Aftermath

Aftermath

Ginny was her brothers' sister; blatantly so. From the time she could talk she was as mischievous and wild as Bill, Charlie, Fred, George, and Ron. She was a complete bundle of curiosity and sunshine for the family. A girl -- just who the house needed. A beautiful girl who loved to laugh and loved to be alive. She was a Weasley down to her flaming hair.

When she was six she somehow managed to pin flowers onto the garden gnomes' hats. Fifteen garden gnomes to be exact. Ron had pestered her for days on end trying to find out how she did it but she would only giggle in response. Even at a young age she was good at keeping secrets.

When she was nine she was alone in her room doing Merlin knows what, when something exploded out of her window. The Twins ran into her room asking her what she had done to make such a great explosion. She simply stood in the middle of the room playing with her hands, with a giant smile across her face. She sort of chuckled with the tip of her tongue between her teeth when the rest of the house came to investigate as well. In the end, she was never punished because, as far as could be seen, she, and everything else in the room, was perfectly fine.

When Ginny went to school she was slowly starting to change. Being the only girl in a family of boys had made her completely unprepared for living with other girls. Even before she was taken into the Chamber, it was obvious that she was slowly changing. Everyone blamed it on Tom and the power of the diary. Ginny never corrected them nor dispelled the myths, so everyone began to believe they were right.

Still, to my horror, I watched Ginny change. I always made sure to talk with her each day, so she would not feel alone. At the time, I felt a small resistance on her part, pulling away from me. I blame that on Tom because I know that he actually did that; she told me so. It was not until after the 'Tom Affair' I realized just how much of Ginny had died in the Chamber.

Everyone in the family saw Ginny becoming a different person, a quieter person, but if there ever is one thing Weasleys are good at, it is washing over a problem. Soon the Burrow was its normal blustering mess. So only I was left to realize with a sickening feeling that Ginny was shrinking away from the girl she had once been. She became less and less like the Twins, and, as her will to live seeped from her, she was turning more and more into me.

She was colder then; her movements more calculated. She wrote in a journal still, though. Unlike the journal she had used as a child -- blue with clouds and her name scrawled across the front in purple ink -- this one was black and she had carved her name into it with a knife from the kitchen. We talked while she did it. I had just gotten home from working overtime and I was drinking some hot tea when she came downstairs in her nightgown, clutching the book to her chest. She looked at me for a moment, unmoving, judging me, before deciding that I was not a threat to her way of life. She carved her name and I held the book still.

The next day she was sitting in my chair as I came downstairs, dressed in a black and red sundress, eyes hopeful, a stack of books in her arms -- her journal on the top. Mum was about to tell her no when Ron came down to breakfast. I stared into her pleading eyes for a moment longer before telling her yes. I held onto her tight as I apparated to work.

She would come with me twice a week and sit in the corner of my office reading her books and writing in her journal. No one at work noticed her and so no one minded.

One day, after a secretary had left papers on my desk without seeing her, Ginny acknowledged the fact. "No one sees me, Percy."

I looked at her for a moment before I realized that she meant that no one looked at her in general, not just in the office. I wanted to tell her she was wrong, that everyone looked, but I found that I could not lie. "I look at you," I said, and she smiled.

The only times I saw her being truly emotional were late at night. She would come into my room silently and shut the door. I turned the light on the first night she did that. She had tears streaming down her cheeks and when I saw them she looked ashamed. I never turned the light on again when she came in after that.

She would lie under the covers and wrap her arms around me, her skin cold to the touch. She slept with her head on my chest, and my night shirt would grow damp from her tears. I would hold her and let her cry. Each night I would always say the same thing. "I know you're there Ginny. I can see you." And she would fall asleep, leaving me awake to wonder how long we would do this. How long before she got better.

~fini~