Harry rolled over in bed, rubbing his eyes in a bid to help them adjust to the soft sunlight trickling in from between the curtains. The clock at their bedside told him it was nearly nine and for once he actually felt refreshed. The scents wafting in from the kitchen told him Ginny was already up and about. And hopefully still undressed he appended, remembering their rollicking from the night before. It was, no doubt, a principal reason for the uncharacteristic soundness of his slumber.

Tugging on a pair of Harpies branded shorts she'd brought home from her last promotional event with the team, he wandered out of the bedroom and down the hallway toward their living space. Being in London it was hardly a spacious flat, but it was theirs - on income only - and carefully removed from the prominent wizarding areas where prying eyes and often lenses laid in wait for a glimpse of them.

"Morning, love," he called out as he stepped into the kitchen.

Silence.

He looked to the joint living-dining area to his left. Hmm. Not a sign of her.

"Gin?"

He headed the opposite direction toward the guest bed and shared bathroom, but still found nothing. Well...not nothing. Perhaps she'd tried to sneak off and pick up something special, leaving a meal for him in case he woke before she'd returned. It was, after all, the first day they'd both had completely off in somewhere near two months and they had planned meticulously for nearly that long everything they wanted to do together.

Retreating to their room briefly to fetch his wand, Harry decided he might as well tuck in before searching her out. It was an idea that was reinforced by the grumbling of his stomach and the fact that from the looks of what was left on the stove, she'd already had her portion.

Harry waved his wand and muttered, summoning a plate from the cabinet as he grabbed silverware from a nearby drawer and headed to his place at their small table. Instead of a waiting napkin this time, there was instead, a bit of parchment, folded like a tent that had his name written on it in Ginny's familiar hand. He set the plate down and ran a hand through his hair. Shrugging he picked up the note and opened it.

My dear sweet Harry

Well...things were off to a sarcastic start.

My dear sweet Harry,

I know we had so much planned for today but alas, things have gone...diagonally...from what I'd expected and I'm afraid we can't just run around like kids in a candy shop today. Something hugely important came up, but if everything turns out according to the (new) plan, we'll still see each other.

Love always,

Ginny

His face soured. Something hugely important came up. Hmph. Probably that git manager they'd gotten. It wouldn't be the first time he'd ruined their plans with an obsessively-detailed and unnecessarily "urgent" team meeting. If he hadn't won as many titles as he had, the old curmudgeon would've been run off by now. As far as Harry was concerned it would be good riddance. Alas, such thoughts were best kept to himself since he'd been the one to give Ginny her big break.

There was a knock on the door.

Looking through the peephole, Harry saw a bearded man holding a box from Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes. Though it had been some time since it had happened, it wasn't beyond George to send Harry a sample of a new product, particularly when he felt it might have an application in the line of duty. After taking the package, he walked to the island and set it down next to Ginny's note.

If everything turns out according to the (new) plan, we'll still see each other.

He was so riled he shivered. There wasn't even a guarantee. He had half a mind to test the strength of his Fire-Making Charm on the thing.

Instead he tossed it down and shoved a fork-full of egg into his mouth. With nothing much to stare at he decided now was as good a time as any to open the box. Tugging on the fat orange ribbon he untied the oversized bow the clerk had made and wriggled it off, revealing a soft purple box with the trademark cartoonish logo they'd made using the design for the head outside the shop. Just in case, Harry cast a detection spell. It wouldn't be the first time a prototype had been delivered with an extra ounce of fun. But this time, nothing was amiss. Lifting the lid as he munched on a piece of sausage, he was surprised to find that there was only a card inside.

Flipping it over he found print from the wonky typewriter Arthur had given George to use when the store had first opened. The height and spacing of the letters remained slightly off, but it appeared they'd finally found a way to correct the gargantuan spaces that used to exist between lines.

Oi, Harry.

He smiled. People who didn't know him often assumed that George's personality was a deliberate caricature or that the stories that had become much widely known about his past and the store's history were merely marketing or at least urban legends. Notes like this always felt like something of an inside joke because of it. More than anyone else he knew, George Weasley wrote to you exactly like he talked. He just added punctuation.

I know you're probably already fuming about the little note my wee sister left you this morning, but I wanted to tell you there's good news! Knowing you two had this day planned for so long, sis came up with a very different, but totally wicked idea for it. Since you and I both know you're hopeless at solving a riddle, I decided I'd get you off to a good start. Look under that fancy fake velvet under the card. Should jog your memory.

When you do sort it all out, tell Gin-Gin her favorite brother says hello.

George

So Ginny had come up with a clever idea to prank him. Today. Of all the days she could've chosen given the fact that they lived together. Harry decided he wasn't going to give her the satisfaction of rushing to solve whatever puzzle she'd supposedly left for him so he dawdled. First, he picked up the latest copy they'd been sent of the The Quibbler and thumbed through it lazily while he finished eating. After an extra glass of juice, he wandered back to their bedroom and considered what he could do to milk the clock there. Alas, a wizard only had so much to wear and he wasn't about to bother with something fancy that would actually take time for her wild goose chase, so he settled for showering again even though he had last night, followed by a careful shave.

Satisfied that the process had taken a least an extra hour and a half, he dumped the box upside down to see what was supposedly hidden. When he shook the box loose from the packaging inside, his only reward was a dusty cloud as piles of a powdery substances poured all over the counter. After a few coughs and a sneeze that ensured there would be even more of a mess, he finally got a good look.

"Floo Powder?" he said aloud. That was supposed to set him on the right track? There was an almost infinite number of places he could Floo to.

Picking up Ginny's note again, he re-read it several times to see if anything jumped out. No people. No items. No locations. He paused...or maybe there was a location. There. Yes. Set off between a pair of ellipses. It was still quite a large place, but maybe...

He headed toward the fireplace and the small urn where they kept their...Absolutely not. Returning to the empty box he grabbed a fistful of George's "present" and, stepping into the firebox, cast the powder at his feet as he shouted:

"Diagon Alley!"

Even though letters had already gone out for the coming year, most families left their school shopping late and so the only crowd to contend with was weekend shoppers. Though they were a substantially larger bunch than the midweek batches Harry still occasionally dealt with investigating larcenies and small-time con artists as a Deputy Auror, it was easy enough to move through them on his way to Sugarplums'. The confectionary had recently opened in the space formerly occupied by Spintwitches' misguided effort to battle Quality Quidditch Supplies on two fronts after the giant had established its own outpost in Hogsmeade. Offering fresh, store-made treats that largely differed from the standard fare sold near cash registers throughout the Alley, it had become heavily-trafficked almost immediately.

When he walked in, he was immediately struck by the pleasant scent of sugary baked goods and cooking chocolate and candies. The question now was what the hell he was supposed to do here. Looking for Ginny was obvious and it was fair to say the brightly-colored reds and yellows of the store's walls would make that something of a challenge. But at the same time, it felt far too easy for all the trouble she'd gone to. Sure enough, after checking the lines at the counter, the rows of bins and shelving on the ground floor, and even the candy chutes and observation areas on the upper balconies, he came up with nothing.

Next he decided to try an old Auror trick that Ron dubbed "The Package Approach". After waiting in a painfully long line, he stepped forward to the cheerful face of a young wizard that Harry wasn't sure had even graduated Hogwarts. Perhaps it was the uniform that made him look like some sort of candy cane clown, but when he opened his mouth it certainly didn't help things.

"Welcome to Sugarplums', where everything you see was made today. How can I assist you?"

Harry frowned and looked around before leaning in and lowering his voice. "I need to pick up a package. Last name Weasley."

"Is there a first name, sir?"

"Ginny."

He ran back and forth for the next few minutes scanning several shelves before returning to Harry disappointed. "We don't have anything under that name yet. Was it for today?"

"Yes. She may have put it under another name."

"Of course, sir."

"Harry Potter," he mumbled.

The boy's eyes widened and they flashed up to Harry's face for the first time, recognition dawning. To his credit he remained silent and went through the routine again, before reporting a failure once again.

"It's alright," Harry said, waving the boy off as he walked away.

Stomping behind a shelf, he cursed himself. A mother trailing a child bumped into him. "Sorry," she said hurriedly as she chased off after her daughter.

Now he became a wanderer. He fiddled over the bags of caramel slugs and chocolate DA coins. He examined the different flavors of sugar scrolls. He was beginning to wonder if the point wasn't for him to wander around the store until she decided he'd had enough - or if George was having a laugh at both of them at the moment.

It was then he remembered there was one place he hadn't checked. Ginny had never been much of a card person, but the store did have a small section, tucked away in a corner with a few rows of cards on each wall - mostly cheap and featuring candy-connected puns that related to various occasions. If anything the low number and poor quality led Harry to believe their snappy little check-out slogan might actually apply to the cards as well.

He grumbled as he moved back in that direction, fighting past scattered people taking up too much space in the aisles. It was something he should've checked before - should've seen when glancing down the last aisle really - but he'd been hasty, hoping while not really believing that Ginny would actually still be here. If she ever was. As he approached he thought he'd reached another dead end, but he peered at each facing carefully nevertheless. The last thing he wanted was to have to go through the place again. People might start to take notice and then Merlin knew when he'd get out of there.

After a few scans he was about to resign himself to that fate before he realized that the bottom row of the left section of shelving - one dedicated to birthday cards - was far more disorganized than the others, the cards jutting out at all sorts of angles, obscuring most of the identifying labels. Squatting low he noticed the first five had only one letter showing, while the sixth was perfectly straight.

H-A-R-R-Y

Damn. He checked behind each jumbled set, putting them back in order in the process, but found nothing.

He reconsidered the message. Though the row itself had been different, there was one thing that was different within the row. The last facing. On closer inspection, it contained mostly larger cards and seemed stuffed particularly full. With a sigh, he began fingering through them. Finally, about two-thirds of the way back, he found it - a small card with decidedly out of place coloring and a strange image. It was dark blue with a simple brown border and a picture of a dwarf that appeared to have been custom designed by some unlucky artist. Opening it, he expected to find a Ginny's inelegant scrawl or typing from George, but instead he found neat, flowing script.

The first lines were four he would never forget, the first time Ginny had really tried to tell him how she felt. But what followed still wasn't from her.

Harry, it's been too long mate. When Ginny owled I had just quaffed a hangover potion, so there was a bit of delay. You've been there. Head feels like it's taken a Bludger. Anyway, I hate to snitch on her, but she paid for words and art, not silence.

Dean

It was unclear whether Dean was actually hungover when he wrote this. On one hand, it was incredibly tidy. On the other, it seemed way too easy. It was obviously referencing Quidditch. But then perhaps difficulty solving the riddle wasn't the point. Ginny was a bloody professional player. How many pitches had she played on? Figuring out which one she was talking about would be the problem. Tucking the card in his pocket, he glanced at his watch. It was nearly lunch time. He'd have to Floo to work. On his bloody off day.

After arriving at the end of his two-part journey, Harry found himself on an elevator going down to the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures. His watch read 12:10. With her rigid schedule, he had about five minutes to catch her before she insisted on ending her desktop meal and getting back to work. He strode into the tiny lobby.

"Is she in?" he asked.

Rolling her eyes, the elderly receptionist simply nodded her head down the corridor. Harry strode off as briskly as he could without running, rounding a couple of corners before finally reaching the door with the dingy golden placard: H. Granger - Deputy Head, Being Division.

Rapping a few times, he stepped in before she even answered.

Hermione scowled at him over the last remnants of her salad, her head almost ensconced among towers of books that seemed to be falling apart and dozens of tattered scrolls. After a moment she finished her current bite.

"Harry," she nodded.

12:14. "I know. One minute. Literally." He tossed the card to her. "She's at a Quidditch pitch. Which one?"

"What?"

"Ginny."

"I thought you two were spending the day together. It's all either of you have been talking about."

"Yeah, yeah. But she's at a Quidditch pitch, so...which one?"

Hermione laughed, tossing it back.

"Find it funny, do you?"

"The card? No. I find it terribly uninventive. It's obvious where she is."

Harry stared.

"Merlin, Harry. Ginny would never draw attention back to that moment if there wasn't a reason."

He frowned. "So...she's at Hogwarts?"

Hermione smiled, shaking her head. "The Auror Office should really review who they graduate into the job."

"Shut up."

It had taken an absurd amount of finagling and several wasted hours, but he'd finally gotten clearance to enter the Hogwarts grounds while school was not in session. After apparating to Hogsmeade he'd walked to the pitch as quickly as he could, hoping to find fiery red hair flying. Instead he saw empty skies. She wasn't in the locker room. She wasn't on the ground either.

"Damnit!" Harry yelled. The entire day was nearly gone and the only indication anyone had ever been here was one of the practice brooms propped up just inside the tunnel. He stared into the sky in frustration. Clouds were gathering. Hell, he might even get rained on.

Then he saw it. Something white was flitting around in a jerky manner near one set of goalposts. It was probably some bit of trash from the town, but the way his day was going, who could say. Grabbing the broom he kicked off to investigate. The closer he got the clearer it became that it was indeed a scrap of bleached parchment. Hoping it would be straightforward, he approached slowly. Yet as he did, the scrap began to take what could only be described as evasive maneuvers.

What followed was a nightmare that dragged him back to his days as Seeker. He'd chased it high until the hoops were almost specks. He'd chased it low until he could almost touch the blades of grass. He'd flown through multiple hoops and in and out of the stands. Eventually he'd been about midfield, back near the grass and decided to speed past it, slashing back to a full stop. Before the force of his rapid deceleration flung him from the broom, he snagged his target between two fingers.

As Harry lay on his back trying to get the wind back in his lungs, he pulled the scrap close in front of his eyes and unfolded it. Blurry. He reached in his pocket and pulled out his wand. He groaned. He'd had his wand the entire time.

"This day...Accio glasses."

Catching them in the other hand he put them on and Ginny's writing came immediately into focus. He saw one word.

Perfect.

Of all the clues, it was easily the most vague, yet Harry read her meaning perfectly. Forgetting whatever he'd done to himself, forgetting the grass stains and what was sure to be a completely disheveled appearance, he headed for the castle.

As he walked through the doors outside the Great Hall, he was surprised to see them swing open revealing Professor...ahem...Headmistress McGonagall and Hagrid.

" ‘Arry!" the half-giant shouted, embracing him in a crushing hug.

Harry smiled. "Good to see you, Hagrid!"

"You too, though I ‘spose yer not here fer me, are ye'?

"Not this time," Harry admitted. "But I will be soon. That's a promise."

Hagrid nodded and gave way to Harry's old teacher. "Potter," she nodded. "I trust you know where you're going?"

"Yes, ma'am." He started to set off on the path he'd trod so many times before, but she called out after him.

"Potter!"

He turned.

"I assume you'll be wanting the password to get in?"

Harry flushed. "Right. Absolutely."

"Felix Felicis."

"Thanks ma'am."

Almost panting from the pace at which he'd climbed the many staircases to Gryffindor Tower, Harry walked into an empty common room, a sight he hadn't seen since the day the War ended four years ago. It was dimly lit by the large fireplaces. Surveying the area he saw nothing. He ran a hand through his hair. He'd been sure. They were sure. Where was she? Suddenly, he heard something drop and whipped around.

His invisibility cloak lay discarded on the floor, but Ginny was running toward him, like she had six years ago, too quick for him to so much as move to meet her. They kissed again. Merlin, they'd kissed so many times since then, but this place, that sprint gave it an intoxicating intensity that could be rivaled only by the original. He was older, wiser, and far more coherent, but he still couldn't honestly say which had lasted longer as he got lost in her again.

Finally she pulled away grinning. Arms still around his neck, she pressed her forehead to his. "Took you long enough..."

"Don't you dare!" he growled, picking her up around the waist and carrying her across the room toward one of the couches while she laughed and tried to swat at him.

Finally he had to navigate the space between the couch and chair and set her down on the other side of the small gap before hopping over. He'd expected her to join him when he sat, but instead she stayed on her feet, eyeing him with biting her lip in what seemed to be a sudden and bizarre bout of nerves.

"Harry," she started. "I want to start by saying that I'm not going to apologize for making you run all over Britain."

He laughed. "Very well."

"I loved...loved...everything we'd planned to do today and I know it would've been everything we imagined if we'd done it. But...the more I thought about what we'd come up with, I realized there was one thing we could do - just one - that I thought would be a really huge improvement."

He watched her carefully as she continued, seeing the light that danced behind her ignite the red of her hair, the occasional brighter glimmer showing the soft brown of her eyes where he was always left, in moments like this, trying to read her emotion. As she took a breath, they were a mess of complexity.

"I could've just changed our plans. Made sure it was easy for you to meet me here. But...I also thought that wouldn't be us. Because we've never done it the easy way. One day though, we finally got there. Right here. People can say, write, whatever they want about everything that followed - me stuck here, you fighting a war the rest of us couldn't understand until the bitter end - but from that day forward...I knew that even though I'd first thought it when I was so young and terribly naïve I'd been right all those years before - you were the only one for me. You never had to tell me either - nobody did - that from that same day, I was the only girl you wanted. I just knew it."

Harry tried to stand up. He wanted to feel her, to hold her, to tell her everything she was saying now was absolutely true, but she'd waved him back down.

"That day, that kiss...they were perfect. And no matter what hell we've been through since - including the miniature one I put you through today - we've stayed true and turned that perfect start into a relationship that's...maybe not perfect, but as close as anyone can ask for. And so..." she stepped toward him, now holding out her hands for him to take, "...I figured if there was one place to go...one place to make another perfect start...this had to be it."

A million thoughts flashed through Harry's head. Was he saying what he thought she was saying? Surely not. That was his job. That was always for the wizard. Right? Shit. Was she pregnant? They'd been careful, but there had been times...things happen...sometimes you're only so careful.

She yanked a chain off her neck and slid something off of it. She held it up between her thumb and forefinger. "What do you think, Potter? Ready to start a new adventure?"

Harry smiled wider than he ever had. He really should've expected this - Ginny never had been much for convention. "Nobody I'd rather start it with than you."