Chapter Seven.
Decent Not To Fail in Offices of Tenderness

After Harry's announcement, Hermione, eyes wide, her mouth a perfect "O", had blinked a few times before scrambling for a clean sheet of parchment.

She scribbled furiously, while Harry finished cleaning the Transfiguration Classroom. She was still writing as Harry piled cleaning supplies outside the classroom door for Filch to collect.

They walked back to Gryffindor Tower in silence. Hermione, lost in thought, would've run into a suit of armor if Harry hadn't grabbed her arm and guided her around it.

Harry himself uncomfortably pondered the vague realization he had come to in the Transfiguration Classroom.

He remembered Crouch, when he was disguised as Moody before the First Task of the TriWizard Tournament, telling him to play to his strengths. But what were his strengths?

He admitted to himself that he a decent dueller, but he also knew that he wasn't good enough. He knew he was a good seeker, but he didn't see how being a good seeker could help him defeat Voldemort.

He sighed. As much as he wanted to follow Ginny's advice and ignore the prophecy, he couldn't. He didn't like to think about the power the Dark Lord knows not, but he had to figure it out if he could. The answer was locked away inside himself somewhere, and if he couldn't find it out, they were all doomed.

The Common Room was nearly empty. Hermione mumbled a distracted good night to him, and Harry climbed the stairs to his Dormitory.

He changed into pyjamas and closed his bed-curtains. He didn't think he could sleep, so he sat cross-legged on his bed and read the next Metamorphmagus exercise from Tonks by wand light.

He blushed slightly as he carefully reread it. He hadn't really noticed this exercise before.

Concentrating hard on her directions, Harry grew a thick, luxuriant patch of blond hair on the palm of his left hand. Shocked that it had worked, he glanced around nervously to make sure no one could see him. He hastily concentrated again and the hair vanished. Grimly he resolved to get past this exercise as quickly as possible.

He experimented with creating different hair colors, as Tonks had directed, and only had trouble with red. The color stubbornly refused to become anything but a reddish ginger, which, to Harry's horror, distinctly resembled Ginny's hair.

Promising himself he would find a way to repay Tonks, he switched to the Occlumency exercise he had promised Dumbledore.

The term hasn't started yet, and I'm already buried in homework, he grumbled. He shrugged off that thought and tried to clear his mind. Minutes ticked by, and he found himself thinking that he would be much more comfortable lying down.

Focused on an image of the Hogwarts Lake in winter, he drifted off into a dreamless sleep.

Dean woke Harry up with a not so gentle nudge. It took him a few seconds to realize why Dean Thomas was poking him in the ribs before dawn.

With a grunt, he dressed and grabbed his practice gear. Harry silently hoped for a cup of tea before Ginny spent the morning pounding him into a pulp.

The two boys walked down the steps to the Common Room.

"It's really good of you to tutor Ginny," said Dean coolly.

"Huh?" Harry blinked.

Dean looked a bit suspicious. "She said you were helping her."

"I am." Harry shrugged.

Ginny was sitting in a chair next to a table that held a battered teapot and several mismatched cups. Eyes swollen with sleep, she was holding a teacup with both hands.

"Morning!" said Dean brightly.

Ginny mumbled something.

Harry poured himself a cup of tea and drank it down as quickly as he could.

When he was finished, he picked up his practice things. "Ready?" he asked.

Harry led them out of the Common Room and up to the third floor of the castle. Around the corner from the Room of Requirement, he stopped them. He really didn't want Dean Thomas knowing how to find and use the Room. "Wait here," he told them.

Dean and Ginny looked at him oddly, but they both did as he asked.

When the door appeared, Harry called them over.

The Room had arranged itself into a bare stone chamber with a springy floor that felt like forest loam.

Ginny unceremoniously dropped her things in the center of the room and rolled her head around her shoulders. Dean hovered uncertainly nearby.

"Right," said Ginny, taking a deep breath. "Dean, you face me...back up a bit...hold there...this is called Tai Chi—"

"Cool," said Dean.

"Heard of it? Good," Ginny smiled. "I will talk you through the movements."

Harry thought it best to stand beside Dean and settled in on his left. He didn't know Tai Chi all that well. His mannequin had shown him Ba Kua, so he had been practicing that all summer.

"Stand like this," Ginny began, watching Dean mimic her stance. "Feet a bit further apart...Good, that's fine. Now then, deep breath...OK...your hands...your hands are floating up. The ground is gently pushing them upwards..."

Harry focused on the slow, fluid movements and Ginny's slow, calm voice. He lost all sense of time as the exercise progressed.

"Amazing," Dean grinned as they finished. "That was amazing."

Ginny smiled happily at him. "It is, isn't?"

The Ba Kua form required more room, so Harry, feeling a bit irritated, walked a few paces away and waited for Ginny and Dean to stop smiling at each other.

He looked down and saw that two black circles had appeared on the floor. Directly across from him, the two circles briefly touched, creating a large figure eight.

"I think you should sit this one out, Dean," Ginny told him, "it's harder to follow."

Dean sat down against the wall and waited expectantly.

Harry had the feeling that Ginny thought things were going far better than she had expected it to.

Harry, still feeling tetchy, began before she was settled, so she was a movement behind as they reached the point their circles intersected.

It happened in slow motion. As Harry's left hand, palm open, pushed forward, Ginny's left arm came down and brushed it out of the way.

He saw Ginny's eyes widen in shock even as they continued with the form. They circled around three more times and clashed each time in slow motion.

Ginny bounded over to Harry. ""Let's try that again," she said excitedly.

"All right, but let's follow the form again," agreed Harry.

So they did, circling around each other in slow motion. Ginny skipped the first movement, and it turned out that one of them was always executing an offensive move when the other was defending.

"Oooh, very cool," said Ginny happily as they finished. "We have to experiment with this some."

"Maybe next time. We should spar," Harry said stiffly. He didn't like Ginny using the word "cool".

Without warning, 'giddy-happy' Ginny vanished, and she eyed him with that closed-off look she had perfected.

It's like watching a door close, Harry thought irrelevantly.

"Right," she calmly agreed.

Harry turned away to find his things. He shrugged into his padded vest and picked up his practice stick.

The Room had changed the two circles into one. Ginny was showing Dean the basic movements with an extra sparring stick that she had brought with her. He looked doubtful.

She stepped away and moved into the en garde position in front of Dean. Dean mimicked her, and they went through a slow motion lunge, parry, riposte, parry, and lunge sequence.

"Good," approved Ginny.

"Is that all there is to it?" Dean asked in surprise.

"Basically, yes," said Ginny, attempting to smother a smile. "Ready, Harry?"

Harry stepped into the circle, as did Ginny.

"One," called Ginny.

"Two," Harry responded.

"Three," Ginny finished, lunging at him.

Harry parried the lunge and responded with a series of wild, quick slashes that Ginny blocked as she retreated. He overextended slightly on the last attack, and his stick went too far out of line for him to recover as quickly as he should have. Ginny poked him in the ribs.

They broke apart, Harry rubbing the spot she'd hit.

He risked a glance at Dean who looked stunned.

"Dean," said Ginny, "you call it this time."

Dean let out an explosive breath. "Er...all right...umm, ready? One..."

Harry stepped backwards, whipped out his wand and turned around quickly, muttering a spell.

"...Two..."

He turned back around, but kept his stick behind his back. Ginny was staring at him suspiciously.

"...Three!" Dean yelled.

Ginny immediately dropped into a defensive stance as Harry attacked with what appeared to be nothing but a ripple in the air.

Surprised, she parried wildly. Harry stepped inside her guard and tapped her on the shoulder.

She backed away, staring at his right hand.

Harry grinned at her. "I disillusioned it."

"That's not bloody fair," Dean told him angrily.

"I didn't intend it to be," replied Harry smugly.

"How she supposed to learn if she can't see what you're doing?" retorted Dean.

"That's enough," Ginny said to Dean. "Whatever gave you the impression Harry was teaching me?"

"You said he was helping, and I thought that meant—"

"You thought wrong," Ginny told him curtly. "He's helping me, not teaching me."

Harry was secretly pleased that Dean had gotten himself in a bit of trouble.

"I'll count this time," said Ginny intently.

The match was prolonged. Ginny, since she couldn't see Harry's stick, had to follow his hand and estimate where the end of it was. She kept her stick very close to centerline and parried conservatively as close to his hand as she could while circling away from him.

Harry, trying to edge her out of the circle, stalked after her as she backed away. They intermittently clashed.

Harry finally managed to crowd her against the line, and there was a blindingly fast volley of cracks as they swung, stabbed, parried—

--And suddenly, Harry saw stars.

His head throbbed, and he realized that he was on his back. He gingerly reached up and encountered an enormous knot on his forehead above the hairline.

"Ouch," he gasped, opening his eyes.

Everything was hazy. A blurry Ginny was staring down at him.

He grinned weakly. "Ouch, but Voldemort's done worse."

He heard Dean gasp.

"I think we should be using helmets," said Ginny, helping him up. "D'you need to see Pomfrey?"

"No," said Harry firmly.

"I think we're finished this morning," Ginny said, handing him his glasses.

"Tomorrow, then?" Harry asked.

Ginny nodded and began collecting her things. "With some kind of headgear," she added over her shoulder.

"Ginny, you just knocked Harry Potter unconscious," said Dean, smugly.

"Brilliant, isn't she?" Harry grimaced ruefully, feeling the throbbing knot on his forehead. "I thought I could beat her with a disillusioned stick."

"Maybe if you had disillusioned yourself and the stick," she said matter-of- factly, from across the room, "but I doubt it."

Dean hesitated. "Why? Why are you doing this? I mean, it's fun and all, but why are you lot going at it so hard?"

"That was an accident," Ginny shrugged.

Harry collected his things and was pleased that the pain in his head was lessening to a dull throb. The three students left the Room of Requirement and walked in silence. Dean still looked deeply puzzled.

"Still, why are you so serious about this?" he asked Ginny.

"I don't like feeling helpless," Ginny said with finality.

Dean did not seem willing let it drop. "But why not learn curses or something else that—"

"Wands can be lost or broken or taken," interrupted Harry. "Death Eaters wouldn't expect a blade, would they?"

Dean stopped walking and stared at Ginny. "Death Eaters? What's this about? Why are you expecting to run into Death Eaters?"

The question hung there.

Harry tried desperately to think of a way to stop the conversation, but his mind was a blank.

"You know why. There's a war going on, Dean," Ginny told him quietly.

"There's plenty of qualified witches and wizards fighting You-Know-Who now. The Ministry was a bit slow, but they're on it now, and Dumbledore's out there as well," Dean objected, "we're just teenagers."

"Remember Anthony Goldstein? His family?" said Ginny bitterly. "He's a dead teenager."

Harry started to edge away. He did not want to hear this.

"This is not about Anthony at all, is it? This is about him," Dean replied in a cool voice pointing at Harry.

Harry froze.

"You leave Harry out of this," said Ginny quietly.

"I'm not stupid," retorted Dean.

"No, don't—" Harry started.

"You're going to go running off every time Harry here does something mad...every time You-Know-Who tries to kill him, aren't you?" Dean accused her.

"You have no idea what you are talking about, Dean Thomas!" said Ginny, white with fury.

"Then tell me," said Dean angrily. "I'm sure Harry knows."

Ginny paused, her look unreadable.

Harry started to say something, but Ginny stopped him with a gesture.

"You're right, Dean," said Ginny heatedly, "Harry does know!"

"He knows there's a BLOODY WAR GOING ON!"

"He knows that VOLDEMORT kills CHILDREN!"

"He knows that what it's like to have nightmares about everyone you love DYING PAINFULLY!"

"HE KNOWS BECAUSE HIS FAMILY IS DEAD! AND IF YOU EVER SPEAK OF HARRY LIKE THAT AGAIN, I'LL HURT YOU BADLY, YOU STUPID, INSENSITIVE PRAT!"

Dean blinked.

Ginny glared at him. "Yes, Harry knows. Harry knows what it's like to have a Dark Lord stalk you. He's seen my Mum hysterical, thinking about which of her children is going to die. Outside this school, we can't use a loo without an armed escort. Between terms, my family hides in nasty old houses and abandoned castles. My home is still burning because no one can figure out how to put the ruddy fires out!"

"Did you think I was playing a game when I told you my life wasn't all rainbows and unicorns? No worries, you said," she spat, "Bollocks!"

Ginny's look was icy. Dean flinched away from her.

"I just wanted to date a nice boy. I just wanted to be a normal teenage witch for a little while," said Ginny bitterly, "but Voldemort won't even leave me that."

Dean just stared at her.

"I don't know what to say," he finally said.

"You don't have to say anything, then."

"We're through, though, aren't we?" asked Dean thickly.

"Well, it was like we were friends with snogging rights, anyway," Ginny shot back.

For a second, Dean looked simultaneously hurt and relieved, but he hid it quickly. "Maybe we can still be friends?" he asked.

"Good-bye, Dean," Ginny said flatly. "I've left a book in the Room of Requirement. Harry, can you get me back in there?"

"Er...OK," Harry blinked.

Dean glared at Harry for a moment and then abruptly walked away.

She turned back to the Room of Requirement, and Harry followed her.

The door simply appeared when he reached it, but before Harry could even ponder that, Ginny darted in, and he followed.

The only object in the room was an overstuffed chair near the door. Ginny kicked it hard. Then she kicked it again, toppling it over. Another chair appeared, and she kicked that one too.

Harry felt responsible. If he hadn't opened his mouth, none of this would have happened. He stood nervously by the door, unsure whether he should help or leave. Then he remembered the scene outside of the Infirmary.

Ginny kicked the second chair until it toppled. She continued to kick at it, cursing to herself. He hesitantly approached her, and after standing there undecided for a few seconds, gingerly reached out and touched her shoulder from behind. She seemed to relax a little.

"Er..." Harry started," are you...ah...OK?"

"Yes."

The silence lengthened.

"Ummm, thanks," said Ginny, "thanks for staying with me."

The silence grew uncomfortable.

"I wish I could be normal, too," said Harry quietly.

"But there's nothing for it, is there?" Ginny said turning around to face him. "Merlin, I've made a mess of things."

Harry didn't answer immediately. "Are you hungry?" he finally asked. "Things always look up after a meal."

"Serves me right, having my own advice thrown back at me," Ginny sighed. "I suppose I should."

Harry concentrated on breakfast, and a table appeared already set for breakfast. The two chairs Ginny had battered disappeared and then quickly reappeared upright and repaired.

They ate in silence. Harry surreptitiously glanced at her now and again, but she resolutely avoided his eyes, glowering intently down at her plate.

Harry wracked his head trying to think of something to talk about.

"You know," Harry said suddenly, "I've never seen your animagus form."

Ginny glanced up at him. There was a soft pop, and Ginny disappeared. Before Harry could blink, a blue-gray cat with ginger-coloured eyes leapt onto the table and sniffed at the plate of bacon. The cat teased a rasher off the plate, and holding it between her front paws, proceeded to gnaw on it.

When Harry finished eating, he lazily watched Ginny for a moment. Then a mischievous thought struck him, and he concentrated hard. He looked around and, with a grin, retrieved the knotted up tangle of yarn on the floor beside him.

With his hands under the table, he teased one end out of the bird's nest of yarn. Keeping a hold on the string, he flicked the knotted-up end onto the table. It arched upwards and fluttered down beside the cat. It caught her attention.

Harry watched this out of the corner of his eye. With his hand still hidden, he pulled gently on the line. The knotted ball of yarn twitched, and the cat tensed suddenly, completely focused on the yarn.

Harry gave the line another quick yank, and the cat pounced on it, rolling over onto its back and tearing into the yarn with all four feet.

Harry, trying not to laugh, doubled over choking.

The cat, still on its back, froze and rotated its head towards Harry.

After a moment, the cat untangled itself, rolled onto its feet and jumped off the table.

Ginny appeared with a soft pop. "I suppose you think that was funny?" she asked, resuming her seat.

"No," replied Harry, "but now I know what to get you for Christmas."

"Ha, ha," Ginny deadpanned. Then she grinned. "You had better not. I'm expecting something much better than a ball of yarn from you, Harry Potter."

"We'll see," Harry grinned.

"You know, we do seem to spend a lot of time eating together," he said hesitantly. "Since we're practicing in the morning anyway, would you like to have breakfast here with me?"

She made a face. "Once the term begins, I'm not sure we'll be able to manage it. You'll be busy, and this is my OWL year." She paused. "What about...Sunday morning breakfast?" Ginny asked tentatively. "In the kitchens?"

A standing weekly date! Harry thought happily. "It's a date, then," he said aloud.

Ginny's eyes grew wary. "Is it?" she asked quietly.

"I think I'd like it to be," Harry admitted slowly.

"When you say something like that, it's customary to be sure," Ginny said pointedly.

"I'm sure," said Harry.

He thought that she seemed pale and fragile sitting in the big overstuffed chair, nearly all of her hidden behind the table.

"Well then, the cat's among the pixies now," she muttered.

Harry shifted uncomfortably in his seat.

"You know what this means, don't you?" said Ginny firmly, "we have to Talk."

"Talk?"

"Yes, Talk. You know, where I blather on, and you grunt when you think it's appropriate. Maybe you even try and string a few thoughts together, but I'm trying not to get my hopes up too high."

Despite a clenching knot in his stomach, Harry nodded. He felt distinctly uncomfortable as he guiltily suppressed the urge to make an encouraging sound.

"This is complicated," said Ginny bluntly. ""The way I feel about you is complicated. There's the war. My family. You're not at all like Dean."

Oh," Harry said, his gaze dropping to his empty plate.

"That's not what I meant," Ginny said quickly. "I am trying to say that we have a history together. What happens if we date and things don't work out? What if we fight and break up? Do you want howlers from Mum if we muck it up? I certainly don't. Have you thought about any this?"

"I thought," Harry mumbled, searching for the right thing to say. "I thought we should maybe, ummm, work this out together."

Ginny's mouth dropped open.

"I mean, it's not really fair to either of us any other way, is it?"

Ginny gaped at him. "Are you really Harry James Potter?"

Harry waited and silently thanked Snuffles.

"Right," said Ginny carefully. "Maybe we should, ahhh, take things slowly. "You know, have our weekly breakfast date and see what happens. Maybe even have a Talk now and again. But promise me one thing—if this doesn't work out, will you try to stay my friend?"

"Yes," Harry nodded fervently. He stood up, knowing there was a ridiculously big smile on his face, and took her hand. "Umm, thanks Ginny."

She smiled brightly at him and gave his hand a gentle squeeze.

"You know, I didn't grunt, not even once," he said.

To be continued...