Chapter 11- Doing it for some Doll
Ginny woke up late, which she was grateful for. After seeing her mum and dad off, Ginny had come back to an unofficial slumber party between her dorm mates. She decided to join in, none of them going to sleep until just before the sun was to rise. Still tired, Ginny started getting dressed, not wanting to miss breakfast.
As she went to a mirror, she noticed on the counter space a folded piece of parchment. An owl, which seemed to have been resting on top of the mirror, swooped down to pick it back up and landed on Ginny's shoulder. "For me?" she wondered aloud, taking it. The owl left before Ginny could even go to her drawers and get out some sort of treat for it.
She wondered how long the owl had been waiting as she opened the paper. She frowned as she saw the handwriting, but having it right in front of her, Ginny couldn't avoid the intrigue of reading it.
Dear Ginny,
I want to explain everything to you, whether you forgive me or not. Please meet me by the lake 1 hour before the cast party.
Harry
Ginny bit her bottom lip and stuffed the parchment into her pocket before heading out the door to get some breakfast.
As she approached the Great Hall, Ginny was glad to see that Harry wasn't there, but Hermione still lingered. "Morning," she said, sitting across from her. "Where's Ron?"
"Harry and him went out to fly for a bit," Hermione said.
Ginny gave a quiet 'oh' in response, but didn't do much other than pick up a piece of toast and take a bite out of it.
"When are you going to talk to him?" Hermione asked directly. "This really is getting ridiculous."
Somewhere in Ginny's mind, she knew that. "Well… he sent me a note to meet him before the cast party… wanted to explain some things," Ginny said, taking it out and showing it to Hermione.
"And you're going?"
"I hadn't decided," Ginny said, concentrating on her orange juice. "I mean… after last night…"
"I'm sure he'll explain last night as well," Hermione said. "Think about it, Harry was nervous enough being out on the stage without changing what he was told to do on top of it all. There had to be a reason for that."
Ginny nodded. As much as she hated to admit it, Hermione was right. Harry did everything exact to script the best he could… and even then he was jittery about being out there. "Fine I'll go," Ginny said, watching Hermione smile, "but it doesn't mean things are going to be fine after this," she added.
Harry and Ron came back from the pitch with just enough time to change and head to an unused classroom that was being used for their cast party. "I thought you were meeting Ginny," Hermione said as they passed her in the common room.
"Why would I be meeting Ginny?" Ron asked.
"Not you, him," she said, pointing at Harry.
"Er—not until after the cast party."
"Your note said before," Hermione said.
"You read it?"
"Ginny showed it to me," Hermione said.
"I put after," Harry said. "I swear I did," he added, the conviction in his tone wavering. He had, hadn't he? Or was this another mistake that would push Ginny further.
"Well, it didn't say that," Hermione said.
"Maybe you can still catch her," Ron interjected.
"Ginny left for the lake an hour ago," Hermione said. "By now, she's given up completely. Don't worry, I'll talk to her about it," she said, then left for the portrait hole.
There was a sense of unease in Harry as he looked around the room of people enjoying refreshments and talking. Colin had made his way around the group, handing pictures out that he had taken throughout the course of the show. "Here, Harry, these are for you," he said.
On the top was a picture of him trying to learn a couple dance steps from Ginny. His jaw tensed as he watched Ginny laugh while he was making an idiot of himself. He remembered this too well.
"Have you seen Ginny around anywhere?" Colin asked. "I have some for her too, but I can't find her anywhere."
"She isn't here?" Harry asked. He had figured she was avoiding him—which Ginny had become fairly sufficient at doing—and Harry wasn't going to seek her out until Hermione came back, telling him whether or not his hide was saved.
"I haven't seen her at least," Colin said. "If you see her, just tell her I have pictures for her."
"Yeah… sure," Harry said then directed his attentions at finding Ginny, or Hermione for that matter. He found the later first. "Have you talked to Ginny yet?"
"No, she hasn't shown up yet," Hermione said.
"But it's almost over," Harry said. "Where is she?"
"I don't know," Hermione responded. "She was supposed to bring some butter beer, and Ginny wouldn't have flaked just because of you."
Harry looked around the room, hoping to see a glimpse of bright brown eyes somewhere in the crowd, but before he could find anything, he noticed some Slytherins laughing in their own little group, a couple that had been a part of the production missing.
Harry didn't even notice he was staring at them until Draco talked to him. "Where's your little red head, Potter?"
"I don't know what you mean," he said, turning.
"I'll send those greetings to her, then," Draco said from behind him.
Harry froze.
"She's just dying to hear from you… anything else you'd like to say?"
Harry turned around, his face turning as red as it possibly could. "What is that supposed to mean?"
Draco stepped out from the group, Blaise laughing behind him and Goyle standing there as well. Harry noted that Crabbe didn't flank his other side. "Is it supposed to mean anything?" Draco added with an air of mocking. "Or is it just… your imagination."
Harry grabbed Draco by the collar of his robes, several girls gasping as he did so. "Careful, Potter… wouldn't want to cause a scene, would you?"
Harry's jaw tensed as he dropped Malfoy and walked towards the exit, his confidence to how he'd penned that note coming back.
Ginny woke up on the floor of a very damp room. Her hair was a bit wet and she pushed herself up, examining the room. When she went to meet Harry, she had been nervous about what he would say, though it never got to the point of actually listening to Harry. Instead, Draco and his idiotic band came around, patronizing her. She wondered where Harry had been, but was too busy trying to push them away to truly consider it.
"Using his own words against him," Ginny heard a voice from outside the door on the other end of the room. She felt for her wand, but it wasn't there. Thinking back she remembered how someone summoned it before even coming out in the open. "All Draco had to do was get to the owl… good thing he wasn't using his own."
Ginny rubbed her head and listened. The voice sounded familiar, and she started putting everything together. They had used one of Harry's own notes… let it read how they wanted to… the owl left before getting its due rewards, it must have been under instructions for that. Maybe Harry wasn't going to meet her at all. Oh, she felt like such an idiot.
With a deep breath, Ginny stood up, her head pounding. Without a second though, Ginny searched through her pockets for a Migraine Delight and ate the purple end, chucking the other since it was useless to her. The headache started subsiding as she thought of how well Fred and George would do in Mungo's, searching for cures.
As she looked around the room, she noticed there were no windows, and seeing how it was rather cold, Ginny figured she was in a lower level of sorts.
"She's waking up," one voice said from outside the door. She noticed the bars that allowed a person to look through.
"I've been awake, you sniveling excuses for wizards!" she shouted. The voice was familiar now, and she wondered why she hadn't noticed it before. "You toe rags better let me out of here before I—"
"You don't have your wand," Crabbe said. "It's not like you can do anything to us."
"Let … me… out," she warned. Walking up to the door and hitting it as hard as she could.
They laughed at her. Ginny couldn't stand being laughed at. She looked around, knowing there was always a way out. The stone seemed solid, but she figured there might be something, and spent several minutes feeling around the walls trying to get out.
"Will your brother miss you, Weasley?" Millicent Bulstrode asked. "What about your parents… one less mouth to feed… I suppose they'll have a party."
Ginny could feel her face going red in anger and tried to calm herself instead of slamming her fist into a stone wall, which certainly wouldn't help the situation. Finally, as the other two continued to make snide comments, Ginny felt in her pockets for anything, the only help she could find being a pack of ice mice and a box with the words 'Skive away from your worries' on the back. She opened it up, wondering which pill was what.
Finally she picked one up, snapped off the first half and swallowed it, stuffing the everything else into her pocket, unsure what would happen. Her answer was given moments later as she felt something rising in her throat.
Turning to her right, Ginny started to throw up all over the floor. "Gross," Millicent squealed. "Stop that!"
"I… can't," Ginny said before vomiting some more. "I think I ate something bad," she added before another convulsion.
"Oh no," she could hear Crabbe said as the locks on the door creaked open.
As he was still working on that, Ginny swallowed the other half, careful to continue making gagging sounds.
"We have to take her to the nurse—"
"But Malfoy—" Millicent started to argue until she saw Ginny kneeling on the ground with a mess in front of her.
"He's not the one that will be in the worst trouble," Crabbe pointed out. "Besides, maybe we can get some points this way."
"Just make sure you wipe her memory," Millicent said.
"You do it… I don't know how," he argued.
Millicent walked up to Ginny, pointing her wand down towards her. Ginny placed her hands firmly on the stone floor and kicked as hard as she could, knocking Millicent off her feet, hearing a loud 'thud' when her head hit the ground. Ginny took Millicent's wand and pointed it at Goyle. "Expeliaramus," she shouted, his wand shooting out.
As he was reaching in his robes for another, Ginny summoned what he was going for, only to have her wand in hand again. With a smile of success, Ginny cast one last spell… her specialty.
Harry had gone up to his dormitory to get the invisibility cloak before making his way to where he knew the Slytherin Common Room was. Draco had done something with Ginny, and he could find out if someone was coming by with the password.
So far everything had worked as he stood quietly in a corner of the room, waiting to hear something from someone about Ginny. Something Harry hadn't noted before, though, is that Slytherins always seemed to be talking in hushed tones. Malfoy could be out of the ordinary at times, seeing as he'd run his mouth off to anyone, but no one—if they did know anything—spoke loud enough for Harry to hear.
He was about to go around into the dormitories himself when he noticed someone entering on the other side of the room in shadows. If everyone else hadn't been so involved in their individual conversations, Harry was certain they would have seen too, and he hurried before anyone did.
Harry walked quietly along the edges of the walls, careful not to knock into anything, just about meeting up to Ginny halfway through.
She was being stealthy, watching as everyone talked, holding her breath. Harry did the same as he lifted the cloak slightly and grabbed Ginny by the arm to pull her under, covering her mouth to muffle any kind of scream. "It's me," he whispered in her ear.
Ginny seemed to let out her breath. "You didn't have to scare me half to death," she mentioned. "How do we get out of here?"
"This way," he said, taking her hand in his while leading the way to the exit. He noticed that she didn't pull out of his grasp.
The two of them walked along silently until they arrived at the entrance hall. Harry pulled off the cloak after making certain no one else would see. "You okay?" he finally asked.
"Yes," she answered.
"What happened?"
"Well I went to meet you and—"
"I thought I had written after the party," he interjected, wanting to make perfectly clear that he hadn't stood her up.
"I know… they changed it," she said. Ginny looked down. "At least, I figured that's what they were talking about. I tried to get away but there were too many… they had my wand and Malfoy forced some potion into my mouth."
"We have to go tell McGonagall," Harry said, taking a step towards the stairs in fury.
Ginny grabbed him by the wrist. "Don't worry about it, I'll figure out a way to get him back."
Harry looked down at her hand and Ginny let go. "Can we talk?" he asked.
"You can," Ginny replied. "I've said anything I've had to."
Harry gulped and nodded. He started from the beginning, explaining everything… how he was upset when Cho quit… how he started to realize he liked her instead… even explaining how he felt when Dean was spending so much time with her. Then he went on to explain what happened the night he kissed Cho, what he went through with Ron, and why he had to keep her from her spot the night before.
"I still want to take you to Hogsmeade," Harry finished. "If you'll go."
Ginny looked at him with a look of serious contemplation. "So I was right? You were under the cloak with Ron?"
Ashamed, Harry looked down at his feet and nodded.
Ginny started to laugh. As Harry looked up, she threw her arms around his neck and gave him a kiss on the cheek. "Fine then… I'll go with you," she said.
With a large smile Harry pulled away, taking Ginny's hand in his and leading her towards the Gryffindor tower.
"About bloody time," Ron said when they entered the common room holding hands.
A/N: YAY! I finished it before the Book 6 release! That makes me happy :D I hope you all like how this ended, even if writing action isn't my forte. Please review before this goes into the catacombs of fanfiction! Oh... and in case any of you thought the idea of her kissing Harry after vommiting was gross, before getting to the common room, Ginny was able to find a bathroom and rincer mouth out and have some ice mice to make it better... just a thought I had which I thought might clear some stuff up for everyone.
Phillippa of the Phoenix: Oh, she would listen eventually… but I would be a bit obstinate too, if I had just had my heart trampled on by said love-sick hero… Thanks for all the reviews here!
MrsNorisII: No, not quite the end… but the explanation is really in the scenario as a whole: The Weasleys are coming to watch their kids perform… what a better way to entertain yourself than to watch them worry about their only daughter who has had a light fall on her head… on top of which, being something like this, it would look like a complete accident, unless someone watched him, and even then there wouldn't really be a way to prove Draco had done it. So yeah… that's the reasoning… if you wanna know why they targeted her after, it's probably because Draco was in a foul mood at not having accomplished the light thing before.
MsMissProngs: Thank you! One thing I've got to say is that you never never try and kiss a girl when she's already mad at you… hence why in the last chapter, everything just kept getting worse for poor Harry. At least she knows now what it was that happened!
Bhekie: I think Ginny has right here to be a bit stubborn…. Though she is a bit better at holding a grudge than most. Still, in the end she listens to reason.
Dancerrdw: Thanks! I'm glad you've enjoyed!
Lynsey: Thank you! I liked the idea playing in my head… I found it a funny thought! Thanks again for your review :D