"Do you believe in love?" She had asked, all red tumbling hair and green eyes and he was pretty sure his heart burst.
It was just an innocent question really, a question shot in the middle of a game that he never thought he'd play. Especially not with her.
Secretly, she scared him a little bit.
She was beautiful. But not the usual kind, she wasn't beautiful because her hair was a tumble of the colour of leaves in autumn, she wasn't beautiful because her skin was like snow, and her eyes were like moss. Those things were all beautiful, but it wasn't what made her beautiful. She was beautiful because her socks never matched and she held her wand weird. Because her hand was always first in the air, because her smile was always warm, no matter whom she was talking to.
He remembers the day he first saw her. Red hair only up to the end of her ears, a smile so wide people stopped to stare. A sparkle in those moss eyes and one pink sock, one green sock.
He had unleashed his 'charm' on her and suddenly her hand was coming in contact with his cheek, there was a stinging feeling and she was flouncing off.
She was beautiful, and he was a goner.
She was beautiful because her soul crackled with energy and passion, and sometimes he sat up late at night and wondered just when his heart would slow down around her.
She was most beautiful when she was mad, he decided. When her moss eyes flashed and her cheeks flushed and she shot biting words at him. So, because he was young and stupid and in love, he kept ticking her off. That went on for a while.
But now, she sat with him, all shy smiles and hushed laughs because she doesn't want to wake the others, and he finds she's even more beautiful this way. When her eyes are so bright they could be stars, and her autumn hair is piled into a messy bun. He can feel his heart hammering, and again he wonders if it will ever slow down.
He decides he doesn't want it too.
He thinks about the teasing from his mates, the smirks, the knowing smiles. About the hammering heartbeats and goofy grins. He thinks about the girl in front of him, with her gunshot temper, and he doesn't think he's ever been so sure.
Does he believe in love? Of course he does.
"Yes" He says carefully.
But he's scared, too sacred too admit that, yes, he does believe in love, because he's in love with her.
-
Squashed between pillows and buried on the Gryffindor sofa. She wasn't sure how they ended up there, they had just been doing homework until suddenly the common room was empty and their books were shut.
"Truth or dare" She had grinned, but he had looked so adorably confused that she couldn't help but laugh a bit when she told him the rules.
After tap dances and concerts had been performed, pranks pulled, laughs so loud they had to muffle the sound with a spell, exchanged. Guilty pleasures and embarrassing stories revealed, she asked it.
" Do you believe in love?" she had asked, eyes turned on her fingers playing with the frayed end of the blanket. He took awhile to answer, when she looked up, he looked almost miserable.
"Yes" He said quietly, and she wondered (again) whether he still loves her from when they were kids.
But, she knows that he doesn't. Because he's gone out with exactly three girls in this year so far, and he hasn't been anything but teasing, charming, and friendly to her.
She hates it.
Theirs a tense beat of held breath, and then he looks at her, lips turning up, and says. "Do you?"
"Do I what?"
"Believe in love"
Yes, was her obvious answer, of course she did. Since she was a little girl she believed in fairytale love, prince charming and happy endings. Even before she had come to Hogwarts, she had believed magic existed.
She believed in falling in love, and thumping hearts and excitement. But she wasn't in love.
Wasn't she?
She looked over at the boy who had asked her, messy black hair, casual grin, twisted in the blankets, his glasses almost falling off his nose, her heart hammered in response and she wonders why.
(She knows why)
She remembers last year, she remembers the fear and the darkness from the beginning war and the shocking realization that maybe James Potter wasn't as bad as she thought. Because suddenly, he was charming instead of arrogant, polite instead of rude, haughty cleverness turned into quiet brilliance, and rude humour into witty comments. He was only ever nice to her and she wonders just when she fell in love with him.
Because suddenly she was thinking about the little things about James Potter and it was starting to scare her. When had she noticed that he took three sugars in his tea? That his socks always matched, that he ruffled his hair when he was nervous, he liked things neat and tidy, his friends meant the world to him, and his favourite number was 3? She wasn't sure, but she noticed, and she couldn't stop thinking about them all.
He was a good person, he really was, and she cursed herself for not realizing it all those years. He was the kind of person that noticed the little things. Things like that one person with the forced smile in a sea of cheering students, or the one person struggling in class. He was perceptive and observational and he helped the little slip ups he saw. He always seemed to notice when she wasn't wearing shoes outside and when she had done too much studying.
She looked at him, eyes careful, curious, face full of wonder and maybe even love.
So when she said firmly "Of course" and leaned over to kiss him, it was perfect and she wasn't scared at all.
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AUTHORS NOTE
Hellooo! so this is my fourth story, still haven't had any readers or reviews *hint hint* i love you so so so much for reading this and pleeaseee review because i lovee you!
X SARAH