In Which Ginny's Clumsiness Finally Pays Off

Chapter One: In the Hands of the Enemy

"Psst, Ginny!"

Ginny Weasley was driven out of her reverie (or sleepy reverie for that matter) in History of Magic in which Professor Binns amazingly managed to transform the twisted love affairs of the four Hogwarts founders into a dumbfounding lullaby. Somehow, Helga Hufflepuff's and Salazar Slytherin's secret relationship didn't seem remotely interesting. For the fifth year Gryffindors' and Ravenclaws' cases, it was extremely boring.

Ginny, who didn't approve much of note passing, but in this case will do anything to be distracted, craned her neck to face Colin Creevey's grinning face.

"Happy birthday, Ginny," he whispered, shaking her hand.

With her last ounce of strength, Ginny shook Colin's shoulder, in an attempt to hug her bestfriend. An hour of history didn't give her the required amount of strength.

"Thanks, Colin. Can you believe this? I'm fifteen--and this is five years in a row that I've forgotten it's my birthday," she whispered back, eventually turning around to talk to him, knowing very well that even if she danced naked in front of Professor Binns during class, that will still not drive his attention away from his precious notes.

"Well, Neville and I certainly didn't forget."

Ginny watched excitedly as he turned around to get his school bag, wrenching it open, and appeared to be trying to find something amidst thousands of pictures and notes.

Ginny waited patiently, watching Colin from the corner of her eye. She had just thought of the best poem for Harry, something that certainly didn't include toads and Dark Lords. She mentally slapped herself for even spending a whole night, three years ago, trying to come up with decent words just so it would rhyme with toad, board, mine, divine and so on and so forth.

"Here," Colin panted at last, smacking into her table a picture of Harry in his broom, in what year she didn't know, his hair waving in the wind gloriously. He was obviously playing Quidditch. On the bottom-left of the picture, a neat signature was scribbled.

It read: Harry Potter.

"Ah, Colin!" gasped Ginny, speechless. "Yep, the first, ever signed photo of Harry Potter, courtesy of yours truly, from me to you. Happy birthday, Gin," said Colin proudly, as Ginny gave him an enthusiastic hug which earned a glance from Professor Binns. Just one glance, though, as he probably thought history was acting as a stimulator to two of his students.

"Hold unto it, I only got 63 copies left," Colin piped in gravely, his tone sounding serious. "Of course I'll keep it. Heck--I'll sleep with it under my pillow."

The bell rang suddenly and soon, there was a stampede towards the door. Ginny and Colin sped out, clutching their books in their hands. "So what's Neville's class again?" Colin asked as they walked down the hallway, along with other students, trying to catch their breath.

"Ermm..." Ginny racked her brain for a second then answered, "Potions."

The two bestfriends rushed into the dungeons, knowing that Harry was in Neville's class, thus were both very keen to know what happened throughout the class. Their footsteps echoed around the damp walls, bouncing back to them, and by the time they reached Snape's dungeon, they both out of breath.

Neville Longbottom was waiting for them outside the classroom, arms folded across his chest and wearing a very grim smile.

"Remind me again," he ordered as he saw the two approach, "why I took Potions for the fifth time?"

"Because you need credit for Potions badly or else you fail your entire life?" Colin guessed, trying to cheer Neville up.

No response.

"Because Hermione's there," Ginny answered confidently, as she gave her bestfriend a reassuring pat on the back. "Thank you," Neville finally gave them a smile.

"Are you forgetting something? Like your report?" Ginny inquired; excited to know more about what was Harry's state.

"Oh yeah, my report, I almost forgot about that. You don't have anything to worry about Hermione, Ginny. She seems distant when it comes to Harry. Honestly, if you ask my opinion, I'd say Hermione and Ron sort of have--you know--something between them."

"Yeah, I've seen that coming," Colin agreed, nodding his head, "I think everyone saw that coming."

"Did you hear anything about Cho, though? Did Harry say anything about her?"

"Well, I overheard Harry telling Ron at Care of Magical Creatures that he's a little reluctant to approach her right now, since, you know, Diggory's death. I reckon he doesn't want Cho to think he's taking advantage of her. Good thinking, really."

"So, anyone heard about the upcoming dance? Is it just a rumour or is it proven already?" asked Ginny anxiously, while tugging her hair.

"No, it's not proven yet," Neville replied, "but if there is, who will you go with, Gin?"

"If Harry won't ask me--"

"Hey, it's my turn to be with Ginny, remember? You had your turn Neville, come on," Colin pouted, crossing his arms. "I wasn't able to go to the Yule Ball last year because you took her. Not fair."

"Oh yeah, I already promised Colin, sorry Neville."

"Not a problem--oh yeah, before I forget--here," Neville grabbed something from his bag and then, after a few minutes, shoved a beautiful looking flower plant into Ginny's hands. Its leaves were red and its petals were bright yellow. "It's the mood plant. Look, it's yellow; you're happy--happy birthday."

"Aww...this is so nice, Neville."

"Hey, careful, it's shy!" True enough; the flower seemed to shrink from Ginny's touch as soon as she tried to lay her hands on it. "You have to spend a little more time with it," Colin suggested, stating the obvious once again.

"So, are we doing the plan today or not?" Neville asked, arching his eyebrows. Ginny and Colin looked at each other.

"Umm..." Ginny elbowed Colin hard in the ribs. Colin got the gist and blurted, "Ginny chickened out!"

"What?" Neville gave her a frown, "How hard can bumping Harry and taking one of his notebooks so you can return it to him be?"

"Harder than merely staring at him!"

"Come on, Gin, all you have to do is bump him hard enough so his books fall out--"

"No! Not in front of his friends!"

"One of his friends is your brother and other one is your roommate."

"And both of them don't talk to me so that doesn't count."

"Please, Gin, what better day than your birthday?"

"This is Harry we're talking about--H-A-R-R-Y, the person who defeated You-Know-Who when he was a baby. To make a long story short, he's famous--F-A-M-O-U-S, and I'm nothing to him. N-O-T-H-I-N-G."

"I do spell you know."

"I am not doing it, period."

"P-E-R-I-O-D?"

"Neville!"

"Tippy-toe! Tippy-toe!" Colin exclaimed, jumping up and down and waving his arms wildly, their signal for Harry's arrival. Sure enough from the end of the hallway, they saw the familiar streak of red, brown and black. Ginny looked at the ground while Colin fumbled for his camera. Neville stayed relaxed--as if nothing was going on. When he saw Hermione with Ron and Harry however, he began to tug at his hair involuntarily.

Ginny knew it didn't matter if her brother's trio pass them or not. Either way, they just walk by as if she and her friends had just thrown an Invisibility Cloak over themselves. Ron, Harry and Hermione notice nothing at the ends of their noses. They really didn't matter.

Just as they were about to come disregarded, Ginny felt a hand slide at her back. Before she could react, she was pushed rather hardly by Neville, crashing into someone that sent them sprawling into the floor.

Ginny looked up just as soon as she saw the trio round a corner.

Wait--if Harry was there with Ron and Hermione, then who was person she just smacked into?

"Aargh! Get off me, Weasley!"

Ginny looked down and saw that she was actually on top of a very disgusted-looking individual, smirking up at her.

It was Draco Malfoy.

"I--I'm sorry," she stuttered as she gathered herself up, blushing to the roots of her hair. That Parkinson character (what's her name again? Ginny asked herself.) will have a fit if she sees her on top of her boyfriend. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Crabbe and Goyle, standing on guard.

She quickly picked her books, not bothering to look at them as Malfoy followed suit.

"Of all the people you can bump into, it just have to be me," he drawled on, eyeing her with loathe.

"I couldn't help it," she said defensively, trying hard to sound as if she wasn't afraid of him, but the tiny squeak that came out didn't help. She was going to kill Neville later, that is, if Malfoy doesn't kill her first.

"Well, be careful next time then, I personally don't want to be jinxed by your filthy poor hands--you might transfer some deadly disease unto me."

Ginny felt the tiny pinpricks of tears out of the corners of her eyes, as she just accepted all of his insults. She bit her lip to stop the tears from flowing but it didn't help very much. Malfoy was a terrible person for thinking that he's better than anyone just because he was pureblood and is the son of a very prominent person in the Wizarding Community. Just because her family didn't do as well as his, doesn't mean he can treat them the way he treats his house-elves. She was about to be finished in stuffing her books in a much disoriented manner when she sniffed loud enough for Malfoy to hear.

"If your tears were gold, Weasley, you'd be rich, considering all the tears you've cried since You-Know-Who's curse and Potter's decision of ignoring you."

She was just about to burst into tears when Neville and Colin appeared beside her, obviously there to defend her against the enemy. She saw Crabbe and Goyle slowly advance.

"Ah, the pathetic team, it's as if all the Potter-lovers in the whole world united and formed your group, the Harry Potter fan club. One advice for you three, go get a life for Merlin's sake," Malfoy insulted, hitting their soft spots and squeezing it.

"You go get a life, Malfoy," Ginny said stiffly, feeling the same anger she felt when she saw Malfoy three years ago, at Flourish and Blotts, when he offended Harry, just because he was jealous of all the attention Lockhart was giving him.

Malfoy's eyes darkened as he heard her last comment. He leaned closer to her and whispered malevolently, "Whatever, loser."

Before they could spat something back at him, he had already walked-out of their conversation, his two thugs behind him.

"It's okay, Gin," Colin murmured comfortingly, patting her back and hugging her close to him."

"I'm sorry," Neville uttered guiltily, shifting closer to her.

"It's okay," she sniffed out as she dabbed her eyes with her robes.

And the three of them huddled closer, as though something inside them was tearing their hearts apart.

*.*

Ginny felt dead all throughout the day. Try as they may, Colin and Neville couldn't force her to eat dinner happily since it was her birthday. Even Hermione's promise of giving hers, Ron's and Harry's gift after their meal didn't stir her resolve of staying at the Great Hall. She took refugee into her room, planning to sleep early and forget Malfoy's spiteful and unforgivable words.

Since You-Know-Who's curse...

She hasn't had many friends since then. They were all afraid of her, thinking that the Dark Lord still has some kind of power over her, thinking that she can wreak havoc anytime she wants. She was under a curse; she didn't mean all of what she did. A nagging feeling still lurked inside her, telling her that somehow, she knew she was doing something wrong--that made her flush Riddle's diary into a toilet. How could she have known that Harry, of all people, will find it?

She sighed.

She needs to put all her thoughts in her notebook right now, or else she'd explode. Ginny have this notebook, well, not actually a notebook but a couple of parchment clumsily sewn together by a piece of string, that contained her random thought. It wasn't magical or cursed, she made sure of that. This time, she built her own book. It contained all her secrets and ranting; even Colin and Neville didn't know anything about it.

She searched for it in her bag. After a few minutes of arranging and rearranging her books in her bag, she gave up. It wasn't there. She began to panic. She turned her room upside down, panicking every second.

No, it couldn't be.

It wasn't to be found.

Then it dawned on her. No--the crashing--could it be? Could it be that--that terrible person had it? She really wasn't looking at her books when she picked it up, did she? Was Malfoy looking too? No, she was pretty sure he was just stuffing things in his bag too, the way she did.

Oh no.

Her heart thundered double-time.

Draco Malfoy has her diary!