After The War (Romione & Hinny fan fiction)

Other Birthdays And Diagon Alley

Ginny was staring at the wooden ceiling of her bedroom. Outside it was all dark. Hermione was already asleep, but Ginny hadn't been able to do the same.

Tomorrow it would be her seventeenth birthday.

She was quite exited to turn seventeen. Then she'll be able to do household chores that Mrs Weasley asked her to do with nothing but a filck of her wand, and she won't be little Ginny who has to do things like a Muggle anymore.
She will be able to pass the Apparition test and apparate wherever she wanted.
Her brothers would stop teasing her because she sill had to use side-along Apparition, and she wouldn't need permissions for Hogsmeade anymore.

She smiled, listening to the rain's steady ticking on the roof.

She went on thinking of what she'd be able to do when she'd come of age and only half-sleeping until sunrise, then she got out of bed and went downstairs, creaful not to wake Hermione up in the process.

She took her wand and tied her shoes with magic, just because she enjoyed the feeling of it.

The garden was still wet from the previous thunderstorm.
She walked around sing-songing under her breath. "Happy birthday to me, happy birthday to mee, I'm turning seventeen, I'm turning seventeeen."

Suddenly a thoght crossed her mind 'the presents!' how could she have forgotten them?
She hurried to her room, only to find Hermione was already awake.

"Hermione! Did I wake you up?"

"No, no, bad dreams thought." she said, yawning.

"You alright now? Want to talk about it?"
Hermione let herself fall back into the pillow and buried herself under the sheets.
Ginny went there and sat on the corner of her bed. After a some time she heard Hermione starting to cry quietly into her pillow. Tentatively, Ginny reached over to hug her, and they stayed like that until Hermione had calmed down.

"Accio glass." Ginny appelled the glass she kept on the nightstand and handed it to Hermione. "Aguamenti!"

"Happy birthday Ginny." Hermione said, remembering only now that it was the eleventh. "Sorry if I didn't remember it before."

"No problem Hermione, really, you just had a bad dream! It's normal to forget things when we're not well ourselves." she said calmly. "You sure you don't want to talk about it?"

Hermione considered it for a moment. "Alright." she agreed at least, "Only... I feel stupid, having bad dreams like a little kid." she said with a sigh.

"Everyone has bad dreams, and you know it doesn't mean you are weak: it means you fear, like everyone in their right mind. If you want to speak I'm not going to tell anyone what you said." she patted her shoulder.

"Well, it was a dream about Ron, and there was Harry, too. I-I don't remember it exactly, but Ron and I were kissing," and here Ginny noticed her face grow a little red. "and then Harry was in a room with me, he was really angry and he said he'd never felt more betrayed in his life and..." Hermione buried her face in Ginny's hair, and when she re-emerged she clearly forced herself to go on, "he said Ron was his best friend and I wasn't allowed to love him... And-and he went on like that, then Ron entered in the room and he began to say it was all my fault if Harry was angry with him. He said he didn't want to stay with me anymore and that he didn't love me. They said I wasn't their best friend and I was only a... a stupid little nerd." now she really was crying.

"Oh, come on Hermione. You can't cry over someone who calls you stupid! Especially if it's a dream. Honestly Hermione, you are the smartest person I know! And no one with a brain would call you stupid!" she said in a matter-of-factly tone, "And you know Harry and Ron would never say those things about you loving my brother." Hermione blushed again.

Ginny heard Hermione's breath slowly come and go in a steady rithm again. She helped her friend to get up, she washed her face and they went downstairs to have breakfast with the others.
Hermione better just by thinking she a friend like Ginny.

It was a beautiful day, and the guys went around playing Quidditch - Hermione watched and read a book - and pranking each other with Harry's new set of pratical jokes.
They ate one of Mrs Weasley's fabulous cakes and Ginny opened her presents and a pile of letters from Neville, Luna, Bill and Fleur, Charlie and many people that addressed her as a war hero or the Chosen One's girlfriend.
A dude even called her Mrs Potter.

At lunch Mr Weasley had announced that for Ginny's birthday they were going to see a Quidditch Match. Ginny's jaw had fallen open and she had begun to go around hugging everyone.

They saw no other than Gwenog Jones and Meg Johnson themselves playing for the Holyhead Harpies against the Falmouth Falcons.
The Harpies won, just like Ginny had predicted.

Ginny wished she could see a Quidditch match like that every day. It was absolutely awesome!

***

Harry and Ron went with Ginny and Hermione to Diagon Alley on August, 19th.
The letters from Hogwarts with the required material hadn't arrived yet. Well, for the rest of the school they hadn't. McGonagall had already sent eight year students letters to be sure everyone who had decided to come at Hogwarts hadn't changed idea.

'Eight year students' were one year older that seventh years but McGonagall said they were going to attend classes together anyway because there weren't teachers and enough hours in a day to teach them as  an older year.

It was the first time Harry had gone to Diagon Alley on his own after his third year at school. Usually he'd been escorted by someone of the Order or the Weasley family.

They Apparated at ten in the morning at the Leaky Cauldron, they greeted Tom and went in Diagon Alley.

They went at Gringotts first, then at Madam Malkin's shop, where Harry bought Ginny a new uniform since her old one was too small to fit her.
They went at 'Eeylops, the Owl Emporium', to buy owl and cat's snacks and at 'Flourish & Blotts', to take new books for Ginny, Harry, Ron, and for Hermione just the ones she didn't already own.
When they went out of the shop it was twenty past one in the afternoon, because Hermione had insisted to buy other books related at every bloody topic in the seventh year school program.
"I have to know the basics." she had said firmly, and when Ron'd snorted she had added, "You could read these books too, Ron, seeing that many of the eight year students were at school last year and we weren't." she said, carrying a pile of heavy books and a big bag full of extra-reading ones. Ron didn't reply.

They had a quick lunch at the Leaky Cauldron before going at their last stop: Quality Quidditch Supplies.

Ron looked around, looking at a new broom model with wide eyes, while Ginny tried on a new Gryffindor Quidditch sweater.

Harry gifted Ginny, like he had promised on the day of her birthday, a new broom, but not just any broom: a Thunderbolt IIII.

Thunderbolt was, like the shopkeeper had told them proudly, an ultimate model of a beautiful Nigerian broomstick.
This broom was classified as one of the best and fastest brooms in the world, faster but a bit less stable than a Firebolt.

Ginny fell for it at first sight, and she couldn't wait to test it, but in the end she agreed with the others to have an ice cream at Florean Fortescue's before going home.

The four friends really enjoyed spending time together, laughing at Ron's strange taste for jokes and speaking of news they had read about on the Daily Pophet.

That, Ginny thought, was probably the best birthday she'd ever had.