Ginny Weasley and the Heir of Slytherin

Most of the school wasn't too happy to be back when term resumed. Kimmy Seong was an exception, cheerfully telling the other girls about her Christmas with her family in New Malden while Fleeta Fleece naturally made a show of not listening. Even though she was Muggle-born, Kimmy didn't seem too worried about the Chamber of Secrets and was able to slip right back into her bizarre role as Lorelei's constant confident.

Luna Lovegood was also happy to return, eagerly running up to Fleeta just after they got off the Hogwarts Express.

"Fleeta, guess what?" said Luna. "I talked to my father over break about what's happening here and he believes me. Maybe you'll believe me too now that it's in print."

With that, Luna held up the latest issue of The Quibbler. The headline "MINISTRY AGENT PERPETRATES 'CHAMBER OF SECRETS' HOAX AT HOGWARTS" was accompanied by Gilderoy Lockhart's smiling photograph from the cover of Magical Me.

"Let me see that," said Fleeta with maliciousness which no one but "Loony" Lovegood could fail to miss. Luna passed the magazine over and Fleeta immediately proceeded to tear out every single page, tossing them behind her like large piece of confetti.

"That wasn't nice," said Luna vaguely as the last of the Quibbler pages settled on the ground. Fleeta's only response was to throw the empty magazine cover in Luna's face and strut away, leaving Luna looking mildly surprised.

Hermione, meanwhile, had been in the hospital wing since Christmas. Apparently, whatever she had been planning with Harry and Ron to discover the Heir of Slytherin had somehow resulted in her being turned into a cat-girl. Ginny decided it was best not to wonder about this. There was no reason to think Madam Pomfrey wouldn't cure Hermione soon enough, but this still left Ginny unable to talk to her for a time. Ginny wasn't sure whether Madam Pomfrey would let her into the infirmary, but that was a moot point -- she didn't trust herself to go near the Petrified students.

"It's bad enough having Hermione in the hospital wing for the cat thing, but what if she's Petrified?" Ginny wrote in the diary as she sat on her unmade bed one evening. "Then I won't have anyone to tell my secret to and it'll be all my fault. And what if she dies?"

Ginny had not told Tom Riddle that she suspected him, which often made it quite difficult for her explain her guilty feelings to him. She was sure at times that he must see through her words and realize what she was really thinking, but he never asked her about it. Why would he? She no longer sought his advice, knowing he wouldn't tell her anything useful, instead relying on him purely for emotional support. And he was still good at that.

"Oh Ginny, I hate to repeat myself, but you have no reason to believe you're doing this and Hermione would tell you the same thing. It tears me up inside knowing that you're blaming yourself for something so horrible and so beyond your control. Besides, I still don't understand why you think you need to share your fears with Hermione. You hardly know her and you can tell me anything. I'll always listen to your --"

"Hey, Ginny! What've you got there?"

"Nothing," Ginny lied quickly, slamming the diary shut as she looked up to see Kimmy had just entered the dormitory.

It was only a second later that Ginny realized what a pathetic lie this was -- Kimmy could clearly see she had something there. This was exactly the situation Ginny had so worried about in the days before the opening of the Chamber -- one of her dorm mates walking in on her using the diary none of them knew about. Whenever she used the diary, Ginny always closed the dormitory door so that the sound of it opening could serve as her warning that someone was coming in, but by now she had become too comfortable and had stupidly forgotten to do that.

"It's -- it's my diary," Ginny said eventually, sure her face must be a picture of guilt as she looked into the smiling face of the Muggle-born witch whose life she had just been endangering.

"There's nothing wrong with keeping a diary," Kimmy assured her. "You don't need to feel ashamed of it."

"I -- I don't feel ashamed," lied Ginny, feeling even more guilty. "I just wanted it to be a secret, that's all."

"Well, don't worry, I won't tell anyone," said Kimmy cheerfully. "And I would never read someone else's private diary. You know, you never really struck me as the diary type, but I think keeping a diary would be good for you. It's like having a little friend who always listens to whatever you have to say."

"Yeah, and then you can worry about people finding it and reading all your embarrassing secrets," said Ginny. Kimmy smiled weakly.

"It's too bad diaries are one-way," she said thoughtfully. "You share your private feelings with them and they never write back. Wouldn't it be wonderful if diaries could write back to you?"

"Yeah, wonderful," echoed Ginny in a toneless sort of voice.

Muttering "bye", she got up and left the room, taking the diary with her. She wasn't about to leave it out in her dormitory right after someone had seen it. She knew Kimmy was a decent person and that it was extremely unlikely she had been lying about not reading someone else's diary, but Ginny wouldn't let herself take that chance. It felt too unsafe leaving the diary alone with a person who had just seen it. After all, if Kimmy looked in the diary and saw it was blank, she would ask questions Ginny couldn't answer.

Kimmy. Why did it have to be her Muggle-born dorm mate who walked in on her using the diary? That just made the guilt so much worse...

Ginny arrived in the common room to see a large third-year boy raving about hunting nogtails with his uncle before a captive audience of younger boys. They included Momus Gumption, who was almost singularly responsible for all points lost by the Gryffindor first years. Although none of the boys seemed to have noticed she was there, Ginny felt very aware that this was the first time she had taken the diary outside her dormitory of her own free will and so she kept it out of sight. Besides, she could easily see Momus Gumption wrestling someone's diary out of their hands and he stood a good chance of succeeding considering he was surrounded by boys who were probably as immature as he was.

Not entirely sure where she was planning to go, Ginny edged towards the portrait hole while the boys remained engrossed in the wiry-haired third year's increasingly improbable tale which now involved him being chased by a nundu he had accidentally awoken. As she neared the common room fire, it suddenly occurred to her that she could just toss Tom Riddle's diary into it. After all, she couldn't write in the diary very well if it were burned to a crisp, now could she?

She stopped moving. She had thought she was pretty sure that Tom Riddle was the one possessing her, but she would have to be really, really sure if she were to go so far as to destroy the diary -- killing him, essentially. But, however much it pained her to admit it, it was a fact that she was incapable of resisting the diary. She had tried and failed so many times. She had no choice but to stop herself forcibly -- and she could only do that by ridding herself of that cursed book.

"Hey, Weasley!" shouted Momus Gumption, causing all the boys to turn and look at her. "You wanna sit with us?"

"N-no, thanks," she said with an anxiousness she couldn't quite explain. "I'll go now." She walked out the portrait hole rather quicker than was necessary, sure the boys were snickering behind her. She felt like such a little girl!

Once she was outside the common room, she continued, not even sure where she was going and gradually upping her pace until she was running. Finally, she stopped in a corridor on the second floor and looked down at the black diary she was still holding in her right hand. She was going to get rid of it -- the one thing in the entire world which made her feel just a little happy. There was no doubt about it anymore -- the only question was how she would do it.

Ginny tried not to cry. She knew this was her only choice.

But she also knew that she did not want Tom Riddle to die. He had been so kind to her and he had made her feel so loved. Even if it was all a lie, she couldn't bear the thought of killing him. Of course, she was already a killer, having taken out a couple of Hagrid's chickens, but at least they were animals usually killed by people. However, every time she wrote in the diary she risked murdering one of her classmates. The danger never felt real enough to stop her -- after all, no had died yet -- but she knew it was real and that should have been enough. What would she do if, heaven forbid, someone did die? What if that someone was Kimmy or Hermione?

Ginny had wasted so much time trying to stop herself from using the diary and she wished none of it had ever happened. She wished that when she found that diary she had had the sense to turn it over to her parents. She wished she'd never found it. She wished it had never existed in the first place. But all the wishing in the world wouldn't change anything and she knew it. She had done what she had done. There was nothing she could do now except stop it from continuing. And if she destroyed the diary on her own, no one would even have to know.

Ginny looked down the corridor she hadn't passed through in ages -- the one leading to Moaning Myrtle's bathroom. Even thinking about going near that horrible writing again made Ginny shake. She hadn't looked at it since Halloween and aside from the time after the last attack she hadn't gone near Moaning Myrtle's bathroom since then either -- at least not that she was aware of. And yet that scene from Halloween was burned indelibly into her memory. Even now, she could remember the exact wording of the ghastly message that had been left on the wall. It haunted her constantly, while she was awake and in her nightmares. At least when she was awake, she could try to force herself to not think about it, but trying not to think about it only made her think about it more.

And now for some reason she was thinking of actually going down there again. If she did that, it would leave her with more scarring images she couldn't forget! What would be the point of that? But she was a Gryffindor, and she couldn't avoid that corridor forever. When she was in her seventh year, would she still be taking the long way around just to avoid a perfectly harmless wall? She would have to confront her fear eventually, but not today. Not when she felt this scared. But she would feel scared anytime she decided to face that wall again. And she was already there.

Her heart raced as she walked down the hallway, with every step thinking that she should be running away in the other direction as fast as she could. She knew that she would not enjoy this at all, and that she wouldn't feel much better after it was over. Why she was doing this was completely beyond her. But she couldn't keep away from this corridor forever. As fear swept through her, she thought that this might actually be worse than Halloween. Even though she now knew there would be nothing dangerous there, at least before she had been thrown into the situation unexpectedly. Now, she was freely walking into it and that required much more bravery.

At long last, she reached the wall. The words which haunted Ginny's dreams gleamed just as brightly as ever -- Filch had been unable to clean them off. Aside from the absence of a Petrified cat hanging from the torch bracket, everything was still the same as it had been when she was last there. She still wasn't sure whether the words were written in red paint or blood, but gloomily figured it was probably blood. Her heart was still racing, but after she had built it up so much in her mind, actually being there didn't seem so bad after all. At least not at that moment -- she was sure the real horror would come later when the images her eyes were presently taking in would refuse to leave her alone.

She looked at the message, trying to see Tom Riddle's refined handwriting in the large, crude letters. It was impossible, of course. Her heart beating outside of her chest, Ginny stepped forward to examine the letters more closely. She felt herself shake and tremble just as she had on Halloween. It was funny how she had only seen these words once before, but remembered them so well. There were entire days of her life she had forgotten and she couldn't even remember anything from when she had been really little. And yet her mind cruelly picked that terrible Halloween night for her to remember so well over so many innocuous and now forgotten moments.

Ginny kind of wanted to step into the bathroom to look around it again. She hadn't been in there since the attack on Justin Finch-Fletchley and Nearly Headless Nick. But she was shaking so much -- maybe she could come back later when she felt braver. But she was already there and she didn't plan on going through this again anytime soon. She might as well get it over with. Besides, nothing in there could be worse than a huge threatening message possibly written in blood. Feeling like she was making a bad decision, she opened the door and ventured into the dark girls' toilet.

Strangely, Ginny felt eyes on the back of her neck, but when she looked around she didn't see anything. Maybe Myrtle was spying on her, but floating inside a wall or something whenever Ginny turned around. Ginny had never actually met the unpleasant spirit which haunted the bathroom, but from what she was told Myrtle was the ghost of a former Hogwarts student who made Lorelei look thick-skinned. Ginny noted her scared reflection in the cracked mirror. She didn't like the way she looked at all. She still hadn't been eating much nor had she been taking good care of herself. When you factored in her secondhand clothes, it added up to make her look like an underfed homeless child. Not that she would have preferred looking fat or anything.

Her reflection was holding Tom Riddle's diary in its right arm. She turned her gaze down to the diary, having almost forgotten she still had it with her. Almost reflexively, her arms wrapped themselves tightly around the diary. She turned her head back up to the mirror. She looked so stupid hugging a book like it was a person! But she didn't stop nor could she take her eyes off her reflection even though she really didn't like her appearance at all. Ginny decided she was hugging Tom Riddle goodbye. After all, she had decided to rid herself of the diary and what better place was there to dispose of it than right there in the bathroom off from where this had all started? She could simply flush it down a toilet, assuming at least one of them still worked.

After indulging her desire to hug the diary for far too long, she pried her arms off her chest to hold the book with one hand. She didn't want to let go. There was still that really, really stupid part of her which continued to believe Tom Riddle loved her. But what else was she going to do? Go back to her dormitory after accomplishing nothing here, continue to write in the diary, and murder Kimmy, Hermione, or Penny? No, she was going to end this right here and now!

Ginny forced herself to walk into an opened stall, knowing that the sooner she got this over with, the sooner she could get away from this terrible place and its bathroom smell. She still didn't want Tom Riddle to be destroyed and this way he probably wouldn't be. If he were flushed down a toilet, he would be out of her reach and unable to posses her, but he would remain alive. He might not have much of a life without someone writing to him, but it was the best she could do.

She was taking too much time. Ginny threw the diary right into the toilet. Now she would at least be very disinclined to pick it up again. After watching it float in the toilet water for awhile, she again pushed herself to get this over with. She unceremoniously pushed down the flush lever with her foot, not wanting to touch anything in that bathroom with her hands, and watched the small black book spin down the toilet.

An ear-splitting cry rose up as the diary disappeared, causing her to jump in fright! Figuring it was probably Moaning Myrtle, whom she had no desire to meet, Ginny speeded out of the bathroom. As she ran, a lingering fear that she had done the wrong thing crept into her. But she had done it and now it was over. It was a rather odd ending to all her problems, but it was an ending nonetheless and any ending signified she would no longer have to worry about attacking anyone.

Ginny didn't even seem to know where her legs were carrying her until she pushed her way through the castle's oak front doors. She stopped just outside the doors and surveyed the grounds. The cold grays of January had never looked so bright and colorful! In the distance she could see the Quidditch pitch where the Hufflepuff team was finishing up practice for their upcoming match against Gryffindor. Ginny let it go to her head; she was free now. It was over. It was all over for good.

But she would have to carry the horrible secret that she had opened the Chamber of Secrets inside of her for the rest of her life. With it over, there was no reason for her to tell as it would only serve to make her loved ones aware that she was apparently a horrible enough person to endanger the lives of her fellow students for a little emotional security. She didn't want to share that with anyone ever. She would much rather carry that awful knowledge inside of herself until her dying day.

As she thought back on what she had just done, she realized the way she had ended this wasn't so bad. She was free of Tom Riddle, and she had never had to share her secret with anyone. Was there a better way this could have turned out? No one else, of course, knew the danger had passed, but they would slowly realize it after enough time passed with no attacks. The tension which filled the corridors would slowly but surely die down and disappear. The Petrified people would be returned to their normal states to go about their regular lives again. It would all go away eventually.

But Ginny's guilt would not go away and no one else would ever even know about it. It was a terrible prospect, but what could she do? She decided there was nothing to do except to try as hard as she could to act normally again and not think about any of this. Maybe she could even be a happy eleven-year-old girl again. Happy. She hadn't been happy in so long! What it felt like to be truly happy was almost a faint memory to her. Could she ever manage it again?

She smiled a little smile almost just to see if she still could. It felt good -- she didn't know when the last time she had smiled was, but it was probably months ago. Tears started rolling down her face. She had been so miserable for so long that smiling felt a little weird to her. How sad was that? Ginny decided they were tears of joy. She was finally free. Her mouth twitched oddly as she pushed it into a full-fledged grin. She did feel happy.

Smiling and still crying, Ginny began to skip happily down to Hagrid's hut to visit him for the first time since she had killed his roosters. She knew that from that moment on, everything would go right.