Singer/Band AU
Part 4. Peep under the cut for a surprise.
When Harry heard his phone ding and read the message, the first word out of his mouth was 'shit.' He wasn't anywhere near ready to host a guest. Fuck, fuck, fuckity fuck. After quickly buzzing the front desk and asking them to let Ron's little sister in, Harry quickly snatched his old plaid blanket off the loveseat and raced back to his bedroom to throw it on the bed. Then he closed the door. She didn't need to see what a mess his room was.
Not that his work space was any better.
He and Ron still lived in a little flat just outside of Dover. They'd looked for other places now that they could both afford it, but nothing had ever come of their search. Ron wanted to be close to his family, and Harry was not about to leave this flat as long as his best friend wanted to room with him. He figured that he only had so much time left before Ron and Hermione moved in together, shagged til she got pregnant, and popped out two point five kids.
The front room was one half living room and kitchen and one half studio. His keyboard was stuck in the corner across from the door while his guitar rack, sporting only three guitars currently, sat to the right of it. On the left side was his desk, cluttered with lyrics ideas, his desktop and two monitors, and what seemed to be a week old sandwich. Quickly, Harry snatched that and dumped it into the trash. The rest of his equipment was to the left of the desk; two mic stands and two microphones, headphones hung over the mic stand, a seat for when he played guitar, some cables running to his computer, and a partition to keep the acoustics sounding crisp when he sang or played.
Besides his desk, his studio area was mostly clean. The rest of the flat on the other hand was a mess.
Hurriedly, he scooped the trash off the counter and shoved it into the already full trash can. Then he grabbed the blue blanket sitting on the old love seat and quickly folded it, his aunt's voice shrilly ringing in his ears about making the place presentable. Everything still looked old and splotchy and like something you'd expect to see from someone who was just getting started in the music industry, not someone who'd been working at for four years and was successful.
That was when Harry heard the knock on his door.
After brushing his hands off on his sweatpants, which he realized he should have changed out of if he didn't want to look like a bum, he pulled the door open. Ginny Weasley was standing there looking up at the top of his door frame, probably at his and Ron's initials Hagrid had carved when he thought that they were moving out. Hagrid must have thought that if he put those there the boys couldn't leave.
Her eyes fell to his then, and Harry deeply regretted not putting more effort into his appearance. She was wearing denim shorts with a striped shirt tucked into the waistband. She also had an oversized denim jacket on. Her hair, similar to Ron's but not quite as orange, was pulled into a ponytail, allowing Harry to get a full look at the constellation of freckles across her nose and checks and her big brown eyes. He hadn't expected her to be this pretty.
"Hi," she said easily. "I'm assuming you're my brother's roommate and not a dumb thief who decided to open the door of the flat he's robbing."
If Harry hadn't been so shocked by her statement, he would have laughed.
"Yeah, I'm Harry," he said, stepping aside to let her in. Nervously, he ran a hand through his messy hair.
"Nice flat," she said before dropping her bag into the only chair he and Ron had. Her eyes immediately snagged on the equipment on the other side of the room, and Harry immediately felt self-conscious, a remnant he'd tried to smash from his childhood. Realistically, he knew that she was the one who should be nervous since he'd been doing this for a while, and she was relatively new to all this. However, none of the people he'd worked with had been in his flat before.
This was his personal space where he decompressed, where he knew that he could write trashy lyrics that didn't have to be perfect because no one was going to see them. It was home and only two people had shared that with him. When Ron mentioned his sister, Harry figured it would be alright to let her in here since she was his best friend's sister, but now, he felt exposed.
"Do you mind?" she asked, pointing to his acoustic Martin.
And, yes, Harry very much did mind, but something in the tilt of her head reminded him of Ron and so he shook his head no.
Ginny beamed and picked up the guitar. Harry thought it was about the brightest smile he had ever seen. After sitting down on his playing stool, she started to strum out a rhythm, which Harry quickly realized was to The Woods. He was slightly impressed that she had been able to pick up the chords just from listening to the audio recording he'd sent her.
"It's supposed to be a G there instead of an F sharp," he said when he heard the slight turn in what she was playing. A easy mistake to make if you were only playing by ear.
Ginny easily corrected herself and continued to strum, unbothered that she'd gotten something wrong. Harry wondered if she was just that confident or if she took criticism well. After a few more run throughs, Ginny stopped playing and offered the guitar to him. Thankfully, Harry took it, relief filling his chest and uncoiling his shoulders.
"Are you going to be this awkward the whole time?" she asked, her nose scrunching up.
Harry raised his eyebrows. "Are you going to be this sassy the whole time?"
"I prefer sarcastic," Ginny said. "Sassy's a little demeaning, don't you think?"
Harry didn't have an answer for that. Instead, he just strummed his guitar for a few moments before he picked up where Ginny had left off.
"So, how does this work?" she asked.
"What?" Harry said absently, still trying to work out the ending melody.
"This whole collaboration thing," she said. "I've never really done this before." She said it casually like she was learning to swim or something equally as trivial. "I've only ever played with a band before and they've offered suggestions, but I've never sat down and written with someone."
"Who worked on your EP then?" Once it was out of his mouth, he realized how it sounded; like she couldn't have possibly written it herself. Shit.
"I did," she said, her eyes blazing. "Thanks for the vote of confidence."
Harry winced. "That came out wrong." He stopped strumming and leaned across her to grab the lyrics he'd been working on. The smell of honeysuckle filled his nose. "These are the lyrics I've been working on." He handed them to her then grabbed a pen and handed her that as well. "Feel free to mark them up."
He moved over to the loveseat to put some distance between himself and the redhead, who looked like she still might throttle him. While she looked over the lyrics, he started to strum out the melody again. He could hear her quietly humming as she nodded her head along to the beat.
"Maybe replace 'what' with 'the things'," she said. "I feel like that's more concrete." Then she opened her mouth and sang the line. "There ain't no language for the things I've seen." Her voice was gritty and textured, just like Harry remembered it from her concert. She wasn't a smooth singer, though he was certain she could sing the notes clearly and cleanly if she wanted to. Her voice had character.
"I like that," he said. "Mark it up." She seemed surprised, but began to cross out and write in her change. She probably wouldn't have looked so surprised if she knew he kept all his first drafts on his computer and that version was just a copy.
"This next part," she said, pointing about halfway down the page. "Is this a verse?"
"Chorus," he said, changing the to the chorus melody.
She hummed. "Maybe speed that up?"
And so they went, back and forth, Ginny asking questions and Harry answering anything she asked about the song. When they were done, Harry was fairly confident that they were close to being able to record a demo. Ginny was standing up and stretching when Ron came in, dunking under the doorway.
"What the fuck?" Ron said, his eyes widening as they landed on his sister.
"Nice to see you, too, Ronald," Ginny said, rolling her eyes.
"I didn't know you were coming over," he said. "Have you been working on music?"
"No, just our making out skills," Ginny said.
Ron sputtered, his ears turning red.
This time Harry did laugh at her humor.
She grabbed her bag and waved. "See you later, Harry."
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