This was so good I had to rereading it immediately from the start! Every moment was brilliant - all the wizards and witches hitting on Ginny, Harry brooding and jealous in the corner, watching his Auror friends make fools of themselves, Harry being giddy and wanting to hear what Ginny had said to Simon, the way Ginny turned everyone down, when Harry had enough and they pretended to be strangers, Harry asking Ginny to escort him home! Omg when Harry's pick up line was "Er, hi. I'm Harry." How he felt when Ginny didn't look at his scar. How she yawned and rebutted his defeating Voldemort. I was crackling and giddy the entire time.

You need to write their realization! I laughed so much :'D

Great short story, excellent writing.

Awesome! ;]

It was everything I wanted to read.

Super cute, thank you.

This was so fun! It was even more fun because I didn't know if it was AU or not so it was a surprise for me

Simply awesome! I liked it. Keep it up!

Nice plot twist right there.

hahahah!
I liked this! jokes! Nice and light and fluffy and fun! Way to go Ginny - really turning those men (aurors) down!

Awww this was so cute!

-loved it

Ok, I'll say that at this point my comment got lost in the internet ethereal, so I'll give it another shot (from PC, this time). And think that I'm 100% sure a 'you're comment has been sent' message appeared on my screen back then! -.-
I'll definitely forget something, but I'll blame for that :P

I found this story very jovial and entertaining, it made me smile from the beginning to the end! The atmosphere was very spot on, it really screamed 'colleagues chilling out at the bar'.
I really appreciated how naturally the atmosphere was: I believe it's quite hard to put together several characters – especially if many of them are OCs! – around a table and keep the conversation flow in a spontaneous and not overly calculated way, and I think you definitely succeeded in achieving that.
Plus, I don't know if you've already used these OCs again and as such you 'know' them well, but I was impressed that you managed to give them their own, recognizable voice in such a short story. They're a bit stereotypical may be, but I think it suit well for this kind of light, friendly story.

Also the known characters were very spot on: Neville and Hannah are adorable (and I'm a great Neville fan, so I'm pretty picky with his characterization!), Ginny is the confident and funny Ginny we know, and Harry is brooding as usual :P Joke aside, I did appreciated that he let Ginny free to handle her suitors as she liked (until to a certain point, at least!).

Another thing I really appreciated is the suspense you created: I wondered for a long time if this was going to be an AU were Harry and Ginny aren't back together yet/have never been together (even if I had overall assumed that they knew each other as in canon, through Ron and Gryffindor) or a canon compliant story set before they're relationship went public. That really kept the suspense up, I couldn't stop reading because I needed to find out, to know how the situation was going to develop!
So, thumps up for the way you've built the story
I'd already thought all this on my own before reading James's comment on discord: I read that he enjoyed this suspense as well and that he also wondered if it was an AU or not, and the fact that we had the same impressions independently confirms that you did a good work imho

Referring to James's comment, I'd say I'm ok with the fact that Harry 'plotted' a bit with Neville, because I'd assumed Harry and Ginny knew each other and I didn't think the fact that Harry sent her a message through Neville spoiled the fun. On the other hand, I sort of agree with him about being a bit weird that Ginny wasn't famous (both as an Harpies and as a Weasley), but I still see the point of the choice in this story

Well, I think I've remembered everything after all, and I even added the considerations about James' comment since I hadn't read it yet when I wrote my first reviews, so it was for the better that didn't work properly (so far, at least...)

See you! :D

Great story. Loved it. The flirting and jealousy made me laugh. Any chance for a second chapter? What was it that made Chelsea realize they were dating, was it Ginny's name, cause whatever it was flew over my head. Wonderful read though, thanks for posting it.

Hello there! :D

This is a very enjoyable fic! It's very entertaining from the beginning to the end, in a way that made me smile non stop!
I loved how you made the characters interact, especially considering there are several of them and many are OCs, and it's always hard to balance all the voices when many characters are chatting togheter around a table! It felt very natural and spontaneous.
And the characters we do know were prefectly depicted, including Neville and Hannah (Nev is one of my favorite character!).

Plus, since basically the beginning I was dying to find out if it was an AU with Ginny and Harry not together (even if presumably friends through Ron) or if they were together, and the way you built the suspence was perfect, even during their chat!

Very very nice work!

Isidar

Ps do you have an Ao3 account too?
Pps what 'permanent 5 o' clock shadow' means? I'm not sure you can answer here since I don't have an account but in case tag me on Discord ;)