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Fred's funeral was two weeks after the battle.
It was a mockingly beautiful, sunny day. The wake was at the Burrow, and it was all very proper and sober. Mum kept disappearing into the kitchen to cry. George kept looking to his left with dead eyes and scarcely spoke at all — his sentences odd and halting as if expecting someone to fill his half-formed thoughts.
Fred would've hated it.
Ginny was sitting next to Harry out in the garden, respectably apart. He hadn't touched her at all or asked how she was feeling. Family, friends, and people she didn't know kept coming over, offering him their condolences and thanking him while giving Ginny brief, solemn nods.
And it hit her then, suddenly. That this was going to be her life.
Panic splintered inside her, abrupt and violent, and for a moment, she couldn't breathe. She wanted to scream, he was my brother. She had to — She needed —
Ginny stared at Harry. He caught her eye and smiled a bit, wan and tired. She thought dimly of noticing him at the entrance of the Great Hall over Fred's body before he'd run off, or realising he was missing again after the battle, before Ron and Hermione had let her know that he'd gone up to the dormitory to sleep.
"I—" she said, her mind blank. "I need to—" Ginny went on, but couldn't think of anything, and then just got up and left.
"Ginny?" Harry called after her, but he didn't follow her.
She rushed heedlessly through the crowd, the faces and voices blurring together in a cacophonic nightmare. Ginny darted inside and looked around the sea of unfamiliar faces, panic gnawing sickeningly at her. Breathing fast and shallow, she pelted upstairs to Ron's room. It was empty, and Ginny tore back downstairs.
She had to find him, she had to get out, before she started screaming.
A thought occurred to her, and then Ginny was already all but running through the back garden and the gate. She halted at the edge of a secluded grove by the river, catching her breath. Ron sat on the swing under an oak tree, staring at nothing in particular. He turned his head when he sensed her. Their eyes met, and after a beat, he opened his arms. Before Ginny knew it, she'd crawled into his lap and started crying for the first time since it'd happened, her head tucked safe in the crook of Ron's shoulder.
It was ugly. Loud sobs wracked through her, ragged breaths hurting her throat. She was vaguely aware of Ron's lips pressed to the top of her head, his tears sliding into her hair. He didn't say anything and simply cradled her close, sweeping his hand soothingly down her back.
She exhausted herself, eventually, and leaned wearily on Ron. Ginny breathed in the quiet, her eyes closed, his formal robes gripped in her fists.
After a long while, Ron cleared his throat. "Ginny," he said roughly. She felt another jolt of unexplained panic splinter through her. Her hands convulsed, grasping Ron's robes tighter.
Don't, she thought. Don't don't don't.
"Ginny," Ron repeated, hoarse and pained. "I — I need you to look at me, okay," he said, coaxing her with gentle, patient hands, and Ginny couldn't imagine a life where he didn't touch her.
It was a selfish, wretched thought.
But she'd always been selfish and spoiled, unlike Ron, who'd sacrificed the most out of them without ever leaving, acting out, or complaining.
Slowly, Ginny managed to lift her head. Ron held her face between his hands, thumbing tenderly at the tears on her cheeks. He looked wrecked and conflicted and unbearably sorry. She knew what he was going to say, and she didn't know if she wanted to cry or laugh hysterically.
This couldn't be happening.
She couldn't be dumped at a funeral twice.
Her hands ached from how hard she was holding on.
"I—" Ron rasped, and tried again. "We need to stop this. It was—" He stopped, his eyes flicking desperately over Ginny's face as if to memorise her. He opened and closed his mouth, then went on in a ragged voice, "Mum and Dad already lost one kid. We can't do this to them."
His voice broke down, and he looked almost stricken, his expression bleak with despair.
Ginny stared at him, her mind gone utterly, terrifyingly silent.
Don't, she thought. Don't leave.
It was an absurd thought. Ron was her brother. He'd never leave her like the other boys.
And that had always been the problem, hadn't it?
No matter how much she loved Ron, she couldn't love him.
Ginny looked blankly down at her hands, still curled in Ron's robes. She realised she had to let go. She uncurled her fingers painstakingly, one at a time, and let her hands drop limply into her lap.
Ron turned away and took a quiet breath, speaking at the trees. "I'm gonna try to make it work with Hermione. You don't mind her, do you?" he said roughly. "But I meant what I said. It doesn't have to be Harry. I shouldn't have put that on you."
Ginny stared at the side of his face wordlessly, feeling curiously detached — as if the core of her had gone cold. Ron looked back at her — his expression crumbled, desperate with grief. He touched her cheek again, brushing his thumb over the corner of her mouth. He said, his voice low, "It'll always be you."
She still didn't say anything when he got up and hurried off. Then slowly, incrementally, Ginny leaned over her knees, her face in her hands. The urge to scream was building in her, but she stomped it down ruthlessly until her bones ached.
There was nothing she could do or say. Ron was right. They'd already lost Fred, and it was selfish and wrong enough that they'd even had this conversation at his funeral.
It's okay, she thought in the darkness. It wasn't the first time she'd had to pretend she was fine. It wasn't the first time she'd been a convenient doll for someone. She could do it again.
After a long moment, Ginny stood up and walked back to Harry. He glanced at her, his eyebrows furrowed. "Everything okay?"
"Yeah," she said. "I just needed some fresh air."
Harry gave her a bewildered look, then went right back to mostly ignoring her. Ginny sat down next to him, unobtrusive and impassive.
After all, Harry was better than nothing.