Disclaimer--If you like it, assume I don't own it. The Potterverse belongs to JKR, Steve Klowes, Scholastic and WB. Fanon belongs to the multitude...I'm simply paying homage. Most of this scene is from GoF by JK Rowling. No copyright infringement is intended, and no money is being made.

Author's Notes-- Progress has been a lot slower in this work, but I hope you'll all stick with me anyway. As you all know, I may not own it, but I work hard, and I love it, so if you read it and enjoy it, please review it! Please don't print or post this elsewhere without my knowledge.

Congratulations, all!! Book 6 is on the way!! Yay!!!

Raiining—I know what you mean, but hang in there if you can…completing a story is worth it! You assume correctly. Poor Harry. And I liked that line too. ;-)

JamieBell—You're right…Ron can definitely be a handful! But I think Ginny enjoys "mothering" him. I like the insight, too. J

J. Rhaye—YAY!!! Welcome back!!! hugs I thought I'd bored you to death. ;-) Thanks for the praise. I agree…I love our girl's tendency to be a step ahead. hugs

EEDOE—I hope you enjoy this! hugs

Bill—Hope you're still enjoying the story! hugs

Ron may not have read the article, but in the days that followed, he certainly heard enough about it. Someone—Ginny only wished she knew who—had caught wind of the article and proceeded to hand it around the school without discretion. In no time at all, Draco Malfoy had organized quite a cabal of hecklers on Harry's behalf.

The Hufflepuffs, still stinging over Harry's theft of Cedric's spotlight (accidental as only Hermione, Neville, and Ginny believed it to be) were suddenly all-too-willing to join forces with the Slytherins in a way their generous hearts would normally condemn, and the Ravenclaws couldn't really help enjoying the excuse for sharpening their wit with such an appreciative and involved audience. The halls were so full of students waving handkerchiefs mockingly; Hogwarts seemed like a museum tableau of decorations for a Muggle Halloween. As if that were painful enough for everyone involved, the handkerchiefs were accompanied by a constant cooing sympathy that often involved reassurances Harry needn't miss his parents much longer anyway as he was sure to die and join them in attempting the First Task.

The noise—and more, the malicious aura that seemed to infiltrate the air like cloying perfume—gave Ginny a length of tight knots along the back of her neck and a constant, throbbing headache that made her stomach churn. Hermione was calm and silent, but with large flashing hazel eyes, and Neville went everywhere with a nervous scowl and shaking hands that matched the tremor in his voice. She could only imagine the effect it must have on Harry. But, as far as Ginny could tell, Ron hardly seemed to notice—unless he gave off the faint but distinct air of satisfaction Ginny sometimes thought she imagined. If so, maybe his anger would soon be assuaged when he felt Harry had been appropriately punished.

"Which shouldn't be much longer by the looks of things," she said to herself for what had to be the twenty-fifth time that day as she watched Harry struggle down the hall, looking particularly strained and cross. She moved forward to say something to him, she didn't know quite what, anything that might cheer him up a bit and take that horrible lost look off his face. It was at that moment Harry dropped his quill—the perfect opening to conversation. She bent forward to retrieve it, only to have her vision obscured by a swirl of delicate black robes and the sweep of equally black silken hair.

"Hey, Harry!" the girl called in a voice that seemed oddly, and not altogether pleasantly, familiar.

"Yeah, that's right!" Harry all but snarled in response, wheeling sharply about on his heels, he stopped suddenly as he caught sight of who'd addressed him. If Ginny hadn't already known the suggestion of romance between Hermione and Harry in the Daily Prophet was rubbish, she would have known then. Ginny, all-but-resigned to loosing her chance to talk to him, winced as she caught sight of his expression. "Cho?"

That explained why she'd felt a vague impression of dislike when she looked at the girl—Ginny had met Cho Chang on the Hogwarts Express, and she hadn't been particularly impressed with her giggly, gushy, girly demeanor. "Unlike some people I could name," she added sharply under her breath. She crossed her arms defensively and leaned back against the wall for support.

"Oh, right, sorry," Harry muttered, looking about as strong as Ginny felt. As Cho handed him his quill, her smooth, slender, dancing fingers brushing Harry's strong, square ones; Ginny thrust her own short, ink-stained fingers and ragged nails deeper out of sight within the folds of her robes under arms in a surge of self-consciousness. She could feel an embarrassed flush nearly identical to Harry's staining her cheeks as she ducked hurriedly into Professor Flitwick's classroom.

In spite of her feelings toward Harry, it was hard to feel unsettled for long with life more and more brightly illuminated by the approach of her first Hogsmeade weekend.

"I wanted to show you the sights, me, and Harry, and Ron," Hermione complained that night, looking uncharacteristically dejected. "But it doesn't look as if they're going to be any fun at moment."

"So we'll have fun, just the two of us," Ginny assured her stoutly, carefully marking a correction on her Ancient Runes translation. "We can go places the guys wouldn't enjoy anyway. Like....uh..." she paused, at a loss for a place she and Hermione might want to visit that wouldn't interest Ron and Harry.

"That sounds like fun."

"I hear a 'but' in there somewhere," Ginny observed with a sigh.

Hermione smiled ruefully, the tight edges of the smile making it look almost pained. "If I tell you, you'll change your mind about going with me."

"Harry is going with you to Hogsmeade."

"Well, he doesn't really have anyone else right now, and--"

"I wouldn't want Harry to be alone," Ginny agreed immediately, and with only the faintest twinge of jealousy. Less than she felt, in fact, seeing Ron spending so much time with the twins and Lee.

"Oh, do come," Hermione begged. "You won't have to seem him or anything—he insists on staying under that ridiculous Invisibility Cloak the en--" She stopped with a horrified look on her face.

"Oh, Hermione, don't look so worried. Snape was muttering about that Cloak every day for weeks the end of last school year." Ginny rubbed the back of her neck. "But if Harry insists on staying under it, he obviously doesn't want a bunch of strangers gawking about him and--" And she couldn't possibly face him, let alone make comfortable conversation, while she was still remembering that look on his face, wishing...

"You--"

"Should probably just go the first time with my classmates. You and I can go on the next visit together."

"Arrgh. Weasleys! Why must you all be so bloody pigheaded?"

Ginny just laughed.

After a second of mad glowering in her direction, Hermione suddenly broke down and began to laugh, too, throwing her arms about her.