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SIYE Time:7:26 on 29th March 2024
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Don't Give Up On Me
By HappyHouriFanfic

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Category: Alternate Universe
Characters:All
Genres: Action/Adventure, Drama, Romance
Warnings: Death, Mild Language, Mild Sexual Situations, Violence
Rating: PG-13
Reviews: 173
Summary: Harry Potter has a destiny to defeat Voldemort and save the Wizarding World, but it’s hard to do when he’s the only one who knows that the Dark Lord has returned.
Hitcount: Story Total: 50271; Chapter Total: 1833
Awards: View Trophy Room






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“Did you and Ginny have a row, or something?”

Harry looked up from his camp bed to see Ron watching him. They were lounging in Ron’s room, escaping the chaos of a crowded house at Christmas break. It was hot up here and Ron had cracked open the window. Flurries of snowflakes would blow in, landing on the sill to melt into puddles. Harry had been watching them and trying not to notice that he was two flights above the girl he couldn’t stop thinking about.

“No."

Ron’s expression was one of disbelief. “Seems like you did. You haven’t been in the same room with her for...I don’t think the entire year.”

“Have too,” Harry said. He turned back to watch the snow, which had now turned to rain. “The Common Room and the Great Hall. We were in the kitchen together an hour ago.”

Ron scoffed and began tossing a deformed quaffle up toward the ceiling before catching it and repeating the motion. “And you’ve been as surly lately as she has. I figured after she stopped seeing Dean--”

Harry lifted onto his elbow. “Since when?”

“Since...I don’t know, a few weeks ago? Maybe longer. They were always fighting. You don’t pay attention, do you?”

Harry lay back down and tried to remember when the last time he’d seen Ginny and Dean together was. It’d been awhile. He had walked down a corridor in September and seen them snogging; he’d scarpered and buried himself in the library with Hermione, trying not to look up spells that would permanently remove the memory from his mind.

“--not my business,” Ron continued, “but I don’t like seeing her so...sad.”

“She’s sad?” Harry thought about that and the ache in his chest seemed to grow. “Maybe they can work things out.”

Ron slapped his hands against the ball and Harry thought for a moment he might toss it at Harry's head. “You’re daft. I said she’s seemed to be better since they broke up. At least, that’s what Hermione says. I don’t know, Ginny’s...difficult. She doesn’t seem to know how to be happy. Mum and Dad…”

He stopped speaking and Harry looked at him, wondering what he was going to say.

“Mum and Dad made her to go a healer this summer, said they couldn’t stand to see her like that anymore.”

“What happened?”

“No idea. They don’t talk about it.” The quaffle went up and down a few more times and Harry tried to imagine how that had gone. Did they even have healers who could help with sadness? If so, Harry wondered if he should see one.

“She doesn’t seem to be much better. She thinks we can’t see it, because she pretends, but….my sister’s not that good an actress. We all know she’s sad.”

Harry thought she was pretty damned good, actually. She’d been pretending that he’d never kissed her for a long time now. In fact, she’d been pretending that she barely knew him. He rubbed at the spot in the middle of his chest that felt the worst. It ached with a sort of coldness that he couldn’t describe, other than to think it was in his very bones.

“Maybe Christmas will help,” Ron said, a hopeful note in his voice. “She always loves Christmas.”

“Maybe,” Harry agreed. He watched the sleet make patterns on the window and tried not to think about it.

After an awkward dinner where Harry found himself the one playing a role, he pretended to be tired so that he could go up to Ron’s room. Ron, who was trouncing Bill in wizarding chess, had waived him off and wished him a good night. Harry walked up the stairs alone. He almost paused at Ginny’s room, where he could hear Ginny and Hermione talking, but knew he wouldn’t be able to stop himself from staring at her, so he forced his feet to keep moving.

The top room was hot again, so Harry threw open the sash, breathing the cold December air. He fell into bed and kicked his trainers off before pulling the blanket over him. Despite thinking he wasn’t tired Harry fell asleep almost immediately.

He was running through putrid tunnels that seemed to go on forever. He kept turning, darting down one way only to find that he was even more lost. His face was wet, but he wasn’t sure if it was the water that lined the walls, or if it was something else. Harry kept pushing forward, familiar with the dream now, after having it for so long. It wouldn’t lead anywhere. He already knew he’d wake up before he found whatever it was he needed to find so desperately.

Each tunnel seemed to only lead into the next, but Harry kept running, slipping and sliding in the muck that covered the floor, ignoring the crunch of whatever it was he was crushing with his steps.

For the first time, he emerged into a large open area. Harry stopped running, awed at where he’d come to. His heart pounded in his chest as he looked around at the cavernous area. Something lay crumpled at the far end of the walkway and Harry felt a chill come over him. He took a step forward, and then another until he was running again.

Ginny.

She lay still on the floor, her hair splayed around her on the damp floor. She was so silent, so frozen when he touched her hand, and she didn’t move at all. If he hadn’t known better, he would have sworn she was made out of the same stone that she lay on.

He called to her, gathered her into his arms and began to rock her, begging for her to open her eyes. But she didn’t; she stayed still in his arms, limp and lifeless.

“She won’t wake.”


Harry gasped and sat upright, shivering at the coldness of the room. It was dark, but he recognized the outline of Ron’s bedroom. Ron’s familiar snores came from across the room, a pattern that Harry knew well after all these years.

Teeth chattered, Harry swung his legs over the edge of his bed, watching as snow fell on the window sill. He’d left the window open and Ron hadn’t closed it when he’d come to bed. The clock on the bedside table said it was almost midnight.

Harry closed his eyes against the vision in his dream and prayed he wouldn’t get sick. It had seemed so real. He swore that he could still feel Ginny’s lifeless body in his arms. He got up and closed the window, his sock-clad toes brushing the small pile of snow that had formed on the ground.

So very real.

He knew he had to see her, to check… His mind told him it wasn’t real, but his heart and the feeling in his chest told him that it might be. He had to know.

Careful not to let the door squeak when he opened it, Harry watched Ron to make sure he didn’t wake. He stuck to the edges of the stairs, where the old wood didn’t sigh or creak, and made his way down to Ginny’s room, but he couldn’t bring himself to open the door. Hermione was sleeping in there, too. He wouldn’t wake Ginny, but he needed to see her, to feel her skin and make sure it was warm, not icy cold.

His fingers brushed along the handle but pulled back.

“Harry?”

He spun on his heel, catching a gasp behind his teeth.

Ginny stood on the landing in her nightdress, her long red hair falling over her shoulders in a cascade of color.

“What…?”

He couldn’t stop himself from moving forward, catching her in his arms and pulling her to him. He buried his face in her hair, clinging to her. Ginny’s arms came around him, hesitant at first, and then holding him just as tightly.

“I had to make sure,” he whispered once he felt he could speak again. “It seemed so real.”

She didn’t say anything, but nodded, resting her forehead against his chest with a shuddering sigh.

“I’m sorry. I know I’m not supposed to…” It sounded stupid. The first words he said to her and he sounded like an idiot. Slowly, before she could push him away, Harry pressed his lips to her cheek, and then her forehead. “Happy Christmas, Ginny.”

He forced his arms to let go, his feet to move him to the other side of the landing. He could feel the weight of her gaze on him and wondered what she thought of his middle of the night assault, before banishing the thought. Rather than go back up to Ron’s cold room, Harry went downstairs instead, to sit near the embers in the fireplace. The dark outline of the Christmas tree was there, along with the shadowy gifts beneath it. He tried to imprint them on his mind instead of remembering the dream.

Xxxxx

The grounds were the brightest green that Harry could ever remember them being. Scotland had gotten more snow this year than he remembered in all his Hogwarts years, and the result was the lush, emerald green paradise that lay before him.

Students were scattered around the grounds, sunning themselves in the bright Spring day, dots of black marring Harry’s vision of green. He was meant to be meeting Hermione and Ron somewhere now that they’d finished their classes for good, but Harry couldn’t bring himself to move.

He kept the castle in his peripheral vision, an anchor in the sea of unknown that lay ahead of him. He thought back to the day he’d first seen the castle, a young boy brand new to the Wizarding World and so very unsure of himself. He’d like to say he’d changed in those seven years, but he felt as lost, as adrift in a sea as he had been when Hagrid had set the boats out across the lake.

The grass tickled his hands as he ran his fingers over it and he found a long piece, tugging patiently until the green gave way to white. Using his fingernail, Harry cut the white into small pieces in his palm and then scattered the bits into the ground below him.

Hermione had grand plans for her future--a career at the Ministry after a summer abroad. Ron had been invited to join her family for a tour around Europe, and with a small loan from Fred and George, had agreed.

Everyone else had been talking about their plans for weeks now, excited to be getting on with their futures.

But not Harry. He had an acceptance letter to the Auror Academy tucked away in his trunk, but he hadn’t told anyone about it. There was so much unsurety, so many unanswered questions that Harry didn’t even know how to phrase, that he couldn’t bring himself to plan more than an hour, a minute, in advance. The Wizarding World that he’d fallen in love with so long ago was different now, or maybe Harry was seeing it with eyes open instead of in the hazy glow of childhood.

The Daily Prophet was full of happy stories about a prosperous community thriving and growing, but if you read between the lines, Harry swore he could feel a dark undertone to everything. It all seemed too happy, too positive, like one of the frilly lace doilies that Aunt Petunia would toss on her precious furniture to hide an ugly watermark.

And Harry seemed to be the only one who saw any of it. Hermione and Ron rolled their eyes at him anytime he’d bring it up. Even Sirius and Remus, who were in Eastern Europe on some sort of holiday, pushed off his questions and assured him that everything was fine.

The only person that he could even imagine talking with about it didn’t want to talk to him. Since Christmas, he and Ginny had seemed to find a place of compromise. They didn’t talk often, and when they did, they spoke with hesitant words, carefully chosen to convey little emotion. It was painful and Harry found himself craving and dreading the moments all at once. But at least they’d stopped pretending that the other never existed.

They’d even both joined in to make fun of Ron the other day, laughing together before they looked at each other and realized. Well, the moment had ended when Harry excused himself to hide in the loo until his next class began.

He sighed and pushed himself up off the grass, deciding that he’d better get inside and get his things packed before the train left tomorrow. He didn’t want to forget anything and have to come back. Harry knew he couldn’t take seeing the castle again after finally leaving; in fact, if they’d allow him, Harry would apparate to London rather than take the Hogwarts Express. But Headmistress McGonagall had already put her foot down when Harry petitioned for it. Unless there was some emergency, then Harry would be riding the train like all the other students.

He turned away from the lake and took a step, only stopping when he saw someone standing behind him.

Ginny’s robes were undone and a sort of light-colored dress on below them. The color drew his eye and Harry forced himself to look away, aware of where his eyes had been.

“Ginny.”

“Hi, Harry.”

“Hi.”

The awkwardness washed over him, but Harry couldn’t bring himself to walk away. She was...here. Her hair was tucked behind her ears, draping down her back and there were small flowers woven into the place where it was clasped. She smiled at him and the realness of the emotion slammed into him like a bludger. He hadn’t seen her like this...in a very long time.

“Congratulations on finishing.”

“Thanks.” He shifted his robes, wishing that he’d thought to leave them off; they were too hot out in the sun today.

“How does it feel?”

“It feels…” Harry almost lied to her but knew he wouldn’t be able to pull it off. He’d told her that she could be real around him, and even though there was a gulf between them, he still wanted to be real around her. “Strange.”

Ginny looked away from him and he could see the war in her eyes, the battle between staying and running away from him, tinged with a darkness that he’d come to recognize every time he looked in the mirror. He wondered if this was how Ginny felt all the time and wanted to ask her how she managed to keep going every day, but it seemed too hard to ask.

“I can only imagine. This place has been your home for a very long time.”

He looked back up at the castle, tracing the lines of it with his eyes. “Yeah.”

“Ron said you were moving in with Sirius?” Her eyes were bright again, but Harry couldn’t tell if she was pretending or being genuine. They’d spent enough time apart that he felt he couldn’t read her well anymore.

“Yeah. He has a house in London. I…” He’d almost told her about becoming an Auror but wasn’t sure how she’d take it. “I got accepted into the Auror Academy,” he finally said. “I’m not sure…”

Ginny moved closer, but still far enough that Harry would have to reach for her if he wanted to touch her. She smelled like flowers and fresh air. “I think you’ll be good at it.”

“I don’t know,” he said as he looked away. “I don’t know what else to do.”

She moved even closer and Harry tried to steel himself for the moment when she touched him. Her hand lifted and she straightened his lapel, brushing her fingertips along his neck. “Does it feel right?”

“No.”

“I know.”

The realness between them allowed Harry to take a breath. Before he knew it, Ginny’s arms were around him, locking him into a strange sort of one-sided hug.

“I’ll miss you.”

“I’ll miss you, too.” He rested his arms around her sides, burying his face in her hair.

“And I think you’ll be okay, Harry. You always find a way to make it through.”

“What about you?” he asked. “You’ll be alone coming back here next Fall.”

She sighed and rested her forehead against his chest, right where his heart beat in the hollowness. “We’ll see,” she said.

“You’ll do fine,” he said, even though he wasn’t sure what he meant. Ginny had been anything but fine these past years. Flashes of her in the dream he’d had at Christmas came to his mind and Harry pressed his eyes closed against them. He’d had the dream regularly lately, more and more detail adding until he couldn’t decide if it was real or not anymore. His lips rested against her temple and Harry breathed in the smell of her.

“I like the flowers.”

“Hermione,” she said. “She’s been trying to convince me to come talk to you. She’s got this theory that you and I… Well, she nearly talked my ear off about it the past month.”

Harry chuckled and promised himself to buy Hermione something very nice if all her talking had provided him this lingering hug.

“Don’t let her push you into anything you don’t want--”

“Don’t think I don’t want it,” Ginny said, talking over him. Harry couldn’t bring himself to look at her. He closed his eyes and tried to remember why they were not together.

“I know.” And he did. He could see now how being around him had hurt her, had made her think of nothing but the bad, since it was what they had in common together. It wasn’t healthy to be together, to wallow in whatever depression, or sadness, or mental issue they both seemed to have.

“Good luck, Harry.” Ginny finally pulled away and then darted back, pressing her lips to his for the briefest second before leaving him.

Harry watched her go, feeling his heart ache. He felt a bit like the tin man from that movie that Aunt Petunia had made Uncle Vernon and Dudley watch one time. Harry hadn’t been able to see the screen from his cupboard under the stairs, but he could hear the television. The tin man had wanted nothing more than to have a heart. Harry felt like his heart was walking away from him, and he wasn’t sure if he’d ever get it back.
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