b Platonic love /b
i -noun /i
1. i Platonism. /i love of the Idea of beauty, seen as terminating an evolution from the desire for an individual and the love of physical beauty to the love and contemplation of spiritual or ideal beauty.
2. i (usually lowercase) /i an intimate companionship or relationship, esp. between two persons of the opposite sex, that is characterized by the absence of sexual involvement; a spiritual affection.
No matter how many times Nick repeated the definition to himself, he could never figure out just what made his relationship with Rita Skeeter seem so different. They were close, yes. They weren't having sexual relations, yes. But yet, it wasn't platonic. The things he wanted to do to her hardly counted as platonic. She invaded his dreams, his every rational thought was about her, every time he even looked at her in class his heart soared. She was like a plague, infecting his every move with her sweet, innocent smile and that honest laugh of hers.
She had fallen asleep on his couch, he hadn't wanted to wake her. They'd talked well into the night, about everything from cheese to yodelling, and it had been well near 1am when he's looked at the clock. She couldn't very well walk through the castle at this hour. So they'd kept on talking until her eyes had drooped too low and the couch had become much more comfortable. He'd put a blanket over her, watching her sleep while he attempted to sleep on the other couch. Her breath was regular, soft and slow as her chest moved up and down. He wanted to sleep next to her, hold her close and just breathe.
He knew it was wrong. Every second he thought about her was a sinful second, every time he gazed at her reading was wrong. Society told him it was wrong. Teachers don't have all-consuming crushes on their students, he would tell himself. Teachers weren't meant to dream of their students, no matter how perfect they were. He knew it was against everything teachers ever stood for, everything he'd worked for, but he didn't care. It felt right, these feelings, no matter how wrong and ridiculous people thought it was. Everyone thought teachers who fell head over heels for their students were sick and disgusting. He wasn't sick, was he?
There was a time, not too long ago, when Nick would dream of his perfect woman. She would be modest and innocent, beautiful and shy, well-read and traditional but at the same time wild and adventurous. He never would have thought he'd find her. Mind you, he also never thought he'd be lusting after a student. Head Girl, no less. He knew there had to be a flaw in his perfect woman somewhere, and he had hoped she would have been a little messy or poor. Never someone who looked up to him, never a student. There must have been at least an 11 year gap between them. He would have been 11 when she was born. He was here, at Hogwarts, when she had just come into the world. The thought sickened him at times.
Nick was 28 years, 9 months, 3 days and 18 hours old when he first kissed Rita Skeeter, who was 18 years, 7 months, 24 days and 9 hours old. It was everything he had ever dreamed of, and more. It was magical, he would later tell his horrified friends, but the most important thing to him was that she kissed back.