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Chapter 2 A Simple Plan
The following morning, Hermione woke up early. She didn’t like to sleep in late whether it was a workday or a Saturday like today. She got up out of bed and decided that she would go into the office for a little bit; she wanted to get some work done. There was a difficult new healing potion she wanted to work on, and a nice and quiet office was exactly what she needed now. Work in silence, and get some thinking done at the same time. The best combination Hermione could think of.
Although she didn’t want to admit it, Ginny had been right yesterday: she still liked the man a lot. Hermione wasn’t too sure on love though. That was a whole other thing, but all the same, she wasn’t quite able to get him out of her mind today, so there must have been something there. After quickly taking a shower and getting dressed, Hermione headed for the kitchen to grab some food and then apparated to the ministry. As she walked to her lab, thoughts of him and of the work she wanted to do today fought in her mind on who would come first “Quiet you two”, she thought sternly, “there’s plenty of room for both of you!”
In all her haste to leave the apartment and get to her lab, Hermione didn’t notice that Ginny was up early as well, unusually early for someone who loved to sleep in as late as she could, especially on a Saturday.
When Hermione had left the apartment, Ginny had heard the familiar pop, and she got out of bed and quickly wrote a note to Harry to prepare him for her early arrival. When her owl, Artesimius, had flown out the window, Ginny started to get ready. She and Harry had decided that they didn’t want to wait much longer now that he had finally asked her. And since marrying a month from now meant a lot of planning, this fine Saturday at the beginning of June would be the day to do all that. “ And, ” Ginny thought mischievously, “a little bit of extra planning would do as well.”
Just when she was getting impatient with her fiancé, Artesimius arrived back in her kitchen with a short, “Okay love,” from Harry. Ginny smiled at the little note, and she apparated to 12 Grimmauld Place immediately. She was greeted by a, “Good morning love,” from Harry. He was still waking up. She could tell because he was only half-dressed. It seemed Artesimius had woken him up, for his jet-black hair was more ruffled than ever. His green emerald eyes, on the other hand, were shining and wide-awake as they were looking at her. “They always seem to be doing that lately,” Ginny thought lovingly, but it made her feel special, so she wasn’t complaining.
Ginny walked up to him “Good morning to you too,” and kissed him on the cheek. “We need to talk about something,” she added more seriously.
“So I gathered from your very early note. I wasn’t even up yet, and Artesimius scared the living daylights out of me when he was trying to wake me up,” he had sounded upset on purpose and looked at his fiancé to see if the words had the effect he was looking for. He knew of Ginny’s love to sleep in late, even later than him, and her dislike for being woken up too early. No reaction came from her. There were certainly no loving words to sooth him or make him feel any better. “Is everything okay?” Harry was starting to get worried. Her lack of response was not something he had ever dealt with before; it was usually her lack of silence that came his way. Deciding that it must be something serious, he tried a different approach, “Ginny, what is going on? You know you can tell me anything,” he stroked her cheek with his hand when he said this.
Ginny, in the meantime, had hardly listened to anything Harry had said. She had been thinking of how she would tell him the secret she had kept for over six years now. She had never told anybody. She had not even made any direct comment about it towards Hermione herself. But finally his last comment registered. She sighed and finally looked at him, “I need to talk to you about Hermione”
“What do you mean? What is wrong with her? There’s nothing wrong is there?” Harry had always been very protective of his best friends, and Ginny placed a comforting hand on his shoulder to reassure him.
“No, nothing’s wrong. It’s actually very right. I mean, the feelings are there and all, but she’s not doing anything to make it work. She’s not acting on them,” Ginny was babbling, and when Harry looked politely puzzled, she knew she finally had to get it over with. “Look, Hermione is in love. She has been for a long time…for over six years and….”
Harry couldn’t believe what he was hearing. It was quite a story even more so because Hermione and Ginny had both been able to hide it from him for all this time. On the other hand, it did make sense to him. It made sense why Hermione sometimes behaved as if she was an old spinster already.
Playing with his coffee for a while a thought struck him, “Hey Gin but wait...what about that guy, you know, the one she dated while at university?” He had never been able to remember his name.
Ginny looked up from the battlefield that was their breakfast, a cracker still in her hand, “You mean David?”
“Yeah him.”
“I don’t know. Hermione seemed to like him at the time, but…” Ginny looked into Harry’s eyes and felt a sudden weakness wash over her, “he never made her shine like you do whenever you look at me,” she suddenly giggled and turned as red as her hair. She hadn’t meant to say anything like that, but at the moment she was drowning in those shining emerald eyes again.
“Ah,” he got up and picked Ginny up before walking back to his bedroom, “and what about you Ginevra Weasley? Do I make you shine?”
“Oh yes, very much so,” was all that came out in between their kisses.
Sometime later, Ginny was lying in Harry’s arms, placing small kisses on his chest and the arms that were holding her. “We need to plan this,” she whispered softly.
“I know. I was thinking that maybe we could ask Albus to conduct the ceremony. He would love to, I’m sure. But maybe not at Hogwarts though. I know it’s a beautiful place and all, but it would be lovely to hold it outside somewhere, standing there in sunshine.” All of a sudden he was laughing out loud, “Can you imagine what it would be like to get married on the Quidditch pitch or under the Whomping Willow or at the…what?” he exclaimed, confused.
Ginny had sat up rolling her eyes and now no longer in his arms, “Harry James Potter will you please stop your rambling right now? You know I wasn’t talking about that,” her eyes were ablaze with a fire that he knew only too well, and it wasn’t the kind of fire that he liked in her.
“I know love…hey, Ginny look at me,” he cupped her chin with his hand and made her look at him, “I know,” he stated softly. “Look, the whole thing is new to me and has to sink in a little. Besides, if we want to do this right, we need to plan it. She is a very intelligent person, and so is he. We can’t risk either of them finding out about us meddling or they will kill us,” Harry sighed, but then his eyes started to twinkle.
“What is it Harry? What are you smiling about?” Ginny laughed as she started tickling him, knowing he would soon spill everything just to make her stop.
“What about the lake Gin?” he looked at her hopefully, “let’s gets married at the lake with Albus conducting the ceremony. It would make it easy to get them together as well.”
Ginny thought for a second, seeing Harry and herself standing at the edge of the lake, “Yes that would be perfect.” As she lay back down into his arms again, the simplest of plans started to form in her head. “Yes, a simple matter of getting everybody involved, and making the two spend time together. That would just work perfectly.”
AN Thanks again to my two Beta's Natasha and Ceciel. And to everybody who reads my little story. You keep me alive until HBP comes out.