Chapter 5. When you broke up with me

A/N. I couldn't bring myself to write the ditching scene, so there is no flashback. But I consider it essential, because war veterans or not, Harry and Ginny were still a young couple who were learning to love and maturing in the process.

This chapter contains my first OC. Hope you like Lola!

2003

A heavy silence followed Harry's words. It seemed that none of them felt inclined to reminisce the episode; the playful mood had vanished. Finally, Ginny broke it.

"I still feel bad for that. I was stupid and naive, and I hurt you so much. I know you buried the whole issue, but I haven't forgiven myself," she said, picking at lint in the sheets.

Harry hugged her and kissed the top of her head. "You're being ridiculous. Both of us were stupid and naive. We were stressed; we had not the best communication and dealt poorly with separation. Add Skeeter to the mix and the conflict was served."

"Hermione and Ron had the same troubles but they didn't fell off," said Ginny. "Rowed like mad, I admit, but always made up. Quite noisily, I might say." She scrunched her nose in disgust. "You'd think the Head Girl would remember to cast a Muffliato."

"Or to lock a door," he chuckled. "Those two have always been a little careless when they let their hot heads take command. The number of times I walked in on them when we were living at George's flat…" He shuddered. "I ended up Flooing to the shop and announcing my presence stomping up the stairs every time I got back home."

He glanced at Ginny, who for once did not look inclined to take part in further berating their best friends. "A Knut for your thoughts," he said.

"I've always made fun of Ronald's immaturity and, well, he's still a prat, of course, but was I better than him? In the face of adversity, I chose to leave you, too."

"In the face of adversity, I had ditched you before, remember?"

"But that was you being stupidly noble and it did serve your purpose: I was safer. I was simply stupidly worried, madly stressed and insanely jealous. Quite a difference," she said.

"If I hadn't neglected writing to you, you wouldn't have been worried or jealous. I'm afraid your captaincy duties and Hermione's revising schedule are to be blamed for the stress. What was she thinking, beginning to revise on September?" he huffed. "She's lucky I didn't return to Hogwarts. Would've Confunded her every other day into believing I had revised."

"Well, thanks to her, I achieved five NEWTs. Not that the Harpies asked me for them, but one day they'll come in handy. Anyway, jealousy is crap. I'm ashamed I believed Skeeter's shit about you and Lola. She was so glamorous, and I was so insecure, I truly thought I couldn't compete with someone like her." Colour tinted her cheeks as she said that.

"There never was any competition. On our first assignment, she looked down at me and said she wasn't going to change my nappies. Wasn't even impressed by the whole Voldemort thing," he recalled.

Lola Amaya had been a tough but fair mentor and that had suited Harry perfectly. He was already sick of people treating him differently because of all the 'Boy who lived once again' crap. She was one of the foreign Aurors that answered Kingsley's international petition for help. The daughter of a Spanish Roma wizard and a Welsh witch who was traveling on her gap year and never went farther than Granada, her CV was as impressive as her looks. And Rita Skeeter had had a field day when she found about the dark haired beauty that Harry seemed to follow everywhere.

"If anything, I should have been the one worried for competing with her for you! When she got wind of our break, I distinctly recall her saying that if you weren't so bloody gorgeous, she would've gone to Hogwarts to try and knock some sense into you. I think she meant the knocking part literally," he chuckled.

"You should've let her. Maybe then we wouldn't have spent the rest of the school year acting like bloody teenagers," she said, annoyed.

Harry felt exasperated. "Ginny, we were teenagers. Teenagers that were learning to have a relationship while dealing with post war stress, separation and mourning among other things. I was so overworked I didn't write you for days at a time. We had not seen each other since you left for school. Then I got injured and you had to find out from the press, which made it look like I was having an affair with my mentor. If that had happened today, you would've Bat Bogeyed me into next year and gone to do the same to Skeeter, and then we would have returned home and we'd have made chocolate gateau. But that's because we have learned from the past. And anyway," he grinned, "you have to admit, those months apart were also kind of sweet and funny."

Ginny groaned. "Nothing funny about having Dean drooling around me like a puppy begging to be scratched. Until I hexed him on practice, it was insufferable. Mind you, at least that made him focus on the game the rest of the year."

"You think that's insufferable? You try to go on a blind date with your cousin Daisy. I don't know what was Ron thinking, arranging it. Why on earth did I accept? It was worse than the one with Cho, and that's saying something," he said.

"He did it on purpose. Ron gave me hell for ditching you. He made a mission of getting us back. He had no intention of letting you move on, so he consciously arranged the whole thing knowing it would be a fiasco and made you miss me more." She snickered. "What did you love the most, the fact that she had bought the same glasses you wore, or the dessert she had ordered with your names written on the icing?"

"No, that was lame, compared to the fact that she had tipped the reporters and our date was featured on Witch Weekly the following day. That got me out of further plans for dating anyone, for good. Which probably was Ron's intention all along, now that I come to think of it," admitted Harry. "Although I wouldn't put past George to be responsible of the press tip, it sounds like his idea of a prank. But let's talk about awkwardness. I was not the one that seemed to be eleven again on Christmas break…" He did not finish the sentence, but looked devilishly at her.

"Oh, Merlin, that Christmas Day at the Burrow." In spite of the memory, she smiled at last.

"You, putting your elbow in the gravy boat when I talked to you. Priceless."

"Ha! What about you, sneaking into my bedroom to leave broom polish as a secret gift?"

"You never told me if you liked it," said Harry.

"It took all I had to not going downstairs and snogging the daylights out of you," she admitted, blushing. "Now, about embarrassing things: you signed up for Hogsmeade watch every time we had a trip!" accused Ginny.

"Yes, and I persuaded McGonagall to have an Auror squad at every quidditch match, and, oh, guess who was on duty every time Gryffindor played!" said Harry, wiggling his eyebrows.

Ginny shook with laughter. "You could get away with murder with McGonagall's blessing, she can't say no to you. Her face when we finally made up! I hadn't seen her shed a tear until that moment."

"You had the look on you again," said Harry, "although it lasted the moment it took you to fly into the stands and jump on me."

Ginny laughed out. "What a spectacle. McGonagall, waiting to give the Quidditch Cup to the team, crying of joy. Ron and George catcalling, and weirdest of all, my mother telling Hermione to pay up! They had a bet running on when we were going to get back!"

"They weren't the only ones. Savage won the bet at Auror headquarters. I know because he used the money to go on a date with Lola and she told me."

"But I thought she liked women? Didn't she go out with Callie? Or was it Gretchen?"

"Gretchen, actually, but she beats for both teams," he said. "Good old Lola. We should pay her a visit, she wrote to invite us to Ronda. She's stationed there, something about rogue Red Caps from the Civil War battlefields and mass graves, attacking hikers on the hills. Nonetheless, she says the city itself is beautiful and we're welcome to stay at her house."

Ginny hummed in appreciation. "I'd love to go to Spain. We haven't been back since our honeymoon. It's a pity the Harpies moved summer training camp from Almeria to Bulgaria. Viktor can say whatever he wants but I prefer the beaches at Spain. And the food!"

"It's settled, then. I'll owl her later to tell we're visiting," he said.

"Better now than later," she muttered, and giggled one more time.

Harry sighed. "Ginny, are you going to tell me what's up with you? I'm tired of this game."

Ginny turned to look at him, her eyes glinting with mischief. "Not a chance. Tell me another story, Scheherazade."

"Ha, ha." He rubbed his eyes. "Well, not much left now. Next time was more than a year later, on that night at St. Mungo's…"

A/N. I'm aware that Bulgaria has magnificent beaches. But I'm Spanish, so… ;-) JKR wrote that Harry is still friends with Krum years later, so I thought that Harry and Ginny might have visited Bulgaria more than once.

Ronda is a real village in southern Spain, near Malaga. In Spanish Civil War, blood was shed in abundance in both sides of combatants. That's why I located the rogue Red Caps there. Sadly, it's not the only place in my country where they could exist, but at least, it's true that the city is worth a visit.

Although it is now used as an independent name, in origin Lola was a nickname for Dolores, which means 'pains'. Lola Amaya is severe and tough, like Dolores Umbridge, but the similarities end there. Lola suggests a younger, fair personality, while Dolores suggests seniority, severity… Umbridge. :-)