Chapter Three

At six o'clock on the dot, Ginny turned the key to her flat and stepped inside, locking the door behind her. She dropped her key ring on the side table and walked down the hall, pulling off her scarf and unbuttoning her coat as she did so.

"Harry!" she called, hanging her outerwear in the hall closet and turning on the kitchen lights. "Harry, dear, are you here?"

"Yeah, sorry, Ginny," Harry called from the far room. "I've just got one more paper to go through, then I'll be out."

Ginny smiled at her boyfriend from around the corner. "I'll get something together for dinner, babe."

Harry smiled wearily back. "Thanks so much. You're perfect, Ginny, you know that?"

Ginny felt her breath catch in her throat the way it always did when Harry said things like that. She was never sure whether it was from fear or pleasure. It might have been a combination of the two. "I doubt you'd let me forget it," she responded cheekily as she went to the cabinets, opening and closing doors willy-nilly as she looked for something worth making that she could cook. Eventually she decided to quietly order a pizza, cursing her utter lack of culinary skills. What had happened to so solidly scramble her genetic pattern that she received no cooking talent from Molly Weasley, arguably the best cook in the wizarding world? Ginny doubted she'd ever figure it out.

Just as she completed this thought, she felt a pair of arms slide around her waist. Harry kissed her cheek and rested his head on her shoulder, sighing against her neck. "I'm guessing you got a Chinese?" he asked, and Ginny could hear the smile in her boyfriend's voice.

"It was a pizza this time," she replied, twining her fingers around his and leaning back against him. "I hope you don't mind, but I've got to eat a bit fast tonight."

"Mmm, why is that?" asked Harry, kissing the hollow of her shoulder. "I'd sort of wanted you to myself tonight."

Ginny sighed in wasted anticipation and explained the situation to Harry. "Hermione seemed so desperate for me to go to this painting class with her that I couldn't say no. I told her I'd only go tonight, and even if, Merlin forbid, I decide to keep going with her, it'll only be two nights a week. It's a painting class, Harry. I'll paint you something lovely."

Harry groaned. "I feel like you and Hermione are in more of a romantic relationship than you and I are, sometimes," he chided gently.

"Well, I've never shagged Hermione like I have you," Ginny quipped, "although I might have thought about it."

Harry pulled his head back to look at his girlfriend, his eyes widening. "Really? When was that?"

"Don't get your hopes up," Ginny laughed, gently disengaging herself. "It was during my wild younger days."

"As if you're not wild now," Harry murmured, pulling her against him again. "Come on, Ginny, don't go to the class. Stay at home with me tonight."

Ginny sighed. "Harry, I've spent a lot of time with you lately. I think giving one night to Hermione won't hurt. Besides, the class is only until nine thirty, so I'll be home before you go to bed, most likely."

"Not if Hermione has a choice," Harry said, rolling his eyes. "I'm sure the two of you will be Flooed in by a designated wizard at two in the morning and I'll have to put you both to bed and make you hangover potion in the morning."

"That was one time," Ginny said. "I heard the doorbell ring, dear, so let's get the pizza and have our dinner, all right?"

"All right, darling," Harry said. As Ginny made to head to the door, he caught her wrist and looked into her eyes. "I love you so much, Ginny," he said. "You know that, right?"

"Of course," Ginny replied, her mind going utterly blank for a second at his intensity. "Of course I know that, and I love you too."

Harry smiled warmly and released her. "All right, sous chef, bring out the entree."

At seven fifty-three, the doorbell rang again. Ginny was still putting the finishing touches on a ponytail that she thought looked artsy yet would be prohibitive to paint getting in her hair, so Harry answered the door. She heard his and Hermione's voices drifting up to her room through the open door, the kind of friendly ease that had existed between them for as long as Ginny had known them. She put one more bobby pin into her elaborately-crafted illusion of messiness, slipped on her shoes, and headed down the stairs, right into Hermione's arms.

"Thanks again so much," the brunette gushed to Ginny. "You'll love it, I promise, and if you don't you don't have to come back, I swear."

"I know, Hermione, I know," Ginny replied, patting her friend on the back until they separated. "Now let me say goodbye to my boyfriend."

Harry smiled at Ginny. "Bye, dear. I hope I'm still awake when you get home."

"Bye, Harry," Ginny replied, kissing him lightly and turning back to Hermione.

"She'll be back on time, I promise," Hermione promised, grabbing Ginny's elbow and twisting her into Apparition. The last thing Ginny saw was Harry's smiling face, sending her off again to some weird situation with her best friend.

The two women landed right outside a tall, pale building fronted by two strange gargoyles. Although it might have been forbidding in the dark, the facade was well-lit, and the overall effect was strangely welcoming despite the snarling statues. There was a banner-shaped carving on the front that read "Magic as Art," which somewhat confused Ginny for a moment.

"Hermione," she said slowly, "what exactly is this class?"

"It's a sort of painting with magic type of thing," Hermione explained, dragging Ginny up the steps by the elbow she still grasped. "The instructor is a wizard, and the whole point of the class is to learn how to be creative with your magic in a healthy environment where you won't accidentally injure anyone. It's supposed to relax you, make you more in tune with your magic, and of course make a bunch of art, you know."

Ginny nodded. "To be honest, Hermione, that sounds a lot more interesting than whatever you told me earlier. If you'd said I wouldn't have to actually paint, I would have gone a lot more willingly."

"Well, I can never really predict how you'll act, you know," Hermione replied, pulling open the front door.

Inside was almost as brightly, and certainly as well, lit as the outside. Various works of art hung on the walls; some were definite pictures, some were merely blobs of color, some were clearly magical statues that moved with Hermione and Ginny as they passed through the pale-carpeted atrium and into the stairwell. The front desk was empty; Ginny attributed this to the relative lateness of the hour.

When they reached the third and final floor, Hermione led Ginny down a wood-paneled hallway and through an open door into a bright classroom. The floor was white, as were the walls, but it was difficult to see that initially as all the surfaces were spattered with paint. Easels with canvases and pads of paper were set up all around the room and there were shelves and shelves worth of paint. Ginny could see flashes of every color on tubes, jars, and other containers. A lightly-accented voice floated across the room from behind an easel, where two pairs of feet were visible between the legs.

"...so you see, Mr. Davies, it turns out much more creative if you just let your wand hang loose. We'll learn about that as we begin the term here, I really think you'll like this class."

Just as whomever it was finished this sentence, Hermione brought her foot down awkwardly on the floor and stumbled. The two people behind the easel- who turned out to be men- both looked over the easel to see what had made the noise. Ginny stopped dead for a second.

"Oliver?" she said, looking at the familiar face peering over the canvas. "Is that you?"

"Blimey," said one man, obviously the one who had been speaking before. "Is that Ginny Weasley with you, Hermione?"

"Wow," Hermione said, somewhat comically. "I just thought you were a different Oliver Wood when I signed up."

Oliver laughed and stepped from behind the easel, wiping his hands on a rag hanging out of his pocket. "Nope, the one and only. You're both intrigued by my painting technique, hmm?"

"You could say that," Hermione replied.

"You could not," Ginny muttered, rolling her eyes surreptitiously- or so she thought, apparently, because Oliver turned his gaze to her with a twinkle in his eye.

"So, Ginny, you're not as keen an artist as Hermione," he said, sauntering over to her.

"I don't think so," she said, trying to be gracious. "I mean, Hermione's brought me to a load of art stuff and it's never worked out for me. I guess I just don't have the gift like she does."

"More like the patience," Hermione interjected. "Your stuff was always better than mine when you actually finished it; I just took the time to make mine worth looking at."

"A prodigy," remarked Oliver, glancing back to whomever Davies was behind the easel. "Looks like you're out of a job, Roger."

Ginny craned her neck, trying to see what Roger Davies looked like now, but it was impossible to see him.

"Well," Oliver said, moving back toward the center of the room, "this is actually all the people in the class, so we might as well get started. If you want, you can tell your friends about it, but if we like it this size, maybe we'll just leave well enough alone, huh?"

"Not very professional, is he?" whispered Ginny to Hermione.

"I'd say not very mercenary," the brunette replied rather shortly.

"Well," Oliver was saying, "why don't you all just pick an easel that you like?"

Ginny half-followed Hermione, not wanting to be far away from her, until Oliver called her name. "Ginny," he said, "I think you should probably separate from Hermione. Each of you should have your own space to be creative for a while. Choose a space you like that isn't connected to someone else's area, all right?"

Ginny glared at Hermione, who offered her an apologetic look in return, and wandered to another part of the room, settling at a random easel with a canvas stretched across it. A splotch of blue paint stretched across the floor under her feet, mingling at the edges with other spots of red and yellow. The canvas almost glowed in its pure whiteness in front of her.

"Okay, all," Oliver said, leaning lightly on his own easel in the center of the room, "I guess we can get to work."