27 May 1996

I don’t know what I wasthinking — maybe that Harry would be so glad we won that he’d sweep me off myfeet; kiss me in the middle of the common room or something.  I had a dream like that you know, just thislast week.

In my dream, Harry hadjust come in to the common room after we had won a game.  Ron grabs him,shakes the cup in his face and tells him that we won the match.  Then Harry sees me.  He sees me and his eyes meet mine and hedoesn’t look away and then he’s kissing me; kissing me in front of god andeverybody and I must say that it was quite lovely while it lasted.

Ah well.  I guess I have to be content with his beinghappy that we won.  He’s jealous though,just a little bit.  He’d never admit itof course, but he wishes that it was him that had made that catch, him thateveryone was cheering.  He lovesQuidditch, but he also craves the attention that comes with being a HouseQuidditch player.  Maybe it comes fromhis having had so little attention up until the time he came to Hogwarts. 

He had so little ofeverything, Harry, especially love.  Ifeel downright rich by comparison.  Imean, mum and dad may not have a lot of money, but we’ve always had a roof overour heads and plenty of food to eat and all the love that any of us couldpossibly have asked for.

I wish that he would letme show him what its like to have someone love him without reservation.  He needs it so.  He’s hungry for it, it’s like a gnawinghunger deep inside him, I don’t think he actuallyrealizes what it is that he’s feeling. Sometimes, especially at night, I can feel it particularly clearly and Iwant to cry for everything he’s had to deal with — but especially for everythinghe’s missed.

28 May 1996

Stup id git.  Michael is getting downrightridiculous with his pouting!  He keptmaking little cutting remarks to Anthony Goldstein all through lunch about howit wasn’t fair that Gryffindor had won. I finally gave up and went to sit with Neville.  Neville may not be the worlds bestconversationalist, but at least he is nice to me. 

And now that I’m on thesubject, I’m really getting sick of Michael’s attitude. We went for a walk lastnight, and I really wasn’t in the mood for anything more than a little snogging,but he wouldn’t leave me alone, trying to get me to do what I did that onetime, what we did, and I finally had to fake a headache.  He got all tetchy, and his tetchiness isprobably one of the reasons he was so pouty today; blaming me for his being a randy bastard.

Anyw ay, I guess I couldhave let him.  It’s not like it wouldhave hurt anything, but I just couldn’t bring myself to let him, and, to beperfectly honest, I didn’t want to.  WhatI want I can’t have — yet.  It’sdownright depressing. 

You know what else isdepressing?  I know Harry is supposed tocome around during his sixth year — but that could be this summer, or next forall I know!  It could be months yet!  And I refuse, Iabsolutely refuse to act like he and I are a foregone conclusion, not when he’sbeen so dense about everything for so very long! 

30 May 1996

Well , that’s over.  I broke up with Michael.  Damned fool wouldn’t stop going on about howit should have been Cho who got the Snitch and not me.  You’d think he’d be glad for his girlfriendplaying such a good game, even if he felt bad that his own house didn’t win,but not this. 

Well , he’d been adownright pain in the arse since Sunday! Every time I’ve seen him he jumps right back into his tirade about howbad it made Cho feel etc. etc.  How she’sbeen crying (as if that is anything new!) and how he thinks that I shouldapologize to her.

“You think that I shouldapologize to Cho for flying better than her?” I asked him, and I wouldn’t doubtthat I looked as incredulous as I felt.

“Wel l, you were prettyaggressive up there.”

“Agg ressive?”  I started laughing, I swear, I couldn’t helpmyself!  “Honestly, what was I supposedto do, ‘oh, excuse me Miss, I’m so sorry, here, you can have the Snitch if youreally want it that bad.’”

He glared at me, and toldme not to make fun of him.

“The n don’t be such anidiot!” I told him.  “This is Quidditch,not some bloody garden party.”

“Lan guage, Ginny,” he saidin an admonishing tone, and then the prat actuallypatted me on the head like a stray dog; last straw that was.  Nobody gives me a condescending pat like thatand gets away with it.

“I’v e had enoughMichael.  We’re through.”

“Thr ough with what?” heasked blankly, his fork poised halfway to his mouth, a bit of bacon danglingoff of the end of it.

“Us.   You and me.  Through.”

“You ’re breaking up withme?”

“Lig ht dawns at last,” Itold him acidly.

He couldn’t seem tobelieve his ears and just sat there gaping at me for a full minute like afucking flounder.

“You ’re breaking up withme over a Quidditch game?” he asked incredulously.

“I’m breaking up with youfor a lot of reasons,” I told him coolly. “But if you want to chalk it up to your being a poor loser, by allmeans, be my guest.”  Then I told himthat if he felt so bad for Cho that he could take his sorry arse back over tothe Ravenclaw table since that was obviously where he wanted to be.

He told me not to bestupid, that he was in the middle of breakfast, so I took his plate, bacon,eggs, the lot, and dumped it over his head. That got him going, he stormed out of the great hall to a round ofapplause from Lee Jordan, Neville Longbottom and Dean Thomas, all of whom hadoverheard our conversation.

All three of themcongratulated me on getting rid of the pompous git, and even ProfessorMcGonagall had to fight the urge to smile (I could see her lips twitching) whenshe told me that dumping my food over Michael’s head had landed me anotherdetention and twenty points from Gryffindor.

What ever.  It was worth it.

1 June 1996

And to think that Ithought Hermione was tetchy last week! She’s snapping at people right and left and I’m surprised that Ron andHarry can deal with her.  Better thanHannah Abbott though, she actually had to have calming draughts from MadamPomfrey.  She won’t be the last.  Demonda Hess, theHufflepuff fifth year was freaking out in the library yesterday when I wasresearching witch light plants for Madam Pomfrey.  She was going on about there being just toomuch to remember.  Madam Pince had to askher to leave because she was disturbing the other students.  I wouldn’t be at all surprised to find thatshe’d been sent to the Hospital wing. She looked like she was just a hairs breadth away from a nervouscollapse.

Tell me honestly, are O.W.L.’sworth all the fuss?  Look at Fred andGeorge, they only got three O.W.L.’s each — andthey’ve opened up a joke shop.  Bet itwill do good too! Some of the stuff they’ve come upwith is fantastic.  Mum doesn’t knowabout their plans — yet.  She’ll have acow when they tell her.  She’s not one totalk though.   I mean, she keeps going onso about how they’ll never amount to anything, but who is she to talk?  She went and took her O.W.L.’s and her N.E.W.T.’s and then ended up stayinghome and having seven children in quick succession.  What good do N.E.W.T.’sdo you when you’re cooking and cleaning all day?

For that matter, I have towonder why working at the Ministry of Magic requires such good grades?  Fromeverything dad’s said, most of the Ministry workers just sit around for a goodpart of the day shuffling paperwork. Maybe that’s what they should teach — Paper Shuffling 101 — or How To Write The Worlds MostBoring Reports.  They could get Percy to teach that one.

That wasn’t very nice, Iknow, but after the way he’s treated mum and dad — and Harry for that matter —I can’t say as that I’m sorry.  Hedeserves to be brought down off of his high horse.  He’s so obsequious around his superiors —it’s obvious that he is trying to get noticed.

That ’s my newest word — obsequious.  It means “excessively eager toplease or to obey all instructions”. Damned if that doesn’t describe Percy. They could have his picture next to the word in the dictionary.  He’ll go far, Percy will, but my question ishow many people will he hurt in his quest for fame and glory?

2 June 1996

Tap.Tap. Tap.

Ginnyopened her eyes, squinting against the glare of the early morning lightstreaming in the window beside her bed.

Tap.Tap. Tap.

Itsounded for all the world like an owl . . .but what onearth would an owl be doing at their window? Why wouldn’t the owl have waited to deliver the Post (she assumed thatwas what it was doing) until Breakfast with the rest of the owls.

Tap.Tap. Tap.

Groaning,Ginny rolled out of bed and unlatched the window beside her bed.  To her surprise it wasn’t Mandy’s Screech Owlthat fluttered through the open casement with a note from Mandy’s currentboyfriend (as had happened at least six times so far this term) but Hedwig.

“Hedwig?” Ginny croaked as the Snowy Owl landed onher coverlet and held out a scaly leg to which a large package wrapped up inbrown paper had been tied with a length of twine.

Withan odd, fluttery feeling in her stomach at the thought of who the package mustbe from, Ginny untied the box, fully expecting Hedwig to take off, back out ofthe window. But instead, once freed from her burden, the beautiful owl settledherself on Ginny’s shoulder, watching interestedly as Ginny removed the brownpaper to find a gold embossed square box tied with scarlet ribbons.

“Hasto be from Harry,” Ginny murmured to the owl who gave a low hoot ofassent.  “Any idea what he put inhere?”  Ginny wondered, weighing the boxin her hands.  It was oddly heavy for itssize and she couldn’t for the life of her imagine what it could be.  “Too heavy for anengagement ring do you think?”

Hedwigturned her head weirdly in its socket so that she was looking at Ginny withboth her large amber eyes.

“You’reright, stupid idea,” said Ginny, grinning at the owl.  “He will someday though, and I bet you’llbring me that box too.”

Anotherlow hoot and Hedwig turned her gaze back to the box.

“Allright, all right, give me a minute.” Ginny swiftly unknotted the ribbons and lifted the lid off the box beforeremoving several layers of protective tissue paper and exposing  a small crystal sphere about fourinches in diameter.

“Acrystal ball?” she asked the owl as she tipped the crystal sphere out onto herbed.

Butit couldn’t be a crystal ball, this looked to be madeof a clear crystal, unlike the milky look of the crystal balls ProfessorTrelawney kept in her tower room. Besides, this wasn’t really a sphere, it wasflat on the bottom so that it could stand alone.

Ginnyplaced the flat-bottomed sphere on her bedside table before leaning over it toget a better look and felt her breath catch in her chest.  As if by magic, someone had caught adandelion seed head in the act of releasing its seeds to the wind.  The seeds had been caught in an updraft thathad whipped the releasing seeds into a delicate, but unmistakable spiralpattern, the entirity of which had been perfectlycaptured in the timeless world of the crystal sphere.

Ginnytore her eyes away from the sphere long enough to remove a small note card fromthe bottom of the box.  It was, as shehad suspected, from Harry.

Dear Ginny,

I don’t know if you’ve ever seen one of these before.  It’s called a paperweight and, if you can believeit, was made by Muggles!  I know it looksas if they had to have used magic to capture the flower so perfectly, but thereis actually a method they use (don’t ask me to explain it, I just think itlooks incredible!). 

Some Muggles use paperweights to do exactly what it says —weigh down papers — you know, to keep them from blowing away in a breeze.  Other Muggles just collect them.

I had  to wait untilI got to school to send some money to Mrs. Figg  (the old lady down the street who used tobaby sit me and who, it turns out, isn’t really a Muggle at all, but a Squib)so that she could buy it for me.  Itseems like something you would like and, more importantly, it reminds me of youfor some reason.

Anyway, I hope that your fifteenth birthday is everythingyou hoped for!

Love always,

Harry

Ginnystared at the signature for several minutes before turning back to the sphere, thepaperweight, shereminded herself.  He might not know whyit reminded him of her, but she certainly did. The seal he had used on his letter from the future was a dead giveaway.  This symbol, this spiral, they had adopted itinto hers and Harry’s family crest, a crest that included the runic symbols forbody, mind andsoul. 

He knew.

She’dhad feelings of fore-knowledge before, and this just proved that it wasn’t onlyher.  Somehow he knew.  He knew and he’d made the connection.  Ginny felt a shiver of anticipation make itsway up her spine to crinkle her scalp.

Oneday it was going to click.  One day hewas going to realize just what he had been feeling all these years and shecould only pray that she would be there when it happened.