Without a Trace

Author's note--Ginny....raw, unedited, and uncut! lol Seriously, though, so many of you have been asking after Ginny that I decided to throw this out to you tonight (double chapter! You are very welcome!!!) I hope that this puts things in a little bit better perspective now.

This begins when Ginny storms out of the conference room in SEVEN HOUR MISSING and continues up until the AFTERMATH.

You guys deserve so much for reading and reviewing! Thank you!!!
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Without a Trace

Special Features: Ginny

Ginny stormed out of the FBI building. She knew the girls would be safe with Ashleigh, and she just had to get out of there. Seeing Malfoy had been one thing; seeing Malfoy cry, completely another; and still the third shock to her system was that her own twin daughters had taken it upon themselves to extend Gryffindor comfort when she herself could barely manage to express her sympathy. She left her car in the parking garage and headed towards her favorite bar. She ordered glass after glass of wine and proceeded to brood about how things had gotten to this point and why she still put up with it all.

In truth, Ginny found it hard to sympathize with Draco Malfoy; she was a year younger than both Harry and Draco when they were at Hogwarts, and she had revered Harry as a kind of demi-god, at first. In having a crush on the shy, nervous young man, she had bristled in his defense from the blonde’s taunting. Malfoy had been a spoiled-rotten, self-centered, egotistical prick whose only goal in life (it seemed) was to make Harry as miserable as possible. Ginny had been so infatuated with Harry that she never quite forgave the Slytherin; even after he left Harry alone, she continued to be suspicious of him. She had actually gotten to know Harry a little bit better and had fallen in love with him. She never quite could gauge exactly how he felt about her, but she had allowed herself to hope that he cared for her, but was just too shy or quiet to say so.

Then in Ginny’s fifth year, Dumbledore was killed by Snape, but everyone knew that Draco was supposed to have done it. Harry had taken it especially hard, and Ginny had longed to be the one he turned to for comfort. She suspected that he thought of her as “Ron’s little sister” and therefore undateable by reason that Ron would have a massive coronary, so she had tried to make herself available at every opportunity just in case he wanted to talk or hang out or something. She had also talked Ron (well, really, threatened Ron) into mentioning to Harry a few times that he didn’t have a problem with his best friend and his little sister dating, and Ron insisted that he had relayed the message to Harry. Ron had also reminded his lovesick sister that Harry ‘had a lot on his plate’ so she shouldn’t be too disappointed if he didn’t return her feelings. Hermione had reiterated what Ron said, citing that Harry might have a chance at a social life after Voldemort was dead, but most certainly not before. While Ginny admired Hermione and got on with her extremely well in school, privately she was supremely jealous of the amount of time the older girl spent with Harry. It also drove Ginny mad that Harry felt more comfortable confiding in Hermione than in her…and Hermione wasn’t even interested in him! She, for reasons unknown, had ‘the hots’ for Ginny’s brother, and Ginny wondered silently whether that meant Hermione was unstable mentally.

It had killed Ginny to watch Harry fall apart after Dumbledore’s death. And then December 1997 had been the turning point. It was the middle of Ginny’s sixth year (and Ron, Hermione, Harry, and Draco’s seventh) and the Golden Trio had gotten a tip-off of where Voldemort’s exact location would be right around Christmas. Naturally, they had gone, and Harry fulfilled his destiny and killed Voldemort, ensuring that it was an extra-merry Christmas for the British wizarding world that year. The three of them had returned to the Burrow worn out, slightly injured, and with a haunted aura, but no one appeared more unfocused than Harry. At least Ron and Hermione had each other for support, but Harry staunchly refused Ginny’s pleadings to confide in her, citing his noble desire ‘not to burden her’ with his problems, even though Ginny did everything short of drug him with Veritaserum to get him to talk to her. Hermione spent Christmas with the Weasleys before she and Ron went back to her parents’ house for the remainder of the break. Harry had also left, much to Ginny’s crushing disappointment, under the pretense of moving into Grimmauld Place, Sirius Black’s old home.

She hadn’t seen Harry for the rest of break, but there were rumors that rang in the New Year of a one-night scandal involving Harry and (of all people) Draco Malfoy on New Year’s Eve. There had been an article in the Daily Prophet that was fraught with half-truths and speculations, and it had been the talk of Hogwarts for nearly the entire spring semester. Ginny, for her part, had been livid, outraged, and thoroughly betrayed until her parents talked some sense into her, and she realized that it had to be pure fabrication. The newspaper had been slowly turning into more of a tabloid over the years, so of course they would print a false story without checking the validity first! Upon returning to Hogwarts, she had immediately pounced on Harry, who vehemently denied all of the rumors, and Ginny believed him whole-heartedly, defending him to the death against any who insisted upon continuing to speculate. At the time, she was more delighted and overjoyed than suspicious when Harry suddenly seemed to take an interest in her in April. She didn’t question it because she had been terrified of losing touch with him after he graduated in a month or (even worse) terrified that he would graduate, become an Auror or a Quidditch champion, and meet another girl.

There had been a little voice in the back of her mind telling her to step back and take a look at everything, but with Harry paying attention to her, Ginny lapped it up. She had desired Harry for five years up to that point, so when the Savior of the Wizarding World expressed an interest in snogging her between classes, Ginny didn’t complain. She even took it to the next level, choosing not to notice Harry’s startled look when she reached for his private area that first time and gave him his (and her) first blow job. After that, things progressed rather rapidly, and before either of them knew it, Ginny was unexpectedly retching in the bathrooms at odd hours. Hermione’s Muggle upbringing allowed her to sneak in a ‘home pregnancy test’ which came up as positive to a terrified Ginny and a horrified Harry. The Gryffindors kept it a secret until after Harry, Ron, and Hermione graduated in May. Harry, ever the knight in shining armor, had gone with Ginny to talk to Molly and Arthur, and both Weasley women had burst into tears when Harry got down on one knee and asked for Ginny’s hand in marriage.

Ginny had agreed, naturally. She remembered thinking how lucky she had been to land the sweetest, most thoughtful man in all of Britain who wanted to make her dream of being a June bride come true by getting married right away. Yes, she was roughly two months pregnant, but she hadn’t started showing yet. The wedding had been such a gorgeous affair—Harry really went all out to make it a fantasy, so Ginny didn’t protest at all when he seemed distant, moody, and withdrawn, being too caught up in the whirlwind of a soon-to-be bride. The Daily Prophet, after its up-and-down relationship with Harry as the ‘Chosen One’ and then as the ‘Scandal of the Month’, tried to make amends by covering the wedding and making a big deal of it. Their readers who were not invited to the wedding ate it up, and requests for copies of that particular volume poured in even six months after! Ginny had been the one to respond with a thank-you from both of them, and it seemed as though Harry could care less.

The wedding day had been a reunion for Gryffindor, even though they had been separated for less than a month. Cho Chang, Luna Lovegood, Terry Boot, Padma Patil, and Michael Corner from Ravenclaw had all been invited, as well as Ernie Macmillan and Justin Finch-Fletchley from Hufflepuff. Ginny, at that point, had felt obligated to send a couple of invitations to the Slytherins as well, and she was very surprised when Draco Malfoy had shown up, looking haughty as ever, with his own fiancée Pansy Parkinson, Blaise Zabini, Theo Nott, Gregory Goyle, and Vincent Crabbe in tow. Ginny was surprised further when she received the most expensive set of cutlery from the best knife company in the world (American-made, but Ginny took the high road and overlooked that) as a wedding present from Draco and Pansy. She distinctly remembered the pinched look on her new husband’s face, how he looked as though he were about to cry, when she opened the professionally-wrapped box.

Still flying high from all of the excitement, Ginny had continued to make excuses for Harry’s behavior even during their honeymoon. He had been a perfect gentleman in all ways, except for the fact that Ginny began to wonder whether he really loved her. When hormones took over and she would relentlessly accuse him of not loving her, being in love with other women, or having an affair, he would patiently reassure her that he was devoted to her and their future child. She had made the mistake of believing him then, still hopeful in her illusions. When her twin daughters were born in January, Ginny felt like she had been doused with a bucket of cold water. The twin gene ran in her family, the red-headed, easy-going, clumsy-but-always-friendly Weasley family, and yet, her twin girls looked exactly like their father. One month after bringing them home from the hospital, Ginny realized she had been relegated to third in Harry’s heart, and she began to resent him silently, torn and confused because, in spite of all of the red flags and signs she ignored that screamed he didn’t love her, she still loved him.

Their marriage, while flawed from the start, began to disintegrate slowly, even as both of them looked the other way. Harry grew more and more distant after they received the invitation to the Malfoy-Parkinson wedding that was the fanciest wedding since, well, their own. They had several arguments about whether to go; Harry flatly refused, and Ginny, with her jaw set, had forced him to go, citing that she had just given birth four months ago and worked hard to get her figure back into shape so as to look presentable in her low-cut navy blue party dress. It came as a complete shock to her when, one month later, Harry announced that they were moving to America, and more specifically, New York. She had been furious and reluctant to leave her family and friends; Hermione and Ron had both cried, begging them not to go, and even Fred and George, endless pranksters that they were, had been very somber the night of the announcement. Ginny wondered if it was revenge for her making him do something he didn’t want to, but Harry, ever the courteous gentleman even when he did inexplicable (to Ginny) things that tore her apart on the inside, insisted that he just needed a change of scenery. His other argument was that they were both still young and had never been outside of the United Kingdom, so what better place to go than the consumer capital of the world?

The British Ministry, through the Crown and the British government, managed to secure Harry a lucrative job as a sort of high-end detective/law enforcement officer, which was fine with him. The Ministry met with both Harry and Ginny, making sure that they knew they weren’t supposed to do magic in New York until they were granted permanent American Licenses to Practice Magic. The young couple was given temporary ALPMs for New York and Reciprocal States that expired six months after their arrival date. Harry expressed no desire to apply for his permanent license, which Ginny found odd but could never extract an explanation from him for it, so she gave up on magic as well. She had never finished her schooling at Hogwarts, either, since she was pregnant during what should have been her seventh year.

Living in New York, Ginny worked at a local bookstore that was around the corner from their apartment. It was a modest affair, but it sported comfortable chairs, children’s events, and even a small (but with the best cappuccino in New York, according to Ginny’s trying-to-be-unbiased opinion) coffee shop. She had happened upon it quite by accident, actually. She had left her seven-month-old daughters with Ashleigh for the afternoon (Harry’s co-worker’s girlfriend had been her first and only friend in New York and a considerable life saver when Ginny needed a moment to herself) and had walked past the bookstore, always seeing it but never going in. Ginny had never been one to sit still, and the past two months of being ‘Mommy’ and a housewife were about to drive her nutters.

This time, she noticed a handwritten ‘Help Wanted’ sign in the window and, on impulse, stopped to chat with the owner. Since Ginny didn’t even have the equivalent of an American high school diploma, her options for jobs were severely limited (and flipping burgers was not an appealing choice). The owner was a quiet, friendly, single man about ten years Ginny’s senior, and he hired her on the spot. He was from Kentucky originally and had moved to New York and opened his bookshop. Ginny was fascinated with the stories he told of Kentucky, especially of the Thoroughbred racehorses his family had trained, and she spent many afternoons rapt with interest when he told of exercise riding or the excitement of Churchill Downs. He was a decent fellow, and they had a casually flirtatious work relationship. Ginny appreciated his interest, especially when it was obvious Harry’s was waning, but, despite how she loved and hated her dark-haired husband, she respected him too much to actually have an affair, though it wasn’t like she hadn’t been tempted.

Ginny didn’t NEED to work for financial reasons; Harry’s job supported them nicely, plus they still had all of his inheritance from England tucked away in savings accounts. She worked because it filled a void in her life that remained even as her daughters were growing up. The owner allowed her to bring the girls to work, and they charmed the customers (who ended up purchasing more because they stayed longer to play with the babies). Her job was also more flexible than Harry’s, so she kept the girls more often than not. That was one of the reasons she couldn’t bear to see their excitement whenever Harry walked into the room; she cared for them day in and day out, and while they were always appreciative and showered her with kisses and hugs, a wicked hook of jealousy always pierced her heart whenever the four of them were around. All he had to do was walk into the room, and their faces lit up like it was Christmas and their birthday rolled into one…consistently. Not just every once in a while, but sometimes Harry’s job kept him away for a couple of days, and it never failed that the girls looked at him like he hung the moon every time he came back after a case. Not only that, but Ginny could still remember very vividly looking at Harry that way herself; she could still taste the bitter tears of disappointment, and she wanted better for her daughters, which drove her double-edged fear that Harry would let them down as he had her or he wouldn’t, which incited a sense of injustice in Ginny.

After a couple of years of this, combined with her childish attempts to get his attention, Ginny had reached the end of her rope. The girls had had their second birthday, and Harry had missed it. She cursed him as she put away the video camera and sent the guests home, not able to bear making a tape of her two beautiful daughters sitting glumly in front of intricately decorated birthday cakes with cheerfully flickering candles. It had been another close-call case, and Harry arrived home exhausted long after the twins were in bed, having cried themselves to sleep. He had been less than thrilled to find Ginny sitting in their bedroom, a family portrait in one hand and an empty bottle of wine in the other. She had proceeded to tell him exactly how his daughters’ birthday party had gone, blaming him profusely and screeching at him to ‘sleep on the couch’ since she couldn’t bear to look at him. He had complied, gotten up early, and made a special breakfast-in-bed for the twins with their favorite morning food: chocolate pancakes with strawberries. Ginny had wished her disappointment in Harry could be eradicated so easily, but then again, it was clear he loved those girls more than he had ever loved her.

Their marriage, while rocky before, turned frigid, and Harry quickly replaced their old couch with a much more comfortable one. Ginny continued to work at the bookshop and drinking herself into a stupor at night. It had taken about a week for Harry to notice, but coming home to two very frightened little girls who indicated to him that ‘Mommy wouldn’t wake up’ when it was clearly way past their bedtime, had woken him up. Harry had promptly taken the girls and showed up at Danny and Ashleigh’s apartment in the middle of the night, outraged and not able to stay in their own home (since Ginny was passed out on the floor in the girls’ room) but not knowing where else to go. The slightly older couple was still awake, and Danny had been invaluable at entertaining and cheering up the scared two year olds while Ashleigh, acting as a friend and legal representative, recorded Harry’s observations, just in case.

Ginny had woken up the next day with a massive hangover and a missing family, but instead of being properly contrite when she found out where they were, she herself had thrown a screaming fit on the phone with her husband, and then proceeded to go on a three-day-binge that nearly cost her her job. The girls had basically moved into Ashleigh and Danny’s apartment, since his co-worker’s girlfriend had taken over as ‘surrogate mother’, and it was a more stable environment than being at their own home while Harry tried to figure out what to do about Ginny.

Ashleigh had broached the subject of a divorce, and to his surprise, Harry had found himself seriously contemplating it. In the end, though, he was more terrified of the custody battle (and the fact that Ginny might get custody of the girls, alcoholic that she had become) than of staying in a failing marriage. Ashleigh’s own parents were divorced, and she stated with emphasis how much healthier her family had become after her father was no longer in the picture (only, in Harry’s situation, Ashleigh believed it would be better for Molly and Lily if Ginny was no longer around or only marginally involved). However, it had been Jack’s experience that finalized Harry’s decision; Jack and his ex-wife, Maria, had gone through a brutal custody battle for their two daughters, Jack lobbying for them to return to New York and Maria fighting to keep them in Chicago. (Maria had accepted a new job and moved the girls there before announcing to Jack that she didn’t want him to go with them and that she wanted a divorce.) It had been a very rough time for Jack, and he had eventually conceded, after a particularly cruel deposition session, that his daughters would be better off with their mother, even though he missed them terribly and adopted Harry’s girls as ‘granddaughters’.

It was only after Harry had finally been broken, during one of their legendary fights, and had ended up in tears before Ginny for the first time, that Ginny figured out just how bad things had gotten. He had whimpered the ‘D’ word, and drunk as she was, it had caught Ginny’s attention. While she had gotten a perverted sense of pleasure at watching Harry break, she knew deep down that she didn’t want to fail as Molly and Lily’s mother or Harry’s wife, even though she had come very close to throwing it all away because of the alcohol. She had signed up for an Alcoholics Anonymous program, stuck to it faithfully, and emerged on the other side, sober and ready to communicate with Harry. He HAD made some sacrifices, as much as he could, to change his work schedule and be home when he said he would be, and they had reached a compromise that, while not ideal, they could both live with. It had been a miracle that the girls had been too young to really remember what was going on and that they hadn’t been more affected by all of the negativity.

And so now, here she was, roughly two years later, drinking again (in moderation this time, though) but contemplating yet again that perhaps their marriage had been doomed from the start. She had finished her second bottle of wine and ordered a third when her boss came up to her, surprised and concerned. He had heard about the blonde British three year old being kidnapped, and he was surprised to learn that Ginny and her mysterious husband had known the family from back in England. He provided a comforting shoulder to cry on and a supportive ear. He helped her finish the third bottle of wine, listening to her rant about how she couldn’t believe America would be sympathetic to the missing child of a ‘foul, loathsome, evil little cockroach’ (Gryffindor’s second favorite nickname for Malfoy back at Hogwarts) who deserved every ounce of pain and suffering that was directed his way.

Her boss was appropriately empathetic when Ginny had the inebriated revelation that everything Harry had done over the past six to seven years had been motivated by Malfoy, ever since killing Voldemort. Even to herself, she sounded more jaded the longer she talked, but disillusioned as she was, she needed to get it all out. First, it had been the denied rumors; then Harry asked her out after Hermione informed them of Slytherin’s newest couple; Harry’s proposal, while fueled by the duty to take responsibility for his actions, had been prompted by Malfoy’s engagement announcement to Parkinson; the way he religiously avoided Malfoy at their wedding, the way he nearly cried when Ginny opened the wedding present from him; his reluctance to attend Malfoy’s wedding, and his subsequent uprooting of his family and moving them to America; it had all been an avoidance of Malfoy, but Ginny wasn’t sure if she wanted to contemplate Harry’s underlying motivations.

Feeling relaxed and yet distraught, Ginny made a snap decision. Harry was running from Malfoy, Malfoy had somehow followed them, and Ginny wasn’t going to wait around any longer to find out what new cruel pain Harry could (inadvertently) inflict on her scarred heart. She thanked her boss for listening and walked, albeit unsteadily, out of the bar, intent on hailing a taxi to the airport to fly home.
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Author's note--Yes, Ginny calls Ashleigh to tell her that she's leaving for England so that Ashleigh knows to keep the girls (for the time being). I hope you enjoyed! (More special features coming tomorrow night!)