Disclaimer: Look, I don't own the Harry Potter Universe. I've never owned it, and I never will. If I did, Fred wouldn't be dead and he, Angie, and George would've lived happily ever after together.
A/N: This is the second story I promised you. It didn't quite turn out like I planned, but I still like it and I hope you do, too. And sorry for the cliffhanger, but this is intended to be a trilogy. But don't worry; you'll get a resolution...eventually.
Angelina Johnson stared at the red envelope that her owl, RJ Fowl, had dropped in front of her. If she hadn't known better, she would've sworn that her bird gave her a sad shake of the head before flying back towards the Owlery. She knew exactly what the Howler was for; what she DIDN'T know was who tattled to her parents, though she had a good idea. She would've bet her entire inheritance that it was her sleazy Slytherin cousin, Blaise Zabini, who snitched. The boy spent a large amount of their childhood trying to make Angelina's life hell; why should their almost-adult years be any different?
Grabbing the Howler, she turned to leave the Great Hall with the intention of her mother's berating not being heard by prying ears. As fate would have it, she ran smack into the last two people that she wanted to see, Fred and George Weasley.
"Morning, Ange," the twins said in unison. "Whatcha got there?"
"Nothing," was Angelina's terse reply.
"Doesn't seem like nothing. Looks like…" Fred started with a smirk.
"…a Howler to us!" George finished.
"But why would you have a Howler?" Fred continued. "You never get in trouble."
"Well, not without us, anyway," George added.
If keeping this Howler away from meddlesome classmates hadn't been her top priority, she would've laughed. After all, it WAS sort of their fault her parents were upset. "It's none of your business, and I'll thank you to not stick your identical noses in my affairs!" Angelina screeched instead before striding purposefully toward Gryffindor Tower. As she walked away, she heard something that sounded like "Who pissed in her pumpkin juice?" Ignoring them, she kept going. Unfortunately just as she made it halfway up the stairwell that led to her House, she found herself having to tighten her grip on the railing because it chose that moment to move. Oh well, she thought, it could've been worse. It could've moved as soon as I hit the last step. However, that small comforting thought still didn't change the fact that she wasn't anywhere near Gryffindor House. In fact, if the blue and bronze decorations were any indication, she'd ended up in Ravenclaw Tower.
Please don't let me run into Roger, she silently prayed to whatever deity was listening. I'll do anything. Just please don't let me run into… "Roger," she said aloud as fellow sixth-year Roger Davies materialised in front of her. "What brings you out here?" she finished lamely, trying to be cordial, but not quite succeeding.
Roger looked around at their surroundings and back at Angelina, trying to decide if he should answer such a ridiculous question or address the elephant in the room – or in this case, the hallway. The latter won out. "I got one, too," he stated simply.
"Wait, what?" a confused Angelina asked.
"I got one, too," he repeated, gesturing at the Howler, which had yet to burst open. Clearly Angelina's mother had taken great pains to ensure that her familial issues wouldn't end up the subject of the Daily Prophet's gossip column. "Yesterday." He took a deep breath before resuming. "Though I imagine you got it worse. What were you THINKING?" The rest of his question remained unspoken. He didn't need to voice it, anyway; Angelina knew exactly what it was.
"I don't know. He asked, he was cute, he was my friend, I like them... Any and all of the above. I couldn't turn him down like that in the Common Room in front of everybody; I was raised to be a lady and ladies don't embarrass men like that."
Roger raised an eyebrow at her use of the them, rather than the expected he, but didn't mention it. "Ladies also don't play Quidditch like violent maniacs."
Angelina groaned. "Now you sound like HER."
"Sorry. But going with a Weasley, Ange? At least I went with the Beauxbatons champion, a half-Veela. You could have done so much better." Angelina raised a perfectly arched eyebrow at that last sentence. "I mean, you could have at least gone with a guy that would have made THAT" – he pointed at the Howler that was about to burst into flames – "nowhere as bad as it's going to be."
"It wouldn't have mattered who I went with, Roger; if it wasn't you, I would've been yelled at, regardless." She took a step back and counted to ten in an effort to calm herself down. "You just said you got one yesterday for not taking me."
"I did. But at least I escorted someone acceptable by our families' standards. And stop screaming at me."
Angelina chose to ignore the fact that she wasn't raising her voice. Yet. "Or what?"
"I'll pull rank on you."
"You'll what? I don't know if you realise this, but we are not at war and this is not the military!"
"Angelina Leigh Johnson, as your husband, I command you to stop shouting at me and calm down!" Unfortunately for Roger, that was the worst thing he could say to try to diffuse the situation.
"You COMMAND me?! Oh, hell no!" she yelled before switching to a deathly quiet voice. "There are a few things that you should know, Roger Barrington Davies, which I don't think you do. One, you are NOT my husband yet. Two, you will NEVER 'command' me to do anything, even when we ARE married. And three – and the most important – my middle name will under no circumstances come out of your mouth in an open area again."
Roger threw his hands up in exasperation. "I don't even know why I bother. You are the most infuriating girl that I have ever had the displeasure of meeting."
"Well, if I infuriate you so much, why don't you call the wedding off?" Angelina regretted it as soon as the words were out of her mouth. Roger didn't want to marry her any more than she wanted to marry him. Considering that this was the nineties, she still couldn't believe that the Johnsons and the Davies subscribed to such antiquated traditions as arranged marriages.
But before she could take the words back, her fiancé had risen to the bait. "As if either of us has that power," he snorted. "Believe me, if I had the choice, I wouldn't choose to marry a Gryffinwhore like you," he stated frostily.
"What did you just –" Before Angelina finished firing off her angry question, the bright red envelope busted open.
"ANGELINA LEIGH JOHNSON, HOW DARE YOU EMBARRASS YOUR FATHER AND I?!" came the booming voice of Jaclyn Cyrah Chapman-Johnson. "A WEASLEY, OF ALL PEOPLE?! THE LOWEST FORM OF POOR WHITE TRASH? AND TO HEAR IT FROM LUCINDA DAVIES, OF ALL PEOPLE? DO YOU KNOW HOW UNCIVILISED YOU'VE MADE US APPEAR TO OUR SOCIAL CIRCLE? WE'RE VERY DISAPPOINTED AND ASHAMED OF YOU RIGHT NOW! FOR ALL OF OUR SAKES, YOU BETTER HOPE I'VE CALMED DOWN BEFORE I SEE YOU NEXT!" The Howler finally burst into flames, leaving a pile of ash at the feet of the two students.
A few seconds went by before either sixth year was able to say anything. Roger was the first to speak. "Angie, my mum asked me how we enjoyed the ball and…"
"And you couldn't have just said that we had a good time? We did, didn't we? You didn't have to mention that we didn't have that good time together!"
"Just how good of a time did you have with him?"
Angelina's eyes narrowed again at the loaded question. "What are you talking about?"
"You know what I'm asking, Angie. Just answer it."
"How can I answer it if you don't frame it properly? Just spit out the bloody question that you want to ask!"
Her suspicions were confirmed with his next words. "Dammit, Angelina, did you sleep with him?"
"And what if I did? You jealous or summat?"
"Not me. My dad wants to know; any excuse in lowering the bride price. You know that he's always maintained that he and Mother could find a good wife for me for far less than 10,000 Galleons," Roger answered in a much-too-innocent tone.
Angelina, however, didn't just take the bait; she grabbed on and held for dear life. "Please. You're getting off cheap; I'm worth so much more than that. Even if I had slept with him, I'd be more than the few Knuts that my parents are asking."
Roger chuckled to himself. Not that he was going to admit it aloud, but he'd gotten quite attached to Angelina over the years. As much as he resented his parents for not allowing him to have a love match, he had to concede that he probably would've chosen someone a lot like her: funny, feisty, fun. The Gryffindor lioness with whom he achieved the perfect balance to his being the stereotypical uptight Ravenclaw. Seeing her at the ball with Fred Weasley irked the hell out of him. Not because he was in love with her or some asinine idea like that; no, it was because she was his fiancée. His property. The very idea of another man putting his hands on what belonged to him annoyed – nay, infuriated – him. He silently thanked Merlin, or whoever else was listening, that she hadn't gone to bed with Fred; he didn't think he would've been able to keep his rage in check if the unthinkable had happened. "If you say so," he responded nonchalantly.
If his tone-of-voice bothered her, Angelina didn't let it show. "I'm just saying, you could do a helluva lot worse for a helluva lot more." She paused before continuing. "But since we hate each other thanks to you being a pompous arse –"
"And you being a smug bitch –" Roger interrupted.
"ANYWAY," Angelina continued loudly after a quick look around to make sure that they were still alone in the Ravenclaw corridor, "it's a moot point. It doesn't matter since in a year or so, we're doomed to live unhappily ever after."
"True," Roger acknowledged with a shrug of his shoulders. He had to admit it; coming from old wizarding families, he knew that neither he nor Angelina had any choice in the matter. "It could be worse; at least our families aren't Death Eaters." Both teenagers shuddered at the very thought of being forced to take the Dark Mark.
"I suppose."
A moment of silence passed between them before Roger asked, "Angelina? What were you doing here in Ravenclaw Tower?"
"Trying to make it to my Common Room before the Howler burst open. Stairs changed. You showed up. Sod's Law, more or less."
"Oh." Another second passed in silence. "Ange? I'm sorry for calling you a Gryffinwhore. I know it isn't your fault that you got stuck there."
A perfectly arched eyebrow shot up. "Stuck there? I got stuck there?! Bloody hell, Roger! The Sorting Hat put me in the right place! Look around you! It's so bloody boring. At least Gryffindor is a bright, cheery place with good people that care about each other. And you know what the best part is? I don't have to see your smug -" Angelina's words were cut off as she suddenly found herself attached to the current object of her ire. One slap later, it was over and the outline of a hand was imprinted on Roger's face.
"What the bloody hell is wrong with you, you crazy bint?"
"What's wrong with me? How about what's wrong with you?! What were you thinking doing...THAT to me?!" Angelina shouted, no longer caring whether or not anyone heard or saw them.
"I thought that I was kissing my fiancée!" came the retort from Roger as he continued to massage his aching cheek. "I didn't think you'd attack me!"
"Why wouldn't I? You kissed me!"
"I thought you wanted me to! You had finally accepted the fact that we have to get married; the next logical step would be that we behave like a couple."
"EW!!! That's the last thing I would've wanted from you! UGH!!! I can still taste the arrogance," Angelina spat before slapping him again. "I still can't believe you did THAT!" With that last statement, she whirled on her heel and all but ran the entire way back towards Gryffindor Tower.
After muttering the password ("cauldron cake"), Angelina dashed into the Common Room and immediately crashed into Fred. "Where've you been, Ange? We've been looking for you," he started before his twin took over.
"We reckoned you could use a butterbeer after your Howler," George went on with a chuckle.
"So are you going? Are you gonna tell us what you did?" they finished in that annoying, but adorable way that kept her from staying angry with them.
"Um...yeah. Let me change into my jeans and trainers, and I'll meet you back here at the Portrait Hole," Angelina answered before heading up the girls' dormitory stairs toward her room. Once she made it safely, she leant against the door, took a deep breath and touched her lips. The urge to vomit was overwhelming and she didn't see any point in fighting it.
Later, while sitting in the Three Broomsticks with her best friends and sipping hot mugs of butterbeer, Angelina decided that she was going to make her last year and one-half at Hogwarts count. More so than it ever had before. After all, she had her whole adult life to worry and be miserable. These last three terms were going to about her and what she wanted.
"Oi, Angelina, what are you thinking 'bout?" the twins piped up, interrupting her thoughts.
She took a swig of her drink, praying that her inner Gryffindor would come out before she answered. "I like you. As in fancy you." She looked at each twin in turn. "Both of you."