I'll Owe You One
The walk to Three Broomsticks was awful. Ginny could usually handle the cold. After years of playing on the Quidditch team, she thought she would have built immunity to it with the early morning practices, the grass still covered in frost, or the games played in lightning storms.
But no. It’s mid-winter, meaning the hills surrounding Hogwarts and Hogsmeade are covered in at least a foot of snow and the black lake is half frozen over. Trudging through the snow, boots crunching on the icy snow was not a pleasurable experience.
At least the trip was worth the reward. Ginny could not wait to step inside the pub, warmed by the roaring fire. She would order a butterbeer, hopefully the alcohol could help to heat her insides as well.
She finally crests the hill, setting off to cross the old stone bridge towards the cozy-looking candlelight in the windows of the restaurant.
The old brass door handle stings the skin of Ginny’s palm as she clutches it to open the door from the frost along its metal curve. She hisses and rubs her hands together.
Walking into the room roaring with chatter from other patrons, she makes a mental note to not forget her mittens on her next walk. If she’s honest with herself, however, it’ll probably slip her mind. For some reason, mittens are always the one thing she forgets.
Across a crowd of what looks to be third years, way too young to be in the pub, she sees her brothers, Harry, Hermione, Draco, Neville, and Theo huddled on the couch and surrounding armchairs propped in front of the massive sandstone fireplace.
She weaves her way through a bumbling group of teens, probably drunk off Butterbeer, past two fourth years awkwardly flirting. She inwardly cringes at the boy pretending to yawn, wrapping his arm around the girl. It’s the oldest trick in the book, does he think that’ll actually work?
The girl tips her chin down, hiding her small smile, and blushes when his hand makes contact with her shoulder. I guess so Ginny thinks. She shakes her head, leaving the awkwardness behind her to continue on her path.
Once she reaches the group she’s met with Hello’s and Gin you’re finally here’s, spoken over the top of one another. She addresses them all with a general “Hello, hello,” in greeting before shoving George to the side and plopping down on the end of the couch.
“Hey! What was that for?” George wines.
“I wanted to sit. You were in the way Georgie,” she says the last bit with a sickly sweet tone in her voice.
“You’re lucky I love you,”
“Yeah, yeah, I love you too Georgie,” she stretches her legs and arms out in front of her towards the fire, trying to warm the limbs. The cold from outside still lingered in her bones.
The conversation between her friends resumes. Apparently, Harry was still hopelessly crushing on Cho and needed advice from Ron on what he should do about it. Neville, sitting in one of the armchairs chatted with the twins about the Quidditch game from two days ago. Ravenclaw lost against Gryffindor and while Neville had a lot of house pride his girlfriend, Luna, was a Ravenclaw so he sided with them, hence the friendly arguing between the three.
Hermione was sitting in Draco’s lap in the other chair; the pair in their own little world. They whispered in each other’s ears, Hermione giggling and blushing every so often at whatever suggestive thing Draco says.
Ginny’s heart aches a tinge at the sight of the couple. She wanted that. Her own person. Someone who understood her completely; could make her blush and laugh. Someone to love.
Ginny stands abruptly from her seat on the couch’s end, stretching her limbs. Hermione casts a worrying glance at her. The girls had become very close over the last couple of years especially. The best of friends truth be told. It’s almost as if Hermione could instinctually tell something was off with Ginny’s mood.
Ginny didn’t know if this warmed her heart or only made it worse. She loved that her friend knew her so well and cared enough to pay attention; Ginny was used to getting overlooked. Growing up in a house of almost all boys, she was just another one of the brothers it seemed.
She loved Quidditch more than the average girl her age, she wanted to know all about her father’s trinkets and tinkering, and more often than not she came in for dinner covered in mud after playing in the yard all day when she was young.
It did unsettle her, however, that her friend was so in tune with her cranky mood. She didn’t want that to be the norm for her personality. She did not want to weigh down her friends with her own issues. It wasn’t their problem to deal with.
Though nowadays it seemed that she was… unsettled more often than not. She was always finding the glass half empty rather than full and she didn’t know what to do; or how to change her mindset.
“Getting a drink,” she said with the brightest tone she could muster for Hermione’s sake. The woman just nodded, turning back to her boyfriend, knowing the redhead did not want to talk about what was on her mind.
Making her way across the room, she saddled up next to the mahogany bar. The bar top was glossy and smooth, the grains of wood stood out against the dark stain. There were brass stools with black cushions sporadically placed under the counter.
There was enough space for her to squeeze in between two stools and wait. She gave a wave, trying to flag down the bartender. He just gave a grunt of acknowledgment before turning back to the glass he was polishing. Grump Ginny thought.
He was an old man, with a scruffy beard and just as white of hair that reached the tips of his ears. In all the years Ginny has been coming here she doesn’t think he’s muttered more than ten words to her; usually choosing to communicate through grunts.
She looked to the shelf containing the alcohol, knowing it would take the bartender a couple of minutes before he begrudgingly made his way to Ginny to take her order.
She scanned the top shelf, nothing looked too enticing. The second shelf had some sort of liquid in a pear-shaped bottle. It glowed blue and had, what seemed to be a shimmer to it. Interesting, I’ll have to try that one of these days.
By the time the bartender made it to her, she was on her second perusal of the selves.
He grunted again by way of asking for her order.
“Just a Butterbeer please.”
He said nothing and grabbed a stout cup with a thick stem and some sort of swirling pattern to the glass. He filled the container almost full from the tap, then he set the glass down on the counter. Before Ginny could grab it however she noticed a figure in the mirror on the back wall behind the liquor.
No. Please no, not right now! It was her ex-boyfriend, Dean. They had dated for a handful of months before Ginny called it quits. He was nice enough if you ignored the fact that he complained about everything Ginny wore, who she talked to, and everything she did. Oh, and he seemed to be allergic to monogamy; always chatting up other women.
When she finally officially broke up he was upset but he left her alone after that, at least until a week later when he started showing up outside her classes, dorm room, at dinner or breakfast, and just in general any place he thought Ginny might be begging for her back.
He’d plead that he would change, that they were great together, that they should not let that connection go, they should give it another shot, blah blah blah.
At first Ginny found herself feeling sorry for the guy. Why? She had no idea, but then she remembered all the trouble he put her through and those emotions quickly faded. She tried to explain that this was best to Dean in the least harsh way possible; trying to keep some semblance of peace, but maybe she needed to be a bit harsher because he was not getting the point.
No matter how many times she’d tell him that it would never work, that they weren’t right for each other he didn’t take the hint. She was getting sick of having to reject the guy at every turn.
Now Dean’s form was moving closer in her direction. She moved to grab her glass and bolt for her friends but the bartender grunted again in disapproval. She looked away from her cup, at him to see that his wand was out. Right the foam. He tapped the stick on the side of the glass as it magically began to fill with a frothy foam on top.
She tapped her foot in impatience, grabbing the glass as soon as he was done and leaving a couple of galleons in its place, not caring that they were worth more than the cost of the beverage.
She turned intent on racing back to her group. If she made it in time Dean would surely leave her alone. Ginny was almost positive that Dean was scared of Draco.
Who could blame him really, Draco’s a scary guy but after seeing the way his eyes soften when Hermione rants about the latest book she’s reading or the way he places a steading hand on her elbow when she stumbles walking back from the library after hours of studying, Ginny can’t find it in her to fear him anymore.
Unfortunately, Dean was too close for her to make it back to the cozy couch. She turned in the other direction, hoping to lead him away from her friends so she could circle back before he noticed what was happening.
She passed the hallway that leads to the bathrooms when she heard him call her name. Ugh, the desperate way he said it. Like she was the one causing the issues and if she just heard him out they could fix this.
Well, they couldn’t. There was nothing to fix, not before and definitely not now. She was beyond sick and tired of having to delicately explain this concept to him. He just could not take no for an answer, could he?
She had to get this to stop. She could not take any more of the relentless pursuit. She felt like she might lose her mind if she had to endure one more moment of it. That’s when she saw her.
Pansy Parkinson.
She was in the same year as Ron and Harry but the Slytherin and her had shared quite a few classes. Even sat next to each other in one.
Pansy was walking towards her, likely on her way to the restroom from the looks of her route. Ginny sidestepped just in time to block the woman’s path. Pansy stopped abruptly at the unexpected intrusion. Eyebrows furrowed in confusion at Ginny’s obvious interruption of her path.
“What can I do for you, Weasley?” she had a teasing tone in her voice
“Kiss me?” her question was high-pitched, in an effort to soften the unexpected question.
“What?” her brows shot up her forehead.
“Please, I’ll owe you one. A huge one.” Her eyes pleaded, turning to the side in a way of gesturing to her ex, now standing behind her at a distance. Maybe he feared all Slytherin’s not just Draco? That could be useful information.
Pansy seemed to ponder the idea for all of two seconds, looking back towards Dean and then focusing her attention back on Ginny, “Okay,” she surprised Ginny by agreeing.
Just like that Pansy’s lips were on her own. She really didn’t think this far into her master plan, in the moment, stupid, impulsive plan. What should she do, and how should she react? She’d never kissed a girl before. She’d thought about it sure, but never done it.
Pansy answered her questions by sliding her cold fingertips across her temple and into her hair, the other hand coming to her waist and pulling her in. Their hips met in a crash just as Pansy’s tongue brushed lightly across her bottom lip asking for entry.
Ginny immediately granted her access, opening her lips, their tongues meeting and swirling. She whimpered, her free hand coming to the curve of Pansy’s waist and melting into the woman.
At Ginny’s touch, Pansy pulled back just slightly, her eyes closed, their foreheads resting together. The breaths intermingled, tangling just as their tongues had moments ago.
The woman pulled back, the cold air filling the now gaping space between them. Ginny wanted to whimper at the cold; the loss of touch but she held back. She looked up at Pansy, a slight pink, almost invisible, now coating her cheeks and the tip of her nose. It’s as if she’d been walking out in the cool air for a few minutes.
“You own me, Weasley,” Pansy started back for the hallway, “Don’t you forget it.” She threw that last bit over her shoulder.
Ginny looked over her shoulder to where Dean had been minutes ago only to find the space empty, the man nowhere in sight. She turned walking back to her friends, biting down in a hopeless effort to hide her smirk.
Except this smirk had nothing to do with the fact that she had avoided a confrontation with her ex and everything to do with the sassy woman she now owed a favor to.
She was so fucked.