Ginny Weasley and the Seventh Year.

Summary: Ginny's sixth year was one she would rather forget. But, as life goes on, Ginny learns how to grow stronger, fall in love, pass her NEWTs and succeed in life.

A/N: About time, right? I'm sorry, I really am. But – more excuses, yes – I had a very busy first term starting three different projects, then in the holidays I will still be doing one massive project, then a hundred bajillion more during second term then I go away to Europe for 19 days for a school history tour and I'm not allowed to bring my laptop which sucks because I know I will have heaps of inspiration whilst abroad, then third term should hopefully be fairly quiet and I should be more regular in updating around then. So that's...2-4 months. Trust me, you can't be more annoyed about this than I am.

I also blame it on several bouts of writer's block and plain old laziness. But I will work around these :)

Disclaimer: I wish I was the ridiculously talented J.K. Rowling, but I'm not, and I have to live with that every day *sob*. But everything that seems relatively new is most certainly mine :)

Chapter 1: Saying Goodbye

It was very late in the morning when Ginny finally woke up hungry, as she'd gone to bed without dinner the night before. The sleep had done wonders for her, though – she hadn't been sleeping very well after The Battle, and while she had been getting enough sleep during the last month of school, she felt refreshed and re-energized.

She'd spent the entire night tossing and turning, before settling on her back. She turned her head to look at the figure of the sleeping girl next to her, and sat up when she realised that Hermione would not be awake for a while. The older girl had a smile on her face, reminding Ginny of the unnatural amount of smiling she'd done at the station yesterday, hand-in-hand with her brother –

Ginny jumped up from her bed and started searching for some clothes to change into, running into the bathroom and leaving feeling in a daze, but fully awake. She flew down the stairs, tripped over someone's shirt and bolted into her room – where Hermione was, somehow, still asleep, still smiling. Ginny walked over to her bed and threw her pyjamas on top of the covers, and paused when she heard Hermione say, "Ron."

Ginny was about to laugh, and reply with something she hoped was both witty and clever, like "Love has made you blind, Mione, I'm Ginny," when she turned around and saw Hermione was still asleep.

"Ron," she said softly again, and turned around.

Ginny smiled to herself, and sat down cross-legged on her bed, facing Hermione. She was, in all honesty, very happy for her best friend and her brother. They both deserved a bit of happiness after the experiences they had shared with each other and Harry, and if they found it and so much more in each other, who was she to stop them from being perfectly happy with their wonderful new lives to lead? Yes, she was definitely happy for them – how could she not be? She had won 43 Galleons, 39 Sickles and 182 Knuts from various students who had all been foolish enough to bet against her and her reasoning ("It's Ron, so the timing will be exceptionally awkward, and it's Hermione, so it'll be because he said something that was unexpected, but in her favour...probably in the heat of a battle or something.") in the running bet on when Ron and Hermione would get together, with Ron confirming their relationship in their speech at the memorial – but it didn't stop her from being jealous, and slightly angry.

Who were they to be happy when she was wallowing around in misery, and close to breaking? How dare they put themselves first, when Harry needed to be found? What sort of people were they, to get together and be in love and whatever else went on when they were alone, when so many people were dead and many more were grieving? If being in love made them so selfish, she wasn't sure she'd want to be in the same kind of love they were in. And besides, why were they the ones who had the perfect ending? Why couldn't it be her and Harry? Ron and Hermione had bickered for their entire friendship, and had snogged in the middle of a battle when people were dying left, right and centre. Her and Harry had faced a horrible ordeal during his second year, her first; had become friends over the years, fighting and defending each other against physical, magical and verbal onslaught; romantically united under the gaze of the entire Gryffindor House; tragically separated and... missing their fairy tale ending. If anyone deserved the fairy tale ending, it was her and Harry. They had the orientation, the complications and the climax – all they needed was a resolution.

It was at this point that Hermione started to stir, and Ginny sat up, her back straighter than she ever remembered. Hermione, facing away from Ginny, turned on her back to stretch her arms, still smiling.

"Christ, Ginny!" she exclaimed, clearly startled as she turned to face Ginny, obviously expecting her to be lying down, sleeping – not eagerly sitting on her bed with a look on her face like she'd found a million Galleons.

Ginny's expression changed, confused, and she cocked her head to the side. "Who?"

"Never mind," Hermione mumbled, rubbing her eyes and sitting up. "What on earth are you doing anyway? You almost gave me a heart attack."

"Sorry about that," Ginny smirked. "But I have questions, and you have answers."

Hermione laughed. "Yes; no; five drops of belladonna; thirteen years; 1876 – "

"Not those sorts of answers, you idiot," Ginny laughed, rolling her eyes. "You know what I mean."

"Ask me a question first," Hermione replied, imitating Ginny's position on her own bed and hugging her pillow. "I can't give you any answers without questions."

"True," Ginny smiled. "Ok – you and my brother."

"That's not a question," Hermione laughed. "It's a statement."

"It's a statement that wants an explanation – an explanation you have, incidentally."

"I specifically said questions."

Ginny glared at her friend. "Ok – what's going on with you and my brother?"

Hermione smiled. "That's a question."

"Don't be funny, Hermione, answer the question."

Hermione's grew. "We're together."

"Yeah, no shit," Ginny said sarcastically, rolling her eyes. "Seriously, though, elaborate. You're making jokes...and smiling all the bloody time...what gives?"

Hermione looked down and fiddled with her fingers. "He told me he loves me," she said softly.

Ginny almost exploded. "What?"

"He told me he loves me," she said again. "And he'll propose once he gets enough money for the ring." She looked up, tears shinning in her eyes. "I've never been happier, Ginny, I love him so much."

Ginny was at a loss for words. "Hermione, I-I'm so happy for you."

The older girl laughed and screamed into her pillow. "I feel like I'm flying, Ginny, it's so amazing...I want to scream it from the Astronomy Tower and let everyone in the world know that I'm in love with Ronald Weasley."

More money for me, Ginny thought to herself, before saying, "I'm sure you'll have your chance next term."

Hermione, still grinning like a mad woman, could only nod happily.

"Now – not to purposely bring the happiness levels down a million points – how's everything on the Harry front?"

The effect of using Harry's name was instantaneous – Hermione's smile slid from her face faster than a sneaked in bottle of Mrs Scower's All-Purpose Magical Mess Remover cleaned a Potions fight for detention.

"Something's changed," she replied.

"Really?" Ginny asked, hopeful. She had not expected something to change so quickly after she came home, especially not overnight.

"There's wards up around here, just to detect whether or not he comes by," Hermione said. "They don't stop him from seeing the house, or stop him from getting in, they just let us know when he comes within a couple of hundred yards of the house. And last night...they were breached."

Ginny's eyes widened in comprehension. "He was here?"

"Yes, but it was only for a second or so – by the time Charlie and George went out to check, the light in the sitting room was off."

"What light?"

"It's not the same sort of ward to warn people when people intrude their property, so there isn't a siren – there's just a light that comes on. Bill's organised it so that the ward's connected to the clock in the sitting room, and it'll flash only for Harry, and Ron and I were talking about him and we all must have looked at the clock at the same time, because it flashed for a second and Charlie and George jumped up to check."

"Is it supposed to flash once or stay on?"

"Stay on, I think – so Ron Floo-called Bill and Charlie and George checked around the house, but they couldn't find him."

"You don't think he detected them, do you?" Ginny asked, slightly worried. If Harry had, indeed, detected the wards and taken them the wrong way, to mean they were intended to block him out, he could withdraw from them forever.

"It's not like he detected them...more like, he stepped inside the wards and stepped out again after a second. Bill said the light was supposed to flash on and off if we suspected Harry detected the wards – at least we know the wards work."

"So you still don't know where he is?"

Hermione gave her a reproachful look. "I'll tell you the same thing I told you yesterday: we have looked everywhere we could think of, even the places that seemed least likely, but we're sure he doesn't want to be found, or he'd've come to us."

"You don't know that," Ginny counter-argued. "Wouldn't it be just like Harry to hide away for a bit to see if his friends cared enough about him to be looking in the right places?"

Hermione sighed. "That's true. It would be like Harry to do something like that...but if we haven't been looking in the right places, where have we missed? Where are we not looking for him?"

There was a minute's silence, where both girls were pondering the mystery location of their friend. The silence was broken by Ginny, who asked, "Mione?"

"Mmm?"

"Well...I can't believe I'm asking this...but you never...er...that is, you never really...um...you never actually – "

"Spit it out, Ginny."

"You never...um...liked Harry, did you?"

Hermione looked at her for at least thirty seconds, before throwing her head back and laughing.

"Me and Harry?" she said in between laughs. "Oh please...you're killing me..."

"I'll take that as a no, then?" laughed Ginny.

Hermione couldn't respond, and instead nodded, still laughing hysterically. "That reminds me of that stupid Prophet article Rite wrote in fourth year!" Ginny, remembering the article in question, snorted, and both girls dissolved into laughter and giggles.

Once their laughter had subdued, Hermione gave a last laugh and said, "To answer your question, Ginny, I have never liked Harry like that, and I hope I never will if you're the competition."

Ginny laughed. "Good," she said, "Because I really don't want to hurt you."

They shared another laugh, before Ginny said, "How's...how's it been at home? With your parents?"

While Hermione had refused to tell her why she, Harry and Ron had disappeared for a whole year, she had told Ginny at the memorial that she had altered her parents memories and sent them to Australia, and that she planned on setting out to retrieve them a week after the memorial.

Hermione sighed. "It's fine...well, no, it's not fine, you know, it is what it is, but..." she paused, squeezing her eyes as if to stop the tears from falling. "Gods, Ginny...it was so hard."

Ginny immediately stood up and moved to Hermione's bed, wrapping an arm around her shoulders.

"What happened?" she asked softly.

"It was so hard, Ginny, they didn't recognise me...I had to get there by Muggle transport, and I knocked on the door, and Mum answered, and she...she didn't know who I was, and she asked what I wanted, and I just said I had to speak urgently to her and her husband, and she wanted to know why, and I wanted to fix her memory right then, just so she would understand, but I couldn't...so I told her I worked for the government, and I needed to speak to her and her husband, so she let me in and she called Dad down and the three of us were just awkwardly sitting there, so I pulled out my wand and reversed their memories. And that's," she stopped again. "That's when it went downhill."

"What do you mean?" Ginny asked.

"Well, they were happy enough at the start, but then Mum got annoyed...she asked if it was really necessary to move countries, and when I said that not even Muggle security systems would have protected them, she said she found that hard to believe. Then she said that nothing could get through Muggle security systems, that magic was stupid, that she was disappointed in me for getting involved in magic and being 'hoodwinked into believing magic could fix everything', and that I at least should have told them what I was doing before altering their memories. Then she told me to get out," Hermione sniffled.

But they came back...didn't they? Ginny thought to herself. But, sensing that Hermione didn't want to be interrupted, she kept her silence.

"Then I told Mum I wasn't going anywhere until she let me explain...I always thought I'd have more of a problem with Dad, I never thought I'd have to deal with Mum like this...I transfigured her into a hamster."

"You never!" Ginny exclaimed, smiling in spite of the situation.

Hermione choked out a laugh. "And I put a Silencing Charm on her and told her I wouldn't change her back until she listened to me. That's when I got around to telling them everything, and I changed Mum back and took the Charm off her." She gave a short laugh in spite of herself. "Suffice it to say Dad did the rest of the talking. They put the house up for sale the next day, and came back to England within in a month. But Mum," she sighed. "Mum doesn't do a lot of talking when I'm around. I think she thinks that if she says much when I'm around, she'll say something to upset me and I'll turn her into a hamster again."

"You did what you had to do to make her understand," Ginny said reassuringly.

Hermione gave a small smile. "That's what I'm hoping she'll see," she said in a small voice.

Looking at her friend, who was always so strong, feeling small and insecure, Ginny hugged her, trying to convey a message of friendship and strength for the girl who had always been like an older sister to her.

It was at this point that Hermione gave a final sniffle, announced she was fine and swept out of the room. Ginny inspected the box of tissues in her hand and, noting how much lighter the box felt due to the abundance of tissues that littered her bed, set the box down and left her room.

It was a while later when she saw Hermione again, but the bushy-haired girl was sitting with Ron in the backyard, their heads together deep in conversation. Wanting to leave them be, she sought out her mother.

Mrs. Weasley was in the kitchen, standing with her wand at a pot, muttering spells under her breath to increase the temperature. Ginny smiled at how familiar this image was, and how much she had missed it when they were in hiding. She had missed the hustle and bustle of life at the Burrow, and how any privacy you wanted was there for about a second before a loud and tall redheaded brother would walk into the room. She missed seeing her mother shouting at someone tall and redheaded, sometimes black-haired; she missed watching her dad tinkering with Muggle objects in the shed that would blow up not long after; she missed the shouting of Ron and Hermione, and she suspected that as a couple, there would be even more fights between them; she missed hearing the bangs and the noises and feeling the ground shaking as something from Fred and George's room exploded.

But, she thought, it's just George's room now.

The funeral for Fred had been organised to be on June 23rd, a few weeks away, and George had all but banned anyone else from choosing the date. He claimed the responsibility to choose the date and pick out the headstone for his dead twin fell to no one but himself, and Ginny didn't have the heart to disagree with him. Not when he looked so lost and alone.

Her Mum had claimed to be the chief organiser of the event, and Ginny didn't have the heart do deny her that right. No parent, Ginny believed, should have to bury their own child. There was just something sincerely wrong about it; something that went against nature. Ginny just thanked her lucky stars that she had lost only one brother – she was still trying to get over the loss of Harry.

It was at this point that Mrs. Weasley turned around, seeing her daughter.

"Oh, Ginny dear, could you come help me please? I'm making roast lamb and I need you to make the gravy."

Ginny smiled. "Of course, Mum."

A few hours later, when everyone was congregated around the kitchen table, Ginny said to Bill, "Hermione says Harry was sort of here last night."

The effect of this once sentence on everyone present was amazing – the entire table fell silent, their eyes either on Bill, who was growing nervous, or Ginny, who was looking innocent with her eyes wide open and looking curious.

And suddenly, several people started talking at the same time.

"That is not appropriate dinner talk, Ginny – "

"Per'aps later, after ze meal – "

"Harry was here?"

"Hermione, why'd you tell her?"

"So the wards work?"

Bill sighed. "Yes, the wards work. The light flashed on for a second last night, and Ron Flooed me while Charlie and George went to check the perimeter. We suspect he was here for a moment before he left," he informed the table. His statements were met with silence, until Mrs. Weasley said very loudly, "Seconds, anyone?"

"Yes, please," said George and Ron at the same time, hurriedly scooping more mashed potatoes and roast lamb onto their plates.

The subject of Harry suddenly became a very delicate one that no one but Hermione wanted to discuss with her, she found out over the next few days, and even Hermione had her limits. Her Mum was prone to abruptly changing the subject anytime she mentioned Harry; her Dad dropped whatever he was holding and stammered about not knowing anything; Bill and Fleur were never home for her to ask about him, and whenever she did they'd wave her away; Charlie would stare at her wordlessly and walk away; Percy never mentioned Harry if he could help it; George stopped what he was doing for a moment, then carried on as if nothing ever happened; and Ron pointedly ignored her every time she said Harry's name.

"I don't understand," she complained to Hermione two weeks later when they were lying in bed. "No one wants to talk about him."

"I don't understand it, either," Hermione said, flipping the page to the book she was reading. "Ron's the biggest surprise."

"Is it weird that I just want to know what's going on?"

"I think every was expecting you to act a bit differently."

"How was I supposed to act?"

"Angry...hurt...cheated...betrayed...and others among them."

But I am angry," Ginny argued. "And hurt and cheated and betrayed and all those others among them. But I want to find him first so that I can tell him that myself."

Hermione stopped reading for a second, then turned to look at her. "You're very good at hiding your anger. You look like you're taking it very calmly and everyone's just a bit confused as to why."

"What's there to be confused about?" Ginny mused. "There's no point of feeling angry and hurt and all those other ones if it isn't helping to find him."

And to that, Hermione had nothing to say.

The weeks rolled lazily on by until, towards the end of June, her Mum approached her when she had been reading in bed.

"You all set for tomorrow, dear?"

"Tomorrow?" Ginny asked, confused, before it hit her. Tomorrow was June 23. "Fred's funeral."

"Know what you need to do?"

"Yes, Mum."

Her Mum briefly touched Ginny's face, smiled, and walked away. Ginny sighed, and leaned back to hit her head on the headboard, the book she had borrowed from Hermione sitting forgotten on her bedside table. How could she have forgotten her own brother's funeral? Had she really been so caught up in wondering where the hell Harry was that she forgot to mourn Fred? Tears welled in her eyes at the thought of what Fred might say if he was here.

"Ahh, Gin-Gin, don't worry your pretty little head. I might have to disinherit you as my favourite sister and protégée, but someone had to worry about him, I'm glad it's you."

Or would he have said something like that? Merlin, she didn't know anymore. It would have been something he would have said, wouldn't it? Would it?

Did she even know her own brother anymore?

It was a sombre Weasley family that woke up the next morning, but none were quite as sombre as Ginny was. After crying herself to sleep, she had woken up at dawn groggy and exceptionally emotional. Crying, she dug through the contents of her desk to find the speech she had written for the funeral; crying, she had changed out of her pyjamas and into her black dress robes; crying, she had eaten her breakfast before anyone had woken up; crying, she had visited the place within the Burrow's backyard where Fred would be put to rest; crying, she sat through the service, read her speech, shovelled a spadeful of dirt into the grave.

Crying, she said goodbye to her brother.

She only vaguely heard the speech that her parents and siblings gave. The only thing on her mind the whole day was her grief for her lost brother. So lost was she in her thoughts that she ignored the sharp intake of breath that the congregation took as someone approached the front of the group; she took no notice as it registered to her that her mother had collapsed into another onset of tears; she never saw Ron and Hermione get up and walk towards the podium. It was only when the new member cleared their throat did her head snap up to meet their bright emerald eyes, and his name was whispered throughout the crowd.

"Harry Potter."

You know what to do. Read and review.

Muchos graçias.