just murdered one of the most powerful wizards in the world. What were people going to say? I had been able to commit a murder so horrible that no one else had ever been able to do it. His followers were scattering. I was afraid some of them would come for me. I knew the ministry would be on my back in half a second. I had been up for over 48 hours straight at that point with not much sleep before that either. I was a mess."
"Don't you know, I was waiting to make it all go away?"
"You couldn't Gin, not all of that. I couldn't ask that of you."
"You didn't have to ask, I wanted to." She snapped. "Don't you think I had some idea of what condition you might be coming back to me in?!" Her voice was rising. She stopped for a moment to get her temper in check before it went off. She sighed letting the excess energy out and continued. "Harry, I didn't care if you came back to me on the brink of death as long as you were breathing I was waiting and I could deal with the condition later."
"Gin, I …."
"No Harry you listen for a moment." Ginny got up and started pacing. She hadn't felt this alive, since, since …anyway she thought, she could feel her blood pumping though her and her heart was beating in her chest so loudly she was certain it could scare the birds away.
"You were just playing the bloody hero for another round. Don't give me that look. I know you probably didn't mean it, but when was it you got it through your skull that you couldn't have gotten that far without your friends. It took you a while, but you finally realized it and you let Ron and Hermione tag along. Yes, I know they played their parts they weren't just tagging along. But Harry, that same thing applied after that battle. All of us who had been behind you the whole time were still waiting, waiting to catch you and bring you home. Home to a life that you deserved beyond anyone who was present that day and you threw it away on your own." Ginny was pleading now, desperate to make him understand the possibilities of what he left behind that day. "Harry, you not only threw away your future and the past five years aside but you tossed mine aside as well."
"No, I didn't… I had to get away, you didn't go anywhere. You didn't deserve to have to deal with me in the mess I was in mentally, emotionally."
"YOU ARE NOT LISTENING!" Ginny stopped dead in front of him. She took a breath and steadied herself.
"Harry, what did you promise to me the night you left?" Ginny squared off in front of him and pointed at him. "Don't lie and say you don't remember. I can read it in your face, you've thought of that every day since you left that morning. I know I have."
Harry looked up at her quickly.
"What was it Harry, what did you promise?" Her voice was softer now, gentle and pleading again.
"That I ….. I would come back, if I was alive at all, I would come back for our future together." Harry whispered the words as he remembered then and then hung his head. He didn't know why he had come to try and apologize. He should have stayed gone, dug himself into some kind of hole and hidden there for eternity. There was no way after Ginny finished her tirade, that she had every right to give, that she would ever speak to him again.
Ginny stooped down in front of him and looked up into his eyes. He reached out tentatively for one of her hands and she drew them closer to herself. He sighed and pulled his hand back.
"Harry," Ginny whispered his name as she looked at her hands. "I just don't want to touch you right now because I don't trust myself." Harry looked down in her brown eyes and nodded.
She continued. "Harry, the night you banished Voldemort and everyone came home but you, well…you might as well have let me go along in the first place and I might as well have died on that battle field because I did die that night. My heart did. I…I almost thought I didn't have a reason to live anymore."
Ginny was shaking gently again. She had to get her nerves under control. She took a deep breath and stood up to continue her pacing for a moment.
"I'm sorry Gin, I know now. I knew once I was gone that I shouldn't have, but I just couldn't bring myself to turn around. I was a coward."
"No Harry, you are anything but a coward. You're thick at times and you don't ever value your own self worth enough or the fact that anyone in this wide world loves you, but we do. That's your problem."
"Do you still love me Gin? Because if you do, I don't deserve it."
Ginny didn't answer his question but asked one of her own. "Do you still love me? Did you leave that on that battle field as well?"
Harry stopped for a moment wondering if he should go on. "No, no, I kept that with me. I don't have any right to love you anymore. But I never stopped."
They stared at one another for a moment before Harry dropped his gaze when Ginny returned to her pacing. "I still love you Harry, it's just….it's just that things aren't going to automatically be the same as they were before." She whispered. "I don't see how they could be."
Harry watched her for a moment. "I know. I just wish. I just wish I could close my eyes and when I open them things could be back to the way they use to be."
"How's that Harry? How did things use to be?"
Ginny had sat back down on her log and now it was Harry's turn to burn off some nervous energy.
"Back to the days before we both had graduated. Back before the war had gotten so bad and Voldermort so powerful. Back when we could walk hand in hand around school and not have a care except for what to do not to have Snape on our case or how to stay out of detention with Filch because we had been caught snogging in the hallway." Ginny made a soft giggling noise and Harry smiled. He thought he saw a soft blush on her cheeks.
Harry hid his grin and sighed. "Ginny back then, I would go anywhere you wanted me to. I'd follow you anywhere and I was perfectly happy. As long as you were by my side I was home. I could breathe for the first time and I felt free. I felt love, not just from a friend, but true, deep, passionate love for the first time. I wish we could have that back." He hung his head a bit dejectedly.
"You broke that off Harry, even before you left to go and find Voldermort."
"Yes, but I thought we already had that row, years ago in fact."
"I know, you did it because of your saving people complex and I understood then, I still do. I don't want to go through that again. But Harry, that's what I was waiting on too. I was waiting for you to rid us of Voldermort for good so that we could have all that you just talked about, I thought that was what you were fighting for and what you were going to return for?"
The silence hung around them like the leaves on the trees for a few moments.
"Is it too late Gin, is it too late to even try again? I know I don't deserve it, but I would like the chance." He was now the one stooping in front of her. He didn't dare touch her even though all he wanted was to just take her hands in his.
Ginny looked down at him. His eyes were the color of the leaves that were filtering sun through to the forest floor.
Ginny thought long and hard, her mind filtering though all the changes her life had taken. She now had more responsibilities than for just herself. "I don't know." She whispered.
"At least it's not a straight out no."
He stood up and sat back down on the opposite log.
"I know, my timing in all things has always been awful. We could have had longer the first time if it hadn't taken me so long to wise up. And I've made you wait longer than any woman should ever have to wait for someone. But, please Gin, there hasn't been a day that hasn't gone by I haven't thought of you. I've dreamed of you and woke up and swore I could smell you or feel you. That's how I knew you had come outside earlier. I hadn't heard you, but I could smell you, I could feel you nearby."
Ginny sat quietly for a moment a hundred thoughts turning in her head. Harry sat opposite to her; his head hung down and dejected looking as she stared at the top of his raven head. She remembered that first flutter when she understood who had caught her that day at the press conference. The recognition when she remembered the scent of Harry, the pace her heart took when she realized it was his hands holding her steady.
Ginny took in a deep breath to steady her mind and then sighed. "Let's just" Ginny sighed unevenly, willing her heart and mind to slow down. "Let's just see what happens. This is day one. Ok. You're back in England and I didn't hex you or murder you myself upon setting sight on you. So, let's just consider this a truce on the argument of you walked out on our life and have shown up almost six years later. Ok?" Ginny didn't know where all that had come from, but her resolve to have it out and then banish him from her life had left. She knew it whether Harry did or not, that he still held her heart. It was sore and bruised, but if anyone could heal it, she was sure he could if given time. But did she want to go through the painful process of letting it heal completely?
"Ok, I think I can deal with that."
"Good."
They sat there for a little while and stirred around the fallen leaves with their feet. Ginny played with the edge of the top of the box she was once again holding in her hand.
"Ginny?"
"Yeah?"
"What is that you're holding?"
"Umm.." Ginny wasn't sure she was ready for this part of the discussion. But she needed to tell him. Praying to whomever was listening she prayed for strength to tell Harry she had bore him a daughter and that she could handle whatever reaction he had to that fact.
"Do you remember that last night before you left?"
"You mean the conversation we had that we've already talked about?"
"No."
Harry looked at her across the way. Ginny was blushing slightly he could tell.
"I mean, do you remember that night before we had that conversation."
"What we did?" Harry choked out.
"Yes." Ginny whispered like a school girl who had been caught doing something she shouldn't.
Now it was Harry's turn to blush. He bowed his head and a grin spread across his face as he remembered that night. The circumstances were horrible, but it was one thought that had sustained him at times. They had made love for the first and only time that night. Well, actually twice that night, but still it was the first times for either of them and the only time they ever had been together.
"Yeah Gin, I remember that night." Harry's voice was a bit rough around the edges. He cleared his throat in an effort to make it sound normal again. "I know the circumstances were not ideal, but Ginny I wouldn't, couldn't take back that night if you begged me to."
"I know, me neither."
"Well, what does that have to do with that box?"
"Well, we'll get to the box in a moment. It's actually a present for you. But first I have to tell you something."
"Ok?" Harry drew out in a question.
Ginny swallowed hard. "Harry, I wasn't necessarily honest with you in the few letters I did get to send to you when you all were gone on your mission for the Order."
Harry looked at Ginny perplexed. "What do you mean?"
"Well…I mean everything I ever wrote was true, it's more like what I wasn't including in those letters."
"Ok…" Harry's mind felt like it sure was working slow. Was he supposed to understand anything already, because he didn't?
"I didn't want you to know, because well, I thought it would endanger you, or me or ….or us."
"Ginny, what are you getting at?"
"Harry, has Ron ever mentioned anything to you about the evening they all came home?"
"No, other than" Harry's mind traveled back to the few letters he had exchanged in those early months with Ron. "Other than you were inconsolable for a bit."
"Yeah, well, that would be putting it mildly." Ginny swallowed hard, she had to do this, she had to tell him. Maddie was waiting in the house.
"The day that you had your final battle with Voldermort and you banished him from this life, well I was fighting my own battle so to say and well, instead of banishing life from this earth, I brought life to it." Ginny's voice was a whisper almost as she finished her statement.
Harry was truly lost, he couldn't quiet put things together, what did she mean, she had her own battle, brought life? Harry sat puzzled for a moment and then a thought popped in his head and he snapped his head up to look at Ginny.
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