Disclaimer: It's not mine. I'm not the one with the castle in Scotland.
Summary: This is the best thing that could be happening, but it's never that simple. You always knew that it wasn't going to be easy, but no-one ever told you that it was going to be this hard. TomxGinny
Fast-Forward
Chapter One: Juliet
With a fat red quill, Ginny Peregrine drew a lazy circle around a job advert in the Daily Prophet. She chewed her thumbnail thoughtfully.
"What do you think of working in an Owlery?" she asked of her best friend, Grace Hartwin (whose house she was staying at), sprawled out on the floor.
"For you?" Grace raised her eyebrows. "I'm not going to comment, but I'll remind you of the scratches all over you."
Ginny held up her hands to observe the thin red welts on her skin. "That's different," she said crossly, scowling. "Your owl is vicious."
"Astor is lovely," Grace said defensively. "You just don't mix with birds."
"…Fine." The redhead pouted. She scratched an X through the circle she'd drawn previously, and dropped her chin down onto the newspaper with a glum sigh. "I'm the only one now you doesn't have a job…" She rolled her eyes. Alden was training with his father to become a Ministry lawyer, and Philippa was currently tending a bar in East London to get enough money for a university application. "I feel like a hobo."
"You are a hobo," Grace laughed. "Still, I don't have a job."
"Yeah, because you're going to live it up in medical school," Ginny pointed. "That qualifies as the same sort of thing." She sighed again. "I suppose, if the worst comes to worst, I could always dance in the streets and try to get people to put money in my hat."
"You can't dance."
"That's why it's my last option."
Grace pushed away the application form for which course she wanted to take at the medical school she'd applied for. She wanted to be a Healer, but was enrolling in Muggle training to get all areas of expertise down perfect. She stretched out on the carpet and sat up. "I was wondering…"
"Why you're the one lying on the floor when it's your bedroom?" Ginny guessed.
"Well, that, yeah. But mainly, I was wondering why you've so far totally avoided talking to me about something fairly important." Grace's blue eyes flickered down the glimmering ring on Ginny's finger.
"Um." Ginny went red. "Hey, look!" she exclaimed, pointing at the Daily Prophet. "I could be a-"
"No avoiding." The brunette reached over to her bed and snatched the paper away.
Ginny hid her face in a nearby cushion and groaned loudly. "I don't want to talk about it," she said, her voice a muffled mutter because of the fabric she was surrounded by.
For the most part, Grace was incredulous. "You're committing to spending the rest of life with someone, and you don't want to talk about it?"
"That sounds about right." Ginny shifted uncomfortably, and sighed. "I dunno. I'm not getting cold feet or anything. I just…" She made a 'merghf' noise and buried her face once more in the cushion wrapped in her arms.
"Scared?"
Another groan answered this enquiry.
"Good. You'd be a retard not be scared."
Ginny sat up, irritation on her face. "Oh, fantastic. It doesn't really matter that I'm terrified out of my wits because of a choice that I made in three seconds that's going to change my life forever… as long as I'm not a retard."
"You love him. He loves you. This is everything you could have possibly wanted. But now that you have it, you're frightened of how it could turn out." Grace made a sympathetic face. "It's going to be fine."
"You wouldn't say that if you'd learnt the hard way that if something seems too good to be true, then it probably is."
"Stop holding onto the bad things you've known and look ahead at the good things you're going to have."
"You sound like something out of a cheesy romantic comedy."
"…Yeah, I stole it from somewhere," Grace admitted. "I can't remember where I found it, but it's good, isn't it?"
Ginny rolled her eyes and took the newspaper back from her friend. Just as she flipped to the next page, a tall brown-haired man stuck his head through the door. "Oi," he said. "Lunch."
"Coming…" Grace sang.
"Now."
"I said I was coming, Jake!" Grace snapped.
"You're not moving," said twenty-three-year-old Jacob Hartwin, lifting one eyebrow mockingly. "When someone comes somewhere, they usually move."
"RARGH!" yelled Grace, tossing a spare cushion from the armchair nearby at her brother. "Go away."
Jacob retreated, and Grace turned back to Ginny. "Let's roll." They stood, and as they made their way down the hallway, the brunette asked, "Soooo… when's the big day?"
"I dunno." Ginny combed the ends of her hair with her fingers. "We were thinking January, February-ish. Late Winter. Spring. I dunno."
"What have you planned so far?"
"Er. Not much."
"How little is 'not much'?"
Ginny grimaced. "Nothing?" she tried, wincing in anticipation of her best friend's reaction.
"Ginny!" Grace exclaimed. "You have to decide, or you're going to leave everything to the last minute and it's going to be a rubbish wedding."
"Geez," Ginny frowned. "You sound like my mother." Images of a warm, smiling Molly Weasley flashed back, but she banished those. The last thing that she needed was to start remembering now that her mother wasn't going to be there to sob into a tissue at her only daughter growing up, and that her father wasn't going to give her away. It would start the tears up. "Anyway, I have loads of time."
"Coolsville – though you need to talk to Romeo about it as soon as possible, I'm not going to get involved. Now… the real question." She eyed Ginny. "Am I invited?"
"Duh. Your whole family is." Ginny knew how Harry had always felt with the Weasleys now – an orphan, included in something warm and special. "You're like my own family."
"Even Jake?" asked Grace sarcastically.
"Surprisingly, even Jake," said Ginny.
"I'm touched," Jacob threw over his shoulders, emerging from the study and jogging down the stairs. Ginny peered into the room where he'd just come from. She didn't remember that room existing. Grace was, quite frankly, filthy rich, and her house was almost a mansion, it was so big.
"Anyway," she continued, "you're a bridesmaid, so you have to be invited."
At this, Grace glowed with pleased pride. "Bridesmaid? Really?" she squeaked. "Yay! Who else are bridesmaids?"
"Pippa and Heather."
"Heather? Well, you seem to have got over your aversion to her," said Grace as she found her way to the dining room, and sat down.
"She had an aversion to me, thank you very much – but we're past that. I helped her; she helped me. She's like the little sister I never had." Ginny smiled fondly, thinking of her friend, Heather, who would now be in her second year at Hogwarts.
"Aw," Grace cooed, sitting in her usual seat at the table, "that's so sweet. You know, since her sister…" she trailed off meaningfully. Ginny understood. Heather Tristanebury was the younger sister of Moaning Myrtle, one of the castle's ghosts.
"Piggie!" said Grace's other sibling – however, Leah was only five, and liked to refer to Ginny as Piggie, due to the fact that she associated Ginny with guinea-pig. "Hello. We're having scrambled eggs."
"I can see that. I like scrambled eggs," said Ginny to the little girl. "Thanks!"
"And toast!" Leah added.
"Thank you."
"Are you sure you want her to come to your wedding?" asked Grace. "Halfway through exchanging your vows or whatever, everyone will just suddenly hear someone shriek, 'Piggie!'"
"That would be funny," said Ginny, pushing her eggs around her plate with her fork and stabbing some into her mouth. "I could hire her as an entertainer incase it gets too boring." She pursed her mouth thoughtfully. "I've just realised that I hate weddings."
"Everyone hates weddings – except their own," Grace amended, seeing Ginny's face.
"You'd better be right about that." Ginny looked up at Grace's mother, who had just made her appearance into the massive dining room. "Is there anything I can help with after lunch, Mrs. Hartwin?" She hated doing jobs, but she knew that people wouldn't like having her around unless she was helpful.
"No, thank you, though, sweetie," said Dorothy Hartwin, sitting down to enjoy her own lunch.
"Speaking of pushing your weight around," said Grace around a mouthful of eggs, "when are you going to move in with Romeo?"
"Grace!" exclaimed Dorothy. She turned to Ginny. "Don't worry – you're perfectly welcome to stay here as long as you want, it's been lovely having you."
"Mum, it was just a question," Grace complained. "Seriously, though, are you just going to marry him, run off into the sunset, and then come back to my house?"
"I don't know," Ginny said. "At some point. And by the way, I'd appreciate it if you stop calling him Romeo."
"Whatever, Juliet." Grace stuffed more eggs into her mouth.
"Piggie has a boyfriend!" Leah said happily. "Did you know?"
"Yes, we know," Grace said wearily for what was the millionth time. Since Leah had discovered this, it became her hobby to announce it as often as possible.
"Our little baby's all grown up," said Jacob, dumping himself in a chair. "Isn't that sweet?"
"You," Ginny said, pointing a fork at him, "stop patronising me. I know a hundred-and-twelve legal ways to make your life hell."
"Really?" Jacob nodded, as if considering this. "I know a hundred-and-thirteen." He grinned. "Touché."
Ginny rolled her eyes. "Yeah, yeah." She finished her last mouthful of toast and then wiped her hands off on her dungarees, even though she really wasn't supposed to. "Thanks for lunch," she said, and carried her dishes through to the kitchen. It was the only place that she'd memorised her way to, as she could live without the numerous studies and sitting rooms, but in a time of trouble, she needed to be able to find the chocolate.
Grace followed a minute later, and then they decided to go out into Grace's garden – though, honestly, it was more like her grounds, as she had at least two acres.
"Meh, you're so rich it's annoying," Ginny scowled. "You could set up an amusement park in your garden – that's how big it is."
"Er." Grace didn't really know what to say. Ginny understood her silence. What modesty could she say – oh, it's not that good? It was, and she could see that.
"It doesn't matter," Ginny dismissed the brunette's discomfort. "Sorry for making you feel awkward. I'm fine."
"Okay. Well, tell Romeo-"
Ginny glared.
"Er- tell Tom, I mean, that you need to start discussing the wedding if you ever want to have it," Grace advised. "If you don't, then I'm going to have to be forced to be your wedding planner."
"Oh, dear God."
"Exactly." Grace grinned. "Tell him."
The redhead agreed, and they moved onto talking of less nerve-wracking things (for Ginny, at least), but it meant by no means that the anxiety building up inside her had disappeared. Quite the contrary – it was building higher than ever.
xxx
A/N: Hooray! What an… uninteresting start. Oh well. Trust me, it gets better. Sorry that this chapter is so short. For all of the other chapters, I tried my hardest to keep them at least eight pages long (in Microsoft Word). Well, this is seven pages. XP Please review and tell me what you think so far!
Also, I would like to point out that I know that Jacob and Leah Hartwin have werewolf names from Twilight. That's a coincedence. I decided what Grace's brother and sister were going to be called before I even starting reading Twilight.