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“You may begin brewing,” Professor Jigger announced, and students quickly got to work. Ginny moved towards the cupboard to gather the needed ingredients. As she hurried back to her station, she bumped into Blaise Zabini. She looked up and opened her mouth to apologize, but then she saw the smirk on his face and the wink he sent her way. She felt her face warm, grumbled in his direction and quickly walked away.
When she had returned to Hogwarts to complete her seventh year, she had been excited that a few of her fellow Gryffindors from the year above would also be returning to finish their studies. She hadn’t put much thought into who would be returning from the other houses.
There weren’t many students who chose to return for their eighth year,so those students had been lumped in with the seventh years. For the most part, Ginny enjoyed the eighth years that she had classes with. She got along with all of them, even Daphne Greengrass in Slytherin. There was one exception, Blaise Zabini.
She found him entirely too full of himself. He always seemed to be around and whenever he caught her eye he dared to wink at her. He was the captain of the Slytherin quidditch team this year and since she was the captain of the Gryffindor team they were naturally rivals. He never missed a chance to brag about how much better his team was than the others.
Ginny often overheard other students talking about the Slytherin and how attractive he was, but she didn’t understand what they saw in him. He was attractive, but he knew it. Any favor gained by his good looks was quickly squashed by his pompous attitude.
She shook her head to empty it of thoughts of Zabini and got to work on brewing the Memory Potion that had been assigned. She did her best to focus on the task at hand, but was quickly distracted by the humming of the git working behind her. She glanced behind to see who it was, and of course, it was Blaise.
“Zabini, would you please stop that. It’s making it difficult for me to focus, and I need to track how many rotations I have completed,” she gritted out.
“Sure, Weaslette. Anything for you.” She could hear his smirk as she continued to stir her potion.
“You know that’s not my name,” she hissed looking over her shoulder.
He chuckled, but got back to work. Ginny followed suit and continued to brew knowing the potion would require all of her attention.
It was nearing the end of class, and she was bottling up her potion when she heard it.
“Pssst...pssst..” Knowing that it was the menace behind her, she ignored it not wanting to waste the few precious minutes she had left.
“Hey, Weaslette,” Blaise called a little louder. She stiffened, but kept her back to him as she corked her phial and kept going.
“I know you can hear me!” he said even louder. She continued to ignore him and labeled her potion.
“Hey, Carrots!”
She froze for a second, and then angrily turned to face him with her eyes blazing.
“How dare you!” she shrieked, as she snatched his filled phial from his table and whacked it over his head. The phial completely shattered and the gold liquid ran down his face. “Maybe this Memory Potion will help you remember that I don’t like to be called Weaslette, and I sure as hell don’t want to be called CARROTS!”
She turned and stormed to the front of the room to turn in her potion to Professor Jigger and stalked out. Blaise sat there wide eyed as a smitten look slowly slid across his face. He couldn’t help watching her walk away.
*
It was game day, and Ginny was mulling over their formations over breakfast. She had done all the preparations to make sure her team was ready. As team captain, she made sure that Gryffindor had practiced as much as possible. They’d barely had any free time in weeks. She knew they had done all they could to be ready for today, but she was worried that it still wasn’t enough. Slytherin had been doing well this year with Blaise Zabini as their captain, and she couldn’t let that git win.
Zabini. It was like she couldn’t get away from him, and it was driving her crazy. First, he managed to be in almost all of her classes. Then, they were always crossing paths on their way to and from the Quidditch pitch. He always seemed to have a smirk on his face and never forgot his new signature wink.
She didn’t care how strong his arms looked or how wide his shoulders were. He was too full of himself, and she couldn’t stand it.
She looked up from her plate when she heard someone clear their throat.
“Hey, Ginevra, is your team ready for today?” Blaise asked her grinning.
“Ready to ride circles around your team,” she snapped. She didn’t feel Ginevra was much better than Weaslette, but at least it wasn’t Carrots.
He chuckled, “Glad to hear you seem so confident in your team. Do you care to make a wager on the game?”
She raised an eyebrow at him. “You want to bet on our game today? What’s the wager?”
“If Slytherin wins, I get to take you to Hogsmeade next weekend,” he smirked.
She felt her cheeks flush and swallowed. Quickly masking her reaction she asked, “And WHEN Gryffindor wins, what do I get?”
He grinned, “You get to take me to Hogsmeade next weekend.”
She snorted. “I think I’ll pass, but good luck today.”
As she got up and walked away, she couldn’t stop thinking about Zabini’s wager. Had he been trying to ask her to Hogsmeade? Where had that come from? He was probably just trying to distract her from the game today. He would stoop to anything to increase his chances of winning. He is a Slytherin after all. Why would he even think she would want to go to Hogsmeade with him!? She absolutely did not! She bit her lip and continued towards the Quidditch pitch. Right?
After an hour and a half of intense competition, the Slytherin seeker caught the snitch ending the game. The final score was Gryffindor 170-Slytherin 270. Her team had worked hard and had been outscoring the Slytherins, but Zabini’s seeker had bested them.
As she walked towards the changing rooms Zabini ran to catch up with her.
“It’s a shame I didn’t get you to agree to our bet. I would have really left a winner today,” he sang teasingly.
She grunted and pushed past him, skipping the changing rooms and heading towards the castle.
“Aww, come on, Ginevra! Don’t be a sore loser,” he called after her.
*
“Today you will be working with partners that I have randomly selected.” Groans could be heard throughout the room. “ Dobbs, you are working with Perks. Greengrass and Vaisey. Baddock, work with Thomas. And Weasley, you will work with Zabini.”
Of course she was stuck with him. She couldn’t escape him. She sighed and turned to face her potions partner. He stood there with a giant grin on his face. He cleared his throat and the smile slid from his face.
“Well, Ginevra, we best get to work. You gather the ingredients, and I’ll get the cauldron settled.”
She huffed and gathered what they needed from the supply closet. What was it with Ginevra? Was this his latest way to annoy her? When she got back to the table, she found that Blaise was there with the cauldron ready and studying the instructions.
“I’ll chop the mandrake root, if you measure out the bat wings,” he stated authoritatively without looking up from the recipe.
Ginny nodded and got to work surprised that he was taking this seriously. She was baffled to find that they actually worked well together. They worked quickly through each step and finished in record time. When they turned in their phial, Professor Jigger complimented them on their teamwork which only annoyed Ginny more.
As they walked back to their work table Blaise nudged her arm with his. “We seem to work well together, Ginevra.”
“I hate to say it, but I think you’re right, Zabini.”
“You can call me Blaise, you know,” he said hesitantly as he gave her a sidelong glance.
She looked up at him and sighed, “And I guess you can call me Ginny.”
He smiled in response. It wasn’t a grin or a smirk. There was no winking involved. It was a genuine smile, and she was surprised by how nice she thought it looked on his face.
*
After that day, Ginny and Blaise became friends. They studied in the library together and argued over whose quidditch team was stronger. They flew together and even talked about their dreams of playing professional quidditch after their time at Hogwarts was over.
As the school year progressed, scouts from professional quidditch teams made contact with both of them expressing interest. Scouts were present at their games and even conducted interviews with them.
It seemed that their dreams may become a reality, but the two friends were also in competition with each other. As the year drew to an end, it appeared that two teams were interested in both of them, the Appleby Arrows and the Vratsa Vultures. Each team had only one position they were looking to fill and it appeared they were debating between Blaise and Ginny.
Ginny thought a lot about the two teams that had shown interest. The Vratsa Vultures were a fantastic team, but their home base was in Bulgaria and that made her hesitant. Since the war, being close to family was even more important to her. They had all taken the loss of Fred very hard and made an effort to reunite as often as possible. Charlie had even moved to work at the newly founded British Dragon Sanctuary to be closer to home.
One Sunday afternoon, Ginny found herself sitting by the Black Lake wondering about the future. She heard someone approaching from behind and turned to see Blaise. She smiled at him as he lowered himself to sit next to her. They both sat quietly for a few moments.
“I got an offer from the Arrows today.” Blaise whispered.
Ginny felt her heart drop, but quickly recovered. “That’s great! I am so happy for you” she said with a grin that didn’t reach her eyes.
“I turned them down,” he scooted closer.
She froze. “What?” she exclaimed, shocked by the news.
“I told them that they should go with you,” he said
She quickly turned to look at him. “Why would you do that?”
“I know you want to be close to your family. If you took a spot with the Vultures it would be more difficult to see them as much as you’d like to.”
“Blaise, you didn’t have to do that,” she whispered, as she looked up at him with tears in her eyes.
He reached up and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “Anything for you, Carrots.”