I burst through the Portrait Hole gasping for air.
"You are late." I stood up quickly and grinned at the sight of her. I held up one finger telling her to hold on. I doubled back over, breathing heavily. After a minute, I stood back up and walked over to her.
"Yeah? Well, what are you gonna do about it?" I put my hands on her hips and looked down into her eyes. She leaned in to kiss me and stopped at the last second.
"This." She pulled back away and giggled. "Now, let's get down to business. How many guys did you get to help?" She took one of my hands off her hips and lead me to a couch. Man, she was good at this manipulation stuff.
"You're mean. I think I got about eight. Maybe a few more if word gets around." I sat next to her on the couch, pouting slightly. She gave me a quick kiss and smiled.
"Better? That's better than I did. I think I only got about five. Turns out a guy is less desirable when he has a girlfriend." She made a face at this.
"Well, if it matters, I do not feel better because I want a kiss and not just a peck." I crossed my arms across my chest, she just chuckled. "Ali, come on, this isn't fair at all. It's not like I'm asking for anything more."
"But Frank, I don't want to kiss you. And if I don't want to, guess what? You don't get it." She grinned. Great, she can take control of the relationship and she's telling me that now. "You're lucky you're so adorable."
"Wha-?" She leaned in, closing the gap between us quickly. For a split second, I was too shocked to react, then I realized what was going on. Her arms wrapped around my neck and my hands rested on her back as I deepened the kiss. She broke it way too soon, and I thought I did something wrong.
"If I'm going too fast for you, just tell me, all right?" I said softly, brushing the hair off her face. She nodded and smiled.
"I know, I know. Always such a gentleman, Longbottom." We both chuckled at this.
"I suppose I should start calling you Logan, shouldn't I?" I grinned at her.
"Perhaps you should just call me Longbottom. On second thought, Ali works just fine for now." She gave me one more kiss, lighter, shorter than the first. "We should head down to dinner so people, and by people I mean Sirius, don't think something happened between us." She stood up and pulled her hair into a low ponytail.
"Wait, so this didn't mean anything?" I was so confused. I thought this was real.
"No, I meant like anything more than what actually happened." More than…What? Oh! Right, don't want anyone thinking that. I nodded and stood up, taking her hand.
"Shall we?" She nodded and we headed down to dinner.
--
By the time we got down to the Great Hall, the food was disappearing and being replaced with desserts. Feeling Ali's hand still in mine gave me butterflies. Bad enough I stopped right outside. Ali wasn't paying much attention and got pulled back as she stepped into the Hall.
"Erm, you know what happened upstairs was real and I really do care for you. But I think it would be best if we didn't go in holding hands just yet. Just cause Sirius and James kinda found out about the kiss and Sirius was proud of me." I looked down at the floor as I spoke. Alice lightly unhooked her fingers from mine and I looked up in shame.
"All right, I understand, but now you owe me." She said with a smile on her face. Something about her smile made me slightly nervous, although I'm not quite sure what. I smiled gratefully and nodded. We walked in together and sat next to each other. James was on my other side, Sirius on the other side of James. Sirius shoved James' head out of the way to talk to me.
"So, how was it?" I stared at him in horror, not being able to believe what he just said.
"Excuse me, what the hell are you talking about?" Alice spoke in a dangerous voice, glaring at Sirius. He didn't even seem to falter under her glare.
"You know, the…" He started making all kinds of sexual gestures. After about thirty seconds, something red and shiny flew across the table, narrowly missing James and hitting Sirius square in the cheek. He fell backward off the bench and onto the floor. Everyone at our table roared with laughter, along with some people at the Ravenclaw table behind us that saw it as well. I turned around and saw Alice leaning across the table to high-five Lily. Of course it was Lily. She's probably been itching to do that for ages.
"Oi, you all right, mate?" I got up and stretched out a hand to help Sirius up. He grabbed my hand and I pulled him to his feet again. I must just say that I don't Sirius will ever be the same after that. I mean, his ego was seriously bruised. He glared at Lily and stomped out of the Hall.
"Aw, poor Sirius got embarrassed by a girl," Lily taunted after he left making all burst into laughter again. I wondered for a second whether I should go after him, but decided I'd just talk to him later.
"Jeez Lily, you have much better aim than I thought you had." I shook my head and grinned at her. "You should try out for Chaser next term." She just shrugged, probably trying not to be too full of herself. "What did you throw at him anyway?" I looked at Sirius's plate and there was a red apple sitting there with a large indent that seemed to align perfectly with Sirius's cheekbone. I picked it up and showed the indent to Alice and Lily and we all burst into laughter again. Alice took it from my hands to examine it, then handed it to Lily.
"I think you should keep that as a memorandum. You know, for the day you finally bruised Sirius's huuuuuge ego!" They lapsed into giggles again and I just shook my head. We were gonna be hearing about this for ages. Girls never let anything go quickly. Ali laid her hands on the table next to her plate. I wanted so badly to just reach down and put my hand on top of hers, but James was still sitting with us and Lily would rat us out anyway.
"Oi, Frank, you still among the living?" James was calling to me. I turned towards him and he asked his question again. "So, what did you guys have a meeting about in the Common Room before? Sirius wasn't telling the truth, was he?" I shook my head.
"James, come on, you know me better than that. We just talked about the…" I looked around and whispered dramatically, "revenge." I ran my fingers through my hair and grinned. Just then, two girls walked by, grins on their faces and their shirts practically half unbuttoned.
"Hi, Frank." They said simultaneously. Well, what's a guy to do other than stare, slightly openmouthed as they walked by. I turned as they passed and watched them walk away. When I turned around though, Alice turned towards me, thinking I was turning to talk to her. When she saw the look on my face, she turned around to see the two girls. She got up in a hurry and practically ran out of the Hall, Lily close behind.
Well, this just got a lot more interesting.