Was I Ever Loved By You?

THE FALL

Just for how long
Did you know before you left me?
Nothing to do
It's up to you
Use it against me

Use it against me
Now that you left me

You are ahead of me now
Because you left me
Words that I said
All yours now
Use it against me

You have erased me
Now that you left me

Deuce by The Cardigans

* * * * *

At the Burrow I sit at the kitchen table telling my mother what has just happened. She listens in shocked silence as I recount my day and only ventures to speak when I pause in my crying to blow my nose.

"Oh dear," she says, absentmindedly patting my hand. I sigh, relieved to get everything off my chest. At least someone understands how I feel, at least my dear, sweet mother can sympathize... "You threw the cake at him?"

"Mum," I cry, "He just broke up with me!"

"But dear..." she says, frowning at me. "Making such a scene! Harry must have been mortified!"

I look at her, not believing my ears. Who is this woman sitting before me? Not my mother, surely. Don´t mothers console their only daughters when they get their hearts broken? Don´t mothers sympathize or curse the lost lovers? "Surely, you can´t be serious!"

"And...his broom," she says, pouring herself a bit more tea. "That was very expensive."

"Mum!"

She looks at me. "I mean...well, not that he didn´t act terribly, dear. He shouldn´t have led you on like that."

It´s not much, but I´ll take what I can get. "He did! He led me on!"

"But..." she says, sighing. "I wonder if he´s all right."

Suddenly it hits me. I can´t even rely on my own family for sympathy. Harry is an honorary member of our family. He´s a son or brother in the eyes of everyone else and because he´s Harry most of them will probably back him up.

I get up abruptly. Mom looks up startled. "Where are you going?"

"To bed," I lie.

"Well, goodnight," she says, patting my hand. "Things will be better in the morning."

I walk up the stairs, slowly realizing that if I wanted sympathy I´ve come to the wrong place for it. If it had been anyone else that had broken my heart, most of my brothers would go beat the bloody hell out of them if I asked them to. Anyone else...but not Harry.

I open the door to my room only to find that all evidence that I ever lived there has been removed during one of my mum´s redecorating frenzies. Mum´s way of dealing with empty nest syndrome is to redo each bedroom one by one. My room is now the Yellow Room, emanating a cheeriness I don´t feel.

I realize with a sigh that I´ve left my nightgown at the flat and have nothing to sleep in. I step across the hall and rummage through Ron´s old dresser. Mum hasn´t touched his room yet and it looks the way it did when he graduated ten years ago. It might as well be the orange room, or the Chudley Cannons room, either one. I pull out a sad looking pair of sweat pants and what looks like an old sweater. I open the sweater and feel a pang. It´s not Ron´s at all but one of the sweaters Mum made every Christmas for Harry when we were in school. I move to put it back but instead I pull it towards me and smell it. It still has his unique smell...a kind of freshness. I bite my lip and put it on, cursing myself for being so sentimental.

I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror and it is a sad sight that greets me. My eyes are red from crying, my hair is an absolute mess and Harry´s sweater has swallowed any curves I ever had. I look like warmed over crap.

No wonder he doesn´t want you.

I take in a sharp breath. Even my own thoughts have turned against me. Surely I can´t be that horrible, can I?

Everything was so perfect, though. Something must have happened.

Suddenly it hits me. Hermione. She was the last one to talk to Harry. Maybe she knows what came over him. I grab my wand and Apparate to a spot near Hermione´s flat.

* * * * *

I run up the stairs to her front door and ring the doorbell. Behind me the busy London street is full of people enjoying the night life. There is no answer and I ring the bell again.

Hermione opens the door and looks at me, startled. "Ginny?"

"Hermione, I need to talk to you. Something terrible has happened. I need to know what you told Harry today."

"Ginny..."

I feel the tears falling before I can force them back. "Because he broke it off with me. He left me, Hermione."

She looks absolutely miserable. "Ginny, I´m so sorry..."

And then I notice him standing behind her, with a frown on his face. "Harry?"

He steps forward so that he is directly behind Hermione and it occurs to me why he might want to break up with me out of the blue. My breath catches and then, suddenly there is a bright flash of light. I turn dazed only to see the face of a photographer emerge from the bushes. He grins at us and Disapparates.

I turn back to shocked looks on both their faces.

"Great, that´s going to be all over the front of the tabloids now," Harry mutters.

"You were supposed to be my friend," I say, unable to hide the hurt in my voice. Hermione frowns down at me and then her eyes grow wide. She looks back at Harry.

"Ginny...we´re not..."

But I´m already running down her stairs. I miss a step and stumble. I feel my foot fold under me as I fall down the last two stairs. I land hard and cry out as a clutch my ankle.

"Ginny, are you all right?" Hermione says rushing down to kneel beside me.

"Don´t touch me!"

Harry kneels on my other side. How is it possible that he honestly looks concerned when everything he´s done tonight indicates he couldn´t care less? He places a hand on my back and I slap it away hastily through my tears.

"Ginny, that looks sprained," says Hermione, looking at my ankle. "Won´t you just let me..."

"No! Just leave me alone."

Harry sighs. "Ginny, Hermione and I aren´t seeing each other behind your back."

I look up at him and then at her.

"It´s true," she says, quickly. "Harry and I are just friends. That´s all we´ve ever been or ever will be."

"I got upset and came over here to talk to Hermione. There`s no one else."

"Then why?" I ask.

"Let´s get you inside," Harry says lifting me easily. I close my eyes at the pain. Not pain from my throbbing ankle but pain from the thought that I´m never going to feel his arms wrapped around me anymore. Hermione follows as he takes me inside and lays me gently on her couch. "I´ll just get my wand," she says disappearing into her bedroom.

Harry looks down at me, his green eyes sad. He´s so close, I just want to reach up and kiss him. But I know that would be stupid. He could pull away and I don´t think I could take that. So I force myself to lie there.

"Just tell me what I did wrong and I`ll fix it."

The words hang there between us. It doesn´t sound like me at all and it takes me a moment to realize what I´ve just said.

"Oh, Ginny," he says, and I realize that his eyes are wet. "You didn´t do anything."

"Then what? You don´t love me? You never did?"

"I didn´t want to hurt you."

"It´s too late for that, Harry. Just tell me what it is. What is it that made you suddenly decide you didn´t want to be with me."

"I loved you," he started. "I still love you...but not the way you deserve. I´ve been a coward, Ginny. I´ve held on to you because you made everything so easy. You made it so damn easy to be with you." I swallow and he looks up as Hermione enters the room again. "Love should be more than convenience."

Hermione glances up at him at these words and he waves her toward my ankle. He clears his throat and stands up. "I´m leaving."

Neither Hermione or I say anything to him as he grabs his coat and Disapparates. Hermione quickly heals my ankle using a spell she invented herself at the hospital. She looks up at me. "There, it will be better in a day or two."

I shake my head and say, "No it won´t."

* * * * *

Harry is right. For the next few weeks the three of us are involved in a scandal that appears on every single wizarding paper and magazine except my own. The Golden Quill has the most eye catching headline, running "The Boy Who Loved Two Women" for three weeks straight, complete with a picture of our so-called confrontation. It doesn´t help that I look the picture of the rejected lover with my wild hair, Ron´s sweats and Harry´s old school sweater.

The girls at work avoid looking me in the eye now and Collin collected his bet the day after. He assured me it was only because he was penniless and eating three-day old Chinese takeout that he collected at all, but it still felt like a slap in the face.

I´m living with my parents now, in the Yellow Room. My family acted the way I expected them to. They were upset, but there were no unnecessary acts of violence. Ron did show the appropriate sympathy, though. When he found out he Apparated directly to my office and demanded all the gritty details. Then he had left in search of Harry. I didn´t see him again until three days later. When I tried to address the issue he had just stated that they weren´t talking and that Harry wasn´t good enough for me.

I´m trying to put my life back together. Trying to remember what I was before I was Harry Potter´s girlfriend. But whenever I reach deep down inside of me, trying to pull on that inner strength, I find nothing.

Without Harry I´m nothing.