I Don't Know You Anymore

I Don't Know You Anymore

**********

Yes, another dreaded songfic by yours truly.  Please don't think this has anything to do with Shatter.  If you do, you'll be desperately disappointed.  This is just something random that came to me while listening to my Savage Garden cd around midnight.  You asked for more Ginny, and here she is.  She's always so angsty with me.  I suppose we all are angst-ridden, we just don't know it yet.  As I said in a conversation with Valkyrja, issues come part and parcel with the wand.  And yes, the Muse is on the move…she can't seem to settle in this humidity.

Disclaimer: Everything recognisable as Harry Potter doesn't belong to me!  It belongs to the most magnificent JK Rowling.  I just fill the characters with angst and set them to music, honest.  The song belongs to Savage Garden, those wonderful lads from Down Under.

**********

The answering machine picked up the call, and Ginny looked at it as she sat with a book in her hands.  She was becoming more and more enamoured of the Muggle machine the longer she remained married.  She brushed an errant curl out of her tired eyes, eyes that seemed hollow, even at 23.  Muggle machines were handy, and carried no memories.  She could pretend she was away.  She pretended to be away a lot.

"You've reached the home of Alex and Ginny Hopewell.  No-one can get to the phone, so leave a message and eventually, we'll catch up."

The light flashed, and after the tone, a voice began to speak.  "Ginny?  It's Harry.  I'm pretty sure this is the right number…Ron gave it to me.  Anyway…look, I'm in England for a few days this week, today, Friday and Saturday.  Could we possibly catch up?  Please?  There are a lot of things I should have said that I need to say now.  It's important, Gin.  Anyway, here's the number of the cell phone thing they gave me, 568-9005.  Call me?"

I would like to visit you for a while
Get away and out of this city
Maybe I shouldn't have called but someone had to be the first to break

We can go sit on your back porch
Relax
Talk about anything
It don't matter
I'll be courageous if you can pretend you've forgiven me

Ginny stared at the answering machine, and pressed the button in a state of shock.  The sound of Harry's voice filled the room once more, and she focused on it intently.  "He sounds so sad," Ginny murmured.  Just the sound of his voice brought back so many memories.  Hogwarts, Yule Balls, Christmases at the Burrow, stories told by the fire in the Gryffindor Common Room, kisses stolen in shadowed corridors.  They'd grown up at Hogwarts, both of them.  She was his best friend's sister, and once he learned to see her as more than that, once he understood her, they came together so naturally.  It was as if she was meant to be by his side, made for it.  So it seemed at the time.


Because I don't know you anymore
I don't recognize this place
The picture frames have changed and so has your name

Everything had seemed so right, Ginny remembered.  Until yet again, Harry Potter, the Boy Who Lived, broke her heart.  The first time it had happened, she had been so young, going to her first Yule Ball with him and feeling so grown up.  She'd had the world's worst crush on him then, and when he lost interest in her at the Ball, it seemed as if her world had just shattered.  Ginny realised she didn't know pain, didn't know what it felt like to have a dream crumble beneath her until much latter.  When the rumours started to fly, when the accusations started, then her world crumbled.  Harry and Hermione.  He'd been cheating on her, perhaps for months.  Apparently, after Hermione and Ron had ended things, she sought comfort in the arms of her best friend, and it had turned into something more.  It was then that Ginny knew what it felt like to have the bottom drop out of her world.

We don't talk much anymore
We keep running from the pain
But what I wouldn't give to see your face again

She had picked up the pieces and carried on, ignoring him.  People had called her the Ice Queen after a while, so effectively did she shut out the world.  Harry didn't exist.  Hermione didn't exist.  Nothing existed except schoolwork and her family.  And even her family was questionable at times.  She just shut out the world, shut out everything that could possibly harm her.  That was until Alex.  He was a Ravenclaw, gentle where she was frozen, forgiving where she held a grudge, loving where she was cruel.  Eventually, he melted her heart, and he won it.  At least most of it.  Ginny was tired of having her heart shattered, tired of trusting.  But Alex was enough for her.  The best she thought she'd do, and for once in her life, she listened to her mother.  She married him.

I know I let you down
Again and again
I know I never really treated you right
I've paid the price
I'm still paying for it every day

She assumed Harry knew.  Everyone knew.  The Weasleys had managed to do well for themselves towards the end of her Hogwarts career, thanks mostly to Fred and George with their joke business.  It was, if nothing else, a beautiful wedding, and everyone agreed that Ginny was a truly stunning bride.  Her mother was slightly disappointed that the groom wasn't Harry.  The Burrow wasn't the same without him, she'd complained.  But Mrs. Weasley was never one to deny her daughter happiness, and when Ginny said Alex made her happy, that was enough for her.  Ron fussed and fretted, in his own brotherly way, letting her know he cared enough to inspect the man he was letting his baby sister marry.  All and all, everyone was happy at her wedding.  Except her.


 So maybe I shouldn't have called
Was it too soon to tell?
Oh what the hell
It doesn't really matter
How do you redefine something that never really had a name?
Has your opinion changed?


She put all her dreams away with the white robes she wore that April morning, tucked her hopes away with the dried flowers from the bouquet.  Ginny was willing to settle for being safe from harm, she was willing to settle for being secure.  Harry had promised her the world, and trampled on that promise.  When Alex merely promised to be faithful, to protect her and provide for her, she believed him.  Yet she was still empty somehow.  No children in the house, no real passion, either.  They were just two people, almost flatmates who happened to sleep in the same bed.  When Ginny slept, and that was too rare to think on.  Insomnia was just one of the things that kept her up at nights.  Dissatisfaction, bitterness, and frustration…those were the easiest for her to name at least.  Often times, Ginny wondered what her life had been like had she accepted Harry back.  Had she listened to his version of the story.  And time and time again, that ending seemed happier than the one she was living.


Because I don't know you anymore
I don't recognize this place
The picture frames have changed and so has your name
We don't talk much anymore
We keep running from the pain
But what I wouldn't give to see your face again

And now Harry came back, just when she was thinking of him.  Just when the emptiness of her house and her marriage and her life was threatening to consume her.  Just when she missed him and was threatening to walk out on all her safety and security.  She'd felt safe with Harry, too, but it had been something more daring, something edgy and special and wonderful.  She'd felt complete.  But how she missed him now, with an intensity that was almost physical.  Just the sound of his voice, that was almost too much.  She picked up the phone, her fingers dancing over the number pad, and she held her breath as it rang.

            "Hullo?"

            "Harry?  It's me, Ginny.  I…I got your message…"

I see your face
I see your face