Harry Potter One Shots

Grey Eyes

Hermione squealed as the ball of icy powder smashed into her side, crumbling down the loose maroon jumper she was wearing. It fell to her knees and had a large gold R on the front. Ginny suspected it was Ron's.

"Ron!" Hermione bellowed, and he laughed as she furiously began packing snow into a tight ball. "I'll get you for that one!" And she threw the snowball at him so hard he fell over.

"Nice one, Hermione," Harry grinned, trying to hold back a struggling Ginny as she fought to get Hermione back.

"Well well well, what do we have here?" George Weasley said as he walked over to them. Every time she saw him, Ginny expected Fred to be loping by his side. Every single time. And he never was.

"Do you want to join?" Harry asked.

"I'm on his team!" Ginny exclaimed, finally breaking free from him.

"What?! That means I have to be on Harry and Hermione's team and they're so bad compared to you," Ron complained.

"Excuse me?" Hermione demanded, glaring at her boyfriend with her hands on her hips.

"It's alright, Ron, I actually have to go anyway," Ginny said, glancing at her watch.

"Where are you going?" Harry asked in confusion.

"Places." She gave them a wave and darted off, down the dirt lane that started in Hermione and Ron's back garden and led to the mass of trees beyond.

The forest behind Hermione and Ron's house was beautiful. So different from the Forbidden Forest at Hogwarts, or the forest she'd run through at the Quidditch World Cup. The trees were young, barely halfway to their adult height, Neville had told her once. They were almost all deciduous, and they stood like dark skeletons around her, stretching their spindly arms up to the sky, which was as grey as the eyes of someone she knew well. The ground was carpeted with a thick pile of leaves, visible between patches of snow, no longer the vivid oranges and reds of autumn, but brown. The forest wasn't as fresh and green as it usually was, but Ginny found herself liking it better this way. Hermione and Ron had only moved in together less than a year ago and she'd never seen their property in Winter before. She made a mental note to talk to Hermione about hosting the annual Christmas dinner here. Though a part of her would miss having it at the Burrow, her childhood home, she knew too many painful memories resided there, and she didn't want another Christmas stained with grief.

There was a crunch of dry leaves, and a boy stepped into the clearing. He was a man now, really, with skin as pale as the snow slowly melting on her emerald green woollen Weasley jumper, and hair as silvery gold as the weak sunlight streaming through the deadened trees. His eyes were the ones she had thought of when she'd looked at the sky. His name was Draco Malfoy.

"Hi," he said, smiling at her. He had such a nice smile. She didn't think she'd ever seen him smile with anything other than malice during their time at Hogwarts, but since then his smiles had thawed to sweet, lovely things that tended to be constant around her.

"Hey, you," said Ginny softly. And then she was running across the ground towards him, her brown boots padding across leaves and snow, until she reached where he stood beside a baby oak tree, and she threw her arms around his neck, pressing her face into his shoulder as he spun her around.

"Ginny," he breathed as he set her down again.

"Draco," she replied, a smile stretching across her face.

And then, her arms locked around his neck, her brown eyes fixed on his, she kissed him, soft and slow.

After the war, every single Death Eater who'd survived was captured and jailed. Draco hadn't fought, he'd let himself be dragged to Azkaban. Ginny had been relieved at the time. She felt sickened at the thought now, of Draco, already haunted by his past, fighting off the inner demons that threatened to consume him, trapped in a place that embodied despair. There were no more Dementors. For that she was exceedingly thankful. But there were his thoughts, and she couldn't bear to think of what would have happened if she hadn't gone to see him that fateful Saturday.