But now that was all going to be for Hermione to have and she'd be left as one of the faceless others. She was going to be stuck as "the littlest Weasley" for the rest of her life, she just knew it. What a pathetic little thing to be. She hated it.
Why couldn't something just happen to change everything? That was always the best part of the books, when things just suddenly change like that for someone and their life's never the same. Wasn't that what storybook magic was - miraculous change which brought out the best for people? She'd give anything to have it happen to her. But it was never going to happen, not for the littlest Weasley.
Tap tap-tap Tap TAP Tap tap! came the jaunty little knock on the door. How could she not hear a single creak on the person's way up? Everyone made a creak at some point and Ginny knew them all. And what kind of knock was that? It wasn't the knocks she knew from her brothers and Harry would never knock on her door - and certainly not a light jaunty knock like that.
Then it came to her. That was a girl's knock. It was her knock.
'How dare she knock on my door like we're friends! I don't know her, and I don't want to know her. I want her to go away and leave me alone!'
Mouth open to yell through the door, Ginny stopped. This was the girl who couldn't even stand up to a troll. It was time to show her what a true Gryffindor would do when faced with ugly opposition: charge in and show them who's boss. Face set in a Keeper's scowl, Ginny pulled her trunk out of the way and wrenched open the door.
She stood stunned. The person she found standing there wasn't the one she'd thought… but how?
'Was this storybook magic?' she thought numbly. And was it her or for someone else?
"Luna?" she asked, still in shock.
"Hello," the girl said dreamily. "I'm glad to see your mother's wrackspurt infestation's cleared up. She was ever-so nice."
"What are you doing here?" Ginny asked.
"I'm talking to you," Luna replied. "Have you caught her wrackspurts?"
"No, but… Why are you here?" she asked, not that Ginny wasn't glad she was here, but it didn't make any sense.
"Oh, Harry invited me," the other girl explained, "but the way the dirigible plums were blowing in the breeze when we got home told me I should come early."
"So you're a Hopeful?" Ginny asked, her mind coming back to herself.
"I try to be. It's the best way to live I think," Luna smiled.
"So he invited you and Hermione?" she asked.
"No, she couldn't come," Luna replied. "She's a bit rumbly in the pebble department."
"Then why would he-?"
Harry had asked her mum if he could invite someone over, a girl whose mother had died. But Luna was here. Mrs. Lovegood wasn't… She couldn't be- She couldn't be! She just couldn't! Not to Luna!
She was hugging Luna before she even knew she'd moved.
"I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry," was all she seemed able to say as she sniffled once again.
It just couldn't have been to Luna, she was her friend. And then another thing struck her.
"I lost your mother's books," she said.
"Oh that's alright," Luna said as she patted her hair. "I don't think she needs them anymore."
That got Ginny crying. Somehow she knew this was all her fault.
.....
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