Title: "Seeking Ginny"

Author: Casca

Rating: PG

Spoilers: Through Goblet

Classification: Post-Hogwarts H/G

Summary: Ginny Weasley has tried for years to bring to an end to her feelings for Harry Potter… she's even uprooted her life… but what happens when it's time to come face to face with him again? A post-Hogwarts tale revolving around Ginny's discovery of herself…while coming to terms with her feelings for Harry.…

Disclaimer: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros. Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.

Chapter Ten

The twenty-four hours before the grand opening of Ginny and Sarah's shop found the two business owners brewing what was left of their products and bottling it all into the brand new packaging that had only just arrived from the labeling company. The setting of this project consisted of the shop's rather dingy basement and bubbling cauldrons from which a dozen different aromas rose.

Ginny and Sarah had begun working at one o'clock on Thursday afternoon and by the time midnight rolled around, they were so tired that Ginny could barely see straight as she filled the jars. Sarah, who'd kept nodding off, took about twenty minutes to finish each step in the creation process just to make sure she was doing everything correctly. Then, around four in the morning, their energy began to rise; they had taken a short break to retrieve Ginny's wireless from her bedroom at home and the music helped, as did the brief change of scenery. Before they knew it, they had energy in abundance. The scents rising from the cauldrons were welcoming and they sung loudly to the tunes, laughing and working quite efficiently.

And then came the fatigue—it hit them like a hippogriff stampede on Friday afternoon, exactly twenty-four hours after they had begun. When Ginny stood up from the stool she had been sitting on for the past thirteen hours, her knees buckled and she allowed herself to plop unceremoniously onto the stone floor.

"Ouch," she said, and stayed there because she was too tired to get up. Sarah's voice, however, cut through the fog in her brain. Sarah tended to mumble while she worked, but this time, her words caused Ginny to narrow her eyes suspiciously.

"Well, I can't really believe it, but I think it's true, isn't it, if my calculations are correct, I can only assume that it means we're finished, but is that really possible, I mean to say…" Sarah continued to mumble to herself, but Ginny, having caught only two words in her entire ramble, gaped at Sarah.

"What do you mean, we're finished?"

"I mean we're… done. Right? Let me see… yes… if that's correct," she muttered, looking around at the mess and scratching her head, "it means … we're actually done." Sarah hopped off her stool with a great deal more grace than Ginny. "If you count all of these boxes and multiply them by twelve - the number of bottles in each – well, except for the extra large jars of the Self-Massaging Foot Cream, only six jars to each box—or is it seven? Well, anyway, if you count the boxes of twelve - you'll see that we have enough to stock the shelves three times over which would mean that we've actually met our goal! We're done!"

"Are you sure?" Ginny asked, still on the floor, looking around at the cartons and cartons of products stacked around the dusty basement.

"Yes! Because each carton has a dozen products—except for the extra large jars of the Self-Massaging Foot Cream, as I said, but anyway, I don’t think that people will really want the huge jars since it will be the first time they're using the products, so we can get away with half of those." Sarah moved around the room as she spoke, floating the cartons one by one up the stairs and into the shop as Ginny watched, helpless. "So anyway, we have eight cartons of each product and room for two out on the shelves right now so there you go – we can refill three times, after we stock the initial two boxes. And don't forget I'll brew more as we go. I mean I doubt we'll be selling out of things right away and—"

Ginny nodded as Sarah kept reasoning, then pulled herself from the floor and dusted the dirt off her jeans. "All right, sounds good. Shall we stock the shelves, then?"

Sarah waved her hand at Ginny – unfortunately it was her wand hand, which sent a box of Wrinkle-Vanish Ointment hurtling across the room; it nearly spilled before Sarah hastily righted it. "Oops. No, we don’t have to stock the shelves. I told Rosemary to come by tonight to do it. She has a copy of the diagram we wrote and I went over it with her when she was here the other day, I even drew another one with more detail so that she'll be able to handle it."

"Oh," Ginny said, looking around. "Are you sure she can handle it all?"

"Oh, she'll be fine, she's glad to earn the extra gold. And there isn't that much left, Ginny, all she has to do is…" Sarah kept talking, pushing a plait of hair over her shoulder with her arm as she continued to float the cartons upstairs. Since she flat-out refused to work for Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes, Sarah's cousin had agreed to work for Ginny and Sarah for as much as they could afford to pay her.

The two chatted a bit more as they climbed the stairs into the shop, then parted ways outside. Ginny considered for a moment that she was too tired to Apparate, but realized that it would take an even bigger effort to walk to the joke shop to use the twins' fireplace—she hadn't stocked floo powder in her own shop yet.

Adding that to the long list of things to do before tomorrow morning, Ginny pulled out her wand and concentrated on clearing her mind so that she didn’t wind up splintched a day before the grand opening. The cluttered worktop of the Burrow kitchen came into view and she sighed with relief. No body parts were missing.

"Hey," she said to Ron, who was sitting in the kitchen and looking at a copy of the Daily Prophet that lay on the table in front of him. "Aren’t you supposed to be… what's wrong?"

Ron's brow was drawn, his face pale. Wordlessly, he picked up the copy of the Daily Prophet and handed it to her.

Ginny looked down at the paper in confusion for a moment, then she saw the headline of the front page article:

Eleven-Year-Old Son of Ministry Executive Killed by Captor

How Harry Potter Risked his Life to Save the Boy

Ginny looked up at Ron, horrified. "How—what happened—?"

"Just read it."

She pulled out the nearest chair and sat as she began to read the article:

Late last night, ten year old Devon Forthwright was killed in a devastating incident involving his captor, Andrew Cummings, pictured left, who has apparently been holding Forthwright captive for several months. Devon is the son of William Forthwright, a prominent member of England's Ministry of Magic and has been working with the Ministry's team of aurors to help bring his son home. Harry Potter was assigned to the case in early summer and has since been working tirelessly, along with the Ministry's Auror Division, to find the boy. Potter was not available for comment, but head of the Division, Kingsley Shacklebolt has stated in a release this morning that the department received a lead yesterday in the form of a ransom note, demanding one million galleons for the safe return of the child. "We did everything possible to rescue the boy," said a fatigued Shacklebolt to the press, “But it was not enough. Our hearts go out to the Forthwrights during this difficult time."

Details are unclear as to how the boy was killed, but sources say that Shacklebolt lead his team of aurors to a house where they believed the boy was being held. The rescue mission tragically failed when the young boy was caught in crossfire.

A photograph below shows Devon Forthwright with his father promoting Devon's favorite Quidditch team, the Chudley Cannons, at a game held in Durham last May. The photograph was taken just a few weeks before Devon's disappearance.

Ginny's eyes found the huge photograph of Devon Forthwright – a dimpled grin minus two front teeth beamed up at her beneath a Cannon's hat.

"My God," Ginny whispered.

"Yeah," said Ron, his voice rough. He cleared his throat.

"Have you spoken to Harry?" she asked, swallowing hard, tearing her eyes away from Devon Forthwright's face. It was Julian in a few short years.

"No… I've just read this… Hermione owled it to me, she's trying to finish up with work, but there's something really important she had to do there and…the hell with it, she should just leave!" he exploded. "She works like a bloody house-elf!"

Ginny looked up at Ron. "She's probably torturing herself about how hard she's been on Harry. Maybe work is her escape."

"Yeah, well, that's ironic, don’t you think? Anyway, I haven't exactly been supportive," Ron admitted gloomily.

"What do you mean?"

"Well, I don’t give him grief about his job, but…" Ron shook his head. "I haven't stood up for him either. It's just hard, being in the middle—"

Just then, there was a tapping noise as Hedwig the owl landed on the windowsill. Ron rushed to let her in and didn’t even allow the poor bird to land before grabbing the parchment off her foot. Ginny watched Ron's eyes scan the letter as she reached out to stroke Hedwig.

"He's in St Mungo's," he said at last, throwing the letter down and pushing back from the table.

Ginny stood up at once. "Is it serious?"

He pulled out his wand. "Doesn't sound like it. Look, don’t tell Mum yet, all right? She'll go mental."

"Ron—"

"I'll let you know as soon as I know something." And he was gone with a pop.

Ginny stood there in the middle of the kitchen, her heart pounding as the sunlight poured through the window onto the table, illuminating both the letter and the article. Ginny snatched up the parchment and scanned it. Harry was very brief and very vague, but the letter didn't read as though someone badly injured or very ill had written it. At least that was something. Closing her eyes, she set it down and rubbed at her temples.

After letting an anxious-looking Hedwig out the window, Ginny made sure the letter and paper had burned to a crisp in the fireplace before trudging upstairs to her bedroom. There was more than enough fatigue in her system to allow her a sleep; however, she spent a restless hour trying to empty her mind of the thoughts that kept assaulting it. When she finally did fall under, it wasn't very peaceful at all.

~*~

"It's okay, Harry…Dumbledore is on his way, I've just sent for him."

Harry's shoulder jerked. It could have been a result of the pain or just a move to make it known that he had heard her. But Ginny knew there was a touch of humor in that movement as if what she'd said was amusing. It filled her with a very dark and very cold feeling.

"I know there's probably nothing he can do for the pain," she whispered. "But… well, perhaps something…"

Harry didn’t respond, but Ginny knew that he'd heard her – every sound louder than a minute whisper was probably equivalent to that of a siren in his head.

So, she didn’t say anything more. She became aware that her hand was on his back and though there hadn’t been a clear thought in her head when she'd put it there, the contact suddenly became real. She didn’t move it – he didn’t seem to notice and maybe, just maybe, it was a small source of comfort. Maybe.

He was seated on a snow-covered bench in the freezing dead of winter. His upper body was bent so low that Ginny feared he would simply fall headfirst into the thick layer of snow that covered the ground. His breaths were short and shallow and every inflation of his lungs seemed to cost him dearly. Ginny's own breath was laden with shivers, not only from the cold, but also from a dreaded, anxious feeling in the pit of her stomach.

And then, through the snow that had begun to fall only moments after she'd set out on what was supposed to have been a leisurely walk, Ginny saw two figures. They were running directly towards Ginny and Harry and as they neared, she recognized them. While seeing those faces in a crisis had always made her feel safe, the only feeling Ginny could muster was a sense of relief that she wouldn’t be alone with him anymore. She felt more than inadequate here.

"Miss Weasley? What happened?" barked the voice of Professor McGonagall.

"I was out for a walk … Harry was sitting here and he…"

"My scar."

They all turned at the sound of his voice. Harry had lifted his head; his eyes were unfocused without the shield of his glasses, but they gazed past Ginny, past Professor McGonagall and right into the eyes of the headmaster.

"He's happy," Harry said in a voice that sent chills down Ginny's spine.

She turned her face towards the tree a few yards away, unable to look at him. For no matter how exhausted and red-rimmed Harry's eyes were, there was no ignoring the anger, the resolve, the violence in the piercing green. It made her absolutely terrified.

Harry straightened, causing Ginny's hand to slide from his back. She brought it around her front to clutch the other. It must have subsided a little, the pain in his scar, because he sat up fully and his breathing was now completely controlled. Too controlled.

Ginny stood and walked towards the tree, her booted feet crunching in the thick snow. She heard them talking in low voices while she stared at the castle and the figures running over the grounds, darting around and heaving snowballs at each other.

Feeling eyes on her, Ginny turned and saw that Professor McGonagall watching her. She nodded briefly, letting Ginny know that she was excused if she wanted to leave. Dumbledore and Harry seemed to be having a quiet conversation and Ginny knew that there was nothing else she could do here. Thankful for the reprieve, she hurried up to the castle, ducking her head against a sudden wind.

Something had told her to take a walk this afternoon…she'd thought it had to do with being locked inside all weekend with her heaps of homework. She'd thought it was because she needed some fresh air.

Biting her lip hard, Ginny turned on the path that would take her away from the students playing in the snow. She thought she could make out some faces and didn't want to be stopped by anyone.

The look in Harry's eyes remained at the forefront of her mind as she heaved the huge wooden door open and stepped into the entrance hall…and the sound of his voice echoed in her head, reporting on Voldemort's happiness as she walked quickly up to Gryffindor Tower.

Her dormitory was empty, which was a good thing because Ginny didn't think she could hold it in any longer. Yanking her bed-curtains closed, she climbed onto her four-poster and closed her eyes. Her sobs came in gasps of breath. She was crying because she was scared and even though she knew it was useless, she couldn’t help but give into it.

Why did it have to be him? Why?

Fury welled inside her to the point of violence. She punched her pillow once, twice. She was so scared of Harry dying that she wanted to break something, hurt someone.

Please let him live through this. Please don't let him die…please…please….

A horrible thought came into her head just then and Ginny had to squeeze her eyes closed to rid herself of it.

So what if he did live? What if he did survive this, if Voldemort was killed and the world went back to normal? Would Harry ever be normal? Would he be able to sleep at night? Would he ever feel safe and if he did, would he have to spend his entire life reliving every horrible moment?

She just wanted him not to hurt anymore. She wanted it to be over with, to end, no more Voldemort or Deatheaters, no more darkness, no more fear—

~*~

Ginny awoke at once. Her heart was pounding and her entire body was drenched in sweat. For a moment, fresh fear gripped her throat… then it began to subside slowly, bit by bit, as she breathed. Her bedroom was dark. The moonlight that shined into the room through the window made her disoriented. For a few moments, she didn’t know which day it was … or which year.

She pressed her palms to her eyes, trying to clear the fog that was floating around in her head. Motionless, she lay back against her pillow, breathing heavily and staring up at the dark ceiling of her bedroom. Her limbs felt stiff and her mouth was dry. She remembered that she'd gone to bed in the afternoon and now… it must be the middle of the night. After several long, still minutes, she forced herself to move the covers that were tangled around her legs and climb from the bed. She stumbled into the loo where she stood in the shower for what seemed like an eternity. As the water streamed over her body, her mind began to clear.

She had gone to bed in the afternoon because she'd been awake preparing for the grand opening of the shop, which was… tomorrow morning. She breathed a small sigh as she stepped out and wrapped a towel around herself. Part of her wished that the opening wasn't so soon…it seemed a bit shallow to have to focus on that tomorrow.

Ginny dressed in a comfortable sweater and jeans and hurried downstairs to see if there'd been any word from Ron. She expected to find a letter, but to her surprise, when she stepped into the kitchen, there was an actual person.

"Hi, Dad," she said, startled to see him there. "What are you…?" Then she saw the clock in the living room, which read half past nine. It wasn't nearly as late as she'd thought it was.

"Worked late," he said, pulling out a chair for her with one hand, while the other used a fork to spear a piece of broccoli on his plate. "I heard you had a long day."

"Who told you?" she asked, pulling the bowl of steamed vegetables towards her. She realized that she was very hungry.

"I saw Ron earlier."

"Oh – at St. Mungo's? Did you see Harry, is he alright?"

"No, I saw Ron at the Ministry—he'd just come from St. Mungo's. Harry's fine, they've patched him up, but he has to stay the night for observation."

"Was he badly hurt?"

Her dad rubbed his eyes underneath his glasses. "No. He caught the short end of a few hexes, but nothing serious."

"Thank goodness for that. Has there been any word on…" She'd been about to say the Forthwrights, but realized that it was a stupid question. Her father seemed to understand though.

"William and his wife are doing as well as can be expected. Or so I've heard."

They sat quietly for a moment, and then Ginny asked softly, "Did you know them, Dad?"

Her father sighed and placed his napkin next to his plate, smoothing out the creases in an absentminded gesture as he thought. "William was an acquaintance. I didn’t know him very well, but he often brought his son to visit. Devon was an only child…"

They lapsed in silence then and Ginny was sure she knew what her father was feeling. Guilt, perhaps for being so lucky with his family... and a keen sense of understanding as well.

"Where's Mum?" Ginny asked then, wanting to change the tone of things.

"Asleep… I think she had a bit of a long day. Worrying over Harry and all that."

"Ron must have told her, then. Where is he, do you know?"

"The last I heard, he and Hermione were going to stop by St. Mungo's and then have a late dinner somewhere."

Ginny nodded and they lapsed into another silence.

"Well," Arthur said, wiping his mouth on a napkin and pushing back his chair. "I'm going to bed. Big day tomorrow, eh?" His smile was bright but it didn't quite reach his eyes.

"Yeah," Ginny said, managing a smile of her own. "Goodnight, Dad."

"Goodnight," he said, squeezing her shoulder as he passed. He held on just a second longer than he might have any other night before disappearing upstairs.

Ginny sighed and laid her head on her folded arms. She sat quietly, listening to the noises of the house: the clock ticking from the living room, the creaks from the attic, and the wind against the windowpane. Without any warning, a chill raced down her back. It was small and just a twinge of the feeling she'd felt from her dream, but it represented something familiar. She shivered and hugged herself, sitting back in the chair now and gazing out the window.

She knew she was safe, but it was frightening that her life hadn’t always been so secure. Ginny thought about those dark times and, though she remembered the fear very well, she remembered action and determination and… bravery. And when faced with the decision to fight or be safe, she remembered how clear the answer had always been. How many risks had they all taken? How many times had they been close to death and how many times had they saved each other?

Harry came into her mind then and a flood of memories surrounded him. She could hear his voice in each one, feel his protection as if it was palpable.

How many times had he saved her life?

A bout of guilt assaulted Ginny. She stood abruptly and walked into the living room. But the dark and silent room did nothing to help the apprehension that was squirming around inside her.

Ginny didn’t know why these questions were at the forefront of her mind now, or why she was feeling the presence of the war so vividly. The nightmare? She tried to remember exactly what she had dreamt, but she couldn’t conjure a physical picture of it in her mind. All that remained was the feelings.

She hated times like these… when something tragic happened and there was nowhere to go but back in time.

Her eyes fell on the clock again. It was almost ten. She knew it was too late to go, but something made her think she could try. She went upstairs and retrieved her wand from between her bedcovers and gave it a twist to Apparate.

St. Mungo's waiting area was quite empty when she stepped inside from the street. There were four people seated in the rows of uncomfortable-looking chairs: two small children sat on either side of an irate-looking witch, all three of their faces the color of an orange and an elderly wizard across the room eyed them disdainfully, sneezing a continuous flutter of lady bugs into a bin.

Ginny walked across the wide floor and approached the sleepy-looking welcomewitch at the main desk. Dropping her voice to a whisper, Ginny leaned forward a bit and said, "Hi, I'm here to visit Harry Potter."

The witch gave Ginny a complacent look. "Harry Potter is not a patient here, sorry."

If Ginny hadn't been in such a strange mood, she would have returned the witch's smug smile. Instead, she straightened the handbag on her shoulder and said calmly, "I know he's a patient here, I'm a friend of his. If you can tell him that Ginny Weasley is here to see him, I'm sure he'll say it's all right."

The witch didn’t look impressed. "I'm sorry, but we do not have a patient here by that name. Also, our visiting hours are—"

"I know. But if you can see if he's awake and ask him, that would be great. If he's asleep, I'll leave, but if not…I'm sure he'll be glad for the company," Ginny lied, sure that he probably wouldn’t.

The witch looked at Ginny for a long moment, as if contemplating doing what Ginny suggested or calling for security.

"Look, my brother Ron Weasley was just here, you'll probably see his name on the list. He was here with Hermione Granger."

With a suspicious crease in her brow, the witch began tapping her long fingernails at a gilded keyboard, watching as tiny words appeared in mid-air, disappearing faster than Ginny could read them.

"One moment, please," she said, her eyes level with the space in front of her. A moment later, more words began to appear and disappear there and Ginny saw her lift a brow. She reached into a drawer and pulled out a small piece of parchment, and began to write something on it. "There you are, miss."

Ginny took the paper, frowning at the words on it. It read Floor Five, room 599. The fifth floor was the gift shop level and though Ginny was certain that there were probably rooms hidden for… particular patients, she had no idea where to find them. It took a bit of creativity and the help of an elderly custodian before she finally walked through a tapestry, leading her to a very hidden corridor with doors packed on either side. Room 599 was at the very end, and Ginny walked down, stamping her curiosity to peek inside the open doors to see if the rooms contained anyone famous.

Harry's door was closed, so she tapped her knuckles against it lightly, and pushed through when she heard his muffled reply. It was a small room, but much bigger than it seemed from the corridor where another door stood just a few feet away. The only light came from a candle on the table next to the bed and the tiny dots of gold from the city in the window. Everything from the brass handles on the bed to the linoleum floor glinted from the shadows cast by the flickering candlelight and shined from cleanliness.

Harry was sitting at a small table beside the window, peering towards the doorway where she stood. He looked weary and a bit pale, but there wasn't anything horrid about his appearance. Ginny didn’t know if she'd expected him to look sick or injured, but he looked fine… just very tired.

"Hi," she said, stepping hesitantly inside. "I hope you don’t mind that I came. I just…." she paused, and because he looked curious and not put out, Ginny continued honestly, "Harry, I wanted to tell you how sorry I am about what happened. I know… how hard you've been working and I …well, I'm just … sorry…."

Harry held her gaze for a minute, looking unsure if she was finished or not. "Thanks." There was a pause before he said, "D'you want to sit down?" He gestured to an armchair that was opposite his and Ginny hesitated.

"Oh… well, I didn’t plan to stay, I know you're probably tired."

"I am. But I'm not going to sleep, so.…"

Something about the way he'd said it made Ginny pause only momentarily before nodding and crossing the room to join him at the table. "What's that?" she asked, indicating the steaming goblet in front of him.

Harry looked at it with a bit of an ironic look on his face. "Sleeping Draught."

"You don’t want to take it?"

"I already did," he said, lifting it to show it was empty. Ginny took it from him and put it to her nose, then gasped at the wave of drowsiness that absorbed into her senses from only breathing in the scent.

"That's a strong one, isn't it?" she asked, setting it back down as the sleepy feeling began to ebb away. "Did you just take it?"

"About twenty minutes ago."

Ginny gaped at him. "And you haven’t passed out yet?"

A ghost of a smile appeared on his face and the sarcasm in it wasn't lost on Ginny. "I'm a bit immune to those things."

She said nothing for a moment as she regarded him. His eyes, though red-rimmed and surrounded by dark circles, were alert; his fingers tapped lightly, but impatiently, against the surface of the table. Someone who looked so tired shouldn’t seem this restless, she thought, and didn’t hesitated before asking him,

"Do you often have trouble sleeping, Harry?"

He looked at Ginny for a moment, and turned his head towards the window, taking a slow breath. Then, still gazing out at the city below them, he nodded his head.

Ginny suddenly thought of the difficult time she'd had trying to fall asleep this afternoon. The horrible images of that boy being killed had been such a strong shield against sleep and when fatigue finally had claimed her, the haunted dreams had taken over. For Harry, having that boy's kidnapping at the forefront of his mind for several months meant more sleepless, haunted nights than Ginny wanted to imagine. And that was only one case, one example of the dark things he dealt with at work.

"There has to be something," she said thoughtfully, "some way to help insomnia without potions or magic…."

"Firewhisky."

Ginny's eyebrows shot up, remembering that evening in The Three Broomsticks. "It really works, does it?"

Harry heaved a sigh. "Yeah. But it's not so fun in the morning."

She smiled. "Have you talked to anyone about it? One of the healers here might—"

He gestured to the goblet. "Talked to dozens of them. They keep giving me stronger stuff and I keep taking it until it doesn't work."

Ginny frowned. She had a few suggestions of different types of Sleeping Draughts that she remembered, but reasoned that they were probably old news to him.

"I suppose you just have to keep trying," she said at last. "Horrible that you have to suffer until you find the solution."

Harry arched his brow and muttered faintly that he didn’t think there was a solution. Ginny looked down at the table, feeling a wave of déjà vu wash over her. Something in the tone of his voice …it was all so familiar to her. She cleared her throat.

"Did you have many visitors today, then?"

"Just Ron and Hermione… and some of the people who were working on the case. Your mum sent me food, of course."

Ginny smiled at that. "It's her way, isn't it? Did Hermione walk in with her tail between her legs?" she'd asked with a bit of a humorous tone, but Harry's eyes turned inward.

"She… yeah, she did."

"You feel guilty about her, don’t you?" Ginny asked, looking at him closely.

Harry shifted uncomfortably. "She was really ashamed. I never wanted that. I don’t want…."

"You don’t want your work to affect them."

"It's not just that. It's horrible to say, but I see this sort of thing – not very often, but enough, so they don’t have to feel sorry for me when something like this happens… I mean, if only she would stop giving me grief about everything, then she wouldn’t feel guilty and…"

"It's like … she creates the guilt for herself sometimes?"

"Yeah," he said, looking relieved. "But she means well, so it's …it's not like she deserves to feel so terrible. I don't want her to feel like that…it's just…"

Ginny smiled as he failed to get his tongue around the words. "I think you might need a holiday, Harry."

He managed a week smile. "I just had a holiday."

"When?"

"Paris."

"I though your were working there."

"Well, it was actually a bit of a break," he admitted, giving into a yawn. "And not an approved one."

"Those meetings you talked about and the auror's convention…?"

Harry shook his head. "I didn’t need to go to those meetings … or the convention, really," he said, his voice thick from yawning. "I thought being away might help with the insomnia thing, but I really wasn't supposed to go to Paris. I sort of… snuck away after we'd finished a three-month project overseas."

"That's right," Ginny said, recalling the letter she'd received from her mum in Paris. "I forgot about that. Mum had told me in her letter that you'd been gone almost three months."

"Yeah… that was a top secret thing. It was rather… stressful. And I didn’t feel like going home afterwards, so I went to a stupid convention in Paris."

"And you didn’t write home…" she said, almost to herself. She remembered everything now… everything that her mum had written to her and everything that she and Harry had fought about in Paris.

"So, you left for a job that took three months... and when you arrived in Paris, were you able to write home?"

Harry looked up at her. His glasses were off and his green eyes were watery and drowsy, but very focused on her. "Yes."

She sighed. "Then why didn’t you? I mean, just to tell them that you were all right—it's understandable that you would need a break, isn’t it? Especially after a case that lasted for months like that one and… hang on." She closed her eyes and shook her head. "I'm doing it again, aren't I? Sticking my nose into your business."

He half shrugged. "S'okay. If I had written home, I would have received howlers in return."

"I don’t think that's true," Ginny said. "They couldn’t possibly blame you for leaving without notice if you had no choice."

"They wouldn’t. But they would blame my job, Ginny. They would think I’d chosen it over them or something. I didn’t need for them to make me guilty about what I do for a bloody living so I prolonged writing to them."

Ginny started to say something, but the truth was that she didn’t know what to say. Having a job like Harry's where he spent so much of his time and energy, where he had to disappear without notice and be away for so long… it wasn't easy on the people who cared about him. But it couldn’t be easy on him either. And if it wasn't so very important to him, if it didn’t define who he was, then Ginny might almost think he should put his family first….

But then … his family consisted of two people, basically: Ron and Hermione. Two people who were about to be married, who were about to become one unit, one family by themselves. What sort of family did Harry have to himself? Why should he put aside his job, his obligations, for them? They loved him, sure, but his place in life was not with them.

"Anyway, I suppose that was why I was a bit … strange in Paris," he was saying. "It was a difficult job that I'd come from and I knew that I wasn't supposed to be there and, well…"

Ginny sighed, trying not to let her thoughts run away with her. "I was also pretty stressed when you were there," she said slowly. "I suppose we both had a lot on our minds."

Harry nodded. It was an apology, on both their parts, for something Ginny had forced herself to forget about. There had been quite a bit to that little row, hadn’t there?

"Do you miss it there?"

Harry's voice cut through her thoughts and Ginny suddenly realized that she was staring out the window in silence.

"Paris?" she asked him and he nodded. "Yes, I do. I've been keeping busy, so I don’t really think about it much, but I do miss my friends and the city and university…."

"Studying?" He managed half a smile.

"No, I don’t miss studying," she laughed, "but... the lessons, the professors, well some professors. Others I'll gladly never see again."

"Really?" he asked, looking mildly interested. "Worse than certain… Potions professors?"

"Oh, definitely not," she grinned. "But there were some winners, I'll say that." Because he appeared slightly interested, Ginny told him a few stories about several professors she'd had the fortune to encounter at university and Harry listened to her with the sort of interest of someone who needed something to help pass the time. Ginny felt rather sorry that he had to resort to listening to tales that were probably quite boring to someone who hadn't experienced them.

"I think I still have nightmares about her," she admitted after she'd told him about her Mermish professor, Madame Horne. "People used to cry when her little timer would go off, signaling the end of the exam. Brian liked her—well, any wizard in the lesson liked her, for … well, slightly shallow reasons."

"I think I understand."

"Yeah…and she favored boys over girls, so that only gave them more encouragement. Though Brian never needed any encouragement for that," she added dryly.

Ginny chatted a bit more about Paris and the things she missed and Harry seemed all too happy to listen as he grew more tired. Finally, Ginny couldn’t think of any more stories that would be even remotely entertaining, so she changed the subject.

"Do you think you'll be able to go home tomorrow? Have the healers said anything about it?"

"I'm leaving even if they say I can't," he said irritably. "I don’t even need to be here right now, it's auror protocol to stay and all that, but it's stupid. I don’t have anything wrong with me."

"I suppose you would be more comfortable in your own house, in any event. Was anyone else injured?"

He nodded. "Nothing serious, same as me. It was an ugly fight, though…"

Ginny looked down at the table. She had questions, but she didn’t want to force him to recall the last twenty-four hours for any reason.

"He recognized me," Harry muttered, rubbing his tired eyes beneath his glasses. "When I came in, he saw me and … and he thought I was going to save him. He looked at me like I … I was his hero or something…." He swallowed as if he had suddenly acquired a bad taste in his mouth. "Me."

Ginny watched him take a long sip of water from the glass on the table. "So he was… happy, then. For just a moment."

"For just a moment," he echoed. Then he nodded, and took another sip. "So, er… how is that shop thing of yours coming along?" he asked, and Ginny took his cue without hesitation. She told him about all of it, the grand opening tomorrow, what they had done to get to this point, and what they projected in sales. It was simple, the opening of a little shop, compared to the sort of things he accomplished day to day and Ginny didn't mind offering it as an escape for him.

"What's it called, again?"

Ginny grimaced. "Lotion Lady. Don’t ask, it was a very … last minute decision. I really don’t like it."

"Are … you the Lotion Lady?" he asked, with a bit of humor.

"Actually it's Sarah. Sarah is the Lotion Lady. I'm … the other lady. I dunno, it's going to take a while to grow on me."

"Could be worse," he said on another huge yawn, which caused his eyes to water up, which caused his glasses to fog. He made a noise of frustration then and took off his glasses again to wipe at his eyes. Then, yet another yawn assaulted him. "Bloody exhausted, but can’t sleep," he said in sudden frustration. He grabbed a tissue from a box on the table and blew his nose – loudly – and tossed it in the bin. "How stupid is that, I'd like to know?"

An inexplicable feeling of sorrow shot through her. Ginny would challenge anyone in the world to see him as she did right now and not want to help him.

"You know," she began, not knowing what she was going to say, but vowing to stay here talking until he was tired enough for sleep, "if Paris was like a holiday, then you should have said something. We could have seen more than we did, like… the Louvre. I've been there a few times, but there's an absolutely humongous section of the magical part that I haven't seen, not to mention nearly half of the Muggle part."

There was a long pause where Harry stared down at the table with a bit of a dull expression on his face. She knew he was tempted to end this conversation and he could have rightfully done so by saying he wanted to go to bed. It would have been a lie, and they both would have known it, but she would have left regardless. She watched him struggle with it for a moment.

"I… heard it's really crowded in there," he said after a moment.

"It is," she said at once, and elaborated fully on the subject, if only to delay his bedtime even further. "I've always thought how cool it would be to go inside at night, you know, after closing? I mean during the day the people are packed in there like sardines, but to go through it all with nobody else in there and see all the paintings and the sculptures and…."

It was almost one o'clock in the morning when Ginny left St. Mungo's. She walked across the waiting area with a heavier heart than when she'd first arrived, not even noticing the arched brow from the welcome witch as she watched her leave.

~*~

Sarah, in her perpetual state of nervousness, also had a nightmare before the grand opening. In it, the only customer that came into the shop was a person they knew quite well and she wasted no time telling Ginny and Sarah how disappointed she was with the career path they'd chosen and requested a product that Sarah refused to repeat.

"That’s what made it a nightmare," she shuddered.

"Who's McGonagall?" asked Brian.

"One bitch of a witch," said Rosemary, grinning.

"Professor McGonagall is the most brilliant witch of our time," Sarah said firmly, frowning at her cousin. "Just…slightly scary at times."

"Hey, that was a compliment!" Rosemary insisted.

Rosemary, it turned out, had changed quite a bit over the years. No longer was she the mousy girl with pigtails Ginny remembered, but nearly a whole foot taller than her cousin with a rather exuberant style of dress. Her brown-turned-black hair and purple lipstick clashed startlingly with her pale skin and if Ginny hadn't asked her to wear Lotion Lady's colors for work then she would most definitely be sporting her ankle-length, chain-clad black robes.

Everyone was scattered throughout the shop, waiting for the clock to chime so that they could open the doors. Fred and George were going to stay behind the scenes, getting more product if needed. Ginny and Sarah were going to work on the floor, assisting customers with products and Rosemary would mind the till. Brian was quite useless, but he had brought breakfast, which Ginny's nervous stomach hadn't allowed her to eat.

Ginny tried to reassure Sarah that McGonagall wouldn't be disappointed in them at all – that owning a shop was very prestigious and look at how often she visited Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes!

Sarah sniffed. "That's only because she thinks Fred and George are devising a quill that looks like her anti-cheating ones."

Fred and George looked startled. "How d'you know that?"

"She told me," Sarah said, her brow still drawn from worry. "She's onto your Forging Quills, too, so you had better watch out."

If there hadn't only been ten minutes until they opened, Ginny would have found it amusing how a half-hearted warning from someone as harmless as Sarah could cause such alarm on the faces of her brothers. But she had one thing on her mind and that was the shop.

Things started off a bit slow. Ginny had to bite hard on her lip to keep from laughing at Sarah when the bells over the doors jingled and Professor McGonagall herself walked in. She peered at Brian in a scrupulous sort of way (he straightened his back), said to Rosemary in her clipped tone, "Miss Shawnessy", and congratulated Ginny and Sarah on their wonderful new business (Ginny stood on Sarah's foot). Then she said something about needing a Christmas gift and walked brusquely towards the anti-wrinkle section.

"Christmas gift my arse," Rosemary muttered with a wink and Sarah sent her a warning look.

Other people trickled in, mostly friends and relatives to congratulate and support them. Sarah voiced her worry that they were fast running out of friends and Ginny shushed her, but secretly thought the same.

By lunchtime, however, all was chaos. Ginny had to enlist Brian to help at one of the tills, direct Fred and George to bring more stock from the basement and even beg Bill to stay for an hour to cover Rosemary's lunch. Customers piled in, purchasing more in one sale than Ginny thought would sell all day… even week! People from all ages roamed the shop, stuffing as many products as they could into their wicker shopping baskets, some needing two or three baskets just to carry everything around.

At one point, Ginny thought that she might still be asleep and having another dream, this one being really good to make up for the nightmare, but when she banged her hip against the counter as Brian carelessly bumped into her, the pain was very real and made her realize that it was no dream. It was all real. And it was a success.

At least for the moment.

"Hey, Ginny, where's Ron?" called Dean Thomas with an armful of rose-scented products

"Not sure, he and Hermione were supposed to come." Then her lips quirked at the products in his hands. "Buying a gift?"

"My Mum for Christmas – she loves Sarah's stuff, she's tried it before—"

He was cut off by a crashing noise and Ginny looked across the aisle just in time to see a shelf of foot cream crash to the floor and a guilty looking young girl dive for her mother.

"Oh, no – have to run – thanks, Dean!"

By the time it was over, Ginny felt as though she'd pulled a double shift at the café—alone because Aurelie had skived off. The thought of her friend made Ginny smile as she, Sarah and Rosemary cleaned up the mess that was left. Fred and George left to close down each joke shop and Brian had gone a few hours ago. It occurred to Ginny that she hadn't even thanked them for all their hard work… she hadn’t thanked Bill either for covering for Rosemary or Emma for sending over a carton of butterbeer for everyone. In fact, Ginny had a long list of people to thank… except for Ron and Hermione. She frowned and wondered if everything was okay with the two of them – Hermione had promised that they would come.

Clean-up took just over an hour and after bidding farewell to Sarah and Rosemary, with promises of bright and early the next morning, Ginny Apparated home. She'd gone right into the kitchen, where she thought her mum and dad would be waiting to see how everything went. But the kitchen was quite empty and voices—rather loud voices—could be heard coming from the living room.

"I just don't understand why you can’t get married before you go," her Mum was saying. "We can have something small instead, something—"

"There's no time, Mum," Ron interrupted impatiently. "Hermione can’t even think about the wedding right now, she's going to be working non-stop until we go—"

"Go where?" Ginny asked and everyone looked at her in a startled sort of way. "What's going on?"

"Never you mind," her mother said sternly, as though she didn’t want Ginny to get any ideas about doing whatever Ron was.

"Now, Molly," Arthur said from his position in his armchair. "There's no need to snap at Ginny. Look, I think we've exhausted this conversation, let's leave Ron to fill Ginny in and—"

"I'm sorry, Arthur, I just can’t see how you can be okay with this. They're not married, it's not right—"

"He's an adult, he's been of age for years, he can do whatever he wants—"

"He is still living in my house!" Molly said angrily.

"Not anymore," yelled Ron and stormed up the stairs, taking two at a time. The house rattled as his bedroom door slammed closed.

Ginny looked at her parents in surprise. Her mum's lips were thin as she stood and retreated into the kitchen; her father gave her a small smile. "Ron will fill you in, why don’t you go on up?"

She didn’t need telling twice. She rapped on Ron's door loudly before pushing it open. The site that met Ginny caused her mouth to drop. For as long as she could remember, Ron's room had not changed at all. The Chudley Cannons and the orange and the comics and the old Quidditch equipment thrown around haphazardly had always been the site that greeted her. Now, however, it looked as though a handful of pixies had been thrown into the room and left to their own devices. There were clothes everywhere, bedding piled in a corner, posters hanging off the walls, and Ron's open trunk in the middle of it all.

"Where are you going?" she demanded.

Ron puffed out a disgruntled sigh.

"Africa."

He explained nothing more, but began yanking drawers open and pulling out even more clothing.

Ginny opened her mouth but nothing came out for a moment. "Erm… can I ask why?"

"Hermione's been transferred there," he tossed a shirt over his shoulder into the trunk. "And I'm going with her."

"When did this happen?" .

"Today. They just told her and she has to bloody leave next week."

"For…ever?" she asked, sinking down onto his cluttered bed and watching her brother wreak havoc on his room.

He blew out a breath and tried to push the piles of clothes further down into his trunk. "No… yes… I don’t know. It's not permanent, but we'll have to wait until, you know, or at least—"

"Hold on," Ginny said, putting a hand out. "You are not making any sense, can you explain this to me properly, please? How did Hermione get transferred? Is it a promotion? And why is mum going mental?"

But Ron merely kicked his trunk, yelped in pain, and started taking everything out.

"Oh for the love of—" Ginny took out her wand and used it to close the trunk. Ron sent her a furious look and tried to open it, only to realize it was locked.

"GINNY!" he yelled and reached for his wand on his shelf, but Ginny was too fast.

"If you want it back," she said, holding it up, "then you have to talk. Coherently."

He made another, much louder noise of frustration, kicked the trunk even harder and all but fell onto his bed.

From his jumbled explanation, Ginny gathered that the funding for Hermione's Muggle remedies research was to be tripled in the new year, giving the project the opportunity to expand to other countries. Hermione had been asked to go to Africa where she would be part of a team to help treat a widespread Muggle disease with the medications they'd been formulating. Ginny didn’t need Ron to say that this was an extraordinary opportunity for Hermione – it seemed like a tremendous breakthrough in Wizard-Muggle Relations, not to mention the help it would give to the disease.

"That's amazing! Of course she has to go—"

"Yeah, try telling mum that."

"Why doesn’t she want—"

"Well, it's me she has a problem with. She thinks it's not "proper" if I go because space is limited and we'll have to live together."

"Oh, she's so old-fashioned!" Ginny exclaimed.

"Yeah, and I'm not letting her go alone, so mum can forget it. Some of the areas over there aren’t very safe and all that."

Ginny nodded fervently, managing a straight face. If Hermione were here, Ron would certainly not get away with saying he wasn't 'letting' her do anything.

"So she wants you to push up the wedding so that you can be legally married before you go?" Ginny had to smile. "Well, that's mum, isn’t it? I don’t understand though, she let me live with Brian in Paris, and she didn’t even know him."

Ron gave Ginny a look. "That was because you were all alone in another country, Ginny."

"Oh, come off it, Mum didn’t have any problems with me going away—"

"She was bloody thrilled when you told her about Brian—er, since she knew that you were only friends, that is. Do you think she'd let you live with Brian now?"

"Well—"

No," he answered for her. "Trust me, she's still mental about it, it's like she tries to control us for as long as she can—because soon, she won’t be able to control any of her children anymore and then what will she do with her time?"

"I don't think that's true—she only wants the best for us, Ron. She'll give you her blessing, I know she will."

"Probably not—I don’t bloody care anyway—"

"Yes, you do care. And yes, she will – dad will talk to her."

Ron just threw his arms up in the air and looked around the room miserably. "Hermione will kill me when she sees this mess. She told me to pack efficiently for once in my life."

"Some things never change, doesn’t she know that? "

"Hey—THE GRAND OPENING!" he said so loudly, his mirror shook. "How did it—"

"Fantastic, we sold triple what Fred and George projected. But, anyway—"

"Excellent, so can you give me some for Hermione for Christmas?"

"Yeah, sure, but I was going to ask what you're going to do with your job at the Ministry? Will you quit or—"

"Extended leave of absence," he said. Then he grinned. "My woman will support me until we get back."

Ginny rolled her eyes. "You talk really bravely when she's not around."

"Whatever… look… help me, will you?"

"I suppose," she sighed, tossing him his wand so he could open the trunk. "Here, don’t do anything." She waved her own wand, and pronounced a clear incantation. At once, things began to fly around the room, arranging themselves into neat folded piles in thin air, and landed gracefully into the trunk. "Is that all you have?"

Ron looked at her in amazement. "That was good!"

"I've had practice," she grinned, then a wave of sadness washed over her. "I can’t believe that you two are leaving. I've only been back for a few months and…things are already changing…" She watched the team members in a Cannon's poster duck as Ron sent a shirt zooming past it into his trunk; the poster fell sideways on the wall and the players toppled onto one another.

"Oh, don’t cast the water spells, okay? Between you and Hermione, I can’t bloody take it!"

"I won't," she promised. "So… are you nervous?