Butter

Ginny turns fifteen, sprouts breasts, and can suddenly get whatever she wants. Even Harry Potter watches her across the table at dinner.

"Is something wrong, Harry?" Ginny asks.

Harry blushes and mumbles something incoherent. Ron, engaged in telling Seamus a long and complicated story about Pansy Parkinson's sexual proclivities, pauses long enough to give Harry a suspicious look. Ginny smiles sweetly and passes Harry the butter.

Ginny can get whatever she wants, and Ginny wants Hermione. It's just a matter of time. She learns Hermione's schedule and does her best to structure her own around it. She sits next to Hermione at meals and she stakes out a table in the library.

Hermione remains oblivious. Ginny watches her all the time. Hermione has a number of nervous habits. She chews the ends of her hair when she reads. She hums to herself, odd songs that Ginny assumes must be Muggle. Hermione's hands are spattered with ink; the nails are ragged, bitten. She's pale and thin-lipped and her stockings have runs and Ginny wants her.

Ginny's been following Hermione around for two months when she decides it's time to take things to the next level. She wears a very, very low-cut shirt and goes to find Hermione. Hermione is, typically, curled up in a dim corner of the library, studying and looking quite delectable. Ginny leans over the table, propping her chin on her hands and squeezing her elbows together to maximize her cleavage.

"Are you busy, Hermione? I've got an essay for History of Magic I'd like some help with, if you don't mind."

Hermione looks vaguely startled. "Well, I would, Ginny - really, I would, you know I'm always willing to help you with your schoolwork - but I've got a huge test tomorrow, and I really need to get some studying done tonight." She chews on her thumbnail. "Is tomorrow evening all right with you? I can spare some time after dinner."

"Oh, sure, that would be great," Ginny says, doing her best to sound enthusiastic. Hermione smiles happily and goes back to her books. Ginny wanders off through the stacks, enormously disappointed. She looks at her breasts. You let me down, she accuses them mutely. They just sit there, round and lightly freckled.

Seamus stops her in the corridor and asks her if she wants to snog. His eyes are glued to her chest.

"Bugger off, Seamus," Ginny says. "I'll tell my brother you're hitting on me. He'll give you a right pounding."

Seamus looks duly terrified and scuttles away, probably back to the dark hole he crawled out of some time in the late Paleozoic. Ginny rolls her eyes. Boys.

At dinner, Hermione gets into an argument with Harry about the inherently misogynistic nature of Quidditch. Ginny thinks about slipping under the table and finding out what Hermione's hiding under that skirt. Instead, she slips her shoe off and runs her stocking foot up and down Hermione's leg. Hermione starts and glares.

"Yes, I get it, Harry, very clever, but if you don't quit it I'll hex your broom before the next Quidditch match."

Harry squawks in righteous indignation. "Hermione! I didn't do anything! What are you talking about?"

Dean leans across the table. "Hey, Ginny, could you pass me the butter?"

"Get it yourself," Ginny snaps. She stabs her knife into her roast and it stay there, quivering.

On Thursday afternoon, Ginny finds Hermione napping in the deserted common room. Her hair is frizzy and sending tendrils creeping over the arm of the sofa. She's all curled up, a concise tangle of arms and legs. Her skirt has hiked up far enough that there's a pale sliver of thigh showing above the top of her stockings. Ginny bends down and kisses Hermione: once lightly, again with more force. Hermione's lips are chapped and taste vaguely like pumpkin juice.

Hermione smiles in her sleep, murmurs, "Crookshanks, is that you?"

Hermione's cat, skulking under the sofa, hisses and claws Ginny's ankle. Ginny gives the monster a swift, vicious kick and hobbles off to staunch the bleeding.

On Friday, Ginny hides in the library stacks. She's waiting for Hermione, who finally walks by with an enormous tower of books. "Hermione," Ginny says, and Hermione predictably shrieks and drops everything.

"Oh, I'm so sorry!" Ginny says, kneeling to help Hermione pick up the scattered texts.

Hermione laughs. "You scared me half witless, Ginny." She hefts the books onto a nearby table. "Was there something you needed?" Her eyebrows crinkle up inquisitively.

"Actually," Ginny says, trying hard to look bashful, "I'd like to have a word with you, if you don't mind."

"Well, of course I don't mind, Ginny," Hermione says, smiling bemusedly, and Ginny tugs her over to a dark niche and presses her against the shelves and kisses her. And Hermione's frozen at first - just the shock, Ginny thinks, she'll come round in a moment - and sure enough, Hermione buries her fingers in Ginny's hair and kisses back. Ginny runs her tongue over Hermione's lower lip. Hermione opens her mouth: it's small and hot. She tastes like peaches. Ginny's intoxicated. She can't get enough.

Hermione has an oddly-shaped birthmark on the inside of her right thigh. She wears white cotton knickers. Ginny pushes two fingers up inside of her and Hermione whimpers and claws at the floor. "Ginny, Ginny," she hisses. She makes almost no noise when she comes.

When she's pulled her stockings back on, Hermione fixes Ginny with a mildly accusing stare. "It certainly took you long enough," she says.

Ginny is shocked. "What?"

"I've been trying to seduce you since the beginning of the term," Hermione says quite innocently, running her hands over her hair to check for disarray.

"Well, it seems to have worked," Ginny says, and leans in for a kiss.

At dinner, Ginny and Hermione hold hands beneath the tablecloth. Ron looks suspicious. Ginny smiles sweetly and passes him the butter.