One Good Day
Chapter 5: Fireside And Moonlight
Disclaimer: You know the spiel; JKR owns all the characters, not I. ‘Nuff said.
Big A/N: Well, this will be the final chapter of this story. I truly hope you enjoy it. Before I get to saying what I was going to say, I had a couple of extra credit questions that I suppose I’ll get out of the way now. The first, the inspiration for the title, comes from season Five of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. In that season, Buffy goes to another character, Spike, to find out how he killed two previous slayers. His initial answer was simply that he had, “one good day.” A bit morbid, I know, and I’m sure there seems to be no connection, but then, my mind works funny that way. As for the book shop owner, anyone who has read “Good Omens” will most likely find a something in common between a book shop owner in that story, and the one that I used. To the story at hand. I first wanted to say that I poured a lot into this last chapter. Particularly the last half of it. It was a lot of effort, and a lot of emotion, and I have only one favor to ask in return. Please review. Let me know if it was worth it or not. Another interesting thing to note is that this is the first time I take the camera off of Harry. Something I don't like to do as JKR rarely does it, but Ron and Hermione needed some alone time this go around, so what are you going to do? Okay, enjoy, and let me know what you think.
By now, Harry, Ron, and Ginny had learnt not to distract Hermione from her driving. No one made a sound as Hermione negotiated her way out of the cinema car park, and through the crowded streets.
It was mid afternoon, and the warm summer sun seemed to wrap its arms around Harry and Ginny as they lazed in the back seat, filling Harry with an immense sense of contentment. I just don’t see how this day could get any better, Harry thought to himself as he hugged Ginny closer to him.
When they had reached the expressway, Hermione broke the silence. “Well, Harry, we’ve only got one more stop planned, but it’s going to take a while to get there,” she said glancing at him through the rearview mirror. She then suggested that they play a travel game to pass the time.
She had started by explaining how to play a game called “I spy.” Harry thought this game was incredibly funny as neither Ron nor Ginny knew the proper name for much of the things that they had seen, and therefore resorted to just making up names for them. As a result, no one was able to guess any of the items they had tried to describe. While Harry couldn’t control his laughter at Ron’s triumphant cheer at stumping everyone on “The three-legged big ball thingy”, Hermione quickly grew annoyed and changed the game to one she called “slug bug”.
Harry wasn’t quite as fond of this game as Ginny punched him frequently, excitedly yelling “SLUG BUG!” despite the type of car she was pointing at. Ron didn’t seem so pleased with this game either as he complained, “But it doesn’t look like any kind of bug I know of.”
The four soon grew tired of this game too, and Harry found that Ginny had fallen asleep, her head resting on his chest, and her breaths coming in long, slow, draws. He stroked her hair fondly, and noted that either driving on the expressway was much easier than driving in town, or Hermione had finally gotten the hang of things.
In the front seat, Hermione had taken Ron’s hand, and, placing it on the gear shift, was explaining the difference between driving her parent’s Mercedes, and the old Ford that Ron had driven back when he was twelve. Those two really are good together, he mused as he watched Hermione cover Ron’s hand with her own so they shifted smoothly together. His eyelids grew steadily heavier and heavier, and before he knew it, he too drifted off into a very comfortable and dreamless sleep.
Sometime later, Harry had awoken to the sound of two of the car’s doors slamming shut. He opened his eyes to see Ron and Hermione walking hand in hand into a grocery store, and, trying to gage how much time had passed since he had first fallen asleep, he redirected his attention towards the sky.
The sun hung a little lower in the sky, but, Harry had guessed, there was plenty of daylight left. Feeling curiously relieved, he looked down at the sleeping Ginny in his arms, and inhaled her flowery scent. It had mingled with a strangely familiar scent that wafted in from the cracked windows. He couldn’t place it, but he did know it had made him feel slightly uncomfortable. Trying to shake the weird feeling, he rolled up his window, and buried his face in the sheet of red hair snuggled against his chest.
As he let himself get lost in her hair, he thought to himself how nice it would be to just sit there forever. Her scent, the gentle rhythmic pressure he felt against his chest as she breathed, and the incredibly soft skin beneath his fingertips had all made him feel as though he were in the most wonderful of dreams, and he was loathe to wake up.
The moment was broken as Ginny shifted, and in a very sleepy voice asked, “Are we there yet?” She turned her head to meet Harry’s eyes, and kissed him quickly on the lips.
Chuckling, Harry shook his head and whispered, “Not unless the last stop is a super market.” Ginny sat up, rubbed her eyes, and stretched luxuriously.
“Oh, good,” she chirped. “That means we’re nearly there!” Harry couldn’t help but feel a little disappointed when instead of retaking her position against his chest, she sat up fully and folded her hands in her lap.
“I suppose I won’t get any answers if I asked where exactly we are going?” Harry asked, masking his disappointment.
“Exactly,” Ginny answered, offering him a cheeky grin. “But, don’t worry. Hermione said that once we got to the store, we were less than a quarter hour from… where we’re going.”
Harry nodded, and was about to turn to see if Ron and Hermione were emerging from the store when he felt Ginny’s hand on his cheek. Directing him to look into her eyes, she leaned in and said, “Hermione also told me to keep you distracted when she and Ron came out of the store.”
“Are they coming?” Harry asked, arching his eyebrows. She only nodded with a coy smile on her face as she leaned in towards him.
**
Thankfully, Ron managed to at least pretend to ignore how enthusiastically Ginny was distracting Harry, and they spent the last few minutes of their journey in good spirits. Time on the expressway must have done Hermione some good because Harry noticed that not only was she driving much more smoothly, she was able to talk as she did so.
As she drove, the strangely familiar smell began to grow, and when Hermione rounded a tree filled bend, everything clicked into place. There, on the other side of the trees, beyond a sandy strip, was the ocean.
“Here we are Harry!” Ginny exclaimed. “Your very own beach party.”
“Yeah mate, we got some Frisbees, and some warm dogs…” Ron had started to say.
“Hot dogs, Ron,” Hermione corrected him.
“But they weren’t hot, Hermione. In fact they were a bit cold.”
The sight of the ocean did not exactly please Harry. The last time he was in such a setting, Dumbledore… He shook the thought from his head, and, determined not to put a damper on the rest of the day, Harry put up a false grin and said, “But I don’t even have a set of trunks for swimming.”
“No problem,” Ron said, breaking from his argument over hot dogs with Hermione. “Got you covered.” And with that, he reached under his seat and pulled two sets of brightly covered shorts, handing one pair back to Harry.
“And what about you two?” Harry asked Ginny and Hermione as the car came to a stop.
“We’ve been wearing our suits the whole day,” Hermione matter-of-factly informed him. Harry stopped short. Ginny’s tank top and shorts were hardly concealing as it is, the thought that her swimsuit was easily hidden under that had made his heart flutter erratically.
This news must have come as a shock to Ron as well, for Harry heard a very audible gulp in the seat before him. For the first time that day, Harry really registered what Hermione was wearing, and thought that it wasn’t much less revealing than Ginny’s attire. Her khaki shorts were nearly as short as Ginny’s, and while she did wear a full t-shirt, it was rather small, allowing a glimpse at her midriff as she shifted in her seat.
That definitely settles it, Harry thought. They aren’t Hermione and Ginny, they’re death eaters who took polyjuice potion and have brought me out here to give me a heart attack.
Harry’s thoughts were interrupted by Hermione, who had said, “You two can change in here, and we’ll meet you out on the beach in a few minutes.” The girls exited the vehicle, and after retrieving a few items out of the trunk, had made their way out towards the beach.
For a few moments, no words passed between Ron and Harry. Finally, as Harry began to shuffle out of his jeans, Ron spoke in a squeaky voice, “They’re evil. Totally, completely, absolutely evil.”
**
It wasn’t difficult to find the girls once they had finished changing. For one, there was hardly anyone else on the beach. For another, they had both already stripped down to their bathing suits, and the image would have been hard to miss for any teenage boy.
Hermione was stretched out on her side, laying on a very large beach blanket, and idly skimming through the one book she managed to convince the book shop owner to sell her earlier. She wore a sleek navy blue bikini that revealed a rather well toned and tanned Hermione that Harry was simply not used to seeing.
Ginny’s bikini, on the other hand, was the same pale green hue as the tank top she wore earlier. Her cream colored skin was the most alluring thing that Harry had ever seen, and he barely even noticed that she was sitting on a completely different towel and tossing a red Frisbee up in the air.
“Evil,” Ron whispered as they reached the girls.
“Hey guys. Fancy a game of catch?” Ginny asked, brandishing the Frisbee.
“All right,” Ron nodded, unable to take his eyes off of Hermione. “You coming?” he asked her, and she shook her head.
“No, you three go on. I’ve never been able to catch or throw one of those things, so you go. Go on, I’ve been wanting to page through this book for a while now anyway.” Ron’s shoulders hunched a little, but he nodded, and followed as Ginny led them away.
The three of them formed a kind of triangle, and started off somewhat slowly, but as they were all rather good quidditch players, the game soon took on a more frenzied and acrobatic pace. Ginny, being the only chaser among the lot, was easily the best at throwing the disc and after only a short time had managed to pull off some impressive tosses that would curve at the last minute. Ron, likewise, seemed incapable of dropping the Frisbee as his long arms magically reached it no matter how far away he was.
They were all three laughing and having a great time when Harry noticed that Ron kept casting furtive glances over towards Hermione. Deciding to help Ron out a bit, he threw the Frisbee way over his head. Ron never took his eye off the disc as he ran full speed to try and keep up with it. Then there was a scream as Ron tripped headlong over the unaware Hermione.
“RON!” she barked as they lay there entangled sloppily with one another.
“What?”
“You could try watching where you are going once in a while.”
“Maybe if you came to play with us, you wouldn’t be an innocent bystander.”
“That’s not the… HEY! Put me DOWN!” Hermione squealed as Ron collected her in his arms and started running for the water. Harry and Ginny both grinned at the two as Hermione batted at Ron’s chest and shoulders, laughing hysterically. When he was waist deep in the water, Ron kissed Hermione on the forehead, and unceremoniously dropped her in the water. She jumped up almost immediately and shot a spray of water from her mouth directly into his face before tackling him.
“Come on, Harry!” Ginny prodded, grabbing at Harry’s wrist, but before he let her take him away, he stopped her.
“Wait a minute,” he yelled over his shoulder as he ditched his t-shirt and glasses on the blanket Ginny was using earlier. Then, running full speed, he snatched her up in his arms (which was rather clumsier than he would have liked since he couldn’t see very well without his glasses), and plunged headlong with her into the ocean.
All four friends had a marvelous time swimming, splashing, and trying to duck each other underwater. Somehow, they had gotten into a match of chicken, and since both Ron and Hermione were considerably taller than Harry and Ginny, they won nearly every bout. When they traded partners, Ron and Ginny sang in unison a rousing chorus of “Weasley Is Our King,” as they toppled Harry and Hermione three times in a row.
“Sorry, Hermione, I guess I’m just not much good at chicken,” Harry offered with a weak smile after their fifth loss.
“It’s no matter,” she said, a smile plastered on her face. The sun was getting low now and the shadows were growing longer by the minute. After a little more play, Hermione stood and asked Ron if he would help her get the rest of the stuff from the car. Ron shrugged and followed her out of the water. Halfway to the towels, he picked her up in his arms again, and Harry could hear Hermione squeal. He smiled after them.
A little tired out, Harry and Ginny sat on the mushy sand as the salty water lapped against their shoulders. The water was quite warm and pleasant, he thought. Quite unlike the water the night Dumbledore…
“Something wrong, Harry?” Ginny asked him with a look of deep concern on his face. Harry mentally kicked himself for his thoughts, but just shrugged. “Oh, come on,” she said, slipping her hand into his. “You know you can tell me.”
“It’s just,” Harry sighed. “Last time I went swimming was when… was the night Dumbledore died.”
A horrified look filled Ginny’s face and Harry had to mentally kick himself again for being so honest. “Look, it’s nothing,” he tried to convince her, but he could tell she wasn’t biting. Then, refusing to let the day be ruined, refusing to let things make a turn for the sad, Harry splashed her in the face.
Ginny’s face shifted from horror, to shock, to indignation, and without so much as a word, she splashed him back. Harry raised an eyebrow, and splashed her again.
“That’s it, Potter!” she screamed and went to duck him under water. Only this time he saw it coming and wrapped his arms around her waist to pull her under with him. As he did so, his pinky finger grazed the waistband of her bikini, and it was as if an electric shock went through his entire body. That little bit of fabric was a mystery begging to be unraveled, and something indescribable awoke inside of him.
By the time they had surfaced, they were kissing. But this kiss was unlike anything they had shared before. It was frantic, and desperate, and searching. Their hands seemed to take on a life of their own. Ginny’s fingers raked through his hair as she wrapped herself tightly around him. Harry’s own hands, seeking to feel every bit of her skin, were eagerly exploring her exposed back, pressing her ever closer to him. He could hear, and feel, something between a whimper and a moan die in her throat as her knees squeezed around his middle. They were close, more physically close than they had ever been before, and yet Harry felt himself feeling like it wasn’t close enough. He had to get closer.
His hands worked their way up her back, his thumbs tracing the straps of her bikini bra. Ginny slowly began to rock back and forth, the whimpering moan returning as she attacked his lips. One of his hands dropped to the small of her back as the other traced along her side and her arm until it found her hand, and instinctively their fingers laced into each other, their grip tightening until it almost hurt. An irresistible pressure built up inside Harry until he…
…pulled away.
Gasping for air, Harry kept his eyes closed as he touched Ginny’s forehead with his own. He could hear her panting as the short, shallow breaths mixed with his own in the space between them. Cautiously, he opened his eyes to see that hers were still shut. The tips of their noses grazed against each other, and their lips were dangerously close. He could feel her heart racing against his own, as though they were having a contest to see whose heart could beat the hardest and fastest. When she opened her eyes, he saw only a scared look, and knew instantly that he too must be wearing an identical expression.
For a few silent moments they just sat there like that. Their lips worked uselessly in the air, the both of them trying to get a grasp on the situation. Harry wanted to say something, but didn’t know what he could say. He wanted to kiss her, but was afraid of letting himself fall into her again. At once, Harry had never felt more exhilarated, and terrified in his whole life. They had done little more than kiss, and yet, at least to Harry, it had felt as though they had done so much more.
When he finally saw the edges of Ginny’s lips curl up into a half smile, Harry let out a very relieved chuckle, and Ginny joined him. The air between them had ceased to be so dangerous, and Harry could feel both of their hearts steadily slow down. Rubbing a thumb along her side, Harry whispered, “I think we…”
“Yeah,” Ginny nodded in a quiet voice.
“Yeah.”
“Okay.” She still didn’t move for a second, as she looked as though she might say something more, but instead, she kissed him gently. With a smile, she rolled off of him, stood, and started back towards Ron and Hermione.
When she noticed he wasn’t following her, Ginny stopped and asked, “You coming?”
“In a minute,” Harry replied, and watched as she walked away. What in the hell was that? he wondered in exasperation.
**
When he felt it safe, Harry made his way back to Ginny, Ron, and Hermione. Ginny and Hermione had put their clothes back on, and all three of them had managed to construct a rather pathetic fire that was more smoke than flame. Ron complained (for the first time that day) that it would have been much easier if they had had their wands, but Hermione just continued to issue instructions.
Hermione, Harry could notice, was visibly distracted though as Ron had forgotten to take off his shirt when they all went swimming, and had now taken it off to dry. As she walked back from a pile of what looked like presents and supplies, Harry watched her spill nearly half of the marshmallows that she and Ron had bought onto the sand as she tried to open the package. Ginny must have noticed Hermione’s reduced state as well for she instantly offered to give Hermione a hand.
As the girls handled the food, Harry pulled his shirt and glasses back on, and helped Ron tend the fire. Ron wore a dark look, and Harry knew exactly what was coming.
“So, what exactly was that over there?” Ron asked him accusingly.
“Nothing,” Harry lied.
“Didn’t really look like nothing.”
“Honestly,” Harry said. “Besides, I think you have your own girl to mind,” he added as he saw what looked to be an ogling Hermione applying mustard to her index finger.
Ron turned to look at Hermione, and Hermione quickly turned away and frantically searched for the napkins. Ginny caught his eye and flashed him the kind of smile that made him feel unbelievably warm, and he returned it.
By the time Hermione had finished explaining the concept of cooking the hot dogs on the skewers to Ron and Ginny, the sun had set, and the last vestiges of daylight were quickly draining from the sky.
They had eaten hot dogs, and potato chips, and roasted marshmallows, and washed it all down with cans of soda, and Harry was incredibly pleased at how Ginny had hardly lifted her head from his shoulder the whole time. When Hermione had dropped her marshmallow in the fire, Ron gallantly plucked his own marshmallow from its skewer, and fed it to her. Ginny and Harry looked at each other and both made gagging sounds as they did this. When all the food was gone, the embers of the fire were rising gently into a star filled, moon lit night.
The time had come for Harry to open his presents, and it was by far the most presents he had ever received for any occasion. Mr. and Mrs. Weasley had both got him a gold watch similar to the one Ron received for his seventeenth birthday. Bill and Fleur had given him a carryall that really could carry just about all the things you could ever need with you. Lupin had gotten for him a book entitled, Defeating the Dark Arts: Advanced Techniques That Will Have The Darkest Of Wizards Begging For Mercy, while Moody had gotten him a metal contraption that was so strange and complex that even the little note explaining it was a kind of dark detector had left Harry with absolutely no clue on how to use it.
Fred and George’s gift was a box labeled, “The Master Prankster’s Kit: 101 Jokes And Gags For The Distinguished Troublemaker”, and, much to Hermione’s disapproval, Ron had given him a bottle of fire whiskey. The last gift in the pile was a very fancy looking journal from Hermione, and she assured Harry that she would explain in more detail when they got up in the morning.
With Hermione’s grudging permission they stuffed all the presents in the magical carryall that Bill and Fleur had sent when Ron stopped. “Oi, Ginny, didn’t you get Harry a present?”
In the commotion of all the gift unwrapping, Harry hadn’t even realized that he hadn’t opened one from Ginny. Trying not to look too accusing as he turned to her, he noticed her cheeks blush as she said, “I did, but I was hoping to give it to him in private.”
“Private, eh?” Ron asked suspiciously.
“Yes, Ron, in private. As in; it’s none of your business,” she said with her hands on her hips and looking very much like her mother for one scary moment.
Before Ron could come up with a retort, Hermione had looped her arm around his and said, “Come on, Ron, why don’t you take me for a walk?”
“But…”
Hermione whispered something in Ron’s ear, and without further convincing, he nodded and said, “All right, yell if you need us.” And they walked off.
As soon as they were out of earshot, Ginny scrambled over towards the remainder of the hot dogs and sodas, and dug out a small little box wrapped in shiny red paper. Harry half expected to see that mischievous grin on her face, but when her face turned back towards the fire, it was quite grave, almost nervous.
She sat very close to him, nearly crawling into his lap again, and handed him the package. “Before you open that,” she said in a small voice. “I want you to know that I had an impossible time trying to find you something. I wracked my brain for weeks, went shopping with Hermione, asked Ron, everything, and nothing worked. And then I came up with this, and,” she paused, her hands worrying nervously in her lap. “Just don’t be mad at me, okay?”
“How in the world am I going to be mad at you?” Harry asked amused, but this didn’t seem to comfort Ginny in the slightest as her shoulders just slumped.
“Just open it,” she said dejectedly.
Harry peeled off the red wrapping revealing a cardboard box. “Yes, Ginny, you were right, this cardboard box angers me to no end,” he mocked her, but was rewarded with a swift slap on the arm and a very disapproving glare from her. Putting his arms up in defeat, Harry opened the cardboard box.
The moment he did, his mouth fell wide open.
**
“What’re you thinkin’ about?” Ron asked Hermione. They had walked in silence, arm in arm, until the fire was a tiny speck of light behind them before Ron chose to speak.
“The full moon,” she answered quietly, pointing at the pale orb in the sky. “When I was a little girl, it used to fascinate me, and I would spend hours just watching it. What I wouldn’t give back then to walk on it, or maybe,” and here Ron could see her blush in the pearly glow of the moon. “Maybe just share a kiss underneath it once in a while.”
Ron had wrapped an arm around her shoulder and kissed her on the cheek before she continued on. “I even used to wonder what it would be like to be a werewolf. How strange and thrilling and wonderful it would be to turn into something else, if only for one night out of the month. And then I met a werewolf, and ever since, looking at the full moon just makes me a little sad.”
“Me too,” Ron had said. “Except the bit about being a little girl,” he added, and Hermione playfully swatted him on the chest, only remembering as she did that he was still without a shirt. Her proximity to his bare skin had made her want to scream, to wrap herself around him and do something very unladylike, but instead she satisfied herself by giving him a nice, Hermione hand-sized, welt.
“Ow!” he said as he winced, rubbing the spot where she hit him and looking at her reproachfully. “That hurt,” he finished, just to make sure she got the point.
They both stopped walking, and Hermione turned to face him. “I’m sorry,” she whispered, and kissed him briefly where she had hit him. What on Earth do you think you are doing, Granger? Kissing Ron on the chest? That is definitely far lower than is good for either of you! is what she thought, but the only thing she said further was, “you were saying?”
Ron stammered for nearly a full minute, and Hermione couldn’t stifle a grin as he did so. Eventually he found his composure and struggled on. “Yeah, no, the moon. I was saying I felt the same way as you about the moon, even how since Lupin, it doesn’t seem nearly as cheerful. Except, this time, it’s not that bad.”
He looked down at her meaningfully, and she returned his gaze with the faintest hint of a smile, as she said, “no, it isn’t.” Standing on tiptoe, she kissed him.
“Not nearly,” he repeated, and wrapping his arms around her, Ron smothered her in a much deeper and satisfying kiss. After what seemed like the passage of several full moons, they broke apart, and Ron had said, “You know, I’ve been doing a lot of thinking lately.”
“Uh-oh,” Hermione giggled, but at the hurt look from Ron she quickly added, “Sorry. What have you been thinking about?”
“Well, I’ve been thinking about the Horcruxes, and this stupid war. Been thinking a lot about Harry, and how at least you and I chose this. He didn’t have the choice, and it’s not fair, not really. It’s like the way things are between him and Ginny. At first they’re dating, and then they break up, and then they went through whatever that was at the wedding, and now they’re dating again, but tomorrow, they’re going to have to break up all over again, and it’s not fair.”
“It’s not fair,” Hermione agreed, and feeling the sudden urge to sit, she dragged Ron down with her so that they sat side by side letting the ocean gently lap up against their bare feet.
As Ron continued, something thick happened to his voice, and Hermione started to suspect that he was on the verge of tears. “I’ve also been thinking that this has been the best week of my life, and if I knew that life could have been like this, I would have definitely gotten over myself and gotten up the nerve to ask you out a lot sooner than I did. But I didn’t, so now all I know is that I really don’t want this to end.”
Hermione rested her head against his (bare) shoulder, and didn’t even try to keep the tear that had been threatening to fall throughout Ron’s monologue from rolling down her cheek.
“I’ve been thinking,” Ron continued, taking Hermione’s hand in his own, “That it’s not fair that we can have this, and Harry and Ginny can’t, but I’ve also been thinking that it would be even more unfair if we didn’t have it. It’d be unfair because… well… I love you, and that’s what all of this is about, isn’t it? Isn’t that what we’re supposed to be doing all this for anyway? So we can all, I don’t know…”
“No, Ron. Keep going, please?” Hermione sniffled as she fell into his lap. In his own way, she was beginning to realize, Ron could be the most eloquent person in the world, and the last thing she wanted was for him to stop talking because if he stopped talking, the world very well might just end.
“Uh… Okay, well, see I’ve also been thinking, or wanting to know what you would think about…”
**
“What the…? How did…?” Harry stared at the contents of the package in a complete stupor. Ginny flinched at both unfinished questions, and began to look as if she might cry.
Hoarsely, she said, “I nicked it.” She bit her lip as Harry pulled out the locket that he and Dumbledore had wrested from the cave on the night of Dumbledore’s death. The fake Horcrux. He let it twirl in the firelight and was about to give talking another go when she beat him to the punch and sighed, “that’s not really the present. You’ll… you’ll have to open it.”
Harry wordlessly followed Ginny’s instructions, and the sight he saw in the locket had made his jaw drop again. It was a single picture cut in two so that it took up both halves. He saw himself on the right side, anxiously looking about a crowd of red and gold clad students. From the left came a furious flash of red hair, and he recognized Ginny’s hard blazing face as she leapt into his arms. And then he saw the miniature image of himself kiss her. He looked into her eyes, but she again cut him off before he could say anything.
“Let me explain,” she pleaded, and he could see a single tear fall down her cheek. “It… I… Colin took that picture, and before the end of term he gave it to me. Originally I was going to just give that to you, but then I remembered that locket. I… I don’t know what it means, but I think that whatever it is, it’s something bad because I never saw you with it until after Dumbledore died, and then, you hardly let it out of your grasp. And so, I nicked it a few days ago, and shrunk the picture and put it together.”
“But… why?” he asked in a voice barely above a whisper.
“Because you won’t let me come with you, and I’m okay with that, I really am. But,” she stopped for a moment, steeling herself to say something very important. “But whatever it is you’re going to go do, I know it’s going to be hard, and what I hoped is that… that when things get so hard that you don’t think you can go any further, that you’ll remember that you keep a piece of me with you, and hopefully that’ll make it… a little easier.”
She dropped her eyes from his, looking down at her hands, and Harry thought he had never seen her look so alone. He wanted to wrap his arms around her and tell her that everything would be okay, but he couldn’t. Instead, all he could do was look at that locket, and finally say, “I don’t…”
**
“… or wanting to know what you think about maybe us being married,” Ron blurted out, and then hastily he added, “You know, later, after everything is settled.” He cringed, waiting for the tirade he was sure would follow, but when Hermione continued to lie in his lap, staring at the moon, he relaxed a little, and waited.
“Well,” she started in her most matter-of-fact, Hermioneish voice. “The first question I would have to ask is, are you mental?”
“Hey!”
“Shh, Ron, that was only my first impression, and one should always question their first impression. So my next question would have to be, are you completely mental?”
“Hey.”
Hermione sat up and gave Ron a slightly stern look. “I’m trying to show you how I think sometimes, Ron, so be quiet.” Even when Hermione was in lecture mode, Ron thought her beautiful. Even more important, he thought, no matter how well he thought he knew her, she always surprised him, a fact that only caused him to love her more.
“See, I now have two questions to answer before I move on,” she explained. “Do I think you’re mental? On the contrary, I think you’re quite smart, whether you believe it or not. You’re brilliant at chess, and that’s no small accomplishment, and you’re a prefect.”
“Yeah but you thought Harry should have been the prefect,” Ron interrupted, hating how quickly he jumped on the defensive.
“Oh, Ron. The only reason why I thought Harry would have been made a prefect over you is because of how close he was to Dumbledore. Besides, competitiveness aside, all prefects have certain standards to meet, and you don’t see Dean or Seamus wearing badges do you? That’s to say that despite who should and shouldn’t be a prefect, you still have the marks…”
“But…”
“Hush. You’re smart, Ron. Just trust me. Now, we know you’re not mental, which means we can bin the first two questions since you can’t be completely mental if you’re not even partially mental. So the next question I would have to ask is, do you love me?”
Taken off guard, especially since he knew he already told her this once tonight, all he could manage was, “of course.”
“Right then,” she nodded. “The next logical question is, do I love you?” Ron looked at her funnily. Was he supposed to answer this? If so, then he would obviously answer yes if only to tilt things his way. But before he could finish this train of thought, Hermione leaned into him, and kissed him deeply, pushing his back down to the ground as she did so.
Pulling away, she smirked at him and whispered, “In case that doesn’t make the answer obvious, Ron, yes, I love you.” She helped him back up into a sitting position and once again assumed her position in his lap and continued on in her lecture tone, “So the last question is, what is marriage to you?”
What is this? Some kind of trick question? he thought. In all the scenarios that ran through his head as he planned this, this didn’t come up at all, and he found himself thoroughly unprepared. Finally, in an attempt to at least say something and not make Hermione go back on her conclusion that he wasn’t mental, Ron spoke.
“Well, I don’t know a lot of married people, but, well, I guess it’s more than just loving someone. I mean, I guess you can fall out of love with someone, and besides, you can do some really nasty things to someone you love, can’t you?” Hermione nodded in agreement, and gave him a look that told him to keep going, but Ron found himself at a dead end.
Then he asked himself a question that he had never asked himself, but yet always seemed to know the answer to. Why do I want to marry her? And then, as if a light came on, the words just formed in his mind.
“So it’s more than love. It’s having a row with the other person, but knowing that in the end, you’re going to make up. It’s being able to take on the world and whatever it throws at you, whether it’s a mountain troll, or a bunch of really dark wizards, or just a really tough homework assignment, because you know that other person will be there to help you get through it.” Hermione laughed at this one, giving Ron a boost of confidence to press forward.
“It’s being on your death bed, and knowing that if no one else came, at least that other person would. It’s also knowing that you couldn’t care less if no one else came, as long as she did, and then you could die happy.” He had taken to stroking her cheek, and could see more tears in her eyes threaten to overflow. “So it’s more than love, or at least a different type of love, really. More boring in some parts, like shoveling breakfast down together every day as you both get ready for work. But it’s also more exciting in some ways, like when you’re just sitting there, doing nothing in particular, and you think to yourself that someone belongs to you, and they always will.” He sighed, signifying the end of his definition of marriage, but just to make sure that Hermione got the hint, Ron added, “So, that’s what marriage is to me.”
Hermione sat back up, leaned in very close, and looking him in the eyes whispered, “that’s a very good answer,” just before kissing him.
When they broke apart, Ron muttered, “Yeah?”
Hermione nodded and said, “If that is what being married to you is like, Ron, than I think I would kind of like it. You know, after everything is settled.”
Ron let out a relieved sigh. “Good.”
“Oh, ‘good’?”
“Yeah.”
“And why is that good, Ronald?”
“Because…”
**
“I don’t deserve this,” Harry muttered. He just stared at the locket in his hands, and Ginny could feel something boiling inside of her. She expected he would be angry with her for stealing, or quite possibly altering something important. She had even bore the slightest glimmer of hope that it might make him happy. But this was beyond the pale.
Staring into his green eyes sparkling with the reflection of the fire light, Ginny barked at him. “Don’t deserve this? Of course you deserve this!”
“You can’t understand,” he said dully.
“Try me.”
Harry sighed, and it broke her heart that he felt this much pain. How she wished she could just heal all the wounds by holding him, but she knew better. She knew this would be difficult. “I didn’t ask for anything to happen. Not Voldemort, not my parents, none of it. And yet it happened, and I didn’t do anything to make it happen, and much of my life’s been rubbish because of it. And then, when I look at the people I care about, it’s bad enough that so many of them seem to end up dead or badly hurt, but I’m left to wonder. I mean, would Ron and Hermione still be my best friends if my parents were still alive and well? Would your family still look after me the way they do if my own family was there to do it instead? Would…”
“Stop,” she commanded, and Harry’s mouth fell shut instantly.
“I don’t know, and happily enough I don’t care,” Ginny started. She hoisted herself onto his lap, facing him, and was reminded of the white hot moment in the ocean only a few hours earlier. Oh the things he could make her feel. Suppressing that track, she took the locket from his hands, and gently placed it around his neck.
“Listen to me, sweetie,” she said kindly.
“Sweetie?” he grinned.
“Yeah, I was trying it on for size, you like it?”
“I could get used to it.”
“Good, now listen. Dumbledore said love is your greatest power, right? You know this, but you don’t understand it. It’s like knowing the incantation of a spell, and knowing the wand movements, but not really understanding them all put together. It’ll never come out right until you do.”
“I don’t follow.”
“Of course you don’t follow, that’s why you need to shut up and listen. We don’t love you because you’re ‘famous’ Harry Potter. We love you because you’re just Harry. Can’t you see that? All day, you’ve been just Harry, and we didn’t automatically start shunning you. You’re problem Harry isn’t that you don’t know how to love. It’s that you won’t let anyone love you. And given what’s happened to you, I can understand, but Harry, you have to let us in. There are a lot of people here who love you not because of whatever is going on between you and Voldemort, or because you hand him his arse nearly every time you meet. We love you because you’re a wonderful person.”
As she spoke, she could feel Harry’s hands lace themselves at the small of her back, and she had responded by draping her arms over his shoulders. But she wasn’t finished, and she knew he didn’t get it yet. “Harry, you don’t deserve any of this because of that scar, or the prophecy, or even what you did in the Department of Mysteries. You deserve it because you are you.”
“When I was ten, I was infatuated with the ‘famous’ Harry Potter. I had seen you for only a minute, and I was rapt because that was what I was supposed to do; moon over the hero. When I was eleven, I developed a crush on the ‘famous’ Harry Potter, and when you saved me from Tom Riddle, you became my knight in shining armor.”
“But something funny happened after that. You grew normal. By the time I was thirteen, and you stayed with us at the Quidditch World Cup, you stopped being some mythic hero, and I felt myself falling in love with who you were. Like the chocolate egg we shared in the library, or even when you were being an absolute prat in thinking you attacked my father, and you wouldn’t talk to anyone.”
She leaned in so that their foreheads met, and whispered, “I had a crush on ‘The Chosen One’. I fell in love with you, Harry.”
Before she had a chance to kiss him, he buried his face in her chest, and she could immediately feel hot tears soaking through her tank top. “Don’t” he moaned in a strangled sob.
“Don’t what?” she asked, scared.
“Don’t say…”
**
"Because it makes it easier to do what I'm about to do," Ron said. He had separated himself from Hermione, and she just sat there and looked at him as though he had just been transfigured into a hippogriff. Fishing around in the pocket of his trunks, he found what he was looking for, and bent down to one knee.
"Will you marry me, Hermione? After?" With a somber look in his eye, he held to her a very simple gold ring with a single tiny diamond set in it. Hermione didn't move a muscle for a very long time.
When she did move, it was only the slightest shake of the head. The tiny movement grew more and more pronounced, and as he watched her, Ron could feel his heart break. "No," she whispered, her head shaking more violently by the second. "No, Ron. Don't do this. Just, don't!"
She had gotten up and started walking, and Ron jumped to his feet to go after her. "What? Don't do what?"
"Don't ask me Ron! I can't!" she sobbed at him.
"But you just said..." he cried, panic filling his voice.
"I know what I just said, Ronald!" she yelled, rounding on him. "But that was different! That was two kids talking about the future! This!" she shrieked. "This is now! And I can't!"
"But why?" his voice cracked and he hated how it sounded in his ears, like a child trying to figure out why his mummy wouldn't let him have another ice cream.
"Because, Ronald, I'm petrified, okay? Because today has been wonderful, but we leave tomorrow! Tomorrow, Ron! Everything starts tomorrow, and this time tomorrow, one of us may already be dead! And I can't... I can't do that... I can't...go on if my would-be husband is DEAD! Don't you get it Ron?"
"No, I don't get it!" he shouted at her, wishing he hadn't. "I don't get how a ring makes it different. I'm sorry Hermione, I don't get how you could tell me you'd want to marry me one minute, and then turn me down the next. I don't get ANYTHING anymore!"
"Damn it Ronald!" she sobbed, turning away from him again. He lurched after her, grabbing for her hand, and she yanked away from him, but he held tight. They struggled, Ron desperately trying to pull her close, Hermione trying for the life of her to just get away, and in the struggle, Ron had landed hard on his bum and Hermione had managed to land directly on top of him. He wrapped his arms around her, though she still tried to separate herself from him.
"Just tell me!" he pleaded, and the streams of tears running down her cheeks pushed into his heart like a dagger. She struggled some more until she realized he would not let her go. Her breaths came out in quavering hisses, and she refused to meet his eyes as she spoke.
"I want this so badly," she said in a very watery voice. "I want the fairy tale ending so badly it hurts. It already hurts Ron. And if I take that ring, if I say yes, that makes it real... and if... if something should happen to you..." she sniffled and screwed her eyes shut as though to block the image of a dying Ron from her mind. When she opened her eyes again, she looked straight into his and finished her sentence. "I'd die."
Ron pulled her into him and stroked her hair as he felt her tears roll down his skin. Her legs wrapped around him, and he could feel her fingernails start to dig into his back as her sobs grew stronger and stronger. Slowly he started to gently rock her as he made a soft hushing noise. "You know, Hermione," his voice came in a hoarse whisper. "There are about six million ways to die that don't involve Death Eaters or V-Voldemort."
That was the first time Hermione had ever head Ron call Voldemort by his proper name. In pure astonishment she pulled away from him and met his eyes, and the look she found there was more determined than she had ever seen. Chuckling he continued, "I think your driving might account for half of them, really." Hermione couldn't help a watery chuckle.
"War or no war, Hermione, we might be dead tomorrow anyway. And that's the point I think I've been trying to get at all night. I reckon that if you stop doing what you want or need to do because you're afraid of dying, than you might as well not be living. Especially when it comes to Voldemort. We may win in the end, but if he keeps us from living, then at least in that small part, he won. It's like how everyone refused to say his name even after he was gone the first time. Sure, he was down, sure he lost, but he still won because people were still afraid to live because of him, weren't they? Yeah, he might kill me. But then, I might die in a car crash on the way home tonight too. I don't think I should stop my life on account of either of them." He paused to collect his thoughts, and then continued.
"The only reason why I want to wait until after isn't because I'm afraid of anything, it's just because I want our life together to be different. More perfect, I suppose. And that's a bit difficult if we're out chasing down Horcruxes or fighting some stupid war, isn't it?"
Hermione stared at him in complete awe, her tears still flowing freely. Finally she managed, "You're not worried at all are you?"
"The only thing I'm worried about, love, is getting you to change your answer." He offered her a warm smile before kissing her forehead.
"Ask me again?" she asked, smiling feebly and trying very hard not to cry any more than she already was.
"What?" he replied a little taken off guard. She took his hand and looked as deep into his eyes as she could.
"Ask me again, Ronald."
"Right, okay," he said, and for a moment he contemplated getting back down on one knee, but she was so close and felt so right, and in an instant he knew that this was perfect, this was real. Miraculously, the ring was still clasped in his hand. "Will you marry me?"
Hermione couldn't help the increased flow in tears as she nodded, and whispered "okay." The kiss they shared was wonderful, unlike anything Ron had ever had in his life, and when they broke apart, Ron could see Hermione hold her hand out, but he shook his head.
"I... Well, I kind of didn't want Harry to know so..." his hand reached in his pocket again, and pulled out a thin golden chain. Snaking the chain through the ring, he reached behind Hermione's neck and fastened the clasp. His fingers trembled slightly as he withdrew his hands from her back, tracing his fingers along her jaw, and then down the chain. With one hand he lifted the ring off of her chest, and with a very nervous other hand, pulled slightly at the collar of her t-shirt so that he could slip the ring underneath it. He sat fascinated with the barely noticeable circular impression the ring made, and on an impulse he kissed it, and whispered, "you're my life now."
Hermione's hands buried themselves in his hair, and for a few sweet, blissful moments, they lost themselves in one another.
**
"Don't say... Don't tell me you love me!" he yelled at her, and in fright Ginny jumped out of Harry's lap. Hopping to his feet, Harry ignored the very hurt Ginny and began to pace by the firelight, collecting his thoughts, desperately trying to put together what he had to say. When he did speak again, his voice was low, gravelly, and utterly defeated.
"I love those two," he began, nodding in the direction that Ron and Hermione had disappeared to. "Ron, and Hermione. At a time when all I had was a rotten cousin that liked to beat me up, they became the brother and sister I never had. I could always depend on them, and you have no idea how much it kills me to understand how much danger just being my friend puts them in."
"I love your family. Especially your mum. I'll never forget the summer before Sirius... The summer before my fifth year. Your mum had said I was just as good as her son. Do you remember?" Ginny nodded silently. "I never properly thanked her for that. I never told her how much that meant to me, that someone could care for me so much to take me... to take me in like that." By now Harry could feel a few stray tears escape the prison of his lashes, and he felt no strength to stop them.
"I loved... I loved Sirius. Heh," Harry offered a watery chuckle. "When I first learnt about him, I wanted to kill him. But... but he grew to be so important so quickly that when he was... when he was murdered I just felt. I don't know, like this hole had been punched in my chest." Harry found that for what seemed a long while he could not speak further as the pain seemed to clench his throat entirely shut. But, needing to get this off his chest, he pressed on.
"And I loved Dumbledore. For as dotty as he was, and as completely stupid about Snape as he was, I still loved him because he believed in me. And now I miss him so much Ginny..." The stinging in his eyes intensified, and yet it couldn't come close to reflecting the pain in his heart. "I miss him, and I wish he was here right now to tell me what to do because I'm so lost, right now." Harry crumpled to the ground in tears, and Ginny rushed over to him, wrapping an arm around his shoulders and just letting him cry. She cooed to him and let him know that he could cry with her.
Finally Harry looked into her eyes, his tears glowing red in the dying firelight, and whispered, "And I love you Ginny. With everything I have, and you've given me this perfect day, and now that it's over, I wish it never happened."
"Don't say that, Harry," Ginny pleaded. "Why would you say that?"
"Because I'm sick of all of it!" Harry hissed. "I'm sick of fighting, and Voldemort, and Death Eaters, and Prophecies and the whole bloody lot! I'm tired, and I don't want it anymore, if I ever did. And more and more I've been thinking we did this for a day, why can't we do it again tomorrow, and the day after, and forever because I don't want to fight anymore, damn it! I don't want..."
"No, Harry. I can't go with you, that's fine. But you can't stay with me, and you know it. If you're not going after him, he's going to come after you..."
"Then LET HIM!" Harry cried. "Let him, because I don't want to do this any..."
"STOP IT!" Ginny shrieked, and Harry fell into silence. "You don't... You still don't get it do you?" she asked hysterically, feeling the tears spill from her own cheeks and not caring. "The whole reason for this Harry, the only reason why I wanted to give you one good day is because I wanted you to have something to fight for. You... you three know a lot more about Voldemort than I do, I'll give you that. But I think I know Tom Riddle a little better than Ron and Hermione, and I may still not know him as well as you, but I think we know him well enough to agree on one thing. Even he deserved a chance at least one good day."
Ginny had started off harshly, but as she continued, her voice softened as Harry was willing to listen. "And that's what I'm getting at, Harry. Deep down inside I think you know even the most vilest of people deserve at least a shot at a good day, which definitely means you do too, and that's why I wanted to show it to you. A good day. A reason to come back... to come back to me. I know you Harry, and I know you'll throw yourself on the sword without questioning it, and that's what this day is for. Because I don't just want you to go against Voldemort, Harry, I want you to come back. You have to come back, and if there is no one else to do it, I'll give you every good day I have left in me. But you have to come back."
They sat there in each other's arms for a long silence, the light of the flame setting their tears aglow, incapable of speech. Finally, rubbing her thumb along Harry's cheek, in a voice so small it even surprised herself, Ginny said, "just come back to me, okay, Potter?" When he nodded, Ginny pulled him into her and kissed him. They sat like that, alternating between kissing each other, and telling each other they loved one another, and Harry promising to come back, until Ron and Hermione had returned.
**
Later that night (or actually very early the next morning as they had gotten in quite late), Harry lay awake in his bed at the burrow. In a few short hours he and Ron and Hermione would be getting up, packing their bags, and setting off. He had only the slightest idea as to where to start, and he had no idea where to go from there, but unlike most nights, this thought didn't fill him with the same sense of dread. In fact, as he lay there, he felt a smile creep across his face. After all he thought as he felt himself drift to sleep. If there's nothing else, I think I can fight for at least one more good day
fin
INCENTIVE A/N: After 150 consecutive reads (this chapter is up to 750 reads total so far, thanks folks!) without a review, I've decided on a little incentive. I've already started a little bit, but now I'm upping the stakes. As many people have asked for a sequel, I'm here to tell you that there is not only one in the works, it's almost finished, but I'm not publishing a single chapter until I have it done completely, and revised fully. BUT, if you leave a review, I will not only answer your review, but I will also provide more and more detail regarding the sequel in the Author's response to the review! So please please please, good or bad, leave a review. Thanks!
final a/n: This was perhaps the easiest and most difficult chapter to write, and by far the most satisfying. I really want to thank everyone who has read through the whole thing, particularly those who have left all the wonderful reviews. I truly hope everyone enjoys it, and please please please please leave a review, even if it's a bad one. Thank you.