Chapter Fourteen

"Hey, Harry," Ginny called as she shut the front door behind her. She had needed to take an all-day shift, as she did occasionally when Verity or Ernie couldn't come in, so Harry should have gotten in before her. As she turned around, unbuttoning her coat, she suddenly smelled something. It was a fairly light smell - coming from the kitchen, she hoped - so she couldn't quite make out what it was. She tiptoed through the hallway, around the corner, and into the kitchen, and gasped.

Harry, who hadn't heard her due to the headphones he was wearing, was standing at the stove, stirring something in a pot with one hand and holding a cookbook in the other. "I doubt she'll know whether I use magic or not," he muttered, and Ginny stifled a giggle. "This is ridiculous."

He continued to stir the pot, but he put the cookbook down and felt around blindly on the counter until he found a bottle of some kind of spice; Ginny couldn't tell what kind. He shook it over the mixture deliberately before setting it back on the counter; however, he had placed it too close to the edge without realizing it and it wobbled and fell off. The scene changed instantly as Harry froze, his gaze traveling rapidly from the pot to the bottle tumbling off the counter. Ginny couldn't control her laughter any more as her boyfriend's jaw dropped comically and she chuckled aloud as the parsley spilled all over the floor.

Harry's head whipped around as her laughter finally reached his ears, face still frozen in hilarious surprise at the spilled spices. Ginny walked over to him, carefully avoiding the parsley, and took the headphones from his ears. "You made dinner for me?" she asked, still grinning from her laughing fit.

Harry nodded, reaching into his pocket and turning off his music. "Yeah," he sighed. "I guess it just isn't turning out too well."

Ginny peered into the pot. Inside was a mysterious reddish sauce, and she could smell meat in the oven. Probably chicken. "It's the thought that counts, baby," Ginny said, kissing Harry soundly. "You're such a nice boyfriend."

"It's easy when your girlfriend is perfect," Harry replied, smiling and pulling out his wand. He waved it and vanished the parsley on the floor. "I guess we'll have to get new … whatever that stuff is called."

"Parsley," Ginny supplied, turning off the stove. "I think your sauce is burning, honey."

Harry smacked his forehead. "And I was trying so hard," he groaned. "Well, we could just season the chicken."

"Sounds perfect," Ginny smiled. "I'll make a vegetable; I'm sure we've got something in the freezer. Unless you feel like being a complete saint and making it yourself…"

"I am a saint," Harry said, smirking and kissing Ginny on the cheek. "You just sit back and watch."

"You're perfect," Ginny said, smiling back and sitting on one of the kitchen chairs, putting her feet up on another one. "I think you've got some great reward sex coming up for you this evening."

Harry had started to light up when she mentioned his perfection, but as Ginny finished her second sentence, she thought her boyfriend's smile was going to crack right through his face.

"I know this is terrible pillow talk, but I just remembered that Oliver invited us to the Puddlemere United game on Saturday," Ginny sighed, running her hand up her boyfriend's stomach and curling her fingers into a fist on his chest. "He said he could get tickets for you and I and Hermione and Ron. And George too. He's a nice guy."

"Yeah, I can tell," Harry agreed, laughing. "Yeah, all right. But that's tomorrow, right? Or later today? Do you want to go?"

"Yeah, a little," said Ginny. "I haven't been to a match since that rubbish club league I was in. And Oliver said he'd get tickets for us, not that it really matters."

"It's a bit late in the game to get back to him about it, though," Harry murmured, kissing Ginny's forehead.

"That's the thing," Ginny said slowly. "I sort of already wrote and told him we were coming. I just assumed you would want to go."

Harry was silent for a moment, and then he chuckled. Ginny could feel his laughter through his chest. "You're insane, you know that?" he said, still laughing. "You're basically the best girlfriend ever. Sex every night I want it, free Quidditch games…"

Ginny started laughing. "Sooner or later you'll realize I have flaws," she said. Then, her voice a little quieter, she continued. "I just… I don't know, I wanted to do something. I feel like sometimes things are a little routine with us, Harry. I thought even something little might shake things up enough. You know, we wake up, go to work, come home, have dinner, have sex, go to bed, wake up, go to work, over and over again. Going to the game might start something in us again. Kick start things."

There was another silent moment. Ginny waited with somewhat bated breath; Harry sometimes took things so personally that it wasn't always worth it to bring something up unless it was important. "Yeah," Harry sighed finally, and Ginny looked up at him. He was staring, rather empty-eyed, at the ceiling. "You're probably right. I'm sorry I'm so boring, Ginny."

"No, that's not-" Ginny began, but Harry was still talking so she let him finish his thoughts.

"You'd think that since I had such an exciting life in school, things would be the same now." Harry laughed, and the sound was anything but mirthful. "I guess I thought I had had enough excitement. I thought I wanted to have a more sedate time, with the woman I love, living together. To me, you're all the adventure I need or want anymore. But it does make sense that you'd want more, Ginny. You're different than I am. You're more lively. And I love that about you, I don't want to squash it out of you."

Ginny sighed. She remained silent for a moment, collecting her thoughts. She did want more variety, but she didn't want it from someone who didn't want it himself. "Look, Harry, I'm sorry," she said. "I didn't mean to make you feel like anything was wrong with you."

"No, I know," Harry interrupted, and Ginny sighed huffily. He ignored her, however, and continued. "I'm not mad at you. I'm more mad at myself than anything else. I'll fix myself for you, Ginny. I promise. I'll be better for you."

"I don't need you to be better," Ginny said, "and you don't need fixing or anything. I'm just saying I thought it might be nice if we start doing things again." But Harry didn't reply, and neither of them said anything else that night.