-Chapter 3-

~*Hermione*~

I suppose I shouldn't have been that shocked when Ginny came home that day from the Burrow. I was at first though. The more I thought about it, the less it shocked me. Whether or not they were blood-traitors they were still pure-bloods. They had been given the idea of continuing the wizarding population. It was hard after that. Really hard. I saw her father the Monday after at the Ministry. He looked at me then slammed the door to his office. Honestly, I was scared for my life. If anyone had found out…it would be over.

We were on eggshells for the entire week. We didn't go to dinner at the Burrow the next weekend. We were waiting for one of the Weasley brothers to show up at the flat to kill one or the both of us. I figured I would be first.

Sure enough, the next Saturday afternoon we were cuddled up on the couch and I was reading one of my favorite books to Ginny when a knock came on the door. It was George.

"Mum told us everything, Ginny," he said when she answered the door. He looked at me. "Listen, I'm not…I'm not like the rest of them, okay? But Percy…first thing Monday morning he's…that prick is going to report it. You guys need to leave."

"What?!" Ginny's face drained of its color.

"No one is going to stop him, Gin. You guys have got to leave."

"Where the hell are we going to go, George?"

He pulled Ginny to the couch and she sat next to me. I wrapped an arm around her waist and George sat on the coffee table.

"Wherever it is…you can't get jobs having to do with magic. I…I've done the research. I had to. It's the reason Lee Jordan had to leave. I helped him get out."

"I thought he had a job offer in…"

"No, Hermione, he didn't. Listen…I suggest going to the States. Lee was in Massachusetts last I heard from him and he said it was great. Muggles there were pretty okay with it. I'll help you guys in any way I can, I promise. Just tell me what to do and I'll do it."

"'Mione…what…how do we…what do we do?"

"We book a flight, it sounds like."

"Why not fight this?"

"You fight it, you die," George said.

"Ginny we don't have anything here to stay for! My parents are dead, yours hate us. Even if we fought it and won…what do we have that keeps us here? Changing the laws won't change the way anyone feels. Let's just go. I've got a bit of Muggle money left in the bank, enough to get us started at least."

"I can go to Gringotts for you and get everything changed to Muggle money, too. Will that help out any?"

Ginny and I both nodded. We started packing immediately. Luckily I kept that handbag with the Undetectable Expansion Charm. I booked our flight for Sunday evening and by then (thanks to a ton of shrinking charms) the flat was virtually empty. George had emptied both of our Gringotts accounts and I had emptied my Muggle bank account.

-*-*-*-*-*-

~*Ginny*~

Did I want to leave? Hell no. My entire life had revolved around magic and Britain and everything in it. Hermione had lived in the Muggle world, she was perfectly fine with hopping on one of those plane things and crossing a bloody ocean to live in it again. I didn't understand what she and George were talking about half the time with passports and visas and whatnot. All I knew was that it was going to be a bitch to get me into some other country since I didn't have a passport already. Whatever they did worked though, I passed through airport security without a problem. It probably took some confunding charms, I still don't know. What I do know is that I am NEVER getting on another goddamn plane again.

Really, how in the hell do Muggles travel like that? Honestly, if someone could let me know I would seriously appreciate it. Hermione didn't want to spend the money on first class which I later had a very lengthy bitching session about, so we were stuck in coach. If I were a few inches taller I would've had teeth marks on my knees because the idiot in front of me decided he needed to recline his seat back the entire fucking time and I had to curl up in my seat.

And the…gods what was it…the shaking! Turbulence! Every five minutes, I swear it! I think Hermione still has indentations where my fingernails dug into her arms. She giggled at me and continued reading through the Muggle newspaper. I have yet to find out the name of the pilot of that plane so I could complain to anyone and everyone that would listen about the landing. I still don't think he actually put the wheels down or whatever. I'm fairly certain he just crash landed the damn thing into the runway.

So, we crashed…I mean, landed…in Boston, Massachusetts. I told Hermione we should move to Salem. She didn't speak to me for three hours because she insisted that wasn't funny. We had an argument with airport security because they thought my rucksack looked suspicious. Try explaining wands to Muggles. Finally Hermione convinced one of them that they were handcrafted knitting needles. The idiots fell for it. I laughed. I'm just glad they didn't look inside her handbag I had stashed away.

Hermione exchanged part of her British Muggle money for American money. She said it would look suspicious to exchange all of it since there was quite a bit of it. We found a hotel for the night, the ass behind the counter grimaced at us when we said we only needed one bed. I started to tell him to go to hell. Hermione shut me up with a kiss. He grimaced again and tossed the room key at us. I slipped my hand in her back pocket as we walked to the room.