After The End.

Sitting in a quiet corner of the pub in the village closest to The Burrow, Arthur Weasley stared into his third glass of firewhisky of the afternoon, still trying to come to terms with the revelations of that day. The call for him and his wife, Molly, to go up to Hogsmeade had been unexpected, but not as unexpected as the reason for their visit. To discover Ginny had laced some chocolates with love potion and infected half of the seventh years, her brother included, had been the last thing Arthur had expected to hear, and he'd been left horrified and disappointed in his only daughter.

However, the most shocking moment had come when it was revealed that Molly had given their daughter the love potion. Arthur could still picture the guilt in her eyes as she'd stumbled over her excuses. The revelation had chilled him to the bone, and even though he was trying to focus on his two youngest children and the predicament they were in, he couldn't help his mind returning to the moment when he realised his wife was involved in the whole sordid affair.

The thought of her using the potion on him was obviously running through Arthur's mind, and he found himself reliving their courtship. He and Molly had gone to school together, and it would have been impossible for him to miss his wife. She was the beauty of their year, with her curvaceous figure, glistening red hair and warm friendly attitude. In fact Arthur had harboured a crush on Molly for several years before he plucked up the courage to ask her out, during a party held by a mutual friend just before their seventh year. But now Arthur was wondering just how much of that was courage, and how much of it was artificial assistance. Had Molly slipped him the love potion at the party, and if that was the case, would he still have asked her out without the potion in his system, or would he simply have gotten over his crush and moved on with his life? Not knowing was killing him, and as he polished off his firewhisky he knew the time had come to return home and speak honestly with his wife.

With three drinks inside him, more than he usually drank, Arthur wasn't confident about apparating home, so he walked instead. The half hour walk home gave him time to clear his head, and by the time he entered the family home he had a fair idea of what he wanted to know from his wife. Although what would happen after that remained to be seen as until he knew the truth he didn't know how he would want to proceed.

There was no sign of Molly in the kitchen, which was her usual domain, but when he moved through to the living room he found his wife curled up on the sofa. While Molly was no longer crying, it was clear she had been doing so as there were crumpled tissues lying all around her.

"How is Ron?" she asked, sitting up so there was space for Arthur to join her on the sofa.

"Not great," Arthur replied, choosing to sit in one of the armchairs. He noticed Molly visibly wince at his rejection, and while part of him wanted to hold her and assure her that everything would be okay, he was too angry at the moment. "The poor boy is a mess. It's bad enough his sister did this, but then he found out his mother was also involved."

"You told him?" Molly gasped in horror.

"I wasn't going to lie to him," Arthur retorted, the barb clear for his wife to hear.

"He must hate me," Molly sobbed, reaching for a fresh tissue.

"He needed to know the truth," Arthur replied, unrepentant at having told his son the whole truth about the love potion.

"I'll have to explain my side of things to him over the Easter holidays," Molly muttered.

"He won't be coming home at Easter," Arthur informed his wife. "He's going to stay with Harry and Sirius," he explained, jumping in before Molly could protest. "Unsurprisingly, he doesn't want to be anywhere near Ginny. Speaking of which, where is she?"

"In her room," Molly answered. "The poor thing is devastated. I've told her to just give it time and it will all blow over."

"It will not all blow over, Molly," Arthur snapped, annoyed at his wife for failing to see what a big deal this whole situation was. "There is a chance that someone will still go to the Ministry over what has happened."

"The Ministry?" Molly gasped in horror. "But she hasn't broken the law."

"I am sure a father seeking retribution, especially one who wields some influence with the Ministry, could convince them to take some form of action against her," Arthur said. He didn't name names, but he knew that Molly would guess he was talking about Lucius Malfoy.

"You can't let them do that, Arthur," Molly cried. "Please don't let them punish her further."

"If that does happen, it will be out of my hands," Arthur said with a shake of his head. "While Ginny may be my daughter, and I will do everything I can to help her, I couldn't blame any father who chooses to go to the Ministry. If some other girl had done this, we might have been considering stepping in for what Ron is going through. All we can do is pray that no-one decides to take this further."

"Let's hope not," Molly muttered. "And then she can get over it."

"As I said Molly, it is not going away," Arthur snapped. "Even if no-one takes the matter further, what happened won't just be swept under the carpet. There is a chance Ron will never forgive her for this, or Harry for that matter. But even if they do come around and make amends with each other, she will still have the stigma of what she's done to contend with."

"What do you mean?" Molly asked.

"Too many people know what's happened," Arthur reminded his wife. "The whole school knows, and word will spread to parents and other family members. From there, it's only a matter of time before word reaches the wider society. You know how gossip spreads in our world. And then what do you think will happen to Ginny? People who don't even know her will be judging her for her actions. They'll also be judging us for raising her to think that way."

"Who cares what other people think," Molly scoffed defiantly.

"Ginny might when it comes to starting a life for herself," Arthur replied with a sad sigh. "She's going to have a reputation before she even leaves school, and future employers are already going to have an opinion on her. They're going to ask themselves if she can be trusted. Can a girl who resorted to a love potion to win over a boy who wasn't interested in her, be trusted not to use unhand tactics in the workplace? Would she use magic and potions to get ahead in life? Those are the sort of questions people will be asking about her. And that is the sort of reputation she now has to overcome. And like it or not, Molly, you have to take your share of the blame."

"I didn't know this would happen," Molly sobbed, reaching for yet more tissues.

"I should bloody well hope not," Arthur snorted. "I can see you didn't think through the consequences of your little plan. But what I want to know, is why you did it? Why did you encourage her to be so reckless?"

"I didn't think it was reckless," Molly admitted, still sobbing softly. "I thought I was just helping her give Harry a nudge in the right direction."

"And who is to say Ginny was the right direction for Harry?" Arthur muttered with a shake of his head. "I thought it would have been very obvious that he isn't interested in Ginny. He sees her as a little sister, or at least he did before all this happened."

"The potion was just supposed to give him a taste of what it would be like to be with Ginny," Molly said, still defending her actions. "I'm sure that if he'd the chance to see her in a different light then he would have come to his senses. They would be such a lovely couple. They're perfect for each other."

"And what about free will? What about Harry's right to choose?" Arthur demanded. "It wasn't your place, or Ginny's, to make that choice for him."

"We didn't mean any harm," Molly whispered.

"Whether you meant it or not, you still caused harm," Arthur retorted, shaking his head at the fact his wife still couldn't see she'd been in the wrong to give Ginny that potion. "And I guess now is a good a time as any to discuss the potion, and where it came from. Why did you have a love potion Molly? One that dates from the time we got together. Did you use it on me?"

"How could you think that, Arthur?" Molly exploded, jumping to her feet.

"I can think that because you encouraged our daughter to do exactly that to Harry," Arthur shot back. "Now sit down, and tell me the truth, Molly. Unless you want me to walk out that door and never return, you will sit down and answer my questions.

"You would leave me?" Totally stunned, Molly flopped back onto his sofa, seemingly deflating at the very idea of losing her husband.

"Just tell me the truth, Molly," Arthur urged, not answering his wife's question as in all honesty he didn't know how to answer it as despite everything that was happening he and Molly had been married a long time, they had a life together, a family, and more importantly, he still loved her.

"A friend and I brewed it for a laugh," Molly confessed. "She had her eye on a boy who lived nearby, and decided she needed something to help grab his attention. I wasn't going to take any of the potion, but she insisted."

"And have you ever used it?" Arthur asked, well aware that his wife's answer was going to change his life in some form or another. Either she would admit to using it on him, and his whole world would tilt on its axis, or she would deny using it and it would simply be the situation with Ginny he had to deal with, or she could admit to using it on someone else, and then Merlin knows what would happen.

"No," Molly answered with a shake of her head. "But I did come very close," she admitted in a small voice.

"When?"

"That party where you first asked me out. I liked you, but you seemed so oblivious to me. At least as anything more than a friend. One time when I went to get the drinks I was so close to using a splash of the potion. I'd actually mixed a dose with some water and had just added it to your drink when you came over and finally asked me out."

Arthur stared at his wife, trying to decide if she was telling him the truth. Casting his mind back, he replayed asking Molly out for the first time, and her recalled that in her excitement she knocked over the drinks she'd been getting. So if she was telling the truth, his drink with the love potion in had ended up all over the floor.

"That's why you knocked the drinks over," he muttered.

"Yes, I didn't want to risk you drinking it, not when you really liked me," Molly said.

"So why did you keep it then?" Arthur asked. "If you didn't need it for me, why keep hold of it? Were you frightened I would change my mind? Or did you keep it in case you met someone better than me?"

"There is no-one better than you, Arthur," Molly protested. "I kept it as a memento of my youth. I tucked it away, and quite honestly I never gave it a second thought until Ginny's problems began."

Arthur wanted to believe his wife, and while her story of nearly using the potion on him at the party made sense, he still couldn't get his head around the fact she'd kept the love potion for all these years. Despite what she was saying, he couldn't help but think that she kept it for a reason.

"I want you to swear on our children's lives that you've never used that love potion, either on me, or on anyone else," he eventually demanded. "Swear to me you've never used it, and we can move on."

"I swear," Molly replied without hesitation.

"On our children's lives," Arthur urged.

"On our children's lives," Molly repeated. She didn't sound quite as sure of herself now, but the very fact she'd done it was enough for Arthur.

Truth be told, there was still a niggling worry over why she'd kept the potion, but he had to decide if it was worth pursuing. And quite honestly, given she'd sworn on their children's lives, Arthur was content to let it go. Even if his wife had kept the potion for a reason, the important thing was that she'd never used it. At least not until she'd passed it onto Ginny.

And that of course was a very different matter, and one Arthur wouldn't be getting over quite so quickly. It was going to take time to forgive his wife for her part in Ginny's dramas. Although chances were it was also going to take Molly a long time to forgive herself, as Arthur had meant every word he'd said earlier. He predicted a rough ride ahead for their daughter. Thanks to the actions of her and her mother, her life was never going to be the same again. But she had to live with the consequences of her actions, as did Molly. And as for Arthur, he would be there for both of them, as well as for Ron, and he would do everything in his power to give his family all the love and support they would need in the wake of the love potion scandal.

The End.