Harry Potter was not entirely sure why he was sitting in the middle of a dark wood. Considering how cold the summer night had managed to get, and the way that the dampness of leaf mold and whatever else was on the forest floor was seeping through the knees of his jeans, one would have thought he would be making for home, but instead he was holding perfectly, absolutely still, with no more thought of moving than of flying his Firebolt to reach Jupiter. He exhaled slowly, wondering again why, exactly, he let himself get talked into these things.
"Not so loud!" came a hissed whisper from somewhere nearby, and Harry remembered why.
"Are you sure tonight's the night, Luna?" He was starting to wonder about himself. Any sane boy would have taken Ron up on his offer and ensured a fake Snorlak sighting by now. But no, not Harry Potter. Night after night, he left his comfortable bed in the Burrow to tramp out in the woods and kneel for several hours next to Luna Lovegood, waiting for sight of an animal that Hermione was prepared to swear, on penalty of never being allowed in a library again, did not exist. All because of a single, stupid kiss.
It hadn't been deliberate. It had been Christmastime, and the Weasley twins had, in the spirit of the season, sold Dumbledore a case of enchanted mistletoe, practically at cost. Luna had been walking to the library besides Ginny when some had appeared over her head, and Harry had found himself sprinting down the corridor to get to her before Malfoy did, as the git had had a look in his eye that Harry did not trust in the slightest.
Of course, several months of hindsight made it clear that Malfoy had been looking at /Ginny/ that way, and that the redhead fully approved of such looks being directed her way, but at the time he hadn't been aware he was making an idiot of himself. Instead he'd stood there, panting, as the damned mistletoe had drifted a few inches to hover over his head.
He'd stared at it for a moment in mild horror, trying to work out what he was supposed to do. He could kiss Ginny, but he was fairly sure that she'd hit him, just as she had Ron when /he/ had kissed her cheek instead of allowing any other boy to kiss her the last time she'd been caught under the mistletoe. He could kiss Luna, but it'd be...
At that thought, he had looked up into Luna's wide blue eyes and his heart, which had almost settled back to normal after his run, had started thumping as if it had a full snare kit and was auditioning for a rock band. Luna was... Pretty. Very pretty. And, wow, her eyes were the exact shade that the ocean had been in the picture postcard Hermione had sent him from Jamaica, where she was holidaying with her parents.
A giggle interrupted his thoughts, and Ginny had leaned over to kiss Harry's cheek. "There, you're free. Happy Christmas, Harry."
"Uh, happy Christmas, Gin," Harry muttered, equally relieved and disappointed that the mistletoe was now floating away.
"My turn!" Luna had said merrily, snatching the mistletoe out of the air with reflexes that a professional seeker might envy. Then she'd planted her lips on Harry's, completely shorting out his mental processes before smiling at him vaguely and going on her merry way.
When he came to his senses, thanks in part to a hard shove by a certain Slytherin, Harry had started trying to track down a sprig of the mistletoe, in order to casually release it in Luna's vicinity. His plans were foiled by every shred of mistletoe in the castle being destroyed, thanks to an incident that no one dared speak of, which involved a furious Snape and a transfer student named Serena.
In any case, Harry had spent the remainder of the school year trying in general to be in Luna's vicinity, and to get an idea of whether or not he dared to make a move in the direction of her lips without there being mistletoe involved. Ron's considered opinion was that he was insane, both for having what appeared to be a truly gargantuan crush on Luna Lovegood, and for not simply snogging her out of hand. This usually led to Harry making a reference to Viktor Krum and/or the Yule Ball, which invariably led to a certain amount of burning red Weasley ears and roughhousing that threatened anyone in the vicinity with severe bruising.
After a short sojourn at the Dursleys, just long enough to maintain the blood bond, Harry had decamped to stay with the Weasleys, just a very short broom ride away from where Luna and her father lived. He'd tried to sound casual as he asked about Luna, but Ginny had spent rather a lot of time grinning at him in a distinctly smarmy manner, so he thought he'd probably failed at it. In any case, Luna had been invited to dinner, and she had issued an invitation to go Snorlak hunting, so he went.
Night after night, for two weeks now, he'd made his way from the Burrow into the woods that ran between the Weasley and Lovegood properties. He'd decided that, on the whole, he rather hated nature in general, and woods in specific. He had acquired countless mosquito bites, a distinct creak in his knees, and a mysterious rash in a place that didn't bear thinking about. Still, he thought that she'd been smiling at him in a special way the past few days, and so he persevered.
"Yes, tonight's definitely the night," she said, the feel of her breath on his neck breaking him out of his reverie.
He jumped, not having realized she was so close, and managed to bump his head backwards into her skull. She gave a little shriek and clutched her nose as he whirled and stared at her in horror. "Are you all right?"
"Fine," she said, waving one hand casually while still holding onto her nose with the other.
"Let me see," he said, walking on his knees to where he was directly in front of her. He took her hand in his and moved it down from her nose, relieved to see that it was still the correct shape and bore no signs of bruising. "You should be... Okay."
The last word had come out as a squeak, because once again, she had looked at him with her big blue eyes and all thoughts had decided to abandon him en masse. It took a minute for his ears to manage to get his brain's attention away from devoting all available resources to memorizing the way her lips curved as she spoke, and then another long moment as what she had actually said sunk in. "What?"
"I asked if you would be willing to kiss me, Harry," she said calmly, as if she hadn't just applied a match to his entire nervous system. "I liked kissing you before, but Agony Aunt Edna said that girls weren't supposed to ask boys for kisses."
"They're.. Not?" Harry asked dazedly, still trying to fully understand what was going on.
Luna nodded solemnly. "I kept trying to follow her advice, but you didn't seem to want to kiss me if I just spent time with you, and then Ginny said that I shouldn't take her seriously, because she works for several papers, not just the Quibbler, and so I couldn't be sure she was completely trustworthy, you see?"
"Oh." Harry stared for a moment, considering whether there was something else he felt needed to be said. "Oh." Apparently not.
She frowned. "Of course, if you don't want to kiss me, you can just say no."
"No! I mean yes! I mean..." Harry's brain gave up entirely on the concept of coherent speech, and decided to put his lips to much better use. Grasping Luna's shoulders, he brought her close and started to kiss her, hesitantly at first, then with growing confidence as she responded with enthusiasm.
After a few breathless minutes, they broke apart and Harry breathed out, "Luna!"
She looked at him in confusion, then followed his gaze to where there sat a small creature with pearly grey fur, a turned up snout, and a single, crumpled looking horn. It was looking at them with its head tilted in a way that reminded Harry entirely too much of Hermione when she was curious about something. "I don't believe it," Luna said.
Grinning, Harry put an arm around her shoulder and continued to look at the Snorlak. "You did say tonight's the night, didn't you?"
"But..." She frowned at the beast, then at Harry. "Snorlaks aren't supposed to be this far south, certainly not at this time of year."
Harry arched an eyebrow before saying, in what he thought was quite a reasonable tone of voice given the circumstances, "Then what the flaming hell have we been doing out in the woods for the past two weeks?"
The Snorlak scampered off at Harry's raised voice, but Luna just giggled and leaned in to drop a kiss on Harry's nose. "Waiting for you to kiss me."