A/N: Updated so my dear friend Nephthys Moon has something besides her interview earlier today to think about. Things get steamy towards the end. Enjoy!

Less than a minute after she'd gotten Oliver to the Hospital Wing, Professor McGonagall appeared, highly distressed, to ask Ginny what had happened.

Ginny had explained as briefly as she could, earning a hard look from her Head of House when she blamed Oliver's accident on account of his "flying stupid."

"Well I can assure you that Instructor Wood is in good hands, Miss Weasley. You may proceed to your next class," McGonagall said, effectively dismissing her.

Ginny's eyes flicked over Oliver's bed. She didn't want to leave yet. "Oh! Um, I don't actually have anywhere to be until practice at 8, would you mind if I stayed, Professor? I was supposed to be helping with the brooms… If I hadn't been a bit late this wouldn't have happened, so I feel responsible," she lied easily. "If he doesn't wake up before dinner, I'll leave."

McGonagall pursed her lips."If Wood was flying in the way you claim he was, I personally absolve you of any and all guilt, Miss Weasley. But if Madame Pomfrey approves, I won't force you out. I will personally oversee your practice this evening, and every evening until Instructor Wood is prepared to resume his duties." She exhaled. "Now, if you would excuse me, I must be getting back to my office before I decide I'd like to be the groundskeeper and the Divination teacher as well."

"Oh, Professor, that won't be necessary," Ginny offered quickly. She noticed how old the overworked Headmistress looked, who was eyeing her curiously in response.

"I won't allow you to sabotage our chance for the Quidditch Cup simply because I'm a bit tired, Miss Weasley," she countered tersely.

Ginny insisted. "We'll be fine! Ol–Instructor Wood won't be here for more than a week, we can manage! I swear it." Her cheeks heated a little at nearly slipping on Oliver's name. She irrationally felt like she had nearly revealed something deeply personal.

Professor McGonagall's shoulders relaxed almost imperceptibly in relief. "I'll notify the other teams that their practices have been cancelled as well. Good evening, Miss Weasley," she finished, taking her leave.

Once she was gone, Ginny exhaled deeply and settled into a chair by Oliver's bed. She looked him over, examining all of his injuries. His right eye was bruised and swollen, he had a busted lip, and his left arm was wrapped from the shoulder down. She knew they weren't too serious, but still had to look away.

Thankfully there was a magazine on the bedside table. She picked it up…and groaned. It was the dreaded copy of Witch Weekly she'd been running from since the day before.

The Hero of our time has had a busy few months since peace was reached! Personal friend to the Minister of Magic -and- some of Wizarding Society's highest elites, Playboy Potter is ever-so-popular! He gallivants with lovely gals, parades around with pretties, and traipses with TRAMPS! Read about the sordid pasts of his many romantic entanglements...

Her assessment from the previous morning hadn't changed: It was trash, mostly old stories and pictures. One was of Harry and Hermione after the battle. Well that's rubbish, she rationalized, you can see Ron's whole arm in the picture, and I'm pretty sure I'm on Harry's other side… The pictures of Harry with herself and Luna were from Ginny's 17th birthday party at the Burrow over the Summer, which the article didn't fail to point out. Ginny read the puerile paragraph, absentmindedly fingering the gold watch on her left wrist, a souvenir of the same party.

In light of what had happened a few months before, her party had been a rather subdued affair. She'd gotten the watch from her parents, along with the general gamut of birthday presents. She remembered how excited she'd been for Harry's present, and how knowing that Ron had already given Hermione a silver bracelet as a token of their relationship only served to increase her eager anticipation.

The actual present was unexpected, tiny lily-shaped earrings in white gold, each with three tiny peridot gems in the center. She hadn't thought of it at the time, but in retrospect, the connection with his mother seemed a little…weird. They had even belonged to her; they'd been found in the back of a drawer in Sirius's room with a spare set of his father's glasses, long lost after an overnight stay. She'd loved them at the time, but the longer she was away from Harry the more deeply they troubled her. Do many girls have to remind their boyfriends that they aren't his dead mum? she wondered bitterly. Right now, the trinkets were deep in the bottom of her trunk.

Oliver stirred, and the thoughts of Harry's vaguely Oedipal gift-giving behaviors fled.

"Grrn," he mumbled, tossing lightly, "Grrnny."

Ginny blushed, all at once confused, a little embarrassed, and very glad Madame Pomfrey was in her office. "Are you saying my name?" she whispered at him, suddenly feeling extremely vulnerable.

Indisposed, Oliver didn't answer. He tossed a bit more, said her name more clearly, and cracked open his unbruised eye.

"You rang?" she said, grinning to hide her confusion.

Oliver's eyes shot open and he whipped his head toward her. "Hells," he moaned, wincing, "What did I do?"

Ginny shrugged. "The summary is that you were flying stupid and I saved your life. Why were you saying my name?"

The color drained from Oliver's face. He blinked a couple of times, searching for an answer. "Y-your name? I reckon it's 'cause you claim to have saved my life," he offered quickly. Fuck. That's not good at all. He blushed darkly, the memory of his pre-crash thoughts flooding his mind. He was in serious trouble.

She simply shrugged, flipping her long red hair over her shoulder. "Well, if you're awake, I'm going to go wash before dinner. Saving lives is apparently a rather sweaty business. Pomfrey's starting to get a look about her, anyways." Ginny shot a look towards the plump old witch, who was loudly banging bedpans around a dozen beds away. "Let me know when you're ready for me to go back to helping you. Until then, thanks for clearing out my afternoons. Feel better!"

Oliver grunted a goodbye and she was gone. Pomfrey came by a moment later to scold him for hurting himself. "I'd thought I was done with you!" she chided. Then she force-fed him something thick and vile filled with what seemed like gobs of troll hair buried inside. It made his head feel warm and stuffy and heavy and he dimly recognized that me may have been falling back asleep.

He didn't recognize the room he was in, but it smelled of cinnamon and a crackling fire he could hear but not see. The warmth at his back and the shadow on the wall told him he stood in front of it. Combined with his nakedness it reminded him of a story in a cheesy pornographic magazine he may have read as a teenager, and he half-expected an overly made-up witch with dry blonde hair to be laid out naked on a stained sofa. "Not quite,"a familiar voice corrected him. He jumped half out of his skin at the sight of her, flaming hair and creamy skin both striking against the black satin nothing she was wearing.

"G-Ginny?" he stammered, aroused and embarrassed and confused. His eye were glued to her short, shapely form.

"You rang?" Her smile was incredibly seductive, and her voice sounded exactly as it had when she'd said it in the Hospital Wing.

Suddenly it was arms and lips and hands all around him, a clash of tongues and heat. He couldn't think of anything, he couldn't feel anything but her soft skin beneath his hands. Everything about her was smooth and bright and strong and she was practically shining in his arms. It was so much of what he'd wanted since nearly the start of the term and he could barely breathe from how perfect it felt.

It was too much. The sensation of her lips flitting across the skin of his bare chest alone was too intense. His wanted his hands to be everywhere at once because he needed her to be as naked as he was. And her hands…small and calloused from flying, traveling all down his back and sides! She hit a particularly sensitive spot on his waist and he moaned, desperate for more of her touch.

The fervor of it all was such that his consciousness only coming in short bursts. The whole scene grew to be like a scrambled transmission. Her hands would be at his neck then at his hipbones without moving. She'd be biting his neck the same time her tongue traced the insides of his teeth. He was sitting, they were standing, she was lying beneath him. They were by the fire, in his office, on the pitch.

It felt so right, without his conscience telling him it wasn't.

A/N: He's got it bad. Read and review!