A Bitter Pill to Swallow (and a stiff drink to wash it down) by Luvscharlie

Warnings: Fluff, abuse of ellipses, and I fear there may be a bit of anti-Ron/Hermione-ness here, but in defense of Lavender's nastiness, she is drunk, and no woman anywhere is going to say nice things on the day her first love marries another woman… about either of them. So while I want to be up front, I don't think I took it to the point of character bashing, or at least that was never the intent… well, it was totally Lavender's intent, but not exactly mine.

A/N: This was originally written as a pinch hit for the 2010 Wizard_Love exchange on Live Journal but was ultimately not needed. The request asked for a bit of a traditional/vanilla relationship with drunken antics and the noble resisting of drunken advances. There was also a request for a charming/gallant Seamus with no accent (thank goodness!). Instead, it was submitted for the prompt of "I was off to drink you away" at the fandom_fridays community on Live Journal.

Seamus shook the snow from his shoulders as he made his way through the front door of The Leaky Cauldron.

"You know, I have better things to do than clean up after you, Finnigan," Zacharias said with a bit of a snarl, using his wand to remove the water from the floor as the snow melted in puddles at Seamus's feet.

Zach was all bite and no bark, and Seamus did little more than snarl in return, curling his lip before responding, "Don't clean it up then, fuckwit."

With a look of astonishment at Seamus's suggestion that he leave a mess on the floor, Zach nodded toward the bar where Hannah Abbott (at least that was her last name for now, Seamus suspected there was far more going on between employer and employee than either was willing to talk about), "And risk her wrath? Are you mad, man? Runs this place with an iron fist, she does."

Leaning in conspiratorily, Seamus winked. "Nah, but you are. Mad about her, that is."

Zach opened his mouth to fire back a retort, but Seamus held up his hand. "Save the excuses and denials for someone who might actually believe you, mate. Now, where is she? Hannah Flooed and said the lass was here."

Zach nodded and pointed to a distant corner where Lavender Brown was tossing back a Firewhisky; and from the look of the empty glasses surrounding her, it was far from her first. Hannah hurried over when she saw him. "Seamus," she said warmly. "I'm glad you came. I wasn't sure what to do with her. She's so pissed that I tried to nick her wand from her pocket three refills ago, but she caught me. I was afraid she'd try to Apparate back to her flat, and Merlin knows that would be a disaster. Poor thing, I do feel for her. I think we all saw this coming today."

"Yeah, I reckon we did. She never did quite get over him, did she?" Seamus replied. He gave Lavender a sympathetic look.

"Nobody ever really gets over their first love," Hannah said with a good deal of sympathy. "And all the press this wedding's gotten, well, it just can't be easy for Lavender."

Seamus patted Hannah on the shoulder. "You're a good friend to her," he said, then started toward Lavender's table.

Zach grasped his upper arm and pulled him back before he got very far. "You'll want to be careful there, mate. She's right vicious this evening. She threatened to turn me into a toad last time I passed her table… and I think she meant it. Even shot a few green sparks out of the tip of her wand for good measure."

Seamus couldn't resist grinning as he made a show of looking Zacharias up and down with false contempt. "She'd have only been doing you a favour," he said with a chuckle. "It would be an improvement over your current state."

Rolling his eyes, Zach started back behind the bar where someone was waiting to order a drink, and tossed the words back over his shoulder: "Let her do her worst… it couldn't happen to a nicer, more deserving bloke. You won't be laughing when you're covered in warts and hopping mad… literally."

Seamus feared Lavender would do just that… her worst, and he didn't think he'd look all that good with little toady feet. He had seen her worst and had no real desire to be on the receiving end of her wand. He took a deep breath and started forward once again, this time unimpeded by Zach.

Lavender looked up with bloodshot eyes when his shadow fell over her table. "Oh great. Who called you? It was Zach wasn't it. I warned him." Lavender drew her wand, her hand trembling and the table directly across from her toppled over. Seamus managed to duck just in time.

"Oi, lass! Put that down. You near took my head off."

"I wasn't aiming for your head. I was aiming for Zach's… or better yet, Ron's. But he's not here, is he? No, sir. He's not," she said, answering her own question. "Off getting married, he is, the big pain in the arse."

Seamus took the chair beside her, being extremely careful not to make any sudden moves. "Might you hand me your wand, Lavender?"

"What is it," she said, stopping to gulp down another bit of her drink, "with everyone trying to take my wand tonight? First Hannah. Now you. Get your own wand, Finnigan. This one's mine."

"I have my own wand, thank you, and I'd like to live another day to use it," Seamus said, grabbing Lavender's wrist and extracting her wand from her hand. Once he was out of immediate danger, Seamus gave Lavender a sympathetic look. "Upset about the wedding then?"

"I don't want to talk about it."

"Aye, I see that. But drinking doesn't really change anything, does it? Ron's still marrying Hermione." Seamus looked at his watch. "About right now, I'd say."

"First of all, I said I don't want to talk about it. Secondly, you're pants at this comforting thing. Don't you think I know he's marrying her right now? I don't need you to come be time keeper so I won't miss knowing the exact moment someone else becomes Mrs. Ronald Weasley… so scram."

"Well, I'm sorry. I'm not Parvati, and I'm sure she'd be better at this, but I'm the best you've got. Parvati is at the wedding."

Lavender snorted in contempt. "Do not speak Parvati's name in front of me. I've decided to de-friend her. I cannot believe she went to that wedding!" She splayed her hands wide as though this were the ultimate in friendship betrayal. "Can you? My best friend, agreeing to be a part of that ridiculous farce of a wedding."

"You don't mean that. Parvati believes, like the rest of us, that you should be over Ron Weasley by now. It's been a while, yeah?"

Lavender made a hrmphing noise and glared in his direction. "Why does no one ever listen to me? I said I did NOT want to talk about this, and yet you just keep talking about it."

Seamus had always had a thing for Lavender. Dean described it as infatuation, but Seamus knew it was more than that. Infatuation didn't go on for this many years… well, apparently it did if the person you were infatuated with was Ron Weasley, but that was another story. Of course, if Hannah was right, birds never really got over their first love, and this wedding had gotten a load of press. Still, Seamus hated to admit it, but hearing that she wasn't over Ron Weasley yet wasn't a surprise, but it wasn't a welcome bit of news either.

"Okay then, lass, what would you like to talk about? Maybe we could talk about just how pissed you are?"

Lavender flinched. "Yeah—no, not that either. I'm a grown woman I can drink what I want, when I want, and I don't need the likes of you, Seamus Finnigan, to tell me otherwise. And what kind of man marries the first girl he ever kissed anyway, I ask you? Nonsense, I say."

"Well, Lavender," Seamus said, "I'm pretty sure you were the first girl Ron Weasley kissed and—"

"Oh, who asked you anyway?" she interrupted. "Besides, I do not want to talk about Ron Weasley. Not what a total prat he is, or what a stupid decision this was, or how no man in his right mind would marry a bird with hair like that or—"

"Lavender," Seamus broke in, "are we going to stop not talking about Ron Weasley any time soon?"

"Well, I stopped a long time ago. You're the one who just will not let it go. Honestly, Seamus, this is not the way to cheer me up. I'm not sure why you even came here if Ron's all you're going to talk about. I could have gone to the wedding and not heard nearly so much about him."

"Hmm, so could've I," Seamus muttered under his breath.

There really was nothing like trying to reason with a drunk person… except attempting to reason with a drunk bird who was also a little heartbroken… and who happened to be one of his oldest and dearest of friends. Lavender was unreasonable on the best of days; tonight she was simply impossible. When sober, Seamus thought Lavender, for the most part, was over her schoolgirl crush on Ron Weasley… or as over your first love as you ever get. Drunk, she felt slighted and hurt and probably a little like a failure… which was mental, and he never would understand birds, but he really did hate seeing her like this, so he did his level best to be at his most patient.

"How about I Apparate you back to your flat?" Seamus suggested, laying some coins down on the table to cover her tab. He took a good look at all the many empty glasses Lavender had gone through and emptied his pockets. If the bill was more, which it probably was, it wasn't like Hannah didn't know where she could find him.

Lavender leaned in and batted her eyelashes in a way that made her look absurd. "Now, see, Seamus, that's how you cheer a girl up. You take her home." She licked her lips, which Seamus found incredibly sexy. "I'll just make a final trip to the loo, and…" Lavender stood, wobbled and toppled over.

Seamus ran to her aide and attempted to lift her. "Jeez, you're heavy," he said, tugging her to her feet.

And apparently that was exactly the wrong thing to say… Lavender burst into tears. "You said I had a big arse," she blathered. "Why ever would you say something so horrible to me? Haven't I suffered enough?"

"What? No! That's not what I meant at all."

"It is too," she wailed.

Hannah rushed over and shooed him away. "What did you do?" she demanded.

"He said I had a bum the size of a hippogriff," Lavender wailed.

"What the—? I did not! She completely made that up."

"Oh honestly, Seamus, if I'd known you were going to help in this way, I never would have called you," Hannah scolded. "There, there, dear. Men are idiots. Pay no attention to him."

Seamus did a mental playback, trying to figure out what had just happened and how they'd gone from him trying to help Lavender off the floor to a bum the size of a hippogriff… and after a moment he just gave up. Drunk birds and trying to deduce reason were so far on the opposite ends of the spectrum of sanity that even trying to figure out what had just happened made his head hurt.

Thus, he opted for flattery, which he knew Lavender was a big fan of. "Come now, lass. Don't cry. You just didn't hear me right. I said you had an arse finer than any hippogriff could hope for." Way to go, Finnigan. That should only make things a million times worse.

Lavender looked at him puzzled, but she did stop crying. And who wouldn't be puzzled. His comment made no sense… not that Lavender was making much sense herself.

"Huh?" Lavender asked.

Seamus wasn't sure what to say now or now to attempt to explain that last comment. He mostly didn't want Lavender to start crying again; he just wasn't sure how to accomplish keeping that from happening. Thank Merlin for Hannah. The woman was a god send.

"He said, dear, that you have a far better bum than Hermione Granger could ever hope for, and anyone who would choose her over you was clearly blind. You're a far better catch and any man would be lucky to have you."

Honestly, Hannah should do all his talking for him all the time. She was far better at it than he was.

"Really?" she asked, looking at him hopefully. "Oh Seamus, you do say the sweetest things." She tried to look over her own shoulder at her bum to verify how much better than Granger's it was, and she would have toppled over again if Seamus hadn't caught her. "And my bum really is far better than hers, isn't it?"

"Well, I—"

Hannah stomped his foot and he barely squelched down a scream. "Best bum I've ever seen, Lavender. Best by far. Now, can I Apparate you home, lass?"

"Oh, Seamus, of course you can," she gushed.

They arrived in the alley behind Lavender's apartment building with a loud pop. She lived in a section of London that was mostly comprised of Muggles, so Seamus looked carefully around for the all clear before they exited the safety of the alleyway.

The lift in the building was broken, of course, and unlucky for him, Lavender lived on the fourth floor. They made their way slowly up the slick-with-snow stairs, though Lavender nearly knocked the two of them back down the staircase several times. When they finally made it to the door of her flat, Seamus was breathless and sweaty despite the cold of the evening. Lavender was unable to find her key, so he Wanded the door open using her wand so the wards would recognise it and lift.

"All right, in you go," he said, nudging Lavender through the open doorway. He had intended to see her safely inside before leaving, but she whirled on him outside the doorway, grabbed hands full of his cloak and pulled him flush against her, using a surprising amount of strength for someone who'd been virtually useless in stair climbing only seconds before.

"Don't leave. You should come in." She leaned in and bit his ear lobe, her voice all breathy in a way that made his cock twitch in response.

"As really inviting as that sounds. I'd rather keep my cock in working order."

"Oh, I could definitely give it a work out." Her lips worked their way to that spot behind his ear that made him shiver, and though he tried to step away from her, she held tight.

"I've no doubt of that, but you'd cut it clean off in the morning when you sobered up and realised I'd taken advantage, and I like it just fine attached to my body."

She ignored his attempts at logic and kissed him full on the lips, and as much as his good sense told him to resist, he found it hard to listen to himself, and was soon kissing her back.

When they broke apart, he knew he had to leave or the temptation was going to become more than he could withstand. He spun Lavender around so she was facing inside her apartment, put his hands firmly on her shoulders and marched her inside and over to the sofa. Once she was safely sitting on the well-worn couch and he'd wrestled his way free from her, Seriously, how many hands did she have? And that pinch she'd given his bum was going to leave a bruise, the feisty bird!, Seamus exited the flat and locked her inside setting wards on the door with his own wand, so he could assure himself of her safety for the remainder of the night.

But he wanted her, and did a good bit of a cursing himself on his way back down the stairs for being an honourable bloke. Being honourable, at least at the moment, rather sucked… a lot.

The next morning Seamus arrived at Lavender's flat and raised the wards with his wand while balancing two coffees and attempted to open the door. He was unsuccessful with the door, as balancing cups of coffee and doing intricate wand work did not go well together, and he had no luck in getting the door to budge and allow him entrance.

Thus, he knocked softly. No response.

He knocked a little more loudly in an attempt to rouse Lavender. No response.

He banged hard, and finally heard heavy footsteps approaching from inside. The door was flung violently open. "Are you trying to make my head explode?" Lavender said, clutching her forehead.

"I brought you coffee," Seamus said, holding out his peace offering. "I thought you might need some after last night."

"Oh God," she moaned. "I probably made a total fool out of myself last night. I don't even want to think about it."

With a grin, Seamus handed her the coffee and brushed past her into the apartment. "Nah, Hannah called me before you made too big a fool of yourself. And me, brilliant bloke that I am, rushed right in and saved the day."

"Oh, Seamus, I owe you one. Boy, that could have gotten really bad… or worse than it already was."

Seamus took a breath and steeled himself for rejection. But, he had come to the decision to ask her out last night while he was at home having a late night tryst with his right hand and thinking of the drunken girl he'd left behind in her apartment. He would never know if he didn't ask, right? Well, that's what he kept telling himself. "Go to dinner with me tonight then… I mean since you do owe me one, like you said… and-"

"What? Dinner with you?" She chuckled, then grasped her pounding head again and groaned.

Okay, laughing wasn't really what he was going for… but she hadn't said no, at least. "I'm not sure how to take the laughter or the groaning that followed. Is that a happy laughing yes, or a could-you-be-a-bigger-idiot kind of laugh? I just need a bit of direction here."

"Why not? After all, it's not every day some dashing hero who saves drunken women from total humiliation asks you out. I'd be a fool to say no, right?"

Relief washed over him, and Seamus made a show of flexing his muscles to make her laugh again then burst out in a fit of laughter himself. "Clearly. I'm quite a catch, you know."

Lavender took a sip of her coffee, still holding her aching head. "Seamus, do I remember something about a hippogriff and the size of my arse being a topic of conversation last night?"

"What? Nah, must've been a hallucination. Really, lass, you shouldn't drink so much. I've never seen a bum that looked less like a hippogriff's than yours, you know, unless you have some sort of a tail that I don't know about." He took a drink of his coffee and averted his eyes. He was a terrible liar… but he was moderately successful with flattery.

"My bum thanks you… I think."

"Your bum gets my hearty 'you're welcome'. Though if you'd like me to check for a tail, I'd be willing to accommodate your request."

"Pig," Lavender said with a snort. Then she did something Seamus hadn't expected. She leaned in and kissed him on the cheek. "Thanks for bringing me home last night. You know, some guys would have tried to take advantage, but not you. You're a good man, Seamus."

"I am that," he said, thanking Merlin he'd left the night before when he did, rather than succumb to the temptation of Lavender Brown's ample charms. It had earned him a chance to start something with her and see where it would go. "You know, you really should brush your hair before answering the door. You look a fright."

"You're a pig and an arse."

"And make up your mind," he said with a laugh. "One minute I'm a good man, the next I'm a pig and an arse. Next thing you know, I'll be a pig's arse. Could you—"

Lavender cut him off by pushing him back against the sofa and kissing him full on the mouth, slipping her tongue over his lower lip and digging her fingers into his shoulder. "Still care about my hair?" she asked when they broke apart.

"Your what?" He blinked his eyes in an attempt at focusing. He failed completely and gave up trying. Lavender's hand curled around his neck and she looked at him in a way that made Seamus want her all the more. "You're not still drunk, right?"

"Nope" she replied.

"So if something happened now, it wouldn't be taking advantage, right?"

"Absolutely not," she said again with a smile.

"You know, I think traditionally, we're supposed to have that dinner I just invited you to before any of this other stuff takes place."

"I'm not really a traditional kind of girl."

"True, that." Lavender threw a leg over his lap and attempted to sit astride his legs, but Seamus pushed her back. "Lucky for you, I am a traditional kind of guy, and I'd like to do this the right way."

"Wait. You're saying no to sex?"

"Not exactly. I'm saying later to sex. I've been waiting a long time to ask you out, and I'd rather not rush it. It's the kind of thing I'd like to savour."

"You really are an odd man, Seamus."

"Thank you from the odd pig's arse," he said with a smirk, smiling wider when she giggled at his terrible joke. "I'll pick you up at half eight for dinner."

Though his cock protested this newfound bit of chivalry, Seamus made his way to the door and smiled back at her. "And I'll do my best not to compare your arse to any flying creatures this evening."

She smiled back. "Good, then I won't have to clock you one, Finnigan."

"Deal."