The room went so silent you could hear a pin drop. Ginny felt her stomach fall to the floor. She must have misheard him.

"Dumbledore went to the Ministry to sort it out," Dad continued, looking slightly uncomfortable with everyone gaping at him. "Harry left his house and he and his cousin were attacked by two dementors. Harry used the Patronus Charm to get rid of them and the Ministry expelled him for using underage magic."

"Outrageous!" breathed Mum. She was white as a sheet. "Dementors! Impossible… Is he all right?"

"He and his cousin were unharmed, Molly," said Dad consolingly. "Harry's Patronus easily repelled them."

"Thank God you taught him that spell, Remus!" cried Mum, turning to Lupin. "If you hadn't… if he hadn't known how to defend himself…"

"Where was Dung?" yelled Sirius. He was boiling with rage. "That is exactly why Dumbledore had people from the Order watching him! In case something like that happened!"

"He left his post," said Dad. "We're not sure why yet, but knowing Dung, it was probably something stupid."

Several people swore loudly. Ginny was too shocked to speak and felt on the verge of a panic attack; she stood up hurriedly and turned to stare at the wall. She began fidgeting with her hands and cracking her knuckles without realizing she was doing it; her heart was pounding and her breath was short.

"I am told Figg took Harry back to his aunt and uncle's," Dad continued. "It is imperative he stays there."

"But the Reasonable Restriction of Underage Sorcery!" squealed Hermione. "Surely getting rid of dementors qualifies as an instance where underage magic can be used!"

"Of course it does, Hermione; it's preposterous!" Tonks shrieked. "They can't expel him for this. They can't! Even for Fudge, it's outrageous!"

"Dumbledore never should have put Dung on Privet Drive," snarled Mad-Eye. "He's too unreliable."

"I assume there was nobody that witnessed the dementors other than Harry, since Mundungus left?" said Lupin.

"I assume not, since Muggles can't see them," said Dad. "I'm sure Mrs. Figg and Harry's cousin felt their presence though. Since Figg's a Squib, she would be the only one who could be useful.

"Anyway, we'll know more when Dumbledore comes back. I've already sent a letter to Harry telling him to sit tight, stay in the house, and not do any more magic."

Through her shock Ginny numbly registered how Harry wasn't going to appreciate such an inadequate response to this ordeal, but her thought was interrupted by a bright, silvery something which shot into the room, making them all jump. It was a Patronus, and it took the form of a phoenix and spoke with Dumbledore's voice.

"The decision to expel Harry has been overturned. He will attend a hearing on the twelfth of August where a final decision will be made."

The Patronus dissolved and the room let out a collective breath.

"He has to attend a hearing?" said Ron. "He should win that easily. He didn't do anything wrong."

"And that should give us time to prep Mrs. Figg," said Dad. "Hopefully she'll be willing to testify."

"We'll make her," growled Mad-Eye.

"What were dementors doing in Little Whinging?" said Ron suddenly. "I mean, that's basically a Muggle town, right? Isn't Harry the only wizard that lives there?"

"Your guess is as good as ours, Ron," said Dad. "And yes, Harry's the only wizard there."

Sirius got up abruptly. He wrenched open a drawer in a nearby table, withdrew some parchment and ink, and quickly wrote a letter.

"Is that to Harry?" said Dad apprehensively.

Sirius nodded.

"Make sure you tell him —"

"— to be a good boy and stay in the house?" said Sirius angrily. "You think that's a reasonable response to what's happened?"

"No I don't, Sirius, but we don't have a choice, Dumbledore explained —"

"Oh, fine," he snapped. He looked, if possible, even more livid than before. He crumpled up the first letter and tossed it aside, then promptly scribbled out another one, this time very short. He hustled out of the kitchen, slamming the door behind him.

It took Ginny awhile to recover from her near panic attack, and only when Sirius returned from mailing his letter and poured them all drinks did she feel like going to bed.

Nobody except Ginny felt like doing any cleaning the following day (she wanted a distraction), and Hermione spent the morning poring over books in their room. As Ginny didn't want to decontaminate the attic by herself, she went back to her other routine: reading Quidditch books.

"See!" Hermione burst out suddenly, jabbing at her book. "Right here! In the Decree for Reasonable Restriction on Underage Sorcery! Magic can be used by those underage in life threatening situations! They can't expel him if they abide by their own laws. The question is will they?"

"Dad reckons there's still enough sane people that aren't total Fudge bootlickers in the Magical Law Enforcement office to prevent Harry from being expelled," said Ron.

"But Dumbledore had to intervene just to get them to change their mind on expelling him right away!" said Hermione anxiously.

Ginny had just spent most of the morning convincing herself that Harry was almost guaranteed to be cleared at the hearing, but found Hermione's anxiety to be highly contagious. She got up to leave the room.

"Where are you going, Ginny?" said Ron.

"I'm hungry, I'm getting an early lunch," she responded.

"Can you bring me a sandwich?" Ron said hopefully.

"I'm not a house elf," she hissed. She caught Hermione glaring at her before she turned and walked out. To her surprise, Hermione seemed to be the only one worried that there was a decent possibility of Harry getting expelled. Sirius and Dad agreed that there was simply no basis at all for it, that Harry was well within his rights to defend himself from the dementors, and there were still enough people not corrupted by Fudge at the Ministry that would hear Harry out. This made Ginny feel better, and in a couple days Ginny felt back to normal, or at least what was now considered "normal" for her.

"Harry's coming on Friday," said Sirius at breakfast on Wednesday as Ginny, Hermione, Ron, Fred, and George sat down at the table. "Dumbledore finally relented."

"About bloody time," said Ron.

"We should be able to finish the attic today," said Sirius. "We'd probably be finished with it already if it weren't for that stupid house elf."

Ginny glanced at Hermione, and she saw her give Sirius a stern look.

"You know," she said tentatively, "if we were all a bit nicer to him, he might be nicer to us."

"You sound just like Dumbledore," said Sirius resentfully. "He's always going on about how I'm too hard on him and whatever."

"But he grew up with Death Eater sympathizers," pressed Hermione relentlessly. "Of course he's going to repeat their tropes, it's all he's been exposed to, which is why maybe he'd start being more sympathetic to us if we treat him —"

"Give it a rest, Hermione," said Ron.

Hermione gave Ron a very dirty look, and Sirius merely said, "You try living here with nothing but that pest for company, then we'll talk."

Once they finished cleaning the attic, Sirius moved Buckbeak up there temporarily so they could clean the master bedroom. This turned out to be much less labor intensive than the attic, as it seemed Sirius had already cleaned some of it himself.


Friday morning arrived, and the five of them went down to breakfast, looking forward to getting the bedroom fully decontaminated, which Ginny thought should be accomplished before lunch.

"Ron, what happened to your hands?" said Ginny. When Ron went to take a bite of food, Ginny noticed his hands looked like they had a lot of bite marks on them.

"Harry's bloody owl," said Ron angrily. "Pecked me and Hermione silly when she got here with Harry's letters. He was demanding answers on everything and we can't give them. According to Dad, Dumbledore doesn't want us sending any more letters to Harry at all, since he's arriving tonight anyway."

Ginny could tell Ron, Hermione, and Sirius were all fed up with Dumbledore.

After completing the decontamination of Buckbeak's room, they spent the rest of the day relaxing as best they could. Ginny was feeling a sense of cabin fever. As dreary as the house was, she was at least glad that it was big, which helped keep the boredom and claustrophobia down slightly. They still had almost an entire month before school started. Ginny could not have imagined a more miserable summer if she tried. Of course, Harry would probably have something to say about that if she happened to voice that opinion when he got here…

Ginny's thoughts were interrupted by a knock on the door, and Mum entered.

"How's everyone doing?" she said warmly. Everyone shrugged and grunted in response. "Now that you've finished cleaning the attic and the master bedroom, tomorrow we'll start on the drawing room. Just don't open the writing desk, I'm waiting for Alastor to come by and see what's in it first, as it's always rattling and shaking."

There was a lot of the usual grumbling at this, but Ginny found herself indifferent.

"Dinner's going to be late tonight, so if you want, come on down to the kitchen and grab some snacks." Everyone was feeling rather hungry, so Ginny and the others hurried down to the kitchen at once. Ginny grabbed a sandwich off the table and shoved it down before she had even figured out what kind of sandwich it was.

Ginny spent the evening alone in her room, playing with Crookshanks and reading books. Shortly past nine, there two loud cracks which announced the arrival of Fred and George. Ginny was so used to this by now she didn't even flinch.

"Hey Gin, guess what?" said Fred gleefully, holding up a pair of Extendable Ears. "The Order's having a major meeting tonight, we thought it'd be a good opportunity to break out the old Extendables again. It's worth the risk, everyone's gonna be here."

Ginny suddenly remembered what Tonks told her.

"Good idea! That reminds me — you got any Dungbombs?"

"Dungbombs?" said George curiously. "Certainly sis, of course we've got Dungbombs. You want some?"

"Yeah."

"We'll get you some." They Disapparated and, a couple loud cracks later, returned with a bag full of Dungbombs and handed them to Ginny.

"Thanks," she said.

She snuck down to the ground floor, which was now completely dark as the sun had gone down.

"Lumos," she said, igniting her wand tip, and she headed toward the end of the hall, stopping at the top of the stairs leading to the kitchen. She retrieved a Dungbomb from her bag, but just before she was about to fling it at the door below, she heard a chain rattle and the front door click open: Order members were arriving for the meeting. Not wanting to be caught, she hurried off to the bathroom to wait.

She heard stairs creaking as people walked down to the kitchen, and once it sounded like the last person had entered the meeting, she opened the bathroom quietly and looked around. The hallway was now completely empty, though the gas lamps along the wall had been lit and the hallway was now bathed in a dull light. She put out her wand light and retrieved some Dungbombs from her bag, lining them up at the top of the stairs. One by one, she flicked them down toward the kitchen door. Sure enough, the Dungbombs soared away from it and didn't make contact. The door was Imperturbed and the Extendable Ears were useless.

Ginny heard muffled shouting coming from up the stairs, and she knew at once what the source was: Harry had arrived, and by the sound of it, he was just as angry as she expected him to be. With a jolt she heard the kitchen doorknob rattle, and she hurried back to the bathroom before whoever it was opened the door and saw her.

To her annoyance, it turned out whoever had left the meeting needed to use the bathroom. Ginny felt stupid; she thought she should have expected that and hid elsewhere.

"I'm in here!" she said as a knock sounded on the door.

"No problem," came Lupin's voice. Ginny flushed the unused toilet, pretended to wash her hands, and then opened the door.

"Something wrong with the bathroom upstairs?" asked Lupin seriously.

"Yeah, it smells really bad," she invented. "Fred's doing. Or George. Not sure."

Lupin could not hold back a laugh. Ginny wished she were still capable of laughing. She quickly went back upstairs and heard voices outside of Ron's room. Ginny opened the door and walked in.

There was Harry, along with Ron, Fred, George, and Hermione. They all looked at her when she entered. Harry looked very bad tempered, Hermione's bushy hair seemed frizzier than usual, and Ron looked like he'd recently been clubbed over the head.

"Oh hello, Harry!" said Ginny. "I thought I heard your voice." There was no blushing, no nervousness, no embarrassment, no butterflies, no nothing. She was dead inside.

Hermione gave her a very strange look; it seemed like a mixture of quizzical and sad. Ginny looked away from her sharply and turned her attention to Fred and George.

"It's no go with the Extendable Ears, she's gone and put an Imperturbable Charm on the kitchen door."

"How d'you know?" said George, looking crestfallen.

"Tonks told me how to find out. You just chuck stuff at the door and if it can't make contact the door's been Imperturbed. I've been flicking Dungbombs at it from the top of the stairs and they just soar away from it, so there's no way the Extendable Ears will be able to get under the gap."

Fred sighed. "Shame. I really fancied finding out what old Snape's been up to."

The six of them chatted for a little bit, though Ginny didn't say a whole lot. She took a seat on one of the beds while her brothers filled Harry in on Bill and Fleur's new romance and the family row with Percy. Harry was prone to lash out and Ron and Hermione seemed nervous about saying anything that would set him off. Their conversation ended when they heard Mum's footsteps coming towards the door.

"Uh-oh," said Fred, and he and George Disapparated. Mum opened the door.

"The meeting's over, you can come down and have dinner now, everyone's dying to see you, Harry. And who's left all those Dungbombs outside the kitchen door?"

"Crookshanks," said Ginny at once. "He loves playing with them."

"Oh," said Mum, "I thought it might have been Kreacher, he keeps doing odd things like that. Now don't forget to keep your voices down in the hall. Ginny, your hands are filthy, what have you been doing? Go and wash them before dinner, please…"

Ginny grimaced at the others and followed Mum out the door. How could she have screwed up that badly? Luckily Mum didn't seem to put two and two together, but if she knew how dirty Dungbombs were, she would have. Ginny thought about how she had just been in the bathroom and, for whatever stupid reason, didn't wash her hands. She had even turned the water on to make Lupin think she was, but didn't actually do it. What caused such foolish, careless stupidity? A part of her still knew the answer, but she no longer acknowledged it.

Ginny washed up at the kitchen sink and took a seat at the table. There was a greenish, hazy smoke hanging in the air from Mundungus Fletcher's pipe, which gave off an acrid smell of burning socks. Mundungus was asleep in one of the kitchen chairs, his hat covering his face, and his extremely shabby and baggy clothing made him indistinguishable from a large pile of old rags. Sirius, Dad, and Bill were the only ones there, aside from the sleeping Mundungus. Bill and Dad were poring over some parchment that looked like building blueprints and muttering to one another.

"Hi, Ginny," said Dad, looking at her and smiling. Before Ginny had a chance to respond, there was a loud crash that came from the hallway upstairs. Sirius swore loudly, knowing what was coming.

"Tonks!" Ginny heard Mum's exasperated voice upstairs.

"I'm sorry!" wailed Tonks. "It's that stupid umbrella stand, that's the second time I've tripped over —"

The earsplitting shrieks of Mrs. Black's portrait reached their ears. Sirius hurried out of the room to go shut her up. Even through the shrieking of the portrait Ginny could hear Sirius yelling back at her, nearly matching her in volume.

Silence fell again as Sirius had evidently managed to shut the curtains over the portrait. A moment later he returned to the kitchen, followed by Harry, Mum, Lupin, and Tonks, respectively. Tonks smiled sheepishly at the rest of them when she entered, clearly embarrassed by being responsible for the tumult. Dad jumped to his feet.

"Harry!" he said, rushing over to him and wringing his hand. "Good to see you!"

Bill hastily rolled up the parchments he and Dad had been examining.

Ginny kept herself busy by helping set up the table prior to food being served, and things proceeded as normal until Fred and George accidentally bewitched a cauldron of stew, a flagon of butterbeer, and a breadboard with a knife to zoom across the table. The butterbeer fell to the floor with a crash while the knife went flying and came very close to stabbing Sirius in the hand.

"FOR HEAVEN'S SAKE!" screamed Mum. "THERE WAS NO NEED — I'VE HAD ENOUGH OF THIS — JUST BECAUSE YOU'RE ALLOWED TO USE MAGIC NOW YOU DON'T HAVE TO WHIP YOUR WANDS OUT FOR EVERY TINY LITTLE THING!"

"We were just trying to save a bit of time!" said Fred, hurrying forward and wrenching the bread knife out of the table. "Sorry Sirius, mate — didn't mean to —"

Sirius, though, wasn't angry at all. In fact, he and Harry had a good laugh about it, and Fred and George looked relieved. Mundungus had fallen off his chair and got back up, swearing, while Crookshanks, who had been sitting on Sirius's lap, hissed loudly and streaked under a dresser.

"Boys," Dad said, lifting the stew back into the middle of the table, "your mother's right, you're supposed to show a sense of responsibility now you've come of age —"

"— none of your brothers caused this sort of trouble!" Mum raged at the twins, slamming a fresh flagon of butterbeer onto the table and spilling almost as much again. "Bill didn't feel the need to Apparate every few feet! Charlie didn't Charm everything he met! Percy —"

She stopped dead, catching her breath with a frightened look at Dad, whose expression was suddenly wooden.

"Let's eat," said Bill quickly.

"It looks wonderful, Molly," said Lupin, ladling stew onto a plate for her and handing it across the table.

Things went back to normal. Ginny sat by Hermione and Tonks, who once again entertained them with face-morphing while they ate. Bill, Dad, and Lupin discussed goblins while Ron, Fred, and George laughed heartily with Mundungus, who was telling stories of his shady business dealings. Ginny heard Sirius talking to Harry, who were both sitting just across from her. From what she could overhear, Sirius was complaining about being cooped up. Ginny could hardly blame him, as she had been feeling the same way. After she finished eating, she plopped herself down on the floor and started rolling butterbeer corks for Crookshanks to chase, who she had managed to coax out from under the dresser. The conversations started being replaced by yawns as the hour got late and things wound down.

"You know, I'm surprised at you," Ginny heard Sirius saying to Harry, not sounding sleepy at all. "I thought the first thing you'd do when you got here would be to start asking questions about Voldemort."

Everyone heard him, and in an instant, the room had become as quiet and tense as it was when Dad had announced Harry's expulsion from Hogwarts.

"I did!" said Harry indignantly. "I asked Ron and Hermione but they said we're not allowed in the Order, so —"

"And they're quite right," said Mum. "You're too young."

She was sitting bolt upright in her chair, her fists clenched upon its arms, readying herself for a fight.

She got one. Her and Sirius snapped back and forth heatedly over giving Harry information about Voldemort and the Death Eaters that he had so desperately been yearning for ever since being sent back to Privet Drive, and Mum tried her hardest to resist, pulling both the "Dumbledore" and "I care about Harry and I'm doing this for his own good" cards. At one point, Lupin had to step in and keep the peace. Unfortunately for Mum, however, nobody was very sympathetic to her at all, not even Dad, and she finally relented. Fred and George also got to stay, because they were now legally adults and couldn't be bossed around anymore. It was now just Ginny, Ron, and Hermione who had to leave.

"Harry'll tell me and Hermione everything you say anyway!" Ron told Mum heatedly. "Won't — won't you?" he added uncertainly, looking at Harry. Harry hesitated for a moment.

"'Course I will," he said finally.

"Fine!" Mum seethed. "Fine! Ginny — BED!"

Ginny felt her blood boil. Of course this would end with just her leaving! What other outcome could she possibly have expected? That was the way life treated her now. She almost laughed out loud at the injustice. It wasn't the fact that she wouldn't get to hear anything interesting that enraged her — Hermione would tell her everything anyway — it was the fact that it was just another reminder that she was not part of the "golden trio". She had hoped getting closer to them during their time at Grimmauld Place would improve her situation, but no. She was still just stupid little Ginny, Ronnie's ickle sister, too young and delicate to be allowed in on anything important, as if she'd break into a million pieces if she so much as heard Voldemort's name. It went through her like a white-hot knife. If Mum had a clue about what the past five weeks had been like for her, she'd realize whatever they were about to discuss would pale in comparison.

"I WILL NOT!" she yelled at Mum, folding her arms.

"You will do as you're told!" Mum said furiously. "And you will not make a scene or you will be sorry!"

Ginny didn't move. Mum managed to grab her as Ginny attempted to swat her away; she hauled her to her feet and practically dragged her out of the room and up the stairs.

"IT'S NOT FAIR!" Ginny screamed as soon as they left the kitchen, nearly tripping over the stairs as she looked back to rage at her mother behind her. "I'M ONLY A YEAR YOUNGER THAN HARRY!"

"You're still thirteen!"

"I'll be fourteen in less than a week!"

"STILL TOO YOUNG! I tried to stop Harry too if you didn't notice! I was overruled!"

"BUT WHY?! WHY ARE YOU SO DETERMINED TO KEEP EVERYTHING FROM US?"

"Because I am your mother and I care about you! And I care about Harry! There are things we know you can't even imagine —"

Ginny scoffed so loud it was almost a cackle. Mrs. Black's portrait began wailing again as they reached the hall, and Mum prodded Ginny along to the stairs leading up to the first-floor landing, ignoring it.

"YOU DON'T CARE ABOUT US! YOU ARE JUST ON A POWER TRIP!" Ginny screeched at the top of her lungs, making Mrs. Black's screams sound like a pleasant lullaby. She couldn't remember a time when she was more enraged than she was right now. Over a month's worth of bottled-up misery was bursting forth and she couldn't stop it.

"GINEVRA WEASLEY, HOW DARE YOU!" cried Mum as they stomped up the stairs. "DUMBLE —"

"HOW DARE ME? HOW DARE YOU HUMILIATE ME LIKE YOU DID DOWN THERE IN FRONT OF EVERY —"

"I DID NOT HUMILIATE YOU! YOU THROWING A CHILDISH TANTRUM IS WHAT IS HUMILIATING! THIS IS NOT HOW YOU WERE RAISED, YOUNG LADY! YOU'RE BEING ABSOLUTELY RIDIC —"

Ginny interrupted her with a shriek of deranged laughter as they reached her bedroom.

"Get into bed, no talking!" Mum fumed at her. Ginny stood at the foot of her bed, shaking with rage at her mother, who glared back at her intensely from just in front of the door. "One day you'll see this from my point of view and understand —"

"I HATE YOU!"

Mum's lips quivered for a moment, then she walked out and slammed the door so hard the room shook. Ginny threw herself on the bed and started crying.