Chapter Number: 28
Chapter Name: Alicia & Katie and the hint of war
Alicia opened her eyes slowly to see whom she had tripped over. She hoped it was not George Weasley. He always seemed to be following her - for so long that had been happening that she had concluded that her mind was indeed playing tricks on her - or maybe a trick on her by George/Fred. She just wasn't sure.
As odd as it seemed to other people, she could actually tell them apart. Something even their mother could not do. ' It was a handy skill in my second year... I'm getting side-tracked, ' she thought.
She was relieved to see that it was actually Lee she had stumbled onto. Alicia quickly rolled herself off him. Fortunately there was no one in the common room as far as she could tell, so no one saw the compromising position they had ended up in right after the collision.
" Lee..." said Alicia, " I'm really sorry. I wasn't watching where I was going..."
" That's ok" he replied, rubbing his head a little where it had hit the floor.
" Are you sure?" suddenly she felt concerned for him, " Do you need to go to the Madam Pomfrey? -"
" No. I'm fine. I have to get going now."
" Why are you in such a hurry?" she asked curiously.
" Snape's called a meeting of the school board in about two minutes"
" Why do they need you there?"
" I don't know..." Lee checked his watch to see what time it was. When he did he wished he had not.
" I have to go... I'll talk to you later" with that he rushed out of the common room and headed for a passageway close by.
Alicia had not noticed, but Katie had moved silently behind her best friend and was waiting for her to turn around so she could scare the hell out of her. When Alicia turned around she found herself almost nose to nose with her.
" Boo." said Katie in a soft voice, but it was enough to scare Alicia half to death.
" Aaaaah" screamed Alicia, as she took a step back. She got very angry, very fast when her brain registered that it was Katie. " I'm going to kill you," she said as she reached into her cloak to get her wand out.
" Sorry... I couldn't resist," said Katie as she lowered her head a little and covered it with her own hands.
" Well...." said Alicia, putting her wand back into the pocket, " Just don't do it again"
Alicia did not say anything to Katie before she headed for the girl's dormitory. A bit surprised that she was not punished, Katie followed her into the room. She watched as Alicia tore through all her outfits in search of something. Katie saw the range of clothes Alicia had in her closet opposite of her four-poster bed. Katie sat down on Alicia's bed and asked, " What are you looking for?"
"...I have to... I have..." Alicia tried several times to start the sentence but in her search she would forget to finish the sentence.
" You know you'd sound a lot more sane if you didn't leave your sentences half finished."
" What? Oh" came a reply from Alicia who actually had paid no attention to what Katie had said.
Katie waked over to her friend and put her hand on her shoulder to get her attention. " What are you looking for?" she repeated the question.
" Well..." Alicia blushed a little and to avoid the topic she made a grab for one of her blouses, but Katie would not let her go.
" Nuh-uh. 'Well' what?" asked Katie. She had just seen her best friend blush and she wanted more than anything to find out the reason why.
" I have a game with Harry" she said, making Katie very confused.
" What game?" she asked innocently enough until suddenly it dawned on her, " -Sweet Merlin!" Katie yelled as she stepped back from her friend. She put her hand on her mouth covering it and the other on her chest. " ...You...him... you..." Katie started to stammer, " you..."
" What?" asked Alicia finding her friend's reaction a bit of an insult.
" Well... it's Harry!"
" So"
" I know he's the tall, dark and handsome and all that.... but He's two years younger than you! And you're the head girl!"
" He's handsome and-" Alicia's eyes glazed over very slightly as she said, " Besides he looks really good in running shorts."
Katie's initial shock wore off, after she remembered that Alicia was the youngest Seventh year in the school. The shock would not have come at all if Harry was a year older. The shock turned to curiosity after a little while.
" So... how long have you guys been going out? Don't tell me, all summer and you didn't even tell me," she said with mock anger.
" We're not seeing each other, for your information" she blushed and said, " -I'm just interested."
" So it's not a two way thing?"
" No." Alicia said frowning. " Not yet"
" Oh! So you're just trying to get close to him to see if there's interest in his part?"
" Hey! How did you know?" replied an astounded Alicia. Katie did not answer her friend, but rather started to look through all the clothes that Alicia had in her closet. Finding nothing that she felt was appropriate for this type of situation, she went over to her own closet covered in posters of the Irish National Team. She opened it up and started to look through the mess for her friend.
" You didn't answer my question," said Alicia putting her hands on her hips.
" It's common sense... Well actually you didn't think it through did you?" Confused, Alicia asked, "What do mean?"
Katie replied, " If you did think it through, you would have had me involved from the beginning.... Here" she said as she handed two pieces of her clothes to Alicia.
" Why would I want to get you involved?"
" Because... then you would have someone to tell you his reaction when he sees you.... Now let's see what we can do about your hair"
" I don't have much time..."
Katie had a grin on her face when she said, " Don't worry it'll only take a minute..."
As Alicia and Katie headed for the Quidditch field a few minutes (8 and 5/9 minutes to be exact) later they got talking.
" What are you playing anyway?" asked Katie
" Catch the snitch..." said Alicia.
Alicia explained the rules of the game (took half a minute). On their way to the ground Alicia told what had happened the day before and also told how Harry had let her use the Firebolt.
" He let you use his Firebolt..." she was astounded. Katie the proud owner of a soupped up Nimbus 2001 and was reluctant to give it to any one else. She highly doubted that if she was in Harry's shoes, then anyone other than her would even know that she had one, let alone allow someone other than herself to ride on it. Broomsticks like Firebolt aren't just made to be shared.
When they arrived at the field they saw Harry looking at the hoops from the sideline. They had expected Harry to be waiting from them ready to go, but they were surprised to see that Harry was just staring at the hoops at the other end of the field. He had his book bag with him and he was still wearing his black cloak. A worried glance was exchanged between Katie and Alicia as they headed towards where Harry was.
Alicia tapped on Harry's shoulder bringing him out of his daydream. He slowly looked up to see who it was and he was greeted with the sight of Alicia, a very big smile on her face.
" Aren't we playing?" she asked.
Harry looked at her from where he was sitting on the ground. She had changed from the clothes that she had worn before in class to more casual clothes. She was wearing a light blue t-shirt with long black shorts. Her black hair was tied with a ponytail and the loose portion of it swished back and forth in the air. The bottom part of the t-shirt did the same as her hair.
" Yes..." he managed to stammer out.
" What about me?" asked a feminine voice.
Harry did not actually notice before that someone else was there too. Harry turned to the other side to see that the voice belonged to Katie. She looked rather stunning herself in a vivid red coloured sweatshirt and dark grey trousers. " You want to play as well?" he asked skeptically
Katie had noticed before that Harry had been growing more and more 'cute' over the last four years and now over the summer he seemed to have jumped the bridge between cute and handsome. Not only that, he seemed to have also broke the record for it. Even underneath his cloak she could make out the outline of his body. A little pink showed on her cheek as she examined Harry's body.
" Of course I do" she said with a mock-annoyed tone, " I thought that's what I asked."
" Erm… " said Harry as he got to his feet. " Fine I suppose."
" I want a rematch first," said Alicia. " ...If that's OK with you Katie."
" Sure go ahead. I'll do some loops in the air for a while" Katie sounded a bit disappointed.
Harry picked that up from her voice and said to Alicia, " Why don't both of you play on one team and I'll be the other one. You'll need all the help you can get from Katie not to loose this time." there was a mischievous smile on his face.
" Well... If you say so but, I get the Firebolt this time," said Katie sounding very happy indeed as she looked around to see where Harry's famous red Firebolt was.
" Where is it by the way?" asked Alicia.
" It's in my room... I'll just summon it," he said as he took out his wand from the left compartment. " Accio Firebolt"
Right after saying the spell Harry started to undo the cloak. He did not notice the way the two girls were looking at him when he was doing so. Harry undid the top part of the cloak revealing that he was wearing a grey t-shirt with black sleeves and sides. When the top of his old faded black trousers became visible, the attention of the girls switched to the red blur heading straight for Harry at an incredible speed.
Katie quickly grabbed it, before giving Alicia her supped-up Nimbus 2001. It was almost as if she was afraid that if she took too long getting the broom Harry might change his mind. Katie might have thought that it would be fun to ride the fastest broom in the world, but she should have been more careful and tested out the controls. No sooner was she three feet off the ground and the broom turned too fast and dived right into the ground. She was thrown of it and landed on a particularly muddy patch on the field.
Harry and Alicia fearing the worst when she did not get up, and ran to where she had landed. Katie was lying flat on the ground. They were not sure if they should move her or not, when Katie started to get off the ground.
" That was a rush," Katie beamed, sitting up on the ground. Alicia came closer to her friend and hit her on the head with the palm of her hand. " Ow... what was that for?" asked Katie.
" Being stupid" stated Alicia as she grabbed one of Katie's hands and helped her off the ground.
"... That was worth it. It's amazing!" Her eyes were glazed as she started to describe all the feelings that she got on her short ten second ride on it. Harry was glad she did not crash until after a full minute of joy riding. He was fairly certain that he would not have been able to stop her from talking about it if she had. Ever.
Alicia and Harry both gave Katie lots of advice before letting her on it again. Once she was used to the controls, the game stared. Alicia conveniently took the soupped up Nimbus 2001 and rode up to where Katie was. Harry did not know that there was a difference between two light blue Nimbus 2001's so he did not object to the girls having both of the faster brooms present
.
A bit further away in the castle the castle, two boys watched from the seventh year dorm room. It was the Weasley Twins. George was the one who looked like he could murder someone.
" See... I told you. The scoundrel's making a move on both our girls!" said George.
" Technically they aren't our girls... you do know that right?", said Fred.
" That's only because we haven't told them how we feel about them yet. No one can resist the Weasley Charm."
" Is that so? - When are you going to tell Alicia how you feel about her?"
" The same day you tell Katie how you feel about her..." retorted George.
" I never said I like her... that way.... anyway, I know what you're thinking. I'm in if this goes on.... Just remember this is because of you and Alicia I'm doing this"
" And I believe you."
" He is a scoundrel."
The game lasted and hour and a half before Katie 'suddenly' remembered that she had some homework to finish off so she took off. But before she went Alicia and Katie had a small talk at the edge of the frield. " So what do you think?" Alicia asked Katie's opinion.
" Cute bum." Katie said looking over at Harry, bending over to put away one of the practice snitches.
" Be serious!" said Alicia.
" I am." Katie giggled. " Don't tell me you've not thought of it, Alicia, I know for a fact you've got a gutter mind… somewhere deep in that mind of yours…"
Alicia flustered. " Just answer the question, please."
Katie sighed. " He seems interested..."
Alicia's mouth spawned a smile. " Really? So you think I should ask him out?"
"What?" shouted Katie, " Are you crazy? - You don't make the first move. You let him make it."
"Oh OK."
"... And if he does ask you out sometime in the future, say that you're going as "friends" nothing more. You'll know from his behavior after that whether you want to get involved with him.... anyway I better get going. I just remembered, I really have to finish off the Muggle Studies homework"
Alicia nodded. Just before she was turning to go she said, " Send him my way, if things don't work out."
" Hey! I thought you were supposed to root for me.."
" Nuh-uh… I just wanted to get an excuse to look at him - like now."
Alicia started to chase Katie. " C'ya Harry" Katie, as she ran from Alicia.
Harry who was on the other side of the field, struggling to put the practice snitch into the box. Harry did not turn back and face Katie, but rather put up his hand in the air and waved it while he used the other hand to keep the snitch from escaping.
After Katie left, Alicia jumped on the Firebolt and went to where Harry was. By the time she reached him, Harry had managed to put the snitch back in the box. Snitches aren't supposed to fight when being put into a box, but this practice one was rather odd. " You done?" she asked.
" Yep" Harry replied to a mud covered Alicia.
" So how long is it till dinner time?"
" 12 minutes" he said without looking at the watch.
" How do you know? You didn't check the watch."
" ...Err...err... I was looking at the watch rather a long time, when I tried to put the Snitch away..."
" Well... we should head into the castle now. It was a good game" she said a smile, " What was the score? - I forgot"
Harry picked up the cloak and his book bag that he had deposited on the banks of the Quidditch field before they had started to play. " You didn't forget... you just like to rub it in that's all. 6-4 to you and KATIE". Harry emphasized the part about Katie.
" A win is win.... By the way, I was wondering... Are you going to sign up for the tournament, the Dueling one? 'Cause I didn't see your name up there and the deadline is today at midnight. Professor Pasha made the deadline rather short to make sure only the people interested signup."
" No. I'm just going to watch it from the sidelines" there was no regret in Harry's voice when he said that, so Alicia was interested to know why Harry would not want to enter the tournament. When suddenly she remembered the events of the last year.
" Do you think you could… I don't know… help me out getting ready for the tournament?"
" Sure… what do you need help with" he asked.
" I know a lot of spells and things but I really need someone to practice it on..."
" You mean, like a guinea pig?"
" Well when you say it like that, you make it sound so negative. All you have to do is just stand there and let me practice it on you… oh! that does sound like I'm testing things on you."
" Don't worry… I don't mind being tested on…" He said smiling. " I mean yes I'll help you."
" Good."
When Harry and Alicia walked into the Gryffindor common room everyone was leaving for dinner. They stood to one side of the corridor as the whole house went by. Harry received many venomous glares from older students while at the same time he could see the very young ones suddenly look up to him like he was a god. When the procession finally ended they went their separate ways. After dinner, the two played some exploding snaps before retiring to their own dorms.
When Harry entered through the door, he was surprised to see that Fred and George were waiting for him…
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END OF CHAPTER
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