Run

But you wanna fall in love

Do you wanna touch the light of morning?

'Cause it's who you're thinking of

(It's you I'm thinking of)

.

Let it never be said that she doesn't take after her father.

She is nearly a carbon copy of him. Her red hair, her Weasley trait, falls in tight curls down her back when she lets it down—and she doesn't, usually, because she finds that it falls in her eyes too often. Her sister, Lucy, is blessed with gorgeously wavy hair and a real concern for it. Molly, on the other hand, couldn't care less about her hair. There are more important things (and she suspects she gets this notion from her father as well).

Unlike him, and unlike her sister, and unlike the rest of her cousins and extended family, she is not a Gryffindor. She is a Ravenclaw, and she is proud of it, so the rest of her family can shove it if they feel like mouthing off about it.

She sits in the common room enjoying a book—the Chronicles of Narnia, which her mother read to her as a child—and manages to ignore the rest of the world. Although their common room is usually a quiet, studious sort of atmosphere, their Quidditch team had just beat Hufflepuff, which was apparently something to celebrate. Molly doesn't care, as long as they beat Gryffindor and shut cousin James up.

And it is in this way that Lysander Scamander saunters over to her, plops himself down next to her, and puts an arm around her shoulder.

"You know I hate it when you do that," she says without putting her book down.

"You know you love it," he says, and she resists her urge to stand up and storm off.

"You stink like sweat," she says instead.

"We won," he says, "or didn't you hear?"

"Yes, I heard, and great for you. Go bother someone else."

"Oh, Molly," he says, and his words are laced with sarcastic frustration, "I do wish you'd look at me."

She frowns, but finally puts her book down. "What?"

He looks her in the eye and gives her a huge smile. "Would you like to go to Hogsmeade with me?"

"Oh, honestly Lysander!" She stands up and slams the book shut. "How many times do I have to tell you no?"

"C'mon, Molly," he says, and for once he sounds serious as he follows her toward the edge of the common room. "Give me a chance."

"Lys—" she sighs deeply. "You're my best friend, and I'm not going to ruin that."

"Who says we're going to ruin that?"

"I've watched Lucy date enough to know. You date and then you ruin lives."

"You're not Lucy, though, and you have a clear head. You won't ruin this if you don't want to."

Molly bites her lip in frustration. "I'm scared, okay? I don't want to lose you, and if I lost you because of something stupid like falling in love with you, I would never forgive myself. It's for the best." She turns around and begins to storm up the stairs.

"It's not," he argues, and then he pulls her hand, and she spins and finds herself very close to his face.

"Lysander, please. I can't do this."

"Give me a chance, Molly Weasley."

She looks up into his eyes and finds herself shaking her head. "I can't."

And she flees up the stairs before he can say anything else.

She tries and tries to focus on Edmund and Lucy and anyone else's problems but her own, but she can't.

It isn't really a problem. Lysander is her friend, her best friend, and she isn't sacrificing that to make out with him (even though she wonders what he tastes like).

Her thoughts swirl angrily in her head, and finally she puts Narnia down again. "Damn it, Lysander," she mutters to herself, and then she swings her legs off her bed. She paces for a long time, and then she decides what she's going to do.

When she gets downstairs, it is much quieter. The excitement of the Quidditch win has died down, and there are only a few people left in the common room. To her luck, one is Lysander.

"Walk with me?" she asks quietly, and he looks up at her.

"Yeah, alright," he says, and he stows his books in a corner. He opens the common room door for her, and she thinks, very briefly, that chivalry is not dead, after all. "So what's this about?"

"Lys." She shrugs and focuses on walking, one foot in front of the other. "I said I'm scared."

"Yeah, I heard that," he says, and she can tell that his frustration is growing.

"It's not that I don't trust you—"

"It kind of feels like it is."

"—it's just that I don't trust myself."

"Molly," he says, and they stop. "Let me try something."

"What are you going to do?" she asks suspiciously.

"An experiment."

She looks at him and frowns just a little. "Alright."

"You have to close your eyes."

"Oh, honestly," but she obliges.

He cups a hand to her jaw, runs his fingers delicately over her face, whispers in her ear, "trust me," and then presses his lips to hers.

He tastes like Butterbeer, like chocolate, like every glorious thing she has ever tasted.

And then it's over, and he's looking her in the eye.

"Don't say no to me again," he begs.

"Alright," and it's all she can say, but it's enough. He smiles and kisses her again.

And maybe this part of her, her silly, romantic alter ago, maybe she doesn't get this from her father.