Delusional

Chapter 3: A Funeral and a Plan

That I can stand my ground
And my feet are there, haven't washed my hair
Too be lost before you are found
Don't mean you are losing

Falling Down; Avril Lavigne

Waking the next day, Ginny was oblivious to her whereabouts and panicked for a moment before Jacob came to remind her that, yes, she was dead, and yes, she was a Death Omen. After realizing she had slept on a cloud, and looking far across the sky to find a very sullen looking Lily with James's arms around her, she opted on believing Jacob.

She also remembered that today was September First, and Ron, Harry, and Hermione would be returning to Hogwarts...and she wouldn't. Bringing her hands to her face in frustration she sighed loudly and ran her hands through her hair to prevent more aggravation. Jacob was talking, but his voice seemed distant, almost as if he were talking through her.

"....I'm sorry, I didn't mind the time. Your brain is on its nocturnal hiatus." Ginny was finally brought back from her daydream with the snapping fingers of Jacob. "Need a Q-tip?" he asked, almost as if he already knew she hadn't heard anything.

"Yeah...yes," she said, entwining her hands and looking up at him.

"Then you know we're going to Hogwarts," he said, his eyes glazing over momentarily in remembrance. "I haven't been there in a while myself."

Ginny's eyes widened in shock. She was unaware of whether the shock registered on her face was in horror or in happiness. She was adept to looking at both sides to a surprise. She wasn't actually going to interact with anyone except Jacob, and she would have to actually see the person who had killed her, for a couple of cons. She shuddered slightly at the thought.

"Cold?" Jacob asked, not bothering to warm her or acknowledging the fact that she was there; he was basically talking to the air, because he had already walked through the curtain to the sky's predecessor.

"Not cold..." Ginny said distantly. "Did you say Hogwarts? As in Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry?"

"No, I was simply mouthing psycho babble for my own sad amusement," Jacob said, pulling open the door to the room where Ginny had chosen to become a Death Omen unknowingly. He caught the nonplussed look on Ginny's face "I'm just showing you what's to your power; those damn ghosts can't have everything..." His voice faded. "Prankles, finder and keeper of heartless mockery."

"Prankles," Ginny said, having a hard time keeping up with him. "That sounds familiar."

"He's the almighty lord of the other other side...or the other side, our side. I'm not sure, I still get confused. He reincarnates us...and brings us to that other side. The side with people who can see us...again."

She wasn't following Jacob at all. Instead she stared at the large figure now disappearing behind a door across the way. For a while she simply stared. Suddenly she was aware of the fact that she still had a chance to get back down on earth, only no one would ever know it was her. All sorts of things could go wrong. As soon as the thoughts of what could possibly go wrong reached her head, Jacob spoke again.

"He's up to something," he said, "but whatever it is, I'm sure it'll protect us from those damn Death Eaters trying to lure us to the dark side with cookies. I'm probably a part of it, though."

Ginny's eyes narrowed. "What makes you so sure? I mean, those Death Eaters are probably bloody persuasive."

Ignoring Ginny, Jacob continued, "He's probably reincarnated everyone here if only for a day. He hasn't gotten to me yet."

"Way to be optimistic," Ginny commented

"Don't try sarcasm, that's my job," Jacob snapped. "You're a part of it too."

"What? The plan? But I just died!" Ginny asked, striding beside him now as he entered Diagon Alley.

"Just this morning, before I went and attempted to throw a bucket of acid to wake you up," Jacob said. He led them both out of Diagon Alley and stopped at the bar in the Leaky Cauldron. Tom the bartender appeared behind it, but Jacob had already slid behind the bar and poured himself a goblet of Butterbeer. Following in his lead, Ginny slid behind the bar as well and grabbed a bottle of Butterbeer. The two stood there silently drinking their Butterbeers before Ginny decided to speak.

"Do you know what Prankles is up to then?"

Jacob had been by the sink washing his goblet when Ginny had asked, and shook his head slowly. He turned and Ginny handed him her empty bottle which he threw in the trash behind him. Tom had begun to walk to the sink and missed a near collision as Jacob whipped around and was face to face with him. The bartender was unaware, but Jacob nearly fell atop him.

Ginny had already slinked out of the Leaky Cauldron when Jacob had appeared next to her, looking a little breathless and a trail of transparent smoke behind him.

"Why didn't you go?" he asked her, clutching his chest.

"Where?" Ginny asked, turning down a street in Muggle London and stopping at the corner.

"Hogwarts! I was just there. Blimey..." he said under his breath, earning a look from Ginny of utter disrespect. She was silent, but because she knew he should know she had no idea what he was going on about. How was she supposed to get to Hogwarts without the train? And how had Jacob been there and back so quickly? She crossed her arms indignantly and stared at Jacob, who was resting on his knees.

"Would you like to tell me how you got there and back in about three seconds?" she asked, uncrossing her arms and letting them hang limp at her sides.

"Like this," Jacob said, grabbing one of her lanky arms and disappearing completely. Ginny felt numb the moment Jacob had grabbed her arm. Wind slapped her in the face and cut her like a razor blade, and she knew she was traveling faster than she had ever experiences, even with a Portkey. The two landed smoothly on a stone floor Ginny knew was in the dungeons. Jacob had been busy waving away the silvery vapor he had left behind when Snape had appeared from around a corner. Her breath caught.

"Bloody hell! It's Snape!" Ginny squealed, before diving behind a nearby column and grabbed Jacob's leg.

He lost his balance almost instantly and crashed into the floor, his eyes rolling behind his head as if he had lost consciousness.

Ginny stared at him. "J...Jacob?" she asked, but he remained still and silent on the floor as Snape breezed past him, grazing Jacob's hair with his robes. Ginny immediately turned so that her back was to Snape.

Laughing made Ginny freeze in her tracks. She tugged on Jacob's leg and felt her stomach drop a significant amount as he lifted himself up and began laughing hysterically.

"He can't see you...and I got you good!" he exclaimed, clutching his stomach as it panged with pain. He looked after Snape. "Man walks like he's got a stick up his arse..."

"It's because he does have a stick up his arse," Ginny pointed out. Then added, "We're way to early...it's still light outside... As a matter of fact, the train hasn't even left." She glanced at her watch.

"You know what, you're right," Jacob said, beginning to walk up a marble staircase that led to the first floor. Ginny followed him uneasily, wringing her hands and knowing where she wanted to go.

"Could we, maybe, go to the Burrow...my house?" she asked in the tiniest of voices.

"No," Jacob said quickly. "It's a quarter to eleven; we should get to Kings Cross."

"Oh," Ginny uttered slowly. "But I want to see my parents."

Jacob looked at Ginny through the corner of his eye and sighed. "Damn redheads," he muttered before grabbing Ginny's arm and feeling the cold sensation that was usually sent through when he Transferred. Ginny landed with a thump on the couch in the Burrow's living room, Jacob landing lopsided on the staircase and falling forward with three large Bumps.

Almost instantly, voices filled the air. They came from the stairwell which is immediately where Ginny turned when she first heard them. Jacob fixed himself and stood up, taking in the surroundings.

"Quaint, tidy home you had here..."

Ginny watched him with a slight grimace upon her face. The mention of past tense terms when speaking about what Ginny...had...was still something to get used to, and Ginny would have liked for Jacob to respect that. Turning her gaze towards the stairs once more, two figures came into view: Hermione and Ron.

"I don't understand why mum won't let me help in the planning for...for Ginny's funeral," Ron was saying to Hermione, his hair unusually messy. He looked shaken a bit, and, wanting to continue hearing Ron's voice sat on the couch quietly and stared at the pair. Ron really looked terrible. He looked as if he'd stayed up all night...with Hermione, because Hermione looked awkward and morose as well. Her face was streaked with tears.

"Ron, you need to understand that your mother doesn't want you or your brothers involved. This is a very emotional--"

"You don't think this is emotion for me as well?!" Ron exclaimed. "I think mum needs to understand that we're all going through this! She can't shun us and think we'll forget about it! Ginny was...no, Ginny is still my sister and I simply refuse to sit and watch while my mother plans our...our formal goodbye."

The two had ended up sitting on the couch, Ginny trying hard to fight the temptation of calling out Ron's name and saying she was all right, or placing her hand on his knee in compassion. She couldn't believe she was, to them, gone, had perished, was dead, to put it blatantly. It wasn't fitting that Ron couldn't see her sitting right next to him, couldn't feel her presence.

She continued to inspect the two, biting back her tears.

"Imagine how Harry must feel, Ron," Hermione was saying. She was rubbing her thighs with the palms of her hands and staring at the carpet on the ground. Her eyes were slightly glazed over as Ron responded.

"He said the Muggles were dropping him off at the station...that's all the owl said. That and he wants to show us something."

Hermione craned her neck to look at Ron. "Show us something?"

Ron glared at her, specifically because she had changed the subject from his deceased sister to a distraught boy. "Yes," he said simply.

There was silence. Jacob stood up, took a knut out of his pocket and began flipping it out of boredom. Ginny stared at him for a while, wondering how he could be so apathetic to this. She watched as the silence between Ron and Hermione was sliced only by the steps of somebody else walking down the stairs. Jacob was looking at the Weasley clock, his face contorted into something along the lines of amusement and I've-Seen-It-Before. He turned to Ginny as a hand moved.

"It's Arthur. Is that you're father?" He pronounced every syllable in her father's name with a sort of liking. Ginny nodded.

"Your mother insists that you go to Hogwarts," Arthur Weasley said from the bottom of the stairwell, staring at the two figures sitting on the couch lethargically.

Ron's head snapped up. "No." His voice was firm.

"Ron, it might do us some good...get away..." Hermione cooed from Ron's left, standing and offering him a hand up.

"It hasn't even been a day since...you know, and you want to run away? Why can't you face what's happening, and stop trying to soothe everyone, Hermione!" Ron said, his voice lifting as he said Hermione's name. He grabbed her hand and yanked himself up, narrowly missing stepping on Ginny's foot, which she moved casually before lifting herself up and walking to Jacob.

"This is weird," she commented. Her footsteps were light as she stepped onto the wooden floor that was the kitchen. As she lowered herself into a mismatched seat at the table, she rested her chin on the palm of her hand and succeeded in shutting off the thoughts in her mind and listening to the dialogue between Ron, Hermione, and her father.

"Your mother insists," Mr. Weasley was saying.

"Where is, if you don't mind my interrupting, Mrs. Weasley?" Hermione asked, curiosity etched along her face.

"She...she's locked herself up in the room, and there's really no use getting into a row with her when she's like this..."

"She acts like she's the only one going through this," Ron said thoughtfully, stuffing his hands into his pocket and kicking the ground harshly. "Why should we go to school?"

Mr. Weasley sighed and rubbed his face in agitation. "Ron, your mother and I have a lot to deal with right now. We can't have our whole family-" he glanced at Hermione- "and Hermione running about the house trying to plan a funeral." His voice was suddenly so small when he said the word "funeral." Hermione wrapped her hand around Ron's waist and watched as he and Mr. Weasley dissolved into tears. They were silent, but unmistakably there.

Hermione began to rub Ron's back as his whimpers grew steadily louder. Ginny could tell by the look on her face that she herself was fighting back tears. She couldn't stand it. Nobody had ever cried for her like this, let alone a grown man. The sigh she attempted to produce was cut by the feeling of salt water making its way to her mouth. She knew if she didn't do something quick she'd end up in a heap similar to the one her father, Ron, and Hermione were now in.

"Jacob," she whispered harshly. He was resting against the wall, watching the scene emotionlessly and glancing at his watch every so often. "Jacob!"

He jumped slightly, and quickly shushed Ginny. He put his hand to his heart and stared at the three crying figures in front of him before wiping away a fake tear and turning to Ginny. "Isn't this beautiful?"

"You think this is funny?" Ginny asked, suddenly growing outraged. How could he stand here and watch these people break down in sorrow and desolation and just not care? Was emotion wiped from his mind when he had died? Had he been a classic Draco Malfoy when he was alive? "This is my family! And I'm never going to fucking see them again! What the hell is so funny about that?!" she roared.

Jacob was still unfazed. "I can't wait to see this mother of yours. Shall we?" Before Ginny could protest, which she opened her mouth to do, Jacob had grabbed her arm and they had landed lightly by her parents' room. The door was shut, and there were stifled sobs echoing around the corridor.

"Come along, let's go in," Jacob called, his hand on the doorknob.

Ginny slumped against a wall, losing herself completely in her mother's wails. "No."

"Why? She won't see the door opening by itself. I always place spells on items that might destroy the secrecy of our kind..." His voice trailed away as the sixteen-year-old on the ground curled up into a tiny ball. He swore if he hadn't seen her in action he would have never guessed she was there. He could comfort her, but that would be so unlike him he dismissed the thought immediately. Instead he just stood there watching the tight ball begin to rock back and forth.

Suddenly her head snapped up. "My funeral," she said urgently. She brought herself back to life and grabbed Jacob's shoulders. "Was I cremated or am I to be buried?"

"I...I don't...why don't we check?" he suggested, quickly placing a spell on the door and pushing it open.

The room was enveloped in absolute barrenness; it was slightly messy and unkempt, the bed's mattress halfway on the floor. Her parents' robes littered the floor; stray undergarments lay atop the robes and from the lamp on the bedside table. The bed had been sheepishly made, and her mother sat looking completely lost, looking so old and worn, the bags under her eyes giving Ginny the idea that she hadn't slept or eaten anything whatsoever. She looked nauseatingly horrid; Ginny could feel herself grow sick at the sight of her. She had never experiences such suffering, such disgustingly disturbing sorrow... Her mother had completely lost it. It would be Ginny's fault if she ended up on the fourth floor in St. Mungos. Parchment littered the area around Mrs. Weasley, and every so often she'd pick up a paper and mumble a blasphemy under her breath.

"Your mother's really gone off the deep end, hasn't she?" Jacob's voice sliced through Ginny's mind and she shook violently. "I know, the thought it pretty...violent when you think about it..."

Ginny ignored him. She walked to her mother and reached forward to touch her hair, but Jacob snatched her hand away.

"No," he said stiffly.

Sighing, she simply sat on the edge of the bed and picked up a nearby parchment and read aloud.

To the family of Miss Virginia Weasley,

At precisely 9:17 P.M. in Diagon Alley, a horrid and violent fight broke out amongst three teenage boys unspecified. The onlookers were oblivious to the action that was mere inches away from them. We deduced from witnesses that stray Killing Curses were being thrust from one boy to another, one horribly off target.

Who threw the curse is still a mystery, but the stray curse swept into the streets of Diagon Alley and hit a young woman. According to a witness the boys immediately disappeared, but there was still the matter of the young woman, announced dead moments after. She was killed instantly.

Healers from St. Mungos Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries rushed to the spot as quickly as they could, and, while bringing the corpse of the young woman onto a stretcher, one Healer found this woman's identity in a purse that was still in her grip.

We are terribly, terribly sorry to inform you that your daughter, Virginia Weasley, was killed at 9:17 P.M. in Diagon Alley on the date of August 31^st. Her murderer is still unspecified.

"Way to phrase it," came Jacob's muffled voice from the closet. "Bastards can't even deliver news well..."

"It doesn't say who it's from," Ginny pointed out, searching the parchment for a name.

"Who else?" Jacob asked as if it were the easiest thing in the world to figure out. "The Ministry. They always send out those types of notes. Perhaps," Jacob walked over to the bed and pulled out a wide, yellowish type envelope, "if you looked at the envelope, you'd know."

Ginny blushed slightly and turned to look at her mother.

"Get a grip, Molly," she was saying to herself. "Ginny's all right...you have a funeral to plan. Visit to the crematory-"

"That answers your question," Jacob said from behind Ginny. He was pulling a shirt off the lamp on the bedside table. "We should really get going. We've wasted enough time."

Ginny stood up quickly and wiped away the tears that threatened to engulf her face. "Right," she said. "One question though."

"Shoot," Jacob said, failing to notice the irony of the word.

"All right, I lied. Two. First: would you please tell me how to get from one place to another? And second: I need to see Harry. Can we see him before we go off to Hogwarts?" Ginny said quickly as Jacob shut the door behind her. She stole one last glimpse of her mother before beginning to walk down the stairs.

"All you have to do is concentrate on where you need to get to. Transferring is similar to Apparating or Disapparating, only when you Transfer you can get to any destination you desire. There are really no safe points or places where you must land legally. With Transferring, you can basically go anywhere. For example," Jacob grabbed Ginny's shoulder and righted her as they reached the bottom landing. "Watch."

He disappeared in a hoof of silver and appeared only a moment later. His face was suddenly drained of colour when he reappeared though. Ginny tried to shake him out of this sort of reverie, but his face remained pale as ever.

"OK, what about my second question?"

"No."

There was a certain finality in his tone that frightened Ginny so much, she didn't even ask why.