A/N: Delays, delays. Hell week has started in water polo and the last week of work is in motion so I was being a dead beat. Oh well! If you all want to check it out, my Pansy and Draco story is up, in it's fledgling chapters, so there! Happy, happy, joy, joy! Read, review, enjoy.

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Ron looked down at the tabletop, knowing the second he looked up his eyes would be drawn to Lavender. After the way she humiliated him he was hardly in the mood to talk, or even look. He restricted himself to tracing the carvings in the scratched woods with his finger.

"I will not look up... I will not look up... I will not look up..." Was his inner mantra. "I will not..." He felt a tap on his shoulder and instantly was connected with Lavender's soft blue eyes.

They were half-lidded and seducing. He knew she knew this and he was trying everything in his power to resist them.

"Yes, Lavender? Can I do anything for you? Like showing you the way out?"

"No," She purred. "I just wanted to be near you. It's just been far too long."

"You might not remember last evening, but I do perfectly well." He said coldly. He may not be the sharpest tack in the box, but he had a feeling something was up.

"I was trying to keep you away, you were far too close." Lavender moaned, touching his arm.

"You could have pushed me away any time."

"But now I want you close to me, oh so close." She took this opportunity to straddle him in the chair.

"Lavender I don't know what sick trick you're trying to play, but it won't work on me." He tried to lift her off, but she was in a more- er- advantageous position.

"I'm not trying to play any sort of game Ronny. I really miss you."

Ron heard the truth in her voice, and any living, breathing man, would have taken this opportunity to shag her senseless, but Ron saw something in her eyes that made him quite sure this wasn't the Lavender he knew. Doing anything now would be far less than honorable and doing something (we all know what) while the real Lavender was away was hardly any sort of way to get back into Lav's good graces.

"Lavender, I don't believe you're well right now, so please get off me, so I can go about forgetting this."

"Why would you want to forget my profession of love?" Lavender asked, with wide-eyed innocence.

Yep, this wasn't Lavender. She couldn't pull off innocence if she tried.

"Lavender, if you don't get off me right now, you might say something that you'd rather not. And besides that, choosing between this person and you, I like you better when you're slapping me."

"That's kinky darling. I could slap you if you wanted."

That was the last straw. Ron stood up, with no though as to where Lavender might end up (she obviously was dumped onto the floor). "For your sake I hope you don't remember this." With out a look back, he left, leaving Lavender to slowly come back to her senses.

"Yep, that was painful." She growled from the floor.

~~~

Things on Hermione's front were resolved quickly, though not in the sort of way you'd hope for, but stiff, sort of- well- the Harry and Hermione way. She didn't melt into his arms and shower him with kisses for his gallantry, but gave him a reproof for knocking one of her friend out. She also thanked him, but instructed him to do it in a more civilized manner next time.

Next time. That's the thing with these two. There will always be attacks on them and there will always be a bit of celebrity to deal with, but they handle it, and they handle it well. Hermione is the only person kind, but firm enough to deal with the flocks of young girls who follow him and not get jealous. And Harry is one of the few men who could deal with Hermione always being more intelligent and having a better way to do things than he has. They have found a balance, and though Ron might be going about it the wrong way, he's got the right idea, getting those to together. As long as he doesn't muck it up too bad...

~~~

"Colin, I know this is none of our business," Fred began, while they ate breakfast, or actually a late lunch in the burrow kitchen.

"but is Ginny actually worth the trouble?" George finished, through a mound of eggs being sloshed in his mouth.

"What trouble?"

"Well, Ron being your boss,"

"For one, and what about the fact, we'll have to harass you too."

"Brotherly duties and all." Fred shrugged.

"Yes, she is worth it. She's worth everything." Colin said, willing them to understand. "She's just so perfect."

"Perfect?"

"Our sister?" They looked at each other in shocked disbelief.

"you haven't spent much time with her,"

"have you?"

"I have, we were in the same year and all." He shrugged. "And I've liked her since about third year. She was just so brave and nice. It was like having a sister to lean on. Then she just became more beautiful and charming."

Fred and George began to gag.

"Scoff if you want, but I really like her."

Fred and George stopped, and they sighed identical sighs.

"Well, if you put it that way,"

"We'll have to help." George shrugged. "Another brotherly duty I suppose."

"Who knows, this might make up for the fact we'll have to kick the crap out of you later."

~~~

Ginny couldn't stop thinking about what her mother had said. She had strong conviction in what she had said, but mother's always right.

She tried to divert herself with Witch Weekly, but found no solace in the horoscopes.

"Dear Libra, Try as you might, but you can't get him out of your head, can you? Yes he's a goof and yes he's a prankster, but did you ever think sometimes that's what you need? Go against your better judgment Libra. Under all that is a witty, bonafide, romantic prince charming."

Yeah, no help, what so ever.

She sighed and looked around her room for another source of amusement and distraction. She didn't live in the burrow anymore so her room was lacking in some of the finer comforts, but her bookshelf still held some books she had grown out of.

She looked over the immaculate, dustless spines (what kind of house did you think Mrs. Weasley kept?) and read some of them.

'How to Prank a Prankerster.', 'Living With Brothers and Surviving.', 'The Love of a Gryffindor', and her personal favorite, 'Passionate Trousers'. With this little jaunt down memory lane came her diary. To get the spookiness away from her previous experience with them, her parents gotten her a red leather-bound book with the Gryffindor insignia. On the cover there read the Gryffindor motto: "Decus non solum amor" or "Virtue but also passion.".

Picked that one and opened it slowly, as if she went any faster it would break. She looked at the pages with her juvenile hand writing and went back over to the bed.

~~~

"What does she like to eat?" Colin asked, looking into the refrigerator.

The twins looked at each other and shrugged. "Do we bloody look like we know what she eats?" George asked.

"You've lived with her for her entire life, I figured you might be of some help!"

"Like we actually looked at her eating habits?" Fred asked, almost appalled at the thought that he should know his sister's favorite foods.

"Well there was once." George said with a look on his face like thinking hurt him. "She asked for mashed potatoes so while mum wasn't looking we threw a backwards white brownie into it."

"I remember, that was hilarious! and we figured out that they don't work as well as we'd have hoped."

"Yeah, Gin wasn't able to put her clothes on straight for weeks. That and her ear was where her nose used to be."

Colin looked slightly amused for a moment then stifled his oncoming laughter with a reproving look. "Well, what did you eat on her birthday?" Colin pushed aside the rainbow flakes with actual rainbow, and tried to navigate his way in the cluttered cabinets that were filled with things half used from the party.

"I always enjoyed her birthday,"

"Yeah, Chocolate cake is the easiest to prank with,"

"and mum's is delicious."

"All right, so chocolate cake and mash it is then." Colin said, looking satisfied.

~~~

"When a cat is dropped, it always lands on its feet, and when toast is dropped, it always lands with the buttered side facing down. I propose to strap buttered toast to the back of a cat; the two will hover, spinning inches above the ground. With a giant buttered cat array, a high-speed monorail could easily link New York with Chicago. " ~ An ancient saying

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