Chapter 64

Ginny POV

It had been a long few months.

Demelza was released from the Hospital Wing on Valentine's Day. It had turned out that McLaggen hadn't done anything but threaten to do plenty, and had just scared the girl severely. He'd been given detention for the remainder of the school term and was not to go anywhere near Demelza. Ginny would've liked this extended to not only Hermione, but herself and Katie as well, but she couldn't accomplish that without admitting she'd cast a Bat-Bogey Hex on him, which would likely get her a term's worth of detention as well.

The match against Hufflepuff in February had been close, but Gryffindor had managed to pull out the win thanks again to Harry securing the Snitch before Cedric was able to. Ron had played better, but still not anywhere near what he was actually capable of. Ginny hadn't gotten any playing time, which was not at all surprising. At this point, her getting playing time would mean one of the teammates she was either related to, basically related to, or had gotten close with over the year had something wrong with them, and she certainly didn't want that. She'd play next year, and she was perfectly fine with that.

Both Ron's birthday and Fred and George's birthdays had come and gone. Ron's party was large, but the twins' party was much larger, and got so crazy and raucous that Professor Dumbledore actually came to Gryffindor Tower to reluctantly shut things down at the request of Professor McGonagall, who appeared to be at her wit's end with the twins. Despite the best efforts of the Gryffindor Prefects, Fred and George had spent the spring running a full-blown operation selling their Skiving Snackboxes, with varying results, and Professor McGonagall had let them have it when she had to visit the Hospital Wing for a third time as yet another first year had forgotten to take the purple antidote half of a Puking Pastille. Of course, the angriest of all Gryffindor Prefects at this was Hermione. Ginny wasn't sure if she was angry because of the clear lack of acknowledgement of rules and the well-being of younger students by the twins, or the fact that she was the biggest investor in the twins' company and, by extension, was financing the chaos that had been caused by the Skiving Snackboxes over the past few months. Ginny would have even possibly found the situation funny, if she and Hermione had been talking.

Since the night Katie pulled Ginny out of the library on Valentine's Day weekend, Hermione had avoided her worse than ever before. In addition to that, she'd adopted a new, angry attitude towards Ginny that she could feel nearly a mile away. It was as if she thought Ginny had chosen Katie over her in that moment or something, which wasn't untrue, but Hermione wasn't even giving Ginny the chance to explain. Ginny was again tired of the situation, and figured it was best to just continue giving the older girl space. Especially with her own end of year exams coming up and Hermione's O.W.L.s just a little over a week away, it just wasn't worth it. They'd talk again eventually, they had to.

Even with the distance between the two and Hermione's new angry demeanor whenever Ginny was around, she still couldn't help but fancy her. When Hermione didn't know Ginny was there, Ginny had witnessed on numerous occasions the older girl being extremely caring and nurturing to not only the Gryffindor first years, but any younger students that needed the help of a Prefect. She'd watch her study at her table in the library as Ginny sat at her own table, mostly hidden behind shelves. She'd watch her lips move as she read, her brow furrow as she concentrated. At this point, it was beyond fancying the girl, Ginny figured at this point it was bordering on love for the girl, who was currently refusing to talk to her. Not ideal, but still not enough to stop Ginny fancying the girl. Distance was clearly making the heart grow fonder.

June 1st brought the final Gryffindor Quidditch match of the season, against an unbeaten Ravenclaw side. Winner of the match would win the Quidditch Cup. Ginny had a lot of confidence in the team that they'd pull it off, but they did have to compete with two factors. One being Ron and his utter lack of confidence despite his proven ability in practice, and the second being Harry's still massive crush on Cho Chang. While Cho was a nice girl, Ginny also knew her to be incredibly competitive, and worried she'd use Harry's crush to her advantage in order to win the Quidditch Cup. They'd done all of the training they could at this point, now all they could do is play, and Ginny was hoping that both Harry and Ron would be focused and ready to play at their best.

The locker room speech Angelina gave was short, sweet, and to the point. Go out and do your best, and whatever happens, it's been a great season and a great many years competing for Gryffindor. As they were walking out of the locker room into what would be a loud and sun-filled stadium, Katie grabbed Ginny by the arm and held her back.

"You alright?" Ginny asked.

"I feel amazing… I think we're going to win, I can feel it," Katie said, beaming at the redhead.

Ginny patted Katie on the shoulder pad supportively and the two ran out of the tunnel into the loud and electric stadium where the rest of the Gryffindor team was flying around warming up. Ginny took her usual seat on the Gryffindor bench and waited for the match to begin.

From the start, Ginny could tell it was going to be an intense match. Ravenclaw started off by getting the first 30 points, then Gryffindor rallied back with 50 points, 40 of which were from Katie. She must've really meant what said about feeling amazing, because she was on fire. Ginny looked up into the stands and located Demelza who was positively radiant with pride, which made Ginny smile. She loved that two of her best friends had such a great relationship. Now only if she could figure that out for herself… Beside Demelza were Ritchie and Colin, whose faces were beet red they were cheering so hard. A few rows up from them, Ginny spotted Hermione. Dressed in red and gold, Hermione was cheering along with everyone else in the Gryffindor section. She didn't clap nearly as hard as anyone else when Katie scored, but cheered loudly when Angelina had scored. Ginny found it odd that Hermione disliked Katie so much, most everyone liked Katie. Shrugging it off, Ginny refocused on the game.

Ron had just made a huge save, keeping the score 50-30 in Gryffindor's favor. Katie was speeding down the pitch now, Quaffle in tow. She passed to Angelina, who passed to Alicia, who passed back to Katie, who SCORED! 60-30 Gryffindor! Ginny peered up to see what Harry was doing, and found that he was circling high above the pitch, seemingly trying to keep a good distance away from Cho, who appeared to want to stay as close as possible to him. She was tailing him, not a bad move.

Suddenly, the wheels fell off.

60-40.

60-50.

60-60, they were tied.

60-70, Ravenclaw was up.

60-80, Ravenclaw up by 20.

Ravenclaw just couldn't be stopped as Ron appeared to have lost all faith in himself. They weren't even taking good shots, Ron was just making poor decisions. Then, the unthinkable happened. As Harry was flying down to Ron to likely try and give him a pep talk, Fred swung at a Bludger headed for Angelina, and Harry flew right into the pathway of the Bludger and it's intended target of a Ravenclaw Chaser. Luckily, Madam Hooch was able to slow Harry's fall to the ground, but the damage had been done, and he was out cold.

- TIMEOUT GRYFFINDOR -

As Harry was taken off the pitch on a stretcher, the Gryffindor team all gathered around the bench where Ginny sat.

"Ready?" Angelina asked.

Ginny couldn't believe the turn of events and the fact that she'd now have to be playing Seeker in the game that would decide the Quidditch Cup. That, and her brother was playing terribly, which meant she'd need to catch the Snitch as quick as possible. She was scared, she was nervous, she couldn't believe this was the scenario she was entering into, but she couldn't show any of that. She refused to let her team down, this is why she was there as the reserve, and she could do it, she knew she could.

"Ready," Ginny said with a fierce look of determination on her face.

"Alright, let's go baby sis!" George shouted, clapping her on the shoulder pad hard.

"I promise I won't get you with a Bludger," Fred said with a grin. Everyone gave him a look.

As they walked off and mounted their brooms, Katie came over and ruffled Ginny's hair reassuringly.

"You still think we're going to win now?" Ginny asked, a bit sarcastically.

Katie grinned, "Now I know we will."

Ginny smiled, then they both kicked off the ground into the air. Ginny flew up higher, above the rest of her teammates, until she was level with Cho Chang.

"Alright there Ginny?" Cho called out as she offered Ginny a friendly smile.

Ginny gave her a nervous smile, trying her best to not come off as such.

"Congrats on your first match, too bad it'll be a loss!"

That was all Ginny needed to hear, she had never been more determined to win in her life.

As play restarted, Ginny blew past Cho towards Ron on the other end of the pitch. Cho followed, which is exactly what Ginny wanted. If she could distract Cho and keep her chasing after her, Cho wouldn't have time to locate the Snitch. In the meantime, Ginny had plenty of practice locating objects while flying at top speed, she'd worked on it with Juliette loads of times. She could do this, she'd trained for it.

70-80, Katie had added ten to Gryffindor's score.

80-80, Alicia had leveled it.

Ron made another great save, and another, and another, they were still tied at 80 apiece.

Then, Ginny saw it. Dead center of the pitch about 100 feet up. The Snitch. Ginny took off with her body flat against her Comet 260, pushing herself to fly as fast as she could. Cho was on her tail, and gaining. They were level as they came upon the Snitch, it climbed straight up into the sky as they followed. Ginny saw out of the corner of her eye Cho extend her arm out to reach for the Snitch, just as she did, it darted off to the side, and Ginny lunged, firmly grasping the small golden object. Comet 260 still in hand, Ginny let herself freefall back to the pitch under gravity's influence, pulling up just as she would've crashed into the pitch, and gliding along the grass pumping her fist into the air that had the Snitch firmly trapped inside. She flew to the center ring of the pitch and jumped off of her broom, showing the Snitch to the screaming Gryffindor fans up above her. Then she was tackled to the ground by her teammates. Cheers and tears flowed through the group, the Quidditch Cup belonged to Gryffindor.

Later that evening, after celebrating as a team in the locker room, Ginny and the rest of the team finally made their way up to Gryffindor Tower. Harry had joined them in the locker room, but had been advised that a party in the common room would be too much for him, so he had to return to the Hospital Wing for the evening. As Ginny and the team entered the common room, Ginny wasn't sure she'd ever experienced anything louder and energetic, except for maybe the Quidditch World Cup. Everyone was cheering and screaming, the sea of red and gold was endless, and suddenly, Ginny realized the group was chanting her name.

"Ginny! Ginny! Ginny!"

The twins grabbed her and hoisted her up onto their shoulders to a wild applause. Ginny looked across the crowd and found who she was looking for, Hermione, who was not donning her usual angry look that she'd reserved just for Ginny the past few months. Instead, she was smiling. Proudly, it seemed. Ginny smiled back.

Hermione POV

"Ginny! Ginny! Ginny!"

The Gryffindor common room was exploding with cheers for the Quidditch team, and mostly, cheers for Ginny, their youngest player. Hermione still couldn't believe it. Ginny, as a reserve, entered the game and won it for Gryffindor. She outflew Cho Chang, then after catching the Snitch, plummeted back down to the pitch in what was arguably one of the most dangerous, stupid, and incredibly attractive bits of flying prowess Hermione had ever seen. Even with all of the anger Hermione had been holding onto towards the girl after she abandoned her in the library months ago immediately after Hermione told her she'd broken up with Juliette, she couldn't help but be proud and incredibly drawn to the girl in the center of the room. She'd won the Quidditch Cup for Gryffindor, and she'd shown the whole school what a phenomenal Quidditch player she is. The hard work the redhead had been putting in was showing, and Hermione was proud. Ginny caught her eye from the shoulders of her brothers, and Hermione smiled. Ginny smiled back.

Everyone wanted to congratulate Ginny. And by everyone, it meant everyone. Hermione wanted to talk to Ginny and congratulate her herself, but she didn't want to get in the way of all of the attention the younger girl was getting. After waiting for a while, Hermione decided to go up to her dormitory for a bit to hopefully let the crowd thin out, she'd try to talk to the younger girl then.

As she walked up the stairs and made her way down the hall to her dormitory, she noticed the fourth year dormitory door was cracked open. That was odd, as the door to Ginny's dormitory was almost never open. Ever. As Hermione walked by, she softly opened the door a little bit further so she could look inside the room. In the center of the room was Demelza, wrapped up with someone just a bit taller than her. Hermione froze, and then she nearly lost all feeling in her body when she realized who Demelza was snogging was Katie Bell. As she opened her mouth to say something, anything, a hand clamped over her mouth and the door to the fourth year dormitory was promptly pulled shut. Whoever had her hand over Hermione's mouth was walking her forcefully towards the fifth year dormitory, until they both made their way inside, the door closing behind them. Hermione whipped around, wand out, ready for whoever had forced her into her own dormitory.

"Ginny!"

Ginny was staring at Hermione with cautious, worried eyes.

"Look, I know we're not exactly talking right now, but we have to talk about what you just saw…"

Hermione was completely confused. Why was Ginny being so calm about seeing her girlfriend snogging her ex-girlfriend? Why wasn't she angry or crying or upset at all?

Hermione realized she hadn't yet put her wand down, because Ginny was staring at it, with her hands up. Hermione slowly lowered her wand, and Ginny did the same with her hands.

"It's a secret… They've been together since October, but they don't want anyone to know… You can't tell anyone… Do you understand?"

Hermione stared at Ginny, the younger girl was so serious about this request. She clearly cared about both Demelza and Katie, but Hermione couldn't possibly process anything she said because she'd been operating on the fact, at least what she'd thought was a fact, that Ginny and Katie were together this whole time, not Katie and Demelza.

"Please…? Hermione?"

"Katie and Demelza are together… Have been… For months…?" Hermione asked slowly as she tried to process the information.

"Yes… Is that… A shock to you?" Ginny asked, a look of confusion on her face.

"I… I thought that… You and Katie…"

Realization dawned on Ginny's face, "Wait… You thought that me and Katie were together? This whole time?"

Hermione turned red and nodded. Ginny laughed, which caused Hermione to glare at her.

"Honestly, Ginny, it's not funny!"

Ginny tried to stop herself laughing, but was unsuccessful, "You – You're right… It's not funny… Is this why you've been like this…? So – So angry and distant…?" she asked as she tried to calm herself down, "I can't believe that for so long I thought you were with Juliette, and for longer than that you thought I was with Katie…" Ginny continued to laugh, "What a mess!"

Hermione started to laugh a bit at this point. Ginny was right, what a mess. So many misunderstandings and miscommunications led to a pretty long and exhausting year for the both of them. They could have been together this whole time. Hermione looked over at Ginny, who was looking at her, shaking her head in disbelief and smiling lightly.

"I want you to really hear this, alright?" Ginny said, sitting down on Hermione's bed and beckoning the older girl to sit down as well. Hermione sat beside Ginny, butterflies starting to flutter in her stomach.

"Alright," Hermione said softly, staring into Ginny's bright brown eyes.

"I meant what I said on your birthday. I fancy you, Hermione. Blimey, I fancy you way more now than I did back then, even with all of the time we've wasted this past year. I have not dated anyone else, I have not looked at anyone else, I have not thought anything of anyone else this entire time. I've only been looking at you, Hermione. Ever since I found out that you fancy girls and that I maybe could have a chance with you, it's been you. You, Hermione."

The way Ginny was looking into Hermione's eyes so earnestly, everything she'd just said, and how Hermione could hear the emotion in her voice, she couldn't stop herself. Even if she could stop herself, not in a million years would she have even tried.

Hermione reached out, gently moving Ginny's red hair out of her face, and settled her hand on Ginny's cheek, pulling the girl to her. Just before their lips touched, Hermione paused, looking into the face of the girl she'd fancied for nearly two years now, wanting to commit this moment to memory, and saw that not only was Ginny looking back at her, but she was smiling. Hermione smiled back briefly before she crashed her lips against Ginny's.

The sheer electricity that flowed through their lips and pulsed through Hermione's entire body was nothing close to what she'd ever felt before, not even with Juliette. All of the pent-up emotions and feelings she'd had for Ginny over the past two years came to the forefront, and she put it all into the kiss as she responded to Ginny's lips on her. She wove her fingers into Ginny's hair, pulling her closer to her as she was desperate to be as close as possible to the girl. As if reading her mind, Ginny dropped a hand down to Hermione's leg and wrapped her other arm around Hermione's waist, then gently but firmly shifted Hermione from her seated position on the bed up onto her lap, never breaking the connection between their lips. Hermione wrapped her arms tightly around Ginny as their bodies pressed together, and she couldn't help but let out a small gasp at the sensation, which finally broke their first kiss.

Both breathing heavily, they looked into each other's eyes for a moment, before Ginny smiled her trademark crooked smile. She reached up and pushed Hermione's curls out of her face softly, her hand brushing Hermione's cheek before she returned it to Hermione's waist. Hermione could feel the butterflies in her stomach thumping against her insides. Ginny was so beautiful, she could hardly stand it. She gave Ginny a small smile, then brushed a few strands of red hair out of her face. She brought her other hand up to Ginny's face as well, and gently ran her thumbs across the collection of freckles that ran from the bridge of her nose out underneath her bright brown eyes. She held Ginny's face in her hands for a moment, and smiled a bit bigger as Ginny's smile lit up her whole face. Hermione leaned in to kiss her again, this time much more gently, but somehow with even more passion. Kissing Ginny was so different than kissing Juliette. Juliette was so practiced, so experienced. With Ginny, it was less polished and much more raw – just like Ginny.

After what felt like hours, but was really only a few minutes, they pulled apart, their breathing heavier yet. Both faces were flushed, Hermione's red and gold lines of face paint under her eyes were completely smudged and had smeared onto the freckles of Ginny's face. Hermione could see that Ginny's bright brown eyes had darkened somewhat, and knew that her own eyes must've darkened considerably as well based on how she was feeling. Hermione reached up, trying to wipe the smudged face paint off of Ginny's face as Ginny looked up at her, still smiling. Eventually, Hermione gave up on the face paint, and kissed Ginny's cheeks where it had rubbed off instead. They sat in silence for a while, Hermione still firmly seated on Ginny's lap, until Ginny broke the silence.

"So… What are you thinking, Hermione?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well, for starters, you're always thinking. But what are you thinking about this? Us?"

"I mean I certainly like kissing you, and would love to do it again," Hermione said quickly.

Ginny laughed lightly, "I agree completely. I meant in terms of a relationship. Hermione, I'm all in. But I also know we clearly need to work on our communication skills, because had they been better, we wouldn't have spent the majority of this year essentially torturing ourselves and each other for no reason."

Hermione sat with this. Ginny definitely wasn't wrong. Because they'd refused to just be honest with each other and ask questions and communicate, they'd wasted so much time this past year.

"I'm not at all saying I don't want to be with you, I'm just saying, maybe we take this slow?" Ginny suggested, looking up at the older girl.

"What does that look like to you?" Hermione asked.

"I feel like at least through the end of the term, we just keep this to ourselves? We're both going to be so busy with our studies anyway, we really won't have much time to uh…" Ginny broke off suddenly, smiling sheepishly.

"To what, Ginny?" Hermione asked knowingly, smirking lightly as a blush crept up the redhead's face.

"To do this…" Ginny said, leaning forward to capture Hermione's lips again. Hermione wasn't sure if it was just the fact that it was Ginny and they had so much history, but she'd never felt so much passion in a simple kiss before. Ginny was a fantastic kisser, and Hermione never wanted it to stop.

Once they broke apart, Ginny elaborated, "I mean we'll have to find time to do that… But what I'm saying is, maybe we just spend time together. We can prep for my end of year exams and your O.W.L.s. If we have time we can go down to the lake and walk or just hang out. We can just be together without the pressure of anyone else knowing we're in a relationship. It can just be ours, and we can enjoy it and explore it just the two of us. What do you think?"

Hermione looked down at the girl who was looking up at her nervously.

"That sounds great. I agree. I think we just keep it to ourselves, and enjoy it, just the two of us," Hermione smiled down at Ginny who beamed up at her, before a mischievous look flashed across her face.

"Eh, on second thought, you might be too old for me…" Ginny said seriously before breaking out her crooked smile in reaction to Hermione's shocked and offended face, "I'm just kidding!"

Hermione shook her head, "You're lucky you're so cute…"

"I know," Ginny grinned up at Hermione before pulling her in for one last kiss. As Ginny deepened the kiss, Hermione felt her entire body react to it, and knew that they'd have to make sure to find time for this over the next few weeks before they headed home for the summer.

AN: I want to give a huge shout out to those of you who hung in there with this story over the past 64 chapters, we finally made it! Thank you to everyone who has reviewed, favorited, followed, etc. over the past 6 months, I've really appreciated it! Definitely looking forward to writing the next chunk of this story as the girls have finally figured it out :)