Forbidden Fruit

Chapter 8

Harry and Ron were sitting in Ron's dormitory and were supposed to be doing homework but they weren't getting much done. Ron had asked for Harry's help in making a plan to get back at Ginny. Harry was reluctant at first but in the end he gave in and helped Ron come up with something they felt was worthy. It wasn't easy to pull pranks while living up to the infamous Marauders' and the Weasley twins. After they had all the details planned out, they got back to their homework.

"Hey, Ron, do you have some extra parchment?" Harry asked.

"There should be some in my trunk," Ron replied.

Harry knelt down on the floor in front of the trunk and opened it. He rummaged through the trunk until he found the parchment; he was just getting ready to close the trunk when a red box of TroWizard condoms caught his eye.

"What's this Ron?" Harry asked, holding up the box.

"Ron, are you and Hermione...?" Harry asked.

"It's nothing, Harry," Ron replied, ignoring the second question.

"If it's nothing then why is the box open?" Harry asked.

"Well, Seamus found them and he needed a couple," Ron said.

"Needed a couple of what?" Hermione asked, walking into the room.

Harry quickly put away the condoms and closed the trunk.

"Quills, and a bottle of ink," Ron said quickly.

"Oh, ok. Well I was just wondering if either of you wanted to go to the library with me, I figured you two might need help with the Potions homework," Hermione said.

"I've already finished mine, I think I am just going to go down to the Quidditch pitch for awhile and practice," Harry said.

Once Harry left the room Ron's mind drifted back to the box of condoms in his trunk.

"So are we going to the library or what?" Hermione asked, sitting on the bed with Ron.

"In a minute," Ron said, leaning in to kiss her.

Hermione wrapped her arms around Ron's neck and lay back on the bed pulling him down with her. Ron moved himself in between Hermione's legs, rubbing his hips against hers. Hermione squirmed underneath him, twisting her fingers in his red hair. He slowly started working her shirt up, finally pulling it off over her head. Hermione quickly stripped Ron's shirt off of him, and then he started kissing her again. When Ron started pulling off her jeans Hermione said, "Ron...we don't have any protection." Ron paused and then leaned over and grabbed the TroWizard condoms. Hermione looked at the box and then grabbed one, pulling the wrapper off. Ron gave her a smile and then pulled her jeans off.

***

The next day, Ron walked into the Great Hall and immediately looked around for Harry or Hermione. When he finally spotted them he saw that they were sitting with Ginny and Draco at the Hufflepuff table. Ron reluctantly walked over and sat next to Hermione.

"Hey, 'Mione," he said, kissing her on the cheek. "Harry, Ginny."

"Hey, Ron," Harry said.

"Hey, Ron," Ginny said. "Can I ask you a question?"

"Sure, Gin," Ron said.

"Draco wanted to know if we could borrow some of those condoms you have stashed in your trunk, we ran out," Ginny said. Her face stayed completely straight even as Harry and Hermione burst out laughing.

"'How long have they been sitting in your trunk unused, Weasley? Since first year?" Draco said.

Ron sat there for a moment, his face turning beet red, he felt his anger rising. Ron was about to stand up and leave when he felt a hand on his arm. He looked at Hermione.

"Don't," she mouthed.

Ron nodded his head and calmed down slightly. He turned to Draco.

"Shut it, Ferret boy." He glared at Draco.

"Make me, Weasel," Malfoy replied in his cold drawling voice.

Ginny stood up. "Stop it now. I'm not going to sit here and listen to you two argue."

Ron mumbled something and Ginny could just make out the words 'tell' and 'mum'.

"Ronald, if you say a word to mum, I'll hex you myself." As Ginny sat back down, she shot a quick look at Draco and saw him smirking. He leaned over and moved her long red hair out of the way to whisper something in her ear. Ginny shook her head and laughed

***

Two weeks later, Harry found himself standing in the Room of Requirement flanked by Ron and Hermione, facing seventy-five of his fellow classmates.

"Everyone needs to sign this parchment. Don't worry, it's not jinxed," Hermione smiled to herself at the memory of Marietta.

Last year they had kept a list of the DA members on a piece of parchment just like the one she had just passed to Neville Longbottom. Cho Chang had dragged her friend Marietta Edgecombe to the DA meetings. Marietta had ended up telling on them and had been disfigured as a result of the charm Hermione had put on the parchment.

After everyone had signed the parchment, Harry stood up and whispered something to Hermione and Ron then turned to face the group again.

"For those of you that weren't involved last year I will give you a quick overview of what these meetings are for and why we are all here. Those of you that were involved can go with Ron and Hermione," Harry said.

Harry led the new members to one side of the room while Ron and Hermione took the others and had them practicing the spells they learned last year. Once he was done explaining the basics of the DA to the new members, Harry walked to the front of the room again.

"I want everyone to split into pairs," he said.

The group quickly divided into pairs. Harry spent the next hour walking around making sure everyone was doing the spells correctly, stopping occasionally to compliment a few on wand movements or to give tips on how they could improve. Harry walked past Neville, who was working with a slender girl of average height. She had long, medium brown hair with purple streaks, and grey eyes.

"Good job, Neville," Harry said, complimenting the other boy's precise wand movements, but never taking his eyes off of the girl.

"Thanks, Harry." Neville blushed.

"You are doing very well too," Harry said to the girl.

"Thanks, my name is Alexia Briggs." She held out her hand.

When she spoke, Harry noticed that she had a tongue ring. He shook her hand. "Harry Potter."

"Nice to meet you, Harry. Please, call me Alex," she said.

"Harry!" Ron called from across the room.

Harry rolled his eyes in mock frustration. " Nice to meet you too Alex. Keep up the good work, both of you."

He walked over to Ron." What's going on?"

"Hermione and I have both tried to help Seamus with this spell, you want to try?" Ron asked.

Harry nodded and walked over to his Irish classmate. He was somewhat surprised that Seamus had shown up. Last year the boy had been on the verge of changing rooms so he would not have to be in the same room as Harry. His mother had believed the stories in the Daily Prophet about Harry being a delusional glory-hog. Eventually, Harry was proven right and Seamus and his mother had changed their tunes.

"Hey, Seamus, need some help?" Harry asked.

"No, I've got it. Thanks, Harry," Seamus' Irish brogue was thicker than usual; Harry could not help but noticing.

A loud explosion interrupted Harry's thoughts. He looked over at Seamus and saw the look of shock on the other boy's face, which was covered in soot. Harry could not help but remember a similar incident in their first year when Seamus had been trying to turn his water into rum and he had ended up in almost the exact same state of dishevelment.

Harry looked at his watch and realized they had been working for over an hour. He walked to the front of the room again.

"Ok everyone, I think we are done for now. The gold galleon each of you was given at the beginning of the meeting will tell you the date and time of the next meeting so pay close attention to them. See you then."

Harry, Ron and Hermione watched as the crowd thinned out and then began to clean up.

***

Ginny walked down to the common room the next morning. She had been furious with Harry, Ron and Hermione for the last few days and it was time she confronted them. They were sitting by the fire, Harry in his favorite chair and Hermione and Ron cuddled up on the couch across from the chair. Ginny sat down in the chair next to Harry's.

"Morning, Gin," Ron said.

"Did you sleep ok?" Hermione asked.

Ginny could not help but smile at her clueless as usual friends.

"Yeah, I'm fine." Ginny's voice was dripping with sarcasm.

"What happened to you last night, Gin?" Harry asked.

So they noticed I wasn't there after all, Ginny thought to herself.

"Well I decided that since my boyfriend wasn't welcome that I wasn't either," Ginny said.

"Ginny, we already talked about this. You know why we don't want any of the Slytherins involved." Hermione tried to reason with her, even though she obviously wasn't in a reasonable mood.

"Yeah, but that doesn't mean I have to like it," Ginny said.

"True, and it doesn't mean we have to like the fact that you are dating him," Ron said.

"Oh, shut it, Ron." Ginny stood up and sighed.

This conversation is getting us nowhere, Ginny thought. She glared at her three friends before turning her back on them and heading for her dormitory.

Harry stood up and was just about to head down to breakfast when he saw a new piece of paper stuck to the bulletin board.

"Another Hogsmeade weekend already?" Harry sighed.

"Yes. It's not that soon though, we have two weeks until this one and the last one was a month ago," Hermione said.

I need to ask someone this time; I can't hang around Ron and Hermione all day again, Harry thought to himself.

"I think I am going to go get some breakfast," Harry said.

"Ok, Ron and I will be down soon," Hermione said.

Harry walked down to the Great Hall and out of habit sat at the Hufflepuff table. He was scooping eggs onto his plate when the pretty, grey-eyed girl who had been practicing with Neville at the last DA meeting sat down beside him. Harry noticed the purple streaks in her hair were gone and she now had green streaks.

"Hi," Harry said.

"Hi," Alex replied.

"Hi," Harry said again.

"You already said that." Alex smiled.

"Oh yeah, I did." Harry sat there quietly for a few minutes. "So how are you?"

"Good, how are you?" Alex asked.

"I'm good," Harry said. "Alex, right?"

"Good memory, and you are Harry?" Alex said.

"Right, are you in Hufflepuff?" Harry asked.

"Yep, fourth year, what house are you in?" Alex asked.

"Gryffindor, sixth year," Harry replied.

"Ok, don't take this the wrong way but why are you sitting at the Hufflepuff table then?" Alex asked.

"Oh, well my best friend's younger sister started dating Draco Malfoy and since Slytherin and Gryffindor have never gotten along, we decided it would be easier to sit in neutral territory," Harry explained.

Alex gave Harry a sympathetic look, "Poor thing, I wouldn't want to hang out with him, for any reason."

"Oh, so you know him then?" Harry laughed.

"Yeah, I've had a few run-ins with Captain Peroxide, he's taken points away from Hufflepuff on several occasions," Alex said.

"Captain Peroxide?!" Harry almost fell off the bench he was laughing so hard. "Oh man, that's funny; I'll have to tell Ron about that one."

Alex blushed, and Harry calmed down some.

"Hey, Alex, did you know there's a Hogsmeade weekend coming up soon?" Harry asked.

"Yeah, I'm really looking forward to going. It will be my first time in Hogsmeade," Alex said.

"Why haven't you gone before?" Harry asked.

"Well, I got my tongue pierced the summer before my third year and my mom flipped, when my Hogwarts letter came with the permission slip she refused to sign it. She signed it this year but I couldn't go to the last one, I had too much homework to catch up on," Alex explained.

"Do you want to hang out with me in Hogsmeade?" Harry blurted out before he could think about what he was saying.

"Sure, sounds like fun," Alex replied.

Harry and Alex were interrupted when Ron, Hermione and Ginny sat down at the table with them.

"Hi," Harry said.

"Harry." Hermione nodded. "Who's your friend?"

"Oh, sorry, Alex, this is Hermione, Ron and Ginny." Harry gestured to each as he said their name.

"Guys, this is Alex," he continued.

Hermione smiled at Alexia, Ron nodded his head, as his mouth was full, and Ginny reached across the table and shook her hand.

"Nice to meet you." Alex smiled warmly.

A few moments later Errol, the Weasley's owl, swept into the Great Hall along with the rest of the owls delivering post to various Hogwarts students. Errol skidded to a stop in front of Ginny, knocking her pumpkin juice in her lap as he dropped an all-to-familiar red envelope in front of her.

Ginny looked at her brother suspiciously as she looked at the envelope to see who it was from.

"Ron, do you have any idea why mum would send me a Howler?" she asked.

"No, Gin, no idea at all," Ron said, feigning innocence.

Harry smiled. He had been against the prank at first but now he almost couldn't wait to see the look on her face when she opened the letter. Ginny opened the Howler and her mother's voice filled the Great Hall:

GINERVA WEASLEY,

HOW DARE YOU DISOBEY ME! I TOLD YOU, YOU WERE NOT TO HAVE A BOYFRIEND FOR ANOTHER YEAR. I HAVE IT ON GOOD AUTHORITY THAT YOU ARE DATING DRACO MALFOY?! HOW COULD YOU DATE A MALFOY? THERE IS NO EXCUSE FOR THAT! ARE YOU HAVING SEX WITH THIS BOY? DON'T TRY TO DENY THAT BECAUSE YOUNG LADY, I'VE SEEN PICTURES! YOUR FATHER AND I ARE VERY DISAPPOINTED IN YOU! AS A RESULT OF YOUR BLATENT DISREGARD FOR OUR RULES YOU ARE NO LONGER A PART OF THIS FAMILY. GO TO MALFOY'S, WE DON'T WANT YOU.

*BLOWS A RASBERRY*

After the letter destroyed itself, Ginny ran from the Great Hall and up to her room.

Ginny was sitting in her dormitory a few hours later. She couldn't believe her mother had threatened to disown her. Maybe if I wrote her a letter and explained, that would change her mind, Ginny thought to herself. She pulled a piece of parchment from her desk and began scribbling away furiously.

Mum,

I know we agreed that I wouldn't date for another year, but I really like him. As for the pictures, I don't know where they came from but they definitely aren't what they look like because Draco and I are not having sex, we've never even come close. Forgive me?

Ginny

Ginny folded the letter and ran up to the Owlery to send it off with one of the school owls.

The next few days passed uneventfully. Finally, Ginny received a reply from her mother.

Ginny,

What are you on about? I don't know what pictures you are talking about but believe me, we will be talking about you dating this boy when we have time to discuss it properly,

Mum

Ginny read the letter from her mother several times before leveling her brother with an icy glare. It all seemed so obvious now. Ron had sent the Howler to get back at her for telling Charlie and the rest of their brothers about the magazines. The git probably even enlisted Harry's help. Ginny smiled proudly; she was already cooking up a nice little payback.