George walked me to our first class after lunch, like he did every day. Like he had done since our third year, somehow we always had the same classes in the afternoon.
He sat on the desk next to me, waiting for class to start, and stared at me again with his burning eyes. I stared back. I knew it would make me hurt even more next class when he looked at somebody else the same way, but I didn't care right now. He playfully nudged my foot. I stopped staring at him and looked at the floor. I knew I had to try to ignore him if I wanted to finish the day without crying in the bathroom. He nudged me again when he got no response. I wanted to respond even though it was just a game for him. Just like joking with your best friend, exactly like that because we were friends and we would never be any more than that. He nudged me again. I looked up, he was grinning at my resistance, at my challenge. His smile made me feel like I was melting, I had to look down at myself to make sure I was still solid. Before I could look up again, class started. George sat in his seat and focused on the teacher.
We usually walked to our next class together, but after class he got up without speaking to me. I called out his name, but he didn't turn.
"Ugg," I groaned, "should've seen this coming." Whenever I refused to go along with George's games he would ignore me.
Once, when I asked him why he felt this was necessary he told me, with a smirk, "I've been told you should always treat others the way you want to be treated. So, since you ignore me all the time I thought you'd want me to ignore you too." This was another one of his jokes. One he only used on me.
He completely ignored me for the rest of the day. Well, almost. He did notice me in the hall, but every time he saw me he would look away and throw his arm around the nearest girl. This was yet another one of his games; he was trying to make me jealous.
*
The next day, he continued to ignore me.
At lunch, Katie and I sat in our usual spot at the Gryffindor table (Katie, Leanne, and I sat next to each other; George, Fred, and Lee Jordan sat across from us and occasionally Oliver Wood sat in between lee and Fred) . When we did sat down, I noticed that the seat across from me, George's seat, was empty. He was exactly 16 people away, in the middle of a group off 5th year girls. I turned toward Fred, who was sitting on the left of George's empty seat, and positioned my body so that my back was facing George.
"You know what's wrong with George?" asked Fred, glancing over at his twin brother with a puzzled expression on his face.
"He's mad at her again," said Katie.
"Oh," said Fred, Lee, and Leanne, all understanding immediately. Lee smiled apologetically at me and said, "You know he's not actually mad at you?"
"Yes, I know."
"You should've known better," said Katie, putting chips on her plate. "After all, this has happened before."
"Yes, I know!" I said once again.
I glared up at George while Katie told Lee about an essay McGonagall had assigned her class.
George looked up at me and smiled. Then he remembered he was supposed to be mad at me and he frowned.