Ginny’s heart was still pounding as she and Harry stumbled out of Umbridge’s office and into the second floor corridor. She’d barely been able to control herself with him so close to her.

Her heart was bursting with happiness as she replayed in her head that brief moment before Umbridge had come into the office. Could she be Harry’s true love? Did he harbor feelings for her deep down that the potion was finally bringing to the surface?

She desperately wanted to kiss Harry and tell him she’d never given up on him, but she couldn’t bear to do it while he was under a love potion. Even though Fred and George had assured her he’d be acting under his own will, it didn’t feel right to her. But the potion made it nearly impossible for her to hold back her own desire.

Before she could ponder the situation further, Harry had slipped his hands around her waist.

“You are so brilliant,” he said in a low voice, pulling her close to him. Ginny felt her breath catch in her throat, and her heart fluttered as her eyes met his. Harry was looking at her with the same fierce look he’d given her in Umbridge’s office…

Suddenly, there was a crash in the corridor. Ginny whipped out her wand, still jumpy from the near-miss with Umbridge and Snape. Harry stepped in front of her in one swift motion. She quickly sidestepped him, so she could see the commotion.

Ginny heard George’s raucous laughter as he rolled around on the ground, surrounded by metal pieces of what must have been one of the many suits of armor than lined the corridor.

He clambered to his feet, but fell again when Angelina burst around the corner, slamming into him.

They both giggled loudly as they collapsed into a heap on the floor. Harry snorted dismissively, stepping away from Ginny.

“Let’s find somewhere a bit more private,” he muttered. He seemed keen to avoid George and Angelina.

But just as Ginny was about to let him lead her away, she heard Hermione’s voice ring out.

“GEORGE! I KNOW YOU’RE UP TO SOMETHING!”

Ginny had never heard so much anger in her voice. A moment later, Hermione stormed around the same corner with Ron following calmly in her wake.

Harry stopped, clearly torn between wanting to avoid the confrontation and wanting to help his friend. He gave a frustrated sigh before setting off toward Hermione. “Let’s make sure everything’s okay first,” he said quietly, sounding annoyed.

Ginny followed, dreading what they would learn. She had a sinking suspicion that Hermione had found out about the love potion. Hermione had drank far less pumpkin juice than the others, so she wasn’t surprised that she was onto the twins. And Ginny was fairly certain that, like her, Hermione wouldn’t want Ron to confess his feelings for her under the influence of a love potion–despite the fact that Fred and George were insisting it wasn’t actually a love potion.

George and Angelina were still giggling as they got to their feet in front of Hermione.

“I take it you tried the pumpkin juice?” asked George, his back to Harry and Ginny as they approached. Ron nodded behind Hermione, the same goofy grin on his face that he’d had at the feast. The potion was clearly having a much stronger effect on Ron than Hermione.

“Ron and I were in the kitchens, and Winky told us that you asked them to brew a special Valentine’s Day pumpkin juice,” she retorted angrily. “What did you put in it?”

“Ah, so you and my little brother were getting cosy in the kitchens?” smirked George. “Good move, Hermione. You know the fastest way to a Weasley man’s heart is through his stomach.”

Hermione’s face reddened, and she drew her wand. “It’s none of your business what were we doing in the kitchens.”

“Yeah,” said Ron weakly, apparently trying to fight the potion. “Don’t change the subject, George!”

Ginny cringed as George merrily explained how the potion worked. She watched Harry carefully, her face burning, as he slowly learned the truth.

Harry’s arms went slack at his sides and his shoulders slumped. He furrowed his brow as George talked, his face becoming stony and unreadable. Ginny looked at the ground, unable to watch the inevitable anger and disappointment take hold of him. What if he asked her if she’d known? The potion would compel her to tell the truth. Would he think that she was complicit? That she’d tricked him?

“But it’s clearly a love potion!” Hermione protested when he’d finished.

“Why? Do you feel anything that you hadn’t already felt before?” asked George skeptically.

“Well, no, but it’s certainly much more intense now because I can’t think about anything else,” she retorted more calmly now. She was losing a bit of her momentum.

“And that’s why it’s an enhancement potion, not a love potion,” explained George with a hint of smugness in his voice. “You’re in love with the same person you were always meant to be in love with, but you’re just falling for him much faster.”

This seemed to stun Hermione into silence. She opened and closed her mouth, like a fish out of water, presumably trying to find a way to prove George wrong. She was going through the same shock and outrage that Ginny had when she’d first learned about the potion, and it only annoyed her when George reassured her that she would very likely forget about the whole thing the next day.

To Ginny’s surprise, Harry moved in front of her and gently lifted her chin from the ground. His face was serious, and his green eyes were dark with emotion.

“Who is your heart’s desire?” he asked quietly, his warm hand still resting under her chin. She knew what he was asking. He wanted to know if the potion had awakened her feelings for him. And in that moment, it didn’t matter that the potion was forcing her to tell the truth because, for the first time, she wanted to tell him how she truly felt.

“It’s always been you, Harry,” she whispered, feeling a thrill of anticipation run down her spine.

He bent down and kissed her, softly at first and then with more passion as Ginny reciprocated, wrapping her arms around his neck. She felt a rush of blood to her head as she melted into him. Harry deepened the kiss and slipped his hands around her waist.

“Potter!”

They ignored the snarling voice that had joined them in the corridor. Harry was kissing her, and nothing else mattered. Harry’s hands moved to her hair, his fingers getting tangled in her messy plait. Ginny moved to clutch him harder, but she was suddenly ripped away from him by a flash of red light.

She stumbled to the ground, her lips still hot from where he’d kissed her. It was only then that she noticed Professor Snape had returned. He was standing over her with his wand out, glaring at Harry bitterly.

“Go back to your common room!” he barked at Ron, Hermione, George, and Angelina. George and Angelina hurried away, but Ron moved beside Hermione and slipped his hand into hers, both of them silently refusing to leave. Ron looked gobsmacked as his eyes darted between Harry and Ginny.

“Don’t make me report you both to the High Inquisitor,” spat Snape in a low voice. Harry nodded stiffly at Ron and Hermione, as if giving them permission to leave. Reluctantly, they stalked away. Ginny couldn’t help smiling to herself when she saw that they were still holding hands.

But Ginny’s happiness was quickly replaced with disgust as Snape rounded on Harry, his black robes flapping, making him look like an overgrown bat.

“Potter, your arrogance continues to astound me,” he snarled. Harry didn’t flinch under his glare. He remained standing ramrod straight, his face immobile. Ginny felt a surge of anger. She glared at Snape, imagining that she was boring a hole through him.

“While many work tirelessly to protect you from the Dark Lord, you’d rather risk expulsion so you can show off for a silly girl and jeopardize everything,” he continued, his lip curling.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Professor,” said Harry flatly. Ginny stepped beside Harry and stuck out her chin defiantly. While she felt guilty for provoking Harry to break the rules, she wouldn’t give Snape the satisfaction of being right.

“A poorly conjured Disillusionment Charm can’t hide you from a skilled wizard,” he replied. Ginny suppressed a laugh and bit back the obvious question of which skilled wizard spotted them in Umbridge’s office. Was Snape trying to insult her abilities or boast about his own?

Harry blinked, but said nothing. Ginny slowly got to her feet as Snape lowered his wand.

“You’ll both be getting detention,” he said swiftly. “Potter, yours will start now. Weasley will serve hers tomorrow.”

Harry looked like he was about to protest, but Ginny gave him a significant look. His shoulders slumped in disappointment, but he held his tongue. They both knew that arguing with Snape would only make the punishment worse.

Ginny watched as Harry dejectedly followed Snape down the corridor, undoubtedly heading for the dungeons. She raised her hand to her lips, trying to savor the memory of his searing kiss. She couldn’t imagine why Cho would be crying after being kissed like that. Her heart sank as she remembered that she would forget that moment of bliss and worried that she may never get the chance to know it again.

***

Gin ny woke the next morning feeling as if she’d been trampled by a group of rampaging hippogriffs. She’d expected to be sore from playing Quidditch all day, but she didn’t expect to have a pounding headache as well.

She stumbled out of bed and dressed quickly, focusing all of her energy on getting to the Great Hall. Perhaps some hot tea and breakfast would make her feel better.

She was so tired that she nearly ran into Professor Snape as she entered the Great Hall.

“Weasley, watch where you’re going!” he spat.

“Sorry, Professor,” she mumbled, silently cursing him.

“I’ll see you at six o’clock sharp tonight in the dungeons,” he replied coldly.

Ginny perked up slightly at this comment. “For what?” she asked, nonplussed.

“Your detention,” he retorted, talking to her as if she were dense. “And Mr. Thomas will be joining you as well.”

Without another word, he swept away in a torrent of billowing black robes. Ginny watched him go, utterly confused. Was Snape giving out detentions for simply walking around now?

She decided there was nothing to be done about it since arguing would only get her more detentions, and she stalked off to her house table.

As she scanned the table, she noticed that many of her classmates were a bit more bleary-eyed and lethargic than was usual for a Sunday morning. She wondered if they’d all partied a bit too hard after the Valentine’s Day feast.

Hermione and the twins were already eating breakfast and appeared to be having a heated discussion. Ginny took a seat next to the twins, who were sitting across from Hermione.

“Good morning!” said Hermione brightly, abruptly ending her conversation with the twins. Ginny took a long swig of her tea, feeling that it was way too early for Hermione to be so chipper.

“Morning,” the twins muttered, not looking up from their eggs and bacon.

Ginny mumbled back a greeting and bit her lip as she poured herself a steaming cup of tea, trying to recall what she had done after the feast. She remembered eating dinner with Harry, Ron, and Hermione, but she didn’t remember anything after that. She felt her heart quicken and her shoulders tense, her thoughts automatically going to Tom Riddle and the blanks in her memory from when she’d been writing to him.

But she knew that was impossible. Her eyes fell on Hermione as she recalled the they had eaten dinner together. Perhaps Hermione would be able to provide some reassurance that Ginny hadn’t simply blacked out…

“Hermione, did you see me after the feast last night?” she asked bluntly. She wasn’t sure how else to ask without sounding strange, so she thought it would be best to be direct.

“You were really tired last night, Ginny,” said Fred, abruptly. “I remember seeing you leave the Great Hall early because you wanted to go to bed.”

“That’s right,” added George. “Hermione had to help you to your dormitory.”

Ginny looked at Hermione for confirmation. She knew not to trust the twins.

Hermione shot the twins a nasty look before turning to Ginny and softening. “Yes, I saw you to your room immediately after the feast. We were all very tired,” she said gently.

Ginny relaxed a bit, feeling reassured despite the obvious tension between Hermione and the twins. She was too groggy to spend much time wondering what they’d done to upset Hermione, and she didn’t want to get involved in any of their disagreements.

It was silly to think she had been possessed, but she couldn’t quite get past how unusual it seemed.

“Thanks, Hermione,” she said. “It’s certainly odd, don’t you think? I’ve never been so tired that I lost my memory.”

“You know, I think Umbridge may have put some sort of Sleeping Draught into the pumpkin juice because we all turned in early, too,” supplied Fred. George and Hermione nodded.

Ginny rolled her eyes. That certainly made sense, she thought with a surge of annoyance. Umbridge would do anything to ruin a celebration that made students happy. She was about to say so, when Harry and Ron showed up.

“Morning,” they mumbled as they collapsed onto the bench next to Hermione. Ginny quickly poured each of them a cup of hot tea.

It seemed that Harry and Ron each had a strong dose of Sleeping Draught as well. Both of them looked worse than Ginny felt. Harry managed to give her a small smile before he took a sip of his tea, and she felt a weak flutter in her stomach. No matter how hard she’d tried to move on, there was always a small part of her that still fancied him.

She sighed, wondering if the feelings would ever completely go away. Her eyes automatically sought Michael at the Ravenclaw table, looking for a distraction. She spotted him easily, sitting next to Anthony Goldstein with his head on the table. He was undoubtedly suffering from the same potion hangover that the rest of them were.

With a start, she realized she hadn’t told him about her Quidditch practice! She had been dying to give him the play-by-play. Perhaps she would tell him once he had a bit more time to recover from the sleeping potion.

“What’s going on with Umbridge’s hand?” asked George, tearing her away from her thoughts.

Ginny’s head snapped to the head table. Umbridge was sitting in her usual seat at the center of the table with a large, white bandage around her right hand.

“I hope it’s her wand hand,” muttered Ron darkly. Ginny couldn’t help agreeing.

“It is,” said Hermione matter-of-factly. “It must have happened overnight because she was fine when we left the Great Hall after the feast.”

“Maybe she tried to catnap Mrs. Norris,” wondered Fred. “That woman has an unhealthy obsession with cats.”

“Maybe someone slipped her the Black Quill,” said Harry heatedly. He was glaring at Umbridge with an intensity in his eyes that Ginny had not seen before. She noticed that he was clenching his fist so hard that the the words, “I must not tell lies, stood out in bright white on the back of his hand.

Ginny couldn’t help feeling a bit of schadenfreude at the thought. “What do you think is etched on her hand?” she wondered, a satisfied smile curling at her lips.

“I’m a liar,” smirked Ron.

“I eat kittens for dinner,” snorted Fred.

“Dear You-Know-Who…” started George, as if reading aloud a letter. Fred and Ron tittered, and Harry shot him a lopsided smile.

“I hope she was writing a nasty letter about Harry,” said Ginny, her smile getting broader.

“I’m sure she’s always writing nasty letters about me,” replied Harry, rolling his eyes. “Why would you hope for another one?”

Ginny looked at Harry. “So that she can’t get away from you. Every day she’ll have to look at your name, carved into her skin, and remember that she will never break you,” she said heatedly.

Ron nodded approvingly. “And it’ll drive her mad.”

Harry nodded slowly, considering the possibility. Then he grinned. “I like the idea of that.”

“That’s why you must always resist,” replied Ginny, urging Harry not to lose hope. She knew he’d had a rough year so far.

“That’s right,” he said, his green eyes blazing fiercely. “Every act of resistance counts.”