"I'm counting on you to catch me when I fall. I've counted on you all my life."
Ginny Weasley's eyes scanned over the many pictures arranged neatly in the photo album of herself and her father. These were pictures that held so many memories. It was s evening, and the stars were shining, luminous in the velvet sky.
"If I saw a shooting star right now, I wouldn't change a thing about you. I wouldn't take anything back." She whispered softly.
"There's an endless river that winds ahead of me, limitless with prospect and opportunity. It's waiting for me to make the dive. Waiting to see if I'll sink or swim. There's an invisible rope attatched to my waist, your pinching the very end of it…scared of letting go."
"Two hands." She continued.
"They held me at the start, when I was an hour old. They held me with the promise to always be there, to protect me from the cruel and tainted consequences of the world. Two hands you used to hide behind, in a game that we used to play. You'd dissapear behind them for a second, and then re-emerge, beaming at me with love and adoration." Ginny smiled at the memory.
"Peek-a-boo!"
"You'd shout it, scared I wouldn't see you, scared I'd get upset that you were gone. This taught me that you'd dissapear, but you'd always come back. For me, it was an inevitable fact of life." Ginny sighed, it was still an inevitable fact of life for her.
"I remember a time when I was slightly older, five or six years more, and mother had bought me my first bike. I fell of on my first attempt. It was just a scrape, but you carried me inside the house anyway and cleaned the cut and wiped away my tears. This taught me that you'd always be there for me, there to help me in any way that you could, until things were right again.
A few years later, and I was a teenager; fourteen years of age and much more difficult to fool. There'd be nights where I'd come home late. You'd be angry, see the dirt on my jacket, and make a wrong assumption. Screaming, tears and tantrums later, and we wouldn't speak for another day or two. This taught me that you wouldn't always understand me, but it would only be because you did nothing but care about me.
Now I've reached that point, where everything in the past must remain in the past. I'm older, stronger and wiser. It's nearly time for me to spread my wings and fly, out into a bottomless world. I'll be graduating Hogwarts in a few days time, and then I'll have changed forever. I'll still be your daughter, but I won't be your little girl."
Ginny smiled at her father, he didn't respond.
"You're asleep right now, as I say all of this to you, but I'm hoping that you can hear me. Maybe you can, and you're just pretending that you're not awake, because this is a conversation you want to avoid. I know because every time I bring it up, you're quick to change the subject."
Ginny knelt by her father where he rested in his armchair, light snores coming from his mouth. She kissed him lightly on the forehead.
"But you haven't lost me," she whispered " I'll always be there for you, like you've always been there for me."
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