Ron thought Ginny would've been ecstatic. He absolutely and in full honesty thought she would gleefully beam at him, her favourite brother, and walk round their home alight with happiness. After all, she was very much taken with Harry, was she not?
What he didn't expect was to be rudely kicked in the shin and be hissed at by a furious, raging thing.
'Why did you bring Harry Potter here?' the thing, whom he recognised as Ginny, hissed at him through the dark. She'd been waiting for him on the second landing, curled in a corner, her nightgown wound tightly around her. Her feet were bare, Ron noticed, and her hair showed no signs of having touched the pillow.
'What are you on about? You should be thanking me now, shouldn't you?' he whispered back, tongue darting over the bits of toffee still stuck to his teeth. In his nightrobe's pocket, wrapped carefully in a brown kitchen towel, there was an extra toffee piece for Harry.
'Thanking you?' Ginny somehow simultaneously whispered and screeched. The sound itself alarmed Ron, and he took half a step back, nearly sending himself plummeting down the creaky stairs.
'Yeah, that's what people who aren't completely mental do,' he mumbled, adding some distance between himself and the staircase.
'He saw me in my nightie,' Ginny hissed at him again, and she sounded nearly apoplectic.
Ron rolled his eyes. 'Relax, it's not like Harry saw your knickers or something.'
Ginny simply stared at him, as though petrified. Even through the thick dark, Ron could see her eyes widened in horror. She stood like that for several long beats, Ron suddenly wondering if he should say something or maybe alert their parents. Then, as he was about to run to Mum, her bottom lip lightly quivered, and Ginny careened through her bedroom door, shutting it loudly in Ron's face.
Ron continued to stare at the spot where Ginny had been, stunned and deeply miffed. What was all the fuss about? If he'd had fancied someone as his little sister did Harry, surely he'd have been over the moon to have them in his house, Ron reckoned. Girls, he thought, simply lacked the common sense to appreciate considerate, nice gestures.
He sighed, reaching for the toffee in his pocket and carefully gripped it in his fist as he climbed the stairs up to his room. He'd place the toffee on the bedside table if Harry'd already fallen asleep, and in the morning he'd write to Hermione. She, at least, would certainly appreciate Ron taking his time to let her know he'd managed to save Harry and that all was well.
A small smile creeped onto his lips as he thought about it, and Ron lightly pressed the handle to his door, tiptoeing inside.