Author's Notes: This is a challenge set down by my friend Angelina. Write a story where Harry gets dared to go out with Ginny.
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Harry walked up to his dorm, exhaustion weighing heavily on his shoulders. He was so tired: tired of pretending he was happy, tired of keeping the mask of the Boy-Who-Lived in place, tired of acting as though he didn't care for her...
Voldemort had been defeated during his summer holidays, having wasted no time in challenging Harry once he was technically, to the Wizarding World at least, an adult, so there was no need to worry about him anymore. The only thing was, Harry had played the part of the hero for so long that he no longer knew how to just be himself. So he just kept acting.
"'Arry!" Ron greeted him cheerfully. "Good to see you, mate, good to see you. Where you been?"
Harry blinked. "Uh...downstairs...doing my homework?" he suggested, rather surprised. Ron seemed sort of out of it.
"Cool!" Ron grinned goofily. "Want some Firewhiskey?" The redhead waved around a bottle.
"Hey, yer gonna shpill it!" Dean slurred. "Careful bozsho."
Well that explained it. Ron was drunk. Harry looked around. And from the state Neville and Dean were in, they were, too. Seamus, however, looked completely sober.
"De boys canna hol' their liquor, Harry," the Irish boy chuckled. "Na loike Oi can. But den, Oi'm Oirish."
"Uh huh," Harry said. On second thought, perhaps Seamus was slightly tipsy. His accent was thicker than usual. "So exactly why are you guys trying to get drunk?"
"'S Dean's birfday, 'Arry!" Ron crowed. "We're 'aving a party!"
"Right..." Harry said. He knew it was Dean's birthday, of course; they'd had a celebration at breakfast this morning.
"Yerp," Neville spoke up for the first time. "An' now yer here, we can play a game! What should we play?"
"Truth or dare!" Dean said.
"Truth or dare?" Harry raised one eyebrow. "You guys are drunker than I thought."
"C'mon, 'Arry! It'll be fun!" Ron pleaded.
Harry sighed. Why not? It was certainly better than lying on his bed and staring at the canopy while he waited for the nightmares to come. "Why not? Might be fun." He sat down on his bed. "So who's going first?"
"Neville, truth or dare," Seamus said.
"Trufe."
"Did Oi really see ye an' Susan Bones snoggin' unner the mistletoe at Christmas?"
Neville blushed. "Yeah."
"You shnogged Shushan Bonshe? She'sh shupposhed to be goin' out with a boy in Hufflepuff," Dean said. "Parvati told me."
"Nay, they broke up. Big foight in the middle o' breffast on Halloween. Dinna ye hear 'em? Never seen Susan Bones do anythin' other'n smoile 'fore then," Seamus dismissed.
"Oh yeah, I 'member now..."
"My turn," Neville said. "Ron, trufe or dare?"
"Dare," Ron said defiantly.
"Dare yer to go downshtairsh an' kissh 'Mione."
Ron went pale. "Nope. Won' do it." Apparently he wasn't yet drunk enough for such an idea to seem like a good one.
"Why na?" Seamus asked slyly. "'S na loike ye have feelin's fer her or nuthin'"
Ron blushed. Either he admitted he had feelings for Hermione, which everyone knew, or he went down and kissed her.
Harry grinned. "You're stuck between a rock and a hard place, Ron. Suffer."
Ron glared at him and stormed downstairs. A moment later, he came back up, the tips of his ears extremely red. "Colin took a picture if you want proof," he snapped irritably.
"We'll check it out later," Seamus said with relish.
Ron nodded. "Now it'sh my turn." An evil grin slid across his face. "'Arry. Trufe or dare." Blue eyes challenged Harry to take the easy way out and pick Truth.
Harry rose to the challenge. "Dare," he said.
"I dare you to go out on a date with my sister Ginny."