XVI
Martyr, Martyr.

-x- Ginny Weasley & Harry Potter –x-

'Tell me, tell me,
what makes you think that you are invincible?
I can see it in your eyes that you're so sure.
Please don't tell me that I'm the only one that's vulnerable.
Impossible.'

To say Harry Potter had martyr-like tendencies was like saying that Fred and George Weasley looked sort of alike… it was a complete understatement.

That, of course, is not to say that he was the type of person who frequently bored others with his long-suffering talk and nor was he the type of person who would allow people to walk over him. He was just a bit too selfless for the taste of Ginny Weasley, who, it may be noted, was the strong and fiercely independent woman her mother had raised her to be – the perfect partner, in fact, for a martyr who needs reminding every now and then that he can't save the world every minute of every day.

A fact that only Fred and George themselves seemed to have figured out.

'Y'know Ginny, I think Harry's gone a bit off the deep end.'

As he said this, Fred, along with his twin and younger sister, was lying sprawled across the drying grass at the back of their property watching lazily as Harry zoomed from one side of the unmown field to the other, occasionally punctuating this rather dull exercise with a few loop-the-loops.

'What makes you say that?' Ginny asked distractedly as she watched their raven-haired friend flit about with avid interest.

'Oh, well I just get the feeling that he's a bit too selfless for his own good,' replied Fred, exchanging amused looks with George when Ginny didn't immediately retort to this.

'What?' she said, her brown eyes still fixated on Harry, 'Oh, well he is a bit martyr-ish, yes.'

Unfortunately for him, Harry unknowingly reinforced Fred's point ten-fold when, with his Seeker's eyes, he spotted a baby sparrow fall from its nest in a nearby tree and start to plummet towards the ground with a pathetic little squawk. Lying himself flush against his broom, he zoomed forwards and nearing the tree began to dive, catching the fortunate little chick in one hand tenderly as he gently toppled from the broomstick and landed awkwardly in the grass.

'"A bit martyr-ish"?' echoed George with slight incredulity as Ginny got to her feet and raced towards Harry, already admonishing him from twenty feet away.

'Told you he's gone off the deep end,' said Fred with a slight air of satisfaction, lying back in the grass with a sigh and placing a long stalk of grass between his teeth.

'What the hell d'you think you're doing!' Ginny shrieked as she stormed up to the older boy who was still lying in the long grass, panting heavily, the tiny bird cowering in his outstretched hand.

'It – would've – died – if – I – hadn't – saved – it,' said Harry weakly, smiling lightly as the little sparrow tottered dizzily off of his hand towards its mother who was chirping at it from a few feet away.

'You could've died!' she cried, tossing her hands up in the air before stopping short as a jet of red light hit her square in the back and she collapsed in the grass beside him.

With a strangled yelp, Harry leapt to his feet, his wand raised as Fred and George fell about with laughter a distance away, George cackling hysterically and Fred half-laughing and half-choking on what looked to him like a piece of grass or something.

Frowning slightly, he turned back to Ginny who was lying sprawled on the ground, her long red hair splayed out around her face and her expression infinitely more peaceful than the one she'd been displaying seconds earlier. With a wry smile he sat down quietly beside her and waited for the Stunning spell to wear off.

A few minutes later she began to stir, and with a little whimper her eyes flickered open and widened with surprise as she found the startlingly green ones of Harry staring down at her with concern.

Transferring her body weight to her elbows, she sat up slightly.

'What happened? I feel like I've been Stunned.'

'You have,' he replied quietly with an indicative glance at the twins who were walking back up to The Burrow, still hiccoughing with laughter.

'Oh,' she said, glaring daggers at them as they turned to wink at her cheekily, 'gits.'

There was an awkward silence in which they sat, determinedly not looking at each other, and watched the little sparrow Harry had just saved snuggle up to its mother as she sat in the grass, unwilling to leave it on the ground and return to her nest.

'You know, Fred and George are right,' she said suddenly, breaking the quiet, 'you've developed some serious martyr-like tendencies Harry.'

'Martyr-like tendencies?' he echoed, staring at her, 'I'm not a martyr!'

Ginny raised one graceful eyebrow.
'Oh yeah, and what about your little stunt just then?'

'What?' he cried defensively, 'I told you: it would've died!'

'Yeah, and you could've died yourself if you'd come out of that dive wrong! You could've broken your neck or anything!' she said heatedly, staring him down with those fiery brown eyes so like her mother's.

'Look,' he said quietly, looking down at his palms with a small amount of interest, 'I'm not a martyr, all right? I'm a lot of things, but I'm not a martyr.'

She shrugged.
'I'm just saying… you can't save the world all the time Harry, it's not your sole responsibility.'

He smiled weakly.
'Sometimes it feels like it is.'

'I know,' she said quietly, lying back in the grass and staring up at the clear blue sky, 'but you've just got to remember that its not… just try Harry, try now… just be a normal boy for once. I'm just Ginny Weasley and you're just Harry Potter… a normal girl and a normal boy.'

Looking a little awkward but at the same time intrigued, Harry followed her suit and laid down beside her, smiling as the flowery scent of her long red hair mingled with the smell of summer, intoxicating him.

They lay like that for several minutes before he felt some inexplicable feeling tear through him like lightning and in what seemed like an impulsive action, he leant over and pressed his lips to hers in a collision of chapped lips and a sharp intake of breath on both their parts.

He held her there for what could have been an eternity or several fleeting seconds before pulling away, breathing heavily, his cheeks flushed a bright scarlet.

'I um, I'm really, er –'

'Harry,' she interrupted him mid-stammer with what he found to be a rather adorable little frown, 'do you want to kiss me?'

'Well um, yes,' he replied awkwardly.

'Do you like kissing me?'

'Yes.'

'Then stop being a bloody martyr and kiss me already!'

He obliged… and most willingly, too, Fred and George noted as they watched them from inside The Burrow, identical smirks on their freckled faces.

A/N: lyrics used - "Vulnerable" by Secondhand Serenade

one more to go... -smiles-

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