Coming Home

August 2000

I can't give up on you.

I know you'll come back, sometime.

Somehow.

Ginny lay in her bed, unable to sleep. Today made four years. Four years alone, four years without Harry. They had lost touch long ago, a couple months after Harry had left to search for Voldemort and the rest of the Horcruxes. Nobody had seen or heard from him for the last two years. Many people thought he was dead. She almost found herself believing that at times, but some small part of her knew it was not true. She knew he would be back, someday. She rolled over, looking at the clock beside her bed. 1:46 a.m. Tossing the covers aside, she pulled on her robe and went into the kitchen. She tapped the kettle on the stove with her wand, and it was immediately whistling. She poured herself a cup of tea and sat down at the small table in the kitchen. She pulled her robes closer around her, though the chill had nothing to do with the temperature of the room. Her apartment was a modest four rooms above a shop in Diagon Alley. The sink and oven were side by side, with the little table and the refrigerator just across from it. She stared at the sink, sipping her tea and remembering when she and Harry had said goodbye.

"I'll be back, Ginny. I love you; I would never leave you alone. I promise." Harry's promise was the only thing that kept her going sometimes. It was the only thing that she had to hold on to, even as her family was torn asunder and her friends picked off, one by one. Percy had been murdered by Death Eaters. Luna kidnapped and never found. Lupin had not been seen for several weeks. Her father dead, her mother devastated by the loss. Tears began to fall as she laid her head on the table, crying herself to sleep.

Ginny awoke to sunlight streaming through the window. She was still at the kitchen table where she had fallen asleep. She opened the refrigerator, dismayed by its utter lack of food. As she walked into the bedroom to find clean robes, she saw an owl perched on the windowsill, a letter in its beak. She hurried over to let it in, and took the letter from it. She let out a shriek. It was Harry's handwriting. She opened it with shaking hands, terrified and hopeful all at once. The envelope fell away, and she began to read. It was only a few lines.

Dear Ginny-

I did it. I destroyed the Horcruxes and Voldemort. I'm coming home.

-Harry

Ginny stared at the parchment, at a loss for words. All she had hoped and prayed for was done. Voldemort was gone and Harry was coming home. She gathered up her robes and ran to the fireplace. She grabbed the Floo powder, spilling most of it on the floor as she threw some into the fire, shouting "The Burrow!"

∞∞∞

Molly Weasley sat at the kitchen table, waiting for the kettle to whistle. She had not felt up to even the slightest bit of magic today. It had been her fault... her fault Arthur was dead. If she had just been quicker... if she had just been paying a little more attention, he might have still been alive. The kettle began to whistle as she rose, and took a teacup out of the cupboard and found a teabag. Suddenly, a blaze of green flame flared in the fireplace, and her daughter Ginny tumbled out, a wildly happy and excited look in her eyes, with a letter clutched in her hand, her robes only half-fastened.

"MUM, MUM, HE'S ALIVE! HE'S COMING HOME! HARRY'S COMING HOME!" she shouted, as she waved the letter around wildly. Molly hurried over to Ginny, and took her by the shoulders to steady both herself and her daughter.

"Mum, he's alive... Harry's alive" murmured Ginny as Molly guided her to a chair and pushed the cup of tea she had made for herself into Ginny's hands. An owl landed on the windowsill, a Daily Prophet clutched in its beak. Molly took it, and unrolled it to see the headline blaring "HE-WHO-MUST-NOT-BE-NAMED DEFEATED!" A subtitle under that read Whereabouts of Potter Unknown. Another green light flared in the room and Ron and Hermione came spinning out of the fireplace.

"Ron, Hermione, Harry's alive, he's coming home!" Ron stared at Ginny, incredulous, until Hermione collapsed into his arms, tears of joy rolling down her face. There was a knock on the door as Fred and George came running in, throwing their arms around their mother. Bill and Fleur were the next to arrive, much to Ginny and Molly's chagrin. They heard another knock on the door. Molly ran to open it, and there stood Harry.