Ginny Weasley had hit a boy (man, when she grew older) in the face many times before. But this was the first time she had hit someone who wasn’t her brother, and who hadn’t really provoked her. At least, he hadn’t done that in years.
She hadn’t meant to hit him. She was aiming for Michael Corner, her sorry excuse of an ex-boyfriend. They first went out in her fourth year, broke up by the end of the same year, and went back together six months later. The pattern repeated itself in that manner for most of her adult life, and now at twenty-four, she had broken up with him for the sixth time. She didn’t know what was wrong with her. Maybe she was just plain stupid, or lonely, or just in for a mutually destructive relationship. It was not the first time he had cheated on her, and she didn’t know why and how she had been putting up with it time and again. It wasn’t as if she lacked suitors. She never lacked suitors. But she kept going round in small circles, dating other men, but ending up with Michael again, and ending up getting hurt, and made to feel small, undesirable, vulnerable, worthless. It was the last straw, she told herself that day when she marched off to find him. She was going to give him a souvenir to remember her by, and she would be done with him.
He was at the Falmouth Falcons party, celebrating their latest win against the Ballycastle Bats. She got in the party easily. She was a Quidditch player herself, playing Seeker for the Holyhead Harpies, and everyone at the party recognised her, and thought it natural that she should be there. No one ever suspected that she was there to trash the party.
When she finally found him, drinking and flirting with a tall, leggy, blond bombshell by the punch bowl, she did not waste any time to appreciate the irony of the situation; she stalked towards them with all the confidence she could muster. She held her head high in her short, backless dark blue dress, picked up a cup of punch as she walked along, her expensive silver high heels clicking against the shiny reflective marble floor. She smiled sweetly to everyone who greeted her on the way, and took big gulps of her punch to build up her guts. When Michael saw her, he did not even suspect a thing. She smiled at him. He leaned towards her. She threw the rest of her punch at his face, flung the cup away, and drew her fist back. In that split second, she savoured the sight of the colour draining out of his face, and she swung her fist with all her might.
She did not expect him to duck and move away as quickly as he did, and when that happened, the next thing she knew, she had punched someone else, and that someone else happened to be none other than her brother’s old nemesis, Draco Malfoy.
His bad luck that he had been standing behind Michael and had turned his face at the most inappropriate time. Given his identity, Ginny was not entirely sorry for the mistake.
It all came out in The Daily Prophet the next day. But it did not come out quite the way it was supposed to. Instead of the glaring, status-compromising report on Michael’s cheating ways on one of England’s most successful female Seeker -- the report she had been wishing for, so that she could make sure she had trashed his reputation thoroughly -- there was a report on her punching Draco Malfoy at the Falmouth Falcons party because he had cheated on her.
Six years of being a high-profile Quidditch celebrity had sharpened her media awareness tremendously, and it did not take her long to realise how quickly one misreported story could spin off many other versions of similarly bizarre misinterpretations.
Sure enough, by noon, all tabloids in the Wizarding world, big and small, had run a story about her and Draco Malfoy. The history of the bad blood between their families was dug out, along with the fact that they had been schoolmates at Hogwarts. It did not help matters that Draco Malfoy was an attention whore and had his own archive of juicy celebrity news from which the reporters could work on. In short, there was more than enough information for reporters to spin their stories any other way, making up histories of her relationship with Draco Malfoy that were non-existent in reality.
That faithful day, she thought her fireplace might have exploded with all the floo calls from her friends and the press and most of all, her own family. It was a single event that demonstrated to her clearly just how big a family she had, and after she got tired of explaining herself to her father and mother and six brothers, she cut off the floo network entirely, and stayed home so that she could get thoroughly pissed and not care about the consequences. Damage control could wait, until later.
Her manager came over to her place at six o’clock that evening and let herself in.
“Ginny,” her manager had called and shook her when she found her dozing on the sofa. “Ginny, I need to talk to you now.”
“Sod off, Alicia,” Ginny replied drunkenly, turned and buried her face into the back of her sofa.
“Gin!” Alicia called again, pulling her upright. “Come on, we got shit to sort out!”
“Argh!”
“Sobrietus!”
“Alicia!” Ginny screamed and clutched her head. “Ow! Why do you do that for?”
“Sit up,” Alicia said and helped Ginny shift to a more comfortable position, leaning back against the sofa. In her usual efficient moves, Alicia went to the kitchen and made Ginny a warm cup of water with a dash of lemon. “Drink up,” she ordered. “Rehydrate.”
Ginny followed Alicia’s order obediently. She drank as Alicia brought a cool towel to wipe her face for her. Ginny suffered the big-sisterly action quietly, and after Alicia was satisfied that Ginny was completely sober, she sat down on the ottoman and smoothed down her work robes before she spoke.
“I see you already know how ridiculous things have become,” Alicia begun, jerking her chin at the magazines and newspapers spread out messily on Ginny’s coffee table.
“I know,” Ginny replied as she pressed the heels of her palms against her closed lids. “I’m sorry.”
“I guess that’s why you will always be a better Seeker than a Chaser,” Alicia said and paused to take a sip of water. “You were never very good at aiming.”
Ginny opened her eyes, and was glad that Alicia was not really angry with her.
“Maybe I should have asked you along for the ride,” Ginny replied. “You were the Gryffindor star Chaser, after all.”
“And I’m sure a Quaffle would do a more satisfying job than a fist,” Alicia said, leaning in and placing a comforting hand on Ginny’s shoulder. “You feeling okay?” she asked, concern evident in her eyes.
Ginny was touched. She placed her hand over Alicia’s and nodded. “I felt a lot better after the punch.”
“I’m afraid I can’t say the same for Draco Malfoy,” Alicia said, leaned back and folded her arms, a grim expression on her face. “But I see what you mean about the punch.”
They looked at each other for a few seconds. Alicia tried to keep her straight face and be serious about the topic, but Ginny could see the twitching at her jaw, and they ended up laughing and slapping their thighs.
“My god,” Alicia cried, wiping a tear. “I can’t believe you socked that bastard. I wanted to do that for ages!”
“It was an accident,” Ginny said, clutching her stomach.
“It was a good accident,” Alicia said.
“Am I going to get into trouble with the Association?” Ginny asked.
Alicia waved her hand carelessly as she spoke. “It’s a wild party, Gin. Someone always gets socked at those sorts of parties. Especially a Falmouth Falcons party.”
“So I’m not in any kind of trouble?” Ginny asked, heaving a sigh of relief.
“A warning letter at most, I expect,” Alicia answered. “The finer part of this episode we have to deal with is all these rubbish,” she said and gestured at the pile of tabloids, “and Draco Malfoy.”
“What about Draco Malfoy?” Ginny asked. “He didn’t die, did he?”
“Of course not, though I can count the many who wished he had,” Alicia answered. “I spoke to Marcus Flint today morning, that arsehole. He said Malfoy is going to bring on a lawsuit.”
“What?” Ginny whitened.
“I told him it wouldn’t be a good idea,” Alicia went on to say. “It would make Malfoy look rather pitiful, suing a young lady for punching a dude his size. I mean, look at you! You are so small, it would take three of you to make one Malfoy. How would that look for Malfoy, I asked him, if it comes out in the papers?”
“What did he say then?”
“Well, he agrees with me, I can tell,” Alicia replied. “It wouldn’t do Malfoy’s popularity any good to be suing a pretty and popular young lady like you. Laughable, really. You don’t look like you could hurt a fly, and given your consistent image as a good young lady from a good old Wizarding family, Malfoy wouldn’t stand a chance when it comes to winning the sympathy votes. I told Flint, it would be tonnes better if Malfoy just forget about it and come off being the perfect gentleman. Golden opportunity for publicity. A good chance to help Malfoy clean up his image as well.”
Ginny fell back to her sofa inelegantly, relief washing over her.
“I’m still waiting for Flint to get back to me,” Alicia continued as she reached down into her bag to retrieve her organiser. Ginny watched her quietly, admiring the way she could manage things step by step, bit by bit, in a calm logical manner that Ginny never could. “Meanwhile, we can worry ourselves with what I think is the most important aspect of this issue,” Alicia said as she opened her organiser to the page she was looking for. “I’ve already written a press release, but I want you to have a choice. Let it be, or correct them? If you ask me, either works. The latter will require more work, of course, but that’s what I’m here for,” she finished with a smile.
“Do I have to do anything like a press conference if I picked choice number two?” Ginny asked, biting the fingernail on her thumb.
“Well, you can’t escape that, I suppose,” Alicia said kindly. “But, it will resolve the matter once and for all.”
“And what are the chances that the story will just fade if we let it be?” Ginny asked again.
“It will fade eventually,” Alicia said as she peered at the tabloids on the table, “but I must admit I’m not sure how long it would take. It’s a big story, Ginny, and there haven’t been many big stories for a long time. The media is positively having a red-letter day. Two of England’s most popular Quidditch players caught up in a single story of torrid secret affairs, family rivalries, school sweethearts, forced separations, the modern Romeo and Juliet. Congratulation, Gin, I think you’ve single-handedly revive the tabloid circles with a single punch. Way to go.”
“But it’s not only my choice, is it?” Ginny asked. “What about Malfoy’s side?”
“He’s eager to set the record straight,” Alicia answered. “But he’ll need you for that. So it’s back to you. It’s a little embarrassing, this whole situation, and I know how hard it will be for you to speak about it to hordes of reporters, but if you concede, we are going to set up a date for you and Malfoy to sort things out, prepare what you two are going to say, and the likes. We figured it would be faster than having the two of us managers relaying the messages between you two. Besides, I need time to set up the conference, if we were to have one, and there’s a lot of coordination involved that I’ll need to work out with Flint, which means I’m going to spend as much time as you do with a similarly dastardly Slytherin prick, so don’t worry, you are not exactly alone in this.”
“Alicia,” Ginny said, touched, and reached over to hug her manager. “Have I told you lately just how much I adore you?”
“Just remember you owe me one, big time,” Alicia said and hugged Ginny back.
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