AN: Replies to reviews/comments at the end. You can thank Doctor Who for this quick update. If anyone else has just seen 'Stolen Earth' then you will understand me when I say cliffhangers are evil and the words 'To be continued' are the most horrible words in all of existence. And yet...

Chapter 22 – If I Just Pretend

Ron was miserable. There was no way else to describe it. It had been a week since he saw Harry and John together at Hagrid's Hut and since then he had been avoiding them. He wasn't even sure that they had noticed, they spent so much time with each other lately that he felt like an invisible snitch in the room.

Ron watched Harry and John talking animatedly at the Gryffindor table of the Great Hall with resignation. Who was he to say who she should like? But he liked her so much and had thought she felt the same way.

'I suppose kissing her 'male cousin' may have convinced her that it would be safer to spend time with Harry. Just like me to totally mess it up when it was finally looking good.'

Ron took a deep breath and walked towards them. If she liked Harry then so be it – who was he to stop her?

'Just the guy who would jump of the Astronomy Tower for her,' Ron sighed, 'Merlin, I'm pathetic.'

"Ron!" John smiled at him as he approached, "Harry was just telling me this hilarious – "

"Harry a word," Ron said hastily before turning and walking back out the hall.

"Okay, sure," he heard Harry say behind him.

He reached the empty entrance hall to the Great Hall and turned to wait for Harry. He saw his friend run up to him with an alarmed expression.

"What is it? What's happened? Ginny? Merlin, it's Ginny isn't it?!"

"Shut up," Ron hissed when Harry's voice attracted the attention of a few students walking past.

"It's not Ginny, and the world isn't about to implode so stop freaking out," Ron continued not caring that Harry looked surprised at his tone.

"Okay," Harry said slowly leading them off to a secluded area before continuing, "So what's wrong."

"Have you fixed my watch yet?" Ron questioned not really caring but doing his best to avoid the real issue at hand.

"Oh, ummm…not yet, I had John look at it and he – "

"You let John look at it?"

Harry faltered before rubbing his neck nervously.

"Well, he's you're friend and remember I said that if you trusted him so do I," Harry said all this hastily his head turning to look over his shoulder every now and then.

"Yeah well fine, feel free to make him your new best friend for all I care," Ron blurted out before cringing at his own words.

"Look," Harry glared back at him, "You're the one who told me to be nice, well I'm being nice."

"Yeah, I bet you are," Ron mumbled.

"What was that?"

"Nothing, look since you're such good friends why don't you swap rooms with me then?"

Harry looked startled and Ron realised with anger, that Harry was embarrassed.

"N-no I don't think he would like that," Harry replied looking over his shoulder once more, "What's going on?"

"I'm just sick of playing baby-sitter that's all and sharing a room with one person will drive anyone nutters sooner or later, unfortunately for me its sooner rather than later."

Harry eyed him suspiciously.

"Is this about you kissing him?"

Ron started at this.

"How did you – never mind, no it's not because of that, like I said I don't want to waste my time looking after him anymore. I have better things to do with my time," Ron resisted the urge to scream because he knew every word was a lie.

He loved being around Hermione. True she did drive him nutters but he kinda liked that. Merlin knows why but he did.

Harry looked thoughtful for a moment before looking back at Ron.

"I'll take over guarding him but you can continue sharing the room, I mean you don't really want to go back to living with four other guys right?" Harry asked him incredulously.

Ron shrugged.

Harry continued to look at him suspiciously and Ron quickly continued lest his friend discover his lie.

"Fine, I'll keep the room…for now. I gotta go," Ron said before heading up the stairs to collect his school books.

"Ron, wait a minute!"

Ron continued walking ignoring his friend, if he spent any more time around Harry he was at risk of physically hurting him. Instead Ron clenched his fist and ignored Harry's voice calling his name.

Lavender was miserable. As the week progressed and the inevitable Hogsmead visited creeped ever closer her friends – well the people who still talked to her without laughing in her face after the Peeves incident – were not so subtly questioning her non-existent relationship with Ron Weasley.

She tried to recall why she had even started that rumour.

'Oh right, because I'm an idiot.'

She did see the red haired girl around more often though, or perhaps Lavender noticed her more now. Every time that red hair flashed before her eyes she bit back the horrible feeling deep within her chest.

Lavender idly kicked dirt at her feet. Once again she found herself in the lonely courtyard. It was overgrown and the pavement was cracked and overturned from the roots of the plants and trees that had been left to grow wild. Lavender leaned back on the column behind her, one of the few in the small and dark courtyard that still stood. She remembered hearing about this place being one of the famous Weasley Twins pranks before they left Hogwarts but she wasn't sure whether that was rumour or the truth.

A laugh escaped Lavender lips at the irony of those words.

Her life was so twisted with lies and truth that she found it difficult to distinguish between the two anymore.

Lavender lifted her eyes towards the canopy and towards the light that still filtered through the leaves of the overhanging trees.

She pulled out her sketchbook from its hidden place and stowed it carefully away in her handbag before heading towards the Great Hall.

"Better get this over with," she sighed.

Ginny was giddy. Hermione had asked her to come along to Hogsmead with her, apparently McGonnagal had given Hermione special permission to do so. Ginny suspected that the teacher wanted Hermione to have friends other than boys. Understandable, Ginny thought to herself, after all spending too much time around Ron tended to have side effects.

Her thoughts returned to Hermione's eating habits, not as bad as Ron but still, definatly different to how Hermione used to eat. That wasn't all bad, she was a Weasley herself and her love affair with food seemed genetic but that didn't mean that it was the kind of appetite that everyone could stomach. She remembered watching Hermione warily on more than one occasion preparing to conjure a paper bag in case the food decided it didn't like being unappreciated.

Ginny halted in her step.

Lavender Brown was pushing aside a portrait and walking towards the Great Hall. She felt a gnawing feeling in the back of her of her mind and the blood rushed to her face.

She sighed. Why couldn't she be one of those girls who enjoyed revenge? All this rubbish about empathy for others was really slowing a girl down.

She had to admit that at first she enjoyed the horror and pain that she had inflicted on Lavender Brown. But that faded away quickly. It was the day after she had promised Peeves WWW products, if he dropped her horrible cake laced which she charmed to make it impossible to remove.

She remembered seeing Lavender from across the corridor of her Household Charms class. Her hair was still a mess despite having removed the cake mixture from her hair. It resembled a birds nest if she had to be quite honest and she realised that in her attempt to remove the mixture Lavender had cut some of her hair off.

'Why then did she not just regrow it back?' Ginny wondered, 'Surely someone like Lavender could easily fix her hair.'

It was then that Ginny saw it.

Despite the girls that laughed and talked about her Lavender was walking the hallway as though she owned the place. Her hair was a mess and there were scratch marks on her face but Lavender held her head high as she walked to class.

Ginny was angry at first. She instantly planned another revenge plot but faltered when she saw Lavender turn suddenly and walk swiftly into a nearby toilet. Ginny quickly followed.

She was horrified by what she found.

Lavender was no where in sight but in that room she heard the gut renching sound of Lavender crying her heart out.

Ginny backed out of the room and her eyes swung around to meet the Patel twins and some of the girls she often saw with Lavender.

They whispered and darted glances to the entrance of the girls toilet.

Finally Ginny spoke.

"Aren't you going to go in?"

Padma looked at her for a moment before looking away.

"Why?" one of the other girls said with a completely straight face.

The next moment they all continued on their way to class.

Ginny unconsciously let a hand pass through her own hair. She breathed deeply and with dragging feet walked to her class.

'No,' she repeated to herself, 'she deserves it.'

That thought did very little to drive away the guilt she felt. Ginny watched from the top stairs above Lavender, her eyes followed the shadow of the usually cheerful girl walk towards the Great Hall.

Ginny blinked at Lavender's hair. It was brown. She furrowed her brow, the usual bottle blond look was gone and the mousy brown replaced it. She had to admit that it did decrease the impact of her hasty haircut but did very little else. In fact, the colour almost made Lavender's fair skin seem almost deathly white – like a ghost.

A horrible jolt shot through her. Lavender was trying to disguise herself. Where she once sought attention she now shied away from it. The thought should have left her jumping for joy but it didn't. Making someone wish they could disappear was not a nice feeling.

'But she did that to me,' Ginny argued in her head, 'She made me want to hide away and if it hadn't been for my friends…'

Ginny's trembling fingers covered her horrified face.

Lavender had no friends and she was pretty sure that Lavender herself only just realised this too. There was no one to comfort Lavender. No one to glare down the gossiping hoards or to tell her to not worry about what others thought of her. No one's shoulder to cry on and no soothing hands to wipe her tears away. No army of older brothers to protect her, or secret crush to distract her with jokes and flying lessons.

It was more than the prank that made the girls act this way towards Lavender. They saw that someone had intentionally humiliated Lavender and the other girls seemed to all snap out of the spell that they were under. They all shunned her now, because they weren't afraid of what she would say about them anymore. All it took was one domino to fall and Ginny had counted on that to be the case.

Why then did she feel so horribly guilty?

"Come on Gin," Lucy's voice called from the bottom of the steps and snapped Ginny back to reality, "You're gonna be late."

Ginny waved at her friend and followed her down to the Great Hall.

"Hi," Lavender greeted Amanda, one of the few girls who had yet to laugh in her face, but she didn't openly talk to her either.

Amanda and her group of friends turned to look at her.

She saw some of them bit their lips as though trying to stop from laughing, they weren't doing a very good job and a few of them walked off, their laughing echoing behind them.

Amanda turned slightly to walk towards the Courtyard where the students were to meet for the Hogsmead visit.

Lavender followed and she saw Amanda glance at her nervously when she did.

"What are you're plans for today?" Lavender questioned hearing her voice shake.

"My friends and I are going to…the Hogs Head. Look I better go, I don't want to keep them waiting."

Lavender watched Amanda run over to the group of girls who stood in the courtyard waiting for her. A few glanced back at Lavender before they headed off towards Hogsmead.

Lavender felt her eyes sting. She turned and walked back to the Hogwarts, she didn't feel like going outside today.

In her haste she slipped on an icy step and slammed straight into a wall.

"You alright?"

Or not.

Lavender felt someone hold her up.

She nodded meekly looking shyly up at the boy and her eyes just as quickly looked away blushing. She had forgotten that Hogsmead visits were the one opportunity to see the students from Hogwarts Boys.

"Sorry," she said standing up properly.

"Do…I know you?"

"I don't think so," she sighed, "You wouldn't want to either."

He raised an eyebrow at her comment. After a moments silence Lavender moved past him to walk back inside.

"You not going to Hogsmead then?" he questioned her.

She turned back to look at him.

"I don't think I'm welcome," she said her eyes focused on the ground rather than his face.

"Don't be daft," he replied, "If you're invited you can come. And I'm inviting you."

Lavender's eyes widened.

"You're asking me on a date?" she said in shock.

"No," he scoffed, or perhaps she just imagined that he was laughing at her, everyone seemed to be these days.

"But I wouldn't mind some company," he continued, "it's a bit of a walk there, and I'm kinda getting sick of being on my own."

"Yeah me too," Lavender smiled, "Thanks Ronald Weasley."

"You're welcome…hang on, how do you know who I am?" Ron stared at her in surprise

A smile spread across Lavenders lips before she skipped towards him. She linked her arm in his.

"Better be off then," she said happily, her heart soaring.

"OH – MY – GOD!"

"Ginny? What's wrong?" Lucy said in concern.

Ginny gaped as she saw Ron and Lavender walk, across the crowded courtyard. They walked straight past Harry and Hermione who didn't even seem to realise that hell had just frozen over right in front of their faces.

"Lucy, I'll see you later," she said hastily before running down to the Courtyard.

"So, are you asking Ginny to Hogsmead?" Hermione questioned Harry as they waited in the Courtyard.

Hermione fidgeted in her spot. She was so used to pants that the outfit that Ginny had picked out for her, a baby blue sweater over a jean skirt and brown boots, felt all wrong. Her fingers itched to be stuffed in pockets or to run through her hair. The latter didn't work because she had felt like she was in a bad shampoo commercial if she ran her fingers through her long bushy hair.

"What do you mean?" Harry sounded alarmed at her suggestion.

"So we can all hang out with each other," she replied innocently, "What did you think I meant?"

"Oh, well…"

"Hi Ginny!" Hermione waved at her friend and she laughed when Harry spun around so quickly he almost tripped.

Ginny ran up to meet Hermione.

"What did you do to Ron?" Ginny said breathlessly.

"What?! Nothing!" Hermione replied instantly.

"Then why – did I just see him walking with Lavender Brown down to Hogsmead?!"

"W-What!"

AN: Yes I am evil. But don't fret I am working on the next chapter now.

HGT: That they are. Thanks for the support!

3's all around: I love you, you always make me feel better. I always have a panic attack after each chapter afraid that someone will say my writings terrible or something :)

xzotic: Yeah I don't really hate Lavender, I mean she was just a plot device for JKR, I thought I'd flesh her out more just so I don't end up hating her just because she's there.

tkdchick: I will lol if you continue to review :)

johnadams: surprising good or bad? I was actually going to let Ron go crazy green eyed monster but after I started writing Ron decided to go in a completely different direction. I don't ask why I just type what they tell me. I think he'll tell me why he acted the way he did by next chapter...although I'm starting to understand from what happened in this chapter.

TiffanyM: Aww thanks - moral support keeps me going :)

CEO-FLEX: Really? You think Hermione and Ron should just tell each other? Unfortunately they don't seem to want to do that, they seem determined to be daft. Don't blame me :P

IsIWisi: Thank you so much! Did you only just start reading or was this you're first review?