Disclaimer:
Harry Potter and all of its characters belong to J.K. Rowling.
I own nothing but the original characters I make.
"Dialogue"
'Thoughts'
-Author notes-
Chapter 57: Date?
"Can they see us now?" Ginny glanced down at herself. "I don't think I'm appropriately dressed for this…" She was wearing a simple-looking dark green dress.
"They won't pay much attention to your attire. I placed a mild 'Notice-Me-Not' charm on ourselves. The Muggles will see you but won't think too much about it or how you look."
Harry noticed the change in her expression. "Not that you look bad or anything!"
Ginny chuckled. "Oh, okay. Good to know."
"This is the place I was talking to you about. They have one of the best ice creams that I have ever tasted." Harry went ahead to the counter and talked to the lady working there.
"Ehm… I don't really speak a single word of French, though." Ginny just realized the issue. She had no way to communicate with this Muggle.
"You can leave it to me then. I'll choose something for you." Harry then proceeded to speak in perfect French to the lady and paid her for the ice creams with a single golden coin.
"Was that a translation charm?" Ginny asked.
Harry nodded. "I thought it could come in handy one day, so I made sure to learn it. I can also help texts written in foreign languages."
"It sure does seem that way. Ehm… Harry?" Ginny gave one last look at the coin that Harry had left for the lady.
The woman took it, looked at it for a moment, and placed it in her pocket before going back to work.
"Did you give her a Galleon?" Ginny asked.
"I did...since I dont have any local muggle money." Harry responded as he guided her toward a more secluded table in one of the shop's corners. "I added a Confundus Charm to it, so the Muggle won't really think much about it and will just see it as normal money. I mean… technically, it's still valuable for them. After all, Galleons are made of gold."
"Aren't you worried about getting into trouble? We are not supposed to use our magic on Muggles," Ginny said.
"Mmm…" Harry stopped to think for a second. "To be honest… no. Using magic has become such a normal thing for me on a normal basis that I don't think much about it while doing so."
Ginny found the comment somewhat strange, but she almost forgot about it when she took the first spoonful of ice cream. "This is so good!"
"Right?" Harry said before doing the same. "Oh, it's even better than before," he added.
The ice cream was already decent while inside the frozen world, so in the real world, it was one hundred times better.
"Harry, I feel like I have to ask this." Ginny placed the ice cream down and looked at him. "Is this… like… supposed to be a date?"
"Oh, ehmm…" Harry's mind began to race, searching for the correct answer.
'Should I say no? Is it too soon for that?' He hadn't anticipated that question.
He didn't want to scare her off.
'Did I mess this one up already? What does she think of me right now? That I just brought her here to impress her?'
'Calm down, Harry. Your magic is starting to react,' V's voice resounded inside his mind.
All of a sudden, the ground began to shake.
"An earthquake?" Ginny got startled.
Harry finally opened his mouth to speak. "This is n—"
'Say yes, damn it!' V interrupted him.
"I mean, yes. It is definitely a date. If you want it to be, at least." As Harry responded, the ground stopped shaking.
Ginny was looking around at the other people in the parlor, but no one else was acting as if something unusual had happened. "Did you feel that? I think there was an earthquake a moment ago."
"Mmm?… No. I did not feel anything."
Ginny gave him a look of suspicion. "Harry, did you just ask me out?"
"Ehm… yes. I think so." He wasn't sure if he did it right. His Godfather's lessons hadn't been all that helpful in that regard.
Sirius mostly went on about what to do once the relationship was more advanced, but not how to start it.
Ginny looked shocked. "And Hermione assured me that it was never going to happen…" she muttered under her breath.
"What?" Harry could barely hear what she said.
"N-Nothing," she hurried to say.
"I'm not sure how this works at this point, but weren't you supposed to say something else?" Harry asked.
"No? I mean, yes! Hold on, Harry…" Ginny got serious. "Before that, I would like to know about what happened to you at the Ministry. What made you change so much?"
"Ah, that… yes." For a moment, he had almost forgotten that this had been the original motive behind bringing Ginny to this place.
He was now supposed to tell her about the incident.
"Okay, give me a second." Harry needed to collect his thoughts about how he wanted to explain this to her.
'Need help with this one?' V sent him a mental message.
'No, I think this is something that I need to do by myself. Or at least, I want to do this by myself.' Something inside him told him that it was important to do so.
'Very well. Good luck.' V remained quiet after that.
Harry cleared his throat and began. "It all started when Bellatrix Lestrange was chasing me, and I stumbled across a room filled with Time-Turners…"
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