Getting Personal

CHAPTER 12

The first morning they were there, Ginny and Draco went down to the kitchen in their bed clothes and no one even noticed. Tonks, Lupin, Harry, Fred, Snape, and Professor McGonagall were sitting at the table, eating, or at least picking at their food in silence, and no one even gave them a second glance. Ginny supposed she should be glad, but she had expected a bit more fireworks for having a Malfoy as a boyfriend, but she knew that each of them was coping with the loss of Ron in their own way.

The summer would have dragged by like an Azkaban sentence if Draco had not been there. Ginny's parents barely spoke, both of them immersing themselves in planning for the Order to defeat the Dark Lord, not speaking Ron's name except late at night. Harry, Hermione, Draco, and Ginny made their own plans, practicing spells and hexes and curses, until Ginny was certain she could kill someone with Avada Kedavra if she tried. Fred and George threw themselves into their work, while Bill, Charlie, and Percy only came around to help with the Order, unable to deal with the obvious lacking presence of Ron. No one seemed to notice, or even care, that Ginny and Draco slept in the same room every night. Her mother had hugged Draco tightly after Dumbledore told her parents how he helped fight the Dark Lord in Hogsmead. Her father had thanked him, but Ginny didn't expect much more from him. He barely spoke to anyone.

"So, this is Harry's house, right?" Draco asked her during their second week.

Ginny nodded and looked up. "Sirius left it to him."

"So he doesn't have to stay with his Muggle family?"

"I'm not sure. I think he'll have to, but only for a week or so."

"Why? If this is his house, why can't he stay here?"

"It's something about his mother's blood protecting him, and since he lives with his mum's sister, that is a power that keeps him safe. I don't really know."

Draco crossed the room and stared out the great window in the living room. "What do you think is going to happen to us when we go back to Hogwarts?"

"What do you mean?" she asked, watching him.

"I don't think I'm going to be welcome back in Slytherin."

That thought hadn't occurred to Ginny. Her family was suffering terribly; she had after all, lost a brother, but Draco had essentially lost his whole family. "Why not?"

"A lot of their parents are big supporters of the Dark Lord. I'm sure they'll have heard about what I did."

Ginny nodded and picked up the day old copy of the Daily Prophet. Attacks, attacks, and more attacks. The Order was making progress; they were capturing Death Eaters and their supporters everyday, but it was hard to contain them, since there were no Dementors to ensure their stay in Azkaban.

"I don't want to fight anymore," she said finally. "I just want this to be over. I don't want to lose anyone else."

"That is what we all want."

Ginny turned and saw Tonks standing in the doorway.

"Here." Tonks crossed the room and handed Ginny a large paper bag. "I thought you might need some entertainment."

"Thanks." Ginny looked in the bag and found a deck of wizard playing cards, chess pieces, several books and comic books and a small bottle in the very bottom. "What's this?" She pulled out the bottle and held it up to the light.

"Put that away," Tonks hissed. "Someone could walk in here."

Draco reached for it and glanced at the bottle.

"I figured it was the least I could do to keep another disaster from happening in your family. You take two swallows on the same day of every month. So if you start today, you take your next drink on the 15^th of next month." A sly smile was forming in the corners of her lips, and Ginny felt her face heating up.

"Is this anti-pregnancy potion?" she asked quietly.

Tonks nodded and then laughed. "Why are you so embarrassed? It's not hard to figure out when you're staying in the same room."
"No one else has said anything," Draco pointed out.

"Well, they have other things to be concerned with," she shrugged.

"You're not here at night," Ginny said suspiciously.

"No, but Lupin is."

Ginny felt like a firework had gone off in her skull, even her ears and the back of her neck were burning painfully.

***

Harry left for a week in the middle of the summer without warning to go stay at his Muggle family's house, and Hermione seemed so distraught, Dumbledore sent her home to her parents.

Neither Ginny nor Draco were allowed out of the house, so they spent their days searching the house for remnants of the Black family's past, and occasionally finding pieces of the family history, and they spent their nights clinging to each other, trying to fill the emptiness inside.

When Harry came back he brought with him a present for Ginny. "For your birthday, since I missed it."

"You shouldn't have gotten anything," she said, shaking her head. "We aren't allowed out of the house, so I can't get you anything."

"You can order something," Draco reminded her lazily.

Harry's lips attempted to curl into the first hint of a smile Ginny had seen all summer. There were only three weeks left before they would head back to Hogwarts, and again, things were different. If a stranger looked at her family, they might not guess that they were missing a family member, just maybe that they weren't very talkative.

Ginny peeled the wrapping off and then stared at the large box. "This is . . . is this a Muggle television?"

Draco sat up and frowned. "A what?"

"Close," Harry admitted. "It's a DVD player."

"What does it do?" Draco asked.

"I thought you didn't like anything to do with Muggles," Ginny teased.

He shrugged and focused on Harry.

"It plays movies," he explained.

"Oh. We watched one in Muggle studies," Ginny recalled.

"Watch." Harry pulled it out of the box, opened a plastic case and took out a thin, round, silver disk. Carefully he set the disk in the machine, closed the lid, and pressed several buttons. Draco nearly jumped in shock as sound emitted from the machine.

"And it's for me?" Ginny asked.

Harry nodded. "I figured it would keep us entertained since we're not allowed to leave, you know."

Draco poked the screen with his finger. "Maybe Muggles know more than my father gave them credit for."

Harry, however, wasn't as interested in the Muggle toy as Ginny and Draco were. He spent most of his time with Lupin, except in the evening, when the Order met after dinner to discuss their plans. At first, Ginny assumed Fred and George would let them know what was going on since they had officially joined the Order, but they took themselves seriously and remained quiet. Ginny also had the sneaking feeling that being around her reminded them too much of Ron, and that they couldn't stand the fact that Malfoy was there, as her boyfriend.

Draco and Ginny spent their remaining days shut up in their room, the window wide open, and the Muggle movie machine playing almost all the time. Tonks brought them new DVDs every week. Instead of helping Ginny though, they seemed to have a numbing effect on her.

"You have to eat," Draco told her crossly one evening. "When was the last time you did?"

"I don't know," she muttered, staring at the tiny screen.

"It was yesterday, wasn't it?"

She shook her head.
"Damn it!" he shouted, snapping the cover shut. "Look at me."

Slowly, she let her eyes travel across the space to Draco's red face.

"When was it?"

"I don't know. When Dumbledore was here."

"That was three days ago."

"Okay." Her eyelids were falling downward. If she couldn't watch her Muggle movies, well then, she wanted to sleep.

"Get up!" he snapped. "You need to eat!"

"I just want to sleep, Draco, okay?" she pleaded.

"You are going to waste away in here! What is wrong?"

"My brother," she whispered, pain hitting her in the chest. "My brother is gone."

Draco sucked in a large breath and leaned down, cupping her face in his hands. "Ginny, he's been gone all summer, baby. You already know this."

Tears piled up in her eyes. "No." She had known that Ron was gone, but it had just hit her so hard it physically hurt, Ron wasn't coming back. "No."

"Come on. You have to eat," Draco insisted, pulling her from the bed.

She shook her head, sobbing. "I can't."

Draco let go of her hands in disgust and stomped out of the room. Minutes later, he was back, Lupin and her mother in tow.

"Ginny, honey," her mother's voice weary reached her ears. "What is it?"

"He's gone," she sobbed.

"She hasn't eaten in three days," Draco told them, his words sounding helpless and afraid. "She acts like she just realized . . . what happened."

"Oh, honey," Mrs. Weasley choked back her own tears and put her arms around Ginny's small body. "He's not gone forever, you know. Death, well, death is not the end."

Draco's eyebrows knitted together in confusion.

"You're not going to make things better by starving yourself."

Lupin put his hand on Draco's arm and motioned for him to follow. "Let's give them some time," he whispered, once they were in the hall.

Unsure of what else to do, Draco followed Lupin down to the kitchen and dropped into a chair at the long table.

"What's going on?" Potter asked.

Draco jumped slightly. "Sorry, I didn't see you. Ginny's upset."

Lupin sat between them and passed out bottles of butterbeer. "The reality of the situation is setting in," he said softly.

"Oh," Harry nodded and focused on the invisible dirt specks in the tabletop. "Oh."

Lupin cleared his throat and looked around. "So what will you be doing when you finish your N.E.W.T.s, Draco?"

Draco looked up again, startled. "Um, I'm not really sure. My father . . . well, my father wanted me to, uh, follow in his footsteps, but I'm pretty sure he's officially disowned me, so I guess I'll just see what I . . ."

"What you?" Lupin prompted.

"I guess I'll just see what I do well in." He stared uncomfortably at his hands. What was going on? When in his life, had anyone every asked him what he wanted to do with himself, except for Professor Snape, when he had been required. He had no idea, at least, no idea he had ever shared out loud. "I'd like to play Quidditch." There, he'd said it. He braced himself for Potter's laugh.

But Harry nodded. "Me too."

"I thought you wanted to be an Auror," Lupin asked mildly.

"Yeah, I do, but once Voldemort is gone, that's what I'd like to do."

Draco stared at Harry. He spoke so calmly, as if defeating the Dark Lord were simply the next item on his list.

"You can stay here, you know."

"What?"

"You can stay here," Harry repeated. "I mean, this house is pretty big. There are plenty of rooms. Ron was going to be my roommate but, well I'll be needing one now."

"What about the Order?" Draco asked, unable to believe what he was hearing. Why in the bloody hell would Potter offer his house to him?

"They can still come. Like I said, plenty of rooms. If you have other plans, though-"

"I don't," Draco stated bluntly.

"Well then," Lupin interjected. "Settled."