InsaneJournal

It had been weeks since Harry had arrived, weeks since they had sat down and realized the problem of their respective timelines and the wrench that it had thrown into their relationship. It had been painful, but Ginny hadn’t bargained on the awkwardness lingering like it had between the two of them.

Part of it - perhaps even most of it - was her own fault. She had spent a lot of time telling herself that Harry would prefer not to be around her, that it was better for the two of them to simply try to avoid one another and let the worst of the hurt fade away. But the Enterprise was small, even smaller than the rather isolated faction that was the magical community in England, and she had come to realize that avoiding Harry had been the wrong move.

There was also the fact that she simply missed him, she wasn’t too proud to admit it to herself. Before hormones had entered the picture, they had been friends, hadn’t they?

Wrapping her hands around the edge of her food tray, Ginny made herself turn towards the table where Harry was sitting though she didn’t take a seat immediately once she had reached the chair opposite him. Instead, she merely placed her tray on the table, waiting until he looked up at her before she spoke. “Mind if I sit down?”

It was habit for Harry to look up at Ginny and smile brightly, lighting up, which is exactly what happened before he remembered that they weren't together and he had been doing his best to avoid her (in much the same way he suspected she was doing the same). His smile didn't falter, but some of the brightness faded a split second later even as he gestured for her to take a seat.

"No, not at all. Please. Uh - how are you doing? How are things working in medical?"

The trouble with knowing one another as long as Ginny had known Harry was that it was hard to miss things. Other people might not have seen the way his smile faded or the slight slump to his shoulders as gestured for her to a seat.

This was the sort of thing she had been trying to avoid by avoiding him, the awkward and sad interaction where they both tried to pretend things were fine when they were anything but.

And yet she sat down anyway, trying to make up for Harry’s smile with one that was too bright and cheerful for an early morning in the mess hall. It would have been easier to just apologize and leave him to his breakfast but Ginny was a Gryffindor and she’d be damned if she let awkwardness and fear convince her to walk away. “It’s pretty good,” she replied, picking up the fork at the edge of her try and carefully twirling it between her fingers. “I keep getting quizzed about different symptoms for various diseases when I least expect it and get the answer wrong half the time.” Ginny shrugged at that, if only because she knew there wasn’t much to fix the problem other than more time to acquaint herself with the material. “Quidditch was easier, as odd as that sounds.”

Harry laughed a little at the idea of Quidditch being easier but he didn't disagree. He could have gone the easy route and played the sport instead of becoming an auror too, but he liked the challenge. This whole thing here was just a different sort of challenge. "I'm sure you're doing a great job," he said sincerely.

"Although, I have been thinking about what you mentioned a while back, about us not using magic for our jobs around here. I haven't really pressed the topic or anything, but I think we have a pretty good case to make for why we should be using it and how it can be beneficial. What do you think?"

“They haven’t kicked me out yet, so I guess I’ve done something right,” Ginny said, giving him a quick smile that was very genuine. Of course, there was the very real chance she would do something wrong and be banished from Medical by Bones, but then she could always just go serve drinks at the Lounge. She could definitely manage to do that.

Picking up a piece of bacon from her tray, Ginny bit into it as Harry started talking, listening to his explanation even if she wasn’t quite sure where he was going. “Well,” she began, holding a hand in front of her mouth until she had swallowed, “I think it’s a good idea, but what case are you going to make? Captain Kirk and the others aren’t easily persuaded.”

Harry sat back and cross his arms, thoughtful for a moment. "Well, for one, my case can be anti-discriminatory. We're here in this future that isn't our own future, out of time and out of place, and we still have to hide and pretend to be something we're not. I'm sure there's some regulation in Starfleet or the Federation somewhere that prohibits that sort of behavior. They seem pretty progressive otherwise." He shrugged. "And two, there's always the argument that some of the spells we can use are good substitutes for what they're already doing. And three, using magic is what comes most naturally to us, so if they want us at one hundred percent after our training period's over, we should be allowed to handle things to the best of our abilities."

She had to bite her bottom lip to keep from smiling as he talked, so many memories coming to mind about Harry in situations not that different from this. He was the sort of person that was a natural leader, thrust into it as much from his connection to Voldemort and his fame as his own personality. He wasn’t the sort to seek the spotlight, but if he was passionate about something, Harry wasn’t going to just sit by either.

And right now, he was pretty adamant in his argument. “All good points,” she replied, reaching for her mug of tea and taking a measured sip. “But maybe it isn’t discrimination so much as protection. Some of the people on this ship are already suspicious of us because of how we arrived, and those of us with powers….” she gave a quick shrug of her shoulders. “But that’s here and I think we are protected by Starfleet from anything anyone might think to do. But then we visit these planets where we could be causing an intergalactic incident if we used magic and got into trouble.”

Ginny felt a little bit like Hermione, playing devil’s advocate like she was, but she didn’t dwell on that much. Instead, she took another sip of tea and gave him an expectant look from across the rim of her cup.

"Sure," Harry said, "but there's a difference between what we do and are permitted to do on this ship versus rules and regulations planetside. We always have certain rules when we go on shore leave anyway so this would just be more of them." He had no idea about that for sure, but it was something to propose and ask questions about.

“Personally, I think you’ve got a point,” she replied, all too aware that Harry would know from the tone of her voice that there was a ‘but’ coming. “But in my experience, the officers on the Enterprise aren’t as willing to listen when it comes to stuff like this.” Not that Captain Kirk was unreasonable, she had never thought that, at least about him, but more that Starfleet was very set in its ways and not likely to change many of them.

Setting her mug on the table, Ginny grinned at Harry. “But when has being told no ever stopped you?” In fact, being told no usually had the opposite effect on him.

Even from separate places in their timeline, Ginny still knew him very well. "I definitely don't mind going off and asking about this. Or demanding it," he said with a grin. "Whichever ends up happening, at least."

He scratched the side of his neck after a moment passed. "Look, Ginny, I - I should apologize for any of this discomfort or awkwardness between us," he said. "I've had enough time to think about it and I just - want us to go back to being friends, if you're up for that."

She had been about to make a joke, a sarcastic remark, something to diffuse the awkwardness that now came when it got quiet between the two of them. It was just one of the many side effects of coming from two different points in time, two different sections of life where so many issues got in the way. But Harry beat her to it, saying something that hit Ginny quite hard, though that hadn’t been his intention.

“Harry,” she sighed, something curling up tight and uncomfortable in her gut. He was apologizing for something she had caused, a decision she had made that was really worse on him than her because Harry was being forced to live through it all twice. “You don’t have to apologize to me,” Ginny told him, putting her mug down with a decisive move and reaching over the table to place her hand on top of his. “None of this is your fault. It’s all mine. If anything, I should be apologizing for making you go through this again.”

She had told him she was sorry during the initial conversation, and she had meant it, but it wasn’t quite the same. So, with that in mind, she opened her mouth and said it again. “I’m sorry for doing this to you, and for avoiding you ever since. But I thought…..well, I thought it’d be easier if we didn’t spend much time around one another, but I think that was less about making it easier for you and more of an excuse to make it easier for me.”

“But friends is…..” Ginny paused to smile at him, slowly squeezing his hand with hers before she pulled it away. “It’d be nice. I do miss spending time with you.”

He didn't disagree with her, though he didn't fully agree with her either. He had been doing just as much avoiding as anything else. And she had nothing to be sorry for at all, in his opinion. "Good," he said, going back to his food. "Friends it is."

With a grin, Ginny picked up her toast and took a bite, trying to decide as she chewed just how far this friendship thing was going to go. Once upon a time, Harry had told her things that she knew he’d struggled with telling Ron and Hermione, and she had kept that confidence but this was something altogether different.

But she reasoned that she also knew Harry and that for the most part, his way of dealing with particular things was avoidance. They were the same in that. “Harry,” she said after a few minutes of silence, waiting until she was sure she had his attention before she spoke again. “Are you doing okay since your parents left?”

It wasn’t the first time it had happened, but she didn’t think it’d get any easier for him. Especially for him, given that he’d grown up without them.

He looked at her, surprised at the question. "Sure," he said carefully. "I mean, I'm used to not having them around and they were so young and - it's fine." Except that he was still kicking himself for being an utter wanker and avoiding them both as much as possible, in the same ways that he had been avoiding Ginny.

She doubted that, wholly unable to imagine that it could be fine when you grew up an orphan and always wanted to know your parents. But Ginny wasn’t Harry, she had two parents that were always around and that made it easy to take them for granted, and because she didn’t really understand what that part of his life was like, she let it go.

“Well, if it’s ever not fine, you can talk to me about it,” she told him. “Or yell at me about it, whatever you need to do. I don’t mind.”

He smiled, just a little bit, at her and nodded. "Yeah, I will. Thanks, Gin."