A/N It seemed to me that the overwhelming response was that you guys liked the split POV better, so I'm going to oblige with your requests…..thank you guys for all the opinions cause I probably would have gone back to the single….. So I think I'm going to do a slip POV when they are together and single when they are apart……In case you guys didn't figure it out in the last chapter, "xxxxx" means that it is happening at the same time just a switch of POV where as "xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx" means time has elapsed….. Well here is chapter 7 I hope you all enjoy……
Ginny was standing in front of her dresser trying to decide what to wear for the day when she heard the door open and someone walk into the room. She turned expecting it to be Hermione, who had just left, coming back to for something she had forgotten. Instead it was Harry, and a very red Harry she noted.
Why is he so red? She looked down at herself Oh…that's why.
She realized that she was wearing, well, not much of anything. What she was wearing was khaki green boy cut underwear and a lacy, but thankfully not see through, black bra.
"I'm sorry, I didn't know….I just thought…umm…"
"Good Gods Harry would you learn to knock! I could have been completely starkers for all you knew," she yelled , causing Harry to turn an even deeper shape of scarlet.
"Yeah I'm so sorry… I didn't realize… I just came to tell you… well to ask you… that is I…" he stuttered never taking his eyes off her.
"Harry?"
"What?" he asked his eyes snapping up to hers.
"Would you mind!" she asked gesturing to the door.
"Oh!" he exclaimed as he quickly shuffled out the door. He was about to close the door when he turned and popped his head back in. "I'm really am sorry about - "
"Harry!"
"Sorry…" he muttered as he shut the door behind him.
Ginny was angry at first, as she finished getting dressed but after a moment she started laughing. The look on his face when he walked in here was priceless. I think that he might have been even more shocked then I was. It's a good thing I'm comfortable with my body or I might have to kill him. But I wonder what he was so eager to tell me?
She debated with herself on what to do with Harry and she weighed her options. She could go show him the patented Weasley temper and then ignore him for the rest of the day, but then she wouldn't get to find out why he had been so eager to talk to her in the first place. Or she could go make fun of him and embarrass him sufficiently enough that he would never want to do it again and she could still find out what he wanted. Her curiosity won out over her temper and she decided on her second option.
Harry ran back to his room and put a pillow over his head thinking that maybe if he smothered himself he wouldn't have to face Ginny again. I am such a git! I can not believe I just barged in without knocking. And then I just stood there staring at her in her underwear and bumbling like a complete and utter idiot. But she did look awfully good in her underwear… Oh gods why am I thinking about it, it's Ginny! She's one of my best friends, she's like the sister I never had, she's Ron's sister…Ron, he would kill me if he knew what happened or what I'm thinking now.
"Hey Harry," she said in her best attempt of a sexy voice.
Harry heard Ginny announcing herself from the door and groaned inwardly.
"Hey," he answered with his head still under the pillow causing his voice to sound far away, even to himself.
"Are you going to come out from under there?" Ginny asked. Harry could hear her heals clicking over to the bed.
"No."
"What, you don't want another free show?"
"No!"
"Didn't you like it?
"No!"
"Am I too much woman for you?"
"Oh Gods Ginny! Please leave me alone!" he cried from beneath the pillow. He was so embarrassed and was blushing so hard that he wouldn't have been surprised if his hair had turned red.
Ginny laughed figuring he had suffered enough and climbed on to the bed and sat on his stomach. "Come on, now you're just being silly," she teased as she tried to pry the pillow out of his hands and off his head. "So, are you going to tell me what was so important that you felt the need march into my room unannounced, or am I going to have to tickle you out from under there."
That got his attention, "Alright," he relented "just get off."
She obligingly shifted her weight so he was able to slide out from between her legs. Once he sat up, she sat cross-legged at the foot of the bed looking at him expectantly.
"Gin, I really am sorry about umm… walking in on you like that," he mumbled unable to look her in the eye.
"It's alright Harry…Just don't do it again or I may be forced to hurt you," she said sternly. She paused for a moment and took pity on him before she spoke again. "You consider me a friend right?"
Harry was confused, was this a trick question? "Of course, one of my best."
"Then lets just consider it 'getting to know me better,'" she said using air quotes.
They both laughed and Harry was relieved that she was forgiving him and was willing to make a joke of it.
"So, why did you feel the need to 'get to know me better' this morning?"
"I wanted to take you on your birthday present, you didn't think I forgot about you yesterday did you?" he explained eager to be able to change the subject.
"I didn't know, I wasn't going to say anything," Ginny shrugged. "Okay maybe I was a little hurt yesterday at my party, but I figured that there was a reason." She sat thinking for a moment, "Wait what did you mean take me on my birthday present?"
"I, am taking you out to lunch, just you and me. Weren't you just saying the other day that you had to get out of the house."
"Of course I would love to get out of the house for the day, but we can't do that, it's not safe to be running around, plus everybody would kill us and you know it," Ginny stated sensibly.
"Don't worry, I promise nothing bad is going to happen today and if it makes you feel better we can stay in Muggle London so we don't have to worry about being recognized. It will be fun, we can walk around, have a bite to eat and do what ever else we feel like doing," Harry persuaded.
"But my mother will kill me if I just take off without telling anyone again," Ginny protested.
"I already took care of that," Harry reassured her. "Now come on, don't you trust me?"
Ginny looked at him with one eyebrow raised as she evaluated the situation. She knew that she should really stay put, but she wanted so badly to get back out into the real world and Harry made it sound so appealing. After a moment her sense of adventure and mischief won over her better judgment and she had made up her mind, "Alright, let's go."
"Great, come on. Ron and Hermione snuck off about half an hour ago so we have a good twenty minutes before they resurface for air and everybody else is finishing breakfast, so if we move quickly, we should be able to get out of the house unnoticed." Harry explained as he walked out of the room motioning for her to follow.
"Wait…If you already took - "
"Shhh…" Harry put a finger to her lips as they tiptoed downstairs and out the front door.
Once they had walked a few blocks and they felt they were a safe distance from Number 12, she asked her question again.
"If you already took care of it and told my mum, then why the need for stealthyness?"
"I didn't tell your mother exactly," he said looking at her out of the corner of his eye. "I left a note where she will find it saying that we went on holiday for the day and that we would be back before dinner. And is stealthyness even a word?"
"What!" she asked as she whacked him on the shoulder, choosing to ignore his last comment. "That's not taking care of it, that's just giving her all day to think of creative ways to end my life when we get back, so you better start thinking about what your going to say at my funeral now because I want a good eulogy."
"Ginny relax," he laughed as he put an arm casually around her shoulder as they walked. "This is my birthday present to you, I'm not going to let you get in trouble so don't stress. I promised you that I would take care of it and I will. I'll just explain how I dragged you from the house under false pretenses and that you would never dream of disobeying your Mum's orders. Then I will drop a tidbit of information that will make them forget all about our little excursion into the big bad world today."
"What could you possibly say that would cause such a diversion?" she asked skeptically shrugging his arm off.
"Let's grab some breakfast, are you hungry? I'm famished," he said purposely ignoring her question as he took her elbow and led her into a small coffee shop.
Ginny's good humor was quickly restored by a small breakfast of coffee and crumb cake. She absolutely feel head over heels for her caramel macchiato and declared it better than tea. After eating they continued their way through the streets of London, taking in the sights and window shopping, occasionally entering a store if something caught their fancy.
About mid afternoon, they were pursuing a music store, flipping through CDs. Ginny was complaining about how unfair it was that the wizard world didn't have something comparable because it was such a good idea. Harry was in the middle of suggesting that they buy a CD player so they could figure out if they could make it run on magic when a voice from behind them made them both stiffen.
"Harry Potter?" a female voice questioned.
Harry slid his hand into his pocket where he kept his wand, ready to defend himself as he turned around slowly.
"I'm sorry….Do I know you?" he asked the pretty blonde girl who looked to be about his age.
"Oh, don't you remember me? I'm Leah, Leah Murphy, we went to primary school together. My mother is friends with your aunt, awful gossips those two," she explained good naturedly.
"Oh yes of course, Leah, I didn't even recognize you. How have you been?"
"I've been great, keeping busy, I couldn't help but recognize you. I saw you from across the store and recognized that wild hair of yours and those glasses. Do you still have the scar you got in that car accident as a baby?"
"Yup," he said using his hand to push up his fringe. He felt Ginny shift next to him. "I'm sorry I'm being rude, this is my - "
"Girlfriend," she interrupted. "Hi, I'm Ginny nice to meet you," she said as she held out her right hand to shake and slipped her left around Harry's waist.
Harry looked down at her confused, but a quick glance from her told him to play along and so he quickly put his own arm over her shoulder and pulled her close.
"Lovely to meet you Ginny. Oh don't you two make the most perfect couple. You are so pretty and with your red hair contrasting against Harry's black. You two absolutely seem made for each other, I can tell you two are going to last, don't ask me how but I can always tell these things, you seem to have such a connection, a real aura about you."
"What can I say, we're in love. Isn't that right dear?" Ginny asked looking up at Harry with merriment dancing in her eyes.
"Of course peanut," he responded giving her a peck on the forehead.
"Well I must be going, I have lots of errands to run today. I'll have to tell mother all about running into you today Harry, Ciao," and with that the bubbly being that was Leah Murphy bounded from the record store.
As soon as she was out of sight Ginny started cracking up "Peanut! What kind of pet name is peanut!"
"I don't know, it was the only thing I could think of. What was all of that about anyways?"
"Oh come on, like you don't know?" She saw the look of befuddlement on his face. "Okay maybe you don't. She said that her mother was a friend of your aunt's right, and that they are both gossips. I could tell by the way she was acting that she is no better, so I knew that anything that happened would be reported to her mother and consequently be reported back to your aunt and therefore your uncle. And since you said yourself that you are never going back I thought what would be more enjoyable then royally ticking them off with the thought of you happy and in love with a wonderful lady like myself."
Harry laughed at the expression of innocence on her face, "I like the way you think Ms. Weasley."
"Sometimes my brilliance even amazes myself," she joked.
"Well then brilliant and modest, it doesn't get better than that. How about we get this CD player, a couple of CDs, then we go get ourselves some lunch. What do you say peanut?" he asked holding out his elbow for her to take.
"Yes snookums, let us go." she laughed taking his elbow.
After a quick argument over who was going to pay for the items, Harry wanted it to be part of his birthday present to Ginny, but she said the trip and lunch was her present. It was finally decided that Harry would pay for it only if they shared it and only if he promised that he would steal it whenever he wanted to use it so it wasn't just hers, they decided to get pizza for lunch.
"I think that pizza and caramel macchiatos are my two new favorites," Ginny said as she grabbed her third slice of pepperoni and sausage pizza.
"Just hopefully not together," Harry joked wrinkling up his face at the thought of the combination.
Ginny laughed and nodded but didn't say anything. She wanted to ask Harry something but she wasn't sure if she should. It had been weighing on her mind for a while now and something he had said earlier was nagging at her thoughts.
"Harry, can I ask you something?"
"Sure, anything."
"What is it that you know that the rest of us don't? What is it that you are not telling me?"
Harry took a bite out of his slice and chewed slowly as he thought about how to answer that, he decided to stall instead. "That wasn't a question I was expecting, what makes you think that anyways?"
"Lots of little things, like some of the things you say or the look you get sometimes when you think no one is watching you. For instance how did you know that Lupin was called away on your birthday, or how come on the day you came to Number 12 you said that there is no point of you going to the Dursley's next year and why did you say that you knew nothing was going to happen to you, just like you said this morning. And I also have a feeling that what ever you are going to tell everyone when we get home also will fit into this category."
"Ahh…well…I see I can't keep anything from you. I might as well tell you now, since I was going to you tonight. And you deserve to know since you are partly responsible." He paused for a moment watching the ice swirl around in his coke as he spun his straw. "Remember that day in the park when I told you that I had stopped dreaming."
Ginny nodded, unsure what this had to do with it.
"Well that night I started dreaming again. Except these aren't ordinary dreams, I've been dreaming real events, but they aren't even like the ones I was having before, like when your dad was attacked. In those I was tapping into someone's mind and watching what was happening as it happened. But in these dreams that I'm having now, I'm just watching from the side lines and they are about stuff that hasn't happened yet. So now I always know what is happening in the world of the dark arts. That's how I knew that we would be fine today because I know that nothing involving us is happening today. It's almost like having the dark arts playbook. It's really quite handy."
"So you know everything that is going to happen before it happens, do you ever miss anything?" Ginny asked trying to wrap her mind around this new development. "Does anybody else know about this?"
"Yeah, so far everything has played out exactly how I've seen it . But I haven't told anybody about the dreams because there hasn't been a need to. Everything has ended positively for us and I don't really know what the ramifications would be if I told someone how they would win or if I meddle with it in general."
"Until now."
"What do you mean?"
"Well I assume that the thing that you are going to tell everyone tonight, the thing that will make everyone forget about our little outing, is a future an attack that you want to change the outcome of," Ginny explained.
Harry looked at her with a gravely serious expression, "Yes. The next attack." He sighed and then gave her a weak smile. "But you'll find out all about that tonight. Lets just finish enjoying our afternoon."
Tears were running down Ginny's cheeks and Harry was gasping for air they were both laughing so hard as they relived Ginny's first encounter with a soda dispenser.
"I didn't know that the soda came out when you push that little lever," Ginny defended herself between giggles.
"It wasn't so much that, but how the soda ricocheted off of your hand and right into the face of that poor unsuspecting eight year old who was just trying to get a straw."
"He just looked so surprised and confused…" Ginny gasped as she held her sides. It had been one of those things that was funny when it happened, but the more they thought about it and talked about it the more hilarious it became.
By this time they had made it back to Grimmauld Place which caused them both to stop laughing. Ginny reached out to open the door but Harry grabbed her wrist and stopped her.
"Hold on a second." Harry closed his eyes and took a deep breath. After a moment he opened them and said, "Okay, I'm ready."
Ginny opened the door slowly and on the other side was an extremely irate Mrs. Weasley. But before she had a chance to explode at her daughter, Harry jumped in front of Ginny placing himself in the line of fire.
"Before you start yelling at Ginny for taking off without permission again, I want you to know that it should be me you are yelling at. Ginny didn't want to go out today, I had to convince her to come with me and she only agreed after I lied to her and said that I had already worked it out with you. But before you start yelling at me you should also know that your daughter and I were never in any kind of danger today. I will never put her or any of my other friends unnecessarily in harms way ever again. Trust me ,I have learned my lesson with that. That is why it is so important that I talk to everyone tonight. I believe that there is an order meeting scheduled for this evening that I would like to attend, I have a few secrets I need to confess."
Mrs. Weasley was so surprised by this, that she didn't say anything as Harry purposefully walked past her and into the kitchen with Ginny trailing meekly behind.
"Wow…Good speech," Ginny whispered in his ear as they walked.
"Thanks, I have been practicing it in my head all day," he muttered back as they sat down at the table.
About forty-five minutes later all the order members, plus Ron, Hermione, and of course Ginny, had gathered and were waiting for Harry's announcement. Harry had to have a brief argument with Mrs. Weasley about the three youngest in attendance but he had told her that he had kept Ron and Hermione in the dark long enough so he was going to tell the anyways and Ginny already knew more than anyone else so she should be there too.
Mrs. Weasley gave in without much of a fight, but was a little put out that all of this was happening so fast and all of it was out of her control. Harry knew that she just wanted to protect all four of them but she had to know that this was inevitable.
After Harry explained his dreams and he was tested by several order members about events that he should have known nothing about until everyone was satisfied that he was telling the truth, Moody finally asked the question he was waiting for.
"So why are you waiting till now to tell us this kind of information."
"Because there was no need to. I knew that everything was going to turn out well for our side and I didn't want to risk changing that outcome if I mentioned what I knew." Harry explained.
"So when does it not come out okay Harry," Tonks inquired.
"September 1st"
A/N So what did you guys think? That was the longest chapter so far and I hope you enjoyed….time should start speeding up after the next chapter, I just really wanted to show the beginning of Harry and Ginny's relationship and really show how close they have become and that they have a really strong friendship before anything else happens
I'm not sure when chapter 8 is going to be ready, I've hit a bit of a wall, I know what I want to happen and what needs to happen but I cant seem to formulate it into a cohesive chapter…..but while you guys wait if you want to check out my other story Just Married….Kinda that should be updating frequently