Home by The_Real_Hermione
Chapter Notes: I never expected myself to write Harry/Ginny, I've always had trouble characterising both of them, but I had this idea and this is how I imagine their relationship after the war. I hope it is at least a little bit in character. (Obviously they are not my characters - it all belongs to JK Rowling.)
She sticks her tongue out and catches a snowflake on it. She feels like a child again. Then she remembers that she is only seventeen, barely out of childhood. When was she last a child? Before she had to grow up and fight and suffer and worry and grieve and feel so old, so tired, as though there is nothing left that this world can offer her.
She remembers joy and innocence of Christmas at the Burrow when she was a child, when everyone was home and together and happy, and Bill piggybacked her everywhere, and Charlie showed her new creatures he found in the garden, and Percy read stories to her, and Fred and George made her laugh, and Ron was her best friend (even though he could be the biggest prat sometimes), and her father treated her like a princess, and her mother dressed her all in pink because she was so thrilled to have a daughter. And they played outside in the snow until they froze and then came inside and warmed up in front of the fire with a warm mug of Butterbeer. But it seems so far away now that it feels like someone else’s life.
She will be there again in a week. The Burrow itself is unchanged, and the snow will lie like a soft blanket in the garden, but nothing will be the same. Bill has his own family now, and Charlie won’t make it back from Romania, and Percy only ever talks about work, and Fred –
None of them can quite believe, understand, cope with their first Christmas without Fred. They won’t be able to talk about it. Christmases at The Burrow are loud and fun and embarrassing (but in the way that makes you laugh), but this Christmas will be quiet and awkward, like no other Christmas has been. It will be worse, even, than during the war, when at least there was the hope of future, untainted Christmases. Back when they thought they would escape the war when it was over.
The war, when she was always terrified for her friends and family and Harry (always Harry), when her breath caught in her throat every time the post arrived and she saw the Prophet, when she watched children be tortured and heard them scream and stood by, helpless; when she fought for her life, when she learnt the value of true bravery and friendship. She hates to remember it, but something in her misses it; they always had a goal, even if they only won small victories, and it taught her what true friendship was, and how to be loyal, and how to feel like you were actually doing something useful. This, at least, she misses. And she could miss Harry, while knowing that he was doing something important that was so much bigger than all of them, that had to be done. He had left her for her own safety, he didn’t really have a choice.
It’s different now, because she still misses him, but she knows he could see her anytime he wanted to. But he doesn’t.
She watches Ron and Hermione walking towards Hogsmeade, their arms around each other. They are so happy together, though they still bicker like always. They are truly living, proving that there is something worth fighting for in this world, that they can put aside (though certainly never forget) the terror of what they have survived.
Ron is much less of a prat, and a surprising romantic, if the length of the letters he writes Hermione are anything to go by, when he has rarely so much as written a sentence to anyone else. Hermione becomes positively giggly when she sees one of his letters. At these, rather frequent, moments, Ginny avoids her, because there is something unnerving about a giggly Hermione. As Ginny watches them, she remembers how they all laughed at Bill and Fleur’s sickly romantic behaviour two years ago. It’s a lot less fun laughing by herself.
And it’s hard to laugh when she’s just jealous. Harry has barely spoken a word to her since the Battle. Having said that, he’s hardly spoken a word to any of them. He talked to Ron and Hermione at the beginning, but even they look worried now and don’t see him much. She watches his life as his fans do: through the papers, the magazines, the wireless. He has done countless interviews and spoken openly about his ordeals, he has heavily supported charities to help Muggleborns get their rights back, he went to every funeral, he has set up counselling services, he has worked constantly at the Auror office to identify and track down the remaining Death Eaters. But he’s had hardly any contact with his friends.
And it’s not like he couldn’t take some time off work, Ginny thinks sullenly. After all, Ron has been doing the same job, and yet he hasn’t missed a Hogsmeade visit yet, and he comes to every Quidditch match under the pretence of watching her play, but she’s never actually seen him (or Hermione) in the stands.
Everyone says they have to give Harry space. Mum invites him over at least weekly, Ron tries talking to him at work, Hermione owls him, but no-one wants to push him. ‘He’s been through a lot’, they say. Merlin, they all have. Sometimes she feels like curling up in a ball and closing her eyes tightly and pretending that nothing is real, that she hasn’t been tortured, that she hasn’t lost a brother and many friends. But she doesn’t, because she has to believe that there is something worth living for (and inside she knows there is, and with him everything would be better, or at least bearable), so she struggles on alone, merely existing.
But she is Ginny Weasley, and she doesn’t give up. Her family needs her, and she will be strong. She will try to make George laugh, and support her mother who can’t stop crying and her father who is grieving more than he lets on. And together they will find something good out of all of this, even though Harry’s absence will be almost as noticeable as Fred’s and she will look for his green eyes everywhere. If only she could just see him once…
She sighs and starts to walk down to the village. She will do her Christmas shopping and then meet up with the usual people at the Three Broomsticks: Luna, Ernie, Susan, Dean, Justin, Dennis, Michael, Parvati, Anthony. They will all talk and try to laugh, but there are too many holes in their ranks for them to be happy. The problem is that every one of them was happy to die for the war, but none of them were prepared for going on having lost someone else.
*
–Did you invite him, Mum?â€
Molly stops bustling around the kitchen and looks at her daughter.
–Yes, dear, but he said he had to work again. That boy really works too hard. But Ginny, dear, can you please help me set the table, the Delacours will be here any minute and the Minister is coming for Christmas lunch –â€
–When is this going to end?â€
Molly looks at her sadly.
–He’s been through a lot, dear.â€
–So? He’s not the only one. He can’t just keep ignoring us. You know what, I’m going to go and talk to him. He’s barely talked to any of us for over six months, and I’m sick of it.â€
–Ginny, I forbid you –â€
–I’m of age, Mum, and I’m going to talk to him.â€
*
She walks into the office slowly. It’s deserted except for him. She walks until she’s right behind him, but he won’t acknowledge her.
–Harry?â€
He turns around, but he doesn’t look at her. When she left The Burrow, she was angry, but now she doesn’t know what to say.
–Um, how are you?â€
–Okay,†he replies. –How are you? And everyone else?â€
–Trying to be okay.â€
She can’t remember the last time there was an uncomfortable silence between them.
–When are you going to come home, Harry?â€
–I don’t know.â€
–Why not now? Come back for Christmas today, everyone wants to see you, we’ve missed you.â€
He shakes his head.
–You don’t understand, Ginny –â€
–For Merlin’s sake, Harry, how long will this go on for? How long are you going to ignore everyone who loves you? And don’t give me that shit about not understanding. No-one’s had the exact same experiences as you, but that never stopped you talking to them in the past.†He is looking away from her, and now she sees him, her anger evaporates as quickly as it came.
–I’m sorry. Just talk to me, Harry. Or if not me, at least Ron or Hermione. You can’t just not talk to anyone, not after all you’ve been through.â€
She expects him to shout or be angry, after all, since when has Harry been able to control his anger, even in the face of torture?
But he doesn’t say a word, he doesn’t even seem affected.
–Please, just talk to me, at least look at me. I know it hurts, it hurts like hell, but somehow in the end it has to make things better. But you know that already. You’ve set up all those counselling places, you’ve told people they have to talk it all through with their family, so why don’t you? It was all supposed to be for love, we were fighting for a better world, because we had something worth fighting for. What was it all for, then?â€
–It’s different for me, Ginny. I have to fix this mess before I can do anything else.â€
–Why? You’ve already done so much –â€
–But not enough. Do you remember when Hermione said that I have a ‘saving people thing’? Well, maybe she was right. I’m involved in this, I have to see it through.â€
–And when is that going to end? You’ll never make the world perfect, Harry. Are you going to spend the rest of your life trying to do something impossible?â€
–You don’t understand, Ginny. The wizarding world is my life. Before I found out I was a wizard, I had nothing. Hogwarts is my home and my family.â€
–And what about us? After all these years, do we mean nothing to you? Hogwarts didn’t save you, the people you met there did. Ron, Hermione, Hagrid, Dumbledore, Neville…†and me, she adds in her mind, but she doesn’t dare say it.
–And anyway, I never said you shouldn’t help with the rebuilding, we all want to do that, but it doesn’t mean you have to cut yourself off from all of us.†She can’t control the frustration that has been building up for months anymore. –I think I know why you ignore us. It’s because you’re scared of just being normal –â€
–That’s rubbish and you know it. I never wanted to be famous –†Finally she has got a reaction from him.
–I know that, but it’s part of you now. You’ve always been the one who had to save everyone and admit it, part of you has liked that responsibility, but it’s not like that now. It’s not you and Ron and Hermione against the world. This is the world you fought for, Harry, and you don’t need to fix it anymore, not all by yourself.â€
–Do I look like I’m enjoying this responsibility? I don’t like it, but I have to do it.â€
–You don’t have to do it, you’re just scared of who you are if you’re not always fighting. Who is Harry Potter, if he’s not fighting Voldemort? I just want you to be normal, Harry.â€
–Well if you’re looking for normal, I’m the wrong person, Ginny.â€
–Oh for Merlin’s sake, stop twisting everything I say, you know I love you because of who you are.†He looks down and she stares at him, stunned. She can never control herself when she’s angry; it’s one of the things she understands so well about him. This isn’t how it’s supposed to be the first time she tells him she loves him (although she suspects he’s known it for some time now). He doesn’t say anything at all. She can’t think of anything to do except walk out, without turning back to look at him.
She doesn’t know where to go. She can’t go back to The Burrow, it would only make things worse for her and for everyone else. She thinks about finding Neville, surely he would understand. In a way, no-one will ever understand her the way Neville does; she imagines that is how Harry feels about Ron and Hermione. But it’s Christmas Day, and she can’t just interrupt his plans.
She wishes she could go to Hogwarts, to the Room of Requirement or down by the lake, but she can’t do that either.
So instead she goes to the nearest bathroom and lets herself cry for the first time since Fred’s funeral. She is Ginny Weasley, who is always strong, who never cries, but right now she has to let it out.
She tried her best. She thought that maybe if he saw her, and talked to her, that it might change things, but it just made everything worse for everyone.
She hears a knock on the cubicle door.
–Yes?†she croaks.
–Ginny? Can you come out, please?â€
–This is a girls’ bathroom!†She doesn’t know why she says it – like that fact would ever stop Harry anyway – but she doesn’t want to face him after what she’s just said.
–It’s Christmas Day, no-one else is here.â€
–How did you find me?â€
–I am training to be an Auror, you have to give me some credit. And I couldn’t let you go home like this. Your Dad would kill me, for one, and then your brothers would skin me. But seriously, Ginny, I’m sorry. Now can you please open the door?†She can hear the tiredness underneath his jokey manner.
She opens the door slowly. Before she steps out fully, he is in front of her and suddenly his lips are on hers. She loses herself in the kiss.
He breaks it off too soon.
–I love you, Ginny,†he murmurs into her hair. –And I’m sorry. For everything.â€
She knows that one day they will have to talk about everything she has said and everything he has been through during and since the war, and one day they will have to talk about what she went through, and they will probably argue, and she will probably cry again, but that day is not today, because right now all that matters is that he is with her, and someday things will be okay again.
–Ready to go home?†she says, finally letting herself smile. He nods.
As they Apparate, she knows she is still going to have to face the pain and loss (and already she is aching for Fred, who she knows would have joked about her and Harry) of a Christmas overshadowed by war, but she knows she can get through it with Harry, and, like Ron and Hermione, they can build something that validates what they were fighting for.
Chapter Endnotes: Thanks for reading!