Squelch squelch squelch.

Ginny gazed, exhausted, at her girlfriend's back as the blonde sprinted along the riverbank. It was pouring: buckets of rain crashed from the sky, turning the landscape into a sea of mud. She was spending the Easter holidays at Luna's house, and was currently helping her girlfriend search for 'fresh water plimpys'- Luna had informed her that these, cooked in a soup, were traditional for her and her father to eat at Easter time. Ginny loved her girlfriend, and desperately wanted to impress her father, but wasn't even sure what a 'plimpy' was, never mind whether she even wanted to eat one. Tramping beside the riverbank, swollen with rain, she stared miserably at Luna who was now hopping up and down excitedly, waving at her.

'I've found some! Pass me the bucket!'

Ginny prised the bucket she had been carrying from her numb fingers and put it on the ground between them, then stared at the river. Luna had taken the net from underneath her arm and had begun to swirl it vigorously around the water, scattering the fish in all directions.

'Luna,' Ginny said, 'Those are minnows'.

'No they're not', said Luna calmly. 'They're fresh water plimpys. You can tell from the tiny markings at their sides, that's where they'll grow legs in a few weeks.'

Ginny breathed in, deeply. Normally she enjoyed Luna's theories, but it was hard to appreciate her girlfriend's creativity when she was ankle deep in mud and freezing cold. 'Look, Luna', she said. 'My Dad loves this kind of stuff, he has a book on spotting wildlife which we used to look at together when I was a kid. These are very obviously minnows, they just have natural markings-'

At this point, Ginny fell into the water. As she had spoken, she had leaned toward the fish, pointing at them to illustrate her argument; an act of foolishness when the ground beneath her feet was easy to slip on without any movement. The cold shocked her straight to the core; she gasped, icy river water filling her mouth, her nose, startled fish shooting away from her in a flurry of movement. Suddenly, she felt strong hands grasp her arms and pull her back up the riverbank. Ginny spat water out of her mouth, her hair plastered to her face and began to shiver violently. In a further fuck you, the sky began to thunder and rain poured down even more violently than before.

Luna gazed at her. 'Are you alright?' Ginny felt irrationally furious at her. Here Luna was, staring at her with obvious concern after having the audacity to drag her out when it was pissing down, attempt to convince her that a minnow was a made-up fish, and then witness her fall into the river. 'I'm fine', she said bitterly.

'I don't think you are', said Luna. 'You just fell into a river and you look miserable.'

'Of course I'm fine. Let's just find these stupid fish and go home.' Ginny stood up and stomped angrily along the riverbank, her sodden socks chafing her feet. Luna walked behind her, occasionally poking the water with her net.

/

'Luna', said Ginny, 'why haven't we killed the fish yet? Aren't we meant to make soup out of them?'

They were in the kitchen, back at the Lovegood house. When they had gotten home, Ginny had taken a long, hot shower and now felt much better- her hair up in a towel, wrapped in a dressing gown the nightmarish plimpy-hunting experience didn't seem so bad. She stood next to Luna who had similarly donned the towelled hair and robe, and they were about to make plimpy soup. Ginny was a little nervous about this- it sounded difficult. Luna had pulled about 30 different herbs and spices out of the cupboard, along with a number of root vegetables, which Ginny was slicing. Luna had poured the plimpys, (or minnows as Ginny was determined to call them), into a pot along with the river water, but had made no move to kill or cook them.

Luna stared at her, chopping a carrot. 'Of course we're not going to kill them!', she said. 'They're simply here to witness us cooking this soup. It makes it taste much better. Once we've finished, we'll put them back'. Ginny stared at the fish. The fish stared back at her.

'The fish are going to…. witness us making the soup?'

Luna smiled at her, glad she got it. 'Yep!'

Ginny sighed, about to launch into a rant on how ridiculous this concept was. Then she paused: yes, it was strange, but wasn't this part of the reason she had wanted to go out with Luna in the first place? This determination, despite what anyone else said, or despite anyone's judgement to do what she wanted- despite, Ginny thought with a flush of shame, her sneering attitude today. And wasn't there something really lovely about this tradition? To let the fish go at the end- Luna couldn't kill any animal, she was far too kind hearted. She had been horrible today. Horrible and rude and grumpy to her girlfriend who just wanted to share a tradition that was important to her.

'Luna', she said, putting the knife down and coming up to give Luna a side hug 'I am so sorry that I've been so grumpy today. Let's make this soup, it sounds delicious.'

Luna smiled, then kissed her on the cheek. 'Thanks Ginny. You've had a bad day, I know you didn't mean to be grumpy. I would love to cook with you.'