They met Fred and George, as arranged, at The Leaky Cauldron at five o'clock – the matron at St Mungo's, once she saw Harry Potter (and had him autograph something, much to Harry's discomfiture), let them use the hospital staff room's fireplace to go by Floo powder. They were still five minutes late, however, and when they arrived, were practically leapt upon by Fred and George.
Fred was patting Ron up and down like a customs official. "You all there? George, check Ginny!"
"Don't!" Ginny shrieked and grabbed Harry's arm. It sent a shiver from the back of his neck to the base of his spine.
Fred and George eventually stepped back, looking – no matter how much they tried to cushion it with jokes – very relieved.
"Where've you all been today?" George asked conversationally after they'd fetched some Floo Powder from the barman (Ron and Hermione had clamoured not to go by Apparition). "We barely saw the light of day."
"Too busy raking in the galleons," Fred crowed, flexing his fingers.
Hermione and Ron did their telepathy thing again, and then Ron nodded and Hermione told them about Dumbledore. The twins were first impressed, and second subdued. They loved Dumbledore as much as the next Hogwarts graduate (and there'd always been a special place in his heart for those two particular hair-raisers).
"Well, well," said George sadly. "Just goes to show, doesn't it? Nothing's what you think it is."
"You're right," said Harry. He looked at Ginny out of the corner of his eye. She was smiling to herself. He really, really wanted to touch her. He couldn't wait till they were out of there.
"Anybody want a Butterbeer?" Fred suggested.
"No!" Harry said immediately. Everybody looked at him. "I mean – I'm tired," he added, rather unconvincingly.
"Aw, little Harrykins didn't sleep well," said Fred and George, almost simultaneously. That set them laughing, which set the others laughing, which took the spotlight (damned spotlight) off Harry.
"Come on, then," George said, flinging powder into the fire. "The Burrow," he said clearly, stepping inside and disappearing.
Fred went next, and then Ginny. Harry watched her disappear into the flames with a roiling in his stomach. He followed her into the fireplace. When he turned to face the room and pronounce his destination, he saw Hermione looking at him with an unsettlingly knowing expression. Could she know?
"The Burrow," he said loudly, shaking off his uncertainty. There was the usual rush and then he was stumbling into the Weasley's kitchen, with Ginny brushing ash from his clothes.
"Where's Fred and George?" he said quickly.
"Already upstairs."
"Your mum?"
"Outside giving the garden gnomes a bash."
"We really need to talk."
"I know."
"Ginny –"
The flames sprang up, and Ron and Hermione stepped out together. Hermione was coughing.
"Remind me never to – *cough cough* – go tandem with you on the Floo network again."
"Tandem, eh?" he said, raising his eyebrows suggestively.
She tried to look disgusted, but failed and laughed instead. She turned to Harry and Ginny. "What are you doing now?"
"I should really go finish by Defence Against the Dark Arts essay," Ginny said, quite unexpectedly Harry thought.
"I could help you," he offered. "I got an O on my N.E.W.Ts."
She smiled. "Thanks, but I'm OK. See you later. See you later, guys." She waved at Ron and Hermione and headed for her room, taking the stairs two at a time.
Now, this bothered him. First she wanted him to talk to her. Then he kissed her. Now he wants to talk to her and suddenly she's backing right off. His confusion must have shown on his face, because Ron asked him what was wrong.
"Nothing," he said. "Feel a bit sick from the ride back."
Ron slapped him on the back. "Nothing a bit of quidditch won't fix," he said heartily. "Hermione, you playing?"
She screwed up her nose. "No thanks." Then she looked at Harry. "Maybe quidditch will do you some good," she said, and widened her eyes meaningfully. "It's all a question of timing really."
Was that a message? Hermione made another face as if to say 'You get me?' A question of timing, hey? mused inner monologue. Maybe she was right. The talk with Ginny could wait a bit – not too long, but a bit.
Ron shook his head at her. "Honey, what are you talking about?"
Hermione stopped looking at Harry and stared at Ron.
"What?" he asked, bewildered (and a little scared, Harry thought).
"Did you just call me 'honey'?" she said quietly.
"Er –" He looked at Harry, who wasn't getting involved. "Yes?"
"Ron," she said, and then launched herself at him. He was thrown off-balance at first, but then put his arms around her. "You've never called me anything like that before!"
"You like it?"
"It's nice." She pulled back a bit to look at him. "Not too often, mind – but now and again, it's nice."
She hugged him once more and kissed his ear. He went red and looked pleased. "I'll do it every day if I get this kind of reception."
Hermione released him and headed for the stairs.
"Have fun, boys," she said over her shoulder. Ron grinned up at her with a ridiculous, puppy-dog, I'd-walk-through-fire-for-you expression, and then quickly cleared his throat and said: "Come on, broomsticks."
Harry couldn't be bothered to fetch his Ascendant (despite Ron's pestering – he wanted a go on it) so they played on the old Cleansweeps. It was nice and lazy, just throwing the quaffle around while the sun set. Harry felt oddly calm after his outburst in the hospital. It was like he'd been purged. He hadn't said nearly all of the things he thought, but it had been so good to get that terrible feeling out. He felt like you sometimes do after you've thrown up – like you're cleaned out and ready to start being well again.
"Oi," Harry called, feeling philosophical and tossing Ron the quaffle.
"What?" Ron caught it easily.
"Do you love Hermione?"
Ron barely paused before throwing the ball back. "'Course," he said gruffly.
"How did you know?"
"Bloody hell," Ron said, laughing a bit and looking embarrassed.
"Sorry," Harry said, realising what a personal question it was. "Don't answer that."
"No, it's OK." Ron scratched his head, and Harry tucked the quaffle under his arm, suddenly very interested to hear Ron's answer. "Well," he said eventually, "she was asleep in one of the armchairs in the Gryffindor common room one night, textbooks open all around her – it was right before the N.E.W.Ts, I think – and she was shivering because the fire had gone out. Anyway, I was passing through to go to bed. I saw her, and I looked at her for a minute, then I went to my room, took the blanket off my bed, brought it back and put it over her. I guess that's when I knew – because I'd rather be cold than let her be cold. You know?"
Ron had said all this mostly to the ground, frowning thoughtfully. When he looked up, Harry was staring at him, dumbstruck.
"Shit," he said, flushing. "I sound like a twat."
"You should tell Hermione that," was all Harry could say. He'd never heard Ron talk like that. Ever.
"Nah," Ron said. He held out his hands for the ball, and Harry obediently threw it. Ron caught it and tossed it up in the air a few times. "I don't need to tell her. She knows."
Mrs Weasley had finished with the garden gnomes, and chose this point to shout up at them.
"Boys! Come down here! You can help me with dinner!"
"There we go," Ron grimaced. "Come on, the sooner we help, the sooner we can get out."
He headed for the ground. Harry followed, suddenly seeing Ron – his best friend, almost his brother – in a whole different light.
~
After dinner, Fred and George set up a game of Wizard's Chess, which they promptly enlarged (with enthusiastic cries of "Engorgio! Engorgio!") until they were as big as people. Mrs Weasley let them be – it was scaring off the gnomes, at least. Everybody was out watching besides Ginny, who was upstairs again, working.
"I've never known that girl for putting so much time into her schoolwork," Mrs Weasley remarked to Hermione. "It's remarkable. It must be your influence, dear."
"Er – must be," Hermione said, laughing uneasily.
Harry couldn't pay much attention to the chess. All he thought about was Ginny, her salty tears, the taste of her. He tried to push his very recent memories down (along with something else, which was pinching his jeans a bit), but eventually it was too much. He realised that this was actually a good moment to find her – everyone else was outside, involved in the game.
"I might go to bed," Harry said to Ron. "I'm buggered."
"Right," Ron said, a bit surprised but not unhappy. This way he had Hermione all to himself. "G'night, then."
"Night," Hermione agreed, and surreptitiously winked at him.
Harry slipped into the house. It was very quiet without all the people, like in the early mornings. He liked it. He felt the need to match the silence, and tried to go softly up the stairs. It was useless – they creaked. When he reached Ginny's room, she'd opened the door before he even knocked.
"Hey," she said.
"Hey. Can I come in?"
"Yes."
He went in, and shut the door. She stood at perhaps a metre's distance from him.
"So," he said awkwardly. "I like your room."
"You've mentioned."
"Very nice."
She shrugged. "Not really. It's OK."
"No, no," he insisted. "It's – nice."
She nodded. "How was quidditch this afternoon?"
"You saw us?"
"Out the window."
"I thought you were doing your essay."
"I was. Mostly. I perved a little."
"Right."
He grinned at her. She bit her lip.
"Ginny," he said in a strangled voice.
"Yes, Harry?"
"Would you mind if I kissed you right now?"
She practically ran forward, forgetting to answer, and then he was pressed up against the door, her tongue in his mouth and on his lips. He could taste her, that same taste, and pumpkin from dinner as well, or maybe that was him. He didn't know, he didn't care. She was amazing. She was pressed up against him too, and frankly it wasn't doing him much good in the way of control.
"Ginny," he said breathlessly. "Merlin."
"Don't stop," was all she could manage. He kissed her neck, not really sure where he was going to go with this as he headed for her collarbone, but knowing that it'd be hell or high water, or Ginny herself, who'd have to stop him now.
She tilted her head back and his mouth kissed down to her top blouse button, just under the hollow in her neck. He slipped his arms around her waist. He didn't want to go too far or freak her out, especially not right away like this, but she felt so good –
Stop it, Potter, snapped inner monologue. You came here to talk and you're going to talk, dammit.
"Wait," he said, pushing her back gently. He swallowed and tried to get his breath and everything Down There under control. He didn't have much luck when he looked at her, so he closed his eyes instead.
"Ginny," he said, eyes still closed. "We should talk about this."
"I know," she said. "You're right."
"Right." He cleared his throat, and opened them again. "Do you want to be with me?"
"Yes," she said.
Well, that was good – he didn't know what to say now.
"Do you want to be with me?" she asked.
Yes, by God, he thought feverishly. "Of course," he said out loud.
She smiled. She looked like she might cry. "Really?"
"Really." He touched her hand. "Hey, what's wrong?"
"I want you to be sure," she said. "Really, really sure. I don't want you to look back on this, and think I was a mistake."
"I could never think that," he said honestly. "You're the opposite to a mistake."
She bit her lip again. She looked so good when she did that. "If anything goes wrong between us," she said, "what'll happen with you and Ron?"
"We'll make do," Harry said firmly.
"And Hermione?"
"We'll make do, Ginny. It'll be alright."
"If you want this to have been just a fun little snog, we can leave it at that. I don't mind, if that's what you want. We can make it the end of things."
"Ginny. You know that's not want I want."
The further they went, the more afraid she seemed. "Why now?" she asked suddenly.
"What?"
"Why now? Why not before? Why do you want to be with me now?"
Harry knew he had to answer this truthfully – and right – or he'd have blown it. He sensed the importance of the question. Problem was, he didn't really know himself. He thought for several seconds, very hard, and very carefully. Finally, he opened his mouth and said:
"Because we need each other."
He didn't know where that had come from exactly – he wasn't usually the poetic type – but once he'd said it he knew it was exactly what he felt. They needed each other. That was it.
He moved forward and kissed her again, softly, and she leant against him. He loved that he could hold her like this.
"Are we going to tell people?" she said after a few minutes.
"Do you want to?"
"I don't know."
"Maybe not for a while," said Harry. "I think I'd better check out your brothers first."
Ginny giggled. "I think you'd better. Ron'll probably be OK."
"Merlin knows," Harry said. "You just never can tell with Ron."
She kissed him again, and he was reciprocating enthusiastically, when she forcibly restrained herself. "We should probably stop," she said.
"You're right," he agreed. His head knew she was right. The rest of him wasn't so sure.
"I don't want things to get out of hand," Ginny went on.
"Of course." And he was blushing now, and she could see he was blushing.
"Night, Ginny," he said hurriedly, and opened the door.
"Night, Harry."
She shut the door quietly.
Harry went directly to his and Ron's room and flopped back onto his mattress, unable to suppress a grin.
That went very well, said inner monologue.
"Sirius," he said aloud, looking up at the ceiling, "if you could see me, you'd be proud."