A/N Yay my first offical George/Katie story! *happy dance* This actually came as a bit of surprise, this story, because when I started writing it it wasn't meant to turn out like this....it was meant to cover a long period of time, and be short about the ball....but...anyway. Enjoy and please let me know what you thought!
We revolve slowly, Christina and me. She babbling away in my ear, and Jesus, she just won't shut up.
I can see the door from here and I see a smirking Fred and a giggling Angelina slip out. They're practically running...Fred moves fast.
I shake my head. At least he'll be snogging a girl that he actually likes for once.
We turn, and now I'm gazing at another couple: Katie and Cormac Mcbloody Laggen. I could punch him right in his stupid face for beating me and asking her to the ball first.
I, for one, am not unhappy when the ball finally ends. I say goodbye to Christina. I planned to make a quick escape but she's very keen and we end up kissing in a broom cupboard, until McGonagall catches us and sends us away. Thank god she's a Ravenclaw and has to go in the opposite direction.
I straighten my tie as I give the fat lady the password, in case Ka- anyone is there. I don't want it to get out that I was snogging Christina Hayes.
It turns out that the effort was wasted. The common room is empty except for Katie and McLaggen. She's on the bottom staircase; he's on the step below, his arms around her waist.
They break apart as I walk in. Is it my imagination or does she look relieved? Doubtful, George I tell myself. They're all over each other for god's sake.
"Night." She says quietly to McLaggen and makes her way up the stairs. McLaggen, like the utter twat that he is, plucks at his robes as he turns around in a stupid who's the man? way and winks as me as he saunters past me and up the boys staircase. It's only once he's out of sight that I unclench my fists and throw myself onto the sofa.
I hear light footsteps and then Katie's voice hissing my name. I turn my head and then my whole body, my elbows leaning on the back, propping me up. "What?"
She takes a timid step forward "Is he gone?"
"Who? McLaggen?" I hope that she doesn't hear the sour note in my voice. She nods. "Yeah," I tell her "he's gone."
She sighs. "Thank god." She says, tripping lightly down the rest of the staircase. "The boy kisses like a bloody whelk. And he's got a severe case of wondering hands."
I wrinkle my nose. "Er, too much information Kate." I inform her "I'm actually not that interested on McLaggen's kissing technique-"
"I wouldn't call it much of a technique." She snorts, sitting down next to me. "But ok. How was your evening? Did you have fun with Hayes?"
I shrug. "She talks too much." I say bluntly.
"I talk too much." She says teasingly. "Does that put you off me?"
Nothing could put me off you I want to say, but I think it's too serious, too pretentious, too...un-George-and-Katie to say, so instead I laugh.
"Without a doubt." I say obnoxiously.
She smiles. "I'd like to think that I'd know when to shut up though." she says contemplatively.
"I'm not sure Snape would agree..."
"Oh potions isn't the right time to shut up." She says dismissively.
"So, when is the right time?" I ask curiously.
"Well," she says slowly "If I'm slow dancing or kissing someone or- or if someone was telling me that they loved me..."
My chest is tight. She's looking at me with such a funny expression on her face. Is this my chance?
"Although," she counters "Maybe sometimes I need to talk to get to that point..." She ends smiling hopefully at me. I smile back and something flashes across her face. She gets up.
"Goodnight George." She says softly. As she walks around the sofa her fingers trail along the back and then across my neck. I catch my breath, still staring at the fire. I hear an impatient tut then she bends so that her lips are at my ear.
"That was your cue, you bloody fool." She whispers, tickling my ear.
I jump as if scalded. She knows! I think frantically and whip my head around to face her. She leans on hear hand, her elbow resting on the back of the settee.
I swallow and the words come out of my mouth as perfectly as if I was in a book and my line had been scripted for me. "And sometimes, Katie, words aren't needed." Then, hardly daring to believe my own audaciousness. I bend forward and press my lips against hers in a sweet, soft kiss.
"Oh!" she exclaims when I pull away, putting her fingers to her lips. "You do! Thank god I was just beginning to think that I'd-"
I silence her by kissing her harder, longer.
"-I thought I'd got it wrong, that you didn't feel the same way as I-"
The sofa is getting in my way so I clamber over the back and kiss her again. We stumble backwards and into the wall, still not breaking the kiss, her back against the hard stone.
When we eventually break apart I forestall her inevitable babble by placing a finger on her lips.
"Katie, remember when you said you'd keep quiet when someone was saying that they loved you- the right moment?"
She nods. I run a finger across her lips and then under her chin and pull her into a quick kiss.
"Well, this is that time."
And, for once in her life, Katie Bell keeps quiet.
A/N Tada! And by the way I thought that McLaggen in the latest film was BRILLIANT.