A Glimmer within a trial

A/n I'm free, I'm free!! Now maybe I can get my stories out quicker. Thanks to all the reviewers-you're all fantabulous!!

A Glimmer within a trial

Part 5

"Wow, this is amazing," Ginny exclaimed as she walked into Liberty's house. While the house looked relatively small, though appropriate for a single woman living on her own, on the outside; it looked huge from the inside. She walked into a long hall with chandeliers cascading from the ceiling. At the end of the hall was a door that entered into the living room. Liberty showed them around room after room, all of them were very classical looking. Ginny couldn't believe Liberty lived in this house alone; it had to get very spooky at night all by your self. There were plenty of guest rooms; so they could each have a room to his or herself. The last stop was the library, which was in Ginny's opinion, the most beautiful room of them all. She heard Hermione shriek as they saw row after row of books, most looking hardly used. A refurnished old oak table sat in the middle of the room, surrounded by ten chairs. She assumed that was where they would be doing their research, but she wondered whom the tenth chair was for.

"When are we getting together to research," Hermione asked, amazed. She lightly touched one of the books on the shelf, and quickly pulled back as if she was afraid to touch it.

"We planned to get together in two days."

"Two days, but that's Christmas Eve," Ron whined.

"Don't worry, we're planning on holding off the research until after Christmas. I just thought it would be nice for everyone to get acquainted first. Now, should we go sit in the living room?"

They agreed, and went into the living room to sit, although Ron had to tug Hermione by the arm to get her out of the library. Ginny sat between Harry and Kimberly on a small red couch, still trying to take in all her surroundings. Finally, Kimberly spoke up.

"So, tell us about when you were at school aunt Liberty."

"What do you want to know?"

Harry looked like he was barely able to keep his questions inside any longer. "Were you good friends with Moody, Wormtail, Padfoot, and Prongs?"

"Yes I was. And I was good friends with your mother as well Harry."

"Please tell us more," Kimberly begged.

"Well, it's a long story. Are you sure you all want to hear it right now."

"We'd love to hear it," Ginny exclaimed.

Liberty sat in a chair by the fireplace in order to face everyone as she spoke. "Shelby and I were neighbors, so we've known each other long before we entered Hogwarts. By the time we were eleven, my brother and her sister were going out, and we were already good friends. We made friends with Lily and Remus on the Hogwarts express, before we even set off, so, we were pretty happy when we were all sorted into Gryffindor by the sorting hat."

"So then were do James and Sirius fit in," Kimberly asked her aunt.

"Now Kimberly, you know how you don't like to get interrupted."

"Sorry."

"Well, I was getting to that. We met James and Sirius at the sorting. Shelby had quite a crush on Sirius back then, and they became friends rather quickly. Sirius and I were a different story. To make a long story short, we could not stand one another, but we did learn to accept one another. Since we were all friends, I eventually learned to put up with him, difficult as he was."

"What about Professor Snape, how does he fit into this," Ginny asked.

"I disliked Snape worse than I disliked Sirius. In fact, all of us disliked Snape, and the feeling was mutual. Except, he always had a soft spot for Shelby. He never put Shelby down like he did to the rest of us. We all used to tease her, saying Snape had a crush on her, which to this day I still suspect is true. She wouldn't hear of it though, but she did stick up for Snape whenever we made fun of him." Liberty stopped as she saw Hermione shuffle a yawn. "You kids are probably getting tired. Are you sure you wouldn't like to hear this some other time?"

"No, no. Keep going," Harry insisted, eager to hear more about his parents, and Sirius.

"Everything was going well, until fifth year. That was when You-Know-Who arose. We didn't know much about him though, and we really didn't care. We were too busy having the time of our lives at Hogwarts. James and Lily fell in love that year, which was quite a story in itself…I'll have to tell you about that sometime Harry…That was also the year Shelby started going out with Sirius."

"Sirius went out with Shelby," Ginny asked.

"Yes, in fact everyone always thought they were the perfect couple. We all figured they would be married one day."

"What?" Harry couldn't believe Sirius never told him any of this.

"You-Know-Who killed my parents in sixth year, along with my younger brothers and sisters. Only Kimberly's dad and I were left in my family. Sirius really came through for me. He was a lot of help, and I really reconsidered his friendship. He came to be the only one I could talk to about my family back then. I decided I really misjudged him, so we finally became friends."

"Well then why don't you two get along now, and what happened to Sirius and Shelby?"

"After seventh year, Sirius asked Shelby to marry him, and she refused. The funny part was neither of them seemed too upset. Shelby told me they just didn't have any spark. She said it was funny how they could love each other so much as friends, but she couldn't love him as anything more. It really surprised all of us. Two years later, Lily and James got married, which was another big surprise. You know Harry, none of us thought your parents would last as a couple, but then we all thought Sirius and Shelby would, funny how life turns out."

"You're telling me," Harry said, looking at Ginny.

"A year after that, Harry was born. We were all so happy to have a new addition in our big family, as we liked to think of ourselves. The day James and Lily died had to be the saddest day of my life, sadder than the day You-Know-Who killed my family. I should've known better than to believe Sirius did it, but I wasn't the only one to make that mistake. Sometimes I think I should have been there for him, because he was there for me when my family was killed. I guess I feel so guilty, that I can't let myself become friends with him again."

"I'm so sorry," Kimberly said, comforting her aunt.

"I need to get some sleep now. I'll tell you more about your parents another time Harry."

They all said good night to Liberty as she headed off to her bedroom. Ginny, Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Kimberly said up for a while longer to talk before heading off to bed. Ron and Hermione seemed to separate themselves off in the other corner of the room. Kimberly stayed to talk to Ginny and Harry a little bit before going up to bed; soon Ginny was sitting alone with Harry by the fire.

They sat there for about an hour, just getting warmed by the fire, when Harry decided to go to bed himself. As he got up, they noticed Ron and Hermione having a heated discussion on the other side of the room. After a couple minutes of bickering, they both stomped up the stairs.

"Well, those two defiantly have spark," Harry said, laughing at his friends. "Defiantly," Ginny agreed. They both knew that Ron and Hermione would be inseparable again in the morning. That was just how Ron and Hermione were, it wouldn't be the same without them getting into an argument at least once a week.

Ginny got to thinking about how Shelby said there was no spark between her and Sirius. It was begging to worry her. She knew she felt a spark towards Harry, but what if Harry didn't have one towards her.

"Harry," she called before he could go into his room. He stopped and turned to face her.

"Never mind," she said, and watched him depart into his room. She didn't know what exactly she wanted to ask him. She needed to know if he felt the spark, but she couldn't just bring it up. After thinking a while in bed, she got the perfect idea. She knew it was deceitful, but she had to know if he loved her as much as she loved him.

A/n Haha, back to the cliffies!! This part was so much fun to write. I didn't get much in about Lily and James, but I didn't want that part to get too long. I could've just went on and on with that part…

Hey, did anyone see that commercial where the guy was trying to get I love Donna tattooed on his shoulder. When the guy giving to him was almost done, he realized he didn't have enough money, so he didn't get the whole tattoo, and it ended up saying I love Don. I just saw it, and I thought it was soo funny, I had to walk around the house just to calm down.

The next part shouldn't take as long since I'm out!!

Disclaimer: I don't own them.