Living the Legend Chapter III: Oral Arguments Marie McKinnon

She threw herself down onto her bed, an expression blacker than a thunderhead on her normally relaxed face. Lavender and Parvati, giggling together in the corner, turned to her in surprise.

"Ginny, what's wrong?" One of them asked, eyes wide.

Ginny didn't respond. She stared at one of the drawings she'd recently framed, a casually smirking Draco, and the tears began to well in her eyes. They'd been so happy, and Harry Flipping Potter had to ruin it with his bloody male hormones. He looked so alive in the picture, so enticingly insolent. Icy gray eyes looked right at her, almost right through her, and his delicate eyelashes could be seen as very fine lines underneath his perfectly arched eyebrows. As usual, soft white-blond hair tumbled in an organised chaos over his forehead. Seeing that superior half- smile brought her even closer to crying, but she forced it down.

Lavender sat down on Ginny's bed and looked at her, trying to make a diagnosis. The drawing of Draco caught her eye with its sparkling eyes and light hair. She nodded to herself, picking it up and examining it.

"Has Draco done anything to you?"

Ginny gave up her wrath, sitting up, and relented. "Not really. He made a mistake, and it's kind of destroyed our relationship. He was very clear about it."

Parvati, interested, asked "What did he make a mistake about?"

"I went to talk to Harry about something and I knew Draco needed to be there and hear what I had to say, but I was standing in the shadows, so Potter jumped me. He realized who it was and started snogging me, which Draco saw, so I am now both extraordinarily angry and extraordinarily upset."

"Does Draco know that?" Parvati wondered aloud.

"I'm not stupid," she spat. "He won't believe me if I try to explain. The only one who could convince him is Potter, who probably won't do anything. It *is* to his advantage, after all."

They both nodded in understanding. Lavender showed her best friend the drawing, murmuring about Ginny's talent. For a moment they put their heads together, then, smiling brightly, lay the frame on her velvet bedspread in front of her.

"Who drew this?" Lavender asked.

Ginny reached for her little black book and flipped it open to several other pages of sketches, pointing another Draco out as she told them about her artistic passion. Both girls oohed and ahhed over the boys she'd drawn, mostly the Harrys and Dracos. One, a caricature of McGonagall, set them to laughing so hard they almost cried.

"Would you do me?" Parvati inquired, twiddling her plait. "I'd pay you for it."

"That's brilliant! You could make money drawing portraits and caricatures for people. In the end you'd have enough money for some stress- relieving shopping," her friend giggled.

"I draw for myself, not other people. I'll still draw you, if you want, though," she offered.

"When you have time. Is there any way you can feel better?"

Ginny smiled slowly, almost scarily. "I think I know just the thing."

*

"Hi, Harry," she whispered coquettishly, sliding into the seat next to him on the couch in the Common Room. He bent to peck her on the cheek and was stopped by a sudden qualm. Smoothing her skirt over her knees, she scooted over a little bit so she could more easily mutter in his ear.

"Ginny, you look lovely," he finally managed.

She shook her head modestly, then got down to business. "You arrived a bit late this afternoon to practise, so I suppose you may want to understand what the - er - fireworks were about," she continued smoothly. "You see, I was in your room last night to give some important information pertaining to our quest, which it was necessary for Draco to hear. He didn't quite get the information he wanted, however; he arrived while you were rather busy. I was made aware of that somewhat rudely, and we've taken some time apart. It will be forever apart unless you get your rear in gear and tell him the truth because the burden of explanation is on you, not me. You did something wrong. You betrayed him, not me. I didn't ask you to pounce on me, and I certainly didn't ask you to kiss me. In fact, I fought you, but you took no notice. So now it's your responsibility to tell Draco the truth."

"Or what?" Harry asked, squirming slightly over this blunt order. "I see no advantages to me that way."

"I will be considerably kinder to you if you make that confession."

"That's something I can risk," he whispered, turning to kiss her full on the lips.

She rose, a gleam in her eye. "I'm beginning to regret not wounding you before. Don't make me regret it any more, or you will begin to regret it yourself."

Before she could make good her escape Dean came up to her with a question. "Is it true you and Malfoy've split up?"

A casual "Yes, why?" brought him to his next question.

"Would you consider coming dancing with me on the next Hogsmeade weekend?"

She smiled happily. "I would enjoy that very much."

*

Dean, in a daze, went back up to his dormitory and flopped down onto his bed, making it creak.

"What's up, then?" Seamus asked. He had been reading Ron's volumes of "The Adventures of Martin Miggs, the Mad Muggle" and hadn't been present to hear Dean's hazardous questions.

Answering a question with a question, he taunted "Guess who's got a date for the dance at Hogsmeade?"

"What? Are you going with Parvati?"

Grinning, he shook his head.

"Lavender?"

"Unh-unh."

"Hermione?"

"Nope."

Coming to the end of his list, Seamus risked "Neville?"

Dean sat up in a flash, glaring. "What the hell d'you mean asking that? It's a girl, you daft twit! Besides, Neville's got a girlfriend. Hannah Abbott."

"Well, who else is there?"

"Try sixth years."

It was Seamus' turn to sit up. "*Not* Ginny?"

Dean, bursting with pride, nodded. "The one and only. She's just split up with that bugger Malfoy, so I thought I'd ask, and she said yes."

"You lucky, lucky b******."

"Yeah," he said dreamily. "I can hardly believe it myself."

*

A smile seemed plastered on her face. She danced up the stairs, down the girls' corridor, and into her bedroom, flopping down onto the bed with a small sigh of happiness. Lavender and Parvati looked up from the Teen Witch magazine they'd been discussing and grinned at each other, easily guessing what had happened.

"Who is it?" They asked simultaneously.

Startled out of her gleeful daze, Ginny blinked several times and rubbed her forehead. "Sorry, who's what?"

"You've got a date to Hogsmeade, haven't you?" Parvati inquired. "Is it Harry?"

"Honestly, that's not what I went downstairs to do. I reprimanded Harry for a bit and was coming back to the dorm when Dean--"

"Ooooh!" They squealed, both having dated him before. "He's really sweet, Gin, you won't regret it."

"--asked me if I'd split up with Draco," she continued, glaring down her nose in a very McGonagall-ish way.

Lavender rolled her eyes. "Please don't tell me he didn't ask you to go with him. That would have been a bit thick, even for him."

"Well, he did, actually."

"And?" The seventh years demanded excitedly, leaning over the edge of the bed.

Like most Weasleys, Ginny went red when she got embarrassed. "I said yes," she blurted, the tips of her ears unusually pink. She had never been shy about Draco, and didn't understand why the mere mention of someone else's name made her withdraw from her exuberance.

"The dance is in two weeks," one of them said, checking a calendar on the wall. "We'll help you a bit. I noticed earlier that you don't have any makeup."

"What would I need it for?"

Lavender sighed in exasperation. "If you need to look that little bit special, it's perfect. Now, get yourself downstairs and sit with Dean. He'll be very pleased."

Still squeamish, she did as she was told. Later, comfortably nestled on the couch with his arm supporting her head, she made polite conversation, all the time wondering about Draco's reaction to the newest turn of events. Of course, she would never have admitted that. Knowing she was the reincarnation of a famous witch had given her an unusual amount of arrogance and pride, even for her.