Stephanie O requested a follow up to Chapter 31- Cat Person.

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Cut and Run

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"Is he still following us?" she asked him.

Harry looked over his shoulder again, it wasn't hard to pick out Ron's bright orange hair, even when there was only a bit of it poking out from beneath his knitted hat. One would think the maroon hat would be the first thing noticed, but no, it was still the hair that shone like a beacon. "Yep, still following us."

She let out an audible sigh. "Well, this date is now nowhere as fun as I had expected it to be. He's been following us for an hour."

Harry grinned. "And what exactly did you have planned for us to get up to had your brother not been tailing us this whole time?"

She swot at him gently. "Nothing like that!"

"Nothing like what?" he asked, grabbing her hand and pulling her over to the corner of the store.

They were in Zonko's and the store was completely packed with the lower classmen. Generally the chaos was a bit of a nuisance because the younger students were so much louder and crazed, in this case though, it helped him keep an eye out for where Ron was lurking, since he was a full foot taller than everyone else. Had Zonko's still been considered the 'cool' spot to visit for the sixth and seventh years then Ron wouldn't have stood out so much.

"Nothing like what you currently have planned in that devious little mind of yours." She said it as though she didn't want him tucking her away in a small corner of the store for a quick kiss, but she wasn't putting up a fight about him guiding her toward one.

"I don't know what you mean. Aren't we out in public together to let everyone know that we're dating now?" He leaned down and gave her a quick peck on the lips.

"That's the label you're giving to it, is it? Just dating?" she raised her eyebrow.

"What would you call it?"

"Well, I certainly wouldn't let someone I'm 'just dating' sneak into my bed and do what we got up to the other night."

It was dangerous of her to bring that up when they were packed into a place like this, surrounded by thirteen and fourteen-year-olds. That night had been fantastic, one he wanted a repeat of as soon as she would let him.

He felt his face warming up at the memory of it and could see from her expression that he was likely turning red at the collar, and she was enjoying that she'd made it happen.

"Tread carefully, Ginny, or I'm likely to throw you over my shoulder and carry you off somewhere much more private."

She reached up to thread her fingers through his hair and down his neck, then pulled him closer to her by the front of his shirt. "Don't tempt me," she said before kissing him properly.

This was the first time they were kissing in public, but they might as well have been in the middle of nowhere for how his hearing had suddenly vanished at the feel of her lips on his like this again. Three nights ago was when he'd been in her bed, but it felt like ages, and they hadn't been able to sneak off together since then either; he missed her, even though she'd been around him plenty it just wasn't the same, or enough.

"I missed you," he whispered between kisses and pulled her closer.

"Oi! Quit pawing at her!" Ron's voice cut into their private moment. He was now moving through the crowd of other students to get closer to them.

"Oh, for fuck's sake," Ginny groaned and stepped back. "Ron, if you would pay any attention to your own girlfriend then you would have something better to do than follow us around."

"You think I'm leaving you alone with him?"

"What 'alone'?" she asked. "We're in a store surrounded by people, what do you think we were going to get up to?"

"From where his hands were about to wander, I'd say he was ready to carry on plenty."

Harry knew he couldn't say anything, but he wanted to jinx Ron just then and stick him to the ceiling of this joke shop until someone else freed him. Which would likely be a while given how annoying he was.

"Be grateful you didn't see where my hands were then," Ginny told him. "And since I've had to suffer through the sight of you and Hermione snogging on the common room couches several times, you've got no leg to stand on here."

"Hey! Hermione is a nice girl, and I treat her right! You can't tell me he's going to treat you right!"

That accusation didn't sit well with him. "Hey! I've always been nice to her and I plan to continue doing so."

"Oh please, you've had how many girlfriends?"

"About the same number as I have had boyfriends!" Ginny spat at him. "I don't remember you tailing me when I was dating any of them, so what's your problem with him?"

"I room with him! I know what he's like."

"And you plan on continuing to follow us all day reminding us of that, do you?" Harry asked dryly.

"Yeah, I do. No one can say I don't have her best interests in mind."

Harry opened his mouth to say something about how he had her best interests in mind too, but Ginny reached behind her and took a display can of Geronimo's Goo and opened it in her brothers face. The goo burst out of the can and encased Ron in a Jello like substance from the floor to his nose and would keep him stuck there for 1-5 minutes. It had been a long time since Harry had seen anyone use one of those joke products; they were entertaining the first few times used, but then the joke got old after that. It worked perfectly in this situation though.

"I can take care of my interests all on my own," she snarled at Ron. "Come on, Harry." She grabbed his hand and dragged him out of the store.

"I like that you're so quick on your feet," he grinned. Seeing a shimmering amber Ron stuck in place and the stupid look on his face wasn't supposed to be the highlight of their date but it certainly was entertaining.

"And I like that we have time to disappear somewhere else before he breaks free of that and keeps tailing us. So, time for you to think on your feet; where to next?"

"Depends, are you hungry?"

She looked up and down the street. There were several places to eat that she could choose from.

"This place is packed with Hogwarts students," she pouted. "Can you think of anywhere that we won't wind up being noticed? I think we've made a big enough announcement that we're 'dating'."

He understood where she was coming from. He'd taken a date to every one of the eatery spots in Hogsmeade, and not a single one of them was private enough. He was over the crowd and wanted to escape the noise and prying, gossip-mongering eyes as well.

But where could they go?

He wasn't ready to head back to the school and pop down to the kitchens so they could scrounge up something for a picnic.

"I'm seventeen!" he said suddenly.

She turned to look at him like he was crazy. "Er, congratulations?"

"No, I mean, I've got my Apparation license. We can go anywhere, we don't have to stay in Hogsmeade. I could take you to Edinburgh or Inverness. Oh! There's this little pub one the North end of Isle of Kyle with great seafood."

Her eyes lit up and he knew this was a fantastic suggestion. "Wouldn't we stand out a bit? Wouldn't we need Muggle money for that?"

"No, and yes. We're dressed just fine for this, and I've got Muggle money. Remember, my mum is from a Muggle family, I've gone into the Muggle world plenty of times."

"And you are sure you can Side-Along me?"

"Absolutely!" He wrapped his arm around her and pulled her close. "Just don't you try any funny business while I'm trying to concentrate," he warned her as a joke.

He closed his eyes and thought of the waterway close to the main road in Inverness, just at the corner of an old watch building where they could appear and anyone that might see them could assume they'd just come around the corner of the building.

He spun on the spot once he felt he'd got it just right and they disappeared from the streets of Hogsmeade.

Ginny chuckled when they landed in Inverness. "You know, technically this is you kidnapping me."

"Oh, come now, you're nearly of age. Let's call it what it is, shall we? I abducted you."

He offered her his hand and she took it with a grin and followed along beside him as he headed towards the restaurants on the main street.

"So you hadn't thought about how you could Apparate anywhere from Hogsmeade if you felt like it, before now?"

"No. I've used the Floo in Minnie's office before, but Apparation is still new to me, I've only had my license for just over two months. I did it plenty during the summer, but for whatever reason I didn't consider it as a means to get further away from Hogwarts during my time off from class or Quidditch."

"And here I thought you were supposed to be some kind of daredevil/rule breaker," she teased. "And can we back track to 'Minnie'? Is that what you call Professor McGonagall?"

He shrugged. "She's a family friend. I called her 'Aunt Minnie' until I started Hogwarts. Pretty sure some of my classmates thought I had some strange memory problem when I was in her class and kept calling her 'Aaa- Professor' for the first several months."

"So weird. I only see our teachers in that setting so I can't picture them having lives outside of the school."

"Ever wondered if the Headmaster head's down to some sunny beach location during the summer months?"

He felt her shudder through their clasped hands. "Dumbledore in swim trunks. No thank you."

"Italian?" he suggested when they got to the 'tourist' street that was lined with souvenir shops and restaurants.

He liked this town, it had been a Wizarding village for centuries until they decided to let Muggle's start moving in, then a wizard had seen the economy failing for his neighbors and came up with the Loch Ness Monster, using a charm to make it appear that there was a sea serpent of some sort that lived in the lake nearby. The wizard had only done it a few times but it had been bringing in tourists that wanted to 'see the beast' for ages and that gave the Muggle's plenty of income from the tourist trade.

"I could go for a big bowl of pasta," she agreed.

They got a table in the warm restaurant and Ginny started telling him about her eldest brother and how he had just got engaged to a woman none of the other Weasley's had met, how she was excited at the prospect of having a 'sister', but that she wanted to make sure that the woman was worthy of being a member of the family first.

"I wonder if Ron will have any say in that," he joked as the waitress put their food down in front of them.

"That's putting the cart before the horse, isn't it?" she laughed.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean you were relating my eldest brother's fiancé and Ron's potential reaction to her, to how he feels about you and I dating."

"Well, if he's this bent out of shape about us dating, I can only imagine what he'd have to say about someone marrying into the family."

She dismissed that with a wave of her fork. "He'll be fine with it. I'm sure she's pretty, and she works with Bill, so she must be smart."

"I'm pretty, I'm smart," he pointed out.

"You're handsome, not pretty."

"Ah, so you think I'm handsome?" he grinned. He'd set her up for that one.

She scoffed and rolled her eyes, just the reaction he was hoping for.

They talked through their meal and then he showed her around what he knew of the town before finding a secluded spot to Apparate them back to Hogsmeade.

There were still students milling about, so it appeared they hadn't gotten too carried away with their time spent in Inverness, and they made it back to Hogwarts without encountering Ron, but Harry wasn't ready to go all the way back to Gryffindor Tower then, the odds that Ron would be there waiting for them was too high.

"Care to see if we can find a quiet spot for ourselves?" he asked.

"Well, the date was pretty good," she said, pretending to think it over. "I suppose it's the least I could do to say thank you."

He took her hand and led them up to the third floor where there was a series of alcoves behind many tapestries, each tapestry had a small marking on the bottom that indicated whether it was 'occupied', and to those that were familiar with this stretch of corridor and that lovely feature, it was deemed Snog-Alley. Harry found one that was unoccupied and pulled her in, silently casting a charm on the tapestry so they wouldn't be interrupted.

"I did good then, you were saying?" he asked as he took her hands in his own, they were still cold from being outside and he held them in his own to try and warm them up.

"You did good with showing me the Whomping Willow and Shrieking Shack, and you did good today," she told him, coming up on her toes and giving him a kiss. "One more and I think I'll owe you a gold star."

"Hmm, and what exactly does a gold star earn me? I work well with a rewards system," he pulled her closer and gave a kiss to her cheeks, which were still showing signs of being cold as well.

Ginny chuckled as he continued to place kisses all over her face. "What? Like a gold star earns you the right to slip into my dorm room again? Or it might mean it'll be my turn to plan something for us to sneak off and get up to?"

"I like getting up to things with you," he told her, kissing his way down her neck now and slowly removing her coat as he did so. Her hands were now under his coat and at his hips, keeping him from moving away from her. "It could be something innocent too though, you could plan some kind of rule breaking adventure, or let me be an accomplice to some prank you're going to be pulling on the Slytherins."

"Is that what you would really want as a reward?"

"No," he told her honestly. "I'd rather the rewards just involve the two of us holing up somewhere and winding up wrapped around each other."

Her hand moved to his hair and she pulled him back so he could see she was smiling up at him. "Me too."

He wasn't sure how much later it was that they finally detangled from each other, but they were both sweating with their outer layers, and their shirts, on the floor at his feet, when a Prefect called out from the other start of the corridor that it was thirty minutes to curfew. And the clothes were piled only around his feet because Ginny had her legs wrapped around his waist.

"I am going to need a very cold shower when I get back to the dorm," he panted.

"There's no hurry just yet," she panted back. "Let everyone else have a chance to clear out of here first. Let's see if I can help you with that."

Then she was back standing on her own feet against the wall and her hand was slipping down his trousers and starting to stroke him.

"Ginny," he groaned. "You don't have to." He was saying it to try and show he was a gentleman, but if she took him saying that as a license to stop he was about to be seriously disappointed.

"I want to," she assured him and kissed him, nipping his bottom lip so he would keep on snogging her while she kept pumping. He moved his hand to try and get her own trousers undone, but she swatted his hand away. "No, just you."

"Just me?" There was very little argument she would be getting from him over this, but he wanted to know why at least she was turning down him returning the favor.

"Think of pleasuring me as part of your reward system if you like," she said, starting to move her hand faster.

He felt loads better ten minutes later when they'd collected their clothes and straightened themselves out before coming out from behind the tapestry. Ginny looked proud of herself too, as well she should.

Trying to keep the dopey smile off his face was hard when they got to Gryffindor Tower.

It wasn't too difficult when he saw their Head of House standing there in front of the portrait of the Fat Lady.

"Mister Potter, Miss Weasley."

"Professor," he greeted her with confusion. "It's still before curfew," he pointed out.

"Yes, I have been able to tell time for quite a long time."

"Okay. So, why are you looking at us like we're in trouble?"

"It was brought to my attention that the two of you did not keep your wanderings for the day restricted to Hogsmeade." She said this in the sharp, lecturing voice that he had come accustomed to.

"What do you mean?" He squeezed Ginny's hand so she would understand that he wanted to take the lead in evading the question that was about to come at them.

"You were seen Disapparating on the main street of Hogsmeade. Both of you."

"And?" he asked innocently.

"And, Miss Weasley is underage, and she does not have permission to leave Hogsmeade."

"And, how do you know we left Hogsmeade? Her brother was following us around, after he got stuck at Zonko's an hour into our date we were hardly going to continue making it easy for him to track us, were we. That doesn't mean we Apparated out of Hogsmeade."

She took a step towards him and flicked her wand at him, causing a receipt to shoot out of his pocket and into her hand. "Inverness? And with today's date stamped on it no less. Still going to try and talk your way in circles around this one?"

"Damn."

Ginny let out a single chuckle at that, then quieted back down quickly given the look on Minnie's face.

"Detention. Both of you. Saturday morning," Minnie said, then turned on her heel and headed down the other staircase.

Ginny started toward the portrait and said the password to let them in, looking like she had a few choice words for her brother again. And lucky for her, she didn't have far to go to find him.

"Ron!" she yelled. "You ratted us out to McGonagall? Since when are you such a snitch? Can't you just leave us alone?"

"No," he replied defensively. "And where do you think you get off? I was trapped like that for twenty minutes! Immediately after the cannister you opened started wearing off someone else opened another, then it happened two more times before I was let go by the shop keeper."

"Good! Serves you right! And I hope you know that it's only a small taste of what you'll be getting if you don't come down off your high horse and deal with the fact that Harry and I are together now."

Ginny was still holding onto his hand as she railed off at Ron and he shared a commiserating look with Hermione over the way the two of them were bickering back and forth.

"You don't seem very bothered by the fact that you've got detention because of what he did," Hermione said quietly to him.

"I'm not," he shrugged. "Some good things have happened to me in detention, I've spent weekends doing worse things."

"Excuse me?" Ginny asked him, catching what he said. "You don't care that he got us a detention?"

"Not really. The last time I got stuck in detention with you things turned out pretty great," he grinned.

"What? You guys started spending time together in detention?" Ron asked, looking like he was realizing his mistake.

"Yep," he now smirked at Ron. "You've just guaranteed that I'm getting several hours alone with her on Saturday morning. I should be thanking you." To emphasize this he leaned over and gave Ginny another kiss, and not just a peck. "I'll see you tomorrow," he told her.

Then he turned to head up the stairs, leaving Ron looking dumbfounded, Hermione trying not to chuckle, and Ginny grinning from ear to ear.

It didn't matter what Ron was going to try and throw at them, he wasn't giving Ginny up just because her idiot brother wasn't keen on him, all that mattered was that Ginny was.

It was going to be fun messing with Ron and his attempts though.

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