A/N: It's been awhile since I wrote a oneshot for fun. So here we are! Ginny/Harry, Neville/Luna, and Ron/Hermione.
Disclaimer: I don't own. And if I did, I'd probably be on a cruise or something right now, not suffering through yet another boring day NOT in England!
Neville was always my friend.
On the first day of my Hogwarts career, when Ron wasn't there to see me Sorted and I cried, Neville was the one who was there for me.
After the Chamber of Secrets fiasco, Neville was the one who ran up to me in the middle of the Great Hall and asked if Ron, Harry and I were all right.
And then he asked me to the Yule Ball. That was the night of my first kiss. I'd had a slight crush on Neville since that first day, and though the one on Harry overshadowed it by miles, it was still there, festering in my heart. I was extremely excited that I'd been asked at all, and he told me I looked beautiful. On the way back, he got all embarrassed and said, "Ginny, I like you a lot, and not just as a friend."
And then we kissed. Not with tongue, or anything--kind of how friends kiss. But after that we just stayed friends. We could both tell from the kiss that we weren't meant to be. Besides, that monster of a crush on Harry--which Neville knew about--rather ruined it.
My fourth year was a blur of Umbridge and the DA, which Neville was in as well, of course. And so began my friendship with Luna that year.
Luna was always weird to me. Just Loony Lovegood, nothing special, not friend material. Too mental for me.
But of course Fate had it in for me, and we became the best of friends. Luna was everything to me--a friend my age, so now I didn't have to tag along with Harry, Ron and Hermione when they obviously didn't like me there.
She was a shoulder to cry on, a confidant, and almost a sister. In turn, I defended her against stupid bullies and ignorant others.
Neville and Luna liked each other immediately, and I knew it. Not in a like-like way, but in a friend way. They hit it off so well that soon we became what we are today: a trio.
Ron, Harry, and Hermione left us in my sixth year. Left to go fight, left to destroy someone in ways I didn't understand.
It was us who continued the DA, who fought the Death Eaters, who worked against Snape in Dumbledore's sacred memory. Yet we were never really recognized like the Golden Trio--not that it bothered us. Neville was too humble, Luna too out of it, and I too worried about everyone's well being--was I turning into my mum?
Still, it took a fool not to see Neville and Luna's budding relationship, even under the stress of everything. Luna told me, in her peculiar way, that she felt tingly around Neville, that she was nervous, that she wanted to hold him and hug him and kiss him in ways that she never had before. They were all signs of the love that I knew was there. And even the blind could see Neville's feelings laid out on his sleeve.
I was happy for them, I really was. But I felt so left out, so alone, not for the first time. But I'd never felt like this with the trio we formed--I'd always felt like I belonged. Now, I found excuses to leave them alone, and I felt like a hassle. Not someone they wanted anymore.
That's when I knew. We were as much a Silver Trio as Ron, Harry, and Hermione were a Golden Trio. And not just because of our status, the fact that there were three of us and we were fighting Voldemort. Because there was one of us left out. There had to be. With that close of a friendship, romances sprout. For awhile, I'd been terrified that Harry would fall for Hermione, or perhaps Ron.
Because that's the way things were in intense friendships. Ron and Hermione were as meant to be as Neville and Luna, but that didn't mean that it wasn't hard for Harry and me. That, I think, is why we had--and still have--each other.
That is why I'm fighting this battle. Curses fly by my ears, screams rip the air. I'm fighting for Neville and Luna's love, for Ron and Hermione's soul-mate status, for Harry and me. I'm fighting for my brothers, for my parents, for my teachers and friends and even enemies. Because nothing and no one is worse than Lord Voldemort, the Dark Lord, He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, Tom Riddle--whatever.
I run past a hallway and see Remus and Tonks battling Bellatrix and Dolhov. I see Kingsley dueling Lucius Malfoy, and his wife screaming and writhing, terrified, behind the next door.
I'm fighting for everyone and everything Light, full of love, and happy. Perhaps I'm fighting for Neville and Luna's unborn child, or for my parents to grow old and grey together. Whatever I'm fighting exactly for, it doesn't matter, because the important thing is that I'm fighting.
Fighting for life. Fighting for love.
EL FINE