In the Melancholy Moonlight, Part 4: Nebula

Chapter 172: As Long As We're Together

HARRY:

When Ron's birthday rolled around, Lucy was no longer the only one who didn't feel like playing truth or dare. I remembered too well Hermione's birthday, when the first words out of Ginny's mouth as soon as I'd swallowed the truth candy were "Tell us, Harry, who do you fancy?" I couldn't risk letting that happen again, especially considering I had a very different answer almost six months later. I remembered, too, that she'd asked Lucy the same question, and that Lucy had responded with "No one at the moment."

I'll admit I spent the better part of the day worrying about what I'd do if truth or dare was suggested, or worse, if we actually played it. As it turned out, though, I didn't have any reason to worry. After how chaotic everything had been as of late, Ron didn't want a party, he just wanted us all to be together. The common room was crowded since it was a Friday night, so Hermione and Lucy headed up to our dorm for the evening.

Lucy smiled when she looked at my section of the room. I had started using the camera she'd gotten me for Christmas, as evidenced by the picture from the Gryffindor-Hufflepuff match and the couple of sunset pictures now hanging around my bed.

"Be sure to have the camera ready," she said, "because I want photographic proof of my victory against the birthday boy in wizard's chess."

Unfortunately, Ron won all four games they played, but the camera did make its rounds that night. By the time curfew arrived and the girls had to leave, there were several pictures strewn across my bed.

Lucy studying the chess board with her thumb pressed over her mouth, something I had realized she did when she was really concentrating.

Ron and Hermione laughing hysterically while flinging Chocolate Frog cards at each other as fast as possible both with and without magic.

A series of pictures consisting of Hermione attempting to braid Lucy's hair by hand the way Ginny did, then sighing and attempting a braiding spell, then sighing again and putting it back into a ponytail and doing the same to her own hair.

Ron and Lucy tossing a Quaffle back and forth as Hermione ran back and forth trying and failing to snag it out of midair.

Then, apparently, Hermione got a hold of the camera at one point while I was distracted, because the final picture, my favorite picture, was of Ron, Lucy, and myself sprawled on the floor with four scrapbooks of Chocolate Frog cards between us. Lucy had brought Cedric's Chocolate Frog collection up, and I was helping her combine his with hers into one scrapbook. In the photo, I was firmly placing the Lucy card on its own page, Ron was laughing, and Lucy was blushing clear to the tips of her ears.

That blush was the most significant detail about the last photo, truly. The fact that we could tell she was blushing at all only a couple nights before the full moon was nothing short of a miracle, because it meant that the Weasleys' hypothermia candy was working.

It wasn't entirely without side effects, as the magic warred within her. Lucy had to take more and more to try to keep up with the ever-increasing fever, leaving her with not much of an appetite for anything else. She was having a hard time focusing, too, and her eyes were often distant. Just the same, though, whenever the twins dramatically kissed her on the cheek or Ginny cuddled up close to her in the common room or I reached out to feel her forehead for myself, there was no fever, and she seemed to welcome the relief.

The full moon itself was blessedly uneventful. Lucy tried the twins' Fever Fudge to combat the cold she felt after the fact, but it worked too well, giving her an uncomfortably high fever, so she just ate the other half of the sweet as well to neutralize it and said she'd be alright.

"Besides," she said with a bit of a mischievous twinkle in her tired eyes as she looked at me, "I do believe I have a duel to win after Harry's Occlumency lesson tonight, and the hypothermia candy weakened my magic a bit. I can't lose my winning streak just because I was a little cold."