Okay guys I finally went through my 200+ bookmarks on ao3 and picked every HBP fic rec I had! I’ll likely do this with other categories (post war, smut, etc.) as well but for now, enjoy:
Everything I Wanted
Distraction
Hanging by a Moment
Ginny Weasley and the Green-Eyed Monster (canon divergence)
Written for @hinnymicrofic December 2023 - Prompt 22
Ginny’s eyes were wide as saucers as the Potter family took their seats. “This is amazing!”
Harry didn’t bother trying to hide his grin. “We saw the hall when we came to look around, Gin.”
“I know. But look at what they’ve done with it! It’s like Christmas exploded in here!”
Even accounting for Ginny’s obsession with Christmas decorations, Harry had to admit she had a point. The teachers at St Grogery’s in Little Whinging hadn’t put in half as much effort when it came to decorating the school for the festive season. The tree in the back corner stretched almost to the ceiling, and was covered with decorations made by the children. The ceiling was swagged with criss-crossing paper chains that Harry was sure his wife would fully appreciate, and the walls were covered with bright pictures showing Christmas traditions from around the world, created by each class. Harry made a mental note to hunt down and admire James’s picture amongst the reception class creations before he left.
Ginny, however, was staring at the front of the hall. “How have they made the stars appear on that curtain? Without magic, I mean,” she asked.
Harry let his gaze fall on the temporary stage constructed in front of them. It was edged around the front with black velvet, and there was a matching backcloth hanging from the wall behind, punctuated with little pinpricks of light to look like a starry night sky.
“Electricity, Gin. It’s just lots of tiny little lightbulbs, poking through the fabric,” he explained.
“Really? Take a picture! Dad will love it!”
Harry rolled his eyes, but did as she asked, raising the camera to take a picture of the empty stage, taking care not to disturb his infant daughter, asleep in the baby carrier strapped to his chest.
Albus, seated on Ginny’s lap, seemed just as taken with the school hall as Ginny, wriggling around and pointing as different things caught his eye. Then, the reception class filed onto the stage, and he was mesmerised. Harry searched the line of small children for his elder son, pointing him out to Albus and Ginny as soon as he spotted him.
James stood to the side of the stage, wearing his Wise Man costume (expertly constructed by Nanna Molly), cardboard crown sitting crooked on his wild hair, dark eyes wide and searching the crowd. As soon as he saw his parents and brother, his face split into a huge grin.
The nativity was predictably adorable - though with twenty-seven four and five year olds in homemade costumes, none of them standing in the right place, half of them forgetting their lines, and most of them stopping to wave at their parents, how could it be anything else?
James aced his line, shouting it at full volume (“I BRING THE GIFT OF GOLD TO HONOUR THE NEWBORN KING!”), Ginny cried, Harry took about a billion photos, Albus demanded snacks roughly every thirty seconds, and Lily slept through the whole thing.
That evening, when the kids were finally all in bed asleep, Ginny handed Harry a glass of red wine and flopped down on the sofa beside him. She was uncharacteristically quiet. With the experience of several years of marriage, Harry waited silently for her to marshall her thoughts.
“I’ve been worrying about putting James into Muggle school for months, you know,” she said eventually. “Questioning whether it really was the right thing to do.”
Harry’s eyebrows lifted in surprise. “I didn’t realise. You should have said something.”
“No,” she sighed. “There wasn’t any point. Realistically, we didn’t have much choice, given neither of us wanted to stop working. I just… didn’t have any frame of reference for what it would be like. I don’t know anyone else who’s done it. Mum was so shocked, Bill and Percy’s kids are learning at home. I just felt so guilty.” She took a sip of wine, then turned to look at him, brown eyes dancing with flames reflected from the fireplace. “But after today, I don’t. Not any more. It was so wonderful. I… I wish I’d had the chance to do that.”
“The play?” he asked.
“Yes - but all the rest of it too. Being with the other kids. Learning together. Playing with their friends. They just all looked so happy.”
“I dunno, Gin. I’ve always thought your childhood sounded pretty perfect.”
“In a lot of ways, it probably was. We didn’t have a lot, but I know how lucky we were. It’s just that it… it could be lonely. Me, Ron and the twins were this little unit, but I was the youngest and the only girl, and I got left out a lot. Then, when the boys got older and started leaving for Hogwarts, it was just me and Mum.”
Harry took a sip of his wine. “I would have loved having what you had.”
Ginny turned to face him, looking earnest. “That had nothing to do with how you were educated though, it was because your Aunt and Uncle are evil child abusers! It’s going to be so different for our kids, to what either of us had.” She turned to face him, and something about her expression reminded him of a fierce mama bear protecting her cubs. “They’re going to get the best of both worlds. Love and magic at home. Play and friends and learning at school. And the fact that we get to choose this for them makes everything we went through for this to be our future seem more worth it than ever.”
Harry nodded. “Sounds pretty idyllic, now you come to mention it.”
“Yeah, it really does, doesn’t it?” She snuggled back against him, cradling her wine glass, as he put his arm around her. “I’m sorry it took me a while to realise it.”
He dropped a kiss onto the top of her head. “They’re lucky kids.”
They were quiet for a moment, until Ginny looked at him with a grin. “I think so. But tell that to James next time he’s complaining about the school dinners!”
people love to shit on the failings of a classic protagonist in favor of more interesting side characters but what appeals to me about a harry potter is that he’s a huge bitch
the minister for magic will say “sirius black has escaped from azkaban prison” and harry will be like “and what do you want me, a 13 year old with much more serious 13 year old problems (can’t go to hogsmeade), to do about that 🤨?” he’ll have his first kiss with a girl he’s been crushing on for Years and his review? wet. someone will bring up his parents and he will not hesitate to tell them to put their manners back in. umbridge assures her students that voldemort hasn’t returned and he interrupts in front of the whole class with “so, according to the ministry, cedric diggory dropped dead of his own accord?” and he rocks for it.
(Go check part 1!) Sorry if this is a bit too long (777 words), couldn't resist!
Ginny’s gaze was hard and her expression unreadable. The only thing that betrayed any emotion was a single tear streaking slowly down her cheek. This was it.
Harry had just told her his last, most shameful secret: a piece of Voldemort’s soul had lived inside him for sixteen years. It had seen his every thought, peered into his every emotion and tainted his every passion.
“I thought it was only fair for you to know, I’m sorry,” Harry said, defeated.
“Fair?! Fair?! There is nothing fair about this, Harry! How can you think there is anything fair?” blurted out Ginny, furious.
Harry had expected it, had always known it, but it still felt like his heart had broken at that moment. It was the first time they had talked, really talked, since the Battle of Hogwarts. Too much pain had kept them apart, and Harry felt it would be unfair to resume a relationship with her, if she even wanted one, without her knowing the whole story. He also knew that once he told her about the Horcrux and his own death, Ginny would want nothing more to do with him. Her soul was too pure to accept the darkness he had harbored all his life. That did nothing to ease the pain. If anything, Harry was reminded of the walk to his own death in the forest: once again, Harry knew that he was throwing his life away, that he was moving towards his own demise, and he also knew that it was the right thing to do, that it was what he had to do, that it was the only thing he could do. Ginny deserved nothing less than the whole truth, even if it meant the end of the dream he had cherished without admitting it to anyone, let alone himself - the dream of a world after Voldemort in which he could enjoy some happiness. That dream was now dying.
“I understand if you are angry. I understand if you want nothing more to do with someone so tainted and so... evil.”
The last word struck Ginny’s heart like lightning, and the memory of a conversation she had had five years ago came back to her as clearly as if it had been yesterday.
“Harry, look at me.”
Harry’s green eyes met Ginny’s brown for a long moment. They shone with such emotion now that for a second Harry felt almost crushed by the power of that gaze.
“You’re not evil, Harry, you never were.”
Harry was stunned: this was not what he had expected. How could she not understand?
“But the Horcrux...” Did he dare hope? “How can you be so sure?”
“You are not evil, you were never the Horcrux that was inside you. You are Harry, and that is enough.”
There was a pause, then Ginny continued:
“I know the evil that is Riddle better than anyone, Harry. I lived with him in my head for a year. I know what it’s like.”
“It’s not the same, Gin,” Harry interrupted. “You didn’t grow up with him inside you. What if he has distorted the way I see the world, my opinions, my feelings?”
Ginny saw the fear and terror in Harry’s eyes, glistening with tears he refused to let fall. The memory of their conversation after the Chamber became clearer and Ginny knew what she had to do.
“Do you trust me?”
“Yes,” came his immediate reply.
“Then answer me one question, Harry.” He nodded and she came closer. “Do you remember what Dumbledore told you? Do you remember what it is that Riddle doesn’t understand, the power he knows not, that is stronger than any evil?”
“Love,” Harry whispered, and Ginny nodded encouragingly.
“And now answer one last question, Harry, now that I have the words,” The silence lasted a heartbeat. “Can you love?”
Harry looked into Ginny’s eyes and felt like he was drowning. Her gaze was hard and bright and he sank into it. Harry thought of the nights he had spent looking at a dot on the Marauder’s Map, he remembered the summer she had pulled him out of his depression over Sirius, he thought of the kiss on his seventeenth birthday, the memory of which had been like a Patronus to him in the hardest moments of the Horcrux hunt.
Harry understood and could not hold back a tear. A feeling unlike any he had ever felt erupted in his chest and grew until it reached his lips.
“Yes, I think I can love.”
“Show me.”
As his lips brushed hers, Harry tried to express in that kiss all that words could no longer say.
And that's a wrap! Thank you to all the lovely creators who made this Weasley Fest possible, and for creating all the amazing content we've seen over the past three weeks. It would not have been possible without you, and I am so deeply thankful that we were all able to come together and celebrate our favorite redheads! Below you will find a list of all the weeks for this fest.
Art
Charlie & Norbert(a) by @the-al-chemist
Chaser Ginny commissioned by @liiilyevans and drawn by guine_evere
Fic
'What's Wild?' by @astridastrolabe (ft. Ron, Fred, and George)
Where's that Gryffindor Courage? by @nena-96 (ft. Ron and Percy)
Invisible String by @liiilyevans (ft. Bill)
Silence by @hinnyweasley (ft. Ginny and Ron)
Not Just a River in Egypt by @ginisbetterthanfirewhisky (ft. Ron and Ginny)
Regrets by Imera (ft. Percy and Arthur)
Almost Over by @nena-96 (ft. Bill and Ron)
Best Brother by @fizzyginfizz (ft. Bill, Charlie, and Ginny)
Deep by @drarryandotherdisasters (ft. Ron)
Late Night Office Breeding Session by Imera (ft. Arthur)
first steps by @harryissuchalittleshit (ft. Percy and Ginny)
Forever the Sidekick by @ala-baguette (ft. Ron and Ginny)
Fade In/Fade Out by @four2andnew (ft. Bill and Arthur)
How the Locket Affected Ron by @nena-96 (ft. Ron)
Letters to Charlie by @liiilyevans (ft. the Weasley fam)
Seven of Seven by @harryissuchalittleshit (ft. the Weasley fam)
picture this: in 1995, the weasleys (+harry and hermione) somehow end up fucking something up and time travel to somewhere in the 2000’s and, suddenly, the war is over, they are all married, having kids, etc. they actually end up in one of the golden trio’s place and the people who have to get them into their “present” is harry, ron, hermione and ginny and they have no idea how to do it. firstly, they tried to figure things out by themselves because they don’t want the ministry getting involved, but it becomes very hard to try to send them back into the past, while also trying not to reveal any meaningful information like who died, who married who, children, etc, just in case they aren’t able to obliviate them. they try so hard to keep the fact that they are LITTERALLY married to each other from their past selves they eventually can’t figure out how to get them in the past again. when I inagine this, I imagine that this happens around the time where ginny is pregnant with albus (who does NOT have this name in MY universe, seriously I would rather name my child Rudolph rather than albus, why couldn’t they just name him Daniel or smth) and baby james sirius and tiny tiny rose are sleeping in the next room #messy. the fact that they try to keep this all a secret makes the situation extremely hilarious (and it’s even funnier because I imagine that they let little details spill out) and when they finally decide to let the ministry know what has happened and get the all clear to say anything they want because the ministry is going to obliviate them once they go into the past again, they tell the 1995 weasleys all about the war and how their lives have changed since then and obviously mrs.weasley cries the life out of herself because she has like a gazillion grandchildren and it’s all very funny.
IM TALKING ABOUT ROMIONE AND HINNY FLUFF AND MOMENTS AND CHILDREN AND WHATEVER. my heart literally melts
can someone pls write this ?!?!?!?!?!?!!!?! 😍🥰⭐️☀️😘🫃😻🤩🤨 I’m extremely lazy 🫶🏼🫶🏼🫶🏼🫶🏼🫶🏼🫶🏼🫶🏼
You bask in the sun like a house cat | Perseids | Prefect | Summer Rain | Overanalyze | “Mum thinks I'm dating you" | “I’m too sober for this” / “You don’t even drink” | Shoelace | Valentine’s Plans | To make it better | Private practice | Chocolate (in the common room) | Harry's best smile | How did you not realize we’ve been dating for over a year now? | Slug Club Daydream | Wish I'd left it there | “People are talking about us” | After the kiss | Goodnight kiss | Getting caught in the act | In the dark (of a broom closet) | Pareidolia | Ducks! | Come fly with me | Lil cute kiss on the forehead | Divination | Nightmares | Goodbye kiss
DH
“Zip me up, will you?” | Dance | Into her sleep (Rated M) | Things you said while you were drunk
Post-Hogwarts
Summer after the war: Hold me close | Love | Comfortable kiss | First I love you + I'm so lucky to be able to live this life with you | Summer date | “I thought it was obvious, I’m in love with you” |
Year 8: "I love you. Ain't that the worst thing you ever heard?" |
Pre-engagement: Holyhead Harpies' locker room | Family of two
Engagement/Married life: Golden | You are speaking about my future husband | I did something bad | “Harry and Ginny go on a break, but Harry gets jealous” | You are not wearing any underwear, are you? | Harry is sick | Cuddle | Ginny x Dursleys | Snuffles
