#the amnesia

POV: you are a fourteen-year-old boy, and your childhood best friend (perhaps your only friend in the ways that matter) just had a growth spurt.

He stands half a head taller than you do now, and he probably will keep growing if time and luck and genetics are on his side. You think they are—because your friend almost seems born to play baseball, and it’s as clear to you as the day you first met when he threw that ball into your glove without ever having done so before. You, on the other hand, are always trying desperately to catch up to him.

He stands taller than you now, and you can’t stop staring. You don’t like that you can’t—nor the warm buzz that rises in your chest whenever you do. It’s distracting, and you can’t afford any distractions when you’ve devoted yourself this much to making your friend the country’s top pitcher, to working to make sure you can remain at his side to do so.

(He will only keep growing. You are always trying desperately to catch up.)

You’ve already decided to focus only on delivering your friend to the future. He Baseball is your world now, so long as the promise you made to him as a child still holds.

this world is built for people like you and built to kill people like him

you’ll burn it until you’ve cleared a big enough hole that you could imagine him slipping through and coming out the other side alive

I’ve been meaning to put together several fic recs because there are so many amazing writers out there. I started reading voraciously since end of November 2019, getting completely re-immersed into Harry Potter fanfiction, especially Harry/Ginny (which will make up about 99% of my recs). I haven’t read everything, but by god, I’ve read a lot and am excited to share some amazing stories. There are too many stories to rec in one post, so here are some of my all-time favorites!

Anything with an * is a WIP.

The Changeling by @annerbhp  

Ginny is sorted into Slytherin. It takes her seven years to figure out why.

Armistice Series* by @annerbhp  

The thing about war is that it never ends. Not really. The battlefields just change locations. Harry and Ginny after the war. (Sequel to The Changeling)

Bonus Materials for The Changeling and Armistice Series & Lucky* by @annerbhp

Because we’re lucky to receive multiple perspectives/missed moments/and an AU of The Changeling.

All right, be prepared to have your mind blow ten thousand ways. The Changeling and the Armistice Series are the pinnacle to fanfiction in my humble opinion. The themes. The themes. The nuance, the character develop, the exploration of the houses, events and circumstances that shape us but keep the core of us the same, the slowest of all slow burns, the absolutely magnetic attraction between Harry and Ginny, learning to accept who you are, feminism, house unity, realistic post-war politics and ramifications, everything that could have been in one amazing package. If I had one story (I’m counting all of these as one – bite me) with me on an island, this would be it. I could read it forever and ever, and still learn, laugh, and cry. Please read this and realize that Ginny should have been sorted to Slytherin and the epicness that would have ensued.

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Everything of @floreatcastellumposts​, but my particularly favorites are the Harry/Ginny bits in Missing Hogwarts Moments, Slice of Life One-shots, and those only located on her tumblr

Okay, if I had to choose any writer whose writing reminds me the most of canon, whose writing makes me feel in my bones that I’m reading more of the actual series, who has completely spot-on characterizations, who expands my mind what these characters could have been feeling beyond the canon narrative, this is it. Flo has made me laugh, cry, feel all the feels, and desperately wish for more of the canon world, particularly Hinny.

I love her longer series, such as Not from Others, and still need to read the rest of her amazing work (it’s too good to read all at once, and better to spread out as wonderful gifts over time), but it’s really those stolen, happy, pining, angsty, loving moments of Harry and Ginny during Ootp, HBP, DH, and then post-DH that get me.

There are far, far too many to rec, so really just read everything, but my absolute, absolute favorites include:

Missing HBP moment – Harry trapped in a cupboard with Ginny for the first time

Missing HBP moment - Harry falls asleep being held

Realising – Harry realizes he loves Ginny 

Safe – where Harry tells Ron and Hermione that he broke up with Ginny

Missing DH moment - Ron interrupts the kiss

Missing DH moment - Harry thinks about what could have happened with Ginny 

Missing DH moment - Harry stares at Ginny’s dot

Drunk in Love – because who doesn’t love drunk!Harry?

Quizards on the Run – who doesn’t like a good pub trivia?

Aunt Marge's Even Bigger Mistake – yes, yes, because Ginny is the best

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gone was any trace of you by @annerbhp​ 

An accident at work left Harry with a mysterious case of amnesia and a wife he couldn’t remember.

I have read this story so, so many times, and I still get emotional every time. Amnesia is one of my favorite tropes, but it’s very difficult to get just right in my opinion. Annerb works her magic once again, even managing to make Harry jealous of himself (an absolute favorite trope of mine).

Read it. Read it again. Read it always. I’m writing my own amnesia fic that was inspired by this one and Annerb’s pontificating on what if Ginny were the one with amnesia. Hope it can hold a candle to this gem.

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such a beautiful blank (but smooth it out) by Pocketfullof

Ginny picks a rose, and her world spins out of control.

I read this over ten years ago, when it was originally posted on LJ. It stayed with me all these years, and I was overjoyed to find it again. It fits the amnesia trope, but not in a conventional way. I love Ginny’s struggles with this, her loneliness, the exploration of the point of life, and the aching loneliness of missing someone who is right beside her.

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All right, I’m a bit of a perfectionist, and I also have way, way too many stories to rec that I can’t possibly fit them all in one post, but these are some of the stories I have reread too many times to count, and my love for them never, ever fades. That’s not to say I don’t absolutely love many more fics, but these hold a special place in my heart.

-Baji