Disclaimer: I hereby disclaim all claims to the characters and setting enclosed herein.

Just a Dream…

Hermione and Harry watched Draco walk off into the distance.

"I guess it's up to us to give Ginny the potion." Hermione said, looking at the apparently innocent vial in her left hand. "And we better do it fast. It only makes the hour before the potion seem like part of the dream, and it's been at least thirty minutes already."

"Look, I'll do it Hermione. It's only fair, seeing as I got you both into this mess." Harry said magnanimously, holding out his hand for the potion.

"Are you sure?" she asked doubtfully. His set expression told her that he was, and she handed him the bottle. "Now be careful to give her the right dose. EXACTLY seven drops. Any more than that and she might go into a permanent coma, but any less and she'll just hallucinate without falling asleep, which needless to say, would be hard to explain. So make sure she only drinks seven drops. Got that? Good. Then I'll see you back in the common room."

Harry nodded, and pocketed the vial. 'Seven,' he thought to himself, as he walked towards the Great Hall.

"Hi Harry!" Colin Creevey said excitedly, bounding up to him. "I heard from Luna, who overheard Lavender and Pavarti talking, that you have hickeys on your neck. Can I take a picture for the school newspaper?"

"Get lost Colin," Harry said through gritted teeth. "Actually, have you seen Ginny?"

"She left about ten minutes ago, I think she went up to her room. She looked a bit upset, actually."

"Brilliant," Harry said sarcastically. He turned and walked away without another word to Colin, pausing only to pick up an almost empty flagon of pumpkin juice, which he stashed in his pocket.

Once out of the Great Hall and up a flight of stairs he found himself briefly alone in a corridor. He took the opportunity to very carefully add seven drops of the sonumbulus potion to the pumpkin juice.

Up the rest of the stairs and through the portrait he looked around the common room for some sign of her, the only flaming red hair was that of her brothers Fred and George. He looked for Hermione as well, so that he could ask her to check the dormitories, but she didn't seem to be there either. With time running out, Harry could only see one real option. To check the dormitory himself.

So Harry made his way to the staircase leading to the girls room, and looked at it with a sense of foreboding. Halfway up the first flight his fears were realized when the stairs melted together into a slide and he tumbled back to the start.

"Right," said Harry to himself, getting up and brushing the dust off. Taking a deep breath he looked up to the first landing, and then ran as fast as he could up the still slide-like stairs. He made it three quarters of the way before loosing his footing and tumbling right back to the start again. He was up and getting ready for another shot when he heard a voice.

"Harry?" Lavender Brown said, "What are you doing?"

"Oh, hi Lavender. Sorry, I just need to speak to Ginny for a second, I think she's up in her room."

"Do you want me to go get her for you?"

"That would be great, thanks!"

"You know Harry, you could have just asked in the first place instead of running up and down the stairs like a mad thing." Lavender said, walking up the stairs as they appeared beneath her feet. Harry didn't reply, just tapped his foot nervously as he waited for Lavender. It seemed to take a long time, but actually only took about two minutes for her to return with Ginny.

"What do you want Harry? Hey, you got rid of those hickeys," Ginny said from the stairs.

"What hickeys? Did you have hickeys Harry?" Lavender asked curiously.

"Did somebody say hickeys?" George said enthusiastically, getting up form a chair and bounding up to Harry's side.

"Who gave you hickeys Harry?" Fred added, appearing on Harry's other side.

"No one! Um, what do you mean hickeys? I don't have hickeys."

"You did this morning," Ginny said, reaching the bottom of the stairs.

"Ha ha ha, you must be imagining things. Who would give me hickeys?"

"I can think of a few people," Lavender said looking at him appraisingly.

"Now don't go selling yourself short Harry," said George.

"We've caught quite a few girls giving you the eye," said Fred.

"A couple of boys too," said George.

"George!" said Ginny.

The brothers shrugged, grinned and looked like they were going to continue, but Harry cut them off. "Right, well, must be off. Lots of, um, study. Come on Ginny!"

"Bye Harry!" the twins called to his back as it proceeded out of the common room with Ginny in tow.

"Oi! Harry! Let go!" Ginny said, wrenching her arm away as Harry closed the door on an empty Charms classroom. "Alright, alright, so I'm here. What's so very important?"

Harry thought quickly.

"I just wanted to talk to you about something rather personal… It's kind of hard to put it into words. Oh!" he said, as though the thought had just occurred to him. "I brought you some pumpkin juice. Thirsty?"

"Not really."

"Oh. Well, what I wanted to say to you, Ginny, is that I've always respected you," Harry began slowly. "You're such a nice person, and a really excellent witch, and just really brilliant, you know." Inspiration suddenly struck him, and he picked up her hands, holding them between his. "What I'm saying Ginny, is that I want you –"

"Yes?" Ginny said, leaning forward.

"I want you –" he began again.

"Yes?"

"I want you to tell me what you think of this spell I'm learning." Harry finished.

"Oh," said Ginny, feeling deflated. "Go on then, show me."

"Alright," Harry said, pulling out the pumpkin juice. "Now, I'm going to transfigure this pumpkin juice into something a little more exciting, and I was hoping you could try some for me, and tell me what it tastes like."

"Couldn't you just drink it?"

"Well, I could... I mean, I have! I've tasted it before, but it's one of those things… you know… those things." He grasped desperately for any idea at all, and finding one, said triumphantly: "One of those things that tastes differently for everyone!"

"Oh, alright then. Go on."

With a complicated, and somewhat shoddy wand movement, Harry attempted the spell to turn water into a wine. However this was pumpkin juice, not water, and transfiguration was not his strongest subject, so instead of turning into a full-bodied pinot noir the liquid just bubbled, turned slightly purple, and smoked copiously.

"You want me to drink THAT?" Ginny said, wrinkling her nose at the pungent smoke emanating from the flagon.

"It tastes much better than it looks, at least it did for me. Try it!"

With a grimace Ginny took a sip.

"Eugh! It's horrible!"

"Try it again, it just needed time to smoke away. Here, I'll give it a quick shake. There, try a big gulp this time, it gets too smoky in small doses."

Against her better judgement, she lifted the flagon up to her mouth and quickly took a large swallow. "Oh, bleh! It tasted even worse than last time! Harry, that is really foul. I think you need to practice more on your own before practicing on other people, eugh!"

"Wait, there's still some left! You've got to finish it!"

"No way, you finish it!"

"No, go on, it'll be better this time, all the good stuff is at the bottom anyway."

"Yeah right, if you're not going to drink it then I'm getting rid of it. Evanesco!"

"No!" Harry said, as the last of the pumpkin juice instantly disappeared.

"Right, well, if that's all, I'm going back to the common room." But as she reached to open the door of the classroom she moaned "Oh, I don't feel so good. Woah…" and collapsed on the floor.

Harry raced to her side. "Ginny?" he said softly.

Ginny opened her eyes slowly, and a vague unfocussed smile spread across her face.

"How do you know my name, little purple phoenix?"

Harry's eyes widened, "Oh fu-"

A/N – Sorry it's been so long posting! Hope you enjoyed, please review!